I'm so excited....and I just can't hide it.

I'm so excited for next fall and all it's curriculum!!!!!  I want to squeal with joy.  I want to dive right in and start NOW.  BUT, my kids need somewhat of a summer, we have the neighbor boy over for tutoring and babysitting most days, and things wouldn't be consistent with all of our summer plans.  SO, I will have to hold on to my enthusiasm and wait until August to start. 
My kids will resume TRADITIONAL (as opposed to Summer) schooling on the same day their peers go back to school.  Two reasons for this:  1) I'm just way to excited to wait any longer than that, and 2) the kids get bored and complain if their friends are in school and they aren't. 
I have two other "what's in the box" posts in the works.  One will focus on Bree's tot tray boxes and the other will focus on Audrey's school work.  I'm waiting to do Audrey's until I get her boxes all set up with next year's curriculum.  That way you can also get a look at what we're planning for next year. 
So much fun, I can't wait!!!  I will try to enjoy my summer and not get TOO carried away though.  :)  We still have to reach our goal of trying to get Audrey to progress enough in reading to be on a SOLID third grade level.  Hopefully my interventions will work.  She may never enjoy reading, which breaks my heart as I am such an avid reader, but she needs to be able TO read.

One year ago.

With great anticipation we loaded the bags into the car, hugged and kissed all of the children, and thanked my parents for staying with the kids.  We headed over to the hospital to welcome our newest bundle of joy, Breanne Janeen Stephen. 
After getting all settled into my room, the nurse came to give me an IV.  She couldn't find a good vein and I ended up with black and blue bruises all over my hands.  Finally that was over and things really started moving.  The labor was fast, just a couple of hours, but all those details have faded in my head in wake of the nightmare that was about to unfold. 
Finally, after my hardest labor yet, little Breanne squirmed her way into this world.  She was perfect, and pink, and crying up a storm.  They cleaned her off, wrapped her up, and handed her to me.  Such a blessing.  I held my little baby for a few precious minutes, then it all began. 

Holding Bree before the "fun" began

She started making a weird kind of chattering sound.  It was weird, but I didn't think much of it.  The nurse came over to check on her, and with concern in her face asked if she could just take a look at the baby.  She just didn't think she "looked" right.  The nurse took Bree over to the bassinet and unwrapped her little body.  It was purple.  She called the NICU team right away and began listening to the baby's heart and lungs.  The NICU team arrived and listened to Bree's heart and lungs as well.  During this time, Ben and I were sitting off to the side just holding on to one another, waiting to hear what was wrong with our beautiful little girl.  The NICU team reported that they suspected Bree had punctured a lung during the birth process.  Phew!  A breath of relief.  A punctured lung, I could deal with that.  I knew it meant a few days in the NICU with antibiotics until the lung healed.  My friend had gone through it with her 4th baby as well.  I could live with that.  They would take Bree for x-rays to confirm the diagnosis. 


Bree, after her surgery, hooked up to all of her machines

So, breathing a little easier I sent my baby off for exrays and relaxed.  The time stretched, and stretched.  My anxiety grew and grew.  During my entire pregnancy I had felt that something was "wrong" with the baby.  The first trimester I worried about a miscarriage.  The second and third trimesters I worried about a still birth.  All ultrasounds were positive however, and showed that she was growing and functioning just perfectly.  Still, I could not shake the feeling that something was "wrong."  We received no word from anyone about the status of our baby.  After a long while, I had grown too antsy and NEEDED an update.  I sent Ben off to see what was happening.  He was gone for so long, I began to worry more. 

Holding Bree right before her surgery.  This was the only the 3rd time I had held my baby in 4 days

Ben finally returned.  He said he had good news and bad news and which did I want first.  I asked for the good news first, and he told me that Bree had NOT punctured a lung.  The bad news:  Something was wrong with her heart.  My own heart dropped out of my chest and onto the floor at this news.  NO!!!!  My little baby couldn't have heart problems!  She couldn't die!  She couldn't be sick!
Calling our parents with heavy hearts, we informed them with tears in our eyes, that Bree had been born.  She was beautiful and precious, but there was something wrong with her heart and they were preparing her to be Life Flighted to Primary Children't Medical Center. 
Our dear friends arrived to give love and support and help Ben administer blessings, the first of many to come over the next two weeks, to both Bree and me.  I was wheeled to see my little baby.  She looked so small and tiny in her incubator all hooked up to many beeping machines.  I was so scared. 
With fear in our hearts, we watched our baby be taken to the helicopter.  Ben followed the helicopter down to Salt Lake, while I had to remain at the hospital.  My mom came to spend the night with me.  I couldn't bear the thought of being alone when any moment my baby could die. 


