Sometimes I feel as if I'm on top of the world, excelling as a wife and mother, ordering my home and tasks with ease, accomplishing more than I imagine possible. I am confident and energetic. I feel like an achiever and a conqueror.
Those moments of grandeur are fleeting. All too often they are followed by mediocrity -- days of chaos and struggling to keep all the plates spinning without dropping anything. Weeks when I am rushing from one task to another -- or simply wandering around somewhat aimlessly, overwhelmed by all that I SHOULD be doing. In these moments, I am merely persevering.
In the moments of grandeur, those near-perfect days when I am feeling that maybe, I might be, almost, just a little bit of a Super Mom -- I think I am doing it all. I am the great one. I have my act together.
But when the chaos returns, and I'm trying to figure out what I've done wrong -- I have to admit that I am not SuperMom. I can't maintain the grandiose days forever. I am merely an imperfect human relying on God's grace.
Everyone has revolving (and evolving) moments of grandeur and mediocrity. It is just life. And life is much less about me than I often believe. It isn't really about what I'm doing RIGHT or what I'm doing WRONG. It's not all about my success and failure.
So in these days of mediocrity, disorder, distraction, and even laziness -- I am once again humbled, but also hopeful that the more organized and productive days will return. I like those moments of grandeur more than the days of just trudging along.
But I persevere, each and every day -- even when I'm not in my most glorious state. Even when I'm merely mediocre.
Galations 6:9 "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up."
Hebrews 12:1, 2 "Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, ane let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith ... "
1 Thessalonians 4:11, 12 "Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your hands, just as we told you, so that our daily life may win the respect of outsiders ... "
In a former life that I now dimly remember, I occasionally got free music as a sales associate for The Ark Bookstore in Denver. Normally, the samples were of new, relatively unknown groups that their label was trying to push. There was the rare exception, however, and those were moments that made the low wages and long hours almost worth it. Chief among those moments was when our Sparrow representative stopped by with a pre-release copy of Steve Taylor's 1993 album, Squint. It was the last—so far—studio album that Taylor would release, capping a decade-long career in the Christian music industry. Most folks don't know who Steve Taylor is. However, most Christians have likely heard the Newsboys' song, Shine, which Steve produced and wrote the lyrics to. In fact, Steve's partnership with the Newsboys is what most credit them for their success.
Steve's music has had a huge impact on my life. Songs like Hero, Meltdown, On The Fritz and so many others fed my spirit when I faced religious hypocrisy and pretentious spirituality at a young age where I needed truth and solidarity. Truth confronts, but it also comforts. One of the best examples is in the song, "Curses," where the chorus (echoing Psalm 37:25) repeats,
Never have I seen the righteous forsaken
Never abandoned in the floodlands
Never have I seen their children out begging
Never have I seen them slip through your hands
This simple refrain would echo in my mind every time I faced worries about making mortgage or buying groceries. It remains a reminder that not only is God faithful, but that I am not the first of his children to encounter financial difficulty.
There is something else about the chorus. In this modern,"lower-middle class" lifestyle, I tend to forget the meaning of floodlands. Today, modern civilization has flood control. Rivers that used to rage and ravage towns and cities are now harnessed and regulated by dams and reservoirs. The floodlands were areas that were normally dry but prone to extensive inundation. As a result, no one who could afford to build would build in such an area. They tended to be vast areas with thick undergrowth crisscrossed by a myriad of foot trails. The only inhabitants were the poorest of the poor, vagrants living a nomadic lifestyle and eating hand-to-mouth. If a river were to flood, they would be among the first victims, sometimes the only victims. Being abandoned in the floodlands would never be by choice. It would be the last stop before dying.
God is always mindful of our situation. He never lets us slip through His hands. We make mistakes, but He never does. Also, notice what it doesn't say. It doesn't say that we would never see the floodlands, or walk through them. He may have us pass through the floodlands for any number of reasons, not the least of which would be to reach out to those are also in desperate need. Yet here is the one thing that brings me such comfort: we will never be abandoned! We have a God who carries us through the fiercest storms and the highest waves. Most importantly, when it's all over, we get to go home with Him. That's worth any trek we might face here on earth.
