Homeschool Journey and journal - #1

Well here begins my journey and journaling into homeschooling.  As I live in Turkey I have supplemented my children's education with English for years, however this year is my year to homeschool completely. As of September 2012 I am a homeschooling mom. :)

I am homeschooling my oldest daughter who is 9 years old. We are experiencing this adventure together with the good, bad and the ugly days. :) My other two children are presently in Turkish schools, 1st grade and kindergarten.

I have wanted to start sharing about my days and I feel that journaling our homeschool days is very beneficial for me 1)  it will log all we are doing for when I homeschool my other children eventually
2) it will help me think through things I may be missing and lastly 3) it just could benefit someone else.

So you will see these post titles on and off from now on: Homeschool Journey and Journal.

For any of you homeschooling parents that could chime in along the way I would LOVE it. I am a rookie and I am a learner and love to learn from others. So please share away or feel free to give helpful links.

Much love to each of you Mamas as you seek what is best for our kids and their education. It is not an easy or simple task, especially living overseas...grace and encouragement to you today!

Here we go on our journey homeschooling in this west corner of Turkey,
Becky

Clothes pin dolls and sweet childhood

Found these little dolls the other day hanging around my girls bedroom. We made these 2 years ago!

Cute little peg heads don't you think? :)

My daughters creations.

Felt for the hair

tp tube cut and shaped and glued for the cowboy hat

scraps of ribbon and fabric for the clothes

Sharpies for the faces.

Oh the little things that make me smile. :) Childhood is one of them. Look for the sweetness in your kids childhood today, it is there!! 

In my west corner finding sweet little things in my home.
Becky

10 minutes of deleting a day...Who's with me?

Yep, pics like these have to GO. Seriously I had several of this lake, and this "lovely" pole from like 5 years ago.??

Since I started blogging I now have pics of projects that I NEVER posted about. 

For example:

So who is with me???? Anybody. Come on lets make it viral. 10 minutes a day sit down and delete. 

I soo don't want to do this but the time has come and boy would I love it if others joined in on the "fun". :) 

Just think 10 minutes of deleting a day will give you: not stronger abs or a tighter fanny...(maybe a sore fanny) but you will have a happy computer and you will be organised and life simplified.

Well off I go .... to delete, erase, get rid of unwanted pictures 10 minutes a day every day this week. :) 

In my west corner blogging about crazy things,

Becky

IF we never slow down...

If we never slow down we may never be able to hear God calling to us to come deeper. We may never enjoy loneliness where Christ becomes our all. Business can keep us from being effective.

In Turkey things moves at a much slower pace, I have gained wisdom from this culture in this, even if it has at times come painstakingly. Oh my sweet country America, you too could learn from Turkey in this.

Today dear friends hold still a bit longer, know that achieving tasks is not always the end result.

When we fill all our empty times so we never feel uncomfortable or alone we end up missing out on true inner peace and life. 

Source: Thomas Saliot

My Pinterest ART 

Is there something you could/should take off your schedule for this season? 

Do you ever feel lonely or isolated? Do you run from it, try to change it or embrace it?

From my west corner to your corners,
Becky

"A peaceful heart leads to a healthy body..." Prov. 14:30

"For he himself is our peace." Eph. 2:14

Cardboard Mixed Media art with kids

Hi all. Happy day after lovers day. :) 

Here is our novice ideas of mixed media art. :) Enjoy

Each child was given piece a of perforated cardboard.

I just peeled off the top part of the cardboard for this look.

I had them paint the base colour white. 

Autty is using a tooth brush here. :)

This part is pretty important I think!

Use a blow dryer to dry the different layers of paint it really helped keep us moving.

Then they used water colours over the base colour. 

One thing the kids really liked is holding up there cardboard and letting the water colours run down or across the cardboard to give texture to their pieces.

We used:

Acrylic white paint

Blowdryer 

Water paints

Lots of brushes (tooth brush, foam brushes, etc)

Alphabet stamps and black stamp pad

Markers (permanent)

Pieces of paper (scrap book paper, newspaper, etc)

Glue stick

Mod podge

Our Cardboard Mixed Media Art pieces:

I gave a few instructions and then really tried to let them create as they desired.

