Attributes of God...by Noah

Today I was sitting here in the living room and Noah was in the bathroom. Kids in the bathroom alone can be quite amusing....Katie loves to read, and of course if you are a faithful blog reader, you remember the story of the bananas in the bathroom...
Anyway, Noah was in there, just talking to himself, and VERY loudly...suddenly I hear him say (in a very awe-struck tone) "God makes us POOP, huh?"
That caught my attention..so I started really listening. I really wish I had a recorder handy or something because I can't remember just exactly everything he said, but the monologue continues...all talking about God.
"And God can put his hand in his mouth without even CHOKING!, and He never gets sick!, and he is bigger than ANYTHING!".....there was more, but I can't remember it all.
It just was so cute...he was just sitting *there* in awe of the great things God is, and can do!
I just don't know what else to say to that....

My newest favorite things!

So, I am not the best at being disciplined about doing things to conserve resources or save the earth....I used disposable diapers...we use paper towels for napkins at dinner, and I will buy paper plates if I am having people over. I don't catch my rain water to water anything, and will buy plastic bottles of water when its on sale. I don't claim to be an avid recycler. We have put bins on our back deck, but since they are all full we haven't been the best to get the stuff out to recycle and start over. BUT....there is one trend that I finally gave in to, and I am SO glad that I did!

I LOVE recyclable shopping bags! I could say that I am doing this to do my part to stop waste of the plastic bags, but I can't really do that and be truthful. I actually DID recycle the plastic ones at least once by using them again at home...I think most people actually do that, so is it SO bad to get the plastic bags? Don't really know, but the real reason I love these reusable bags is because they truly are better than getting plastic bags!!!!

I can get my entire grocery trip into 5 reusable canvas bags and with one trip my husband and I have all the groceries in! No more bags ripping on the way in, no more making 3 trips to the car because your fingers are going to rip off if you try to tuck one more plastic bag in your hand! These canvas bags are AWESOME! They fit completely over your shoulder, so you can get about 3 on each shoulder if you need to. PLUS, each bag will hold a TON of groceries! That is, IF the bag person knows how to pack them. I did have a kid at Kroger haphazardly throw groceries in my bags and I was able to completely condense and empty one of his bags into the others, but for the most part I have found that when you have these canvas bags, the bag people will actually take more time to bag the groceries properly and carefully...Unlike many times when I would and up with 12 bags of groceries with 2-3 things in each bag...ANNOYING! Also, when I get home from the store, all my groceries are still packed neatly and safely away in the bags where they were when I put them in the trunk...no more escaped canned goods or produce!

At first, when I started seeing the reusable bags for sale, I thought, "why would I spend .89-$1 for a bag when I can get the other ones for free?" Well, I still envisioned having to buy like 10-12 bags to ever have enough. I was SO wrong! MOST of the time for a run-in to Wal-Mart or the grocery store, one bag will hold whatever I need...I have gotten $40 worth of stuff in one bag before, and because of the way they are made, the stuff doesn't get smushed or ruined on the way home, the sides are supported by the stuff you bought so it stays neat. Second of all, I have only ever used at the most 6 bags, that is for a week's worth of groceries for a family with 2 kids! About $100-$130 worth of groceries in 6 bags!

All the bags I bought were less than $1 each too, so for less than $6 I have more convenient and durable bags, plus I get BETTER service with the way my groceries are bagged!

That is really a good deal in my opinion.

AND, you get to feel all earth-friendly and trendy when you check out at the grocery store! ha ha!

Get yourself some bags! And, for the record, they will use whatever canvas bags you bring in. I have 1 Food Lion bag, 3 Kroger bags, and 2 Wal-Mart bags. I use whichever one I happen to have with me.

Don't worry about forgetting to bring it with you! After you have used these once to get your groceries, you will love it so much you will NOT forget to bring them with you the next time you go out!

Oh Katie....(and Noah)

The other day we were in the car...I think it was on our way to Mellow Mushroom after Noah's soccer game...
Anyway...we are driving down the road and Katie says, "My homeschool teacher is SO silly!"


?!!?!?!?!? ha ha haha! Corey says, "You mean your mom?"

And she said, "yes!" and just giggled! I have no idea what that is supposed to mean.

