Homeschool and Mother's Journal, 9/15

In my life this week:

This week entailed a field trip, our regular Wednesday night AWANA, the beginning of the fall clothing switch, and on Friday night a homeschooling social at a dear family's house for game night.

I also worked to finalize our fall homeschool daily schedule. School officially starts on Monday, but on Friday morning we tested our morning schedule to see what changes would be required. 

The DVD player broke in our older, master-bedroom computer, meaning we now have to do the Teaching Textbooks math CD ROM on the playroom computer, which is off the kitchen and can also be heard in the dining room. One part of our morning called for Teaching Textbooks math going on during the same time as the song CD for the girls' Sing, Spell, Read & Write program. That got a little interesting and needs to be tweaked, but otherwise the schedule worked fine.

On Monday we'll test out the morning changes and see how the afternoon works, but we're finishing early so I can get the clothing switch finished before my four-year-old daughter tries on all the clothes and makes me crazy wondering where my tidy pile of give-away clothes just went.

Did I tell you our air conditioner went out and Monday through Thursday were blazing hot, with the house reaching 82 degrees and us owning only one small fan plus a couple air cleaners that hardly qualify as fans?

Not fun, so when we woke up on Saturday morning to a 67-degree house, Momma was doing the happy dance and I even made cornbread to go with our chili and chocolate chip cookie bars for the preschooler church snack tomorrow morning.

I love me some fall weather and I will earnestly pray summer doesn't reappear (much to my husband's dismay). He's a summer creature you know and I don't know how we ended up together, feeling so strongly about our seasons and all. It's a war around here sometimes, with husband praying for summer and me praying for fall.

Our bi-weekly Jesus Storybook Bible children's ministry occurred on the first cold day of the year, so I had to frantically go through storage boxes to find suitable clothes for the children, while trying not to create a laundry and clutter nightmare on the same day as our Bible Study. It's always slightly frantic getting the house tidy and clean before 4 PM on Saturdays, especially since Daddy works on Saturdays until 1:00 PM and can't run much interference with the kids.

I delegated well today, though, with the boys doing all the vacuuming and the girls dusting and tidying up the playroom, getting it ready for a vacuuming. The 4 year old is a lousy housekeeper and needs to be frequently reminded of her "duties". Why is it that 2 year olds are thrilled to help but when age 4 arrives, cleaning becomes the bane of their existence, unless it involves the duster or the windex bottle?

Anyone out there nodding their heads? At least at the four year old trying on clothes incessantly and leaving a trail everywhere of shoes, play handbags, and dresses and shirts?

I would get mad, except she's so darn cute when she tries on clothes and dances around me. "Do I look enchantingly beautiful, Mommy?"

To which the 6-year-old, frog-toting tomboy sister replies, "Beth! There's more to life than just clothes!"

In Our Homeschool this week:

See notes above. I guess I'm poor at sticking to categories.

The only other homeschool note is that taking a break from school should maybe not include taking a break from math. Fractions and percents are hard and the procedures get fuzzy in the brain during periods of un-use. There was much groaning on the first math day back. Too many fractions and percents for their liking.

Helpful Homeschooling Tips to Share:

Try to do the fall and spring clothing switches on a school break. Pretty obvious and what's wrong with me, anyway?

Places We're Going and People We're Seeing:

The Friday night game night was a fantastic stress reliever. We all had a wonderful time and one of the families in attendance also has a child with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis. That's amazing because the frequency of this disease is 1 in a 1000! The mother and I couldn't stop saying how amazing it was that we ended up at the same homeschool party. God is simply amazing.

She's a dear woman and I will see her once a month at this Homeschooler Game Night. Next month she's bringing her recipe for crockpot lasagna. She promises us you don't have to precook the noodles. Sound fascinating?

She also has an autistic daughter of 15 who functions like a 9 year old, and she has a son with ADHD. Autism is one of several things that can pair with ADHD either in the same child, or in a sibling of an ADHD child.

I will be praying for this woman, and she for me. Her sweet son with the arthritis patted my Beth on the head before they left, and told her he would pray for her joints and her joy. That about sent me into tearful convulsions.

