TRUTH

I'm just letting you know this weekend will be tough...

I lost my 4th baby this weekend, 3 years ago.  

I was not even 2 months pregnant.

It still hurt....

My 6th baby was due to be born this weekend.

I was only 2 months pregnant..

It hurt even more....

Life goes on.

In the midst of pain.

Life goes on.

It doesn't stop.

Life doesn't stop for new life.

Life doesn't stop for young death.

I believe that is what makes miscarriage hard.  Your life goes on.  There is no stopping.  If anyone pauses, even a little, it is you.  You might stop.

Pause.  

Think.  

Grieve.  

But everyone else?
They don't, can't, feel what you feel.
They don't grieve how you grieve.
They go on living.  You must too, of course, sometime..

I'm just letting you know this weekend will be tough...

As they speak...

N comes into the room wearing a clip on tie....

"Look mom, my bow-tie!  I'm a genius!"

Z is standing outside my room...

"Yours, mom. Yours, mom. Yours, mom"

Knowing that this will continue until I figure out what exactly she is trying to say to me, I go investigate.  

It took me a minute or two to figure out it was "legos" she wanted.  They were up on a shelf and she needed me to get them for her.

Legos? 

Yours?  

They kind of sound alike, right?

Let's Get It Started

We started school last week....

and it went well...

It is amazing what a year can do..

We started school on Tuesday after a last minute organization of the school room Monday night. The first day went awesomely.  No meltdowns.  M did copywork and dictation without any attitude problems. L finished her Math and she liked it.  N and I were able to sit down and go through his reading book. Z tore books off the bookshelf and colored on paper. We even finished two history lessons.  I had not planned on starting history.  Our history and science books have supplemental books that I had found at the library but I had not been to the library yet to pick them up(we did that together on Wednesday night).

Speaking of History....

We are using The Story of the World 

I am in love with our History CD. 

We used The Story of the World curriculum for History last year and loved it. This year I bought the CD that goes along with it.  Basically it is every lesson you would read to you children on CD. So they can listen to it and you can sit back and listen to it.  Its not that I don't like reading to my children but I read to them often and so its great when I don't have to read.  

We were not going to start History until next week but we had a mid-morning snack time and listened to the lesson while the kids ate their snack.  They loved it so much that we did it a second day(we only need to do two lessons a week).

You can find Story of the World here.

The rest of the curriculum..

It is funny how we have converted to using mostly all Peace Hill Press curriculum. 

Writing with Ease comes from Peace Hill Press.  This small book provides you with instructions for all of the elementary grades.  I can use it for both my girls for multiple years.  I did not buy the workbooks that go along with it but I'm sure it would save you time on preparing for lessons.  The first week using it has gone well.  No complaints from me or the students.

First Language Lessons is also from Peace Hill Press.  It is the grammar part of their Language Arts curriculum.  Confession: We only completed 67 lessons of the 100 something lessons in Level 1 but we are still moving on to Level 2.  This year we will be more pro-active in completing our grammar lessons.  We have already completed 4 lessons. 

Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading also come from Peace Hill Press. This book is for N.  N is four and a half and already knows all of the letters of the Alphabet and the sounds that they make. I decided it was time to teach him to read. He already sounds out three letter words.  I think he is pretty amazing considering that I have never done formal "school" with him yet.  We plan on going through this book plus some of the books from our Kindergarten curriculum that I bought from Living Books Curriculum when M was starting Kindergarten, three years ago!! Can you believe this is our forth year homeschooling?  N was just a toddler when we started schooling the girls.  

I absolutely love Apologia.  This is our second year using it for our science curriculum.  Last year we used Zoology 1 and now we have Zoology 3.  Our kids love animals so that is why we decided to study animals! The text is engaging and the workbooks easy to use.  

School pictures

Are You My Sissy?

2 year old Z can say all of our names except for M.  Instead she calls her "sissy".
This morning we were going through everyone's names.
I asked Z, "Where's L? Can you say L?"
"Where's M? Can you say M"
And she says "sissy"
She also calls my mom, Grandma M, "sissy".  So I mentioned  that to her.
Then she says "L sissy"
"Me sissy"
"Momma sissy"
All in her cuteness.

I Lost the Track

"I like starting school before Labor Day 

but this year it may need to start after Labor Day"- me

When I discovered I was expecting I jumped on the planning track.  I needed to figure out how we could get the most out of our school year before the beginning of March.  I was due in the middle of March and could realistically give myself a month off before needing to start full time school again.  There's nothing like a mid-school due date to throw a homeschool mother into planning mode.  I was planning to start the second week of August-then the bleeding started and I miscarried and since then my planning has lacked muster.  It's expected that it would be hard to get back on track but seriously, it's not like I can't plan.  I need to plan.  I cannot let myself get totally off track.  So, very slowly, I've planned. So slowly that we might have to *gasp* start after Labor Day.  It is really not a capital offensive but I have never in the history of homeschooling(going on our third year) started schooling after Labor Day.

 I believe starting school after Labor Day is a Michigan thing. We began our homeschool journey in Oklahoma where public school starts the second week of August.  So naturally we have started mid August.  I have loved the extra week or two of time that it has given us to take off during the year.  I seriously would LOVE to end school at the end of May but you really can't do that unless you start school early then stay on track.  So that is our goal... staying on track if I can, somehow, find the track to stay on.  

Fun In The Sun- beach time photos

While on vacation in Ludington we spent some time on the beach taking photos.

I started taking pictures of Z first, it was her birthday.

 I wanted to get some shots before she got grumpy(it was bedtime)

Then I took some of M, L and N in that order. 

Next was group photos which honesty did not go well, 

they were goofy by this point and did not want to listen.

Cute goofy.

`Group black and white

 Colors.  

The sunset was amazing and gave us excellent lighting.

I just started editing with Lightroom 5 so I tried some presets out.

 Middles

 Youngest and Oldest

My most favorite of the night!

A more cars

Z is upstairs on a mission.  She quickly enters the bedroom she shares with her older brother and is struggling to push the bin back on the shelf, all the while uttering the same phrase over and over.
I don't understand her utterances but help her push the bin back.
Her hands are full of matchbox cars.
She then leaves her room and starts heading down the hall towards the stairs.
M comes upstairs and she informs me they are having a rubber band car race(whatever that is).
It is then that I realize Z was saying, "a more cars, a more cars, a more cars" over and over again.