Home schooling: Not just at the kitchen table

     When I first started this new adventure a few months ago the vision in my head was to have my little pupils sitting at the kitchen table doing their work enthusiastically. I quickly realized that wasn't a realistic vision. My kids are active, like most kids, and want to be where mom is most of the time. 

     At this current season in our lives we can generally do most lessons during nap time, but lets face it... Mama needs to shower at some point... Oh sure I could shower before they get up, but I would be getting up at 5 am in that case for I have an early riser. Or I could shower at night after they go to bed, but with my long hair dripping wet at bed time means a sloppy wet pillow all night. So a nap time shower works best for me. 

     So what's my new homeschooler to do while I am in the shower... Usually, she showers with me and I am completely fine with that. After a few showers I started to pay attention to her drawings on the shower door in the steam. To my heart warming surprise she was drawing letters in the steam and asking me questions about each letter. Then as her attention went from drawing letters to stick people she would count the people and ask me basic addition problems, which I made her figure it out on her own with her drawings. 

     So I then realized that now I do not feel like she has missed any "school" time when we shower during nap time. I also realized that I could teach just about anything anywhere we are and not be limited to a kitchen table doing worksheets. And so simply drawing in steam has opened the world of home schooling to me and enabled me to see lessons anywhere from the park to the grocery store and everywhere in between. I hope this post will encourage new home schooling families to think outside the box of the kitchen table. 

Topics

     Good morning to my two followers, who happens to be the same person. :) I am new to blogging and I have a lot to learn. Even if I get just a few followers I would be extremely happy. This blog will cover a bunch of topics, including but not limited to natural child birth, breastfeeding, motherhood, home schooling, and modesty. My post will most likely start on home schooling because that is the area I am currently learning on and OH am I learning. So look in a couple days for a new post. Until then may God's grace flow around you. Have a blessed day.

Updates

Hi! I will get better at blogging... Its all about making habits... Well in my last post I continued my update with the birth of our third baby, Bailee, or B for short. Now at this point in our lives my husband, Aaron, was traveling for work a lot and only getting to come home a few days at a time. When Bailee was 2 weeks old he was called out for 6 weeks... only getting to come home Easter weekend... I was struggling to care for my family. I just had a baby and I was an hour away from any family. My house was in a constant disarray and I had a giant lack of care that plagued me. Aaron voiced his displeasure with what was going on at work to his boss only to be spat at and sent on his way... We were getting mad. the original agreement was 25% travel... The turning point came when he got an offer from the very company he was traveling to as his customer... We started to get a sense of what God was doing right away... God wanted better for us. God put us in Tyler so Aaron could get experience on the machine, learning from it intensely. The "customer" that offered the position used the same machine. God also used Tyler to wean me from seeing my family as often because where we would be going was three states away. He took the position and went out here to start as soon as he could. In the mean time the children and I were living at my inlaws home while they summered up north. Aaron search for a home for us and after two months he finally found one. Then we had to wait another month to come out here. That's right... three months with out seeing my husband. Again God used all of Aaron's traveling to prepare us for a long summer apart.  At the end of August, as a family,we finally came to our new state and our new home. Well, there you have it, a three part update to our life. Now that the update is finished I'll get to start blogging about things that pertain to the actual blog topics. I will post a topic in a couple days. Until then, May the Lord bless you and keep you.

Updates

So in the last post I told everyone that I was pregnant. Right away I found a wonderful midwife in Tyler. My pregnancy went about as good as most do. I had the morning sickness, headaches, backaches, etc. which were all elevated because my husband was still traveling more than 50% of the time. But some how I managed. I had a lot of help toward the end from my mother in law. I went to 41 weeks, which was a week better than my last. And I have elevate blood pressure while in labor again... The gender of our baby was a secret to everyone except my Nana, who performed the ultra sound. On March 9th at 6:51 am Bailee Ann was born at 7lbs 9oz and 20 3/4 inches long. She was a spitting image of her big sister with a little added weight. That chapter in our lives came as a surprize, but we wouldnt change it for anything. We wouldnt change the next chapter either... More on that later, but for now enjoy this photo of B the day she was born.

Updates

Sorry for the length since my last post. Life has been rather crazy. Its been a year...and a lot has happened. I will do a short post every day, or every couple days to catch everyone up. Then I'll do weekly posts.

