Crushing our Debt and other goals for 2014

Well friends I haven't blogged in quite awhile!  I quit in the middle of a homeschooling blog series due to the devastating tornado that came through our area.  So grateful for safety and God's protection during that and to see the rebuilding that has occurred in the months since.  But I am back and hoping to be more diligent about blogging.  I love to write and I seem to get my point across better when writing then talking!

It is that time of the year where everyone makes their resolutions/goals and I am no different.  Some of my goals are similar to last years (I wasn't as productive as I would have liked to have been) and some are new ones that are in place because of lifestyle of last year.  So here we go I only have 3 goals this year.  I am keeping it simple... you know baby stepping it.

1. Crush our debt! We had participated in Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace 8 years ago right before getting married.  What we took away from it was minimal but saved us in our earlier years of marriage.  We learned the power of creating a budget and the diligence of doing it for each dollar received.  We also learned that if we desired to live free of debt we needed to live without credit cards.  I am very proud to say that we as a married couple still don't have a credit card! (We did apply for a gas only credit card that lasted 3 months and we cancelled it.)  These things are wonderful aspects of Dave Ramsey's teachings but they are the tip of the ice berg.  We missed so much.  We are now on baby step #2 and are getting more and more excited about what debt free will look like!  The snowball is just what it sounds like you put all your debt in order from least to greatest and start with the least.  Pay your minimum plus whatever else you can add to it each month, when that debt is paid off take the amount you were paying to it PLUS the payment of the next debt and make on larger payment to the next debt, and so on and so on so that the amount you are paying is snowballing into a bigger amount.  So far we are 1 debt down starting 2014!!

2. Read through the Bible using a Bible reading plan.  I had this same goal last year too.  I am embarrassed to say that I have known the Lord since I was 15 years old and grew up in church and have never read through the Bible intentionally.  I am sure there are pages that my mind has never poured over.  So that I don't repeat my failure of last year on this goal I have included an action plan to this goal.  It is easy to say what you are going to do but how and what will it look like after a month or two?  Or when the little one has kept you up all night and you're worn out?  Work is so overwhelming that you don't have time?  Or you are angry with God and you don't want to spend time with Him?  (I went through this in 2013 and due to my stubbornness I now long more for the loving healer that I worship.)  The first part of my action plan is to set a time and STICK WITH IT!  I wake up before my kids every day, they sleep crazy hard and long, but I am not ver intentional with what I do with that time.  Sometimes I get on Facebook, very rarely but sometimes I start my chores early,  but mostly I waste this time sitting in the quiet and drinking coffee.  This is not a bad thing as a work at home mommy I am constantly with my kids and need this time to myself.  This time would be perfect for Bible time and coffee.  (I would still probably have time for Facebook after becasue seriously they sleep long and hard!)  During those times when I am too tired I am going to put a new background on my laptop and tablet that say 'Have you spent time in the Word?' because if I have time to piddle on the computer then I have time to spare!

3. I started a life style change (I hate to use the word diet) in the way that I eat.  Trim and Healthy Mama was and is a lifesaver literally for me.  My hormones were leveling out, my sugar levels were remaining low, and I had energy than I knew I could have!  Well it is a wonderful plan that I gave up on during that time I mentioned above about my anger towards God.  I gave up on many things during this time.  It was right before Thanksgiving and we were grieving and my anger and lust for weight loss were gone.  While this dark time didn't last too terribly long my attitude toward weight loss during the holidays was not good.  I am now back to my starting weight that I had worked since July to loose.  I am back to my THM ways.  If you get a chance to look into this please do it is wonderful for the entire family!!  My kids love the desserts!  There are brownies made with black beans that my G man begs for! Don't tell him its black beans shhhh its a secret. :)

Thats it.  Action plans and goals and Hello 2014... Lets do this!  I plan on reporting back on this blog every quarter on goal progress.

Here is some of our 2013 memories!

Day 7: Be patient through all the lessons today.

As all parents know nothing can ruin your day more than when we are in such a rush or caught up with life that we lose our patience with our kids.  When we are impatient we create an environment for our kids to feel anxious, frustrated, and unworthy of our time.  Some days school (when I say school I mean the sit down instruction) seems rushed and thrown into our daily schedule.  Wednesdays especially when I spend my morning in meetings, we eat lunch, get chores done, prepare and go to Taekwondo, get ready for church/Awana, then we always eat out on Wednesday nights so it is bedtime when we get home!!  So you can see how we rush school into our schedule.

