Dangers of Homeschool Conventions

I am really loving a series "thatmom" is doing on the dangers of homeschool conventions right now. I've been reading her blog for over a year now and have found her to be thoughtful and discerning. Are those two words for the same thing? :)

She has discussed three dangers of homeschool conventions so far. The first was that conventions can be a threat to your sense of reality. Any homeschooling mom who's been to a convention knows the truth of that one! Every philosophy, every curriculum, every booth in the vendor hall looks so good that we often forget the reality of our own family situation.

The second danger is the threat of contentment with your husband (I think's it better called discontent with your husband). She writes:

One of my greatest concerns about homeschooling conventions is the remaking of dads that seems to be high on the agenda for many speakers within the homeschooling community. Just looking down the list of various upcoming conferences, nearly every convention has a workshop or two or even a keynote address that is geared to dads. One of the more popular themes this year at larger conferences is that of promoting multi-generational faithfulness, a wonderful concept that looses [sic] it wonder when examined under a brighter light and one that places many fathers in a role never intended to be held by anyone but God.

This particular blog post is a must-read in my book.

Today, she wrote that the third danger of homeschool conventions is a threat to your relationship with Jesus and others. She defines this threat as "...the temptation to align ourselves with one particular homeschooling speaker, author, or vendor to the exclusion of others and without examining the core teachings that are at the root of that person’s agenda. Rather than remaining simply a Christian homeschooling mom, we are tempted to identify with one particular branch of homeschooling, putting on the jersey, as it were, of one special group, which can often cause us to look at the world through a particular paradigm rather than looking at homeschooling from a purely Biblical perspective." Wow! I have found that to be true during the past 13 years that I've been officially homeschooling and have even given in to this temptation myself.

Moms, put on the full armor of God before you head off to your local homeschool convention this year so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes!

Happy Birthday, Gerren!

Well, I'm only six days late getting this post about Gerren's birthday done! On Thursday, March 10, Gerren turned 16. Of course, that's not really a big deal in our family since we can't afford car insurance that would allow the kids to get their licenses. Gerren doesn't even have his restricted license yet, though he's studied for it.

Chase usually makes breakfast for the boys on their birthdays, but this morning Greg decided to make waffles. He went out to get pecans from the freezer in the garage and found the freezer door open. What a great start to the day!

One thing Gerren got that he actually asked for was a new pair of running shoes.


He had asked for a game for the Wii, but I couldn't find a good price on it. Landon got a new game for his birthday which Gerren plays more than he does anyway!

Greg found this awesome remote control helicopter in the mall in Illinois when we were on our little trip. Gerren LOVED that and never expected it because I said I would never buy another remote control anything. They seem to break the first time you use them. This one if made of metal, however.




Gerren had been saving his money to buy a refurbished 5th generation 8gb iPod. He was SHOCKED when we gave him one!


He looks happy, though, doesn't he?


Carys always has to give her gift last, which is always a drawing of a dinosaur. :)


We had dinner out at Beef O'Brady's--hadn't been there in a long time. It was great. We came home for Gerren's requested dessert, peach cobbler. Yum!

Of course, the cobbler overflowed in the oven and made another huge mess. Seems to be the theme of the day!

Fast Trip to the Midwest

We left Wednesday evening, March 2, for a quick visit to the Missouri University of Science & Technology (MST) where Landon is interested in going to school. We spent Wednesday night north of Atlanta and drove the rest of the way on Thursday. Friday was spent touring MST. Landon LOVED the small school atmosphere (8500 students) and both of the professors with whom he had a chance to speak. However, he would have to piece together about $17000 in scholarship money to attend this school. It would be stressful, and he would be VERY far from home as well. Decisions, decisions! We'll be visiting UCF again in a couple of weeks before making any decisions.

We left Rolla and headed for Belleville where we visited with my parents over the weekend. It was fabulous to see some old friends at Winstanley as well. Wow, I love those guys and really miss them! We threw in a ride on the Metro and a short walk over to the Arch on Sunday. Landon loves the Arch! On Monday, we left IL at 6:30am (CT) and managed to get home slightly before 10:00pm (ET). Ugh! Doing that drive in one day is tough.

