First of all, you winners from the last
post need to EMAIL me to get your prize.  I'm talking to you too
hippiechick! i need your addy iffen you want your stuff.
JenIG@TheHomeschoolMagazine.com

and now onto other mindless drivel.  Here is my own personal Year In Review…

January:
Went to New Mexico to see about planning a national homeschool
convention that we later decided not to take on, and instead
concentrate our efforts on getting behind local homeschool conventions
to help connect homeschoolers.

February: Went to visit Lorrie Flem
up in Washington State. She's pretty neat,we had a good time. 
Came home and packed up and flew out to Michigan to look at houses and
see if a job would pan out for Geoff so we could move there, which it
did not.

March: Drove
down to LA for TOS meetings and Geoff decided to take a job with the
magazine and work at home and leave his 16 hour a day job.  YIKES!
What a big change that was!  Gena decides to start a blog site, which I try to talk her out of, which eventually becomes HomeschoolBlogger.com

April: Geoff and Paul (gena's hubby)
drove out to New Orleans to some big convention out there.  Then
Geoff came back and me and Coie flew out to Baltimore to a special
needs convention .My brother in law Paul and nephew Paulie drove up and
we all had a good time making fun of how ugly Maryland is.  Sorry
to any of you Maryland people.  Boy do you live in a ugly state.

May: May is a blur.  What did I do in May? OH YES! Me and Kate Kessler flew out to the huge FPEA convention
and had the time of our lives.  We'll be back again for the next
one.  Those people really know how to put on an event.

June: Me
and Coie flew out to Colorado to the CBA convention where we saw those
“I Love Jesus And Cute Boys” T-shirt.  This was also the month me
and gena started talking about moving to Tennessee, and we just
happened to meet Kris Price who we started badgering for information. 

July: Gena
put her house on the market and packed up. At the end of the month Paul
and Geo moved her out to the rental Kris Price found for them.

August:
During the trip out to move Gena, Geo found the big log rental cabin in
TN for us to move to. At the end of the month, Gena came back out to
California and then we drove across the country together, Geoff and
Coie leading in our van, to our new home in TN.  Paul stayed
behind to wrap up the sale of their house.

Sept: Geoff
dropped me and five of the kids off at the new rental and he and Coie
drove back to Cali to finish getting our junk.  They would not be
back until the middle of Oct.  Paul was also gone so I made gena
stay with me.  Our cabinets fell off the wall, I got in a car
accident, I became shrouded in a poison ivy rash and I nearly went off
the deep end.

Oct: Geoff and Paul finally came home.  We made super new friends, AmyBeth
and Annemarie, Vickie, Maria and a bunch of other people that we really like.

Nov A bunch of staff drove and flew in for meetings, and then my family drove up to MI and met Spunky and SpunkyJr and went shopping. Boy we had fun.

Dec:
We thought about moving to Hohenwald, drove out there and loved it,
decided not to move, found a house about 30 minutes from where we live
right now, fell in love with it and bought it.  And our friends
from Ca, the Pepitos came out to visit and we all got the flu.

WHAT   A    YEAR.   I've never had
such a busy year in my life, except for 1995 when we got flooded, moved
seven times, my mom died I had a baby and my eleven year old sister
came to live with us.  Other than that, I think 2005 has topped my
most crazy year list.

What did your year look like? And what are your plans for the future?

December 31st, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments

Before I tell you who the winners are, I
have to let you know that I myself doth not yet knoweth who thine
art.  I made my weird kid Coie
do all the pickin' and choosin' on account of me being so lazy and
such. And if you think I'm mean for calling my kid weird, just go read
her last blog entry and you'll be forced to heartily agree with me. And
like I said, she chose the winners so send all hate mail her way if you
are unhappy with her choices.  So now, here I go, I am gonna copy
and paste the email she sent me with the list of winners (drum roll
please….)

The following two bloggers have won a free one year subscription:

LindaI–

momanna98

mominpa

CactusWren

The following three bloggers have won a Learning Calendar—
and I'm including the history tidbits from the Learning Calendars that
is recorded on your birthdays (along with some babbling comentary)….

Dina2025–
January 20- After 444 days in captivity, 52 American hostages were released on
this day in 1981.  The hostage crisis
began when Iranians seized the US
embassy in Teheran, angry that the US
had allowed the ousted shah of Iran
to come to New York
for medical treatment.

homekeeper4him–
January 30^th– On this day in 1948, a Hindu terrorist assassinated
Mohandas Gandhi as he made his way through a crowd to lead a prayer
session.  Known as Mahatma, or “the great
soul,” Gandhi peacefully led India’s
independence movement against Britain.

