Our Week In Review–The One With All The Grandparents

My parents came to visit this week. We only got two weeks notice, so I didn’t change up the entire school schedule around their visit; it’s gone well despite the interruptions. PWM’s mom arrived Thursday so we had some overlap in visits. She usually comes twice a year so I don’t worry so much about working school around her visits. It’s all good.

Overall, it has gone remarkably well, except for my near constant severe headache. I did get started on some dexamethasone on Tuesday afternoon. It definitely has side effects, but the headache was much better on Thursday. Early Friday morning, though, I slipped and fell in the wee hours of the morning (dexamethasone gives me insomnia) and hit my head on the corner of a table and strained most of my other muscles. I didn’t tell my parents till they were Friday night, when they were already stopping for dinner in Missouri! The headaches weren’t fun, but they allowed the grandparents to spend more time with the grandchildren, I suppose, and I felt no guilt over not doing anything useful in my own house!

My mom was completely taken in by the yarn shop. I refused to make a shawl out of novelty yarn for her because it’s so simple that she can do it herself and I don’t like working with that yarn. So, she’s well on the way to having a lovely Organza scarf that she knitted herself. But, she did twist my arm (about 3 degrees did it!) to make her a silk shawl.  By the time she left, she had yarn and needles for three projects along with some shawl pins.

Grandma (PWMs mom) arrived late Thursday morning. She got to hang out some with my parents, but she’s staying at a friend’s house, so we will get to see her after breakfast most days. She has a new  toy – an ipad! I’m a bit jealous, especially of the picture quality! She’ll be here for a week or so. And Rosie Girl actually has this weekend completely off, so she requested that we do something family-like. We’ll see what we can manage!

Wild Man

He seems to be enjoying his American History. Yesterday, he was particularly intrigued by Roger Williams since he  seems to embody the American ideal of freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and freedom of association.

The N.T. Wright Revelation commentary is also rather interesting. I’m glad we’re using this particular commentary because it is the clearest explanation of some of the confusing images from the book of Revelation that I’ve read. Wright is good about explaining what the various options are for a symbol and then explaining the most likely meaning. Wild Man understands what he’s reading, but has told me that this is more unusual than he expected when he requested to study it!

Grandpa was most impressed  with Wild Man’s science book. I have Wild Man read a section of DK/Smithsonian Earth each day and answer a question or write a summary sentence for me. Grandpa was amazed by the amount of information and pictures, but then also by the price! I bought the book about 5 years ago for only $25 off Amazon. It’s now being used for the second time for a high school science credit – probably the best money I’ve ever spent on these kids’ high school studies!

I’ve found that his handwriting fluency and legibility is much improved by having him answer questions for each subject each day. The questions aren’t hard, but they make sure that  he  has read the material.

He’s playing drum kit for one of the Christmas songs in band but still playing bells in marching band and cymbals in pep band. And I’m super-proud of him for staying a few minutes after class to get the band director to help him with his timpani part when none of the other percussion players could.

At church, he and another few teenagers lead worship for the kids during the 10:30 service on Sunday. The teen bands have practice on Sunday afternoon where Wild Man plays drums or acoustic guitar. On Wednesday night, he and a couple of other teens lead worship with just keyboard and drums.

Wild Man and Rosie Girl Went to the local nursing home a few weeks ago and played guitars and sang for several residents. They are working up some pieces to play in a few weeks when they go again.

Wild Man is delighting Grams by eating everything she makes plus some! He and Grandpa shared some “guy time” by watching LSU play pitifully against Towson (although they won) and the Packers play OK against the Saints (again, they won). There was much testosterone to be had in the living room during those games. During half-time of the Bears/Cowboys game, the kids brought out their guitars and played and sang some beautiful music for the grandparents. And a good time was had by all!!

Rosie Girl

Rosie Girl is enjoying British Literature except for poetry – although I suspect that deep down she really doesn’t mind it all that badly. She’s reading Sherlock Holmes right now and really likes it.

I DVR’d the presidential debate to watch next week as part of her American Government (and Wild Man’s American History). She likes her American Government Text even though I regularly assign her questions that require a little internet research.

Rosie Girl is finished with Japanese except for taking the final exam! Now she gets to use Rosetta Stone for her second credit of Japanese. And now she has extra time to finish Algebra 2 before Personal Finance starts. Yippee!! Can you tell that  these aren’t her favorite credits to rack up.

In music, Rosie Girl is learning pieces for her college audition (while also filling out her general college application). She’s taking composition lessons as well. And, we are borrowing an old electric guitar from church so Wild Man can practice guitar without bothering Rosie Girl, but Rosie Girl is finding that she likes the idea of getting to learn to play electric guitar when Wild Man isn’t using it. I think she has musical ADD.

And, of course, she’s taking a tap dance class and demonstrating for  intermediate child ballet and intermediate child tap classes. And teaching piano lessons.

Rosie Girl  and Grams spent some time Monday driving around and taking pictures of Fall colors. She’s also been driving Grandpa around making sure he knows where the grocery store, etc. are. And, of course, there’s cooking. They made some delicious Zuppa Toscana on Thursday morning for all of us to have as the weather cooled down! And then they proceeded to have a girls’ day out. Grams went with Rosie Girl and watched her demonstrate for dance classes. Then they did a bit of shopping and stopped at Starbucks. A teenager and her Grams. Does it get much better than that?

How has your week gone? Anything exciting or educational in your world?

Check out Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers to see what others are doing!

7 Quick Takes Friday–October 5, 2012

 

This has been quite the week – many more than seven things have happened, but I’ll see if I can get it down to the seven most interesting.

1. My parents arrived on Saturday afternoon just as our knitting class was ending. We got to show them around the shop since the last time that they saw the building, it was just two empty rooms. Now, though, it is two rooms full of yarn, notions, and books. PWM and I are pretty darn proud of our little knitting shop!

2. My mom took over custody of the kitchen Saturday night after I made some spaghetti. I felt kind of bad because she took over before I had gotten everything nice and clean for  her, but she likes to clean and said she was happy, so I guess it’s all OK. They leave tomorrow morning which means that I have to take back custody of the kitchen. Actually, than means I have to make the kids fill and empty the dishwasher and PWM and I will alternate the rest of the kitchen cleaning. And Grams will come back in a year or two and give the kitchen a deep cleaning again.

3. I don’t need to cook for a good week or so, though, since Grams cooked double the amount that we needed at each meal. The refrigerator is completely full! No arguments from me. I was having too many headaches to cook this week. If it had been up to me, people would have had lots of sandwiches.

4. Grams and Rosie Girl spent the day together today. They started by making the soup for dinner tonight. Then Rosie Girl did her schoolwork while Grams came to the shop to buy more yarn than she’ll ever use. Then, they drove to Stevens Point so Rosie Girl could demonstrate during two dance classes. Of course, they needed a Starbucks break on the way home! Overall, it sounds like they had a very nice girls’ afternoon out.

5. I’m now on dexamethasone for a week and a half to try to break my headache cycle. I’m headache-y tonight because of the weather change, but the medication (which is a steroid) has me pretty hopped up! I got lots of work done at the shop today and I’m not very tired yet. Hence the blogging at 1am.

6. Grams decided that she needed to hem some pants tonight. Unfortunately, I don’t have a good relationship with my sewing machine. I managed to get it working a few weeks ago to make a bag for Rosie Girl’s Zelda costume, so I tried the same thing again tonight with no luck. Then Grams tried. With no luck. So we got Rosie Girl out of bed. And she had it working in about 25 seconds. This is what you get when you have a grandmother with a gift of shopping and a mother with a gift of knitting facing a sewing machine. We’re pathetic.