Just in case one thinks I'm blowing smoke, I'll offer a subjective proof, one of many small miracles God has done for me and my family. Two weeks ago, my mind turned to Christmas. It dawned on me that we might not make mortgage, let alone have the ability to purchase gifts this year for my children. Rather than fret, I told God about it and asked Him to please provide Christmas gifts for my kids. Later that week, I got a call from our church saying that a family wanted to bless a family in need with Christmas presents and asked if I would be interested. "Are you kidding? I was just praying about that this week!" I told them. Needless to say, everyone was blessed at how God worked the whole thing. He usually isn't so blatant and obvious. God uses subtle and practical ways for us most of the time. But once in awhile he offers us unmistakable signs that He's there. With God, we are never abandoned.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free,
in a state of civilization,
it expects what never was and never will be."
~~ Thomas Jefferson
The American Heritage Education Foundation is a non-profit organization created to help educate our children in the history of our nation and the philosophies upon which it was established. They believe that the focus on diversity in our schools is tearing the country apart and threatening its survival, and that it needs to be balanced with a study of our country's history. They focus on four themes in US history: Freedom, Unity, Progress, and Responsibility.
In order to promote these four themes, the American Heritage Foundation created an American history/citizenship curriculum for K-12. They provide this $150 value curriculum free of charge as a free PDF download, as PDF documents on a free CD-ROM, or for $19.50 in a printed notebook format.
The curriculum is provided in 3 levels: elementary, middle school, and high school. They also provide a Spanish language variation in the elementary level. Each level of curriculum is over 180 pages long, with information for the teacher, lesson plans, group activities and individual activities.
These materials are designed for public school use, and some of the activities are obviously created with a larger group in mind than a typical homeschool family (like the Colonial America Simulation Game). These could be adapted with some effort, or they could be used in a homeschool group or co-op setting. Now, I will admit that adapting materials intended for a public school classroom to the family homeschool isn't always easy, but sometimes it can be worth it.
Although the American Heritage Foundation is a secular organization, the curriculum refers to the founding father's belief in God and the Bible with factual respect. The Christian beliefs of the Colonial settlers and founding fathers is not ignored, but it is still a secular curriculum. This makes it suitable for classroom use, or use in a homeschool group with members of varying beliefs.
Some of the citizenship topics covered include:
The American Revolution
George Washington
U.S. Presidents
The Declaration of Independence
The US Constitution
The Great Seal
Thanksgiving
The Bill of Rights
Our National Documents
Entrepeneurs in American History
The United States of America's Flag
The Star-Spangled Banner
The Gettysburg Address
The National Motto
The Statue of Liberty
The Pledge of Allegiance
America the Beautiful
What is An American?
The three levels include much of the same materials for the teacher, with age-appropriate differences in activities and discussion questions. This means they can be used together in a homeschool or co-op setting to teach the same material to all the students. This is NOT a complete American history curriculum, but can be used to supplement your American history or US government studies.
For myself, I have to admit that I will not use all these lessons and activities, but I will use some of them. Most of our citizenship lessons are oral discussions. We aren't likely to use most of the worksheets, but we are more likely to use the activity ideas. I think this curriculum lends itself to a homeschool group or co-op more easily than to an individual family situation.
BUT, it's a FREE curriculum!! Request your own copy and check it out for yourself. Even if it's not something you'll use regularly, there may be some helpful information or even one activity that makes it worthwhile. Get it for your homeschool group ... or you might fall in love with it, and take the time to make it work for your family. You have nothing to lose!
If you'd like to help promote the American Heritage Foundation, you can donate to their non-profit organization. These donations will help them continue to share their curriculum free of charge to public schools, private schools, and home schools.
This item was provided free for our review as a member of the TOS Homeschool Crew. We received no other compensation, and this review is our honest opinion. Click the TOS Homeschool Crew banner at the top to read more reviews on this product by other Homeschool Crew members.
My wife came up and told me that Sesame Street had done another spoof. This time it was a skit called "Desperate Horse-wives." I got a groan when I asked if the characters were less than neigh-borly.
In all seriousness, I'm not that thrilled with how the folks at Sesame Street parody network TV shows. While I am sure that the creators mean simple and innocent fun with their skits, I believe it also sends the message that the shows they represent are normal and acceptable in normal households. I'm not sure how normal we are, but Desperate Housewives is a show that we do not let in our house. My children know that when Extreme Makeover Home Edition is over and they hear, "Previously on Desperate Housewives..." power to the television is to be immediately terminated. It's almost comical how they scramble to turn it off, as if they were diving on a live grenade.