HappyApple–
February 26- Same as Red Head Ryann- The treaty ending WWI forbade Germany
from any military air force.  In complete
defiance of that order, Adolf Hitler signed a secret decree establishing the
“Luftwaffe,” a German military air fleet.

hippiechyck–
March 29- Mariner 10 became the only man-made spacecraft to visit the planet
Mercury on this day in 1974.  The
temperature on Mercury ranges from 800 degrees F when facing toward the sun to
-279 degrees F when facing away.  How
long does it take Mercury to orbit the sun? 88
Days.

MaryBeth –
May 29- Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit of Mt. Everest
on this day in 1953, becoming the first to conquer the tallest mountain in the
world.  Located  in Nepal,
the 29,035 ft giant is part of the Himalayan
Mountains.

quietcajun–
October 21- On this day in 1520, Ferdinand Magellan sailed from the Atlantic Ocean into what would later become known as the
Straits of Magellan.  It would take him
38 days to pass through 360 miles of icy water before reaching the calm Pacific Ocean. 
Magellan was also the name of Coie’s imaginary friend
when she was 5.

cudltot– December
3- The first human-to-human heart transplant surgery was on this day in 1967 in
Cape Town, South Africa.  The 53-year-old man dying from heart disease
lived for 18 days after receiving the new heart.  Today, about 83 percent of heart transplant
patients live at least 1 year.

Tah Dah! (to be read in a
sing songy voice). It seems that Coie never learned how to count, so
apparently we'll be sending off more things than orignially stated.

If you won something, then you must email me within the next ten
minutes to claim your prize.  Just kidding.  But you do have
to email me so I know where to send your loot:
JenIG@TheHomeschoolMagazine.com

December 29th, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments

Everybody needs a calendar, right?  Every single year I make sure that I have a new Learning Calendar. 
They are *so* extra ordinarily stupendously excellent.  Every
single day has a history fact telling what happened on that day in
history.  SO fun!  We love the Learning Calendar, as a matter
of fact, they are the ones who power our A Day In History (free) enewsletter. 

Want a Learning Calendar of your very ery ery own?  Ok, tell me
your birthday and you're entered to win — three human bloggers will
get one.

Also, are you a subscriber to The Old Schoolhouse Magazine? 
We're just about ready to come out with our Winter issue.  It may
be our best issue ever.  If you are not a subscriber let me
know.  Two bloggers (human or otherwise) will win a free one year
subscription starting with the Winter issue — compliments of the Curly Headed Monster

Enter both contests iffen you please. 

Love Jenefer Igarashi, Who Can't Hardly Button Her Jeans Anymore

December 28th, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments

Don't fundamental Christians who think they are so right
drive you mad?  Shouldn't we all just get along if we claim
Christ?  Don't you think that tolerance and love for one another
should trump doctrine?  Me neither. I wish that all Christians
knew what they believe and why. I wish that those who claimed Christ
would long to study His Word and that they (myself included) studied
enough to explain to others (or their children) why they know it is truth. I wish I was more disciplined in this area.  I really liked this blog entry that I found over at Two-Talent Living.

I suppose this is the kind of entry that can make a person mighty
unpopular.  It makes me think about the end of Christ's ministry
when His words became too unpleasant for people to swallow and they
left in droves.  Were the same ones who witnessed His miracles
part of the same crowd who nodded with approval as He was
punished?  People are so fickle.   Anyhow, I appreciate
those who are willing to speak truth despite the cost; it inspires me
to do the same.

I'm really excited because our very dear
friends came out to visit; they got here tonight.  They have been
missionaries in Mexico — they have given up the comforts and security
of living in America to minister to the lost and dying.  I am so
honored to have them as friends and I am so thankful to see them again
after so many months.  They have a blog here about their ministry, go say hi and encourage them!

December 27th, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments

I've been thinking a lot lately (insert
wise crack here) ever since we got the house and all.  It makes me
nervous on several levels.  I have been so thankful and feeling (note the word *feeling*) eager to praise and worship God for His blessings. 

First of all, feelings are not our friends.  Disney movies and Hollywood have convinced us that 'we should always follow our hearts'. 
This is baloney.  Feelings change with the wind; wants and desires
can change on a dime (which is why affairs and divorce
happen).   Rather we should be following truth, namely Christ, regardless of what our feelings might be.

