I just finished reading Hittite Warrior by Joanne Williamson. The traditional way of study has been to seperate the study of God's plan for the Jews, his Chosen People, from the ordinary study of ancient civilizations. For one thing, most modern texts compartmentalize the various ancient peoples. Egypt is studied, then Babylonia, then Greece, then Rome. The tie between these cultures is largely seen as simply chronological; one came before or after the others. But there is a more important relation between all cultures. They are all moving toward or away from the central hitorical event of all time: the incarnation of the Son of God. Hittite Warrior shows the relationship between all these ancient peoples at one time in history, bringing into clear focus, the connection between salvation history and the rest of the events of the world. This story, based on an episode in the Bible's Book of Judges, took place about 200 years before the days of Saul and David, and about 1200 years before the birth of Christ. I highly recommend this book for anyone over the age of 10 years, especially those who are studying the ancient world!

Have you ever wondered...

What Light did God divide from the darkness on the first day of Creation if the sun and moon and stars were not created until the third day?

I want to welcome my pilot homeschool students, Mark, Trina, and Savannah! They are leaving public school to be homechooled and are already working very hard. I will be here to help them get started and to make sure they have the right curriculum. We all know the first few weeks are a little stressful and even difficult at times so show them support and leave encouraging comments!

Right here...click on the comment button...do it now!

WOW! We just got Winston Grammer in the mail today and have already tried it! It is so easy! You get a set of colored cards, each color a different particle of speech.  The student arranges the cards (one per word) to identify each word of a sentence you have written on the board (or piece of paper). To correct his own work, he turns the cards over. Each card has it's own rules on the back! Then you follow that exercise with a sentence diagramming worksheet. These are very easy because you start out with only two colored cards and blank ones for ones you haven't learned yet. So you only have to find the nouns and the articles in the first two lessons. Ryan loved doing this lesson! It is SO painless that I can't even argue about why or if it should be taught. This is just plain fun!

We even came up with a way that all three kids can do the same workbook without having to make copies! We carefully tore all the pages out of the workbook and placed them in page protectors. They can use dry-erase markers (in pretty bright colors) to diagram the sentences. They use the colored cards (rules are on the back) to self-correct their work. All you do is dialog with them asking them "why or why not..."  (they learn by correcting) Then just wipe them clean!

Mrs. Winston must have made a fortune with this wise and creative way of teaching!  I got the basic and the advanced sets together from eBay (used) for $35.00!

I found a Preying Mantis in the nursery today. He is about three inches long! We have been feeding him grass hoppers. I  wonder how long he'll stick around? He has a ferocious appetite!

Ryan has been doing a lesson per day in math for a whole week now... indepenently! He is doing very well too! Well, until today. I corrected his lesson from yesterday and found that he had missed 9 problems. I went back through those nine and found that the Saxon Textbook shows you, with each problem, the chapter in which the concept was first introduced! All nine problems that he got wrong had a number (6) next to it. We reviewed Lesson 6 this morning, then he repeated the written practice from yesterday, AND GOT THEM ALL RIGHT! Oh, How I love Saxon Math!  It won't let him forget anything!

Year One in TOG begins at the beginning, with Creation. Last night I brought up a couple of questions that came to me during Ryan's lessons this week. Before I knew it, my husband was searching the web, I had my nose in the concordance, and Ryan was digging in deep with the King James version! We finally decided to use our "shout out" and called a friend for help. There was a large group of people at her house for a bible study and soon they were all digging in as well. We answered the first question but it soon led to another and another! We had such a good time! So, in case you are wondering...the original question was...why did God feel the need to put the Tree of Life in Eden, even before Adam and Eve sinned? Were they not immortal in the beginning? I am not going to spoil your study and give you the answer, but I will tell you that Genesis is a very fascinating book to study!

Our Lord and our God. We joy in Thee. Without Thy Help we could not face unafraid the year before us.

