Sunday, January 25, 2009

Saturday's Events

Stan and I have been looking at a house to buy in Belgrade (that probably won't even be there by May--that's when we get out of the lease here) and decided to go to the home show to look at a few things we would like to buy.

The first thing was a new furnace. The one in the house is rattly and obviously old. We talked to a guy about a heat pump and another about a furnace. The heat pump costs about the same as the furnace (more than we want to spend) but looks like a nice thing to have. It cuts heating costs by about half, but only works if the temps are over 35 degrees (maybe half the winter). It is also an air conditioning unit. Might be nice, but the furnace would have to be replaced first, then this is added on.

The furnace guy tried to talk us into switching to a natural gas furnace. Right now most people with natural gas have about the same bills as the people heating with electric. Not sure it's worth the price to switch.

The other thing that we were really interested in was an instant water heater. We knew that they cost quite a bit more, but last longer than a regular water heater. What we didn't know was that if you have mineral rich water or a lot of chlorine in the water you have to buy a water purifier to put before the water heater. The minerals and chemicals solidify at the point of heating. We just wanted hot showers even on the eighth one. Totally tired of cold showers. Once again probably not worth the money now. Oh, well.

For the afternoon, Stephen, Jessica, Jacob, Sarah, and Joseph went to Science Saturdays at MSU and learned about Bio-Materials. It's for kids 10-15, but younger kids can go with an adult. Stephen went as our adult...he really wanted to go too anyway. They learned how nature has inspired science and came home with that slime you play with. I know they did other things, but I'm not sure what...

Saturday, January 24, 2009

Hansel and Gretel

Stephen, Jacob, Jessica and Sarah have been attending a homeschool choir this fall. They performed a couple of places just before Christmas and this month they are doing an operetta.

They are doing Hansel and Gretel. The performance will be next Saturday at 1pm at the Bozeman Library in the big meeting room. The older three will be doing some solos--Stephen is the father, Jessica is the dew fairy, Jacob is the huntsman and Sarah is an angel. They've had lots of fun with this group. We'll have to join again next year.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Sarah's schoolwork...

I keep waiting to post until I get pictures loaded up...I think I need to stop waiting. It's not getting done :\

Sarah's Language Arts today was talking about cause and effect. We read the story about Jesus walking on water from the Bible and talked about possible causes and from some effects. We discussed possible causes of Peter sinking in the water. Then I asked her what she thought the cause was of the storm stopping when Jesus stepped on the boat. She said "Jesus stopped it." I asked her if she really thought that He could do that. She said (while rolling her eyes) "Mom...He made the world." :)

The next part of this assignment was to write three sentences telling about a situation that made her worry, then one sentence telling how the situation turned out. She couldn't think of anything that made her worry except having to write these sentences. Here's what she wrote:

Mom's making me write.
I don't want to write.
It's no fun.
Hurray! I'm finally done!
She cracks me up :)