I have always loved books. Ever since I was little, I have loved the feel of a book. I remember my first trip to the library in elementary school and realizing, “I can read any of these? All these books? Are available to me? To take home?” ‘Twas not long after that I developed deep abiding friendships with Laura Ingalls and Ramona Quimby.
My affection for books led me to quite the collection, even with regular purging. More than once I have had large book sales or donated hundreds of books to a local public school. I couldn’t resist a “special” book. What about the old, slightly tattered U.S. history book marked 75% off? The illustrations? Be still my heart! What if no one buys it? What if someone buys it who doesn’t really care? Don’t my children need to know about Daniel Boone and the other, “regular folk” who settled the Blue Ridge Mountains and cooked Johnny cakes over an open fire in a “spider” pan?
With this move, I am being brutal. It is amazing, when you know you’ll have just one shelf, how cutting you can be. I’ve glanced rows of titles, keeping what gave me an instant feeling of comfort and joy, and then swept boxes away, armloads away, to Goodwill and the consignment store.
I have found that this kind of purging is cleansing, in a very natural sense. Is it what I wanted? No. Not like this. But I can say that I have learned something about myself. Books…. Things…. They can fill empty spaces in our lives. Until we realize that that is what they are doing.
Just listen to me! The clutter QUEEN giving out advice on not being taken up with stuff. I’m only sharing what happens when you have to choose.
I thought you might want to see my one large shelf. I plan to have a craft area in my bedroom for my brooches and artwork, but once again, I’ll be culling huge amounts of stuff to focus on what I love most.
Well, that’s all for now.
I’m off to work now, but have something to show you soon. I found a treasure today! A bunny of a treasure.
I’m thinking of minimizing this year. Not to such an extreme. Well, I can’t. There are six of us here in this jumble of mess, after all. This video does, however, make me feel free.
I’ll be working towards clearing out this year. Really.
By the way, I hope your Christmas day was lovely and filled with family and love.
Where’ve I been? I was actually out of town last Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and I humbly apologize because I didn’t let anyone know. Thankfully, everyone has much more important things to do than hang around my blog, but it still would have been nice of me to say a little “see-you-later.” I worked a lot of my “off” days last week in order to be able to go, and the time just ran out.
The carpenter and I always try to get away this time of year and it is one of our most-looked-forward-to times of the year for both of us. It is a time of rest and soul searching and I always come back humbled due to realizing how much my priorities in life needed to be worked on.
Anyway, here I am, back, and doing a lot of cleaning up today. Yesterday was a work day, so I rightfully made myself stay at my desk and work. Today there’s sun pouring into the naked windows as the curtains swirl around in the washing machine, and I have been going through papers and notebooks and “stuff” getting rid of handfuls and armfuls of things we do not need.
I get myself carried away sometimes (or is it that I carry myself away?) coming up with all of these extra, ridiculous things I must be doing. You know I’m a notebook girl, but even I have accumulated too many lists, directions, how-to’s, directives, and plain ol’ rambling that is collecting dust and cluttering up my mind.
Life is simple after all. School is school, life is life, work is work, and it all revolves around relationships, first with God, then with family, and then with everyone else. I think the simpler I keep things this year, the more I’ll get done.
I’ll soon post our lessons for last week, just to stay on track with that. Princess of the Universe and I have done a lot of review from 5th and 6th grades today as we’ve gone through old papers and glued some of the best into the last few pages our our keepsake books from those years. ( Yes, there were indeed a few things floating around that never got glued in.)
Looking at all of the pictures of the things that we did… Well, I just know we are right where we need to be.
First of all, in my series of posts about our school plans, has to come the planner. It hasn’t been long since I went back to carrying a large purse/planner because I just love having everything with me, all the time.
I have SO enjoyed working with my planner and getting it just right. You know how often I’m in thrift stores, and it is really fun to look through books, papers, and the bag/purse section of the store to see what I can find to enhance my planner.
