Teenager or Young Adult

Yesterday was the day that my boy anxiously awaited and his mother dreaded.  15 happened yesterday.

Now, I know that he has been a "teen" for a couple of years now, but 15 just seems like a bigger milestone.  Maybe each one is that way, and I forget from year to year.

15 is a difficult age in many ways.  Not old enough to get just any job, not old enough to drive, not old enough to handle some things on his own.  However, he is too old to stomp around the house, too old to hang with the little kids (for long periods of time, anyway), too old to "act like that".  Old enough to have thoughts, feelings and emotions, but not old enough to just spill them out.

15 seems to be even more "tween" than 12 was.

I remember that age and the awkwardness of it. 

We are attempting to train our Teen and our almost Tween.  Wow!

I am hard on them because I do not allow them to treat each other or others around them (including their parents) like "everyone else" does.

In fact, I am very aware that I am not training a Teen, a Tween, a son or a daughter.  They do a GREAT job fulfilling those roles. 

I am, in fact, training future citizens, future parents, future spouses.  The childhood home, in my beliefs, is the training ground for adulthood. 

I have to train them in the ways they speak to one another, ALWAYS.  Even on the bad and grumpy days. Just like they are being trained to learn, clean house, cook, do laundry, they have to be trained in how to related to others around them.  That doesn't always come naturally.

Hmmm, what we do naturally actually comes out of our nature, which I believe is a sin nature.  We are suppose to all be learning to follow after the new nature given to us by the Lord Jesus Christ.  That means it is difficult to lay down our "naturally" and look beyond ourselves.

Diligence in seeking after the God of Love, day-by-day, is the only way our old nature dies and we actually learn to live in the new nature given to us as a gift.

That same training has to happen daily, all the time, for my sweet children.  To train them, first requires that Mom be disciplined.

15 years has sure gone quickly.  I hope the next several slow down a bit, but I don't see that happening.  I only have today.

What a precious adventure it has been!  I look forward to more!

I love you, Punkin!!

Our 2012-2013 School Year

I was challenged by my Grateful friend to tell about our home school for this year.  Of course, she was more wise than I and divided her postings into 3 different ones.  All of mine will be reduced into one.

First of all, our school is actually called Rock Castle Academy.  My husband came up with the name of Rock Castle Ranch for our property years ago and we use it for all types of things.

We started school a couple of weeks ago, but are just beginning to get in full swing.

My students are:

My boy (looking a bit goofy) will be turning 15 in 12 days (egads).  He is doing 10th grade work.

My girl is 10 years old and is doing 8th grade school work.  (She has her own long story on that one.)

We do history, science, Greek, spelling, Bible and Easy Grammar together.  They have separate math, Wordly Wise, and critical thinking books.

Together we are using Notgrass Publishing's "Exploring World History" (so far I am enjoying this one!); Apologia's Biology; Elementary Greek is the title of the book in which we are starting on Year Two (of 3); spelling on Spelling City (online); and Easy Grammar.

For Bible, last year we started reading a book called "Parallel Gospels in Harmony".  We only ready short passages (and spent a lot of time talking about them), so we didn't finish it.  We are working on finishing that one and then we will start on the "Victor Journey Through the Bible".

For math the kids are using Math U See.  He is finishing up Algebra I and will head into Geometry soon.  She has just started Algebra I.  We made the switch to this curriculum last year and have found it a good fit for our family.

For Critical Thinking, she is doing Analogies 1 and 2 this year and he is doing one called "Critical Thinking: Readings in Nonfiction, High School".  They also have to read and document at least two current events each week.

The history has writing assignments that they will be doing, and they both practice writing skills in their personal (very supervised) blogs.  His is Creator's Son and hers is A Kid's Life.

Our school space is....our house.  Mostly the dining room.  

This buffet belonged to my husband's grandmother, so I feel so privileged to be able to use it.  His books are on the left, hers on the far right, in the middle are the ones we use together.  So of our most used resources are on the middle shelf.

Last year, when we started learning Greek, I actually broke down and purchased a workbook for myself.  I wasn't going to learn it like I wanted to unless I made myself do so.  It was one of the best purchases of the year.  Therefore, I didn't even hesitate to purchase mine for this year, too.  It has made a difference in getting Greek done each week, too. :-D

I do have an extra shelf in a corner that we keep notebooks, dictionary, spare books for later in the year, papers, our "finished shelf", etc.