So the reason why I'm feeling nervous is because while it is quite easy
for me to praise and worship God while I am getting want I want, I
don't know for certain that I would praise and worship Him with the
same devotion if Dippy ended up drowning in the pond.  Or if Ryann
had a heart attack (she's been complaining of chest pains for the last
six months), or if something terrible happened and we were financially
in ruins again and ended up losing the dream home.  Is my faith
conditioned upon my circumstances? 
Dear God, please let me be faithful in both times of blessing and/or
devastation.  Let me know You for who You are.  Let me be an
example of perseverence to my family.  Please keep my heart soft
and teachable.  Thank you for choosing me to be a daughter of
Yours.  Lord, please give me the faith and love for You that I
long for.  You are the giver of all good gifts.  I want the
gifts that I can keep after my flesh dies and blows away.  I want
to be found faithful in the end and worthy to be called a follower of
the Messiah.

December 27th, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments

Thanks to my friend Maria and her very talented daughter Tracy, my daughter Emmiko had an extremely happy Christmas.  She wanted nothing more than a “back then” outfit.

Thank you, Tracy!  She has been wearing it since she opened
it!  I'm so excited that it's reversible, she loves the white side
(too bad you can't see the stitched butterfly from this picture – it is
so gorgeous)

I hope everybody had an awesome Christmas.  Tell me what you
did!  We stayed home and ate curry all day and talked about our
new house.  PLUS I got a set of new beautiful dishes and a
DEHYDRATOR from the curly headed monster so now I can make beef jerky at my new farm.  I also got a Starbucks card from my oldest nephew.  What more could a girl want?

December 26th, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments

I hate long entries (transalation:
anything longer than a paragraph and a half) and that won't be possible
with this entry even if I save the story of all the top secret white
dainty goat intel that my undercover goat agent has obtained over the last few days for my next post. But let's suffice it to say that the goat police
will finally, once and for all, be silenced about her mad ravings about
the goat picture up there to the left of my blog. So since this is
already getting long, for the sake of brevity, please choose from the
following options: 

Push One for the story about how my finance agent did not come back with the rate we expected. 
Push Two for my real live true honest Christmas story six years ago. 
Push Three
to hear about how the “happy good luck we're so glad and praying for
you for the possibility of a new house”  comments from my last
entry totally made me almost cry.

 Push
four to see why Jay From Cleveland earned a full sized chocolate house
from me and to learn why Paul Suarez the distinguished publisher of The
Old Schoolhouse Magazine is going to take legal action against Jay From
Cleveland and perhaps put a contract out on his life.

Did you people really try pushing any numbers on your keyboard?  Because I totally would have tried.

Number 1: The Story of My Finance Attempt 
Ok, so in my last post I dreamed about the possibility of getting the
beautiful House of Igarashi. This would only be possible if we got the
loan terms we needed (which I knew from the get go was unlikely because
of past credit history).  So anyhow, we figured that if we got an
interest rate of no higher than 8% that we could get the place. 
At the very most, we could consider 8.25%, but there is just no way we
could justify moving forward with loan terms any higher than
that.  Despite my nervousness, I still felt semi-confident that
the loan agent would go through all of our stuff and come back at an 8%
interest rate, or if we got really lucky maybe it would come back at
7.5% but it did not.  The bank guy called yesterday and said they could give us a loan at a rate of 6.75%. 
So then I had a heart attack and dropped dead because that is just
plain impossible. I still get shakey when I talk about it.  So we
are now officially in escrow with my dream house and should be able to
move in on Jan 22.

Number 2: The Story of My Christmas Six Years Ago: So
like six years ago life was so hard for my family that I was always
finding myself wishing that God would drop several large elephants on
our house and just end it all.  Our life was pretty close to being
in ruins.  Geo worked about 16 hours a day (self employed) and yet
we were so poor that our electricity and phone was always in danger of
being cut off (sometimes it was cut off).  I was pregnant with
Dippy and on bedrest, and we had just lost our home and were living in
a neighborhood where men would beat up their wives in the middle of the
street.  This place was scare E.  I hated life so bad. 
So Christmastime rolled around and I was bummed about it.  All our
kids were little and I decided not to hang up stockings or get a tree
because there was literally nothing we could give them that year. 
I didn't get too sad at the thought of that only because I knew that
missionaries in Africa or other places around the world couldn't give
their kids presents either… and life just goes on.  So I was
determined not to feel sorry for myself or my kids.  Anyhow, Geoff
was gone a lot and my best friend who never left me or let me down was
my sister Gena (who was also dirt broke).  On the day before
Christmas Eve she had been staying with me since I was on
bedrest.  It was getting late at night and Geo was still gone. Me
and Gena were in the living room and suddenly there was a burst of
horrendous banging at the door.  It nearly sent us into joint
heart failure.  Coie went wide eyed and whispered, “Should I call
911?”  I was so scared.  We just sat there frozen, and then
'they' began pounding on the door again.  So in an effort to get
them to go away, I screamed –in my loudest most ferocious voice– at
the door, “Get away from here” ( I had recently watched a show on
survival that if you act mean and not afraid that many times the
predator will think you are too much to handle and will find another
victim).  Well it worked.  The banging stopped and everything
went silent.  We sat frozen forever, wondering if they had really
left, and then carefully and so quietly, Gena tiptoed to the front door
and peeked out the little eyehole thingy, and she was like, “Oh my gosh
Jenefer, you're not going to believe this”, then she swung open the
door, and there, on our front doorstep was a tree and a pile of
Christmas presents for my children.  The whole point of my story
is two-fold.  God was the God of us when we were at our most
desperate and God is the God of us when we are blessed more than we can
even conceive.  He is worthy of our praise and worship… and
would still have been even if the banging on the door would have been a
gang of house jackers who had come to kill us dead.  Being a
Christian is not about us.  It is about Him.  He is always worthy of our praise and adoration in the good times and in the bad times.  My second point is that He uses people
to show His amazing love and grace.  I want to always be available
to be used by Him to bless others like the way that crazy Christian
family came pounding on my door to bless us six years ago.  I
still don't know who they were, but God does.  God bless them, I'm
tearing up like a big blubbering baby just thinking about their
kindness.

