Raising Arrows
Large Family Homeschool Life – Week 7 of 2023
Wedding preparations abound this week in our large family homeschool life!
Read all of the Large Family Homeschool Life!
MONDAY
I made a peach blackberry crisp last night to have for breakfast this morning. The peaches are from seconds a friend bought last fall, and the blackberries we picked as a family at a friend’s house last summer. They have been in the freezer, so I thought it would be a nice treat!
Most of the kids ate the crisp, but Mercy doesn’t eat much fruit because of her mouth surgery, so I made her oatmeal and made her try one bite of the crisp. We are still working to get her used to certain textures.
I refilled the birdfeeders and drank some coffee while I watched the birds eat their breakfast.
During Morning Time, we learned about the assassinations of MLK and Bobby Kennedy, and we read in The Phantom Tollbooth.
I helped the little girls with their independent school work, and Keian finished American Sign Language today. We use Sign It! for teaching sign language. If you are interested in other options for ASL, check out my post:
American Sign Language for Homeschoolers
In the afternoon, a friend of mine came over to teach our 8 year old guitar. They worked on a C chord, and the 12 year old sat in on the lesson as well.
The kids played outside the rest of the afternoon and into the evening, and Ty and I chatted with the neighbors. Ty also helped Garin (12) smoke cheese and bacon in the smoker he got for his birthday. It was quite tasty!
For dinner, the kids had chicken tacos and black beans while we took Keian out for his last Special Night as a single man. We went to a local Mexican restaurant that recently reopened after a remodel – it looked awesome and was packed with people!
While we hung out watching movies with Keian in our bedroom, the little kids played with their felt board. We have several sets from Felt Fantasies and we LOVE them! And they are so reasonably priced!
TUESDAY
For Morning Time, we read in Hurlbut’s Story of the Bible, and learned about Nixon in All the People. We recently bought the updated version of this book to go along with our Tapestry of Grace studies.
If you are interested in learning more about how we use Tapestry of Grace, I have an entire page here on the blog that explains it:
We also studied conceptual art (not impressed), and the planet Mercury in the Apologia Astronomy book. And we are really enjoying our current read-aloud – The Phantom Tollbooth!
Then, the kids went to their independent schoolwork. Creed is super excited about his Graphic Design class! He’s enjoyed showing me all the things he’s learning! If you’d like to know more about this class, check out the review post below:
For lunch, I had the leftover air-fried chicken from last night, and some of the kids made egg sandwiches and used some of the bacon our 12 year old smoked yesterday.
Some friends from a city we used to live in were able to come by for an afternoon visit, so we enjoyed a long talk while the kids played.
This evening, we had a game night for our Titus 2 Group, so I brought along homemade bread and an English cucumber to cut up. All of us women just take whatever we can find from our refrigerators and create a meal from it all. It’s always delicious!
WEDNESDAY
This morning, I put the electric skillet roast on for dinner, and then made myself some peanut butter and banana toast and coffee.
We are not having Morning Time today because the 17 year old is getting breakfast with friends. He has been a bit cut off from his friends since finding out his girlfriend was pregnant last fall.
Many of his friends attend a church we used to go to. A month or so before finding out our son’s girlfriend was pregnant, we had left that church due to doctrinal differences and concerns we had over things being said from the pulpit. However, our son and his girlfriend were still attending Youth Group there until that day in September when we found out she was pregnant.
After that, it became very clear our son was not welcome in that church, and would have to jump through a multitude of hoops to prove to them that he was repentant (something we addressed as a family immediately). He would not have been allowed to sit with his girlfriend and her family or even converse with her because the church believed it would give the appearance of evil. There are many other things we totally disagreed with church leadership on that I may someday be willing to talk about, but suffice it to say, we decided then and there our son would not step foot near that church as long as he was under our roof.
It was a horrible experience and handled rather contrary to Scripture, but we are incredibly thankful to be in a Christ-centered church now. It is the pastor of our current church that will be marrying the kids this weekend. Thankful for how he stepped in and counseled them, and is now performing the ceremony for them.
So anyway…
I spent much of the morning on the phone with both my mom and my oldest son. I also finally got my website email back up and running – that was stressful because you never know who might have emailed you while the email was down, and I hate missing things!
The older kids headed to the bee farm for work, and I took the little girls with me to the vet for our little kitty’s booster shot. They really enjoyed going with me to see where Alice goes to the doctor.
When I got home, the kids tidied up and watched their shows for the day. We had roast and salad for dinner, and then Ty went to Men’s Group for our church.
The young adult group for our church ended up meeting at our house because one of the kids at the house where they usually meet threw up on the way home from school. It was fun to have the young adults here. I joined in the study and the games as well!
THURSDAY
For Morning Time, we studied Ford’s presidency, minimalist music (we liked Glass’ Metamorphosis the best!), and read in The Phantom Tollbooth.
Aspen finished her phonics book about a cat in Holland today. I can tell how much improved she is!
This afternoon, I had a hair appointment. I had a tinted gloss put on, which makes my hair smooth and shiny. I also had my eyebrows tinted. They seem a little dark to me, but they will fade.
Note to self: Don’t get my hair (or eyebrows) done a couple of days before a wedding!
Tonight, we went to the movie Jesus Revolution. We attend a Calvary Chapel church plant, so it was very interesting to see how it all started! I also appreciated that the movie didn’t sugar-coat the story. These were real and often messy people, but God likes to use messy people so there’s no doubt it is His work and not theirs.
FRIDAY
I got some great sleep last night after several nights of not great sleep. I’m sure it’s the upcoming wedding and my subconscious mulling over everything. I have also been a bit nauseous the past few days. I remember not sleeping well and being nauseous before Blake’s wedding too. Whenever there is a big event, I’m always a little nervous someone will get sick, and so I think that’s what causes me to not feel well and not sleep well either.
This morning, we tidied the house and moved certain items for the wedding tomorrow. Then, we did our usual Home Blessing Chores.
I decided to mop the hardwoods in the living room (where the wedding will take place) with my new eCloth mop. It worked amazingly well! But, I can definitely tell my mopping muscles are out of shape!
My 18 year old and I traveled into the city to get a new battery for her phone. It took a lot longer than I anticipated, so we went to Michael’s and Hobby Lobby and chit-chatted a bunch as well.
While we were taking care of that, Ty went and picked up our 22 year old from college. I usually do it, but I was concerned it would be too stressful for me to travel that far with all we have to do to get the house in order for the wedding tomorrow.
However, we did meet Ty and Meg and our oldest son and his wife in the city for dinner that evening. Blake is turning 25 next week, so we celebrated his birthday and then headed home to help decorate and settle in for the night since we have a BIG DAY tomorrow!
NOTE: Here are a few photos I took at the wedding. (We will have the professional ones once they are ready.)
