Another Year Of School...All Done!

With both the older boys done their final exams and Danika being finished the end of this week, things are becoming a bit more relaxed around here. The temptation is to dump everything and just sleep in, do nothing, and "chill" for the entire day. But life in a large family doesn't allow for a vacation from LIFE! Even without school, we still have a lot to keep up with or we'll soon see the fruit of our laziness...after all, even though some of us are technically on summer vacation, we still need to be productive members of the family! Cooking, cleaning, various chores that need to be done, helping out the little one's, watching for proper attitudes, being ready to serve others when needed. Sleeping in til noon is not an option (and frankly not good for anyone's body anyway)and neither is spending all day, everyday at a friend's house, etc. We will just enjoy the simple rhythm of a gentler schedule...one united family in Christ focusing on spending time together.

Advent

It's December!  We've been dumped on with a LOT of snow and it's "Starting-to-feel-alot-like-Christmas!"

We typically change things around a bit for school in December to focus more on Advent activities and ministry stuff.  This year we've linked our Advent devotions to our school day so we can really dig in and soak up the good things that God has revealed to humanity since the beginning of time.....the coming of a Savior!

The basic meaning of Advent:  The foretelling of the coming of Jesus Christ through over 300 distinct predictions more than five centuries in advance!!    These prophesies are unique to all history.

"The ancient world had many different devices for determining the future, known as divination, but not in the entire gamut of Greek and Latin literature can we find any real specific prophecy of a |Savior to arise in the human race.....Mohammedism cannot point to any prophecies of the coming of Mohammed uttered hundreds of years before his birth.  Neither can the founders of any cult in this country rightly identify any ancient text specifically foretelling their appearance."  Wilbur Smith

As we go through each day studying the prophesies (our devotional book only covers 18) we will be creating a giant Advent calendar on our wall.  (Replacing the giant Fruit of the Spirit tree we had before...we needed something less summery and more Christmasy)  By the end of the month our entire wall will be covered! Here's a sneak peak of what we're creating:

(Update: Here's where we stopped since I felt like barfing my guts out all day, lol, we studied up to 16)

A Little Creativity Never Hurts

Our little one's needed a little help understanding "Christ in you" and so we built a little (okay, huge) visual for them.  We printed off a bunch of fruit shaped stickers that have each fruit of the Spirit printed on them.  Then we sat back and tried to watch for when they were behaving in a way that expressed that particular fruit, and then gave them the matching sticker so they could place it on the tree.  They are loving it! Eventually we'll have to take the tree down, but for now it's working well.
Maybe we'll transfer it to their bedroom when it's full, so they can look at it...or maybe downstairs in the playroom??

Our Fruit of the Spirit Tree

Galatians 5:22-24

Amplified Bible 

But the fruit of the [Holy] Spirit [the work which His presence within accomplishes] is love, joy (gladness), peace, patience (an even temper, forbearance), kindness, goodness (benevolence), faithfulness,
    Gentleness (meekness, humility), self-control (self-restraint, continence). Against such things there is no law [that can bring a charge].

Ahhh.....Spring Nature Journaling

With Spring FINALLY here, we are breaking out the Nature Journals again.  We all love it when we can get outside to draw and learn about God's creation.  There is something so peaceful and joyful about watching our little one's playing by the water while our older one's are sitting contently drawing.  For one moment in time everything in the world feels right.

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A perfect rock to sit and draw!





Not sure how to start a Nature Journal?  Here's what we do:

1) Choose an area that has some natural living scenary (anwhere will do).

2) Draw a picture of what you see (with as many details as possible, big and small)

3) At the bottom of your picture page, write the time & date, the weather conditions & temperature.

3)Now choose and circle ONE specimen inside your picture

4) On the back of your picture list the following: The Common Name of your specimen.

                                                                         The Latin Name of your specimen.

                                                                         Any Scripture References of your specimen.

                                                                         Five fascinating facts about your specimen

                                                                         Close up drawing of your specimen.

5) Now paint with water colors your entire picture. (we don't always do this, but it's fun)

                                                                        

Great Books for Boys

A new month, a new Novel Study for school...(Dun, dun, dun...the dreaded novel study).
If you want to see them run fast, show them the great book you`ve chosen for them to read!  Our boys don't tend to make wise choices on their own, so I've taken on a bold adventure of "assigning" good literature for the rest of the year. While I was pondering what would be considered "good books" I was reminded of Philippians 4:8.  God actually tells us what is good to set our minds upon.  Things that are true, noble, just, pure, lovely, virtuous, praiseworthy and of good report.  So, with that in mind, I set out to compile a list of "God honoring" (and hopefully boy friendly/adventure-filled) for our boys to read through.  Here's what I came up with so far (all unabridged):

Knights of Arrethtrae Series
Kingdom Series
Adventures of Robin Hood
Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
Lord of the Rings Series
Chronicles of Narnia Series
3 Musketeers
Ballentyne Series (set of 20)
Oliver Twist
Anything by G.A. Henty! (set of 50)
The Hiding Place
God's Smuggler
Pilgrim's Progress
Around the World in 80 Days
Crown and Covenant Collection

Don't worry, I don't expect them to read ALL of them by June, haha,  but I'll help them put their best foot forward.  A few of these I could only find on visionforum.com but most of them can be found at christianbook.com or even Chapters.

