Wow, September already, huh? I hope you all had a fantastic weekend and Labor Day. Over the weekend my sister, Amanda, and I had a surprise birthday party Mother Dear. We had a wonderful time and she had no idea about it! We were thrilled! It was her 40th birthday and we wanted to something special, though we have been thinking about the Drews Family TX all week. Please continue to pray for them and offering your words of comfort and encouragement. We also published our September issue of Growing In Grace Magazine the layout is BEAUTIFUL. We had so many wonderful articles and three giveaways going! If you have a daughter, or are just a mother, please go check it out.

THEME

I hope last week’s theme helped you get a bigger view and maybe some ideas about different ways to homeschool or curriculum. There is so much to share and so I hope this helped, especially the new homeschoolers, narrow things down a bit. I am sure some of you are still getting into your homeschool routines. I know some people are very routine oriented while others may be more “day-by-day”, and it all depends on your family and what works best for your life-style. This week please post what your planned homeschool routine is. The theme banner should give you some ideas on how to do that. I had fun making that and adding in real info (except for the times! lol).

When you’re done posting your routines please share your prayers for this school year, and then sign the linky so others can visit.

Again, please enter in your DIRECT link to your HM post and not just your blog link. When others go back to look over the themes they will be able to go directly to your post rather than just your front page.

MY THEME

While I am going to be following Mother Dear’s lead with the routine here is what I plan to do for myself. I will be doing a lot of independent studies, I think.

7:30 - Rise, feed animals, do chores

8:00 - Read Bible chapters, prayer time

8:30 - Hygiene - brush my teeth, get dressed, hair/make-up

8:40 - 20minutes room sweep

9:00 - Check email, read comments, post (if scheduled)

9:30 - Start mathematics

10:30 - Write articles (Growing In Grace Magazine, Feelin’ Feminine, Homeschool Seniors, A Pondering Heart)

12:00 - See about lunch

1:00 - Manage business work (GGM ads, A Pondering Heart designs, The Homesteading Carnival)

That’s all I’m planning to for now. I know Mother Dear has some wonderful plans for school, including learning Spanish, Bible-Ancient History-Jewish Culture Study, Science, and lapbooking. I’m not sure how well I can stick to this routine, but at least I have some goals set forth and perhaps that will give me more motivation to stick with it.

Blessings!

Seeing how I am not smart enough to use the random number generator, um, like to do things the old-fashioned way, I cut up little slips of papers with appropriate numbers on them, folded them, put them in my favorite teacup, and had my son draw one.

And the winner is . . .

#18 - Karen at Lil Momma’s Haven!

Congratulations, Karen!

Recently a new blogger and friend asked me how he could get more hits to his site. Being the blogger who loves blogging so much and wants to share that love with others, I quickly compiled a list for him to go off.

Here is that list of ways I found that are great to get more hits to your blog.

#1: Get your name and url out there. Go to people’s blogs. Leave comments even if you don’t know them. Comment on their post, then kinda introduce yourself.

#2: Get things like mybloglog. When I see a new face on mybloglog on my sidebar I click it, and then go to their blog. If they are savory!

#3: Get on blogrolls. There are a couple blogrolls on the bottom of my right sidebar, you could consider joining.

#4: Get on stat counters. Counters like Homeschool Gold and Blog Statter.

#5: Send out blog alerts. When you send them out, people will see it and click it and read.

#6: Blog often. I try to blog on Saturdays and Wednesday, but usually end up posting more. I think that a blog receives more attention when it posts often. I would try to post more than once a week. If your friends know that you blog alot they will come and visit to see if you updated.

#7: Blog about many topics. The more things you blog about, the more searches your url will come up on.

#8: Blog about what you know. You don’t want to sound high and mighty, but you want people to know what you believe or what you have learned. I try hard not to talk about things that I don’t know about. I would go and post about how you can be an astronaut, because I don’t know much about it. Talking about things you don’t know about turns people off.

#9: Exchange ads and links. Talk to your friends about exchanging links and ads. I have an ad that people can put on their sidebar that links to me. If you don’t have an ad, you can email my awesome sister and she can come up with something that is totally you!

