This topic may be weird to most of you out there.. but it is on my mind this morning.  It was actually on my mind all day yesterday.  Many of you know that my family and I enjoy watching Asian Dramas.  One of the main reasons is because there storylines are much cleaner then alot of American shows out there but also there are alot of morals that our shows don't have.  Most of the dramas we enjoyed as a family are about young innocent love.  The girl in the story treasures that first kiss.. it isn't just given to anyone.. She waits for that special someone.. there are lots of funny situations.. sometimes outrageous ones too.. children have a huge respect for the parents.. Ever seen a 33 year old beg her mom for forgiveness in the american shows.. I can't think of any.. Yet I have seen it in these dramas.  Respect for your parents is huge in these shows.. (of course usually the rich families don't have that.. they usually have some severe dysfunctional issues.. lol) 

Well, back to what has been on my mind.  Right now I am watching a drama .. just 1 hour a week.. and the main guy in the storyline is one I am familiar with.  I have seen a few of his other dramas.  I found out not too long ago about his love for the Lord.  Just recently, I discovered that he has a twitter... so I thought it would be fun to learn more.  Since then I have found his testimony which was very inspirational to me and his tweets.. wow.. He mentions God in probably every tweet he sends.. It brings a smile every time he tweets..

Part of me started to think.. ok.. am I being obsessive here?? why am I following this guy's tweets??  Yes I also am now a fan on facebook.. lol.  So I talk to a friend about it.. during our discussion I realize something.  I am loving his tweets because he is truly On Fire for God!  I have not been in a long time.  I have just been going through life, going through the motions.. etc.. but where is my zest for the Lord?  When did I lose it?  I want that fire back in my life.  I think it is seriously time to start looking for a church closer to us.  We have been away for too long. 

So, I feel better now.. I am not drawn to this good looking popular asian actor .. . I am drawn to his zest for the Lord.. he is very vocal about his Love for the Lord while I sit here quietly loving God in my own way.  I want to be bold.. I want to really feel the Lord in my life again.  I have alot to learn! 

Sometimes I feel like I am suffocating.. My days can be so alike but some days it is just a struggle to get the basics done.  Yesterday was one of those days.  Then in the middle of schooling a simple text from a friend.  She didn't have much time but wanted to stop by and visit.  She was here for 1.5 hours.. just enough to make my day.  The amazing thing, Annaleah also managed to finish school.  Wow.

Yesterday was a different day.. Most of the time around here, things don't change much. Being a homeschooling, stay at home mom of 1 child.. not much happens. Yesterday however, was a bit different. First Ethan arrived really early.. we were kinda surprised to hear someone knocking on the door as we were doing English. Apparently, David made arrangements for Ethan to come early but forgot to tell me. David and Abby were not even here yet.. So of course I text David who ends up feeling awful about it. But it really wasn't a big deal at all. Anna still managed to do her English and ate lunch with Ethan. Then continued her work while Ethan was supposed to be napping.. He never actually fell asleep.

Ethan had a silly moment.. David wanted to go get pizza for Ethan and Anna.. so he asked Ethan.. "what do you like on your pizza?" Ethan's response, "Strawberries". Silly boy.

For school, Annaleah has been reading Sarah Noble. We are now reviewing the book while working on a lapbook for it. Corn was the topic of this week. Abby had gotten some dried corn on a cob from work and the kids were able to check it out last night.

Dried out corn cob

putting it in a microwave bag

 popped corn

Ethan's turn

After popping popcorn,  Ethan left and Anna, Abby and David all watched UP.  What a sad movie!  We had watched it the night before and I have to say, it had alot of depressing parts.  It was good though and funny.. I loved Dug the dog.  He was my favorite character aside from Russell. 

Yesterday was a pretty easy day. Annaleah and I found some online videos about Dr. Martin Luther King jr. Brainpopjr.com was a great resource for this. Then we did an online quiz to see how much she was paying attention. We discussed some of what we learned and then went over to Youtube to watch his speech.

Last night we watched "Up" I totally did not have a clue to what the movie was about. Hubby actually had tears.. well I did too but that is usual for me.

It was a good day and we all piled into bed at 9:30. Nice and simple.

Well, let's see..

Thursday night was Annaleah's ballet and tap class. I was able to get in there and video tape.. I taped alot. I have not uploaded yet. Abby watched Ethan so after class we went over to Popeye's to check them out. Have not been to a Popeyes in forever. We were shocked on Monday when we suddenly seen one.. here.. in CT.. no clue when it got there.

