Here is one of my favorite pictures from the Biloxi trip. You can click on it and make it bigger.



More pictures are up on my family website . Follow the links on the bottom of the home page to "photos" for some beach pictures and check out the "pets" page for more pictures of the new hermit crab that I bought for William. It's named Miss Piggy since the other one is named Kermie :)

My mom called me about a week ago and asked if I wanted to head to Biloxi to see David Copperfield. She had tickets and my dad wasn't able to attend, so I took his place. We headed off on Saturday morning. The travelling party included my mom, me, my cousin's grandmother (father's side, not related to me), and one of her friends. My cousin's grandmother goes to Biloxi quite a bit and had some room comps at two hotels and some food comps. My cousin (his grandmother was the one travelling with us), two of my brothers and a girlfriend followed later and met us at the hotel. Just 2 exits from Biloxi the car started sputtering and my mom was able to pull over into the emergency lane. The car had run out of gas. She'd forgotten that the gauge was faulty. We called AAA for gas but before they came a guy stopped and offered to give my mom a ride. She declined and asked for him to get us some gas. He came back with the gas and even poured it into the car. I'd like to thank Drew, the Marine on the way to Houston, for helping us out :)

The Isle of Capri is a beautiful hotel. Unfortunately, I didn't have my license, and even though I am WAY over 21 I had to have escorts to go through the casino to the hotel every time, and the shortcut to the garage was through the casino. Otherwise I would have to walk out the front door of the hotel - and it was COLD - and around the corner to the garage.

We got there around lunch time and ate at a deli in the hotel. My cousin then called on my mom's cellphone and told his his grandmother's car that he was driving had broken down about 6 miles down the road. He put some water in the engine and managed to get to the hotel, but it was steaming when he parked and it was obvious the car would have to be towed back home.

Around 3pm I was totally beat as I'd worked for 4 hours before we left, so I'd been up for over 24 hours by then. I headed up to our room and left the ladies in the casino. My mom was also helping to arrange for the rest of the rooms we were supposed to have and she checked on our Copperfield tickets.

I slept until just after 6. We met up with my brothers, the girlfriend and my cousin. We were all going to the show together and we still needed tickets for one brother and his girlfriend. The shuttle to the hotel only came by every 45 minutes so we had to wait a while. We made arrangements with one brother and my cousin to meet us between 8:30 and 9 - the show was to start at 9:30 - and then we caught the shuttle and headed to the Beau Rivage.

The Beau Rivage is absolutely gorgeous. It's a huge hotel with so many stores. We stopped in a jewelry store and admired the $115 picture frames encrusted with diamonds and the spinning rings. My mom bought the tickets for brother and girlfriend then we headed to the deli in the back of the casino. I didn't get carded this time - I guess I looked over 21 :) The food was excellent and the desserts were so beautiful. We ate and talked and by then it was almost 8:30 so we headed to the lobby to wait on 2nd brother and cousin. Mine and my mom's tickets had been purchased by my cousin, so he had to pick up the tickets.

At 9 they hadn't shown up so we sent brother and girlfriend into the theater and we waited some more. At 5 after they showed up and we were able to get into the theater. The theater was pretty small, which I loved because we were able to see the stage all around. My brother and his girlfriend got seats on the floor so they had a very good view.

The show started late but it was worth it! David Copperfield totally rocks \m/ And the man still looks exactly as he did on TV when I was, like, 10. I always thought he was very handsome and yep, he is :) There was some innuendo in his show, but nothing overboard. There were a lot of kids there. I had no idea the man was so funny. His illusions were outstanding and well worth the trip for the show. He ended it with an illusion that made it seem as though he and an audience member travelled to the Phillipines. My brother is studying video production, and he believes the illusion was partly pre-recorded, partly green-screen, but he agreed that it was very well done and said that well-done green screen doesn't look like it's green screen.

After the show we used some of the meal comps to order room service. We had coconut shrimp, carmelized corn, broccoli & cheese, garlic bread, garlic potatoes and cheesecake. It was fabulous.

Sunday we checked out of our hotel and took brother and girlfriend out to take pictures. We left brother, cousin and the other ladies at the casino. My brother's girlfriend goes to the Art Institute of Atlanta with my brother and she's studying photography. She's working on her portfolio for school. We went to the roof of the parking garage in 2 hotels and out on the beach. They took some fabulous pictures with the digital camera as well as her regular camera. Based on my brother's advice I took a picture of a bench on the boardwalk at the beach with the shadow falling behind. I think it looks pretty good - the pic will be uploaded soon - but my brother took pictures of the same bench and they are so much better. He definitely has an eye for photography as well. There was absolutely no one on the beach and you can feel how cold it was just by looking at the picture.

