I am moving my blog.  You can see the new one here.

Hope to see you there!

~Linda~

Nathan surprised me last Sunday by saying that he wanted to start school on Monday.  So we did!  We had a great first week and I wanted to brag on my boy a little!

Nate's reading has improved by leaps and bounds since the beginning of the summer.  I am amazed by what a couple of months can do for a child's reading ability.  His handwriting is coming along nicely as well.  Here is a picture of his copywork from this week.  He just started learning to write a couple of months ago, and we have not been consistent to practise, so I'm pretty pleased with this...

Photo can be seen here.

(OK - I give up!!  I've worked for over 2 hours trying to get my photos from picasaweb to post in here - they were on flickr before!! I switched because I read in the forums that flickr and photobucket should not be used! - so now I'm just linking to the images I want you to see!  If I figure this out, I'll come back and change) 

We are using Sonlight Core K this year.  I am also trying to incorporate the Charlotte Mason method.  Sonlight science and language arts both include activity sheets - aka: worksheets.  Since we are trying notebooking this year, I wanted to tweak the activity sheets to make them more Charlotte Mason friendly.  Here is the result.  These two pages were questions on the worksheets.  Nate cut and pasted the "Water Cycle" pictures and he colored the "Rainbow" page.  He then narrated to me his understanding of the water cycle and how rainbows form, and I wrote for him.  I used the large "writing tablet" lines so that Nate could see how his writing is supposed to look.

 Photo can be seen here and here.

I am very pleased with our first week of school.  It only took us about 2 hours per day to  complete all subjects except for math.  I'm still waiting to receive the math curriculum.  Evan is going to 4-H Mini Society Camp (I'll post about this next week) this week so he will not start school until next week.  It has been nice having this time where I can focus on Nathan alone and get into the swing of working with him as up until now we've done very little formal "school". 

Here is a very cute pic of my little scholar!

Until next time!

~Linda~

The last two weeks have been crazy for me.  Evan went on a week-long vacation to Kentucky with some friends of ours.  I didn't realize how much of a help he was until he wasn't here for a week.    This week he had his birthday party with his friends.  We had six boys over.  They were supposed to camp out in the back yard, but as soon as they got set up in the tent, the bottom fell out!  they came running in the house wet and yelling.  I told one of the boy's mother that it sounded like and Indian war party invading our home!

Well, here are a few picures of the party!

Here is a picture of the cake and a couple of his friends.  Elizabeth's head is there in the bottom.  I didn't realize that until I uploaded this picutre! LOL  Anyway, we bought those trick candles which are like 4 times as much as normal candles, and they didn't work!  Oh well!  We still enjoyed the cake!

The boys were spread out all over the living room with their sleeping bags!  The Birthday Boy got the couch!

A sleep over tradition at our house.  The last person to wake up gets "dog-piled"!  Cousin Donovan was the unfortunate victim this year! 

The boys had a blast, and I'm sure they can't wait for next year.  For some reason, Evan's birthday party is always a much anticipated event by his friends and they discuss it  all year! Last year they camped on an island in a lake near our house and played paintball.  This year was much more calm.  After the sleep over, we went to see Alvin and the Chipmunks at the free summer movie (I don't recommend this movie, it's not very good, and I felt some of the lyrics and dancing were inappropriate for kids - or adults for that matter).  We are having all the grandparents, aunts and uncles over Sunday for cake and ice cream.  Nathan is already planning his party and it's not till September!

I can't believe my "baby" is eleven already.  Time keeps marching!

~Linda~

As homeschooling mothers, we focus so much on our children's education.  However, what are we doing about our own continuing education?  The longer I homeschool, the more inadequate I feel for the task.  While it's true that I learn a great deal right along with my children, I feel that I need to add something more to my own education.  I was a product of the public school system who just barely "squeaked by" to graduate.  Somehow I managed to come away with a love of reading which has led me to pursue learning  on my own since highschool.  I want to instill a love of learning in my children and encourage them to enjoy a lifetime of learning.

So how do I accomplish this lofty goal? Well, I don't know for sure.  Since my oldest is only ten, I don't have any time proven techniques!  However, I do have a couple of ideas that I pray will work.  The first is to make learning fun.  My children enjoy reading great stories and I try to accomidate them as much as possible.  I also like to add in as many fun projects and field trips as possible. 

