Saturday, October 31, 2009

Fun, Fun, Fun!!

Tonight was our church's Fall Festival. We had a band fronted by two of our preacher's kids. They actually have a cd, the name of the band is Discover Radio. Grace has their cd and has memorized all the words. Who knows maybe one day they will be famous and we can say we knew them when.
This is our 19 year old son Travis. I don't have many pictures on here because he is usually not around for alot of activities. Always working or hanging out with his friends. It was good to have him there tonight with the family.

Scott did his duty a chief face painter.

Here are all the goodies for the cake walk right before we started.

My mom, Grace, and my neice and nephew.


Crazy Queen of the Nile.

Serious Queen of the Nile picture.
For the first time in alot of years it rained for Halloween. So we didn't get to do our hayride and the band had to play in the fellowship hall but luckily we built a new gym last year and we did everything in there. We had a really good turn out for the festival and all the kids had a really good time. I think the adults enjoyed it just as much. They served pizza for dinner (order 75 pizzas from Papa Johns and all got eaten except maybe 6). There was cotton candy and snow cones, games, and trunk or treating.







Friday, October 30, 2009

Another Rainy Day But Fun

Today was lots of fun, at least for the adults. Me and my mom went off for the day. Hubby was off and stayed home with Grace. We took the day off from school. I had a little extra money and wanted to do some Christmas shopping. I had given my mom a lunch out for Mother's Day back in May but she was still recovering from radiation treatments and her appetite wasn't the greatest. So today I took her for her Mother's Day lunch to Chili's and it was really good. I ended up getting alot accomplished. I was able to cross two neices, one nephew, and most of Grace's presents off my list. My kids have been warned that this is a tight year and only three presents apiece, and I don't mean $100 each. This year we drew names amongst the adults and that will help. On my hubby's side of the family last year we didn't do presents for adults, might be the same this year. Hubby and Grace carved the pumpkin today (better late than never) and watched Monsters vs. Aliens. They also went up to the church to help with some of the set up for our Fall Festival which is tomorrow. We are about to go back over to my mom's house for dinner - bque - yum! Once I get home I need to make brownies and blondies for the cake walk tomorrow. We also still have to make a cookie cake in the shape of Georgia for our Geography Festival on Monday. Lots to do.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

What We Did On a Rainy Day

It seems lately that all we have are rainy days. Looks like the rain is going to be with us until Friday. Tonight we went to my mom's house to plan the annual, extended Thanksgiving Feast. The picture above is my neice playing sorry with Grace.
This is my sister and mom.

Today at Trinity started learning how to frost for cake decorating. Obviously we did lots of other things today. Wanta hear? Okay, I'll tell you anyway. Continued reading about bats in our zoology book, also read more about Eli Whitney and did some written narration, spelling, grammar, Bible, and more long division in math. Also learned this weekend that after two years of practicing cursive and then taking a few months break, Grace forgot how to write her last name in cursive. So I put a review page in one of the workboxes for some extra practice. I will probably need to order another cursive book from Queenhomeschool to continue with more practice.


Monday, October 26, 2009

What We Accomplished Today

We have been studying Da Vinci and this cathedral was in the kit I recently purchased. Grace and her dad worked on it this afternoon and got it finished.
This is my baby!

This is Grace's baby, Fernando. We raised him from a sick 4 wk old kitten that was left out to fend for himself.
Here was our other work:
Science- We have gone back to our Zoology book and with it being Halloween we started the chapter on bats. Read four pages of the introduction.
Math - Continued on with 9 problems of long division out of our Making Math Meaningful workbook.
Art - Put together Da Vinci's cathedral.
History - Started reading a book about Eli Whitney.
Spelling - Started a new word list and played a couple of games on Spellingcity.com.
Typing - Next lesson for 15 minutes.
Writing - Had her choose an animal out of our big animal book, read about it and write a one paragraph report on it.
P.E. - Grace went on a walk with her dad.
I baked my first apple pie today. Me being on a diet I cannot try it tonight. I actually baked it for a dinner we are having at my mom's house tomorrow to plan the upcoming Thanksgiving Holidays. Hopefully it will be tasty.


Sunday, October 25, 2009

Celebration of LIfe

As I mentioned in a previous post little Katie passed away this week. Her parents did not want to have a traditional funeral. They did have private gravesite service earlier in the day. Everyone was invited to a local park for a Celebration of Life Picnic this afternoon. Before Katie died she had collected beads from all over the world and was going to have a beading birthday party a few weeks ago but ended up in the hospital instead. They took all these beads and had people make jewelry, there were scrapbooking tables and people were encouraged to bring photos and make pages for the family. The family were big Bluegrass fans and in their small community they meet every Saturday for fellowship, music, and fun. People sang today and there were many people that stood up to tell wonderful stories about Katie. There are not words to describe how special this child was - compassionate, caring, loving, affectionate, never had a bad word about anything. Even up till the end she was such an inspiration to everyone who knew her. It was a great day but also a very hard day.

Friday, October 23, 2009

Misc Pics

As promised this is the finished product from our Solar System Study. We learned about planets, sun, moon, rockets, asteriods, comets, and the landing on the moon.
Grace and Scott took this photo while out jogging yesterday.

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Today's Highlights

I knew when I woke up I was not going to feel the greatest. I guess now it is my turn, I am coming down with a cold. I hope it is just a cold. A little early to tell. Anywho, this is today in a nutshell:

Handicrafts Class - We finially got to start our cake decorating time. Today the girls learned a recipe for icing and how to mix it all up. Next week we will actually start decorating with tips on cardboard.

Choir - I don't help in this class so I assume singing. lol

Drama- Thursdays are our long drama days. Elementary class is at 10:45, solo song practice at 12:45 then stay for the high school class since Grace has a lead role. Grace has most of her lines memorized and her solo song is also.

Book work- Since we had such a long day at Trinity we only had about 1 1/2 hours of bookwork. Bible, spelling, math, literature, grammar, and reading.

After all our work was finished we went out for a mexican dinner. It was really good. I guess I need to update you on the weightloss. I have lost 8 pounds and I can fit back in to most of my clothes. I think I will just continue on with what I am doing and see how far it takes me.

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Eternally Healed

We received word today that little Katie has gone to be with the Lord. Words cannot express our sadness. Please continue to pray for the Seaman Family for the grieving process will be long and they will need our prayers to make it through the difficult days ahead.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Urgent Prayer Request

There is a little girl (katie) that was once in our homeschool group and is now a classmate at Trinity. She was diagnosed with a brain tumor back in March or April of this year. Treatments have not really helped and she has steadily gone down hill. Three weeks ago Make a Wish sent her family to Hawaii and the day they returned she was admitted tot he hospital. She has been on a ventilator ever since and the MRI yesterday showed that the tumor has spread everywhere. She is unresponsive and the doctors say it could be a matter of hours. She is very peaceful and not in any pain that we know of. Please pray that God will give us a miracle and have her turn around if it is his will. Also pray for her family that they can handle whatever happens. The mother is also very early in a pregnancy. Please pray for peace, understanding, and strength to get through the coming days.

Monday, October 19, 2009

Zoo Atlanta

We went to Zoo Atlanta yesterday and stayed all day. Had a blast! It was cold when we first arrived and stayed jacket weather throughout the day. I have included only a portion of the pictures we actually took. I will not bore you with every single pic. The guy in the first picture, we just watched forever. So busy and so fun.
Figured I should at least include some of Grace.

This is a Komado Dragon and he was huge. Never seemed to move a muscle while we were watching.
So cute!!! We love otters.
Funny pic.



Zoo Atlanta is famous for its Gorilla habitat. Willy B was the famous gorilla who put us on the map before he passed away. We are also well known for our Pandas but I didn't take any pictures of them because they were all sleeping.



Who doesn't like Meerkats?


This was Grace's favorite place in the entire zoo. The parakeet aviary. Hundreds of parakeets flying all of the place and landing on you to eat. She went back here twice. It was a wonderful day, so glad we made the trek out to do it as we are about 2 hours away.












Flowers from Zoo Atlanta

Towards the end of our Zoo trip I was messing with the camera and came up with these shots. I am learning so don't be to critical. lol











Items Picked Up This Weekend

Went by the School Box (a teaching supply store in Georgia) yesterday and picked up this easy game that deals with fractions. We will be starting fractions soon and I thought this might help us both.
In our small town we have a used book store that is pretty good. Every once in a while you luck upon a great deal. As you may have noticed in a previous post we studied Da Vinci in our last artist class. This kit has three activities in it and I picked it up for .99 cents. Thats right .99 cents! It was still in plastic but the box was crushed. All the pieces were there and Grace thought it was great. We have only finished one of the activities which is the flying machine in the picture but will work on the others soon.

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Pets Gone Wild

Pets Gone Wild is a local pet store that specializes in reptiles as well as rescueing. They do all their educational programs for free. Clint the owner is very knowledgable about alot of animals. He introduced to us, snakes, lizards, spiders, and hissing cockroaches. The kids had a great time. Everyone got to touch and hold. Clint spent about 2 1/2 hours with our group. We are so thankful for him.
Annabelle the Burmese Python.

Frank - Frank doesn't know he is a lizard. Clint has to spell L.I.Z.A.R.D. when he speaks about him because Frank thinks he is a puppy.










It was a really good afternoon. We buy all our pet food from him and support him totally. Anytime we are studying something that he has in the store he invites us for a closer look. To top things off he was also once a science teacher.







Choir Performance

On Thursday Grace had her first performance with Trinity's choir. It was a small venue to get her feet wet. They sang two songs.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Weightloss

That dreaded word. Weightloss. Another dreaded word, diet. Don't even get me started on exercise. About three years ago I lost 20 pounds and was happy with that. Since then I have gradually let myself go again. Now it had gotten to the point where I could not fit in to most of my clothes, and I really don't have the money to buy an entire new closet of clothing. So.... three weeks ago I decided it was time to get myself back together. I have lost 7 pounds so far and I am feeling better about myself. The clothes are starting to fit again. I have done it through slim fast and counting calories. The first week was really hard, but I have kind of gotten in to a groove now. I have a bike and treatmill that I have started using the past 1 1/2 weeks. Not every day but at least every other day. The nights are the hardest. I hope to loose about 10 more pounds and I will be done. I will then continue to watch what I put in my mouth each day and not forget how I got there in the first place.

Monday, October 12, 2009

Friends for Dinner and a Stroll

Saturday night we had a family from church over for dinner. They moved here within the past 6 - 8 months and we have been meaning for invite them over for awhile. You know how life gets in the way. The other great thing is they homeschool too. We had dinner then we took them on a walk down to our neighbors house. Our neighbor has a wonderful area to walk and meander through. This first photo is their little waterfall at the end of a creek lined path.
This tree is on their property and it is a indian trail marker. These trees pointed to water, food or other villages for the indians to follow.

They also have koi ponds with huge koi fish that like to be fed and touched.




Recently our neighbor has created a gallery of bonsi trees. It truly is like walking through an art gallery of natural bonsi trees.


He also creates many structures out of stone.





It was a really wonderful night with new friends.