School 2012-13: How it has all come to an end!

The school year has come to an end!

Last day of the school year in Tomorrow! 6/11/13!

(Currently 6/10/13 11 PM)

My Smart Little Dudes are about to finish their last day of their first year of home school! They did AMAZING! I have never before been so proud of them!

These 2 little geniuses are finishing off the year with a ton of new information that I feel they would not of had if they had been left on their own in the traditional Brick and Mortar schooling program. 

My eldest is ending his school year in the middle of a 4th grade class! He had a lot more work to get done than his younger brother this year so I am proud that he got as far as he did. His year end testing compared to his beginning of the year testing had a great rise in numbers. Most kids only get an increase of 145 points in both Math and Reading, my guy improved by 245 points in Reading and 345 points in Math! He is so smart! He also did pretty great on his state testing, he passed them both!

My guy who started his year off in 1st grade courses is finishing the school year off at 15-20% completion in all 2nd grade courses! He has gotten so good at his work that when it came to his scores for his testing from the beginning to the end of the year he had massive improvements! The one that I am most impressed with was he word recognition. (I am sure this is because he knows what letters make each sound and he knows how to put them all together!) He went from below Kindergarten level in word recognition to a 12th grade word recognition this school year! I know his teacher said to take the score on that with a grain of salt but I think he is an awesome kid for getting that score! LOL His other scores were all in the 2nd to 4th grade range for all the other categories. Which is great since he is in all 2nd grade courses.

I look forward to continuing to work with my children over the Summer and into the next school year. They are also excited to be starting their Summer Camp Classes next week as well! Even my little 5 year old is going to be joining the Summer Camp fun this year and learning to use the online classroom tools that his brothers learned over the summer last year.

That is all for now. I hope to post lots of new photos and information soon! Take care!

~TTFN!

Preparing for the big baby shower!

With getting ready for my sister's baby shower on Saturday, I have been sort of scrambling around trying to get projects done so that she gets more than one gift from me (which is all I have 100% completed). I was finally able to finish one project the other day, which was a no sew project so it was finished rather quickly. I then started another that I have been working on and all that is left now is the sewing part. Yippee!!!

I wish I could share photos of the things I am working on, but how much fun would that be if my sister were to read this and see the photos... Not much! Not much fun at all. So... Until after Saturday, y'all gotta wait! Sorry! But I promise, I will share with every one what I made for my sister and her baby. My Mother is helping a lot with finishing touches on all these things too. There is one thing I am slightly panicked about, but I am sure that if I do not have it done for the shower, she will get it before the baby gets here.

My oldest son is with my sister now and when I spoke to him on the phone the other day, he was super excited! He always gets his birthday gifts from his Aunt and Uncle early. He spends the time around the 4th of July with them every year (this could be his last year with them though) since they moved up to Washington(5ish years ago). Last year they gave him his own laptop computer (he has been on computers since he was about 4 months old!!!) and he has had a blast with it. One of his favorite things to do while at their house is to play World of Warcraft on their computers. Well, that is what they got him, on his computer, for his birthday this year! Apparently he had been spending all his time on his Aunts computer playing from there but now that they got it up and running on his computer, he is even happier! LOL His words to me were: "Mom! I am playing WOW on MY computer!!! It is sooo cool!" It was great to hear him so excited! Of course, I seem to remember that he had the same sort of response last year when he got the computer! Still, it is cute how excited he gets!

My 6 year old is working on his behavior while his brother is gone, and this is working out well too! My Mother and I discussed giving him 1 Quarter for each full hour he is good during the day. This means that he does everything he is told and does not back talk and is not rude and we do not have to remind him of his manners more than once, if that! He loved the idea! And as a bonus, for each 8 hours straight that he doesn't lose any Quarters, he gets one extra Quarter! The most he has made in one day I believe is 13 Quarters and this has only been going on for 3 days! LOL and we told him we would keep up this earning money thing for the entire time his older brother was out of town and that he is not allowed to spend any of his money until we go to Portland for the Baby Shower! The reason we went with 8 hours is because that was about how long he was away from home and working on his behavior while in school. From the time he left home, until he came back home each day. He has been doing great. Most of the time all we have to do is remind him that he will lose the Quarter if he acts up and that snaps him back into good behavior real fast. He wants to earn the money and he truly wants to be a good kiddo! He has had his moments, he lost 2 quarters ion a row tonight. So, see, no kid is perfect! Ha ha! He also did not enjoy his second week of camp as much as his first. He said his Dinosaur class was boring. And I would have to agree. The dinosaur teacher did not seem as enthused as the twisty tales teacher did. And this kiddo has decided that he wants to be a Paleontologist when he grows up and I think that is AWESOME!!! But oh well, win some and lose some! Not all teachers can be #1, that would defeat the purpose! LOL!

