100 Things to do in 2012

This took me a little longer to compile than I thought it would! But it is done, and now I can concentrate on doing as many as possible. :)
1. Blog more
2. Geocache more
3. Use the crock pot more often
4. Walk more often
5. Knit & craft more often
6. Go on more field trips/day trips
7. Organize craft stuff
8. Organize kitchen cabinets
9. Learn to bake bread
10. Garden (it was a small garden, just some zucchini, but it was still a garden)
11. Read more (by visiting my book shelves more often)
12. Visit NYC (completed on 4/25/12)
13. Play on the big piano in FAO Schwarz (completed on 4/25/12, well technically my daughter did for me)
14. Get together with friends on a regular basis
15. Do the local walking tours (from newspaper a year or 2 ago)
16. Walking tour of Philly
17. Visit DC (preferably near apple blossom time) (6/16/12)
18. Go to a stargazing event at Antietam
19. Visit the planetarium at least once
20. Go to the Baltimore Aquarium
21. Rewatch Lost :)
22. Knit Jake's Slytherin scarf
23. Facebook less
24. Do more science-y things
25. Go to the beach (9/13-9/16/12)
26. Eat more local foods
27. Visit more local places (shops, restaurants, historical places, etc)
28. Make my recycled newspaper tree
29. Help Amanda with her craft list
30. Update home décor
31. Buy better sneakers that don't make my feet ache
32. Use my cookbooks more often
33. Use our fire pit
34. Do some non-vandalizing street art, such as http://isaacgracelily.blogspot.com/2011/03/rock-on.html
35. Have a harry Potter party
36. Lose weight (boring I know.. But whatever)
37. Go to a comedy club/show
38. See a play (completed 3/10/12)

39. Visit the Hager House
40. Go to the farmer's market more
41. Make a new friend (Made a few new friends YAY!)
42. Take a carriage ride
43. Go to a drive-in theater
44. Send a message in a bottle
45. Release a helium-filled balloon with a message in it
46. Visit the American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore
47. Go to Brookside Gardens in the Spring or Summer
48. Visit the DC Zoo
49. Go yardsaling
50. Organize photos
51. Hike up to Cunningham Falls
52. Picnic at more MD State Parks
53. Hike on the AT
54. See all the Bridges of Washington County
55. Make a late night run to Krumpe's Donuts
56. Host a Murder Mystery Party
57. Visit a winery
58. Go to maple Syrup making demo at Cunningham Falls
59. Eat Fastnachts
60. Go tubing
61. Play croquet
62. Pick strawberries
63. Watch fireworks
64. Play disc golf
65. Go on a ghost tour (no matter how lame it may be lol)
66. Find a better pizza dough recipe (technically the same recipe, just bought fresh yeast lol)
67. Watch a Quidditch game
68. Learn to cook some Greek foods
69. Visit College Park Aviation Museum (use CertifiKid coupon)
70. Visit State Museum of Pennsylvania (Use Groupon coupon)
71. Take more pictures
72. Organize recipe binders
73. Have a yard sale
74. Buy a new couch
75. Celebrate Christmas in July (just for something different)
76. Wordless Wednesday (on my blog)
77. Menu plan every week
78. Some sort of community service/volunteer work (hopefully not court-ordered hehe)
79. Play a game of pinball at the arcade
80. Go to the Great Frederick Fair this year
81. Eat something deep-fried at above mentioned fair (Not from the fair, but we had deep fried Oreos at teh beach)
82. Have a water balloon fight
83. See a movie in 3D (just to confirm that I do in fact hate 3D movies)
84. Buy a new board game
85. Go to a concert
86. Make candy
87. Go putt-putting
88. Get my passport
89. Watch all of John Hughes movies
90. Go on a scavenger hunt
91. Have a swap party
92. Eat at an Indian restaurant
93. Have dessert for supper
94. Grill pizza
95. Visit the Goddard Space center
96. Go to Dinosaur Land
97. Visit the Poe Museum and Poe's gravesite
98. Go on a train ride
99. Visit the MD Theater
100. Visit the Rural Heritage Museum

