Annette is the only one who has continued to use Rod and Staff English.

(there's suppose to be a picture here of Annette completing a R&S lesson but since I can't copy and past from LiveWriter (long story) I don't know where it is so here's another picture of her).

Yay, I found the picture that was suppose to go here.

I love Rod and Staff and wished it would have worked for my younger boys.

My Ethan. He’s such a sweet boy.

Lance was upset because I accidentally gave his brother his coffee by accident. Ethan barely touched the straw but Lance wouldn’t drink it.

The coffee that was mistakenly given to Ethan.

It’s the little things like having Zevia  delivered to our door that makes my kiddos happy. Each were able to pick out four flavors.

The kids like to get their school done on my bed. Usually it’s Annette but this day I found Caleb.

His work.

He likes to listen to his tunes when doing school. I wonder though how much he retains this way.

Ethan completing his ACE Bible PACE.

He reads the assigned Bible passage then answers the questions. I like how he has to go back and skim his Bible to find the answer. Sometimes he copies a verse. I’ll have to blog more about it.

Photo shoot with our latest review item, Cursive Logic.

Baked a low-carb cake. It was so yummy. I’ll have to make it again and share the recipe and take more pictures.

Mom and Josh at Starbucks. I love being a mom.

Half Price

One of our favorite hang-outs!

Latin Anyone?

I have been wanting to teach my children Latin for years now. Really, like since Josh started homeschooling but . . .

I would start and not finish. I would buy a Latin program, sell, and repurchase, ack! Crazy homeschooling mama!

Currently I am teaching Latin to one student, Ethan. I really hope we continue with it. It really isn’t taking that long to do the lessons.

I want to start Latin with Lance too and every week I tell myself, “Next week I’ll get started with Lance”. So far it hasn’t happened. Life has been so busy with non-school stuff.

We are loving IEW. Lance is using Fix It! Grammar.

And both of my youngest boys are using IEW Level A. I’m so excited about this one. After years of thinking this program is too much, I think I’m ready to just go with it. I want to get my two middle boys back to using it since I have Level B (thanks to the Crew).

Next week Brent and I start a 1:1 Bible study. I’m pretty excited to do something with just the two of us.

A few weeks I’m excited that Lance will start Cursive Logic. I’m really praying that this will improve his writing.

I want Lance not only use cursive in his workbook but be able to use it when writing in other subjects.

Dissecting a Fish

Lance wanted in on the fun and showed up fully equipped with goggles and gloves.

Of course he was being his funny self.

Ready to take on the fish (not that he did any of the cutting).

Heart of Dakota’s 9th grade year science is actually not Biology. Annette wanted to do Biology with Josh this year so she wouldn’t have to handle the dead animals as much but surprisingly she’s the one that does most the cutting.

Everything is set and ready to go.

My daughter ready to get started.

Love her cute smile.

I don’t think the fish was as excited as the kids!

Schoolhouse Review: FishFlix.Com

My whole family was excited when I told them we were chosen to review Unbroken Legacy of Faith Edition by FishFlix.com! Unbroken was our Friday Night Movie watch list.

Review item: Unbroken Legacy of Faith Edition DVD which comes with extra bonus content.

Company name: FishFlix

Review helpers: the whole family

About FishFlix: FishFlix is a family-owned Christian company founded by a Turkish gentleman named Enis Sakirgil.  He was asked to help produce a documentary called Apostle Paul and the Earliest Churches by one of his pastoral mentors.

Dr. Sakirgil immigrated to Amercia, he began selling the Apostle Paul movie. Eventually he started selling other Christian movies online and that is how FishFlix came to be. 

One of FishFlix ministries it to see some of their earning be used to fund God’s work in the least reached places of the world. The company seeks to glorify God by hard work and great customer service, living out Colossians 3:33 “Working for the Lord and not men”.