Well if you read my last post you'll see that Hayden and I were not feeling well. I dont remember what Hayden had, but he did get better. I, however, did not get better, I got worse... and I finally got better around September. Through July I got progressively worse. I was extremely tired and had nausea all the time. Aaron suggested that I go get a check up. I was going to the next time he was going to be home a while.( He still traveled a lot) Well shortly after I went walking with a couple friends and I could barely keep up... I was so tired. Well, my friend also suggested something........A pregnancy test...... What?! No way! I just finished nursing Hayden and hadnt gotten my cycle back. I had been looking for signs that my cycle would be returning soon... nothing. I took pregnancy test in July and they were all negative. So I told my friend that I would get one the next time I was at the store. I picked one up and the next morning I took it... Right away, before it had finished its absorbing I could see the two lines... I WAS PREGNANT!!!

Well thats where I will leave off for now. That takes you through about the startish of August. I will continue as soon as I get some more free time.

Total Comfort

This has been one of those days where you just wish you could go to sleep and try it over again... Hayden and I have not felt well the past couple days so our nights are long with waking up every couple hours... Then we were up WAY too early... Before the sun and birds were up... So mommy got hardly any sleep and then forced to get up before the birds do... Well Skylar woke up just a short time after us because Hayden wont stop crying. Like I said we have not been feeling well( colds or allergies) This was like 6:30 am. Well both kids cried all through breakfast and into mid morning when I finally put Hayden down for his usual mid-morning nap. He falls asleep and there is peace for a sort while until Skylar decides she wants cry and whine about any little thing. At this point I have already lost my temper 100 times and I am not being the caring, loving parent I so desperately want to be. Skylar cries until Hayden wakes up and they both cry through lunch. After lunch we are all on the love-seat attempting to have "cuddle" time when mommy gets punched in the face, then kicked, then hair pulled then smashed in the face by a misplaced curtain rod(was in the couch cushions) Again I lose my temper.... I put the kids down on the floor and I make them go away and play. Skylar complies while Hayden just stands by me holding my arm and rubbing his cheek on my arm crying...( Hayden loves skin to skin contact, even more so when he does not feel well) Now Skylar is whining again, but not at me... She has curled her self on the couch with a blanket, pillow, and teddy saying, so quietly I could barely hear her, "I'm scared, I'm scared" I asked her what the matter was and she told me there were monsters and they were going to get her... Well I told her to get up and come see me and I told her that Jesus was here and we were safe and those monsters could not and will not hurt us...

The rest of the afternoon was so peaceful and calm... The kids went down for their naps without a single cry... Dinner was pleasent and bed time came and went with no major meltdowns... Only after hanging up cloths and thinking to myself did I realize what happened today....

Not one time all morning did I pray... give glory to God for anything... nor ask Him to guide us and protect us this day... But the moment that sentence left my mouth to comfort Skylar a total peace came over us... When I realized this I cried... Did Skylar see daemons in our house? She told me they were pink, blue, and green... I have no real words to describe the overwhelming emotions that have come over me. Fear Not, God is With Us... God is with us so no one can stand against us...

I have been a little down the past few days, with just not feeling well, house work backed up from not feeling well... Aaron gone... This was the revival I needed and was looking for. To God be the Glory in all we do!!!

Updates

Wow, it has been a long time since I have wrote a blog! A lot has changed since December... Aaron graduated(finally), He got a job, made a temporary move to Dallas, Aaron went to Italy for two months, in the meanwhile, I bought a house( well, Aaron did, I just signed all the paper work), moved into our new house, with the help of family, Aaron finally came home, now we are just now really getting settled. Aaron is gone a lot on business. A week away, home for the weekend. It is hard with him gone so much, but I am not lacking with things to do. I have a home to keep and children and animals to tend... I really am still trying to figure out how I am finding time to write this blog...


Well, Skylar just had her third birthday and she grew up over night. She is mostly potty trained during the day, only having accidents when she is very involved in play. She has even gone a few nights in panties without a waterproof cover on... I am very happy that she has finally "Got it". Pooping in the potty is now done with little fuss as long as she is not in a diaper and she can be alone in the bathroom, Which has helped me have alone time in the bathroom as well, strangely enough. If Skylar does not want to be bothered in the bathroom she understand that mommy does not want to be bothered in the bathroom either. So now I get to use the restroom in peace, for now anyways. We still have not quite mastered toilet training when away from home yet, but we have made a first step. She will ask if there is a bathroom where we are at... so I guess she is understanding the concept. I have ventured out with her in panties with a waterproof cover on, sometimes we make it home with no accidents, other times not. I just keep a backpack with me that has a new dress in it with new panties and shoes( if needed). I am very happy to have my diaper load down, but laundry size is about the same because of accidents.