Holiday Happenings

Been awhile since I've posted and I thought I'd do an update. :) We finally moved! The end of October to be exact. It was a bit rough at first... Amanda is never good about change, so we had about a week before she felt "ok" about living here. She was the one that BEGGED us to sign the lease and then once we moved she wanted to go back to the apartments. (She was like this when we moved into the apartments as well, but I thought it was because we moved from Smithsburg because we HAD to, not WANTED to.) I was very stressed about about various things and that was the icing on the cake. On the plus side of it all, I did lose 10lbs. lol School-wise things are up & down. We started off ok back in Sept. then with the move we kind of slacked off since we were packing and what-not. And since we've been moved & unpacked things haven't restarted yet. The Holidays came up quickly and we were wrapped up in that. We did manage to sneak in a field trip in Nov. We drove to Triangle VA to the Marine Corps Museum. We had a really nice day. There was a LOT to see there.

We've done a bit of baking since early Nov. Cupcakes, pie, coffee cake, and cookies. A LOT of cookies!

Jake also turned 16, so that's why the slice of pie is getting a candle stuck in it. ;) Mid-Dec we attended our homeschool groups Christmas party. We wanted to go since we really aren't "active" in the group much anymore. There aren't many older kids in the group so there just isn't anything going on for my 2. :( But anyways, we went and had a great time. The kids each got a gift from the kids' gift exchange. Jake got a recycled butter box with about 27 tiny wrapped "presents". He had to open each one to find the Gamestop gift card. We had a fun time watching Jake open them. Amanda got a cool Hello Kitty "lunch-box" with 4 Hello Kitty Pez dispensers. I had seen this at AC Moore and told the mom about it. So Amanda was happy about getting that. For the moms gift exchange, anyone participating just brings a gift. we draw numbers and go round choosing or stealing a gift. Whoever gets #1 can go again at the end to steal if they choose. I got #1 (again) this year. My first gift was a bunch of nice ornaments and scented items. It of course was stolen. My 2nd one was a really nice crochet shopping bag. It was stolen. The 3rd time I thought I was picking up some candy or something, but it was a Port City Java gift card, a really cute coin purse and a handmade Golden Snitch ornament. I LOVED it. And I warned everyone if they took it from me I would be stealing it back at the end. So of course, I kept it. :) I had made a really awesome recycled newspaper sparkling tree. I have to make one for myself yet. So hopefully will get that done this week. lol

Amanda and I also made cranberry & popcorn garland for the trees out back. I meant to get this done for the Winter Solstice, but we were a day late. Christmas has come and gone and we had a very nice one this year. Kids got a lot of cool & fun stuff. I guess they were pleased as they both dove into their games and such. lol

Here is sweet little Dwight posing...

Amanda's pile

Jake's loot

Family gifts

Now we just need to figure out what to do for New Year's Eve, besides eating Chinese Food.

Goodbye 2008!!

This year seemed to go by really fast. I dunno, maybe it was because the kids and I were involved in more things this year. We certainly weren't bored! Here is a look back at some of what we've done:

Homeschool co-op: This is an ongoing group that meets the 1st and 3rd Fridays of the month (aside from summer months). We've had so much fun with our co-op. We've done science classes, cooking classes, gym classes, a Wizardology class, the kids have had plenty of time to just hang out and chill, they've made some really funny videos. I've been able to watch all of the kids grow, not just my own. I've watch the babies go from just newborns to toddlers. I really love our group of homeschoolers. The new semester starts in a few weeks. YAY!

Earth Scouts: We got this group up and running in April. We met twice a month on Tuesdays at a local library. We've had some members leave and have gained some new members. So right now our group is staying at about 8 families. We did a lot with the Respect for Nature principle. Some things we did include: made field guides and went on a nature walk along the C&O canal; made bird feeders & nesting bags; made glass lanterns & some of us braved the cold and went on a nighttime stroll around the local park during the Christmas lighting; Trick or Treated for Unicef - the kids raised almost $200!! There were a lot more we've done since April, and it has been a blast facilitating this group.

