Jonathan Rolled Over!

Last Saturday Jonathan rolled over for the first time! I laid him down on the floor in the parsonage we were staying in for the weekend. I laid him on his back and I turned around for just a second and he was on his tummy looking around. I wish I had a camera! I told Scott about it and he turned him back over a little later and sure enough he rolled back to his tummy again. That time we saw him do it. They grow so fast! He’s even smiling at me right now. He’s too cute! I’ll have to put some more recent pictures on here.

We enjoyed our trip to Florida. We took a supposed short cut that Scott’s coworkers suggested but it took way too long. I think they had to have been speeding to go that route. We had to go 55 mph most of the trip because of the road we took. Although it was scenic it was dreadfully long. On the way home we took the Interstate and it was 70 mph the whole way. It was a lot quicker or at least seemed quicker since we were able to drive faster. It also helped on the ride home that Scott was able to drive more. He had caught a Virus and was not feeling well Friday, so I drove and let him sleep most of the drive. Thankfully he was better by Sunday.

Of course like a regular virus Joshua had to catch it as well. I thought of my mom the other night, while I was sitting on the floor scrubbing the carpet that Joshua threw up on. I thought about all the times my mom helped me when I was sick. You feel especially close to your mother in those times. Other than that we had a wonderful time in Florida. The members of the church were real nice. Of course I say that about everywhere we go. It seems like most everyone at our churches are especially nice. I’m looking forward to our visit in Oklahoma this week. The kids enjoy all these trips as well.

I took the kids to the zoo yesterday. They learned a lot. I had them read most of the signs themselves. They practiced following the zoo map. That was real good for them. They had to tell me which way we needed to go to see whichever animal we were wanting to find. So it turned out being a great learning experience for everyone. Joshua and Ruth got to participate in a class that the zoo had for homeschoolers. Ruth’s class learned about animal senses. Joshua’s learned about animal survival. Jonathan, Hannah, and I stayed outside with some other mom’s with toddlers and enjoyed visiting. Hannah even made some new little friends.

I guess that catches me up a bit on my blogging. Now I need to help the kids with their lessons and do the laundry I didn’t get done yesterday. I’ll try to write again soon.

Luk 5:31 And Jesus answering said unto them, They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick.

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3 Months

Wow, it’s hard to believe that Jonathan was 3 months old this past Monday. Time sure goes by fast and yet it’s seems like he’s always been around. We can’t picture life without our Jonathan. Babies grow so fast the first few months of life. It’s amazing to me that I had to buy him a size 3 diaper already. His other ones kept coming unvelcroed too easily.

It’s also amazing to think that Hannah will be 3 years old in March. I still remember when she was the baby, in fact I remember when Ruth was the baby as well. I even found a shirt in a bag of hand-me-downs that used to be Joshua’s and now fits Jonathan. Scott and I had Joshua hold it up to himself to see how big he’s gotten in the past 9 years. Joshua thought it a bit strange but he humored us and held up the baby shirt to himself. It’s amazing how they grow.

Today I have them working on their reading. They read a chapter in their readers and then they work on the workbook pages that go along with their reading. It’s been real good for them. I’m glad I found this set of curriculum for them.

Whenever Scott gets a preaching appointment outside of Texas. I look on a website to see what their homeschool laws are. Some States are a lot stricter and harder on homeschoolers than others. If you are interested in homeschooling and want to know the Legalities in the state you live in or if you might move to another state you may want to look at this website to see the legalities and requirements for homeschoolers in that state. http://www.hslda.org/laws/default.asp

You would be amazed at how many families there really are that have started homeschooling for various reasons. It’s been good for my family and I don’t regret having made that decision so many years ago, when our oldest was only 2 years old. At the time my husband was a substitute teacher in a public school system. He came home one day and told me that we weren’t putting our kids through that. I was glad since I had already been thinking on homeschooling since I had friends that were homeschoolers. And now even when I get discouraged, I just picture my kids sitting in public school, and I’m glad I have them at home where they can learn and thrive without as many negative influences in their lives.