Another idea is to follow their interests.  For example, both of my older boys are fascinated with all things to do with army, war and weapons.  We recently went to our county museum and the boys were able to read about some Revolutionary and Civil War heroes from our area.  They were also able to see memorabilia from actual soldiers who served in WWII and the current War in Iraq.  This was living history, something they could relate to because they were interested in the subject.  They weren't nearly as fascinated with the history of education and the one room school house display!

My final and, right now I feel, most important idea is for them to see me learning and enjoying the learning.  With that goal in mind, I let my kids see me "doing school" in the evenings.  How do I "do school"?  Well, mostly by reading and discussing the books I read with them.  I am using the Pre Year 7 Book List from Ambleside Online.  I have added a Shelfari Book Shelf to my site so that you can see what I'm reading or have read for my school! 

I'm excited to be able to share my love of reading and learning with my children.  I hope they can see that.  I hope that my passion for books will instill that same love of books and learning in them.  I hope to see them pursuing a lifetime of learning when they are grown... and passing that love on to my future grandchildren!

~Linda~

Here is a picture of my family. From the left in the back is me, Elizabeth, Jeremiah and Ben.  Down front is Nathan and Evan.

Well, now you know what we look like.  I want to post some more pics soon.

~Linda~

We have been very busy this week with our summer cleaning.  I want to get the house clean and in order for the new school year.  We have worked very hard all week and we are starting to wear down.  I had an ambitious goal this week of deep cleaning the entire house.  Thankfully we live in a small house.  (The only time I'm glad of our small house is when it's time to clean.) 

Here is our ambitious to-do list for the week:

Monday - Clean the boys room, clean Elizabeth's room - this included going through toys and getting rid of broken toys or ones that were not played with.  We also had to clean up the rest of the house from the weekend!

Tuesday - Kitchen - We scrubbed the front of all the appliances and cabinets.  Cleaned out from under the stove and all along the baseboards.  Cleaned out three cabinets and the "catch-all" drawer.  Cleaned the top of the fridge and dusted the ceiling.

Wednesday - Scrub bathrooms and the hallway floor. 

Today - I plan to clean up my bedroom.  My room is where we put everything that doesn't have a place of it's own.  I also plan to clean up the laundry room.  Actually, I confess, I should be working on my chores right now, but I'm using blogging as an excuse!  

Friday - I plan to clean the Living room, dusting, sorting, cleaning knick-knacks, etc.   By the end of the day tomorrow, the entire house should have had a thorough going over, except for the windows. 

Here is our Plan of Action:

On Sunday, I made a check list for each room.  We set the timer for 15 minutes and work with no water or bathroom breaks for 15 minutes.  Then we stop for 2-3 minutes for drinks and potty breaks.  We work like this for 1 hour and then we take a 15 minute break.  After 2 hours we take a longer break for lunch or snacks or what-have-you.  This has worked very well, and we've only taken about 3 hours each day to complete our checklists.  I have given leeway for the younger kids to be able to take more breaks and for Elizabeth (2) to completely opt. out of cleaning if she wants. 

I admit that housekeeping is not my strong point, but I've been convicted recently by this verse:

"Every wise woman buildeth her house: but the foolish plucketh it down with her hands."  Proverbs 14:1

I've also begun memorizing Proverbs 31.  As much as I don't want to admit it, I believe that if we are to be the wives and mothers that God intends us to be, we need to improve our homemaking abilities.  We know that there is lots of info out there to help us with this, here are just a few resources that I've tried:

Flylady

Managers of Their Homes (MOTH)

Large Family Logistics

I'm sure there are plenty more out there.  I still haven't found the perfect fit for me.  I am currently trying a sort of combo of all three of the above.  But I think that my most powerful weapon is prayer.  The Lord wants me to be a successful homemaker so that I can be a good wife and mother.  I admit that I've often overlooked prayer as the source of power I need to get everything accomplished.  I encourage you to try prayer!  Ask the Lord for the wisdom and strength that you need to get your house in order!  Be a "Wise Woman"!

