Reflections on 2011

I've been meaning to write this for several days now, but I suppose since the new year is still quite young, it's all still good! At any rate, I don't typically make New Year's resolutions, but I do like to reflect on the previous year, and ponder hopes for the coming year, so I enjoyed this article from Vision Forum. I admit, though, that while I appreciate the folks at Vision Forum , I did snicker a little at the idea of writing a week-by-week summary of 2011. Right. I'll get right on that!





But I think I have time to write about our year using the bullet points he suggests, so here goes:






Where did I/we travel?





We took the kids on their first plane trip early in the year, back to SC to visit family, including my globe-trotting sister, Erica. Then in September, we drove down to Edisto Island, one of our favorite places on earth, for vacation. Both were great visits.






What were the most important sermons I heard this year?





Perhaps it would be a good idea to write down influential sermons/talks. But I didn't this year.






What books/articles did I write?





Ahem.






What significant household projects did we accomplish in 2011?





Well, we...that is, I...that is...um.....






What were the most important meetings of the year?





We obviously are not important enough to have "meetings," unless you count those great meetings Dave has had at work, in which his work ethic and effectiveness at his new job has been noted.






What special friendships were made this year?





Oh, I love this one, because we have in fact made some special friendships. We met some great people at the first church we attended here, and although we don't go there anymore, we still keep in touch with some of those people. In particular, I've made a great friend in Christen, who shares my affinity for gentle parenting and natural (ish) living (which I think she probably does better than I do). We even made our own deodorant together once, and I think that's a pretty bonding experience! And in fact, when she had to go back to work, I began keeping her darling baby, who is welcomed into the happy (hopefully) chaos of our home two days a week. Hers is a friendship I certainly cherish. Also, La Leche League never fails to deliver kindred spirits, and the kids and I have made some connections with friends there. And in our newer church, we are slowly but surely making connections there.






Which children lost teeth, and how many?

Aimee lost her last baby tooth this year, which does make me a bit sentimental. Drew didn't loose any baby teeth, but he did run into a wall - really - and break off half a front permanent tooth the day after Christmas. This was distressing to me, but both Drew and his father shrugged it off. Drew even told me it wasn't "the end of the world." Still, we're thankful for modern dentistry! Just a few days before that, Ryan lost his second baby tooth, his first in the usual way (the very first, to the dismay of my mother heart, he knocked out when he was a baby). And of course, Scarlett gained quite a few teeth this year - eight total (and pretty much all at once, which made for some pretty fun times).

Who grew in physical stature, and how much did they grow?

Well, they grew, I know that. I'm a little ashamed to admit that I didn't keep track. But I know that Aimee achieved 5 feet, Drew's ankles began to peep out of his pant legs toward the end of the year, and Chase closed the gap between himself and Ryan, further fueling those "Are they twins?" questions. And Scarlett reached 30 inches, putting herself into the 10th percentile, which was quite an achievement for her. She's still a little miss, but her short stature no longer poses any questions about her health, as all tests revealed complete health and wholeness.

Who learned to read this year?


Ryan did, in fact!






What diet and physical exercise regimen did I maintain to honor “my temple”?

I did the Couch to 5k training program earlier this year, and found it invigorating and rewarding! Then I drifted back to the "couch," as it were, so at the end of the year, I resolved to do it again, which process began this week. Also, as I've explained, I went almost completely dairy free at the beginning of the year, and continue that voluntarily. I've really never been healthier.

What books did I read? Did we read as a family? Did my children read?


Somewhere, I've kept a record of this. Probably in more than one place, actually. I'm not about to dig all that out and try to consolidate it for the purpose of this post. Suffice it to say that we did a lot of reading. The one thing that all four advanced readers in the house read was the Underland Chronicles, and it was interesting to have discussions about it around the dinner table.

What Scriptures did my family memorize?

As a family, we dove into select chapters of Hebrews and 1 Peter, since that's what the older kids are doing in Bible quizzing this year. The kids also picked up numerous verses from church.

