Ben here. One of my favorite
memories is when Nana, Pa, and my
family went to the Gateway and Roo got to choose a new puppy and make her just like she wanted her. Here is a picture of her "washing" her puppy before we went to choose clothing for it. I remember that even though Audrey was not supposed to get one, Nana and Pa gave in and Audrey ended up with one, too. It was a fun day. I can't remember if this was Pre Trent time or barely post Trent. I just remember the smile it made on her face that day.

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Do you like my, as my friend so astutely puts it, "floating baby"? LOL. 200 days seems so far to go!!!!!!

Ben Here

This blog is about to get a little more interesting. I, Ben, am going to attempt to get more time to put in my two cents on the world here in the blog. I'm going to start figuring out how to put my pictures from the old BlackBerry and put them in here (getting them onto the computer is easy, getting the pictures onto the blog is a different story). We will see how well this goes.

Top 10 things I love about Homeschooling

1. SLEEPING IN!!! I love that we all get to sleep in. No HAVING to get up and get people out the door for us. It is SO nice. Poor Ben has to get up and out the door, but the rest of us can sleep in to our hearts content.

2. MINIMUM EXPOSURE to bullying (either side), swearing, drugs, sex, gangs, ect. So many of those things that our kids are being exposed to way too early in life.

3. THE "AHA" MOMENTS. Nothing is better than watching your child finally "click" with a concept and "get it!" Watching the light that goes on is a memorable experience.

4. RELIGION. I can talk up religion all I want. My kids learn scripture stories, memorize scriptures, learn primary song and hymns. We use morals from the scriptures all the time in school. I love that I can add it in to my heart's content.

5. PLENTY OF DOWN TIME AND FAMILY TIME. My kids school for less time than public schooled kids because they get one on one attention. They tend to finish quicker and thus have lots of time to be kids. They get to dig in the mud and play in the snow. They get to find bugs for pets and roll around in the leaves. I LOVE the extra downtime they get! We also get lots of family time. When Ben gets home from work the kids don't have to do homework, or music practice, ect. We get our evenings to ourselves to enjoy as we please.

6. LIFE SKILLS. I get to teach life skills to my kids consistently. They do chores, cooking, pet care, child care, ect all as part of a regular school day.

7. FAMILY UNITY. I love watching how close my children are growing to each other. Because they rely on each other for playmates so much of the time they are growing closer as the years go by rather than farther apart. Family is the central unit of God's plan. I hope to build a strong, close-knit one. Homeschooling is helping me accomplish this.

8. THE ABILITY TO THROW ALL PLANS OUT THE WINDOW. I love that I have the freedom to just throw all the plans out the window as needed/wanted. A sick child or mom can mean just snuggling up on the couch and reading that day. A spontaneous field trip or play date can mean rearranging of school to allow the kids a treat. Holidays and Birthdays can mean a free day to simply focus on the joy of the day. A snow storm can mean dropping the days work and heading out to go sledding while everyone else is in school. It's a wonderful freedom to have!

9. PUTTING FUN BACK INTO LEARNING. I love playing learning games with my kids. It's fun to pull out the board games and teach educational skills as well as good sportsmanship and turn taking. I love to pull out of my memory games I remember playing in school, like spelling basketball and being able to play them with the kids. We get to get creative and have fun learning about stuff.

10. ALL THE WONDERFUL FAMILIES I HAVE MET through homeschooling. I have met so many wonderful families!!! I have a whole new set of friends now. I love all my friends that I can talk about homeschooling and bounce ideas off of and get support and help from. So many wonderful people in my community homeschool. I am truly grateful for the oppportunity I've had to meet so many of these families.

Yes, we have our good days and bad days. Yes, some days I wonder WHY I am doing what I'm doing. BUT, I KNOW that I am doing what the Lord wants me to do for MY family at THIS time. I hope you all enjoyed reading about why I enjoy homeschooling, and a little bit of WHY I homeschool.

Wow! Can I say, long time no see?! I seem to have fallen off the blogging bandwagon. Much of that is thanks to facebook. But some people don't have facebook....so for all of you out there that care to read this here is our life!
Audrey finished up kindergarten in great style. She has lately discovered that she DOES like to read. I have to comb the easy reader shelves in the library for books easy enough for her but she enjoys reading them and is SO proud of herself. She recently lost her 3rd tooth thanks to cousin Adrian who pulled it out for her.
Marissa FINALLY learned how to sleep through the night. Yes, she's 4. We have some night waking but it's much rarer than every night! She is very excited to learn to read. She likes to pretend that she can read the books Audrey does. Hopefully we'll have her ready to start reading next summer!
Trent is a crazy and zany two year old. He LOVES his pjs and is nearly impossible to get out of them. He also loves flip flops which he calls "flops." Daddy accidentally took off with them in the car the other day and we had a meltdown over "FLOPS!!!!" He is nearly as big physically as Marissa now. He's getting better at talking every day and is quite hilarious. The other day he fell off the end of a slide into the dirt and proceeded to tell us all about it by saying: "Slide! Boom!! Dirt. Clothes."
Ben is still looking for a better job. His current job...is, well, a job. That's about all that can be said for it. Hopefully we will be blessed in the near future with a better suited job for him.
I am happily plugging away as a stay at home and stoking my favorite hobby: homeschooling. I have next years curriculum all planned out and am just starting to get it all assembled and ready for the year. I teach piano and clarinet lessons on the side to help a bit with money. That's about all going on here.
We are excited for my (Shelly's) family reunion next week and have some fun activities planned for the summer like camping and swimming and letterboxing.
Life is good. Hard, but good.

My FAVORITE homeschooling resource

Ok...for all my friends out there who either homeschool or have preschoolers and toddlers. You HAVE to check out this blog if you haven't all ready! I have already told and shown many of you this blog, but here it is in print for you to link up to!!!!!
This lady is AMAZING!!! She has SO many wonderful ideas and FREE printables!!!!! You will love this. She does everything from her toddler up through her 1st grader. There's something for ANYONE who has young kids.
Enjoy the link and let me know what you think!
http://lovemylifex4.blogspot.com

Adventures in Homeschooling

I absolutely LOVE homeschooling! I am so glad we made the choice. I never would have pictured myself as a homeschooling mom, but here I am, and I love the adventure. I LOVE watching my kids learn, especially when a concept clicks and you see their face light up. I love how I keep finding new resources every day: blogs, dollar store items, printables websites, ect.

We have just been having a ton of fun. Audrey is learning how to read. Marissa is learning how to spell and write her name. We have fun with puzzles, playdoh, art supplies, science experiments and all kinds of things.

We take advantage of nice days and get out and play. We are excited to finish off the tree house this year, with the help of a friend. It is going to be SO cool!

The one thing I do wish, is that we had the money to put the girls into a gymnastics class. That would be so much fun for them and educational as well. I suppose now is not the season for that though. Until that time, we'll have fun discovering all the many resources out there for us and enjoy learning together!

My Goober is 2!!!

Trent turned 2 on the 8th. A happy, yet sad day. Happy for him because he got a party and presents and cake! Sad for me because my baby is not a baby any more! He is talking more and more every day. He has such a cute personality. I love to hear him laugh. I love watching the kids when they play well together, which doesn't happen often enough in my opinion. He's such a big boy and thinks he can do everything his sisters can. He gets VERY mad if anyone goes outside without him. I just love my little guy!