I've always been a spring time person, new growth, flowers, sun breaks....but this fall has made a strong case for becoming my favorite season. The weather has been spectacular, leaves have been turning and the children have been in school. Definitely strong points for swaying my opinion.
The kids didn't start school until the 21st of September, which is more like a college schedule than an elementary one. Before we started school we celebrated with a trip to Silverwood! The kids earned a free ticket by reading a certain amount of hours last spring, which was great! We had each of the kids bring a friend and came up with a brilliant idea. Let the Kids Go Free! We gave each kid $20 for lunch and any other forms of entertainment & a cell phone (which they had to use every hour to check in). It was awesome! Silverwood isn't a very big park and Balin and I felt pretty confident that they were old enough for this kind of responsibility and we weren't proven wrong. Oh happy day!
Turns out the kids had a pretzel for lunch and spent the rest of the change on candy (the girls) and carnival games (the boys). The boys went through it pretty quickly and pretty soon Sam is asking for a loan to continue to play. Not 30 minutes after we gave him another $10, we get a call with the boys saying they're ready to go home. What? You might have guessed it, they blew through their money at the carnival games. Reminded me of Pinocchio.
I wasn't ready to go home yet. We met up with the kids and found out in the 3 hours they had been wandering around, they hadn't gone on very many rides. Hah! We gathered the kids up and headed to the rollercoaster, the spinning round thing that goes up in the air, the river raft ride where you get soaking wet. (It was pretty chilly out that day....which made for an exciting ride as no one wanted to get wet!)
All in all I have to say it was a pretty awesome day. Balin and I got a few hours to hang out and the kids had a lengthy leash of freedom. Thinking in the future this is how we should do amusement parks.
School at the Oaks has started and I can't say enough good things about it. For Real. There are so many things I'm impressed with but I'll give you just one thing that I see making a positive impact.
The rules. There are a lot of rules at the Oaks. Wear a uniform, raise your hand, go to the bathroom when you go to recess not during class time, sit up straight, write clearly and neatly, etc. I'm not a huge rule fan myself, I tend to want to break the rules, but I'm seeing huge positive results because of the rules.
The interesting thing about the rules at the Oaks is that they are all cached in the simple theme of "think of others more highly than yourself." For example, a student may not raise their hand until the teacher has finished talking. One might think this unreasonable but if you take a minute and think about it, it's truly about regarding the other person higher than yourself. When a student raises their hand while the teacher is talking, the student has heard something and then wants to tell everyone what their thinking, whether or not it's on the subject. Once the student raises their hand they are no longer listening to the teacher, they're just thinking about what they want to say and often they miss what instruction the teacher is giving, which then leads to other disruptions when the student isn't tracking with the lesson. By having the students wait with their questions, they are giving the teacher respect and listening to what they have to say. Often a lot of other off subject material is avoided and class time is better spent focused on the lesson.
One simple rule that has such broad implications. Amazing.
The cool thing is you can look at so many of the rules and see the same trail of logic.
Another quick comment the teacher said during the back to school night is they tell the students to do everything without grumbling or complaining. (Philippians 2:14) He said, "I tell the kids that your parents want your very best and their trying to help you. When they correct your homework tell them thank you and fix it without grumbling. When they ask you to do something, don't grumble or complain, just do it." Hallelujah. That is worth the tuition right there.
Our house has literally been transformed. I hear a lot of "thank you's", "what can I do to help?". The kids are dramatically kinder to one another. The other day I made some cookies for their after school snack and Sam asked if he could make a cookie smiley face and take it down to Perrin with her milk. What???? He did the same today. I. Am. So. Thankful.
Our house is actually filled with joy and singing and laughter and kids learning.
Worth every penny.
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| The kids have to wear uniforms and on formal days Sam's in a tie. Balin taught him how to tie it, but it was pretty early in the morning so he'll probably need a redo lesson. |
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| Poor Sam felt so awkward the whole day while Perrin's comment was, "I feel like a little school girl." Yeah, you are a 9. Year. Old. Schoolgirl. It's nice to have her look her age again. |
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| I told Perrin to give a little flavor to her outfit with some Converse...I think it makes the look. |
One of the other blessings that has come out of the Oaks is friends. This summer I called up some other families in the directory that lived in Liberty Lake and invited them over to have tea and get to know one another. The Carter family came and it was so nice to get to know them. Perrin and Isabel play for hours and hours with American Girl doll and are constantly asking to see one another. Meanwhile, Perrin is making friends left and right with all the girls in the classroom. Unfortunately it's difficult for us to have play dates after school due to my desire that they get their homework done right after they get home.
I don't think I've seen Sam and Perrin get along so well in a quite a while. It's sooooo nice.
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| Rocks of Sharon off Dishman - Micah road. |
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| Mountain biking on Mt. Spokane. |
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| Hiking with Yogi in the Ille Conservation Area |
People ask me often, "what do you do now the kids are in school". Good question. Perrin was home sick the other day and she said as she did her homework, "I want to be like you when I grow up mom. Alone at home in a quiet house." Hmmm....she must not have noticed all the chores I had just done.
That said I am trying to stay on top of feeding the family, which when you're trying to eat healthy takes a lot of time in the store and kitchen. I also clean my own house and do my own yard work, which take some time. I was in the garden the other day doing some fall clean up when I came across some seed heads that were dried and ready to be dispersed in the garden. I thought to myself that this is my true happiness, putzing around in the garden, sowing seeds and deadheading flowers. I truly love it!!!
By Tuesday though my house is usually clean and the yard is done for the week. (I have a goal every week to fill the yard waste bin and then wait till it's empty on Mondays and then do it again. It usually takes me an hour or so for the week. What a great incentive and it keeps me from working non-stop in the garden.)
Since all domestic chores are done by Tuesday, I then try to get outside and play. Yogi and I have been going on all sorts of local hikes, since we haven't been on very many since we moved here. I am also mountain biking while the weather is good, which has been spectacular!
I'm also volunteering with Young Life 2 mornings a week, helping with administration items. I enjoy being part of Young Life but am so thankful it's in the mornings as I love being home at night with my family.
That said, not much else has been going on. I've got some plans for the future that I'm pretty excited about:
I just booked our trip to Switzerland last week and got the deposit down on our house in Italy. Check out this link to see the trip we're doing in Switzerland:
Here's where we're staying in Italy. Our trip thus far includes Gen and Kai Wimberly for both Switzerland and Italy and then Glen and Debbie Stewart will join us at this house for a week. Pretty excited about it.
I also booked a trip to Austin, Texas for a long weekend in February, which I am super excited about. I've been wanting to get involved in this women's ministry for some time but between homeschooling, not knowing many people to do it with and just the chaos of life last year, I put it off. This year a friend of mine and I decided to host a bible study based on the IF:Gathering curriculum and see where it leads. We're both really looking forward to it.
I decided to take it a step further and I signed myself up for the If:Gathering in Austin. I got on line thankfully just as the tickets went on sale and within 20 minutes the event was sold out. I ended up getting one ticket and am on the waiting list for another. My friend Debbie courageously said she would go with me, even without a ticket. I booked our airplane tickets and hotel room 5 minutes later and we're a go.
I've found that if I debate adventure I often back out and make all sorts of excuses to why I can't make it happen. Sometimes I find legit reasons, but often it's just because I'm being lazy. So - Debbie and I are going to Austin.
Check out the IF Movement and see if you'd like to become a part of it.
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