7. It’s always interesting to see what the parents think of our current state of home education. This time, Grandpa was very taken with the Smithsonian/DK book Earth that Wild Man uses for Earth Science. Rosie Girl used it 4 years ago. I would have her read a section and write a response every week. That worked great until she gave me a haiku about volcanoes. The next week, I requested prose again. Wild Man isn’t as comfortable writing yet, so I give him a question to answer about what he reads each day. My dad was really impressed about the level of information, but was shocked that the book was only $25. And, truly, I think it’s some of the best $25 we’ve spent in high school home education. And then Grandpa and I talked some about Bible curricula, especially since I’ve veered away from formal curricula. Wild Man is reading N.T. Wright commentaries which are written at about a high school level. Rosie Girl spent the last two years reading the Bible along with some basic introductory and cultural material. She’s studying world religions right now. Grandpa and I share a strong conviction that we would understand the Bible better if we would pay more attention to the cultural time and location of the writers and readers of the text.

That’s been our week. Lots of headache, lots of good food, lots  of yarn, lots of learning. How about yours?

Check out what others are saying at 7 Quick Takes Friday!

Music

Our family LOVES music. Obviously. I play piano and clarinet and have been known to sing in a church choir or two. PWM plays acoustic guitar and bass guitar as well as doing sound for the worship team at church. In high school, he played clarinet, trumpet, and drums (but not all at the same time). Rosie Girl is outshining both of us musically, playing piano, acoustic (nylon string) guitar, ocarina, and clarinet (a little); arranging and composing music; and planning to study music composition next year in college. Wild Man is musical but managing to be different from us all. He plays percussion in the high school band. In the youth worship band, he plays drum kit, acoustic guitar, and bass guitar while on Sunday mornings, he and a few other teenagers lead worship for the children’s ministry.

Now that I’ve laid down our family’s music-loving credentials, I’ll tell you that the point of this post is to express appreciation for all the artists out there who are making beautiful instrumental music that continues to fascinate and inspire my children. When I was younger, I loved listening to Chopin and Debussy, but I doubt that there were many of my friends who shared such tastes. And, even with those tastes, I still didn’t turn to NPR or other classical sources for most of my music. Baroque and Classical didn’t do much for me at the time.

My kids, though, are loving a wide variety of musical eras due to artists like The Piano Guys. They’ve got some amazingly beautiful Beethoven and Bach reimagined musically and then videotaped in some amazing scenes. And then there’s the very silly Rockabel’s Canon (well, the video is silly – the arrangement is still beautiful). Even the pop songs sound less “pop” when done on grand piano and cello.

One of Rosie Girl’s passions is movie and video game soundtracks. She has several movie soundtracks that she can tell you the action and dialogue that is happening throughout the entire score. And explain why the composer made the choices he/she did. A couple of weekends ago, Rosie Girl and I spend a “Girls’ Weekend” in the Twin Cities and saw the Zelda Symphony. Because of the 25th anniversary of the Zelda video game series, the composers had put together the music of the series into a symphony. It was amazing! Rosie Girl and I loved it. And there were two harps!! The Zelda video games were what got Rosie Girl playing ocarina. In fact, at music camp this summer, Rosie Girl composed a piece for ocarina and piano.

These are the kinds of things that are getting my kids excited about instruments besides piano and guitar. I’m not sure Wild Man is going to be asking for cello lessons anytime soon, but I love that he’s listening to these “classical” instruments and isn’t turned off by them like so many teens have been in the last few decades.

When the kids were younger, I would put classical music on to play while they were doing their schoolwork. They didn’t complain. These days, they quite often have their ipods on while they are working and I don’t complain because they are usually listening to one of the soundtracks or Piano Guys. Generally, they manage to choose things that have a rhythm that helps them focus – especially good for Wild Man.

Music is not some accident of nature. It’s wired into us. Not everyone is as talented as my kids at making music, but I dare say that almost all of us enjoy it at some level. And God enjoys our making music. Entire families were devoted to making music in the temple. The whole book of Psalms is music to be sung to God – everything from laments to wild praises! And the New Testament also tells us to continue to sing hymns and psalms. All of this music is like part of nature – it points us to the beauty of God. And I’m so thankful.

A Missive on Migraines

Did ya see that alliteration? Huh? As a homeschooling mama, I’m pretty proud of myself! Now, to get my kids to see and use alliteration. . . .

On to more important (?) things. My head and the pain therein.

So, I’m still seeing this neurologist who seems to know what he’s up to. And he listens to me and doesn’t think I’m crazy (although he didn’t quite know what to make of the needle phobia). I went back last Tuesday (9/25) for my next scheduled Botox treatment. I told the Neurologist that the treatment had probably worked – the headaches were probably 30% less intense, but no less frequent. And I’d had a 4 day raging migraine the week before, the timing of which added weight to the fact that the Botox might have been helpful. We decided to go ahead with another series of Botox. Since I haven’t had a completely headache free day in long enough that I can’t remember when, he offered to do an occipital block which has a 95% chance of giving me complete migraine relief for 1 day to 2 weeks. The other 5% have no improvement or worsening of the headache. Well, with my parents coming, I thought 95% were good odds.

The doctor did the Botox (which was a bit more painful this time since I still had a bit of a migraine from the day before) and then did the occipital block (which took all of 2 seconds). By the time I got to the car, the back of my head was numb and I was feeling pretty good, not to mention optimistic. Unfortunately, by the time I got back to Weyauwega, the right side of my arm and neck were hurting, as if the medication had traveled down some tissue planes or something. The left side seemed OK.

The neck and arm weirdness improved by that night. But, by the next morning, my headache was up to an 8/10 and stayed there all day. And Thursday, it was a 7/10. Friday, it let up to about a 6. Thankfully, it seemed to calm down, which was nice because my parents got into town that afternoon. But, the headache returned back to a 5+ on Sunday morning and worsened during the day. On Monday, it was only a 6 and I thought I’d be OK. I had called the neurologist on Friday, so when his nurse called on Monday and offered some steroids or a 3 day hospitalization for another medication, I figured I was OK to decline it. Until Tuesday when I had a rip-roaring migraine at about an 8 all day which went up to a 9-10 at 4 am on Wednesday am. Thankfully, some Imitrex and Zofran and Compazine got me down off the ceiling. With a few naps, I managed to get back into a normal range. I called neuro again and said I’d like to try the steroid.

So, here I sit. Awake. Due to a combination of sleeping all day and being hyped up on Dexamethasone. I’m also keeping a heating pad on my neck because I injured it a month ago. I see occupational therapy about trying to calm that down in a week or so.

I think I’m in really good hands with this neurologist. He’s up on all the literature. I come home and check out the things he’s doing (I still have access to the medical literature) and he seems to be on target. He’s willing to adjust medications as well as do Botox and other interventions. This  time around, he wants to see me in six weeks. I’m doing a better job of keeping a headache diary. And still seeing my therapist.

And, on my good days, I’m a Yarn Diva. I prefer that title to Headache Queen. Maybe soon I’ll be able to use it more often.

A Girls’ Weekend

The Rosie Girl and I spent Saturday and Sunday together on a Girls’ Weekend – being girls together and having fun. I’d share photos, but I only took a couple. I’ll just share  memories instead.

