Wintertime! Brrrrrrrr. Ain't nobody got time for that.....

Oregon has pretty mild winters. I know this to be true when compared to other states freezing temperatures and blizzards et cetera. I'm still not liking this cold snap we have been enduring for a couple of weeks now. I mean brrrrrr, it's cold. Don't laugh, I am miserable. My toes and fingers just won't stay warm. It doesn't help that my hubby is working in our not-at-all-insulated shop. He's freezing, he'll deny it, but he is quite cold out there. He has a heater, and it is better than not having one, but it only heats a small area at a time. Anyway, I go out to visit him throughout the day and it is cold... Ok, I'm done whining....for now.


Time for a laugh.

Homeschooling with foster kids....

Once upon a time it was very easy to get permission to homeschool foster kids. Not so much anymore. I have homeschooled a few kids in the past, with great success. Somewhere around 2008 Oregon made some pretty intense changes to foster parenting rules. Now it is really hard, nearly impossible even, to get permission to home educate the displaced youth in foster care.
The trouble is, in my humble opinion, the kids in foster care seem to be the ones who would really benefit from homeschooling. Academically as well as socially. Keep in mind that as of yet, the past 8 or 9 years, my family has worked with kids from birth to 10 years old. I have little to no experience with preteen kiddos in foster care. Keeping that in mind, here are some ideas for homeschooling with foster kids.

If the foster child is of a similar age or educational level as one of your own children....Save some of the daily lessons which would benefit both children and have them do the work together either in the evening or perhaps on the weekend. I have found it to be beneficial to my kids to (if younger) receive instruction from a peer who understands a concept, as well as (if older) be the peer to explain a concept. There have been many occasions in which my kids have further cemented a concept in their mind by simply explaining it to another child. Not to mention, the ego boost a child receives when they are able to "teach" a concept. A lot of my foster kids have had really low self esteem and that damaged self image proves detrimental in school and blocks their ability to learn. Sometimes a simple task of helping a younger sibling with their school work, can go a long way towards building up their self worth.
If the foster children are younger or not educationally similar...
Have the older sibling be responsible for a ten to fifteen minute daily assignment together with a younger sibling. It is nice for the little ones to have something fun like a story or drawing or craft time together with another child each day.
As much as possible I try to work with my foster kids on whatever areas of weakness they have. Sometimes that is education based sometimes not. I try to make up for what they miss out on as far as one on one and small group activities. i know public school teachers are tasked with educating a wide range of kids daily, their skills are so vastly different from each other. I have yet to meet a teach, who was unwilling to share what needs a child has that could be improved to help make school more pleasant for both the child and their classmates. Sometimes that is a deficiency in healthy boundaries, sometimes it is learning to be patient, sometimes an educational goal. I highly recommend working with your foster child's teacher and school. More often than not, they will be grateful.


Foster parenting is an important job. Today's youth need loving homes when their homes are no longer safe. I'd like to personally thank those who choose to be the shelter in the storm.

Reminder: Why We Homeschool

I have been reading around the bloggy world quite a bit lately and I keep running into the same theme over and again; Why we homeschool. It is funny to me because most of them hint around as to why their family has chosen to homeschool. Most say God called them or lead them to it. Of course most of the blogs I read have a religious spin to them anyway, so it makes sense to say that God called them to homeschool. I kinda think we are all lead to homeschool by the influence of God, whether we know it (or Him) at the time. That is just my thinking. I tend to believe our actions are guided by either God or some variation of the Adversary. I'll leave that alone for now as not to offend anyone.

Anyway, all of these posts have made me think about why we chose to homeschool. In the beginning, 9 years ago, when our oldest was 4, I couldn't imagine putting him in a classroom with people of the same age for kindergarten. Not because public school is evil, or anything, simply because academically he was way too advanced to be with kids who did not already read, write, and do arithmetic well. When I looked into having him skip kindergarten and begin in first grade, the requirements were what we thought to be ridiculous. He needed to be tested academically, we thought that was understandable. He needed further independent testing by a psychiatrist to determine his mental and social maturity. That included dropping my child off with a stranger for eight hours of rigorous testing, including a psychological evaluation.That seemed to be too much for any child his age. Not to mention the cost would be our families responsibility. It really felt like the school district was less than accepting of the idea to skip kindergarten, which in our state is not even required by law.
After talking it over with my husband, we decided that I had been homeschooling him since birth, and he was doing really well. Why not continue through "kindergarten" and revisit the public school idea when he was old enough for first grade. We figured we could encourage his love of learning and wait until he was older and kids typically get broken down into groups based on ability at some point in or after first grade. Make sense?
We of course prayed about it, talked about it and rediscussed it over the next few years and in fact continue to discuss it. At some point in morphed from " We'll homeschool a year at a time" to "we'll homeschool for as long as we can make it work". I believe God has called us to homeschool. I believe we ran into issues with our original plan as a way to get us here. God is smart. He knows what each of us needs for motivation and encouragement. He rewards us for our efforts.
I think it is hard to homeschool some days. Some days, not so much. :0) I love our life, as different from other people's lives as it is, our life as a homeschooling, foster parenting, work from home, 24/7 together family has blessed us beyond measure. (Even if my dear hubby cringes when the word "blessed" is tossed around:0)) We have grown as a family and it is great.
Do I have days where I question our decision to homeschool? You betcha. Those days are usually more frequent when it is nearing a testing day. We are required to have our kids given standardized tests after 3rd, 5th, 8th, and 10th grades. I have issues with getting nervous toward the spring of those years. Nervous that I haven't taught the boys what will be on the test, not that my kids haven't learned what I've taught. I could change my methods to teach what is on the test, but I don 't actually want the state dictating what I teach. My kids usually do really well on their tests. So I should probably learn to let that fear go, but I probably never will master that one. :0)
So there it is... Why we homeschool. Any questions? Please feel free to ask.