What I like about FishFlix is if your order totals $35.00 shipping is free and when you sign up for their newsletter you will receive a coupon code for 10% off your order. How generous is that! My daughter Annette and I have our eye’s on a few more movies from FishFlix.

About Unbroken: Unbroken is an Academy Award winner movie directed by Angelina Jolie. It’s based on the incredible true story of Loius Zamperini’s life from when he was a young boy (causing and getting into trouble) to an adult who survives a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp during WWII.

As a young boy growing up in California during the 1920’s Louis (Louie) was often in trouble. One time he painted the inside of a small milk jug white so when he drank liquor people would think he was innocently drinking milk. His parents were besides themselves not understanding why Louis was misbehaving and getting in trouble with the local police.

Thankfully Louis had an older brother who saw that he had a gift for running. His brother encouraged Louis to join his school track team instead of using his gift running from the law! He eventually became one of the greatest runners of America competing at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. Adolf Hitler requested to see the boy with “the fast legs”.

During WWII Louis joins the the Army and serves as a B-24 Liberator bombardier. On a rescue mission his plane goes down. He and two other men survive on a raft for 47 days!!! Eventually two end up in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp. It was there where one Japanese officer called The Bird tormented him physically and mentally almost daily.

Unbroken Legacy of Faith Edition: The Story Behind the Film from FishFlix also includes:

• Coming Full Circle: Louie’s Exclusive CBN Interview
• Faith Lesson: Louie Discusses the Faith of that sustained him
• Captured by Grace: The Billy Graham Evangelical Association and Louie Zamperini give an inspirational message of faith
• Louie and Laurie: Pastor Greg Laurie interview Louie Zamperini

It’s in these extra interviews where you really get the whole story and what Louis went through. It truly is an amazing story of survival and forgiveness. You know, Louie didn’t forgive right away. He hated The Bird for years. This hate almost destroyed him but thankfully Louie came to know Christ and the power of forgiveness.

When I received Unbroken in the mail I noticed that the back of the DVD said, “NOT RATED: This edited version contains material different from the original theatrical version.”

I hadn’t watched Unbroken before so I couldn’t compare the FishFlix copy to another. I decided to email the vendor to find out because I wanted to share what was different with you all. I got a prompt reply saying that nothing was cut from the film (customer service A+ for super fast & friendly)

My only concern with watching Unbroken was the rear male nudity scene. I warned my daughter (so she could cover her eyes or look away). Guess what?!?! This is the scene that is different from the original. The backsides of the men are all blurred so you don’t see nude males, yay!

The rating for this movie is PG-13 because of the rear male nudity (which is blurred out in the FishFlix version) and violence. Louis is beaten, hit with a pole, wounded when the plane crashed, so you will want to keep that in mind with who you allow to see it.

If you haven’t watched Unbroken or would like to own it I highly recommend you purchase it from FishFlix. For $19.97 you get their exclusive bonus DVD: The Story Behind the Film.

At our house all of us watched Unbroken together including my 10 and 12 year old sons. Lupe and I were fine with this because we have watched many documentaries regarding wars throughout history. If the movie was going to focus on only beating, had lots of blood and gore than we wouldn’t have had the younger two watch it.

And the extra DVD: The Story Behind the Film was a great addition. My daughter and I watched it together. You really get to know Louie Zamperini and his story.

Schoolhouse Review: Homeschool Legacy

Unit studies, the very words bring mixed feeling about schooling in this style. I’m not creative at all nor do I want to do all the foot work with putting one together so thankfully there is Homeschool Legacy. They make it easy with their Once-a-week unit studies. Here at Homeschooling6 we have been reviewing their We the People: Getting to Know Your Constitution.

What I received: a digital copy of We the People: Getting to Know Your Constitution

Company name: Homeschool Legacy

Review helpers: Ethan 12 and Lance 10 years old and part timer helpers Caleb 14 and Brent 13

These once-a-week unit studies are great if you are like me and don’t want to do a full blown unit study. It’s the perfect way to take a break from your regular studies and NOT feel like you’ll fall behind if you do. Homeschool Legacy really came up with a grand idea with having a unit study one day a week.

