Memory Verse:  Romans 10:17 - So then faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God.

Intro:  America’s Favorite Dessert J-E-L-L-O - What we read affects what we believe.  When we feed the Scriptures in our spirit, faith comes alive and becomes a living force within you.

Assignment:  Write about your favorite ‘faith food’.  Tell about the books of the Bible that you read that help to build your faith.  Nurture the seeds of faith inside you.  ex: Acorns become Oak trees.

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The very first book that came to mind is probably the book of Isaiah.  This book convicts me in all sorts of ways. The prophesy of the coming Messiah, the warnings against idolators, God's wrath and redemption. All of it is definitely soul food for me that strengthens my faith, it's a book I read frequently. I find it fascinating, enouraging, profound, and comforting.  My favorite verse from this books is Isaiah 40:31 But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they will soar on wings like eagles...

The next would be the book of Philippians "the book of joy". This was one of the first Bible studies I did with my ladies' class as a new Christian over three years ago.  It reminds me to keep my faith foremost in my mind. I have a note next to Philippians 4:8 that whatever we think about the most is what will influence our actions and habits the most. It's a reminder that comes to mind when I find myself caught up in the stresses of the world, we have the truth to focus on and that's is what I should be the most focused on.

Saving the best for last, I'd say the Gospel of John.  Probably my favorite of the four Gospel accounts.  John 4:10 and 4:14 (along with John 7:38, obviously) are the name and inspiration for this blog. "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you the living water" and  "...whoever drinks the water I give will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life".  The woman at the well might be my favorite section of the Bible. I think there is SO much wisdom in this. I love seeing Jesus preaching in this way, gently exposing the sin of the woman,  reaching out to a Samaritan which was unheard of for a Jew at that time, offering forgiveness and hope, it makes me think about His example and how can I follow it today?  

I hope everyone enjoyed a nice Thanksgiving!!  Ours was really wonderful.   We spent it with my side of the family and it was a good day.  The kids really impressed us with their good behavior and polite manners. Noah kept reminding Abigail "it's Thanksgiving, you need to use your manners" lol!!   They sure are growing up fast!

Yesterday, we went out shopping for Black Friday deals.  Kris and I have only gone out once before and that time was for one specific item. Generally, we aren't fans of crowds and avoid shopping crowds at all costs.  Kris saw an advertisement for jeans at Sears for $9.99, so we decided that made it worth it to go out since he desperately needed new jeans.  It was SO fun! The crowds actually weren't too bad, we didn't leave the house  early since we aren't morning people (we left the house around 10am), and all the stores still had their advertised bargains available.  We finished up the last of our Christmas shopping...yay!  We hit Wal Mart after the mall and it was actually less crowded than when I go in on a normal weekday, so that was nice.  Now, that the shopping is all done, we can relax and focus on the less stressful and fun parts of the holiday (well maybe, we have two weddings to attend in December, lots of birthdays, Abby's recital, and several holiday celebrations, but we can dream right?)!  We even put up our tree yesterday!  Normally, we wait until a week or two before Christmas, but this year we did it early.   This is definitely the last year we use an artifical tree.  Last year the kids really wanted a white tree, so we obliged  It's barely holding up this year and kind of leaning and pathetic looking lol!! Real trees look and smell so much nicer.

I'm not sure why it looks so weird lol. It does look better in person, but we'll definitely go with a real tree next year:

Anyway, next week I'll get back to my weekly "boring" posts about homeschooling lol!  This week was sort of crazy.  Have a great weekend everyone!

Because this is Thanksgiving week, we don’t want to take you away from your family and preparations. Instead, we offer you, like the Lord offered us, a blessing.

Luke 24:50-52
When he had led them out to the vicinity of Bethany, he lifted up his hands and blessed them. While he was blessing them, he left them and was taken up into heaven.Then they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.

Numbers 6:23-27, ESV
Speak to Aaron and his sons, saying, Thus you shall bless the people of Israel: you shall say to them,
“The LORD bless you and keep you;

the LORD make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you;

the LORD lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.”

So shall they put my name upon the people of Israel, and I will bless them.

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Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!! 

Sitting here on a rainy, cold, late November day, there are so many things I have to be Thankful for.  Our loving Heavenly Father,  my gorgeous husband, beautiful children, our home, our friends and family,  our freedom to homeschool in this awesome country, plenty of food to eat, clothes to wear, and our pets to keep us laughing!   

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.

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Love the title on this one, (my husband works for Big Blue).

I don't know of too many sites that I go to that aren't common knowledge.  

Love, love, love, Starfall:

www.starfall.com

My kids love watching videos at National Geographic.com, there are some really cool ones, their favorite is an Octopus (or maybe a Squid, not really sure), fighting with a Shark.   There is a twist at the end and it's really neat. Just screen them yourself before allowing your children to watch, they may not be for the sqeamish:

www.nationalgeographic.com

Letter of the Week is a great resource that I turned to occasionally when my kids were younger:

www.letteroftheweek.com

A paid site that I used last year with my son for spelling, he loved it:

www.spellingtime.com

Curriculum choices:

Noah:

Rod and Staff Math 3

Simply Language Arts

Pathway Readers

Usborne Ancient Times and Medeival Times

Five In a Row

Bob Jones University Science

Handwriting WIthout Tears, cursive

Abigail:

Phonics Pathways

Bob Books

Alpha Omega Lifepac Math

Usborne First Book of Nature

Five In a Row

This was a really fun and busy week of homeschool. 