I stand between the years. The Light of My Presence is flung across the year to come - the radiance of the Sun of Righteousness. Backward, over the past year, is My Shadow thrown, hiding trouble and sorry and disappointment.

Dwell not on the past - only on the present. Only use the past as the trees use My Sunlight to absorb it, to make from it in after days the warming fire-rays. So store only the blessings from Me, the Light of the World. Encourage yourselves by the thought of these.

Bury every fear of the future, of poverty for those dear to you, of suffering, of loss. Bury all thought of unkindness and bitterness, all your dislikes, your resentments, your sense of failure, your disappointment in others and in yourselves, your gloom, your despondency, and let us leave them all, buried, and go forward to a new and risen life.

Remember that you must not see as the world sees.  I hold the year in My Hands - in trust for you. But I shall guide you one day at a time.

Leave the rest with Me. You must not anticipate the gift by fears or thoughts of the days ahead.

And for each day I shall supply the wisdom and the strength.

Ryan started reading How Majestic is Thy Name today, and he does not want to put this book down! Not only does it have beautiful pictures of God's creation in it, but it contains the most amazing facts too! Ryan couldn't wait for Dan to get home to share this book with him!

Ryan: How hot do you think the sun is?

Dan: Oh, about 450 degrees?

Ryan: Come on now, we're not baking a pizza!

Me: (fall off my chair and roll on the floor laughing!

I had no idea that Ryan would take such an intrest in the Olympics! He does not play sports and has never even been much of a spectator either. He has spent much of the week watching late into the night!

Our guests departed on Friday, so we took off up north to the Au Sable River to conoe and kayak. Ryan has only used his new kayak once before so he especially enjoyed this trip! It was a beautiful day and did not start raining until we were leaving to go back to camp. On the way back, the hitch broke on the trailer, sending it rocking up on one wheel and spinning out into oncoming traffic! The only prayer I was able to pray quickly was "PLEASE! PLEASE! PLEASE..." followed by a grateful "THANK YOU!!!" as the truck and trailer came to a stop. No one was hurt and the trailer managed to stay upright!

Then, as we loaded the canoe and kayak onto our little 2007 Ford Focus to go home, we discovered that they had to ride upright in the roof top carrier. They went up on a friend's trailer but now we were leaving before anyone else to make it to church. Dan got them all tied down and I thought to myself, "I hope it don't rain much..."  Well, by the time we got to Carson City it had been pouring for an hour. We looked into the canoe and there didn't seem to be much water in there. We got over to the church and forgot that there was a men's meeting. So, we left Dan there and went on to my friend Lynn's house. It continued to rain as we visited and then...Ryan came running in shouting something...I ran out to see...the kayak on top had filled up and tipped the whole thing, rack and all, off the back of the car! There was the canoe, with the kyak inside, resting on the rear edge of the roof of the car. There was already an ugly dent forming. So Ryan grabbed a bucket and bailed about ten gallons of water out while I am trying to hold the thing off the rear window. Still, we couldn't lift it off. Mind you, it was still pouring the whole time! Ryan finally ran down the street a few blocks to the gas station to summon help. A nice young couple came and soon we had all the straps off and the two boats on the ground! Turns out the dent is small. We were able to dab it with some epoxy primer and will soon have it covered with a sporty looking rear spoiler that they make for our car! It sure beats paying the deductable!

It was a blessed weekend as we witnessed the protecting hand of God upon us!

I've found that I must be diligent when it comes to lesson plans! We wasted a lot of time this week without our usual focus. Some of this could be that we have friends coming from Minnesota on Wednesday. They will be staying through the weekend. I have a lesson plan for Ryan for this week but it is only very light independant studies.  We won't be having our regular class time, so we shall see how he does!

