Funeral of a Blog

RIP sbees.blogspot.com
June 8, 2005 - June 8, 2012

In lieu of flowers, please make sure your links and buttons are pointed to www.sprittibee.com so you can find me tomorrow.

The Ultimate Top Secret Guide to Taking Over the World

My teen boy has a love of humor. When I got this book in the mail, I asked him to review it for me. I knew he would love it after reading the email from the publisher. Here's his take on this hilarious book (that I hesitate to call a book for kids, because I loved it, too):



The Ultimate Top Secret Guide to Taking Over the World
by Kenn Nesbitt
Review by Kaden

Want to know how to conquer the world? Kenn Nesbitt's "The Ultimate Top Secret Guide to Taking Over the World" walks you through the process in 10 ("well, maybe not 10 exactly") easy steps. This book turns innocent children into self-taught tyrannical overlords nearly overnight! Through his carefully laid out, easy-to-understand instructions and slap-stick humor, Kenn Nesbitt instills in the reader all necessary skills to produce mayhem and madness on a global level.

Here are his 10ish steps and the chapters the book includes:

1. Becoming a Genius Overnight
2. Making a Name for Yourself
3. Equipping Your Underground Lair
4. Evil Robots 101
5. Stopping Time for Fun and Profit
6. Dressing for Conquest
7. Of Monsters and Minions
8. Your First Doomsday Device
9. Defeating Secret Agents
9 1/2. Your Evil Trademark
9 3/4. Spending Your First Billion Dollars
10. How to Rule the World

Here's a snip from Step 2, to give you an example of Kenn's brilliance:

"You don't have to be a real doctor to call yourself a doctor. After all, Dr. Seuss wasn't a real doctor. Of course, he wasn't a maniacal villain either, but that's sort of beside the point. Adding a title like 'Doctor' or 'Professor' to your name lends a certain gravitas. (Gravitas, by the way, means weightiness or seriousness, but it sounds a lot cooler.) It makes you sound like the genius you are, as if you've got a PhD in conquerology. And when combined with a wicked last name, the right title can make you sound like someone smaller countries shouldn't mess with.

Imagine being known as Doctor Destruction or Professor Sledgehammer. You see what I mean?"

This book came as a free review item, but it is one of my favorite books that I've read. I love to laugh, and this book inspired quite a lot of laughing. If you have a kid that enjoys humor (and we all need more humor in our lives), this book would make a perfect gift. Of course, if you have any kids bent on world domination, you could speed their conquest of the planet considerably with this DIY guidebook of evil dastardliness. "World domination has never been so easy!"



Disclosure: This book was free, our opinion was not compensated... and we aren't trying to take over the world. Besides maybe becoming the Mayor of a few key spots on FourSquare - does that count?

Doing What Works

Through this past decade or more of homeschooling, I've tried a lot of things to help us in our quest to 'get school done' and keep track of what we are doing. We've done daily white board lists, assignment binder systems, assignment sheets that mom printed, lesson planners that I filled out as we went along, just reading through our books and not really following a lesson plan because we knew what books we wanted to finish, and laminated flip charts with pictures. I've used baseball card holders with assignments stuck in them, peg board chore charts, iPhone apps, hand-written daily lists, elaborate worksheets that I have created or others created, and Homeschool Tracker software. We used a few different versions of workboxes (school boxes or drawers), too. I sometimes revert to one or more of these methods to change things up, but I find that I always fall back on low-tech lesson planning: good old fashioned paper and pen.

Even while I keep all of my graded work and records in Homeschool Tracker, I still enjoy writing out our weekly requirements. There's something cathartic about actually WRITING something out. It helps me get my mind around what all we have to accomplish during the week. It reminds me of my own school days. It connects me with my to-do list in a way that is tangible. Best of all, it seems to be the one thing that really helps keep the kids on task better than all of my expensive, detailed, complicated 'programs' and processes I tried to implement.