What loved ones died this year?
What a sad thing to remember! I wish I could say no one, but in fact Dave's cousin took his own life in February. It was shocking and heartbreaking, and I certainly hope 2012 holds nothing anything like it.

Moving along (and skipping a few points, or I'll never get done with this!)...

What are the top ten themes of 2010 for my family?
Ten! How about one? I've posted about how Scarlett's birth (albeit in 2010) was one that helped us choose faith over fear, and the whole of 2011 really was about that for - faith over fear. The year began with questions about Scarlett's health and future, and we found great comfort in choosing faith in that situation...and then great joy in discovering that she was perfectly healthy after all. Then the situation with our house in SC didn't go as planned, and spiralled downward until it went into foreclosure. That obviously wasn't supposed to happen! We still don't understand the plan there, and we certainly wish things we going down a much different path...but we still choose faith in God's providence over fear. In that, as well as in other situations this year, we don't claim to have achieved a perfect attitude of faith, but it's something that has grown our family by leaps and bounds this past year. May it continue to do so in this new year...but may God also have mercy in his teaching methods!

Happy New Year, everyone!

In Which the Grinch Speaks

Several weeks ago I posted about how we abstain from Halloween celebrations of any kind. So it should come as no surprise that we also don't do the Santa thing during the Christmas season. *Gasp!*

I know - we're the Grinch-y adults in all the Christmas movies who "don't believe" and who contribute to the horrible vortex into into which all the Christmas spirit is apparently disappearing. Don't we believe in magic? Don't we believe in joy? How could we deprive our children of this essential part of childhood? Now I have to say, once again, that it's both interesting and frustrating to me that it seems acceptable to pose these kinds of questions to those who abstain, but it is practically unthinkable to challenge in reverse. Even those of us on this side of the practice feel we need to handle the issue very, very carefully. We don't want to offend. We don't want to burst the bubble for anyone else's children. And yet, few people have qualms about saying, "What? You don't believe in Santa?", often in the presence of our children.

We strive to deal with all matters "with gentleness and respect," so we would never encourage or condone our children in mocking other family's practices and beliefs, or in making it their determined goal to set the Santa record straight among their friends. But I will say that I would also never ask them not to say out loud that Santa isn't real. It is not our responsibility to help anyone perpetuate deceit, and however it's wrapped in all things magical and sacred to the wonder of childhood, this is a deceit. I'm not attacking anyone personally here, so I don't wish anyone to take it that way, but also, I won't apologize for speaking the truth, and for defending our choices.

So I suppose that's one primary reason we don't go the Santa route. It's a deception, rather elaborately packaged, and there's no way for us to make a conscious choice to begin such a lie in our family. Another is that it doesn't actually appear to have any redeemable quality that could possibly contribute to our celebration of Christmas. We realize that some Christmas traditions do have their roots in pagan culture, and some of those , we still incorporate in our family traditions. We only adopt those forms that we feel can have new and valuable meanings under our belief system, and that works for us. For some people, even that's not acceptable, and we completely respect their choices. For us, there's just nothing redeemable about Santa.

Now, we try not to make a huge deal about this, and we don't have a problem watching some movies about Santa (hey, we LOVE Elf here!), and we don't forbid songs which include Santa.
That's probably inconsistent of us, I know, but that's the way it is. I guess we feel that if we tried to eliminate any mention of Santa altogether, we would create a forbidden fruit type of situation. At any rate, this means that the other day, Ryan was stuck on the song "Santa Clause is Coming to Town." "He sees you when you're sleeping/ He knows when you're awake!" he sang as he walked by me at one point in the day. I smiled and said, "That's kind of a creepy thought." Ryan stopped and said seriously, "Well you know, that's really about God. God always does see you." And I, remembering something I had read in my Bible that morning, replied, "That's true. And you know what is really neat? Santa only gives us gifts when we're good. God gives us gifts because He's good."

And that for us is where we're always trying to direct our Christmas traditions and practices - toward celebrating the absolute goodness of God. How thankful we are that he has never rewarded us for our own worthiness! How grateful we are for his Son, of course, but also for the countless gifts He gives us daily simply because He is good. How completely, and thankfully, unlike the manipulative Santa figure.

