Christmas 2011

We had a wonderful Christmas this year. God was so gracious to us. We had some dear friends who "blessed" us with Christmas and it was a HUGE blessing. Lots of special memories. Lots of fun times. It was just us 7 for Christmas day and then my parents come today and Dave's parents come next week.

The pre-stocking picture

 Josh with his hot wheels

  Sarah with her American Girl Stickers

 the boys with their swords

Anna with her orange in the toe of her stocking

with a few of their favorite gifts

Then we headed off to church to celebrate the birth of our Savior with our dear church family. That is one of the big blessings that the Lord has given us here - our dear church family. It was a wonderful time of fellowship and celebration with them. We are so thankful to the Lord for all these precious gifts and memories and most of all for His most precious gift - Jesus.

Christmas Photo

Before church last Sunday, we did get a family photo:

Last day of school before Christmas

Christmas break - here we come! We were all ready for a little break and I think we will be nice and fresh and ready to go once the new year starts. (That's my story and I am sticking to it, anyway.) For now, we are done for a week and a half (maybe a little more!) to celebrate Christmas and enjoy time together with our family. (My parents are coming to visit at the end of December and Dave's parents in early Jan. to celebrate Christmas together.) Yippee! Christmas is in just a few days!

We actually finished the alphabet with Sam in preschool yesterday. We did zippers and zigzags for the letter Z. Here is Sam with his zipper and the "zigzag" pictures the children made (out of rickrack):

Progressive Dinner - falalalala la la la la

Last night our church had a Progressive Dinner. For those of you who are not familiar with the concept, it is where you start at one house and have an appetizer, go to the next house and have salads, go to the next house and have the main course and then finally heading to the last house for desserts. It was so fun. Most people had never done it before, so I kind of dragged everyone into it! Our church is fairly small, so it was doable to invite the whole church (although, of course, being so close to Christmas, not everyone came.) It was a great time. The first house had appetizers and she has grandchildren and her backyard was AMAZING for children! There was a trampoline built right into the ground! (The hole was dug underneath. Very cool) There was also a tire swing from a VERY tall tree. Let's just say the kids loved the appetizer stop - even though I think most of them forgot to eat!

Then we went to another family's house for salads. The kids played football in the backyard (in the dark by this time) and had popcorn. (The salad for the children.) :) Then we headed over here to our place for the main course. No, we didn't have everyone in our church at our apartment, we actually reserved the big room downstairs for this part. It was perfect! Everyone had a place to sit and plenty of time to fellowship.

Finally, we went over to our dear friend's the White's house for desserts. It was just too fun. The whole night we got to fellowship with dear friends from church, see everyone's house decorated for Christmas and celebrate the coming advent together. What a blessed time! We are so thankful for our dear church and the fellowship provided by these dear friends in the Lord!

Christmas Traditions

When I was a little girl, we had certain Christmas traditions. Christmas Eve was always special. We would sing Christmas carols - as many as we could remember - and then when we couldn't think of any more, we would end with The Twelve Days of Christmas. Then we would open one gift on Christmas Eve and have Christmas cookies. Christmas morning we would wake up early - no coming down until 6am! - and then tear into our stockings. I have fond memories of my Christmases growing up.

Then when Dave and I got married, I assumed (incorrectly) we would do those things that my family had done growing up. But, you see, Dave had his own Christmas memories from when he was a child. They always went to a candlelight service at their church on Christmas Eve. They also did not open any presents on Christmas Eve.  On Christmas morning they did stockings, of course, and had cinnamon rolls in the shape of Christmas tree. So, hmmm, what were Dave and I to do with our family? Well, we had to make our own Christmas traditions.

We do have our own traditions, now. Some we borrowed from each of our families and some we introduced ourselves. We almost always go to a candlelight service on Christmas Eve now and stockings are a big part of our tradition. Our kids aren't supposed to come out on Christmas morning until 6:30am :) and we usually make them suffer through a picture of them all by the tree before they can open their stockings. (Another tradition Dave's parents started years ago.)