He's ten and was diagnosed at 18 months old. He has it in fingers and other smaller joints (a different type than my Beth has).

Our field trip was to a working farm to learn how to make our own bar soap and other household supplies. The woman who taught it lives and dresses like a woman from 150 years ago, and she has the lofty goal of teaching sustainable-living classes to as many adults and homeschoolers as she can, so that these valuable skills will not disappear from our culture.

We took home many recipes to try.

Lye, used to make soap, is a poison, though, so I won't be trying my own soaps until my youngest is a bit older.

They are working on building up their farm to include original buildings with working equipment you would have seen in a town 150 years ago. A real working village.  It was a fascinating place with many buildings already in place!

My Favorite Thing This Week:

We went to a large rummage sale at the church my husband works at, and my Beth, upon leaving, gave all the volunteer senior citizens a hug. They were thrilled and I felt so blessed to be her mother.

She made out like a bandit, finding a beautiful porcelain doll for $2 and other little trinkets for cheap.

My other favorite thing was getting some neighborhood evangelism done, and praying about the outcome. May it be a glorious one, Father!

My Children's Favorite Thing This Week:

The game night and the church rummage sale. The boys found the Battleship Game in perfect shape at the rummage sale and brought it to game night.

The family that hosted game night had a beautiful bunny they let run around the house like a cat or dog. It goes to a cage to do its business though (it potty-trained itself!). My Mary was thrilled with it and didn't even make time to play a board game. Bunnies are very timid though and this one, at two months old, wasn't tamed yet and mostly hid from all the kids under the couch.

I'm Grateful For:

~ The Lord and his faithfulness and provision

~ Four precious kids who keep me young and happy

~ My husband's gentleness with me

~ Good Christian friends

~ Fall temperatures

~ Online friends and e-mail friends from afar

~ Children's books

~ The teaching of reading

~ A wonderful letter from our Compassion child Nelson from El Salvador

~ Expecting a letter from India soon, from our precious Divya, and from Raphael in Burkina Faso (all the Compassion letters seem to come in chunks).

Verse or Quote to Share:

Giving thanks for this wonderful verse:

Psalm 86:15 But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

Thank you for reading and how was your week?




 

How To Love Like Jesus

11-year-old Lexie came over today, our neighborhood friend. She frequently wants to come in and play on the piano and see what my children are up to, but I'm ashamed to confess, I don't always let her in.

Those of you with no ADHD experience won't understand this, but letting her in is like enduring fingernails down a chalkboard for a half-hour, non-stop. 

I love this young lady, but she has severe ADHD with oppositional defiance. She's unable to play a board game or do any activity for more than five to ten minutes. She flits around like a butterfly, or like the mouse in If You Give a Mouse a Cookie. I'm always reminded of those books when she visits.

Extremely passionate and insistent about something, only to forget it moments later.

And she absolutely must be the center of attention at all times, which is especially annoying on van rides.

God has this knack for taking her out of the neighborhood at just the right time--when I don't think I can endure one. more. visit.

Boom. She's gone.

Moved out of her grandparents' house, sometimes for months, sometimes for a few weeks.

Just recently she's come back to the neighborhood and can I be honest? My eyes roll when I hear the knock at the door. Must I, God? Must I let her in? 

And I grieve my own ugly heart for asking this.

Sometimes he lets me say no because my own children's needs are overwhelming me, and sometimes he makes me let her in.

Today she told me, again, that she wants me to homeschool her. She tells me the kids at school are mean, they tease her, they never include her. No one ever invites her over and it's no wonder. Few will tolerate her bossiness and chronic fibbing and her desire to be the center of attention, not to mention the exhausting lack of focus.

I want to make it all better. I want to homeschool her, but I can't. I can't do love that way, day after day, sacrificially. I think homeschooling is the answer for her, but it has to be her own mother investing in her that way. She doesn't really want me to homeschool her. She wants her own mother to be capable of rescuing her from the callousness of public school. I sense the truth from her young heart and it makes mine break. She wants a mother who isn't paralyzed by her own issues...one who can and will fight righteously for her daughter.