The 4 year old has been sort of being his normal crazy and wacky self! But that is him! He has decided that he does not like our bigger pool again this year and that he does not want to get into it. I wish I could get him to realize how much fun it is and keep him calm. I almost had him there the other day but he just kept yelling in my face to let him out of the pool, so I did. Other than the pool thing yesterday he has been good and taking all his medicines and he even stays on top of it! I guess the kid likes to feel well rather than sick all the time. Go figure! Since his most recent doctor visit, he has had less of an issue with his allergies. Of course, he has a mommy who gives him allergy medicines and his inhaler like they are his life support! Which is how it should be, because they are. And this kid is the easiest as far as taking his medicine. He sits there and breaths in on his puffer machine for his inhaler and then picks up the allergy medicine and takes it and then puts his head back and is ready for his eye drops, they go into his eyes and his blinks away the extra stuff and he is good to go!

The baby, he is still low on the growth charts, but someone has to be there! Last doctor appointment he had they said he was still below the 10th percentile for weight but he was shooting up there on his head and length! I know that my son is healthy and happy. He does not have to be a chunky baby... I know a fat baby is a happy baby, but this kid just does not put on the weight like other kids do! I do not know why, he just doesn't. A lot of people have been asking me in stores lately how old he is and when I say 7 months they say things like "There is no way!" or "Is he ill?".... No, he is not ill and Yes, he is 7 months old! Another lady asked his age and after her reaction of "no way!" I told her he was 9 pounds at birth and her reply was the best I have heard ever..... "What is he now, 10?!?!?!" LMBO!!!! Too funny! I seriously laughed out loud at her for saying that. He is creeping up on the 20 pound mark, but not too fast! He is just a happy little baby!

As far as the diet goes, I am stuck on my same weight for a while now. My Mother and I have discussed doing sit ups to lose more belly fat and I think that is a great idea! I also need to start getting up, eating breakfast and then going for a walk with the kiddos (at least the ones who want to join, depending on the day I may go before they get up or Daddy might be home to take care of those boys not wanting to go for a walk with Mama)! I also need to make sure I am tracking my food intake somehow and also need to ensure I am eating 3 full meals and at least 2 small snacks a day! Does any one have any ideas on how I could get going with this diet better? It is basically a low carbohydrate, Atkins-like diet.

Oh, I also found that I am super into the second book in my 2 book series for my BzzCampaign! Being a BzzAgent is Awesome! I just wish I could get on more campaigns! I am only on my second one! I will be posting a review here on both my Kindle Books, The Hangman's Daughter and The Dark Monk, A Hangman's Daughter Tale. I was not too into The Hangman's Daughter from page one. The Dark Monk is another story though, only a few pages into it, but I LOVE it! I am struggling with the fact that I still need to read my most recent Sookie Stackhouse Novel, But I will get to it after the Baby Shower and After my BzzCampaign!

So much for typing up a quick and short blog tonight LOL.... For now, I hope everyone is enjoying their summer and families! I will try my hardest to post some of the pictures of gifts after the shower so that everyone can see my craftier side! He he he! But, like I said, for now... The suspense wont hurt you too bad! Or all least I hope it wont! Until another day....

Baby in his newest on sale Ross Dress for Less outfit!
$2.99 and it has a frog on his rear!
Plus came with the super cute hat!

~TTFN!

Summer? Or Fall already?

