Baker Book Club

I've really enjoyed reading some great books over the past few weeks.  Both books related to the Baker Book Club, my Book Club, and just fun reading!

First up, the Baker Book Club Books.

The Girl From the Train was a book originally written in a different language.  I had started it quite awhile ago but it did not hold my interest.  It takes place during World War II and has to do with a young Jewish girl orphaned but rescued and then adopted by a family in South Africa.  It was actually a really good book once I got through the more than confusing first few chapters.  I'm glad that I did actually go back and read it and it ended really, really well.

 This was last weeks read for the Baker Book Club.  The Secret Life of Sarah Hollenbeck was a funny book that made me smile while I was reading it.  It would fit in the category of "Christian Fiction Romance" and the book is actually written about itself!  The main character in the story is a writer and, after becoming a Christian, wants to switch from writing her hot and steamy stories to writing a story that brings romance to the Christian world that is clean and fun.  She meets a new Pastor at her church and the story goes from there!  The challenge last week was to read a book by a new author to you and since I hadn't heard of this author it fit in perfectly!

 Bear Town was the book for our book club this month - we are meeting on Sunday to discuss it.  Let me tell you, this is by far one of the best books I've ever read.  It made me angry!  For real.  I was so mad as I read it and the story unfolded.  From the very first (short) first chapter, I wanted to jump to the end to find out what happened so I wouldn't be angry throughout the whole book but I forced myself to just read it.  It's the type of book that when I finished it, I wanted to reread it right away in order to see what I missed.  Now, this is not an easy read.  It is a hard read with really tough topics and some strong language.  But wow, it was amazingly written.

 These four books are all part of a series I cam across because the first book was free.  Then, the other books were all available on Kindle Unlimited as was one of the Baker Book House Books.  I decided to try Kindle Unlimited for free for one month to see if I can find enough books to read to justify the $9.99 fee each month.  I tried it once before and didn't love it.  Anyway, this series is an easy read but a great story.  One of the reasons I enjoy it is because the main character is a single woman who is about 40 years old and makes major changes in her life that bring her back home to help her family and rent a farm.  Because I was single until I was almost 30, I find books like this encouraging.  So often all books are written when the young woman finds the perfect spouse and lives happily ever after and it leaves out the single girls!  It doesn't mean that in the next book that doesn't come out until April she won't find someone but it does show that it's ok to do things on your own too. 

I just started this book yesterday.  It's a slow start but was free on Kindle Unlimited so I hope it picks up!  It was an Amazon Best Seller so I assume it will be good!

I'm trying to remember to save all of the books I read to my Pinterest Board so feel free to check it out!

Origami Week Week 5

This week, we focused on the fact that Dr. Seuss' birthday was Saturday, March 2nd. 

I opened class by reading a favorite Dr. Seuss book.

Have you read this book?  I'm not actually a big fan of Dr. Seuss.  I find his books often long and not super interesting but this book was fun to read and the kids enjoyed it too. 

Once we finished reading, I taught the students how to fold an Origami Fish (which, as they quickly learned, was not as easy as they thought it would be!).  Then the students made the following craft with their fish found at Artsy Craftsy Mom

As was the case last week, I completely forgot to take pictures of their finished projects and I leave those projects in our storage room at Friday School to put out on presentation night.  So for now, you will have to believe me when I say that they turned out really, really good! 

This week I actually had a second project planned but folding fish took the students longer than I anticipated so we didn't get to the second project.  I'll shift that one to next week plus I have one other project I hope to get to next week too!  After a slow start to the semester (and my ideas for this class) we are finally picking up speed just in time for class to be over!

Sunday Worship - He Will

Honestly, I have no idea when I heard this song - I was recently cleaning out the "notes" on my phone and came across this one listed in one of those notes.  It's a great song though and I'm glad I wrote it down!

Our Week in Photos #9

We had another quiet week this week.  On Monday, our friends had a snow day so we had a snow day too :-)  Beyond that we really stuck close to home all week!

 We started out our week celebrating Darryl's birthday Saturday and Sunday.  

We ended our week with Friday School. 

 Josh and Nate in their Grateful Hearts class. 

 Nate's fishing class. 

 The Grateful Hearts class made "Get Well Bags" and then were supposed to take them home and give them to a friend or family member. 

 The boys and their bags. 

Delivering their bags to our most wonderful neighbor Cyndi who has been sick with the flu all week.  We love Cyndi (and her whole family).  They are the best neighbors ever!  I'm thankful that this time WE could help her! 

Finally, this is Nate in his Stones and Bones class.  The students were able to bring in rocks and minerals to share with the class.  He had lots to set out on the table for showing but the ones he chose to talk about were from Brazil that my brother and sister-in-law gave him.  The best part was when the teacher asked him why he liked the rocks and he said, "Because they are from my Uncle and make me think of him."  

So, that's our week.  This time of year when we are home bound due to weather, trying to stay ahead in school, and trying to avoid everyone else that is sick, we live a pretty quiet life :-)  

Weekly Menu

Welcome to March.  I have no earthly idea where February went but it is gone and we are moving onto March.  Last weeks menu changed alot because our plans changed; weather changed; and I didn't feel like going shopping.  It's amazing what you can find in the cupboard/freezer when you don't want to go to the store HA!

Here's the plan for the coming week.

Friday:  It's Friday School day and that means I won't feel like doing much when we get home!  So, I'm putting my crock pot to good use and using it to make Chicken and Stuffing.  I'll make some green beans and crescent rolls to go with it.

