The Homeschool Chick

A New Home for The Homeschool Mother’s Journal

2012-05-04T03:35:22Z

I am soooooo excited to announce a brand-spank’n-new home for The Homeschool Mother’s Journal Community to gather each week!

Starting this week, the wonderful, awesome, amazing team of 45+ homeschool bloggers over at the iHomeschool Network will begin sharing their Homeschool Mother’s Journal posts and hosting our community each Friday-Monday.

Amy from Milk & Cookies blog is sharing the first journal entry this week and all of the fun happenings from her homeschool…

The link up will still open each Friday and close at the end of the day on Monday, and the fun writing prompts that you all know and love are still the same.

The address and the curtains of the HSMJ home may be different, but the faithful, supportive gathering of homeschool moms will definitely remain!

Wanna join the fun?

Click HERE to visit the new Homeschool Mother’s Journal link-up guidelines page, grab an updated graphic & then click HERE to visit this week’s link up post.

Happy Homeschooling!

Sue :)

A Whole Lotta Math with a Little WWII on the Side

2012-04-27T05:14:53Z

In our homeschool this week…

We only have Math to finish up before our homeschool year is over, so we’re shaking things up a bit around here with some fun unit studies.

It’s Math, Math, Math each morning – lunch – then something fun and interesting in the afternoon.

This week, we have found ourselves intrenched in the middle of wartorn Europe watching this fantastic WWII documentary series that my father-in-law gave us.

The series was made by the United States war department back in the 1940′s to educate troops being sent off to battle and it’s absolutely fascinating!

Of course, I love documentaries so I’m loving the fun educational time on the couch with my son each afternoon.

Helpful homeschooling tips or advice to share…

It’s been a really long, tough year and I can’t tell you how nice it’s been doing a little “unschooling” this month.

Finding subjects that kids are interested in and encouraging them explore those topics in a deeper way, is such a great way to help them develop a life-long love of learning.

Questions/thoughts I have…

Have you discovered any other great educational series that your kiddos have loved?

A photo, video, link, or quote to share…

This is the great WWII series that we’re watching this week:

Happy Homeschooling,

Sue

Our Little House on the Prairie – NOT!

2012-04-20T03:45:19Z

In my life this week…

It’s going to be 102 degrees here in Arizona on Sunday and I’m none too happy about it.

I planted a TON of new summer plants in my yard and discovered a little too late that my watering system decided to go on strike leaving everything in serious jeopardy of dying.

Soooooo, I have been watering everything BY HAND all week and anyone who knows me well, knows that I am NOT a putz-in-the-yard, gardening-kinda-girl in any way shape or form.

Needless to say, I’ve been a bit grumpy fetching water like Laura Ingalls Wilder.

One more reason why God did not allow me to be a pioneer.

Well, there’s that and the prairie skirts.

Fortunately Almanzo called our landscaper and all will be fixed this weekend.

In our homeschool this week…

I sat down with my son and a big calendar earlier this week so we could calculate when our last school day would be.

I included him in the decision because he wanted us to finish our year at the end of May sooooooooo badly, and I knew that it was going to take some extra work on his end to make it happen. After shuffling things around and MUCH discussion, I am please to announce that May 31st will indeed be out last day of school this year.

WooHoo!

Questions/thoughts I have…

I’ve been in a “purging” kind of mood lately and am finding several pieces of curriculum in our homeschool closet that DID NOT work for us this year and I CAN NOT wait to get rid of them.

Tell me this… What piece of curriculum are you most looking forward to purging from your homeschool at the end of the school year?

Mine?

Latin’s Not So Tough

A monotonous subject meets a super monotonous method. – Good Bye!

A photo, video, link, or quote to share…

A sweet little Laura quote in honor of my Little House on the Prairie water fetching week:

Happy Homeschooling,

Sue

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Bloom – The Homeschool Mother’s Journal

2012-04-13T15:27:53Z

In my life this week…

The winter flowers in my front yard have officially kicked the bucket and my planters are overflowing with crunchy, brown petunia carcasses.

Just one day of 90 degree weather here in good ol’ Arizona and they all give up and called it quits. (A sentiment I can totally relate to!)

So, I’m off to the nursery this weekend to buy bushels of pretty little things that bloom and rise to greet me when I pull into my driveway instead of all of this ugliness:

Bleh!

In our homeschool this week…

My son is writing his final paper for his Classical Conversations class this week and boy-oh-boy is it a doozy!

He’s writing a five paragraph apologetics essay answering this question:

In what ways has God revealed Himself to man?

I don’t know about you, but I NEVER would have been able to put together a paper like that when I was 13.

I may just have to publish it when he’s done.

