a quick personal note...

Well, we are now in Texas, and we were only delayed a week due to crazy circumstances... the twins decided to come 10 weeks early! By God's divine grace they are healthy and stable and were medivaced from Washington to Texas so we could all be together. I have had the most amazing support from the most amazing people and my thank you list is growing by the hour!

2 weeks before we were due to fly out I found out I have breast cancer. To make this short my awesome OB felt a lump and got me into an ultrasound and then a mammogram within days, I had a biopsy, got the results and had a lumpectomy and lymphnodal section all in one week, still pregnant. That was the 14th, the stress from packing up the house and the surgery induced early labor and I had the twins via cesarean on the 19th. Our house was packed and we were living in the base hotel, waiting to fly out on the 21st.

My awesome friend Sue Ho put my family, including my parents, up in her house for a week while she was in Idaho (thank you!). What a relief it was to be in a house and not squished in a hotel room for that long!

The twins were born amazingly healthy and already look like babies instead of little potatoes, Lucy was born at 3:44 am at 3 pounds 1 oz and Sarah was born at 3:46 am at 3 pounds 4 oz.

I can't thank enough all who have helped us and who are still helping as the twins are in the NICU and I get set up with chemotherapy, our household goods will be delivered on Monday.... what day, or month is it? I fell as if I've slipped into a black hole, this all happened literally in less than 3 weeks!

I will continue to post great stuff that I come across, but as you can guess it just may be less often.

God bless and believe in the power of prayer!
Mrs. Murphy

Homeschooling-How do I start?

Whatever your reasons for choosing to homeschool, we all start from the beginning; and we all have the same questions. How do I start? Where do I go? What can I afford? I got this great site forwarded to me today that breaks down some different options and philosophies widely used in the homeschool world. Check out: Advanced Learners!

And as always, feel free to send me a comment and ask any questions, I would love to help you!
Mrs. Murphy

Another Great Catholic Mom Book Review Site!

Check out the Treasure Chest for Tweens! I have made a separate section on the left side bar that has all these book review sites so they are easy to find on Mrs. Murphy's Methods! Kudos to Pam in El Paso for passing this great one along, and thanks Regina from Dei Gratia for letting us know this mom is one of our own!

Online Summer Classes

Check out these online summer classes offered with a Catholic perspective through Homeschool Connections. Just click HERE!

Enjoy!
Mrs. Murphy

Been Slackin!!

I'm sure I don't need to explain all that goes on when you are selling a house (SOLD!), preparing for a move from the top of the country to the bottom, trying to transfer, change, cancel things, get some school work done (ha ha ha!) and are pregnant with twins....I'm sure I don't, do I?

One high light I will share is that I had the privilege of meeting Father Frank Pavone at a Pro-Life Mass and dinner. (Thanks to my Amiga Sue for being my date!) He is an amazing speaker, and if the name just sounds a bit familiar, he is the founder of Priests for Life. I was also given the Mother/Children blessing by him, quite the honor!

My latest bout of research has been on children's literature, and the same question seems to be going around my groups of friends who all have budding readers: what is safe for them to read? I have been reading Michael D. O'Brien's A Landscape with Dragons, which written around 1992, still gives extremely relevant explanations on what literature is fruitful for the child's mind and what can be morally confusing based on the depiction of good vs. evil. I highly recommend it. Here is an article about more recent children's literature and it's impact.

Some other Catholic sites that have reading lists and book reviews are from Love 2 Learn, Catholic Fiction.net and Catholic Mom. My other methods of finding good children's literature is when I collect my homeschool catalogs (I always check out Seton, Kolbe, Our Lady of Victory, Mother of Divine Grace, Emmanuel, Rod and Staff (Mennonite-but has some basic wholesome kids books about faith, note: to get a real catalog from the actual publisher (not a store) you have to call them and request it: 1-606-522-4348) and Sonlight (non-defined Christian, but still has some good books) and I'm sure there are some I've left out...) and I take my time to go through their reading section grade by grade. I love to hold the paper catalogs, to dog ear, to circle, to compare prices (for example a lot of repeats are in Seton from Rod & Staff, but are much cheaper through R & S, also whatever you find from the publisher go online and then check out Adoremus Books, it is usually cheaper and less shipping). FYI: Some of these sites have a place to click and just put in your info to request a catalog, others, like Kolbe, you have to send them an email and request one.