~Linda~

So I'm thinking about the next year while we're taking our summer break.  Honestly, I'd be happy to start school tomorrow, but my kids are enjoying their break.  Actually, we are doing some things right now.  We are reading the Little House on the Prairie series and learning how to do notebooking.  I'm trying to get us in the habit of notebooking during the summer so that we will be ready when we start up in August. 

I've asked my husband, Jeremiah, to help me plan a summer schedule and a school schedule so that we can easily transition back into our full school day.  So I composed a list of things that I'd like to schedule time for.  Here is the list of summer activities I want to schedule:

Quiet time for Evan and me

Morning chore time to follow breakfast

Family Bible time - I will use my Betty Luken Bible Felts

2 seperate Read Aloud times  - one for the Little House Books and one for Parables From Nature

Notebooking Time

Deep cleaning time in the afternoon - to get the things I don't have time for during the school year

Personal reading time for me

Here are the items I want to schedule for the school year:

Time for individual subjects:

Bible - we will have a Bible time with all children and then a more in depth study with Evan in the afternoons - I am using Bible study workbooks from here.

Notebooking - our writing will be accomplished through this

Math

Spell to Write and Read

Read Aloud - History, Science, Literature, Poetry - We use Sonlight for these subjects

Reading Practice for Nathan

Reading for Evan

Grammar Ace

Vocabulary Vine

Dictation and Copy work

Foreign Language

Geography - we actually do this with Sonlight history, but I want to add in some map coloring to go into our notebooks - Does anyone know any free resources for black line maps?

On Friday's I want to do these things:

Studies of Shakespeare, Composers, and Artists - I will use resources from Ambleside Online for this

Games

Experiments

Special Projects

Art

Here are a few more things I need to incorporate:

Chore time - morning and afternoon

Preschool time with Elizabeth

Quiet time for Evan and me

Reading time for me

We also do Co-op on Thursday afternoons. 

I realize that this is a lot, but this is what I want to get accomplished.  If I can't get this stuff done between 8 am and 9 pm along with all the other stuff I have to do, then I will cut stuff from the list.  Also, some things like Grammar Ace and Vocabulary Vine don't have to be done daily.  Neither do science or history.  So I could do Grammar Ace on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Vocabulary Vine on Tuesday and Thursday for example.  Maybe I'll do one day of science reading and one day for experiments, then I can do some other reading or another subject during the "science" time slot.  I plan to discuss this with Jeremiah and to really pray about my schedule before I implement it. 

Another idea that I'm really excited about is that some friends and I are getting together, just the girls, one day next month to work on our plans for next year.  This will be a nice time without the kids to distract us where we can really focus on what our goals are. 

Hopefully with God's help and my planning, this will be our best school year ever!

~Linda~

I have been reading some posts on an e-mail loop I'm on that discusses the curriculum that I use.  The discussions lately have centered on the study of science and our preferred curriculum for science.  Because it is a Christian curriculum and a Christian group, I was shocked to find out that several of the women don't believe in a young Earth and that they believe that God used Evolution to create the Earth.  This saddens me greatly to know that the enemy is using Christians to spread his lies. 

The theory of evolution was put forth by an athiest who wanted to disprove the existence of God.  When Darwin came up with his theory, all scientists knew and believed that God created the world in seven literal days just as the Bible contends.  There are many problems with Christians believing in evolution.

1.  Given the nature of the Bible and it's claims to be the inspired Word of God, we have to believe it in it's entirety or not at all.  Either the Bible is the inspired Word of God, or it isn't.  We can't pick and choose what to believe.  When we read something in the Bible that makes common sense (such as God created the world and everything in it in seven days), we shouldn't try to seek another sense.  In other words, we should take the Bible for what it says.  The Bible is NOT all symbolism.  Most of it is literal.  If we can't take the creation account  as truth, then how can we take Jesus' death and resurection as truth?  How can salvation be real?  How can we believe any of it if we can't believe all of it?

2. The Hebrew term for "day" in the first chapter of Genesis literally translates into a 24 hour period.

3. The scientific evidence does NOT support evolution.  If the earth evolved and animals evolved into other species, we should see evidence in the fossil record, and we do not.  Consider, if the earth really is billions of years old and there are even just one million evolved species, we should see somewhere fossils of a half bird half fish or something, right?  There just are not any fossils that support the idea of animals evolving into other species.

