School Already?

We had planned to start school after Labor Day.  I am a staunch lover of summer and being outdoors as much as possible.
No stuffy days indoors doing school when it's beautiful outside.

But then...

Last week the four youngest kids started begging to open all those tantalizing boxes that had been sitting in the basement for a few months.
You know....the ones with all their curriculum for this year.

In a moment of weakness, I caved.

I couldn't lift the heavy boxes yet (post gallbladder surgery), so they recruited Jillian to lug them upstairs for them.

With great glee, they unpacked all their books.

We spent some time getting things organized and then the chorus started.

"Can we watch our videos?"

We are doing the Abeka video school program.

Riding a tide of euphoria that I still cannot explain, I blurted out, "Sure!  I'll set them up for you!"

About an hour later, there were no visible signs of euphoria as I attempted to get the streaming videos to actually stream.
Like right that minute.
While my little scholars fidgeted impatiently.
Argh.

By the following day, everyone was up and streaming.
Sort of.

Within five minutes one of them had a computer issue.
Then another.
And other.

There were no less than 437 'issues' that day.  It went on ALL.DAY.LONG.
I began to dislike the sound of my own name.

Jeff was home for only a few minutes and after noticing how many times I was summoned to the dining room to address a computer issue, he said,
"That is going to drive you crazy."

Yep.
Pretty much.

I'm happy to say that they are learning how to navigate a few of these issues...use the refresh button, try a few options when the cursor freezes, etc.  So now I am only summoned 157 times a day.

But who could resist these cute, eager little faces?

Me, either.

Farmer in the Dell

No idea what Farmer in the Dell means...
And I won't do a commercial for Dell computers because I don't like any that I've ever bought.
But I couldn't think of a title.
So shoot me.
Hee!

The kids and I are hankering for spring in a big way.
What says spring better than seeing seed packets at the store?
Since we are homeschooling, we thought it would be fun to try to grow something.
The kids are extremely excited about it.
Let's see if they are this enthusiastic if/when our plants grow outside and the sun and mosquitoes make harvesting difficult.
That always cooled my excitement...to say the least.

Getting instructions on how to put their seeds into the dirt.

Let's hope these peas make it to our dinner table.

Love seeing little fingers poking seeds into soil.

Taking turns.

"Look at my fingers, Mom!"

Zoey was very intent on getting her seeds pushed to the correct depth.

Jake had some trouble with the whole concept of waiting his turn and everyone was mad at him by this point.

The kids were very excited today to see that there are already a few green shoots coming up!  I have a feeling we planted them a bit too early.
Oops.
Amatuers.

Homeschool Update

It's been a little over a month since we started homeschooling.
I am now an expert.
Ha.

We have had good days and bad days but overall, I think it's unanimous.
We love it.
(Please excuse the iPhone pictures)

Where else can you do school on the floor?

Or in your pajamas?  (I did have a picture of that but have been forbidden from posting it.)

Or on your mom and dad's bed?

The kids have been pretty good about not fussing about their lessons, although I did have to institute a reward system for good behavior.  Everyone who does their school work without stalling, fussing, or making mama cry, gets a Dove chocolate at the end of the day.  They also get a star for each day of good behavior and after 10 days they get to pick a prize from the prize box--full of fun stuff from the $1 section at Target.  So far it's working.

The other day the boys were studying Davy Crocket.  So we broke out our hat.
You know....the hat that Davy is famous for.
Jake put it on because being in character helps you retain more knowledge.  Right?

 Until....
Jordan brought me his workbook and pointed to the hat that Davy actually wore.
Gasp.
It had no similarities whatsoever to a coonskin.
And it went on to say that he wore a completely different style.
Well...burst my bubble.
We thought we had been so clever digging out the coon....

Saturday School

Homeschool - Week 2

We had several good days and one awful, horrible, no good, very bad day. 

Today--Saturday--three kids came and asked if they could get started on school.  I gleefully told them that it was Saturday.  They said, 'We don't care.  Can we still do school?"

Um....

I guess so.  If you want to do some work sheets by yourselves.
'Cause this Mama is NOT doing school today.

A few minutes later, I was telling Jeff that several of the kids requested to do school on Saturday, and Kate piped up,
"Not me!  I'm gonna be a slug today."