What is a Once-A-week unit from Homeschool Legacy? It’s a cross-curricula study that includes: Bible, geography, read aloud, history, science, field trip suggestions, family movie night, Stump Your Dad Trivia questions, and more! And it’s all put together for you in this 8 week study (not all Once-A-Week Unit Studies are 8 weeks).

In the We the People: Getting to Know Your Constitution your child will learn:

• Week 1-The State of the New Nation
• Week 2-The Constitutional Convention
• Week 3-Your Bill of Rights
• Week 4-The Legislative Branch
• Week 5-The Executive Branch
• Week 6-The Judicial Branch
• Week 7-Amending the Constitution
• Week 8-Your National Studies

What’s great about these once-a-week unit studies is you can use your library. No need to purchase anything more (unless your like me and will take any excuse to purchase more books!). Sharon the author provides the dewy decimals  making it even easier to find the books at your local library.

My daughter Annette would request the book online and all we had to do was pick them up. How easy and convenient is that!

Homeschool Legacy provides a sample schedule of how they used it.

Monday: complete your regular studies but read the read aloud from Homeschool Legacy (and if you can’t obtain the read aloud that is suggested you can use any book that is similar with the time period and theme). Have your child do their independent reading using a book from the library list provided.

Tuesday: continue with your regular studies, read aloud and independent reading book selection from Homeschool Legacy.

Wednesday: instead of doing your daily studies you will use Homeschool Legacy for family devotions, read aloud, independent reading, and any of the activities scheduled:

• History-make a timeline that will be used throughout the unit study.
• History/Vocabulary- we looked up the term self-evident any any other words that we were unsure of in the Declaration.
• Language Research- we researched the Articles of Confederation to discover the strengths and weaknesses. We made a list of both.
• Language-we read a biography of George Washington
• Life Skills- made George Washington’s Hoecakes

Thursday: back to your regular studies. Continue with your read aloud and your child’s independent reading.

Friday: complete your 3R’s, family read aloud, and if you can go on a field trip (virtual ones are good too), and watch the suggested Family Movie Night movie, and/or the suggested Game Night game.

The movies can all be found on Netflix or you can watch a similar one. We had no trouble obtaining movies and documentaries from the library or Netflix.
The sample schedule above is flexible. If you know you will not be going on a field trip you can make Friday your day to complete the unit study activities.

Each week there are different activities. So another week you might have Fun & Games scheduled and play Preamble Scramble. Art might be included where you study Howard Chandler Christy’s Signing of the Constitution. A link will be provided in your Once-a-Week Unit Study. Current Events is another. This is where we read the national news daily and discussed the events. As you can see each week has plenty to do with and you don’t have to do every, single, thing.

We usually skipped the writing assignment. The kids do enough writing and I wanted to keep our once-a-week unit studies more on the fun side.

How we used Homeschool Legacy’s Once-a-Week Unit Study: For part of the review I did a little bit everyday. One day I did the Bible study, the next read and examined the articles of the constitution that was assigned for the week, and continued with the activities throughout the week along with our daily read aloud. This worked great but it was becoming too much.

The last half of the review period I used it how it was intended. I read the daily read aloud and did a day of activities which for us usually fell on a Friday. We only took virtual field trips.

So we combined the activity and assignments with the family movie/game night and watched a documentary on the same day.

The kids did real well with this. It was not overwhelming and I didn’t feel like we were getting behind with our regular studies. It was a nice little break and I loved, loved, that my kiddos learned about the constitution (and continue to learn). It really inspired our whole family with digging deeper with understanding the constitution. My older kids were checking out books for themselves on the constitution and government too.