Psa 34:11 Come, ye children, hearken unto me: I will teach you the fear of the LORD.

Pro 4:1 Hear, ye children, the instruction of a father, and attend to know understanding.

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Homeschool

Today has been a good day, as most days are. Today, I got up and got the kids their breakfast. I am amazed at how big Jonathan is getting. He is one big baby! I may have to give him rice cereal earlier than I did my other 3. He just seems to need to eat more often. The pediatrician had told me at Jonathan’s 2 month visit that he would be ready for some rice cereal at 4 months of age. I waited until 6 months on the other children. I’ll probably wait and ask the Doctor again at Jonathan’s 4 month visit. Right now he nurses every two hours during the day time. At least he does sleep through the night. However I feel like I’m always feeding him in the day time.

The kids have been working hard on their homeschool lessons. I started them on knew readers yesterday. I found some wonderful readers at a Bible Book Store. They are really good readers for a good price. The workbooks were a good price as well and will be easy for me to upgrade each child to the next level when they finish. All I will have to buy is the workbooks for each of them but those are only $2.25. So that is not a bad price. I started Joshua on the 2nd grade reader and Ruth on the 1st grade reader. Technically they should probably further along than that but I wanted to start them off simply. This way we get through all the workbooks in that grade level and then by the next grade level they will be familiar with the format of this set of lessons. So when Joshua completes Grade 2, he will go into grade 3 and Ruth will go into Grade 2 and use his hard cover books and I will only have to buy the workbooks for her.

For math I found some reproducible workbooks. I like those for I will be able to reuse the lessons for each of the kids. When Hannah and Jonathan get bigger they will be able to use all these lessons as well. Right now Hannah has an Alphabet workbook that we found at the same bookstore. So far she has learned the letters “Aa” and “Bb”. I’m trying to teach her the letter names and the sounds they make. The hard part is keeping her serious and keeping her brother and sister from laughing at her when she makes a mistake. She likes them laughing at her and so she will make mistakes on purpose just to make them laugh.

Jonathan has gotten to where he can chew on some of his toys. Here is a picture of him chewing on his Butterfly toy that he got for Christmas. He was so cute I had to take pictures of him. So I will include them on this post. Even Jonathan is learning. I guess we are all learning something new all the time.

I’m sorry this post isn’t very neatly and probably has a lot of typos. Joshua and Ruth are finishing up there lessons for the day and Jonathan and Hannah are napping. I want to take advantage of this quiet time while I have it. I’ll write more later.
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One Month Left!

I just realized today that I’m on the last Baby on my Baby Ticker! For those who don’t know what the ticker is it’s the picture at the top of the page that shows which month the baby is in. It updates itself. I’m officially at 35 weeks! The baby can come any time this month and still be fine. I guess that does make me a little nervous but I’m ready. I’m really not afraid of labor being as this is my 4th child. All of my other children were born past their due dates so I half expect this one to throw us off and come before the due date.

This weekend my husband and I took our kids to the park. It was a lot of fun! We had a little picnic and then the kids all played on the playground while we watched. They are all getting so big so fast.

I started working on a baby blanket but haven’t been the most faithful at doing it every day. I guess I need to get busy! I hope Jonathan likes yellow. The yellow and white yarn was so pretty to me. The yellow looked so bright next to the white! So I’m crocheting a pretty yellow and white blanket. Maybe after this blanket I’ll crochet a more masculine color one for when he gets a little older. I know that yellow is suppose to be a neutral color but my older children all thought I should do blue. Oh well, I like the colors and will have a lot of fun making it.

I’ve been giving the children homeschool assignments. One of the things they do is memorize a bible verse for their class on Wednesday nights. They were told to pick one on their own for this next couple of weeks. Of course they were wanting to pick an easy one, but I’m insisting they rememorize Psalm 23. They still have it partially memorized from before but were starting to forget some of it. So I told them that they were smart enough to memorize a longer passage. Of course I’ve taken the fun out of their getting to pick their own verse but I’m sure they will thank me for it one day. Hannah is proud to be memorizing the verse 1. She says my turn after the other two are done and I help her quote the first one. She quotes her verse with a smile on her face.

