Ladies...It Matters...

Ladies...It matters. And for those of us that know better, we will be held accountable.

Take the time to watch this video. Written from ordinary Christian men's perspectives. Very eye opening.

Adventures in Review - Week 31

MFW - Adventures Week 31 is full of Bible Scripture :) The kids took turns reading out of the Bible each day. The kiddos recently helped me plant corn in our garden, so, on Tuesday, instead of talking about a kernel of wheat, we changed it to a kernel of corn. ...Fit rather nicely and made more sense to the kids than the wheat would have.

We also covered North and South Dakota. Didn't have time to make the honey peanut butter balls b/c we went out of town, but we love the chocolate covered peanut butter balls Aunt Rinda makes. We will definitely have to try to honey version of them. The kids also took a liking to the Armed Services Medley...after all, the tune is rather catchy.

Because we were one the road traveling during the week, some school was done in the car. The kids didn't seem to mind ;) {I had a really cute picture to put here, but technology was not my friend this week. The SD card had a fatal error and most of my pictures were corrupted :( }

In language, one of the things the boys learned about were pronouns. So, of course, another CATegorical book was in order :)

I'll close with a few of the pictures that survived from our trip. *sniff, sniff*

Lego Land

Lego Land Discovery Center

Grapevine Egg Hunt

Grapevine

I promise, no Guinea pigs were harmed in the taking of these pictures ;)

Bubbles Anyone?

What can I say? She loves bubbles!

Confessions of a Carseat Collector

So what does a little boy collect in the cup holders of his carseat...ahem...booster seat?

Well, take a look below. The items are always changing and he fills the cup holders up faster than I can clean them out. LOL!

vanGO

This post is about 2 young ladies I had the privilege of meeting today when they came to speak to our Sunday school class about the amazing journey God has them on. I have blogged about them in the hopes that you will pray for them, check out their blog,  pass the word on about them to your friends, and donate to their ministry if you feel the Lord calling you to do so.

In short, Jenna and Stacie are putting Luke 10 into action. They travel around the states in a van (many times living out of it) going to places where no one else can, has, or is willing to go. As you can imagine, some of these places can be quite frightening. At times, they are able to join up with other local ministries already working in the area, and other times, they are on on their own simply going where the Lord leads them...loving on people, sharing Jesus, meeting needs, and planting seeds. 

To learn more about them, please watch their short video below and check out their blog, vanGo. They just finished up one 6-month journey and eagerly await to start the next leg of their journey.

vanGO from Jason Hight on Vimeo.

Adventures in Review - Week 30 (Meals on Wheels, a Birthday, & Cool Books)

Today is my little man's 8th birthday!!!

 He missed his Daddy's birthdate by only 4 hours and 6 minutes!

He weighed 7 lbs. 14 oz and was 19" long.

Today, he is a whopping 55 lbs. and 51 inches tall.

Happy Birthday J!

On Missionary Monday, we learned about Yubelina. She is a young Christian woman from Indonesia. She was burned very badly while trying to escape a Muslim attack on her Christian village. We prayed that she would stay strong in her faith and let the love of Jesus shine brightly through her. I also took this opportunity to discuss inward beauty vs outward beauty. 1 Samuel 16:7 says, "The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." The most important thing to God is how we look on the inside. Because Yubelina has the love of Jesus inside, it shines outward, making her beautiful :)

Tuesday was our day to volunteer at the Hope Center. Sorry, no pictures today. Some days are so busy, the camera never gets time to make an appearance ;)

On Writing Around the World Wednesday, the kids wrote letters and drew pictures to send to Yubelina.
Here are a few sayings we had to choose from in her language:

Kami mencintai Anda. (We love you.)
Anda cantik. (You are beautiful.)
Terima kasih untuk mendorong kami. (Thank you for encouraging us.)
Kuat di dalam Tuhan Tetap. (Stay strong in the Lord.)

If you would like to write to Yubelina. Mail your notes to:
Letters to Yubelina
c/o The Voice of the Martyrs
P.O. Box 443
Bartlesville, OK 74005-0443

Wednesday was also our day to begin something new...Meals on Wheels. Normally, I do not have 2 volunteer thingys scheduled back to back like this, but we are just starting out with the Meals on Wheels program and have to work out all the schedule kinks. So until then, we will have a few weeks of insanity running here and there this month. But the kids had a great time delivering the meals to the elderly and are learning some very valuable lessons along the way, so it was all worth it! And again, sorry, no pictures this time around :( We were focusing on learning the ropes and routes. Maybe next time though :)

My granny-in-law suprised us last weekend with some really cool books. They are from the series called Words Are CATegorical. They cover all sorts of language elements like nouns, verbs, antonyms, (and the list goes on) in a fun and creative way. The boys learned all about nouns and we read the book A Lime, A Mime, A Pool of Slime by Brian P. Cleary. We also took some time this week in language to review synonyms by reading the book Stroll and Walk, Babble and Talk  also by Cleary.