• We shared the driving from Weyauwega to Minneapolis and listened to Shadow of the Hegemon by Orson Scott Card most of the time. Interspersed we had some serious conversations about religion and life.
• I’m really glad Rosie Girl is old enough to drive.
• We were hobbits and had breakfast when we left home and then second breakfast a few hours later.
• When we reached our hotel, I took a nap (because I’d slept so poorly the night before) while Rosie Girl researched whether we could take public transportation to the Mall of America and/or the concert that night. Short answer – no.
• After my nap, we drove to the Mall of American for dinner and shopping. And, can I just say, thank you, Minneapolis for all your clear driving instructions through the construction – NOT! Thankfully, Rosie Girl reads quickly.
• For dinner, we went to Bubba Gump’s and shared snow crab legs. Wow. Yummy.
• Then, a quick stop at Hot Topic for Rosie Girl to find some more T-shirts (like she needs any more!) before we were off to the concert.
• We needed to drive west for one exit and then go north into downtown Minneapolis to the Orpheum theater. Unfortunately, it was about 7pm and the sun was directly in our eyes. Despite sunglasses, Rosie Girl and I were completely blinded. I couldn’t see the cars in front of me or the barricades beside me (again, thank you, Minneapolis construction!) and Rosie Girl couldn’t read the signs because of the sun!! Talk about stressed! Rosie Girl had me just keep going for another couple exits till we got to the exit for our hotel where we knew we could turn around and then go east to find the correct exit to go north.
• We got to the Orpheum theater and parked in time for the concert – Zelda Orchestra: Symphony of the Goddesses!
• Talk about geek heaven!! Rosie Girl didn’t change into her costume until we got to the theater, but there were tons of folks of all ages already in costume when we got there! Some were costumes purchased online or in costume shops, others were homemade, while others (like Rosie Girl’s) were a combination of thrift shop and homemade.
• The Orpheum Theater is beautiful! I have no idea how old it is, but it has been restored and looks amazing. We were in balcony (aka cheap) seats, and could see so much. It was gorgeous!
• The symphony conductor is a woman! I realize I should not be shocked, especially since I went to medical school at a time when women were still a minority. But I was still surprised since I’ve never seen a woman conduct in person.
• The conductor was just wonderful, but her jacket was atrocious. She wore what looked like a black suit with pants, but the jacket had ruffles on the back right on the butt that were just awful. Thankfully, the music more than made up for it.
• And the music was, indeed, amazing!! They had two harps!!
• On a large video screen, there was footage from the game that went along with what the orchestra was playing. I understood some of it really well, but some of it I was completely unfamiliar with. But the music was wonderful!
• At intermission, Rosie Girl got a T-shirt and a poster.
• I can’t say enough good things about the music. What was really cool was that I was used to hearing it while the other three family members played the video game, but hearing it played by a symphony was like going from 2 dimensions to 3 dimensions. Wow.
• Saturday night, Rosie Girl and I stayed up and I listened to her chatter for about an hour about music, Zelda, and books.
• We were a bit disappointed that there was no free continental breakfast in the morning, but that motivated us to get moving and get to the Mall of America.
• When we got to the Mall, we had manicures at an Aveda salon – something we’ve never had done before.
• The next few hours were spent shopping (I got some cute tops at Lane Bryant) and generally sight seeing.
• The hardest part of the trip was coming home! We were both tired and had a hard time staying awake, so we traded off frequently. At every stop, the next driver would get some soda and run around outside in the chilly air.
• But, the best part of the trip was coming home because we were very glad to get home to PWM and Wild Man – and to tell them about the amazing concert and all the fun we had!

On How to Read the Bible

Note 1: This is not a post on how you should read the Bible. Rather, it is a post about the myriad of ways I’ve read the Bible in my 45 years. You may or may not get anything useful out of it, but it may be entertaining nonetheless.

Note 2: I’m coming off a 36 hour migraine. See Note 1 about this post possible being entertaining.

I grew up in a Christian home, going to a Baptist church, and (for my elementary years) going to a Christian school. I have been exposed to the Bible. In many ways. And many were good and useful. Although some not so much. But I see a counselor about those. (I kid, I kid. I see a counselor about lots of other things, too.)

As a very young child, I was read Bible stories at home, church, and school. Generally, these were the basic Adam and Eve, Esther, David, etc. stories. Much of the book of Genesis was left for later.  (PWM and I learned to edit on the fly when we decided to read the Bible all the way through to our kids one year when they were entirely too young to hear about Lot’s daughters, Tamar, and plenty of other stuff that makes me blush.) One rather disturbing thing that I do remember during my elementary years about Bible stories is that the third grade class one year acted out the story of Aachen. You know, Israel is told by God to completely destroy the city of Ai and collect all the treasure. Well, Aachen hides some treasure in his tent, which God knows about because he’s God. Joshua calls Aachen on it. Aachen and his entire family are stoned. What disturbed me as a first grader was that they acted out the stoning part, too, although they had the decency to use tissue paper “stones”. That’s a tough story to understand, but then to act out as 8 year olds? Hmmmm.

A big part of what I learned about reading the Bible in my Evangelical and vaguely Fundamentalist Christian school was that it is full of rules. And, man, this school did rules like no body’s business. We had rules for how short our skirts could be at school, for how close boys and girls could sit on the bus, and even that we couldn’t wear blue jeans at school events. In fact, every classroom I was every in had a board with the kids’ names and little paper pockets for “tallies” which were the slips we got when we broke rules. We learned lots of Bible verses, particularly the ones with rules. But, I was good at following rules, so I did well at that school.

We also only used the King James Version of the Bible. I think the NIV was still pretty new, but the school was also pretty conservative. There are lots of verses that I memorized as a kid that I still have in my head in the KJV and probably always will! As a child, I got a gorgeous Bible with a blue leather cover with my name in silver script and silver edging on the paper. I still have that Bible but I hardly ever use it because the cover is coming off and we have about a zillion Bibles at home. When I was a teenager, my parents gave me a leather bound Thompson Chain Reference NIV Bible which I still use as my primary study Bible when I’m not at the computer. But, being a child of the modern age, I have to admit that I usually use Bible Gateway at home and my ipod at church.

As I got older, I learned some more important things about reading the Bible. In the 80s, people were getting worked up over the Bible being “inerrant”. In the two youth groups I attended when I was in junior high school and high school, this translated to “literal”. Particularly when we were talking about the first two chapters of Genesis. Not only were we supposed to read them literally – as in, God spoke the universe into existence 6000 years ago in 6-24 hour days – but, we were supposed to make sure that our Biology teachers knew that we believed this. The good news for me was that my Biology teacher didn’t seem to think that evolution was all that necessary for a good Biology education (or I fell asleep that day – but, really, the man could only handle so much controversy; he also had to teach us about sex that year and I think that almost did him in). Somewhere along the way, we were also told that Psalms and Proverbs didn’t have to be read literally, but that if we didn’t read Genesis literally, then we were probably denying the Gospel. Life got really confusing around high school. (That was also when the hormones showed up, though, so I don’t think it’s fair to blame it all on the Bible or biblical interpretation.)

Somewhere along the way, I also learned to “proof-text”. If someone had a problem, someone else would find a verse for them. (As you’ll see later, I’m not so much a fan of this nowadays.) I was pretty good at this since I’d learned tons of Bible verses in school and at church. Need prayer answered? “Pray without ceasing” Need help in making a decision? “Seek ye first the kingdom of God . . . “ Things not going your way? “But I know the plans for you, says the Lord, plans to prosper you . . .”
Feeling stressed? “The Lord is my shepherd . . . “ Heck, with a little work, I could come up with some serious enemy-smiting verses, too!!

When we hit the 90s, people got more enlightened and started reading the Bible for answers to life’s tough questions: how to lose weight, how to find a spouse, how to become emotionally healthy. And guess what? They found answers! It wasn’t much different than the way the Bible was used in my elementary school – it was a whole bunch of rules. This time, though, they had come across some really cool verses with promises about what would happen when you followed the rules. People are still doing this today, by the way. Check out your local Christian bookstore. The Christian Living section looks pretty similar to the Personal Growth section of Barnes and Noble – and about as large.

I bought into it, too! Some author would take some section of scripture and decide that we could also apply to some problem that’s common to our current society. Wow! What an idea. We’d be off and running. But, when we quit following the rules, we weren’t any better off. Turns out that following rules doesn’t actually effect much inner change. But, eating your fruits and veggies still is good for your cholesterol.

