List of Thankfulness

Depending on where you visit from, you may not know that this is Thanksgiving weekend in Canada. As I spend my day getting my house ready for company tonight and for our family meal on Monday, these are the thoughts that came to my mind:

1. I am thankful for my sweetheart husband, who is the leader of this family and continues to grow in his leadership skill in Christ.

2. I am thankful that in that growing leadership we have the Young Adults Conforming to Christ (Y.A.C.C.) group that my husband leads and has invited for study tonight.

3. I am thankful for the bread machine that makes the pizza dough to feed YACC when they come.

4. I am thankful for the oven that has faithfully put out delicious pizza each time - even when the pizza slides off the pan onto the element and sets fire to my stove,

5. I am thankful for the oven cleaner that directs me to just spray the oven surface before I go to bed and simply wipe off the grime in the morning,

6. I am thankful for the entire bucket of rags that was needed to simply wipe off the grime,

7. I am thankful for the spatula I used to scrape, scratch and dig out the encrusted, burned remainers of the flaming pizza,

8. I am thankful for my kitchen floor, counter, backsplash, taps and cupboards that also needed to be cleaned after simply wiping off the grime of the oven racks,

9. I am thankful for my washing machine for the entire outfit that I was wearing and now needs to be soaked,

10. MOST OF ALL, I am thankful that my husband and daughter were out of the house while I dealt with the majority of this list this morning!

All kidding aside, I did need to focus on thankfulness during this little trial. It did make the task go faster and without frustration - well, without too much frustration. Now my kitchen is clean from the top down for all the cooking and baking that happens this weekend - for this I am thankful, as well.

Happy Thanksgiving!

The Top Ten Questions from Non-Homeschoolers

These are the top ten questions I get from people who don't homeschool their kids - both christian people and non:

1. Is it a church thing?

Well...the quick answer is 'no'. There are several families in our church who do not homeschool their children - for various reasons. However, it is our own walk with Christ that lead us to this conviction.

2. How organized do you have to be?

I do believe that God blessed me with the gift of organization - there are days that it fails me, though. Really, everyone has to be organized to accomplish their goals - short and long term - being a home educator isn't any different in that sense. The difference does come out when considering how much I care about completing our goals each day and caring about Duck's future goals, as well. I am putting my organizational skills into my family rather than into an employment situation.

3. What time do you get started in the morning?

The implication here is generally that we must get up at 5 a.m. to be able to accomplish a full day of school and housework. Actually, we start our day at about 8 a.m. - we do have the occasional sleep in/cuddle in mom's bed morning - those are part of the benefits of home education! The schedule I posted here keeps us on track for both school and house stuff.


4. How did you ever pick a program to follow?

There are a tremendous amount of curriculums (curriculi?) to choose from, and it can be very overwhelming to new homeschoolers. When we chose to use Rod & Staff, it wasn't because we felt the program was the most superior - in fact, I find most curriculum cover the same material in different ways - it was because this program used scripture the most. All of the lessons in reading & comprehension are based on actual scripture and I see this as a great advantage for Duck. If she is going to be reading, it might as well be biblical history.

The other thing I point out to people is, I am not tied to one curriculum. I am always seeking out new ideas, used books, etc. to incorporate in school.


5. How do you find the patience?

Hmmm. Do you like your children? Do you believe the public school teacher has any more patience just because of a pay cheque?

Sorry, slipped into my sarcasm there.

Any homeschooler will admit to trials during the week, me included! Overall, I enjoy my time at home with Duck - homeschooling is as fun and fulfilling as the parent makes it.


6. Don't you worry that your child will be unprepared for the real world?

I hope someone can tell me what the real world is soon - so I can prepare for it! As for Duck, she can socialize with any age group comfortably and with confidence. She has held little jobs already at her tender age of 8 (housekeeping for her daddy's workplace, gardening for neighbours and friends, and has babysat parrots and rabbits for friends), and has shown a good amount of responsibility in these jobs.

Quite frankly, the last place anyone will learn about the real world is in public school.


7. What about socialization?

What about it? Let's take a quick look at the socialization found in public school: negative peer pressure, bullying, profanity, conformity, feminism, promiscuity & STDs - do we need to keep asking this question people?!


8. What if she wants to go to college?

Most homeschool curriculums provide direction on completing a highschool diploma for the purposes of meeting the criteria for college and university. Most colleges and universities provide entrance exams that homeschoolers can challenge, or they have entrance criteria for 'mature students' that does not require an official diploma.

