Ally Pitching

Bird Wars

A young baby blue jay braved his first flight into our yard. Our rooster attacked it and the war was on. The blue jay parents mounted a pretty good defensive, squawking and dive-bombing the rooster. It was quite a battle as he tried to defend himself.

Not sure what will happen to the poor baby. Gracie tried to put it back in the tree, but it fell out again. No, Gracie, get it out of that shoebox, you can not raise a baby bird!

Edited post - Update: The chicken won. Are chickens carnivores?

Canning House Party!

I get to have a House Party! I'm so excited! If you have never heard about it, you can find out more HERE . It is a really unique program. Companies advertise their products by parties where they send lots of samples and freebies and people try them out. Nothing to buy, just lots of free stuff. So, my party is sponsored by Ball Canning products. It's a really genius way for the canning people to promote their products because they can't sell their products if no one knows how to use them. They sent me a ton of cool stuff! A really nice $75 canner, 4 cases of jars, a canning discovery kit, all kinds of utensils I needed for canning, a BUNCH of fruit pectin, and gifts for each guest.

Check out this canner! Way nice. I just got a nice pressure cooker canner for Christmas, so I am going to give this one away to one of my lovely guests. I've never made jelly before, so that is something I am going to experiment with -to make some for each guest. I found a good deal on pears and apricots, so pear and apricot butter it is (separately of course)!

If my garden and my dad's keeps producing, I'd like to do a lot of canning this summer. Last year it seemed we made a ton of picante, but we ate it all by August. Fresh tomatoes and peppers make the best salsa ever!

Review: The Last Christian

Title: The Last Christian
Author: David Gregory
Publisher: WaterBrook Press
Price: $14.99

HERE'S THE LINK TO A BOOK TRAILER

The Last Christian was a really fun book to read. It is set in 2088 and it is really realistically written for a futuristic novel. Among other changes - all intolerant speech is against the law - and Christianity has become non-existent.

As you can gather from the title; one girl comes out of the jungle to discover Christianity is almost gone from America. She is tasked with the job of bringing it back. It was interesting to me - the main character had to change her approach to share the message of Christ. She couldn't tell people about how they needed forgiveness, or needed saving. The lines of right and wrong were so blurred, much of what was immoral was done in a "virtual world," and they just didn't grasp their need for forgiveness. The people did, however, have lives without meaning or purpose. So, she had to express to them the peace and fulfillment of Christ; the abundant life. Abundant life turns into a neat theme throughout the book.

This was a neat book, very exciting! Makes you think about where society is headed and how people can be reached for Christ. Some references to "virtual sex," although not detailed or descriptive - would make this book inappropriate for some audiences. When I say that I just mean my 12 year old is not reading it. This is really quality suspense writing with a Christian core, and that makes it a really great book.

click HERE to purchase AND to view an excerpt of the book. You'll be hooked!

WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group provided The Last Christian for the purposes of review only.

Pickles!

Some of the first of garden produce, cucumbers. Now, to make pickles! Not sure how to do that, but I'm plannin' on figuring it out. I was hoping to catch enough tiny ones, but some of them are really big so I'll have to slice them. Any advice?

Too Busy for School

I remember it happening this way last year too! May hits and we get so busy - the weather is great -we just want to be outside - so many fun activities! School gets pushed aside. We don't really have a definite end date for school, just when courses are done. Ally is down to just math and spelling, the others have a couple more. The kids got to attend an adventure day camp -they hiked and had a great time.

Okay, and for the month of May's photography- Mom gets an F. This is the only photo of adventure camp - and below, the only sad photo of the family reunion last weekend. I'll try to do better!

Things should be easing up for us, since Daniel and Ally are finishing off their ball seasons! Daniel's team almost went undefeated, Ally's...not so much.

The following weeks are setting up for more whirlwinds of activity! Today we went to the local museum to drop off Daniel's Lego bridge - it will have to be there all summer as part of a Lego exhibit! He's not sure what he signed up for -he really didn't want to leave it that long!