Several years ago, we started watching A Charlie Brown Christmas during dinner a bit before Christmas. We would usually do it on "pizza night" (Friday nights in our house) and I would usually pick up some Tony's pizza for that particular meal. So last night was our "Charlie Brown Christmas evening."

 The kids watching their movie and eating their Tony's pizza :)

And Sarah asked if she could take a picture of their stockings hung on the wall with care. (Sorry - no chimney here in FL.)

What are your families traditions at Christmas? I'd love to hear them.

Jingle Bells

Epcot - around the world in our backyard

Last Thursday, our home school co-op Time Travelers went to Epcot for our Christmas around the world party. It was great! We had a wonderful time and Disney gave us an amazing deal for the field trip. They really worked with us and gave our little home school group a special day to remember. We have been studying Geography this year in our co-op and so it was VERY COOL to see some of the countries that we have been studying (even if it was Disney-fied.) We got to see Mexico, Norway, China, Germany, Italy, Japan, Morocco, United States, France, United Kingdom and Canada.

In China, for example, we had studied about the Terra-Cotta Soldiers, and we got to a miniature version of them right at Epcot! We saw a lovely movie about France and rode the rides in Mexico and Norway. Just fun things and a great way for the children to "see" the things we have been learning about. I just went with our three older children (Dave graciously stayed home with Sam and Anna so I could focus on the older three) and we had a really nice time.

 We did have a few minutes to get our picture taken with Mickey Mouse and Daisy Duck

 The Terra-Cotta soldiers from China

 Sarah with her friend and her friend's sister with Pooh and Tigger

Sarah had a great time getting her autograph book signed while we were at Epcot this day! She actually found a Disney autograph book in the mission barrel (like a free Goodwill here at the mission) last year and has gotten lots of use out of it. She loved getting the character's autographs!

 Josh, Sarah, Tim and I with the Epcot ball

our family and Sarah's friend in the Japanese gardens

  the smaller version of Eiffel Tower from France (I must say I do wish I had gotten a French eclair while we were in France. We didn't do it and I wished we had.)

It was a wonderful day. Thank you Lord!

Roller Coaster Fun at Home

This year I put away the science textbooks and we have been exploring different science topics that I feel the children need to know about. Well, since we went to Legoland last Monday, I thought we would explore roller coasters and do a little of our own science with it.

Years ago, I taught at the Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh and they did a week long camp with roller coasters. We didn't do a week-long camp here, but we did do some of the experiments in our school at home. I checked out a ton of books from the library and lo and behold one of the books had the very experiment they used to do with the children at the Carnegie Science Center. It is where you build your own roller coaster using foam insulation for pipes. Here was the cool result of our labors:

 Sarah setting up her roller coaster 

Sarah rolling her marble down it to see if it worked

Josh made a double loop roller coaster

Nine Years Ago...

The Lord blessed us with a beautiful baby girl. Sarah turned 9 yesterday and what a wonderful birthday it was. Sarah got to go out for a special breakfast with her daddy - just the two of them - to start out her special day. Then for lunch we had a family from church who came over for cake and ice cream and to watch her open her presents. Then in the afternoon, Sarah and one of her friends from our home school co-op went ice skating. She has been faithfully learning how to roller blade for several months and so going ice skating was like a dream come true for her. She was so sweet and said that her birthday was as wonderful as she could have asked for. I think it was just as special as she was.

 Our dear friends the Whites came over to help us celebrate

at the ice skating rink with Sarah's friend and her friend's sister

Enjoying some hot chocolate at the ice skating rink

 Sarah at the end of her big day. (She looks tired here! This was at the end of ice skating!)

Legoland

I have to admit that Florida was not on the top of our list of places in the world to live, but many good things have out of living here. We have a wonderful church, dear friends and we feel that the Lord has us here doing His work. So many good lessons too. God has been good to us.

