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.  

Busily Blessed

I have to say that this was the busiest summer I remember in YEARS!

The kids and I went to my grandfather's memorial service in June.  We got to see lots of family I hadn't seen in forever, and then we met some that I had never met before (and some of those were my age).

My girl got to attend Junior Citizen Police Academy, an mini art camp, and then orchestra camp.  My boy  attended a theater camp.

So far, that sounds like a pretty normal summer at my house.  That usually leaves plenty of time for my most favorite of all my quirks.  Cleaning THOSE spots.  

Now, I must, almost shamefully admit that my favorite way to start the summer is to list each room in my house and assign a week to that room.  During that week I break that one room into sections and go through everything I possibly can.  Closets and drawers, corners and crevices.  Nothing is suppose to be safe during that week.  Of course, time gets past me and some of those closets still have some STUFF in there that should have gone.  But, I do find joy in this methodical restructuring.

However, this summer, that did not happen at all.

My girl and I were given the most fabulous opportunity to spend almost a constant month or more with two of our most favorite people (outside our family).   Thankfully, it is a mother and daughter pair so our time wasn't divided very much. What a blessing to be able to spend this precious time with them!

Unfortunately, most of the time was spent packing all of their entire house into a storage facility so they could join Dad where he has been working four hours away from us.

There is not one single drawer or closet in my house that is sorry it got overlooked as we did all of theirs instead.

My Abba Father was so gracious during the whole time to encourage and exhort all four of us to be able to enjoy the time (almost) to its fullest.  Only occasionally did my girl or I have to focus on the loss before us.  What a faithful Father He is!

Hopefully, in this techno age, I will be able to keep up with them better than other people I have lost.  

We continue to ask Father, "What do You have for us in this situation that You could not have provided any other way?"  He continues to answer.

Bless you our dear, dear friends as you are faithful to follow where the Lord sends you. 

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.

What We Are Learning This Week

1) I am learning that this is a really good excuse to sit down and actually update my blog.  It also provides a way for me to slip little tidbits in that I want to remember.  Kind of like a mini-journal.

2) Being privileged to hear a good story in person (like GFG's Crater and Crazy), makes it twice as much fun to read to the kiddos.  THEN, the kids can more easily spend the next two days being "Jill" to each other about some rather silly things.  Sweet, goofy, and very silly.

3) Factoring polynomials wasn't so bad after all!  Koine Greek is really very interesting and we are not dreading Year 2! 

4) 5 inches of rain in one week is such a giant blessing after last year's severe drought.  We still refuse to complain about the mud.

5) We counted and we only have 8 more school days before we can say we are done this year.  Woo hoo!  (I usually have it counted out and marked in red.  I have been too afraid to look this year, and we are still finishing well!)

6)Watching my two work together is still just as sweet as it was 8 years ago.  I am so blessed to get to school at home with them.

7) End of season is always so busy, but it can be so rewarding.  And just think of the two evenings a week I get to be home now!  This weekend marks the end of the last extra class.  We are sad to see it go, but looking forward to the break.

The Mysterious Gentleman - Mr. Mumph

Tap Dance

Violinist

What We Are Learning This Week

In our house, we are pressing "toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."  Truly!

Some days, especially in the springtime, it is all we can do to remember that we aren't just doing this to mark of the plan book.  We really have a purpose for learning all these things.  It is our calling for this time in our lives to prepare us for the next part of the calling.

Now we just have to remember that.

Other things we are learning are:
1. Seemingly horrible and potentially embarrassing disasters, like Firefly experienced on Tuesday night, can be real blessings in the long run.  First, our friends have a chance to stand beside us and lift us up instead of beat us down (Thank you, Lord, for the heart of home schoolers!!) Second, it gives us the opportunity to rise over the tribulation and be true victors. 

2. Creator's Son had the opportunity to share his story even more publicly than his blog.  Boy, what a rush to share things from your heart!

3. Adding and multiplying polynomials isn't as bad as we were afraid they would be. :-D

4. Julius Caesar, Cleopatra, Mark Anthony, and Herod the Great had great big problems, but still did some interesting things.  God turned all things they did toward the glory of the manifestation of His son, Jesus.

5. "The Door Within" trilogy is almost as good as the "Wingfeather Saga".  Of course, Mom has only just gotten a good start on the first book and the other two might debate which is better.

6. The "Little House" series is still a great set of books to read aloud.  Even to 7th and 9th graders.  And even if Mom's copy is falling completely apart from age.

Next week marks the beginning of the end of numerous things (including having our Grateful friends nearby).  Should prove to be busy.  But at least we get to do it all together!!

What We Are Learning This Week? Really?

This has been one of THOSE weeks. And I am not even sure why.

We really didn't have a ton of things going on or lots of meetings (that is next week).

Everything just seemed to take longer. Everything! From our morning chores to getting ready for bed.

Who knows. Maybe it is springtime and that makes us want to do something different.

Of course, we are always learning something.

1. The Ancient Greeks, well the whole ancient world, seems to have been in quite an upheaval, but it did take 4000 years for most of it to happen. That is a long time after all.

2. Diligence really does pay off toward the end of Algebra I. It isn't quite as hard as when we started out. However, the further you get into Pre-Algebra, the more time it takes to get it done.

3. Even weeks with one of the greatest holidays in the weekend can be just another week on the list. Except when we stop and read through the stories every morning to keep it "new every morning".

4. Circle skirts are fun to wear and make, even the third or fourth time around.

5. A day spent with friends flies past way too quickly!

Things on the list can get checked off, but the most important things sometimes just go past and we don't always notice.