The HerdKeeper

One of the fun/scary thing is having a hairstylist in your house. My hairstylist has hot pink hair, two of my boys had mohawks throughout the summer and now my 3rd daughter had her long curly brown hair chopped off.

we went to the beach this summer and Emma, Rebekah and I made T-shirts for everyone. We figured everyone is always counting us so we would give them some help. It was a lot of fun!!! I only regret not having t-shirts for the grand-rents.

On Monday afternoon/evening Emma, my 16 year old, fell in a cheerleading stunt and has a compression fracture of her L1 vertebra. She spent about 36 hours in John Hopkins Hospital. My goodness is that a big hospital. It is like a mini city. She now has a brace that resembles a corset and she is in a good deal of pain. So for the next week or so I guess we will be having a health unit on our skeletal system and practicing the character quality of servanthood and patience. Emma has been asked multiple times if she will go back to cheering and stunting. she says well I just won't do that stunt again. I am not so sure.

Great first day. The best part is watching my older kids all working together instead of all reading separately in their rooms. Today was map work and we pulled out Atlases, encyclopedias, magnifying glasses and believe it or not binoculars to read the small print.

Today during school Melaina said to me "Mom can you please hit the pause button I have to go to the bathroom."

She is the sweetest most adorable baby. She calls me "her mamma".

I love a good schedule. I am always searching for the perfect schedule. I have a feeling I will always be searching as there is no such thing as perfect. Or so they tell me. So here is my fall schedule overview Mondays we school from 8:30 – 3:30 or 4, we clean up and I theoretically clean up and start dinner. Annah has guitar practice on Monday nights. Emma and Rebekah tag team babysit if Don has to work late Tuesdays are co-op days. This is the first time we have ever participated in a co-op and my kids are loving it. Don drops off Emma, Rebekah and Donny at 8:30 for a government class and then I come at 9:30 with Annah, Ben and Josiah. My littles are babysit by big sister, till my Aunt and her little one come for an hour or two to play, then my mom comes till I can get there and she does science with Annah and Josiah. Tuesdays, Emma and Rebekah have cheerleading from 4-6, Emma and Rebekah go to a Bible study after cheerleading till about 9:30 and Donny has football from 6-8

The Votes are in and the Emmalacins are in office. We held a mock election on Friday between Annah and Emma. Emma won with a narrow margin of 4 to 3. My kids got to understand a little bit about the checks and balances of government. Because of the size of our family we did it in house. Our inauguration and inaugural ball will be on Wednesday, our final day of the study. It was between my 11 year old and my 16 year old. The 16 year old won hands down but I got to witness the sweetest act of love. My 16 year old voted for her sister. Is that not awesome? My 11 year old is all about order and rules and well you can imagine how well that went over. Anyway, we got a good "drill" on the branches of government and checks and balances because Mom is the legislative and judicial branch and I get to decide if it goes along with our “constitution”. If it does not violate our constitution we will enact that law. It really made that all so much clearer to the kids and it was fun too. One