Today as she played the piano and went from one activity to another, trying to monopolize my home, I felt the strongest pity I've ever felt for anyone.

I wondered of God: How will she ever find a decent husband? How will she overcome her reading and math difficulties and find a job? Will she ever have close friends? Will her family ever emerge from serious dysfunction? Will she turn to drugs for comfort, as the despair and loneliness get worse? Will callous men take advantage of her and then drop her?

She's sweet at times--a sweetness born of suffering, I suspect--with an even sweeter face, but how far will that get her, in the face of her many, serious challenges?

The enormity of her situation overwhelms me. How many people are this annoying, without being capable of change? Her impulse control is three years old, not eleven years old. It seems so terribly unfair, it's hard to fathom. Personalities are so varied, but in most cases, they are tolerable to most people. This allows some acceptance in our lives, which is so important.

God, how I want this child to be an instrument of your glory! I want you to take all the strikes against her--the neurological ones, the family ones, the social ones--and make something poignant and beautiful and whole of her life.

Because when I think of the negative strikes, it seems so hopeless and dark. I can't even stand contemplating it emotionally, it's so depressing.

Pity is never as good as compassion and shame on me for feeling it. Compassion is never as good as love and shame on me for stopping there.

Pity comes from a self-righteous place. God transformed my pity to compassion and my compassion to temporary love, as I listened to her conversation and tried to let love flow from my heart to hers, divinely, despite watching the clock frequently, wanting her to just go. Love her through me, God. I'm no good and I'm too selfish, but use me anyway to love her. Let her have a taste of the love you're capable of. May she yearn for more, for a Lover of her soul who will never leave her nor forsake her.

I hope she keeps knocking. I want my heart to get better at welcoming. I need to get better at this.

All of us need a Lexie in our lives to remind us: while we were sinners, Christ died for us. He accepted us and loved us radically. He concentrated on what we would be in Him.

We're no better than the worst personality we can think of. We're no more tolerable, no more lovable, no more worthy.

When we have a Lexie in our lives, we have a picture of the gospel. The gospel took hopelessness and brokenness and despair, dunked it in the water and brought it back up...baptized into His holiness. What was black and vile becomes white and glorious, like a glistening fresh snow.

We are all Lexie and we best not forget it. And we better learn how to love, as we are loved.

We can't create love from pity, or even from compassion. Only from a position of humility can we truly love. Only by choosing to view our fellow man charitably, in a baptized, pure-as-snow light, can we love him as Christ would.

The Lord's love eclipses brokenness. May ours do the same.

Prayer Time:

Dear Heavenly Father,

You are glorious and perfect. You graciously love us even though we fail you daily. Thank you. Thank you for the Cross, for the washing of our wretched souls. Thank you for the fresh start everyday. Give us a fresh start as lovers, too. May we love from a position of humility, not of pity or compassion. May our love heal, uplift, eclipse, and make new.

In Jesus' name I pray, Amen.

Note: I haven't given her mother a book yet, but I did find this online , which I gave her tonight, written by Lee Strobel. If you're ever asked the question: "Why does God allow suffering?", you might want to print out this article.

Wanted: Just the Right Book

Updated to Add: Thank you for the book suggestions! I'm writing them down and checking them out. In the meantime I took this wonderful article over to my neighbor.


One of the neighborhood children we minister to went to AWANA with us last night. She hasn't had any spiritual input that I know of since the last time she was at AWANA, as she moved out of this neighborhood for a time. Our young friend's spiritual ideas are a bit confused, mixing a little with what she's heard about meditation and possibly about eastern religions. I think she's made a commitment to God, but I can't be sure due to the other ideas that seem to have cropped up in the last five months.

At any rate, she's very spiritually interested.

This afternoon she told me she is trying to get her mom to believe in God. Five years ago her mother lost a child to drowning, then she left her husband, and things have gone down hill from there, according to our eleven-year-old friend. There's been a lot of grief and even more trouble, with the law and with unfortunate liasons.

Her mother asked, "If  God is real and he knows the future, why doesn't he tell us when something bad is going to happen?" This is a variation of the common question "Why does God allow bad things to happen?

