Busy Holiday

We have had a busy last couple of weeks. I think that is pretty standard. I say busy, but yet not crazy. It has been a great month. Here are some highlights....

Our Church Christmas Play - The Pirate's Christmas Treasure

All of the girls and mom were in it this year

Michigan State University Graduation

The girls uncle graduated from my alma matter. A fun day spent with family.

Enjoying the Michigan Snow With Friends

American Heritage Girls Christmas Party

We did our first service project, which was collecting new shoes to donate to Shoes for Orphan Souls.

Cookie Day 2010

We baked and decorated cookies all day with friends. A great day of playing games and even dinner afterward.

2nd Annual Gift Wrapping

Last year I shared pictures about taking the girls to a mission, Carriage Town, not far from our town to wrap Christmas gifts for the children who are staying there. We went with our co-op and had such a wonderful time. Thankfully we were able to go again this year and it was equally as lovely.

Sissy has been talking about our return trip since the day after our trip last year! Once we started school this fall she started asking, "Did they schedule the Carriage Town trip yet?"

For fun I appliqued matching t-shirts and jeans for the girls and off we went!

It was run the same way as last year. The mission was able to purchase gifts for the children and they put them on long tables according to gender - boys on one side, girls on the other. The gifts

were then arranged according to age. We were given sheets that listed the children in a particular family, their ages and their "wishes" for Christmas. Sissy wanted to work with a friend so the two older girls worked together and wrapped gifts for 4 families.

Peanut, Sweet Baby and I wrapped gifts for 3 different families. The girls were most excited when they were able to give a child the exact gift that was on their wish list.

Another day in the books...We still have 14 days till Christmas, but our family has had the most fun already this season as we are working to share with others. I hope that as my children grow older and look back on their Christmas memories, they aren't filled with thoughts of the gifts they got, but rather they remember the fun ways that we tried to help others, the family and friends that returned to Michigan (you know who you are!) and the way that we tried to bury Jesus deep into their souls.

Science - Apologia Anatomy

This year we are not following the science recommendations of My Father's World, rather we are doing our own thing and decided to take a look at Apologia. Apologia Science is widely used and loved by homeschoolers, but this is our first year using it. We decided to use their brand new Anatomy study and we have really been enjoying it. Sweet Baby has decided that looking at the pictures and talking about "all the blood and stuff inside me freaks me out", so her and I are doing a ladybug unit right now.

The textbook itself is beautiful and the content is more than complete. One concern I had about using Apologia is the narration. Sissy is not a strong writer and it takes her some time to get a decent couple paragraphs down. Aplogia works on the narration aspect of learning - the child reads (or is read to) and then they are expected to write about what they just learned. I knew that if we did narration our days would be LONG and wold be fraught with tears. Rather than do narration in the traditional sense, a friend suggested mini books from Live and Learn Press. This has been a perfect option for our family!

The mini books that were designed by the ladies at Live and Learn correspond to each lesson in the book. These books are just like mini books that you place in lapbooks but we place them in a 3-ring binder. The kids enjoy cutting them out and gluing them together when the lesson is completed. What I like is that each book has a topic with specific questions for the children to answer. This really helps them zero in on a particular topic and pull it together.

It does take the girls some time to do all of the books for each lesson, but if we were doing narration, I still think it would take longer. Just giving them an open ended question about a topic would prove difficult for Sissy. In terms of writing the narration, I would expect the girls to write a rough draft and then finalize it which would take even longer. With the mini books they are guided with exact questions to answer. I do not expect perfection in the books (we do correct spelling though) and the kids like the graphics on most of the books.

Right now we are studying the blood - the difference between veins and arteries, functions of blood, etc . Here we were looking at veins...under the tongue.....

and in your eyes. YUCK!

Operation Christmas Child - Part II

After church yesterday we went to drop off the girls shoe boxes for Operation Christmas Child. I had not intended to take my camera but it was in my purse from the day before. What fun they had! The time we dropped off, they were the only children there and they had fun watching their boxes packed inside larger cases like these.

We were told that Samaritan's Purse sent 450 cases to this distribution center. Each case can hold approximately 14 shoe boxes...for those of you who are curious - that is 6, 300 shoe boxes! As we were talking with one of the volunteers, another volunteer asked the girls if they wanted to help pack a couple cases. The kids were very eager to do that!

What an experience! It was wonderful to work on this project with the kids, amazing to see all the boxes that were being collected, and a great way to end the entire process - the kids helping pack a couple cases. The only thing that could make this better would be to go along as a distributor....maybe some day.

Operation Christmas Child - Preparing Their Hearts

The last couple of years have seen HUGE faith growths in our family. My dear husband has grown in ways I would never have expected and it has been amazing to watch. The last year or so God has grown him immensely in the area of financial giving. We have been looking for ways to involve our children in the act of giving and understanding what it means to give without reluctance. After church last night we enjoyed the watching the process of giving unfold for our children. As parents we really enjoyed preparing their hearts for what we hope will be a lifetime of compassion and generosity.

