Things Fortnightly

Time once again for our biweekly thing festival. SO many things so little time. Let's get to them shall we.

Thing #1. Blog Insider - A look at the widgets, gadgets, and what nots of Home School Dad.

Tonight's Episode: Here but not here.

My family was visiting the Washington D.C. area last week. We had a wonderful time. I took plenty of pictures and even kept a trip journal. I will be sharing from both of these sources in the posts to come. While I let my face book friends know I was gone, I didn't want to announce on the blog my absence just to make sure that no unscrupulous types took advantage of our absence from our home. To that end, I used one of my favorite features of blogger and wrote and scheduled 4 posts that appeared the week I was gone.

If you click on the post options menu while writing your current post, you can schedule your posts in advance. This not only helps when you are warning to post date a post, it also helps if you start a post and save it and want to have a current date on it. If you save a post without changing the date and then come back and publish it later it will retain the original date and often get lost behind whatever you published in the interim. If you post date your work and save it, then you can change the date to the current date once you have made your revisions.

Thing #2 What's on my screen saver

Charlie is playing soccer for the first time in an organized league. He really enjoys it. His first game is Saturday. He is looking forward to it.

Thing # 3. Chock full of Chuck.

It wouldn't be Thursday if I weren't telling you about the awesomeness that is Chuck. As I have mentioned in the last few times here Chuck VS. the Beard was the Best Episode Ever. The 4 episodes that followed it and ended the current story arc all were very very good. I would have to say that Monday's episode Chuck vs. The Other Guy was the second best episode ever. No Spoiler alerts here, but many things transpired in this episode that would have been impossible to even fathom less than a season ago. But every plot point seemed to fall in place and seem very genuine and most of all immensely watchable. Chuck takes a 3 week hiatus until the end of April. This means that in the next things fortnightly, I'll have to fins something else to go on and on about.

Thing # 4, Something to count on.

Last year right around Thanksgiving time I applied for a temporary job with the Census Bureau. I worked with them in 1990 and was hoping to do so again this year. I got 98% on the test and was thinking I should have heard from them one way or another by now. They called and I got a job as an enumerator. I have 4 days of training in late April and then a number of weeks of collecting census data form the field. This is my first paying gig in 2 years and I am just excited that I'll get a W2 next year. Besides the training, I'll be able to work my schedule around the kids homeschooling. It is a real answer to prayer.

Well that's all the things I have for today. If you have some things you'd like to share please click on Mr. Linky below.

Next Time: DC Trip Day #1

Things This Thursday

Thing 1. Carnival sightings

This weeks Carnival of Home Schooling is at Corn and Oil. I haven't read it all yet, but what I have read is first rate. I especially appreciated Tag your Truant at Home is Where you Start from.


My blog is still the site of the most recent carnival of book review blogs. You can check it out by clicking here.

Thing 2. Sew what?

Emma is taking a machine sewing class at our home school co-op this semester. It is the only course I chose for her. She would have rather taken a drama class offered at the same time. I chose for her because she has shown interest in sewing before, and it is a class that at this point neither Amy and I could teach her. We have supplemented her yen for drama with a park district class on improvisation that takes place in the spring.















It turns out she LOVES the sewing class! She had a little trouble the first week with the sewing machine we borrowed, but we borrowed another one which is working fine.

She sewed this pocket in class. She has been working on a few more at home.















I always try to teach at least one co-op class to one of my kid's grade level and assist in one of the other kids classes. I hit the trifecta this year. I am the assistant in Charlie's gym class, Emma's is taking the second part of my Narnia class, and I am teaching a pre-K class called, "Let's go to the store." This week Lucy and her classmates made a shopping bag. Here is a picture of Emma and Lucy with their projects.
















Thing 3. Two Race Charlie

It seems that no matter how full or empty your schedule is that there usually are two "can't miss" events scheduled for the same day or time. Recently, we have been experiencing that phenomena in spades. For example, the sewing class and drama class Emma wanted were two of the classes Emma wanted to take most this semester and they were offered at the exact same time. This is the second year in a row that the Awana closing ceremony and our home school closing ceremony are scheduled on the same day.

We are hyper vigilant when it comes to avoiding scheduling conflicts. I should say that Amy is hyper vigilant when it comes to avoiding scheduling conflicts. Last Fall when we received our schedules for cub scouts and Awana Amy entered them all in our calendar to make sure there were no conflicts. We were glad to see that the Pinewood Derby and the Awana Grand Prix, two similar model car events were scheduled on different weeks in January.

