I had one of those rare days today in which I was able to actually relax and enjoy the day while getting a lot of extras done. For me, when I’m able to just be a mommy and housewife without adding on other job titles, I get quite excited. Most of my schedules each day are changed due to unforseen circumstances. Therefore, a normal day is a great day in our home!

I awoke this morning only to find that all the little ones were still sleeping. What bliss! I was able to get my devotions and a shower done before they decided to wake up. I knew right then that this was going to be a great day! The kids were motivated to get their schooling done quickly so that they could go into town with their big sister for the afternoon. Guess what that means?!!! Free time for me while the older ones are gone and the little ones take naps!!! I have been yearning to get back into the habit of making our own homemade yogurt, so that was first on my to-do list. 5 hours later I had 2 1/2 quarts of beautiful, creamy yogurt. Since I had new-found energy, I tackled the sack of apples and made an apple pie. My 6 year old helped me and soon was enjoying making her own little pies with the left-over pieces of pie crust and apples. I remember how I used to do that with my mother when I was her age. Ah - what sweet, sweet memories! While the pie was in the oven, Joyanna helped me hang the clothes on the line. Yes - I’m one of these moms who love to save electricity by putting all the clothes I can on the line. They look so pretty flapping in the wind and they smell so good!

To top off the evening, my sweetheart took me out for the evening. We try to have a date night every 2 weeks, so I was really looking forward to spending time alone with him. Even though the evening was too short, it was still a blessing to have time alone to visit together. The Lord is bringing new adventures into our life, it appears - so having time to talk through all that was appreciated. Proverbs 3:5,6 kept going through my head as we discussed what the future holds. “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not on your own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths.” We are literally clinging to that verse at this time. In the near future, we’ll share our new adventures with you - but for now - please just keep praying for our family. It’s so easy to say “have faith”. It’s another thing to put that faith into action.

Well - that was my simple, but wonderful day! I’d love to hear from you moms to see what a normal day looks like for you! As moms we need to be able to encourage and pray for one another. Let me know how I can do that for you!

Becky, God’s Eternal Masterpiece

www.godseternalmasterpiece.com

The summer of 2011 went by too fast for our family! As we begin another homeschool year, we rejoice in all the memories made during the summer months. While we thoroughly enjoyed taking the bookstore around to various homeschool conferences in the midwest while meeting new friends, we were still relieved when we could actually slow down and just enjoy being at home with our own family. Many of the hot days of summer were spent harvesting the garden, watching the children swim in their pool, and renewing our weary souls. As we have discovered over the years, traveling and managing a bookstore tends to take away from the extra time we used to have just studying God’s Word. We have been convicted that as a family, we need to spend more time in our personal devotions and less time doing things that don’t truly count for eternity. To help in this endeavor, we are now using “Who is God?” by Apologia Curriculum. This apologetic curriculum is perfect for our family devotional time around the breakfast table. As we read about the various characteristics of God, our children work in the accompanying notebooking journal or coloring book which emphasizes scripture memorization and putting various doctrines into practice. (This material has great strengthened our children’s Christian worldview, so we are now offering it, along with volumes 2 & 3, in our bookstore at www.godseternalmasterpiece.com.)

We also worked on serving one another with love and humility. It comes easier for some of our children; however, it was a struggle for others. As each child assisted another sibling in picking berries, cleaning their bedroom, hanging laundry on the line, etc, we saw stronger sibling unity and a great love for one another being established. Even our one year old joined in by helping to pick the blueberries, strawberries, and blackberries while the older children were doing it. Of course, many of the berries ended up in his mouth - but that’s OK! It was a great source of Vitamin C!

Summer wrapped up with our vacation to the Iowa Regular Baptist Camp for Family Camp. What a joy to be refreshed physically and spiritually there! We all enjoyed the zip line, archery, swimming, boating, and reviving friendships with believers of like faith. Yes, there were loads of laundry to wash and overgrown weeds to pull when we came back home, but that’s OK! The memories made as a family were worth the work afterwards!

Now we are looking forward to what this new school year will bring us. It appears that the Lord has some new challenges for us in the days ahead, but we’ll tackle those as they come. It is so encouraging to know that God has promised never to leave us or forsake us!

Let us know how your summer went and what God’s been doing in your family! We can then rejoice together in all the amazing ways God works!