But, then, post-modernism came along and told us that we needed to quit reading the Bible as a puzzle to be solved and instead get into the narrative and understand the story. We’re all part of the grand meta-narrative and we just need to understand our place within it! Huh? That didn’t resonate too much with me. I’m a decidedly modern thinker.

A few years ago, our pastor was taking some online seminary classes and he asked me to read and outline his hermeneutics book to help him study. That was one of the best things I’ve done for my Bible study! I started to get a picture of how a text is situated in time and place and situation. For us to understand it, we need to first understand what it was saying to it’s original audience and then try to figure out how God wants us to understand it today. (BTW, this wasn’t my first introduction to this concept. My dad had already given me and PWM a set of Barclay New Testament commentaries and Broadman entire Bible commentaries. This book was the best explanation of how to use commentaries, other resources, the rest of the Bible, prayer, and common sense.) One of the biggest practical effects of this “little education” was that I almost never take proof-texting at face value any more. I always want to know the original source and context of the text.

Most recently, in the last few years, I’ve been reading some blogs and books that have helped to sharpen my focus on reading and studying the Bible. They are a reminder that the Bible is about Jesus. It’s not a science textbook. While it gives a lot of history about Israel, it does it in order to point to Jesus. It may give us lots of good guidelines for living, but it’s not a book on how to live – it’s a book on how to know Jesus, and he’ll walk with us through life. it’s still quite important to look for the best scholarship out there to find out what the text says. How is it pointing us  to Jesus? In some parts of the Old Testament, it may just be giving us some background or history of Israel. But, God gave it all to us.

So, what does this mean for me now? I usually try to study what the pastor is preaching at church since he likes to preach through books of the Bible. Right now he’s doing “King Jesus Rules the World” about the book of Ruth. I also read daily (well, I don’t actually get around to them daily, but it’s a goal . . . ) readings on Bible Gateway. I have an audio Bible on my ipod and I’ve started listening to the Gospels recently. The advantage of audio is that I can listen to a large section and get a real “feel” for it while I’m knitting or cleaning and don’t need to feel like I’m “studying”. These are all valid ways of interacting with the Bible as long as I understand their strengths and weaknesses. (A blog I enjoy is studying Esther over the next couple of months, so I might do some of that as well. It will be a nice contrast to look at women of the ancient East while studying Ruth.)

I hope this has been helpful, enlightening, or entertaining. If nothing else, it got some stuff out of my head and written down. How has your interaction with the Bible changed, if at all?

 

Our Week In Review–Week One is Done!

This was a very sentimental week for me – Rosie Girl’s last year of high school and Wild Man’s first year of high school. Forgive any random outbreaks of “Sunrise, Sunset” in this post.

The children, however, were not remotely sentimental. They were, for the most part, typical teenagers. Meaning, they needed to be reminded to do schoolwork and housework and they occasionally had teenager attitudes. And they did not understand my need to hug them and sound like a Hallmark commercial.

Here’s how the week went (with commentary):

Our evening read-aloud is usually one of the kids’ literature selections. This week, though, we’re finishing The Restaurant at the End of the Universe. OK, fine literature it’s not. But, it’s entertaining.

Wild Man

• Social Sciences – He is doing Sonlight Core 100 American History. I alternated reading out loud with him on Monday and I’m confident in his reading ability and comprehension of the books. Whew! (I was a little concerned that his dyslexia might be an issue, but I guess it’s not.) This week, he read about ancient South American peoples and very early Native Americans. I had him writing a paragraph each day and one of his paragraphs was about his history reading.
• Literature – This is part of his Sonlight Core. His book this week was Peace Child.
• Math – ALEKS Algebra 1 – Seems to be going pretty well, but PWM and I need to stay on top of this a little more to make sure Wild Man spends enough time on it each day.
• Science – Wild Man is reading 3 or 4 pages from Smithsonian Earth each day. This is his most challenging reading, but he wrote about it twice this week and was able to talk intelligently about it the other days, so I’m pleased with how he’s doing.
• Bible – We are reading N.T. Wright’s Revelation for Everyone, a commentary on the book of Revelation. So far, it has been an excellent book. The reading level is great for Wild Man, and it is broken up into very manageable sections. I really like most of what I’ve read by Wright, and this is no exception.
• Spelling – Ah, spelling, the bane of Wild Man’s existence. We are still using Spelling Power. Unfortunately, Wild Man’s assessment placed him lower than he was last year. This means that his lists are easier, but he’s still got a long way to go. I hope that the increased amount of writing this year will help him use more words and put them in his working vocabulary. He speaks with a wide vocabulary – he just can’t spell them!
• Writing – This last week, I had Wild Man write (as in, use a pencil on paper) a paragraph each day. His writing fluency is improving markedly, but he still has issues with capitalization, punctuation, and spelling. And, in order to fix those while he’s writing, he should be writing on his computer. This week, I’m going to have him answer some study questions each day from one or two of his subjects. That should give him practice in writing fluency. On Thursday, I’ll have him do a paragraph that should have good punctuation, spelling, and all the IEW “dress-ups” that he learned last year. He’ll be able to fix any issues that come up on Friday. In a few weeks, I hope we can increase his writing assignments to a couple of paragraphs. For a kid with such great verbal expression, we’re having to work really hard on written expression!! But, he’s doing the work and not fussing about it.
• Band – Wild Man isn’t crazy about playing cymbals, but he’s sticking with it. Next week is the first pep band of the season.
• Volunteer work – Unfortunately, Wild Man won’t be able to work at the Nutrition Site because of his band schedule. We’re hoping that the kids will be able to do music at one of the local nursing homes (their idea!).

Rosie Girl

• English – Rosie Girl is doing Sonlight Core 530 – British Literature and is pretty happy with it so far. The core is intended to be an Advanced Placement course. Rosie Girl isn’t too interested in the AP exam, so I’ve reduced the memorizations from 6 to 3 and the research papers from 2 to 1. Otherwise, she has lots of reading and writing to do each week. This week was Beowulf, so Rosie Girl requested the DVD of it being read in Anglo Saxon with captions instead of just reading it from the book. OK. She also bought a copy of Henry V when she and a friend were out shopping because she’s going to memorize the prologue for her first memorization. She’s a little confused that I didn’t read all of Shakespeare’s plays in my free time in high school and college. Ummm, yeah.
• Social Science – She’s reading a book about American Government right now and answering study questions about it. So far, so good.
• Religion – This year, we’re using the Hippocampus World Religions course. I’ve also added the few chapters from the textbook that the online course doesn’t use. She has been answering the questions I assigned without problem.
• Math – Rosie Girl is still finishing Algebra 2. Hopefully, she can do this in a month or so because she’s scheduled to start the Dave Ramsey Personal Finance Course sometime in October.
• Japanese – She’s almost finished with her BYU Japanese semester 2. When that is done, she’s going to start Rosetta Stone for her last Japanese credit.
• Music – Rosie Girl started her piano lessons again this week. She has pieces for her college audition to learn as well as some other pieces for the final contest. In two and a half weeks, she also starts her composition lessons. Yep, lots of music.
• PE – Rosie Girl has been diligent in getting out to walk every day. She’s going to continue taking a tap class every week. She’s pretty excited that she’s also going to be a dance demonstrator for a Music and Movement class (3 year olds) and  Pre-Tap/Pre-Ballet class (4-5 year olds).
• Volunteer work – Rosie Girl was the one who suggested taking their guitars to the nursing home. I will be talking to the nursing home next week to see if this is something they are interested in.
• Employment – This was the first week in a long time that she didn’t work at all during the week. She was only supposed to work till noon today, but ended up having to work till 4pm. Bummer. On the flip side, she has a good bit of money in her savings account from working all summer.
• Getting into college stuff – In addition to getting schoolwork done, Rosie Girl is supposed to be filling out her application, writing a personal statement, and practicing her piano pieces for her audition. She’s taking the ACT one more time (mostly to improve her chances for academic scholarships). There are three possible times to do her music audition, so she’ll do the early spring since she doesn’t think her pieces will be ready in the fall.