A few things I’m working on…

While I still find myself bummed out over the loss of our current community homeschool program with nothing in our area to replace it, I am making some progress in our curriculum search for next year.

I think that I’ve landed on some winners for science (Apologia), math (Teaching Textbooks), writing (IEW), and Latin (Visual Latin), but the jury is still out on history and Bible.

The hunt continues.

Questions/thoughts I have…

By any chance, have any of you ever used BJU Press curriculum? If so, have you used it for middle school or high school?

I’m super curious about their individual subject offerings for Jr. High as well as their accredited High school program.

Thoughts???

A photo, video, link, or quote to share…

Lucky for me not all of the flowers in my yard are dead.

I found this beautiful BLOOM showing off in my backyard just this afternoon.

Happy Homeschooling,

Sue

When Art & Science Colide

2012-04-06T22:38:15Z

In our homeschool this week…

We’re on count down finishing up our Classical Conversations program this month and I am now smack dab in the middle of the sometimes fun/sometimes not so fun process of picking our curriculum for next year.

We will not be continuing on in our current CC program after witnessing what is coming down the pipe for Challenge B (8th grade) and beyond. Unfortunately, I’m just not convinced that CC will continue to be a good fit for my son and his less intense learning style in the years ahead. Our current program is only 2 years old and is struggling at this point to find “tutors” willing to instruct the upper grades. So, even if I wanted my son to attend next year, I’d most likely have to be the one to take it on and my plate is waaaaay too full for that kind of responsibility right now. — Yikes!

At times like this I wish that we lived in one of the other states where homeschool tutorial programs and co-ops were more plentiful, but alas God has planted us in Arizona, so I’ll have to trust that He’ll carve out our homeschool path before us regardless of what programs may or may not exist here.

You know…. blooming where we’re planted and all.

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…

My family was blessed by an invitation to attend a special event at the Arizona Science Center this week called the Van Gogh Alive Experience.

The exhibit hall of our local science center was filled with floor to ceiling screens that featured over 3000 moving, digitized Van Gogh images set to classical music.

I wasn’t sure what to expect of such an artsy event being held at a science center, but I was pleasantly surprised by the unique beauty of it all.

I am a lover of art, but have found it difficult to get my son remotely interested in it over the years, but the three demential movie-like feel of this exhibit was so visually stimulating that my son was really captivated by it.

I am now completely convinced that a high-tech approach makes just about anything ten times cooler!

Unfortunately, I don’t know where the exhibit will travel to after it leaves Arizona, but if it ends up in a Science Center near you, grab your fam and GO!

A photo, video, link, or quote to share…

Along with a few pics I snapped at the Van Gogh event, I just had to share this short video so you could get a slightly better grasp of the full experience.

It was soooooo cool!

If you can’t view this video for some reason, click HERE

Happy Homeschooling,

Sue

For Days When You Just Don’t Feel Like Homeschooling Anymore

2012-04-04T21:50:57Z

I have homeschooled my 13 year old son since he was in the 2nd grade and it has truly been one of the greatest joy of my life.

However, there are days and even entire weeks that I just don’t feel like doing it anymore.

The homeschooling lifestyle can be hard, and I feel weary and discouraged at times.

Sometimes I feel like no one truly understands the magnitude of what I’m dealing with and worrying about each day as I lay my head down on my pillow each night.

Did I really do enough to educate my son today?

What could I do better tomorrow?

Will my son really be ready to go off to college if I homeschool him through high school?

Would he be better off at a “real” school?

Helplessly, these questions rage on in my mind until I finally cry out to God and ask Him why in the world I ever attempted all of this insanity.

And then it happens.

In the stillness of my darkened room, that all encompassing peace that only God can give folds over me like a blanket. And in that warm, safe place, He gently takes me back in my mind to those years of frustration with the public school system and the inability of the private school to grasp the individual way my son learned.

He brings to my remembrance all of the victories and triumphs my son has had over the last few years because of the specialized, tailor-made education he’s getting at home. I think of the math problems he’s now able to solve because of the amazing curriculum we found or the outstanding papers he’s now able to write because of the countless hours I spent teaching him step-by-step how to craft them. Two subjects that brought tears, now bring pride and I’m so thankful for each and every accomplishment.

Returning to the last place I knew in my heart that I was supposed to homeschool my son and dwelling there in the peace and grace of that moment helped me to regain my perspective. I felt hope and confidence rise up as my worry and frustration began to fade. Until one of the greatest joys of my life became just that again….

A joy.

Cook’n, Laugh’n & Homeschool’n

2012-03-30T07:47:08Z

In my life this week…

Okay. Raise ‘yer hand if you went to see The Hunger Games this week.

My local theater was showing that film almost every hour, on the hour and every show seemed to be totally full. Yowza!

