It's Monday, it's laundry day! Wish I only had three baskets like this lady! LOL!   I'm hoping and praying that this fresh new week is a good one, void of sickness and busy-ness!!!

The girls got the rest of Christmas decor put up!  I got another good start on cleaning out my school bookshelf!

Rachel's recital was Sat, I'm going to try and get that vidio put on here soon, we were so proud of her!!!!

I got my weekly menu started but now just need to grocery shop for the stuff....which do you do, make the menu first, or shop the sale add first?

So thats all for now, I've got to get busy!

I may end up being a Homeschool mom veteran afterall, I just may be able to write a book...it would be about all the don't I'm sure!  We have recently had a big upset with one of our homeschooling decisions, it was the decision to have another teacher for DD#1 for Algebra. Not that there's anything wrong with seeking out a tutor for help in a subject that the parent does not have time to teach or isn't good at..the difference in out situation is that she wasn't tutoring, she was teaching the whole thing, which meant I had little involvement at all. Sounds great, right? I thought so in the beginning  too, but as it turned out, it was not a good thing. The messages she was sending to Leah was contrary to the way's we have taught her. Our philosophy on education totally different. See I do want my children to have a good education, but I also want them to learn the importance of thier family, and thier God, so I guess I'd have to say accademics is not the key to why we homeschool. I had read or was in a workshop early on when the girls were little, and I remember them talking about how that you can't serve two masters, taking that scripture from the bible and likening it to how our children cannot serve a teacher and also serve thier parents. At the time I thought the person saying that really wacked out  but now I see what they were talking about. We were standing here as parents trying to Leah thru whatever she had to do for highschool, and then there was the teacher making her believe it was life or death, and telling her how far behind she was in certain subjects. Which once again, I do want my children to be smart and do what is required of them, but IF I was so concerned about what the state says my child should know per what age or grade, then why not just put them in the public school?! This has been a big upset for me, I'm trying to not get descouraged about the other not nice things the teacher said about our family, it saddens me because we thought she was our friend. We thought it best to cut all ties to her, so none of my children who had been taking art or music classes will go back, I just can't risk to be connected to someone who doesn't understand our methods of homeschooling.

If any of you have any similiar experiences or oppinions on this, please comment, I need to hear from you, I know I didn't go into full detail about all that happened but I hope it's not too hard to understand.  Could use your prayers also.     ~Jill~

Well...it has been a very eventful week, we have had someone in the house sick everyday, starting with Sunday! the order went like this...Rach on sun, mon, and Hannah Grace on tuesday, ME on wed and thurs, Hope on thurs evening, and today woke up with a temp of 103.2

I had mentioned earlier about the Prison Crusade being this week, DH has went in yesterday and today to sing, I was signed up to go to the women's prison (which I haven;t been to yet) I was too sick to go yesterday, and thought I would go today, and I would have felt good enough, but with Hope's fever that high, I decided my calling today was to be MOM. I can't go tomorrow either, so I guess this year is a total washout for me   But the Lord knows why, and I'm going to try and not be too bummed about it .

 We are the group pictured there as "Because of Mercy"   We sang as a family the last two years, but this year they wouldn't allow minors to come in, so Dave decided he'd go as his own singing team and I'd go in the womens.

Tomorrow is Christmas on the Square, Rachel's piano recital, the Christmas parade, and Christmas in the pioneer settlement. We plan to go to Rachel's recital, and hopefully the parade, but other than that, I doubt any of us should be out in the cold much.

I'm finially feeling good enough to work on Christmas cards, but I also have stuff I need to catch up from being down the last two days  Decisions....!!!! which should I do???

The girls are wanting to finish decorating today, especially since we're home bound anyway! They also have stuff to make sugar cookies. I told them they can AFTER they have thier rooms cleaned and some school done!

Wish this was more exciting but I guess that's all for now, Please keep our family in prayer.   ~Jill~

 It's been the sick house around here this week  DD#2 started out Sunday being sick, fever, congestion, all that stuff, then yesterday DD#3 wakes up with a fever , so back to bed she went. DD#1 had a bad day with her Math teacher, which that started today out bad too... but after talking with DH and asking a dear friend for prayer, things started going better. I needed some space, so off I went to the Thrift store to Chirstmas shop! I was successful!!!  On DH's side of the family, we decided to draw names with the stipulation, that we should only buy from thrift stores! So it has been a fun challenge!

Here's some thanksgiving stuff, I would have like to have posted earlier but here it is... Thanksgiving dinner at our church for the senior citizens

our pastor and his wife

Our pastor's daugher and son-in-law

tables filled , if you look close you can see a little girl standing at the end of a table, that was Hannah Grace, she served coffee, tea, and water, they were all bragging on how hard she worked!

some more servers, Leah and Rachel were apart of that

one tired little server here!

