Praying the Scriptures

Right before school began this year, Rich and I spent some time thinking about and choosing a specific scripture passage for each of our children. The idea is that we wanted to choose a passage that specifically dealt with areas of struggle in their hearts and minds. Once we chose the scriptures for each child we committed to praying those specific scriptures over them hoping to invoke change in their hearts. We also hoped that it could be a tangible way for them to see the Holy Spirit working in their lives. In just a matter of days, I have seen God moving in a mighty way - not only in their lives, but in mine as watch how He is working.
I want to share one specific way that I have seen the power of the Holy Spirit working on Jonathan.
I chose Romans 12:9-10 for Jonathan.
"Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another."
The area where I was hoping to see growth in Jonathan was to love others well and think of others first before he does whatever he wants to do for himself.
For the past 10 days, since I started praying these scriptures over him, he has started carrying his Bible around with him everywhere as if it were the greatest treasure he has ever received. He has called the entire family together numerous times for family Bible reading time and prayer(he reads to us and prays for us) He has started reading his Bible everyday on his own without any prompting from me. If that is not powerful enough on its own, the other night when I was praying with him at bedtime, he looked up at me with eyes full of tears and said, "Mommy - I just want to get all of the bad things out of my head!"
I admit that I didn't make the connection right away with the scriptures that I had been praying over him and that statement that he made. However, this morning when I was praying for him, it hit me like a ton of bricks. God is working in Jonathan's heart to abhor what is evil! God is moving in the hearts of my children - and in my own heart!

A New School Year! 2014-2015

Here we go again. A fresh start to a brand new school year. You may or may not know that I LOVE starting a new school year! Before children I was either going to school or teaching school…and I loved the beginning of a new school year then as well. Now, the stakes are even higher … because I am educating my own children! I suppose it could be that it's because I am starting my 9th year of the Holland School that our first week of the 2014-2015 school year went so smoothly. Or perhaps it is because I am not chasing a toddler down while holding a baby on my hip. Whatever the case, it was a fantastic week! I am thankful!

Rosalie is somewhere between Kindergarten and 1st grade. We did some light Kindergarten last year that included some math, handwriting, and learning to read. This year she will continue to work on those things and finish up what we didn't finish last year. We are calling it Kindergarten in order to keep it simple! She is doing Beyond Little Hearts For His Glory along with Jonathan this year. They will do Science, History, Bible, Art, Music, and Read a-louds together and they will work on their own level in handwriting/copywork, math, and Language Arts. She is already reading pretty well and she loves math! 

 Jonathan is in 2nd grade this year! It takes me about 2 1/2 hours 4 days a week and about an hour 1 day a week to complete each box in the guide. It is my goal to be very thorough with Jonathan and Rosalie this year. The past couple of years has been very intense with Martin and Aaron and I have managed to get them both to the point where they are able to do most of their work independently. So, this year I can focus more on my younger two.

Aaron is in 5th grade this year and will have a significant increase in work load from last school year. The curriculum that we are using for 5th grade is: Creation to Christ. When we start our school day at 8:00 AM, he and Martin both begin working through each of the boxes in their guide. At 10:30 when I finish with the younger two, I meet with each of the older ones and have them show me all of the work they have completed up until that point and I spend time working through the boxes that require a teacher. 

Martin is in 7th grade!! It's so hard for me to believe that he is in 7th grade! He is almost completely independent in his learning now. There are still several things that I do with him each day including looking through all of his work to make sure it was completed correctly as well as lessons for which he may need instruction, narration, dictations, etc. He is doing Revival to Revolution this year. We are doing the guide as written except for the writing program. We are choosing to do IEW US History Lessons instead of the creative writing that is scheduled. We also chose videotext for math this year. He will spend the next two years doing: Algebra 1 and Algebra 2. I went with videotext because I believe the approach will work well for him after having completed the Singapore Elementary Math and because we are at the point now where he needs more than me to be his teacher for math. Videotext provides lessons on DVD. He did incredibly well for his 1st week of 7th grade. Martin is a diligent worker and I am so thankful for his hard work and great care that he takes to complete his work!