Weekly Wrap Up

From the Heart We had snow again this week! Amazing! So clean and pretty.

Went to Winter Jam http://www.hearitfirst.com/WinterJam/default.aspx  concert with hubby and the gals...you know you are aging when the subwoofers make your clothes move! Wow is all I can say! We stood out in the cold and drizzle for  2 hours ( waiting in line). It was amazing to find folks we knew and fellowship with them. Once inside we found ourselves 12 rows from the front and center ( felt like row 1!) It was an awesome performance. Awesome testimonies. There was lots of fun stuff like confetti, streamers shot out over the audience and giant balloons! Awesome celebration for the Lord.

On the Mission Field: I help out each week  to bring "church" to a poor neighborhood. We meet in a community building. We feed the kids dinner, do praise and worship, a bible lesson and a craft. These kids are amazing. They live very undesireable conditions. Its hard for me to see as we do live in America! Anyway this past week there was a disagreement between a few a the kids and a fight broke out. It was totally awesome to watch the Lord at work as with love we worked this out. There was forgiveness and brokeness before the Lord. These kids are quick to act with "fight" and rarely experience a peaceful solution.

Around the House: Finished that closet under the stairs...Such a large but small space! I mean you cannot stand up in it but its big in there and hard to store stuff neatly. Even has a cute little window in it. Anyway DD2 and I finished organizing all the craft and sewing stuff that is stored in there. Found a treasure trove of long "lost" items.

Our Learning This Week: Sprained thumb times three weeks equals gong to a specialist.... the doctor wanted to know why my other dd who was with me was not in school. She did a fabulous job telling him about her school. DD1 has a sprained thumb , no fractures or chips. So she will be doing three visits to a physical thearpist to strengthen her hand. Since we are doing anatomy it was cool to see her Xrays on the computer. They can actually zoom in on part of the xray and enlarge it. Very cool.

For English this week the assignments were class room related and sorta lame. ( have the teacher give you a word, tell what it means and see how many words you can make out of it kind of stuff) Thought it was way below their level and could not believe it was in that level book. So what to do? We played Scrabble, Up Words, and Boggle.  We used the dictionary a lot! Learned a lot of new words and variations of words. They spend many hours doing "english" this way and it was fun! It was good to see that DD2 has improved in her skills...she won most of the time! We have a rule that when playing board games we cannot use the computer to look up words. They must use a real dictionary!

We watched a movie from one of the books DD2 read. (Eragon) She discovered that she liked the book much better as it has more detail and explains so much more. We were asking her lots of questions during the movie because the movie did not make some things clear. She did a good job!

The gals have been crocheting like crazy. I know they are better than me! Their stuff looks awesome! So we have put Folk Art on the back burner as they are doing a lot of fiber arts right now. This is the joy of homeschool! Flexibility.

I am enjoying listening to the gals discuss history. They seem to relate to history better this year as we are in this century and things seem familiar to them. The cool thing about the curriculum I am using on line is that it already updated and has Obama and Bush added ( just last month!) The gals were not happy about the extra chapter! I think its awesome.  http://www.hippocampus.org/AP%20US%20History%20I We have really enjoyed using this curriculum. The site is always updating and seems to have very little time out for repair ect.

We started our spring break Saturday. ( this lines up with college break not public school break) We will be visiting our oldest son during his break so this worked out best. DD2 has to catch up due to her sprained thrumb and DD1 was behind in a few topics due to illness. Other than that we are free next week!!!!! Looking forward to it. I plan on getting a sewing center set up downstairs for dd2 and I to work on that dress. I am looking for a used dress form.  It would make it so much easier to alter the patterns for her.

Moms Education This Week: Driving a smaller car...not an easy task when you have been driving a van since 1983! DS 2 got a new to him car and we have use of his old car till he decides what to do with it. Its been great! My first lesson was in the snow in the dark ( what was I thinking!). It was actually so much fun to drive once I got use to looking up at other cars! ( its a 19 yo camary) We also went shopping for a new to us car. This is much much harder than it appears! It was fun, exhausting and comical. Ever seen Flywheel? Well they did a great job of showing just what a used car lot is like. ( honest and dishonest ones!) Getting behind the wheel of a Suburban was an experience. I did not drive any of them but checked to make sure the seat would come forward enough ect. ( I am short!) One we tested has seats that rise up as well as move forward and back. Very nice car.

I did not finish any books this week. But I did get a chapter done in Entering the Presence of God by Derek Prince.  This weeks Chapter was on our response to worship.  It was all about hearing the voice of God, responding in obedience, and entering into His rest. Very good reminder to take time to be still before the Lord. To rest in Him. There is such peace and healing in doing this.

Also continue to move forward in our Bible Study Cure For The Common Life by Max Lucado. Great study!

Weight Loss Wednesday: Keeping it in perspective. Smaller portions, much less sugar and almost no "white" foods. More green tea and yoghurt.  Finally got the afternoon coffee out of my system! this was soooo hard for me. Starting to feel better again. ( fibro, headaches, itching were becoming bad again) I do not see any weight loss. I know I need to get moving. It looks like spring is here and I can get outside.

Kitchen Goodies: Lemon Wings, Hamburgers, Chicken Fajitas, Chili Dogs. Chili, Steak and all the fixings ( we had company over), Leftovers, Tuna Noodle Casserole

On the Thrifty Side: We honestly do not plan to go to the thrift store weekly....sometimes it just works out that way! I ended up going to the one by our kids pediatrics this week as we had an appointment. I am so glad we did! I found 36 skeins of yarn for $3.48!!!!!! Isn't that fabulous! ?

We also attended the Concert for free as we won tickets for it last month.

Birthday and Christmas Boxes: Found lots of stuff in that closet under the stairs! Stuff that had been put aside to use for Christmas and was never found again...so its now in the Christmas box for next year!

Goals for Next Week:Clean out and organize spice and tea cupboards in the kitchen. Wash decorative plates that sit on top of cabnets in the kitchen. WALK as much as possible. Mow lawn ( weeds really) Sew dress with DD2.