Month: May 2005 Page 1 of 2

Christian working on his AM/FM radio kit

We really did not do much over the Memorial Day weekend. On Saturday we did not do much other than go out to eat, get the sprinkler system to start working automatically, go to the library, and watch the Two Towers DVD with Warren Bone. The kids had read the book and I promised them they could watch the DVD when they finished so we watched it. I thought it was going to be too scary for them, but it did not phase them at all. On Sunday, we went to our fellowship meeting at the Waldo’s, then just hung out for the rest of the afternoon. Christian and I started in on assembling his AM/FM radio kit. That was a LOT of fun. On Monday, we went up to Washington Square for a couple of hours then on over to Grandpa Milo and Grandma Sarah’s house. Grandma’s twin sister, Aunt Janet was there. I have some pictures I want to post, but my gallery is not working right now. The wonderful people at eChristianWebHosting.com are working on it, so I will put the photos up as soon as that is fixed.

Playing in the sprinkler

It was a hot day yesterday. After school, the kids played in the sprinkler for the first time. Today is the last day of school for the year, so Kelly and Christian spent yesterday evening cleaning up the bonus room where we have the computers and do a lot of the school work. They really do not have much academic work left. Kelly has piano, some math corrections, reading, and logic. Christian has piano, some reading, and some science. After that, they will take all their books and materials for the year down from the shelf so that I can start archiving them to make room for next year. We really need to put up a ton of good, permanent bookshelves so we can keep all the books out and available, but we do not have the resources yet.

We started getting ready for the stuff we will do this summer, too. I had Christian load up the Mavis Beacon version 16 typing tutor on the computer last night. They will start doing 15 minutes of Mavis Beacon every day now along with 15 minutes on the piano. In addition, they are going to continue on their memorization, both so that I can film it for our archive and so that we can quote it for Grandpa Lauro and Grandma Conchita when we visit Mexico. The other project we will start sometime this weekend is assembling the AM/FM radio kit. I will need to get a new soldering iron and an ohm meter to be able to do that properly.

I am going to get both Kelly and Christian an end of the school year gift because they have done such a great job. I am so proud of them I can hardly stand it. The gift will probably be an art kit with pastels or something like that. I will put picutres of that up as soon as I have them.

Kelly and Christian both finished their research reports yesterday. Kelly’s is posted here. Christian’s is posted here. This was their capstone project for the year. They were very dedicated to doing these reports in as professional a manner as possible. Keep in mind that Christian is in third grade and Kelly is in fifth grade. The process I gave them was this:

Do preliminary research to get a general idea of what to put in the report.

Make and outline based on your idea.

Take notes on notecards with one fact per notecard.

Adjust the outline based on the fact gathering.

Right a rough draft of the report from the outline.

Type the rough draft in the computer as your first draft, making improvements as you go.

Add the bibliography based on where you got the information on the note cards used in the report.

Dad will edit the first draft for grammar and spelling only.

Write the second draft making the appropriate corrections.

Dad will edit the second draft for grammar and spelling only.

Produce an illustration and make a cover page.

Write the final draft.

Make three copies, putting them all in their own professional clear plastic binders.

We will file one of the copies as part of their permanent record, take one copy to Grandpa Lauro and Grandma Conchita in Mexico and one copy to Grandpa Milo and Grandma Sarah in Newberg. They really did an awesome job.

Lorena got her College Algebra test score back last night. She is on track to get through the class just fine. She only has to get a passing grade on the final and she will be able to move on to her last math class this fall. Even though this is not her favorite subject, she has worked very hard and I am proud of her. Kelly and Christian continue to finish up their final projects. Christian finished his research report for the year yesterday. Kelly should finish hers today. I will put them up on the internet in PDF format as soon as they are both finished. I sprayed the lawn with what is supposed to be a really good clover killer last night. Now we are supposed to have several days of hot weather her in the mid-valley. We will see if the stuff really works. I will have to put it down one more time in about a week. I am looking forward to working on the lawn this coming, three day, Memorial Day weekend.

Update: A very homeschool friendly was just bill passed in the Oregon State House of Representatives. It is a bill that, if it ever gets signed into law by hour homeschool-phobic governor, Ted Kulongoski, will reduce the requirements imposed on homeschoolers by our the State of Oregon. Currently, homeschoolers have to notify the Educational Services District (ESD) that they have removed their child from the public school for the purpose of homeschooling, then turn the results of standardized tests into the ESD four times over the course of the child’s education. The new bill would keep the notification requirement, but remove the requirement to turn in the test results.

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Kelly and Christian are both getting very close to finishing their annual reports. Kelly has to do just a few corrections and a title page while Christian has only to do the illustration for his title page. Today, I will try to go over to Staples at lunch time to buy a couple of professional, clear plastic binders. The reports are really quite amazing. There are only four days of homeschool left. I will probably have Christian install the Mavis Beacon program on Thursday. Lorena has class tonight and I am hoping she gets her test back today with a high score.