My husband, who I dragged along with me, still can’t understand all of the hype. He thought that the movie was kind of boring and the story a bit confusing at times. That was, until I explained a bunch of details left out of the movie to him on the car ride home.

Then he kind of got it.

Kind of.

Poor thing.

You know what people always say, “The book was so much better than the movie.”.

In this case, they may just be right.

In our homeschool this week…

Things are rolling right along in our homeschool this week and I am so proud of my son for hanging in there when I know good and well that he’s getting really burnt out and needs a change of pace.

We only have a few weeks left of our current community program and then we’ll take the entire month of May to finish up some leftover Math and work on some fun elective-type things instead.

I love being apart of a homeschool community, but sometimes I miss the freedom to do our own thing.

Needless to say, I’m really looking forward to May.

I am inspired by…

I love this post from my sweet bloggy, friend, Jenn, about finding creative ways to show kindness to others and what she did on her 36th birthday a few months ago to step things up a notch: Random Acts of Kindness

Such a great lesson for kids!

I’m cooking…

Oh my goodness! I know that I’ve mentioned SkinnyTaste.com to ya’ll before, but I tried another amazing recipe from the low-fat goddess that creates the recipes over there and just HAD to share another one with you.

Chicken Rollatini with Spinach alla Parmigiana is hands down the best new low-fat recipe I have tried in a long time!!! Since we are only a family of 3, there was more than enough to have the next day and boy-oh-boy were my husband and son excited to get this yummy dish two nights in a row.

My son, who is going through his, “I hate to get my picture taken” phase, was so busy scarfing down his dinner, he didn’t even notice that I snapped this little gem with my iphone…

Gotcha!

In other news…I’m going to try out the Pineapple Bliss Cupcakes this weekend because I just can’t wait until Easter. Yum-O!

A photo, video, link, or quote to share…

Maybe I’ve been living under a rock, but I did not know who Chonda Pierce was until my mother-in-law told me about her a few days ago.

We sat together watching Chonda’s YouTube videos for over an hour laughing our heads off.

This one was one of our favorites:

(If you can’t view this video for some reason, click HERE to watch it in YouTube.)

Happy Homeschooling,

Sue

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Somewhere Over the Rainbow…

2012-03-23T05:32:01Z

In my life this week…

It rained in Arizona this week and it was kind of a big deal around here.

We rarely see large puffy clouds in the sky and almost never see dark puffy clouds overflowing with raindrops hovering over our parched valley.

Our skies are almost always blue and clear and I find it horribly annoying sometimes.

I guess you always want what you don’t have.

Put the girl in the desert and she craves the rain.

Go figure!

{My son, Bible in hand, outside of our church as the storm clouds rolled in over the Superstition Mountains on Sunday.}

In our homeschool this week…

We hit the ground running and dove back into pages of Latin and writing a paper about the characters in The Secret Garden.

We poured over the skeletal system, the countries of Africa, pondered the myths of consumerism and solved algebraic equations.

Would you believe that I still have yet to find the time to lay outside on my hammock?

Here’s hoping for next week.

I am inspired by…

I’ve been thinking about next year a lot lately and have been fretting over what to do with my almost 8th grader and then a friend of mine shared this encouraging post with me: How to End Your Homeschool Year.

It reminded me to not get too far ahead of myself and to enjoy each phase as it comes to an end.

Questions/thoughts I have…

How do you celebrate the end of each homeschool year?

Does your family have any fun traditions or plans this year?

Things I’m working on…

I think that I finally found a solution to the commenting system issues that I’ve been having with my blog since I installed the new fancy-schmancy (not-so-premium-after-all) theme last week.

I decided to try out the IntenseDebate commenting system for a bit to see if I like it.

I think that it will do everything that I’m hoping for, but If you have any issues using it, just holler.

A picture to share…

This is what the valley of the sun looks like after you sprinkle a little water on it.

My hubby spotted this beauty standing on the top of Camelback Mountain after the rain cleared on Monday afternoon this week.

Beautiful, huh?

{Arizona rainbow}

Happy Homeschooling,

Sue

Would you like to share your own journal post with me this week?

Check out my link up guidelines to find out how.

Where, Oh Where Did My Spring Break Go?

2012-03-16T06:31:38Z

In my life this week…

Nooooooooooooo!!!! Spring break can NOT be over yet!!!!

*cry*

I had such lofty plans to read books swinging out on the hammock with a cool drink in my hand, but alas, I never got around to it. There was always something more pressing on my ToDo list.

I helped my son clean out his insanely jam-packed room and purge it of over 6 bags full of things that are no longer “cool enough” to belong in a 13 year old’s room.

