N is for Notebooks (ABC Blogging)

This post may be a little rambling in nature, but when I got to thinking about notebooks one thought led to another and so I'm just going to follow them.

I have been reading through The Living Page: Keeping Notebooks with Charlotte Mason by Laurie Bestvater and in the second chapter she goes through the various kinds of notebooks that are referenced in Charlotte Mason's writings. Mason is probably best know for her advocating of nature notebooks, copybooks, and a Book of Centuries, but this chapter listed a few others that really inspired me to try my hand at. Here are a few:

"My Word Book" - In this book a parent records words that a child has learned to read and can recognize. Delani will be learning to read this coming school year and I really think she will like doing this.

"A Commonplace Book" - This term I was familiar with and it was used for student to write down any passage that came from any reading from any subject. I want to implement this with just the books I read. I do keep an online list of books I read, but I feel inspired to actually jot down the book information, passages I like, and a short summary of the book for reference. I would love to blog about every book I read, but that is never going to happen!

"A Household Book" - This notebook was for keeping "instruction type" written narrations for household duties, though it could be applied to anything a student was interested in. One thing I need to focus on this year is getting my kids more involved in cooking in the kitchen and washing clothes. I can see this type of notebook being very beneficial and could easily be done on paper or digitally.

And speaking of notebooks you may be asking, "Do you do notebooking in your homeschool?". And my answer is, "If it can be done in a composition notebook, yes, and if it requires special notebooking pages, no." I love the thought of using notebooking pages, but I have come to realize that it just won't happen. I love composition books and my kids love composition books. We use them for everything--notebooking, journals, recording written narrations, spelling, English, and more.

Last but not lease--I just had to share this. I love to decorate composition books and years ago I found some mini-composition books and made a few up for my mom. She absolutely loves them and uses them all the time. When she starts to run out she calls me asking me to make more. They also make great little gifts.  So there you have it--my rambling post on notebooks! Thanks for reading.

Football and a Crafty Idea!

Fall means football and listening to NFL and college football is big in this house!! When I first met my husband he had to teach me how to understand the game since I was totally clueless. I did my part keeping up with football for awhile until my boys were big enough to take over.

When Chantry was 3 he decided that the St. Louis Rams were his team. I'm not sure where this came from since we live in Oregon, but that was who he picked. So now our team loyalties are quite divided. My husband and Caleb go for the Seahawks, Chantry for the Rams, and I don't really care until the Green Bay Packers (my Wisconsin roots) play the Seahawks and then I go for the Packers. I know, I'm ornery!

So you are probably wondering where this post is heading. Well, with all this football loving it is easy to make my guy's day with a new Seahawks (or Rams) shirt and though Chantry will wear a Seahawks shirt the Rams is "his" team. Since we live in Oregon it isn't very easy to find football gear for my little Rams lover.

Thankfully, my parents are in the mid-west and occasionally make a trip to St. Louis. Several years ago Chantry had received a Rams shirt for a gift. He has worn this shirt for quite a while now and I finally had to tell him that it had to go since what had originally been a long sleeved shirt was now a 3/4 length shirt and it was just too small. Actually in the picture below it was already too short in the arms and he wore it for another year and half longer. So you can imagine how little it was on him now.

While folding up for the last time I really didn't have it in my heart to get rid of it, but how much stuff can you store? I decided to see if I could turn it into a pillow. Off I went to JoAnn's and found a little pillow form and came home and cut out the shirt, serged up the sides, stuffed it in, finished sewing the closure and had a pillow. The fun part was I didn't tell him what I was going to do so it was a total surprise for him and definitely made his day.

The Homemaker's Mentor Lesson Library & Giveaway!!

 

Homemaking--that is a word that does not bring joyful excitement in my life. Yes, I do it, but it is a chore. There are a few aspects of homemaking I do enjoy such as sewing, but that always seems to get put on the back burner due to time and other homemaking duties that can't be put off. Today I want to talk about The Homemaker's Mentor Lesson Library that I received for review and is a fabulous resource for a frustrated homemaker.