You do your thing - but by faith! Do it because you believe it to be the right thing, not just the thing every one else does! - and we'll do ours.

Merry Christmas!

"...We do not make requests of you because we are righteous, but because of your great mercy." Daniel 9:18

Some Feel-Good Tidbits...

My boys are definitely ALL boy - the rough-and-tumble, energtic, roll-in-the-dirt, and loud variety. but sometimes they can still melt my heart.

Ryan told me a couple days ago, out of the blue, that the way to treat a horse is to use a "soft hand, a firm voice, a sunny attitude, praise and reward." He heard it from one of his Magic Treehouse CD's - the series he listens to for hours on end - but the way he said it, so assuredly and sweetly, he made me sigh happily. Every once in awhile, I ask him to repeat it for me, cherishing the sound of his little-boy voice say things like, "sunny attitude." Maybe it's just me. Probably you had to be there to fully appreciate it.

But it should be easier for everyone to understand the impact of Drew's comment over dinner. We were talking about the code of chivalry, specifically about the "women and children first" policy embraced by most of the men on the doomed Titanic. Aimee was saying that she didn't like how that seemed to make women "weaker" - she's going through a bit of a feminist stage, it seems - and so eventually I asked her what she thought the standard should be instead. This was a little tough for her, as she is just discovering at this point in this point in her life that it is quite easy to make sweeping philosophical statements, but another thing altogether to back them up. At any rate, after thinking it over, she said that maybe it should be "families first." Drew, who had been silent up to then, chimed in seriously, "Families should stick together. Because you wouldn't want someone to survive, just to live the rest of their lives in sorrow."

He really said that. And I really choked a bit on the bite of food I had just taken, and my eyes really did start to tear up right then and there.

Today they acted, sounded, smelled just like boys. And I love every inch of their dear little selves.

In Which We Broach a Touchy Subject

"We don't celebrate Halloween."

The way many people react to that statement alone, you'd think we had said something like,

"We never let our children get within ten feet of candy," "We don't believe in letting them have fun," or "You're evil."

It's tiresome. We have family and close friends who celebrate the holiday in various fashions, and I think most of them respect our decision not to, the same way we respect their decisions, but this is still such a tricky (no pun intended) subject that those who abstain feel the need to walk on eggshells around it. It's hardly safe to make the above statement alone, much less to explain why, without people getting defensive.

For several reasons, this year seemed to be a harder one than others for my kids. They really wanted to know - again and again - why we don't do it, and can't we PLEASE?? So while we don't usually do anything at all on Halloween, I looked around for some kind of alternative event. After all, I have no objection to dressing up in costumes, having fun, or...ok, it's true. I do think candy is probably of the devil! But my kids still get to have some now and then. At any rate, I looked, and I found plenty of trunk-or-treat events, but no fall festivals or anything else completely removed from the trick-or-treating category. Still, I suggested that we might go to one. I didn't want to be legalistic and have the kids eventually become resentful.

But it never quite sat right. We believe that "...whatever does not come from faith is sin," so we feel like we need positive reasons to do a thing that might be considered a "gray" area. We have abstained from Halloween in the past because we believe that the festivities currently associated with it are too attached to the holiday's origins, and have no redeemable qualities. As I considered whether we could do something this year that we had previously not done, for those reasons, I went through all the reasoning for why we might do it, and it amounted to the following:

...The kids wouldn't feel left out.

...It would be fun.

...It's not necessarily "bad."

None of those are "from faith" reasons, particularly the last one. Just because something has an apparent absence of evil certainly does not make it a good thing. In fact, for us, it would be an unfortunate compromise of what we believe to be true, and therefore a decidedly bad thing. Actually I think the Bible uses a stronger term. It would be sin for us.