A proud Marissa holding her baby sister for the first time

The night passed, thankfully, with no more bad news.  I was discharged a scant 24 hours after giving birth in order to drive down to Primary Children's to be with my baby.  There, we received the final diagnosis.  Breanne had TGA, Transposition of the Great Arteries, meaning that her heart was basically wired backward.  Instead of blood flowing through her heart in a figure 8, it was flowing in two circles.  All the blood in her lungs only circulated through her lungs, picking up more and more oxygen.  All the blood to her body circulated through her body without ever going to her lungs to be oxygenated.  Without surgery, she would only live a few days at most. 


Audrey finally getting to hold her baby sister

We tried to prepare ourselves emotionally and mentally for our little girl to undergo open heart surgery.  In all of this horror, there was a glimmer of light.  Bree, amazingly, had no other heart defects!!  This is very rare.  Usually children with TGA have multiple other defects as well.  Not so with our little one.  The outlook was good.  The prognosis was optimistic as long as she did well in surgery and the first couple days of recovery. 
Thursday arrived.  Breanne was just 4 days old when she was taken in to the operating room to be operated on.  We waited, and waited, receiving updates periodically.  Things seemed to be going well.  There were a couple of snags, but nothing REALLY serious.  Then, blessedly, my little girl was out of surgery.  She had done so well that they were even able to close her chest cavity up that day rather than a couple days later.  This shaved off a few days from her recovery. 
Now on to recovery.  Recovery went fairly smoothly.  We were told that BEST case scenario, she would recover in the hospital for two weeks before being sent home.  They neglected to take into account the fighter Bree would turn out to be.  After the first couple days she was doing so well that machines just kept being taken off her every time we turned around! 


Trent is finally a big brother. 

The day arrived, not quite a week after her surgery, that we were informed that she would be moved to the surgical recovery floor.  She no longer needed one on one care, and we as her parents needed to start taking a bigger role in her care.  That move to the surgical floor was a huge milestone, but while the hospital staff felt she was ready, I was not ready for my baby to be moved.  I was still so scared that something would go wrong.  However, the hospital staff knew what they were talking about.  Breanne soared through recovery.  The only hitch was that she refused to completely give up her need for oxygen.  A short 8 days after her surgery Bree was discharged from the hospital and sent home with us.  She needed oxygen for the first little while, but other than that was doing amazing. 


Daddy holding his little girl

We left the hospital in joy, and trepidation, as we now knew that all her care was in our hands. 
Having great faith in the Lord, we survived the nightmare and here we are a year later.  Breanne is a happy, healthy, one year old today!!!  A fading scar remains on her chest to remind us of the miracle she is.  I am so blessed to have my little girl, and I am so grateful to my Faith, the priesthood power, and knowledge of God's plan which sustained me through those first few weeks. 
 I am so grateful to so many who did so much for our family over that time.  Friends who took our children full time.  Friends and church sisters that cleaned and sanitized my home in preparation for Breanne's homecoming.  Friends and church members who checked up on us, offered priesthood blessings, and love and support.  We were truly blessed by an outpouring of love.  Thank you to all, and most of all thanks be to God for his tender mercies.  Thank you, Lord, for letting me keep this precious daughter of Thine.  To be able to raise her and love her in THIS life. 

Breanne this morning on her first birthday!  Oh how far we have come!

What ELSE is in the box?

Today we're taking a look at what's in Marissa's boxes.  Marissa is in Kindergarten but has done a lot of first grade work this year.  Marissa currently has 5 boxes.  Come fall she will have quite a few more.  As of right now, these are her boxes. 

Her first box, like Trent's, is her Calendar Notebook and media coupons along with the pens to fill out her notebook.

