Nov. 24, 2009 - Life Lessons from Children's Books
Reading aloud to my kids is one of the joys I have from homeschooling them. I love reading to my kids and exposing them to wonderful words and thoughts. Read alouds are the anchor to our day. If we miss reading, then our day sits a bit lopsided.
It has amused me, of late, to recognize that these read alouds have not only entertained my children but they have given me much food for thought for my own life. Who knew that The Little House books could teach you how to live your life in a way that inspires joy?
We have recently finiished These Happy Golden Years by Laura Ingalls Wilder. This is the book where Almanzo courts Laura. I have learned a few things from reading this book. Laura is 16 yrs. old and is old enough to teach school now. Her first school is 12 miles away from home. In those days that is quite a distance so she needed to stay with another family during the week. She stayed at the Brewster's home. This family was quite an eye-opener for Laura, who was used to a quiet, happy and joyful family life. Mrs. Brewster was the complete opposite of Ma Ingalls. I found this very interesting. Ma did not like going off to parts unknown. I don't think she really wanted to leave her family, initially, but she agreed to it because her husband had a yearning desire to see what was further west. Every time her husband decided to root up their family and move farther west, Ma quietly agreed. She may have voiced her opinion but she went along with her husband. She did this with a happy and quiet spirit. She did not conitnually rail at Pa that she did not like the uprooting. Many people would see Ma as a doormat. I don't. I see her as a woman of strength. She was able to trust that her husband knew what was best for her and her family. She trusted. What is even more important, she was able to extend that trust into joy and happiness. Quite simply, Ma made the best out of a bad situation. Wherever she was, Ma made a home environment that was full of peace and quiet. But Ma did have her limits. In These Happy Golden Years, Pa starts to get itchy feet to get travelling again and Ma very quietly but strongly says that she will not move anymore. Due to her lack of nagging spirit, Pa knows tjhat Ma means business so he drops the subject. Ma's quietness speaks volumes for her. There is much strength in her quietness.
As I said before, Mrs. Brewster is the complete opposite. She does share her dislike for moving with Ma, but there the similarity ends. Mrs. Brewster is what I call a fishwife. She is a nagging, bitter hearted woman. She hates her life and she is bound and determined to make everyone hate their's as well. She is a sullen, angry woman that takes every opportunity to rail against her husband and the mistakes he has made in brringing them to that God-forsaken land. Her bitterness travels on to her child, who is always crying and screaming. Mrs Brewster's husband stays away in the barn as much as he can to get away from her berating nature. Mrs Brewster has created an unhappy family life and it all stemmed from her. Mrs Brewster didn't have the inner strength to turn things around for her. She didn't try to make her life better. It was easier to just rant and rave. I felt very sad for her. So did my kids. Even Mia could recognize that Mrs Brewster's husband wanted to be anywhere else but with her.
I thought this portrayal of both Ma and Mrs. Brewster was a powerful example of how we should handle misfortune and life bumps. Life does not always happen in the way that we would like but it is in how we handle those bumps that is telling of our character. In dealing with them in a Ma Ingalls way, those life bumps don't seem as bad and they have a tendency to work themselves out. But when we handle life from a Mrs. Brewster point of view, problems and crisis' multiply and everyone becomes miserable. This was a good lesson for my kids. We had a few discussions at Mrs. Brewster's expense.
Another lesson we learned was from The Wizard of Oz. We are reading that book now. Yesterday, we got to the part where the Tinman and the Scarecrow were deciding what would be more valuable to have: a heart or a brain. I asked my kids what they would rather have. I thought for sure that they would say a brain as we have had conversations, of late, as to how well a good brain can serve us. All of my kids said that they would rather have a heart, over a brain. In Missy's words, "You need a heart to love others. If you doh't have that, then you have nothing." I thought that was pretty good for a 6 yr. old.