Friday, Angel decided we should do our big shopping that night. Oh man.. we finally had money and really needed some things.. we had been doing 'light' shopping for almost 3 months and we were running out! So we got Ethan ready and off we went to eat first at Burger King.. mental note.. Ethan does not like burgers at Burger King.

We then spent roughly an hour or more at Bj's Warehouse and then almost 2 hours at Walmart! $400.00 and 4 hours later, we were finally heading home.. (shopping alone took 3 hours!) We better not need to do serious shopping again for at least 2 months! Although I forgot hearing aid batteries.. and Bubbles still needs litter. No clue why Walmart doesn't carry "Yesterday's News".. it is the only litter we use for him.

We keep bins in the car.. those big packing bins.. 2 bins full and some had to get carried. We left alot of food in the car overnight.. food that we didn't need to worry about.. Next morning, that food also filled 2 bins.. and that doesn't include the bags of cat and rabbit food.. or the box of canned cat food.. whew.

Saturday and Sunday was spent here doing whatever.. I worked on my puzzle a bit.. almost done there.. it is challenging which I love. But I got too lazy.. I never planned for school.. again!

However, just found out today is Martin Luther King day, so we are going to focus on a slideshow of that and some printed questions and call it a day. Everyone else is off school today and Anna has an early ballet class this afternoon.. so sounds good to me.

That is so what I need right now.  Yesterday I allowed negative thoughts and feels to ruin my day.. and I can already feel it again.  This isn't a good way to start the day.. I must think positive!!!

We did manage to finish school yesterday and although we had a rocky start.. it was a good finish.  I am thinking of maybe wrapping up the week the best I can today.. seeing if she is ready for her math test as well as some other things.  This weekend we may be able to finally get some serious grocery shopping done.. but I need a plan.  I don't want to go into the stores armed with nothing.  I want menus planned, and a grocery list done.  I want to know everything we have in this house and what we need to add.  I want healthier choices if possible.. and the weirdest thing is I am craving Grapefruit!!  How odd is that?  I was even thinking of juicing again but to be honest.. the thought of that juicer with no place to call home.. and the work involved.. forget that.. so not ready for that hassle. 

Let me say, I love getting up at 5am, however, guess who decided she liked getting up early too!  Yesterday she woke at 6:50am.. ok.. no problem.. I can handle that.. Today she shows up at 6am.. ok.. now I am having issues here.. this is my time!!  sigh.  Maybe letting her stay up just a bit longer with daddy wouldn't be such a bad idea? 

Tonight is still sneak a peek week at ballet... I will be recording Anna's ballet and tap class.  Monday was her Kid's in Motion class which does more choreography for performances at nursing homes and other functions.  Be prepared for more videos. Hope that doesn't bore you all. 

Monday was an awesome school day.. yesterday stunk bad.. like seriously.  Monday I had it all together, everything on my list was done and on target.. (except for bed and laundry but hubby was sick)..

Yesterday was just a disaster.. spent too much time scolding Anna and trying to get her to move along.. she dragged so bad yesterday.  She had a huge attitude problem.. I am sure I had one as well.. I just wanted to crawl back to bed..

Which makes no sense!  I have been sleeping longer than I have ever slept in my life.. Saturday night 12 hours, sunday night 8 hours, monday night 7.5 hours and last night 8.5 hours.. seriously this girl never used to sleep more than 6 hours a night! 

Although I love being up at 5am.. finally I get some alone time.. I have been doing my Bible and biking when I can.  I love that no one gets up here before 7.  That part I am thoroughly enjoying..

However, I think hubby is having a party every night without me.  I keep finding dishes on the table and things a mess!  That is the one bad part.. with me going to bed at 9pm lately.. I am not spending any time with hubby.  sigh

I don't know how anyone finds a balance.. but maybe someday, it will just come to me..

Oh but let's end with a funny.. I made jello yesterday, Ethan loves jello.. So does Angel.. Ethan saw the jello in the fridge and I told him it was for after dinner.. he was soo excited. 

About 2 hours later (I guess he couldn't wait anymore).. he came out of the kitchen sucking on all his fingers.. (almost his whole hand was shoved into his mouth..)  I said "Oh no!  Ethan what did you do?"  and ran to the fridge

sure enough.. big old hand print right there on the top of the jello..