The kids had to do some school while we were gone because of taking three weeks off to move twice this year. We're in the middle of Week 25 (out of 36 in Sonlight), so we're not doing too bad. We've done 2 more days this week, but we'll be taking tomorrow off for Gerren's birthday (the only one-day holidays we have around here). :)

Happy 18th Birthday, Landon!

How is it possible that I am the mother of an adult? First, of all I'm not that old. Secondly, he was just born a few years ago!

Whatever the case, this young man is such a blessing to me. I thank God for him and pray that he will be an influence for Christ all his life. I'm so excited to see what God has for him as he goes off to college somewhere, but I'm so sad to think of not having daily contact with him as I have for the past 18 years. He's such a joy to be around!

Here we are eating at Chili's.


Goofy brothers!




The kids are really patient to wait until the evening when Greg is home to open their presents. Even Carys waited on her birthday!


This face is so beautiful to me!


For his birthday, Landon received razor heads, minutes for his Tracphone, a t-shirt, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II for the Wii,


and finally a Garmin nuvi GPS.


For both Christmas and his birthday, we tried to get gifts that we thought he would need going off to college. He got a nice set of luggage for Christmas, and then this GPS. I joked with him the the luggage meant "get out". So, when he opened the GPS, he said, "You're making fun of me, aren't you? You gave this to me so I can find my way in a parking lot, right?"


We were all laughing so hard. He IS directionally challenged!

Carys said, "Mom, take a picture of me." Who can resist?


Carys drew a picture of a dinosaur for Landon, and Chase made him breakfast.

A Young Man of God

Landon is a senior in high school but is taking all his classes via dual enrollment at our local community college. There's a club there called PANTS which stands for Pantheists, Atheists, Nontheist Society (or something like that - you get the picture). Every year they put on this event called Faith-A-Palooza. Our church meets at the college, so they've been invited to have a booth for the past 5 years. Usually, we're the only ones (according to the administrative pastor), but this year there were 4 churches (the chairman of the club told Landon that they'd asked 46 churches and only 4 accepted!). Anyway, Scott (the administrative pastor who's also in charge of the youth and children - we're a small church) asked Landon if he'd be at school that day and help him man the booth. Landon said sure. Well, I just have to share this message I just got from Scott:

Hey,
I wanted to brag on your son really quickly. He met us at the Faith-A-Palooza table, and it's definitely not an easy crowd. Most of the people who come by the table are skeptics. I was interviewed by a student who was apparently trying to trip me up on some sort of church/state/gay marriage issue of some sort. Landon and I were the main talkers at our table, as the three international students were more of the setup/cleanup kids (but were awesome nonetheless!)

The cool moment came when a reporter for the Patriot Press came and asked Landon what his table was all about. Linda, I tell you what, this 17-year-old kid made a full-fledged defense of the gospel of Jesus to a newpaper reporter. Landon talked about the supremacy of Christ, the bodily resurrection of Jesus, being His hands and feet in our world, and on and on. I think the reporter was a bit shell-shocked. It was incredible. The reporter got Landon's name, age, and major, so it's possible Landon's quote may even make the newspaper. I told him how incredible of a job he did, but I think his mom and dad should know as well.

It was just awesome to see a young person stand up and unashamedly state Truth to a journalist - and to do it in such an articulate manner as well. I know you and Greg are proud of Landon's academic accomplishments - you should be even prouder of the young man of God you have raised. If he ever needs any type of reference for anything, please let me know!

See you on Sunday!

Grace and peace,

SEC

Totally blew me away! What do you say to that? I answered back, "I'm speechless. Thanks for sharing that with us." As a Christian parent, especially a homeschool mom, the most important thing to me is to raise a young man or woman of character. And it blessed me to hear this from someone. Thank you, Jesus!

Carys is 5!

Well, on January 17, Carys turned 5. However, we moved the following weekend, so I am just getting around to posting pictures from her birthday. Sigh!