Number Three: Nice Comments
I was so blessed by knowing that people were praying for us with the
whole house thing.  That sort of thing really means a lot to
me. 

Number Four: Jay From Cleveland, you are such a
genius. Thanks for posting the best Christmas present ever (here it is
for the world to see):

Posted by jayfromcleveland

(Forgive me LORD for I know not what I do…)

He's bad, he's mean, he's a space cowboy with a laser beam! He's…

HOMESCHOOL HOMEBOY!

HAPPY CHRISTMAS TO YOU!

December 24th, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments

Ok, so this is a little odd.  Monday I decided to move to Hohenwald, and then Tuesday Gena
decided she didn't want to come with me, so Wednesday I started looking
thru the properties around this area again (even though I've gone
through them a billion trillion times and they *don't* have what we
need).  So anywaysies, I twere going thru the listings, and all of
a sudden this house pops up.  Now, believe me, this house had not
been there before because I've been a lookin' and a lookin' and you
can't get nothing like this round these here parts (and when I say *I*
what I actually mean is *we* as in me and Geo the Great).  This
house is on 15 acres, has a pond and two streams, an orchard, wild
turkey and deer roaming the hills around it, a large garden plot and a
well…. all in the price range we were looking for.  So we put an
offer in and the owners said, “okey dokies”. 

Is that weird or what?  wanna see a picture of it?  ok, here you go:

See that little boat behind the dock? Can you believe that?  Is
that the best place in the whole big world or WHAT?  So, if we can
get the loan we need at the rate we need (which is actually quite
unlikely) then *that* my friends, is the new House of Igarashi.

December 22nd, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments

Ok, so the curly headed monster
goes from saying, “Sure we'll move out to Hohenwald with you” to
“Forget it, I changed my mind I think God stuck us in the Smoky
Mountains for a reason”.  All my dreams for a weird little
homeschool commune and roaming the hills with wild goats and elephants
seem to be evaporating like a spilled Mountain Dew on a hot blacktop
interstate hwy.

So anyways, my daughter Coie,
she is such a little brat, she turned our kitchen into a full blown
candy making factory.  Coie Wonka.  But that's not why she's
a brat.  I told her I would help make the candy, and in the
process, I made up my very ery ery own special superb delectible
candy.  The reason why she is a brat, is because she turned her
snobbish nose up at my candy and said 'it didn't count as homemade
because it was too easy to make” whatever.  I think dipping carmel pieces in the melted chocolate she made completely qualifies as 'real homemade candy'. 

In protest of her wicked behaviour I ate half a bag of white chocolate chips for lunch.

I don't feel so good.

December 21st, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments

Me and Geo drove out to Hohenwald, which is
about a five hour long drive from here, and we LOVED it.  We think
Hohenwald will be our new home. Naturally I let Gena know to start packing, and she is dutifully obeying like a good little curly headed monster. My friend Boltbabe is also trying to move to the area… which is another funny story.  We live in a small world.  There are HomeschoolBloggers EVERYWHERE. Go read Boltbabe's last post, it is weird times two.

So who wants to move to Hohenwald with me and Gena and Boltbabe and
live on a farm in the hills by a stream and start a weird little
homeschool commune?  I'll raise the goats, gena can do all the
canning and make all the goat butter and goat candles and goat
cheesecake. Come on, it'll be fun!  Sign up below and be sure to
bring your own livestock, because I aint sharing BettyGoatToesies when
I buy her.

December 20th, 2005 - Posted in Uncategorized | | 0 Comments