Now for some FUN STUFF!! LEGO Education of North America is having a creativity contest! Go HERE to order your FREE LEGO kit and get your kiddos building!

Also, check out my updated You Tube section with your kids! I found some super fun stuff mine love to watch! I added Philomena Girl to the kids section, let's see if it's worth the stay; Hug a Hero Daddy Dolls to the Military Support Section; and I also added some new places to shop that I found on another search. Enjoy!

Extra kudos to Sue & Michaela for the resources and friendship! If you find any of my hyper links don't work, please leave me a comment, I worked on this while my girls were hopping around me having a "balloon party". :)

Missed you too! Will be doing better at keeping up!
Mrs. Murphy

19 Year Old Homeschooler Wins at Film Festival!

Home schooler's feature film opens in theaters
Pete Chagnon - OneNewsNow - 4/15/2009 7:40:00 AM
A movie made by a home-school teenager has been released on 94 screens nationwide.

John Moore is the 19-year-old writer and director of The Widow's Might, a light-hearted family comedy that centers on a widow who is faced with the loss of her property due to heavy taxation. Moore explains the premise of the 101-minute film. "[T]his home-school family finds out about [the widow's dilemma] -- and of course they think that that's ridiculous," says Moore. "So they go to the mayor and attempt to get him to be reasonable. Of course he's not; he's trying to do what he feels is best for the city. "So there is kind of a battle of wills there," he continues, "and eventually the family decides that they should produce a film in an attempt to spread the word about the widow's plight." Moore's film won the $101,000 "Best of Film Festival" award at the 2009 San Antonio Independent Christian Film Festival and will now be shown at 94 Carmike Cinemas across the nation. He shares that distribution of the film began when he received an unexpected call from independent filmmaker Jerry Dalton, who requested a screener copy of The Widow's Might. "And he calls back and says, 'I can get this film into the theaters for you -- would you be interested?' And it was just so out of nowhere that God would bless the project like that," exclaims Moore. The Widow's Might opens this week (April 13-18) in theaters. A movie trailer, behind-the-scenes clips, and a list of showings can be found at WidowsMightTheMovie.com.

Back from El Paso!

I've been MIA because my hubby and I went down to El Paso to do house hunting and recon! It was NO vacation, but it was well worth it. We found a neighborhood, my gracious husband drove us ALL OVER so I could check out dance studios, gymnastics centers, churches, all of it! Even car dealerships! A new friend showed us the Dodge Sprinter, but when I got in one at the dealership I got a bit nervous about the height and me hauling newborns and carseats up that far by myself.... so I think I'm sticking with the Chevy Express and ordering a new one.

I have to give a shout out to my new friends in the El Paso Catholic homeschool group who has an abundance of girls just the same ages as mine! They threw together a welcome coffee for me and it was the most wonderful experience, thank you so much! Erika, Rae, Prudence, Pat, Tabitha, Pat.... I apologize for the names I am forgetting, but I am really looking forward to the wonderful frienships to come!

Bottom line, it was great, I'm exhausted, and the grandparents did a GREAT job staying with the 4 monkeys. How can I ever repay them?

Have some resources sitting in my email I need to sort through, I'm so sorry I dropped Holy Week on Mrs. Murphy's Methods....but I wasn't here! Next up though, check out the Lorax project (previously mentioned and in the April sidebar) for Earth Day. Lots to do to show our Lord God how much we love this beautiful Earth He created just for us!

Lots of love to you all!
Mrs. Murphy