And there you have it.  I have some over-achievers and some not-so-eager achievers.
I'll let you guess which ones make mommy have awful, horrible, no good, very bad days.
Ha.

It has become apparent that a few of my ADHD/ADD kids are going to be a bit of a challenge.  And that is okay.  I just need to adjust to them and figure out how to keep all of us from having those no good, very bad days. 
Well...that...and a bit of daily chocolate bribery. 
I'm not above that.

Here are some pictures of the Saturday school team.

And a few from earlier in the week...

I have been asked what video curriculum we are using.  We are actually using two different ones.  The four oldest kids are using Abeka and the four youngest are using BJU.   The reason for that is that the younger kids were already doing BJU at their school and came home with several of the workbooks.  BJU was running a special on their streaming videos and allowing them to be ordered ala carte, so we decided to stick with the little kids curriculum and use BJU for the rest of the year.  Abeka is less expensive, so we may be doing all Abeka for everyone next year. 

Homeschool, WHAT?!

Anyone who knows me will know that I am a poor candidate to be a homeschool mom.
It's not that I don't like the idea.
It's that I stink at teaching school.
Part of the reason is that I just don't enjoy it and don't want to do it.
Nor do I like doing any type of 'kid' activity.
Hence...the poor candidate I am.

Not liking kid activities also makes me a poor candidate to be the mom of 10 kids.
But God wanted to show others that He is still in the business of doing miracles.
So He gave us 10 kids.
And they are reasonably well adjusted in spite of my weaknesses in many areas.
I do adore them.  They are the source of incredible blessing to me.

About a month or so ago, I was asked to share our adoption story with some of the women at our church.  I explained to them how I was not cut out to be the mom of a large brood but that God had stepped in a picked up the slack.  (Lots and lots of slack.)  I was encouraging them to step out in faith if God was leading them to do something that seemed crazy and it was on the tip of my tongue to say, "You know...like me homeschooling or something like that."

I'm pretty sure I didn't utter those words out loud.
I know from past experience that if I do say something like, "I won't,"  or "I'll never," it won't be long before God will say, "Oh yes you will."
He laughs when He says that.
It's not a mean kind of thing.  He doesn't force me.  He just invites me in a very persuasive kind of way.
And I can't resist Him.
Mostly because I have learned that if He asks me to do something, there is a ton of blessing involved and it's in my best interest to go along with Him.
So basically, it's selfish on my part.
I want the blessing.

So recently, He started in with the homeschooling thing.
Um...really?
Me?
You DO remember that I tried this once and was an EPIC FAIL, right?

Yes, He remembered.
But He had a different plan.
One that involved video teaching so that I don't teach the subjects...I just make sure they are doing them and grade their tests, etc.
But wait....I tried something similar and failed at that too.

Nevermind....

He continued to lay it on my heart and gave me lots of Scripture DAILY with things like, "Don't be afraid."  "I'll be with you."
He reminded me that our income had been shrinking lately and it might behoove me to find a way to cut our expenses.  (Thank you, Mr. Obama.  Not that I'm bitter...just speaking the truth.)

I asked the kids if they would want to be homeschooled.
They did.
Their response was enthusiastic, to put it mildly.

Everyone knows that once you mention something to a kid, you HAVE to do it or they will bother you incessantly until you follow through.
We parents just can't stand up to the reproachful eye of a 7 year old who says, "But you SAID you would."

So we took the plunge.
We ordered the videos and books.
They came in box after box.
And I wanted to cry.
I was so completely overwhelmed.
I sent a distress signal via text to Jeff...."We needs more shelves!"
We have an IKEA not far from where he works and he headed over there and brought us a bookcase with cubbies so we could put the incredibly huge amount of stuff away.  Love that store...cheap and decent quality.

By the third day we were crying.  I was so frustrated trying to figure out the schedule.  After I apologized for losing it, we all decided to soldier on and make the best of things.

And it got better.  I've been praying a lot.  God is amazing.  He always comes through!

Let's recap, shall we?
I am not cut out for this.
AT ALL.
But God is....
And He gives me what I need.

