Wish Etiquette

I made a whole chicken the other night and with this chicken came a lovely wishbone.

Obviously, we saved it and let it dry out. And this morning I gave it to Seth and Kylee to make a wish on.

Here is the problem when they broke it, it broke exactly in half. No bigger side. No smaller side.

So who gets their wish?

Is it both or neither?

Kristen

Dissection Tuesday

We had a great opportunity yesterday! A friend from church who is also a teacher at a christian school here had some left over specimens that she was going to have to throw away and she offered them to me.

Not only did she offer me the stuff, but she offered herself!! She gave up her time off to come over and dissect a worm, perch, crayfish and frog with my kids!!!

It was such a great day!! I was really, really proud of all the kids. Another home school mom came over with her kiddos and did it with us and they all did great.

The best part was when Mike got home yesterday evening they all attacked him at the door and the first thing that came out of their mouths was that they didn't even have to do school work today because Ms. Jen came over to dissect stuff with them!!!! That is a credit to a great teacher! They didn't even know they were learning!

And how much did I love reliving it all while we ate dinner?

Kristen

Easter!

What a super fantastic weekend!!



I have to say I am in awe of Mike, Scott Hodge, the ENTIRE children's ministry, and every staff member and volunteer that participated in this weekend's services.



One of the cool things that I hear over and over again from people, about the Orchard, is how there is never any fear in inviting friends to an event at the Orchard. You don't have to worry that they will be offended, feel unloved, or that they will be pointed out and embarrassed. You also know that when you come to an event that it will be done really well.



Mike and his awesome team ROCKED the house with some great praise and worship, fabulous lights, smoke, and even some live rain. Yes, they made it rain in the building. Excellent. And who knew Mike could rap? Along with some great worship tunes the team also did Linkin Park's Easier to Run and Natasha Bedingfield's Unwritten. Hence the rain.



Scott's message on pain, like always, was relevant, biblical, and applicable to everyone. I love it that you can walk out of a message and apply it directly to your life. It is awesome to hear what God has to say about things that everyone struggles with. You can listen to it on-line here.

And the 20,000 egg, egg drop was huge! The kids were all so excited. I have to say though that I think it has changed Easter for my kids forever. Last week when Josh was drawing an Easter picture it was of a huge helicopter dropping eggs. Too funny. I wonder if he thinks that is just how you have an Easter egg hunt!!!

Well it was all awesome and I am grateful to be part of such an awesome community.

Kristen

Harley Gets a New Hair Doo

I walked upstairs and entered my room. I looked around and something seemed amiss. I couldn't quite put my finger on it but I had a feeling something had occurred in this room.

The first thing I spotted was a broken black crayon on the floor by my bed spread. The thought did cross my mind that my black and white bed spread does look a bit like a coloring book. But nothing there.

Then I looked on my dresser and notice my jewelry box pushed to the edge of the dresser. This was enough evidence to convict.

"Boys!"

They ran upstairs and I began the interrogation.

"Why were you in my room?"
(This is really the best way to start, If you ask who then you are just opening yourself up for problems. Skip the who and go right to the why.)

Seth- "It was Josh he was playing with stuff in your room."

Josh- "Na uh I saw Seth he was in here too."

Me-"Okay, okay, why were you guys in my room"

Seth- "Josh took something"

Josh-"It was Seth he was in here too he touched the mirror"

Seth-"I was just looking for a brush for Harley!"

(This is where I was so shocked and about to burst out laughing that I had to ask them to leave. )

A brush for Harley. So many questions come to mind. Of coarse the first is why he was looking for a brush for his guinea pig. But coming in as a close second would have to be, why, in the world, he was looking for a brush for his guinea pig in my room!!! When I regained composure I asked him to refrain from using anything in my room on his guinea pig.

It kind of reminded me of that Seinfeld where Jerry drops his girlfriends tooth brush in the toilet but doesn't tell her and when she finds out she tells him she had put something of his in the toilet and he goes crazy trying to find out what it was.

Yeah that is how my mind works.

Kristen

Here's Kylee's recital video!! She did great!! My favorite part was when near the middle/end she looks up and sees her daddy and smiles. So cute! She almost lost focus but gets back on track! Enjoy!!

Kristen

Faith's Recital Video

Here is Faith's recital video. She was super nervous but did such a great job. She of coarse thought she messed it up horribly but we just kept telling her that everyone makes mistakes while they are playing and she did such a great job continuing on.

Kristen

A Lesson At Starbucks

I made a decision when I woke up this morning, before I went to the gym, that we were going to have a greatly reduced school day.