#10: Contribute to carnivals. Carnivals are a GREAT way to get your link out. I mostly participate in The Carnival of Homeschooling and The Homesteading Carnival. You can go through a list of carnivals at Blog Carnival.

#11: Enter contests. When you enter a contest, not only do you have a chance to win something, but you also get your link out.

#12: Hold giveaways. This goes hand in hand with entering contests. You can give away something that you won in a contest, if you don’t want it.

Comments:
When I first started, I commented all my friends. I got to know them. I made sure they knew me and would come and comment me back. Now I just comment people who comment and every once in awhile I comment people who I don’t normally comment.

Now if you want some things that will show you where people are coming from and things like that, I would get a Sitemeter for sure and probably a Feedjit.
I would get a Stumbleupon. My Mama has one and she blogged last nite and put it on her stumbleupon and had almost 200 people within less than 2 hours! After I saw that, I got a stumbleupon. lol!
Here is another article you should read about Feeds and Readers. That gives great advice on how to get them and what they do.

Pretty much the biggest thing is to get your link out! And also to get to know bloggers you want to be friends with. Make a relationship with bloggers. Another thing is you don’t just become a superblogger over nite. It does take time!
One thing to remember, blogging isn’t about getting people to your blog and getting a bunch a hits. It’s about relationships and about what you want from your blog. Mrs. C did a wonderful article about Better Blogging: The Purpose-Driven Blog. If you didn’t have a purpose for your blog when you started, maybe its time to think if you have one yet.

Better Blogging To You!

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We just returned from a long vacation that seemed like it literally lasted a month. We are Back Home now, but it was sure fun meeting several bloggers (like Sprittibee!) I think part of the reason it seemed so long is that we planned the trip for at least a month before we left. Planning for a long trip or a vacation can be a daunting task, but I can testify that it makes life a whole lot easier if you take the time to do so.

We had several things to look ahead to when we decided to take our trip, so our planning and arranging had to start early. We had animals that needed to be cared for and articles to have written for a couple of magazines. Because we knew we would be getting back late in the month, I made sure the girls had their monthly columns written before we ever left. I searched Mapquest repeatedly for weeks, planning our route. Be sure to check

• Mapquest,
• Google Maps

and any other online service to get the best route.

One thing we bought on the trip is a Trucker’s Route Atlas. It is a huge, laminated atlas with all the info you could want on it. It retailed at $75, but we found it in Texas for $15. It saved us time and money on the way home.

Gas prices. You cannot do one thing about it. Well, you could stay home, I guess, but that is about it. I must have taken 100 pictures of gas station signs all over the country so we could chronicle the prices everywhere. For the most part, it was around $3.85-$3.98. There was one place in the far west side of Texas, along I-10 where it was $4.39/gallon. The main objective is to calculate how many miles you plan to travel, count gas on the high side and the mpg your vehicle will get on the low side, so you will be sure to overplan finances for the trip. We have a 15-passenger van, which gets about 15-18mpg highway on a good click. I figured it at 15mpg, at 5,000 miles, with the gas prices at $5.00/gallon. We were not planning to go 5,000mi, and I certainly hoped the gas would not get up to $5.00. UGH. I was actually surprised to hear that gas here at home, which was at $3.85 when we left, reached $4.20/gal while we were gone. It is “down” to $4.09 now. Sheesh.
Also remember to check gas prices along your route online before you leave. Then, when you are on vacation, you can check again before you leave to come home.

The main gas stations we found in the South/Southwest are

• Love’s Travel Stops & Country Stores,
• Petro Truck Stops Locations by Map - AllStays Guide,
• TravelCenters of America, and
• Valero/Diamond Shamrock.
• Flying J has a Fuel Prices page that gives you prices in select US cities.

Many of these travel plazas also have Wi-Fi, so be sure to make notes of those places on your route, if that is a concern for you. We found out that Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas are very limited on catching a wireless connection very easily on the Interstates we traveled.