Parties: Oh so many parties & potlucks!! In April we celebrated Earth Day with a huge potluck. We had a speaker come in from the recycling plant, the kids & parents enjoyed that. Our food spread was to be only earth friendly foods (meaning organic if possible, using the least amount of energy as possible to make it, etc); We had a park potluck for Cinco de Mayo, everyone brought lots of yummy foods; in September, we had our annual "Not Back to School" park picnic. As always TONS of food and great time being spent with each other. Then the year ended with our Geo-lunch international holiday party. There was lots of food, gift exchanges, games, and just some fun hang out time for kids and moms.

Field Trips: In March we had a trip to the local PetCo. My kids have done this before with another group, but they never pass up a chance to hang out in the pet store. It was a crazy day, we had the store totally overwhelmed with kids. The manager was a little crabby due to a misunderstanding on her part. But all in all, the kids had fun so that's what matters; April brought around a trip to a local Martin's grocery store. The kids learned about eating healthy and making good food choices; We also headed out to Philly for a day in April. We went to the Franklin Institute to see the Star Wars traveling exhibit. This was great. We all really enjoyed seeing the actual costumes and props from the movies; June brought a very impromptu field trip to Winchester to the Discovery Museum and Sonic. hehe It all started with a discussion of the Sonic drive-in's, so of course to make it educational, we went to the Discovery Museum which the kids had to themselves for the most part. Half of our group worked in the "apple orchard" business, the other half worked in the "hospital" business. LOL Of course, my kids were in the orchard. No big surprise there, since we live in one. ;) But they had a great time!; We headed back to Philly in October. Again to the Franklin, but this time to see the Pirates exhibit. It was nice, but I was pissed because we couldn't take photos. But the kids still had fun.

Geo-lunches: one of the moms in our group decided to start monthly Geo-lunches. Each month we'd have a different country, everyone would bring a dish from that area and if the kids wanted, they can share something they've learned about the area. We attended a few and had a great time. The kids were bummed we didn't get to them all. They'll be continuing in the new year, but I *think* we'll be doing the US this time around. We ended the year with an International holiday potluck/party

Losses: In June we had Amanda's cat put down. He wasn't very old but had a lot of health issues. I had really put this off for way longer than I should have. I don't think he was suffering, but he was getting worse. And it would have been way more traumatic if she found he died rather than just putting him down. And then if that wasn't enough, either on Halloween day or the day after, something killed her bunny. We are pretty sure it was a fox as we've had one stalking around all summer. But whatever it was, took the bunny. we couldn't even find any trails of fur; And not as sad & upsetting as the pets, but Amanda had her wisdom teeth removed in Sept. She did WAY better than I ever expected. So either she is really tough, or everyone else is wimpy. hehe We had planned to start back with school that week, but that was put on hold. Jake didn't mind one bit. ;)

Fun & Entertainment: I like April sometime I had won tickets from a local radio station to see John Mayer playing at Merriweather Post. So a friend and I headed off one icky day in July. Yep, it was storming something terrible on the day of the concert. We still went, in the rain. And wouldn't you know it, the rain stopped during the last song of the night. Aww, how kind of you monster nature. LOL We also saw a few movies throughout the year. Not as many as I had planned on. But oh well.

Birthdays: Amanda turned 15 in August. She just invites some kids over anymore, they hang out and chat, play Rock Band, etc. This year though they did Henna tattoos. This was fun, but stinky. lol I am glad the evening was nice and they could go out to the patio. Jake turned 13 in November. So know I have teens in the house!! He had some boys over, and of course, they played the Xbox & the Wii all day. lol Parties get easier & less expensive as the kids get older. :D

Work: Randy FINALLY got back to work in July. He was off for 2 years with a work related injury. He likes the job and it seems to be going quite well. So keep your fingers crossed for another raise next month. LOL

That's our year in a nutshell. I am sure I forgot to tell you something really exciting. But I figure this post was extremely long as it is. ;) Have a wonderful and safe New Years!! We'll be staying home as usual. I don't like going out on New Year's Eve anymore. We're ordering Chinese food for dinner tonight. YAY!

