It began with Lauren and I getting our studios (the fancy music-teacher term for "all of our students and their families") scheduled for the fall. Although we teach some through the summer, there are always those who want to take a break, and we had many new students joining us this year. With the additional hours, though, we knew we needed to find a new place to teach. (Not only does our house not have an out-of-the-way room in which to teach, but for Lauren and I to each teach 8 to 10 hours of lessons would require people coming to our house four days a week!) Thankfully, God used a friend of ours to help us get into a church. So now we are happily teaching all day Tuesday and the afternoons of Thursday (which explains the sometimes-late Tuesday posts. If I can't get something up before nine, then I have to wait until the evening). Everyone is pretty well organized and new music books have been ordered, so now we just have to start thinking about the Christmas program!
Next, Mama got together the school plan for Susanna, Micah, and Jonah, with our input. We are overseeing and teaching all the subjects for all three of them, though being occupied two days a week with music means that Mama is also busy working with them. I am excited to read through the American Adventure series with them (sadly no longer in print), which I read through as a child for fun. These kids are somewhat more reluctant readers, though they're all good at it, so the books have been incorporated into the school schedule for reading and history.
Written from a Christian perspective, the series follows a fictional family and their descendants from Holland in 1620 to Seattle in 1945, and along the way a lot of valuable American history is learned. If you do decide to check them out, just proceed with discernment, though, because there are a few books we skip or censor, though the vast majority of them are meritable.
Hospitality is something we've been working on this month, and I have thoroughly enjoyed it. What a ministry it is not only to the guests, but also to ourselves! We love getting the house clean, cooking delicious food, getting to know people better, and playing games until the sun goes down. What better way is there to brighten your corner?
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| We enjoyed getting to know this family! |
Last weekend, we took a quick trip to Spokane area to help host a Christian Heritage Homeschool Kick-Off Picnic. We enjoyed meeting many lovely families and had a superb day of fellowship with them. Thus, the picture at the beginning of this post of everyone competing in a relay. Our time spent with the friends hosting the picnic was also a blessing, and we were refreshed by their church and the fun afternoon at their house. Of course, we had to jaunt over to Grandma and Grandpa's house on Lake Coeur d'Alene, and even got some jet skiing in before we headed home on Monday.
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| l-r: Micah, Jonah, Mikaela, and Papa, with Melanie and Lauren in the background. We were putting our brains together for a trivia quiz! |
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| More quiz takers! |
We are back in our symphony again after taking two concerts off. After five years of getting to know all the symphony members, it has been fun to have Sarah and several friends from church join our ranks! We are relishing playing in a group setting again.
So now, one garage sale, two symphony practices, a date (with Jonah), and a funeral later (that is, the summation of the past seven days), I have caught you up on September! We are looking forward to going to a superior science museum on Wednesday, helping a friend move on Saturday, a Polish Festival, a work party, the opening weekend of Courageous, having another family over, a symphony children's concert and community concert, and the Foundations of Life conference over the next few weeks.
Fall is anything but routine, that's for sure!
*Smiles* I know exactly what you mean!! Such fun times, though...
ReplyDeleteHappy, sunny, September (at least today...)!