Reciting Foundations

 We've decided that starting this January 2011 we are committing to recite what I am calling foundation Scriptures. When I first met Jesus there were some key questions that I had about God, Jesus, the Bible,etc.  I wrote them down and searched every way I could to find the answers.  I prayed, I read, I watched, I googled!   When I found the answer, I wrote it down underneath my question inside a little notebook.  I still have that notebook of "first questions" and I'm finding that the more and more I share Jesus with people, the more I realize that the rest of the world is asking the very same questions:

Is Jesus the only way?
Is Jesus really God?
How do we know that this Christian Bible is the real Bible/truth?
What about all the really good people, won't they still go to heaven?
What is sin anyway?
How does God judge sin?
Is my salvation secure?
What does God say about occult and new age stuff?
Why doesn't everyone see the truth?
What's the trinity, is there an easy explanation?

Our system is not rigorous or fancy.  It is simply to recite a couple Scriptures together out loud 3 times per day until we've got it reasonably solid.  I want the main goal to be that we are in God's Word, and to realize that there truly are answers to these questions.  It's not a race to see how many we can do, or even memorize them....if we thought we had to put to memory every answer to every question a person asked about Jesus, we'd hide under our blankets and never leave home! 

 Personally, I've never been that great at rote memory. Actually, I've memorized very few scriptures in my own effort.  But by God's grace, Holy Spirit has never let me down once. He brings to my remembrance, just when needed, words of truth and simple Bible verses that lead someone's heart toward Jesus.  I've always thought that if I just remain constantly in His word, Holy Spirit would do His part and bring them out at the right time. At least that`s been my experience so far. 

**If you would like answers to any of the above questions please click here.

Homeschooling and IDOP

This coming Sunday is the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (IDOP). Over the past few years we've been so grateful and blessed to use the resources offered through Voice of the Martyrs (VOM).

This year we are taking the entire week prior to IDOP to focus everything we can on God`s persecuted church. For school that means we are modifying our schedule a bit. We`ll stick to our morning OT Bible reading but then discuss it within the context of persecution....not too hard since we`re in Exodus right now.

Today`s writing assignment is writing letters. Justin wrote a personal letter to one of the Pastor`s listed in the persecution alert from VOM and Noah wrote a business letter to the Chinese government on behalf of the same Pastor. The rest of the week we`ll be doing written prayers, an essay on why God allows persecution, and an oral presentation on a Christian martyr.

Novel Reading this week will be in VOM`s `Extreme Devotion.` Which is not actually a novel, but a compilation of devotional stories about real persecuted Christians around the world. This has really helped put things into perspective for us. I`ve had the boys pray the Scripture out loud that is listed at the side of each devotion. I hope it will help them to not only be able to pray the Scriptures (which can be powerful), but also to place God`s Word in their hearts regarding those who are suffering for sake of His Kingdom.

Lastly, we`re using the Scripture that the IDOP website has listed for their theme this year, taken from Psalm 10:7. We typically use a new Scripture passage each week to use for memory, penmanship, spelling and grammar, so this was easy to plug in.

Well, that`s what we have planned out (oh, and of course daily Math assignments.) I`m praying that through this the Lord will bless our efforts to lead our children closer to His heart. We desire mostly that they would love how He loves and learn to walk in His truth.

``Remember the prisoners as if chained with them--those who are mistreated--since you yourselves are in the body also.`` Heb. 13:3

Teaching Our Children at Home

The very best advice I have ever heard or read about teaching our children at home was from another lady on another blog at a time when I was feeling very overwhelmed with teaching.

"If you're not teaching your children to love God, then nothing else matters. If you are teaching them to love God...then nothing else matters."

That covers it in a nutshell doesn't it? We spend so much time and energy wondering if we're covering enough material, if we're adding enough of one subject or another, if they are really learning what we're teaching. But ultimately none of that matters if they first do not learn to LOVE the Lord their God.

This goes way beyond curriculum goals. It means we have to be expressing the love of Jesus Christ in every conversation and in every reaction to every situation. From the tone of our voice, to the looks on our faces, in absolutely everything we do throughout the entire day. God actually puts it like this:

"These commandments I give to you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates." Duet. 6:6-9


Do we fall short? Yes, always! And I thank Jesus that we do, since He is made perfect in our weaknesses...He so faithful to lead us along each day delivering us bit by bit out of our insecurities and into His perfect grace. I am learning slowly to rest in God's promises for our children and not to stress out so much about the little things.  We try our very best each day to live out an example of Christ, and then leave the results of that up to God.  Some days it seems as if we're not achieving anything, those are the days that we want to quit and give up. We whine to God about how hard it is, and how long we've been trying, etc.  But then our Lord is so faithful to gently remind us that these children are first His and that He will not leave them or forsake them.  He has a special plan for each and every one of them and we can safely rest in that promise. Academics are such a small portion of the design God has for their lives. We can fully rest in God's promises.  :0)