We should be through with schoolwork for the summer by the first week of June. Daniel is going to continue to work on reading all summer and some math facts -Gracie is going to do a program called 10 Days to Multiplication Mastery. We have got to get those times tables down before next year. Gracie starts summer basketball at the Y and both girls will be going to camp June 5th!

Chosen -Book Review

Chosen is a new novel by author Ginger Garrett

I love a book that really makes me want to dig into my Bible and research! I read several commentaries and I had to get my timeline straight and see where Esther fit in with Nehemiah and the rebuilding of Jerusalem, and other questions brought to mind by the book. This was a fun read! The book provided a lot of detail about Esther's year of preparation for the King. The author, Ginger Garrett, includes a lot of really neat tid-bits - Esther's diary is dated by the Babylonian calendar; and made to look like a recently discovered ancient document.

Because so many details involve life in the Harem and preparations for some pretty mature tasks facing her (if you know what I mean), I would recommend this book for mature audiences only. However, those themes are fairly well handled, not graphic, not overly descriptive.

Ginger Garrett did a great job with the story of Queen Esther. This book is book one in the series The Lost Diaries, I can't wait to read the other historic fiction novels she will add to this series!
Here's some interview questions with the author; Ginger Garrett -
Q: Why did you include Chosen: The Lost Diaries of Queen Esther in the David C. Cook series Lost Loves of the Bible?

A: I chose these diaries for the Lost Loves series because of the potential for love that Esther lost.

The moment Esther was chosen for the harem, whatever hopes she had for her future, her heart, and her family were lost. She became one wife among thousands. She lost freedom and many days, she lost her dignity in the treatment she received.

However, Esther is foreshadowing the story of Christ, who tells us that to surrender our own desires and plans will lead to blessings unimaginable, and overflow goodness into the lives of others. Esther’s loss, and her submission to a cruel turn of events, resulted in the saving of a nation. Millions of Jews were saved throughout history by her sacrifices.

Q: What are the other books in the Lost Loves series?

A: I’ll be adding two novels: the stories of Jezebel and Delilah. Both women have been sorely overlooked by history, painted as cardboard villains without any understanding of who they were and why they acted as they did. Their stories are more poignant, and disturbing, than what we’ve ever imagined.

Go HERE to purchase the book for $14.99 from David C. Cook
Go HERE to watch a trailer for the book

Disclosure: This book was provided by David C. Cook and the B & B Media Group for purposes review only.

White Dog Can't Jump?

Here is Abby chewing on aher copy of The Well Behaved Puppy.

Okay, she is a BIG dog and she can not jump into the back of the pickup! We have to pick her up and put her in there!

Ally is holding a bone trying to give her some motivation, but it didn't work.

We finally got her in by using a chair. The vet said she is overweight so we have been trying to help her get some exercise. Daniel got a laser pointer and she is obsessed with it! She'll chase it anywhere!

Living Simply Sign

Here is a new sign inspired by an incredible recent Sunday message series at our church on living simply.

Here is the link to the sermon series called Rock Solid Love it! Scroll down for all the messages in this series - They've all been really great!

Field Day

For yet another day of continuous motion, we had our homeschool field day today! We had a great time doing fun relays, 3 leg race, sack race, 50 yard dash, softball throw, egg race, eating snowcones. Unfortunately, I was busy & I didn't get many pictures!

Track Meet

Our homeschool group participates in a trackmeet every year with all the private schools in the area. It is such a great experience! We had a great time. There were around 500 students there. Ally got 1st in long jump - which is really incredible since she had never even done it before.

Elana got to come run with us, too! We are so thankful that it didn't rain! The forecast showed 40% chance. And tomorrow... field day! I hope the weather turns out as well for that!

