homeschool

Third Annual Kids’ Day

/ amylynw / 1 Comment

It was a beautiful sight when the kids got home from being at Grandma’s after Matthew was released from the hospital.  It was impossible to fully capture the joy, hugs and squeals.August 20136
Two days later, we declared it to be our third annual kids day!  This is something we started three years ago, and each August we celebrate our fabulous kids with surprises and fun!  Jack and Matthew went to the store early in the morning and bought little gifts for everyone.  Next, we had waffles and ice-cream for breakfast before setting off on a bowling expedition.  The kids had never been bowling before.  It was a nice excuse to use the bumpers for us older folks who haven’t bowled since my belly looked like a bowling ball ten years ago!
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The second place we went was the dollar movie theatre, which turned out to be a great memory as well!  We ended our day with a pop-in at some friends’ and then a visit at Grandma’s to see my brother and his family.  Kids’ day was a success, and we are so thankful for our amazing children who bring us so much joy.  They challenge and inspire us and constantly keep us seeking God.

Yesterday, Elsie was wearing ALL yellow, and Betty was wearing much pink.  Elsie looked at Betty and commented: She’s so cute!  She’s so pink!  I’m so yellow!
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When I went to pick up Jack from a friend’s house, it was just about dark as we got ready to drive away.  He remembered he left his jackknife in the grass.  He ran up the driveway and started to kick the ground around a large area of grass.  Five seconds later, he ran back to the car, knife in hand.  I looked at him in awe.  This is the kid who claims he is not a good “looker” and can’t seem to find something in a well-lit room, let alone a huge lawn in the dark.  I asked him how he found it so quickly.  His reply?  My feet know where everything is.  Of course!  Next time I will ask his feet to do the finding.

On our drive home we got talking about heaven.  He thought for a bit and then said, When everyone on earth is in heaven, this world is going to be left in sadness.  Wow.

Elsie, in mother-like fashion was trying to help out an older sibling who was having a bit of rivalry with another sibling.  Her advice astounded me and reminded me that I guess they really are listening! This is what she said:
Well, maybe you should work it out.  Nope, that wasn’t an option.
Well, maybe you should apologize.  Not trying that either.
Well, maybe you should just walk away. Good girl!

I do love overhearing different conversations in the car between the back-seat dwellers.  Jack and Elijah were discussing broken bones.  He asked Elijah: Have I broken anything? 
No, Elijah said.
How do you know?
I’ve been here all your life.  Enough said.

Today they were having a “gentleman tea party”, complete with lego “newspapers”.  Elijah thinks the raw sugar we use is “camping sugar” and Jack commented about the whole experience: We’re like men.  I LOVE that my boys think drinking tea is manly.  One conversation during this gentlemanly time went like this:
Elijah:  Jack, I was thinking.  If the age of driving was about the age of seven, there would be a lot of dead people in the world…  No offense.

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Nadine was able to start horseback riding lessons again this week.  There is a very real hole in her heart that gets filled when she’s around horses.  She even jokes that her name is perfect: They call me neighhhhh-deen because I love horses!
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Betty is a little walky-talky, except for when she’s sitting in her special little chair… which she brings everywhere.  Yesterday while we were driving, she saw some geese.  She matter-of-factly said, I love birds.  Elsie loves birds.  Mommy loves birds.  When Jack got home from his friend’s house, she ran up to him, gave him a huge hug and exclaimed: I LOVE you, Jack!  She knows how much I love to hear her say, Yes ma’am, so she says it a lot.  It sounds a lot like, Yes, man.

Tomorrow, we officially start school.  Our school room is ready to go, and teacher is a bit trembling in her gut, but excited.  I’m excited to see if our new approach will work smoother than last year, and I’m pumped to share how we do things, after we have settled in a bit.  Speaking of, I need to get back to planning!

Everyone Needs Paperclips

/ amylynw / Leave a comment

Being a week behind in life, what was to be our official starting week of school has been pushed to next week.  It was great being able to go to Ikea and finish off the last-minute things needed to complete our new and improved school room for this year!  (More on that another day…)

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Last night I ran into staples to bind my custom-created yearly planner.  I printed all the calendar and lesson pages (to be filled in as the year goes on) and had them bind it.  It was perfect… until it was backwards.  Thankfully she was able to trim the hole punches off the right hand side and re-bind it on the left.  It was then that I was struck with the need to buy paper-clips.  In the paperclip aisle I stared at the one row: completely sold out.  Twenty-five cents for a hundred paper clips.  What a steal!  There was no way I was going to spend one or two dollars now.  Unfortunately, every other person in Chester County must have needed paperclips this week, too.  I am still a bit irritated.  We literally have no paper clips, and the people who bought them probably only bought them because they were a quarter.

Being in need of something brings out the best and worst in us.  We can either think nasty thoughts of everyone else around us who has what we wish we had.  Or, we can experience God’s strength to power through the intense hunger or need or want we may have.