I've been struggling to find the right grammer/ writing curriculum for him. So far, everything I've tried has been way over his head. He was labled "learning disabled" in the public school, but I just don't feel convinced of that. I've read so much about the way that kids learn and I really believe that it's possible that I'm the one missing something!  He has absolutely astounded me with his reading! He looked up from his book this week and said, "I used to hate to read, but now I like it!" He is reading better aloud than he was when we started and it's only been a few weeks! We have been taking turns reading aloud. He said it really helps him to hear "how the story is supposed to sound." His comprehension has been slowly improving as well.  I think the reading/writing thing might be like several other areas for him. When the rest of the class fits nicely into that round hole...he got pushed to the square peg area in the back  of the class. I'm going to continue to pray about this and keep searching. I'll let you know what I find!

We were finally able to finish all assignments in all subjects today for the first time! This was with many distractions too! Last week it seemed an impossible feat, but I knew we would get used to the rythm and march right through it! Hooray!!!

Ryan doesn't call me "Rookie Teacher" any more either ;)

As a treat for all the hard work we played Settlers of Catan tonight. I won the first round, and then Dan won. I'll bet it won't be long and Ryan will be winning most every game we play. We have only played with the beginners set up. This game appears to be one that will soon become a favorite for the three of us! 

Our first day of school was so long!!! It seems it took forever to get through what I had planned today. I don't know  how anyone would teach more than one grade or student at a time and I certainly could not do this with young children to care for too! We didn't get everything done but Ryan did very well getting the priorities down! It was a good introduction day. He did tease a bit and said we should call Tapestry "tretchery" but I know he wan't really serious. He did say he liked the way the subjects overlapped and saved him having to do more assingments. We were in school for five hours with another hour spent watching the movie Lost Treasures: Ancient Egyptians. The movie had too many details pertaining to the dynasties for the dialectic students. It would have been better suited for the retoric grades. We will be watching 'The Privilaged Planet' tonight when Dan gets home, and reviewing his Bible reading of Genisis chapter 1. He is now out in the garage tearing apart an old bike which he will be restoring. He and Dan called it Shop Class.

Dan has another week of classes to teach at the community college. He will be creating a science curriculum for Ryan in the few weeks that he has off. It will be based on a 101 class that he teaches in Electricity. Ryan got to choose this from a list that Dan gave him. I have been promised that it won't be too much of a challenge to teach! I am glad we will have some time to get used to our schedule before adding another subject!

...but it wasn't! It was a White-lined Sphinx Hummingbird Moth, hovering over my Butterfly Bushes in the nursery! Those bushes are right next to the Tall Phlox which is this little guys favorite snack! The Phlox will be blooming in a few days and there will be dozens of these sweet little angels in my garden! They are not shy at all and will allow you get get right up close to them! They hover while feeding just like a hummingbird! This is not  my photo but I will try to get a few of my own as more of them come to visit!

This is my son Ryan's first year homeschooling. I have decided to start him next week rather than wait until fall. We are both very excited! We researched tons of different curriculum and settled on Saxon Math and we will be doing a four week trial in Tapestry of Grace (yr 1). We are also going to read through the Old Testement beginning with Genisis, learn the books of the bible and their origins, and do daily Bible Drills so he can learn to find scriptures quickly. Week one we will be watching The Privileged Planet, Unlocking the Mystery of Life, and The Quest for Noah's Flood. I'll give you my reviews on those films right here when we see them!

TOG is so exciting! I am only hesitant to buy it because of the cost, since Ryan is already an 8th grader and he will be my only student, it did not seem worth the investment. We are blessed to have a very nice budget for his homeschooling provided through his survivor benefits from my late husband, but I am still, and always have been a very frugal minded person. We shall try it and see how it goes for a month. This is what our library looks like so far! The ones marked ** were on the TOG reading list.

I am back to give these my rating. One * being poor and five ***** being excellent!