Of course, there are things you will come home to, like grass that looks like a jungle, if you live where grass actually grows, so you will want to have someone mow for you if that is a concern. It is not a concern for me, because, now I know we can use the weedeater on it and our goats will have fresh, green grass to eat.

If you are only going to be gone for a few days, then putting a hold on your mail is probably not a big deal, but we left for two weeks, so we did stop it. It came on Saturday as a great big bundle, and I was happy to see it wasn’t *all* junk mail!

We found some friends who took mercy upon us and took care of our goats, chickens and dogs for the past two weeks, and if you are blessed with such friends, be sure to leave them a detailed list. We wrote out all feeding procedures and made enough feed for the two weeks we were gone. We tried to cover all the bases. It is hard for someone, even if they have the animal experience, to care for oyur own quirky animals. We have three younger does who will hog down the older does’ food if we don’t feed them separately. Goats get sick easily if their food is messed with, so we have a particular way of feeding our goats. Be sure to stress the importance of how you feed your animals to the caretakers and get someone you trust to do it exactly as you ask or you may have problems.

Another thing to consider is schooltime. Are you going to include workbook time or field trips or nothing? We homeschool everything. I call them Living Learning Moments. From gas prices to crossing 14 state lines to learning about Uncle Leo and his homemade walking sticks to helping Great-Grandpa when the mower breaks. If your children journal - or even if they don’t - a vacation is a great time for them to record daily things that happen. It will hone their writing skills, give them details to remember, and give you a timeline of the things you did on the trip.

A really easy lesson is to print off a map of the US and using them as coloring pages and noting each time you go through or enter a state. You can let your children track your trip and note special places each time you see a historical marker or stop and take photos. If your children are older, they might enjoy a personal smaller atlas of the States to follow as you travel along.

For heaven’s sake, don’t forget your camera! If you do not own a digital, consider it a vacation expense and buy one. Or borrow one. If you do not own a laptop, buy more memory. We are blessed with two laptops, so we downloaded the pictures as our memory card filled up. I promise you a digital camera will save you in the end. I know. We must have taken over 3000 pictures, but I deleted about 500. I cannot imagine buying all of those rolls of film and printing off all those photos, only to throw away 500 bad shots. Sure, we would have taken less photos, but this is a worthy investment.

I hope you have a wonderful, blessed, safe adventure of your own this summer, on the road or in your own back yard! If you would like to see a list of other items to plan for vacation, like clothing and food, please take a look at my planning post: Planning A Long Vacation Field Trip for A Large Family

CARNIVALS OF INTEREST

From Why Homeschool:Carnival of Homeschooling: The next Carnival of Homeschooling will be hosted at Dewey’s Treehouse. As always, entries are due Monday evening at 6:00 PM Pacific Standard Time, WHICH MEANS tonight!

Carnival of Homeschooling

current issue:
Jun 17, 2008
Apollos Academy

next issue:
Jun 24, 2008
Dewey’s Treehouse

current issue:
Jun 10, 2008
Learn Me Good

next issue:
Jun 11, 2008
Learn Me Good

Learning in the Great Outdoors

current issue:
Jun 01, 2008
The Miss Rumphius Effect

next issue:
Jul 01, 2008
Alone on a Limb

Music Education Blog Carnival

next issue:
Jul 01, 2008
So You Want To Teach?

The Charlotte Mason Carnival

current issue:
Jun 10, 2008
Adventures On Beck’s Bounty

next issue:
Jun 24, 2008
Twinkling Stars Family School

CONTESTS AND GIVEAWAYS

Growing in Grace Magazine has something special for designers. They are are looking for a digi-scrap design for the month of September. Their theme that month will be Fall related.

*HOW DO I ENTER? Click on the icon to get all the information. Your kit must be sent to ggmeditor@gmail.com

ENTRIES are due AUGUST 1ST!

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Dawn is having a Twisted Silver Giveaway

Go on over to her blog and check out the pictures of the Twisted Silver Jewelry she has.

Twisted Silver is premiering three new products this week: Motif earrings, Chichi bracelet, and Pod bracelet. A lucky winner, selected randomly from comments, will receive a pair of the Motif earrings!