4.  In Genesis, when the Lord finished His creation, he called it "very good."  The NLT actually says, "Then God looked over all He had made, and He saw that it was excellent in every way."  (Gen. 1:30)  Why would God call a cycle of death and destruction "excellent in every way"?  He just wouldn't.  God intended for us to live a perfect life in perfect communion with Him in the garden, in paradise!  Animals killing each other and survival of the fittest is NOT paradise!

5. Genesis says that all animals and people were vegetarians until after the flood.  Animals would not have killed each other for food until after the flood. (Gen. 1:29-30 & 9:2-3)

6.  Evolution is a tool of the enemy to turn people against God.  Plain and simple.  How can we as Christians, in good conscience, continue to be the devil's advocate and help him spread his propaganda.  Do you know that the Bible actually predicts that this will happen?  2 Peter 3:5-6 "They deliberately forget that God made the heavens by the word of his command and he brought the earth up from the water and surrounded it with water.  Then he used the water to destroy the world with a mighty flood." (NLT)

7. Scientific evidence supports Noah's flood.  Ken Ham from Answers in Genesis says that if the account of Noah's flood is true you would expect to find "billions of dead things laid down by water all over the earth."  When you study the fossil record, that's exactly what you do find, "billions of dead things laid down by water all over the earth." 

There is too much at stake for us to be spreading the lies of the devil.  Our children's eternal souls are at stake here.  Don't believe me?  Let me share this quote from The Case for Christ Student edition  by Lee Strobel. 

"I could take you back to the very place where I lost my faith in God.  I was 14 years old.  At Prospect High School in Mount Prospect, Illinios, the biology classroom was on the third floor in the northwest corner of the building.  I was sitting in the second row from the windows, third chair from the front, when I first learned about Darwin's theory of evolution... Although the teacher didn't address this aspect of evolution, its biggest implication was obvious to me: If evolution explains the origin and development of life, then God was out of a job!... If evolution explains life, then the first chapters of the Bible must be mythology or wishful thinking.  And if that were true of the first chapters, why not the rest?  Jesus could not have been God.  Miracles aren't possible; they're just the attempts by pre-scientific people to make sense out of what they couldn't understand but which now science can explain."

I urge you to please  do your research here!  We can't afford for our children to lose their faith in God over this LIE!  Answers in Genesis has some terrific material.  Vision Forum's Jonathan Park CD's teach this stuff to your kids in a fun and effortless way.  The video series Incredible Creatures that Defy Evolution is wonderful.  I picked up my copy at Wal-mart.  I know that you can get them from several different curriculum suppliers.  I'm sure there is much more out there, this is just what I've used with my own children. 

"In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth."  Genesis 1:1

~Linda~

Hello,

I'm Linda Botkin.  I've been married to Jeremiah for nearly 12 years now.  He is a cabinet maker.  He and his dad are in business together.  We have four adorable children.  Evan is our oldest.  He will be 11 in a couple of weeks.  He is going into the sixth grade next year.  He loves to read.  He is "all boy."  He loves football and shoots shotguns on the 4-H Shooting Sports team.  Nathan is 5.  He is the most adorable bundle of energy you've ever met.  I always say that Nathan has two speeds: super turbo charged and asleep.  There is no middle ground with Nate! Elizabeth is our little 2 year old princess.  She is so sweet and into everything girlie.  Finally there is Baby Ben.  He is only 3 months old.  He is such a joy to all of us.

I listed my blog in the "ecclectic" catagory because we have used a variety of things and methods over the years.  We've homeschooled since birth.  Since then I've tried unschooling, classical (The Well Trained Mind),  Charlotte Mason, pretty much the only thing we haven't used is textbooks.  We are currently using Sonlight and the Charlotte Mason approach.  I continue to be drawn to Charlotte Mason over and over again.  For lots of good info about Charlotte Mason check out Ambleside Online.

Well that's us in a nutshell.  I hope you'll stop in to here more of my rambling later!

~Linda~