FINALLY, the end result!!

 Here is the final product!! It isn't fancy or anything but it's what Amanda wanted. I told her that she needed to remember this when I am old and need help going to the bathroom!! LOL!!!

 She has pictures of friends scattered throughout the room. We did get rid of most of her stuffed animals. 

 But she did keep some of them. Next to her desk we made a chalk board and Michael's girlfriend made her two bulletin boards that are in her chosen colors(black, white & hot pink).

 The two small box shelves and the round side table had belonged to mom. Spray paint sure does come in handy!! Oh and I scraped the ceiling...NEVER again!! Never again will I do that. I have never seen such a mess!! After that, I began debating why I had started this project. After it was all said and done, I was glad I took the weekend to complete it.

This picture has absolutely nothing to do with Amanda's room. We went out for lunch this afternoon and some of the Seniors of 2011 showed up. Here's my cousins youngest son. You see the plate of pizza in front of this child?? It was much higher and if you saw his feet, you would know exactly where it all goes! LOL!!!

In the process...

WHOA!!! I had to take tutorials to remember how to work this blogger thing again since its been so long since I've been around. It was a beautiful day today! 77! Not ice, snow and below freezing temperatures! Please, Spring hurry up!!!

I'm still trying to figure out how to work Blogger from a Mac. I can't upload from iphoto unless I copy and paste my photos to a folder on the desktop. 

We are on track with school this year!! Amanda and Mason are doing well. They are almost finished with Texas History.

We've been going through some Greek and Roman Mythology. It's funny to read some of those stories and find out why we have some of the sayings that we do. You know, like, "clean out the barn". That has to do with one of the labors that Hercules had to do for penance for killing his family. It's amazing to think that the Disciples were up against these type of "beliefs". 

Anyway, the past couple of weeks I've been doing a bit of updating around the house. Amanda wanted her room taken from a "little" girls room to an "teen" room. TEEN ROOM!!! It was light blue, pink and purple. Now, she wants black and white with a damask pattern.

 

As you can see we are still in the process of preparing the walls, which will be white. Boy, I hope I can find some sort of paint/primer in one!! These are pictures that Amanda took and entered into the 4H county contest. They were good enough to move onto the District level.

 Here's her new bedding. It's from Walmart. We ordered it online. It seems like most of the cute things they have are not carried in our local Walmart store...go figure!

 Most of the things in her room we are re purposing, recycling and renewing. We used black spray paint, ribbon, buttons, white and hot pink paint. Oh, and LOTS of hot glue!!!!

 We recovered pillows, ordered black curtains and repainted old frames to hang pictures of her friends. When everything is finally done, I'll post more pictures. I still have to scrape that nasty pop corn stuff off the ceiling.

 Ok, I did go a bit crazy. Or at least that's what my husband thinks. You see Red is my "signature" color!!! I love RED!!! Blue would have to be my back up color though. Anyway, I did a bit of work in the kitchen too.

 I collect "Campbell Soup" stuff. I think the little Campbell Soup Kids are cute.

 I couldn't resist putting the slogan on the walls too! Most of the things I do in the house have to be on the cheap. So I usually repaint things and move them around to different rooms.  The next thing that'll be on the list will be ours and Michael's room. 
I'm doing ours in "flea market" style. I know Mike will be looking forward to that. Then I'm not too sure about Michael's. His room is small and being a college student he needs a good place to study. He has tons of books so I'm trying to figure out what to do for him.
I'm also counting down for SURVIVOR and DWTS!!! I'm so excited!!! Rob and Russell will be on Survivor this season, GO ROB!!! 
They haven't announced who the celebrities will be on DWTS, I sure hope they're good!!!
Well, I've finished my first post in what, two months and it didn't kill me!! LOL!!! I'm figuring I just needed a break.
If anyone does have any tips with using a Mac and blogger, please let me know.

Let 'em have it! Only wish he would do that in the USA

Mercy...

WOOOO HOOOOO! Look at that good looking couple!!!!

This past weekend Mike and I celebrated our 24 year anniversary. It's very seldom that we get to really spend any time alone so Mike planned a get away for us, WITHOUT KIDS!!! Mike was 22 years old and I was 19 the day we got married! 19 years old!!!! We were out of our minds!!! We have literally grown up together. We've seen each other at our worst and at our best.

I can't imagine not ever having him around. His corny sense of humor, the way he irritates me, how he gags himself when he brushes his teeth! LOL!!

You know, all of those endearing qualities!!

Then a day before our 2 year anniversary, our first baby was born. This weekend, he turned 22. My baby is 22 years old!!! This is probably the most precious picture we have of Michael. He has turned out to be a good, Godly, young man. He's grown so much. 

I look at him and think, your Dad was your age when we were married. That blows me away!