The purse planner above started out as a 2-dollar cloth-covered notebook, though the actual notebook part had been taken out of it. Still, the zipper was in good shape, it had room for credit-size cards, and I liked the bright colors. As Gru says in Despicable Me, LIGHTBULB.
I knew my notebook would fit right in and I imagined using something to make a strap and maybe adding a purse part to the planner somehow. Basically, visions of glue sticks danced in my head.
I ended up finding two belts in complimentary colors in Goodwill, and a small satiny purse planner to glue to the front. (Note: fabric takes glue better and holds better than a small purse made from vinyl. I should know.) The belts are the kind that are just fabric with no holes and have the metal rings on one end, so I hooked one to the other and glued them across the “bottom” of the planner and then glued them up the sides, gluing one on one side and the other on the other side, thus ending up with an adjustable strap!
I found that the reproducible planning page provided in the Five In A Row manual was the perfect size to cut in half, hole-punch and put in the planner. I made copies, front and back for 8-10 weeks of lesson planning.
Since I work at home three days a week, I love having everything with me in my purse planner, all the time, so when I’m out shopping or running errands, if I think of something to write down for school, I can do it immediately and not have to re-write when I get home. When you are working and homeschooling, every minute counts.
I made pretty dividers by using pictures from old magazines that inspired me, laminating them and hole-punching them.
The small notebook you see me holding to the left holds weeks worth of lessons once they are done. I keep the pages in my purse/planner until the week is over and then transfer them to the notebook that will be a permanent record of what we did. (I do realize that a purse planner can’t reasonably hold a year’s worth of lessons all at one time. ) The goal is to keep our current eight weeks of study in the planner at all times. More about that in the next post or two.
The planner has sections for shopping, routines, school, to-do, addresses, etc. It also holds one or two things that I just love to read over and over because it helps me stay on track.
So there you have it: The Planner.
It makes sense to me and it works for me. And now I’m always on the look-out for cool paper that I can hole-punch and use in my planner binder. Or cloth-covered notebooks that can be turned into a purse planner with cool belts. Stay tuned.
PS – This planner is indeed 5-1/2 x 8-1/2. I am adding some more pictures to help explain how I did this. Now I’m looking for fabric-covered notebooks everywhere I go so I can make another one!
Important to note that one strap is glued on one side and the other strap on the other side, for balance.
You know you’re a homeschool mom when a new planner makes you crazily happy for weeks — like a cruise or a new car or something. You just feel rich with your new favorite thing! A planner. Sigh. And a planner purse combo? Double sigh!!
Back in 2007 I wrote a post about downsizing my planner. It was only due to the situation I was in that I let go of my beloved purse planner that I had carried for years. I mean, I began carrying a purse planner combo probably around 1998 and totally loved it. It had the medium to large page size of 5-1/2 by 8-1/2 inches, and I had at my fingertips the capability to work on school lessons, grocery lists, or whatever, any time, ie., waiting in the doctor’s office, sitting in a parking lot waiting for someone… I like to be writing out plans or making notes of things. The situation I found myself in that required a downsize to a smaller planner was out of necessity, not because I didn’t love my planner anymore.
Over the last year, I have been looking for a larger purse planner like I used to have, and you just cannot find them anymore; at least, I have had a hard time finding one. So I got on line and began searching. Lo and behold, I found one just like I used to have, only it was a third of the price! I ordered this planner from Buy The Case Sales on a Thursday night and it was delivered on the following Monday! Four days! And a weekend at that!
In addition to the purse I ordered from Buy The Case Sales, I visited The Busy Woman site and found that their purse planners were on sale as well! So I ordered one of theirs and an insert notebook to go with it. This also was ordered on Thursday night and arrived on Monday!
Ahhh Monday was a joyous day! Two planners arriving at the same time with my three days off work beginning the following day!
As an aside, I had on hand a nice leather strap that I put on this planner, instead of the vinyl/plastic one that comes with it. (I cannot tell you how I would love to have aleather purse planner like this with even more room in the purse compartment on the front, but until I come up with an extra 200.00, this will have to do!) I actually am always on the lookout at thrift stores for nice, removable handbag straps (you usually have to buy the whole purse ) to interchange like this.