We met everyone at the hotel at lunchtime and started arranging for the broke down car to be towed. My dad owns a wrecker service and they are also members of AAA, but my dad had already been working all weekend and didn't want drive 5+ hours to get the car. So we arranged for a driver to tow the car from Biloxi up 100 miles into Alabama. My dad was going to meet us there and we'd head on home. My cousin had to rent a car to drive everyone else back home and it took a long time to find a rental place that would do a one-way rental. We had to head back before everyone else because we had to follow the wrecker from Biloxi.

We met my dad in Alabama and then headed on up the road. We stopped for a late supper at a Waffle House where I showed off William's new hermit crab, Miss Piggy. It has since joined Kermie in the aquarium :) The others caught up with us there but they didn't stop, they headed towards Columbus to turn in the car and meet with my other brother who was driving up to pick them up. I ended up riding back with my dad in his wrecker as he needed someone to help keep him awake. I didn't do much good, though, because I ended up falling asleep :(

We got home after 1am and I greeted Scott and William, then headed to bed. It was a nice weekend, but definitely a long drive for just one day.

I found this while surfing Blog Explosion - a nice analogy about love.

For science we're about to start discussing cell structure. I found some interesting sites to use to help with the study:

Cells Alive!
Discovery School Lesson on Cells with Video
A simple site about cells

I know that I still have a few years before I need to think about high school, but I'm pretty sure that we'll use a correspondence course when the time comes. I did some research the other night and I think we're going to use James Madison High School.

Here is a site I used when I took CLEP tests - you get to practice for free!

Miriam-Webster Online

William found this site about how mummies are made

World Factbook has a lot of information about geography

This is the site selling hoverboard plans. William wants to buy the plans with his birthday money and then we'll build the hoverboard as money allows.




I could have sworn I was nerdier than 58%! I guess I have a ways to go still.

My baby boy is 11 today! I usually post a birthday message and tell a story about his birth or something else. Today I'd like to share a poem I wrote when he was in first grade. It's called "Mama's Kisses".

As I held my newborn baby boy
I kissed his cheek, weeping with joy
I stared with wonder at what God had made
and whispered to him, "Mama's kisses never fade."

Soon he grew but still enjoyed
being Mama's pride and joy
While I knew time and memories would quickly fade
I would tell him daily "Mama's kisses never go away."

As he grew older with each kiss he'd quickly swipe
A hand across his face.
He'd tell me, "No kisses!" as he laughed, wiping them
away.
But I reminded him that Mama's kisses would always
stay.

As he grows I know the kisses will be further apart.
However, each kiss will be etched on my heart.
And as he lives his own life week by week
He'll remember the kisses Mama left on his cheek.

One day I'll weep again when I see him marry
And another love on his heart he'll carry.
Still I know his Mama's kisses aren't being replaced.
His wife will only add her loving kisses to his face.

Well, it's not the 100 points that seems to keep eluding me, but I did get 50 points!



On another note, William's birthday is on Wednesday. He'll be 11. We had his party this past Saturday at my mom's house. She made a mule head cake out of a soldier cake pan that I borrowed from a friend. I should have some pictures up on the family site soon.

It's Friday and that means it's the end of another great week!

For math we are still working on multiplication. Thanks to Tulip Girl I have some great sites and information to help us along. We also touched on liquid measurements.

In English we're continuing with report writing and information finding. This has helped out with the Adventure Club reports that are done each month. The exercises currently are helping explain and expand on ideas to write about.

In Science we are studying animals and their behavior. We did a few experiments to see what behavior is inborn and what is learned. We discussed how our dogs are conditioned by hearing the sound of the leash coming off its peg and how they respond. There was also a short discussion on Pavlov and his experiments and on Dr. Jane Goodall. Science co-op hasn't started back yet, so we'll continue working through our textbook until then.

We've read a few stories as well. We read another 2 chapters about Ben Franklin in Poor Richard. We read more of Kon Tiki. We are at the point where they are getting ready for the voyage and trying to gather supplies. We read more of Minn of the Mississippi and talked about the amount of time she's been in the river and where she's gone. We hope to make a trip to Missouri in September and we should travel over the Mississippi during that trip.