So, Summer is supposed to be here. But, this is Central Oregon and anything goes! We have had some super warm days and some not so warm days that were filled with rain, like today! The "worst" or "best" storm we have had, depending on how you look at it, was a couple days ago. It was raining so hard that my 7 year old could not hear his teacher on the computer, so he sort of missed out on his class a little. We tried to tell her that we could not hear her and I guess she thought we meant our speakers were turned off. We started getting instructions on how to adjust the volume on the Elimunate system! LOL

Summer Camp Online has been great for my boys! The oldest had fun learning all about Camping and campfire songs and that sort of thing. However, they only offer the exact same class or club this week as well, same topic and everything, so he is not going again this week to the same thing. The 6 year old though is attending the Dinosaur Camp this week since he did the "Twisty Tales" class last week. The Twisty Tales class was interesting. He got to hear "The true story of Little Red Riding Hood as told by A. Wolf", "Cindy Ellen, a Cinderella Story" and a couple others that he had a ball with. One they had even read in his Kindergarten class last year at school, so he knew all about it! They gave out printable coloring pages and mazes and word searches and stuff like that every day. It was great for them all. After his class from 9-10 am, all 3 of the older boys would sit at the table and color for an hour or two. The Dinosaur class is turning out to be pretty neat as well. Other than the fact that they gave me some links to some websites that don't actually contain what they said they should. At least, I haven't been able to find the "items" on the sites yet. They did give us the recipe for "fossil molds" and we forgot to make them today, so tomorrow before his class we will have to get them done. Here it is for those who want it.

Fossil Mold Ingredients:

4 cups of Flour
1 cup of Salt
1 and a half cups of water
Mixing Bowl

Instructions:
Mix all ingredients in your bowl until they come to the texture of a usable dough! Salt dough! Have fun making different types of "animal" molds.

This seems like something fun that wont take too much effort and I will post pictures once I have them to post! Another neat part of these "classes" is that if your child misses a class you can get the recording from the day before or the entire week if you don't make it in until Friday. The instructions to make a permineralized sponge so that it seems you have your own fossil! Pretty neat right? According to his teacher, it took her about 5 days to get it solid! I think we will get that going in the morning too! And of course, I will post pictures once I have them to post.

This is a pretty busy week including all the Summer Camp for the 6 year old. My Sister arrived in town today and the boys went crazy! I am so happy to see her pregnant! It has been a long time coming and she deserves this baby! I can not wait to meet the little guy/gal. My oldest is so lucky! He is going home with her Wednesday (this is Also my mother's Birthday) and staying with her until the baby shower on July 7th! But the part that makes him lucky is that he gets to go to her second ultrasound with her where hopefully they will find out if the baby is a boy or a girl! I want to know real bad! There are so many projects on hold for that baby until I know what he/she is!

That is all for tonight. I hope to be back tomorrow with photos of finished projects!

~TTFN!

Summer Time in Central Oregon! Woo hoo!

All 4 boys Chillin' on the couch, watchin' TV!

Summer is here and my boys are finally out of the Brick and Mortar School system! They "retired"(as I like to call it) from school at the same time as my Oldest Son's Teacher! She was an awesome Teacher, She was My First and Second Grade Teacher and now she also taught my oldest child Second Grade! I was so Happy that he was going to have her as a Teacher this last year. She did a great job Teaching me and I knew that he would have just as much fun with her, and he did! That boy is so much like me when it comes to some schooling things it is actually funny! We can both do Math like it was a Sixth Sense. It is sad to see her go, but at least she taught my son before leaving. And I got to see her again. I was/am very close to my Elementary School Teachers. It was very Hard for me to call her by her first name. When she would call to discuss my Son and would say her First Name instead of Mrs. ....... I had to take a minute and go, "Oh, Yeah, You!" to myself! LOL. On the other hand, it was perfect timing for her to retire at the same time that I decided to take my kids out of the "traditional" school system. However, it had me wondering at the same time, How many Teachers can my oldest son get to retire?! LOL. Granted, as far as I know, His Kindergarten Teacher is still working. But, his First Grade Teacher AND Second Grade Teacher BOTH retired after Teaching him! What does that say about my child? LOL I say, it says he had "old" Teachers! He he. Either way, she was a great Teacher for well over 20 years and now she can enjoy her retirement!