All of the trees we planted appear to be growing very well with the exception of six red maple trees. They look moist and green under the bark, but now leaves appear to be forming at all. I hope they come out OK. I used the QCAD program on Linux to draw up a design for the area around the telephone and electrical services at the far corner of our yard. Tonight, I am going to spray the whole yard for clover, but after that, I am going to to work on that relative unattractive corner of the yard.

Digital Cybermation called from Pittsburgh yesterday to say the new CNC router would ship in a day or two. It has been disappointingly late, so I am not holding my breath. Everyone is looking forward to getting the machine, both here and at Quality Corners in Idaho. I have high hopes for what we can do with it.

The big event of the past weekend was Kelly’s and Christian’s spring recital. They both did super. There is one more piano lesson before the summer break. Kelly is going to work on her piano concerto during the summer. Christian has a piece on which he wants to work, too.

Kelly at the Spring Piano Recital

Christian at the Spring Piano Recital

You can see some additional pictures here.

Christian finished putting together his model submarine yesterday. He did just an incredible job. Here is a picture of the finished product:

Christian’s model submarine

There is another one here.

Kelly’s sleepover at the Doolittle’s house was a great success. She stayed up until about 2:00 AM with all her little buddies. They are going to try to get together again sometime this summer. Maybe we will be able to do it at Grandpa Milo’s house.

Curt Nichols is coming over to stay with us tonight. He is going to some event at Oregon State University and we will be glad to have a chance to spend some time with him. We will try to invite Warren Bone over, too. It will be old home week. We can listen to some music, eat some barbeque, and talk about the good times. Curt was going to bring his youngest daughter, Marlena, but she will stay with her Grandpa and Grandma in Sisters instead. I hope she will come next time because the kids will love to have her.

Homeschool is really starting to wind down. The kids are working ahead a little so things are falling off the list. They had plenty of time yesterday to do other stuff, so Christian worked a bunch on the model submarine his assembling and painting. Kelly drew up a cartoon. Next week will be a very light week with emphasis on making a video recording of the verses the kids have memorized and finishing the annual reports..

Kelly is going to her sleepover with her homeschool buddies at Mike and Louise Doolittle’s house. We will have our dinner tonight with my old college buddies. Then tomorrow, we are planning to go do something in the morning with Christian. I will probably try to mow the lawn and get some better pictures of our new trees if the weather cooperates. Finally, we have the big spring piano recital at Jefferson Baptist Church on Sunday at 4:30 PM. Grandpa Milo and Grandma Sarah are going to be up trying to help Uncle Bill and Aunt Betty get taken care of after their recent illness.

Lorena took her second College Algebra midterm last night. She thinks she did well. It will be great if she gets through this class. She has only one more math class before she has all she needs to get the kind of degree she wants. She will still have to take a couple of statistics courses, accounting, and some other stuff like that, but none of them will be as rigorous as the math. I am proud of her for studying so hard. Christian, Kelly, and I went out to dinner at Carl’s Jr. and then on to our Wednesday night bible study in Jefferson without Lorena. It was nice, but it does not feel so good not to have Lorena there.

The kids are finishing their school work earlier every day as we wind down. They have gotten a little stir crazy because it has been raining pretty hard since the day after we planted the new trees almost a week ago now. It is great for the trees, but a little hard on our sanity to be cooped up in the house. After tomorrow, we only have one more week of school. In the next couple of days, I need to stop by Staples to buy some “professional, clear plastic binders” for their research reports. Calvin of Calvin and Hobbes fame put his report on bats — the famous Bats = Bugs report — in a professional, clear plastic binder with absolute confidence that the teacher would give him an A+. It is kind of the family joke now, so we are very much looking forward to our professional, clear plastic binder.

Today is the last piano practice before the big, year end recital on Sunday after church. I will make sure and get some photos to post here along with a report. This will be our first big event to record with our new camcorder, too.

Entropy really takes hold when Lorena has to dedicate her time to getting ready for a test. She has the second mid-term for her college algebra class on Thursday and she is studying hard. I am very, very proud of the way she has gone about this. She is learning a lot and it will pay off in the end. What a great wife and mother.

The kids had a great day of homeschool yesterday. They buckled down and went right to work in the morning. They were able to finish everything up shortly after lunch. It was a rainy day, so they stayed in and played their Nancy Drew Mystery computer game on the computer. We have two of them. We are getting to the end of the first one and having a ball. Today is a swimming lesson day, so they might not finish so quickly, but the level of work is really ramping down, so the day should not be too hard.

