From the Heart:

A key lesson in our home this week was from 1 Corinthians 10:31  So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.

I especially started thinking about relationship issues – you know, just the little niggles that go on in family life.  Whatever you do, (read – however you fix your niggles) do it for the glory of God.  How can how we relate to each other in our home bring glory to God?  So often the niggles come because someone wants to ‘fix’ someone else and yet Jesus told us to love oneanother – not fix one another – so to love each other (even in the midst of a niggle) will bring glory to God.  How?   Well, the only way we can love in the midst of a niggle is because of Jesus love to us and if we can pass that on to others, then we bring glory to God because we are not loving in our own strength but in God’s.  These are just some thoughts that I’ve been thinking about – haven’t shared them with the kids yet.  Waiting for the next niggle!

Our Week:

Our week was pretty busy.

Josh went to his first farmers meeting; the sandalwood growers had a meeting about mealy bug and how to deal with it.  It was a good experience for Josh to be in a meeting and report back to Peter the main points.  The key speaker was a little unsure about what a kid was doing at the meeting but that was soon set to rights by the farmers who knew Josh and knew about our homeschooling choices!  (I know I've already blogged about this but I wanted it in my wrap up as well!)  Josh had a second new experience as he went motor bike riding with a group of boys.  He came home covered in dust – an all over tan!  He ended up on a quad bike which he hadn’t driven solo before – he had a fab-time.

Jessica continues her singing lessons via phone or Skype.  Isn’t technology wonderful!  The girls had Keepers again this week (we do this fortnightly).  Jess and two of her friends are learning to sew, they’ve made shorts, and are now working on a shirt.  This week they learnt about interfacing and tailors tacking (marking).  Jess and I also continued in our planning a unique education together.  We sat down and looked at a list of interests/needs we created a few weeks ago, we looked at her timetable/commitments and worked out how her studies should proceed.  One thing that came out of this review was that her history wasn't working for her -she wanted something a bit deeper.  We've decided to keep Mystery of History but only as an overview and add extra reading to it as she goes along.  This may take longer but she feels she'll learn more this way.  I think it is a good step forward.

Nomi has been doing a lot of drawing on her bamboo mat (which is a large mousepad where she has a pen instead of a mouse and her drawing goes straight to the computer instead of paper.)  The more she explores and takes risks the better she is getting.   For Keepers Nomi and her friend helped a HS Mum look after some little kids – giving another HS mum the afternoon off. 

Daniel completed his math book this week (Math U See).  That was a big achievement for him.  Our focus for Daniel has been reading every day.  He has also started LEM Phonics workbooks as revision and consolidation.  He is doing so well with these, mostly working independently.  Daniel's commitment to his daily diligences (independent studies) is great - he gets in and gets it done every day.  Daniel is also working on maintaining some daily exercise.  The trampoline is his choice at the moment.

Friday was a child free day for me.  My friend had the kids for the day and I was supposed to get in and do a lot of office work.  That didn’t happen though I was productive.  I did a lot of cooking and pottering in the kitchen (I don’t seem to be as fast as I used to be!).  I also worked on my digital scrapbooking files, getting sorted ready for a workshop.

Family Happenings:

It was Jessica’s birthday this week.  15yo.  I cooked a most delicious chocolate mud cake, Nomi decorated one of the cakes (apparently it isn’t a birthday cake unless it is decorated!)  We had a pizza and games night where Jess invited family friends for the evening.  The little kids watched a DVD and the big kids played board/table games (some of the adults joined in).  It was a great family time.

Online Happenings:

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