A good half day

Today is the last day of school before the Christmas and New Year’s break. JD and I are both very excited. (Maybe me more than JD, or maybe not.) We had a good half school day and then headed off to church to help out at the Toy Store.

The devotion was about the first one way street establishment way back in 1791. Can you guess where the devotion will lead? Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me.” (This is where the devotion stopped and Cheryl takes over.) Street signs save us from a lot of trouble. Imagine going the wrong way down a one-way street. Can you say disastrous? Now imagine you ignore the one way to get to heaven that God provided for us…eternal disaster! It is only by believing in Jesus and asking him to be your savior that you will ever get to see heaven. Otherwise you’re headed the wrong direction down the wrong street. Being a good person doesn’t get you out of a traffic ticket and it won’t get you out of hell either.

The math lesson was all about line graphs and line plots. They both show changes over time. It was a fairly simple lesson. They showed us the needed labels for each type. One of the questions was the number of cups of coffee the teachers drank in a week. The lessons answer was 103 cups. (Hi my name is Cheryl and I’m a caffeine addict…Hi Cheryl.) I drink 100 cups during our school week. I’m not sure how many teachers were in the question but I’m sure none of them have a coffee pot in their classroom like I do. Smile) During our lesson JD caught a spelling error in one of the questions. It said, “Each read dot represents 1 student.” Jonathan said, “Hey they typed read not red.” Oh the little things that make me smile.

For language arts JD rewrote the repetitious prayer thing he ripped up Saturday. It was the letter to remind him of things to ask God to help him with and things to be thankful for. The three things he wrote for having God help him with were finding time to read the bible, to become the best student he could be, and to making good choices when he doesn’t want to.

Because of the Christmas Toy Store at church and the fact that it was the last day of school before our Christmas break we did not do science, social studies, or reading.

A "Snow Day" in N.C.

We recieved a slight bit of snow flurries that turned into a small amount of sleet that turned into icy roads this morning in Harnett County.  So the schools here closed for the day. Last night I was watching the news and it showed a 2 hour delay for most schools, but our county has a lot of country bus routes and I guess they wanted to be safe. So JD and I took advantage of the “Snow day” and cancelled school here too.

I still had my part-time cleaning job to do so we packed up at around 10:45am and went down the street to McDonalds for lunch. I figured a “date” would do JD good. A lot of attention has been paid to the little grand girls and Jeff and I think JD is getting jealous.

After lunch we went to my client’s house for 2 1/2 hours. JD’s friend was there so they played with I cleaned. I came right home from there and changed clothes, made a fresh pot of coffee, and relaxed for a few minutes before heading off to the Toy Store from 4:00-8:30pm.

Today in JD’s room I found the language arts lesson from 3 Dec ripped up.  This was the lesson where I had him write three things for God to help him with and five things he was thankful for. I had him post it by his headboard so he would have topics to talk with God about. When asked why he ripped it up he told me he was mad at an unnamed individual in the house. (I think the “jealous seed” is growing.) This anger happened on the 11th while Jeff and I were at his company Christmas party.

When we got home from the church tonight I found all the pieces to the written letter and taped them together. JD already told me he would rewrite it neatly. I think that’s a wonderful solution. He asked if I still loved him and I said, “Yes.” I asked if he still loved me and he said, “Yes.” I said, “I’m not mad at you for ripping it up. It was a letter to God. I’m just disappointed.” The last thing JD told me tonight was, “Thank you mommy for finding all those pieces and helping me out.” (Aw, he’s so sweet.)

This is the 200th post!

Wow 200 posts!  I can't believe I have THAT much to say and you're THAT bored to read it! 

Today was a good school day that turned into a half day of sorts so I could help out our church with the annual Christmas Toy Store. I have traditionally filled the “shopper” slot and for anyone that knows me I hate shopping. Suppose God is trying to teach me patience? We have clients from around Spring Lake that come to get two presents for each child - for free. The toys come from a combination of donations or money from area churches in our association and local kids clubs like Kiwanis Club’s. This Toy Store will last for three days. Jeff and I also serve in the counseling rooms and other areas if needed. So today is my shopping day and then tomorrow starts with the client’s appointments.

The devotion today was about a meteor local office being established in 1654 in Tuscany, Italy. That’s when they started recording daily temperatures. Because of weathermen we can now prepare for the cold fronts and the heat waves. Today’s verse was Rev 3:15-16, “I know all the things you do, that you are neither hpot nor cold. I wish you were one or the other! But since you are like lukewarm water, I will spit you out of my mouth.” This verse refers to those people sitting on the fence about the RELATIONSHIP with God. They sit on top of the fence and look at the world and want some of that. They also look the other way and see God and want some of that. God wants believers to be hot or cold and is saying, “Be fully committed and pick ONE!”

Today’s math lesson was on “histograms.” Those types of graphs show data that can be placed in equal intervals. It was a simple lesson and JD scored a 90% on the quiz. (Yea)

We did not do social studies, science, or language arts today because of the shopping errands.

JD laid out on the couch today and read Grace for the Moment. It’s always funny to me how he asks, “Have I read for thirty minutes?” So I put a post-it page tab on the clock and when the second hand reaches the time he can stop. That saves me from having to answer the question five times in thirty minutes. (smile)

Momma bear has had enough

It was a difficult morning. JD felt the need to debate everything I told him to do. I finally sent JD to his room. (It was one of those moments where I started speaking in cut off sentences and an unknown foreign language because I was so mad and I feared for his life.) When he came out and apologized I explained about my massive headache last night, the good sleep daddy let me have, and the fact that talking back is rude and disrespectful. Once we got over the morning bump it was a better day.