Nov. 22, 2009 - Quote on families and their importance
"Christian
homes and churches are the only institutions in which our children will learn to find themselves in God's story. When they are united more by the trends of pop culture than by the faith and practice of the whole church in all times and places, our youth become victims of our sloth. We should not be surprised that over half of those reared in evangelical homes and churches today do not join or even attend a church regularly when they go off to college. If we are going to see our children grow up into Christ instead of abandoning the church, our
spiritual life at home and in the church must incorporate them into the teaching and fellowship of the apostolic faith. They can find "ministry opportunities" through United Way, the Peace Corps, or Habitat for Humanity. They can find friends at the fraternity or sorority. They can find intellectual stimulation in class. And they can find a sense of meaning and purpose in their vocations. If their home churches exchanged the ministry of preaching and teaching the apostles' doctrine for a variety of ministries and activities that they could find legitimate versions of in the world, then it is difficult to come up with a reasonable answer when they ask, "Why do I need the church?"
--Michael Horton, The Gospel-Driven Life: Being Good News People in a Bad News World
Nov. 21, 2009 - Awesome giveaway!
5 Minutes for Mom is giving away an INCREDIBLE HP TouchSmart 600 computer for Christmas! Check it out here!
Nov. 21, 2009 - Change # 1
I have always been a girl who likes structure. I like knowing what is going to happen and when it will be happening. I have previously been of the thought that I was a flexible person. I mean, my goodness, I used to be a pre-school teacher, you need to be flexible in that line of work. Something happened, though, from that life to the life that I am inhabiting now. I think maybe it is old age or, gasp! peri-menopausal related. Whatever the reason, I do not like going with the flow anymore. I am just not good with it. Surprises are not my best friend.
This love of structure carries over into our learning time. Now, when I say structure I do not mean every subject has its own handy-dandy time slot (I am not that far into OCD land, not yet anyway.) My version of structure comes in the form of rhythm. Our learning time has a flow to it minus the timetable. Our days start with Morning Time, math, reading and writing, lunch, a big break then more learning time. This was our day BC (Before Cancer.)
Since our little life bump, I am not finding comfort in structure. Structure is no longer my friend. Structure is stifling to me now. Structure has become synonomous with suffocation. I don't want structure anymore. I want freedom. I think that just might be my word for 2010: freedom.
I want the freedom to start my day off with doing yoga without those niggling little voices whispering that this is really the time for Morning Time, not Mommy Time. I want the freedom to be able to play a game with my kids in the middle of the morning without those blasted voices reminding me that we should be really doing reading right now, not playing around.
I have been thinking about this for awhile. Two weeks ago when I was told that the drama was all over, I mistakenly thought "Yay, we can go back to the way life used to be." That week we went back to our structured days of learning and I thought my head was going to explode. It all seemed so foreign to me. By the time lunch time arrived, my head was pounding and I was knee-deep in frustration.
i attempted to do this again the following week but I bailed after the second day. I knew that I could not do school like this anymore, well, not for awhile anyway. I spent the rest of that week figuring out how I was going to manage this. I mean, the kids had to learn. I was definitely not going to send them to public school, so I needed to come with a plan on how to loosen up our days.
I think we may have figured it out. I told the kids that each day they can decide when they want to do school. If they want to do it in the morning, then we will do it then. If something pressing pops up in the morning, then we can have our learning time in the afternoon. We can even do it in the evening if that would float their boat. Our new motto is that learning has to be done every day ( that will never change) but when they do that learning, that is up to them.
Now, we are fresh into this new motto but, so far, it is working out very well. It has finally dawned on me that we are not morning people. I have tried so hard to be a morning person but it just isn't flying. The kids do not do well in the morning either. They need some time to ease into their day. So the last few days have seen them starting out with playing (both inside and outside) and then we spend a bit of time with our Morning Time. Mia has been starting math just before lunch and then the learning has been continuing after lunch.
The neat thing about this is that our days will not always look like that. Everyday will be different. Every day will be fresh! new! alive! I will never know what to expect from one day to the next. You would think after our rollercoaster ride of the past four months, that this kind of life would scare the liver out of me. Quite the opposite. I find it very refreshing. I am looking forward to this coming week and to all of the surprises that await us. I am looking forward to next week's freedom.