Rooster

Well, if you have followed our adventures for a while you remember, we hatched out eggs in an incubator as a science project in February. We had 4 chickens; one died from science fair trauma, one was eaten by the dog, and that leaves us with two. I really wanted the kids to experience the full circle of things and have these chickens lay some eggs for us. All that was fine and dandy until last week when all of a sudden this one starts growing these multi-colored extra long tail feathers. Now, he is walking around making these little throaty mini-crowing noises. I don't think anyone can deny - we have ourselves a rooster.
Now this produces a bit of a problem. I can't have this guy crowing at 5 am - we do live in the city and roosters are against city ordinance too. So, what to do? I can give him away - I bet there is not a big demand for roosters. Or we could eat him. Can you eat roosters? Believe it or not my kids would eat him. As a matter of fact I think they would like to see him get processed. They are pretty level headed about where our food comes from and are interested in how it is done. I'm not doing it!
Now, the other thing is, would the other one, the hen, just die of loneliness? Can you keep just one chicken? We sure have been through a lot - keeping them alive in the garage through terrible cold weather, building the coop, keeping the dog away from them, it'd be sad to get rid of them and not even get an egg out of it!

Homeschool Curriculum

Well, this is the time of year everyone around here kicks into high gear planning for next year. Just when the end of the year homeschool teacher burnout hits; I start to get excited about homeschooling again. Our big homeschool convention was last weekend, and the local booksale is just next week. This will actually be one of the most expensive homeschool years I have had because I did not homeschool my oldest in 4th grade, so I have a full 2 years of curriculum to purchase.

So, now is the time to decide what we are doing for the 2010-2011 school year. I will have a 7th grader - hard to believe, a 4th grader, and a 2nd grader. Some of our classes will be done at the co-op, so I won't have to worry about them. All three will be in Apologia science programs there so that is one area we won't do at home, including extra things like PE, theater, Spanish, Art. I am still in the process of looking for some things, especially math.

For 7th grade:

Algebra I - still looking for a good totally computer or DVD based program. I am leaning toward Teaching Textbooks, but I found 2 others that I want to learn more about.

Literature -My own reading list and tests. Ally found a recent list of the top 100 books kids should read and realized she hadn't read 29 of them! Minus the 5-6 I won't LET her read she plans to knock off the rest of those this year. For detailed study we will do 3 Shakespeare plays, The Diary of Anne Frank, various poems, and a few others. I found a 9th grade lit text and she was very interested in it, so we'll use that a bit too. She is basically doing 9th grade work in all levels, even Math, since that is generally where Algebra is done.

Grammar, vocabulary, spelling-My own created pages from when I taught high school. She is finally getting old enough that she can use some of the piles of stuff I have from my public school days.

History-Texas History and a neat book I picked up on the mysteries of history. I go through and look at the Sonlight website and see their history reading list, and we find a lot of those at the library. Our library has some great Texas history fiction and we are going to do a lot of that. She is taking an interesting co-op class called the History of the Church, too.

Art- continuing How Great Thou Art by Barry Stebbing

4th grade:

Science - Anatomy at the co-op

Writing - at the co-op + we will revive our writing times with all of us writing with Story Starters by Karen Andreola - I totally love that book and I love that we can all do it together -even me!

History - Presidents class at the co-op. Also Texas History -putting together on my own. I will use the Abeka My State book as a basis for a state scrapbook. + A Bob Jones to fill in some gaps.

Spelling - Gracie loves Bob Jones Spelling. It has a fun, creative approach with pictures to illustrate and Bible verses to look up. We talked about it and this was her preference.

Language -Abeka, although I am planning on skipping around a lot and having more fun with language.

Math - Abeka. I bought it at the curriculum fair and immediately regretted it. I think this kid needs something like teaching textbooks. Although, looking over the online placement tests, Abeka is so advanced I think she would need Grade 5 or 6. I love Abeka, it is so thorough, but it can be rather overwhelming. So, I guess I am still investigating 4th grade math too.