Becky, God’s Eternal Masterpiece, Mason City Iowa

How many teens or college students can you name that have walked away from the Lord in just the past five years? My parents and I know of a lot, and it hurts to see it happening.
I started noticing several college age students walking away from the Lord when I was about fourteen years old. It broke my heart every time I heard of someone saying being taken off the membership list at our church because they weren’t living for God. As the years went by, I could see Satan working and turning the teens away. More and more often, I heard of another person who was not living for God. I wanted to do something, but felt like I couldn’t do anything.
My friend in the Amana Colonies then told me of a Bright Lights leaders’ training that was going to be going on in Cedar Rapids. I didn’t know a lot of what Bright Lights was at the time, but my parents and I thought it would be good for me to go to. So in October of 2009, I went to the week long leaders’ training. I really enjoyed it being there. There were about twenty-six girls there ranging from 14-25 years old. All but one of the girls were homeschooled. They came from all over the country. Most of them were from Wisconsin, Michigan, and Iowa, but there were some that flew in from Maine and Washington.
Bright Lights is a discipleship group for young girls who desire to live for the Lord. It teaches girls to live strong for the Lord during their teen years and the rest of their lives. BRIGHT stands for “Being Radiant In Godliness, Holiness, and Testimony.” Some of the lessons that it goes through is contentment, truthfulness, modesty, honoring your parents, turning your heart to your father, and purity. It was a Bible study started by a lady named Sarah Mally when she was seventeen years old, and has grown to be over 300 groups worldwide.
Sarah Mally taught most of the time during the leaders’ training, and several other leaders gave testimonies and taught as well. During that week, I learned a lot about how to lead a Bright Lights group, how to rightly divide the word of God especially as I teach, and and rewards and demands of any kind of ministry. I learned so much and was spiritually refreshed.
At the end of the week, I went home and told my parents that I wanted to start my own Bright Lights group for girls here in north Iowa. So I sent in a leader’s application and got permission from my pastor. In February of 2010, we had our first Bright Lights meeting with eight girls.
At first it was discouraging, because we had problems right away. But I got advice from others and God helped me take care of the problems. I’ve also had a lot of encouragement from other Bright Lights leaders and the staff at the main office in Cedar Rapids.
I also thought that Bright Lights would just be some way that I could help disciple young girls and help them to live for the Lord. But as I quickly found out, I have learned a lot as a leader that’s helped me grow spiritually. I’ve also been able to help train a few highschool girls how to teach in a small group setting.
What we do at a normal Bright Lights meeting is we first start with singing. We sing hymns and a few Bright Lights songs, because I want the girls to appreciate the good hymns that were written so long ago. After singing, I teach the Bible lesson, and then we split up into two small groups to discuss the lesson. We also do an activity such as a game, skits, and crafts, and then have snacks that the girls take turns making.
We do dress up during Bright Lights, so that the girls can learn to be young ladies at Bright Lights, and it helps makes the atmosphere as a time a worship God instead of casual and fun. I also try to teach the girls how to serve in the church and during Bright Lights. I don’t want the girls to just be getting more knowledge, but to put it into practice and make it part of their daily lives. If you’re not using the gifts and talents for serving the Lord, it is easier to slip in the spiritual walk and then eventually that leads to the path of not living for the Lord.
I also like to have the parents involved in the girls’ lives. After each Bright Lights meeting, I give the parents a letter telling about what we talked about in Bright Lights, so that the parents can continue to encourage thier daughters in those areas in their lives. I’ve also had some moms help out with Bright Lights meetings, and in November we’ll be doing a Father Daughter night. Parents have an important role in their daughters’ lives and even if they don’t know it, their daughters do look up to them. Without my parents, I definitely would not be the kind of person I am, and I probably would not have started Bright Lights.
Bright Lights has been good for me and it’s amazing to see the results and see how God works. Even though it does get discouraging at times, the outcome is amazing and God is glorified, which is more important. My prayer is that the young ladies in Bright Lights will see the importance of living for the Lord, make lifelong commitments in their lives, and be leaders in their youth groups and churches.
If you have a daughter between the ages of 10-14 and you would be interested in the Bright Lights group, please feel free to contact me at godseternalmasterpiece@gmail.com. There are Bright Lights groups all over the United States. We can see if there is one in your area!

Jennifer - daughter of Jesse and Becky

God’s Eternal Masterpiece - providing your family with godly, character building products for God’s glory!

Throughout the last 18 years of homeschooling, we are constantly changing and refining the way we do our learning and homeschooling.  I first began teaching my oldest son with textbooks and workbooks.  Over the years, however, we began doing less and less workbooks and many more hands-on projects and literature studies.  I began seeing that children learn more with “living books” and when they can see, hear, and touch what they are learning.  Each time I abolish another textbook and workbook, two things happen.  1 - My children cheer!  2 - We begin having much less stress in our homeschooling and much more joy in learning. 

I used to shun the Charlotte Mason style of learning, but over time, I find myself really appreciating her ideas about what a child’s education should consist of.  It makes a lot of sense and I find it working for almost all of my children.  (Please note that I said “most” of my children.  I have one child that would prefer the textbook/workbook style of learning.  However, the other 7 prefer learning through literature, hands-on projects, and real-life experiences.)  Let me introduce you to Charlotte Mason.  She was an educator in the 1800’s, in England, who had very strong ideas of what a child’s education should and should not look like.  She was appalled by how much time was wasted with busywork.  Charlotte believed that learning should be exciting and should cause the child to naturally love learning.  Work should be able to be done in a relatively short amount of time. 