I also gave it a try the day before and here is what I came up with. :)

(I made this specifically for a friend

who is in need of wisdom.)

The verse on the piece is James 1:5

"If anyone lacks wisdom let him ask of God who gives liberally to all who ask for it." 

Truth is I am not a Mixed Media artist myself (shocked are you?) ;)...but I love art and these days have a special infinity for Mixed Media art especially. 

The electricity went out for about 15 minutes while we were working on this. 

Ode to my life in Turkey. It keeps life popping. 

The kids and I tried our hand with what we had: Cardboard! (of course) 

Thanks for peeking in at our humble pieces. :)

In our west corner of Turkey using what we have to create,

Becky

(Yesterday I went to Lydia's 1st grade class and did my first craft for her and her classmates. :)  I'll be starting up my 'Investing in our Neighbourhood' posts again soon. I love that they all call out Rebekah Teyze. :)) (Aunt Rebekah)

Got up early this morning...to listen.

I got up early this morning so that I could spend more time with my Lord. I wanted to be able to hear, to listen. I spend so much time talking to the Lord or asking for numerous things through out my days I forget to listen and hear what is on his heart.

As I sat and listened I realized the absurdity of it all.  There I was in this chair so little and insignifiant and I was saying to God the creator of all things "I just want to know what is on your heart today Lord." Seriuosly can I approach this amazing God in such a simple, humble way?  That God would speak to me and answer me? I am blown away today at the absolute absurdity of this privledge we have to approach God and that he speaks to us, to me!

"Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! 

How unsearchable are His judgement and unfathomable His ways!" Romans 11:33

 In my west corner, 

                                                 Becky 

"That God can be known by the soul in tender personal experience while remaining infinitely aloof from the curious eyes of reason constitutes a paradox...." (A.W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy)

How are your listening skills these days? 

Don't forget~Homemade Play-dough the rainy day necessity.

Just a reminder, in case you forgot ....

Homemade Play dough on a rainy day/cold winter day. 

The day we made play-dough my kids were engrossed for 3 1/2 hours~ 

Seriously if you have never tried to make your own play dough....go for it!

It takes 15 minutes to make with your kids and is inexpensive.

We made a double batch!

Here is my recipe 

given to me by my sweet friend Alyssa. 

I have been using this same recipe for  5 years. :)

(I do have to get to Alum from the States. )

I wait until the dough cools down a bit then I let my kids pick the colors and mix in the food colouring with their hands. Messy is fun and the coloring comes off after a few hand washings. :)

Seriously look how happy this little guy is! 

Using what we have to enjoy our indoor days. 

This time it's home made play dough...go ahead make a double batch life is short. 

So do you let your kids mix there play dough colours?

In my west corner,

Becky

linking up here

Feel free to hit delete.

         I have started to feel funny because I seem to be posting a lot lately. I tend to really see this blog as an outlet for me. I love having all of you follow along it is an honour and sometimes I am so surprised that 500 others have joined with me in this blogging journey. I guess I just wanted you all to know this blog is an outlet and my way of processing out loud especially when times are quieter and friendships are not as plentiful in this little west corner. Thank you so much for following and for commenting and just being a part. If my posts seem to be bombarding your inbox these days, feel free to hit delete. :)

Ok I feel better already. :) Well off I go.

The kids and I had this really fun time creating some Mixed Media art from cardboard so I will be sharing that with you all soon.

In my west corner blogging away... ;)
Becky

Our remedy: An indoor snowmen

Our first real snow of the season!!! SNOW what a wonderful gift this past week.

The snow was too soft the first day for a snowmen.  Living on the 5th floor over looking a street makes playing in the snow and making snowmen challenging, especially the 2nd day when the snow is melting and people are using the sidewalks more.

So to remedy that issue this is what we did: 

A bowl full of snow from our balcony onto our kitchen table.

and this is what we made:

George the snowmen.

George the Snowmen went back out onto our balcony transformed into a new man. ;) ha ha ha

Thank you kiddos for being so easy to enthral, for not noticing we don't have a back yard to play in, for diving in wherever you are with joy and freedom. You teach me so much about enjoying where I am.

In my little west snowy corner of Turkey,

Becky