Marissa's second box contains her Math.  We use singapore math.  I love using it.  It works for us for many reasons.  Marissa has completed level 1A.  After she completed it I decided not to start her out on 1B quite yet and to spend some more time working on addition and subtraction facts.  She will start 1B in the fall (when she is officially a 1st grader) or when she finishes all of her addition and subtraction fact assignments this summer (which she is nearly done with and May isn't even over yet).

 Box number 3 used to hold Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons but she finished it months ago.  Currently it holds nothing because her reading assignments are on the computer doing a program called Funnix.  When she finishes up with funnix, this box will hold whatever chapter book she is currently reading.  Therefore, I just took a picture of the tag on the workbox. 

 Her next box holds her Handwriting.  After learning how to write all the letters, using the Handwriting without tears approach, I moved her into this book by Evan and Moor.  I have really liked it.  She is reviewing all of the letters right now, then she will do numbers and number words.  After that it all becomes copy work.  I can already see improvement in her handwriting.  She will probably be working in this book until the end of first grade.  If she does finish is up before then her handwriting will just be that in her other subjects.

For some reason, unbeknownst to me, she chooses to keep random objects in this drawer.

 Marissa's last box holds her Science book.  This year we used Elemental Science's Biology for the Grammar Stage.  I keep the two older girls together on Science and History and split the difference in their grade levels right now.  We have really enjoyed this curriculum.  Next year they will be doing Earth Science and Astronomy by the same company.  I'm planning on sticking with this company all the way through High School, that's how much I love it! 

Here is a close up picture of her section of workboxes.  You can see that the bottom drawer has 3 tags on it.  In general (and this will become more apparent when I show you Audrey's boxes) I put the tag for whatever is actually IN the box on the left of the drawer.  Tags on the right of the drawer are a visual reminder of subjects that need to be done but don't need a drawer.  On the bottom drawer she has science (which is actually in the drawer), a tag for history (which was a flop this year but will hopefully be better next year), and a tag for English (which we began with but thought our curriculum was so dumb that we stopped doing). 

Next year Marissa will have the following boxes:  General School supply box, Calendar Notebook box, Math, Handwriting, Science, History, and Geography. 
She will also have tags for Reading and Piano

So there's a peek into the school life of my kindergartener.  She is one bright little cookie and catches on to almost everything like lightning.  I feel very blessed to be able to homeschool her where I can allow her to excel in her academics and spend lots of time on character training to help with her temper.

What's in the box?

As many of you know we do a workbox system over here.  I thought that maybe you would like to get an idea of how it's set up and how it all works at our house.  I have three sets of rolling drawers.  These work AWESOME for us.  They are portable and lightweight.  They hold most things I need to put in them and they're colorful.  Audrey has her own set, Marissa will have her own set come fall since she will have more drawers, and the purple one will be Trent's (yes, he chose purple) and Bree's.  The tags on our workboxes come from here. 

Our Workboxes:  Left - Audrey Middle - Marissa (And currently Trent) Right - Will be Trent's and Bree's come fall

  Today, we are taking a look at what's in Trent's workboxes.  Trent is doing preschool.  We use the curriculum from here.  Trent has five workboxes.   His first workbox holds his Calendar notebook, his media coupons, and the markers he needs for his notebook.  We do this box as part of our daily devotional after breakfast each morning.

The other four workboxes are divided up by day.  He does one box on each day of the week.  (We don't do formal school on Wednesdays right now.  That is our homeschool co-op day.)  He gets to choose which box he does on which day.  Here he is doing his yellow box.  The yellow box usually contains:  A playdoh page for the letter of the week, a counting activitiy, a card with his name printed on it to practice writing and spelling his name, and an extra activity of some sort.  Some weeks the contents of the boxes will vary depending on exactly what activities I have for the letter of the week. 

Here Trent is sorting colored raindrops.  Marissa had to help.

Sorting big and little Uu.

The purple box usually contains: A coloring page representing the letter of the week, a Leap Frog video, a puzzle for the letter of the week, and a pre-writing activity.  (Obviously this week is a little off in what's in each specific box)

The green box usually contains:  Lacing cards, a color matching activity, a card to play on starfall, and an extra activity (usually cutting)

This box has been completed this week, but not cleaned out yet, thus the mutilated cutting paper.

 His last box, the red box, usually contains:  A do a dot page for the letter of the week, Big/little letter sorting, size sorting, and an extra activity. 

