homeschooling decisions.

This fall, I will start homeschooling Kaine, Halle and Layla!  And Daisy, if you count preschool :)

How do I feel about this?  Well, I have a couple of different feelings:

1. Excited!  
Ever since I became a mom, I have wanted to homeschool my kids. Nathan and I are excited about it, and our kids are too!  (Lol...we hope that will last!)

2. Anxious.  The main reason for this is the year that we have ahead of us.  Here it is, in a nutshell:

•  Right now, we are finishing out our Ling semester here in MO.  Moving back to IN for the summer on Memorial Day Weekend!

• Our summer will be pretty full!  We will be getting together with lots of friends and believers to share about what we are doing.  Spending about 3-4 weeks of our summer traveling for vacations, etc...

• In August, we will go to Oklahoma for a Linguistics practicum, among the Cherokee.  More on that later, but it will be a busy 10 weeks!  I will begin to homeschool the kids while we are in OK.

• End of October, it's back to IN to finish up stuff for Papua New Guinea, spend time with family and friends, and pack up.  Plus, we have the holiday season in there which is ALWAYS so busy.

• January 2016--Lord willing, we will be on a plane to Papua New Guinea!  (still pinching myself about that one!)

• Once we get to PNG, with the culture shock and beginning to learn the national language/culture--I don't know but just guessing that life will be a bit crazy :)

So...that's why I feel a little bit anxious.  Just wondering how I will balance it all.  But the good thing about having times of "anxiousness"--is that I am constantly reminded that, of course this will be hard!  And of course I won't be able to do it--so I am reminded--again--that I. am. NEEDY.  I need Christ.  And so my times of feeling anxious drive me to Jesus.  Which is a very good thing.

That being said, I/we have made homeschooling decisions for the coming year!  Yay!  It feels good to have a plan of action :) 

I went to the Kansas City homeschool conference with some ladies from training this past weekend. My good friend Asmara went, along with two staff ladies--who just so happen to be homeschool consultants for missionaries.  So that was very helpful!  They have both been overseas, and one of them even served as a homeschool consultant in Papua New Guinea--she was such a help to me.  Thanks, Mel!!

 Here we are, hanging out at Olive Garden :)

My good friend Erika gave me some very invaluable advice this past week, as I was preparing for the conference and feeling slightly very overwhelmed :)

So, what she told me is, since our upcoming year is so full of transitions and craziness, to just focus on the basics.  Which would be:  math, reading, and writing/language arts.  And not to worry about science and history curriculums at this point.  

That advice was really what I needed to hear.  I had been thinking of doing My Father's World (still might do that in the future!), but at this point, it seems like it is best to just focus on the basics.  So that's what we decided to do.  

That being said, here is what our kids will do this next school year:

Kaine and Halle:

-Math (Math U See)

-Spelling (All About Spelling)

-Grammar (First Language Lessons by Jessie Wise)

-Handwriting (something basic)

-Reading--they will just read lots of books.  I also picked up a few used Abeka readers.  And I will read aloud to them, of course!

Layla (Kindergarten):

-Math (Math U See)

-Reading--Explode the Code, may supplement with some other stuff--and again, reading aloud to her!

And that's about it!  So, we will see how it all goes.  Most of all, since I've made those decisions, I'm just feeling excited about teaching my kids.  Thank you Jesus!

our spring.

I absolutely LOVE springtime.  The warm weather after the long winter, and all the green coming back to the trees and grass--I just love all of it!  Springtime is something I will definitely miss when we live in the PNG jungle heat--365 days a year.  So for now, we are enjoying our springtime :)

While we still have plenty of linguistic homework, we have been able to have some fun times with friends and our kiddos!