Week in review (I really need to come up with better titles)

We had a good week. Lots of activities. Lots of running. Glad its over. :)

Monday was a party for a HSing friends daughter, Kate. She just turned 9, but adores Amanda and another older girl from our group, Rachel. So of course, they were invited. hehe The kids had a great time, even Jake who didn't want to go thinking no boys would be there. They had popcorn, and veggies & dip, and apples, cheese, lots of drinks, and then cake. The girls all had fun playing with beads, tattoos, and colored hair spray.

Tuesday was food co-op pickup day. My mom and I rand to Target to get photos Amanda needed printed for photography class. then I ended up getting at co-op early, so was able to help unload and sort things when the truck arrived. I had only gotten 3 items, and was to get produce as well.. but that truck was late as well and had to get it later. As to the photos, if you didn't know it yet.. on Flickr, you have pictures sent to Target from your account and printed for just 20 cents per 4x6 photo! Amanda's turned out really good. So we spent Tuesday evening putting them in a little photo/scrapbook album she had gotten for her birthday.

Wednesday was photography class. But Amanda woke up feeling bad, she was complaining of a bad headache. So she didn't go. Then later in the day she told me she didn't really want to go back because she doesn't care for the guy teaching. She just gets an uncomfortable feeling about him. She's only "met" him once, but I don't want to not listen to her feelings about people. So, I need to get a post sent to our group that she'll be dropping this class. I am planning on doing something else, I guess starting our own group.

Thursday, we got to stay home finally. But had to do some cleaning as the kids had a friend coming over. He comes every Thursday before co-op. He says this is going to be the day he always comes. LOL

Friday was of course co-op day. It went well. First class, Wizardology, we did some reading. Some of the boys needed to finish their wands. They all were to write spells in Haiku form. So they were shared. Jake made a spell to cook scrambled eggs. Luke did a cleaning spell. Jayme did an attack spell that could also be used to feed yourself (along with wand movements), and Zach made a spell to transform a human into an animal. The spells were quite funny. Kitchen Chemistry we did a thinking experiment from this Blog: Think! We did the Apple one from week 4. The kids had fun. Friday night was Mom's Night Out. 8 of us mom met at Tara's home for an evening of good food and conversation. it was a nice evening. But you can tell all of us were worn out from the summer.. by 9:30 we were all yawning I think. LOL I got home a little before 10:30. At the beginning of summer, we all went to Jessica's and stayed until after 1am! So that's how much the summer has worn us all out. ;)

Saturday we took off early and went to Philly for the day. We wanted to see the Pirates exhibit before it ends on Nov. 2nd. It was ok, not as good as the Star Wars for sure. And I was bit upset because we weren't allowed to take any photos. But we had a nice time regardless. Bore going into the Pirates we walked around the Franklin a bit. My kids have been all through the place, but Amanda's friend Phoebe hadn't. So we went into the Heart area. Jake walked up to the guy doing the heart demo and asked if he could touch the brain he had out. LOL Of course he said go for it, so Jake did. Eeew! Then he was telling Jake more about the brain. I learned some things, such as different parts of your brain store different types of words. Nouns in one section, verbs in another, etc. I truly never knew that. Then he had Jake do an experiment. He put on these goggles that were a bit funky, they were kind of like swirls on the lens instead of clear. So he had Jake touch his nose, then a penny, over and over until he could do it fairly quickly without missing. Then he started moving it until he could do the same. Then while touching nose then penny, back and forth, he told him to remove the goggles. He of coursed then missed the penny. LOL It was cool how your brain would adjust to the different situation of looking through unclear glasses, then having to adjust again once you can see normally again. He had fun.