Much of the learning can be done through the reading of living books, art and nature appreciation,  copywork, dictation, notebooking, and narration.  I will admit - I balked at first at the idea that one doesn’t need textbooks and workbooks to teach a child.  However, during the last few years, I have seen our children learn much more as we slowly incorpoate Charlotte’s learning methods.  I’ll try to show you how we use the various methods in our home.

Copywork:  Copywork is not the practice of one’s handwriting.  Instead, it involves copying whatever you place before the child so that every detail in capitalization, grammar, punctuation, and spelling is correct.  This can be done using copywork books (sold in our store), language lessons, or with your own pieces of literature.  In our home, we use this particularly while working on our language arts workbook.  We absolutely love Language Lessons by Sandi Queen (sold separately in our bookstore, www.godseternalmasterpiece.com).  The lessons are short and only take 10-15 minutes to do.  The children practice copying various words, sentences, poems, speeches, etc.  After they believe they’ve perfectly copied their assignment, they bring it to me to check.  If there is even one error, they have to do it again.  It only takes a day or two, and the kids make absolutely sure the work is correct before they bring it to me!  Capitalization, punctuation, and grammar rules are memorized quickly, in a natural way, as a result of copywork.  Most of my kids also learn correct spelling as a result, also.  However, I will say that I have one child that does not learn spelling well from copywork.  He still needs to be reminded of the phonetical and spelling rules.  Therefore, I use “The Natural Speller” with him (also sold in our God’s Eternal Masterpiece bookstore).  It is for grades 1-12 and reinforces all the spelling rules as he moves from grade to grade.  We also use copywork for math facts.  Instead of just using boring flash cards and drilling the kids non-stop, we let them copy the math facts.  That way it’s drilled into their heads while they are copying the facts.  They learn the correct answers quite easily, it seems.

Living Books:  Living books are books that bring any subject, character, and time period to life.  Historical fiction, great biographies, many of the character-building books from the early 1900’s, and more can be included.   Many of our favorite living books include Lamplighter Publishing books, historical books by Emma Leslie, Jotham’s Journey (and the other books in the series), and The Testimony of Charlie Coulson.  (These books are all available on our website, www.godseternalmasterpiece.com).  Kids can learn facts from a textbook, but they quickly forget them.  Read a well-written book from the time period you are studying, and the facts and characters come alive, thus sticking in a child’s memory forever.  When we are reading a great book, many times our kids will run to the internet to look up even more information about that subject.  They will also ask to do crafts or field trips based on what they’ve learned from the literature.  Their love for learning has been fanned by spending time reading a good book with mom!  I enjoy the fact that I can teach children of all ages can learn from the same book I’m reading to them.  I don’t have to be stressed out trying to teach each grade level textbook to each child separately this way.  No advance preparation is needed on my part. 

Narration: Narration is simply having the child tell what he or she has learned.  A child enjoys this much more than filling out blanks in a workbook just so that mom can know what he has comprehended.  It’s so simple to do.  In our home, after reading a chapter of a book, I’ll simply ask who can tell me what they enjoyed about the book.  I also might send a younger child to a teenager to tell them what the book was about.  The little ones love to go on and on about every little detail of the book.  A favorite is when daddy comes home from work.  The kids love to run to daddy to tell them about what they learned in school that day.  Daddy gets to be included in the day, that way, and the kids are reiterating the knowledge they’ve gained from good books.  Sometimes, daddy will ask more questions, which gets them thinking and analyzing even more. 

Dictation:  Dictation is the toughest for the kids, but still workable since it’s done in short spurts.  I usually use it basically for my high school kids.  Instead of copying various pieces of speeches, poems, etc., I read it to the child.  They write it down and pay close attention to the various rules of grammar, punctuation, capitalization, spelling, etc.   This helps the teens to become exact in their writing skills.

Notebooking:  Notebooking looks different to different people.  My high school daughter, Janette, learns best when she is putting everything she learns into a scrapbook form.  She loves using Apologia science and the corresponding notebooks for that very reason.  Reports or small paragraphs are written and placed in a fun way into a colorful scrapbook/notebook.  Extra features are added to make it a keepsake.  My older elementary children enjoy making simple notebooks with facts, maps, and pictures while I am reading science or historical novels to them.  It keeps their hands busy while they are listening and assimilating what I’m reading to them.  Our preschoolers like making simple books out of colored paper with stickers and markers.  They draw pictures of what they hear us reading about.  As they explain their pictures to us, I’m always amazed at what all they’ve picked up on.  Notebooks and journals are also used when we go on nature hikes in our woods or in state parks.  The kids find all sorts of interesting clues about various plants or animals which they then write about or draw.  When they get home, they pull out the nature books so they can add extra bits of facts to each notebook page.  (Nature hikes are also great for collecting rocks, leaves and flowers (for pressing and identifying), etc.) 