That was until, the Cub Scouts moved their race back a week and then they were both on the same day! Charlie was able to build two different cars and bring his Awana car in early so he could enter both races.

Thing 4: An extra special glimpse at my life.

The first time I was on an airplane was in 1973. I was 9 and we went to visit Washington D.C. I did not get on a plane again until Spring of 1992. I spent the next decade as a fairly frequent flyer. I flew domestically and internationally landing in 8 countries outside of the U.S. The last of which was in July of 2001 to attend my brother's wedding. I have not been on a plane since. It has nothing to do with the events of September 11th of that year. It is just that I have had no occasion to fly since then. Everyone else in the family has flown since then , although only 2 of them remember it. Charlie flies to Florida this year to go to DW with my parents.




















Thing 5: Television by the book.

My sister stopped by today and gave me my Christmas present. 2009 not 2010. She gave me the ninth edition of "The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network and Cable TV Shows. I already had the 8th edition which carried a description and cast list for every prime time show from 1946 to the 2002/2003 television season. It also includes the prime time schedule, Nielsen ratings, and Emmy winners for each year. In short a TV geeks dream come true. The 8th edition is 1,591 pages long. The new 9th edition checks in at 1,831 pages and goes up to the 2006/2007 season. Chuck is not included in this tome as it premiered in the fall of 2007. If the 10th edition publishes with a 4 year lapse between editions as the 9th did. It should be available sometime in 2011. I'll be making room on my shelf.

Those are my things this Thursday! What things are up with you? Due to a glitch with mr. linky I am not able to accept links today. If you have some things to share just post a link on the comments.

Next Time: Book Review

Getting Ready for DC

As some of you know, I took over a blog meme this past fall called 3 Things This Thursday. Michelle at Psalm 104:24 originated the meme whose premise was basically simple: On Thursday blog about 3 things and then link to her post. I was a frequent contributor and when she gave me the opportunity to host, I gladly went for it.

The thing is this: Hardly anyone ever participated in it. I have been thinking about scrapping it or begging Michelle to take it back. I have decided instead to tweak it a little.

Going forward I will call it: Things this Thursday.

The reason why the name change is because some people have told me they would participate but can't think of three things. That's okay one thing is fine. Just blog about as many things as you'd like and then link it to my post. If you don't know how to link and still want to participate just leave a comment and tell me the name of your post and blog and I will do the link for you.


Here are my things for this Thursday:

Thing One: Our family is going to Washington DC this spring and we are psyched. I have been to DC several times but not for an extensive time of sight seeing since the 4th grade. The rest of the family has never been. We definitely want to visit the Mall and some of the Smithsonian exhibits. We have contacted our congressman will visit several governmental buildings but it doesn't seem likely that we will get into the White House, which is what we really want to see.

A friend of my sisters, who we have never met has offered to house our whole family for our week there at no cost. What a blessing! We are driving and we hope to visit a few other sites near the DC area as well. As the plans get more fleshed out I will let you know what's going on.

Thing Two: I've been blogging for over a year and there is so much that you don't know about me. Each Thursday I'll try to share something about me that I haven't shared previously. Today's Factoid: My favorite candy bar is Three Musketeers.

Thing Three: Chuck Update. Michelle used to give us Lost updates and maybe she still will and link them here. I don't do lost. I do enjoy Chuck and have blogged about the show a few times. When it was renewed for season 3, I shared my fears that the show would have no choice but to bring Chuck back to the Buy More. I thought this would be a mistake. After watching the 2 hour season premiere and the most recent episode, I must say that I am pleased with the direction the show is going. Yes Chuck is back at Buy More but it sure seems he will be spending less and less time there; and the way they are utilizing Chuck's BIL is, well, awesome!



Thing Four: What's with the music? You ever get a song stuck in your head? Tuesday night Emma, Charlie and I went to visit my SIL. For the entire 45 minutes there and back they sang the words they knew of You Never Let Go. As a result, I've been singing it ever since. I did not know who sang it. As I was writing this post I was listening to the music on Michelle's blog and it came on. So it's going to be on the blog for a few days. Maybe I can get all of you to sing it as well.



Well those are Things for this Thursday I hope you enjoyed them. Just click on Mr. Linky to join in.




Next Time: Poetry