In Our Family...

We are working on character building in our house right now, and this is how we have begun. We are adding one leaf every day to our "Family Tree", reading scripture and talking about practical ways that we can apply each leaf's lesson to our lives. I did not want to call them rules, because it is more than that, instead your could call them principle to live by.

There are 18 leaves in all (for now). So, it goes something like this....

In our family:
1. We honor and obey God. All of our behavior is measured against this standard. When we disobey our parents, we are disobeying God.
Ephesians 6:1-3
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. "Honor your father and mother"—which is the first commandment with a promise—"that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth."
2. We love, honor and pray for one another. That means we treat each other with gentleness and kindness.
Romans 12:10
Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourself.
Colossians 3:12-14
Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another,
forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.
3. We Treat each other with respect. It is not respectful to hit another person, no matter how angry we are.
Proverbs 29:11
A fool gives full vent to his anger, but a wise man keeps himself under control.
Luke 6:29a
If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also.
4. We tell the truth.
Colossians 3:9a
Do not lie to one another.
Psalm 34:13
Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking lies.
Proverbs 19:9
A false witness will not go unpunished, and he who breathes out lies will perish.
5. We consider one another’s interest ahead of our own.
Philippians 2:4
Let each of you look not only to his own interest, but also to the interest of others.
I Corinthians 10:24
Let no one seek his own good but the good of his neighbor.
Philippians 2:3
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourself.
6. We speak quietly and respectfully with one another.
James 1:29
…let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger.
Proverbs 15:1
A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.
7. We do not hurt one another with unkind words or deeds. That means we use “honey” words, not “lemon” words.
Proverbs 16:24
Pleasant words are a honey comb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.
Ephesians 4:29
Let no corrupt talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fit for the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.
8. When someone needs correction, we correct him or her in love.
I Corinthians 16:14
Let all that you do be done in love.
9.When someone is sorry, we forgive them.
Colossians 3:13
Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
10. When someone is sad, we comfort them and when someone is happy we rejoice with them.
Romans 12:15
Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep.
11.When we have something nice to share, we share it.
I Timothy 6:18
They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share.
Hebrews 13:16
Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.
12. When we have work to do, we do it without complaining.
Colossians 3:13
Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men.
Philippians 2:14 &15
Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure,
children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe.
13. We take care of everything that God has given us. We do not create unnecessary work for others.
I Timothy 6:20
Guard what has been entrusted to your care.
14. We are careful to put away what we take out, close what we open and turn off what we turn on.
15. When we make a mess, we clean it up.
16. When we go out, we act just as if we were in the house.
Proverbs 20:11
Even a child makes himself know by his actions, by whether his conduct is pure and upright.
Philippians 1:27
Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.
17. We all work first so that we can all play together later.
Colossians 3:23
Whatever you do, work heartily for the Lord, not for men.
18. Everyone is required to do things around the house because we belong to a family and a family works together. Serving one another is a manifestation of love.

P.S. Sorry for the poor photo, hopefully I will be able to get a new camera this summer when we get our "economic stimulus payment" :)

Noodle Nose

Today we had spaghetti for lunch. I know, your are wondering why I am sharing this bit of information.... Well, it seems that Tallulah has another runny nose and somehow in the course of eating her Spaghetti this afternoon, she managed to get a noodle in her nose! Of course I did not realize it until after she woke up crying from a very brief nap. Poor thing. If you or I had a noodle in our nose, it would be a situation easily remedied, but for a 20 month old, not so. I spent most of the afternoon trying to figure out how to get the noodle out. It just kept slipping in and out of her nose and every time I tried to grab it, she would inadvertently sniff it back up! I tried getting her to blow, I tried covering the other nostril and using the bulb syringe, I even tried grabbing it with tweezers, all to no avail, it was just too slippery!
After dinner, Phil jokingly suggested getting the shop vac and sucking it out and that is when it came to me... I pulled out the small canister vac (of course I tried this on myself before I did it to my baby) and just two sucks and it was out! The picture above is of a noodle free Talullah, much happier now!

Reading Time

Regan loves to make movies on Photo Booth on our iMac. Tonight she made a movie of herself reading Water Everywhere, an easy reader from the library. Hopefully this will work, I have never uploaded a video before!

Long overdue

So, I guess I have been a little slack in blogging lately. February was busy with my birthday, our 8th anniversary and a Valentine's dinner at our church which I coordinated a silent auction for. Post auction blogging was out for awhile since my tendinitis flared up from all the computer time. I am just now getting back to normal. Occasional pain with repetitive actions, but if I am careful, I should be as good as new by next week!