I hope you’ve gotten a glimpse what our homeschool looks like now.  We do still use some textbooks - like for math.  However, even in math - I’m learning to do things with a more laid-back approach.  We’ll discuss that another time.  If you yearn to enjoy homeschooling more, I urge you to consider looking at the literature approach, the unit-study approach, or the Charlotte Mason approach to learn instead of using just textbooks and workbooks like the government schools do.  You might be surprised at how enjoyable learning truly can be!

Becky - God’s Eternal Masterpiece 

As I child I learned the verse, Philippians 4:19 “But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus”.  Although I want to say we always live by that verse, I have to admit that many times I fail in fully trusting God to truly supply all we need.  This lesson in trust has been pounded in my head on a daily basis during the last few months.

Back in November, 2010, our geothermal unit quit working properly.  We’ve had problems with it for the past 6 years, but we’ve always managed to get it going again.  However, it became apparent that it was on its last leg.  In December, during our first big blizzard, the unit completely died, leaving us with a small back-up unit as our only heat source.  We immediately fired up our wood stove to heat up the living room area.  For the next 7 weeks, we had to work extra hard in keeping the house somewhat warm while we waited for a new geothermal unit to arrive.  Our church family loaned us several little “child-proof” heaters so that the kids could be warm in their bedrooms at night.  Another neighbor gave us wood for our woodstove since our wood pile was quickly diminishing. We did a lot of baking during those weeks so that the kitchen could stay warm!  Heat quickly became a luxury and we better could empathize with those who struggle to have heat during the cold winter months. 

While the Lord was obviously caring for us through the assistance of our church family, I still had a tendency to fret about how we’d come up with the finances to pay for the new furnace.  Sometimes I think God must just shake his head in dismay when He sees me showing such a lack of faith in His ability to provide.  Yet - God continues to show his utmost love and concern for us in spite of our doubts and fears.  Last week when our furnace was due to arrive, God once again showed us his great power.  At just the last minute, the last of the funds miraculously came in for the furnace.  Once again I had to humbly ask the Lord to forgive me for my lack of faith. 

The furnace was installed and I’d love to say that that’s the end of the story - but it’s not.  The day after we began enjoying the amazing warmth of 70 degree heat in the house, we were shocked to discover that we had very little water pressure.  It quickly became impossible to flush a toilet, wash hands, or take a shower.  The workmen came back out and worked on the furnace all day, only to discover that we either have a faulty piece on the new geothermal unit OR our 12 year old well is going bad.  We had a choice to make in the meantime.  Have heat (which will use up all the water) or have water and no heat.  Once again, it’s been easy for me to question God.  Yet, I know better.  God has never failed us nor forsaken us.  He has ALWAYS met our needs.  As I pondered upon this in church this morning, I quickly came to the realization that I am expending energy in worrying that could be used in a more profitable way - like serving and glorifying God.  I made the conscious decision to immediately turn the issue over to God as I Peter 5:7 says, “Casting all your care upon Him for He careth for you”.  I was then freed up to focus on what God wanted to teach me through the scriptures being expounded.  What a feeling of relief!  By the way - when we were done with the service, I happened to open a card that was in our church mailbox.  In that card was a note of encouragement and a $50 bill!  God once again was showing us that He is still in the business of providing all of our needs. Are our problems completely solved yet?  No - but that’s OK because I have the best Provider in the world taking care of the problem! 

I don’t know what trials you are going through right now - but could I encourage you a bit?  Turn it fully over to the Lord and see what great and mighty things He has in store for you!  You may not get everything exactly like you want it, but God knows what is best for you and He has great blessings for you when you let Him show you with great and awesome power.  May you have the joy of the Lord today as you rest fully on Him!

Becky, God’s Eternal Masterpiece

www.godseternalmasterpiece.com

I have been amazed at the number of articles written lately about feeding a family of 4 for only $300.  We even have a book in our bookstore, Cut Your Grocery Bill in Half  With America’s Cheapest Family.   The book is chock full of great ideas for eating well for less money.  (Visit us at www.godseternalmasterpiece.com for more information about that book.)  Everyone is feeling the financial crunch and is anxious to save money. 