While it may not be a grenade, many TV shows are painfully difficult for us to watch these days. Some of the shows are so corrosive, I wonder how anyone can possibly watch them. Consequently, some nights we simply don't turn on the television set. Instead, we will read a good book or play a game together, if we don't split up to do separate things. We avoid the shows not because we like feeling superior or cerebral, but because we've found that these shows actively interfere with our hearts and minds.
8-9Summing it all up, friends, I'd say you'll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies. (Philippians 4:8, The Message)
I can't come out with a list of TV shows that I think are bad or good. The verse above should be more than enough for the average Christian, especially when it's paired with the conviction of the Holy Spirit. Each person is responsible only to God for decisions like these. However, Jesus did give us a special charge with children.
"And if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a large millstone tied around his neck. Mark 9:42 (NIV)
To me this verse means that God takes the destruction of children's innocence very seriously. This is why the Sesame Street skits irritate me. It feels like they're playing with fire. Look smart all you want, but I would prefer if they would just stick with "C is for cookie," and the yip-yip monsters.
What? You've never heard of the yip-yip monsters? Yip Yip
Do you remember the High School Guidance Counselor and all the tests you had to take to help you decide where your skills and interests were? I loved those tests! Well, ACT Advantage has an online career planning software called Discover.
As their website states, the Discover software helps students:
Assess interests, abilities and job values.
Explore occupations, majors and schools.
Build an education plan that relates to career plans.
Improve job-seeking skills and develop a resume.
My 14 year old daughter loves personality tests and exploring her interests, so she enjoyed her time on the Discover website. She loved digging through the many career options it presented to her, and looking at the education requirements for each career. It helped her to see what careers were available to pursue, and what would be required for each career. At one point, I teased her that this was really the "stay in school, get a degree" propaganda machine since it lays out what your projected future income would be with each level of education you complete: GED, high school diploma, 2 year degree, 4 year degree, graduate degree. It also included information on scholarships and financial aid, to help plan how to pay for college.
After seeing all the options the Discover assessment provided her, my daughter then started removing fields of study and career paths from her portfolio. Since she doesn't really want to go on to a master's degree, she removed jobs that REQUIRED a graduate degree, for instance. This narrowed her career planning portfolio down to a more realistic and manageable list of careers that interest her most. When she was done with her portfolio, we were able to print it so she could keep this idea list as she continues through high school. We discussed that the high school courses she chooses can be important, as well. If she wants to pursue a science career, she'd need to focus more on math and science in high school than if she wanted to pursue a career in art.
There were some weird things that came up. She isn't really interested in math, yet many science careers that lean heavily on math did appear on her final assessment. I'm sure they were triggered by other interests or values of hers. But it was still good for her to look at those options and consider them.
One of the benefits I see is that homeschool parents don't always know all the career options out there in a specific field, or what educational requirements that career path would have. 14 yo A was looking at careers I hadn't heard of, and wouldn't have been able to advise her on educational requirements at all.
Unfortunately, this is a secular software provided by a secular company. There were very few faith-based ministry careers listed and many Christian colleges were not included in the college database. I also had to remind my daughter that God already has a plan for her life, and that if she is following Him ... He'll guide and direct her into a career. For the Christian student, the Discover assessment can be helpful, but thankfully it is not all we rely on.
The Discover assessment is available with a 3 month license for $19.95, or a 6 month license for $24.95. This can be helpful both for freshman looking at what courses to study in their high school years, as well as for seniors preparing to apply for colleges and scholarships, and choosing their major course of study.
Working through the Discover assessment was a helpful process for my daughter. It helped her see what her options were, and also helped to take some of the fear and worry out of the future. It was a fun way for her to explore her future plans and goals.
This item was provided free for review purposes, as members of the TOS Homeschool Crew. There was no other compensation, and this is our honest review.
Click the TOS Homeschool Crew banner at the top to read more reviews on this product by other Homeschool Crew members.
In the past I've made fall wreaths, and table displays with cloth leaves. It's been a few years since I created anything, and my original wreath has long since been tossed out.