Then...tonight we are playing a Cranium brand game called Balloon Lagoon. Cranium makes THE best kid's board games ever, by the way, even Corey and I don't hate playing them (like, uh the never-ending Chutes and Ladders or impossible Cootie). So, they have been playing for a while, and Katie gets the last 4 balloons she needs to fill up her little animal moving piece. She says, "I won, yay, I won!" and Noah argues, "No, you didn't!!!!!"

Katie does not argue. She does not cry...she doesn't do anything, except....
She gets the instruction sheet out of the game box, opens it up, and spreads it in front of Noah, pointing to the square on the page titled: "How to win."

"See? I do win," she states very matter-of-factly.

HA! Anyone reading this who has ever played a board game with myself or my parents, will find this so amusing! We are DEFINITE rule-abiders around here and Katie has learned from the best. Any time it is game night with the Addis family, it doesn't matter if it is Uno, you can bet the rules are going to be consulted AT LEAST once during the course of the evening! :)

Corey was not impressed, however. He just said, "Good grief!" as I am sure hours of rule-reading while playing games with his own family flashed before his eyes.

I am so proud of her! I mean, really, you can't argue with the rules!

One more Katie AND Noah story. I guess they are really learning some of what we go over every week at school. We have been having a character ed. word of the week. We recite a definition and Bible verse each day that goes together for character ed. Well, tonight when we were praying together after devotional time, it is Noah's turn to pray and he ends his with, "and help us to be grateful for the things we hope for." To which Katie picked up on and corrected in HER prayer time: "Help us to be sure of what we do not see." A little confused, but good things to pray for anyway!

Here is what they got that from:

Our word of the week this week is thankfulness: the definition is: showing gratefulness with words and actions.
Word of the week two weeks ago: Faith: the Bible verse was "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for, certain of what we do not see."

Noah's First Soccer Game!

It was so fun.....ny! ha ha!
First of all, there was a mix-up with the color shirts we were supposed to wear, so our team had to wear the blue jersey thingees..ha ha! Then...the team we were playing today had the best coach ever I think, so they were all playing "positions" and he kept saying stuff like "defense" and we are like, "what?!" ha ha!
At this age we don't get referees, don't keep score, no goalie (though we nearly elected ourselves one before it was over! :)) so the coaches can be on the field and I think the other coach really had a big laugh over us when it was all said and done! Actually, what he said at the end was: "I have been there before, with the all 4 year old team, and you just get stomped all season! ha ha!"
They had so much fun though, and that's what is important! Noah is such a great team player! He never stops, is always paying attention to what is going on and is very encouraging to his team! He was even yelling stuff to the team from the sidelines...it was so cute! Here are the pictures:

The Zoo!

We took an impromptu visit to the zoo a couple of weekends ago with my parents. Literally, we had just been to the track to run and when we left I was on my way to Cartersville to look for some new running shoes and I called my mom, she said, "hey we are in Kennesaw and wondered if you wanted to go to the zoo today," so we just got on 75 and went to the zoo! With no bags, water, etc. I was still wearing my running clothes, therefore I wasn't in very many pictures! :) I am making a funny face in the one picture I am in, but oh well. Here are TONS of pictures from our trip to the zoo!

Weekends.....

We took advantage of a very good promo this weekend and took the kids to Medieval Times. For those of you who live in Georgia and didn't know that there is one here....hey...there's one here! It is at Discover Mills in Lawrenceville. They have a great promo going on right now that with every paying adult you get a FREE child/teen admission! So, that saved us $70! It is going on at all locations through the end of this month, so if you have kids, now would be a great time to go! Especially good if your child is a picky eater and you know they aren't going to eat the massive feast you get with the show! Noah managed to eat his bread, daddy's bread, and his apple pie dessert (which is actually unusual for him to eat an apple pie). Katie, however, LOVED the food and ate as long as they would leave the plate! ha! I opted for the vegetarian meal..just out of curiosity and for the fact that eating that much meat (a half chicken and ribs) is just too much for me! I have to say that I think you actually get MORE food with the vegetarian option! I had a stuffed portobello mushroom cap, a big skewer of vegetables, and hummus spread with pita chips. It was delicious! the mushroom was stuffed with rice, beans, dried cranberries, and was seasoned really well. The veggies were huge chunks of peppers, onions, zucchini, and roasted potatoes. The hummus was mildly seasoned so it went well with the rest of the food. I think I will always check on the veggie options when I do a show like this. Oh, you also got a bowl of "tomato bisque" (vegetable soup) and drinks of course. No one got silverware to keep with the "medieval" theme, but my veggie meal came on a separate platter which did include a fork, so that was helpful! :)
Anyway, the show was fun. Noah said at the beginning he was bored, but once the "fighting" got started he was glued! They had some little games, a "falconer" that did a short little thing,and some dancing horses, which I guess took up the time while they were serving food. But after that it was pretty intense! They had some pretty good choreographed "combat" which Noah thought was great. Katie got a little emotionally involved and when our knight was "defeated" (to the death) she almost was about to cry and I had to explain that it was just a show and pretend and all that. They brought them all out at the end so she saw he wasn't really defeated so much!
It was fun. Each section of the arena was a different colored theme so you are cheering on "your" knight throughout the tournament. All the knights on your side of the arena are allies so you can cheer for someone right to the end. I didn't take a lot of pictures because watching the show and helping Katie with her food took up a lot of time, plus we had our flags to wave when our knight was competing! Here are the few I took, plus some from a photo session this morning while Katie dressed up with her princess outfit with the tiara she got last night at the show.
Overall...it was fun. It was worth it since we didn't have to pay for the kids (I would hate to pay $35 for Noah when he didn't touch his food!), and we will probably do it again one day. >