I know I have read about how universities are jumping at the chance to have homeschoolers, because they are generally successful students and it looks good on the institutions. I also know, and will teach my daughter, that success is not found in 'higher education'. That with diligence, she can turn an interest or skill into a home-based business to add support to any future family or for herself - this is the path that we are setting her on and as she matures we hope she'll follow it.


9. Are you a teacher?

Yes. I teach my child. That makes me a teacher. Did I go to university to get a teaching degree? No. So far, however, I am able to read and write along with her. I also can read instructions to teach her in each subject. Would a certified teacher be able to teach my child better? No. My child gets my full attention for learning (even a mom with eight kids gives them more one-on-one attention than in a public school class). And I have a fantastic educational assistant - he arrives home everyday about supper time!

10. Why do you do it?

Because I should. Because I can. Because she's worth it. Because no one cares more about her future than my husband and I. Because God gave me that responsibility. Because it is the best choice.

Ruby Club Studies

As we continued to build on our earlier topics of mercy and confidence, the next topic we studied in the Ruby Club was designed around the term longsuffering:

LONGSUFFERING - the opposite of anger; quality of self restraint in the face of provocation vs. hostel retaliation; fruit of the spirit

Alot of times the term patience is used as interchangeable with longsuffering. When, in fact, longsuffering is more of an immediate response to an adverse situation. The times when we, as Christians need to turn the proverbial other cheek when we have been offended/attacked. It is another characteristic of God that is a necessity for Christian women.

We read through Ephesians 4:12; Colossians 3:12&13; and 1 Corinthians 13:4-7. Then we considered whether we were applying these scriptures to ourselves or thinking about all the other people who don't seem to follow this? We talked openly about how easy it is to see other peoples' faults while ignoring our own and how important is to take God's word to our own hearts.

Then we played a game - BANG, your dead! If we died right now, would we see that argument with our sister/brother as important? How about God honouring? Was it really worth getting frustrated with that neighbour/teacher/store clerk? Did you glorify the Lord by arguing with that fellow Christian about doctrine?

Our relationship with God will dictate our ability to relate to others around us. Our success in taking hold of the fruits of the spirit come from study, prayer and PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE. It is the failures/sin of those around us that give us need to practice longsuffering by applying these scriptures to our hearts.

All of the girls talked about how easy is to retaliate when they are offended by both Christians and non-christians - it comes naturally with our own sinful nature. We talked about whether any of us are practicing the spiritual things we have discovered in our studies. Are we changing in our day-to-day life? Do we want to improve our relationship with Christ through self study? Are these verses we are finding just feeling good to read or are we practicing them?

The girls that attended the studies all seemed sincere in their wish to study more. They also came across as honest about their failures in practicing what they had learned from the studies, i.e. mercy vs. judgemental; faithful vs. selfish; and now longsuffering vs. angry. It was encouraging to see them return each week with completed study materials and thoughtful questions or input for the topics.

Salamanders

When homeschooled kids go camping, there is always something to investigate. These salamanders were discovered under the tents when we were packing up. I found and collected three and they provided great entertainment for all the kids:

"You pick it up!" "EWW!" "There not slimy at all." "I touched it, I touched it!" "Aww, there so cute." "Do their tails come off?"

The older boys wanted to dissect, which was quickly dissauded by the moms. The little ones wanted to take them home because they "must be scared in the woods". And we had one 5 year old in tears because we put them back into the bush and he said "I already love them!"

We did come home and print out some facts about the little things - like they are called Blue Spotted Salamanders and the 'big one' probably wasn't 'mom' and the two smaller ones probably weren't married ;o)

Look it up at http://www.natureconservancy.ca/

School is everywhere!

For more show and tell, go here!

Good Times and Good Friends

We spent last week camping at a provincial park with our good friends. We were only intending to stay for four days and we ended up staying for nine days - that's how much fun we were having there. Our friends have six kids from age 14 down to 2.

The kids had fires from noon to midnight to cook on. We did the obligatory weiners, marshmallows and cherry pies; but we also grilled steak, potatoes, onions, mushrooms, hamburgers - we really became gourmet campers!

The kids rode bikes constantly and we actually had warm enough weather to spend two full days at the beach. The adults weren't brave enough to swim in the cold water, but they didn't care.
There were multiple volunteers to walk the dogs, whether the dogs wanted to go or not!

And, as a final note, let me quote the words of the experienced 5 year old camper pictured below: "Auntie Kim, do want to put your fire out, cause I gotta pee?"

I can't wait to go again next year!