I realized at the end of every tiring day....
I had JOY in my heart.
The kind of joy that comes from God when we obey Him.  A supernatural kind of joy that makes no sense.
Because obviously, homeschooling 8 kids shouldn't fill a person like me with JOY.  {snicker...}

And the kids?  They LOVE it!  They have been telling me over and over how much they love being homeschooled and in spite of my pathetic attempts, they say they love having me for a teacher!  SaraGrace says she wants to be homeschooled for the rest of her life.   All I can say to that is that God is still in the business of performing miracles.

We have had so much fun together (even though we had those moments of crying)! 

I am so thankful that He has called us to do this!  I am looking forward to what He will do with ALL of us as we spend each day together.

I took some pictures of the older kids in their PJ's doing school but since they are party-poopers, they have forbidden me from posting any of them.

So here are some boring iPhone shots of the 'school room.'

All of their pencils, erasers, etc. are in buckets with their names on them.  They can carry them around the house if they are doing their work in a different room.  The older kids don't want the little kids in the school room when they are on the computer, so the little ones come down to the kitchen to do their workbooks.

They each have a cubby--which SaraGrace informed me was for kindergartner's--and I informed her that I didn't much care.  Baaahahahahahaha   That pile of paper in the right corner is a huge paper chain they made on Friday that stretches from one end of the house to the other.  We are going to try to hang it up.  The curriculum came with an art project for each week but since we are starting in the middle of the year, they can do the projects from the first semester.  They did one each day and had so much fun.  I think I'm going to have to find an art idea website for them.  Anyone?  Anyone?  Bueller?

I will keep you posted on our adventure. 

Memorial Box Monday - God's Amazing Provision

I haven't participated in Memorial Box Monday for awhile--mainly because I am SO BAD at remembering to write things on certain days. ugh. But anyway...I remembered this week.

For as long as I can remember, I have wanted to send our kids to a Christian school. But yeah...the tuition... There is just no way.

We tried homeschooling when Molly was going into kindergarten. God very clearly called us to it at the time. Molly was just too emotionally fragile to attend school. I homeschooled for two years. The second year it went rather...um....badly.

As in epic fail.

The following year, God directed us to put the kids in public school. It was so hard to admit defeat in the area of homeschooling because it is something I think can be such a wonderful thing.

God continually reminded me that He could take care of my kids no matter where they were...home...public school...or Christian school.

And so I had to trust Him to take care of them. It sounds foolish to say that--but it was really hard for me to let them go out into the harsh cold world.

Last year, Molly began asking to go to Christian school. I shared my own longing with her and told her to pray that if God wanted them to go, He would make a way. Honestly, my faith was rather weak in this area. I mean, really, how could we possibly afford to send all the kids to a Christian school?

Well, WE couldn't but GOD could.

And so we prayed.

When we first started attending our current church, I was approached by a family who serves on the board of a small Christian school, wondering if we would be interested in sending our kids there. I laughed and said yes, but we could never afford it.

Over the past 10 months there have been occasional references to the school, but each time, I brushed them off, knowing we could not afford the tuition.

Last week, the mom and kids of the above family came over for a playdate. The mom mentioned again that the school was looking for students and that they might be interested in working with us on the tuition problem.

I gave her permission to have the school principal call us and started to have a glimmer of hope that God might be up to something.

He was.

The principal called and after a long talk, asked me to come up with a number we could afford and get back to her. Jeff came up with a number and I went to visit the school the next morning.

It's a very small school. Each class has about 5-8 students. After showing the kids around, she and I sat down to talk about coming to the school. Bottom line...she is willing to take what we can afford because our family's story of 10 adoptions touches her heart.

And so...our God, Jehova Jirah our Provider, has made a way for our five elementary kids to attend a Christian school this year. And not just any Christian school. A small school.

You see, several our kids struggle with some learning problems. They have IEP's and need extra help. They get pulled out of class for tutoring with groups of about 5-6 kids. It is a great help to them, but they miss class instruction and end up having lots of extra homework that they didn't have time to finish in class.

This year they will have a full class size of 5 or 6 and will get that 'tutoring' all day long.

Only God!

We live 25 minutes from the school, so it will mean a significant amount of driving for us, but I am trying to concentrate on the GOOD in this situation rather than how I will be spending two hours a day in the car. ha ha.

I'll have to find a little schoolhouse to put in our Memorial Box.