Lately, I've been in a weekly rather than daily mode for my list-making. I include our daily chores in one section, our weekly appointments in another, and then a list for mom and a school list for kids - all on one sheet of paper. How simple is that? I make notes on this list through the week and the kids add check marks for completed items (at the end of the week, some items have 5 checks). The hard part is making sure we don't misplace the notebook that contains our list if we end up taking some school on the road.

For those of you that like to see an example of our simple "what works for us right now" list, here's this week (mind you, this is a week's worth of work - not a day):

MOM:
make worksheet copies (MOH final review, AC p.25 for binders)
post Kaden's last book report
add finished work to Tracker/enrichment club presentations from last week
cut in the paint on the kitchen/hall walls
menu/groceries/bills
Bible Study books procured

DATES:
Blog Chat with Lisa this weekend, Help mom w/ tire & yard
7 year blogiversary Friday
Art class Friday

CHORES:
breakfast, kitchen
teeth, dressed
avoid distractions
gather, sort, rotate laundry
dishes, help w/ lunch
laundry folded, put away
clean rooms
help w/ dinner, dishes, floor, counters
cook or bake
extra chores: bathrooms, vacuuming, sheets, refrigerator, closets

HISTORY:
Mapping MOH
Final Review 1-27 MOH
Haley's Bible Handbook
AC: p. 46
Chronology wksht in history binder
VC cards: green 3 & 4, purple 36 & 37, review order
Finish OWH 103-111
Chapter books on historical period
Iliad - keep reading
MOH Lesson 28
SOTAW 131-136 Sampson
OWH 112-121 Mid East & Test
UWH 142-143 Hebrews
Discussion p. 126 rationalizing powers

OTHER SCHOOL:
thank you cards
last few math pages, make sure graded and recorded
work on memory verse work : Psalm 90:10-17
practice piano
ch 8-12 Raising Maidens of Virtue
Psalm 96-105
24 Family Ways 3:1-6
Write 10 fave Proverbs in prayer journals
Write sponsored child : India
Read Science 241-263
Practice Piano

I don't have to add things like drawing and gardening since lately, every time I turn around, one of the teens is sneaking off to pick weeds and spend time outdoors - or doodling with some new art supply. This week charcoal was the favorite - which made for lots of smudges after the babies discovered that big sis had left the supplies unattended on the dining room table.

I used to have little charts with goals that were character related back in the days when time was not so fleeting. Little people under foot make for much less thoughtful teacher planning time. I've been thinking this week about resurrecting those lists, though. I think each of us could work on some character trait issues. Big kids and mom included. For one thing, I'd really like to do less lecturing and more praising. I tend to turn in to a monster when the chores are not done properly and things are left around the house where they don't belong. The three year old is working on potty training (which makes our days even more interesting than usual - and the carpet a lot uglier). Tiny tot is needing to do a little less nursing and a little more eating of solid food - working on figuring out a way to wean him gently since he prefers milk to pretty much anything (and he's 16 months old already). Biggest dude needs to work on doing things without delay, and taking less time to get tasks completed. Girlie-monster needs to work on less complaining and remembering to pick up the things she gets out (which she gets honest from a certain man in the house who stubbed his toe on his workboots this weekend).

We all have our mountains to climb, don't we? Good thing we have a God big enough for all these monumental tasks.



I love it when you are trudging along and you get a glimpse at the much bigger purpose...

"The most important decision anyone is every called on to make is to settle in one's heart, once and for all, the matter of one's attitude toward Christ.

On that depends everything.

It is a glorious thing to be a Christian, the most exalted privilege of mankind."

That was a snip of our devotional reading today in Halley's Bible Handbook. And so we shake off our medicine head (the cedar mulch and garden herb harvesting this past weekend has done a number on all of us), and we stick our noses back in our books... in between mediating fights over toys and filling tiny tummies with snacks to ward off nap-time crankiness.

This is what works right now. However slow and methodical it might seem.

What works for you? I'd love to read your ideas and thoughts about your homeschool journey as it is right now laid out before you...

Keep trudging along, mama of many homeschoolish kids. You aren't alone!