My Newest Idea For Our Homeschool

I am excited to have the boys start using their blogs to keep a log of daily work. Not everything will be blogged but slowly we will begin to "journal" about our day through our individual blogs!

I hope to use this for accountability as well as giving the boys a creative outlet to track their own schooling adventures, who knows, maybe it will inspire them to blog about other things.

I would love to see Brady blog about his passions, currently, Minecraft! (Not to be confused with butt crack, right Brady? Lol, sorry, you had to be there!) or angry birds, or ants, fish, frogs..... The list is endless.

I hope Dakota will post pictures of some of his artwork, either drawings on apps or paper. It would be great to see his awesome stop motion videos forever archived on his blog! What other ideas would be fun to document? I would love some ideas and suggestions....

I am excited. :0)

Back to the ole grind :0)

If we followed our public school model, we would likely be spending a lot of time today and in the weeks to come, discussing how we are safe in our school. In the wake of the Connecticut shooting many children are scared to go to school. Many families are choosing to homeschool instead of public school. I keep reading about children and families who no longer feel safe in their public schools. It is tragic. Not just the horrifying loss of innocent lives, but the waves of innocence damaged by the aftermath. The reality that we are not as safe as we once felt. The reality that no community is immune from the effects of mental illness.

Today I feel lucky. Lucky to have chosen to homeschool and thereby alleviate the fear of a school shooting. Lucky to have my kids and husband nearby on a regular basis. I feel like I have been given a gift of time with my family. I feel a bit less burdened by our family's choice to home educate.

I am excited for this new year. All of the possibilities still laid out in front of us, like a fresh blanket of snow.

I will continue to pray for the families who lost children to this tragedy and the other families affected. I will pray for change in our health care system, that we may be able to help the mentally ill before they snap and commit such horrendous acts of senseless violence.

As for my family, today is a day like most every other. We are cuddled up on the couch reading and writing and talking and laughing. Back to the ole grind :0)

New Years resolution...

I have been giving a lot of thought to my plans for 2013. I have a lot of changes I want to make in my life and the lives of my family. I am sad that some of those changes have been on my resolution list for the last few years and I have come up short on meeting them each year.

I think I have a way to be successful this year. I am encompassing ALL of my proposed resolutions under one umbrella. KINDNESS

Kind to my body...
Kind to my family...
Kind to my spiritually growth..
Kind to others....

You get the idea. I think I will work on one or two measurable goals each month of the year and see just what I can accomplish in 2013! I am super excited!

What is your goal for 2013? Do you make resolutions?

Please share your ideas for 2013......

Life reflects a childhood game?

I was talking with someone I love not long ago, and a comment was made about a religion I "liked" on Facebook. Well not so much the religion, but something to do with that particular church's page. It was as if the thought of me liking something to do with that particular denomination had to be a mistake. Now, do not misinterpret, this person loves me and was speaking from their heart, and I believe genuinely amused or taken back by the thought of me purposefully subscribing to this particular faith. I do not believe the intent was for me to be stuck thinking about it for nearly as long as I have been. Then again, I think about religion a lot.

I read about different denominations and their doctrinal similarities and differences. I wonder which church is the most closely representative of the church as Jesus established while here, walking among us. After all, neither you, nor I were here. In fact no one we know was. So how are we to know, I mean, really know the right answer to life's more elusive questions?

I have written about this before. Kind of. The truth is, I find myself contemplating the same set of questions over and over again. Most people of faith offer similar answers. "Find a church that is a bible believing church." "Read the bible and pray about it." You know, non-assertive, generic answers. I believe the Bible is the inspired word of God, given to man, translated by many men over the course of many years, during many of which, average people were restricted access to and therefore taught from the perspective of other men, passed down through the last few thousand years, leading to numerous translations of that very same collection of books. This brings me to my point....

Have you ever played the game telephone? You stand in a line, or a circle and whisper the same sentence or phrase into the ear of the person next to you and so on until the last person says it out loud and the first person repeats the original statement. It is a fun game, because the last person usually says something outrageous and quite far from the original. How can we truly know that errors like that have not occurred in the translation of our most sacred text? I worry about that. Do you?

It's kind of humbling, for me. It makes me more tolerant of people's different takes on religion. I truly believe if we follow our hearts, and live our life as closely as we can to Christ's example, we will one day find ourselves in the presence of God. Now, if only I could find a church home that was full of people who love God, each other, and the community, who are able to look past people's differences and allow people to live as they see fit, and love them anyway. Well, I would be a very happy camper :0)