Clayton, Liam, and Carrington on the merry-go-round.
Liam, Clayton, Carrington, and Hudson...........my children with my couson's children.
My Mom holding her brother's grandson.
~Clayton has been digging a hole in my flower bed.............just because. I haven't planted anything in it yet, so I told him to have at it. It has gotten pretty big.
~The other day, Clayton saw Warren and I discussing a check that we were sending to a missionary friend of ours. Clayton said, "Are we gonna be poor now?" I just love how he's always thinking of others!
~We bought a telescope for Clayton for his birthday. So far we haven't seen the first star. I hope we can figure out how to use it!
I bought this on the internet, just for the fun of it after Prince William's wedding. We're trying to learn some of the flags from different countries. But don't worry, I'm definitely partial to our own Stars and Stripes! :o) Thanks Carrrington for the picture!
We've been reading this Science book for school this year. It has some great and easy experiments and it is Creation-based Science, which is very important. We have really enjoyed it.
We rented this from the library. It was written by Senator Rick Santorum's wife. She's a homeschool Mom. It has a lot of character-building poems and stories.
I love this book! The pictures are so pretty! My favorite subject is American history, so I really enjoyed reading this to Clayton.
My library basket. I used to keep it upstairs and then I would forget about the books. Now it's in the kitchen, and it's so much handier!
We've been doing school outside a lot lately, especially in the morning before it gets too hot. I don't know why I look like I'm frowning. I actually really like that book!
This past weekend my family went to a homeschool conference. This was the 7th time we've gone! By this time of year, I need to be inspired and the conference always does that. Todd Wilson (in the video above) was one of the speakers. If you ever get a chance to hear him, I highly recommend him! He's not at all the kind of speaker that will make you feel like you're not doing a good job. One of his talks was called, "Lies Homeschooling Moms Believe". It was so funny and encouraging at the same time. Every speaker that I heard had a message I needed to hear.
The main message that I got out of this year's conference was that homeschooling is about discipleship. Math and Spelling are important, but even more important are things like having a close walk with the Lord, working on Godly character traits, and having a good relationship with your children. It's also always great to hear someone like Voddie Baucham ( who is one of my favorites) to remind me of why we are homeschooling in the first place, that we're not crazy for homeschooling, and how important it is that we give our children a Christian education. One analogy he gave was so great! He used the picture of a warrior with a quiver full of arrows from Psalm 127:4 "Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth.". He said that a warrior would not take his arrows to the enemy to train them, but would train them himself. It is our job as Christians to train and disciple our children, not a public school whose philosophy is based on secular humanism and evolution. Even if your child's teacher is a sweet Christian lady, they are not allowed to teach your child from a Christian world view with the Bible as the authority. That hit the nail on the head for me. I can't repeat it as eloquently as Voddie Baucham can, but hopefully you get the idea. :o)