Final thoughts: Homeschool Legacy really made it doable to fit in a unit study. I liked that it was flexible as well. You can do as much or little as you liked. If you wanted to add a lapbook, go off on bunny trails, or just wanted to add more, there was room to do that. If you’re like me and just wanted a break from your regular studies there’s no feeling guilty because it was created as a once-a-week study.

I’m not one for e-books and pdf downloads but with We the People: Getting to Know Your Constitution I was very pleased and actually prefer the download over the physical book because all the links are clickable. If there was a virtual tour or video clip, all I had to do was click on the link!

My only con was was some of the documentaries put my kids to sleep including my 14 year old. They were interesting to me though!

Homeschool Legacy has recently added 4 week micro unit studies called Once-A-Week micro-study, so you can read about those on their website.

A great perk for those of you who have children in Boy Scouts and/or American Heritage Girls, many of the unit studies correspond with the merit badge requirements.

These would also be great to use during the summer months.

Look What We Did!

Ethan and I completed this Latin page without looking at the answer key.

It took us a little while but we were able to figure out the answers. It was great practice for both of us.

Using the puzzles and games book is a good thing. By completing the Grammar Crossword puzzle we practiced conjugating verbs and had fun doing it too.!

Mama’s Day

We had lots of thunder and rain in the morning. My favorite kind of weather. We were late getting up because it was so dark with all the dark clouds outside. Thankfully we made it to church and enjoyed a great Sunday School and Sunday service.

After church Lupe took my SIL and her kiddos and of course our family out for some good BBQ eating. He takes us there every year because we can usually find a seat (yes, one that fits 10 kids and 3 adults!). We find a big picnic table that seats us all.

The kids gave me some neat gifts!

Annette found this coffee sign. I love it! Can’t wait to hang that up in my (some day) coffee bar.

Joshua bought this cute cow butter dish. There’s a story behind it. The kiddos are always leaving butter on the counter because they like it soft for their toast. I’m always saying, “Don’t waist the butter!” or “Kids, put the butter in a dish or something.”

So Josh thought this would be the perfect gift for me, haha! He’s too cute. So now, no more butter will be left on the countertop. I think some of his siblings are going to donate a dollar or two to help him pay for it.

Lance came home from Wal-Mart one week and asked me, “Do you still like that famous singer that you told us about a long time ago?”

I said, “You mean Elvis?”

He was asking to make sure I’d like his gift. Oh, what a sweet boy and how thoughtful. There’s a story behind this one too.

My dad took Annette, Caleb, Brent, and Lance out shopping. Lance found the Johnny Lightning Elvis car. My dad and Caleb wanted to buy it from Lance but Lance would not give it up. Annette said that Lance would not give up the toy even under  pressure to sell it.

Annette made a pretty card for me.

My SIL gave me this ice coffee maker. Now I know you don’t need a fancy maker to make ice coffee but it’s so much more fun.

I am having an ice coffee as I speak.

She gave me a card.

She also gave me this picture. Josh was working that day. We were at the park celebrating Mother’s Day with our church family.

After lunch we dropped Josh off at work and we went for a Sunday drive in the country. I love when we take those drives. They are always so fun. 

Because of the rain we were able to see some turtles hanging out and a mama duck with her 4 ducklings waddling around.

On the way home we stopped at Starbucks for some Happy Hour Frapps.

When we got home Lupe took a nap, the younger boys played with their LEGOS, Josh read, and Annette and I watched a Murder She Wrote episode.

I also worked on a few Word Searches.

My SIL was out with her kiddos and on the way home brought over some pizza which was very kind of her. Some of the kids had pizza but some knew we were gonna go out to eat so they waited.

Lupe took the rest of us: Annette, Josh, and Lance, for some In-N-Out burgers.

I had mine protein style with cheese, grilled onions, and wrapped in lettuce. I also ordered a coffee.

I personalized my cup! The coffee was actually pretty good. Josh even commented on how good it smelled.

I took some undercover pictures of Josh!

He was drawing in my word search book and was last to leave In-N-Out.

And that was my wonderful Mama’s Day!