It's Official!!!

We have, at our house, the absolute best, wonderful, scrumptious, delicious *insert every adjective every created to describe great food here* peanut butter cookies EVER!

This is an experience that has been all week in the making. It all started with trying to get Noah to taste some peanut butter. He didn't. Corey ate some peanut butter off a spoon and commented that it was really good peanut butter. I said I would like to have some peanut butter cookies...the recipe that Bethany makes. Corey wanted to make some but I wouldn't let him steal that from me (I LOVE to bake), but it turned out that we no longer had the recipe card for those cookies...perhaps lost in the Christmas shuffle?

So, I called Bethany to get the recipe. Well, she can't find it either and has to call her sister to get it, which it turned out, they had just made the same cookies this week too! Apparently a peanut butter craving has been going around.

After I read the recipe I realized we didn't have enough butter OR peanut butter to make the cookies and I forgot to pick it up when I was out and about this week.

Yesterday I went by the store to pick up what we needed, so FINALLY this morning I was able to make the peanut butter cookies. And they were even better than I remember!

This has got to be the best recipe for peanut butter cookies I have EVER tasted! I never even liked peanut butter cookies at all until I tried this recipe. They are chewy and gooey, the way cookies were meant to be (sorry Chris F who like crispy cookies, what is up with that?!). You don't have to press them with a fork, it makes such a fluffy batter, even more fluffy than regular chocolate chip cookies. You just lightly roll them into small lumps and place them on the cookie sheet. Ah! Here are some pictures of our's from today. I am going to make a request that Bethany be the awesome friend she is and post the recipe since I have already written a ridiculously long post just fawning over them! She can link back here with her recipe for a "review." :)

Warning: You MUST go buy milk before you bake these cookies! Mmmmmm......

Our Way....

I was inspired today after reading Bethany's post today: Homeschool Wonderworld. Wow. We are so different! ha ha!
It is difficult to explain our way of homeschooling without seeming like I don't approve of other methods. That really and truly isn't the case. In fact, I wish I could lean a little more toward the Binkley method...but I tried that last year and it really didn't work for me. I mean REALLY. ha ha. Give me an inch, I take a mile EVERY time! :) I tried doing the casual thing last year and I managed to slack off after about the end of January. Now, my children were only 3 and 5, and the 5 year old already reading on 2nd grade level I figured, "hey...why not just wait till next year to get truly serious?"
We are on the complete opposite side this year. In fact, we have another 4 year old joining us for homeschool this year! So, that is reason enough to be structured, keep better records, have a set plan, etc. Plus, for the record, today is the NINTH day in a row that our house has been CLEAN! YAY for company every day!!! I mean it!

