My Top 11 Posts of the Year 2011

Everywhere you look there are 2011 recaps.  Wouldn't I be remiss without doing one myself? 



A couple I'm going to lump together because they were on the same topic.










11. Home Education Super Summit--My Recap of Day One


10. The Ways We Have Ruined Our Children


9.  Are you *just* reading to them? GIGO


8.  Fall into Autumn Sept. 23


7.  Christmas Goodies are Finally Underway


6.  Graphic Organizers


5.  A Queenly Review


4.  Spelling City was a hit.
Spelling City Here I Come
I'm Going Back to Spelling City and Moving In

3.  Edible Cell for biology---so cooooool!


2.  Autism Awareness Month


1.  The Ken Ham/Great Homeschool Convention Controversy.
Unbelieveable
AIG Response to Being Eliminated
Great Homeschool Conventions Response
AIG Ken Ham and Apolgia Heart Each Other

Follow Friday Four Fill In Fun

My friend Cindy has a fun "hop" on her blog.  So here I am doing it!

This week’s statements:

1. Lately, I have been feeling  a little___________

2. I am usually a ­­­­______

3. ________________________is always the best feeling at the end of the day

4. _________________________is the first thing I do in the morning

My answers:

1.  Lately, I have been feeling a little like a failure as a mother.

A bright pink bottle of polish thrown during a tizzy.  It broke and spilled on the light tan carpet.  Both lines of polish are about a foot in length.

2. I am usually a very shy and quiet person.  Yeah, right!  It just felt kind of fun to write that down.  Let's just say you know when I walk into a room.

3.               is always the best feeling at the end of the day.  Laying my weary bones down on the bed.  Yup, that a good feeling.  

4.               is the first thing I do in the morning.  Well, I could be all spiritual and say pray, but in actuality the first thing I do in the morning is go to the bathroom!

Is that too much information?  ;-)

Friday Funny

There's nothing like being able to home school on the run!  ;-)

New Year's Review instead of Resolution

I had to steal this picture from my friend Cindy at For One Another!  It was just so on the mark!

I don't do resolutions. I even wrote about it on New Year's Day this year.

But I thought I'd share one thing I do to start the new year.  I use a wonderful set of questions written by Don Whitney of The Center for Biblical Spirituality.  It's written as a bulletin insert, so it fits really well in your Bible.

It's called Ten Questions to Ask at the Start of a New Year or On Your Birthday.  I do one every day for the first 10 days, but you can do them all on one day.  Then there is an additional 21 questions if you want to take it further.  So, I tend to do one question for each day in January and then review it through out the year.

Here's an example of some of the questions:

• What is the single biggest time-waster in your life, and what will you do about it this year?
•  What single thing that you plan to do this year will matter most in ten years?  In eternity?
•  What’s one thing you could do this year to enrich the spiritual legacy you will leave to your children and grandchildren?

You get the idea.

So, if you would like to join me this year to “Consider your ways!” (Haggai 1:5) just go HERE and scroll down to the title.

Quote from Thomas Brooks

A great thought for our children: "Let those be thy choicest companions who have made Christ their chief companion." 
-Thomas Brooks (Puritan preacher and author)

Sunday Coupon Preview

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An exciting opportunity coming for you & me with Eternal Encouragement.

You already know that I review with the Gabby Moms program which is part of Eternal Encouragement. 

Well, Lorrie Flem of Eternal Encouragement has something special planned for both of us.  

For those who subscribe to Eternal Encouragement Magazine, there will be a new addition.  You see, the magazine comes out quarterly, but starting in January, there will be a new, monthly, online publication for those who subscribe to the magazine.  It will be called Etc.

Isn't that great!?!  More encouragement for the same price!

Where do I come in?  

Well, Lorrie asked me to be a columnist for Etc.!  Yup, I will be writing pieces for it each month.  Needless, to say, I was honored that Lorrie Flem wanted me to be part of something this important and special.  Please pray for me, so I will write pieces that will share God's truth and encouragement.  

Look for more details later!

A Crafty New Year Resolution? I have a site for you.

I love to craft and I know many of you do as well. Or maybe you want to make a New Year's resolution to learn a new craft.  I've come across a new crafting community called Craftsy that might help or at least encourage!

It has:

1) Online classes and workshops for beginning, intermediate and advanced quilters, knitters, crocheters, sewists, jewelry makers, and other crafters.  
2) Deals on crafting supplies: organic yarn, lovely fabrics and fat quarters from top designers, high quality needles, etc...

