Happy New Years! Its "Do Over time!!!"

So I have been thinking alot about all this resolution stuff I hear going around, and I for one have never really made any solid commitments one way or another on New Years day for doing or not doing anything in particular.. Did you catch that? I hope you did because I think I just confused myself! Basically what this means is I am to chicken to say or commit to something I may regret or break later, so I decided to commit to not making any resolutions I don't think I can keep. Does this mean I will make any resolutions? No, I will not, because as sure as I am that the sun will rise I am sure that as soon as I say I will or wont do something I'm gonna do or not do it. You may be lost by now, if so go back and read it again. I had to read it twice just to make sure I am making some sort of sense. If you are not lost, good for you please take a moment an explain it to us.
In lue of making "resolutions" per say, I have decided that I am going to call this my "Do Over List". Please feel free to use this term as your own. Here are some things I would like to "Do Over" this year:

Decluttering My House:
This is a very big one for me as I am a consummate collector of all things, which results in massive amounts of clutter. I tried some "decluttering" techniques last year and some of it went well, and some of it wasnt so great, therefore decluttering will be on my "Do Over List". I have huge amounts of "stuff" to go through and will depend on the Lord to help me be brutal with clutter.

Organizing my desk area:
This is a constant battle and no matter how many times I say Im going to clean it up it never gets done very well. I suppose I could blame it on the kids and the husband, but that wont fix the problem. Being totally un-organized is a sure sign of insanity, and insanity defined is doing the same thing over and over expecting different results. With this in mind I will attempt a new organizational plan..not sure what it is yet, but will give whatever it happens to be a shot.

Husband Attention Time:
This is something I have had alot of trouble with recently, like say for the past couple years. It seems as though I always have time for everything BUT my husband, which should not be. Since I am homeschooling, a good part of the day consists of dealing with the inevitable " Mom, what do I do here?" questions, which is probably the bulk of the time I spend going from child to child. The other thing that tends to take my time and sap my energy is cleaning the house, or coercing the kids to do it, whatever the case may be. My husband needs to have my undivided, non-resentful attention occasionally so this is something I will be "doing Over" during the day. Pray for me.

Servant Hearted:
I really need to work on this, as I am learning I am not as Servant Hearted as I had originally thought I was. Oh I have no problem giving things, but try and volunteer me for something, watch it, your going to get hurt. This year I would like to try to serve my family and friends a bit better than I have, and not be so...so...mean, for lack of a better word, when my husband or a friend "accidentally" volunteers me for something I don't really want to do. Please pray for me..again.

I am sure if I sat and thought about it I could come up with some more things to "Do Over" this year, but I wouldn't want to overwhelm myself, or you with all the prayer requests I would be needing. By the way, I started up my Craft Business again, which without the help and prodding of my daughter,  would not have gotten done, so if you don't mind, you can pray about that also:)

Happy New Years!

A Change Of Pace....

The week before last, the children started resisting our typical homeschool day, with groans and feet dragging. This year has been going so well, that it took me slightly by surprise that they would suddenly begin to debate the usefulness of Fractions and Vocabulary and Bible Study. By the end of that particular week, I was frustrated and so were they, so I , in my infinite wisdom, decided without any forewarning, to "do something different". I thought about it all weekend, talked about it with several people and came up with a plan to make the little twirps "grateful" for all those worksheets and spelling tests. Little did I know,  by the end of this school week,  "I" would be even more grateful then they were.

The week started out typical enough, with our usual Bible study time, and after that,  there was little resemblance to worksheets or your normal school type of work. Monday we did "Property Management and Design" this is a fancy  name for splitting wood and stacking it. Talk about hard work! I must be really out of shape because by the time we were done I was ready to take a nap...I suddenly had a little bit more compassion for my kids who have to stack wood and my husband who has to split it. I'm typically wandering around talking about how much I do, however its not near as physically draining as carrying and stacking wood. Good thing I have teenage boys to help out. 

On Tuesday we learned about " Wild Game Processing and packaging" that stands for cutting up the elk and putting it in the fridge. It can also be Home Economics, but for my purposes I wanted a more professional term. We only process wild game once a year, unless I can talk my husband into taking it to the Banderobs, and usually it is a deer, so its really hard to remember how to cut them up. After many many hours of cutting, wrapping, hand cramps, back aches, and tears we FINALLY finished. That was the LONGEST school day ever, and not one I would like to repeat anytime soon. 

The rest of the week was a little more mellow, we learned "organizational skills"(that means we cleaned the house), they learned the art of "Laving" ( that means laundry), and then on test day, which is usually a Friday , we continued practicing what we had learned that week.

