Okay, been up to lots of other things again. And there's always the reluctance of putting too much online. There's still distrust of the information that goes public but recently have lots of thoughts on my mind so I'll hop over to reflections and start writing...

Just got to play the saxophone for a while after our family devotion time. It was great fun. Need to do that more often. Except I can't find any of my books so had to transpose everything that I was playing and do some improvisation.

At some point I should review everything that I learned for geography and get through Asia and Europe which I sort of had a head start on those.

I bought Visualize World Geography this year for the kids to learn their maps. I had once upon a time purchased Mapping the World by Heart based on the great reviews, but I had problems figuring out exactly what I'm suppose to do with it and had no "heart" to have my kids to do more seat work. I think this purchase will go down as one of the smart curriculum buys that I've made. I bought the DVDs just to make things easier. The kids zipped through Africa and are continuing on and I don't think we are likely to forget them. Even my five year old who I've not assigning any are picking up the countries on the side. I'm also developing stories that keys off the DVDs as memory aid for the capital cities (as part of my "homework" for using Dynamic Memory and Study Skills that I bought at the last HS convention from College Plus). When I get a chance I'll put it on the web so others can have access to it too.

So far I've uploaded Africa, Americas

Have fun with it.

Hum, after going further into the program I think my "glowing" review is glowing less. I'm previewing Asia and there are several questionable pronunciations of nations and some are very confusing that I needed to go back over the video several times before I sort of figured out what they were talking about. I think I may try to come up with alternative stories to help my kids learn the countries. Sigh, and it was all going so well. But I can't complain since Africa really was my weakest point (and my kids' as well so this set I think has served us well).

Can't believe that summer's almost over. We were at a family reunion, had a very successful VBS with Glorianna pulling off a puppet show put on by the teens for Hudson Taylor, and now I'm trying to get things together for school. We started using SOS Biology and it's been going well. I'm moving more and more of the kids' work to the computer. Orchestra and band's about to start. Wow, take a breath, let things start...

Wow! Kids are done with all school activities. But now it's onto things that has been put off. I'll need to find the mold to make more pigs for VBS. Need to make more bricks (feel like the Israelites in Egypt). Urge Glorianna on with her puppet script and get clothing for the puppets. So many things to do and so little time. Argh....

We had some friends over today to BBQ. But it had to be over lunch since their kids had to got back to school for ONE MORE DAY! The dumbest thing, especially many of them are just going to be watching a movie. But if the kids don't show up, the truant officer would be at your door. What a messed up system. Oh well....