A Christian Argument for Homeschooling

At church this past Sunday morning the sermon was about Moses coming down off of the mountain after being in God's presence for 40 days and nights.  When he came down carrying the tablets for the second time His face was radiantly shining.  This happened every time he spent time in the presence of God.  He spent time "beholding" God and he was therefore becoming more godly.

Then the pastor said "We become like what we behold"

Well, that got my attention!  I began to take some notes, but gave up in favor of going back and viewing the video later in the day.  The beginning part of his sermon was chock full of reasons why we should home school!  This was, I am sure, not his intention.  But there it was!  There is no denying it!

The following quotes are listed in the order in which they were stated:

"We are influenced by those we spend the most time with"
*Why would we send our children off to a day care or a school building where they are influenced by their teachers and peers for the majority of their productive day?

"It matters who we keep company with"
*Do we really know all of the people that our children come into contact with each day?  Do we trust them?  Do we personally know them?  The children?  Their families?

"We adopt the values, perspectives, and habits from the people we spend the most time with"
*Teachers, aides, students, etc........do we know what the values, perspectives, and habits are of all of these people?  Would we be okay with them if we did?

"Are those people we spend time with good for us?"
*Can you really honestly answer yes to this question? Think about it?

"Do they bring us closer to the Lord or farther away?"
*Public school is never going to bring you closer to God.  It will only drive a wedge of doubt into your child's heart and mind.  It is a place where it is illegal to mention God.

"All our lives we become like what we behold"
*From the cradle to the grave!  We become what we behold.  That is a profound statement in regards to sending your children out of your christian home into a pagan world to learn.

"It benefits us always to make sure that we are gazing upon and investing our time in that which is good and that which is godly"
*I guess you could make a slight argument for some good in public education.  But it does not outweigh the ungodly, not one bit!  And it is progressively getting worse.
A child in public school can easily spend the majority of every school day beholding, investing in, and being influenced by that which is not known for godliness.

As Christians we owe it to our children and our grandchildren to guide them in the way that is right and godly.

A public education, or in my opinion, any education outside of the home, is not in the best interest of Christian children. 

What's going on?

it's been a while since i just wrote about life around here.

so here goes.........

it's winter.  lately it's been cold, then its not so cold.  then it snows, then it rains, then it snows again.  that pretty much sums up winter weather on the maine coast!  i like the snow in the winter.  i don't like the rain in the winter.  especially on top of the snow.  we haven't gotten any big snowstorms yet, just a bunch of little ones.  we have had one frigid cold snap and now we are just entering another one.  they usually only last a few days around here.

it's been quiet on the wink. i even got to go ramble around in the snowy woods alone a couple of times this week.  so nice!  sometimes you have to make things be quiet on purpose.  you have to slow down and remind yourself that it is possible and very okay to enjoy quiet days alone; just the two of us.

things are going well in chicken land.  so far they are doing great with the cold and snow.  this morning i got up at 5 and went to check on them and the coop was about 12F and the outside temp was 3F.  i brought them water and scratch and turned on their light to get them moving and eating to stay warm.  they are about 8 months old now and i pretty consistently get an average of 56 eggs a week from the 9 birds.  it sounds like a lot of eggs, but in reality if we both eat 2 eggs per day that takes care of 28 of them!  then with baking and other recipes and maybe once a week giving the chickens a scrambled egg treat, we usually give away only about 18 each week.  we would give away more if people would remember to ask!

my other big project this winter is organizing my photos.  i've got a table set up in the dining room and enough bins or boxes to cover the years 1983-2016!  now i'm going through every loose photo and falling apart album, writing important info on the backs, weeding out blurry, dumb pics and organizing according to date.  then these neat little boxes will be condensed down and put on a shelf jeff has put up over the doorway in my craft room.

another ongoing project for me is lesson planning for my grandsons preschool homeschool.  i've stated before that i purchased Horizons preschool from Alpha Omega pub.  so far we love it.  my job is to plan out the lessons and assemble what momma needs to teach it.  the best part is that i will be able to use all of these lesson plans for all of the grands that will be homeschooled.  so i only have to do each grade once!  i love doing it!

i'm hoping to get a new camera soon so i can add pics to my blog!  my camera of 8 years finally stopped working, and as i am also pretty newly not working also (lol)  it is hard for me (even harder for me)  to spend money on myself.  but i really miss having a camera!

so i'm still trying to figure out where i'm going with this blog and what the purpose is.  i just feel compelled to keep on keeping on.  i have been blogging since i moved to maine 12 years ago.  i'm a xanga misfit, i loved the xanga blog!  i've had this one now for 3 or so years and i just need to spend more time on it and less time on facebook.  that is my goal for 2017!

well, until next time!

what's going on?

i have come to the conclusion that if i'm going to make my blogs like others i read then i need to take more pictures.
and since all of the pictures i take are of my grandbabies, then my blog would only be about them!