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A Mommy Blogger Unedited

The Blog Post I wrote in the dark of the night on my iPhone notepad... and never planned to actually publish:

I can remember when I used to come here to write the first thoughts... the journal entries of my day. The blank page was just a close friend listening. Only my fingers, the keyboard, and the swirling thoughts from the day... no deep questions about who would be reading the words or what they would think about it.

Then came stats and counters... conferences and swag. The looking eyes. The measuring stick.

I've been through many years of stages. Love and hate with this blog thing. I have grown roses and thorns here.

I have let a lot of writing go since the babies were born. Humble pie, humble pie. God took my rug and shook it out, leaving me with words like dust piles swept under - waiting for a good shaking.

I used to be able to stay up to write. It seems my writer self only comes out to play after the 1:11 AM train has whistled and the cat has found a Curve of my blanket to purr against. in the darkness of my room I exhale and try to stay still enough to peck out a note on my dim iPhone notepad, or edit a photo while the thoughts come.

A mothers time to unwind is stolen in the night, stolen from herself. She knows she will pay twice for it when the morning comes and the little hands clamor.

I hold my breath when the nursing baby stirs and hide my phone to put out the light. Just a moment to be me. Exhale.

The cat nudges my fingers away from the pecking and my thoughts falter. Daylight is only hours away, and the list of urgent things screams through my mind louder than the late train. I should be sleeping.

I am ashamed of myself for being so selfish to stay up late yet again snatching mommy time like a child with handfuls of candy before dinner. I wonder if my thoughts were worth picking out in the dark; if they will make sense tomorrow? If I'll ever find time in the homemaking or homeschooling or nursing or bill paying to actually blog them.

I feel silly in the dark. I think of all the bloggers who seem to have it together. All the homeschoolers, homemakers, and even just mothers who are so much more interesting and put together. Clean houses, neat children, organized desks...

The post erases itself like an unraveling thread in my mind against the snag of self doubts and the rip of comparison. Blank pages can be bullies. So can blogs. So can I.

It wasn't supposed to be about comparisons. This blog thing.

I'm too tired to think.

Another post unfinished, my arms tired and cramping, my body sighing for rest... I sink in to the bed and feel the baby stir for one last bit of mama's attention in the darkness. Sleep is the only thought; blog forgotten. Another day tucks itself in without the art of words to memorialize it. Another day of thoughts and ideas - eyes closing.

Sleep comes like a giant eraser. Maybe tomorrow I'll think of something interesting to write about, I console myself. The iPhone tucked under a pillow, I slip into a dream-state and surrender my words to the greater task of motherhood again.

iPhone Camera vs. DSLR

Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars. ~Les Brown

I pretty much have a camera attached to me at all times. If not the DSLR, I take the iPhone everywhere. Sometimes the iPhone is enough. Other times... like when the Super Moon stopped by recently, I was painfully aware of the major differences between the iPhone camera and my Canon 40D.

For example:

The MOON on iPhone...



The MOON on Canon 40D...

(photo by bananaking on flickr)

Big difference, eh? Yeah. So there are some things that you can't do unless you spring for the big guns. Depending on what lenses you add to your big gun, you can do amazing things - awesome things.

I have had a couple of years to learn that even my "big gun" (40D) isn't big enough to do a lot of things I want to do.Renting the 5D Mark II a few times to do professional photography assignments (including the two weeks I used it for my church photo directory) really showed me some limits that I had with my already high end DSLR. I have quite a few photog buddies who already have this camera and have showed me some differences between the Mark II and mine which make what I love doing - conference and portrait photography - a lot easier. Spending time with Mr. Mark II was enough to push me over the edge. And so, I have decided to take my photography to the next level... even as painful as purchasing the next big gun might be (with plastic - and I hate using plastic, trust me; I'm trying to get out of debt).

Because...

Here's the moon on 5D Mark II...

(photo by claytonkaras.com on flickr)

So I'm going to have to sell my Canon 40D. Even though both of my children are sure to whine about it. I have to help pay for this crazy move somehow. [I may be forcing my kids to sell lemonade all summer. #justkidding, #sortof]

You interested in upgrading to a Canon 40D from your fixed lens point and shoot (like the iPhone)? I've got one that's looking for a good home. She'll be coming to you without lenses (keeping those for the Mark II), but with 2 batteries, a cord for computer upload, a box and manual... and a lot of great memories. [You can get a cheap 50 mm Canon lens for 100$ new at your local photography shop.]

