Our Weekly Schedule

This year, our charter school required that I submit a plan detailing what we expect to complete each week by subject over the course of the year. The plan is in no way rigid or set in stone but serves as a flexible guide.  Each week, I take this plan and make form a more detailed plan for the week.  This is what Mary's schedule for this week looks like:

I love having a plan written down for a few reasons.  First of all, I don't need to remember anything--it's written down, so I just look at the plan and check things off as we complete them.  Also, it's really clear what we have completed.  If there is an x over the box, we completed it; if not, we didn't.  I also like this because Mary can look at the plan and know what is expected of her for the week.  Sometimes, I even allow her a say in the order in which she completes tasks.  I also save the completed schedules and refer to them when inputting attendance and meeting with our Education Specialist.

Anyways, this is the system that works for us at this time.  I have no idea if this will still work for us next year or the year after that, but at this time in life, this works great! 

Dumpster Diving, sort of

In the past few months, we have discovered that University Hills is a great place to find free stuff for kids.  When we lived in the apartment, we found a fire engine next to the dumpster.  The kids have been enjoying playing with it, especially dinging the bell. 

Recently, another family offered up this playhouse for free, so David went over and disassembled it and reassembled it on our back porch.  The girls really like to hang out on the roof.  (Hopefully, it will be a while before Matthew and Jonathan figure out how to get up there!)

Since the boys will be in cribs for quite some time still and after that in toddler beds, I have been trying to keep my eyes open for a crib mattress.  Last weekend, another resident offered an organic crib mattress for free.  We weren't necessarily looking for one that was organic, but you really can't beat free!

One man's trash is another man's treasure!

January's Goal: Make a Blanket and Pillowcase

My goal for the month of January was to make a blanket and a pillowcase. This project was actually organized by our church. We are sending blankets, pillowcases and shoe money to an orphanage in Kenya, called Beloved International. As you may recall from when I made bibs for the boys out of old cloth diapers, sewing is not my strong suit, but I was really excited about this project.  I thought it would be a great opportunity to make something to help someone in need and also to expose the girls to the art of sewing.

Stephen and Jane Njoroge are the parents of this orphanage, which consists of their four biological children (two of which have the awesome names, Mary and Margaret) and fourteen adoptees.  You can read about all the children here.  Just reading the stories of each of the adopted children brought tears to my eyes.  There is so much sexual immorality that most of the children never knew who their father was. Most lost their mother to AIDS.  They lived in poverty.  They suffered sexual abuse.  One sibling group was even abandoned by their own father.  My heart breaks for the others like them in Kenya, who have not yet been adopted and are still suffering from abuse, neglect and poverty.  I thank God that he has given Stephen and Jane a heart for these children and is working through them to shine the light of the Gospel in the darkness.

We were asked to make a blanket for eleven year old Mary, one of the Njoroge children.  On Saturday, Mary, Maggie and I set out for Michael's with coupon and shopping list in hand.   We spent a good 15 minutes looking for the fabric in Michael's only to find out that Michael's doesn't even sell fabric!  There was a JoAnn's close by, so we went there, sadly without a coupon (a smartphone would have been helpful in this situation!)  After a lot of searching, we picked out two purplish flannel patterns and waited in line to have them cut.  My plan was just to do one pattern on one side and the other on the other side, but there wasn't enough of one of the patterns to do that, so we adjusted the plan a little.  (The girls were kind of tired of looking at fabric by this point.)  We also picked up some fabric paint and stencils and planned on painting Mary's name on white fabric for the middle of the blanket.

Well, I did try the fabric paint and it looked great, until I added some hearts around Mary's name and then it got wet and bled.  Forget the fabric paint idea.  Then, I came up with a plan to make somewhat of a quilt style blanket and stitch Mary's name in the center.  Once the top and bottom pieces were completed, I sewed three edges together and suddenly realized I didn't know how to do the last edge.  I thought hand-stitching would take me forever, and I just don't have very much patience for such things, so I ended up folding it over twice and sewing with the machine.  Voila!  My first ever blanket!

Now, the pillowcase was supposed to be a much simpler project.  Except that I had plenty of fabric, but not enough in the right dimensions.  I opted just to go out to JoAnn's for more fabric.  Guess what?  It was gone.  So, we drove all the way to a store in Orange to get the fabric (with coupon in hand, although by this time the fabric was on sale, so we couldn't use the coupon).  I ended up stitching Mary's name on white fabric and then sewed that on to the purple fabric.  I didn't want all of edges of the material to be exposed, though, so I used interlocking fell seams all around.  And voila!  My first ever pillowcase! 

My friend, Mandi, a.k.a. the crafty diva, used to say that everyone is creative because God is the Creator.  I have to say that I really think she is right.  Although this project turned out to be more difficult than I initially thought, I really enjoyed the creative process!  Please join me in praying for Mary and this orphanage as they seek to bring the light of Christ to the darkness in Kenya.  I owe my husband a big thank you for keeping the boys away from my sewing machine during this process!  That probably was just as difficult as making the blanket and pillowcase!

What We've Been Reading

Well, we have only read one chapter book since my last post, but it was a great one!


The Railway Children by Edith Nesbit has been on our reading list for quite some time, yet another timeless classic that I had never read as a child.  Similar to The Saturdays, we came across some excerpts from the book in Mary's writing assignments from The Complete Writer and decided to read it in its entirety.  This is the story of a family consisting of a mother, father, and three children, whose lives are turned upside down when the father must go away for a time due to unexplained circumstances.  Mother and the children move away from their home.  Their new home is located near a railway, where the children spend the majority of their time.  They befriend workers at the railway and even passengers on the train and encounter many adventures.  They save a train from a crash, reunite a Russian political refugee with his family, and rescue a young man collapsed with an injury in a tunnel.  In the end, the father is able to return to his family and the reasons for his departure are explained. 

I want to share one small excerpt from the book.  This was my favorite part, a conversation between Mother and Peter:

"Don't you think it's rather nice to think that we're in a book that God's writing?  If I were writing the book, I might make mistakes.  But God knows how to make the story end just right--in the way that's best for us."
"Do you really believe that, Mother?" Peter asked quietly.
"Yes," she said, "I do believe it--almost always--except when I'm so sad that I can't believe anything.  But even when I can't believe it, I know it's true--and I try to believe..."