My babies are growing up entirely too quickly! But the school year is off to a good start. I think both kids will do well and learn a lot.

How is your year going? Check out Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers to see how others are doing!

7 Quick Takes Friday–August 31, 2012

 

1. On Monday of this week, I had a little black spot removed from my face by our local surgeon. It was an enlarged vein or “venous lake” – completely benign – but I wanted it off because my dad has had several very early stage melanoma lesions removed in the last couple of years. And I grew up with my fair Irish skin exposed to the Florida sun for the first 18 years of my life. So, nothing to worry about with this lesion. But, I know to keep a close eye on any changing skin lesions.

2. The big news this week for anyone not living under a rock was Tropical Storm/Hurricane Isaac. My parents live in Florida and got hit by the storm when it was still a Tropical Storm. They were fortunate to avoid significant flooding in their neighborhood, but I have friends rather close by who ended up with several inches of water in their house. Yuck!

3. And then, Hurricane Isaac went on to the Gulf Coast. And, of course, I have lots of friends and family there since I went to college at LSU and med school at Tulane. Everyone I know is doing well and I don’t think any of them got their houses flooded this time around. My parents also own a some land in southwestern Mississippi with a trailer on it. The most recent word is that the trailer is still standing – but no one would have been crazy enough to try to ride out such a storm in a trailer. They’re glad it didn’t seem to sustain much damage, though.

4. The other big news was the Republican National Convention. And we didn’t watch any of it. I know, I know, we’re pathetic homeschoolers. In our defense, we don’t start “school” till next week when I plan to have the kids watch the speeches by the candidates of both major parties. I’m not sure what kind of discussion we’ll have, but I will ensure that they will be somewhat educated citizens.

5. Wild Man has been taking every opportunity in the last few days to allow his brain to become completely “mushified” before school starts by watching TV and anime shows and playing video games. I told him I don’t mind much – it gives me a nice, blank slate to work with next week.

6. Rosie Girl has worked her last weekday of the summer. She’s now back to just weekends (except for teaching piano lessons and babysitting). She’s saved up a good bit of money which will go a long way toward buying a car before she goes to college.

7. I finally have all the books in the house on the correct bookshelves. Both kids have cleaned their desks in the new schoolroom/old sunroom. (I have several bags of items to sort through and decide how to handle – probably throw away – but at least the kids did their part of the cleaning up!) Now I need to spend a good bit of tomorrow setting up calendars and school assignments. The organizational part of me is happy. The lazy part of me – not so much.

How has your week been? Did you get flooded? Did you watch the convention or make your kids watch it?

Check out 7 Quick Takes Friday to see what others have been up to!!

Some Things I’m Learning About Myself

I’m probably going to ramble. I have a migraine. You’ve been warned.

I still struggle with the idea that the migraines are somehow my fault. If I ate better, exercised more, handled stress better, or was just somehow a better person, I wouldn’t have migraines and would still be working. And that would also make me a more valuable person because somehow having an M.D. but selling yarn is just not right. (FYI, the rational part of my brain understands that these thoughts are not correct, but they’re hard to overcome when I have a migraine because my head hurts and all the neurons are firing in the wrong order or something and I go a little crazy. Yesterday, I was totally loving my life in yarn – and I’m pretty sure I will again as soon as this migraine lets up.)

I also have trouble with the idea that I’m a picky eater. Somehow, that is also my fault. If I could just get over myself, I’d be able to eat all those gorgeous fruits and veggies – never mind the fact that when they actually hit my tongue, I gag and have been known to vomit. This feeling gets worse when I have a migraine, but I’m rather insecure about the picky eating thing all the time. (You’re surprised that I’m a functioning adult? Don’t worry, so am I!)

I’m reading a book right now called Suffering Succotash which is about picky eaters. It has been wonderful in helping me understand that most of my pickiness is likely genetic. There may be a few things I can do to expand my palate (which I’m willing to try), but my pickiness is not a moral failing.

I totally realize that believing my pickiness is my fault is not terribly rational. Somewhere in my perfectionism, I came to believe that anything imperfect about myself must necessarily be my fault – acne, body shape, food preferences, lack of athletic ability, inability to paint my nails neatly, etc. On a spiritual level, though, (you knew I’d go there, didn’t you?) it’s more than just perfectionism. If I can’t accept less than perfection, I’m turning my nose up at who God made me to be.

We live in a fallen world and we’re fallen creatures. Only God is perfect. When I require myself to be perfect, I’m trying to be God. And that doesn’t work out very well. In fact, there are days when I’m not doing such a great job of being me.

What am I learning about myself?

1. Not to trust my emotions when I have migraines because the migraines themselves mess up my brain chemicals.
2. It’s OK to cry, especially during a migraine, because of the aforementioned brain chemical mess.
3. Migraines are still not my fault.
4. Being a picky eater isn’t my fault.
5. I can go a week or longer without sugar without dying. (Yes, I have proven this recently. And I even ate more fruits and veggies to make up for it. Not more variety, mind you, just more of the ones I already like.)
6. I can live without chocolate. And when I do get to have chocolate again, I want the good stuff.
7. I’m a recovering perfectionist. I must be getting better, though, because there’s a load of unfolded laundry in the dining room that hasn’t been calling to me.

There’s another bit of my life I’m learning about. I guess I should thank God for the migraines since it’s given me such great opportunities for introspection!

In the meantime, though, please remember to pray for the Gulf Coast. I went to college in Baton Rouge and medical school in New Orleans and still have lots of family in that area. The damage from Isaac is not nearly as devastating as that from Katrina, but there will be lots of clean-up. You can always donate to the American Red Cross to help defray some of the relief costs. Also, Haiti had still not recovered from the earthquake when Isaac went through there. Food for the Poor is an excellent organization that is already working in that area and is accepting donations to provide clean water and food. Haiti’s relief efforts have been significantly hampered by a major cholera outbreak. Any help you can provide would be greatly appreciated.

What are you learning these days? How did you fare through Isaac? How can I pray for you or your family?

Where is God when it hurts?

We’ve been watching a lot of Olympic coverage here at Chez Martin. We’ve heard Gabby Douglas and Lolo Jones (and others) talk about their faith, and it’s great to hear these young people willing share that this is an important part of their lives. The questions become more complex, though, when these athletes who claim Christian faith don’t win the medals. How does that fit with “I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength”? This article at Christianity Today gives a nice response, but I want to go into a bit more depth here.

Does God promise us an easy life, a perfect life? No. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that we get to win gold medals if we live good Christian lives. In fact, we are told to expect problems and difficulties. John 16:33 “. . . In this world you will have trouble. But, take heart! I have overcome the world!” But Jesus said that he is with us and has already beaten them!

We’re never alone. God is always with us, even when life really sucks. The Psalmist writes in Psalm 139:

Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
⁸ If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
⁹ If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
¹⁰ even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
¹¹ If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
¹² even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.

Our life circumstances may not be what we want or expected – I have chronic headaches, Lolo Jones didn’t get a medal, etc. – but God is walking through it with us. If that’s not comforting, I don’t know what is!

James 1:2-4 tells us to “² Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, ³ because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. ⁴ Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.

Some of these athletes that we’re watching on TV are in the process of losing their dreams. Where is God in that? He’s right there. He’s teaching His children through every circumstance, Olympic or mundane, to love Him and serve him more.