A few days ago, I also read this from Vision Forum, and it re-affirmed what we already knew to be true for us, and my mind was all the more made up. Dave and I talked it over again, and he felt the same way, and so just a couple days ago, I broke the news to the kids, bracing myself for the worst. In fact, I told them that I knew they would probably be angry, and that was ok. It was my fault for beginning to lead them down one road, and then abruptly changing directions. But they surprised me by shrugging it off and saying they didn't mind. When I told them that we had decided to do a Reformation party (of sorts) instead, and that we would have cake, balloons, and games to celebrate Martin Luther's birthday, they were excited. After dinner last night, we played Jenga and Twister (the latter of which caused hysterical laughter and fun), then cake while I read a little about the Reformers from The Church History ABC's, and the central theme was summed up well by the last statement about the last one we read about, "The Bible tells us everything we need to know, from A to Z." And with that, the night was over. It was easier than each of us thought, and the kids went to bed without any regret about missing anything. Dave and I went to bed with clear consciences.

I realize that just by posting this, I am risking bristly reactions. I am certainly not saying anything about anyone else's reasons for celebrating Halloween. As I said, we have family and friends who do. We assume that they do so "from faith." We don't get defensive when they talk about their Halloween plans. We wouldn't get defensive if they even explained their reasoning for their freedom to celebrate. But I confess, we do become weary from feeling like we can't even say that we don't, much less explain why, so that's all this post is.

Although....I still think candy is evil!

In Which Sometimes It's Not as Hard as You'd Think...and Sometimes It's Exactly LIke That

"I just don't know how you do it!"

I hear this kind of comment not frequently, sometimes as a way of communicating "You're nuts!", and sometimes as a way of posing the question for informational purposes - "How do you do it? "It's enough work to handle the three [or whatever] kids I have, and you have five! And you homeschool them?" And my typical answer is, "We just do it. We've got them, so we just do what we have to do. It works out." When people ask how we homeschool such a crew, my line is that it's not as hard as people think.

And that's mostly true. Someone once asked me where I did school with the kids, and when I appeared a bit confused, she went on, "You know...are they all sitting around a table?" I realized that many people have this idea of a "typical" eight hour-school day, with mom as a typical teacher, instructing several grades all at once, which in truth does sound ghastly, not to mention impossible. No, I could never do that. Homeschooling - or at least our version of it, is quite a bit different, and I've posted about that often enough here. Anyway, that's pretty much true of having this number of children as well. When a pregnant mom of several young children asks me, with something akin to terror in her eyes, how I manage, and seem to do it so well, I know she's thinking that having five of the children she's got sounds impossible. I encourage her with the fact that there's good news. Nay, great news! They get older. They don't always need every single thing done for them. (Sometimes I have to remind them of this, but never mind that at the moment...) They go spend hours in their rooms because they want to. They go to sleep at night in their own beds and stay there. All night. And when it comes to homeschooling them, they can do many things on their own. For that matter, even when they are little and need more attention, that's some of the best - and easiest kind of homeschooling. It just involves lots of reading, looking at caterpillars, and playing. Lots and lots and LOTS of reading and playing.

So it's probably not as hard a prospect as they envision. Also, when they look at me and think, "Wow - she's doing it so well," their vision is perhaps not quite clear. It's a nice compliment, truly, and I do appreciate it when out in public it appears that we're doing some things right. Yay! (And I know that even in actuality, we are doing some things right.) But sometimes the appearance of success and "she-has-it-togetherness" can be misleading, and unfortunately so. What I don't talk about enough are days like today. Tonight I talked to a mom interested in having a number of kids and in homeschooling, and it would probably not have been the most encouraging thing to say to her, "You know, it's all not so hard as you might think... except on days like today, when, frankly, I wanted to lock the kids of my bedroom, crawl under the covers and, stay there until their father got home. We're all wearing smiles now, but an hour ago, tempers were flaring, no one liked each other, and my house looked like a bomb hit it. Hardly any "school" got done because no one would pay attention to me, and I was failing at getting them to obey me...hey, I was pretty much failing at being a good mom, period. My crowning achievement this afternoon was that I presided over everyone surviving it."

It might have scared her off, but if she does have a large family and does decide to homeschool them, it might have actually been good to have been able to retrieve the memory of someone essentially saying, "Sister, we're all just doing the best we can. Sometimes it looks nice, and sometimes it looks pretty ugly. That's normal. You're normal. You're not failing."