We have been going continually since the new year began and have not taken a day off to relax. And I feel like we still have so much to cover until we finish up and start summer that I don't really want to take a lot of time off. I have already decided that for their spring break they can take a break from math and spelling but the language, history and literature has to be done so that we can stay on track.

But, I decided that today we would take a break from every thing except our usually Friday wrap up.

Friday's are cool because we take everything we learned this week and spend an hour or so discussing it and making sure that we are all on the same page as far as our history and literature/vocabulary goes. Sometimes if one child has focused on a particular aspect of the history lesson, written a report on something or made a poster, and the others didn't, this time gives them a chance to share what they learned. For example the week Faith did a mini- research poster on leprosy, the other kids did one on ravens. It was cool for them to teach the others what they had learned and present their work.

Any ways, Mike and I got home from the gym packed up everyone and headed to Starbucks. the kids all had cards from Christmas that they had not spent so they went up to the counter one by one and ordered their favorite decaf coffee and we grabbed a few comfortable chairs and did our wrap up at Starbucks.

I was a little worried they wouldn't be able to focus, but they did great! They were so relaxed and listened and participated in the conversation. I think their daddy was a little blown away by the amount of stuff we covered this week and he even said he was impressed by what they learned!

The Starbucks employees did look at us a little strange but it was a great way to start the day. We are off to music now!!

Kristen

Doing a Little Shuffle

Got my new iPod shuffle yesterday (thanks Dad!), and Mike filled it up for me last night from our itunes.

One of the advantages to having a Creative Arts director for a husband is the amount of new music I have access to! Awesome.

Anyways, the cool thing is that I put my little shuffle on shuffle and it mixed everything up. And yes, my Mp3 player did the same thing, but it was funny little shuffle seemed to play just the right music at just the right time. Okay I am being a little wacko here, but it did put together the best work out music. It's like the ultimate mix-tape. ( You know you all used to make and listen to mix tapes)

My newest addition to my musical listening library is Blake Lewis' new CD. Yes, American Idol Blake Lewis. I love it!! So fun to work out to. Don't know if I would want to sit around and listen to it and am certain that the kids shouldn't be listening to it but it is great to work out to.

So me and Blake, The Bravery, Kelly Clarkson, All American Rejects, Linkin Park, Hillsong United and yes Depeche Mode, completed our 45 minute elliptical workout.


What are you listening to?

Kristen

Ouch! But I did it!

This machine kicked my rear today. Mike and I got to the gym and there was only one treadmill. I had really wanted to try this machine and thought this was a great opportunity.


The first two minutes no problem.


After five my legs were on fire.


I pushed through it and made it for about 43 minutes, Yes, I gave up at the end. But, I think I really like this better than the treadmill. It definitely made me work harder.


And I need to give myself a little pat on the back because I have continued my work out even through the horrendous time change. I do not adjust well to time change. Maybe it's because I spent the first 20+ years of my life never falling back or springing forward. Maybe it's because it is stupid, unnatural and completely unreasonable to all of a sudden, out of the blue decide to CHANGE time.


Who do we think we are super man?

Kristen

105 Days of School

We have completed 105 days of school. I can see the end of our school year and am starting to prepare for our summer session. Thought I would just record a summary of where we are right now.

We are moving right along in the old testament. We have gotten through the Israelites in captivity, the exodus, the wanderings in the dessert, the entry into the promised land, all of the judges, through the united Israel under Solomon, divided Israel and Judah and now we just finished with Israel being deported by the Assyrians. And this week Judah is about to get it from the Babylonians. So much interesting history. This week we are designing a version of the Ishtar gate and may try and do some star gazing with our telescope if weather permits. We shall see about that.

Faith is working on play writing for the next 6 weeks and will be writing a one act play. She is almost done with her Saxon Math 76 book and her new one is here waiting for her to begin. We just totaled their reading hours for the school year up to date and she has read 91 hours. Of coarse she doesn't write down every minute she reads but that is close.

Kylee and Seth are working on newspaper writing, so they will be writing articles and ads over the next 6 weeks and putting them together in a newspaper. They came up with the title of God's Piece. I thought it was clever. Kylee is working on her Saxon 65 math book and doing great. Also she has almost completed learning the list of all 50 states and their capitals, where they are on the map and how to correctly spell them! This was a HUGE challenge for her and I am so proud of her! And her reading total so far is 82 hours 15 minutes. Again this is a huge achievement for her. And you can bet that every last second is accounted for on her list!!

Seth is working on his Saxon 3 math book and his biggest challenge is his horrific hand writing. I mean it is really bad. I don't know how to improve it. Actually his cursive is so neat but his printing is really, really bad. He just goes to quickly. His reading totals are 53 hours. He and Kylee are both currently reading Harry Potter the Order of the Phoenix. They have their own copies from the library and are both half way through.