Email me if you are interested!

Memorial Day Memo

Memo to my Readers: I have this 15 year old son... who wrote a really great book review on Memorial Day... that you might want to go read.

That is all.

I Heart My Kids (and Matzo Ball Soup)

She loves me.

See the heart-shaped matzo ball she made for me last week?

What you don't see is the floating head she put in her daddy's soup. Aren't kids fun?

I hope you are enjoying yours this weekend. Make some fun memories together. It goes by so fast. In a blink, your one year old will be fifteen. Trust me on this. I know first hand.



P.S. Because I know someone will ask... This soup was a Matzo ball kit from the grocery store (Manischewitz) - my daughter made the balls, home made chicken broth I made from a previous night's rotisserie bird, shredded carrot, diced onion and celery (all pan fried in butter before dropping in the soup), a few dashes of hot sauce, some pink salt and fresh ground pepper. Mmmm.

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Busy Friday List

Today is the last day in Texas to vote early. You better believe I'll be there this afternoon. That means before I pick my husband up, I have to...

::have the laundry done::
::clean the house::
::pay the bills::
::homeschool the kids::
::help son find his book reports (oy!)::
::change the diapers, bathe the babies and dress them::
::pack the kids' suitcases so they can go see grandma::
::buy a graduation gift::
::make lunch & clean up the mess::
::find out why my driving record never came & drop off my certificate at court::
::file the paperwork on my desk::
::record the grades and completed work in Homeschool Tracker for this week::
::take daughter's computer to Best Buy to see if they can fix it::

What'cha wanna bet that the entire list won't get checked off? I'm going to need to prioritize. This is an example of what all my days look like - #harried!

Thankfully, I have the peace and joy of the Lord in the midst of my chaos. I was just nursing the baby, smelling and chewing on his tiny foot (a fetish of mine), and thinking of how wonderful it was to have these little people in my life.

While I'm checking my list off, head over to the Homeschool Post and see what the rest of my fellow author friends have been posting about this past week. If you were going to bookmark a site, I would highly suggest bookmarking the Homeschool Post. I heart the team of talented authors and highly recommend the great content streaming from www.hsbapost.com. Normally, when I'm really quiet over here, I'm still working behind the scenes over there to keep things fresh and make sure the Homeschool Blog Awards happens every year.

I've also been working on getting this blog re-designed and moving to WordPress. It has been a project on the "back burner" for some time. I have a few sweet friends that are helping me free of charge, so I'm tagging along on their "when I get time" list. I hear that it may happen soon... so you might just surf in one day and not recognize the place. Be sure and set your bookmarks to www.sprittibee.com - because the old Blogger blog will be going away forever. After seven years here! June 8th is my SEVEN year blogiversary.

Of course, you can also find me piddling with my iPhone camera at Instagram (I'm Sprittibee there, too). I like to fall asleep after uploading the day's photo goodness and scrolling through my feed to see what all my iPhone-addicted friends are shooting at.

What do you have going on for this busy Friday?

On Growing

Spring is a quick passing breeze in Texas. We start to feel rather summery in May. This year seems to have been pretty mild as far as the weather goes, though. We are just now beginning to get the first signs of the heat waves that will be here in June.



Being as preoccupied as I have been with homeschooling, planning, paperwork, and the logistics of running a house with a kid in every age group... we completely neglected the garden this year. It was good to us, anyway. We had LOTS of cilantro. Yep - that's the white stuff with the bees and butterflies in it. It begins to taste funny after it flowers, and it dies off at the first sign of heat, but apparently, it seeds itself and takes over your entire garden if you leave it alone and let it do "its thing". This is the second year we've let it alone in the garden, so next year, I suspect our entire yard may be one big forest of cilantro.