So that was the weekend before Thanksgiving, then on Thanksgiving day, we spent it at our pastors house with thier family. Had a wonderful time, such fun people! I took my camera but didn't take any pics, it was just too relaxing to even get out the camera!

this is pastor's grandaughter and our Hope

That evening we went and picked up the girl's friend Katy to go Black Friday shopping with us, no pics of that either except for what the girls took in the back seat!

we had a pretty long shopping day, longer than we planned especially since we left the house at 5!  We wen't there to get the early, early deals, but we did get one kind of by accident, and we got alot of the shopping done! We decided to draw names in our immedient family also to simplify things. So far it has worked, It's been really nice for each person to just have one person to concentrate on! Easier to budget that way too!

Last but not least, Hope decided to give herself a haircut again! The last time, she cut off almost all of her ponytail, but I didn't have to cut anymore off of it that time, but this time I did, she had really done a number!

as you see, she was a bit scared by the time I had found out

she had cut it short on the sides by her ears and her bangs but the rest of it was hanging down in the back

so I finished it off, she's still beautiful, we think she looks like the blonde girl Haley Mills that played in the old Disney Parent Trap movie.  Hannah Grace said she looked like Bo Duke! LOL, They've also called her little boy in the mornings when it;s all flat on her head from sleeping! She isn;t too happy about that one!

part of our tree LOL   Have a good rest of the week, tomorrow is DEC 1st!!!!!!      ~JILL~

I enjoyed reading your comments about what your Thanksgiving traditions/plans were! Wish I had time right now to tell about ours and the last few days of B-fri shopping, but I'm working on cleaning today, starting in my much neglected bedroom! I'm even dusting! Girls are working on laundry and thier rooms sometime today. We hope to get all that done so we can decorate some more! Chili is for supper, DH is making that!  It got cooler in the night, so its a cozy day for it! Next Blog post will be about  Thanksgiving DAY, Black Friday shopping, Hope's new haircut, and the upcoming prison crusade.  On a side note, I just ate the last of the leftovers of greenbean casserole and corn pudding! YUM! My family DOES NOT like green bean casserole, so I rarely make it, this one had come from someone else, but it's so good, I'm about ready to make some anyway to have just for me!   Hope you're all having a great holiday weekend!   ~Jill~

Whats are "YOUR" plans for Thanksgiving???? 

Any special traditions you want to share????

Outside my Window... a little foggy but it looks to turn out a nice day in the mid 70's!

Beside my bed....a little Christmas tree, and a pile of books that is much needed to go thru!!!

From the Kitchen....got to go to the grocery store, of all things TODAY, I can only imagine! After that, there should be dressing being made and cranberry salad!

In the School room....one side of it is good, that's the toy side, we worked on it all day Saturday, cleaned out trash, and bagged up some toys for the thrift store.  Now the school side of the room is BAD! WE only got started on it's clean out and it's a MESS!

In the Living room....a beauftiful Chirstmas tree!!!! sorry I don't have a pic yet! The girls put it up and decorated it last nite, we decided to go ahead and take the Fall decor down, because we got invited out for Thanksgiving dinner, and that was the only reason it was still up. Lots of mess everywhere in there, this is the part of decor that I don't like...the totes of stuff we have to drag in to get it all out! I have insisted that we don't put up all of this year because are spending Christmas elsewhere, but my girls are really putting up a fuss! They promise to put it all up thierselves!

I am Thankful....for Jesus, my wonderful family, our new little one in my womb, my home, God's provision for us!

I am Praying...for my cousin in Ind who is real sick in the Hospital, for the baby, for my fam in Indiana, for more living space by the time the baby comes.

I am excited about....going to Thanksgiving dinner at our Pastor's house tomorrow.

News from my Tummy....Had a Dr. appt. Monday, had labwork done, so far so good, got to hear the baby's heartbeat!!!  Exciting news...I get an ultrasound next month and will find out Blue or Pink!!!  I'm so glad to find out right before Christmas so we can share our news with family!

Children news....Leah is doing better I think, we were concerned about her abdominal pains at the beginning of the week, but thankfully it seems to be a little better.  Rachel is practicing for her Piano recital that;s next Sat. She's doing good, but nervous about it some! I took the little girls to get thier pic with Santa yesterday, can't wait to see how that comes out! Hope didn't quite understand that this was just a trip to see him and tell him what she wanted, she kept saying "he didn't give me a pressent!" we tried to explain it her!

Well I must go, the holiday tredmill has started and it just keeps speeding up, I have much to do today!!!!

      ~JIll~

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Trying to decide out of these four which one I want to use for a card, what's your vote?

I have some more I'll try to post tomorrow, DH is wanting to use the laptop right now

I've been thinking about changing my privacy settings to only xanga friends again because I am getting alot of views from alot of places in the world, but no comments. If you are one of these viewers, you can comment even if you don't have a xanga site yourself. I would just like to know who is reading them, so please stop by and intoduce yourself! I'll give it a little more time before I change the settings.

Ok, so I'm cleaning out my part of the closet too. pretty much most of my regular clothes do not fit now, so I'm trying to decide whether to put all those clothes in totes and just have my maternity clothes hanging, (which would be nice for now) but...will it end up being a great big job I won't have time to do (put them back) after the baby is born the end of May????  What do you think?