First Month Done! (Well minus 1 day)!

Ok so the first month of school is complete! For those of you wondering, it has been going really good! We have a daily routine (which I try to stick to but doesn't always happen!) Our day starts around 8:40 and begins with prayer, a song, then exercise. I have a different person assigned to prayer each day then that person also gets to pick the worship song and gets to use the exercise bike. After all that is done we settle down and get to work. Language arts was a struggle for Aliyah at first, she would just give up and shut down really easily, whoo am I glad that didn't last long! Kaitlin and Joshua have been doing a novel study on Farmer Boy this first month and Monday is the first day I will have to sit down and teach them LA, I may have to readjust my schedule which doesn't make me too happy, pretty sure I worked on schedules for at least 10 hours! I'd spend time on one then find out nope, don't like it, start a new one, nope don't like it, onto my third and I'm liking it. So this may sound strange but I feel more calm, less hassled homeschooling than I did when my kids went to school. Always having to be on the go go go, was really stressful and I feel like our whole family has calmed down. No more stress of being up at 6:40 and out the door by 7:25, no more stress of getting homework done before bedtime, no more stress of bedtime! Yes they still have a bedtime but if they go over, big deal! The weight of time and not enough of it has been lifted up off our shoulders (for the most part anyways), which is funny because I'm reading the book The Time Keeper by Mitch Albom. Interesting story to say the least. The only day that is a wee bit stressful time wise is thursdays which have swimming at 2. So with all this time and all this curriculum money we are keeping really busy. The kids have Pioneer Club on tuesdays. This is a great badge earning program put on by the Salvation Army that is bible based. I couldn't be more happy than to send my kids to this free club. Wednesdays the girls have Highland dance, (which of course they are really happy about!). Thursday is swimming. Kate will take gymnastics in the spring and Josh will take soccer then too. I must say that I am so very thankful to my husband. He is here during the day and he does math with Kaitlin, Josh and even Aliyah most of the time. Math is not my thing so this makes me able to concentrate on other things. Also it enables me to teach Aliyah and Ally while Kate and Josh are doing math with help from dad. Also my husband has helped me out by cooking. He cooked dinner for me two times last week since I was getting home late from lessons. It's really been a blessing to not have to think about dinner on those days when I do school, rush to drive them to one of their activities and then come back home and have dinner ready. So this month I have seen what needs changing and I will introduce these changes on monday. I am going to be stricter on keeping the school room clean, these kids are pigs! Ha ha. I have put a point system in place and weekly jobs to help the kids put away their books and clean up after themselves. I have a giant bin of toys and things that they can cash their points in for at the end of each week. I'm looking forward to the changes and the kids were even excited when I told them they'd have jobs! Now I will leave you with some pictures, until next month....

                                                                Kate, feeling the vibrations

                                                   Alexandra made her name using clay for LA

                                              Aliyah wearing her communities project as a hat!

      Joshua making music with a science experiment

Artwork, I'm enjoying doing it with them too!

Let the countdown begin...

Summer is nearly over and our home school adventure is about to begin! I`m excited, yet nervous. I`m praying into this. This is important. This is my children`s education. I get to be a part of this, yet it`s such a huge responsibility! I`m glad that my God will give me strength, that He will fill my every need. I pray that I see my children grow academically and spiritually this year. That they will surprise me by their knowledge...yesterday Alexandra was reading a book and blew me away when she sounded out the word doctor...I`d have never thought she could tackle that word yet but she did. I need to remember to step back and let them try. This is going to be a learning experience for me, I just know it!
 Recently my pastor did something really neat. He just stood up and read the book of James. Did not preach on it, did not teach on it, he just read it. I LOVE James, its so full of tidbits we can learn from and apply to our lives. It`s timeless. I was perplexed when Pastor Brian read this scripture before starting the reading of James: 1 Timothy 4:13 (Niv) Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching. Do we do this in the modern church? Devote ourselves to the public reading of scripture? We are keen to preach and teach but this is lacking.  I've never been a part of it before that day and it was so amazing to just let the Holy Spirit do His work and speak to us. This is what jumped out at me, (I have read this verse countless times but that day it jumped out at me, this was what the Holy Spirit was wanting me to hear...) My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry. James 1:19 Niv.  Good advice for me, a mom, with 4 kids who easily looses patience, I often find myself doing the opposite of this verse, Lord help me!
So like I said, our adventure is nearly here. I am trying to figure out student learning plans, a schedule, making file folder games and downloading some great lapbooks. I'm eager to shop and decorate my school room even more and get some new school supplies. We will start this Tuesday but plan to ease in to it a bit. On the agenda the first week: All about Me lapbook, math, bible and Kaitlin and Joshua need to read Farmer Boy. The week after that, it's full gear, oh boy!