Anyway, just try winging it with THREE school aged children in the house! It just wouldn't work for us. We have a curriculum this year that has all the lesson plans done for the entire year, a Math program picked out and added in, as well as a super handwriting curriculum that is really fun. Combine that with unlimited resources online and we have a VERY busy week planned out! I really and truly need that kind of thing. Other people go on what their child is interested in at the time, or work it into daily routine, but I get so caught up in the details of what everyone is eating for lunch and IF they are eating it, etc., that it becomes difficult for me to multi-task and grab the moment for a lesson learned. I am like that about everything by the way :) not just school. Ask my husband.
So, you can read about her homeschooling through life, and I will present to you the OTHER end of the spectrum. You can even see in our slide show that we are definitely "school at home." ha! I hope it doesn't make my children jealous of the other homeschoolers who get to have "more fun" at homeschool. See, there it makes it sound like I am berating one or the other styles of doing school at home, but it all comes down to making it work for you and your children. I have a friend coming over tomorrow to see how we do homeschool and I was so quick to assure her that the way we do it isn't like the way many people do it, and every person's homeschool looks, sounds, and works differently! So, without further delay, here is our homeschool schedule for Monday-Thursday. See, there you go, some people don't have a schedule and that is fine and great for them, but I am telling you, if I don't have Math scheduled for a slot in the day, it just probably wouldn't get done! That's the structure I need.... I could very easily see me working in life skill projects, such as baking into our learning experience. The difference is, I would probably have it penciled in my plans for "Thursday, 12:15: Cooking Project: Bake bread." ha ha!

8:15-8:30: Developing the Early Learner workbooks, Name writing practice, some kind of language worksheet.

8:30-8:45: Calendar, Bible Story, character Ed. We also say the pledges and pray at this time. A lot for 15 minutes? I think not ha ha! Always overplan!

8:45-8:55: Read a story (Literature), Sing some songs (movement)

8:55-9:25: Handwriting Without Tears (split between the two age groups,whoever is not doing the lesson will play or do some centers)

9:25-9:45: Writing/Language/Copywork (This will be some kind of acting out a story, brainstorming how to make up a story, exposure to different kinds of writing like invitations, letters, etc)

9:45-10:15: Go upstairs and have a snack, play with toys in bedroom, restroom time (yes we have a scheduled restroom break since we don't have a RR downstairs...it would be endless going up and downstairs if we didn't)

10:15-11:00: Phonics/Reading I do the younger ones first with their letter of the week and Explode the Code workbooks. Then I give them something to make or do with their lesson and then they get to watch a video while I have QUIET reading instruction with my oldest. We have to have about 20 minutes of silence so she can concentrate. Then they can do a "not silent" activity like play-doh, blocks, etc.

11:00-11:45: Math. We separate for these lessons also. First the young ones and the same drill as with Reading. We also have a computer in our classroom so one of the young ones at a time can go on Starfall.com or something like that while I work with Katie.

11:45-12:15: Lunch or Science/SS. Depends on if they are acting tired of "school" If they are restless we go ahead and have lunch. If not, we go right into our Science/SS time, which they really enjoy. It is all based on just reading a book about something, then I find some cool stuff to do to go along with it. Right now we are working on creating a book about the seasons using pages they are coloring of trees. One day a week I plan on doing some kind of art project during this time.

12:15-12:45: Lunch, or if we had lunch we come back downstairs and do our Science/SS/Art. When they first sit down for lunch I will read a story from one of our Read-Alouds. This gets them to actually eat instead of playing too :)

We end after this. Our 3rd student is picked up around 1pm and then its rest time. On Tuesdays we have ballet and soccer. That's about it.

This is how we do homeschool. Works for us! And, we all really enjoy it! This has gone on and on, so I will try to wrap it up with this:

If you are looking for the "typical" way to homeschool, the "right" way, or the "normal" way....you just won't be able to find it...unless you start doing it yourself and THEN you will find it...but you may be the only one doing it "that" way. And that's okay.

School Days....