The whole week I was hoping I would make the kids more grateful for our typical homeschool day and I don't know if I accomplished that, but  I DO know that I am more grateful for it and will do alot less whining about it in the future, hopefully they will to. By the end of the week I was totally exhausted and absolutely thrilled to have just gotten through it. Im not so sure we will do that again for a while, even though I know it was very good for us to be able to accomplish what we did. For now though, if you know of any big extravagant terms for things you would call chores, let me know, Im always on the lookout for suggestions

Homeschooling for the hopeless..The adventure continues....

Thank goodness for one of my FAVORITE home school groups on Facebook! Without them I would be relegated to actually WRITING everything down that the kids are doing this year. Don't get me wrong, writing, with a pencil/pen and paper, is a skill everyone should learn, but lets face it, in this day and age of technology its so much faster to simply type it into a software program, set it to print and Viola! instant report cards or whatever your mind can imagine. If I had to write down everything we are doing this year, Im certain nothing would get done. In the past month, since we started our school year, I have managed to keep better track of lessons and grades and assignments then ever before, all thanks to a  free computer program called "Homeschool Tracker".
One of my biggest failings as a homeschooler is not keeping accurate records and with this little piece of awesomeness, its easy. Just pick a subject add a description, put in the score and time and your good to go! My next biggest failing is not being consistent, it seems no matter what, life happens, and with our family it almost always manages to derail us from our ultimate goal of finishing out the year with a good record of learning, or in the very least, something to show for it. This program also helps me to be consistant because its always there and I can see the schedule and say "wow, forgot about that one, glad I entered that in last week". If your interest is piqued, take a look, it will definitely  be worth your while.
 Our first month has been rife with small setbacks and I am thankful that they aren't big ones. I scheduled everything so tight it actually squeaks if you listen close. Fortunately, we have managed to follow my schedule without to many issues, and although we have dropped Spanish,  for lack of interest,  I'm pretty sure we will try again at some other time or maybe try French. The only other thing I have done differently this year is the heavy reliance on Netflix streaming videos and rentals for educational material. If you have never looked at Netflix as a source for educational videos, you should try it some time. Occasionally  the information will be biased toward a world view that is different than mine, however those are few as I am very selective about what we watch. An example of our VRS (that's short for "Video Reliance Syndrome"),  we recently watched The Last of the Mohicans. Now I guess you are wondering, what possible educational purpose could that have. Well let me tell you, first off,  its a classic written by James Fenimore Cooper. Now as much as I appreciate the classics, sometimes they are darn near impossible to read because of all the humongous words. All you have to do is read the first chapter to realize the authors back then have something we don't seem to have now, a large vocabulary. Even though the movie is more recent then the novel, you can actually follow along without having to have a Masters in english literature. This is very appealing to me and alot more understandable to my young audience. One of the biggest reasons we watched it is we are currently studying that time period in history and I want them to enjoy learning about it. I know its mainly entertainment, but you can get a real sense of what it may have been like back then in a very graphic way.
As you can see, even entertaining movies can be educational.......at least that's what I keep telling myself and my kids, and anyone who asks me "so what are you doing this year to educate your children?".

Calgon..Take me away! (trademarked of course )

Have you ever just had one of those weeks, where that line was so appropriate? In my case the mantra was "Jesus,Take me home!" Usually I start out with such good intentions, like with our homeschooling, or laundry, or "insert your project here". No matter what I try to accomplish, there is some point where I want God to just take me home and get it over with. Everywhere I turn, it seems that everyone else is having this great time and I just don't get it. For me it has been truly hard to maintain a positive attitude in the face of adversity.
Take our homeschooling experience so far. It has only been 3 days and I have already been tempted to throw in the towel, so to speak. They fuss, they fight, they argue, where is the peaceful, calm, homeschooling experience I keep hearing about? I can tell you it is definitely not at my house. Where are the kids who want to cooperate and have a great time with each other while doing school work? What about the peaceful walks in the woods looking at birds and squirrels and talking about Gods creation? Not here. As a matter of fact the last time I took my kids out to the woods for this nature walk thingy, I almost left them there. No worries though, they would have eventually found their way home as we only got a couple hundred yards away before they were pitching fits.
Every family is different, for instance, my kids have learned that I will cave at the slightest hint of noncooperation, because I want to have a whole day where there isn't any yelling or bickering. Another thing they have learned is the harder time they give me, the shorter school time will be. I have trained them well. They know exactly what buttons to push and how to push them to get their ultimate goal, which is to go do what they want. Just for the record, I have great kids, even with all the fussing, they are better than most.
Fortunately for them and me, I have a Savior who loves me. Left to my own devices, with no relationship with the Lord, I would have given up long ago. I can not let them win this battle of the wills, as in the end they will actually end up losing. I don't know what that looks like right now, but I'm working on it.
Yesterday I was watching a Voddie Baucham DVD from a homeschooling conference I went to a couple years ago and he was talking about parents being a blessing to their children, and I asked myself, am I being a blessing to my kids? Honestly, I would have to give myself an F in that category. I just don't know how to do that on my own, but I know that Jesus can help me with that. I want to be a blessing to my husband also, and that seems even harder than being one for my kids.
So now that my rant is done, I am reminded of a verse that seems to fit my circumstances at this moment, which is
Hebrews 12:1
Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also ^(A)lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us ^(B)run with ^(C)endurance the race that is set before us.

