Welcome to the party!

{{This blog is under construction, a new update about us page is coming soon! }}

Welcome to our little spot on the internet!

This is the week for The Ultimate Blog Party '08
hosted over at 5 Minutes for Mom. Click to hop on over and visit other parties!

Make yourselves at home, grab a diet coke and feel free to look around the place.

We are a Southern California homeschooling family;
Jenny is the blogger and homeschool-mom,
Sky is resident principal, handyman/visionary, building inspector by trade (specializing in schools and hospitals) and farmer wanna-be. Our Children are; Meg 12-loves horses and plays the violin, Josie 11- plays the piano, paints and is very into The Warrior series, Demi-Sky 8- very into dragons, Wii and beginner skateboarder (also known as The boy wonder and Snackman) and Amie 6-inhouse personality, budding Irish dancer and always very "sewerious".


This blog is mostly about our family, the things we find humorous, our homeschool adventures, homeschooling methods and books, our faith, our love of reading, travels and projects around the house.

Things around here are kind of scattered, kind of eclectic- a reflection of our house and
homeschool style.

In some ways, we are a typical Orange County family....and in many ways we are probably not.

We currently have 4 hens as pets, this one is Dapples- click on over to see her musings on a perfect day...
We also have a cat named Oliver and a guinea pig named Guinea-Guinea.

We joke that we are farmer wanna-bes...and dream sometimes of having a farm somewhere. But then we come back to reality and realize we are city folks...we love our Barnes & Nobles date nights,
our Indian food, our libraries and our days at the Skate park and Disneyland.

So glad to meet you! Drop a comment so I know you were here...
and stay and visit a while!


Sunday night ponderings and CM links

Photo of Sky, Meg and Josie with friends up in Eastern Washington, overlooking the Kamiak Butte. I think, or on the Kamiak Butte, not sure. I don't actually know what a Butte is...it just looks like a neat landscape photo of lots of snow to me...and cold.

We had the bible school boys over tonight, (called the Full-time training) they have been on winter break- it was nice to have the house full again. They just finished their first week of the term, it's called the "pre-training week" and is a really intense week-from before sun-up to late in the evening every day. I don't really know the reason behind the week, but I gather it might be a sort of encouragement that if you can make it through the first grueling week, you will feel like you can survive the rest of the term. The very cool part of the week is the continual feasting they have on God's word, and we got to enjoy some of the over-flow of what they learned this week...they were so stuffed with the week that it just sort of 'oozed' out of them, and we enjoyed what they shared with us tonight. That is the blessing to us of hosting the boys over for dinner, we get to feast on the richness they enjoy during the week.

We served in Children's meeting today. Mostly it just seems like we survive somehow... The ages are 1st and 2nd grade, and they just seem to run us a little ragged. Tho, we are short on help most weeks, we are supposed to get more help next time we serve, which is every 4 weeks.

here is a little homeschool link love-

First, a blog I just found- Pockets of the Future, very interesting account of going back to living off the land...something I feel like I would like to do- and yet on cold winter days I realize what a wimp I am and know I probably would be miserable! But, this blog is very fascinating, educational and well-written. It is also a Charlotte Mason homeschooling style blog. I found her post on reading Farmer boy very thought-provoking and enjoyable...go read it.

and here, more Charlotte Mason subject- conference speakers to listen to over at
Childlight USA...one more thing to get to when I have a chance... The subject "training the intellect through literature" looks very, interesting. Let me know how you liked them if you listen to any...

I want to be a clone

Tonight, we came home from a date-night - which pretty much follows this format...

Dinner-Barnes & Nobles-home

anyway, we came home and found Demi-Sky (8) and Amie (almost 6) busy drawing and writing in homemade booklets. They were so proud of their work, eager to show us, and Demi waxed eloquent in his professions of great love and appreciation for us. The booklets (stapled on the wrong side) were likewise full of love for mom and dad, and- promises of doing various chores for us, such as making the bed and doing the dishes.
Kind of cool.

conversation we heard as they were getting into their beds...

Amie: "I'm going to promise to make mommy and daddy's bed for 3 days in a row."

Demi: "well, I'm going to promise to make it for 7 days!"

Amie: "I take mine back then, I'm going to make their bed for 10 days!!"

