Thursday of Week 5

As usual this is John's day off.  The boys worked out in the yard.  They got the lawn mowed and cut up a bunch of stick.  Daniel had a blast because he got to use the riding lawn mower to cut the grass.  You should see the smile on his face when he gets to drive that thing!

While the boys were working outside, Nattalie and I went to visit my Dad in the hospital.  He just got transferred to a normal room.  Maybe he will be able to come home Saturday or Sunday.  We sure would like this!  What a praise to see how well he is doing.  They completed the 4th plasma exchange today and they are not sure that they will even need to do the 5th one that they have scheduled.  Yeah!  Thank you to all who have been praying!  We are seeing the answers to prayers with how well he is doing so quickly!

Now, we are home and going through what John would like to take on his trip....of course some of the stuff he would like is dirty so now doing laundry too.  John and a handful of the guys from Grace West Church are headed to the Smokey Mountains in TN for 4-wheeling and dirt biking.  This is the 3rd annual trip and the guys just have a blast when they go.

The kids and I have lots scheduled while John is gone....we will see what we get done :)

Another Wednesday.....

So after our fun evening of bowling....which kept us up too late!  The kids and I stayed at the house this morning instead of heading straight to church.  I normally meet with Joni and had to cancel....thanks for understanding Joni. (I also wasn't prepared to meet, bad me!)

The kids got some much needed rest!  Now we will hit the books before John comes back to get us.  This week in spelling it is set up for review of the words that were the most missed in the first 4 lessons.  The kids are doing ok, but it is obvious that we needed to repeat these words.

The kids have AWANA tonight.  After church I will head to visit my dad at the hospital.  Taking shifts so that he has somewhere there at different times of the day.  Mom was there this morning.  John is headed for a little this afternoon and then I will head this evening.  Then dad knows we are there, but also with only one visitor we don't wear him out.

Tuesday

Another update on my dad: Praise that he seems to be getting better each day.  They did the third plasma exchange.  Then they will skip tomorrow and do the fourth one on Thursday.  His speech seems to be getting better, but after talking for a while he does get tired.  He is still in ICU so that they can keep a closer eye on him in case of respiratory failure.  Thank you all who are praying. 

School today.  Well we did more studying on mummies and pyramids.  We had lots of hands on today.  We made a homemade level (oops for got to take a picture of that) and then we made a sugar cube pyramid.  The kids had a lot of fun making that!!

Sugar Cube Pyramid

As usual we headed to church for guitar and mandolin lessons.  Then second service worship practice.  Afterwards there as a party at Bass Pro Bowling for Matt.  Nattalie was really wanting to go to spend some time with Aubrie.  She has a GREAT time!  Thank you Johnson family.....Nattalie truly enjoyed.  And Matt, Happy Birthday!

Nattalie and Aubrie

Proof that I was there :)

The crazy bunch!

Bethany and Nattalie

Mary and Dennis - Thank you so much!!



Nattalie and Matt (the birthday boy)

 And while we ere out at Bass Pro the boys were home enjoying a movie together....Dairy of a Wimpy Kid.  The boys thought it was so funny!

Monday School and Yard Work at Great Grandma Grace's House

Update on my dad.  This morning when he woke up there was great improvement.  He was able to swallow and for breakfast got to have scrambled eggs and applesauce.  He also ate normal lunch and dinner.  We are very excited that he was able to swallow and  eat today.  His breathing is better, but is still on the oxygen.  They did the second plasma exchange this afternoon.  We are already seeing the benefits of this procedure.  Thank you for your continued prayers.  We are so very grateful that things are looking better!

John headed off to work in the morning and we did get some school done.  The kids enjoyed learning about mummies today.  They did not like how they remove some of the organs.  Trivia...how did they remove the brain as they we completing the mummification??  Post a comment if you know.  Mummification was done to preserve the body.  For science we are learning about molds and bacterias....we are doing a fun experiment with bread.  We will see what is looks like after a few more days. 

After school and when John got home (he came home early to help) we headed out to Kellerton (Southern Iowa) to complete the yard work at Great Grandma Grace's house.  When we got there John hopped on the riding lawn mower and got to work.  Johnathan worked hard at weed eating around the house and trees.  Daniel was anxious to get on the lawn mower.  When John was done Daniel got to get on a push all the cut grass into one row which Nattalie and Daniel then raked into the brush pile. 