God is not like Santa Claus – if we’re good, we get presents. God allows us to live through the circumstances of life, whether of our making, someone else’s, or just “random” (although with God holding together the universe, nothing is truly random). And then God uses those events to teach us and mold us to be more like him.

Let’s also look at who Jesus hung around with. He chose to be with the poorest and most humble of people. His disciples were fishermen – not exactly the upper crust of society. He had dinner with Pharisees (religious leaders) and with Lazarus (rich but immoral), but he also spent time with outcasts like the Samaritan woman. So, while it’s certainly not wrong to pursue excellence like gold medals, it’s also important to remember that Jesus doesn’t love successful people any more than he loves anyone else.

And what about Philippians 4:16 “I can do all things through Christ who strengthen me.” [NKJV] Let’s look at the entire passage.

¹⁰ I rejoiced greatly in the Lord that at last you renewed your concern for me. Indeed, you were concerned, but you had no opportunity to show it. ¹¹ I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. ¹² I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. ¹³ I can do all this through him who gives me strength.

It appears that Paul is saying that he can be content in all circumstances through Jesus’ strength, not that he can do whatever he pleases. I heard in church so often that if we just prayed enough, we could do anything. At times, that message would be tempered by saying that we could do anything that was God’s will. Yet, it appears that Paul is trying to tell us that he has the strength to be content in any situation through Jesus. It’s an incredibly important lesson, but quite different from the usual interpretation.

When we think about Christ strengthening us, maybe we need to think about him strengthening us to be content. When life doesn’t work out the way we want or expect, Jesus is still walking right there with us. When we fall, He picks us up.

Where is God when it hurts? Right beside me.

 

Mourning

At Family Camp this year, Jill Briscoe asked if God had ever taken away one of our dreams. She told a story about how she had dreamed that her mother would visit her in the US, but her mother died before she ever made that visit. Jill talked about mourning the loss of that dream and how God gave her new dreams.

I’m mourning the loss of my medical career, at least the way that I knew it. If I do go back to the practice of medicine, it won’t be practicing medicine the way that I was used to. I won’t deliver babies again or do hospital work. If I practice medicine again, it will probably be outpatient medicine only. Long hours and late nights don’t go well with someone with headache issues!

Only in the last year or so have I been willing to face that reality. I went through high school and college with the intention of going to medical school. I had a few thoughts of other career trajectories – a piano teacher said that I should consider a music career and I debated getting a PhD in Sociology and becoming a researcher and professor. But, in the end, I went to medical school and enjoyed it (well, as much as one can enjoy sleeplessness and general abuse). I loved being a family doctor. I felt like part of the community. Sure, the work was hard, but it was a good kind of hard.

Now that I’ve been out of it for so long, I’m not sure that I want to go back, though. Going back into medicine after being away for a long time is really hard. And running a yarn shop is allowing me to tap into some creative parts of me that I didn’t know even existed until recently. I’m not concerned about my education being “wasted”. All education is a good thing; besides, it gives me an extra advantage in educating my kids.

I’m still mourning, though. It’s a loss. At least my counselor says so. And she encourages me to have my feelings even though I really don’t like feeling sad. (Why can’t I just say “oh, well” and move on?)

The Bible has plenty to say about mourning and then about being renewed.

In this section of Jeremiah, the Jews have been carried off into exile. Nobody is happy about the situation. But, God has Jeremiah prophesy that He knows what is going on and that He will eventually take care of things. Earlier in Jeremiah 29, Jeremiah’s letter tells the exiles that God wants them to settle in the land of exile and live patiently because God is control and has plans for them. In chapter 30, God (through Jeremiah) acknowledges their weeping and mourning and tells them that He will eventually turn it into gladness. Note that He doesn’t say to “get over it” or “be happy”, but to wait expectantly because He is in control.

Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans^(A) I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper^(B) you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.^(C)

Jeremiah 30:13 Then young women will dance and be glad,
young men and old as well.
I will turn their mourning^(AP) into gladness;
I will give them comfort^(AQ) and joy^(AR) instead of sorrow.

The same message is given in the New Testament. In the Beatitudes, Jesus says “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted” (Matthew 5:4). We are told that Jesus mourned the death of Lazarus (John 11:35). Jesus also tells us “In this world you will have trouble. But, take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)

I’m mourning right now. While my emotions may be up and down (also partly a casualty of the migraines), I can hang on to the promises that those who mourn will be comforted and that Jesus has overcome the world. Besides, I love the yarn shop. I think that one day I’m going to look back and say that medicine was the early part of my life and yarn is the later part and Jesus is all through it.

Have you had any dreams that you had to give up? How did you handle it? What are your favorite scriptures when you are mourn?

 

7 Quick Takes Friday–August 3, 2012

It’s Friday again. Funny how this keeps happening every seven days, huh? So, what’s up? Glad you asked . . .

1. Our family finally has 2 clean vehicles!! Yes, I paid (bribed, rewarded, choose your verb) Wild Man to clean them within an inch of their lives. Turns out that money is highly motivating for that boy. And that’s a good tidbit of info for me!

2. Wild Man got back from Colorado with the youth group on Saturday night. I’m sticking with my “migraine diet” as well as “no sugar” diet except that I’m allowing myself one sweet treat on the weekend. After we got Wild Man and all of his things packed into the van, we stopped at the Wega Drive-In for ice cream, enjoying the slightly cooler air of the evening, and being together as a family again!

3. And here is the obligatory complaint about the weather. I promise not to complain much about the cold and snow this winter, but I just can’t help saying something about how awful this summer has been. It’s been above 90 degrees more days than I can remember when we’re used to just having a week or two of such high temps. It’s like living down South again. The nice thing about living up here is supposed to be that we deal with rotten winters but have amazing summers. Alas, that’s not how it worked this year.

4. I really worked at the shop for 2 1/2 days this week. Not bad, considering my usual schedule. I’m being reminded, though, that work is actually work. And I’m tired.

5. Are you watching the Olympics? It’s messing with our sleep and reading time around here, but we love watching it anyway.

6. Yoga is from the devil. Not because it’s got overtones of Eastern Religion – after all, a person can do yoga poses without being Buddhist or Hindu. No, it’s because it’s really hard and almost kills me! I did five minutes yesterday and thought I might never move again. Yes, yoga is from the devil.

7. My counselor and I are working to find something that can be comforting to me during a migraine that isn’t food. When the pain is bad, but the nausea is under control, I like to eat ice cream. It just makes me feel good. But, it’s not really good for me. Well, not in the quantities in which I’d like to eat it. I’m going to try lighting a vanilla candle on the table beside me and see if the scent and general happy glow help the next time I have a migraine.

And now, it’s Saturday. So, maybe it should be 7 Quick Takes Saturday. Alas. Anyway, check out what’s going on with others at Conversion Diary!

Migraine

I’m convinced that migraine headache is a misnomer. The correct term should be “migraine attack”. As anyone who has had more than a couple of migraines can tell you, the attacks take over the entire body. What is interesting, though, is that headache and nausea seem to be the only two symptoms that everyone has. I’ve talked to lots of people with migraines, both in my role as physician and not, and found that there are lots of neurological and non-neurological symptoms that can be associated with these attacks. Here are some of mine:

• One of my more recent ones has been to develop crying spells about 6 or 8 hours before the headache pain begins. And the crying isn’t actually about anything. I just cry. This happened at church this weekend. We started singing the last worship song and I started sobbing for no good reason. It took a good fifteen minutes for the crying to stop, and by then I could feel all the other emotional changes starting.
• Irritability. This usually starts an hour or two before the headache. PWM sent me home from the yarn shop one day before the headache started because he could tell I was getting irritable and knew that things could only get worse. Not that I snap at customers, just that it’s hard to be “normal” when part of my brain is plotting how to get away from the rest of the world.
• GI symptoms. I never get heartburn except during a migraine attack. Sometimes it starts before the headache, sometimes after. And, of course, there’s the nausea (and, hopefully not, vomiting).
• Sleep disruption. Even after the headache pain is controlled, I have trouble sleeping during the attack. I think it’s all part of the crazy brain chemistry.
• Myalgia or diffuse muscle pain. This usually happens late in a migraine attack. My migraines last from 12 to 36 hours, so the myalgias generally start somewhere after about 8 or 10 hours. Moving hurts, being touched hurts. It’s not good.