A few days ago I sat down and did some figuring with our own family budget.  To my surprise, I realized that we feed our family of 10 for an average of $400 (and many times less) per month.  For those of you who know me, I’m big on eating whole grains and making sure each family member gets a minimum of 5 servings of fruits and veggies a day.  We also eat organic as much as possible.  Many people find it impossible to eat healthy on that budget, but it is very possible.  Does it take quite a bit of work?  Yes - but it is possible.  We haven’t gotten to where I’d like to be, health-wise, but I feel like we’ve made quite a few strides toward the right direction.  Some critics may think we’re starving ourselves after reading this, but that’s not the case.  (You’d know that’s not the fact if you saw us!)  Do we work at eating proper servings?  Yes.  We don’t believe our teens need to eat 4 times the required amount just because they are teens.  They learn to eat proper servings and are much happier because they don’t have to worry about being overweight, fight excessive acne, feel extra sluggish, and other conditions that are food-related. 

As a disclaimer, I fully realize that many people cannot do what we all do to save money.  Therefore, please understand that I do not judge those who must spend more on groceries.  However, I do heartily urge folks to re-consider what they truly can and cannot do.  I also understand that we live in the midwest, which is cheaper than big cities or the coasts when it comes to food costs.  Everyone’s situation truly is different.

Here’s some things we don’t do, which help us to save. 

1.  We don’t buy pop, kool-aid, or any other drinks which add on calories, sugar, and other junk.  Water is the preferred beverage for everyone in our home, even when we’re in restaurants or at social gatherings

2.  We rarely buy pre-packaged or processed foods.  It’s much healthier and much cheaper to cook from scratch.  I have found it cheaper to make my own pizzas, tortillas, lasagna, soups, etc. than buying the cheap stuff loaded with additives from the store.  It’s easier and much more filling to eat oatmeal with fruit for breakfast than it is to eat cold boxed cereal.  Our kids also like to eat homemade muffins with fruit smoothies, so that’s another alternative to the cereal route. 

3.  We rarely use the required amount of meat or cheese called for in recipes.  Most foods taste great with just half the amount called for.  We also don’t use the expensive cuts of meat or cheeses.  Steaks, pork chops, and other big cuts of meat rarely come in our home.  Even though we enjoy those things, they are not necessary to have.

4.  We don’t make or eat a lot of desserts or unhealthy snacks.  My family will attest that I love anything with sugar and chocolate, so I have to work hard at not allowing those on the counter too often.  Usually we keep those for occasions when we have guests or are celebrating.  It really is much more filling when our kids have a homemade granola bar, grapes, yogurt, or a handful of trail mix for a snack.

Here’s what we do to save money on groceries.

1.  We buy in bulk.  I buy my grains completely in bulk.  Once a year I purchase 200 pounds of wheat through my local food coop.  My brown rice, oatmeal, and other grains also come through the coop.  I mill our own flour and we make our own breads, bagels, rolls, pizza crusts, and other grain-based foods.  The only thing I don’t make is the pasta - mainly due to the time involved.  I buy that in bulk from Sam’s Club, the coop, or when a super deal shows up on whole grain pasta at the local grocery store. 

Whenever I see a great deal on a certain product, I use the money I’ve saved and budgeted for groceries, to buy a large amount.  For example, today butter was on sale for $1.44 at our local grocery store.  Normally it’s $2.99.  As you are probably imagining, I bought 10 pounds of it so that I can get through the winter baking without purchasing it again.  And yes - we do make good use of our freezers and extra refrigerator.  Yes, I know, those appliances do use electricity, which translates into money, but the cost is still much, much cheaper.  I buy a majority of our food items in bulk when it comes out to be much cheaper.  The challenge for me is making sure that I don’t buy more than we can use in a reasonable amount of time.  Sometimes it is easy to get too much.  When that happens, we give the extra away to those in need.

2.  We have a large garden.  God has been good in allowing us to have a garden.  I’ve discovered that many people can do container gardening or square foot gardening if they truly want to have fresh produce.  We have been blessed with a large plot of land, so we enjoy spreading ours out, although I sometimes question if that’s wise since it takes more time to weed gardens when they are spread out.  I plant as many dark and antioxidant-rich foods as possible.  This year we were finally able to enjoy the blueberries, cherries, raspberries, and blackberries in abundance which we had planted 3 years ago.  The kids love to each choose a section of the garden as “theirs”.  They get to choose the seeds, but are then required to tend it as well.  This year we were blessed with bok choy, pak choi, spinach, carrots, tomatoes, onion, squash, pumpkin, grapes, tomatoes, multi-colored peppers, beans, herbs, cabbage, bitter melon, and much more.  While we froze much of it, some of it was canned into various soups, sauces, jams, syrups, and juices for the winter.  We also made our own homemade applesauce, pie fillings, pears, peaches, etc. by buying fruit in bulk from locals who had plenty of produce they were willing to part with at lower prices.  Sometimes God blessed us by just giving us cases of produce free from friends and neighbors.

