The girls made wallets at VBS. =)

Bethany's wallet.  She used multi-colored tape inside. I like multi-colors!   =)

Rebekah's wallet.  She had watched a tutorial today of how to weave the duct tape.  Awesome!

Blackberries!!!

We have lots of blackberries along the end of our driveway!  Hope to make several desserts this year.
Travis and Bethany went down there Saturday and picked about ¾ of a gallon.

I was busy this weekend, so the blackberries are still in the refrigerator.  I hope to make something with them tomorrow.  Yummy!

Juicy Blackberry Cobbler. I made it today.  =)

Five Boys!

My girls stayed overnight at their cousin Sarah's house, so I had some boys over here for JohnDavid.  =)
Last night they watched Bananas, ate ham and cheese rolls, played games, ate some more snacks I had laid out on the bar, watched National Treasure, and finally fell asleep around 3 or 4am.
Or so they said.  =)

Then they were awake by 8:30!

Five boys can really put away the sausage biscuits!  and pizza... and fries... and Doritos... and bananas... and cucumbers... and...  =D
They did go outside for a bit, but came back in 'cause it is sooo HOT - 95º today.
Guess they should've gone outside earlier this morning.
So then they played the Wii and game cube games.
And ate some more.  hee hee!

Standing on the Solid Rock ♪♫♪

My kids:  Rebekah on the piano, Bethany on the violin, JohnDavid on the bass (who is out of the picture).
My brother's kids:  Alex on the guitar, and Sarah on the other side of Rebekah.
The kids stayed over Sunday night after church, and of course they sing.  My girls and their cousins always sing, and they rope the boys into it sometimes.  This time, they were only able to get them to play an instrument.  =D
My girls had a couple of videos that taught some things about how to play the violin, and they have been taking a free group class for about 5 or 6 weeks.
I love it!

Vengence is mine... =D

Oh, my!  I forgot to post this a couple of months ago when we all went to the Ladies' Meeting!
You have to read this post first, or you will not know what's going on!  =D

Ok, did you read it?

Here is how I got her back.  hehe! [sneaky, evil grin]
When we got to Durham, before we went to eat lunch we put our luggage in our motel rooms, and that's when I put the can of soup into my pocketbook.  (yes, it's a big pocketbook!)  Of course as all girls do, I knew they'd go to the restroom.  But Cousin A and Bethany connived w/ me and suggested to Rebekah that they not carry their pocketbooks w/ them.  So as soon as they were out of sight, I got her pocketbook, took out her wallet and a couple of things, and put in the soup.  Bethany and Cousin A came back quickly, and Bethany got Rebekah's driver permit out of her wallet.  When Rebekah came back, Bethany "returned" the driver permit so Rebekah would open her purse to put it back.  That's when she saw the soup!  I finally got her back good!
All the ladies were in on it.  It was so fun!
It's been back and forth a few times since, but no opportunity yet to score big again. 

Travis ♥

My husband was the one to prove to me that all men are not the same!
I love you, Travis!  ♥♥♥  Happy Father's Day!!!

Shenandoah ♪♫♪

Isn't this song beautiful!

June-July, 2010 issue of "Encouragement for Seniors"

My Mom writes this paper for her church.  (You can read my first post here.)
page 1
Click to enlarge.

page 2

Switched on Schoolhouse On-Demand Presentations

A friend found this!  Go to this link, click on a grade, click on a subject, then click View On-Demand Presentations.  This will show you a lot!
►The "Student Lesson Presentation" which happens to be a 6th grade course, shows 4 additional vocabulary games! (you can disable one or more games if you need to)  I don't know which grades have which games; maybe there are some new ones with the 2010 application disc.  I know that there used to be 3 games besides the regular ones, but we've only ever had the regular spelling and vocabulary games, and 2 others so far (Farmer Frank and All Right) since Quiz Bowl was only for the younger grades.
►Now if you have curriculum that was made 2008 or before, and you use a 2009 or later application disc, you will still get this new look on the home page, but the vocabulary and spelling games will not work.
►►In order to have the vocabulary and spelling games for a curriculum made in 2008 or before, you would need to use a 2008 or earlier application disc.  However, the 2008 app disc is when they started the user-friendly answers (more answers that are considered correct), so I would not recommend earlier than that!
►No matter what application disc you use (unless it is a very old one?), the actual lessons have pretty much the same look.  Depending on which app disc you use, this changes the look of the home page, and some additional features (for instance, highlighting was added in, I think 2007? and user-friendly answers in 2008). 
Clear as mud?  =D

Physical Science, Module 10, Newton's Laws, Part B

 --Videos we watched for Module 10.
--This is an excellent resource with interactive links:  Newton's Physics Notebook
--Find relevant links at Physics4Kids. Laws of Motion and Forces are good ones for this Module.
--Play  Quizlet.  Just scroll down and click on Physical, then scroll to find the Module you want.

