Don't Grow Up Too Fast

One of my prayers for my kids is that I pray they don't grow up too quickly, and that they keep an innocence about them in regards to "worldly" things... I find that they are changing so fast lately that I can barely keep up, and some days I feel like it is all passing me by. But, for today, they are still my babies...

Matt's 12th Birthday!

This year, Matthew had a sleepover with a bunch of friends (Noah, Chase, Nick and Christopher) for his main birthday celebration, so we were not sure what to do for his family celebration. I don't usually ever deviate from any established holiday traditions, but I guess I am learning to be more flexible...he asked if we could have a birthday breakfast with cinnamon rolls instead of cake. He even humored me by pretending to blow out candles on his "cake":

I thought this year was especially fun because his younger sisters were old enough to pick out and even help pay for the gifts that they picked for him!

I must say, the birthday breakfast was a lot more fun (for me) than the sleepover!

Fourth of July

We went to the Fourth of July celebration at the Conyers Horse Park this year, along with Nuna and Papa Hollinhead. All of the kids swiped Papa's "country hat" (that's what Irene & Abbie call it) at least once. We found a nice spot under the trees to park our chairs,

and then wandered around to see what there was to see. We watched a dog agility contest (here we are, trying to see over the crowd),

looked some cars that I think Michael would have liked looking at, but I had little to no appreciation for their beauty :

Nuna and Abbie shared a funnel cake, while I hogged one all to myself,

and then settled in to wait (what seemed like forever...) for the fireworks to start.

We all got a little bit bored, and a lot silly....
see exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

Exhibit C:

Exhibit D:


and, Exhibit E:

All in all, it was a fun Independence Day, but it did make me long for the simple days of watching fireworks from Cazenovia Lake in my dad's beat up old Starcraft.
But then again, we didn't get any funnel cakes...

My Bookshelf: When You Rise Up, by RC Sproul, Jr

I decided that I will start posting books that I have finished reading, mostly just because I love to talk about books. I don't have any great literary analysis skills, that's for sure, but maybe it will be useful information to someone looking for something to read. It also helps me remember what I have read because, believe it or not, sometimes I forget I have already read a book! I don't seem to find a whole lot of time to read these days, but what books my measly, puny reading list does include I will make a quick note of. A final reason for posting it is to let anyone who may want to borrow it from me that they are welcome to it, I have too many books on my shelf already!
Now that I am done explaining why I am telling you what I am reading or have read, I will say that I really liked this book. There was nothing really earth-shattering or ground-breaking about it, but it was a great reminder of the "why" of homeschooling. In a nutshell, it helped me to renew my resolve and to take a minute to stop and commit this school year to the Lord, to whom it belongs already. For someone still on the fence about deciding whether to homeschool or not, I will just say that Sproul comes on very strong in making his case. I personally agree with almost all of what he says here (at least in theory), but not everyone will. It is a fairly short book, and it is not a "how-to" book. If you are looking for that, it will come up short. Basically, the book is based on applying Deuteronomy 6 to the education of our children, and most all of the text flows within that theme. The one aspect of the book that I might say was a bit of a negative is that it is not very grace-filled toward those who see things differently, but in my case there was no problem there for me. All in all, it all boils down to...I liked this book!