 Trent has a lot of fun and asks to do his school almost every day.  He's progressing well and will definitely be ready for kindergarten in another year.  Next fall his boxes will get shaken up a bit as he will be ready for more "intense" work.  This year we have been focusing on learning to:  Sit and concentrate, recognize letters and the sounds they make, recognize the numbers 1-10, put a puzzle together, and motor skills like lacing and cutting. 
I plan on doing a post for each child's workboxes so you can get a better idea of what each of their school days look like.

Sometimes I just don't wanna!!!

Do you have those days where you just don't want to supervise, help with, and check chores?  That's how I feel today.  I want the house cleaned, but I know that my 4 year old isn't capable of doing all his chores on his own.  I know that the 6 year old needs to have some supervision to make sure everything actually gets done.  I know that my 8 year old needs to have the chores checked to make sure she followed through with everything.  I know that I have my own list of chores that need to be done.  I just don't wanna!!!!!!  Thank you for letting me rant.  Now back to your scheduled programming.

The Search for an English Curriculum

I have been searching for a good english curriculum that fits Audrey's learning style.  First, we tried First Language Lessons, but we found it to be SOOO boring.  I was bored and hated doing the lessons and my girls were nearly bored to tears!  So first language lessons went out the window and I started searching again.  I found a wonderful resource called "English Lessons for the LDS child."  It was free and very well written!!!  I love all the poems and scriptures that are memorized in the curriculum.  So what's the problem with it?  It requires a LOT of copywork.  Even when I scale the copy work down, there is a LOT of copywork, and little miss Audrey HATES writing.  She already has to write for spelling, and science, and write in her journal weekly, so adding THAT MUCH more writing on was causing a battle of wills.  So, on to the search again!!!  I am highly considering the Rod and Staff enlglish for 3rd grade.  I would do that workbook and continue the memorization following the ideas from English Lessons for the LDS child.  (Audrey LIKES to memorize).  The rod and staff seems to be more of a fill in the blank kind of workbook, which Audrey would be MUCH more willing to do. 
Does anyone have any experiene with Rod and Staff?  What do you think?  Do you like it?

The Math Plan

Both of my girls have finished up what I deem the NECESSARY math assignments for the year.  Marissa (kindergarten) has finished Singapore Math 1A.  There is no reason to push her into Math 1B yet.  She's already going to be WAY ahead come fall anyway.  Audrey (2nd grade) has finished Singapore Math level 2A.  I COULD get her started on level 2B, but when I looked at it, it is QUITE advanced for 2nd grade.  I guess that's why the website says that an AVERAGE 2nd grader will do 1B and 2A in second grade.  So we are taking a hiatus from our workbooks and focusing on addition and subtraction fact families from now through the end of the summer. 

The plan:  Both girls will be practicing the fact families 0-9 for both addition and subtraction.  They each get 5 minutes of practice time, followed by test time (Audrey gets 3 minutes, Marissa gets 5) to try and pass off their current fact family.  Each test has 50 problems and they have to miss less than 7 problems in order to pass off that family.  We are starting with addition from 0s and working up to 9s.  Then we'll tackle subtraction from 0s up to 9s.

The motivation:  I have fond memories of third grade math.  I remember working on the multiplication tables from 0-12.  Each table we passed off earned us part of a banana split.  The more tables you passed off, the bigger and more elaborate your banana split.  We have decided to recreate that this summer.  My girls are trying to earn a pizza and banana split party.  We have set the date for the party on August 20th.  Whatever the girls have earned at that point is what they will recieve at the party. 

The Breakdown:  The Banana splits are being earned with the addition facts.  0= spoon 1= bowl 2= banana 3= scoop 1 of ice cream 4= scoop 2 of ice cream 5= scoop 3 of ice cream 6= syrup (choloate, caramel, and/or strawberry) 7= whipped cream 8= sprinkles 9= cherries.
The pizza is earned through subtraction facts.  0= flour (for crust) 1= water for crust 2= yeast for crust 3= salt for crust 4= sauce 5= cheese 6= topping 1 7= topping 2 8= topping 3 9= topping 4.

Hopefully we'll have a big old party with tasty pizza and banana splits in about 4 months!!!  Both girls are already on the +2 fact family!