After lots of work the kids asked to get up into the tree.  So we have some pictures to share.

Johnathan weed eating

Daniel moving sticks

Daniel driving the lawn mower....this was his favorite part :)

Daniel moving more sticks

Nattalie dragging a nice big branch

All the boys working together

My three crazy monkeys in the tree

The boys didn't want to come down

Johnathan had to drive the lawn mower around before we headed home

Day of Fasting and Family Emergency

Well, we started out on the fast after dinner on Saturday.  The kids did very good.  They made it until 1pm....almost the full 24 hours.  We had a family emergency that kept us from being able to celebrate our Break the Fast meal.

We picked up lunch after we left church at 1pm so that the kids got something to eat.  We then came home ate and took a nap because of the paper route....we always need a nap on Sunday after church.

Then I headed to the hospital to see my Dad.  He is in ICU.  He is in there because of respiratory problems and unable to swallow.  He also has myothenia gravis which is a degenerative muscle disease.  They are starting a procedure of plasma exchange to get rid of bad anti-bodies in his blood.  They will do this about 5 times.  The first procedure was done this evening.  He is very uncomfortable and is very anxious because he feels that he can not breath.  If you could please pray for our family and for quick recovery for my dad.  Thank you.

We had planned to start week 5 of school in the morning, but I know there are things that we will need to do to help my family.  So we may push it back a few days....love the flexibility!  Tomorrow the kids, John and I will run to Kellerton to cut the grass at my Grandma's house because this is what my dad had on his schedule tomorrow and I know that it will put him at ease to know that it has been done.

Thank you for praying!

Yom Kippur

Yom Kippur - Day of Atonement

At oneness with God

Today we prepared and celebrated Yom Kippur.  This is the day the worshippers would stand before Almighty God and confess his mistakes and admits that he has sinned.

Just before the meal started the father blesses each member of the family.  We have truly cherished this special time that we have shared together as a family.  This is the second time that the feast began with blessing the children and it is just awesome to see how the kids light up as their father is giving them a wonderful blessing.

After the blessing we enjoyed a meal together.  It was fun to have Grammie and Pop join us for this feast.  We enjoy trying some of the traditional recipes.

Callah Bread - made into rolls

 

Kreplach - Pockets of dough filled with meat

In Jewish history meat symbolizes the stern judgement of God, while the dough symbolizes the mercy which accompanied God's justice.  It is still true that "mercy triumphs over judgment" - James 2:13



Golden Yoich - chicken soup

After the meal we will be fasting for 24 hours.  With the kids to be careful they will be having fruit juice and water.  This time will be used for prayer.  This is not to bring notice to ourselves, but to be able to spend time with the Lord. The kids are not sure that they will be able to do the fast.  We will encourage them to pray and if they seem to get to a point that they need more than the juice then we will have them eat some vegetables and fruit.

Tomorrow we will enjoy a "Break-the-Fast" meal together at sundown.  The meal is to be light to break the fast.



Early Egyptian Boat

Today we had a project to build an early Egyptiann Boat.  We built a model together. I think that it turned out pretty good....and it even floated!!  Yeah!



Early Egyptian boat which would have been used for trading

 As normal, John was home today.  We took advantage of this and worked on this project together!

Now it's time to work on dinner.  It has been great to be able to use dinner as teaching opportunities as Nattalie gets older and learning more in the kitchen!!

After dinner the boys will spend more time together and Nattalie and I will head to church for second service worship practice. 

Good day in all!  The weather is cooling off, but it is rainy today...so outside is a little gloomy!

Enjoy your Thursday!

Mid Week

As normal, we pack up our books and head to the church with John on Wednesdays.  On the way John decided it was a good day to get the kids a treat....we stopped of at Krispy Kremes (bummer the hot light was not on).  We did share with Pastor and Amy when we got to the church.

Then we got to work.  First we needed to help move a Sunday School room.  We are having great growth in the church right now and we have a lot of children in the preschool class.  So we needed to move another class so that we can separate the preschool class into two.  Growth is good, but it does make us work on our creativity with the space that we have available at the church.

