Ack! It's Been Over a Month since I blogged!!

I can't believe it!  Well, yes I can.  We started school for the year and got in several weeks.  Hosting a crafting weekend at our church, then attended a scrapbooking retreat.  Grandma took us to Branson for 3 days, then we were home for a week before visiting friends in Wyoming.  Now we are back, staying home and getting lots of school done, not to mention getting into the routine of all of our activities: 4H, choir, confirmation class.

Between the crafting weekend and my retreat I got a lot of pages scrapbooked:  29 pages and 46 at the retreat!  Just this morning, I got them all arranged in their respective books along with the others I had put together and hadn't filed in their binders.  I am happy to report that I put 45 pages (give or take) in each of the kids' albums.  YEAH!  Basically I have Christmas pictures left to put in their books and 2008 is HISTORY (at least in the kids' albums).  I am one happy camper.

I have lots of pictures to post from Branson and from Wyoming, but that will have to wait because I have church council in a couple hours and choir tomorrow afternoon.  Keep checking back.  I promise I will post some pictures soon.

Getting Something Crossed of the To Do List

We are on our second week school and it was hard to get going again after the long weekend.  We attended the Lifelight Music Festival on Sunday evening and drove home very late after it ended.   Totally worth the sleep we lost!  After sleeping in (well most of us), the morning was shot and I had high hopes of decluttering and reorganizing the dumping ground that is my office.  So we decided against going ahead and doing school on the Labor Day holiday and got some things done in there.    Today we hit the books again for a full and very productive school day.  By the end of the week, I think we'll be fully in the school groove again.

Tonight my husband helped me put together the IKEA Expedit that I purchased several months ago in Minneapolis to store my scrapbook supplies, paper, albums, etc.  Here is a link to it:
http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/60071358

I read somewhere on the internet that it took a lady's husband 3.5 hours to put the same kind together.  As my husband said, "I think there was a game in there somewhere."  We put it together in just under an hour, working together.  I don't think it would have taken 2 hours for one person, or that other fellow might not have been very handy.  Only one minor mishap (using a rubber mallet to put the last side on, dented the hollow core, so I will have to be crafty there.  Thinking of using one of the Command Adhesive hooks on the side to hang a little bag or picture I make.  Because the bottom is made solid and the top is not, this side will be exposed, unless I put it on the north wall rather than the east wall.  Because of the sun exposure, I think I will go with my original plan and decorate it to cover it up.

Hubby just came up with a new plan to get it in the room.  Praying it isn't too heavy for us to move it this way.  It would not require me to completely empty the room first.  Then I could simply move items from their current location to the new shelf.  Hope he is right.  Usually is!!  :)

Feeling like I am getting a little crossed off my list.  Still hoping to paint in that room this fall, but it should be made much easier if I can pull my supplies from existing furniture and fill the bookshelf.  That will allow me to paint the other walls first by moving the existing furniture.  Hoping the weather holds and I can get this one in the books and move on to the livingroom (it is connected to the office with a half wall so it will look bad if I don't get it painted).

Thinking of Next Year Already....

Not next calendar year, but next school year. Generally I have made out my curriculum order and placed it in April. Life has gotten increasingly busy for us over the last year, with the addition of DH's consulting business and the growth of our direct marketing and his speaking engagements. Consequently I haven't done it yet.

As we are finishing up various subjects for this year we are looking ahead to next year. Some publishers we will continue on with at the next level. Some subjects, we have decided to try a new curriculum to give us some variation. I am not one to change every year. Generally we go with a publisher for at least 2-3 years. For example Spelling: we started with a Reason for Spelling. While I liked it for the 2 years we used it, it was expensive. Then we used Rod and Staff Spelling. Inexpensive, simple, got the job done. We used it for 3 years. But we didn't feel it was challenging us beyond the spelling lists. We plan to try Sequential Spelling for the next year. It is not laid out like the previous ones and I believe, will transfer to over to words not on the list.

I plan to spend some more time this week getting my curriculum list made and decide which things I want to look at when I attend our state homeschool conference in 2 weeks. Somethings I will order for sure, others I want to get my hands on to decide and compare side by side.

I have determined that with our busy schedules and the amount of time we spend in the vehicle, we could be spending some of that time learning. I plant to buy Story of the World 3 on Audio CD. We already have I Can Do All Things for our art curriculum on DVD. While we won't be able to do the art projects in the car, the drawing and marker portions can be done at our destination or during our in hotel time. I am also looking at math drill and spelling drill CDs to be used on the laptop when we are on the road. This should help us to make better use of our time in the vehicle and not put us behind in our schooling.

What changes do you plan to make with your homeschooling for next year? Who knows, you might give me a great idea I can use.....