There are probably more diffuse symptoms that I don’t remember right now. The point is that migraines aren’t just headaches – they’re “everything hurts” attacks.

One of the things I like about my neurologist is that he understands this. He is treating the headache part most aggressively right now because that is what is most debilitating and because it appears that stopping the headache part can abort the attack, which is why I had the Botox treatment. He doesn’t look at me like I’m crazy when I tell him about my muscle pain or my sleep issues. He doesn’t think I’m crazy because I also have a diagnosis of fibromyalgia. In fact, he said that recent fMRI (functional MRI) studies show changes in the brain that suggest that fibromyalgia is like a migraine all over the body. Which makes complete sense because the myalgias I get during the migraine attacks are like the worst fibromyalgia attack I’ve ever had.

I’m not going to get profound or anything like that tonight. Migraines suck. My treatment is not great right now, but I have a family doctor and neurologist who care that my treatment isn’t great and want to help me get better, if possible. But, they also haven’t guaranteed me anything. I’m thrilled to be listened to and to have a neurologist who is realistic. A cure would be great, but getting through 3 or 4 days without an attack would be a really good start. We’re not there yet, but it’s actually OK. God is still good, even when every part of my body hurts. (It’s easy to say that today since I had a pretty good day! I pray I can say that the next time I’m stuck with a big migraine!)

That’s all. Just some crazy migraine talk from my little part of the world. So, what’s up with you?

Rediscovering Simplicity

At the beginning of the year, I decided that I wanted to focus on Simplicity. I wanted to have more time and energy for my family and anything else God puts in my way as well as more quiet and more space. How have I been doing?

1. Menu planning has actually becoming a bit more complicated instead of simple. Bummer. I’m on a “migraine diet” which limits the foods I am permitted to eat. I’ve been doing that for about a month and doing well. For the last two weeks, I’ve been avoiding sweets. That’s more difficult and I’ve started allowing 1 sweet on the weekend as kind of a way to “let off steam”. With all the headaches, fatigue, and diet restrictions, I’ve been really bad about planning meals. PWM has done a fair amount of cooking. We’ve had a number of days when we all just ate what we could find – sandwiches, chicken salad, cheese and crackers, etc.. Hopefully, I can come up with an easy way to deal with meal planning despite the dietary restrictions.

2. I’ve done a much better job at limiting choices. I don’t spend much time checking the library websites unless I’m ready for another book to read. I’ve reduced the numbers of blogs I read and don’t feel bad when I don’t read posts that look interesting.

3. I am doing a better job of using my time. I don’t mean that I’m necessarily more productive, but that I’m more comfortable with what I am doing with my time. I don’t feel guilty for just listening to music when my head hurts. If I do some knitting, great; but if not, that’s OK, too. I don’t feel compelled to do two or three things at a time. Sometimes I do like to listen to books while I knit or clean, but I’m pretty comfortable with being quiet as well.

4. There is much more silence in my life. This is new for me. I was used to having music or TV or audiobooks or conversation going on. I purposely make time for quiet now. PWM and I moved our bedroom downstairs, so it’s a little easier for me to hole up in my bedroom for a few minutes if I need to.

5. The biggest change is that PWM and I have really made some strides in getting rid of lots of stuff. We rearranged rooms a few weeks ago (Wild Man’s room is now a music room, our old bedroom is Wild Man’s bedroom, the old schoolroom is now PWM’s and my bedroom, and the front sunroom/office is now the schoolroom) and got rid of lots and lots of stuff in the progress. We still have to finish cleaning the sunroom and do some work in the basement, but I’m generally pleased with how we’re doing. And St. Vincent de Paul has gotten lots of stuff for their store.

Overall, I’m pleased with my progress. The diet is still a challenge. Eating only the same food over and over is difficult for me, so my counselor and I are working on finding good alternatives that fit the migraine diet and my own requirement that they aren’t sweet. The headaches aren’t much different these days, but I think that simplifying life is giving me a little more “space” to handle them. I’m not as stressed now when I get a migraine.

I am slowly getting more focused in life. I’m growing as a Christian. I’m spending most of my energy on my family, homeschooling, and The Knitting Nest, and far less energy on extraneous “stuff”.

One of my biggest concerns right now is to keep this outlook on like and staying focused on the important things after school starts. I want to keep our homeschooling focused on the essentials and give the kids freedom to learn other things on their own. Rosie Girl really flourished at Music Camp and is looking forward to Composition lessons. Wild Man has a hankering to play every variation of guitar he can get his hands on. I need to tattoo “Simplicity” on the inside of my eyelids!

How is your year going? Is Simplicity an important value to you? How do you make it work in your home?

 

 

(But, not everyone in the family is buying into the simpler life concept. Rosie Girl’s quote: “Simplicity is for the weak.” Sigh. She’s an artiste.)

7 Quick Takes Friday–7/27/2012

It’s been a pretty full week, so let’s get going! (And, notice that this is getting posted on Friday!!)

1. Wild Man has been at camp since first thing Saturday morning. It’s really quiet around here without him! But the food doesn’t run out nearly as quickly.

2. Sassy (one of the cats) has become Wild Man’s cat. Which means that she wandered around the house for a couple of days meowing for affection with Wild Man gone. In the last couple of days, she’s just been sulking. She’ll be so happy when Wild Man gets back tomorrow.

3. I’ve been spending as much time at the shop as possible – pretty much any time that I don’t have a really bad migraine. Wednesday was great – the shop was busy with customers and we sold a good bit of stuff. Today, we didn’t have as much business, but PWM and I worked on our new window display.

4. The work on the window display was pretty physical, so when I got home I took a hot shower, a couple of acetaminophen, and sat myself in my rocking chair and haven’t moved much since! I have a feeling I’ll still be sore tomorrow.

5. Quote of the week (from Rosie Girl): “Simplicity is for the weak.”

6. We’re watching the Olympic opening ceremonies tonight. Mildly interesting.

7. I hope to get the front room (now the school room) clean in a week or two. I don’t anticipate that I’m going to have much planning done before we officially start “school” this year. I’m not too concerned, though. Rosie Girl is a senior this year, so she’s pretty motivated to get through her courses in a timely fashion. Wild Man and I will just keep moving forward through his books and he should be fine.

How has your week been? Check out 7 Quick Takes Friday to see what others are up to!

2012-2013 Curriculum

By this time of the year five years ago, I had curriculum and books purchased and was scheduling out our year week by week. By this time of year two years ago, I had curriculum and books purchased and was planning the year although I hadn’t gotten around to actual scheduling. By this time of year last year, I had everything purchased and was hoping we got most of it done. Right now, I have a general plan, but haven’t actually purchased any curriculum.

And this is Rosie Girl’s senior year of high school (or, for the more unschooling in the world, it’s her last year of being educated at home). Which kind of freaks me out. I’m not concerned that she’s not ready for college – she has great ACT scores and is clearly academically ready. I’m not emotionally prepared to be the mother of a high school graduate. YIKES!! But it does have the advantage that I’m no longer responsible for her education

Here is the general plan:

Rosie Girl

English – Sonlight Core 450 – British Literature (lots of reading, some writing)

Social Science

Semester 1 – American Government – The Everything American Government Book (with some supplements, I’m sure)

Semester 2 – Sociology – I don’t know what text we’ll use, but I have a degree in Sociology, so I’m confident we’ll figure something out.

