You don't have milk!

OK. I admit I struggled with putting this video out here. After reading Grateful for Grace's post today, I couldn't help but once again be tempted to share my all time favorite video caught on my smartphone. It was taken a little over a year ago. I've been tempted often but have resisted the temptation. After getting an OK from Nate and a watch and approval from my personal friend, Tony C, I decided I would let you in on the cute little laugh, too. (Please excuse my accent. The video makes it worse. I'm really not that country.)

WARNING: Should you be one of the many people who are appalled by mothers who nurse in public and/or speak of nursing in public...do not watch this video. You will not like it. Yes, I know someone...an adult female...who was disturbed by this video.

Homeschooling: Bible and Repetition

I’m not sure why I didn’t learn what I needed to know several months ago. The day when I decided I was going to teach Lily The Lord’s Prayer. We had already been using breakfast time to read God’s Word aloud and a time to open our day with prayer. But Mommy had the good idea of working on some scripture memorization. What better place to begin than the Lord’s Prayer? So, I sat her down on the couch, explained what we were going to do, and said, “Repeat after me…”

“Our Father which art in heaven…” Awaiting her answer back…and then she didn’t repeat after me, she said… “Hallowed be thy name.” We continued the rest of the prayer this way. I closed my Bible and thought that was easy enough. Lily had been hearing the Lord’s Prayer for almost a year each Sunday morning during church. Little did I know she was not only listening…but learning!

We continued on with our regular routine until about six weeks ago when Mommy again had a great idea! I will teach her a commandment a week during breakfast time. So off we went reading Exodus 20:1-17 each morning and eventually added a chapter from Leading Little One’s to God. Week 1, I would emphasize Commandment 1…and so on.

She was doing well learning the commandments until about week 5 or 6. She started “stubbing up” and not wanting to answer my questions when I would ask. I knew she knew who the commandments were given to and how many commandments there were and each commandment we had learned. Why was she refusing to answer? One afternoon we decided to address the issue with Daddy.

We started going through our basic questions and as we got to “You shall not murder.” She continued… “You shall not commit adultery.” I glanced at him with a look of amazement and a bit of confusion. We had not learned that yet! And then I decided to try something…we went through the entire scripture of Exodus 20:1-17 that we had read each morning for the past few weeks. I would leave out words and even phrases and she would fill in the blanks! My three year old nearly had the entire passage of the Ten Commandments memorized by hearing me read them!

All of this time I had been fretting that she wasn’t learning the way I wanted her to. She wasn’t answering the questions that I wanted her to answer. But behind the scenes, at least as far as I could see, God was doing His work. She was learning through her own eyes and experiencing His Word for herself the way He wanted her to. And while doing so, He was showing me my worries and anxieties of not being enough would be met by Him. Again, I needed to quite relying on myself and trust that He will equip me for what He has called me to do.

“What is required of us is, that we should implant a love of the Word; that the most delightful moments of the child’s day should be those in which his mother reads for him, with sweet sympathy and holy gladness in voice and eyes, the beautiful stories of the Bible” ~Charlotte Mason

Homeschooling: The Early Years

"In this time of extraordinary pressure, educational and social, perhaps a mothers first duty to her children is to secure for them a quiet and growing time, a full six years of passive receptive life, the waking part of it for the most part spent out in the fresh air." Charlotte Mason

Several years ago, no one could have told me I would have the mindset I currently have on home education. Before Lily was born, I had the strong desire to home school. I even read articles and books well before it was time. My aspirations were to get started early in preschool and teach her to count and her ABC’s and how to read and write well before she needed to. God has made me much wiser since that time. I have come to see this time is precious and I have many years to come for “education.” Our focus now is building a firm foundation of godly character and having fun.

This is how we home school in the early years…

We play with Play-Doh…

We finger paint…

 We paint birdhouses…

We play in the kitchen…

 

We write on chalkboards…We fly kites…

    We play outside…

and we help Daddy in the yard.

So, it is really quite simple. We educate with life and nothing forced…all with in the security of own home. We talk about God and we talk about character. We show them they are loved and do all we can to make sure they never feel they are burdens to us.

Lily turns 3!

My little angel has turned three! I remember the days when she was a small baby and I couldn’t wait to have a toddler that spoke to me and walked with me. Some days, I can’t even remember that little baby…even though it by no means seems like she has been with us for three years. If you will recall, JJ wasn’t exactly the most peaceful addition to our lives. Lily, however, was just the opposite.