On these busy days when we do the sit down work it is easy to become impatient when G man isn't taking it serious.  Little miss can easily throw a wrench in the day if her school play isn't up to her expectations that day.  Yesterday we started out our busy day and when it came time to do the sit down work and neither child was in the mood.  Instead of forcing school and making it very unproductive and no fun we changed our day.  We had a Love of Math day instead.  G man picked out numbers in the different places we were and then practiced counting to that number.  He got so wrapped up in what numbers have to do with our lives and he started asking about ages, height, and weight!!  Little miss explained to him that he was five (true), she was four (false she is 2), and Mommy is five (obviously false!)  G man corrects her and says Mommy is 6 and a half!!  He asked Little miss about how much she weighed which of course she responded with her favorite number four again.  What do you think Mommy weights? Oh why would I ask that and then G man says the worse thing ever... "I can't count that big!!"

Luckily homeschool is more than curriculum and school work.  When we have rough days or school doesn't happen that day we are still ok.  Learning takes place in unlikely places and all the time.  My personality wants everything to be black and white and fit nicely into a schedule but life just doesn't work that way!  My kids don't work that way!

Am I doing enough?

Day 6: Breath deep and relax, your kids are just fine.

After homeschool convention last weekend I came back and looked over our curriculum choices for next year.  I rewrote our schedule for the school day.  I looked over what subjects were being taught.  I then looked over the piles and piles of laundry and continued worrying about school.  Am I including enough subjects? What about a foreign language? Should I start something more structured with Little miss?  Keep in mind my kids are only 5 and 2!!  I was making myself crazy then I remembered something that happened the week before.

Sitting in the school room going over G man's math paper when Little miss asks for the crayon box.  I handed her the box and made sure she had a color book (I learned my lesson after her and I had to clean marker and crayon off the walls!) and went back to working with G man.  As we are setting up the counting blocks to again work on simple addition I hear Little miss' sweet little voice sing saying her color words.  I look over and she is saying the right word to the right color.  I was floored!  I haven't worked on colors hardly at all this year!  G man knows his colors so we talk about them briefly here and there.  To make sure it isn't a fluke I hold up a yellow crayon and say, "What color is this?"  She gives me the funniest look and says yellow.  I go on with pink, red, green, blue, purple, and orange to which she got them all right except orange!!!  What!?!?!?  When did this happen?  Who taught her that? God reminds me daily that I am doing what He called me to do with my children and the only explanation for my children learning when their was no teaching is that He is in control of our homeschool.

As I look back on that incident many more come to mind.  I then rewrote everything again a little less stressed out about it this time!  I also answered my own questions from above.  I am including enough subjects and most of them are intertwined. (My fellow USAO graduates know why I refuse to use the word interdisciplinary.) I should start a foreign language because G man is already convince he speaks French because he knows one term... cheese omelet.  Little miss needs structure of a daily schedule and she is absorbing more than I could imagine.  

The speaker at the convention opening was Michael Smith from the HSLDA was amazing and explained his and his wife's journey to becoming a homeschool family.  He mentioned a phrase that I have heard many times before but didn't hold onto until this time.  He said that we are raising them for Heaven not Harvard and their world view and future salvation should be our main concern because God will fill in the gaps.  He has already proved that to us in our schooling journey.

It all starts with prayer!

Day 5: Pray for your homeschool.

It took a lot of prayer and time for us to decide to homeschool.  One thing that I am very good at is to pray for my kids future but I don't (regularly) include homeschool in that prayer.  I generally pray for their future salvation, spouse, purity, faith, and character in general.  I stopped last night and just prayed for our homeschool.  Some things that came up were each child and their needs in our schooling, our upcoming decision on curriculum, my organization, my husband's role and how it is going to be changing this next school year with music lessons being thrown in.  So the first part of my prayer is about change.  This year of homeschooling went better then I could have imagined but change is coming with a new grade level coming up.  I am excited about this change and what all that means for our family.

