I found this really fun site that has educational songs for government. Smart Songs also have videos on YouTube. The kids love it, and we bought 2 of the songs to put on their mp3 players; The Presidents, and Political Parties . Ian is half way through memorizing the list of presidents, and I was looking for a way to motivate and help him out.

Oh dear. I do believe I may have entered some very dangerous territory.

You see, my darling husband purchased for my enjoyment an e-reader: The Nook (Barns&Noble) is one of the latest to come out.

Do you realize what this means? It means that my book purchases will no longer be limited by my ability to find space for them on my mercilessly crammed bookcases. This will either be a wonderful blessing, or it may bankrupt us as the whole wonderful world of ebooks wraps me in a warm compulsive embrace.

Since the Nook has yet to be released ( I anxiously await Nov 30) I cannot truthfully say what this will do to my finances, or my obsessive book purchasing habits. Let's not even talk about how I can download ebooks from the library...

AHHH, that feels better.

Do you ever feel like throwing away everything in your house and starting over? Well, that is the point at which I had gotten yesterday. I was overwhelmed with all the STUFF cluttering my closets and living space. So yesterday, I spent the day cleaning out my house, and I have to say, I did a pretty darn thorough job. I took out 6 bags of garbage (4 of which came from Ian's room!) and I have a load of stuff for the thrift store that will fill my entire car. Why do we collect so much stuff??

15 Signs You Might Be A Bookaholic.

I found this on another website, and thought it was funny. I listed my favorites, and the ones that I may or may not be guilty of...

• You're packing for a romantic weekend away with significant other and you give more thought to which books to take than to which nightgown is your sexiest.

• Before you buy a purse you make sure a paperback will fit inside.

• Your significant other mutters about life in prison not being much of a deterrent to you since you'd be quite content sitting in your cell reading all day.

• You call in sick so you can finish reading a book.

• When you move you have more boxes labeled "books" than anything else.

• You have to constantly invest in new bookshelves.

• Your kids holler from the other room with something they consider a dire emergency, and you say, "Wait until I finish this page!"

• You have no idea what's on television anymore (except for Psych) because the boob tube has become just another piece of furniture.

• You tend to buy frozen, microwavable foods that practically cook themselves so that you don't lose any precious reading time for such an unimportant thing as feeding your family.

• You valiantly try to teach your kids "independence," which means you want them to do more household chores (so you can have more reading time).

• It's 2am and you think "just another chapter" and do the same thing at 3am when you know you have to get up in 4 hours and work.

• You try reading and walking at the same time. (Works on a treadmill!!)

• You start fabricating excuses as to why you can't go out with your friends when you're in the middle of a great book.

• You start thinking of the characters as real people.

• Your eyesight goes from 20-20 to legally blind because of reading in poor light.

Charlie's Latest Adventure

My poor beagle Charlie has done it again. He has gotten himself into a world of trouble by allowing his insatiable appetite lead him astray.

The other night, we arrived home from the YMCA, and were preparing a late dinner. The house was chaotic with dinner preparations, excited dogs, and overstimulated children. Mayah was assigned the task of feeding the dogs their dinner while I got our own evening meal ready, and nobody was paying attention to Charlie, who had designs on Sara Beth's dinner, as well as his own. Sara Beth was, at this point, far more interested in greeting her pack than consuming the tasty morsels of dried dog food that was placed in front of her, but Charlie had no such compulsions.

After finishing his own bowl of nutrition, he assumed that Sara Beth had let her guard down, and was in the process of helping himself to seconds- courtesy of Sara's distraction. When Sara realized that her bowl was being robbed at a frantic rate by her rival Charlie, she took offence and set about the task of teaching that rascal a lesson. I am not quite sure if Charlie was protesting the method of Sara's remonstrances- which consisted of a strong set of teeth clamped securely around his neck- or being deprived of his second meal of the evening, but he set to howling and yelping as only a woeful beagle can. The outcome of their little argument was a wound to Charlie's ear that sliced it neatly up the middle. The wound needed to be promptly addresses, as Charlie felt that it would be helpful to shake his head and splatter blood all over the house.

The whole family set off on a field trip to the emergency vet 20 minutes away at 10:00 at night.

Arriving, Charlie insisted on bleeding all over the vet's office while searching out any scraps of food that some other careless pet may or may not have left behind. He spent an uncomfortable night there, getting shaved, stitched and bandaged while Sara Beth was gifted with what she saw as a whole night of having her pack to herself.

The next morning, after paying an atrocious vet bill and receiving instructions for medicating and caring for a wounded rascal, I brought Charlie home . I refused to feel a disproportionate amount of sympathy for this dog, who, through greed and selfishness, single handedly drained the funds we had set aside to go camping in September.

He now wears the "Cone of Shame" as you can see from the picture, and we have made the decision to invest in pet insurance. I am hoping his stitches will be ready to come off in a few days because keeping his head wrapped in bandages has become a full time job, when you consider that Charlie's entire existence right now seems to revolve around determinedly removing said bandages.

Oh, and to avoid future situations of this nature, the dogs are now leased and fed in separate rooms at mealtime.

First time for everything.

We joined the YMCA this weekend, and today JP and I worked out together. It was the first time in our marriage that we lifted weights together, and it was so much fun- for me. I have been working out in gyms for the last 6 or 7 years. Poor JP has not . In addition to that, I spent most of my teenage years working with trainers on the various military bases we lived on, or I had my big brother as a workout buddy (who did a stint as a pseudo-body builder). So I had fun, but I wonder if I will be able to convince JP to come back to the weight room with me on Wednesday. :)

Our course of study for the year.

So, here is our curriculum plan for the year (it looks like a lot, but we don't do every subject every day, and we have a 4 day school week):

Ian- 5th grade Course of Study:

• Classic Writing- Aesop book A

• History- Ancients (5000BC- AD400) Core text- Story of the World V.1, DK History of the World, Usborne Encyclopedia of World History.

• Math- Teaching Textbooks level 4

• Latin- Latina Christiana 1

• Spelling- Spelling Workout book E

• Art- Charlotte Mason method of studying art, Drawing with Children

• Memory Work- first 10 emperors of Rome, 10 Commandments, Major battles of the ancient world, Presidents from Andrew Jackson- Obama, grammar rules, the second part of the introduction of the Declaration of Independence

• Music- guitar lessons

• Logic- Mind Benders, Logic Anyone?

• Worldview/Current Events- God's World News

• Health- Health, Hygiene, and Nutrition

• PE- Dance class at co-op, Fencing, Swim and Gym at YMCA, Basketball

Mayah's 2nd grade Course of Study:

• Grammar- First Language Lessons level 2

• Writing- Writing with Ease level 1

• Spelling- Spelling Workout B

• Math- Math U See

• Phonics- Phonics Pathways, Explode the Code

• History- Story of the World V. 1

• Science- Earth Science (I made up my own curriculum)

• Music- Piano lessons, General Music class at co-op

• Art- Charlotte Mason method of studying art, Drawing with Children

• Latin- Latina Christiana 1

• Memory Work- same as Ian except different poems
  

• Geography- co-op class

• Health- Health, Nutrition, and Hygene

• PE- gymnastics, Swim and Gym at YMCA, cheerleading