School is going great. Today was day 4, but it felt like day 1, because it was MONDAY! ha ha. Katie and Noah and #3 are doing great in their work. I will post some pictures, but I have just been so busy! I haven't even had time to do good at my workout stuff, but I am hoping once we get in a routine things will be a little better. However, tomorrow starts another couple of things that will throw more stuff on the calendar! Tomorrow is the first day of ballet and soccer!
Katie will have dance from 3:15-4:15, and then Noah has soccer practice from 6-6:45! Wow, Tuesdays are BUSY! I am hoping to get a feel tomorrow for if 5:00 would work out a little better for anyone else, because I am thinking that we could go on over for practice at 5pm, then meet Corey and have dinner all together when he gets off work. But, oh well. It will be fine whatever works out. I am excited for them both, and a little nervous about starting soccer practice! I will let you all know how that goes.
In other news: I picked up a fun little magazine at the craft store today. It is a Taste of Home mini-recipe book of kid friendly recipes. I am hoping to find some fun things in there to make for Katie and Noah...something that will be healthy and kid-acceptable!
Oh...I saw the movie Mama Mia this weekend. It was cute. It was a group of girls going out for a friend's birthday and we just cut up and laughed and commented throughout the entire movie. Yes, we were THAT group of people, ha ha! Actually, there weren't very many people in the theater, so we weren't really bothering anyone. It was fun to sing along to ABBA and laugh at all the silly girl stuff in the movie. Guys would NOT enjoy this movie, but girls (well, grown-up girls) will think it is funny and don't expect an awesome plot or anything, it is actually pretty ridiculous. Oh, and if you like Pierce Brosnon and respect him, then don't go see it either. He makes a total fool of himself and he CAN NOT sing at ALL! It is embarrassingly bad singing!
Well, I have lots to do, laundry to fold and put away, dinner to get ready, soccer practice to plan for, ribbon to cut into new laces for Katie's tap shoes, kids to put to bed, and....let's see, that might be all for tonight.

Day Three Today...and a GREAT recipe!

Well, I am sitting here getting ready for day three, and SO happy that we homeschool!!! We decided that on Thursdays we will have a late-start day, since we are out at church late on Wednesday nights. We will start today at 10am.

Our second day of school was AWESOME! We caught up on everything we didn't get done on Tuesday and finished all of yesterday's work as well. The kids were great and worked so hard! We had a great day and I am excited about doing it again today!

On another note: I prepared a really great chicken dish for dinner yesterday and it is super easy! It is called Cheesy Chicken Subs. It is a Taste of Home recipe that I cut out of a magazine probably a couple of years ago actually, but I just now tried it. Click HERE for the recipe and photo. I followed all the ingredients precisely, but I put mine in a slow cooker instead. It cooked for about 3 hours on high and then 1 hour on low and it was fantastic...a very good combo of tastes. It has chicken (cut into strips), olive oil, a pack of Italian dressing dry mix, I used a can of mushrooms,and half a red onion sliced very thinly. After all that cooks you put it on a sub roll, top it with some swiss cheese and toast it till the cheese melts. Mmmmmmm......

update: so I just previewed my post and tried the link to be sure it worked....WHY would they put the nutritional info right there next to the recipe?! ha ha ! They could at least put it has a link where you could choose to look if you want! Well, I just ate a half sandwich, so I guess that's a little bit better!

First day of school!

I feel compelled to write SOMETHING about our first day of school, though I am absolutely about to fall asleep while sitting here and still have a list of things to get ready for tomorrow!

We hosted our Open House last night and it was so much fun! Our new student came over with her parents and brother to check out the classroom and share some goodies to eat. They ended up staying late as my husband and the dad of our student got busy playing guitar and we were enjoying our visit so much that bath and bedtime didn't happen until 11:00 or so! BUT, the good thing about homeschool is that we were able to just decide when they left that we would just start at 9am this morning instead of 8 to give the kids some extra sleep time! :)

It wasn't difficult to get them awake though, but by about 11am it was already catching up with them....so...needless to say our angels weren't on their very best today, though I needed a day anyway to see just how the logistics of having three pupils versus two would change the balance in the homeschool realm. It wasn't very hard though, and it was actually very nice for my two to have the company of the other student. It definitely kept my son's attention span engaged a little longer to have another preschooler doing the same thing he was doing. I think this will be a great situation for all of us...and hey....my house will have to be at least presentable in the mornings four days a week now, so that will be great motivation for me as well!!!

We didn't keep with the "schedule" I had made, and we didn't get everything "done" that was on the plan, but we did have fun and we did learn some new things, so that is what matters, right? I don't have pictures, but I actually need to clear it with our new student's mom before I post any pictures on here. I have actually been considering switching to a new blog provider just to be able to do the password access for pictures...or maybe making this one protected altogether...we will see.

Anyway, just wanted to give a quick run-down of our day. If this comes across as sounding less than exciting, it is only because I am so tired I cannot hold my eyes open! The day continued with a visit to the dr., a decision to NOT take the kids out in the 100 degree weather so I could walk/run, and a very early dinner, bath, and bedtime. Now down to the classroom to get things ready for tomorrow, and hopefully a full night's sleep for me as well! Tune in for an update tomorrow....