3) Posted projects from other members for ideas and patterns.

4) And more!

I signed up before Christmas, but I didn't want to distract you since I knew you were probably busy with other things! ;-)

There's no cost to sign up.  Just click here or the picture below.

I thought this piece was timely.  After all, the magi didn't come until a couple   years after Jesus was born.  Don't believe me?  Check out Matthew 2.  Herod sent them out to look for a child not a baby and they found a child not a baby.

Regardless, this piece from Desiring God blog was really interesting and thought-provoking.  Hope you think so, too. 

We Three Kings of Orient Aren’t

by David Mathis | December 24, 2011

Behold, magi from the east came to Jerusalem . . . (Matthew 2:1)

Matthew says "behold" to make sure he has our attention. He knows how prone we are to fall asleep while we're reading.

"Wake up. Make sure you're listening. This is huge. Don't miss it. It's not what you'd expect..."

But what's so shocking about magi coming to Jesus? We might be so used to this annual Christmas story that we're not surprised, like Matthew wants us to be, that magi came to Jesus. Don't they come every Christmas?

We should we be surprised. Because magi is an ancient word referring to pagan astrologers. And since they dabble in the dark arts, we eventually got our English word magic from such magi.

"Behold," Matthew says. "Look at this: Astrologers are coming! Pagan sorcerers are searching for Jesus! Wizards want to worship! Behold! This is shocking—and spectacular!"

These Dudes Aren't Kings

Now "We Three Kings" is a wonderful Christmas song. Perhaps the Beach Boys' version is best, if that's not too sacrilegious to say. I'm not eager to play the spoiler here, but these dudes aren't kings. They are pagan astrologers, not too far from what we'd call sorcerers and wizards.

Gandalf and Dumbledore are coming to worship the baby Jesus.

Read the rest CLICK HERE.

Christmas Review and Recovery ;-)

Did you all have a blessed birthday celebration?


One of our traditions is making a "Happy Birthday Jesus" cake.  This year, mija made it mostly by herself with only a little help separating the egg whites and getting it in and out of the oven. We discussed how to decorate this year and here's the finished product.

Christmas Eve was spent with my hubby's side of the family.  It always includes pizza, gifts, games, and lots of noise!  Keep in mind, my MIL lives in a one bedroom house and the family that was able to be there included 4 siblings and their spouses, 10 grandkids and 4 great-grandkids which is 23 people all together with my MIL. 


We live about 50 minutes away from his family so it was after midnight by the time we returned home.


Poor mija, she woke up this morning in the same clothes she wore last night, looked at the tree with gifts and stated, "I so tired..."  Not quite the excitement you'd like to hear Christmas morning!  She managed to open everything.

Don't get too impressed with the gifts.  This has been a VERY rough year, but God's been faithful.  Some of the gifts I actually have stored for about four years.  Some, we had in layaway.  A few I won on Ebay for great deals throughout the year. One friend actually gifted us some cash to help out as well.


We got ready for church, and mija wore her Christmas dress.

After church, we went to my family's celebration.  Dinner included tamales.  Christmas isn't Christmas without tamales!  My husband's day was spent doing a lot of this...

All those twisty wires and such makes it sooooo long to open presents!


My hubby had to work this evening, so it's been a quiet evening of sorting through paper, gifts, boxes, direction sheets, etc. and finding homes for all the new things.  


The highlights of the two days includes all the great fellowship with the families and mija mentioning in her prayer tonight, "Thank you Jesus for being born to die for our sins."


How was your birthday celebration?


Linked to:

Hallelujah Chorus on Hand Bells---Awesome Blessing!

Ten Ways to Bring the Gospel Home This Christmas

Another great post from Desiring God.

Ten Ways to Bring the Gospel Home This Christmas

by Jonathan Parnell | December 21, 2011

Tis' the most wonderful time of the year . . . and it's a unique opportunity to give the good news of Jesus to your unbelieving family.

Randy Newman's book, Bringing the Gospel Home, is a resource meant to equip Christians in how to talk about the gospel in their closest relationships. Because of the book's relevance in this season, Crossway is currently offering a free download.