Motif Earrings: An intricate curving paisley motif bracketed by brass hand forged angles. Wear your art! $50

She also has 2 coupon codes for you if you don’t want to wait to win and want to dive right in and buy a set!

This contest is open to non-bloggers, just use a valid email address when posting your comment.

Contest is from June 24-28th, so get on over there and leave your comment!!!

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HSB Front Porch: Salem Ridge Press Good Summer Reading Contest!
Our hope is that once families have the opportunity to see and read one of our books, they will come back for more. In our current contest, twenty-five families will each receive the softcover book of their choice from the eighteen titles we have republished so far.* Then, we would like to bless one special family with a grand prize of a full set of all eighteen of our titles - that is approximately a $250 retail value! We are excited to be sponsoring this contest and thrilled to share our books with you. We hope you enjoy them as much as we have!

There will 26 winners for this contest!

Winners are chosen randomly.

Contest ends July 6th!

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Freebie From Robin Sampson:

I want to share with you a special book by Wayne Jacobson titled ” He Loves Me”. Its available free on my blog in ebook format. Go to my post, Daisy Petal Christianity. I hope it touches you as much as it has me.

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Enter here IntelligentFirstAid “talking” kit valued at $129.99. To enter visit sponsor and tell why you’d like to win. The giveaway will end on June 30th 2008.

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Enter here to win a (as grand prize winner) an entire Olive Kids room valued at $750 from OliveKids. To enter just fill out their form. There are also five runner up winners who receive $50 worth of product. The giveaway will end at 11:59 PST on June 30th 2008.

If you would like to keep up on other events, be sure to check out Jocelyn’s The Weekly.

Summer is right around the corner, and gardening is getting into full swing on many homesteads, backyards and pots on porches. We started gardening a few years back, and have always included anything to do with it as learning. From planting and starting seedlings to observing the fruit of the plants to taking photos of the work and the beauty.

If you have not yet planted a garden it is still not too late. You can purchase plants already started and put them into pots or a garden spot even now. We use organic seeds and plants. I have found too many things out about eating non-organics, and, well, do your own research. Since eating organic has gained popularity, they should be rather easy to find. Organic seeds can be ordered online from reputable companies.

For us, tilling such a large plot is usually the hardest part of gardening. We did buy a nice tiller last year, so it has become less of a job, but it is so important to get the ground ready so that the roots can grow deep. If your garden is small, a rake and a hoe will do the job just fine. We found some pretty nifty tools at Tractor Supply last week that are claws on the front and hoes on the backside. They are also extendable, so any of us can use them.

One thing to keep in mind is that many plants in a garden are direct-seeded, meaning that you don’t have to start them from a plant. You will want to direct-seed lettuce, spinach, corn, squash, beans, lima beans, carrots, cucumbers, and zucchini(I know that’s a squash too, but I love it!).

Vegetables that you will want to purchase as plants are: tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, broccoli, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, and onion sets. We did potatoes last year, and they are so easy.

I was asked last year where to get some Heirloom Seeds from. Here is my experience from the past year or so…. We use organic and Heirloom seeds, so I thought I would give you some links.

We order many of our organic seeds from Seeds of Change out of NM. My Dad ordered ours and his. He ordered from them, because they are solely organic and he wanted to support solely organic growers. He also bought some organic seeds at Lowe’s from Ferry Morse.

Gardens Alive! has organic seeds and chemical-free insecticides, fertilizers and such. We ordered through them last year, and I was happy with them. You could also look at Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds Co. Underwood Gardens has hard-to-find, open’pollinated and heirloom seeds. They also have a safe seed pledge not to knowingly sell chemically-engineered seeds, etc.

Children love to play in the dirt, so planting a garden is an easy one to get them involved in. what aplace to teach your children the beauty and omnipotence of God’s creation. If you are interested in ways to use gardening as a unit study, I posted about it: Gardening 101 - You *Can* Teach Your Children!!

An excellent resource I have found for gardening that is easy to read for adults and children alike is Square-Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew.