2nd grade:

Science - Zoology, Writing, Art, PE, Spanish, all at the co-op

History-Texas History along with Gracie and Ally

Language and Phonics and Cursive-Abeka

Reading - I've done my own thing with 2nd grade reading with the girls. We start off with a few simple readers, then go into some chapter books that we can really discuss together. By the end of the year they take off and work their way through my reading list. With Daniel we will shoot for Spring reading My Side of the Mountain and working through this really cool outdoor adventure pocket guide to My Side of the Mountain I found.

Math - Abeka

So, that's my list! That was me just writing a planning list - I forgot that you were here! It's just a ramblin' list that only a homeschool mom could appreciate! Thanks for listening!

Reading Programs

My kids Clean Up on summer reading club programs! We love them, and we love all the special treats, free food coupons, and free books they get from these programs. We've already gotten our FREE SIX FLAGS TICKETS - for this summer. Now, we are entering the Barnes and Noble Summer Reading Program. See the link HERE for information on that program, this is one I hadn't heard of before. Other good reading programs -

1. Libraries - of course - all libraries have great summer reading programs. Ours last year had a great envelope full of free meal coupons and treats and a book to keep.

2. Grocery stores - several grocery stores have summer reading programs. We entered an HEB summer program last year.

2. Bookstores - small or large, a lot of bookstores have really neat summer reading programs. Usually it is the smaller bookstores that have the best stuff!

3. Zoos, fast food restaurants, and kid-places.

My kids are going to read alot in the summer anyway, I might as well hook them up with some rewards for it! We will enter several programs, but I don't let my kids cheat and list the same books for each program - they'll have to read more books for each. We do more reading aloud in the summer, and we listen to books on tape as we travel around more - (those count too). It is great to treat them to some special outings for free! It just takes a little a little researh to find programs in your area. Definitely some frugal summer fun!

Lego Bridge

Lego Bridge

A local museum is having a Lego building contest. Daniel wanted to enter. It is kind of hard because you have to build a local landmark. And the age range is pretty large, so he'll be up against some pretty big kids. Daniel chose a nearby suspension bridge - kind of because of these "Lego-like" rooflines.e We went by it for research purposes and looked at it. Here is his almost finished bridge. He has done it totally on his own too. I helped him string the string through today. Of course he has to add a boat, a jet skier, onlookers, and a guy fishing. I did suggest that these people not be storm troopers. Pretty good for a 7 year old!

CoverMate Review

CoverMate sent me these great CoverMate Food Covers to review a few weeks ago. What a great product! Here's a video showing you how they work:



These things are great! My favorite use for them is to cover up a plate of food to save for later, or when a kid doesn't eat all his Chicken Pot Pie and has to eat it later! My oldest has to clear the table and put the food away after meals, so she has raved about them and how easy it makes her life.
I have these huge stainless steel mixing bowls with no lids I use all the time and with clingwrap I have to piece together 2 or 3 pieces to cover the top- the Extra Large size covermate just fit it just right and makes it so easy. Not to mention all the other containers around here with LOST or hard to find lids!


A few more cool things about CoverMate -

• you can microwave them - great for keeping your microwave clean
• they are BPA free
• you can put them in the dishwasher to clean them - turn them inside out - and stretch them over a plate and put them in the dishwasher!
• so handy for potlucks and taking food places!
• FRUGAL! I've hardly used any Saran Wrap or Foil at all since I got them
  
  You can actually got to this link and get a free sample pack (you pay shipping) and you get $1 off coupon for more as well.
  http://www.covermatecovers.com/index.htm

OR you could win a totally FREE variety pack with 11 great covers in it -by following here on my blog! Just leave me a quick comment with your email address - let me know if you are a follower and you'll be entered to win! You have until May 12th, so be sure and enter as soon as possible!

These CoverMate products were provided by MamaBuzz and CoverMate for the purposes of review only.