We took a couple of pictures of the trees — well, kind of. Kelly, Christian, and I took pictures of each other standing on the front porch looking out at the trees. They are pretty small in the background. I took what I thought would show them a little, but then Christian arranged Kelly and I in such a manner as to get Mom’s hanging flower basket in the picture as well as the trees in the background. I really think he has that artistic flair that must have come from his Finnish Great Grandma Jenkins. Here is the shot:

You can see the pictures I took here for comparison.

Kelly got invited to a sleepover at Malia Doolittle’s house on Friday night. That is the night Curt is coming, possibly with Marlena. So we are looking forward to a nice weekend with him. I will try to barbeque something up if the weather cooperates. Homeschool continues to wind down. I am starting up a series of posts on how we use technology in our homeschool. It mostly has to do with how we use a Linux computer to administer the homeschool as well as facilitate participation with extended family and friends in other states and countries.

We planted 17 new trees at our house on Saturday. Cayatano did most of the work while I did most of the running around. He planted ten Autumn Flame Maples between the curb and the sidewalk along the two exposed side of the property, one Pussy Willow out by the services inside the sidewalk, and six Red Maples between our yard and the house of our neighbor behind us. In addition, we gave a ton of trees to four other neighbors and to Tony and Martha. Grandpa Milo supplied us the trees and we were quite thankful for them. All this was going on at the same time as our annual neighborhood garage sale. It all really went quite well. Lorena sold an old microwave oven and a turkey deep fat fryer. The kids sold a bunch of little things. A great time was had by all. I will try to put some pictures of our new “look” as soon as I have a chance to take some.

On Sunday night, we went over to a friends house for dinner and to see some pictures of Mexico. The man who showed the pictures is someone we have known for a long time. He pretty much blasted us for homeschooling our children. He mentioned another man with whom he had a discussion about homeschooling and how they thought it was such a bad thing. The thing that was truly odd was that neither of these men had children of their own, but were willing to paint the entire homeschool movement with a very broad and negative brush. It was an amazing and blatant display of bigotry. Oh, well.

We are down to the last two weeks of homeschool. The only big things we have left are finishing up the annual research reports, attending the big spring piano recital at the Baptist Church in Jefferson, and taking the standardized tests for the year in June. We will not turn in the tests this year as the law only requires that we start sending in test results after 18 months of homeschool. We hope that silly law gets changed. Why do people who cannot even teach the people for whom they are responsible need to have the tests scores of my children?

This weekend is looking like it will be quite busy. There will be a neighborhood garage sale on Friday and Saturday to start things off. Then, on Saturday, the guy that helps Granpa Milo keep up his house and grounds, Cayatano, will bring over a whole pickup load of trees Grandpa Milo got for us (for free). We will not be able to use them all, so we will give the ones we do not use to our neighbors. Cayatano will plan our trees for us. Hopefully, he will be able to come back in the next month or so to put in our fence for us, too. Dad was able to get a bunch of redwood boards for building it at a cheap price.

Kelly and Christian got all their homeschool work finished yesterday before I got home. We are really starting to finish things up now, so they will have less to do every day between now and the end of the school year on May 27. Last night, we went through only the multiplication flash cards with which Christian is struggling. It is mostly the eights, sevens, and sixes. We did them ten times. I believe that once he gets those under control, we will be able to get through the deck in less than two minutes for each side which is the overall goal. I imagine we will get all this done within a month or two after the beginning of the school year next year.

I downloaded the software to run the CNC router that should be getting here before too long. One of the first things we want to do is to make a Lone Star shaped rosette for Texas. Here is an image of how the surface of the rosette should appear when we finally get the machine to make it:

Ron is meeting with our big customer today with the hope that we can negotiate a long term contract to produce MDF rosettes for them and possibly grow the number of rosettes we are producing by helping them move into new markets. A contract of a couple of years would certainly allow us to do some things we cannot do right now because we are not sure how long the orders will keep arriving. It will allow us to get additional equipment to go after new markets with less risk.

We are very much looking forward to our trip to Mexico. Lorena and the kids will be there for just under three weeks. I will be there for a week and a half. I spoke with Grandma Conchita last night. Both she and Grandpa Lauro are very excited to see their two oldest grandchildren. Homeschool is slowing down even further. Kelly is working on the final draft over her research report. Christian has finished the rough and first drafts of his report. Both of them should be finished sometime next week. Math is going well as is reading. Now it is just a matter of crossing all the t’s and dotting all the i’s. We have had a great year so far. Between now and the end of the school year, my biggest goals are getting some maple trees planted that Grandpa Milo got for us, working on killing clover in the lawn, and getting down to 180 pounds before we go to Mexico.

I have decided I need to keep working on both future opportunities I have in the works. First, I need to get the CNC router thing going and second, I need to get my plate reader thing going. I am going to work on the plate reader while I am home alone and the kids are in Mexico with Lorena.