Now Michael's going to college, working and becoming a really good man! 

I pray that God sends him someone extremely special!

Homeschool Co Op-Apologia General Science

 

 Our little Co Op has begun for the year. The older kids are studying Apologia General Science and the younger ones are going through the Apologia Anatomy. These are pictures from the experiments the kids performed during the first week.  Above is Amanda writing down her analysis of one of the experiments.

 

The jar on the left contains hot water, the one on the right holds cold water. This experiment showed that atoms are always moving even though the water is still. See how fast the food coloring mixes with the hot water? 

 The picture above and below shows you about chemical reactions. I mixed them up when I uploaded them but boil a red cabbage leaf and save the water. Pour vinegar into a coke bottle, remember, vinegar is clear, right?

 Pour the water(which is blue) from the cabbage leaf in with the vinegar. Look, it turns pink!!! Then add baking soda into a balloon. Place the balloon onto the coke bottle and empty baking soda into vinegar mixture.  And VIOLA!! the chemical reaction forms a gas that blows up the balloon.

This was probably the coolest experiment they did!!! It showed the density of substances. First, pour vegetable oil into a clear glass about 1/4 of the way. Then pour the same amount of water. After that pour the same amount of corn syrup into the glass with the other liquids.  Now remember, how the liquids were poured in? Look at the picture. The corn syrup is now on the bottom, water in the middle and the vegetable on top!!!!!

Mason, my nephew conducted this experiment. He's really into Science but he's learned it from a non-christian point of view. He then dropped a rock in the glass that went straight to the bottom. A grape that landed on the "shelf" between the corn syrup and water. Lastly, he threw in a cork and piece of ice which stayed in the vegetable oil.

I honestly think the moms were more impressed with all of the experiments!! LOL!!
If you haven't checked into Apologia Science you really need to!!! I didn't realize how involved the church was in science until the "Enlightenment" and Industrial Revolution.

Seriously,  check into Apologia. I wish I had Science classes like this when I was in school. 

Night on the town

 

Last night Mike and I took Amanda and her friend, Lauren out for a treat. Above are friends from church that we meet out at the Superpages Center in Fair Park. Fair Park is in Dallas. That's where the Texas State Fair is held each Sept.-Oct. The lovely young ladies you see here are: Samantha, Lauren, Amanda, Emily and Jordan.

 

See, can't you tell that Dad is having a GREAT time! He's trying to listen to the Dallas Cowboy game. It's the season opener and they're playing the Washington Redskins. What a night to treat the girls to a night out, right?

 

If you haven't figured it out yet, we took the girls to see the Jonas Brothers! Above is the one that ALL of the girls think is cute, Nick. They actually put on a pretty good show. It was the whole Camp Rock 2 tour, which was suppose to be in July but due to adding and canceling shows the Dallas one was moved to September. 

I realized last night, that I have failed my daughter. For some reason, I have never taught her how to act at a concert. She and Lauren pretty much stood on the seats, sang and watched in amazement. Somewhere along the way I never told her your suppose to scream and go nuts!

Although, we did see plenty of that! Mike said he had never witnessed "female testosterone" unleashed like that. According to him, he was scared! LOL!! Every little girl, tween and teen girl from Texas and some from Oklahoma were there.  The strange thing that we noticed was women, women my age, you know, the 40ish type. Grew up in the 80's, big hair, leather or parachute pants, Flash Dance shirts, or jeans that you are poured into, you know the type. Not that I was that type...

Anyway, there were women there dressed like that going to this concert with their daughters! We couldn't believe it! Even if I could get away with wearing leathers, skin tight jeans or shirts that hang off of you. I certainly wouldn't take my kid to a concert wearing it.

    The concert was good, Dad couldn't get the Cowboy game on the amazing IPhone, the girls enjoyed themselves and it's something they will never forget! And it's something that I don't think Dad will forget either!!!

First Day 2010

 

Today was our first day of the new school year. This getting up at 6:30am is about to kill me! Amanda and Mason woke up around 8:00am, ate breakfast and began doing work about 9:00am.

In the pictures, they are doing their math work. They use Teaching Textbooks. 

Tomorrow we will be ending lessons early to meet others about the Apologia General Science our 

Co Op will be using. The past 2 years we've used Apologia for Science and everyone has loved it. We can't say enough about it. BUT this year, we are all a bit scared of it. We've decided to split the kids up for this subject. Taking the older kids through General Science and the younger ones will be using the new Anatomy that Jeannie Fulbright has put out.

 

I know the kids are all looking forward to getting together. I've got to get myself up to the church and clean out the rooms for Co Op and get any supplies ready for Sept. 15th. 

Did I mention getting up at 6:30am is killing me?

Anyway, the first day went really well and I think the kids will enjoy themselves.