After that it was time to hit the books.  Spelling is going great.  Daniel actually got all of them right on Wednesday.  He was so excited.  He has been doing good with spelling, but this is the first week that he was able to get them all right on Wednesday.  GREAT job Daniel.

I set them up to work on English outlines and paragraph writing and I met with Joni.  What a blessing working with Joni on a weekly basis has been.  If you read this Joni....thank you!

After we were done we headed to the gym to change our account information there.  They called us this week to let us know that the automatic payment that we had set up didn't work....oops forgot that this was attached to the card that was shut down due to the fraud.  And instead of using a card we were able to use a voided check...I felt much better about that.  I have to say that since we had the fraud I have been very hesitant to use my debit card number especially with automatic payment things.  One finally errand for the day was going to downtown with Liz as she filled out an application for a job.  We accompanied her since she is not comfortable with all the one way streets downtown.

Back at church....we have been working on some changes in the youth room.  A while back the carpet was all ripped out, but we have not worked on cleaning all the glue off the ground.  My brother sent us some cleaning supplies to help get the glue up.  Johnathan and I wanted to try to see if it would work.  We did get a lot of glue up, but when the concrete dried we are not sure we are happy with the look....you can still see the glue lines even though all the glue is gone.  We will see what John and Kris think??

After worship practice and AWANA we are now home and relaxing a little bit before we head to bed.  We always enjoy our Thursdays with John home!

Busy day, but productive!  Very grateful of all the blessings God has given us!

Ancient Egypt and Pyramids

We are continuing are studying of Ancient Egypt and pyramids.  We learned how the strength of the pyramid is great than the strength of a cube.

See how our cube is falling after we applied pressure, but the pyramid stood strong!

Tuesday morning....we start our day out with a lot of papers to deliver because this is the day that we give out the free paper as well.  The paper actually made it to the distribution center on time so we got out of the building a little earlier than expected and it was great.  We got back home and went back to sleep for a while.

Then it was up and at em for the day!  We still have laundry that we need to finish from yesterday so we started that before we even hit the books.  Spelling is still going very good.....this week the lesson is "ough" words and all the different sounds that "ough" can make. 

School got interrupted by the weather.  We were watching the clouds roll in quickly and knew that the boys needed to get the grass mowed before it rained.  So we took a break from the books and the boys took care of the yard.  Nattalie and I did some house chores while they were outside.

Then lunch and back to the books.  The kids are really learning and retaining a lot this year.  I could ask them things from last year that they did and they have no clue, but this seems to be working.  We are all learning together and doing lots of hands on things that are driving home the idea.  I know that is is pretty early to decide what I will be doing for next year, but I do think that we will continue on with the My Father's World with all the hands on learning!

We normally go to church on Tuesday, but I don't have voice lessons today so we decided to cancel the guitar lessons and go ahead and spend the day at the house...yeah!

Waiting on the lasts loads to dry and then the laundry is caught up...for now that is! :)  John has appointments at the church pretty late today so we will be hanging out at the house which is a much needed thing to catch up on things that have been neglected at the house lately.

Oh what a blessing we received yesterday.  We have been taking pictures with a borrowed video camera, but yesterday we were given a digital camera.  What a blessing this is!!  I am so excited to be able to take picture all the time again.  I am sure that as we continue on with all the hands on things that I will upload some pictures to go along with!

Enjoy your Tuesday! 

Monday!

Today was a good school day.  We got everything done that was on the lessons plans....well that is all except our book that we are reading together.  We will be reading that here in the next hour or so.  What a blessing to know that we finished all our lessons for the day! :)

Today was studying Ancient Egypt and pyramids.  We learned about the square pyramid and the tetrahedron pyramid.   We have taken some pictures of pyramids that we made with straws today.  The kids love the hands on work!



Left is the square pyramid and the right is the tetrahedron pyramid

Now we are on to the stuff that is not as fun as school projects....laundry.  Well, I guess that is a project, but normally school projects are fun.  The never ending family chore laundry awaits us this afternoon!  Here we come!

SUNDAY......

Church went good this morning!  The kids and I were really tired.  The front page to the Sunday paper was pretty late so we didn't get done delivering the Sunday papers until 6:00 today.  We are normally done about 4:30-4:45.  So we didn't really get rest before it was time to get ready for church.