I keep a friend's baby a couple days a week, and when she comes to pick him up, she gets to see us at the time of day that is often the most messy and chaotic. Periodically I thank her for seeing us at our most "real," and still choosing to be our friend anyway! I think it would be beneficial if we all got a peek at each other's "real-ness" now and then. Certainly those who saw mine would know that often I am hanging on by a slender thread of sanity some days! And in seeing that, either they would realize that I'm not quite so amazing and feel encouraged...or they would be confirmed in their belief that having and homeschooling five children is in fact an impossibly nutty thing to do.

Perspective...and the Lack Thereof

I recently posted on Facebook about how homeschool kids may lack some perspective. Mine do, anyway. The other day I called up to them that it was time to come downstairs, and one of the older kids called back down inquisitively, "For what?"

Oh, I don't know. To start our day! To do some school - you know, that stuff we (try) to do five days a week. I know we're relaxed about it, but good grief, it does figure into our schedule enough so that I would think they would understand this is a recurring thing. But no, they still tend to act a little surprised when they discover (day after day after day) that once again, we have learning to do. My reaction to this ranges from baffled amusement to annoyance, the latter because I would love for them to understand that most of their peers get up at the same time each morning, get dressed, go the same building, then go the same classes at the same time, every day, pretty much all day. Maybe I'm having a "grass is greener on the other side" moment, because those kids probably complain a fair amount about it, but I wouldn't think they wake up regularly and say, "What? School again? Didn't I just do that yesterday?"

Of course, on the flip side, I am trying to make a statement that what we do here is NOT just "school at home." I'm not after the kids mimicking a typical school experience, so I don't really want to be throwing in their faces all the time the "if you were in school..." line. It might be nice if they had some perspective on their situation, and, if I'm honest, it might be nice if out of that perspective bloomed a sense of gratitude and appreciation for what they do have. And it might be nicer still if that caused them to get dressed, do their chores, and present themselves to me each morning ready to seize the day and learn.

Shhh. Stop laughing. Let me have this moment to dream.

Ok, back to reality...here's what I tend to hear instead,



"Why do we have to start school so early? [at 9:30] Aren't we going to have any time to [read, ride bikes, build with LEGOs, etc, etc] first?"

Upon finding one of my children still in their pajamas at a time in the morning when I would have expected something different..."Why are you not dressed?" Child - "You didn't tell me I had to get dressed." Oh, right - silly me! I thought maybe after nine years of living you might have assumed that's just what we do in the morning.


With dramatic sighs - "What do you treat us like slaves?" This from my six year-old, who does collectively a whole 30 minutes worth of "formal" school each day. I just laughed.

If I start talking about the next subject as we're wrapping up the first subject of the day, "What? Aren't we going to get a break first?" Apparently since we must do school, the ideal schedule is 15 minutes of school, followed by an hour or so of breaks, and so on.

And since we're talking about breaks, this one really cracked me up, "We've had a two-hour break, and you want us just to start right back up instantly?"


A response to being posed arelatively simple math question, "Do you expect me just to say the answer immediately? Well, that's the goal eventually, yes dear.



It never ceases to amaze me that they haven't developed a set a more realistic set of expectations by now. Oh, but what's that you say? Maybe it's the mother who ought to have developed a more realistic perspective and set of expectations after 11 years of having children? I do have to remind myself that perhaps that's true. Perhaps I should expect the kids to act like kids - not to stay there, obviously, and not to get away with doing nothing at all - but it might at least help my attitude to remember that they're supposed to act like children. They can't possibly have a broad perspective on educational styles or any other aspect of life, for one thing, and for another, it's the job of all children to question, to push boundaries, to learn the ropes of life sometimes the hard way. And it's not my job to make sure they know how good they have it, but to gently, lovingly, and firmly guide them through each day. Eventually they'll get themselves dressed each morning without having to be reminded. I don't hold out too much hope that they'll come to accept daily learning and instruction, but it could happen!

