CHE stuff

Our "principal", Ms. Angie, had a birthday this week.  Someone sneaked in a cake so here it is.

Happy Birthday, Ms. Angie, we know it was a big one for you!

This is our "mother's lounge", in the lobby.  I guess this is the last year we'll be meeting here at this school, as we have a principal FAIL!  Yes, she is "retiring".  Didn't know you felt THAT old, Ms. Angie!

May 20 will be our last CHE event - the NEW2YOU curriculum fair - always a much-appreciated event! To qualify that statement, the yearbook party will be sometime in June or July but prolly not at the CHE school.
Can you believe tomorrow is already May??
Happy Sabbath to all!

Shape Note Sing

Here in the south (maybe in the north too, I don't know!), there seems to be a large group of slightly eccentric people who still love to sing shape note hymns (MOST people stopped singing shape note songs 200 years ago); and not only to sing them, but some also to compose new ones!  One of the compilers of the 1991 "The Sacred Harp", Richard L. DeLong, who lives nearby in Georgia, was on hand to coach us and help lead a 3-hour sing last Sabbath (I got his autograph!!).  Now, I'm not saying I'm one of these eccentric ones who gathers monthly to shout sing these lovely hymns, nay, but am a friend of such, and was earnestly bribed urged to attend this 'sing-a-long'.  Here are some photos of the enthusiastic group getting warmed up.  The deal is, different people get up to "conduct" the hymns they chose.   Everyone clambers for a turn, like eager Kindergarteners (even getting ticket numbers in larger groups).  Such enthusiasm is heartwarming, yea, HEARTWARmin', I tell ya!!

(You'll see Richard DeLong's head sticking up above this hymnbook - watch out Duane!)

To get the full impact I should have taped it....I'll do that next time!  Wait!  Next time?  Well, MAYBE I'll be going again :-).  Until then.....

Spring Flowers

Here are some flowers in the local area.  Notice the yellow pollen dust.  We had record high pollen counts in this area a few weeks ago - one day being 7038!  The average count is around 100.  Need I say more!

Tulips

Phlox

Pansies

Levitating before piano lesson (that's usual, isn't it?)

A 5-week Comcam off Mahan Gap

This is a field visible across the way from our CHE building.  The first week (April 6),I noticed how pretty the redbud looked against the green and hills.  The next week it was still beautiful (the redbud bloomed for a long time this year), and by the third week it had just started to change to green.

The second week:(April 13)

The 3rd week: (Apr 20)

And now the 4th week (April 27)...only a slight hint of purple in the tree and the black walnut behind it slightly to the right, is finally showing some foliage.  They're always last to get their leaves and the first to lose them. (That's one way how I'm guessing it's a black walnut)

5th week: May 4, 2010

Perhaps I'll keep adding comcams for a while so check back!

2010 Sonrise and Other

Our garden is slowly coming along. C and A have their little sections all fenced off and in the foreground we have kale, bell pepper and farther back, tomatoes and kale.

Southern's annual SONRISE pageant was on April 3.  Here are a few photos from the day.

The leper colony outside Jerusalem.

In "Jerusalem" there were many shops selling everything!  MUCH better than Walmart or OK! This one sold musical instruments.

What do you know - we meet our own kin in Jerusalem!  How are you, H? Are you ready for Passover?

The next day, Sunday, (Easter) was a day for egg hunting. This is really not a tradition of ours but since I had some eggs leftover from a previous easter egg hunt somewhere, I hid them around the house and the two girls hunted for them.  Since there were only 9 I hid them really well.  Camouflaged, huh?

C's Adventurer Investiture was April 3 at 6pm.  Here is the whole group about to sing a song.

 C's class standing in line waiting to be called to get their pins.

And that's all til next time!

Another dream house site.

Just in case anyone is out scouting for me, here is another ideal location for my cottage. In fact, you can see my prospective cottage in the pic already, which will do fine, even if just a slight bit hilly!  Somewhere nearby would also work.

April Photos

Our azaleas are blooming but I'll add them next time.

Here is another view of our newly ploughed vegetable garden (still in the process of being tilled), just waiting for fresh seeds and seedlings! A couple blogs ago I showed the garden being ploughed so here it is almost finished.