Nov. 20, 2009 - Praying in Colour
I was talking to a friend on the weekend about how my life now seemed like an emotional rollercoaster ride. She suggested that I start 'drawing my prayers." She said that she had begun to do this and it had added depth to her prayer life.
This concept comes from a book, Praying in Colour. I looked at the website and was immediately intrigued. Drawing your prayers just makes them more visual and is a creative way to pray for those that are important to me.In the simplest form. This could just be doodling or, for those who are creatively hinged, they could be masterpieces.
You can use this concept to pray for one person and include all of your concerns on that one drawing, or you can bring all of your prayer needs to that one creation. It can also be used in helping you to memorize Scripture, as a visual aid.
As always, I am drawn to the 'next new thing.' I know, I am fickle. But this idea intrigues my creative side. Right now, that side of me is aching to break out and I think praying in colour might help, at least for now.
Nov. 19, 2009 - Relaxed
I have been thinking during the last few weeks about how I want our schooling day to turn out. I know, this is nothing new. I have gone through this thinking process a few times (understatement) in the last few years. My problem is that I know how I want things to go but the voices in my head (or other people's voices) make me go back to our original way of schooling. The simple and plain truth is that I am not happy with how we have been doing school for quite awhile now. I will explain how I want things to change at a future date. For now, I just want to tell you about our day yesterday. We had a great day and it went smoothly without me having an overwhelming urge to pull out my hair.
For starters, I let the kids sleep in yesterday. They were all up by 8:30 and watched a video (we just got them from the library) while eating their breakfast. After the video, we read Hamlet, A Christmas Carol and These Happy Golden Years (Wilder book.) Then the kids decided that they would like to watch another video. Crazy woman that I am, I let them. By this time it was 11:30. Mia and Rocky did their math lesson then we had lunch.
After lunch, we did some fraction things with Rocky then the two older ones did their reading and spelling. We read The Sword and the Circle. Afterwards, we looked at a Janice VanCleave experiment book that I had found at the library. Mia decided that she would like to do some chemistry experiments. I went down into the deep abyss (aka the basement) to get all of our chemistry books ( I just can't let the experiments stand on their own, we have to have spines as a jumping off point. It's just ingrained in me.) We looked at a few pages of the books then we did three experiments. The kids then wrote out one of their experiments a la WTM.
That's it! That was our day! It was so relaxing and calm. This is how I want our days to be all of the time. Now, we didn't get to grammar or writing. We have to work on that. Anyways, I thought I would just share what a great Prairie school day looks like, at least, imo.
Nov. 17, 2009 - At A Crossroads
Last week was a rough week for me. I would have to say that last week was the worst week that I have had since the whole cancer thing began. It was rough because I couldn't understand why I was feeling the way that I was. I couldn't understand why I was crying all of the time. My cancer was gone. I came away from it relatively unscathed. I should be delieriously happy. Why, oh why, then, was last week a week of endless tears.
In addition to the tears, I felt at odds over everything. I knew that I was at a crossroads in my life. The cancer has changed me. How could it not? I have been changed on many levels--physical, emotional and spritual. I knew that I had a choice: i could either ignore the changes and go on with life the way that it used to be or I could take the steps toward changing things in my life.
If I ignore these changes, then the cancer was all for naught. There was no purpose for these last four months. It would all have been a waste.
If I go down the valley of change, I have no idea what those changes will look like. I know that I have changed, but I don't know how that will all look in my life. I don't know what to do first. I am at a loss and that scares me. I don't want the last months to be for nothing. I want my experience to mean something, not just for me but for those around me but I don't know what all of that means. Hence, the tears and pleading prayers of last week.
I was feeling pretty desparate last Friday. I felt all alone. God, in His extreme Grace, sent friends to show me the way out. Three friends called me that day and the clouds started to lift. I began to make sense out of my craziness. The next day, I talked to a friend that I hadn't talked to in 2 years. Another friend came out to the farm to visit. These talks were like being covered in a warm blanket on a dreary cold day. God gave me a pillow Sat. night to rest my weary head by having another friend call me that night. This friend had gone through cancer last year. Talking to her soothed my soul.