We did have an interesting experience delivering the paper today.  One of our apartment building had the fire alarm going all throughout the building.  All the residents stated coming out....some stood outside and others went and waited in their cars.  The fire fighters got there and went through the building.  I guess they found out it was from some burnt toast.  I am sure that all the people that were outside at 4:30 in the morning in the rain was so glad that someone was making toast that early!  This made it really hard to deliver the papers.  They have those doors that close when the alarms go off so not all of them were opening so that we could get through to deliver the papers.  It was funny because some of the ladies were asking if they could have a paper and the kids asked what apartment number they were.... then they would mention that they don't normally get one.  They said I know.... the kids let them know that they had to pay for the paper in order to get it.....so funny!!  I was glad to get that building done and get on the road to finish the rest of the route.

When we came home from church we spent a some time to eat lunch and then we all took a nice long nap to catch up on some lost sleep....wow that nap was great.  I think that I slept a little to late because I am still up and should be headed to bed so that we are ready to deliver the papers in the morning :)

We are gearing up for another great week with school.  At the end of this coming week we will be celebrating Yom Kippur and then the following week is Sukkoth.  This week and next we will start to study pyramids and do some fun science experiments....should be a great week!!

Saturday....

This morning we went to church to celebrate the life of Diane Nandell.  Beautiful service...Diane will be missed.  Bob and the family put together a beautiful service. 

Then home to rest for our Saturday.  I did go and get the inner sections of the paper to put those together for the Sunday paper.  We are still putting papers together at the house.  On Monday the kids will be able to go back to the distribution center with me so that we will not have to bring the papers home....yeah.  We have been given notice that tomorrow's paper will be late due to the Iowa game.  I guess they are playing Arizona and the game does not start until 9:30 Iowa time.  So they anticipate that the game will not be over until about midnight.  I hope that they are able to get the papers to us ASAP.

We are now getting our clothes and stuff ready for church tomorrow and then time to rest.  We are all snuggled blankets.  We have the windows open to allow this beautiful cool weather in the house, but sitting next to the window it is cool! 

I hope that you all are enjoying your weekend....they are so fast!

Rosh Hashanah

Wow.....lots of baking today.  We got up and got busy.  We needed to celebrate our Rosh Hashanah dinner early because John needed to leave to be at Diane Nandell's viewing.  I am so thankful for all the flexibility that home school gives us.

Rosh Hashanah which means the beginning of the year.  Also known as "The Feast of the Trumpets"  It celebrates the birth of the world.  The celebration began with the sound of the horns.




Party horns used for the "sound of the horns"


Honey Cakes (ie Honey Bread) which are very sweet.  We iced one with an orange icing.  This was dessert kind of like a birthday cake!   Good!


Honey Cake iced with orange icing

 Then we were busy at work on Callah.  This time it is not braided like with the Sabbath.  We made a round loaf and a ladder.  The road loaf was to represent a full and round year.  The ladder to symbolize that we understand that our prayers are directed to God on high.



We made two round loaves with ladders and then a full loaf of bread. 
Good stuff!!

Other parts of the meal.....Salmon.  This would have typically been made with the head on and placed in front of the head of the house.  It expresses the desire that for the coming year the head of your family will serve the Lord.  I didn't find one with a head and I am not sure that I could have really done it....so here is our fish.

Then we had glazed carrots.  Carrots means "to increase."  They are eaten symbolizing that God will increase our blessings as we walk with Him in the New Year.



Glazed Carrots - these were yummy!

We also had apples dipped in honey.  This was passed and symbolic of the hope that the year will be a sweet one.

Apple slices dipped in honey - I have never dipped apples in honey before.  Wow, this was good!



Here is a closer picture of the round Callah with the ladder. 
The ladders were over-baked, but the bread tasted awesome!

 So we enjoyed celebrating Rosh Hashanah together....the beginning on the new year....the birthday of the World.

We are enjoying celebrating these feasts together and eating the foods that they would have eaten.  I told John that I am learning how to make more things.  And to be honest everyone is very trusting that I am able to follow the recipes and make these new things to try.

Yeah....Dad's day off!