I then prayed thanksgiving to God.  Thanking Him for the opportunity to do this!  This wasn't at all in my mind and then God showed us both that we needed to do this and then He provided a way for us to and all we had to do was trust.  I thanked Him that my husband was on board 100% with me and that we don't face much opposition from family and friends.  (We are very lucky!) I also thanked Him that my kids are happy.  G man is thriving and doing well and loving the adventures we have.  Little miss loves being in the middle of everything and is absorbing so much.  I also thanked God for surrounding us with a strong support of friends that are homeschooling within our church and we also have friends that we look up to that we no longer live by but are there for us.  I am also thankful that homeschool is more than curriculum and schedules.  Homeschool is the adventures we have getting lost in the car.  (G man has an AMAZING sense of direction!) We learn by playing, seeing, hiking, shopping, and so much more.  Our family is very close and open and we are growing closer day by day.  I am so thankful for what I have and what all God has blessed us with.  I ended this prayer the same way I end most begging God to continue to pour out His blessings on us but to give us strength when we need it or face opposition.

Squeezing in 2 days in one post!

Day 3: Start on time and stay on schedule all day.

I have accepted that my family runs off schedule and late to everything no matter how hard we try.  That being said it was a while before I could post this blog because we tried hard to stay on schedule!  Well we did it yesterday!!  We made all of our morning runs, went to the gym, hit the library for story time (I was a little sweaty but no one seemed to mind) then back home and in full school mode!  G man started off strong with some picture drawing in his journal about our butterfly hatching, then on to reading/phonics, then we of course took a scheduled break because Little miss has a rough time without a game or puzzle break!  After regrouping with some calendar time and songs he is ready for math where he rocked some simple subtraction!!!  Lastly we return to our butterflies where we get to do a cut/color/paste activity over the life-cycle.

 (We are impatiently waiting to see our butterflies!)


Whew... we were busy busy busy!!  We stayed on schedule, we rocked school, we tackled some chores, and we even squeezed in Mommy's full time job!! ;)  It was wonderful!!  We didn't get as much done as far as house work goes but we did better then what would have normally happened.

"Time's fun when you're having flies." (Kermit the Frog) 



Day 4: Throw the schedule out the window and just read!

That is exactly what we did.  We threw tossed a day and devoted it to reading.  We started out (after the gym) at the library.  We had the best time sitting and reading on the carpets, playing with the puppets, and enjoying the reading games on the computers.  After the library we had to go get the oil changed in my vehicle and G man took a book inside which was great because we had PLENTY of time to read while we waited.  

At the library we got a road sign ABC book which was so fun for G man while we were in the car! Carschooling at it's finest!!  He was so excited that he knew some of the words in this harder book and he could determine what the other words meant from the picture on the sign.  My favorite was the sign with the fire truck on it on the F page.  G man said proudly I know this word says Fire but this other one should say truck but it starts with "s" instead.  I had to glance back at the next stop to see that it read Fire Station.  

Little miss picked out a board book, as usual, at the library but when we got home and started looking at it we realized it was a Braille book.  We had the best time playing with it and reading the words and touching the bumps.  G man loved learning about it!  We had time for this teachable moment because we had no schedule we were following.  

Little miss reading to her baby doll!!!

Let's plan!

Day 2: Plan together one thing you've always wanted to learn about.

We have had a very busy Saturday today but it was the perfect day for us (G man and I) to sit down and plan out a project.  There was some planning that had to do with just me.  I had already planned to finish our curriculum in the upcoming month, but we will continue math and some reading through out the summer.  This may be a project that we begin during the summer on top of our continued work.

I explained what a project is and what it might look like.  Gibson thought for a minute and said he likes the Moon, doing school work, Transformers, and watching TV.  Since our school work consists of thematic units we have already completed a unit study on the moon.  I was overjoyed that he listed school in his list of likes.  Transformers are awesome toys but what type of project could we do with that?  So I ran with TV.  I told him that we couldn't just watch TV for our project but we could create our own TV show if he wanted to do that.  His eyes lit up and he started telling me all kinds of ideas for his show.  Jackpot!!