It seems that what I went through last week is normal. Who knew? I'm not insane after all! The more my friend talked about her cancer, the more I relaxed and could feel myself getting stronger. All of my tears and sense of unknowing is part of the cancer experience. I am learning that regardless of how major or minor your cancer is, you are obligated to go through all of the experiences. It seems to be mandatory.
This past week was just another process of grieving. I still don't know how this is all going to play out in my life. I don't know in what form these changes are going to take, but I do know that I do not want these last four months to be for naught. I want them to mean something. I want, need, for there to be changes in my life. I still have that scared feeling but now the excitement is starting to edge it out. I am looking forward to see what God has in store for me.
Nov. 16, 2009 - Book #48 -- Catching the Fire
I read the first book ( Hunger Games ) in this trilogy in September. I went into that book thinking that I would not like it as it was set in the future and I just don't like those kind of books. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I actually liked it. That book caused me to think about it for days after I turned the last page.
Now the second book in the series is out. Catching the Fire by Suzanne Collins was just as good as the first one. In this book, there is an uprising of the people against the Gov't. This uprising is all because of Katniss and her ways of rebellion that were shown during the Hunger Games. Before the uprising turns into a full blown revolution, Katniss needs to be taken care of, controlled.
I feel little let down, though. When I finished Hunger Games, I knew that the next book was already out so I wouldn't have long to wait to read it. But who knows when the third book will be published ( 1 or 2 years?) That is a long time to wait. A very long time.
Nov. 9, 2009 - Dickens-isms
Mia and I are reading A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens this month. I stumbled upon this site yesterday and decided that I would use some of Dickens' quotes in starting a commonplace book for Mia. I think I have talked about this type of book before. It is a book solely for quotes, songs, poems, or Scripture verses that speak to you. Some people use a Commonplace book for figures of Rhetoric, others use it for examples of the virtues or the Great Ideas. For now, I just want Mia to use this book to put in quotes that speak truth, beauty and goodness. She will use these verses for copywork and use her best writing. I haven't decided if I will have her do it incursive (she is still a bit shaky with this) or printing. I am hoping that if I get her started well, she will be able to do this on her own without any prompting from her mom.
Anyway, I want to use the Commonplace Book for some quotes from Dickens. There are many to choose from so we might do a few a week until we are done his book of Scrooge. Here are some interesting ones that I copied.
A wonderful fact to reflect upon that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other.
An idea, like a ghost, must be spoken to a little bit before it will explain itself.
A day wasted on others is not wasted on one's self.
I never could have done what I have done without the habits of punctuality, order and diligence, wihtout the determination to concentrate myself on one subject at a time.
In the little world in which children have their existence, whosoever brings them up, there is nothing so finely perceived and so finely felt as injustice.
Life is made of ever so many partings melded together.
Whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried I have tried with all my heart to do it well; whatever I have devoted myself to, I have devoted myself completely; in great aims and in small I have always thoroughly been in earnest.
Nov. 8, 2009 - Book #47 -- Tell Me Pretty Maiden
I think I have found an author who is fast becoming a favourite. Rhys Bouwen is author of many books. These books belong to three different series. I have read books from two of her series (Her Royal Spyness and Molly Murphy) and have enjoyed them all. I keep picking up Bouwen's books at the library, meaning that I stumble upon them, I don't order them. I always feel like I have just met up with an old friend when I come upon one of her books on the shelves.
The most recent book that I have read of Bouwen's is from the Molly Murphy series' Tell Me Pretty Maiden. It is set in the 1900's. The main character is a female detective with wildly boisterous friends that always help her to solve her cases. This book, as with all of Bouwen's books, is chock full of action and is all tied up in a neat bow at the end. These books are definitely full mysteries but, oh! they are delightful fluff
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