I just had to laugh

So after dinner.. I scooped out the hand printed area for Ethan.. and that gave out the untouched parts for us.. Ethan had seconds, Angel had thirds.. no more jello..

wonder if I should make some for tonight.. hmm..

Yesterday was Annaleah's sneak a peek week at ballet..  Which meant lots of videos to be taken.. but no worries, I didn't upload them all.. just the best 3 I had.  Oh and I mistakenly uploaded one that they messed up with..The first video, Annaleah is the last one against the wall.  It gets confusing because they have to form circles in the middle and go in opposite direction as the outer circle.  I was quite impressed. 

Here is a blooper video.. I just love it when the girls giggle after making a mistake..

For the May performance, they are doing a dance involving the beach floating tube things.. (forgive my blank mind here).. here they are pretending to have them and they sit in the middle of the tube. 
 
Here the girls are pretending to hold beach balls to hide Anna from the audience.. and then they reveal her. 
I think they we do awesome by the time May arrives..  I love how they have so much fun learning the choreography involved. 

I have a 4.5lb loss from last week..whoo hoo.. I have not even tried!  but hey.. not complaining..

Friday I did not school again.. guess we just took an extra week off.. maybe I needed it.. but today I must start school.  I have been doing some planning and since Anna finished "The Courage of Sarah Noble" and is due for a book report on it.. I am thinking of stopping and getting more indepth in some areas.  A quick scan of the chapters with activities to make a lapbook.  I am also planning on having her make Indian Pudding.  She really loved the hands on stuff when we did Little house in the big woods.. so this will be perfect for her.  We will go over the language arts portions as well as social studies with a review of the animals for the lapbook.  This type of study gets me excited.  It is also the reason I got up at 5am this morning.  I want to make sure we are all ready for school.. since I did nothing all weekend. 

Friday night I worked on a puzzle.  Annaleah worked along side me on one of her puzzles.. picture it.. both of us sitting there with mp3 players and headphones.. singing along with our own music while working on a puzzle.. my kind of day!  We also watched Ernest saves Christmas.. her first experience with Ernest and she loved it.  I went to bed at 7pm and Anna stayed up with Abby til about 11 or so.  They made some cute videos and took pics.. I finally woke at 7pm but it wasn't a restful sleep.. I guess I needed it (everyone knows I do not ever go to bed early.)  because I woke up sick.. However, I was determined to be ready for church.. so I showered and dressed, then woke up Angel who said forget about church.  sigh..

We have not been in church since April.  We were planning on checking out a church closer to us.  We know so many people that have attended this church.. (including Abby and her family).  However, it was probably best we didn't go.. I was definitely not well yesterday.  I barely remember working on the puzzles, staring at facebook.. did some dishes, napped again.  Last night I went back to bed around 9:30 with an agenda already planned out for today.. so here I am.  I do feel better so that is a good thing.  Still conjested but head feels better. 

Today is Anna's sneak a peek week at ballet, which means I get to take videos.. I can't wait.  David and Abby will be here for Ethan which will be perfect.  Leftover lasagna for dinner will also be great for tonight.  We were supposed to have that last night but I didn't want it.  So hubby made ramen with kimchii.. I don't know but that always helps clear the sinuses.. I loved it..  Oh Saturday I made pizza dough using the bread machine.. then made pizza.. and finally, Angel liked it!! I have been trying for so long to make pizza dough instead of buying.. and finally.. this recipe is a keeper! 

Ok.. I am rambling now.. I think it is time to get to my list.. It is awfully quiet here at 5am..  

I am having a terrible time getting started with school.  I had a short list yesterday and still did everything but the lesson planning.. til last night .. I did get it started .. finally..

Yesterday I decided to pull out the "Cooking Up Sentences" which we played twice.  It was a nice review of the parts of speech.  Then we kinda made up a math game.. very simple. 

we only needed 3 dice, 2 sheets of paper, 2 pencils

one dice was set to 2 and placed on the side .. we were practicing our two times tables.. 

roll the other two dices... add them up (2+3).. then multiply 2 (10)

on the paper we wrote 10

Next turn say the answer was 12,  we would write under the 10

10
12/22

and continue add  our answers to the right side.. dice answer left, total right.. We did this 10 times.. Anna loved it.. (strangely since she supposedly hates math!)  She wanted to play by herself to see how high she got.. She did a great job adding up totals on the side of her paper. 

Today we may have company.. if that doesn't happen maybe we could do another round of the dice game and throw in a science experiment.  This could be considered as schooling??  Right?? 

I will be on track next week.. I WILL!!