Contests:

For a May Contest: This month’s contest is geared towards the kids; however, anyone can take part!! The last day to enter is May 31st. To participate, find the very close up pictures on the blog and figure out what they are. On May 31st, email the answers to us at contests@centurytel.net. The prize is Volume 1 of Patch the Pirate’s Story & Song Treasure Box. The winner will be drawn from all correct entries on June 2nd. Complete rules (and a better explanation) can be found at There Is A Season.

Ok, I really don’t *want* to share this, but for all of you mommas who have Littles 4 or 5 and under… here is a contest you do not want to miss: Win the Ergo Baby Carrier of your choice in our Spring 2008 Contest! No purchase necessary to enter & win! Just CLICK HERE to enter by midnight on May 30, 2008. Winner of the free Ergo Baby Carrier will be picked at random from all correct entries.

Don’t forget that my sweet graduating daughter, Miss Amanda Dixon, is hosting a fun giveaway for homeschool Seniors class of 2008! She is giving away some class of 2008 t shirts from The Homeschool Boutique! Be sure to swing over and check it out.

So there…. you still have a few days to enter these contests. Go check them out!

Carnivals for this week:

Carnival Of Homeschooling #126: End of the School Year? Or Is It? at Walking Therein. Come on over and join me!

The Homesteading Carnival is up ap Grandma Rosie’s Texas home. Take a look at the 51st Homesteading Carnival ……..Summers on it’s way.

That is all for this Memo Monday! Have a fabulous week, and get out and get dirty with your children this summer!

Growing in Grace Magazine is having a special contest for daughters age 18 and under to submit a small essay to say what makes their mother so special. This is a great opportunity for daughters to have a gift to give their mother for that special day. The prize package includes:

Some prizes are coming in and here is a sneek peek at what
C.S. Flowers is offering the winner! (U.S. Resident only)

Also we have an e-Book on menu planning that was donated by Graham Family Ministries.

We also have a lovely little goody basket full of stationary (note pad, scrapbooking stickers, shopping list pad, pink note cards, Mary Engelbreit Journal, and garden note cards), a $5 Starbuck’s gift card, a Semi-Precious Stone heart charm necklace with additional charms, AND that’s not all!

You’ll also get a KJV New Testament pocket Bible, and a fun book for mom, ‘Death of a Six Foot Teddy Bear’. A fun little book on Girlfriends ‘Moments of connection’

A Season’s Best Recipe cookbook from Pampered Chef.

Also you’ll get a Strawberry and a Cherry Lip Balm from Burt Bee’s, as well as their Mini Lotion kit.

Prize Package valued at approx. $100

This is a wonderful way to show your mom and the whole world how much your mother means to you. Please pass this news onto your friends and invite others to join us. Here are two graphics you may use:

BUT WAIT! There’s more! If you blog about this on your sites and send us the link to your entries, we’ll enter your name FOR EACH BLOG you post this on, into the drawing. So help spread the word for a greater chance to win!