So today, we are just relaxing. Plus it's my birthday, and I don't feel like doing much at all. But of course, I say this right at supper time and everyone is going to whine about food. *sigh* But in was a good week. We finished up most of our work for the week. I'll post in a few what we have up for this week. I need to get some of the pictures from yesterday as well and upload.

Plans for the upcoming week

I like to blog about what I have planned for each week. Then when I go back at the end of the week and blog about what we did, I can compare the 2. This way I have a better idea if I am planning too much or little. So anyways..

Mon Oct 13 - 4pgs Word Roots; 3pgs Key To Percents; Afternoon birthday party; Read Explorers book.

Tues Oct 14 - 4pgs Word Roots; 3pgs Key To Percents; Start Lewis & Clark unit study (continue throughout week until first lesson is finished); Food co-op pick-up & other errands.

Wed Oct 15 - 4pgs Word Roots (book is finished); 3pgs Key To Percents; Photography class; Science reading.

Thurs Oct 16 - 4pgs Daily Grams; 3 pgs Key To Percents; Science activities.

Fri Oct 17 - All Day Co-op; MNO

Sat Oct 18 - Day trip to Philly

So we'll see how well it goes. We normally do not do much running, hehe.

The weekend & Historic Harper's Ferry

I haven't gotten anything done the past few days. Saturday was spent cleaning out our horse shoe pits (that we didn't use) and finishing the last bit of cleaning in the patio. The Randy got the brillant idea to rip out these ugly, stinky "trees" in the yard by the pits. There was nothing but thistles and thorn bushes around them. So after about 5 hours, we had his dad's truck piled way over teh cab. But it looks nicer out back now. LOL

We had my brothers & mom and Randy's mom over for cookouts on Sunday. My brothers & mom came earlier for a lunch cookout of burgers & dogs. Then Randy's mom came over about 5ish for steaks. Of course it started to rain while he was grilling, but the storm passed over quickly. We played cards all afternoon & the kids swam.

Monday we didn't do anything. Everyone was too tired. Jake didn't get out of bed until after 11am.

Yesterday we visited the Harper's Ferry Historic National Park. I will have some pictures up later. It was a nice day. Wasn't too crowded or hot. We visited the mueseums, shops and the wax museum. (That place always scared me as a kid. LOL) Amanda said it was a little disturbing. ;) Then we ended with a climb up to Jefferson Rock. We are so out of shape. LOL I wans't sure if Randy would be able to make it. He knee was hurting but he made it up. We didn't go on up to the college campus or the cemetary. So that's one place I can check off our list of local places to visit. :)

As for school work, we have a bit of science & history to finish. Then of course math is ongoing through summer. I think we can knock out most of the science this week.

A schedule of sorts..

Well I decided that we needed to have a weekly "plan/schedule" of what was needed to be completed before we end our seat work for the summer. So I've been jotting down in my Homeschooling Organizer (This is the one for next year, mine runns from 8-06 thru 12-07) what I would like to have finished each day. This is not somethign I normally do, because I am just not great at schedule following. But so far, so good. Of course, this was only our first week of scheduling. LOL We did every day but Friday. And that was with running every single day of the week, including Friday (we actually went out 3 differnet times yesterday! ACK!!). I might try to talk the kids into doing some work today.. I know they'll refuse though. But maybe we can at least start our Egyptology book finally.

Thursday we went to the MD Science Center in Baltimore. We had a nice time, spent about 3.5 hours exploring the center. The Grossology tour was there, and I wasn't expecting to pay extra.. but we had to pay $26 for the 4 of us to go in. Well.. we were pretty dissapointed. There wasn't as much set up as I thought there'd be. And half of the games didn't work or weren't working very well. I had wanted to go back for the Animal Grossology tour, but I think we'll pass that one up. But all in all, the Science Center was fun. We had watched a really cool demonstratiion with Mr. Joe about liquid nitrogen. At the end he made fog and let the kids all feel how cool the fog felt. He was very careful about reminding them to NOT touch the pan he was holding. He stressed safety throughout the demonstration as well.