All of us Ling students have really meshed well together.  Everyone is so like-minded, all of us working towards the same goal.  We love our classmates.  There aren't many of us (only 8 ling students, plus spouses who aren't taking ling), so we can get together at each other's houses for fellowship.  Every month someone prepares a devotion for the group, and we pray for and encourage each other.  Nathan and I are really enjoying these sweet times of fellowship!  And the kids all love to play together, of course :)

(some of our ling group)

The girls having fun together :)

Something else we have enjoyed is Sonic!  We have gone there a couple of times this semester--it is definitely our family favorite.  Except for Daisy.  She continues to vote for McDonald's.  But she is only 3, so we can overrule her ;)

We have had a couple of good thunderstorms this spring.  Missouri really has some awesome thunderstorms!  Here, Daisy and I are watching the lightning.

I had a day of working in childcare, and I was able to be in Layla and Daisy's preschool class!  It was really fun to help teach their class--and get to see how they interract with their friends.  There is a really sweet group of preschoolers here :)

Here is Layla with her good friend  :)

And Daisy and her buddy--doing their "mean" faces :)

Something really cool that the training center offered us--some training for our kids!  

The MK (missionary kid) Education Center did a four-evening series for our kids (and other families with "older" kids).

 It covered lots of topics, such as:

• moving to a new place
• learning a new culture
• trying new things (like food, etc)
• being uprooted and "planted" in a new place (they planted flowers at that one)
• making a "memory box"
• how to say goodbye to friends/family
• how to adjust well.

They geared it for our whole family to do together, and we loved that!  Our kids really enjoyed it.  And Nathan and I loved that it gave us some great ideas of things to continue talking to our kids about, and ways to help our kids as we move to a new culture.

Halle filled out her worksheet about where we will go, how long it will take to get there, etc.

They had picked out kids' books for our family to read together, about moving to a new culture.  Here Nathan is reading a great book to our kids, called Hudson On a Mission.  

They also had family crafts to do together :)  Thank you, MK Ed Center, for doing this for our family!  We all loved it.

We love you all!  Happy Spring!

a weekend in mexico!

Maybe you remember last spring, we took a trip down to Mexico?  Nathan's sister Jenna and her husband Adam live down there at an orphanage (for lack of a better word) called Casa Vida y Esperanza (CVE).  They have 5 adorable kiddos that they are hoping to adopt.  Our kids love to be with their cousins!

Since the kids aren't adopted yet, they can't come into the States.  So we go to them :)  It's a bit of a drive, but it is WELL worth it.  We absolutely love visiting CVE!

The kids geared themselves up for a 22-ish hour drive.  A friend told me that it would make our journey to Papua New Guinea feel like a breeze!  I thought that was a good point :)  

We did let the kids watch a couple of movies on the drive.  My very talented hubby crafted a wooden platform thingy, and he velcroed my laptop to it.  Lol!  He is one creative guy :)

Thankfully, this is how our kids looked from about 10 pm until 6 am.  Praise the Lord that they sleep well in the van!

We stopped in AZ at this awesome place called Texas Canyon.  Tons of humongous rocks piled on each other.  It is really cool.  Our kids were very thrilled to get out and run off some energy!  This was at approximately hour #20 of our drive :)

Adam and Jenna met us in Nogales, AZ and drove us across the border.  I am always so grateful that they are willing to come pick us up!  The border intimidates me :)

Our kids were so glad to be reunited with their cousins!

Adam and Jenna have baby bunnies, which were a huge hit!

We had SUCH a good weekend.  Adam and Jenna planned some fun things to do...

We went out to eat, which is always such good food!  And once again, our kids were very happy that they each got their own bottle of pop!  Lucky for them, they can't drink the local water :)

We visited Cafe Sed, which is my personal favorite!  How awesome that I can get the chai that I love in Mexico! (Doesn't Nathan look tired in this picture!  Lol...poor guy.  I took a 3 hour nap that day, since we had driven all through the night.  But Nathan didn't take a nap.  He was too busy being selfless and playing with the kids!)

We stayed at the cutest little house, which was really perfect for our family!

 Oh, kind of off the subject, but we had our very first tick experience!  Gross.  Poor Daisy.  She was very brave though, and we were thankful that Adam removed it for her!  Good job, bro:)

Some other fun things...

A trip to the river!  Our kids had a blast there.