Now we get to start really planning.  Are we going to do a web show or video camera?  Are we going to have a script or wing it? Are we going to use drawings, people, or toys to portray it?  Who is going to pay for the costs?  What topic will our show be about? Is it a continuing show with episodes or a short movie?  We are busy busy busy trying to rein in our ideas.  We may not be able to wait until the summer!!

Loving homeschooling!

Well our state's homeschool convention is coming up next month and it is all that is on my mind!  Last year was our first year to attend and it was amazing.  We are all signed up this year and I have went through the workshop lists and the vendor lists about a hundred times!  I love how this time helps us as a couple prepare for the future of our kids.  G man and Little miss don't attend with us because this is our time to review our goals for them, our homeschool vision, and revamp what isn't working!  In an effort to reign in all this excitement I have decided to start another 30 day challenge.  I really enjoy the 30 day challenges.  This one is 30 days to a better homeschool.  You can see the complete 30 day list here.  (NOTE this will probably not be done in 30 consecutive days since we school in a traditional 5 day week.)

Day 1: Say only positive, supportive things about your child's work.

G man has been working for almost 2 years now on sight words.  He started reading in December and is doing well.  (He is reading age appropriate books that mainly consist of sight words.)  My biggest frustration as of late is that he forgets words that he has been working on since day 1 and sometimes even the word he just sounded out one page back.  Or my biggest frustration he will sound out the word gut /g/, /u/, /t/ perfectly but then he will say "fan" or some other off the wall word!  I just want to scream!!!  But then I sit back and wonder... have I praised his efforts? (Please note I do get excited about his learning with him, this is just a pet peeve that works well with today's challenge.)

Today I made sure that Little miss was ready to listen to a story and made sure I was too.  We got out his BOB book and curled up to listen.  G man started off great and then he hit his first bump in the road... instead of "the" he read "ta-he" so I gently reminded him how to say it.  He was so proud of himself when he finished. Little miss and I stood and clapped for him.

Some of the supportive phrases I used:
     "I like how you took your time on that word you didn't know."
     "Wow!  You read that page great!"
     "I like how you used the picture to help you read the words."
     "You remembered the question mark and tried to change your voice.  I like that effort."

Reading time today was much less painful for me than most and even though I don't show G man my frustrations I also don't praise him enough.  He felt so much more confidant in his reading today.

                         

Both of these are the types of books G man likes to read.

Party like a Time Lord!

G man is 5 and for the last 6 months he has wanted A Doctor Who party.  I wanted him to have one just as much as he wanted it!  We are so wrapped into this wonderful show.  If you don't know what it is check it out here... you won't regret it!  You can also catch up on the seasons on Netflix.  Any who putting on a Doctor Who party was much harder then I thought although this show has caught on in the US there are no party supplies to be found in the US.  I ordered a TON of items from Europe but no typical party supplies (plates, napkins, table cloths, etc.) so I turned to Pinterest.  I found some awesome ideas and came up with some of my own and here is the result!

G man as the 11th Doctor. (his favorite) His suit is from Rugged Butts and I got very lucky and found a nice dress shirt from a thrift store and I made his bow tie myself.  The sonic screwdriver is his daddy's but G man has taken it over!

Love this one!!

Jammie Dodgers or Tardis self destruct buttons!!

Adipose (marshmallows)... the fat just walks away!! 

Edible ball bearings... Sixlets on cookies. 

Puh puh puh pizza!  Got to love plastic Mickey!

Celery of course!

Care for a Jelly Baby?

I also laid out some Vote Saxon signs and there were pictures to accompany all the food since we had some non Whovians in attendance.

The cake is my FAVORITE!!!! We had "Dalektable" cupcakes and the best cake topper ever from this fun Ebay Shop.

Dinosaurs on a Spaceship PINATA!!!! Um yes please!!!!

Tardis goody bags... I had good intentions of making these look better but address label stickers on blue bags did the trick! They had candy, silly straws (the Doctor is always silly), glittery bouncy balls (planets), homemade bowties made by my awesome sister-in-law, and 3D glasses (in honor of my favorite David Tennant!)

Happy with his Whovian gifts and all the fun!!!

He also received a Whovian inspired surprise pack in the mail!!!  This made his day! I suggest you check out Boho Bear and all the fun she has!

We had a good time and one happy boy when it was all said and done!