In My Father's World, we began learning that Jesus is the resurrection and the life. We are saving our resurrection cookies for Easter though since that is still a few weeks out. Here is what our poster looks like so far.

The kiddos added 2 new sheets to their state notebooks: A map of the stages of the United States growth and Colorado.

Life on My Beam

I hope you watched the little 3-4 minute video above. If not, what I have written won't make much sense.

Ok, let me just start by saying...WOW! Sadly, this is a pretty accurate description of what my life has been like...complete with helmets and all :-o  LOL!

BUT, with that being said, God is making some changes in my life :) They are small changes. They are on-going. It'll probably take me years, but I am a work in progress and my hope is to one day be free of  "the beam". Yes, there will be days when I make great strides forward only to fall further back. There will be days when I get stuck in the mud or fall flat on my butt, but not trying at all is much worse and is not acceptable. I don't want to stand before God tangled up in my safety net or with a beam strapped to my back and expect him to be pleased.

Please don't misunderstand what I am saying...no works, no deeds, no lack of a safety net or balance beam will ever be good enough to get me into Heaven. It is ONLY by grace (through the saving blood of Jesus Christ) that I have my name written in the Lambs Book of Life. Ephesians 2:8-9 says, "For by grace, you are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast".

I'm talking about standing before the judment seat of Christ and I think this is what Chan is referring to in the video. 2 Corinthians 5:10 says, "For we" (meaning believers in Christ) "must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad".

I do home school (and I feel God is calling me to do this for the time being...and for me and others I know, homeschooling is a crazy and radical thing to do for the Lord) so I have no plans to change in this department...lol!

....BUT I will mention one area that has had a stronghold on us that we (with God's help) are working to change. Although we do not live in a gated community, we do have a gate...and a fence. By keeping this gate closed all the time, we have, in a way, shut ourselves off from everyone else living on our street. To put this into perspective...when family or friends happened to drive by and saw the gate open, they called and asked, What is wrong? Why is your gate open? Did you forgot to close it? See what I am talking about?

The street dead-ends at our driveway. There's a really long story to why we have the gate in the first place, but the main reasons are 1) because everyone thinks our street goes all the way through to the other Hwy so we get a lot of strangers and traffic driving right up to our bedroom window and 2) because we have a sort of a blind turn off the road (especially when the vines are not cut back) and into our driveway, so before you know it, you are stomping on the brakes to keep from hitting a kid zooming by on a bike. Anyway, what started out as a wonderful safety measure when our kids were outside playing in the yard, playing in the driveway, or riding their bikes has turned into a fortress of sorts...keeping us in and everyone else out. I am happy to say, for the past few days, unless it is nighttime, or the kids are riding their bikes, or playing in the driveway, the gate has been open :) 

This little gate story may not make sense at all to you, but it makes perfect sense in my mind of just one of the ways God is helping me let loose of "the beam".

On my own, I can't do anything, but with God's help, I know I can let loose of my beam :)

On a side note...This song below, Breaking Through, by Audrey Assad is one of my favorites and is such a beautiful description of the journey that God has me on.

Adventures in Review - Week 29 (+Fire's Funeral, Sisterly Love, and Creative Writing)

J's pet hermit crab, Fire, died this weekend. He's had that hermit crab for almost a year. J was extremely upset...a little too upset over a hermit crab that he rarely messed with. Long story short,  it dying brought back memories and feelings of his 'MawMaw P' dying over the Christmas holidays.

So, the kids decorated a 'coffin' for the crab and we had a funeral for it. J wrote a little note and drew a picture to remember not only his crab, Fire, but a previous crab from last summer named 'Hide and Seek'. 

Rock tombstone and paper grave marker

Then A did something that just made my heart smile. She wanted to help her brother feel better, so (all on her own - I might add)  she drew him a picture of them playing together and wrote him a very sweet card. Now these are the kind of "mommy moments" I like having :) 

Now, on to our Adventures in Review - Week 28...

On Missionary Monday, we talked about and prayed for our missionary friends, The Johnson's in Canada.

We thanked God for allowing them to have several successful sports camps where they were able to spread the gospel of Jesus with the First Nations People and plant seeds. We prayed for all those who heard the message and prayed for those little seeds to grow. If you would like to read more about the Johnson's and their Canadian Mission Field, please check out their blog, Go and Be.

In our state studies, we travelled to Kansas (and yes, we enjoyed our sunflower seed snack), West Virginia, (where we enjoyed their state fruit, the golden delicious apple), Nevada, and Nebraska (where we tried out their state soft-drink, Kool-aid). Now, I do not picture kool-aid as a soft drink. When I think of a soft drink, I think of fizzy, carbonated things like Coke and Dr. Pepper. And, believe it or not, my kids are not big kool-aid fans ;)  But they sure do like sweet tea :)

In language this week, the boys had to write a creative story pretending about a day when they were 2 inches tall. Their super-short videos are below.