Prooooobably not the most sanitary experience though :)  Here is Daisy, holding what we guessed is a cow bone.  Haha!

We were able to spend an evening with Keith and Alisa, our really good friends from Gateway days!  We can't begin to say how much we LOVE this family.  We are thrilled that God called them to CVE and we know they will be such a blessing to everyone down there!

Kaine LOVED playing soccer in their courtyard with their kids!

We sang some songs--Braden played the guitar and Adam played a drum.  What a great end to the evening!

For lunch on Saturday, we went back into town for some Mexican hot dogs. They are sooo good.  They put beans, tomatoes and mayo on them.  Even though it may sounds gross, they are so amazing!  

On Saturdays at CVE, they have a whole afternoon of softball.  The little kids play first, then the older kids, and then the adults.  It was so much fun to watch!

My girls played with the kids on a big dirt pile during the games.  They had a blast, but they sure got dirty :)

These two...so funny :)

We ended with another trip to town, this time for ice cream, after church on Sunday.

Here we are with Adam and Jenna.  We love these two so much!  And God has been so gracious to them--it may sound difficult to get married and already have 5 kids.  But even though it has it's challenges, they are soooo in love :)  We are beyond happy for them.

And here is a picture of all the kids.  We will cherish these sweet memories with them!

(top row:  Fe, Kaine, Halle, Mari. 

bottom row:  Perla, Layla, Leo, Daisy, Mili)

Adam and Jenna, thank you for an amazing weekend!  We are so glad it worked out for us to come.  We love you guys!

a surprise weekend!

I am still recovering from this weekend!

On Friday afternoon, I finished up my homework and I was going to start making supper.  We were just planning to do a pizza/movie night with our kids.  So Nathan calls me outside, "Hey Rache!  Kaine wants to show you some of our new football plays!"  So I went outside for a few minutes to watch them play football.

I was only out there for like 5 minutes before I decided to go back inside to make supper.  I walk in my door, and I almost had a heart attack!  

My friends--from very far away--were sitting on my couch!  I. was. SHOCKED.  I could not believe they drove all the way from Indiana to visit, and then what I could not make sense of in my head...Emily is here too!  But how did Emily get here?  And with my Indiana friends???  My mind was trying to figure it all out, and I just stood there saying dorky things like "Are you guys serious??"  Haha!  They got it all on video but I won't be posting it on here :)

Anyway.  Jane started planning this surprise visit with Nathan back when we were in Bluffton for Christmas break.  Jane, you are very sneaky!  I never ever ever ever suspected.  And then, my Indiana friends contacted Emily to join in!  Remember this post, where I talked about how we are going to partner in the tribe with David and Emily?  Well, my friends from back home are so very sweet and they wanted Em to join us, so that they could get to know her.  So they flew her to MO all the way from CA!  How sweet and intentional is that??  I feel so blessed.  So here we all are (minus two very beautiful babies who aren't pictured) :)

This was right after the surprise.  I was probably still shaking! 

It was so incredibly special to have Em join us.  It was like my two worlds collided, and it was so much fun.  

At one point this weekend, Jess made the comment that it felt like they had known Emily their whole life.  So awesome.  Praise Jesus.

Layla was thrilled to be reunited with sweet Brenna!  Brenna almost made up for the fact that her two friends Adalynn and Sunny didn't come along...almost :)

Trying out her babydoll Boba carrier from Christmas.  It works on human babies, too!

And sweet little Louise (David and Em's baby) was such a trooper!  Her schedule was so messed up, but she did great.  It was so good to see this little sweetie again! 

The weekend was fast, but so fun.  It was filled with lots and lots of talking, laughing, and catching up.  And late night virtual tours of my hometown and Em's hometown...thank you Google Earth :)

I feel like one major theme of this blog has been how thankful to the Lord I am for my friends.  He has blessed our whole family so much with some amazing friendships.  We are so thankful.

Jane, Jess, Amy and Emily...thank you ladies so much for an amazing and encouraging weekend!  I feel so loved.  And I love you all :)