Printing Update/ scrapbooking

Printing whatever I want is so nice. I have refilled the cartridges twice and everything is running smoothly. My favorite scrapbook program is called canon photo record. It does everything I want it too and it makes scrapbooking so fast and much nicer than anything I would do with paper. I can crop, size and place my photos on whatever background I choose and I can add text in different fonts and put different frames around the photos and the text. I wouldn't scrapbook at all but the kids love looking at the pictures. I'm excited to be able to print more for them now that I have figured out the printer. It is so nice and very fun. Just wanted to share.

The Saddest Movie Ever

"Crossing" is the saddest movie I have ever watched. It is about a family in North Korea. The mother gets sick and the only possibility of obtaining medicine is to cross over to China. So the father tries to do it leaving his son and wife behind, and one sad thing after another happens-- I don't want to spoil it for you-- you can watch it here.

I think the saddest part of it is that there are real people who have and do experience some of the things portrayed in the movie as part of their life. It is so sad to see, but it also helps me see the world differently. It gave me a better understanding of North Korea and what it is like there. Even though it is sad, it is worth watching.

Food Storage

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints put out this pamphlet on food storage a couple years ago:

http://www.providentliving.org/fhs/pdf/WE_FamilyResourcesGuide_International_04008_000.pdf

I think it has some really good info. Start somewhere. Build up your 3 month supply of food you eat regularly. Then get some longer storage items to just keep like wheat, white rice and beans. Those longer storage items will keep for 30 years. It's insurance. But if inflation keeps us and the economy keeps worsening, we may need that insurance sooner than we'd like.

For water we really like our Berkey-- we use it daily, but it's supposed to be good enough to clean water from a stream. www.berkeywater.com

My new Homeschooling blog

I devoted a blog to just homeschooling. I've got 2 posts up so far. Check it out

www.academichomeschooling.blogspot.com

How to WIN the Printer War!!!!

What is the printer war?? It's the fact that ink costs as much or more than a printer. Also the cartridges are next to impossible to refill and the printer knows if you try and if you use a different cartridge. Well, no more for me after months of not printing because I didn't want to spend the money on ink and some attempts to refill existing cartridges I spent 2 days researching printers and ink. I picked HP Photosmart Plus printer for about $90 and bought the refill kit for about $40 ( I already had ink) from

www.inkproducts.com

This company is so awesome!! they have all kinds of ink refill kits for all different printers. I chose mine because of their recommendation page and then bought their empty cartridges refill kit. It even came with a tool to remove those nasty microchips and a special plastic cover to place them on to trick the printer into thinking you are still using its own cartridges.

Good job Inkproducts.com We love to print and now we can. I'll probably start my digital scrapbooking again!! I love being able to print a lot. I refilled for the first time and it all still works beautifully. The quality is awesome. It makes homeschooling so much nicer. I love having a copier and an unending supply of worksheets and coloring pages!! YAY!!!!

LDS General Conference Oct. 2010

I love listening to conference. It is the voice of reason, truth and happiness in a crazy world. I have to admit that I really don't get much out of it during conference with soccer on Saturday and a bunch of happy kids needing things during the sessions, but I love to relisten to the entire sessions on my mp3 player at night while I tidy up and get ready for the following day.

We did get everybody to sit quietly and listen to Pres. Monson's talk on gratitude. I especially liked this quote found at the Deseret News of his talk:

President Monson asked, "Do material possessions make us happy and grateful?" He answered, "Perhaps momentarily. However, those things which provide deep and lasting happiness and gratitude are the things which money cannot buy: our families, the gospel, good friends, our health, our abilities, the love we receive from those around us. Unfortunately, those are some of the things we allow ourselves to take for granted…. We often take for granted the very people who most deserve our gratitude. Let us not wait until it is too late for us to express that gratitude."

What a wonderful simple reminder of how to find happiness!! Just be grateful for what you have. I am soooooo grateful for my sweet family, my husband, the gospel, our health, my abilities and my friends and many loved ones. It's true, money can't buy any of those things and life would be so empty and lonely without them. Gratitude!!

Education in Utah

I know a lot of people around here are really confused about why I would want to homeschool when the schools out here, especially in my neighborhood are so good-- these are the best schools in the state after all!!-- so they say.

Well Utah education may not be as good as they think. I realized this when I was at BYU and would often not understand references people made to historical events and famous literature like the Odyssey for example. I had zero understanding of history and I graduated from high school with a 3.9 GPA with lots of honors classes and 4 classes worth of AP credit. I began to grasp how much I had never been taught and started wondering if those who told me I was smart and great knew what they were talking about. Thus the open mind to research homeschooling when I came across it. Many people I think, think they don't know things because they didn't apply themselves or pay attention as well as they should have, but for me I did my best and tried hard and did every thing they told me I should, and I got out and realized I didn't know much and it was because it wasn't taught. Utah schools don't teach Latin and Greek. They don't teach history very well. There are no formal logic classes. There are no rhetoric classes unless you count debate which is not true rhetoric. They are great at sports and dance competitions. Math was decent- I got through calculus. The music programs seem O.K. Science was O.K. But overall, my education was poor. I did not feel well read or educated. I did not even know what my deficiencies were, let alone how to make up for them. I felt cheated once I realized what I had missed. I guess that's the big reason I'm homeschooling now- to give my kids the education I wish I had received.

This week the Deseret News had an article about the the fact that when Utah test scores are compared to other states in the nation, Utah comes out somewhere in the middle of the nation, but when Utah is compared with other states with similar demographics of low poverty and high ratio of parents with some college education, then Utah is way at the bottom and often last.

That is very interesting for Utah. I don't fault anybody for sending their kids to the public school, but let's not delude ourselves into thinking they are receiving a superior education. I would really like to see the schools do better. I think we would all benefit from more people having a better understanding of history and the ability to think logically. And I would appreciate people understanding my position a little better. I'm not trying to one up anybody. I'm just doing what I think is best and there are valid reasons for it -- even in the best school district with the best schools in the state!