This year, Steve found a Fall fabric on sale and asked me to make a table cloth. He had 3 yards of this plaid tablecloth with candy corn and pumpkins on it, but it wasn't quite wide enough for our table. So we also chose a burnt orange fabric that matched it to attach for the sides.
I cut the orange fabric in half, lengthwise, to make two sides for our table cloth. Then I sewed it with straight seams onto the long sides, and zig-zagged the seam edges for extra strength. After that I folded the short edges under and hemmed them.
It took less than an hour to sew our table cloth, and we all love it! We usually keep a clear vinyl cover on our table, so we slipped this under that. We can still wipe off our table after meals, but we also can enjoy the rich fall colors.
In retrospect, I wish I had cut the orange fabric in thirds, and then cut the dark plaid fabric in half. I think an orange stripe down the center would have been a nice touch.
Perhaps you've spent time searching the internet for a free worksheet on bird anatomy to print before, and you've found one of the 5000+ free worksheets available at ABC Teach's website. I have. But I hadn't ever really looked at what was available with membership in ABC Teach until we were given a chance to review it for the TOS Homeschool Crew.
ABC Teach has over 35,000 worksheets that members can access, as well as worksheet generators for crossword puzzles, word searches, and handwriting worksheets. When we were reviewing the Sue Patrick Workbox System, I found myself searching ABC Teach's subscription database for logic puzzles, sudoku puzzles, grammar worksheets, and sentence-structure worksheets to place in their workboxes. I printed out worksheets that went along with our history studies, as well. When I wanted to give my daughters some math practice from a different perspective, I printed worksheets on fractions, multiplication, and algebra. They do have worksheets on just about everything, for pre-K through 8th grade!
The worksheets I printed from ABC Teach looked great. They printed clearly and had cute graphics. Their search engine worked well, and found all the Autumn worksheets for me when I was looking for another workbox activity. I printed Autumn acrostic worksheets for my children, to get them thinking and writing creatively.
Although we had a good experience with our ABC Teach review membership, it's not something I'm likely to purchase. To be honest, in our homeschool, I just don't look for worksheets to print often enough to justify the expense. We use curricula that includes its own worksheets, and we do lots of things via discussion instead of worksheets. I prefer having my children actively involved in something, or reading, and it isn't often that I need a worksheet to help them understand a concept. To make use of an ABC Teach membership in my home, I'd be assigning worksheets as busy work, and that isn't a direction I want to go. I'd rather spend the $40 on buying more curriculum or supplemental curriculum for my kids.
However, for those who are designing their own curriculum, filling workboxes, leading co-ops, teaching classes, or needing to complete portfolios of their children's work to show to school boards or skeptical family members, a membership in ABC Teach would save them a lot of time. They wouldn't have to search the internet for just the right free worksheet, and they wouldn't have to try to create their own worksheets each week.
ABC Teach's membership costs $40.00 per year, or $70.00 for a 2 year subscription. But you can purchase it for 50% off through Homeschool Buyer's Co-op, now through November 30, 2009. If you're intrigued by what ABC Teach has to offer, you can see a video tour, and a list of their worksheet categories HERE.
We received a free one-month trial membership in ABC Teach in order to write this review. Click the TOS Homeschool Crew banner at the top to read more reviews on this product by other Homeschool Crew members.
The leaves are half off the trees this week, but I wanted to share some Fall photos I took last week, when the leaves had just finished turning. It was one of those days where I just went, "Oh! Wow! Everything's yellow!" It may have been that way for a few days but it suddenly hit me, and I had to take photos. I'm so glad I took the time to do it since the tree is half-bare now.
A yellow carpet across the lawn ...
The sweet little tree ...
My kids wanted to know why I took this picture ... I just liked it.
The canopy ...
Our friendly scarecrow, guarding the back door ...
The cute little tree from the side, looks a little different from here. I truly had not noticed its tilt before.
The scarecrow guarding our driveway ...
Just a couple of our pumpkins in the rain ...
That's what Fall has looked like at our house this year. Every now and then we just have to take a moment to enjoy (and capture) the beauty of a season.
I strongly suspect that those who would spend 30 minutes decrying Federal corruption and bureaucracy wouldn't spend 30 seconds on Google looking up who's on their local school board. If there was ever a weak point in democracy, this is it.
Writings on our lives as a larger, Christian, homeschooling, homesteading, quiverfull, attached parenting family as we draw closer to each other and our Lord.
