Garden Club 5/ 29/ 09

With the perfect combination of rain and sunshine this week, my garden has been growing beautifully. We have lots of flowers on the peas. My broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower is growing but as of yet has no fruit.

The rest of the plants are growing strong. We were out weeding several mornings this week, and still only got about half-way through. Luckily we have plenty of time to get rid of the weeds. So please just ignore the weeds in the photos. You can do that, right?

We are toward the end of the lettuce, one of them is bolting. So I am going to let that one go and try to get the seeds from it. The rest we will cut today and see if it grows back or if it is too hot now.

My lavender is also about to flower! I am excited for that to happen.

Once again, I have run out of time before posting photos... they are on photobucket, so maybe I'll put them up when I have time. Also- Mr. Linky is still not working, so just leave your links in the comments section.

And Happy Gardening!

If the Shoe Doesn't Fit...

This is a re-run from Feb. 13, 2008... but it is too great of an idea to forget.

"Recently my husband and daughter were preparing to go with our church to the jungles of Ecuador for a week. The only boots Eric had were cracked in the sole, and I was uncomfortable sending him to the jungle with boots which may fall apart before the week was done. So he went to Stuff Mart and bought a pair of waterproof hiking boots.

Unfortunately, the left one was just a tad too tight once he got them home and tried to break them in. That would not work while hiking into the deep jungle, either. So I remembered reading something in Tightwad Gazette #3 -

We put a ziplock bag inside the boot and put some water in it. Then put it in the freezer. After it was frozen, took it out and pulled out the bag of ice. It had expanded just enough to stretch the boot and fit him just right!

I was so proud of this idea I just had to share it!"

This is linked to Works for Me Wednesday. Hope you all are having a great day!

Bible Bee Study Schedule Week 3

We are trucking along on our Bible Bee Memory and studying... The girls are completely caught up, the boys are a bit behind. One of our friend's boys is studying hard because he cannot stand the thought of GIRLS beating him. That psychology is not working on my boys, though I am proud of them!

Some of the people who live around here have asked me what exactly IS the Bible Bee, anyway? You can look at the website here. Basically it is like the National Spelling Bee, only with Bible Knowledge and Memory. In my opinion, much as I think it is important to spell well, I think it is more important to know and love the Bible.

There will be a local competition here in our little town on Sept. 12. The top 100 students in each category in the nation will go to Washington D.C. in November for the national competition. There are significant prizes offered for the top 3 students in each category, but the biggest prize is going to be gained by all who participate... increased knowledge (and hopefully closeness to) our precious Savior. Already, after just two weeks, my children know between 150 and 200 more verses than they did before. That is a winning situation, no matter whether we progress to the national level or not.

For those of you reading who are local, we DO have need of the help of about 10 people who don't have children in the competition... I have 4 who have agreed to help us. If you would like to help correct tests, give the tests, or judge the oral rounds, please let me know.

I have received many questions from people who are having their children also memorize for the competition. This is NOT an easy amount of scripture! We spend time every day working together. We read the verses at mealtimes. I try to quiz the children several times a week... reviewing all the verses they have learned so far.

So THEY are doing the memorizing, but we are also doing it together. It is a family effort. I could use the Bible memory times, myself, so it is all good.

We are going to finish Genesis this week, and start in on Exodus. We are continuing our efforts to learn 5 quiz questions a day, also.

So- we are actually on week 3 of our studying. This week works out that we have 5 verses from each category. We will be memorizing the following verses this week, one each day from each category:

(The * means that a portion of the verses have been already memorized in other categories.)

Category 1:
Psalm 119: 103-105
Psalm 126: 5-6
Proverbs 15: 1-2
Isaiah 26: 3-4
Matthew 9: 37-38

Category 2:
Psalm 37: 1-6
Psalm 66: 16-20
Psalm 71: 16-18
Psalm 85: 8-13
Psalm 94: 8-12

Category 3
Psalm 33: 13-22
Psalm 34: 1-10*
Psalm 36: 5-10
Psalm 49: 7-13
Psalm 71: 14-24*

I'd love to hear from others who are working with their families in preparation for the Bible Bee! Drop me a line!