 Then, we also use our sofa quite a bit.  Since we do History and Biology together, we like reading it aloud together.  It takes us longer to do that because we are constantly talking about the lessons, but we all enjoy it.  I don't read it all to them.  We take turns reading aloud, so they get that practice, too.

And then, of course, the kids spend a lot of time reading on their own.  Sometimes in not so conventional ways.

 I suppose this marks our official 12th year of homeschooling.  I very diligently did Pre-Kinder with him so that counts as one year.  I have loved every bit of it.  Yes, we have our days (and occasionally a week) where it is tougher than other times.  However, after teaching in a public school for 12 years before my boy was born, I am SO convinced that they would not be as wonderful if they weren't at home.

The Lord has been so faithful to guide Dad and I each and every step of the way.  When we forget to ask, He thumps us and puts us all back in line.  

Summer Project

I think my children are strange.  Maybe that is why I like them so much.

On our last official school day, my son brought me a spiral notebook that we had worked on maybe two years ago.  It was a writing project, just for funnsies.

The basic gist of the project is for us to switch off in writing a story together.  I started writing a story that I thought he would enjoy.  I write my portion setting up a scene change or a plot change.  (We often try to leave cliff hangers for one another.)  Then I leave the notebook out for him and he takes over for a bit.

Creator's Son's story notebook

He has to keep the same story line and work it from that point, guiding the plot in a direction that he more prefers.

Yes,  Firefly and I are doing one also.  For some reason, the son and daughter have EXTREMELY different types of stories going.  Ha!

 

Firefly's story notebook

As I said, we had started this idea a couple of years ago.  So when we picked it back up last month, we had to start whole new stories. 

They are challenging me even more than ever before.  They know so much more about their topics than I do.  I think they are having as much fun stumping Mom as they are doing the writing itself.

It is one of those small things that I can do to let them know that they are important to me and I am trying to keep up with them.

We are not doing any spelling or grammar corrections.  (I am making note of spelling words to put on the list when we get back in school.)  I am watching for those things.  (I do make those corrections and instructions before each they post each blog, however.)  We are keeping this light and fun.

Now I just have to make sure I keep up with it.

Milestones

(turning 10, with his sister) (this year) -->

Today is a new day in our house. Our oldest turns 13!

We have been teaching and training for the past 2 years that we do not have to be conformed to this world, nor the ideas and mindsets of this world. We do not have to worry about the teenage years because we are not training a teenager. We are training a young man (and young woman).

At this point of the day, 13 years ago, I was still blissfully ignorant of the adventure that awaited us. It wasn't until 5 that evening that we began to get a taste. Thankfully, the excitement level has been lower in the past 9 years, but we are still ever watchful.

This boy has grown quite a bit since that late night, 13 years ago. He has gone from 12 1/2 inches to 63 3/4 inches. And now he is a whopping 119 pounds, up from that original 1 pound 11 ounces. Wow! Isn't that a great God!


His baby pictures aren't very similar to other babies. His head is on the left, in case you aren't sure.
This is a picture of my mom with my boy before I was released from my hospital. They had him covered in Saran Wrap just to keep him warmer. (Now his head is on the right. Taken from the other side of the bed)
Then we have our first family picture that we were able to put in our Christmas letters that year. Our boy had been home from the hospital only a couple of days when this was taken. He came home 10 days before Christmas.

The years have been fun, amazing, scary, maddening, thrilling and eventful. I wonder what the future will hold. Thankfully I know the One who holds it and I don't have to worry.

My Favorite Thespian

This past Friday, my boy finished his third drama class with a local Children's Theater group. We have been so pleased with his progress under Mrs. Kim. He has had a ton of fun hamming it up!

At the end of each drama class they have had a recital. This time there were quite a few monologues, some short skits and a play written by the little girls. My boy got to do his monologue FIRST, and did it really, really well. We were all so proud of him. He actually learned this monologue completely in just under two weeks time. Cool!

He also got to participate in one of the skits. He had a blast. He is already wanting to write his own monologue for the summer day camp that won't be until the end of July.

Since our girl is already in several activities (tap and orchestra), we have let him have this activity all to himself. I did have a chuckle as we were waiting for the recital to start on Friday. Our girl, who has been on stage numerous times with the aforementioned activities and hardly been nervous at all, leaned over and said, "Mom, my tummy really hurts for my brother." Aww! She was nervous for him. And he didn't even appear to be nervous at all. Even having to go first.

He says he is a theological thespian. *giggle* Dad wanted to know if that means he ACTS like a Christian. But I know that my boy's heart is in the right spot.