Wordless Wednesday (from Spring)

Will my Amazon Order Arrive Today?

I generally order over 25.00 from Amazon to get free shipping. This time I was impatient and paid for shipping and I had less than 25.00 anyway. Okay, maybe I'm impatient in real life (IRL for you savvy people) but I generally can wait a few extra days for my books. It's not like I'm going to run out of reading material in the near future. (she said stepping around the pile of books in what used to be a dining room)

So like the obsessed reader that I am I check my order status at least two to three times per day. It is supposed to be here today. However the delivery confirmation (DC) never got scanned at pickup. How do I know this? Well amazon says my books have left the building, but usps.gov says it hasn't been picked up yet. I know it is not uncommon for DC to not get scanned, so I promise not to chew off all of my fingernails today while waiting for the mail, at least I'll try.

This order has two books that I am looking forward to reading. Now that may sound like I order books I'm not excited to read, which is not entirely true. I've been ordering a lot of books for school but these are for me alone. One is a study group book. It's an honest-to-goodness thinking man (womans) book that I would never attempt without someone elses intelligence in tow. That way they can answer all of my questions, even the stupid ones. I'd like to get a head start on the back and it is almost too late to do that.

Thankfully my computer is within earshot of the mail truck. Since they fixed the brakes it's harder to hear him, but I know the sound. It's different than the UPS truck, which I recognize as well.

Maybe it's simply easier to order more and get free shipping. When I'm not paying for it, I have more patience. Hum, it's too early for all of this thinking, I'm going back to bed.


ETA: Books have arrived safely. I can rest easy now.

Siestas for School

I believe Americans are stressed because we do not have siestas in the afternoon. I have implemented those into my schedule this summer and found them quite relaxing. I do wonder if it is possible to add them into our school schedule.

Just another thing we should have keep doing after kindergarten, afternoon nap time. Thirty minutes to one hour is ideal. Oh, and give your children a time to wake you up. They learn to tell time and gain responsibility at the same time.

Wordless Wednesday

This is for all the guys that work outside all day

An ode to the sweaty man
You toil and labor hard all day
Sometimes for what seems little pay
You do the work, where no one else will go
A roof, an attic, out in the heat
Steam from the asphalt rising on the street
You think of your family at home in the air
You're doing your job, to show that you care
Heat index up in the danger zone
Sweaty man, you're never really alone
Your wife and your kids think the best of you
The sacrifice in sweat for all that you do
We'll turn down the a/c and make some ice tea
We appreciate you and we hope that you see
We love you and we think you of you laboring in the sun
At the end of the day, we know you're #1.

5th Grade is almost here

Here are some photos of the curricula we are using this year. This is our classroom.
This is our geography, history, music, and art. I picked up the wonderful book "Concise History of Western Music" at Goodwill. Here are our Latin, Composition, math, and religion. We are also doing a portion of Beautiful Feet's History of Science.
For science we are using God's Design for Chemistry and "The world of Chemistry". Notice our two other purchases? A microscope and the blue device is a binding machine, otherwise known as mom's favorite new toy.
Another purchase was an inexpensive telescope. We haven't had time to use it yet. Our literature selections are sitting on top of the bookcase. "Bulfinch's mythology" and "Lamb's Shakespeare".

Biology fans: What is this skull?

This is a skull I found on the beach last weekend, it was a rather deserted portion of the shoreline. Like a good homeschooling mom I picked it up and brought it home. I'm assuming it is some sort of marine animal. However it is possible it is a land based creature. It is 6 1/2" long and about 3" wide. Any guesses? Please leave me a comment.

An Angel was on the Beach

Some Day are Like This

More Beach Stuff

If you are a beach nut and you were going to choose where to live, this might be your ideal location. That is all.

Life is a Beach

We were greeted with this lovely sign on our jaunt to the beach yesterday. We did some quick calcuations and decided that since we did not have a round of antibiotics at home, we would skip going in the water. We had a lovely time wandering around the beach anyway.
This is another sign that speaks to the power of nature. We opted to drive a little further down the road and discovered these white sand dunes. I will post more pictures later. The white sand was super hot and we had to wear shoes, or flip flops in my case. Z had tons of fun playing on them. We also found a few surprises which I will share later.

Wordless Wednesday

Tolerate, Educate, Accomplishate

As a child of the 80’s I was/am a fan of the culture of that time. One of my favorite things was the music. INXS was one of my favorite of the time. They were fronted by Michael Hutchence (see picture abve). I have vision of sitting in front of the television watching MTV, back when you could watch MTV, back when they showed videos, and singing along with INXS. Michael unfortunately died in 1997, his voice is missed. His family has created a memorial website here.


As a 40+SAHHM (for those of you who need that decoded… Over 40 years old year, Stay at Home Homeschooling Mom) I enjoy being goofy online
with other SAHHM (I don’t ask their age). In our goofiness the other night I was thinking of this INXS song.. Mediate.... (click title to watch video)


Tolerate and educate were pulled from another message left. In my best INXS lingo I came up with Accomplishate. Not a word, at least my word document is begging me to spell check. I teased that we should adopt it as our motto and thus a revolution has begun. (I hear another song in my head now, but totally different band, so it will have to wait)

What do these words mean? Why do they work? Why are they important for homeschooling families?

TOLERATE: It’s what we give towards others, our children, and ourselves. I think we are all like ice cream. We all come in different flavors. Some of us have had a rocky road, some of us are a little nutty, some are fruity, and some are smooth and creamy. I think of myself as chocolate and peanut butter ice cream, yummy. How boring it would be to go to the freezer case and find only one flavor.

EDUCATE: As homeschooling parents it’s what we do. We take our jobs seriously. I have one child and I have a full time job making sure he is properly educated. I take the time to educate myself as well, making sure that my son’s growth is never hampered by me not knowing what to do next.

ACCOMPLISHATE: (It is officially a word now. I just added it to my word dictionary.) Accomplishment, we all want it for our children. Accomplishate is simply a derivative of that word. Every day we are accomplishing something. We may not see it, we may feel like we are moving backward, but we do something great everyday. We are building people. When you look at a thing of beauty what do you say? Wow? Does your jaw drop in the awesomeness (also a word of the 80’s) of this beautiful thing? Whether it was created by nature or by man, beautiful things take time. Beautiful people don’t grow overnight, like gardens they have to go through an ugly phase sometimes. So never forget on this journey that we are on, that everyday we are placing a brick in the foundation of whom our children are to become. Even if it is one brick a day, that’s enough. One brick could be a hug, a smile, an encouraging word, or even asking for forgiveness.


So let’s all TOLERATE, EDUCATE, ACCOMPLISHATE. Why? Because as the late Mr. Hutchence would say, “You’re one of my kind.”

Happy 4th of July!!