The 2009 Schoolhouse Planner~Review

I recently had the opportunity to review the 2009 Schoolhouse Planner from The Old Schoolhouse. I have purchased planners in the past and have not been overly thrilled with them. The planners I have used the past either have forms I will not use or do not have all the forms I am looking for. There is also the lack of space issue. I want a planner that has calendar blocks large enough to write several things in one block. Last year I ended up making my own planner by searching the internet for the various calendar and forms I wanted. This was very tedious and time consuming and I really wasn't thrilled with my end result.

Naturally I was a bit skeptical. How can this planner be everything I want it to be? What is really going to be different about it? Will it really meet my needs or will I end up having to search for the forms I really want. Not only do I want a homeschool planner, I also want a household planner. A few months ago I spent quite a bit of time searching for some household planning pages that I had seen on a blog. I could not find them! I was so frustrated and was about to spend some more time searching for the perfect household forms to go in my planner. Then along came the 2009 Schoolhouse planner.

To say I was pleasantly surprised would be an understatement! This planner ROCKS! Seriously! I am not exaggerating. This is the best planner I have ever seen. It has everything! A school planner and household planner all in one place! No more searching! It sounds too good to be true, right? Well read on and see for yourself!

Lets take a look at what's inside. The Schoolhouse planner comes in PDF format and is downloadable to your computer.

Table of Contents: There are six pages, yes I said SIX. You can view the entire table of contents here.

The planner calendar runs from July 2009 to June 2010. Each month has a nice two page spread with large blocks that have ample writing space.

Included are calendar pages from 2009-2012, each page holds one year.

There is an article each month from well-known homeschooling authors. Here are just a few examples of the great articles and authors you will find each month:

• The Thirteen Colonies by Michelle Miller
• American Government Basics by Amanda Bennett
  Learning to Spot the Planets by Jay Ryan

You will also find two recipes each month! How cool is that? I don't know about you, but I love trying new recipes. This is a great feature and it will remind me to try something new.

Miscellaneous Educational Information: I love this section! What a great resource. No more searching for a list of US Presidents. It is right there at your fingertips. How about measurement conversions. I always have to look this up in one of my recipe books, only I can never remember what recipe book it is in and end up wasting time looking for it. Yes I know I could mark the page in my recipe book, but I never remember to and usually I am in a hurry. Now it is right in your planner, no more searching! There are also lists for Famous Composers, US States and Capitals, 7 Wonders of the Ancient World, 7 Wonders of the Modern World and much more!

Homeschool Forms: There are a ton of these! There are annual plans, yearly goals, curriculum planning sheet, weekly planning sheets, high school transcript sheets, daily and weekly schedules for 1-4 children, books read this year, week-at-a-glance and much more.

Some of my personal favorites that I cannot wait to use are: books read this year, field trip log, library items, support group information, unit study records and homeschool book inventory.

Household Forms: I have been wanting to create a household planner for a couple of years now, but finding the forms I want and them getting them all organized was a bit overwhelming. Here you will find just about every form you could imagine to keep track of your household. There are forms such as important phone numbers and contacts, emergency medical information, monthly homekeeping remindrs, homekeeping weekly schedule, Christmas card list, my address book and one I am particularly looking for to using, website/login password quick reference. This is just a sampling of what you will find.

So there you have it one planner for both homeschool and household all in one place! Forms for just about anything you can think of. You can print only the forms you need, skip the ones you don't, print more than one of the same form if you need duplicate pages, it is totally customizable and at your control.

Wait a minute! There is one more thing I almost forgot! One very important feature this planner has that my other planners did not have and my very favorite part of the planner (other than all the great things I have already mentioned). You can type on this planner. Yes you heard me right, you can TYPE directly onto the planner before you print it! I have longed for a planner that has this feature!

The planner is $39 and you can find it here at the Old Schoolhouse Store.

You can read more Schoolhouse planner reviews by clicking the TOS Crew button below.

Make your own solar system

A while back I was working on a project using craft foam. Justin and Kaden were at the table with me when suddenly Justin had a brainstorm to make a solar system set. I have mentioned countless times that Justin loves the solar system. He used large craft sticks and craft foam. This is what he came up with.

It is huge!

the construction was all his idea.

He even used the hot glue gun for the first time and did pretty well.



see that tiny white thing by the earth? That's the moon.

see that stick that looks empty by Jupiter is the asteroid/dwarf planet Ceres

finally Neptune and Pluto. Justin loves Pluto so dwarf planet or not, he will always include it.