I enjoyed eating dishes with cilantro, making salads with it, using it in soups and stuffing it in tacos... but it eventually begins to look REAL tacky in the yard as it dries up. Currently, you can hardly see the raised flower beds. We are going to go out and gather some seed to take to my mom's garden, and cut the rest of it down to clear the beds. We missed the growing season for any other type of veggie this year due to this mess of cilantro weed. If we tried to grow anything now, the heat of summer would surely kill it (or cost us a fortune in water bills).



There was one other thing that grew in the raised beds - I forgot - just one thing: a lone stalk of dill weed. And sadly, I didn't make good use of it before it dried up.



Most of what we've done in the yard this year is enjoy feeding the birds, mulch, weed flower beds, water trees, and mow. It has been great seeing the tiny trees get so big. For instance... these were the purple Vitex trees when we planted them...



They were knee-high!



And then there's the mulberry tree we planted on Arbor Day when the 3yo was about the same age as the 1yo is now. It's huge.



Let's just say that the birds are plenty in our yard. We have a resident mockingbird or two, a family of red house sparrows, a bunch of humming birds, and a slew of other seasonal visitors that enjoy the seed, flowers, berries, and bugs.



My son even picked one and ate it. Don't eat them until they are ripe, though. They have a hallucinogenic affect if you eat too many unripe berries. I haven't ever tried to use any of the ripe berries in recipes. Maybe someday I'll have time for those types of domestic gardening pursuits. I imagined having a yard full of crops to harvest when we started our raised bed project, but the amount of work I have indoors with 4 kids and homeschooling keeps me from all those green thumb ideals.



Sweet berries remind me of my sweet sugar lumps that cry when we make them come inside to take a bath after playing in the yard. Yesterday they enjoyed spraying each other with the water hose until the three year old sprayed the one year old in the face and nearly drowned him. Should have seen that one coming.

We keep our trees green using child labor. Shhhh! They don't know they are working.



There are more important things growing on the inside of our home, though. Tiny hearts, minds, little bodies growing bigger (and hopefully wiser) each day. I love tending that garden the best... so I don't mind so much that there are a few weeds that got away from me outdoors. I'll get around to those later.

If you think in seasons, plant cereals. If you think in decades, plant trees. If you think in centuries, educate your children.  ~Chinese Proverb

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Bluebonnet Time (every Texas spring)

In case you haven't noticed yet, I'm a native Texan... and we Texans have a little crush on our state. Especially lovely are the things we think make Texas wonderful: like bluebonnets, which happen to be the state flower.



This year's bluebonnets were THICK, y'all. Maybe it was the drought last year? That's what we were guessing. I wondered if we would ever see green again after being in the worst drought in Texas history last summer.



Anyway, whatever the reason, we were delighted to get out and enjoy them... and to do a little science and research lesson about our bold, blue floral friends with Lucas Miller's book: Bluebonnet Time



I love a good Texan picturebook... especially one with cute illustrations and lots of fun facts in the margins. This one came with MUSIC, too!



There's a CD that has fun bluebonnet hunting (and photo-taking adventure) music for your drive!



The book is an Evan Wilder science journal - and it includes everything you might want to learn about bluebonnets. Fancy that!



The author of Bluebonnet Time is also a singer-songwriter that goes by the nickname "the Singing Zoologist". In fact, you can listen to his bluebonnet theme song in the little movie above.



Bluebonnets are awesome - who wouldn't want to learn more about them? If you are a Texas educator, a Texas parent, or just a bluebonnet lover, I'd say this book would be a perfect fit for your library.



As good as the book was, though, the flowers are what took the cake on our bluebonnet photo field-trip this year. I thought we might lose a three year old in the deeper spots.



The rain has been awesome this spring... and things are lovely here. Now that these pretty blue flowers are gone, there are fields of yellow in their place.



I'm still remembering the blue. See you next spring, bluebonnets!







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disclosure: I was provided a free copy of this book to review, but the opinions are my own.

Every Day is Mother’s Day

It isn’t too late to thank a good mother just because the national holiday has come and gone. Moms don’t get a day off – and it seems kind of silly to limit the gratitude to one day per year.