Years ago, while I the girls and I were involved in MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) we were introduced to Operation Christmas Child. Operation Christmas Child is run by Samaritans Purse and at Christmas families are able to fill shoebox sized boxes with goodies that will be shipped to needy children. We have not been in MOPS for a few years and have not taken part in the process since the kids were little, but there is a local church that is a drop off point for the boxes, so we decided to participate.

Each of the girls were able to do their own box and choose the gender and age of the child they wanted to buy for. Each of them chose girls. Sissy and Sweet Baby chose the 2-4 year old group and Peanut chose the 5-9 year old group. Before we left for shopping we encouraged the girls to realize that some of these children may have never had soap, tooth paste, and things that we take for granted here. While we wanted them to share "toys" and the fun things of being a child, we suggested some of these "necessities". It was BEAUTIFUL to see the two oldest girls being so thoughtful about what the children may need.

Each of the girls chose soap, and a toothbrush and toothpaste, a coloring book, stickers, crayons, mittens, socks and candy. As Peanut was walking through the store she found some small cups and wanted to add that to her box. We found a set of 3 so each of the girls was able to add a drinking cup to their box.

Sissy was certainly the most visibly impacted by our experience. She wanted to carry her own shopping basket and literally clung to it. She was so thoughtful as she was thinking about what a 2 year old would like and what they would need. She was so quiet on the way home (which is not like her). When we arrived home it was getting late so we told the kids to get ready for bed and we would pack the boxes in the morning. Sissy took care of getting ready, came to me and said, "Mom, I don't want anything for Christmas." With tears in her eyes we had a talk about her realization that we have so much and some people don't have simple things. She said it wasn't fair that she was asking for a camera when some kids did not even have socks. This was one of those moments I'll remember forever. The tears in her eyes led me straight to her heart.

The other two girls were so excited to pack their boxes that the could not fall asleep and had goofy grins on their faces as soon as they woke up this morning. You'll notice that they didn't even brush their hair!

Peanut had fun customizing her box with things that she herself likes: a horse statute, My Little Pony coloring book, Tinkerbell stickers and she even parted with a stuffed horse that she bought with her own money not long ago (it still looked new). This was pretty big for her since she LOVES stuffed animals more than any kid I know!

Finally, Peanut suggested that the girls put pictures of themselves in their boxes, she was so excited to share a photo of herself for her new "friend". How I wish that we could be present the day that these boxes are delivered and see the joy in the eyes of the children who receive them.

American Heritage Girls

I have mentioned a couple of times a new program that I am helping get off the ground at our church. I am the coordinator for a new troop here in Michigan and last night we just finished our 3rd meeting. I thought I would share some photos of the girls in their uniforms. American Heritage Girls is a Christian based program that works very similar to Girl Scouts. The difference? It has Christ at the center - after having Sissy involved in Girl Scouts for the last 4 years, it became evident to me that Girl Scouts is very far removed from the program I believe it was intended to be at its inception.

One very convenient thing for parents is that the program covers girls ages 5-18 and all ages meet the same evening in the same building. I love that I can take all the girls to the meeting the same night. Here is a photo of all the girls before our meeting last night.

Sissy is in the Explorer Unit and Peanut and Sweet Baby are both Tenderhearts. Last month the Explorers got to run the flag ceremony, this month it was the Tenderhearts turn. Both of our Tenderhearts got to play a role. Here is Sweet Baby as part of the Color Guard saluting the flag before her group walked it to the front.

Peanut got to be the one who announced the ceremony and instructed the girls in the Color Guard as to what they should be doing. Here she is at the podium.

Finally, I had to share this picture of Sweet Baby...a friend makes hairbows and although none of my girls have really been into hairbows Sweet Baby has asked for a pair. The hairbows are HUGE to say the least but she really wanted a pair. We recently held a raffle fundraiser and Sweet Baby was able to choose a prize as being part of a top selling family, it didn't surprise me that she chose the donated hairbows!

Small Intestine...Really?

I cannot believe it has been an entire month since I have posted about our school days. We HAVE been doing school I guess I just haven't been taking photos of what we have been up to.

In Science we have made our way through the history of medicine, the skeletal system, the muscular system and have just finished the digestive system. While working on the digestive system we learned an amazing fact that I did not know..our small intestines are 20 feet long?!?! REALLY? Here is a picture of of Peanut and Sissy measuring out exactly how long 20 feet is - amazing!

In the weeks to come Sweet Baby and I will be doing a Ladybug unit. I was noticing that every time we would all sit down to do science, she would lay her head on her table and "check out". After a couple weeks of this I finally took her aside and asked her why it was that she was not trying to enjoy science. She ended up crying and said, "Mom, it scares me to think of all that stuff in my body. My bones, my blood, it is scary to me. I just don't like human body science. I want to do bugs not this scary stuff." Sweet Baby has a tendency to really pour it on and I can tell when she is faking fear or sadness. This time she was being very honest and I was feeling bad for her. She is just 6, so I can understand why it might be frightening to her. So, we'll be doing a ladybug lapbook together.