That this woman is asking this is a wonderful sign! This is how the relationships we develop can bring fruit. If we wait and just concentrate on a non-judgemental, caring relationship--in this case it was with her daughter--the Spirit will work and when the time is right, previously uninterested or spiritually-hostile people will become seekers of the Truth, and we, God's people, are already in place to help answer their questions. It's beautiful how God sets it all up.

I desperately want to get this right, but all we have here are theological books that wouldn't be appropriate in answering this mother's question, and I don't communicate very well verbally, so much as through writing. And this mother is shyer than I am. What I really think would help is a short book that answers this question concisely and effectively--a spiritually sound book but without a lot of complicated theology.

Do you have any book suggestions? We are starting school Monday and I'm trying to finalize our schedule. At this time it would be difficult to spend five hours trying to search online for the right book, although I will if I have to.

I thought I'd ask you first? Thank you!

8 Assets to Remember on the Hard Days

What do you find most taxing as a mother? The repetitive nature of household chores, or the tendency to worry over your children? Or maybe over your own perceived failures as a mother? Or does it all run together, sapping your joy?

For me, definitely, the hardest emotional fogs to emerge from are those spent worrying over my children.

As a non-Christian, my middle name? Worry. I'm blessed to say the Lord cured me of general worry. I now live most days by faith with joy ruling, unless the floor I just mopped gets muddied or my estrogen rollercoasters.

Sometimes these both happen on the same day.

Despite the divinely-inspired progress, at times I'm plagued by serious worry over my children.

Will Mary's stubbornness turn people off and how do I make her personality sweeter than it is? Will just the right man come along and find the sweetness buried under the strong-willed exterior?

I worry that Peter's ADHD symptoms will make him so self-focused that his wife and children will wonder where they stand. How do I make him more other-focused?

I wonder if Beth will indeed grow out of this arthritis, or will it be a life-long sentence of drugs and pain? How will it affect her childbearing and mothering? And her joy?

Paul, my nine year old, has given me plenty to worry about in the last couple years. A child who once amazed people with his smarts now has significant difficulty focusing on academic and personal tasks. It's come slowly but I'm more convinced than ever he has his brother's generalized anxiety disorder, which runs in my family strongly, as well as ADHD with mainly the attention span affected, and possibly early bipolar, which often pairs with ADHD. He has a cousin on both sides of the family with bipolar.

A child who people once said "has a lot going for him", now seems disordered. He's still fiercely sweet and plenty smart, but for instance last night he had insomnia until 2:30 AM. What nine year old lays in bed for five hours, tortured by insomnia?

He does have a history of insomnia but never more than a couple hours at worst; last night was severe. He woke me three times and each time I felt more despair over my boy and his future.

Was it the Benedryl he had to take for two days after a bee sting, and then abruptly stopped taking? He has a yellow-jacket venom allergy but last week he got stung by a different bee and had a large local reaction, as opposed to an allergic reaction. The Benedryl helps reduce any unusual reaction.

He seems fine today and slept till 10:00 AM, which I probably shouldn't have allowed. Insomnia is made worse by sleeping in, or so Google tells me.

In the summer when flowers grow everywhere his anxiety is especially problematic. He panics over the sight of sunflowers and black-eyed susans and any flower that looks scary, in his opinion, especially once it goes to seed. He won't pass a flower patch unless we lead him with his eyes closed. It's embarrassing to all of us and no one understands. They judge him and us, wondering what child fears flowers, for heaven's sake?

One of the hardest things about having disorders in the family is the amount of judgement one receives from those not plagued by such things. All their brain chemicals are balanced and they have no clue what unbalanced feels like, so they're harsh and judgemental, even if coyly, assuming it's our parenting.

After awhile you learn to extend grace to the judgemental ones, but you also stay away from them, for your own peace.

Anyhow, each time I go down this worry spiral, writing out my thoughts and letting the Spirit speak to me helps.

What does my son have going for him? That is the question the Holy Spirit asks me to contemplate, and it applies to you and yours too.

Our Assets:

1.  We are loved radically by a gracious God. He weeps over us and with us.
 
Zephaniah 3:17 The LORD your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.