Trust me. I know first hand (times 4) how much encouragement a mom needs all year.

Motherhood is hard. Sticky. Gritty. Taxing. Never-ending. [Sometimes painful.]

It’s also wonderful. Amazing. Beautiful. Fulfilling. Fun.

It’s hard to explain.



A blogging friend of mine decided she wanted to capture the “mess and glory” of motherhood. She gathered the thoughts, experiences, and photographs from many mothers and compiled them in an e-book: Mother Letters.

I'm so humbled to be one of the featured mom photographers in the book! She included my little instagram picture of the "bite after bath time" included in this post. Teething is one of those painful moments for both baby and mama!

I wanted to share about it earlier, but I was in the middle of my “10 Days of Accidental Unschooling”, and then I had a homeschool conference to attend out of town this weekend. I’m planning to download Mother Letters to my iPad. It will be my very first book that I’ve downloaded by myself. You have to learn to live with technology - you can't let your teenagers get too far ahead of you!

Right now, if you hurry, you can buy a copy of the ebook PDF and get a second one for free. The Mother's Day sale ended last night, but I asked Squee! to give me a code for my readers to purchase the book. This week only, you have one additional week to get the Mother's Day BOGO deal (Buy 1, Get 1 Free!). Think of a great mom you know – perhaps a good friend who needs some encouragement.

Enter the code SprittiBOGO at checkout and then you'll both have one to read together! Hurry because the deal is over at midnight on May 22nd!

It’s not too late to bless a good mother with a copy of Mother Letters!




Disclosure: I signed up to be a Mother Letters affiliate, so if you purchase the book through my links, I will get a small commission. Thank you for helping support my blog through my affiliate links!


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A Hallmark Mother's Day

I know that Mother's Day is tomorrow, and that this video is telling you to get your cards in the mail... but my crazy life prevented me from warning you on time. You can hear the chaos in the background. Just listen for the gleefully mischevious toddler and the little "not-happy-unless-I'm-in-mom's-arms" baby. Don't make fun of me for my first vlog attempt, please. I know I look and sound ridiculous on video.



I thought I would share my crazy kids with you for mother's day - and show you the kind of amazing teenage 'tude I'm dealin' with on a regular basis. #pray4me

I so enjoyed meeting up with Hallmark a few weeks ago (I'm a greeting card fanatic). They asked us to send them some quotes and photos before we went, and here's the little slideshow they made for us with them:



The meet-up was part of an effort to get the message out about their "Tell Me" campaign. They shared their newest commercial with us (and made sure we were supplied with a box of tissue on every table):



My buddy Bon who blogs at Math Four and the Homeschool Post drove up from Houston to attend the event with me. Here's a snapshot that their prop photographer took of us while we were busy doing fun exercises with index cards - coming up with captions for greeting cards with the silly photos they brought along.

What are you doing this weekend to celebrate? I've been traveling out of town with two of my kiddos to a homeschool convention in Arlington, Texas and I'm on the way back home to see my mama tonight. She's an amazing lady. I don't know what I'd do without her in my life.

Don't let mother's day pass by without letting someone motherly know how much you appreciate them. Don't have a mama figure? Tell a good friend who you think is a great mom!

Then, don't stop there... think of all the people you love and appreciate all year long and tell them you appreciate them ANY DAY, EVERY DAY. The best greeting cards are sent "for no reason at all" except that you care.

P.S. For those of you who read here regularly, I'm throwing in a little give-away with this post - courtesy of Hallmark. It's a secret as to what the loot will be, but if you leave a comment below and tell me about your mom-figure you would like to honor this mother's day, you'll be entered to win!



Disclosure: Hallmark gave me a ton of cute, glittery, fun greeting cards and some books and a teddy bear, they bought us breakfast and showed us how they do their prop photography (amazing!) - and they were so fun to visit with. I already loved them before they contacted me, so it didn't matter that they gave me cool swag. I would have talked positively about them anyway. So get out there and send some greeting cards already! Snail mail is way better for saying 'I love you' than an email or tweet.