Tuesday, Noah's Scout Pack marched in the Veteran's Day Parade.  It was really cute!!   Kris didn't have the day off, but he worked from home so that he could see.  It was really great!  Noah is a huge dawdler, he does things in his own time, we were afraid he'd lag too far behind and not keep up, but he did really well (although he lagged a little).    Afterwards, I took the kids on a playdate.

On Wednesday, we took our first field trip of the year!  I decided to go to the Currier Museum of Art afterall.  It was really fun, the kids liked it a lot.  They had an amazing Andy Warhol gallery with hundreds of his pieces, it was neat for me to see even though the kids had no idea who he is.    It wasn't the most kid friendly field trip, we were followed very closely (and not very discretely) by security gaurds there, it was really annoying because the kids were being extremely well behaved and not touching anything, but I can understand they were probably aprehensive about kids near such valuable pieces of art.  They do a family night on Wednesdays where they have a craft and the kids did a silk screening type thing, they really enjoyed that and would like to go back soon.   Here they are in this lumber jungle thing, it was pretty neat:

For school, Noah learned about birds in Science.  We've done this before, but this was more in depth, building on previously learned concepts (we stuck with his Science curriculum this week).  Abigail sat in and loved it.  I added something new to his school this week...spelling (Rod and Staff 3rd grade spelling).  His language arts techincally is supposed to include spelling, but I wanted something more formal.  He did really well and I was impressed!  For Reading, I chose to let him take a break from the Pathway Readers and focus on finishing James and the Giant Peach.  Math is going better, he is getting more used to copying down the problems, although he's not thrilled about doing it.   One of my good friends is planning to begin homeschooling soon, we got a package of software from her that she no longer needed (since it's on her computer and you don't need the cd's to run them) called Elemantary School Success Essentials.  It's for grades 1-6 and Noah LOVED this.  He actually chose to do that with his free time after school and I'm sure he'll want to do it over the weekend, which is fine by me!

For Abby, we rowed Harold and the Purple Crayon.  She learned about story setting, perspective- vanishing point, and city scenes in art.  She drew her own purple city today.  For reading she did SO well!  We ended up finding Bob Book #9 and she did that one with no problem, along with her Reading curriculum.  She did well in math, like always.   I gave her many handwriting assignments and she did great on those to.  Today she requested that we do letters "z", "e" ,"q", and "Q".    We aren't doing anything formal, but I am using the methods taught in Handwriting Without Tears and she's remembering how to write each letter well.

That's about all for now!  Have a great weekend!

Memory Verse: Philippians 4:8

In conclusion, brothers, focus your thoughts on what is true, noble, righteous, pure, lovable or admirable, on some virtue or on something praiseworthy.

The passion to sing, the passion to draw, the passion to build, the passion to ride, the passion for reading, the passion for nature… the list is endless. Some children exhibit their passion from day one, others need an experience to spark that passion

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This one I've had to think about a bit.    I felt like there are so much the kids are interested in, but what would I consider their passions?  

For Noah, I would say one is building with Legos or K'Nex.   He spends most of his free time building!   My father is a very talented machinist and Noah definitely has his same ability to look at a picture and duplicate complicated things precisely.   It's really been AMAZING to see.  Now, as for what sparked it.    This year we have limited tv in a big way, during the week the kids rarely watch tv or go on the computer, we have a rule of "no tv, computer, video games before school", after school we are usually busy, weekends they watch tv in the mornings but again not much.   I think this has helped spark his interest in things that require concentration and imagination.

His other passion, I'd probably say is Science.  We get library passes to get into local museums and attractions for free.  A lot of the options would be a bit boring for the children, so we go to the Planetarium and Science Museum frequently.  I think this has really sparked his curiosity and imagination.  He told me he just loves "finding out what makes stuff work".   I think it's great!!!    He really seems to retain what he learns in Science to.  I try to encourage his interest by challenging him in it (we did a unit study on DNA at the beginning of the year, it was a little advanced for him, but he really took to it), also by giving him the opportunity for hands on projects and I try to switch between unit studies and his textbook Science so it never gets monotonous or boring for him.

Abby:

I would say her first passion is probably animals.  My parents' cute little puppy, Benny, probably sparked that.   When we bought our house two years ago we were able to get pets, something I never thought we'd do (but it turns out I love them).  We have two dogs and three cats, our little Balinese princess, Symphony bonded with Abigail right away and follows her around 90% of the time.  Abigail loves being surrounded by pets, she can be shy with people we don't know, but when we go to the vet's office to pick up the dogs' meds each month she gabs with every person in the office about our pets.  We always say some kids play with toys, our daughter plays with pets!   Here is Abby with Benny:

Her other passion is art.   I am not sure exactly what sparked that.  My grandfather was an amazing artist and so is my sister, so she was probably pre-disposed to it.  She loves drawing and painting and is really good at both.  She also loves papercrafts and making her own scrapbook.  Yesterday we took a field trip to a local art museum, she LOVED it and took time to appreciate many of the paintings and scupltures there:

Bible verse:

Revelation 3:16 So because you are lukewarm- neither hot nor cold- I am about to spit you out of my mouth.

I love that verse, it reminds me to always stay passionate about my faith and never to become complacent!  That's how we (as a family) try to live our lives, making the most of everyday and keeping what is the most important our top priority.