Tuesday, January 1, 2013

He Giveth More Grace

I don't do resolutions, but I do want to make a plan for the next year that is about reaching vertically, and  give and accept more Grace. I fully appreciate and and trust God to care for me and my family through all things. But I realize I only expect, and even only ask for what I have carefully calculated and know is the bare minimum I need for the soon to be five of us to survive. But what if Gods minimum is bigger than my minimum? I feel God telling me I have put Him in a box, that I only deserve for myself the amount of Grace I think I deserve.  So I am asking God to forgive me for limiting Him, and accept ALL that He wants to provide for us, and not judge myself into believing anything is too much.

Sunday, April 29, 2012

April 29

I here by declare the second annual All Pink Day.  Today every girl and woman is a Princess. Wear pink, eat pink and know that you are special. Watch a princess movie or read a princess story. 

A year ago today my DD and I had this our all pink day in honor of Prince William and Kate's wedding. We hardly watched the wedding, we had so much fun just being girls!

I think it's important to remember once in a while how valuable we are as women. Rich or poor, young or old, strong or weak, we all influence the people around us. Take this day to reward yourself and the other women around you.

PINK SOMEONE! Leave an anonymous "pink" gift for someone. Here's a note to go with it




Have your cake and eat it too today!

clip art from  http://school.discoveryeducation.com

Monday, January 9, 2012

Special Agents: Greek Alphabet Code Cracker

Wow! Its 9:30 pm and I just got the oldest two settled down and to bed. They are stoked and more excited than Christmas Eve! All because we turned Greek studies into a mystery caper using the Book: Greek Alphabet Code Cracker (click the link for a free sample chapter.)

No one has asked me to review this book, we just LOVE it so much we wanted to recommend it to others interested in learning ancient Greek!

We have a general course we are working through and love, and have mastered saying the names of each Greek letter. But we were having a bit of difficulty learning the sounds each letter made and the diphthongs, to be able to read actual Greek words. But this book was perfect! It uses the Greek letters to form English words...that's the code! Look at the Greek letters and decide what English word it pronounces! It is a complete work book but I only bought one copy. It's full color, so photocopying pages would be expensive and probably illegal, so how do three people use one workbook? We turned the book into a game!

The book is a missing Vase case, and you have to break the Greek code to find clues and discover the thief and his hiding spot.
I made little notebooks for the two oldest children, detective note books! They drew pictures of the suspects and used the notebooks to record the codes, the clues and at the back kept track of diphthongs and general rules. We even drew the map inside the books to follow the thief to his hiding place!

We sat at the kitchen table, at about 7pm...I mean Squad room at 1900 hrs...and I was promoted from Detective to chief by the two other detectives! They chose their badge numbers and wrote them on their books, and then the fun began!

I read the details and witness accounts, and led them through the exercises on the blackboard. We turned some exercises into races between the two detectives, and other exercises were collaborations they had to finish together and agree on the answers before writing in the blanks on the board. And other activities they copied from the board into their note books, all keeping in character of any good Hollywood version Detective team. Actually, I felt a lot like Charlie Eppes, Numb3rs mathematician phenomenon, writing all these amazing characters on the board the normal Canadian wouldn't understand! (Yea, I wish, lol! Me and math are not best friends!)

So what do I hoe this accomplishes? Well, if we can read the letters as sounds that form English words we are familiar with, we should be able to look at the same Greek letters and sound out Greek words that are foreign to us with decent accuracy...and learn their English meanings of course so we know what we are saying! We will then return to our regular Greek course.  I think as a game it was perhaps so much fun for us because we have a previous knowledge of the alphabet and had an introduction to their sounds. So we weren't really trying to learn something new, we are using this to deep root the knowledge we have been trying to retain.

We finished two units tonight, and I had to bribe them to settle down to sleep, and threatening NOT to play tomorrow if they didn't stop talking to each other through the walls of their rooms about the game! We have 6 more units to the book...and even I can't wait until tomorrow to play at least two more!




Image from: http://www.classicalacademicpress.com/

Monday, January 2, 2012

Clean Heart Clean Home Challenge

What woman- single, married, with children or without - couldn't use some encouragement cleaning out our closets, basements, kitchen drawers, office spaces...you get the idea! Most of us just need that little shove and a lot of encouragement.
I recently discovered a link to a blog called "On the Old Path" with a 52 day clean heart clean home challenge with devotions and encouragement to clean out our lives, spiritually and physically. I posted a link on Facebook and  realized how many people would enjoy doing this! So here is a link with a PDF guide to go with it. (see the red word "challenge" ? Right click and save as!)

Clean Heart, Clean Home Link

On The Old Path

Friday, December 23, 2011





Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. 

- Luke 2:10




Merry Christmas!

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

My personal thought for the day.....
 I'm often worried about sharing my past in case I get labeled as "one carrying baggage" ... but sometimes talking about a difficult time in your past is really only showing the stamp in your passport to show you were there once.
 - Charlene Elizabeth

I have changed my profile to read: Single, work from home mother of three homeschoolers. 
YES it can be done, and I am self sufficient by the grace of GOD! My life isn't a bed of  roses, but I'm loving the daisies and can pull out the stink weed when it pops up. 
C'est la vie, and I'm living it stronger than ever!

CEJT/11

 
 
 

Sunday, February 27, 2011

HURT NO LIVING THING by Christina Rossetti
Hurt no living thing:
Ladybird, nor butterfly,
Nor moth with dusty wing,
Nor cricket chirping cheerily,
Nor grasshopper so light of leap,
Nor dancing gnat, nor beetle fat,
Nor harmless worms that creep.