We did our normal paper delivery.  We have been putting the papers together at the house this week because the kids are too young to be in the newspaper distribution center.  We are working with the supervisors there....because the kids can be on a contract for a route and then they can be there.  So we should be able to add their names to a route by the beginning of next week and then we won't have to bring the papers back home.  This morning when I brought the papers back John was up and he helped us put the papers together.  Then when we returned from delivering the papers we all went back to sleep for a little bit.

Got up and got busy on school right away.  While we were working on school John was studying about prayer.  This has been a great study that we have started as a family.  The kids and I learned a lot in school and they did a great job.  Tower of Babel and Mesopotamia were our main topics of the day.

After school was done we spent some time outside playing some soccer and catch as a family.  The weather outside is so beautiful, thank you Lord for the beautiful day to spend time as a family.

Later on Nattalie and I will head to her cooking class....tonight is quick breads.  I think that we will be making banana bread.  Yum...I love to get to taste test when class is done!

Tomorrow we gear up for another celebration....we will be baking more Callah bread, but shaped different than for the Sabbath.  We will also be making some honey bread....this sounds great because we will be making an orange icing to top it with.  The main course we will be following part of the way and will post pictures after dinner tomorrow.

Wednesday.....

Well, as you know, we head into church with John on Wednesday mornings.  This morning started out a little scattered.....my alarm went off and I just thought I laid my head down to think about something and fell back to sleep for 40 more minutes.  Needless to say this made us run late for the day.  Then got to the church and John was called to a members house for his wife.  John asked that I go with.

Please be in prayer for Bob Nandell as his wife went home to be with the Lord this morning just after 9:00 am.  What a fabulous testimony Bob and Diane have been through this trail.  We now also rejoice as we know that she is longer suffering.

This changed some plans that I had for the kids and I with school for the day.  We did get some school done, but not near as much as we would have hoped to finish.  We will buckle down tomorrow to get that completed. 

The kids have been helping me as we begin to make arrangements for the light luncheon after Diane's service on Saturday.  I am truly blessed that they are able to see these real life experience rather than be sitting in a classroom just learning what is in the textbook.  The textbooks don't teach hospitality and compassion.  I pray that this is something that my kids will truly grasp as I know that this is something that is lacking in our society. 

Gearing up for AWANA for the kids in a few hours.  Then headed home and will spend a little time just unwinding and then we will call it a day.

Bible Lands Map

Here it the Bible Land's Map and the labeling is on the side....hope yours turned out great, if not now that you have seen the picture re-read the saying and try it again.

Tuesday, we got up and delivered our daily paper and then went back to sleep for a while.  Our day gears up pretty quickly.  We will do as much school as possible before we head out to church.  Nattalie has mandolin lessons, Johnathan works with the youth band, and I teach some voice lessons and then have 2nd service worship practice.  We are still thinking about letting Daniel play the electric guitar....he is still asking about it.  At this point he is the only one that is really not playing an instrument.  We wanted him to learn to play the piano, but he does not really like playing it.  So, John and I are still talking about having him begin electric guitar... I am sure that if we do he will be very excited.

Well, off to continue on with school to see if we can complete it all before we head to the church.  Pray that you all are having a great day.  We thank the Lord each day for the opportunity to teach and edcuate our children.

Monday....Monday....Monday

Ok, so Monday is always a challenge for me.  I think that I try to plan too much into a Monday since I am home the entire day typically on Monday.  I wanted to get school done, the house picked up, the yard mowed and work on the garage because it needs some serious work. 

So....we are rounding the corner on the school stuff.  Johnathan and Daniel are outside mowing as I type this.  After they are done we are headed to the grocery store.  Then after dinner headed out for a bit to my parents.  Wow, ok so most of the house work will wait until tomorrow, but I know that I need to get some laundry done!  And well that garage....I guess we will try to hit that later on this week and if not then next Monday will have to be the day to get that done.

School today was a lot of work, but the kids did good for the most part.  They learned how to draw a Bible Lands Map with a fun little saying.  I think that I will even be able to remember this.  If History was done like this for me I would have been able to draw the map and label it just fine.

Here is the saying lets see if you can draw the map.  Tomorrow I will take a picture and see if you got it right and then I will help you to label your map:

A man went fishing one day.  This is the front of his boat.  (draw on the left hand side on the paper near the top)  His fishing lines are hanging from the boat and they got all tangled up.  The man looked over the side of his boat and fell into the water!  These are his two fingers under the front of the boat.  He sent up a distress signal to call for help - a balloon with a string, and a mitten tied to the end of it.  In the right hand corner near the bottom of the page there is a head of a huge water bug, with two feelers coming out of its head.