Today was Adventure Club. All the kids did a wonderful job on their reports about China. There were 2 reports about the animals of China that included Panda bears and Chinchillas. There was a report about the art in China. William's report was about the government of China.

Karate was attended once this week and Sensei Bob hopes to test William again at the end of January.

Looking forward to another great week...

Just stopping in on my way to bed tonight. I have to say that the past 2 days on my new schedule has worked out pretty well. We've done the basics daily and managed to work in the readings as well. I like to ask William what his favorite part of the day is and yesterday, on the way to karate, he said "Well, I'm surprised to be saying this, but it was math." Yep, he said math! I know it was mostly because we used the whiteboard, but I'll take what I can get.

We jumped headfirst into multiplication yesterday. I started by writing out a few problems like 2+2+2 and 3+3+3. I then wrote the problems as multiplication, 2x3 and 3x3. He caught on right away that they were the same problems. We did some review today of basic addition, money adding and subtracting and word problems. Then we went back over the 2 times tables. These past 2 days have been the best math lessons ever! It's amazing how taking some time off a topic when a child is having difficulty can totally surprise you when you get back to that topic. I was SO dreading multiplication but now it's exciting!

We watched the Back to the Future Trilogy when it was on TV over the weekend and decided to google the hoverboard shown in BTTF2 and 3. It was fake in the movie, of course, but I was surprised to find the many websites talking about how it may work in the future. The hoverboard in the movie was supposed to work with repulsing magnetic energy, like when you have 2 magnets that repel each other. We found a site that offers plans to build a hoverboard. It's not magnets, it's a basic electric or gas engine with some type of bag on the bottom. It glides on air over almost any surface. William wants to build one as a science project and possibly enter a science fair. Anything relating to science or an experiment gets him excited.

I'd like to close out with a request for anyone who remembers programming BASIC programs in DOS. When I was in 8th grade in Quest class we studied computers. We had a book with BASIC programs that you typed into DOS and when you told them to run it did things like make your name scroll across the page diagonally or something. William watched The Magic School Bus the other day and it was on computers. He asked a lot of questions about our computers so I thought it would be fun to find some type of BASIC program like what I had done in 8th grade, but I can't find anything. Anyone have anything like that laying around from days gone by or know any sites that could be useful?

Student Suspended Over Hit List from channel 11 in Atlanta tonight.

I saw this on Headlines from the Tonight Show. Check out this product. Now I know it's for a nursery, but doesn't it remind you of a kennel?

First week back and we're still behind. Uggh.

We're still working on the report on China. It's due Friday afternoon at Adventure Club. I think I'm learning more about China than William. Math is being added back into the plan tomorrow. We are leaping into multiplication tomorrow. He already knows a little, so hopefully we can grow on that knowledge.

We watched another TLC Elementary School program. This one included information on the planets and the moon. We talked about how the moon controlled the tides and found a great site that listed tide information. The site had predictions along with the actual tide depth. Most predictions were pretty close. We also compared the tide depth in California (3ft +) to the depth in Georgia (1ft+) and why they are so different. We also visited this site and read about the Jupiter probe and looked at more pictures of one of the moons.

I really want to add music and art into our week but just mentioning classical music makes William cringe. I think I need to start slow with that. Maybe a trip to the museum in Columbus would be good. If I wasn't so scared of Atlanta traffic I'd go to the Van Gogh exhibit. Maybe we will do that anyway, we can park at the airport and take Marta into town.

I need to do state paperwork tomorrow and get it in the mail as well as plan out the rest of our week. Dh is home for 2 days and we have a dog pen to finish building and William wants to do a science experiment tomorrow. We also plan to visit the alligator at the fish hatchery.

William and dh played chess tonight and William won! He was thrilled.

I know, the title should be "For Whom Do You Blog?" but since I don't talk that way and I want this blog to be my "voice", such as it is, I chose to use what I would actually say instead of what is correct when written. I do this because I believe I write for myself so I want to sound like myself. While I do try to be sure that spelling and basic grammar is correct - I mean, homeschoolers are judged and if I, God forbid, misspell a word or use your instead of you're or some other type of error then it must mean I'm not capable of teaching my child. This blog is me, even in the respect of spelling and grammar, because I'm the type that will wince at seeing a changeable ad copy sign at a store with a word spelled incorrectly and will even correct handwritten signs if given the opportunity - such as erasing the "e" from "potato" at my chiropractor's office over Thanksgiving.

