Box Day!

As a homeschooling mom I get very excited about this time every year. All of my curriculum came in today...at the very same time. Last week I placed the orders after months of tweaking and praying over what to use next year. I'm so excited about our upcoming year. We take a Charlotte Mason/Classical education approach. I know for most of you that means nothing, but lets just say we use a ton of classical books and not very many text books. Take a look at my homeschooling links to the right if you're interested in learning more.

This was better than Christmas morning for me! I've always loved books and now I get to share these wonderful marvels with my children. I've been called to the very best job in the world! We may just go ahead and start the new year next week!

Jill

VBS 2009

We had VBS this past week and what a blast we all had. We were on the "Boomerang Express" where we visited the "land down under". The kids loved singing all of those wonderful songs and learning about the life of Peter along the way. We raised over $750 for the Baptist Children's Village and one other charity (I'll find out...I forgot). I hope you enjoy the pictures! We're resting this week. We're all exhausted! But what a wonderful week it was!

Busy times...

Do you ever feel like you're just walking around in circles?? I mean, I swear I've been busy all day today but I have nothing to show for it! Honestly, I've been busy keeping Princess out of trouble...or cleaning up the "trouble" she's already gotten into. She's a little 21 month old mess...literally! And now, it's come to a whole new level...she can reach onto the counters!!! Oh, yes! The items that used to be safely placed up high out of her reach are no longer safe. This means kitchen AND bathroom counters. My sanity is going out the window! Earlier today I walked into the living room and sitting right by Tink was Princess...with a permanent marker...and Tink's IPOD! Yes, she'd taken a black sharpie and drawn all over Tink's seafoam blue (or is that green?) IPOD! Luckily a little windex on a paper towel got it off, but now we'll have to see if the IPOD still works. Oh, she keeps me running. Yesterday she threw my brand new Southern Living magazine into the bathtub. It's a gonner. No use in trying to clip those recipes. But she is old enough now that she can go into the back yard with Tink and Princess and not get into too much trouble. I watch them from the kitchen and bedroom windows and she loves playing with the "big kids". So she steps on dog poop every now and then. After all, that's what baths are for, right! lol!

Jill

Orange Beach May

We just got back from a wonderful vacation to Orange Beach, AL. It's been a while since we have been to the beach so we were so excited to get to go back. The kids had a blast! They all loved swimming in the Gulf, the pool, playing in the sand, and eating yummy seafood. This was Princess's first trip to the beach and Prince was too young to remember his last time. So this was a wonderful trip of discovery and trying out new things. Oh, the weather was simply georgeous. High's in the mid-80's. No rain. Yellow flags the entire week (although there were a couple of days that really should have been green flag!). And the best part...there was NO ONE else there! Late one night I counted only 20 lights on in our entire condo. We stayed on the ground floor so we were right by the pool. We could come in off the beach and drop our stuff straight on our patio. While Princess was napping I could sit on our porch and watch the others swimming in the pool. Ah!! We may just have to go back at the end of the summer....once school starts back up again of course! That's the joy of homeschooling. We vacation when others can't! Enjoy the pictures!

Jill

Prince at KinderToT!

Prince has had so much fun at KinderToT this past year. It's a wonderful class that teaches ball handling, hand/eye coordination, and so much more. He's worked on his color mixing, his vowels, counting to five in Spanish and French, and his left/right hands. They even talked about the different senses. It's been a wonderful class and we can't wait to take it again next year. Here are a few pictures of his last class that was yesterday. He'll also have a "Shine Time" and be able to show his skills to parents and grandparents next weekend. He'll even get a trophy!

Easter

O.K. Aunt Judy told Jeremy she was mad because I hadn't posted the Easter pics yet. I'm sorry. I'll put them up now. Hey, better late than never! We had a great Easter. Nana and Pawpaw came over earlier in the weekend and we were able to play with them and take them to Cock of the Walk...yummy! On Easter day we ate lunch with the college students who were here for the holiday. Since Easter didn't fall on Spring Break weekend a lot of them couldn't go home. So a bunch of us got together and cooked a potluck for them. It was fun. We had them hide Easter eggs for our kids and while they were doing that we hid eggs for them. Inside THEIR eggs were lots of coupons that local businesses had donated to them. They really got some good stuff! You should have seen the kids racing for the eggs...both the little kids and the BIG kids. I don't know who was more excited!!! Enjoy the pics.

This past week!

I want to thank all of you for praying for the Kyser family this past week. It's been a very difficult and heartbreaking week. But God has given us a very strong, loving family and most importantly He's given us His strong, loving arms. We are now back in Mississippi and getting back into some sort of routine. Here are some pics of this past week. We went to the Montgomery zoo (which btw, puts the Jackson zoo to shame!) and tried to do some fun stuff with the kids. We really enjoyed all of our family time this past week. I hope you enjoy the pics!