Christmas with Family Who Don't Know Jesus

David Mathis recently extracted some practical ideas from the book in connection to all the family gatherings accustomed to the holidays. Here are those ten points again, or in his words, "a few thoughts from a fellow bungler to help us think ahead and pray about how we might grow in being proxies for the gospel, in word and deed, among our families."

Read about the TEN WAYS HERE.

Friday Funny--Have a Rockin' Christmas from my family

Personalize funny videos and birthday eCards at JibJab!

Christmas/Winter Craft--Toilet Paper Roll Snowflake

I've mentioned our snowflake project a few places and figured it was time to share it on my own blog!

Before I start, I've got to tell something funny.  It looks like we're going to have a brown Christmas in our area.  Yesterday while watching the weather, mija got a pensive look and said, "Someone must have used their birthday wish wrong.  They must have wished for no snow for Christmas!"  Who knew?  I verified that it wasn't me.  Are you the guilty party?  ;-)

Now, on to the snowflake.  Here's what the finished TP roll snowflakes look like.

1. Save TP rolls. (Duh!)
2. Cut them into 1/2 inch sections.  If they flatten out as you cut them, that's fine since you're going to do that anyway.
3. We painted them white and immediately rolled them in glitter.  We set them on wax paper to dry.  We used white tempera paint which doesn't cover that great, but I'm glad I did since it's washable.  You could use regular craft paint if you wanted a more "professional" looking paint job.
4. Some people staple together.  We chose to glue together using a tacky glue.  We were originally going to use six segments since snowflakes have six sides, but, five segments looked and fit together better.

       5.  We cut a piece of silver ribbon to tie around one loop and Eureka!    Snow!

It did take a few days to complete the whole project because you had to make sure the paint was dry and then you had to make sure the glue was dry.

You could also paint them red to make poinsettias.  They could be painted green with three segments glued to make holly leaves. OR you could make sunflowers some other time of the year by painting them yellow and gluing some sunflower seeds in the middle.  You can also make them bigger by continuing to glue segments around.  I'm sure the ideas are endless!

Mija is giving them out as Christmas gifts, but again, this would be a fun project for winter in general.  Let me know if you come up with any more ideas!!

Linked to:

  

An Unwed Teen with an Unplanned Pregnancy

An Unwed Teen with an Unplanned Pregnancy
from Desiring God blog on Dec. 20, 2011

There is a murderous logic to those who advocate aborting children with disabilities. It goes something like this:

• People with disabilities suffer in this world. Abortion is a kindness that prevents such suffering.
• The caregivers (primarily parents) of children with disabilities also suffer.  Abortion is a kindness that prevents their suffering, too.
• Society suffers. Financially and administratively, the burden on society is significant. Abortion is a kindness to the rest of society to prevent such a burden from existing.

The argument has become more sophisticated over time, but the main point is this idea of preventing hardship. Everybody just wants to be comfortable. We like things easy, and cheap — the American and British eugenics movement in the early 1900s had no trouble focusing on the monetary costs to society as sufficient reason to limit the births of undesirable children.

Now, why such a depressing thought in the Christmas season? Because Mary, the mother of Jesus, shows us a different way to think about hardship.

Read the rest HERE

How about some FREEBIES?

I love getting freebies in the mail.  I thought I just share a few freebies with you.  Take what you want and leave the rest!!!


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From Cradle to Crown...Thoughts about Jesus

In case you didn't know, Christmas is upon us.  Christmas is the time of year we remember and celebrate the birth of Christ.  

Even those who aren't very "religious" can handle Jesus around this time of year.  They might have a nativity set or sing a few carols that mention Jesus.  Oh, and the Charlie Brown Christmas is fun to watch even when Linus quotes the Nativity story.

Jesus did not stay a cute little baby in a manager.  Babies are easy to handle.  A man dying on the cross and coming back to life, well, that's another story.

It's harder for most people deal with a risen Savior.  It would mean a Savior is needed.  "Me?  Need a Savior?"  That would mean a person has done something they need to be saved from or to be judged for.


The most challenging Jesus for everyone, including believers, seems to be the returning King, the Ancient of Days, the Alpha and Omega sitting on the throne.  He's coming back and this time it won't be as a meek and mild infant, but a mighty and majestic KING.

Just read a few verses for yourself.



 "And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle. His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire; And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters.  And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp two-edged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength."  Revelation 1:13-16


So, take some time to thank God for the gift of the baby Jesus and the risen Savior, but don't forget to look forward to the coming King!

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