To me this means, there are people watching, set a Godly example, put aside your worldly struggles and sin that can trip you and keep going until you reach the goal, that being telling people the Gospel and going home to be with Jesus. What a great encouragement for those of us who seem to have more problems then others.
Funny how that works. I can always find a scripture verse to fit my struggle or to give me encouragement. I don't know how anyone can make it in this world without Gods Word. After the week, or maybe month,  I have had,  it seems impossible to even conceive of living without it.

Its that time of year ... School Time!

And of course I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to do this year...again. I am so glad I am a homeschooler though, as the options and choices are wide open. I have several stacks of school books in my living room (you know how I love to stack) that need to be gone through and either discarded, passed on or used this year. Unfortunately, because I am so unorganized, this task may take several days, days which I wont be able to do anything else I have on my never ending list of projects. School is supposed to start in a couple weeks though, so it needs to be done.

I am not a very good homeschooler, but I do have a pretty good idea what I will be doing, so that is a big plus, however I do not have a set curriculum that I use all the time, so it is up to me how to put it all together. I have several Bible study books to choose from so that is an easy fix, and a video Math curriculum I can use. I'm still debating on what to do with English, but I am leaning toward some type of Literature with books I already have on hand. I have a list of reading material I received from a friend, so will probably pick a couple books from it.

Okay, so that leaves Art, Music, Science, Writing,  Home Economics, Physical Ed.and the list goes on. Okay one at a time, Art, I know a lady here in town that does pottery, that might be an option, but I also just talked to a nice lady who wants to maybe do watercolor painting, so will have to check with that. Next is Music, the 2 youngest are already taking piano lessons, and the next oldest girl wants to learn flute. She might have to pick something else, as the Lady who was going to teach her is pregnant and busy with several children of her own.
Alrighty then, the next item on the list is Science. This also may be an easy fix, as I wont teach anything except Creation Science and I have a Large book complete with cutouts and quizzes and reading ect. that the kids liked before, but Im not sure where it is, one of those things that I will have to try and find in the next couple weeks. I'm absolutely positive it is in some stack somewhere.

Okay onto the next item, Writing, and I am wondering if that could include blogging, and or  forums, notepad on the computer, or only handwriting with a pencil and paper. I think I will incorporate the writing in with the English Lit. this year and make it Creative writing in any format they choose. I don't want them to be on the computer alot  though, so the majority of it will be with good old paper and pencil, this should be fun.

Home Economics, Definition: Don't burn the house down. Oh I know it can mean other things also, like don't cut off your fingers with the extremely sharp rotary cutter, don't use the 40$ Gingers on paper, make sure to clean up the large spill on the kitchen floor before someone breaks their neck, the list goes on and on. This is the funnest class to have as far as Im concerned. I have a really nice curriculum set for it and I think we will be definitely be using it this year at some point.

Im down to the wire, my last thing to decide on, Physical Education. I did not do well with this class when I was growing up in public school, you would think it would be easy, but it wasn't for me. I was never very athletic and always picked last, ect. Im not sure what to do with this one other than trampoline time, or something along those lines. I think there may be some type of curriculum to go along with it, but I have no idea what it is. So looks like they will be spending alot of time riding bikes up and down the driveway and jumping on the trampoline, at least until the snow starts flying. Maybe an exercise video or something during the Winter months.

Well, this is my plan, hopefully I will be able to stick to it. I seem to get really lazy right around Thanksgiving and Christmas, and sometimes it takes a real effort to get started again after all the vacation time. Im not a really good homeschooler like some of my friends are, as I have a tendency to be lazy and the un-organized bit doesn't help either. Sometimes it just seems like to much and I dont want to be bothered, but I usually start out doing okay. I keep hoping to find some kind of Coop, where people with special talents are willing to share with the rest of us. As for me, I will give our Homeschool year to the Lord, in the hope that he will help us get through it as Philippians 4:13 says, with this is mind we will continue striving toward the goal, alternately standing and falling as we go, hopefully standing more than falling. Now that I write that though maybe I should include falling as a good thing, as in falling on my knees and begging God for mercy when it seems to hard to go on, or maybe first thing in the morning I should start begging!