Lily is calm and sweet. It is only those that she loves the most that can calm her tears and her fears. Nate likes to refer to her as my little clone. I believe it is because she picked up those qualities of mine that drives him the most crazy. She doesn’t like to be tickled…except by her mommy. She really isn’t affectionate…except when she wants to be. And much to my dismay, she has my tone of voice and the ability to look at you like you are the dumbest person on Earth. Since the age of 2 ½, I have come to believe that God gave me Lily as a mirror to remind of who I am…to remind me of the life I am shaping and therefore, how much I need to work on me.

Just the other day, we were discussing how much she is like me. And I thought what an awesome gift to see what that sweet spirit can be when it is nurtured and protected by the hard things in life. From day one, she was the one I wanted to protect. She was the one I shielded from everyone else. I wouldn’t allow anyone to harm her. (Especially all those nut jobs that had already raised kids…because God knows they don’t know what they were doing. I read it in a book; I knew a little more than they did.) And this very day, I still stand protecting her. I will until I know she doesn’t need it anymore.

Lily had an interesting birthday. She attended her great grandfather’s funeral and luckily met her aunt and two first cousins for the first time ever. And after all that …we got our party on!

 

DIY Toddler Chore Chart

When you have two children or less, I am not really sure a chore chart is a must for your toddler. I, on the other hand, need want it. I like to be ahead of the game. I never really knew what I was doing until Amy at Raising Arrows pointed it out. I was reading away at her blog one day and said, “Hey, that’s exactly what I do!” It’s about adopting a large family mentality without a large family. I would, however, be abundantly pleased if God decided to bless me with a few more little bundles of joy. But, in the meantime, I like to be organized and on top of the game should any surprises arrive. I have always adored the way large families function. It is truly amazing! They can flow and roll. (I just coined a new saying.) Now, I understand ALL large families are not like this, but most are close. I love the organization of large families. I love the character building that comes with being part of a large family. I love how you have to learn to live with what you have. OK! Enough of why I love large families! We’re talking about a DIY Toddler Chore Chart here. We have a routine in the mornings and evenings and sometimes I can easily get interrupted and forget something or let something important slip away. For example, I have a horrible time remembering to brush the teeth of the little ones in the morning. (I’ve been lucky some days to brush my own!) I knew I wanted Lily to start chores at an early age, so I thought, “What better time to create a chore chart!” As she gets older, more responsibilities will be added and eventually she will graduate to a more mature chore chart.

What you need:

Poster board

Sticky Back Velcro ™

Graphics for your “chores”

List of Chores Printed (Large Font)

Marker

Ruler

Scissors

Step 1: Locate the graphics you would like to illustrate the chore for your toddler. I found mine online and even used some from Microsoft Word Online Clip-Art.

Step 2: Print the graphics. Cut to size (1 x 1) and place on the back of one side of the Velcro.

Step 3: On your poster board, use your ruler to draw straight rows for the number of chores you have to be completed. Create 3 columns: 1. Chore, 2. Not Completed, 3. Finished!

Step 4: Cut the chores you listed and glue them onto each row of the first column.

Step 5: Glue chore graphics to 1 x 1 pieces of poster board. Place one side of the Velcro Sticky Back to the graphic piece.

Step 6: Place the “matching” Velcro tabs in Column 2 and Column 3 across each row. (Be sure that both of these are the same and match up with the chore graphics backing you completed on Step 5).

***Here is the idea. Your toddler begins her day with all of her chores in the “Not Completed” column. As your toddler completes a chore, she gets to move her completed chore to the “Finished” column. I did both a Morning Chore Chart and an Evening Chore Chart. If you do this, it’s a good idea to print your graphics and the list of your chores twice, as some things will repeat.

Our AM chores:

Potty time

Clean room

Breakfast

Clean up (Lily’s job is to help clear and wipe the table)

Brush teeth

Bible Time and Prayer

Clean Room

Our PM chores:

Bath time

Brush teeth

Pick up toys

Bible and prayer time

Warning: Strategic location is important when having a 14 month old child in the home.