Joshi's focus is on reading. He knows about 140 words by sight and his phonics learning is coming along well. He is still pretty little and not too great at sitting for long periods and I don't force it. I know that it will come and I am not too worried about it. I can't wait till it warms up again so he can spend more time being physical and running around outside. That is really what he needs right now! He has read 47 hours and recently a majority of the hours he has read have been from books he has actually read, not books that have been read to him.

Well, that is a sum up of where we are right now. It has been a great year so far. I LOVE Tapestry and can't really say enough good things about it. Not only is it easy to teach, we have all learned so much this year, but I am constantly hearing things about and from the school kids around here about things they are doing in school and a lot of the things match the skills we are working on as well. That gives me comfort, I know that is silly but it does.

Kristen

Legend

Mike and I went to see "I Am Legend" this weekend at the dollar theater. And I have to say I didn't have great expectations about it. Mostly, because I thought it was going to be about the last man on earth and I kept hearing it was so scary and jumpy and suspenseful. But I just didn't think that sounded very scary.

Oh man!!! It was soooo good. I found that I had no clue what the movie was about!!! I am surprised that I didn't know what it was about. I had even watched interviews with Will Smith when the movie first came out, and I didn't understand the premise of the movie. It seems amazing to me that since we waited to see it for so long that something would have leaked out about it. And I am sure it must have, but we were lucky enough to not have heard it! We jumped through the whole movie!! That is a pretty big deal because I am not a jumpy person when it comes to suspenseful movies, Mike, on the other hand, may hold the record for the highest jump during a scary movie :)

Excellent acting and a great suspenseful story. We loved it so much.

If you like a good suspenseful movie you should see this movie.

Before it leaves the theaters.

Which will be soon since we saw it at the dollar theater .

Kristen

Artichoke and a Contest Winner

Today was a nice breath after our long week. Lots of stuff going on everywhere it seems. Mike had first wed. and practice this week which took him out two nights this week.

I decided to plan a meal that Mike would hate while he was gone. The kids and I got three big artichokes from the store and cooked them up last night. YUM!!! I made home made pizza (no mike doesn't hate home made pizza but I knew there would be some left for him after work) and we chowed. The kids all loved the artichokes and fought over the hearts. We also found out that artichoke season starts now so we will be enjoying them over the next few months.

Mike and I got up and completed our second week at the gym!!! We are doing so great! Mike let me use his iPod at the gym and he used his phone. But when I got home I got a call from my awesome dad and found out that I had won an iPod shuffle!!!! Can you believe it? What kind of luck is that? Thanks Dad!!!

And finally, the quote of the week comes from Joshi.

As he bites into a chocolate covered marshmallow egg he exclaimed,"Hey, there's peep inside!!!"

Kristen

Could It Get Worse?

Mike and I got up bright and early, grabbed our gym shoes and I grabbed my charged mp3 player and headed for the gym.

Got there, gorgeous day out by the way, put on my shoes and jumped on my treadmill.

Turned my mp3 player on....

Turned my mp3 player on....

Oh man, it won't turn on!! It chose today to die. It is only a year old. Batteries charged, it just decided it had had enough.

So I got to listen to Married with Children with "old sitcom lady" today. A few minutes into it I just put the sound proof earplugs in and listened to my heart beat.

I did my 45 minutes and figured God wanted me to be quiet for a while.

I came to that AFTER I got over my rage.

AFTER I almost chucked the stupid little electronic thing out the paneled window.

And AFTER I put the ear plugs in my ears to block out the nonsense.

Aside from all that I feel so good. I have a ton more energy and I have even been eating breakfast. Okay, it was just some fruit, but I am eating something which is a huge thing for me, since I am not a breakfast girl. And my jeans are fitting not so snug, so I am happy.

Kristen

Dinner and a Movie

My good friend, Paula, and I went out last night for a night of fun. We had a fabulous dinner at an Italian restaurant and then went to see the movie that we have been waiting for, for half of a year!!

We read The Other Boleyn Girl last year and shortly after finishing it found out that it was being made into a movie. We knew that it couldn't possibly be as good as Phillipa's book but were hoping for SOME similarities.

Look, I can understand that you can't fit in every detail from a book of that magnitude but at least keep the characters consistent with they way they were written.

But we still enjoyed it. It was just great being out on the town for the night.

So, I don't know about whether I would recommend it or not. The acting was good. And maybe if you hadn't read the book you would enjoy it. But I suggest reading the book and forget about the movie.

Kristen