The thing about this size planner (5-1/2 x 8-1/2 inch pages) is that you’ll sometimes find pages that will fit it that are not necessarily made by Day Runner or Frankling Covey, or whatever. I was suprised, and very happy, to find at the Habitat for Humanity Restore on Tuesday, a brand new address book for $2.00 with beautiful pages that fit my planner perfectly! Even though some of the tabs had headings I didn’t need, I just used some plain white stickers to modify them for my own use!
Sections So Far:
Birthdays/Anniversaries
Shopping
School Notes
To-Do
Weekly Plans
Calendar
Telephone/Address
I also have those handy-dandypages that hold credit/business cards and the nice zipper pouch pages — one for my NC Homeschool Card on one side and a large family picture on the other side, and one to hold coupons. The front holds keys, cell phone, lip gloss, a small lotion and a few other tiny things.
I think a large part of successful homeschooling is having order. Granted, my orderliness may look totally different from your orderliness, but having some type of system in place for assigning work, following through and record keeping helps us reach our individual goals.
As far as assigning work, we are still learning about the Workbox System.
This post is about what I do with the work once it’s done.
This hallway storage chest used to have pictures on top of it, but it is now my work station. I find that I’m constantly moving around during our school days, and this chest is the perfect height for me to stand in front of and work. I stand here and grade papers; I stand here and work on our schools notebooks and portfolios.
On top you see:
A few books we are working on
Michaela’s 5th grade notebook. It’s a combination scrapbook/portfolio of work done during 5th grade.
An accordia- style file folder in which I stand papers and items I’m currently working on. For example, one section holds brochures and Michaela’s journal entries from a recent field trip, but I’m waiting on pictures being developed from that day so that I can glue them into her notebook all at one time.
Glue, scissors and paperclips so I can work and organize without delay
Some of the things in her notebook include some work from a Five In A Row Fold-N-Learn completed during the election, only we stored our information notebook-style.
I love how this “station” lets me keep Michaela’s notebook filled up in a chronological fashion. It helps me not to procrastinate! I used to have little stacks of paper everywhere thinking that at some point I’d “catch up,” but knowing all along that I wanted a pretty and detailed record of some of Michaela’s best work by the end of the school year.
I have changed my procrastinating ways! Right now I probaby spend less than half an hour a week placing things in this notebook and it’s all because of organization. As soon as Michaela is finished writing a story or coloring a map, I glue it into the notebook. Of course she also has a three-ring binder which is organized by subject that’ll hold regular worksheets and math work. I love, though, that her 5th grade notebook/scrapbook is getting done day by day now! The only time I wait to put something in is, as I mentioned before, if I’m waiting on photos to go with it.
Sitting catty-corner to my notebook station is a bookshelf that holds art books, sketch books, and a lot of craft books. This is my home notebook station, the place where my home notebook stays open (unless I’m in my purple chair writing herbal information into it).
My notebook contains my current shopping list, menus and many other things that I like to be able to look at throghout the day.
Guys. Today was a wonderful school day. I can’t recommend the Workbox System highly enough. And remember, I don’t even have my book yet.
On tap for school today were 9 assignments sitting in those 9 pretty boxes. Princess of the Universe was very excited to pull one box at a time off the shelf and do the assignment in it. The excitement lasted all day. We were organized. Everything went smoothly. This is only day 1, but I’m sold. This was a work day for me.
I realize that not every day will need to be done from 9 or 10 or 12 boxes, but for my work days, this is PERFECT. And to be clear, I DO intend to use this system even on non-work days, but I know there will be days that we get lost in Hamlet, or have a fieldtrip, or do something major in the doll house and we won’t do all the boxes. That’s okay, that just means a few are already loaded for the next day!
The beauty of it is the accountability factor. The JUST DO IT factor. Just put the things in the boxes. Even if they are sweet little projects that I bought and keep thinking that we’ll get to them the next day and the next day and I just keep waiting because it’s something special and needs a spotlight or something. Duh.
Princess of the Universe made cookies totally by herself today. Totally. I mean, I got up a couple of times to show her how to properly place the tray into the oven with care and I was totally right around the corner the entire time, typing, and asking every so often (of course), do you need help?
No.
These cookies were so good. Who cares if the only cookie cutters we have are from Christmas? Stockings and stars and Santas can go spring any time. Just use blue and green icing.
This gave us garden time this afternoon when my work day was done. GUILTLESS garden time. Everything was done. I easily refilled the boxes up this evening for her work tomorrow.
A little side note here. It’s not that we weren’t doing school before. We were. I was certainly writing out lesson plans and had things on her school shelf. STACKS of things. But can you envision me at my desk and Princess of the Universe coming to me and saying, “So what’s next?”
“Uh, let me get out the planner.” Then a dark cloud forms over my head when I remember that I want her to do some writing, but did I mark the page in the Story Starters book?
Can you see how easy it would be for me to then say, “Just go read for a minute and I’ll be around there to show you what I want you to do.”
An hour goes by.
It was so different today. Actually, one of her boxes at this very minute contains her Story Starters book with a little note that says, “Read The Brave Robin on page 77 and finish the story.”
Let’s go out into the garden now, shall we?
I just had to show you this. Princess of the Universe and I could not believe it. This spirea is filled with oothecas. I’ve circled a few of them, but we counted 8 in all and we are sure there are more that we just overlooked. How many praying mantises will we have this year?
I counted about five or six violets in bloom. All I could think of was spring infusions. I didn’t really spot any chickweed yet, but it’s coming. I know it. I love to eat violets in salads and to use the leaves and blooms in my infusions. Ahhh.
Thank you, spring, for thinking of coming and staying at last.
We played around in the garden to our hearts’ happy content and I finally got around to turning the old, empty aquarium into a terrarium. I had a piece of plastic from an old poster frame that I cut to fit as a perfect snug lid with heavy scissors. Then I used Sculpey to make a little birdbath and baked it so that it’s nice and hard and is now sitting in the little wonderland in the terrium. The terrarium is on my workdesk, so I can be in a little garden even when I’m working.
When the sun is up in the morning and I can open all the curtains and get a few good pictures without the flash, I’ll try to show you the birdbath and the other little things in the garden. A terrarium tour. Won’t that be nice?
Okay, so I’ve started something new in our homeschool this afternoon. It’s the Workbox System, and loosely started it I should say, as I don’t have the official book by Sue Patrick yet, but I do plan to get it ASAP (hubby just said he would put the money aside next week).
Anyway, there’s a huge discussion going on at the Five In A Row boards right now about the Workbox System, offering up alternatives to the clear shoe-boxes that are called for when using the Workbox System and tons of ideas for what to put in the boxes. I got totally sucked in, but I think we’re gonna love it.
Confused? You should be. I’m talking in circles. That’s mostly because all my Five In A Row buds already know what I’m talking about.
In a nutshell, you use a rolling cart that will hold 12 clear plastic shoeboxes. In these shoeboxes you place 12 items/assignments of school work to be completed during the day. The child works left to right, top to bottom, finishing their work more independently than ever. It’s apparently accomplished great things for children with ADD and other such diagnoses. That’s a broad overview. I have not touched on any of the fine points, which I’m looking forward to reading about further in Sue’s book.
Anyhoo, I’ve started out totally on my own eclectic foot with this program, choosing to use decorated cereal boxes for our boxes. I am not saying I won’t go with clear boxes. I am saying that I want to read the book first and that I want to figure out if I’ve got room for a stand that holds 12 clear boxes. (We can barely walk through the hallway as it is.) I am also starting with 9 boxes. I want to see how Princess of the Universe reacts to this.
Michaela’s school shelf is now totally clutter free.
The boxes are super cute and I know Miss Priss will love them. (I cannot believe she has not noticed them yet. Maybe she cuts her eyes away when she passes by the school shelf. ha ha)
Each box holds an assignment. We’ll start the day with math.
I am sure this system is going to help me pull in things that we don’t always remember to do.
Just look at that little Heart of the Home box. Sweet. This will contain domestic assignments. Like now…
Don’t worry. She won’t get free reign of the stove without supervision, but I do think she’ll enjoy this being HER assignment. I’m going to get everything together this evening so it’ll be easier tomorrow.
She also has a Five In A Row assignment, a handwriting assignment, a page from a test booklet and a couple of other things I *can’t remember* right now. (*That might give you a clue as to why this system will help us do everything every day. It’ll be in the boxes ready to go.)
I could easily have filled up more boxes, but tomorrow is our first day and I want to see how long this takes her to work through. Also I really want to read Sue’s book and get serious about the fine points. In three short months Big Joe will graduate, so I’ll have another shelf for more boxes. We could also perhaps switch to the clear boxes for the new school year.
For now I’m doing a test run with cereal boxes.
I first heard about this system from my friend, Leslie, and she’s got pictures on her blog.
In looking on line, there’s a post on another blog where someone has set up their own version of the workbox system. See it here at Ginger-Snap-Shots.
Another friend, Kristina, has pictures on her blog of her system.
Another friend, Jessica, is using envelopes for her system.
There are other pictures out there, but this gives you some ideas.
Lynn
PS — There is an update on our cereal boxes —>> here!
Since you’ve seen my notebook, I thought you might want to see my clipboard.
We are a clipboard family when it comes to school. I keep three of them loaded with clean notebook paper at all times. They sit in our two school shelves. When I assign something, it’s easy for the kids to grab a clipboard and get started. A clipboard can be taken to any chair or table; it’s easy to work with.
But I wanted my OWN clipboard, especially for when we are all working together, like reading Hamlet, or talking about history, or discussing spelling words or grammar. I keep my clipboard with me when I am reading a bedtime story with Princess of the Universe. My clipboard is even with me when I am working.
Why?
Because constantly things pop into my mind that I want to discuss later, like the other day when I was thinking of the words ORDNANCE and ORDINANCE and wanting to see if Joe could spell them correctly. Or we’ll cover something that I think we need to go back to, but it’s not something I want to stop and research at that very minute. An example would be the Namean lion mentioned in Hamlet. I make a quick note on my clipboard and I know the idea won’t be forgotten later.
Did you see my clipboard is pink? BRIGHT pink? It cannot get mixed up with another clipboard.
Lynn
Valentine’s Greetings
About Lynn
I am the mother of four delightful children: a 23-year-old son, a 20-year-old son, a 17-year-old son, and a bright and bubbly 13-year-old daughter. I share an apartment home with my 17-year-old son and 13-year-old daughter. My little home on the internet is called Rose Cottage because of my love for gardening, roses, and all things romantic and Victorian. Welcome.
I'm a North Carolina girl and I love sharing North Carolina links and information. I do medical transcription from home. My hobbies include making sweet little dolls from clay who are named and have their own stories to tell. I also make old-fashioned brooches. These are for sale in my Etsy shop.
For 13 years continuously, I homeschooled some or all of our four children, but the time came that our homeschool had to be closed. It was the end of a beautiful chapter in my life. I will always be a strong supporter of homeschooling and I will continue to review books and maintain my homeschool website, The Healthy Homeschool.
To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion; to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy, not rich; to study hard, think quietly, talk gently, act frankly; to listen to stars and birds, to babes and sages, with open heart; to bear all cheerfully, do all bravely, await occasions, hurry never. In a word, to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common. This is to be my symphony.
William Henry Channing
1810-1884
What You Do
Sow a thought, reap an action.
Sow an action, reap a habit.
Sow a habit, reap a character.
Sow a character, reap a destiny.
I’m only sharing what happens when you have to choose.
unit study.
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book? 
for you to leave a comment, but you can also e-mail me at lynn AT thehealthyhomeschool.com
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