The devotion today told us in the year 1999 news broke about the retirement of the Peanuts comic strip. After 18,000 strips it officially ended Feb 13th, 2000. Charlie Brown was the lovable loser that never seemed to get it right and ended his misadventures with, “Good grief.” What an odd expression. What’s good about grief? The bible points out how sorrow can actually be good for us. 2 Cor 7:10 says, “God can use the sorrow in our lives to help us turn away from sin and seek salvation.” For example…what if you were injured in an accident and realize it could have been worse, then you actually feel glad about the injury even though it hurts.

We love the math lessons recently. It was just the break we needed from fractions and then integers. (Yuck!) Today we reviewed bar graphs. There are bar graphs and double bar graphs. The lesson also reviewed the needed items in each graph like: title, x axis, y axis, and the legend or key. JD scored a 100% on his quiz.

I back tracked a bit in science because of the workbook. So today we reviewed the three main groups of rocks: sedimentary, metamorphic, and igneous. We put a definition to each one and identified common rocks in each group. This proved to be much harder to research that I thought. But it turned out to be a problem solving moment for JD. I asked him to sit in the “great internet drivers seat” for our research time. We had the hardest time looking for those rocks with the groups they belonged to. That’s when I asked JD, “If you had to do this for homework and I wasn’t here what would you do?” He finally found an interactive game that helped us considerably. (Imagine that…a game.) We also watched a few videos on a site called BrainPop. It’s very kid friendly and teaches only the basics. But we go information about mineral identification, crystals, the rock cycle and the carbon cycle.

I ended up laying down today for a short nap. I was beginning to feel my migraine creeping back to haunt me. So we did not do a social studies lesson today.

But after I woke up we pressed through a “sentence diagramming” lesson for language arts. It broke sentences down word for word and taught JD subject, predicate, verb, direct objects, articles, possessives, adjectives, adverbs, and prepositional phrases. It‘s all those words we use or write daily without even thinking about it. But JD needs help giving descriptive sentences. So I wrote down “Jonathan jumped.” and together we came up with a modified sentence of “Jonathan jumped high on the grey hard rock. The lesson asks the writer to ask himself questions like who, what, when, where, and why to help give details. We did nine sentences together and by the end of the lesson he changed my sentence of “Cookies are good.” to “Peanut butter cookies made by my grandma are the best in the world.” (Now that’s what I’m talking about!)

JD really likes the Max Lucado book called Grace for the Moment and decided to read that again for his thirty minutes. He even reads excerpts to me and has questions too. Yippie! Read little book worm, read.

A good busy day

The devotion was about the Scrooge. He was tired of Christmas, carols, and presents. When I was a child Christmas used to be my favorite time of year. There was always an abundance of presents for both my brother and me. But I didn’t know the “true” meaning of Christmas. Now that I am a child of God’s I KNOW the true meaning of Christmas and the only present I’ll even need I unwrapped in the year 2000. (Wow ten years ago.) Christmas celebrates the greatest gift ever given - God himself in human flesh. The wise men presented gifts to baby Jesus. And for centuries Christians have exchanged gifts in his honor.

Today’s math lesson was fairly easy. It reviewed with us all about the graphs to use when we want to “group” data. First the lesson reviewed the Venn diagram. That’s the one with the overlapping circles. Then, it taught us about the line plot and asked us the questions of range, mode, and median. The last graph was the stem and leaf graph. One question during this lesson was “how many of the children have 8 or more letters in their first name?” JD responded with, “Oh I would be in this group.” It sounded like he missed being in a classroom setting for just this question. (Sad huh?)

We finally got a colored printer cartridge and we were able to print out more pictures for the “recommended places to visit” page of the Argentina brochure. Social studies was once again a fun time for JD and I as we talked more about going here or there. JD decided he would not go on “The train to the clouds.” Apparently it’s too high. We also worked on the “Annual events” and “types of transportation” pages.

We research the Friedrich Mohs mineral hardness scale in science today. JD labeled all ten minerals on the scale. Talc being the softest and a diamond being the hardest. We also learned to identify minerals by looking at the color, luster, hardness, specific gravity, and streak. Did you know all minerals are solid except water, mercury, and opal?

I was at my cleaning job when I had JD write five sentences about things he would do if he was on a snow day. (JD’s second cousin was on a snow day in Tennessee today.) So the language arts lesson wasn’t too painful because it was relevant. He ended up writing ten complete sentences with description in each. There‘s still room for significant improvement but I was proud of him for adding details. For example…he would make a huge snowman…why? Original answer, “To watch him melt.” Revised with details, “So I can cut his head off and watch him melt.” (Should I be afraid?)

JD is flip flopping around with his reading. He cannot locate the Star Wars book and has taken a liking to reading Grace for the Moment, by Max Lucado. He enjoyed his thirty minutes of reading while I cleaned.

We rushed from the cleaning job to the church so the kids could go caroling.  But the temperature dropped so much throughout the day that we just had a Happy Birthday Jesus party in the fellowship hall.  We left somewhat early because I felt the beginning stage of a migraine headache.