so here is what's going on

home organizing and cleaning:  my winter clothes are in and summer ones are out!  some went to the rag bag!  i tend to wear the same things over and over and over again.  went through my bookshelf and weeded out a small stack for goodwill.  i need to get on a cleaning schedule now that i am home every day.  it would make it so i didn't have to think.

crafting:  i made a no sew fleece blanket for sophie in purple camo!

cooking:  apples, apples, apples!!!  i went apple picking 3 times and i think i picked about 100 lbs!

so far i've made a ton of applesauce, six pie fillings, and a few apple cakes.  i'm going to make a couple dozen jumbo apple muffins and a few more apple desserts to keep in the deep freeze.

outside:  cutting down trees, raking leaves, cleaning the garage, and winterizing the coop.  the garden cleaned up so easily this year with having the chickens right there to feed the spent plants to!  i've also been working on a new garden area.

we cut our own wood

charlie keeping warm first thing in the morning.  we have yet to turn on the furnace this season

family:  lots of birthday celebrations lately and family visits.  these boys all love getting together.  their favorite thing to do now is to play hide and seek (charlie calls it hide and sneak)

the television goes on when the grown ups need a break!

school:  cruising right along with prepping lesson plans for sarah to teach ethan.  I hear that calvin is paying lots of attention and learning lots too.  maybe they can be in the same grade at some point since they are only 18 months apart in age?  i've also started to put together a learning packet for charlie at his mom's request.  with winter on our doorstep it will be perfect learning time!

faith:  every morning i do bible writing.  i'm in isaiah 24 right now and its very interesting.  learning a lot.  also attend a bible study with a couple friends and we are studying Girls Gone Wise.  AND, i also do a bible study on facebook for me and the girls, right now its Conversation Peace. 

well, that's it from the wink!  

What's going on?

Here is what's going on!

Home:  Just when you think you have a plan for how your home should be......it will change!  I have been planning on making my dining room into just a dining room.  What was I thinking?!   I was thinking of getting a few pieces of furniture (jelly cupboards) to store my serving pieces in (which are in totes in a closet at the moment)  I've decided to get a piece of fitness equipment instead.  That is what is going in the dining room because the room we use for fitness equipment (previously a bedroom) is full and we can't place it well in there.  Health trumps fancy storage plain and simple.  So I am going through stuff and what has no meaning is going to Goodwill.  Hubby is building a really large bookshelf for me because the one I have is too small so I will utilize the very top shelves of that for some of the platters and serving pieces I use a lot.  For now.

Crafting:  I'm adding this category because I am a crafter!  I dabble in a lot of different things.  This week I went to Joann Fabrics and spent 2 hours walking around and deciding on a pattern (for baby granddaughter stuff) and fabrics for a few different sewing projects.  This week we crafted these pumpkins from scrap wood.  Hubby cut and sanded and I painted.  We are a team on the wink!

Garden:  Still picking green beans and some cucumbers.  There are a few little pumpkins still growing and my dwarf sunflowers bloomed.  Late, but then again I planted them late.  I pruned my raspberries, transplanted some back into line and mulched heavily with straw.  The blueberries got a heavy mulch of pine needles.  I worked on my compost pile  which is growing crazy since I got chickens because of the straw from the pen.  I keep the pen nice and dry so I change out the straw weekly.  Otherwise I've been doing some fall weeding in different flower beds.  The leaves are changing and some are falling here in northern New England.  I've been pulling up random plants that are done producing and feeding them to the chickens.  They loved the squash plants!  This way I will get the garden all cleaned up in bits and pieces.

Family:  We had a family get together yesterday for our son's 30th birthday.  This is my second child to hit this milestone age!  His party was planned and executed by his wife.  I didn't bake the cake, but I did get to frost the cupcakes.  Ask me if I liked not being in charge of my son's birthday cake.  I dare you! haha!  We have six grandchildren, 5 of them being boys 2 1/2 to 5 years of age.  I was ready to go home at the end of the party.  I don't always hold my tongue when it comes to behaviors I see, I really was trying yesterday and I didn't always succeed.  I have to remember that they are not my children and my input is not always welcome.

Home school:  We had a picnic on Wednesday for our grandson's first official day of homeschooling.  As I previously mentioned, I purchased the Horizons preschool curriculum from Alpha and Omega.  I take their lesson plan and rewrite it into an outline for my daughter in law and son to follow.  Then I assemble everything they will need to complete the lessons, crafts, activities, etc.  I love doing this! It is a start and a learning process as we go along.


Work:  This past week I only worked 10 hours!  I loved it.  This is what I want and I can't seem to get right now.  The company I work for knows what I want, but we are always so short staffed.  I usually work 20 hours a week, but this week I have 35 scheduled hours.  I am going to try to whittle that down a bit to 30 and I am going to take lots of deep breaths.

Until next time!