Speaking of diapers. We still fully cloth diaper our son. I bought some Snappis so now daddy does not mind as much to cloth diaper. We are even able to just use one prefold and cover at night now. You know before we were having a problem with night time leaking. Well, for a while we just used sposies at night and clothed during the day... well we ran out of sposies one night and was forced to use the cloth... lo and behold no leaks... so we did it another night... Success... after the third night we knew we did not have to use sposies anymore and I was thrilled. I have a washer and dryer of my own now so laundering the diapers is a piece of cake, for the most part. I still have to rinse off the poop on a couple a day... and I still dont have my diaper sprayer yet( I will soon though). So dunking it is until then. I have developed a system that is working for now... I just have to make sure I only have one or two to rinse at a time... four or more and my "system" would fail, lol my bucket is not that big...But it works for now anyways. I launder a load of cloth diapers at night before I go to bed with the clothes the children wore that day. Put them in the dryer first thing in the morning. In all we go through two pairs of panties, six cloth diapers, and 2-4 covers a day, plus their play clothes, and every other day, their pjs. I actually love doing laundry... I just seem to always get interrupted when it is time to put them away... I started folding them on my bed because if I did it in the living room I wouldn't want to put them away because I would have to travel so far to put them away... now I just have a few feet.. I guess I am a little bit lazy there... but less travel time, more laundry gets folded and put away. And I am sure to do it since it is on my bed... cant go to bed with laundry all over it... too far to walk to take it to the living room.


Well, I told you about Skylar and how she is doing I guess I need to tell you about Hayden and how he is doing. Hayden will be a year old in less than two weeks... hard to believe. Feels like yesterday he was born. At nearly a year he weighs or out weighs his big sister... he was this chunky thing, but slimmed down when he started to crawl. He has four teeth now. Still not walking, but he can stand on his own and has taken a step or two. He is still working on his confidence. He is my cry baby... that's as gentle as I could say that, lol... He still nurses( mostly at night, but not limited to), does not sleep through the night regularly. I can count on one hand how many nights he has sleep more than six hours straight. Though the past couple weeks have produced a more sound sleeper, going as much as nine or more hours before he wakes up to nurse. It amazes me how much this kid sleeps... bed time is at nine, his normal wake up time is 7:30-8am... breakfast and some time outside( about an hour and a half total) he is ready for a nap... Wake up from nap about an hour later, eat lunch have some inside play, and its nap time again, this time both of them go down for at least an hour and a half. They then wake up, have snack, another hour of play, and he is ready for another nap. In total this boy sleeps about 12 hours in a 24 hour period... And usually if he is not sleeping he is eating... Eating while playing... and if he is not doing any of those... he is crying... I have yet to this day have figured out why he cries so much... If I walk away he cries. If the cats walks by he cries. If Sister bumps him gently he cries... Then I pick him up in comfort and he just giggles at me... Attached to my hip, that's what it is... Nevertheless I will be so glad when he out grows this...I am starting to look more like an 'S' than a human because of how much I hold the child. But I love my babies.

but with all that sleeping it does give me and Skylar time to explore this thing called 'home school'. We have started 'home school preschool', which she loves and asks me all the time if we can "do school". Thing is I am finding it hard to keep her attention, not because she is too young for school as some would say, but because she knows all the preschool material for the most part... Colors, numbers, letters, she already knows. I am having to get into math and science and reading readiness just to keep her interested. I mean the child is smart... too smart... But I do not want public school to dumb her up... Not challenging her enough, so she gets bored, then her grades suffer... Homeschooling will always keep her challenged and there will be nothing lost during the summer months when most children are on summer break. In home school it is year round school. Tyler has a great homeschooling network that I am very excited to join when the time is right. Right now we are just try to get a feel for it while it doesn't actually count toward a diploma. I guess you can say we are playing school. That way when it is time to get busy with it we will not be overwhelmed with something new in our daily schedule. Another thing that is very appealing to home school is being able to teach the Word of God with it. There are curriculum's made to focus on teaching the Bible. Our faith is very important to us. Our lives revolve around exalting The Father and proclaiming Jesus as our saviour. And teaching our children in those ways is following the Word.


Which brings me to my previous blogs on my growing conviction on dress. After many months of conviction and prayer I have made the decision to wear modest clothing for now on( skirts, dresses at the knee or longer. No tank tops or low necklines). Dressing modestly does not have to be frumpy. Old Navy has some super cute skirts and dresses. As well as tops and cardigans. I simply love Old Navy... Skylar loves to wear dresses and skirts. They make her feel pretty, like a princess, like a girl... Which is one of many reasons, I believe, God wants us(women) to dress femininely. Many would argue that, but I am not making them wear dresses so why should it matter to them...



Well, I cannot ignore this hunger I feel, I think that has caught you up.

Perhaps I will be back soon with pictures and a silly quote from Skylar. Well, I will give you one so you can leave with a laugh... Skylar sings, " I love Sprite, It goes in my tummy"... I am trying so hard to catch that on video.. Good Night.