One of the other blessings for being in Florida is the cool field trips we have had the chance to be a part of. This past Monday, our family was able to go to Legoland. They are having a special for public schools, private schools and homeschools from their Grand Opening in October until April - $5 a person! That means that our whole family was able to go to Legoland for $35! Unbelievable! It was a fun, fun day and we got to spend it with a dear family from here at New Tribes Mission. Since they are moving in just a few weeks, it was extra special to spend the time with the Hatchers.

Here are some pics from the day:

  The Carousel

 Our children and the Hatcher children - yes, there really are 11 children in this picture :)

 Our guys with the Lego Space man and Lego car -yes, the "statues" really were made out of legos

 Sammy getting his "driver's license"

 Josh passed his license test with flying colors

 Sarah and her friend Rachel

 having a little fun with our friends

 Anna and the cute giraffe

 "AAAAHHHHH!!!"

the 3D Lego movie - notice Anna's upside-down sunglasses

the sign as we were leaving (in the rain)

It was a very fun day. We were so glad that we got to go - and what a deal too! We were so glad to spend it with our friends too! What fun.

Since I love to use all things as opportunities for learning, we are also studying roller coasters this week in science. We are actually going to build our own roller coaster either this week or next - more on that later!

Count your many blessings

Count your blessings, name them one by one,
Count your blessings, see what God hath done!
Count your blessings, name them one by one,
Count your many blessings, see what God hath done.
-taken from the song Count Your Blessings | Johnson Oatman, Jr

This week was Thanksgiving. I love Thanksgiving. I love that we have a holiday celebrating all the wonderful blessings that God has given to us. I don't just mean material blessings - I mean all of our blessings in Christ, our families, being together, the freedoms we enjoy in this country and on down to the food we eat every day. I am thankful for our supporters who allow us to be here. I am thankful for so much; as I said, I love Thanksgiving.

My parents came down to visit this weekend. It was such a nice time with them. We spent Thanksgiving Day here at our house and then went to a park on Friday. They had to head back home this morning, but it was still a nice time.

When I count my blessings, I can name them one by one:

Even though Dave's parents weren't here to celebrate Thanksgiving, they definitely rank in our "blessings" list as well:

The Great Wall of China

This has probably been my favorite Sonlight curriculum year that we have ever had. We are doing so many cool things and it has really broadened all of our view of the world. They take this look at the Far East, but they do it in such a way that it burdens your heart for these dear people who have been made in the image of God, but are lost without a Savior. We have been praying through 100 Gateway Cities of the 10/40 Window and have been traveling around the world in our History. Right now we are studying China and it has been rich in its lessons.

Today we did this totally cool thing where we built part of the Great Wall of China. My dear friend here at the mission let me borrow her Ancient China Treasure Chest and so today we built part of the wall. Cool. Very cool. Here are some pictures from our day:

"Oh no, the Mongols are attacking! But wait! We built this wall so we are safe!"

Joshua Spielberg

Joshua discovered "still frame" movies. This is his first movie. We added a little music for fun...

Around the World in 180 Days

This year we are studying world geography. (Do you like my play on words there in the title of today's blog? You know the book Around the World in 80 Days? Well, we have 180 days in our school year and we are studying world geography throughout the year? Get it? hahaha I crack myself up.)

Anyway...we have been studying certain countries in our school time here at home and then we have been studying other countries in our co-op. We started in Papua New Guinea and continued on to Australia and New Zealand as we were studying here at home. Now we are studying China. In our co-op, though, we started on the other side of the world and began in N. America and then on through Central and South America and just started into Europe last week. Here is the map of the world and countries we have studied so far:

Harvest Party

This is the view before we left for the Harvest Party at a local church last night:

 Anna the clown

 Tim a ninja guy

Sarah a cheerleader. (Sam and Josh decided to go as Sam and Josh, respectively.)

This was the view after we got home:

Josh won the cake walk 30 seconds before we left! Plus the kids got a bit of candy. Just a smidge.