10, 20, 30, 40

Miss K is learning to count by 10's. That is a new concept for her. She is a visual learner and so I try to put things on paper so she can see what she is learning. I made flashcards but then we made a game. I just grabbed some colored paper and quickly wrote 10, 20, 30, all the way to 100. It was a spur of the moment activity. We have too many of those spur moment activities but we have fun and learn during those spur of the moment activities.

We were able to combine math and PT. We put the numbers on the floor and she hopped from 10 to 100. She loved it so much that she pulled it out in the evening wanting to play a hopping game with daddy.



I love our front room which gets the wonderful southern sun. Just a nice warm place to curl up for reading but horrible for photos.

Fire Safety

Fire safety is the one big thing that evaluators look for in your portfolio. I know it so I know to make sure we do something related to fire safety and have it recorded in the portfolio. One year I just printed some things from a few websites. We colored and had some pages to include in the portfolio. Last year I just picked up some things including hats when I went to vote.

The year the fire marshall was invited to our Classical Conversations. I was sure to be there with my camera so I have pictures to include in the portfolio. It was a good presentation and then the students were able to see the fire truck and a fire fighter in uniform. I liked how they showed the children all of uniform so if in an emergency they would not be afraid. They actually had one of the moms put the uniform on.



I have a number of cards for my camera. The interesting thing as I was taking pictures was to see the first old picture on the camera.



That picture was taken almost three years ago. It was open house at the fire station in our town where we lived in Hong Kong. You see how much he has grown.

 

Heard around our house

Miss K's favorite subject in school is "surgery". She will ask to do surgery next.

We are quite advanced here in our homeschool. (insert chuckle) We do need work on speech because really it is history that she enjoys but she says it as surgery.

Thoughts about growing older and aging

Maybe it was my recent birthday or maybe the passing of my grandmother at 95 years of age or maybe it was the old newspaper clipping that I found tucked away in a pile of papers or the comment wondering if it is time to color my hair or maybe a combination of all those things that have caused me to pause and think about aging.

What do I want to be when I get grow-up? J has asked me that question recently. I laugh a bit but then I pause and think that the character qualities and disciplines that I am building now are the ones I am going to have when I am old so build carefully. It seems that if you are a kind person you will continue that way and if you had a foul mouth that continues as well. So I want to work now and build the person I want to be when I am old.

I was reminded of that on Monday as repeatedly it was mentioned that my grandmother was a prayer warrior. Prayer warrior is one of the things on my list that I want to be when I grow up along with a listening ear and encouraging words.

As I grow old, I want to build memories. Memories seem to be the little things that you didn't plan as well as the big things that you do plan. I think of memories that were made along the way of life such as the night I called a co-worker and woke her up at home (that is what happens when you work 12 time zones difference) or shopping trips with cousins, and the big trips that were planned meeting a friend in LA for a few days. So I need to enjoy those little memories and plan the big ones as well.

My great aunt spent a large portion of her life serving the Lord on the mission field so it really wasn't surprising to read the article that I found "Just two days before her birthday she was saying that it would be no problem sleeping in a tent for two weeks if she went with a team to Nicaragua as a translator to help with work after the recent destruction caused by hurricane Joan. So what? Well that was right after her 78th birthday." I wonder what I will be doing when I am 78. I guess I should learn to sleep in a tent now.

This is the youngest age that I could find on my computer. There were color photos of me when I was young.

So tell me what do you want to me when you grow up?

 

My Grandmother

Moved to her new home on Friday morning. She was ready to go home to see her Saviour. She was 95 years old. She missed be missed by us here.

This was last Christmas when we visited her. (Miss K was in a "I am trying to smile period" which thankfully she has outgrown.)





I have so many memories and various things around my house that remind me of her.

She was postmistress on a small town. The post office was connected to the kitchen. I remember sitting on the counter while she greeted the customers coming in to get their mail.

She used to do quite a bit of crewel-embroidery. Some of the things she made for me are now hanging in Miss K's room.

She later took up knitting and I think the only thing she knitted where dishcloths. We have lots of dishcloths.

She was a big Phillies fan. She watched the games and knew the stats.

I remember my grandparents taking up to Florida. We drove all the way there and back -- 8 people in the station wagon. That was in the days before we had strict seatbelt laws.

My grandmother made wonderful pies and oyster stuffing. There was also the brownies that needed to be cut with a bandsaw.

I have so many memories of my grandmother. I think one of the dear memories is the many times that she told me or wrote to me telling me that she was praying for me.

Adoption is a gift

Just as salvation is a gift in many ways adoption is a gift. They did not pay us to adopt them. They did not give us gifts. We gave them the gift of adoption and being part of a family.

He came to us with nothing except himself. When the adoption was final and we were taking the children, we gave him the clothing to wear. Just like us coming to God. Our righteousness is as filthy rags. We gave him new clothing to wear. God also clothes us in his righteousness.

Adoption is costly. We didn't keep careful records of the cost because honestly it would be more than we want to know. Adoption does cost. I will say that if God calls you to adopt he will provide the funds for it. At the same time the cost for God to adopt us was the death of his son, in our place.



 

November - National Adoption Month

November is National Adoption Month. It is also three years that J came into our family. I thought this would be a good time to reflect on some of the things that we learned about God during that process. I remember being in Ukraine for weeks and it was weeks and just being struck again and again with a new truth about God.

We initiated the adoption. We began the process and as you probably know it is a long paper chasing trail. We gathered documents from three countries (that is what happens when you are living overseas and moved to a new country within three years), documents from four different states, and stacks and stacks of papers. Let's not forget that we had to update all our paperwork as it expires. God lead us to adopt and we obeyed. J did not come to us and ask us to adopt him. We didn't even know the child that we would adopt. We initiated it just as God initiated our adoption.

"For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person--though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die--but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Romans 5:6-8

"What is it?"

That was the question J asked as he was pulling things out of a bag that Grandma had brought the night before. Grandma was cleaning out and I inherited some things -- a pink dress that I wore when I was a baby (my husband really wondered if I was that small), another dress that came from Mexico and this which caused the question. I laughed knowing right away what it was.

Once upon a time it was soft, clean, and pink. Once upon a time I dragged it around until it was no longer pink or soft or clean. I was a Linus. I had a blanket. Everybody needs a little bit of security. "What is it?" My blanket.

Now it is remembered here and I think we can get rid of it. There really is nothing to keep. I will have to find a picture of when it was soft, clean, and pink.