The Homemaker's Mentor is a Limited Edition CD featuring a compilation of  110 lessons, tutorials, "hands on" lessons, recipes and so much more that had been featured at The Homemaker's Mentor "member's only" website that was put together by Martha Greene and Rebekah Wilson. Below you can see a small sampling of what it is included.

 

When I received my CD I was almost overwhelmed with the information that was included. Finally, I found the Table of Contents which I printed off and then marked the items that interested me the most.  

 

I first delved into "A Vision of Order" which talks about setting up a schedule and how to turn that vision into reality. I found this very encouraging and helpful. Even though I know I should do this the lesson breaks each step down into bite size and makes it very doable as you work on creating your schedule.

 

I then went through the different recipes looking for an Oatmeal Cookie recipe. I finally settled on the Oatmeal Cookie Tutorial. This recipe has you make up your cookie mix and which you can then store. When you want to make cookies you measure out the cookie mix, add your eggs, vanilla, and any other extras, stir, and bake. I added butterscotch and chocolate chips to our cookies. They were a big hit! Next time I'm going to try adding coconut, butterscotch and chocolate chips.
 

 

 

While reading through the various lessons and tutorials, I also downloaded one of the bonus books, Treasury of Homekeeping Skills by Martha Green, on to my iPad to read through. I really enjoyed this book and found a lot of encouragement. I found I could relate with so many of the author's thoughts. Many of her suggestions I had already implemented in my own housekeeping, which I found confirming.

 

I also was inspired to do some hand embroidery from the Days of the Week patterns for kitchen towels. I already had a new towel sitting in my stash, found some red pearl cotton in my embroidery box, copied the pattern on to the towel and went to town. I had to quick read through the stitches again since it has been years since I did any hand embroidery. Even though the pearl cotton was probably a little too thick for the pattern, I think it turned very well!

 

I can't recommend this wonderful resource enough. It will take me months to work my way through it all. It also will be a great resource to go through with my kids to help them learn some necessary life skills (and my skills). It would also make an excellent Home Economics course. In the meantime, I'm going to be busy doing a detailed cleaning of my bedroom and sparkling up my kitchen.
 

 

Head on over to The Homemaker's Mentor and get your Limited Edition CD for $37 plus free shipping (through October 18). The CD also includes as bonuses The Treasury of Homekeeping Skills and The Complete "Sugar and Spice" Unit Study Series.  Also, enter to win a Grand Prize Bundle of $400. There will also be prizes for 10 runner-ups. Click here to enter. Deadline is October 18.  

 

Lastly, I am away two of The Homemaker's Mentor CDs. Last day to enter is Monday, October 21.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 



Creating Gifts

 

 

I love to put together unique gift ideas, but many time I don't have an opportunity or lack the time. A few weeks ago I had pinned an idea to my Pinterest board called "A Little Box of Sunshine". Last week I had an opportunity to make a gift bag so I decided to go with the sunshine (yellow) theme. I ended up using a little reusable bag instead of a box, and I made my own tag. Then I filled it up with:

• Peanut M&M's
• Starburst
• Chiclet gum
• A pad of paper with yellow on it
• Some Bic Shimmer Pens
• Suave Everlasting Sunshine Body Soap
• Lindor Carmel Truffles

Pinterest is a great resource for finding and filing ideas to help get the creative juices going.

 

See more:

Candy Bar Cake

College Survival Kit

Diaper Cake

Altered Bag

 

 

 

The Homeschool Mother's Journal: Picture Edition

 

Here are a few highlights from our week. We also had a full week of schooling which I did not capture.

1. I made a candy bar cake for my nephew's 16th birthday.
2. Caleb doing and activity from Family Time Fitness that we use for P.E.
3. Cutting out fabric for the Kids Clothes Week Challenge I signed up to do.
4. Sewing.
5. Destini starting a cross-stitch project. Our friend Sarah is instructing her in the way of cross-stitching.
6. We ended the week with a fun night. The boys went to a football game with their Dad and grandparents. Their papa was being honored for winning the championship game 50 years ago. The girls and I stayed home, sewed, entertained friends, started watching Wives and Daughters, and enjoyed pumpkin cookies and German Chocolate Upside Down Cake.

Check out my final projects for the Kids Clothes Week Challenge here.