A wanted to get in on the video action as well, so she picked out something to read too. She ended up choosing to read the letter her Dad and I wrote her at the beginning of our Adventures in My Father's World. Sadly though, try as I might, I could NOT get this stinkin' video to upload. I think my computer is just too old. *This will be remedied very soon***WooHoo!

To check out what other homeschoolers are doing in My Father's Word

or in general,

click on the links above.

Raised Bed Garden...Yay!

It all started last year when my hubby made raised bed containers for our strawberry plants...

Before, when the strawbs were at ground level, when we weren't fighting off the weeds, we were weeding out snails. Ugh! Those little suckers love strawberries! Then there was the 3 ft. long snake *water moccasin - highly venemous*. EEK! It was looking for water in the hot summer months and thankfully got tangled up in the netting before it could get to us. Anyway, this is where we fell in love with the whole raised bed system!

So... this year, my hubby decided to take it a step further and made a few more raised beds for the vegetable part of our garden. Big J loves to build things and is very good at it, so we are very blessed to not have all the added costs of purchasing a kit or having to have someone else do all the work. Blue-eyed Boy, our son, likes helping his Dad too and he is learning valuable skills he can use in the future.

Here is how our garden looked when we first started...

And here are the two raised beds Blue-eyed Boy helped his Dad build.



A few weeks ago, we planted a whole mess of stuff...

-asparagus (first time to try)

-soybeans

-onions

-peppers

-eggplant

-corn

-purple hull peas

-peanuts (first time to try)

-tomato

-cucumber

-peas

-okra

-bush beans

-potatoes

-pole beans (first time to try)

-squash

-lima beans (first time to try)

Whew! Ok, I think that is it :)

As far as resources are concerned, we usually just go off of what has or has not worked for us in years past. We also talk a lot with our friends and family who garden and share tips and ideas with each other.

Aside from the garden, we also have lots of fruit trees. We have been really excited to see the honey bees out and about. They've been pretty slim the last few years, but they were out in full force this year. They sure do like satsumas! We used that whole process to begin discussing pollination with the kids.    

Speaking of kids - -  we try to get them involved as much as we can and for as long as their attention spans can handle-LOL! In the first stages, they used their little hoes to go behind their daddy and his tiller to help break up any large clumps of soil left behind. They also helped us throw any of the larger, easier-to-grab weeds out of the garden area. This year, the kiddos helped us plant a few rows of the corn, some of the potatoes, and the peanuts. We also plan to get the kiddos to help us *try* to keep the garden weed free. I know the raised bed areas will be easier to manage. As far as the remaining areas, well...let's just say, we try not to lose track of where the vegetable plants are ;)

Believe it or not, we do not live out in the country. We live on 2 fairly quiet acres smack dab in the middle of a fast growing (not-so-little-anymore) town.

If you'd like to ckeck out what other homeschooling parents and their kids are doing in their gardens, then visit the link below...or better yet, if you have a garden, link up yourself :)

Adventures in Review - Week 28

On Missionary Monday, we learned of and prayed for a young woman named Somchi. She and her mother were the only Christians in their Khmu village in Laos and they faced many hardships because they refused to back down from their faith on God. To learn more about Somchi, please visit the Kids of Courage on-line newsletter. It is free.  It is through the Voice of the Martyrs.  

Tuesday was our day to volunteer at our local crisis pregnancy center. The kids love to help sort, straighten, and fold the baby clothes. They even help bag up the items for the ladies.

On Writing Around the World Wednesday, we each wrote a letter to Debabrata (our Compassion sponsor child) in India. His birthday is coming up in May (he'll be 8 years old) and in order for the cards to get to him in time, we had to send them out in March. 

In our Adventures in My Father's World, we finished up Parts 3 and 4 of 'Honest Abe'. The kids were amazed at all the things he had accomplished and they especially liked the muddy pig story. Their notebook pages are below.


Jase's



Aleeya's



During Bible time, the kids are also learning that Jesus is the Good Shepherd. (John 10:14)

Other than that, we've caught up on a few episodes of Liberty's Kids via Netflix (The Midnight Ride and Washington Takes Command). *Thanks, Jennifer*



And we liked the Blast to the Past books Mrs. Jennifer let us borrow so much, we decided to purchase a set for ourselves. One of which includes, Lincoln's Legacy. Jase will read books over and over and Aleeya can read them when she is older. Thanks again, Jennifer!

To check out what others are doing in My Father's World, click the link below.

To check out what other homeschoolers have done this week in general, click the link below.