Romans 8:37-39 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

2. We are made whole by the Cross, our brokenness redeemed.

1 Peter 2:24 He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.


3. We have an everpresent Holy Spirit sorting things out for us and restoring our joy.

Isaiah 41:10 fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

 

4. We have a Heavenly mindset that raises our minds and hearts above our present difficulties. It won't always be this hard. Later, there's perfection and glory.
 

Revelation 21:3-4 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

 

5. We have the faith to move mountains.

 

Mark 11:23 Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him.

6. We have the Answer to human emptiness. We don't have to mindlessly search for significance and purpose. We are filled and fulfilled.

Romans 9:17 "I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth."

John 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.

7. We can fill others' cups with our spiritual overflow.

John 15:9-13  "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.  Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends

8. We have the Word always available. Reading it is like walking with Jesus in the Garden.

Psalm 119:105 Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.

Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

Cross references:

1. Hebrews 4:12 : S Mk 4:14; Lk 5:1; 11:28; Jn 10:35; Ac 12:24; 1Th 2:13; 2Ti 2:9; 1Pe 1:23; 1Jn 2:14; Rev 1:2, 9
2. Hebrews 4:12 : Ac 7:38; 1Pe 1:23
3. Hebrews 4:12 : Isa 55:11; Jer 23:29; 1Th 2:13
4. Hebrews 4:12 : Eph 6:17; S Rev 1:16
5. Hebrews 4:12 : 1Co 14:24, 25

I don't know what you're worried about today, but I know you have assets...plenty of them to draw strength and peace from. I hope this helps you as much as it does me.

My Paul suddenly seems very whole to me!


 

Homeschool and Mother's Journal, Sept 7

Don't I wish I was that young and pretty--my dresses so lovely!

In my life this week:
I'm struggling to find time to get our fall school and chore schedule completed. If you've made one, you know it's a huge chunk of time requiring serious concentration (i.e. no children around, preferably). Of course praying through makes it go as smoothly as possible, as with anything else. Right now I'd just be thankful for some time!

I'll have to resign myself to a few late-night sessions--sessions that don't interfere with supervising the children, making their meals, and shuffling laundry.

In Our Homeschool This Week:

We're on break for one more week, only doing reading and read-alouds. I wanted to introduce a series I found at the library last week.

We've enjoyed all the Lois Lowry books we've read, and when I came across a series called Gooney Bird Greene by Lois Lowry, I thought we'd like them. And we do!




Scholastic Synopsis: From the moment Gooney Bird Greene arrives at Watertower Elementary School, her fellow second-graders are intrigued by her unique sense of style and her unusual lunches. So when story time arrives, the choice is unanimous: they want to hear about Gooney Bird Greene. And that suits her just fine, because, as it turns out, Gooney Bird has quite a few interesting and "absolutely true" stories to tell. Through Gooney Bird and her tales, acclaimed author Lois Lowry introduces young readers to the concepts and elements of storytelling. By demonstrating some of the simple techniques that reveal the extraordinary in everyday events, this book will encourage the storyteller in everyone.

This book really does teach storytelling elements, even to middle-grade children. I read it to the whole family and even Daddy wore a smile. We're on our second book as they're pretty short reads.

Other books in the series:                                                                                                                   









As for 2013-14 curriculum, here's the scoop.

80% of what we use comes used, through homeschool classifieds, Amazon, or ebay.

Bible: I continue my quest to have my children memorize all the significant Bible stories--the characters, outcomes, and impact on individual faith. In addition, the boys will follow the Bible curriculum that comes with Sonlight Core F. They'll also work their way through The Message, by Peterson.

All four children also participate in AWANA from September to May. I'll be helping with Cubbies again this year.

Science: All my children are doing Sonlight Science, with the girls, ages 4 and 6, sharing the Core A science package, and the boys, ages 9 and 11, sharing the Core F science package.

Writing: The boys are using Writing With Ease Level 4, by Susan Wise Bauer, and my 6-year-old is using Writing With Ease Level 1. All the children will also write in journals.