The Homeschool Mother's Journal: My Crafty Week

Baked Pumpkin Spiced Donut Holes

In my life this week…
This week was an okay week. I had a minister's wives meeting to attend Tuesday evening and since I work on Tuesdays I had to make sure I left for work a little early so I could off a little early.

Everything else was pretty normal. I feel frustrated at times, because I just can't seem to get to some things I need to. I suppose taking time to reorganized my Pinterest boards could be a hindrance to doing what I should be doing.

I also have had a very hard time getting up in the morning. Gray mornings don't do anything for me. I need sunlight, but unfortunately I happen to live in Oregon which makes a 50/50 chance of seeing it!

In our homeschool this week…
Chantry did about a lesson and the beginning of another one in The Logic of English. He learned another cursive letter. We need to do more letters during the week, but so far that hasn't happened. We did five lessons in Primary Language Lessons and he completed almost all of Lesson 7 in MUS Delta. He also finished reading Tree of Freedom by Rebecca Caudill.

Destini completed Lesson 4 in Spelling with Sound and Structure 5, 5 lessons in Language Lesson for the Secondary Child 1. She had to work on writing limerick poetry. I helped her with the first one:

There was a girl with a twitch in her eye,

She turned out to be a really good spy.

She went to the store to buy a book.

While she was there she caught a crook,

And then a book she did buy.

Then she wrote:

The pest of a flea,

Jealous was he.

Of the firefly's glow,

For he had none to show

Because in the darkness he'd always be.

 

 

Chantry and Destini are still enjoying George Washington's World for world history. They are also reading Poor Richard, Robinson Crusoe, This Country of Ours, & Minn of the Mississippi. They finished up Chapter two in Exploring Creation with Zoology 3. Chantry works in the junior journal notebook, while Destini does written narration in a composition book.

Caleb worked on Lesson 5 in MUS Geometry. He did readings and narrations from Up From Slavery (Ch. 6-7), Uncle Tom's Cabin (Ch. 10-12), and English Literature for Boys and Girls (Ch. 61). He worked on Spanish with Visual Spanish. He also worked on Week 4 in Writing with Skill.

We wrapped up the week with our Music Study of Claude Debussy and Artist Study of Norman Rockwell.

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…
Caleb went to his art class. We went to the library and then Shade picked them up and they went to see Granny and Papa for a little bit.

My favorite thing this week was…
Delani's quotes:
"I'm not enjoying my lunch!"
"Mom, am I a genius?"

What’s working/not working for us…
We have started Family Time Fitness and I really like it, but sometimes I just forget! I also keep forgetting about Bible and Poetry memorization.

Things I’m working on…
I made a "College Survival Kit"  for our friend Hannah, who we consider part of the family, since she was starting college this week.

(Idea from here.)

I also made was able to make my mom some decorated mini composition books and photo's frames for her fridge, and a card for her birthday. I was so with it I even got it in the mail on time and it arrived before her birthday. (See her gifts below)

I’m reading…


I’m cooking…
Hamburgers & Roasted Potatoes,
Baked Pumpkin Spice Donut Holes
Chocolate & Butterscotch Chip Oatmeal Cookies

I’m grateful for…
The beautiful weather we are still enjoying. I am trying to soak it all up, before the cold hits.

I’m praying for…
Our country.

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

Mini Composition Notebooks


Magnetic photo frames


Birthday card

The card and composition books were all made with Echo Park Paper For the Record 2 Tailored Collection Scrapbooking Kit.

I am linking up at iHomeschool Network & Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers.

Diaper Cake

A couple of months ago I came across a new blog, homemade by jill. While browsing her blog I came across her diaper cake tutorial and was totally impressed and really needed a reason to make one. A couple of weeks ago I was finally able to put this wonderful tutorial to use and made one for my SIL. Here is the result:


Front


Side view


Side view

I used the New Arrival Cricut cartridge for the little cutouts attached to the front and sides. I also decorated the cake with the stroller from the New Arrival cartridge.



These were a lot of fun to make and I was thrilled with the results.

Altered clipboard

In need of a gift, I sat down and put this together. It was a quick project and made the recipient's day.

Following the Thrifty Fifty

If only I was this inspired, but for now I'm following along here.