I have a friend who is going through some intense need.  Four kids, no car, mold in their house so they can’t even be there… completely relying on others to be the hands and feet of Christ.  Completely dependent on what others have to get them where they need to go and give them a roof over their heads.  I know the desire is there to give up and wish those hard things away.  In our recent stay in the hospital we were also completely at the end of our own strength and ability to do life as we normally know it.  The same friend stayed up all night that first night and prayed with me through texts, as she held my hand from afar and kept me from feeling alone.  That is why I know her faith is stronger than circumstances.  Our faith has to be more than skin deep.  When we feel the initial pain of disappointment, annoyance, or unknown, how do we react?  Do we wish it all away, or do we look up and wait in expectation for how God will work out the puzzle in which we find ourselves?

When the Israelites were brought out of Egypt, God received glory.   … He saved them for His name’s sake, that He might make His mighty power known.  He rebuked the Red Sea also, and it dried up; so He led them through the depths, as through the wilderness.  He saved them from the hand of him who hated them, and redeemed them from the hand of the enemy.  The waters covered their enemies; there was not one of them left.  Then they believed His words; they sang His praise.  In three verses, a miracle of unimaginable magnitude occurred.  The sea dried up and their problems were literally washed away.  I felt a lot like this the past few weeks.  Things that seemed impossible have happened.  God’s presence was tangibly felt through each sleepless night and raspy breath.  He literally rescued us from death.  Yet the next verses in Psalm 106 are a stark warning.  

They soon forgot His works;
They did not wait for His counsel,
But lusted exceedingly in the wilderness,
And tested God in the desert.
And He gave them their request,
But sent leanness into their soul.

When we forget what God has done for us, we start walking in our own strength and become very discontent.  Over and over, the Bible tells us to remember, remember, remember.  Set up a rock and call it Ebenezer: this far the Lord has helped us.  Write it on your forehead.  Mark it on your calendar and celebrate!  Break the bread and drink the wine.  Don’t forget.  Never ever forget.  Because when we forget, we start to want what is around us.  We wish away the desert and everything hard.  We don’t realize it, but by our forgetfulness and discontent we are never going to experience the way God wants to reveal Himself to us.  When we ask for plenty, we may be given our request, but sometimes it comes at a pretty high price.

I’ve thought long and hard about the past few weeks.  Would I trade the weeks in the wilderness for something a bit easier?  Maybe no sickness, no money problems, no pain?  It is tempting.  Yet the moment I turn my eyes towards what is easy, I sense my focus shifting towards my own strength and not the Lord’s.  My soul becomes hungry and wastes away when it is not relying solely on the Lord for every meal, every need, literally every breath.  I don’t want to forget.  I fear forgetting.  That is one reason I must write:  I must declare out-loud what great things the Lord has done for us!

So whether it is food, mounting bills, a vehicle or paperclips… if we have need, He will provide.  May our souls never become sick because we rush ahead of what God is about to do.  It is incredible both to experience God’s provision and also to be the hands and feet of Christ in practical ways.

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.  For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ.  If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer.  And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort… We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself.  Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead.  He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us,  as you help us by your prayers.  Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favor granted us in answer to the prayers of many.  (2 Corinthians 1:3-11)

A Three-Minute Tour

/ amylynw / 6 Comments

There has been all sorts of rearranging going on over here.  In all of his “spare time” Matthew basically has gone waaaay out of his way to get two extremely helpful pieces of furniture for our growing family!  The first was a bunk bed for the little girls.  Their room was like a pig pen.  Crooked crib, mattresses on the floor.  Nowhere to put things.  An awful mess.  Bunk beds have been a huge space-saver and it is slowly evolving into a cute girls’ room.  Still not finished, but much more functional.

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I don’t have any “before” pictures here, but our living room underwent another change.  Now please don’t think that taking a photo tour through our home replaces a real visit.  I still much prefer real life.  Then you can see how very non-perfect it is and don’t come under any false impressions.  So please, stop by!

As you walk in our front door you see the “listening station”.  A new addition to our school year, there is a basket of tapes (yes, tapes!), CD’s and earphones with the stereo.  Hours have already been spent here listening to books on tape, Adventures in Odyssey, and music.   I want to make piles of pillows for this spot to make it more inviting and cozy, and the shelf on the floor still needs to be hung.  We gave away our piano, and this is also where I would like our replacement to go when that should happen.  In keeping with “listening”, it will be electric with earphones capabilities so practice can happen at anytime during school or naps without bother to anyone else.

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As you look to the left, this is our living room.  I would love a more neutral couch to blend everything together and not clash so much.  I’m reading about re-upholstering.  (Matthew, don’t read that line.)

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Not so clashy in black and white.

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Moving on to our latest find:  red lockers to feed the soul.  (Thanks, Sarai!  You understand!)  I’m so excited to move some not-so-pretty, but needed school supplies into this beauty.  The doors lock so I can have a prize locker, or keep things locked away which need permission to be used.

 

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The kids keep telling me they’re excited for school to start, which thrills my heart.  It helps that their books are all lined up on the school shelves but they’re not allowed to touch them.  I have a few days of planning ahead of me, but I’m starting to feel like my head is screwed on straight again now that things are more in order.