For our Summer fun we have a lot of different things planned. For one, My Sister's Baby Shower is July 7th, we will be going to Vancouver to stay in the same Hotel as my Sister and her other Half so that he can watch the 2 middle boys in the Hotel while we go to our Cousins house for the Shower. At the end of the last week of June my oldest Son will be going to stay with my sister in Spokane until the Shower when he will come home with us. He gets to attend my sister's second gender scan for her baby. The one last week was inconclusive. They caught a quick look at what the tech thought to be "boy parts"! I feel bad for that. I know, a baby is a baby and we are all thrilled for my Sister and her other half because they have wanted a baby for awhile now. But this would be boy 5 for our side and boy2 for her other half's side. Either way, Their little bundle will some day be in the outfit you see on my little guy! It is, what we are calling, the Lumber Jack (or Jill) outfit! The "onsie" is a long sleeved button up plaid shirt, much like what you can find for grown men! The pants are corduroy, and a funky olive green, but cute! And it is a full out onsie style shirt, size 6 months! We figured, put some sort of flowery something or pink in "her" hair and it could look girly! This coming from the Mother of 4 boys who insisted on wearing over-all's for the longest time after about 2 years old! LOL. I think that if I had had any girls, they'd end up tom boys! LOL But, we shall never know now! Any who, back to the "Summer Fun"...

I took on the Pool Cleaning this year and so far, I kinda want to scream! We seriously need to get a cover over that thing so that we (the me part of that) don't have to keep on scooping bugs (gnats) out of the pool, 15 times a day! But, hopefully with using the pool vacuum and a few other added "cleaning tools" I can keep the pool clean and warm and comfy all Summer long! And the kiddos all love to swim, so that will help with some of their being "occupied" this Summer. A few other things "in the works" are, a driving trip to visit some of the "local" dams. Also, we intend to go to Lake Billy Chinook or more importantly, The Cove Palisades (for more info on The Cove, follow the link)!!! My Mom used to take my Sister and I there all the time when I was a baby! I have only been back there a handful of times since I "grew up". That trip will be one of those, get the kids to bed super duper early and then be ready to leave the house at 6 AM to get there around 7:30-8 in the morning and spend all day, packing Breakfast and Lunch as well as snacks and then coming home for Dinner that night! I am extra excited about that one, if you can't tell by the details! LOL Another option in to "travel" the Cascade Lakes Highway again, do some Hiking, picnic by the lake, swim. All that fun stuff! Some of the Lake trips I hope my Hubby will be able to attend. It sorta feels like he will be missing out this Summer as far as "Adventures" with our boys go. We also talked about going to Smith Rock Park, that is a steep climb if I remember correctly. My Mother said she did it with me strapped to her back, so I guess I will be able to do it too, if we go! That is one of my least favorite trip ideas, I never really had a ton of fun there as a kid. One of my favorite places to go hiking is Benham Falls (the link actually takes you to a site for the Falls themselves, but you get the jest. LOL, you can hike to the falls too from Lava Lands Visitors Center at the base of Lava Butte) I took my 2 oldest there with my Hubby and a Friend and we hiked for awhile! I was pregnant with #3 and the other 2 were 2 and 3.5(almost 4) and they had a blast! Of course, we were hot and had some water with us and ended up getting a few scraps and cuts from tumbling over roots and such, but it was a fun experience with my boys! But those are just a few of our "Nature Adventures" I think we can look forward to this Summer. Otherwise, we will be home by the pool(s) (The big 48" tall pool and the tiny waiting pool for the kiddos that we got last year).

The only thing I said was: 

"Let me get a Picture of you 3." 