Saturday:  The boys had plans to do something with Darryl for his birthday last week but we moved it to this weekend so we will eat out and do their plan :-)

Sunday: Chili  w/Spaghetti.  This was on the menu for last week and never happened.

Monday:  Crock Pot Steak Fajitas, Salad, Rice and Beans

Tuesday: Chicken Cordon Blue Pasta Bake and Rolls

Wednesday:  IF we have AWANA, we will go out to Taco Bell.

Thursday:  Leftovers or Chicken Nuggets.

February Recap

My February focus is

Strengthen our Homeschool

Part of the reason I picked this for February is that it won't take as much time and, considering I'm just getting started, I only have a half of a month to focus on it!  I also feel that if we can stay in our established routines this month now that we have missed 2 weeks of school (yes we did!! The weather has not been our friend - but it has brought extra friends to our house making school hard to do!!) that we will end the month on schedule, if not ahead of schedule. 

1. Make sure we are doing Math Minute daily, We did incorporate this is often as possible. I find that even though the boys have two hours a day to do independent work, they don't get through everything I want them too! 

2. Accomplishing our IXL goals weekly (IXL is a math/reading practice program the boys are required to do). We are trying but the boys aren't enjoying this anymore so it is becoming a challenge to get them to do it without a battle. 

3. Focus on cursive writing - the goal is to be writing in cursive by the end of May. This is part of our daily independent work. 

4. Go to the shelter and read at least once this month to the Shelter animals We never did this - between weather, snow days and just keeping up with school, there wasn't a day to do this during February. 

5. Look at some other options for homeschooling next year - do we need to change from Connections Academy?  It's the time of year to re-evaluate what we are doing. I have been doing some research and haven't made a decision about next year yet.  

6. Get the boys reading daily - I have the books and they need to read daily! YES!  I did a facebook post and got lots of great ideas.  I ordered four books and the boys have started reading. 

7. Josh needs to finish 1 Social Studies project and Nate has 4 reading journals he has to complete - I want to be on schedule with these extra projects. Josh picked both his Social Studies project and his Michigan History project, neither of which we could start this month as we aren't that far into the chapters yet.  Nate has completed the one journal related to the story he has read - he hasn't read the other three stories yet. 

Even though that's my main focus, I also have some other goals to work on as well. 

1. Add exercise to our daily schedule - we started this and then the horrible winter weather hit and "locked us in" thanks to bitter cold, lots of snow and then ice, upon ice, upon ice. We've still been frozen in this month.  Maybe March will be better!

2. The basement is always on my list.  I just have to do 15 minutes a day - that's my plan.  I know from past experience that 15 minutes a day = lots of work done.  I had good goals and then it was March HA!

3. Have a movie night at home.  We did this on this past Sunday! 

4. Find one activity to do this month as a family - my father-in-law gave us money to take the boys out to do something as a Christmas gift so we are tossing around a few ideas for that.  There is also a place called "Cat Cafe" that I think the boys would enjoy that is on my radar. We had a few plans but due to weather they didn't happen yet. 

5. Update my Holiday Journal - Superbowl and Valentines Day

6. Scrapbooking - my goal is to order pictures to finish up 2014; and then order January 2019 photos.  I also want to scrapbook both December 2014 and January 2019.  The photos are ordered! 

7. Find my song to sing at church at the end of April. 

8. Read - I'll have a book club book, a Baker Book House book club list and just general reading. I'm reading :-)  Yes, yes, yes! 

9. Plan Darryl's birthday (it's coming up quickly!) Done! 

10. Work on the idea of what class I want to teach at the co-op in the fall. I've picked it - The 13 Colonies.  Now to just plan it out.  I'm also looking at Space - if I want to teach two. 

11. Totally 100% clean the playroom (I have a motto of "organize one thing" to accomplish each month). I'd like to empty the playroom, clean the carpet, clean everything else, and then reorganize and put things back neatly. This is done :-)  (I didn't clean the carpet . . .I'll wait until I'm ready to clean the living room carpet too.) 

12. Purchase 2 items for our grinch calendar in December - I'm trying to get ahead. Nope!

13. Shipt - try to into shipt shopping to earn extra income.  It's hard to get into it started. The weather has really derailed this plan. 

14. Schedule my dental cleaning Yes!  I finally got this scheduled. 

15. Make a list of summer clothing items the boys need so we can get ahead of the game.

16. Practice piano - pick one or two songs to work on until I can play them well. 

17. Plan ahead for St. Patrick's Day - find the annual shirts and plan activities

18. Set up my 2019 Scrapbooking file folders Done. 

19. Incorporate Flylady routines. 

Food Favorites - Mexican Street Corn Casserole

This is a recipe that was on last weeks menu that I actually tried and we actually liked.  In Darryl's words - "It's corn and it's cheese, how can you not like it?"   I did cut this recipe in half and it was the perfect amount for our family.

The recipe can be found at Easy Family Recipes.

Ingredients

• 32 oz frozen corn, thawed
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1.5 tsp chili powder
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp cayenne (optional)
• 5 oz queso fresco, grated or crumbled

For Garnish

• 1/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350˚F
2. Pour the corn into a large casserole dish.  Mix in the mayo, sour cream, chili powder, garlic powder, salt, and half of the queso fresco until combined.
3. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until heated through and the sides begin to bubble.
4. Sprinkle the remaining queso fresco over the casserole and top with chopped cilantro. Enjoy!