Our First School Lesson

****Our family has a vision to home educate our children. I want to share our journey, thoughts, ideas, trials, errors, and successes. I will be adding a new side bar with links to homeschooling posts. I don’t believe this is the time to start a new blog so I will utilize Finding Michelle to share with you on this expedition. And like all things on Finding Michelle…this may last, it may not. My blogging life revolves around my faithfulness to my husband and children first and foremost.****

Lily really wants to ride a bus. And she also really wants to go to school with her 5-year-old cousins. Sometimes the bus thing pulls at my heartstrings a little bit since I know she will probably never go to a public school unless God has other plans. It pulls at my heartstrings, but not enough to become a Halloween Hypocrite all over. We’re just hoping Daddy can hook us up with a field trip ride on a bus.

This morning while in town Lily saw a bus and once again we spoke about her desire to go to school with her cousins. I explained that Daddy and Mommy felt that God’s desire was for them to teach her instead of sending her to school. She wanted to know what her cousins did in school and I explained that they learn about numbers, letters, shapes, and colors in school. I told her if she wanted we could go ahead and start school with her. Later in the car ride she spoke up and said she wanted to “do school” and when asked what she wanted to learn about, her answer was… “God.” (Reason #1 to homeschool, we can learn about God anytime!)

So, today when J.J. went down for a morning nap, Lily and I spent time “schooling.” Of course, the only difference between this and any other day of our life, I told her it was school. I have adopted the philosophy you homeschool your children from the time they are born. They learn simply though living. Some parents choose to do preschool curriculum. We believe we can teach them everything they need to know in preschool and probably through kindergarten virtually free.

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Our first lesson today was on colors. I was aware she basically knew her colors, but this was really a great illustration for me to see just how much she knew. I equipped myself with a role of pennies and Lily with a small purse we got out of a kids meal. We decided to venture off in search of colors. The first few questions consisted of me asking Lily to find something a specific color. As we went on, she pointed to things and told me what color they were. She did a great job and earned 26 coins for her bag! After all the color finding, we counted the coins and she put them in her piggy bank to add to the money she is saving to buy a horse. And finally, we took time to pray and thank God for all the wonderful colors He has blessed us with.

What a great day of school and it only costs me 26 cents!

One Lil Monkey Jumps on the Couch

Let's lighten things up a bit! Shall we?



I must add...the screams you hear at the end are not that bad! Remember JJ was standing there, too? I was laughing so hard I couldn't go to her rescue. The reason I was laughing is because I realized I just caught this wonderful moment on video. Once she realized I was laughing she stopped screaming and hopped back up on the couch.

(Excuse the quality of this video. It was taken via BlackBerry Storm...which has been wonderful in capturing great moments!) And why must Nate repeat everything I say?

Halloween Hypocrite

Halloween 2009 is upon us and I have become a complete charlatan. For years now, my husband and I have made the decision to withhold from Halloween and Christmas activities for religious reasons. Halloween is so obviously pagan, I believe it needs no explanation. However, Christmas is a little more deceiving by having “Christ” placed so strategically in it’s name. It’s hard for me to believe, first, how many Christians don’t know the pagan roots; and second, the number of Christians that know and do not care. I will attempt to not get into other folk’s choice to celebrate or not, and just deal with mine.

People always told us when we had kids our opinions of the “holidays,” not Holy Days, would change. I’ve always been pretty adamant they would not; I’m like a stubborn bull. Christmas was easy. I find the entire holiday to be so deceitful and such a lie. Besides commercialism, there are the pagan roots, the lie of Santa (fake God), and the worldliness and selfishness it so adequately embeds into our youth and adults alike. To me, Christmas can be summed up into a great idol. So, like I said, it was easy.

However, for some reason, just three months before, I was almost in tears on Halloween. This just did not make sense to me. As we drove through our neighborhood, I recall seeing all the kids trick or treating and having so much fun. All I could think was how much my baby girl was missing out on. I struggled so much with this day; it took me by complete surprise.

So this year, I thought to myself, “Let’s give it a try.” The entire time I was out buying candy and costumes, I was watching over my back to see who was watching. It was like I was buying crack in the streets and didn’t want anyone to see. I managed to get out of the store with no questions after seeing two people I know. Since the minute I bought the stuff, I felt so convicted and like an utter hypocrite. I was eating my words and this is something I loathe. Loathe, I say.

We managed to get through the night tonight. We’ve had fun, got hyped up on candy, and managed to not offer any animals or humans for sacrifice. It’s still hard, but didn’t I have such a pretty kitty cat?

We’ll see about next year…