And do you see the looks I got? LOL

My kiddos continue to keep "hamming it up" any time they are out and about and know that I am wanting to snap some cute photos. For the most part, except for a few days here and there, we picked up the 2 oldest boys from school for the last few weeks of their "stay". One of those days we walked up the hill from the dentist's office to the school with the baby and he was enjoying us being early! His cute little "Tot Goggles" are what I think makes this photo extra neat! He looks so laid back and relaxed in his stylish shades, but then he is sticking his tongue out which makes it look like "Hey, get that thing out my face Mom!" or... "Yum, Phone, eat!" LOL I swear, each time he sees my phone, the tongue comes out and the hands fly up! I partially blame this on the guy at the Doctor's office who was talking to the other woman at the counter while I made another appointment and he handed over his phone while saying, "It's ok, I have kids and Grandkids, He can't hurt it any more than they do!" OH MY GOODNESS!!! This was no cheap phone either! This guy willingly handed over his expensive smart phone and basically said "Go for it! Break it! I don't care!" to a 6 month old! YIKES! Mr. Not Very Bright Award has been taken for the year! LOL. In any case, since I had to literally RIP the phone out of his hands to get him to give it back to Mr. Not Very Bright so that I could help Mr. Gimpy out to the car (LOL this was when my oldest was on crutches, he had gone to my appointment with me too), the baby almost attacks phones now. It is almost frightening how fast he lunges for a cell phone!

The boys are all excited to be on Summer Vacation now. I even have my ^ year old set up to do "Summer Camp" through his online school for next year. He was super excited when I told him he had the opportunity to do it. Starting Monday at 9 AM he will be on the computer, Monday through Friday, for 1 hour in his Summer Camp Class. He is starting with the Twisty Tales Camp! I think he will really enjoy it. The "camps" are split by grade level and allow the kids to sort of pick the "class" they want. He picked Twisty Tales, Dinosaurs and Science Explorers for his Summer Camp Classes! They are different each week and in the middle of it all he will be taking 2 weeks off from it, thankfully we have the baby shower in the middle of the 2 weeks off! LOL. The first Camp starts at 9 AM and another is at 10 AM, Depending on the Camp and the week, the time changes as well. My oldest has decided NOT to take part in the Summer Camp thing this year. Which is fine, he would have to skip one of the weeks anyways so that he could go to his Aunt's house and not have to worry too much about anything but helping out his Aunt and spending time with her and his Uncle for what may be the last time, for a while at least. I am not so sure she is going to want my rug-rats running around and having to take care of them as well as her own new little one. He may change his mind once his little brother does it a few times, we shall see. He has different camp choices and at different times for his grade though. He could do Water Safety, Dinosaurs or Boys Book Club. But he said he doesn't want to read this Summer, odd! He loves to read! Silly Kid! Only time will tell. He might see his brother having fun next week and decide that he too wants in on the experience. When they all start to get older I may look more into other actual Summer Camp options. But for now, online works awesome!

Showing off his top 2 teeth in a giggle!
(came in third and fourth)

Showing off his bottom 2 teeth!
(came in first and second)

If I haven't mentioned it before, the baby has been cutting teeth and drooling like a super leaky faucet! I do not remember my other boys "leaking" this much! His pillow he sleeps on his soaking by the time we get to his "middle of the night feeding" and during any day time naps. I almost feel like I need to wring the thing out! He is constantly drooling! It is insane! I am sure they did the drooling thing, maybe I just wasn't as observant! LOL. This IS the first time I have been home with my baby at this age and wasn't so tired from working that I just wanted to sleep. I have always had to go back to work and do the whole working full time thing to support my kiddos before now. Hubby has that end covered now. (The working thing)

At the park on 6/14/12

Maybe it is just me but I think he is growing up so fast! Granted, he is "small for his age" according to the doctor's office, but he is advancing and is always so alert, when awake of course. He has even started to sit up, instead of lean forward. See him showing off in the photo taken at the park? He was enjoying the grass. He soon after this decided he wanted to plunge forward and EAT the grass, which caused him to roll over to his belly. Either way, he was actually enjoying the grass, this was a first. He normally cringes away from the grass.

Now that I have basically filled your minds with my life and my boys' lives, I shall say Good Night! Or Good Morning, depending on when you are reading! I feel tomorrow will be another pool cleaning and outside day. After my 7 year old decided to vomit in the car today (thankfully most of it was caught by blankets and such on the floor of the back seat) I finally made it to the store to buy Sunscreen for the boys so that they will be able to play outside and not get sun burnt as the 7 year old did the other day when we played outside for the majority of the day so that Dad could sleep. Hopefully I can get more color on my legs! LOL We shall see! They may be underwater in the pool! I will update... Hopefully sooner, rather than later!

~TTFN!