In the meantime...[insert the sound of my cracking whip here]!

Play of the Game

I should comment first on my ever so long absence from blogging. Dave was working in Savannah for the past three weeks (three weeks!), so I wasn't doing much else but...well, everything. Perhaps I'll post about our time in his absence, but I may just leave it with this summation - everyone ate relatively good food, we made it to places we were supposed to be (and usually on time), we did a fair amount of schoolwork, and the house wasn't a complete disaster by the time Dave finally came home. So I call that a success. But of course, we're also terribly glad to have him home again!

At any rate, today all three boys had their first flag football games, the two younger ones at our YMCA, and Drew at another nearby branch (for reasons that would take too long to explain and wouldn't particularly enhance this story). We decided that Dave and Aimee would take the younger ones to their games, and Scarlett and I would go with Drew, who actually had a double header. I'll take this moment to mention that I was dreading, just a bit, the idea of having a toddler (have I mentioned that she's walking now? Woo-hoo!), out on a field by myself for two hours, but I discovered that she was content to sit in my lap most of the time. At the end of it, I was just looking at her in grateful awe. For two hours this little miss just sat and looked at books and played with empty water bottles, never once attempting to run off anywhere. As I thought about it, I realized that my last two toddlers, and especially Chase, never once stopped for anything, and I had to spend their entire toddlerhoods chasing...er, following...them and pulling them down off dangerous heights. What fun that was! (I'm not being sarcastic. I really did appreciate their energy and daring, even though, admittedly, it was exhausting.) And what a blessed, beautiful relief that I'm not having to do that with the current toddler!

So I actually enjoyed my two hours watching Drew's games. Part of my enjoyment was supplied by his coach, who is an 18 year-old Y employee and who is one of the most SUPER PSYCHED people I've ever met. I hadn't met him before, because other Y employees had run Drew's previous practices, and this was the coach's first time meeting the team. I was a little taken aback by his hyper intensity at first, but as I sat watching the team with the other parents, we all began to laugh along with his antics, and eventually to appreciate his enthusiasm. Sure, it's probably a little over the top, but he taught the boys, encouraged everyone, made sure they all played the different positions and substituted fairly, and he was a lot of fun all the way around. Drew seemed to enjoy his coaching and the game in general, but occasionally he became frustrated with himself because he wasn't completing some of the flashier and exciting plays that I guessed he had been hoping for. He was also pretty hard on himself for mistakes he made and couldn't really get the perspective I tried to offer him when I assured him that everyone was making mistakes and it wasn't a big deal.

Toward the end of his second game, it was his turn to sit out for a few minutes, and he came to me rather upset. After listening for a minute, I told him (again) that I thought he was doing a good job and playing hard, but that I understood his frustration and that of course he could vent it - when he got home. I encouraged him quietly to take a deep breath and display good sportsmanship and a good attitude on the field, and to continue cheering on his teammates. To his credit, he nodded and took that deep breath. Just about then, one of his teammates got hurt and was escorted off the field in tears. It looked like Drew was going to have to go right back in, and I was glad to see him get up and walk toward the sidelines without hesitation.

But before he walked out on to the field, he stopped and turned to his injured teammate nearby.

He patted him on the shoulder and asked if he was ok. My mother's heart just melted a little and my
knees went a little wobbly. If I had been like his coach I would have bounded (yes, bounded) up and down, shouting, "YES! WAY TO GO! WHAT AN AWESOME PLAY!" But I didn't, of course. First of all, I'm not like that in general. Second, it would have embarrassed the living daylights out of Drew, who had informed me earlier that it was ok to cheer for his team but not for him personally (I think I messed up on that once or twice - oh well.) And third, I think it's best for all involved if good deeds happen with little fanfare. I did tell him afterwards that I was proud of him for it.Even if I had laid the praise on thick, though, I don't think he would have believed that it was worth so much more than the plays he had hoped to make. I think he was probably still a little disappointed with himself. But in my opinion - admittedly biased though it is - it was the best thing I saw happen all afternoon.

Way to go, Drew, for making the play of the game.