3.  We make foods from cheaper cuts of meat or use beans for main dishes.  When roasting a chicken, I’ve quickly discovered that you can feed a 1/2 large chicken at one meal with rice (or potatoes) and veggies.  The other 1/2 is cut up and used in the next day’s casserole.  Many times, it stretches into two days of casseroles.  One pound of ground beef can easily be stretched when making casseroles.  If I’m making meatloaf, I can add quite a bit of oatmeal or mashed beans in to a 1/2 pound of ground beef.  The kids have yet to realize that it’s not pure meat.  Even our guests have commented that it’s one of the best meatloaves (or meatballs) they’ve ever had.   Many times, we have beans every other day.  Beans are cheap, full of fiber, and high in protein.  It’s now common to have beans and rice tortillas or black bean soups instead of using meat in them.

4.  We eat simply.  A majority of our recipes use only a handful of ingredients.  We’ve discovered that vegies are great simply steamed or sauteed with some herbs, spices, or soy sauce.  Expensive ingredients or additional ingredients such as your fancier cheeses, nuts, and pre-packaged ingredients are simply cut out of the recipe.  Some meat, raw veggies, and mustard in a whole wheat tortilla makes a great and filling lunch.  Throw tomato juice, beans, rice, and veggies in a pot and you’ve got almost-instant soup!  Baby carrots, apple slices, or grapes work great instead of a side dish or potato chips.  Salads are an instant meal in themselves.  I could go on and on about we eat quickly and easily.  However, I’ll save you the agony!     

4.  I look for the bargains and use coupons whenever possible.  Many people just laugh at me, but I love finding a good bargain.  It’s like a treasure hunt just waiting to happen!  Whenever, I go grocery shopping, I don’t whiz in and whiz out of there.  Usually I’m there for a good hour or more.  (That’s why I only do it once every two weeks!)  I have discovered that most stores have clearance items somewhere on those shelves.  Many times they are in the early part of the week or late at night.  (Guess when I like to do my shopping?!!)  I love to compare prices in the ads, hunt for the bargain deals in the stores, and then add coupons on top of the bargains.  Double coupons are even more fun.  Target is one of my favorite stores because they give lots of store coupons.  I use those with manufacturer coupons when they have certain items on sale.  Quite often, I pay just pennies for products that should’ve cost dollars otherwise.  My goal is to save at least 50% on each item I buy.  Many times, it’s more like 75%.  When I do find good deals, I stock up.  I’ve also discovered great deals at farmer’s markets.  Many times folks will sell you larger amounts at cheaper prices if you just ask.  Bakery outlets are another great place to buy foods cheaper.  (However, make sure you know your figures before going in there since not everything is cheaper.)  When I have a social event suddenly come up and I don’t have enough buns in my freezer, I’ve found it pretty easy to buy several dozen buns for less than $2.  I also have found our store, Aldis, to be very economical when I need something in a hurry.  As you’ve probably guessed, I’m not afraid to use day-old food or slightly damaged produce, since no food out there is just one day old or perfect anyway  (unless it comes from your garden!).  I’m pretty big on making sure it isn’t rotting or nutritionally compromised, however,  There is a limit to what is acceptable to eat.   

Well, I must end this for now, but we’ll try to write more on this subject another time in the future.  I’d love to hear what you do to save money on your groceries.  Send me your ideas and I’ll try to post them as a way of helping others on their economic journey!  May the Lord richly bless you as you use His resources wisely!

Becky, God’s Eternal Masterpiece

www.godseternalmasterpiece.com

I apologize for not keeping up with the blogs, but life has had plenty of ups and downs for us lately.  Thank you for your patience.  Many of you may know what it’s like to deal with special medical needs in your children; however, for us, it’s been a new road to travel.  Yes, we’ve dealt with slight autistic issues and speech delays in our adopted son for the last 3 years.  However, the Lord saw fit to teach us even more during the past 3 months or so.  This summer we began noticing that our 5 year old daughter would constantly space out while she was talking to us.  Our little “brain child” who loved to memorize scripture and who seemed to have a photographic memory suddenly couldn’t remember anything from one moment to the next.  She desperately wanted to learn to read, but she became very frustrated when she realized she couldn’t even remember a letter one minute after learning about it. 

By October, it was obvious that something was very wrong.  Our happy little girl went from energetic and bright to moody and withdrawn.  It became impossible for me to teach her kindergarten because she’d be spacing out constantly.  All I could think about was that my child must have a brain tumor or something.  (Cancer runs in our family, so it’s easy to concentrate on that thought.)  I prayed desperately for God to give us back our little happy girl, but God very clearly emphasized to us through His Word that He was sovereign and that all things work together for good to those who love Him.  We realized that we should never take good health for granted.  Instead we should be thankful for our children’s situations, no matter what kind of health they are in.  I began learning to thank God for all the blessings God had bestowed upon Joyanna instead of just worrying about the negatives.  All of her little drawings, pictures, and funny sayings became instant precious memories to us.  I found myself wanting to spend much more time with Joyanna and the other chilren as the days ticked by while our daughter got intensively worse.  Intently cleaning the house and doing all those other extras just didn’t seem as important anymore.  Being with my kids, teaching them God’s Word, and raising them for the Lord today - not just tomorrow - became much more important. 