Also, keep in mind that GGM accepts submissions from Christian girls. It’s a wonderful opportunity for a young homeschool girl to write for the Lord and learn about journalism as well. So come on by and enter for your chance to win!

~~~~~~~~~~~Mark your calendar~~~~~~~~~~~

Carnivals:

–>Judy of Consent Of The Governed will be hosting the next Carnival of Homeschooling.

–>The Charlotte Mason Carnival is at Liberty and Lily.

–>The Homesteading Carnival is at Shades of Pink this week.

–>The next Carnival of Principled Government is to be held at She’s Right.  Here is the handy dandy carnival submit form.

–>The Carnival of School Politics and Philosophy is up over at Bell Work Online.

–>This week’s Carnival of Space is up at Dynamics of Cats.

Contests:

*COH Icon - Graphics Contest at Why Homeschool*

• Don’t forget the Cates are holding a contest for icons for The Carnival of Homeschooling!  Why Homeschool’s Carnival of Homeschooling Graphics Contest

*Dianne asks, “Ready for a Contest?” *

• and challenges you to participate and enunciate something great to shoot for as a goal in 2008. You can even abbreviate, and please don’t be late. Contest ends 12:00 midnight on Thursday, January 31, 2008.

*“Write Like Mike” Homeschool Writing Contest * 

• Calling all homeschoolers who think they can “Write Like Mike.” Know any sports-crazy children between the ages of 8-12? Get them to write a sports column about a local or national event (250 words or less) and have them enter Walden Media/The Old Schoolhouse Magazine’s “Write Like Mike” Contest for an opportunity to have their sports column published in an upcoming issue of The Old Schoolhouse Magazine!  SUBMISSION DEADLINE: February 14, 2008

*MamaArcher Book Giveaway*

• MamaArcher is having a giveaway! To enter, leave a comment. If you want a second entry, please post about his on your blog & link back to this post. Please leave a comment HERE with the url of that post. The last day for entries is February 3rd. The winner will be announced on Feb. 4th. Good luck & spread the word! She is offering the following book: Upper Grade Phonics by Joyce Codesa, Sarah McFadden Fornara, Jan Martin, and Norm Sneller

*Heart of the Matter Online Homeschooling Mag Homeschool Care Package Contest*

• Sometimes it is just a bit hard to get back into the swing of things after the holidays so how about a Homeschool care package to bring a little excitement back?  One lucky winner will receive a very well-stocked homeschool care package!

*Heart of Wisdom E-Book Contest*

• I have not yet even blogged about the HOW E-Book I won in this contest! A Free Book Random Drawing will be held every Monday through the months of December and January starting December 10. Each week, THREE Heart of Wisdom subscribers will be randomly selected to receive one FREE Homeschool Book from Homeschool-Books.com. We will offer a new title each week. 1st place will receive the tree book 2nd and 3rd place will receive the Ebooks.

~~~~~~~~~~~Participate in~~~~~~~~~~~~

*January SWAP TIME!*

It is time to sign up for the January SWAP! Leave a comment and let Heather know you want to participate. If you have never participated in a swap, Check out our past SWAP Posts here at HSBA. Chances are they will answer all of your questions and more. Oh, and if you swapped in the past and forgot to send in your link, it isn’t too late! We would love to add your post showcasing your swap gift to our past posts. People still like to click back and see all the gifts, so by all means - share! 
  

*The Winter Reading Challenge*

Trish’s Winter Reading Challenge is from Jan. 7th - March 17th, 2008. It’s not really a contest, but Trish is giving away a $25 Amazon gift certificate to one participant!
You need to read her original post so you know what to do, like sign Mr. Linky with a direct link to your post once you’ve had a chance to make a list of the books you intend to read between January 7 and March 17, 2008. Also, As an added incentive, she will be sending one lucky participant a $25 gift certificate to (where else?) Amazon.com. She’ll do a random drawing from the names of everyone who posts both an initial list by Monday, February 11, 2008 and a post about their results at the end of the challenge. The drawing will be held Monday, March 17, 2008 sometime in the evening. The winner’s name will be posted after the drawing. :)I am making a list of books I want to read this year. I will be adding to it as I go, and I will try to complete as many as I can in the WRC time. Please go to her original post to get all the details! 

*Homeschooling Boys Website and Yahoo Group*

HomeschoolingBoys.com is a site I just found a couple of weeks ago. It is a site for homeschool families with boys and covers topics from homeschool issues to discipline to field trips. There is a Yahoo Group you can Click to join here!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Take A Look~~~~~~~~~~~~~

English and Grammar Curriculum: 

English for the Thoughtful Child 1 is an English/Writing for children ‘Grades: 3-4′. A Simply Grammar-like course for a younger child following the Charlotte Mason approach from Greenleaf Press. It contains everything you need for language arts - wholesome classic literature excerpts, narration, dictation, memorization, and composition. Lessons are self-contained and the book is very easy to use with short, manageable exercises and assignments. Like Simply Grammar, this volume is also a revision of an older book, complete with quaint, but stimulating, period illustrations.