Ok... I will share a picture tomorrow and also I will help you label the map.  Have fun!! 

And I have to say that this year is a lot harder for me since I am doing all the teaching rather than the kids being on a computer and just needing my help every now and then.  I must say that I am working harder, but the kids are learning a lot more this way than they did last year.  And I have to say that I am learning a lot more too!

Gearing up for week 3

So....the Molasses Gingerbread cake was good!  I think that I will make it again in the future.

I have read through the lesson plans for the week and we should have a great week.  At the end of this week we will celebrate another feast....Rosh Hashanah.  This feast has a unique dinner.  I am not sure if I will be able to prepare this one.  I will take pictures and if I actually follow through you will see what I mean by unique.

Praying for a great week!

The end of week 2

Friday.....we got started on things and knew that we had to work hard because of the things that we didn't get finished yesterday....and we are excited to say that we did finish and aer on track.  Praise the Lord.

 I have been busy today.....laundry, dishes, cooking and all the fun stuff that just take time.  John will be headed off to small group tonight so getting ready to make cookies to send with him.  The kids and I are headed to a home school group carnival and I need to make a side dish for that. 

Also, tomorrow we will be having dinner with some friends.  I will be making pasta salad and also dessert.  I had a hard time deciding what to make, but I just found a recipe for a Molasses Gingerbread cake and that sounded really good.  So we will give it a try.

Tomorrow is gearing up to be a very busy day.  We are headed to the church to work on the youth room some more.  Then we are off to soccer for the boys.  After that we will stop and put our papers together for our Sunday route and then headed to Kris and Liz's for some food and fun.  Busy day, but all should be good.

So the post will be short as I need to head to the kitchen and get busy with everything.

Thursday....Dad's day off

Our day didn't start out the way that we wanted it to.  The kids and I got up to go and do the paper route.  We got there at 2:15 and around 3:15 they told us that it would be 4:30 until we got the front pages because the printing press broke down.  At this point no sense in heading home.  Next thing we knew they brought in some donuts and juice....talk about a fresh donut.  They were good!  There were a lot of people that had jobs that they needed to get to so this delay was really bad for them.  Praise the Lord our schedule is more flexible.

So we normally get home at 4:00 and didn't get home until 6:10 this morning.  We went back to bed and didn't set an alarm....the kids and I got up at 11:15, guess we needed some sleep after staying up so long this morning.  John ended up getting up at 9:30 and was quiet so that the kids and I could catch up on some sleep.

So, needless to say school is not going to get competed as hoped today.  We will work a little bit, but with it already being 2:00 in the afternoon and we haven't started it will be hard to get the ball rolling.  I know that we have plans and need to leave the house about 4:30 so that doesn't leave much time...guess we will double up tomorrow. 

WHAT A CRAZY WEEK THIS HAS BEEN!!!  I really hope that school next week is easier, but the kids have been great on the days that we have hit the books they spend the extra time and get it all done.

Wednesday...already!

This has really started off as a busy week.  John had a pastor friend come in town from Nebraska on Sunday night.  We meet them at their hotel and enjoyed some time relaxing together while the kids went swimming.  We stayed up way too late, but had a good time.

Monday morning came very early when it was time to get up to deliver the newspapers, but we did it.  Also since it was a holiday and John was home we decided to not do much school. The Rapley family was still in town.....they came up to pick up some four wheelers they had just bought....it was a surprise to their kids.  Lots of fun!  Then after they were done with that we had lunch together and a little more relaxing before they needed to head home.  After they left it was time to head to the store for weekly grocery shopping.  I need to get back into the discipline of shopping once ever two weeks...I am just not a fan of going to the grocery store.  When I came home as we were winding up the day we went ahead and all did a math lesson for the day just to get something done for the day. :)

Tuesday.....we headed into work with John so that we could take the truck in for brake change and much needed oil change.  Johnathan had a great time working with Chuck Warrick on this.  Thank you Chuck for being so patient and allowing Johnathan to help.  I would have had Daniel help too, but thought that would be too many bodies and hands in the way....maybe next time.  While Johnathan and Chuck were working on the truck Nattalie and Daniel got some handwriting and history done.  Johnathan caught up when we got back to the church.  After Nattalie and Daniel were done with that we had some fun playing 2 on 2 basketball with Peggy....and we played some "Pig"....and yes Peggy won!  Way to go Peggy!!  We did some school when we got back to the church, but not as much as I would have liked because we had mandolin and guitar stuff already in the schedule at church on Tuesdays. 