We are trucking along in school. Only 12 weeks left for the school year! We have stopped using the Sonlight readers and moved on to more challenging stuff for both Regan and Micah. Except for needing some work on his sight words, Micah is reading almost at the same level as Regan. It is amazing how quickly he catches on to a concept once we go over it a time or two!
We have make it to Elisha in Bible. The kids are enjoying Bible so much that they often ask Phil to read more to them when he come home at night. We finished our study on everyday living through the ages in History and are onto Jungles. We are also reading Grandma's Attic and listening to Little House on the Prairie on CD.
Regan started Piano lessons this month and is picking it up quickly. She has a wonderful teacher, Phillip Wirtz :). Max is still loving preschool and asks every morning if it is a preschool day!

Well, I hate to cut this short, but American Idol is about to start, final 12 sing tonight and I don't want to miss it! I will write more soon about my plans for next year, I am getting excited as I go through our new curriculum!

Nothing to do with home school...

Okay, so this has nothing to do with Homeschool, but I am going to a baby shower tonight and for once in my life was organized to make something fun for the gift!  The pictures are not that great since I used Regan's camera to take them, but you get the idea.
I got the idea for the onesie card and bouquet from Lauren Meader's Blog.  I don't know her, but I liked her idea's, so, here is my version!

It was lots of fun to make, I hope that Holly enjoys receiving it as much as I enjoyed making it :)

Trouble in Paradise

Tallulah has not been sleeping well recently and last night, at 1am, she figured out how to climb out of her crib.  I thought it was bad when Regan did it at 22 months, but Lulu is just 18 months.  And one fall was not enough to deter her from future attempts.  She had climbed out of her crib at least 5 times tonight.  Finally, we gave up and put her to bed with Regan.  This is trouble.  Who ever said that boys were harder when they are little has not met our daughters! lol.  

On a brighter note, this week we will be completing the first half of our curriculum!  I can't believe we have made it half way through our first year already!  We finished up The Family Under the Bridge a week or so ago and are currently reading Dr. Doolittle.  I don't remember if I ever read the book when I was little or just heard the stories, anyway, it is a fun read (and I think the kids like it too :). 

We finally made it through the Judges and are onto the Kings now, with David having just been anointed by Samuel.  It is funny, reading through the judges, with every judge it said, "and the people followed God until (fill in judges name) died, and then they forgot what God had done and began worshiping idols again"  and Regan would say "They started worshiping idols again!" She just can't figure out what is wrong with those Israelites!  I guess that would be the time for me to mention that fact that she just did the thing that I told her not to do ten minutes ago, again.  It is nice to think that we are better than the Israelites, always turning back to idols, but a quick inventory of our heart will tell us we are the same.  The same except one thing, we have the fulfillment of the law, Christ, when they had only a promise of Him.

Regan and Micah are both making great progress on their reading.  Regan just completed the 2nd of 3 readers for the year and Micah is reading through book 1 now.  We are a little slower on Math, something I need to pick up the pace on, but Regan seems to have a pretty good handle on it and is doing well with our current curriculum.  First grade math is proving a little too challenging for Micah, mostly in his ability to pay attention and not in his ability to figure it out if he tries.  That is okay though, he does not need to do 1st grade math.  Besides, he enjoys the math workbooks from the Dollar Tree just fine!

We started slow in Science, but are quickly catching up.  Right now we are trying to grow carrots using carrot tops.  So far nothing has happened, but it have been pretty overcast this week and I am having a hard time finding a sunny place to set them.  I should use Regan's new camera and take some pictures for you all, they actually are not too bad as long as no one moves and the light is right.  Next time.

I think that pretty much sums up where we are at.  I will try and get some more pictures on soon.  

Hold on to that picture

Max is sleeping.  I have not been able to get him to nap for at least a week.  Yesterday I almost resorted to Benadryl, but settled for some quiet time alone in his room.   Today, when I was tucking Max in he said, "Do you want to sleep with me Mommy?"  How could I refuse?  These moments are fleeting as he grows more independent everyday.  It only took a few moments before I could hear the even breaths that accompany sleep beside me.  I wish I had a camera with me as I lie there to capture his face in those few moments before sleep.  As soon as I lay down beside him he squeezed his little eyes closed, with a half smile on his face.  It was a picture I will have to hold on to forever in my memory.