Bye-bye, Legos….So long, Matchbox cars….Sayonara, View Finder and your million little white discs of fun!

You will be missed.

In our homeschool this week…

Spring break still found us working around the house and sprucing things up for our final push to the end of the year.

Our homeschool program, while already intense, is going to ramp up the workload over the coming weeks and I’m kind of dreading it.

I think that all of this beautiful weather has us longing to do anything but school work right now, but we’re hanging in there for now.

Questions/thoughts I have…

I just found out that our Classical Conversations homeschool class is going to double-up on things and wrap up the year in the middle of April because of some scheduling issues with our meeting place.

Yowza!

Is anyone else finishing up their homeschool year that early?

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…

The rodeo is in town this weekend and we are seriously thinking about going.

My poor husband has NEVER been to the rodeo. Can you believe it?!?

I used to go every year with my family and strut around in my cowboy boots and wrangler jeans because it was the one time each year that I didn’t feel like a total dork wearing them. Yes, there was a cowboy clique at my Arizona high school growing up, but I wasn’t an official member.

The mere idea that there was such a clique at my former school is hilarious to my Detroit-grown husband. In his old Michigan stomping ground, they had a clique just for Italians, which always makes me imagine sitting in Chemistry class with one those drama-mama Italian housewives from TV as my lab partner. Which kind of makes me thankful that I only had to deal with a few cow tippers every now and then.

Go rodeo!

My favorite thing this week was…

While it took away from my hammock time, I’m really glad that I got so much spring cleaning done this week.

I don’t know about you, but I feel more creative and productive in a clean, organized space.

Things I’m working on…

If you’re viewing this post on my website, and you’ve been here before, you might have noticed that a few things have changed around here.

I had some major website issues this week and while I was cleaning up the memory mess with my server, I decided to try out a new theme and thought, “What the heck. I’m on spring break. I’ll go ahead and totally redesign my site!”

In hindsight, it was an overly ambitious project, but I’m a gluten for punishment and I just can’t leave well enough alone. (at least that’s what my husband tells me.)

With all of that said, I’m having an issue with my commenting system and my replies to all of your comments are not showing up on my blog for some reason. I have sent up smoke signals to the technical gurus and hope to get it fixed soon, but for now, I’ll have to reply to all comments left on my blog by email only.

Sooooooooo….. don’t think that I’m ignoring ya!

A photo, video, link, or quote to share…

My son’s room before & after our big spring clean!

Happy Homeschooling,

Spring Break or Bust!

2012-03-09T05:17:02Z

Click HERE to find out how you can share your journal post with me!

In my life this week…

On Monday, I found myself gracing the doors of Target three different times within a 24 hour period.

I now realize that my aversion to lists has finally reached its breaking point. Either that, or I’m inadvertently working on a new “How many times can I go to Target in one day?” record. – The verdict is still out.

On Wednesday, following my Day-O-Target, I went for groceries, came home and completely forgot about them in the back of my car for the next 3 hours. Thankfully, my garage was cold enough that the frozen items weren’t a total melted mess.

My son thought it was hysterical. I, on the other hand, am counting down the days, hours, and seconds until spring break so I can catch up with the part of my brain that is apparently already on vacation.

My favorite thing this week was…

When my sweet little Shih Tzu, Princess Leia, jumped up on my husband’s lap to curl up for the evening last night, she smelled like a tossed salad.

At dinner, my son accidentally squeezed the Italian dressing bottle so hard that the pour spout shot off the end, followed by a fast-moving tidal wave of oily dressing gushing all over my kitchen table. It wasn’t until after the oil slick was cleaned up and dinner was over that we discovered that there was an overflow of dressing that must have dripped off the table onto the floor.

Unfortunately, Princess Leia tends to frequent the territory under my son’s chair for morsels and scraps that often fall from his plate, and she must have found herself in the splash zone during the great flood.

I soaked her head under the faucet twice, but sadly she still reeks of zesty Italian.

Who needs “Must see TV” with live entertainment like that?

I laughed my big blonde head off.

In our homeschool this week…

Last Saturday morning I sat restlessly in our homeschool room helping my son with his lengthy writing assignment, struggling with the desire to just do it for him because it felt like my precious weekend was slowly slipping through my fingers.

I resisted, but just barely.

It was really hard to loose time to homeschool work over the weekend, but in the end my son completed his work on time and seemed to be really proud of his paper. In hindsight, I was glad that I was able to help him find his way through it instead of just taking over.

With that said, we’re taking the week off for our official spring break next week and I am really looking forward to it.

Questions/thoughts I have…

Anyone else taking their spring break along with me next week?

A photo, video, link, or quote to share…

Here’s a little something from my yard to get you in the mood for spring.

pretty in pink

Happy Homeschooling,