Who are you, and what did you do with my real children?

tv land

We are taking the jump, it seems. We've been t.v. -less for a little more than 5 years, and we just got cable again. When I say t.v.-less, I should probably explain...we do have a small t.v. unit for our son's wii (and for the Bible school boys to play wii on) and we play dvd's and videos on it from the library for the kids. It's one of those little, portable sets, nothing exciting. We can also watch dvd's on my computer, which we do once in a great while- hubby and I are just too busy mostly to sit down and watch anything.

So, hubby discovered if we purchase one of those cable bundles...internet, phone and cable- we'd only spend $10 more a month then we were already spending on phone and internet. And, we'd get animal planet- which my kids adore. And, hubby wouldn't have to stalk the homes of relatives and friends for a place to watch superbowl-like he has had to do in the past.

It was installed Wednesday evening. We have it hooked up to my computer monitor, which is really nice and hd and all that. It was off all day until Thursday evening after dinner when Sky turned on Animal Planet.

I'm thinking I didn't like the result. At the time we had Meg and Josie sitting at the big table working on memory work. Amie was busily drawing and coloring with bird stencils. Demi-Sky was in his room playing the wii. As soon as Animal Planet came on, there was a rush from all parts of the house, and then 4 kids sitting around the monitor- big eyed and silent- watching.

Sky and I had a discussion after witnessing this...and decided it would only be on at the end of the week as a reward for getting through our schoolwork. One good thing is the dvr thingy...we can forward through commercials (in the past we would turn it off, now we can just forward thru.)

I am actually excited to have the History channel now. (and I'll admit to my internet friends that I've always been curious to see a super nanny show-or whatever you call it...shhh!!!)

big changes happening here.

Anemia Diaries part something...

My Wordless Wednesday was put up kind of late this week, I really hate it when I end up past the first 100 entries over at the WW hub...this week I was something like #510. Well, I didn't get my photo posted because I was just dog-gone tired and cranky last night. Sky could tell you, but I know he won't because he is just a stellar guy like that.

So why the uber-cranky mommy?? Uh, because when Sky is gone I fall apart- and he and Meg and Josie were gone for 9 days on a trip. They went to Washington State to visit our close-heart friends in Seattle, and then they went to the eastern part of the state to visit the family who stayed with us in December, and then over to Sky's brother's family. I didn't go, because- biggest reason- the cold. Since I know I have Raynaud's disease- I have a good reason to stay away from snow. And it makes me cranky. And it makes me cry.

So, I digressed there, didn't I? Anyways, when Sky is gone I basically live on chocolate, bagels and chips with melted cheese- and stay up till the wee hours of the morning because I cannot sleep with him gone. My strategy is to stay up till about 2 a.m. then pass out into a deep sleep.
So, it was a recipe for iron- pill- taking disaster. Now I'm cranky and tired. So, now back to my iron pill taking...while he was gone I was only taking one a day. It just helps somehow, as I reach for my 3rd diet coke...to see him lift an eyebrow at me, so I put it back and pour a glass of cranberry/water- which is more conducive for vitamin/iron taking-

They had a wonderful time, spent quality time with our heart friends and their kids...they met some new homeschool families, and went sledding. Meg and Josie saw their first snow-fall.
Sky was treated to lots of/and really good food, cooked up by his brother. Good times all around, the two littles did lots of fun stuff with me. Meg and Josie seemed taller and older to me when they returned for some reason.

good times all around. oh, and I got to rent chick-flicks. :)

Winter painting


Demi-Sky made this watercolor in art class. I really love this. It has shimmering/white glitter on the snow too, you can't see it in the photo. The boy is all boy, yet he has a sweet side too. He is a boy of contrasts who will pause from swordplay (complete with sound effects) to listen to "The four seasons" - which he has always called "butterfly music".

Demi's top 3 ipod picks:
  • Get ready for surrender-Billy Idol
  • "Chicken cherry cola"-Chica cherry cola-unknown
  • Breathless-the Corrs

On a side-note, did you know that Explode the code (phonics workbooks) are online?
go here to see it in action*
Unfortunately, a side-effect of my brain waking up from my anemia fog is a renewing of my consuming curricula-lust and my search for the perfect educational plan...