My astronomer with his work.

and because Justin made one you know that Kaden was not to be left out. This is what he and I came up with for his planet set. One benefit of having a brother who loves the solar system is that little brother learned his planets at an early age! :)

Hand held planets!

We decided that the earth needed a moon to orbit it.

Happy boy with his planets!

Decluttering the CD's

We have too many cd's! Really we do. Do you? Can you relate to this pile? This is a photo of all our cd's and a few audio books over 240 of them! They took up a lot of space. Space I need. I have a small home. Very small. Every inch of space here is precious. Did I mention my home was small? What to do? How do we continue to store them without them taking over our home?

My goal this year is to declutter this house and we are slowly working toward that goal. We have gotten rid of countless items. These were giving me a headache. We did go through and get rid of about 20 of them that we really didn't want but still 240 is quite a pile. They took up four boxes!

A couple of months ago I picked up one of those cd binders similar to this. They come in several sizes and hold various amounts of cds/dvds.

Everything that was in the first picture is now in here. Aaaah that's better!

What's more is they are all in one place. No more searching through every cd to find what we are looking for!

They fit on our bookshelf now and I don't have to mess with all those jewel cases. We have two more binders for our movies and our Christmas dvds and cds...yeah it is bad they needed their own binder! Our dvds used to take up a six foot shelf. Now they take up about 3 inches on the bookshelf. I love it!

I just saved $584!

That's right, $584! I have been going to call the telephone company for sometime now to drop some services off of our phone. Today was the day. There was a small charge I had been paying for quite sometime that I did not realize I had never taken off. While I was on the phone with them I decided to drop my caller ID as well. We don't really get that many phone calls so I decided there was really no sense in paying for this service any longer. When I first had caller ID put on our phone several years ago I was paying $7.50 per month. It is now almost $10 per month. I decided I really didn't need it. Dropping those two services saved me $140 per year!

I have also been going to call our local cable company to see if there were any discounts available for existing customers. Right now we pay $140 per month for cable and internet service. (I don't do the bunde package, voice, internet and cable as right now our phone bill is only $26 per month and that is currently cheaper than the bundle package)

When I called I spoke to a very nice lady named Barbara who said that she would give us a promotional rate of $103 per month. Total savings of $444 for the year! Not only that buy she asked me if I had my current cable bill, I said I did. She told me to not send the $140 for this month's bill but to only send $99. She made it effective last month! She also told me to be sure to contact them when the promotional rate was over and they would issue me another promotional rate!

It pays to ask!

I made a header!

If you've been to my blog today you know I made a header. I love the way it looks. I have been wanting to do this for sometime and was not sure how. My blogging friend Debbie at Following the Narrow Path showed me how! Thanks Debbie!

Looking for Summer Fun? Here's Where I am today!

If you're looking for some ideas for summer fun, look no further.

I'm guest posting over at 3 boys & a dog today.

I'm talking about summer fun! There are 30 ideas for summer fun posted.

There is something for everyone so come visit!

Super Summer Swap!~Sign up deadline today!

Would you like to have your kids make some new friends? You can sign up for the Super Summer Swap! . Today, June 22 is the LAST DAY TO SIGN UP so hurry if your interested!

Here is the info:

What is the Super Summer Swap you ask? It is a fun way for our children to make some friends this summer. The participants will put together little packages to exchange with other children of similar age.

Why should your child participate?
1. What child wouldn't like to get some mail?
2. It will be a fun summer project.
3. Your child can learn a little bit about another child from another state.
4. Pen pals are always a possibility if the children want to continue the friendship.
5. Why not?

So, here is how it works:
1. It is open to all children of bloggers through elementary age.
2. Sign up between June 15 and June 22.
3. We will match children based on age and partners will be notified by June 26.
4. All packages should be mailed by August 3.
5. When you receive your package, write a post about it and we will have a Mr. Linky party after the packages all have time to arrive!

Packages should include a minimum of three items from your child; here are some examples: 1.
A postcard or brochure from where you live, 2. a lapbook or scrapbook or something handmade, 3. a photograph or drawing of your child, 4. a special gift that will allow your child's new friend to experience a hobby or interest that your child has or enjoys.
You do not have to spend any money, but please DO NOT spend more than $15.00 on the items that will be exchanged.