Disclaimer:  In these pics, it seems as if only my daughter is doing something!  But in the videos, you can see they all take part.

Experiment 10.4, Newton's Third Law
The kids LOVED the experiment today!  Something exploding.  =D
Newton's third law says that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.  When we mixed vinegar and baking soda in a bottle, then capped it with a cork, the force of the cork exploding from the bottle in one direction pushed the bottle backwards in the opposite direction. 
The experiment took some trial and error, but it was worth it.  =)

We tried it as the book said, by making a trough w/ aluminum foil to hold 2 tsp. baking soda.  We tried that a couple of times, but it would already be falling off the trough since the vinegar level was lower than the opening of the bottle; the mixture was already fizzing before we got the cork on.
So JohnDavid said to use the cut-off bottom of a sandwich baggie for the trough.  It was flimsy and hard to push thru the opening of the bottle.
After a couple of tries with the baggie, we dried the funnel and just poured in a heaping Tablespoon of baking soda, and corked it quickly.  You can hear my reaction!  And I even knew what was supposed to happen.

When it exploded, cousin A said, "Marty!"  She couldn't believe I'd be willing to make that mess in my kitchen.  Well, that's why I hadn't mopped yet, lol.  Then we went outside to try it again, since they wanted to throw it into the air.  It didn't explode in mid-air, but the reaction (of the cork/bottle AND of the kids) was the same.  They loved it!  With several failures, then finally a few successes, we used about half a gallon of vinegar.
This was yet another experiment that we only quit because it was time to go home.  And I was nearly out of vinegar!  =)




Inside: After the explosion, hear cousin A say, "Marty!"  She couldn't believe I let them do that!


Outside: This one went nearly the length of our house.
Cousin A and Rebekah really got sprayed on this one!



Outside: This one hit the corner of the house.  (I did NOT think about the windows!!!)
And Rebekah was yelling, "No, dog, no!" to Levi just as I stopped recording.  =)





Newtons second law was not quite so interesting, but we did discuss it a little. The force of an object is equal to its mass times its acceleration.  Force = (mass) · (acceleration)  I did read page 245 several times, heh heh.
On the On Your Own question 10.6, I didn't understand how a toy car rolling north would have an acceleration to the south.  My email answer from Apologia said, "When you have a velocity to the north and an acceleration to the south then this means that the object is slowing down.  [and here I said, "duh!" smacking self on forehead]  With Force = Mass x Acceleration, notice that mass is the only term without a direction on it.  So the force will have the same direction as the acceleration.  Since this problem tells us that the acceleration is to the south then the force that is causing the object to slow down must be to the south as well."

Just in case ya wanted to know.  =)
Also see Example 10.2 at the end.  "... friction always opposes motion."
 

Singing with Kay Chandler

Last week, we went to a Ladies' meeting where Kay Chandler was speaking.  She is one of the Hutson Sisters, who are daughters of the late Preacher Curtis Hutson.
The theme of the meeting was "A Sweet Spirit."  At lunch, in the corner they had set up a Candy "Bar" where you could take a small bag and get different kinds of candies.  Mrs. Kay was in line next to my girls and began quietly singing "Sweet Jesus," and my girls joined in.  Smiling, she turned to them and said, "Y'all know that song, too?  Ok, we're singing that!  Do y'all mind if I sing lead?"
My girls were so honored that she wanted them to sing with her!
After lunch, they went back into the church and practiced it a couple of times before the second session started.  There were a couple of differences in how they were used to singing it, but it still turned out pretty good!  They sang it a second time, and it was better, but I didn't record it but once.  =\
Of course, right after the meeting was over, they had to call Abigail to let her know!  Abigail and my 2 girls sing together, and have begun to sing more often at nearby churches.  And getting to sing with Kay Chandler was the highlight of their week!  =)