And now we have plants and some seeds in.  Of course a lot of the squash and such, like it warmer than it is now so we're waiting a week or so.

We had a good rain this week and more big storms predicted for tomorrow.  The weeds have sprouted and we've started the hoeing.  Oh joy of it!

Here we're at LBA for S's alumni weekend.  A came  with us and here they are in Junior SS.  "Boring" says C!  Probably 'cos it involved a pen and paper (some of the time), and little in the way of "entertainment" is my guess! Sad, isn't it?

R, C and family came with us too.  They were happy to see Soekie looking fine and healthy and she seemed thrilled to see them too - knowing they were VERY familiar but couldn't quite lay her nose on WHY.  She became very excited when R patted her in his peculiar way and of course voice recognition - of all of them.

After lunch, S's class met at the Lodge for fellowship and catching up.  Here are a few of the next generation of girls on the porch.  (Cautionary note: Don't lean on the top rail - it's loose!)

This is the view from the lodge, looking east.

For the past month we've been watching a live Ustream webcam of owls, Molly and McGee, as they raise their baby owlet family.  Four owls were "born" to them about a month ago and look how big they're getting! Their mother, Molly, is leaving the nest during the day now, and helping McGee look for rodents for the growing babies. In the beginning, he alone did all the hunting. If you're interested, just google Molly and McGee!  They've had over 8 millions hits on their site.

Ah, isn't this sweet? Only a mother owl could love her babies!

Well, I think that'll be all for now, folk!  As I mentioned at the top, big storms are predicted for these parts tomorrow and tomorrow night.  Big hail and possibly tornadoes...Let's hope not!

Take care til next time!

A little piano piece

Playing Chopin Waltz in c# minor (transposed to d minor and arranged by John Brimhall)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAA_qD5lzGI

C played a very nice little Chopin piece last Sunday night.  This was her second recital after the first one in December.  I thought she did very well - considering we only had one month to properly learn the piece after returning from South Africa.  Another week or two to work on it would have been great!  I'm very proud of her! 

The Grass is Riz

 I kid you not folk, the following three photos were taken within a week of each other.

This one taken on April 2

This one 2 days later on April 4 - (Happy birthday, Mom!),

and this one on April 9 (today)

Wow, I don't know WHAT blogspot is doing now but I can't format this thing - moving photos around is a complete disaster!  And my text is appearing in all sorts of weird places!  One day I suppose I'll figure it out. Excuse my obvious prejudice but this system was not designed by a woman - and therefore not user friendly!!  Uploading photos is also a pain - one at a time to the blog....My control save feature is also not working!  Anyway, if this text is anywhere near the yellow forsythia, this photo was taken March 27 down at the Riverwalk downtown Chattanooga.  We biked about 7 miles on a beautiful spring day.  Since we've had such an unusually long winter, spring has sprung all at once - absolutely gorgeous!

 

And now I can't "return" to the line below - cannot produce a properly behaving cursor!  So who knows where this text will show up.  Below is a "red" bud blooming in the front garden ("yard" as they say in the US.  My prim and proper British Aunts would laugh at this term derisively - "A YARD!  ha ha - what is it - Scotland Yard, or a graveyard? tsk tsk!").

 

OK, now I just click wildly around in the spaces on or next to a picture, and finally a  large cursor appears as if my text is in the middle.  I've clicked "remove formatting" several times to no avail.  The photo below is actually from our Homeschool school on Mahan gap.  Just thought the scene was  beautiful with flowering trees and green grass.  Date taken: April 6.

 

I can only move the text once I start typing in the open area in the middle then move the cursor to the left of the word and hit return.  It won't move the cursor unless there is writing there - how dumb is that?

This is our field being ploughed on Monday April 5.  A HOT day.  We thought summer had arrived with temps in high 80's!

 

Well, I've had enough bother with this "new" blog.  Wish I could revert to the old formatting!

We're going up to LBA for their "Almuni" w/e (well, we HOPE it's Alumni, but last year it was Almuni!) tomorrow.  Will fill you in when we get back.

Happy Sabbath!