A Reading Machine

I am so very proud of my little buddy. He took a little longer than most kids to catch the reading bug. But when he did catch it, boy oh boy!!!!!

Among many books that he has read and thoroughly enjoyed, are the Christopher Paolini series: Eragon, Eldest, Brisinger, and Inheritance. A total amount of a whopping 2,759 pages!!!! It took him about a year to read these, however he has read many other books in between including The Lord of the Rings series.

I am so proud of the avid reader he has become. What a joy to have taken a child from kindergarten to where he is now, not yet 10 years old, having accomplished as much as he has.

While homeschooling can be a challenge, these rewards make it truly worthwhile.

The Fourth Grade Rite of Passage

Can anyone guess what we are doing?

Caeden has chosen the Santa Barbara Mission for his research project and model. Traditions traditions!!!!! What child can possibly grow up normally without having built his or her very own mission in FOURTH grade???? Will it hurt my second grader if she makes one too? Because she really wants to..... ;)

Outdoor Love

There's no doubt about the love of nature in this homeschool! While we live on 3 acres, and have lots of space to roam, there is just something fantastic about the rolling foothills near my parents home.

We needed to pick up some tack equipment from my dad today, so we decided to spend the afternoon there on his property.

Here are some beautiful photos of our littles doing what they like best!

Update!

Howdy! I am so sorry this blog has been neglected this year! We have had some major changes in both our lives and our school environment. All good, yet not without sets of challenging issues.

First of all, my husband and I no longer pastor a church. Our church was very small, and did not support us financially; therefore my husband had a regular job that was requiring so many hours, that we decided it was time to change our focus-he was away from home so much, and the church required so much of his time, that we needed to scale down and focus on our family and their immediate needs.

It's amazing how quickly children grow up and we found ourselves reflecting on the fact we will not have them forever and that now is the time to make sure we are really concentrating on their well-being. Not that we hadn't done so in years past; however, it is very easy to get caught up in the flow of being so busy that life truly passes you by. We do not want that to happen! Or I should say, we want to do everything possible to slow down and savor this beautiful life we've been given. No we will not forsake the Kingdom and avoid working the Lord's field. But we made a choice to resign our position, and move to a place where we felt was healthier for our family, with a strong church and youth group.

We also made a decision to enroll in a homeschool public charter school, that offers on site classes-both core for 8-12th grades, and enrichment for the lower grades. This choice was based on the fact that our older children were desperately needing more social interaction.

Also, even though I can teach upper math coursework, I was getting to a place that doing so was literally frying my brain. Hey, we all have to admit when we are dealing with burnout or frustration right? Well I was reaching that point, so we made this choice. I will cover the details of this option in a post forthcoming.

So now, my duties have been greatly reduced being that I am no longer chief music director, Sunday school director, church cleaner, administrator and so forth. While I do miss working so busily about the Kingdom, the change has helped me to sort some things in my mind, and has given me a fresh view of being involved in ministry. Right now, my family is my first church. My focus is on them. And my husband, although he works many hours and is very busy, he is doing what is required of him to provide for our family.

Overall, things are good. I do see some more changes coming in the future, but for now we will be content to walk the path we have chosen and enjoy the journey.