Month: April 2017

Rejoice:  I am really enjoying She Reads Truth’s Bible studies. I did the Isaiah study over Lent, and I think I am hooked.

Relate: We did a lot this week. The regular stuff feels like a lot right now, and some days I struggled. It also rained a lot this week, and all of the chaos of energetic boys had to be contained inside. Several times, the more sensitive members of the house needed headphones so that the noise of the rest wasn’t so overwhelming.

Remember:  We read stories and other things, and we did memory work and had morning meetings.

Reason:  We did math and grammar, logic and Latin.

Read:  I finished a couple of books (Chasing Slow and The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street.) (Disclosure: those are affiliate links, but as I write this, Chasing Slow is $1.99 for Kindle. The author has some interesting insights. I recommend the book.) I hope to finish Willa Cather’s O Pioneers before Book Club. Josiah finished up Bomb: The Race to Build and Steal the World’s Most Powerful Weapon. 

Record:  I did some journalling and a lot of editing of work for Micah. Micah did a lot of writing because he had two projects to finish. I have a project I’d like to start, but I am not sure it is time yet.

Restore:  Josiah noticed that we haven’t had a family game night in a very long time. I think that has to be on the plan for next week.

Margin:  Here, I am very proud of myself. I did say Yes to one thing this week that I probably should have not agreed to.  However, I was asked to commit eight hours to something on Saturday, and I said, “No.” I actually would have enjoyed it, but my body was demanding rest instead.

Josiah and Gideon finished their project of becoming Cycle 2 Memory Masters and spent two days hanging out with Gramma.  Micah and I went on a very enjoyable adventure to Austin with some friends. Not as much work was completed in the van as I had hoped because of some poor planning that led to technology problems. But other lessons were learned (like “Preparation is the key to success.”)

Yesterday was Week 14 for the Challenge students at our campus, so this begins the last week of work and preparation for Blue Book Exams. I like Blue Books because they tend to focus on the whole breadth of knowledge a student has acquired instead of nit-picking the little details. They allow a student to tell back what they have internalized from their curriculum. As a Challenge 1 Director, I liked to ask them to write an essay defining Freedom (using characters from course literature as examples) and explain how personal liberty effects our government and our economy. I am not the Challenge 1 Director this year, and I am grateful for that. I don’t know what my friend, who is my son’s tutor, will put on his exam, but we will make sure to have that discussion.

 As you saw if you follow @educatingoaks on Instagram, we did not at all have the week that I planned. Instead, we celebrated my mother-in-law’s life, and we began a new shadowy period of grief. We did some shopping, as Mimi would have appreciated seeing her little men in suits and ties. We learned the names of some flowers that we hadn’t noticed before. We talked about Jesus and heaven and death and eternal life. We learned some new-to-us family stories about Mimi. We spent time with family. We processed.

Part of educating these boys is walking them through life circumstances. They need to know how to meet new people, but they also need to know how to say good-bye (for now) to those they love. They need to know how to love well, but great love can lead to great grief, and they have to know how to grieve well also. So, they went to say good-bye to Mimi, and since she was unconscious, they knew they went for them and not for her. There were questions and tears, and there will be more in the coming days. We sang a few hymns for her and for our own spirits. The younger boys went to Gramma’s, and Micah, Jon, and I stayed with our family until Mimi was with Jesus, waiting and praying, singing and being.

This next week, the plans don’t look different than usual, but life does. We’ll be adjusting to life without Mimi and walking through Holy Week. Next Sunday is a celebration of Jesus’ Resurrection, and it will be our first holiday without our family’s primary hostess and party-planner. But we will celebrate because Jesus conquered death in order to bring us life, and because of that, Mimi is probably planning a party in heaven.