I ask this question because I noticed that some of the people whose blogs I used to read have decided to stop blogging for the new year. Now it could be many reasons. It could be that life has intervened and they are too busy. It could be that the computer is down and cannot be replaced soon. It could be a lack of interest in blogging anymore. Basically for whatever reason a person decided to stop a blog is their own business. But if someone is stopping a blog because they don't feel appreciated or wanted or cared about or feel they are read enough by an ever fickle blog reading society, well, I guess that's their right, but then why did they start to blog anyway? If someone starts a blog thinking of the possiblity of fame and fortune and book deals or sales for your business or network contacts and that doesn't come to pass then of course you'll be disappointed. What is your goal with your blog? That is the question and only you can answer that.

I started an online diary first on my family website when we first started homeschooling. I wanted to keep track of what was going on in our lives during that time and also think some things out. I've found that writing helps that process for me. I had never heard the word "blog". I'd done a google search on "homeschool journal" and "homeschool diary" and found precious few journals and diaries online, and the ones I found hadn't been updated in 1-2 years. So my goal at that time - and I believe this is the same goal I have today - is to record my experiences as a newbie, first time homeschooling mom. My beginning diary and this blog has done that now for almost 2 years. A secondary goal is that maybe, somewhere out there, another mom that is considering homeschooling may google "homeschool journal" or "homeschool diary", find my site and enjoy reading about my beginner experiences. A lot of homeschool material online is from veteran homeschoolers. That is good, because we need to learn and get ideas from those that have gone before us, but I also wanted to know about the experiences of other homeschooling beginners. Were you scared? Did you take your kids out of school? What prompted that decision? How did you decide on a curriculum? Did you make the right choice for you? Those were all the questions that I had and I could not find a satisfactory answer. So, in writing my online diary I hoped to show other newbie homeschooling moms what the first few days, months, and year was like for me.

After I'd kept my online diary for just over a year I discovered that the owner of a site I frequented had started a "blog" and I followed the shortcut to blogger. A lot of people don't like blogger but compared to typing out my entries in HTML and publishing them to my site it was so much easier. I played around with my template, changed the colors, found the cool-to-me java script that turns everything backwards (that my art institute brother learning web design hates :), learned to add links and other neat stuff and started keeping my online diary here. I still have the same goals for my blog today that I had when I first started my online diary. While I do enjoy being read and being able to write my rather lengthy opinion pieces I do this because I enjoy it. And isn't that all that really matters?

I found this link today : Discovery School/
I started taping TLC Elementary School in the mornings on TLC and as part of science class today we watched on of the videos. The video consisted of 3 short films about science related topics - today it was the four seasons, the life of butterflies, and a temperate rain forest. I got the site from the video. It has many lesson plans for all age groups and a lot of information. I hope someone finds the site useful. I know I'm going to spend a lot of time exploring it as I don't have a science curriculum right now.

We started back today. We're keeping it light this week so far, so it was mostly reading today, although we did do one experiment at William's request. Here are William's words about what we did today.

Science experiment - We're doing an experiment using a small amount of steel wool in a test tube. Boil water and let it cool. Pour the cooled water into the test tube, almost to the top. Then pour a small amount of cooking oil over the top of the water. This continues to cut off the oxygen to the steel wool. After about 2 hours it was barely rusted.

History - Sir Humphrey was a warrior and an adventurer. Queen Elizabeth let him explore but another queen did not, so he had to work for someone else for money. He went exploring with five ships and all but one, The Golden Hind, were drowned in the sea. Sir Humphrey was on the ship called the Squirrel that went down - no one knows how.

Princess and the Goblin - Curdie is my favorite character because he works in the mine and barely gets paid. He almost gets eaten by goblins after spying on them and he's getting into trouble with them again.

Minn of the Mississippi - I'm surprised at how far she came. Surprised that she's come over 1000 miles in about 20 years. The favorite person she's met is the boy who painted Minn on her shell.

Writing a report - First get on the internet and go to a website called Google that helps you look up other websites. Type in the names you want then tell Google to search. Click on the website you want to go to and start reading the site for stuff for your report. Then you start writing. You have a beginning, a middle and an end that you read when the report is due.

China - I don't ever want to go to China because I might be killed because I'm a Christian.