English for the Thoughtful Child 2 is the English/Writing for children ‘Grades: 3-4′. This sequel contains all the distinctive features of the original. It contains nature lessons, oral composition, picture lessons, memory work, and a gentle introduction to grammar, all centered around the development of writing skills.

Simply Grammar by Charlotte Mason and Karen Andreola is an expanded version of Charlotte Mason’s First Grammar Lessons. The exercises use Miss Mason’s method of narration. Most work is oral, but any of it can be written. One grammar rule is taught per lesson, and all exercises that follow refer to the rule. Your child will learn to create his own sentences, describe pictures, and tell stories using all the important parts of speech. It is nonconsumable, and can be used for a several-year program, and will enhance any language course. For 4th to 8th grade.  

Easy Grammar
I used this for my girls in high school. It is actually available for all grades. In the high school workbook, students start by learning a list of prepositions. Then, by identifying and crossing out prepositions and prepositional phrases, students can see the core of each sentence. Concepts are presented in small, understandable increments, followed practice pages. It is a complete grammar course. I had the girls do their worksheets and correct them themselves. We did the pages that they needed to complete what they already knew.  The workbook pages and tests are reproducible for families, although you will probably want to purchase the student workbooks because of the sheer volume of copying involved (200-300+ pages). Tests can be reproduced from the teacher book or a test booklet purchased for convenience.

Reading Fiction:

These are some of our favorite reads. I tried to categorize them into the best age groups, but many of them fit into any category, so you will have to see how it fits for you!

Blackberry Hollow by Paul Peabody

The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame

Little Faith by Mrs. O.F. Walton A young child on the streets in the last century, the little orphan girl learns to trust people agin.

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery Oh, the lovely stories of Anne with an e, the little orphan on Prince Edward Island, who finds the real meaning of family.

Jeb Stuart by Gertrude Hecker Winders A true story about a famous American boy in the saddle.

The Bronze Bow by Elizabeth George Speare The scene is Jerusalem, the time is of Christ, the characters are realistic, and you will love this historical fiction.

Sign of the Beaver by Elizabeth George Speare A young family in Colonial times must make a choice to leave their young son in Indian country to get their entire family to their new claim in Maine.

Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis Classic story of the children who find the passage to another world in the wardrobe.

Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien Classic tale of good and evil in Middle Earth. There is far too little space on this page to give this justice. I love these books.

Lamb Among the Stars series by Chris Walley  Amanda loves with this series. It is a fully realized futuristic sci-fi/fanatasy epic. If you are interested in this series, “One thing about this series is in order to understand what is going on, you have to take yourself out of our sinful world and imagine a place where there is no sin and “The King Reigns”.”` Read The Lamb Among Stars Series.

A book for moms or dads that I am reading again… and all the way through this time, is Preparing Sons to Provide for a Single Income Family by Steven Maxwell.  Though this is not a fiction selection, I really wanted to let you know about this one! For a detailed list of what I am reading for the Winter Reading Challenge, read My Books 2008.
 

New Online Homeschool Magazine: The Heart of the Matter 

The purpose of The Heart of the Matter is to provide a place for homeschooling parents and teachers to find all of the resources they desire in one convenient location.  It is our hope that you will find inspiration, practical advice, objective reviews of curriculum and products, fantastic giveaways and more! Please take time to read this wonderful online magazine. There are so many writers over there you will consider friends already. Those you don’t know, well, it will be well worth your time to get to know them!
 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~Take a Moment~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pray for Homeschool Families: 

Heather, who is beating brain cancer. Read her testimony at Especially Heather.

Tristan Irwin, a two-year-old with Leukemia, and his family.

Lindafay’s family is being forced to leave their beloved home in Turkey. This is the land their children know as home. Please pray for them as they leave this land and people who hold a special place in their hearts, as well as their safety as they travel.

Thanks for joining me for this week’s Memo Monday. I hope I am giving you a good list to work with. If you have any ideas for Monday Monday, let me know. Is there a list you want to see kept up on or to let other homeschool moms know about?

Have a wonderful week!  Blessings!