I’ve also been printing off worksheets for them. Joshua is able to read his assignments real well on his own. It’s been good for them to practice reading and following the instructions on their own. Ruth isn’t quite as far along on her reading as her brother but she’s not too far behind. She just doesn’t seem to understand why I have her read it, when I’m right there and can read it for her. She’ll eventually understand I’m sure.

Hannah has to have the same number of papers as her brother and sister. I have a table for her as well. She sits down there with her pencil, paper, and crayons and brings me her work just like her brother and sister do. When they finish a worksheet or have a question, they bring it to me and shortly after them comes Hannah saying, “Look Mom!” And I tell her what a good job she is doing.

Jonathan is even showing signs of being athletic. 🙂 Hannah has a small soft football. Today she had the ball and I was sitting on the bed with her and the other children and my husband were sitting around the room. Jonathan started kicking and I took the football and sat it on the top of my tummy. We all had a good laugh every time Jonathan would kick the football and it fell off. It was so funny! Our little football player and he isn’t even born yet!

Well, it won’t be long and I’ll have to get a sideways picture of me. We always get a picture of me sideways. It’s also our family tradition to take a picture of my husband and children all standing sideways with pillows in their shirts. We always have a good laugh over those pictures.
It makes a nice memory over the years. I can see us telling Jonathan, “This is what mommy looked like before you were born. And this is what everyone else looked like.”

Only 4 1/2 more weeks to go or so. I’m looking forward to getting to hold Jonathan in my arms. I’m also looking forward to letting my husband have a turn carrying him. I’ll try to update pretty regular this month and let everyone know once the baby comes.

Psalm 23:1 “The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want.”

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I’m back!

Sorry about the long delay in posts. It seems that summers are already so busy and then to add moving to the summer just made it busier. We managed to get moved about 2 months ago. Everyone made it safe and sound. My husband has settled into his new job quite well, and now that he is being reimbursed for his gas mileage we are actually able to start saving up a little bit for clearing a spot and building ourselves a new home to live in. That will include getting electricity run and water hooked up.

My husband has sure been learning a lot about construction. He comes home just about everyday telling me of something new he has learned. Which will be real handy for getting our new home finished.

Since my last posting in May, the baby has been kicking up a storm. He stops and rests of course but he seems to be a night owl at this point because he especially likes to kick when I either sit down to rest or lay down to sleep. Oh yes, and we found out that we are having a boy! We are naming him Jonathan Paul.

We have had a good summer. I started taking a writing course in June. I really have been enjoying it. So far I have turned in two stories to my instructor. I read them to my older two kids, since the stories were written at their age level. They were actually impressed. Joshua told me, “I didn’t know you could write like that. It sounds like a real story.” I’m not sure who they thought wrote the other “real” stories. I guess they just didn’t think that mom could write real stories too.

Our other 3 children have been having fun. I’ll be starting Joshua and Ruth back to homeschooling next week. I found a homeschool group that do activities together in a nearby town and we joined the group. I’m hoping that our kids will be able to have some friends that are also homeschooled and still get to learn a lot in the process. As long as we can keep our vehicles going, I plan to take them on a lot of field trips and activities. Hannah of course won’t be left out.

Hannah, our 2 year old, has finally figured out that baby Jonathan is in my tummy. We had a 3D ultrasound of the baby, and Hannah growled a bunch because she thought that the baby looked like a little monster. She is also putting more and more sentences together. She still has a little trouble pronouncing every word right, but she is so cute in how she says things. I’ll try to keep a post of her new anecdotes on here. I can’t think of many examples right now, but if I were posting more often, I would have plenty to write about.

So I intend to keep up my blogs. I hope no one gives up on me too completely. I’m going to post some links on the side. Since I’m going to be starting the homeschooling again, I thought everyone might like to look at some links to some of the resources I like to use. I’ll probably put more links up as I go along.

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