By the way.... on Tuesday when we got to church I logged onto our bank account to check it and found out that we had some fraud which started near the end of last week....we are working with the fraud department with the bank to get everything straighten out, but this was scary to log on a see a very different total than expecting and a ton of charges that neither John or I authorized.  I know this will be a long road to get all cleaned up, but I am glad we found it as quickly as I did.

So Wednesday....we always come to church with John on Wednesdays because I have some appointments at the church and it is easier than have to make so many trips to and from church in the same day.  Got started on school pretty quickly and set them up with some writing assignments while I was in a meeting.  After that it was lunch time and then back to the books.....yeah we are all caught up and completed all Monday-Wednesday work.  Good job kids for the hard work....its better to stay on schedule especially since we are only in the second full week.  :)

The kids are really excited because tonight starts AWANA.  I teased them because I reminded them that this is yet another thing that they will have to work on Bible memory verses.  They have Bible memory verses in school, in Sunday School and with AWANA.  Hopefully this will be a great year with great memorization of God's Word!!

Good catching up with the happenings of the week and praising God for all the blessing he has sent our way!!

The End of the Sabbath

We enjoyed a restful day as a family which was as restful as we could make it!

Today at noon we ate the Cholent (a roast).  I was a little nervous about putting this on just as we finished dinner last night and having it cook the entire time.  So our roast cooked for 14 hours...wow that is a long time.  However, it was very good!

Cholent with a mini loaf of the Callah bread from last night

Johnathan holding the candle
(which traditionally would have been a braided candle)
Daniel holding the Spice Box

Dinner was a simple salad, fruit, and dessert bread.  The was more "ceremony" stuff to finish tonight.  Traditionally there is a braided candle which represents creation and redemption come together.  Then over flowing fruit of the vine to represent Christ shed blood.  The candle is extinguished in the over-flow of the fruit of the vine to symbolize Christ's blood is what brought creation and redemption together.  And the final is the spice box with fragrance to remind of the scent traditionally put on the dead in the Jewish culture.

Simple dinner to end the Sabbath Feast - salad, fruit, and dessert bread.

Fruit of the Vine over flowing to symbolize Christ shed blood

Candle extinguished in the over flow of the fruit of the vine

Spice Box - fragrance that would have traditionally been put on the dead as a Jewish custom

 What a great time we had celebrating this feast together.  Some of the things that we discussed was all the "rules" that the Jews followed for their Feasts....lots of work.  But we also discussed that some of the symbolic things really made us take the time to think about the true meaning.  And then John added in that he noticed over the weekend that he really likes homemade bread.  Then I reminded him that I almost burnt up the mixer when mixing the bread dough and then in the end had to finish mixing it by hand.  :)

We had a great time together as a family and we are looking forward to the additional feasts that we will be celebrating throughout the year....I think that the next one that we will be celebrating is Rosh Hashanah.

Ok...Can't wait to share about our meal

Everything turned out GREAT!  The Golden Yoich (Chicken soup) was great and the Callah (bread) was awesome!  I forgot to take a picture of the bread before we total devoired!

Braided Bread (Callah) - after we devoired it!

We took the time to video the blessings before the meal.  I will do my best to share those with you when I figure out how to do that, but I will post some pictures.  We were very excited that our oil candle worked....so pretty!

Blessing sang together by the family before the meal

Homemade Oil Candle - with 5 stars.  One to represent eveyone in the family!
Although they are sperate, they share the same source, symbolic of the family
depending on God for strength and life.

The family at the table as we prepare to begin the Sabbath celebration

I hope you all enjoy these few pictures that we were able to take.  What a fun time we had as a family.  We cleaned all the dishes and now are relaxing together and will enjoy our day together tomorrow.  There will be more to the Sabbath Celebration tomorrow.

