It's a sweet life- faith, family, and friends! Come take a peek... http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/ en-us Homeschool Blogger Tue, 25 Mar 2008 13:46:00 -0500 Tue, 25 Mar 2008 13:46:00 -0500 I have moved my blog home to a new address....please change your bookmarks to www.ladolcevita6.wordpress.com See you at my new place!     http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/504601/ Tue, 25 Mar 2008 13:46:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/504601/   Hey, take a few minutes , click on the button above, and check out this fun place in the blogosphere.... And if you are popping in to my place, thanks for stopping by. :) I am a happy mama to four kids, wife to a wonderful guy, and most of all, a gal who loves Jesus and tries to live every moment for Him, whether it's in how I take care of my kids or take care of my home...I try to do it all in a way that will bless Him. Now, that all sounds nice, and some days it can get kind of crazy around here. But, each day is fresh and new, and God doesn't love me based on how well my day goes, He loves me just because I'm His. Thanks for stopping by La Dolce Vita!   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/498265/ Fri, 14 Mar 2008 00:11:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/498265/ As you might guess from the graphic, you can tell what we have been watching lately. We have watched the original Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and will finish tonight with Return of the Jedi. We are very selective with what we let our kids watch, and have waited quite some time for them to be old enough to enjoy these three movies. It has been fun to watch them enjoy the same stories that we enjoyed as kids. We have also had a great conversation about "the Force" and how it compares to Christianity. It's so lovely to take advantage of teachable moments.   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/495591/ Sun, 9 Mar 2008 19:34:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/495591/ This past week has been full of hard work. We have been skating by doing minimal work-enough to keep moving forward in math and language arts, but not much beyond that. I am finally emerging from the new-baby-we-just-moved-fog enough to end this minimalist schooling, and move back towards the richer, broader schooling I prefer. Naturally, adding more work hasn't been greeted with cheering and jubilations by the kids in the house. In fact, some of the behavior issues that have been surfacing are probably related to the character development we have been enjoying. Nevertheless, this mama is undeterred. We are back to doing our full plate-math, language arts, history, science, Bible, recitation, and hopefully this week-Latin. They're just going to love me this week!       http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/490657/ Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:06:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/490657/ It has been a character development week. For the kids. For me. Since the Lord opened my eyes regarding my tone and attitude, I have noticed a marked improvement in my day. Previous to this, I was getting sucked into whining back at the kids, responding to their bad choices with frustration instead of correction, and just generally not being the intentional parent I want to be. This week has been better. Although their whining has continued, mine has not. Their misbehavior has been met with firm correction. I have been much more thoughtful and intentional in my parenting. Periodically, it seems we go through this refocusing in our house. We move along in life at a pretty good clip, parenting well, and then we veer off course. Just slightly off course, but enough that when ignored for a period of weeks, end up being far from where we want to be. A variety of things knock us off-illness, a vacation, too many activities, in this case-having a baby and moving shortly after. When the kids were little, this refocusing was much tougher on me..by the end of a day full of discipline, I found myself exhausted, maybe even a little teary, at all the conflict. By nature, I'm a conflict avoider, so these intensive times of redirection are hard on me. A couple of years ago, though, I had a revelation (God is so good to give us insights at just the right time!) that these days of conflict weren't bad days (my perception), but were character development days, both for me and for the kids. Since that time, when I find my little family back in one of these high discipline seasons, I have found it a bit easier to endure with grace, I find I am more peaceful and loving as I correct my kids. I see them less as adversaries, and more as young people who need me to help them grow in character-God is using me as a tool to chisel at their character. And that's my job....to raise them in the ways of the Lord.   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/490652/ Sat, 1 Mar 2008 10:52:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/490652/ In recent weeks, the tone in our home has been full of vinegar...children snipping and bickering, mom impatient and frustrated, unkind voices, grouchy faces...you get the idea. I am the one who opened the door to this vinegar tone...I have been very tired, and when I am tired, I am not very patient. Additionally, I have been working to add some good habits back into my day (my rhythm is starting to return since Noah's arrival), such as my Bible time in the morning, group devotions with the kids, and exercising. Nothing extraordinary, but certainly things my enemy would like to quell. I think he has been using my fatigue to his advantage...but no more. Jesus doesn't want our home to be full of vinegar...he wants it to be full of words that are sweet and kind, like honey.  "Pleasant words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones." Proverbs 16:24. I am praying that God will help me put this into practice, and help our home to be sweet and healing. _______________________________________ Running update: I have continued to run, but have experienced a setback that has caused me to modify my plan. I strained my hamstring, causing pain behind my knee, and seem to have some shinsplints. RATS! I am walking my route briskly, trying to keep my cardio up, and hope to be running again soon. ____________________ Noah News: he's still rocking on his knees, but not crawling yet, much to my relief since I still need to get a couple of gates in place. Last night he was up most of the night, with several little catnaps along the way. This was very unusual for him. He wasn't running a fever, but was clearly in pain. He has been teething, so we gave him tylenol, which only seemed to bring minimal relief. At about 4 am it occurred to me he might have an ear infection. The doc confirmed our suspicion later in the morning. After two doses of meds and a good nap, he is mostly back to his normal, smiley self.   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/486176/ Fri, 22 Feb 2008 23:27:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/486176/ Since 2001, Valentine's Day week or weekend has fallen right in the middle of High School Winter Camp. When one is married to the student ministries pastor, that means there are minimal plans made to celebrate Valentine's Day. Lest you think my dh never did sweet things for me on Valentine's Day, let me share with you that he conspired to smuggle bouquets of flowers and tender cards to give to me...sometimes in the middle of camp. I always loved his thoughtfulness, and never minded being at camp on such a romantic holiday....we were so romantic, we didn't need a holiday (and still don't, for that matter!). Now that dh is no longer in student ministries, we are free to celebrate Valentine's Day in a more elaborate fashion, should we want to. This year, sweet dh surprised me with a one night getaway to a bed-and-breakfast. He arranged for my mom to stay with the kids, and even arranged a ride for our daughter to get to youth group. This little mini-getaway was delightful. It was relaxing and reconnecting. It was delightful to have uninterrupted conversation, uninterrupted meals, and (best of all!) uninterrupted sleep! I am so grateful to have a husband that prioritizes time for us together, whether it is a getaway like above, or a regular date night, or even time together in the family room in the evening.   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/481870/ Fri, 15 Feb 2008 23:18:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/481870/ The past two weeks I have been enjoying a wonderful book/journal I received for Christmas: Jesus-90 Days With the One and Only . My sweet husband gave me this book, knowing that I was just finishing up another book by the same author, Beth Moore. Through this book, I am being guided through small chunks of scripture, currently from the book of Luke. Each chunk shares a small part of the story of Jesus. After the daily reading, there are several thought provoking questions, a reflection written by Beth, and then a section for personal prayer and reflection. I have greatly enjoyed this book, and find the scriptures and thoughts coming back to me at different parts of the day.   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/474739/ Mon, 4 Feb 2008 23:55:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/474739/ This was hard! How did you do? Country Quiz     http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/469927/ Mon, 28 Jan 2008 18:28:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/469927/ It has been a fairly productive week in many respects. We are finally settling into a decent schooling routine. I have decided it's a very challenging thing to have a baby, buy a house, pack and move, homeschool, and work part time. Acknowledging that helped me to see that we are doing pretty good to do school every day (in varying degrees of thoroughness, but always math and reading), to be wearing clean clothes most of the time, to have groceries in the fridge, and a mostly clean house (either the bottom floor or the top floor, but not usually both). The big highlight of this past week has been the library. Upon moving into this house, I decided to make our formal living room into a library. (I guess the reading geek in me is coming to the forefront). We have made do with 5 mismatched white bookshelves, but this past week we got to go to IKEA and purchase 5 bee-yoo-ti-ful Billy bookshelves, and five lovely little lights to sit on top of them, casting down a warm illumination on each shelf. My dh stayed up late Wednesday assembling them for me. He hefted the old bookcases out of the way, and I reloaded the new ones. They look wonderful. I find myself just walking out to the library to stare at the pretty shelves. What a goof! ;) Bit by bit, this house is feeling more like us. We have some curtains to hang in the library, master bedroom, and dining room. This was an unexpected expense, as I thought we would be able to recycle some of our curtains from our other home, but the windows are very tall here, and I need 96" panels to hang from the top of the windows down to the floor. Today, we were also thrilled to go buy a dishwasher. The little, low end dishwasher currently in our home was inadequate to meet our needs. I found myself running the dishwasher a couple times a day just to get all our dishes washed. It only had a spinner on the very bottom, so there was always some residue on the items on the top shelf-yuck! The new one will be here on Tuesday-woo hoo! Overall, I am in a celebratory mood right now. It is clear we are experiencing some delightful gifts from our sweet heavenly father, who gives good gifts to His children. I never thought I would consider a dishwasher or bookshelves as good gifts, but I am so thankful..... ___________________________ Running Update: I bumped up to running for 3 minutes and walking for 1. That one minute sure goes fast! The first four cycles weren't as hard as I'd expected, but the last two were tough! But, I just kept running. ___________________________ Noah Update: Sweet boy is now rolling his way across the family room. He has only figured out how to roll in one direction, though, so he gets stuck. He is also pulling his tummy up off the floor. I think crawling is in our near future!   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/469037/ Sun, 27 Jan 2008 00:36:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NancyinCA/469037/