5 is a big birthday at our house. When you're 5 you no longer have to take a nap, and you finally get to chew gum! Carys could hardly wait. Of course, she hadn't been napping since we moved in September. I just couldn't get her back into the routine. I figured that it wasn't worth fighting for 4 months.

But the gum was a big deal! Chase gave her a piece as soon as she got up.


We waited to open presents until Greg got home from work around 3:45pm. He'd been going from work straight to the new house to lay the laminate flooring. So, this was early for him. And what patience for a 5-year-old with a pile of present on the table!


Gerren gave Carys glow-stick bracelets.


Landon gave her the black Color Wonder paper.


Chase gave Carys a box of Bazooka bubble gum all her own...


and a bag of gummy worms. Thank the Lord for the Dollar Tree!


Finally, we got the presents from Mom and Dad. Gerren read the card to her.


Her first gift was a kid-sized Wii remote. She wants to play Wii with everyone so badly but gets frustrated when she doesn't do well.


We also gave her this Nickelodeon Wii Fit game.


She also got this new Veggie Tales movie, Sweetpea Beauty.


Her final gift was this supersized box of Playdoh, which I got at Walmart's Black Friday sale.


I put the Playdoh up right away since we were moving in five days. She was asking to play with it immediately when we were in the new house. I told her she had to wait until the boxes were unpacked. She asked every single day, and I would say, "Look around. Do you see any boxes?" The boxes in the house are now unpacked. The only boxes you can see are the ceiling fans which Greg needs to install. However, there is only one very narrow walkway through the garage. She's stopped asking to play with it, though, so I guess I'll have to give in and suggest it one day this week. :)

Yesterday, 12 days after we spent our first night here, I finally felt like at least the top of my head was above water. Ugh! It's great to be able to have a brand new house, but it comes with its own set of difficulties - like no window treatments or fans in the house. We had trouble with appliances we ordered from Universal Appliance and Kitchen Center in CA. Don't ever order from them!!! Pay a little extra and get them locally. We also sold all our bookcases with our house, so we had to buy new ones at IKEA. The school room in the house is much smaller than the house we designed, so I posted probably 100 books on Paperback Swap. It's good for me to get rid of stuff, but also hard with Carys just starting school. In the future, I will be relentless about getting rid of stuff she has grown out of (except the Sonlight books, I think I'll save those for the grandkids)! :)

There is still so much to do here, but most of that is stuff Greg has to do. Ugh! Ceiling fans installed, transition strips between the tile/carpet and laminate finished, board put on attic floor so some stuff in the garage can go up there, garage door opener installed, garage cabinets purchased and Greg's tools and junk sorted through and stored, garage floor sealed and painted, garage set up as music/weight lifting/toy room, front door painted, blinds for 2 front rooms purchased and installed (we were debating between blinds and shutters in those rooms, so we didn't do them when we did the bedrooms). We also have to decide what to do with window treatments for the sliding glass doors. Those are the major things he has to do. We need one more bookcase from IKEA. The builder has to do the landscaping. We have sod but no plants around the house. He is responsible for that.

It seems overwhelming to list it all, but we're so much farther along than we were 2 weeks ago. My house is neat enough that I can function. We managed to only miss one week of school -- a miracle! So, I'm getting back into a school, cleaning, cooking routine, and that makes life seem more manageable to me.

Greg STILL needs a new job. He needs to make more than poverty wages. And if he doesn't find a better-paying job in the next month, he's going to have to get a second job. We all HATE the idea of that. Please pray for us.

Happy New Year!

While reading blogs today, I read these four questions to ask ourselves when approaching a new year:

• What do I need to Celebrate?
• What do I need to Change?
• What do I need to Conclude?
• What do I need to Contend for? (In other words, whose interests will I look out for?)

I intend to contemplate those four questions over the next week while I pray about a Word for the year as well. I didn't choose a word last year, but I have new inspiration from my friend, Becky.

And let me just say, everyone needs a real woman of God who's a little ahead of her on the road of life to look up to. I've been blessed to have several of these women come into my life throughout the years, and Becky Moews is one of them! Lord, may my life be such a reflection of you that you will be able to use me in such a way as well.