One Sunday in October, I noticed that Joyanna had become much worse.  I couldn’t trust her to be near steps or around the stove because she’d go into her own little world while moving around in odd movements.  It was then that the Lord brought my sister-in-law to mind.  She’s a fantastic pediatrician who really knows her stuff.  As soon as I called her and talked to her about Joyanna, she immediately confirmed that we were most likely dealing with petit mal seizures.  We then met with our own family doctor who immediately scheduled an EEG for the next morning.  That night Joyanna had a dream come true.  She got to stay up all night and have a Mommy-daughter and Daddy-daughter party while everyone else had to sleep!  (We didn’t quite find it as much fun, but it was necessary since she had to be sleep deprived for the EEG.)  Boy was it a party!  We fingerpainted, baked cookies, played Candyland, colored pictures, played internet games, and finished it off with a very early morning trip to McDonalds. 

The EEG confirmed the doctors’ suspicions.  She was literally having hundreds of seizures each day - up to 6 every minute.  No wonder she couldn’t remember anything.  It was affecting her emotions and short-term memory!  As my husband and I read the report, it amazed us that she could do anything at all!  All we could do was praise the Lord for surrounding us with loved ones and doctors who could get on top of this quickly.  Joyanna is now adjusting to her medicine which she must take on a regular basis to help regulate these absence seizures.  She also has to have blood tests done every so often to make sure the liver isn’t being damaged.  The seizures have now been controlled, with the exception of a rare breakthrough seizure here and there once or twice a week.  Joyanna’s smile is back and she’s excited about school again.  Bible verses are being memorized daily and today she was able to read her first 3-word sentence!  She literally danced around the house while reading her sentence over and over again.   Each time she comes bouncing back to the table I thank the Lord for allowing me to see the joy on her face once again.

Are all the problems over?  I doubt it.  God knows that we are refined more for his glory as we go through these valleys.  However, I am so thankful that once again, God has shown Himself faithful.  He has reminded us of His goodness to us and He was shown His grace even during the times of uncertainty.  We have also been shown once again that our children are a precious gift from God and that should never be taken for granted. 

Thanks to all of you around the world who prayed for us as we were going through all of this.  Some of you sent special gifts to Joyanna and let me tell you - that made her day!  She hugged those stickers, cards, and books as if they were the best things she had ever received.  While she was getting her blood drawn, EEG performed, etc, we would remind her that people all over were praying for her.  That would instantly calm her as she realized that her situation was being kept before the throne of her Heavenly Father. 

We would love to hear from those of you who also have been dealing with medical issues with your children.  Your testimonies of God’s goodness to you, suggestions, and prayer requests will encourage all of us.  Feel free to comment!  May the Lord richly bless you as you raise your “gifts from God” for his honor and glory - despite the tough circumstances!!

Jesse and Becky - God’s Eternal Masterpiece

www.godseternalmasterpiece.com

Many of you have asked how we homeschool and what material we use and recommend.  First of all, please understand that what we use is great for us, but may not work at all for your family.  I am a firm believer in the fact that every child learns differently and needs to have his education tailored to his needs and his learning style.  What works for one of my kids, may not work for another.  We do not use the same publishers and curricula for every child.  Having said that, I can tell you what has worked best for us and what hasn’t.  Since it can get to be a rather lengthy discussion, I plan to break it up into sections.

Although my oldest child was an analytical child who learned anything he read in a textbook almost immediately, I soon learned in his early childhood years that doing textbooks and workbooks for every subject was boring and dry.  Children learn best when touching, hearing, and seeing the material being presented to them.  I did use Bob Jones material for Kindergarten since I love their method of teaching phonics and reading.  I also use their reading program in 1st grade so that my kids have a strong foundation in proper phonics, grammar, and spelling.  However, after that we branched out.  Because I had only a few kids when I began homeschooling our oldest children, we began using KONOS, which emphasizes unit studies, literature, and hands-on projects.  Our children absolutely loved studying the medieval days, horses, insects, the Civil War, and much more as godly character traits were taught to them on a day-to-day basis.  To this day, we love KONOS, but do it only for short studies since I don’t have near the time needed to prepare all the hands-on projects that correlate with the lessons. 