Preparation for the Sabbath Feast

We have been preparing all day for the start of our Sabbath Feast.  We cleaned house and the boys took care of the lawn so that we don't have work to do tomorrow.

So.... we have set the table with nice plates silverware and glasses, made the oil candle for the centerpiece, made Callah (braided bread), made Golden Yoich (Chicken Soup), rice, and candlestick salad.  Have the grape juice ready, have the bowl for hand washing, and candles ready.  We have started to put together the Cholent (a roast) for tomorrow.

Lots to do to prepare and then lots of blessings and prayers to follow.  Looking forward to celebrating this time with the kids.  They have really enjoyed preparing for tonight.  The braided bread is the first yeast bread that I have ever made.  We were using a hand mixer that really started to smell horrible, like I was burning it up, so we had to finish mixing by hand.  Guess they wouldn't have had a mixture back then anyway.

And just so that you all know the bread looks like it turned out.  We will see when we break into it with dinner.

Since this time is to celebrate rest and time with family I will not be posting further information about the Feast until Sunday.

Thank you Lord for this prepared time for us just to spend time as a family....what a blessing.  I wish that I could share everything about the feast and traditions, but that would be a seriously long post! :)

Thursday

This morning John got up and went on the paper route with us since it is his day off. We wanted him to come along so that he could see the new small route that we have. It was fun having John with us today. He even treated the kids with McDonalds for breakfast when we were done.


Then instead of hitting school right away we decided to go back to sleep and then get up later to do school.


The kids worked really hard on school today. We did the projects for our Sabbath Meal.... thank you John for the help with the cutting stuff. We needed to cut stars out of aluminum and then cut circles out of cork board. It was very handy having dad there to use the special cutting tools to get that completed. Daniel and Johnathan painted our special spice box....very colorful and looks great. Nattalie helped John with the cutting out. I worked on making the spice mixture for our spice box. That was fun... and wow that smell really reminds me of the fall. So we have an oil candle that we are excited to see if it really works, a nice spice box, and candles in pretty candle holders.


After school we are just spending some time relaxing as a family together and then we will be headed out. Nattalie and I are going to the church for the cooking class and the boys are going to go to the gym.


Tomorrow there is not a lot of school that the kids will do because we will be preparing for the Sabbath. We need to get all the work done so that there is no work that needs to be done on Saturday. I will be excited to share how all the food turns out. We will be making bread from scratch and braiding it together and then making a chicken soup. Looking forward to great time with the family!

Also... I attached a few pictures from the Children's Muscial at the church.

Nattalie and Ana

Daniel and Dominic

All the kids... not sure who that is in the center with their head down....
actually I think that is is Claire....sorry that I don't have everyone's face :)

Wednesday....

Most all went well doing school at church today.  It is hard to make sure that you have everything that you need before you walk out of the house...like glad we were at the church because we forget to bring some colored pencils with us and it was nice because we found some at the church.

And I have to mention again how much that I am really liking this spelling program!  Daniel started on Monday with 6 right out of 15 and today (only two days later) he got 13 right.  Johnathan and Nattalie both got their 15 right today so if they are able to do that again tomorrow then they have mastered these words.  I will also add that we do not spend time writing the words so that they become wrote memory.  We just go over the rule each morning before we take a test.

Also in science we had a fun experiment that we were able to share with John  and Pastor Bob about sight and blind spots.  The experiment dealt with where the light falls and how your eyes sees the light.  Lots of fun.

What a blessing that things have been going so well for the first week.  Looking forward to tomorrow as we will be making our spice box, the spices, and our oil candles for the Sabbath Feast which will start at sundown on Friday.  By the way.....on Monday I was headed to the store to do our normal grocery shopping and I looked at everything I would need for the feast.  The noonday meal on Saturday is a roast.  I told John that we had a pork roast in the freezer and we will just use that.  You should have seen the look on his face when I mentioned that we would have a pork roast while celebrating a Jewish Feast.  Needless to say we are not using the pork roast and I got a nice beef roast.  And we did find the wick to make our candles.....yeah!!

Update again as we continue to prepare for our Sabbath Feast.  Looking forward to great family time as we learn about how they celebrated all the different feasts that they would typically celebrate each year.