After we finished up at the Science Center we walked around the harbor to go eat at the Cheesecake Factory. The kids LOVE this place. We brought home 2 slices of cheesecake. YUM!! This time we tried the Godiva Chocolate and Jake picked out another chocolate, something like Chocolate Tuxedo or something.. can't recall the name. But it was yum as well.

So that was our week. It went pretty nicely, glad it is the weekend, even though it is going to be yucky. But we're going to get started Spring Cleaning!! Today we are doing the kids' clothes. Time to find out what fits and what they need new. Hope everyone has a great weekend!!

Whew! What a week...

Well last weekend we thought the cat was having trouble going to the bathroom (#2).. and on Monday when he wasn't better, actually he was doing much worse, we took him to the vet's. Turns out he actually had a urinary problem.. blockage/infection. He was to be released on Wed. but we were heading to Philly that day, so we arranged for him to be boarded until Thurs.

Well while in Philly on Wed. I get a call from the vet. He was doing fine, going on his own. We could pick him up Thurs. when we got back into town. Ok good. See you then. Well then on Thurs. just a bit before we were ready to come home, I get another call. He isn't going now. They may have to put in another cath. He needs to stay until Sat.

So this AM (Fri.) I give a call to see how he is doing. He is ok & going a little.. but the dr. was very worried about him being depressed. They wanted us to either come visit or pick him up. We picked him up. If we went to visit and then left him again, he'd have been even more depressed in my opinion.

So we got him about Noon. He's doing good, eating and drinking. Just very wobbly from the medicines. He has about a weeks worth to take plus is on special food for the next 6 months. We just have to watch him as he is leaking a bit. Right now he is curled up in a blanket sleeping on the couch. I know he is happy to be home. He's been giving a lot of kisses this afternoon.

On another note... Philly was good. Just happy to be home. The King Tut exhibit & Frankling Inst. were nice. We enjoyed everything. Didn't sleep at all in the hotel though. LOL I'll hopefully post some pictures this weekend.

Getting ready for some snow!

Well we are "supposed" to be getting hit with a winter storm here this week. Calling for possibly up to 8" of snow, plus maybe sleet or freezing rain. Can do without the latter for certain! But the snow we are looking forward to.

School-wise, last week was a bust. We've all had colds and felt miserable... so we didn't do much of anything at all but sat wrapped in blankets and drinking lots of juice and hot tea. Towards the end of the week, I was feeling tons better.. so I started some decluttering. I cleaned out my spices. Tossed a bunch that were VERY old. Made a new list of what I need from the store. I cleaned out the BIG junk drawer in the hutch in the kitchen. Tossed stuff from there and put all the odds and ends into containers. Now I am moving on to magazines. I have the past 6+ years of Family Fun magazines stored in magazine holders. So I started going through these. Last night I went through about 20 while watching the Grammy Awards. So they are in a bag waiting for their new owner to come pick them up. LOL

We have our King Tut tickets!! Can't wait. We are going on the 21st, then staying overnight and check out some other attractions (Liberty Bell, etc) on the 22nd. Amanda is mad because I didn't do the mega-fancy hotel. LOL But hey they charge for their high speed wireless, so I wasn't going to pay even MORE!! hehe But were we are staying is nice and cute. And hey, we're only going to be there for 1 night.. so no worries. So anyways, we are all looking for to a mini vacation.

This week we need to focus on just Math and History. We are slightly behind in both. History is of course Ancient Egypt. So we are going to really buckle down and get caught up there.

So off I go, we have to go grocery shopping today and get some goods stocked up.. just in case this storm really hits us hard. :-)

Franklin Institute Membership

Our membership packet finally came! I am so excited! I can't wait to hit as many of the museums on the free admission program list as possible. We'll be visiting the FI when we go see King Tut, either next month of in March. We are still debating on when, but need to soon because I have to purchase tickets soon.

So we are planning on visiting the MD Science Center to see the Grossology exhibit. And there are quite a few places I want to hit in VA and PA as well. So I will be busy planning fun field trips this year. :)