Public School is O-V-E-R!!!

Here is my lyric for this post:

School's out for summer

School's out forever

Just a quick snip-it!

Today I spent the morning at the school.  Cried to the school nurse about how much we will miss her!! Terribly, I'm afraid!  She has done so much for our family and our children.  Followed up with 2 award ceremonies for Jesse and Elizabeth.  They both did very well this year earning certificates, trophies, ribbons and medals!  The whole morning was very bittersweet.  

We are ready for our new chapter in life.  The simple life.  After an early dismissal we came home for a few minutes to pick up Jacob.  We headed to the library.  Emily, Jacob and Jesse picked out their own books while I chose Elizabeth's books according to what we are learning about this week(s).  

Elizabeth and I are doing a unit study on "Pioneering".  I am thinking of documenting everything that we do and to share the unit study with others.

We are reading the following books this week:

PIONEERS  Adventure in a New Land

A Pioneer ABC

Pioneer Church

Life on a Pioneer Homestead

House Calls  The true story of a Pioneer Doctor

Pioneer Farm Cooking

I want to follow up our Pioneering with reading the Little House on the Prairie books.  I have contemplated on buying the Primer book.  But it is SO expensive.  Here is a website with several lapbook ideas for the different books.  We will start with Little House in the Big Woods.  

She watched the first 10min of the very first Little House on the Prairie tv show tonight.  Will finish it tomorrow.

This Friday's Five

1.  I find that putting everybody else's needs before my own is really catching up to me.  As a mother, this is my nature to do this.  And I will continue to put my kids' needs before my own but I need to get creative and find more time or an outlet to be able to stop and take care of myself too.  I cried yesterday while watching one of Oprah's final shows.  It was a recap of a previous story she did about a 36 year old mom dying of breast cancer.  She spent the time she had left on this earth to record video and audio tapes of her talking to her daughter so that she would have her mom as she grew up.  The daughter was 6 years old when her mother passed away.  There is so much I want to see and do with my children as they grow up to be young men and women...but if I don't find that precious time to take care of my health needs then I am afraid I won't be here to enjoy life with my family.

2.  Friends.  I hope that everyone has friends that they can lean on.  My friends mean the world to me, especially one in particular.  I pray everyday that my children find and keep good friends like I have.

3.  I am really looking forward to continuing with our schooling throughout the summer.  I feel that this will give us a greater flexibility of our time throughout the year.  We can't plan for the unexpected but we can try and be prepared for when the time comes.

4.  It looks like Jacob will be registering as an 8th grader this year.  He will be starting his 8th grade curriculum next week.  We have acquired the switched on schoolhouse curriculum that he will be working on as well as 2 high school courses in US History and Algebra 1.  We will also be incorporating alot of book unit studies.

5.  Tomorrow is the Tour de Cure for the Middle Tennessee area.  Jesse and Elizabeth Anne are the official  youth ambassadors for this year's event.  We have our jerseys and clothing all set out and ready for our 4am departure to Murphreesboro.  Jesse and Judge are riding 100 miles this year and the kids and I will be riding at least 10 miles.  Depending on Elizabeth Anne's blood sugar...we will do more riding.  We are anticipating a really long day tomorrow...please pray for the boys' strength and endurance as they persevere through the long ride.  It is an amazing task for a 9 year old diabetic child to ride that far in one day!  Last August he completed his first metric century ride and did awesome!

I think I can...

So I took some time today to go through the books I purchased from the curriculum sale. I divided them into two categories.  One for teacher's manuals and one for the kids' books.  Do you "hide" the teacher books? Or is it ok to have the books near each other?  So I have those two stacks and then coordinating workbooks are standing up between the stacks.  Then I have some books stacked under the cabinet neatly too. I hope this works for us...would love to know what others do.

In the countdown...7,6,5

We have 4 1/2 days of public school left for the 3 youngest children.  The past 3 months have been really hard on me.  It seems that the diabetic problems have come on almost two-fold lately.  What could happen probably has already.  And the storms, oh my!  We have had our fair share of storms, tornadoes and flooding around our area.  Elizabeth Anne is terrified of storms and when I would pick her up from school her blood sugar was so high from the stress.
Storms will be spent watching the forecasts at home.  Tornadoes will be spent huddled together in our closet and not on a cold tile floor.  Flooding will be spent taking pictures...lol!  Honestly, that is what we did...we documented the floods of TN last year.

I am just so excited to get all of my kids back under one roof and then hopefully my worrying will subside.  It will be so much easier to take care of the 3 children's diabetes too.  I know the school nurse will miss us dearly...no, really!  She has become part of our family.  I told Elizabeth that at school the nurse is her second mommy.  Elizabeth says, "but she doesn't kiss us"...hahaha!  We have relied on our school nurse for many things.  It was so hard to give up that control of taking care of my babies and handing them over to her.  Now I kind of wish I could bring her home with me.  Last night I was begging for a night nurse to take over my shift with Elizabeth having issues with her pump and blood sugars.

I'm Mobile!

I found an Android app for Blogger on my phone!!  So now if I find myself away from the computer I can still blog!  We can go together on field trips, dinners, shopping outings...hahaha, just kidding!

My Friday Five

Its new...lets just go with it.

1.  Went to my first curriculum sale today.  Wasn't what I expected but it exceeded exactly what I needed.  Thank you God!  Hey God? Can you send someone to figure out where to put everything and make it aesthetically pleasing to the eye?

2. There is only 6 1/2 more days of public school left for 3 children.  As school is winding down our family's excitement is stepping up considerably!

3.  We haven't done any schoolwork all week.  I feel so blessed to have this flexibility in order to be able to take care of other household needs, sick kids, diabetes stuff...We will pick up again this next week and try and wrap up a few projects and get ready for the other kids to be home permanently.

4.  Our PE class this summer will consist of swimming, swimming and more swimming.  Natural Vitamin D!!!

5.  I need to find a new way to keep records for our homeschooling.  I am sure I will figure something out but it is weighing heavily in my thoughts lately.  I don't want to miss anything.  I did make a Word document with a four square table.  Labled each square with a child's name and the curriculums listed of which will be studying for the next year.

Friday Five wasn't so hard!!  I say this today, we will see what next Friday is like! LOL  Have a Blessed Weekend!

Curriculum Sale Day!

I have never in my life been to a curriculum sale.  I knew I would need some materials for all the kids this year.  But I really went in thinking I would be in and out within 20 minutes.  I really had no idea what to expect.  Didn't take cash, just the checkbook.  I really didn't spend much at all.  Stayed in lower two digits too! But I walked out with 3 boxes and 1 big tote full of books!  This was in combination with two separate trips that I made this morning to the sale.  When I shop I will get a few things but really I am taking inventory of everything that is there.  I leave for awhile and think about it.  Then will go back if there is something that is heavy on my mind.  

I ended up with a lot of A Beka books.  A curriculum I hadn't really thought much about really.  But I was able to find full sets on the cheap!  I now have Emily's year filled, Elizabeth's year still needs a math curriculum, Jesse's year is complete and Jacob still needs some things.  I am thinking of going with Alpha Omega lifepac's for Algebra I for Jacob.  Wanting to stay with A Beka for Elizabeth's math.



In thinking of what individual things we are going to do.  I know that I want to do Unit Studies with Elizabeth Anne this year.  I found a Butterfly Unit Study on CurrClick...downloaded it free to the computer.  When we are ready to start, just print and go!  Tonight on a fellow homeschooling blog,
Teachable Scotts Tots Homeschool , I saw her talking about the Butterfly Habitat Garden.  I think this would be perfect to enhance our Butterfly study!!  I love it when things come together so nicely!!