You can sign up through comments or email on this blog or the Christy's blog. Please include the following information when you sign up: name(s) of child(ren), age(s) of child(ren), the state in which you live, and your email address. (If you're not comfortable posting any of that information, you may email me at dairyqueen03@gmail.com

Please feel free to ask questions, and PLEASE blog about this so that we can get a lot of people involved. This will be more fun if we have a lot of participants!

Father's Day 2009

We had a fun Father's Day today, celebrating Larry! We started our day by going to breakfast at the local diner with my parents and two of my brothers and their families.

at the diner

Pop pop (my dad) and the boys!

The boys painted wooden pin wheels for daddy! They also made cards. Larry is waiting patiently with his eyes shut for his presents. Notice Justin has his card upside down.

close up of the pinwheels. They look much cuter in person. There is glitter on them and you really can't see the sparkle in the pictures.

Another gift we gave daddy!

Close up: I have to say I loved making this! It just a painted canvas and the boys hand/arm prints made from scrapbook paper. It says: Daddy, no matter how old we get....we will always reach for you. The boys each picked out their own paper. I put their names along each of their arms. I think it turned out fantastic and Larry loved it! This idea came from RootsandWingsCo.

I also made Larry this word cloud from Wordle. This is a site where you can make your own word clouds. It is a really neat site. (just a note that there are some offensive things on this website from people who post their word clouds, so view at your own discretion). You can customize this by choosing font, background color and word colors!

Here is an upclose of the words we chose to describe daddy.

I printed it out and found a frame at the dollar store. It is a 5 x 7. I think it came out great!

We usually go to Cape May for the day on Father's day, but because it has been raining forever here in NJ, we opted to go to the movies and then Wendy's for dinner. It was a wonderful day!

Happy Father's Day Larry!

Happy Father's Day to my wonderful husband Larry!
He is such a wonderful husband and daddy!
A hard worker and dedicated to all of us!
We love you so much!
We are thankful to have you!


Larry and his two best (very silly) buds!

Homemade Granola Bars

I made these last night. They are so good! I have been looking for more homemade snacks and these fit the bill. We are trying to make all of our snacks doing away with all those preservatives that are in store bought items. These were very easy to make. I found the recipe at Frugal Family Fun blog

I ended up using rice krispies on place of the puffed rice cereal and used unsalted peanuts. They were really yummy!

For Granola:
2 cups oats
3/4 cup puffed rice cereal
3/4 cup sunflower seeds, salted and roasted
1 cup crushed peanuts, salted and roasted
1/2 cup raisins
2/3 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup honey
4 Tbsp. butter
2 tsp vanilla extract


For Chocolate Sauce:
1/4 semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 tsp. shortening


Spread oats on a baking sheet and toast in a 400 degree oven for about 10 minutes. Be sure to stir them every few minutes to avoid burning. Once oats are done toasting, set aside and turn off the oven. Line a 9 x 13 inch glass baking dish with wax paper and lightly spray with non-stick cooking spray.

In a small sauce pan over medium heat, mix the brown sugar, honey, butter and vanilla. Stir frequently, until butter is melted and brown sugar is dissolved. Mix all dry ingredients in a large bowl. Add the melted butter and sugar mixture and mix all ingredients very well.

Spread the granola out into the bottom of the prepared baking dish. Add a sheet of wax paper to the top and press down firmly to make sure your bars are well compacted. Let cool completely (about 2 hours).

Add chocolate chips and shortening to a double boiler and stir constantly until melted. Drizzle chocolate over granola. Allow to firm up (about 20 minutes).

Carefully transfer granola onto a large cutting board and cut using a very sharp knife and pressing down firmly to make a clean cut. Store in an air-tight container.

Thrift store decorating

You know how much I love thrifting. About a month ago we purchased a new to us sofa at our favorite thirft store. We love it! It is smaller than our old sofa and looks 100% better in our livingroom. Our old sofa was blue with a pattern. We had it for over 20 years. I was so tired of it and wanted something more neutral with no pattern. We have several patterns going on in our livingroom that just don't seem to mesh well. It is much easier to add/change out accessories with neutral colors. Our sofa is a gold/tan color.

Last week we were at our local thrift store (taking a load of items to donate in our efforts to declutter this house) and decided to take a look around. While I perused the books, Larry headed for the clothes. He is really good at finding clothes for all of us. He did find a winter shirt for Justin. Afterwards we met up in the housewares/bedding department. You really have to look through this stuff as sometimes it is unorganized. Larry found throw pillows for the sofa. A bunch of them. The first ones he found were green. I loved them, but one had several stains. On one side a ball point pen stain, that I knew I could get out, but the other side was a stain I wasn't sure I could. I really wanted those pillows. Then he found a gold set and one other green, really soft pillow. I opted for the 2 gold and one green pillows. (did I say I really wanted those green ones. I almost went back and bought them but I talked myself out of it.....sigh).