**The Ancient Egyptians by Lila Perl  ***

In Search of King Tut's Tomb - Discovery Toys Hide-and-Seek Puzzle Book ***

**The Golden Goblet by Eloise Jarvis McGraw  *****

National Geographic  - Into the Great Pyramid (DVD)  *****

**How Majestic Is Thy Name by Steve Halliday *****

Secrets Of The Pyramids: National Geographic Maze Adventures ***

National Geographic - Quest for Noah's Flood (DVD)  **

Lift The Lid On Mummies - Jacqueline Dineen (comes with a mummy building kit!)  *

Ancient Mesopotamia: The Sumerians, Babylonians, and Assyrians - Virginia Schomp **

The History Channel: Secrets of the Rosetta Stone (DVD)  ****

The Privileged Planet / Unlocking the Mystery of Life 2-DVD Set  *****WOW*****

I am sure we will add to this list when we visit the library next week! If anyone has used or is using TOG for middle school students and can give me some insight, I would so much apprecite it! For now I must say that the Saxon Teacher's Manual is my newest challenge! I am sure the first few lessons may take more time but we'll get the hang of it!

We took off Saturday afternoon for Carson City, this time to spend  the night in a friends camper so that my husband could drive our son up to Mancelona to stay a week with his grandpa on Sunday. The grandkids were here all week. We stayed in Carson City Sunday and went swimming. There is something about a group of girls and the way that they play when there are no boys included. I guess that could be said the other way around too! My grandaughter cried when we had to leave and my grandson pleaded to stay another night. I took the home on Monday (to Battle Creek) and tolled over 700 miles on the car in three days! It sure is a blessing that Dan has a company vehicle for work during the week!

While I was visiting my friends, their 4 yr. old asked me to take some pictures so he could see himself on my camera. I started taking some pictures of his room,  his bed, his favorite pillow, and before I knew it an idea had hatched in my mind! I took pictures of about 30 items in his house, at angles and focal points that would keep him guessing!  I want to print them up on a board book. I'm going to call it a "LOOK BOOK" that he can share with his little friends and they can all find where in the house the picture was taken! I will show how it turns out in a later blog.

It's going to be another very warm day. I could not work in the outside nursery yesterday because it was so hot. I watered very early in the morning and started to clean pots (removing dead leaves, weeds, and inspect for insects) but only made it 1/3 of the way down the first row when I was forced to stop by the heat wave. I went out and finished another row and a half last night while the children ran about catching fire-flies. I also heard them begin a game of "baseball" which very quickly morphed into a play-act when a player was "injured" and hauled away in an "ambulance" (our very old Radio Flyer).

When I went out today, I was thankful to see that it had rained last night! I checked carefully to see if it had been significant because I've been fooled before! By the time I got down to the nursery, I realized that indeed...I still needed to water. Everything else seemed satisfied with last night's refreshments EXCEPT those guys in the gallon pots! I lifted one and felt the disappointing lightness of it, then started down the first row with my wand. As I water I notice that they really don't look like they need it. The dirt on the top is a dark color, as if it is wet, but the need is confirmed when I dig a finger down below the surface. I think I will put a rain gauge near the house so that I can tell immediately how much of the drink has fallen. In the mean time...I prepare for another scorcher and wonder if my spirit is just like those gallon pots. Am I appearing to be quenched on the surface but finding myself needy at a deeper level? I must have enough of God's Holy Spirit within me to go around! Enough to stand strong, healthy, and unwilted against the elements of this world on a daily basis. I will look into that today as I seek shelter from the scorching sun.

My very old Radio Flyer (on a cooler day!)

Drip...

Drip...

Drop!

Dave...I call him Dad. My own father died when I was just 13 yrs. old and my mom passed away three years ago. Dave always wanted a large family but only had a son, whom he raised alone. I brought 4 children along when Dan and I married. (My late husband passed away just after mom).

 Dad loves the busy, cluttered, noise! Dad lives in Manceloa, Michigan. A long drive to visit but we do manage to see him once every couple of months. He came to visit this weekend and I painted an old lawn ornament of his for him. Can you tell he liked it?