Christian struggled yesterday with his math–not with the complexity, but with the tedium of doing the Singapore “Mental Math”. I think we might be in the middle of end-of-the-year-itis. The big push to finish everything up is going on right now with the next big milestone being the research reports. It will all be over soon and all they will be doing for the summer is Mavis Beacon and less than half of their normal piano practice. We need to start looking for some summer craft and gardening projects.

Ron Voorhees, our partner in Quality Corners, gave us a call yesterday that has me thinking that we might have an uphill battle in keeping our current level of business. One of the biggest owners of our principle customer came into our business last Friday. He had a long talk with Ron and was very favorably impressed with our operation. Word got back to him yesterday through the grapevine, the this man had given a talk to the people in the business to whom we sell. Several of them had been trying to figure out a way to do the manufacturing for themselves instead of buying from us. We think the talk stalled them a little, but it certainly gave us a reality check. We need to make these parts as efficiently as possible with the understanding that we could lose the business at any moment.

UPDATE — I got a call from Dad this morning that Ron got called to a meeting with our big customer on Friday to discuss the prices of our products and our relationship with them as a supplier. I called Ron to talk about it a little. It is impossible to know what they really want out of the meeting, but we believe that it is probably not a bad sign right this moment. We are going to go into the meeting without any expectations, but with the hope that we can negotiate a little bit longer term arrangement than the week to week arrangement we have now. If we can have confidence that we will have the business for a little longer, we can make the commitment to invest in more equipment which, over time will drive our costs and the price of our products down. This should allow us to get more marketshare with our other customers which will, in turn, give us more economies of scale to drive our costs and prices even lower. We hope that is what this is about.

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It seems like a lot of people from meeting have been getting very sick with little time to live. That latest two are one of our workers, Lowell Stidolph and our very good friend Edie Plews. Lowell is around sixty and Edie is probably a little over seventy. These faithful people will surely be missed. There has always been a need to raise godly children, it just seems so much more urgent now.

Kelly and Christian did very well in school yesterday. I worked a little more than usual with Kelly. We corrected the second draft of her annual research report on newspapers and spent probably an hour on fixing math problems she did not understand. Christian finished reading his book on Robert Fulton yesterday and is working hard on getting the first draft of his annual research report on airplanes typed into the computer from his hand written rough draft.

Dad called yesterday. He had gotten us twenty Japanese Lilac Trees. Lorena and I looked them up on the internet. We really did not like them so much because they did not look like they would get very big. They also looked like they would make quite a mess. I called Dad and it felt kind of bad rejecting a free gift. He said he would get some maples instead. Dad and Mom are going to run over to the coast to see Joe and Edie in the next day or two. I hope we can get permission to go, too. It would be nice to see Edie. It would also be nice to spend a day at the coast with the kids.

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We had a marvelous Mother’s Day weekend. On Saturday we took Lorena to breakfast at Elmers. On Sunday, we gave her the presents and cards Christian and Kelly made for her and let her pick out two hanging baskets of flowers for the front of the house. I really think she likes the “picking out” better than the “having”. On Saturday, I mowed the lawn, Lorena cleaned out the garage, and the kids played. Late on Sunday afternoon, Christian’s friend Micah came over and invited Kelly and Christian to go to the park. After that, the kids played a really cool “solve the mystery Nancy Drew computer game. We played it a little more after Micah left. I think this is going to be our summer project. Here is a picture of Lorena and all her kids we took especially for Mothers Day.

Here is Kelly’s article that I scanned for your reading pleasure:

Before we went to bed last night, we had just a little bit of time, so I started reading Swiss Family Robinson. It appears to be a great book. It was written in 1812 and has a theology that is very encouraging and well articulated. We are counting this as our first read-aloud of the summer, but we might finish it before the summer starts if it continues to be as interesting as what we have read so far!

Kelly’s article on the difficulty of math won first place in the writing competition in the Albany Democrat-Herald again yesterday! You can read the article here. I will try to post an image of the article sometime this Friday. I really think it was one of her best efforts. This was the last competition of the year. She won the first competition, too. It was quite exciting for us again. I hope it does not become old hat.

Christian finished his Spelling Power for the year last night. He is spelling at an eighth grade level. It might be that we are getting to the end of the year, but we are starting to feel a little burnout. That is especially true with math. The kids have done absolutely great this year after having wasted a couple years learning nothing in their government school math programs. We went pretty fast this year to get them caught back up to something interesting. Now, though, I think it is time to back things off several notches. We can still move along at a good clip, I just want it to be enjoyable and not onerous.

The CNC router we are having made for Quality Corners will ship to me on Monday. It is going to be really exciting to use and could very well open up some big markets for us. It comes from a company named Digital Cybermation in Pittsburgh, PA. Here is the picture they sent us: