Saturday started bright and early for us since we had finally decided to have a garage sale.  After about 6 months to a year of gathering ‘STUFF’ to go in this garage sale we were glad to get it done and over with.  It went well, but we wished it could have gone a little better. It’s funny how you put all this effort into getting all that stuff in the garage sale to make a little bit of money, then when its all said and done, the stuff you have left over you don’t want to mess with anymore.  We now have two different donate piles.  We’ll deliver those later this week.  We did get to meet some neighbors we hadn’t met before so that was an added blessing!  I also met two fellow homeschooling Mom’s and one was in the same covering as us!

Riley did pretty well, he was motivated to make some money!  I was surprised at the number of things he came up with to sell, in the end he made over $20.00!  Not too bad for a 9 year old boy! He decided to sell this old, beat up, guitar that our neighbor had given him when he was two or three.  It had a couple of dents where he had been slinging it around and it was missing some strings.  This elderly man came by and asked Riley how much he would take for the guitar.  Riley said, “Five dollars sir.”  (!!)  The man hesitated and said, “hmmm, I’ll have to think about it.”  I knew that was too much but yet I knew Riley wanted to make some money.  So I suggested that he come down off the price some.  Riley ran back outside and said, “How about $2 sir?”  The man said, “You got a deal son!”  He then asked Riley what he was going to do with the money and when Riley said he was going to put it in savings the man said, “here is one more.”  So Riley sold that old, beat up, dented, string missing guitar for $3.  I appreciated the man showing Riley the benefits of saving money.  You know it always helps when those principles you are teaching your children are reinforced by someone else!  The man thanked Riley for his business and said “I really don’t need this guitar but I wanted to help you make some money.”  Riley thanked the man and stuck his money in his pocket, to go in savings later.

Throughout his toddler years Chris’ mother always made sure Riley had a  good pair of cowboy boots to wear to church.  So, when I found three pairs of them in the bag of shoes, I had to get a picture of them.  They were so cute and all the memories of Riley stomping around in those boots made me smile and I thought it made a cute picture.

Yes, the pair on the far left are what he wore this year.  I just love seeing the difference in size and the tiny ones are just as cute as they can be!  A couple stopped by the garage sale and had their two year old daughter with them.  Her dad picked up both of the smaller pair and tried his hardest to get them on her feet, but they would not go.  That would have been cute too!

After the garage sale the rest of the day was spent at two different birthday parties.  One for my niece and one for my nephew.  I managed to get a picture of all the girls and Riley under Mom’s peach tree at Abby’s birthday.  Yes, to his chagrin, he was the only boy.  It was ok at first but after a while, he was ready for some ‘guy time’.

I was hoping the girls would lean against the trunk and strike some cute pose with Riley up in the tree but they wouldn’t go near the tree because of the bees.  Girls!   I think it turned out cute anyways.

Finally Riley got his guy time at my nephew Calvin’s birthday party.  It was his dream play time, Nerf guns and forts!  He had a great time but the long eventful day quickly caught up with all three of us.  Before we new it, we were ready to go home and hit the hay!  As we drove home recounting the events of the day, we were thankful for lessons learned, memories to recall and excellent family time!

Sunday rolled around and we took off for Church.  Our Pastor has started a new sermon series on the Beauty of God.  It was so good and definitely gave me a new perspective on His beauty.  I’ve always thought of it being within God’s creation but theres more to His beauty than just the creation….I can’t wait to hear next Sunday’s message.

After church we had one more birthday party to attend, Riley’s buddy Cory had a skating party.  All the boys had a good time and skated till they couldn’t skate anymore!  It was nice to sit and talk with dear friends and make some new ones.

It was a full weekend but the blessings out way the tiredness that hit us quickly at the end of each day.  God is good!  We thank Him for Family, Friends, A church home and family and the beautiful weather that we had all weekend long.

Today is a new day! The sun is shining and it is warmer than it has been all winter! I am so thankful for some warmth and sunshine. There is definitely something about spring that renews the spirit and gets you going! I am thankful too for that renewed spirit. I have been struggling over the last month or two with not having any energy, no motivation to get stuff done, being tired all time. It’s time for a change! It’s time to get off the couch and away from the computer…and get busy!!

I posted earlier in How Do You Do It? that I was thinking about starting a household notebook. Do you have one? I am ready to make some changes regarding getting the clutter under control, staying on top of things and keeping track of stuff. I do make lists of things to do, to buy etc but just not consistently. When I do make a list it helps me immensely. I find myself a lot of times getting bogged down with trying to remember when to do something or trying to find that one piece of paper…by the time we finish school, I am ready to tackle a task and not get stuck on a wild goose chase! I heard from a few people about what they do for a household notebook, chores, and managing their household. Once I heard a few of the suggestions I was a little more motivated! So I got started. It took me a while to get a feel for what I needed our notebook to be like and consist of, but I think I at least have a good start.

Jennifer Tankersly aka List Mama at List PlanIt had a good suggestion on household notebooks. She uses more than one, she has one for finances, one for her kitchen and then a third one for household stuff. If you visit her site you will see she has lots of great ideas for organizing, lists and making life easier. For a $20 annual fee you can print the forms she has on her site, she has other options available with an annual fee.

There are some other sites out there that make forms available to you. Molly’s Econobusters Money Saving Digest which you can purchase and download from The Old Schoolhouse store. They have a couple of different E-books that you can download and get the forms to print. They range in price from $4.95 to $20.00, depending on which one you pick. I also found this site that has forms as well. The Organized Home site has download and print forms for free. The nice thing is that there are so many options out there you might be able to find the forms that fit your needs perfectly!

For our household notebook, I have started out with one notebook containing monthly calendars, daily to do lists, weekly planner, weekly chore list, spring cleaning room by room (I hope I actually get to this part…). I bought dividers with folders that I can put coupons, menus from restaurants, and our flex spending info in (with a few extras). I also included a big pocket for our box top collection for school. I can see how I might need to expand to another notebook but right now I will start with one and go from there.

My prayer as I start this is that I will keep it up. I see how it can help me keep track of things, not forget to do certain things, and have a lot of stuff at my fingertips. My problem is getting something started and making it a habit. I am motivated and ready for a change, to get some things under control, so lets go!

So if you have a household notebook or another method of keeping things under control, I’d love to hear about it. Now I am off to get our day going. I am doing the Simplifying for Sanity with Lynnette over at Dancing Barefoot this week, I’ve got a lot to do today so I better get going.

Y’all have a blessed day!

Well let me just say, Happy New Year to each of you!  My prayer for you is that your New Year is rich with God’s blessings.

We thoroughly enjoyed our New Years Eve, the three of us stayed home and had a nice candle lit dinner of crab legs, shrimp, salad and sour dough bread! It was delicious!  Riley was so excited when he found out we were having a candle lit dinner and even more excited when he found out we were having crab legs!  He jumped in there and cleared the table, and helped get it set and got the candles ready.

As we ate we discussed what the new year brings, an opportunity to make resolutions, to make a new start and to anticipate what the Lord has in store for us.  We had to redirect Riley a little when he said his ‘revolution’ was to play more WII…it’s hard for an almost 8 year old to think about anything else except for playing.

Chris surprised me and asked Riley if he wanted to be homeschooled this next year.  I must admit, I was a little anxious to hear his answer.  Thankfully he said he wanted to keep homeschooling!  Whew!!!!  Then we talked about doing the Abeka DVD’s or continuing on our same curriculum choices we’ve been using.  Riley said he liked what we were doing!  That is a good thing!  I just need to get some more energy somewhere!!  This break we’ve had over Christmas has been a BIG blessing to me for I was really tired!!

I look forward to starting school next week.  I have some things to do to get ready.  Math, Phonics and Bible are easy because we’ll just pick up where we left off.  Science we are still studying birds and I need to see what is in store for us there.  We need to finish up our American History/Geography so we can resume our Mystery of History.  Of course we need to do some more reading and make a trip to Pizza Hut for his Book It awards.  We are doing a Coop this winter/spring.  I had decided to take the Fall off from doing any Coop classes and here’s why.  Last year we had Friday classes and it seemed that by Thursday school would be going well and we’d be on a roll then we would have to stop and go to classes on Friday and I felt like we were falling behind.  After taking the fall off, I’ve decided my plan worked, we really enjoyed staying home and getting school done and being able to do our own thing once we were done.  However, I really felt Riley was missing the interaction with other kids.  So we are giving this a try.  I’m looking forward to it, I’ve never done a Coop before.   Riley seems a little excited too, it’s always hard to meet new people.  It meets on Friday mornings from 9-noon.  So we’ll have the afternoon to finish up projects or get other stuff done.  We’ll see how it goes!

I have spent this past week cleaning out particular areas of our house.  They were in terrible need of purging and dusting and cleaning.  I feel like I have made some progress!

So I guess I say all that to say that I feel like we are going into 2010 somewhat ready mentally for somethings.  At least my home will be purged and clean for the most part and we will be ready for school next week!!

So blessing to you this weekend as you start your new year!