Grammar: As we have time, my 6-year-old will also benefit from First Language Lessons Level 1, written by Susan's mother, Jessie Wise. The boys and I will go through First Language Lessons Level 4.

Math: My 4-year-old will slowly (as we have time and as she's interested) work through a BJU kinder math workbook. My 6-year-old will use Saxon Math Level 1; my 4-year-old will join in for the manipulative parts as appropriate. I'll also teach my girls to read graphs and design a few of their own. Graphing is a fun activity I can incorporate into each season of the year, using all four children.

My boys will use Teaching Textbooks, which we love and have used for three years.

Language Arts: My boys are doing Core F Sonlight this year, focusing on the Eastern Hemisphere. Sonlight is the only literature-based curriculum company that provides materials on the eastern hemisphere. I will learn along with my boys, since I've never had any eastern-hemisphere education. My prayer is that my 11-year-old, who has OCD, will not have a difficult time with this curriculum. It includes information and stories depicting eastern religions, and a component of his OCD involves religious distortion, in which he worries his Christian beliefs will be corrupted by false religions.

In order to understand the 10/40 missionary window (missionary materials are included in this package), I believe we all need some knowledge of unreached people groups and their spiritual identities, so I'm willing to take a chance on this curriculum.

My girls will be doing their second year of Sing, Spell, Read, Write. I purchased the K-1 combo kit last year and I'm still very pleased.

Social Studies/History - All the boys' history is included in the Sonlight Core F Eastern Hemisphere package, along with a World Book DVD Rom.

My girls will be learning from all the content-area trade books I purchased as a first grade teacher (1992 - 2001). I have more than enough to write my own curriculum, and the library has excellent social studies-themed books as well. I don't see any reason to purchase anything for social studies at this level, especially if you have access to a good fiction and non-fiction library.

Art: We've accumulated quite a few art and drawing books. I'm also going to teach the boys, using the Internet and library books, to recognize famous paintings. I'll be learning along with them on this one too. We'll also read about each artist.

P.E. and Music: The children will participate in a Christmas Choir at our church; my 9-year-old will continue playing the piano; and we'll go to as many homeschool gym classes as our schedule reasonably allows, along with bike riding and walking. My husband is putting together some CD's for a short music-appreciation class for all of us.

Places We're Going and People We're Seeing:

Today is homeschool day at our local zoo and we're really looking forward to that! Grizzly Bears arrived this year, along with other new exhibits.

Earlier this week we met with a mom of five whom we know from AWANA. She invited us to lunch to talk about homeschooling. Her children are ages 2 months to 6 years (one set of twins). She's just beginning her homeschool journey and was homeschooled herself.  In fact, her mother began homeschooling four children back when homeschooling was extremely unusual. She did an outstanding job. This young mother went to college, knows how to cook from scratch, can her own produce, garden, do woodworking, quilt, sew, and play the piano. She was baffled, however, on how much to teach in one year. "How do you make sure you're not leaving holes?"

They have five acres, 20 apples trees, 3 pear trees, 3 peach trees, a big garden, a playground, a dog, and two kittens to catch mice in the barn.

I held the 2-month-old baby the whole time I talked. I. was. in. heaven.

I'm cooking:

I'm trying to find the time to look for new recipes, but this week it was much of the same:
baked ziti, crockpot whole chicken, chicken noodle soup, taco bake, cheesy eggs and cafe potatoes, grilled chicken breasts

Looking forward to more applesauce, soups, and chili, now that fall weather is approaching...and more that I can do in the oven without making the house feel like a furnace. Our air conditioning broke last week and we've already paid for two new parts this summer. We'll have to wait until tax money comes to have a new motor put on. No air conditioning aggravates my migraines so I consider this a need, not a want.

I'm grateful for:

~ four children to love, cuddle with, and teach

~ a Christian husband

~ four seasons

~ our Compassion children

~ fall leaves coming soon

~ that my youngest is only 4; I have a lot of mothering years to look forward to.

~ transforming words of Scripture

~ the written word

~ homeschooling resources

~ homeschooling friends

~ books to get lost in

~ faith to see me through

~ the wonder of learning

Have a wonderful week and thank you for reading! How was your week?