When God began blessing us with more children, we moved more to a classical education which involves reading LOTS of living books as a family.  What are living books?  I’m glad you asked!!  Living books are books which make history, science, etc. come alive for the child.  We find that many of the older books and classical books do a better job of that than do many of the more modern stories.  The older books also teach godly character, proper grammar, and respect for authority.  We’ll get into specific authors and recommendations at a later time.  We began thinking outside of the box and we quit doing everything just like the government school did it when we were growing up.  Instead, we began doing many more studies outdoors in nature, field trips, interviewing various people in various occupations, ministering as a family in the community, and playing educational games.  As we planted the garden, we studied the ant houses, the various parts of the plant, how to identify the various tree leaves and weeds, how to identify the various classifications of animals/insects/birds, animal tracks, various ecosystems, and the list goes on and on.  The children loved this much more than just reading textbooks and doing workbooks.  I also discovered that they were learning much more this way.  In fact, their basic skills tests proved it when they began showing scores in the 97-99 percentile for the nation. 

We still do textbooks for math, spelling, and some English - but much of the other learning comes through the other methods I mentioned above.  I also quickly learned that the younger children learn what the older children are learning just by being in the same room with them, so I moved to teaching the younger ones the same material.  That saved on time and the older children enjoyed mentoring the younger children on what was being taught to them.  I began seeing the benefits of the one-room schoolhouse style of learning!

Anyway, we’ll stop there for now.  Next time, I’ll get into more specifics of what we use for homeschooling.  May the Lord richly bless you as you raise and educate your children for Him!

Becky, God’s Eternal Masterpiece

Visit us at www.godseternalmasterpiece.com for many more recommendations on godly homeschool curriculum, books, and materials!

I don’t know about you, but it is very easy for me to make great and mighty plans for our summer - only to see those plans dashed in a matter of days.  This summer I had hoped to spend time each day reading classical literature to my children each day under the shade tree.  I had also planned to review math with each child, spend one on one time with each of the 8 kids on mother/daughter or son outings, and build up their godly character through short, biblical character studies.  Somewhere along the line we were going to go to the beach, visit the fossil quarry nearby, and have at least 2 picnics a month after getting all the flower gardens weeded and the house cleaned from top to bottom.  Take a wild guess how much got done?!!!  Maybe 10% of my plans were fulfilled!

Instead of seeing my plans come to fruition, God had other plans.  We had several children who needed special attention come into our  home on various occasions during the last few months.  My kids thoroughly enjoyed having new playmates, but they also didn’t receive as much attention as I might have wished to give them.  The garden needed much more weeding than I dreamed possible, various homeschoolers dropped by for advice and counsel, our bookstore required more attention than we expected, we ended up taking 2 of our daughters to Chicago for National Talents for Christ competition, we became involved in preparations for Vacation Bible School, and the list goes on and on.  I was tempted to get discouraged as I realized another summer was flying by without my dreams and desires being fulfilled; however, it hit me like a ton of bricks that those were MY plans and MY desires.  They weren’t necessarily God’s plans.  God’s ways are always higher than our ways and it is vitally important that we remember that. 

Recently I reflected on what God has done in our children’s lives this summer.  Because of our trip to the National Talents for Christ competition, we saw our family bond together in amazing ways as we traveled in the car together.  The 2 older girls reviewed their scripture memory while we listened to them quote it.  We had plenty of time to listen to scripture on CD also while talking about God’s work in our personal and spiritual lives.  As we toured the Field Museum of History, we discussed the fallacies of evolution and God’s hand in ancient history up to the present age.  When we had other children in our home, God gave us the joy of seeing one of the little girls come to a saving knowledge of Christ.  What an eternal reward!  As we weeded the garden and harvested the blueberries and raspberries, the kids were able to open up to me, one by one, and tell me about their struggles and questions in understanding their daily devotions and their life in general.  Great strides in godly character were made there in the garden and in the kitchen while working on produce.  I saw my older daughters mature rapidly in their homemaking skills as they took on more of the home responsibilities as I did the business.  Our 11 year old asked to help out with God’s Eternal Masterpiece and she got more math review in than I could’ve ever given her if I had handed her a textbook.  She has become our little computer guru and loves to help us out with the bookstore inventory and processing.  We didn’t have time to get in the swimming lessons, but I discovered that the children learned how to swim on their own as they went out to play in the pool each day.  They now can do more with swimming than I ever dreamed was possible.  I can’t help but think that the Lord is chuckling as He sees me marveling in His work in our family’s summer life.  It is so nice to know that God will accomplish that which is good in His timing and with His power - not mine.  Do I still hope to get the beach and a picnic or two in?  Yes, but if it doesn’t happen, that’s OK.  There may be more important things to do that holds much more value in eternity.

I can’t help but come back to one of my favorite passages of scripture - Proverbs 3:5,6.  “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.  In all thy ways acknowledge Him and He SHALL direct your path.” 

Have a wonderful summer!!

Becky - God’s Eternal Masterpiece

www.godseternalmasterpiece.com