brothers and sisters {reason to homeschool no. 2}

to the outside world, we all grow old.  but not to brothers and sisters.  we know each other as we always were.  we know each other's hearts.  we live outside the touch of time.

{clara ortega}

{this little series started HERE}

remember how on my blog i'm the boss of me?  that's why my monday homeschool post is being posted on wednesday...i'm not a very good boss.

this post can pretty much exclusively be communicated via pictures.  the grandparents are going to love this...

i want my kids to be friends.

not just people who live under the same roof and pass one another to and from their respective lives...

friends.

do my kids get along?

sometimes.

do my kids duke it out?

sometimes.

do my kids like each other?

sometimes.

do my kids love each other?

every day.  all the time.

whether they are shoving or hugging, singing or shouting, my kids would always tell you that they love each other and usually they would claim the other one as their best friend.  i don't think that happens by accident.

for friendship to grow seeds must be sown.  seeds of patience, understanding, kindness, laughter, service,  joy, love...all of which must be planted deep in the garden of time.  in a way i guess this reason for homeschooling overlaps with the first...i want my kids to have time together to develop friendship.

we can always learn to love each other better and that's the most important lesson in the education of my family.

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the balancing act {my mother's day message}

how do you balance everything?!?!

it's the question i get asked most often as a mom.
it's also one of the biggest lessons i have learned since having children.

5 years ago when we were preparing for the birth of our first child - life was full.  i laugh at myself when i consider my naivety in thinking i would just add kids into the mix...no big deal.  as if they would just be one more ingredient in this life that i was cooking up.

it didn't take me long to figure out that i wasn't going to add lucy to any existing dish.  she was going to demand a culinary creation of her own and it seemed she would settle for nothing less than being the main course.  one by one the other parts of my life became something i might nibble on every now and then but mostly they never made it onto my plate.  it was then that God began to shift my view of balance and lead me to the freedom found not in doing a little bit of everything but in doing a lot with the big things.  

some of the most profound lessons i have learned about balance have been found in a somewhat unlikely place...the life of a man who lived over 2000 years ago and changed a nation by building a wall.  

his name was nehemiah.

this sunday i will share the lessons i have learned from the life of nehemiah and how they apply to anyone who is trying to figure out this balancing act of life.  if you are looking for somewhere to spend this mother's day sunday i would love for you to join us at new charlotte!

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time and time again {reason to homeschool no. 1}

note :: as with all of my commentary on homeschooling these words reflect only what i believe to be best for my family today.  i would never claim to know what is best for everyone else or even what will be best for my family in the future.  

having said that...let's begin my 'why homeschool?' list {in no particular order}.  here's #1...

i like being with my kids.  
do i sometimes lock myself in the bathroom so that i can have 5 minutes alone?  yes.  
do i take full advantage of family and friends who want to hang out with my kids so that i can do something non-mommy related?  absolutely.  
but the longer i'm a mom the more i realize that if i want to really influence my kids and build deep relationships with them we need time together.

here's what i fear next year would look like if i didn't homeschool lucy...  
take her to school at 8am.  
get her home from school at 3:30pm.  
let her rest {because she still takes a nap a few times a week and i have a feeling 7+ hours of school will do her in}.
by this time i may have 30 minutes tops before we get into the dinner/bedtime routine or i leave for work {i usually work 1-2 nights per week}.
repeat monday through friday.

i'm not ready to give up that time with her.

don't get me wrong.  when other people say - i couldn't wait for my kids to start school so that i could get those 7 hours a day all to myself! - i can see the appeal...really, i can.  i mean...i have lots of things i like to do when i have time alone.  

but i knew what i was getting into when i became a mom.  i knew these little monkeys would seriously interfere with my personal time and as frustrating as that can sometimes be...it's worth the sacrifice.  during this season i really believe that there is no more valuable use of my time than being a mom and a wife and setting the foundation for our little family.

so my reason to homeschool no. 1 is simply this...

time.

time to laugh.
cry.
learn.
play.
teach.
make messes.
clean them up.
love.
break up fights.
pray.
dance.
sing.
time to really see each other.

i need time to accomplish all the things i want to accomplish with my kids right now.

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seeing the unseen {and the 15 minute tea party}

for this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen.  for the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

{the apostle paul}

paul knew what it meant to suffer affliction - much of it i wouldn't consider light or momentary.  stuff like imprisonment and people plotting his death.  

you may not be in a literal prison with bars and locks but maybe there is something that has you feeling trapped...unable to walk through life in freedom.  and even if you haven't had someone sending you threatening letters you may feel a sense of impending doom because something or someone in your life is suffocating you.

at the moment i have a prayer list full of real people who are struggling with real affliction - cancer, miscarriages, divorce, depression...the list goes on.  i am thankful not to be in a season of deep suffering. but... i have been there before and my heart breaks for those around me who are fighting for air and for freedom.

ever since that eyeball post several months ago i have had a greater awareness about what my own eyes are focused on.  they so naturally wander to the dishes piled up in the sink or the temper tantrum being thrown on my floor or the unfinished work spilling out of my computer bag.  i'm so preoccupied with the work that i am doing {and often failing at} that i miss the eternal work that God is doing in all the unseen places.  and let's be honest - there are too many times that i look hard into that little pandora's box in my hand that holds endless posts and pictures and tweets...all keeping my eyes away from what's real.

he has set eternity in our hearts so i'm guessing that's where we'll find the unseen...floating like diamonds in the waters of our hearts, reflecting the light of jesus in a dark world.  and so i look deep in the eyes of my children and my husband and all the others who cross my path each day...looking for what's shining deep inside.  i try desperately to carve out moments to peer into my own heart and unearth the places where an eternal glow is being cultivated.

whether your affliction comes and goes or has set in for a while, i pray you will miraculously find it to be 'light' and 'momentary'.  whatever has got you out of breath or completely out of commission i pray it will fade into the background as the eternal glow of what God is doing in your life becomes more visible.  and maybe together we can agree to leave pandora's box closed for a while so that real life moments won't be stolen right out from under us.

this morning i took 15 minutes to put together a tea party with lucy.  i didn't let my eyes stop on the dishes or the laundry or the unfinished work.  instead i met her gaze over and over as i felt myself falling into that place that will not fade away...  