Math

Semester 1 – Dave Ramsey Personal Finance

Semester 2 – Basic Probability and Statistics (probably using ALEKS)

Comparative Religion – Hippocampus using World Religions in America

Tap Dance at Dance Dynamics

Piano Lessons

Music Composition Lessons

Community Service – helping the Worship Arts Director at church every week.

 

Wild Man

English

Spelling – Spelling Power

Writing – Excellence in Writing, maybe WriteAtHome

Literature – American Literature from Sonlight Core 100

History – Sonlight Core 100 (Rosie Girl did Core 100 three years ago, so all I need to buy is the Instructors Guide and a few new books) – American History

Math – Algebra 1

Bible – Starting with N.T. Wright’s The Bible for Everyone: Revelation because that’s Wild Man’s current interest. From there, who knows what he’ll study?

Science – Singapore Biology with lab

Marching Band at the local high school

Possibly hip-hop class

Community service at the Senior Nutrition Site

 

How prepared are you for the new school year?

7 Quick Takes Friday (Well, Actually, Saturday)–July 21, 2012

I’m doing my 7 Quick Takes on Saturday again, but that’s OK because I’m flexible – and I’m sure you are, too.

1. Lots of headaches this week . . . I have managed to only take Imitrex twice, but it was still a rough week on the pain front.

2. On Sunday, Wild Man found out that there was an opening for him to go to camp in Colorado with the church youth group that was completely paid for! (He had chosen in the spring to go to Hunter Safety camp this summer instead of the Colorado camp because of the cost.) So, on Wednesday, PWM took Wild Man shopping for some nice warm clothes since PWM has grown so much since the winter and on Thursday, I took Wild Man for his physical. And at 8am, PWM took Wild Man to church to get on the bus. And the group is now somewhere between here and the mountains of Colorado.

3. We didn’t do much celebration on my birthday because I wasn’t feeling really well, so we celebrated last night. We had dinner at The Menasha Grill, a Cajun restaurant on Main Street in Menasha, which is surprisingly authentic. Oh. My. Goodness. I had some wonderful blackened catfish, fried crawfish, fried okra, and hushpuppies. It was delicious. Then we walked by the river for a few minutes. And came home so Wild Man could pack for today.

4. My birthday gift is an ipod! Well, actually Rosie Girl’s ipod that I bought from her and she bought a new one. I am realizing that I’ll want a new one in an entirely too short period of time. I’m already spoiled to all the cool stuff this one can do – and the newer ones will do. Right now, though, I’m happy with the cleaner interface than my previous mp3 player and Rosie Girl is happy with having lots more space for more music.

5. My uncle passed away yesterday morning. I mentioned in an earlier post that we were able to set up a Skype connection at my aunt’s 90th birthday party so that he could see and talk to people even though he couldn’t be there in person. He passed peacefully, for which we’re all grateful.

6. Project Runway’s 10th season has started! Five years ago, I would not have given anything to do with fashion a second thought, but I’m learning to appreciate the art and skill involved in creating beautiful and functional garments. And it relates to knitting. Right? Right?

7. It has been entirely too hot this summer! We are used to having one or two hot weeks in the year, but the rest of the time, we keep the windows open most of the time. This year, though, we’ve had the air conditioning running far more than usual. And the cats aren’t too happy about it, either. They like to sit in the windows and keep an eye on the world, but nowadays they only get an hour or so of window sitting, if that.

So what’s up in your neck of the woods? Check out Conversion Diary to see what others are doing!!

Conversations with God

Jill and Stuart Briscoe spoke at Family Camp this week. Oh, the wisdom that they shared! They have been involved in teaching ministry for over 50 years – 50 years!! Married, walking with Jesus, teaching others. I just can’t even imagine the wisdom that they have accumulated. I hope, though, that they don’t tend to get their nuggets of wisdom the way I do – by messing up!

Anyway, Jill talked about having conversations with God. She wasn’t talking about some mystical process, though, like I’ve heard other people talk about. Rather, she was talking about praying and reading Scripture. OK, this seems incredibly obvious now that I’ve written it down, but I think I’ve tended to approach the Bible as something to be studied. I “know” that Bible study and devotional reading are usual different things, but I tend to read “studiously” and not as often “devotionally”. Did that make sense?

Jill’s illustrations of meeting God on the “steps of her soul” I think made it a lot easier to grab on to this concept this time around. She also talked about not shying away from reading familiar passages again because God may give us new insights the next time around. (Although, we have to be careful to avoid reading “new” things into Scripture. The Bible doesn’t suddenly have new meanings after 2000 years of existence. I’m talking about God teaching us something about our particular situation from a section of the Bible.)

And, of course, I felt ten times smarter listening to Jill because of her beautiful British accent! Why is that?

What are you learning these days?

Fort Wilderness Memories 2012

This was our tenth year of going to Family Camp at Fort Wilderness and it was wonderful, as usual! Here are some highlights.

• Rosie Girl and I picked up Wild Man from camp on Friday and the three of us stayed in Rhinelander, went to see Brave, and did Wild Man’s laundry.
• Wild Man had a great time at Built to Live Camp where he got his Hunter Safety certification. It was incredibly hot during the week of his camp, so they spent lots of time swimming and playing games involving water.
• On Friday night, I did an assessment of Wild Man’s injuries – sun rash from his first day which was just fading, blister on his little toe which looked like another toe, various bruises. But, he didn’t complain – he said it was a great week!
• PWM stayed here in town until the shop closed and then drove to camp. He made it just in time for dinner.
• Stuart and Jill Briscoe were the teachers for the week. I felt smarter just listening to them because of their British accents! Well, they’re really smart, too!
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• It was also pretty cool that they both taught. Jill would start each session with a few thoughts, then Stuart would do the main teaching, then Jill would wrap up.
• Both kids stayed in the sessions with us to listen to the Briscoes instead of going to the high school group. They like the guy who does the high school teaching, but they preferred listening to Stuart. And I thought it was pretty cool to be all together.
• The Briscoes taught on holiness this week. Lots of good stuff for everyone.
• We met a family this week that was there for the first time and they have just moved to Milwaukee from England. The kids (even the two year old) have adorable British accents)!
• I am still following my migraine diet, although I did loosen things up for the week we were there. I only had 1 piece of bacon on the mornings when it was available. The only chocolate I had was in mint chocolate chip ice cream. And I did have a couple of Cokes. Overall, not too bad.
• On the headache front, though, my headaches weren’t any better, despite the Botox. I had two definite migraines along with the daily headaches. One of them was Thursday night, so I missed some of the last session. On the upside, though, the kids did all the packing. (Really, though, I’d have been happy to pack if I could have avoided the migraine!)
• Rosie Girl made a basket on Tuesday. I actually don’t have a picture of it – bummer. Anyway, take my word for it – it’s beautiful with blue and green stripes.
• PWM and Wild Man were in the carpetball tournament, but both were beaten pretty early this year.
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• In more important news, I beat Christopher in carpetball!! He proceeded to turn around and beat me right back, but I have the satisfaction of beating him once in my life!
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• PWM and Wild Man did lots of riflery during the week. PWM, Wild Man, and Rosie Girl all did some archery and Wild Man won the tournament, receiving a coupon for a double scoop of ice cream!
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• The weather for Wild Man’s week at Built to Live camp was awful – temperatures in the upper 90s with high humidity. He said that they went swimming a couple of times a day and had water breaks every hour or so, no matter what they were doing. The day that Family Camp started, though, the weather improved dramatically. For Family Camp, the highs were in the 70s to low 80s and the lows were in the 50s to 60s. Absolutely perfect!
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Now that we are home, we have embarked on Laundrypalooza 2012 and resting up for Family Camp 2013!!

So, how has your summer been?