Forward!

It's now 2013 and I was not quite ready for 2012 to end. It was so much fun and involved so much change!

We moved to a new house with more room for our growing quiver.

We had our first new years eve here one year ago amidst the moving boxes. Okay so this picture is of the fireworks we used to celebrate 2012 but it works!

We added a new baby, Chloe, to our family.

We got to travel some.

We homeschooled this year without a co-op group.

I was not teaching BSF this year, which was a huge change for our family- sorry no picture.

 Chloe was baptized.

 It's fun to look back and be reminded of all the blessings for the year. It's also hard not to look back at all the things that I coulda, shoulda, woulda done and did not do. However, as I was feeling like a colossal failure last night in every area God reminded me that I am not a failure. I cannot be a failure so long as I am a child of His because He has already won the victory! My focus needs to be on persevering and finishing this great race called life. I'm too young to wallow in the pit. There is lots of LIFE yet to live.

One of my favorite blogs is A Holy Experience and her post yesterday was about basically the same thing and something she shared really spoke to me. The idea of Forward! She gave a great analogy regarding her daughter Hope. Hope was at a piano recital and during her piece missed several notes but she finished. Her teacher told her in a nutshell that instead of concentrating on all the notes that she got wrong she moved forward to the next bar and kept going. I too can choose to not look back at my perceived 2012 misses but instead fall forward and move on to today. There is no reason not to.

So my motto for 2013 is Forward! My goal will be to focus on each new day as it comes with it's fresh slate. God's mercies are new every morning.

"What curriculum are you using?"

A common question for us homeschoolers by other homeschoolers or by those who do not homeschool but just want to dialogue is, "What curriculum are you using?"

Now other homeschoolers will be familiar with a given list of curricula most of the time but those who just want to dialogue glass over and nod politely. Hey, you asked!

This is what we are doing this year- it's different from last year - and will likely be different next year.

That's what I love about homeschooling- variety, adaptation, make a change when necessary or just for fun!

Drum roll please....those not interested....glazed over, polite nod please....

Bible-  We are reading through Mark. It's an action gospel so the boys are attentive! They are also studying Genesis in Sunday School each week. Another great resource is Leading Little Ones to God and Arch books. We do Advent  devotionals and Easter devotionals during those holidays.

Math- We use Christian Light Publication Math. My friend Tina over at Chasin' Raisins introduced this math to me and for us it works.

Science- Sonlight Grade 2, Nature Walks, Lots of books and outside time- because we can!

History- Veritas Press Time Line Cards, Story of the World Volume 1 with the activity guide. My boys love this. It has it's issues- to put it lightly- but the author does integrate ALL of history (including the history found in the B.I.B.L.E). Plus I had the curriculum from a past purchase and it saved us some money. My friend Tina at Chasin' Raisins has developed her own curriculum- and it's promising. Check it out!

Geography- My own creation. We are studying the continents this year. We are studying one a month. I have a binder for each boy with dividers- one per continent (genius!). We have checked out books and DVDs from the library for the current continent we are working on and I keep a list of those books. I printed a ton of great activity work from Enchanted Learning. We are also using maps, a globe, puzzles and having a great time.

Reading- The Bible, Sonlight Grade 2 Readers, Other books that go along with our history studies and lots of picture books and other read-alouds as we fancy.

Spelling- All about Spelling- I started in Level 1- it's a little easy but I have one natural speller and one not so natural speller and so far both are excelling so that's good.

Latin!- Prima Latina- love it! Nuff said.

Handwriting- Handwriting Without Tears- Jay is doing cursive and Ben just started cursive and surprisingly for a first grader and a lefty- he is doing fantastic. I was planning on him finishing the year with print but he really wanted to begin cursive so since he was enthusiastic I let him move on and it was a good decision.

Other-
Dictation from Spelling, read -alouds, and other sources.
Explode the Code 3, 4, 5- phonics, language
Daily Math Books- drills
Word Ladders- great for vocabulary building and critical thinking
Ancient Egypt Pocket - boys are not as into this as I thought they would be but we will persevere.

Right now as I type this the boys are coloring quietly behind me. They have also picked different locations. We all need a time of quiet. My "quiet time" these days seldom happens in solitude but I don't care at this moment. I like being with my kids- wouldn't be and couldn't effectively homeschool if I didn't!

I find it perplexing, sad, and telling at the plethora of comments I receive about having four children and having four children and homeschooling. Children are joy.

They are not bothersome, tiring, angst creating, patience stealing, annoying small humans. However, my response when I am full of irritation and lacking grace may be any and all of those. So the key to doing this thing called life at home with a quiver full is to choose grace and thankfulness and humor and cling to G.O.D.

That is not always easy and is not always my first response. But when and if I fall into the "pit" emotionally it does me good to remember the real blessing that is today.

And I would be so remiss to not mention too the wonderful man who makes the homeschooling possible. He was my first blessing-