The best part? The pillows were only $2 each! We were looking at pillows a couple of weeks ago at BJ's Wholesale Club that were $17! So for $6 we got three really nice pillows!

So what do you think? yes I know that one of the gold pillows are sideways. I didn't notice it when I took the picture. I am very happy with it and our living room is starting to come together a bit. Just before Christmas we also got a new to us recliner in brown and beige. The sofa is also a sofa bed which is nice since we only have two bedrooms and this gives us some extra sleeping area should we need it.

I don't want to be a toy!

The other day Kaden was playing with our cat Jupiter. He loves to play with her. We have those plastic little cat balls with the bell in them. Kaden will throw a ball and Jupiter will chase it. When she gets it she will bat it around and then wait for Kaden to throw it again. It's fun to watch them!

Jupiter also likes to jump up on her hind legs and try to "attack you" with her front paws. She does this to me frequently, jumping out from behind the chair as I walk by. (sacred me to death one day when she jumped out from behind our clothes tree!) It is really funny! After Kaden was done throwing the ball to her, she came up and jumped at him on her hind legs. I overheard Kaden tell her. I don't want to be a toy! Stop making me be a toy! I don't want to be your toy! I was laughing so hard. I asked him what was wrong and he said: Jupiter is trying to make me her toy! Please tell her I don't want to be a toy! lol......

Book of Virtues Unit Study

Patricia Thompson over at Shiver Academy has created a wonderful study on The Book of Virtues by William Bennett. You can download the entire unit by scrolling down on her sidebar to The Book of Virtues Project and selecting the download. You can download the entire project or sections at a time, since it is a pretty big download. It is wonderful, filled with lesson plans, notebooking pages, lapbooking components and more.

The Simple Woman's Daybook~June 15th

Outside my window...once again it is dark and quiet

I am thinking...that I really should be in bed...but I am such a night owl.

I am thankful for...my best friend Sue whose birthday it is today. (yesterday as this is posting on the 16th) God could not have sent a better friend!!!

From the learning rooms...we''re finishing up our smelly science class this week by finishing up our lapbook.

From the kitchen...some cookie baking is in order...maybe chocolate chips and snickerdoodles
I am wearing...my jammies again. They really are so comfy!

I am creating...some much needed home improvements around the house.

I am going...to bed soon.

I am reading...Until We Reach Home by Lynn Austin

I am hoping...to get all the things I want to accomplish done this week.

I am hearing...the click of the hermit crabs...they are night owls too.

Around the house...another load went to the thrift store last week! Larry put up a new screen door on the porch and a new screen in the front door. The porch is pretty clear of most of the junk that was sitting out there and the house is overall looking better. We still have a long way to go, but with each trip to the thrift store to take items we no longer want/use/love it is improving.


One of my favorite things...a pile of new books from the thrift store for ME.

A few plans for the rest of the week...church dinner this week. Write a review, create a guest blog post for another blog, start our summer learning adventure, clean out the kitchen (trust me it is a mess) make calls to Larry's aunt and sister, Father's Day plans of some sort.

Here is a picture thought I am sharing...

My best friend Sue and my sweet baby, Kade in 2007 on the Atlantic City boardwalk

more daybooks

We have the nicest neighbors!

Our neighbors on one side of us are really nice. They are a little older than us and have no children. A couple of weeks ago Larry was chatting with Roy. They were talking about the wood planter that Roy made for his yard. Roy had extra wood and asked Larry if we would like one. Sure! He told us he would build it sometime in the next few weeks. We thought that was awfully nice of him.

Saturday night, Larry was taking out the trash Roy mentioned he was going to build the planter on Sunday. They got to talking and Larry mentioned that we were going to go to Lowe's to buy wood to make a sandbox. Roy said he had enough wood to make a sandbox for the boys. (we had a one of those turtle sandboxes that the boys outgrew and the top broke so we had to throw it away last fall) Larry said no we could buy the wood and make one. Roy insisted that he would make it. So Saturday night they measured out the wood for the sandbox. When we returned from church on Sunday this is what was waiting for us......

The boy's new sandbox!

Daddy got sand on his way home from work today!

I have two very happy boys!

Thank you Mr. Roy!

(oh and the planter.....pics coming soon!)