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more homeschooling from this homegirl

i am an extreme people pleaser.  extreme people pleasers - unlike regular people pleasers - get their blood pressure up over anyone who opposes them even the slightest bit.  {maybe that makes me more of a defensive jerk than a people pleaser...either way...you get the idea}

i guess i knew that confessing my plans for homeschooling would lead to a lively discussion.  i still got my feelings hurt when people told me they thought it wasn't a good idea.  fortunately i get over these things quickly and remember how dumb it is to think that every person in the world would agree with every decision i ever made.  thanks to those of you who entered into the homeschooling conversation...it was good for me.  i hope it was good for you too.  

because it was so good i have decided to continue with a few more posts.  if all this homeschooling mess makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up or bores you to tears i apologize in advance.  i hope you might still find some redeeming value in some of these posts...i have a lot of words to share on this particular subject right now.  i'm planning to share them on mondays for a little while {unless of course i change my mind and don't...you can do that when you have your own blog}.

i've had some of you ask me about exactly how i am planning to homeschool while working and...well...i'm glad you asked.

here's the plan...

lucy will attend a transitional kindergarten program at her current preschool 4 mornings a week.  I will work during that time.  When she is at home we will work through kindergarten curriculum.   i use the term 'curriculum' loosely because we are taking a charlotte mason approach to education and this means that learning will mostly be woven into our days and direct instruction will be kept to a minimum.  so, although she will be participating in a TK program, this will still be her kindergarten year and she will be a 1st grader the following year.  {and who knows what we will do then?!  we are taking this thing one year at a time.}

over the next few weeks i will share with you the reasons why this formerly anti-homeschooler is moving forward with the very thing she thought she'd never do.  in the meantime, these are NOT the reasons we plan to homeschool:

:: we don't like our public school - i have heard great things about the elementary school we are zoned for.  i have met some of the teachers and they seem awesome.  i am not homeschooling because i don't like our public school option.

:: we don't think our child would do well in the public school - lucy has really enjoyed preschool and does well in her class.  i don't have any reason to believe that she would have problems in a public school setting.

:: we want to shelter our kids from the world - i do admit that i would like to have some control over when and how my kids are exposed to certain things, but my intention is not to keep them in a little bubble apart from society.  on the contrary - i am excited for my kids to engage the world around them.

now i bet you can't wait to find out the real reasons, can you?

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holding people in the fragile places

when i arrived at the arena on wednesday night my cell phone was sitting snug in my back pocket.

the most recent texts that it held contained prayer requests for a friend who was counseling another friend filing for divorce and a young woman in her twenties who is 5 months into her first pregnancy and has just been diagnosed with an advanced stage of cancer.

as i joined thousands of other voices in worship i was keenly aware of the cell phone in my pocket and the fragile lives represented there.  i held the names of these women in my heart and whispered their names aloud during a time of collective prayer.

i often weep when i receive prayer requests.  some tears are born from a place of broken heartedness for those requesting and others are born from a deeper place where i know i am privileged to approach God's throne on their behalf.  i think i was created to connect with people in the fragile places.

sometimes i feel a heavy burden in lifting those names, those souls, up in my incapable hands to a capable God.  then i remember that my prayers hold no special power but my God does and my prayers are precious to him.  all of our prayers are precious to him.

i will never forget discovering the words of john.  

he had spent years in the company of jesus so i feel confident that he knew the heart of God.  at the point when he wrote these words he had lived a long life of knowing God and making him known to others.  God revealed to john some pretty amazing things about the life to come and although i don't understand it all {how could we?  it's still yet to come} i received this particular part like a gift a couple of years ago...

...they held gold bowls filled with incense, which are the prayers of God's people.

i don't know if you pray or not.  even if you don't completely buy into this whole christian thing you might offer up a prayer from time to time...it might be screamed out loud or just barely breathed.  any way that you communicate with God is cool...even if you're not 100% sure you believe in him.  you don't have to work for a church or go to seminary to pray.

i'm not nearly as disciplined in my prayer life as i would like to be.  most often my prayers are spontaneous and unplanned.  sometimes they involve me closing my eyes other times they don't.  sometimes i grab the hand of another and other times i am all alone.  i don't think the specific way we do it is nearly as important as the fact that we do it.  but...every once in a while i begin to wonder if my words are just filling up air momentarily and then get blown away...forever lost.

this week as i re-read john's words and join my voice with the voices of others who believe, i am reminded that i couldn't be further from the truth.  God not only hears every word {spoken and unspoken} but he keeps them.  he actually has a place for them in heaven.  our prayers aren't stuffed in a cardboard box in the back of a dark closet somewhere...they are held in golden bowls in the arms of heavenly beings and they are still at work filling the very air of heaven with their sweet scent.  is that not amazing?  it gives me goosebumps every time i remember.

if you think your prayers don't matter...think again.

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