Aaron's Baptism

We gathered as a church at Falls Lake to worship the Lord through song, prayer, and baptism. It was a beautiful day! Aaron prayed to receive Jesus as his savior about two years ago, and it has been an on-going conversation since then. He has been asking and desiring to be baptized for the past year. He wrote down his testimony of faith and trust in Jesus and why he wanted to be baptized. He bravely got up in front of a large crowd from our church that had gathered together and he read what he had written down. Rich also spoke to the church about Aaron's journey in coming to know and trust in Christ as his Savior. 

My heart was already overflowing to hear my child child publicly profess his faith in Jesus! Then our church family walked to the waters of Falls lake and gathered on the shore to witness Rich baptize our son Aaron. 

It was a glorious moment to observe the symbolism of being buried in baptism and raised to new life in Christ. We have great hope in Christ!

Our family and church family rejoice with Aaron on his new found life in Christ. God is good and greatly to be praised!

Hands on Learning

Aaron is reading about the Desert in Science, and he came up with this fabulous version of a cactus! I was so impressed with it. He used air dry clay and tooth picks. 

In History, Aaron is learning about Egyptian hieroglyphics.  He used air dry clay to carve his own hieroglyphic. Aaron is a very independent student. He reads through his curriculum guide and easily follows the instructions and often has the projects done before I can even explain them to him. His independence is an enormous blessing to me since I have the younger two that need a great deal more attention from me.
He loves 4th grade. So far he is enjoying the content a great deal more than what we did last year in  3rd grade. I am so happy about that because it causes him to have a much better attitude!

Go Play Outside Now

We love this place! It's called Go Play Outside Now and we had so much fun! We went with a group of good friends and had a blast! 

They have a beach area with pools of water and tons of water guns and barriers for fun water gun battles. They have 2 big slides and they hook one of the slides up with water and make an incredibly fun water slide!

Rosalie wouldn't go down the waterside, but she had fun going down the slide without the water.

The chickens came begging for some lunch.

They also have a huge area set up for laser tag. They had so much fun playing laser tag! 

If you haven't had the chance to visit this great place. You'll have to make your way down there. We were there for more than 5 hours and my children still didn't want to leave when it was time to go!

Baseball with a Lesson

I love how much Aaron is enjoying playing baseball!

His coach is a CLASS ACT! He challenges the children to become better players, teaches them the skills they need to improve, and is their biggest cheerleader. I'm so thankful that Aaron has been able to work with this coach.

Once he teaches the children a skill, he expects them to perform that skill properly, and when they miss a ball 3 times in a row, he makes them run a lap! He teaches them to have excellent sportsmanship, to be disciplined ball players, to have good attitudes, to cheer their other teammates on, and to LOVE the game of baseball. We have been incredibly blessed to be on this team this Spring.

Last week during one of their games, the children on this team had to witness a terrible act of selfishness, pride, and loss of self control from an opposing team's coach and the umpire. My child was exposed to words that he'd never heard before(yes, the word that is culturally accepted to be the worst one) and the worst kind of poor sportsmanship that you can imagine. Unfortunately that display of poor sportsmanship by two grown adults ended in calling "GAME OVER", and the children were left wondering what in the world had happened ... and if it was something that they had done wrong!

I'm so sad that pride over an umpire's call became the most important thing on that ball field. I'm sad that my child had to witness the ugliness between those two people. Unfortunately, he had a front row seat since he was playing catcher when it all went down. However, I'm thankful that Aaron's coach is a man of integrity.

He pretty quickly pulled the children off of the field and put them in a huddle. He waited for the argument to be over and then put his team back on the field and ran a practice with them, so that they were able to keep playing baseball. After all, that's what they came to do. When he was done with practice, he put the boys back in a huddle and told them that he was going to explain what happened the best that he could. He told them that some adults made some bad decisions today. He told them that they(the children) did nothing wrong and that they played a great game and did well! He said that when bad things like this happen we can learn from it. We can learn that what the children saw today was poor sportsmanship and that we ought to never be poor sports. We should never act like that. He encouraged their confused little hearts and got them excited about their upcoming game.

I wish that Aaron had gotten to finish playing that game. (especially considering all the guests that came to see him play that day - special friends Brent, Amy, and Hannah - my Mom, Dad, and two nieces came all the way from VA) I wish that he didn't have to see two grown adults lose their self control and shout obscenities at one another. I wish that he didn't have to experience the disappointment of not being able to finish the game.
However, we live in a world full of imperfect people. So, we prayed together that night for the two men who lost it at the baseball game. We prayed for their hearts. Just as I am praying that my own heart be guarded from pride that can so easily overtake me, I pray that these men will come to care more about the little people on the field than themselves.
Isn't that just how it is with pride? We are all affected by it. We are all overcome by it at one time or another.
How can we guard ourselves from it?

Ironically, that very morning I was at a worship leader's summit at my church where my pastor was speaking on the topic of pride. It resounded with me on so many levels because pride is something that can so easily and stealthily sweep me off my feet.
These are some of the bullet points from Pastor Larry:
1. Meditate on Scripture that will cause us to walk in humility
2. Have a shepherd's heart - care more about the people we are leading than ourselves.
3.  Pray for the glory to be all God's and to be free from the fear of man.
4.  Pray that the Word would be exalted
5. Pray for the person of Christ to be exalted
6. Thank God for his unspeakable kindness

Those words of wisdom are a great start to humility in Christ. I will continually pray for this to be my own heart and attitude, and I will teach it to my children because they do and will continue to struggle with pride.

It's Baseball Time Again!

Aaron starts baseball practice TODAY! He is so excited to start another season of baseball. I am excited for him. He's been practicing and he is ready to go!
He had baseball assessments a week and a half ago and he did really well! He hit every ball that they threw to him except for 1 ... and they were really good hits!
He is going to be on the Rangers team this year and he can't wait.

Sibling Love

While, my children argue with one another just like every other family out there ... I am thankful that they are best friends and love each other the way that they do. I love the sweet bond that they have with one another ... and how each of them have distinct and special relationships. It encourages my mother's heart to see special hugs and pats of comfort. 

A Recap of Aaron's 8th birthday

I surprised Aaron, by making him a baseball themed cake. He was only expecting a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting.

We invited a couple of his friends over for a "make your own pizza" dinner and birthday cake.

He got a book from one of his favorite book series.

A Webkinz caterpillar.

Money from Mamaw and Papaw.

Money (and an awesome frog book) from Nanny and Pupup.

Aaron has been saving his money since this past summer ... so he mostly got gifts of money. He's not quite to his goal yet. (He wants to buy an ipod touch) He'll get there eventually.

He chose pasta, sauce, and meatballs for his birthday dinner and Daddy took him to the Olive Garden for his special father/son birthday lunch.
I can't believe he's 8!!

Aaron's First Baseball Game

Aaron had an AMAZING first baseball game! Here doesn't have nearly as much experience as most of the boys on the field ... so he's figuring things out as he goes along. He's having such a great time with it and is loving every minute of it!

Aaron got to bat 3 times during this game. He hit the ball every single time! I was so excited for him! The first two times he made it to first, and the third time he got out. I was just thrilled he hit the ball every time. (many of you may know that I don't know very much about baseball ... or about any other sport for that matter. In fact, I have always had the urge to take a book with me to sporting events, so that I would have something to do. I have to tell you, though, that sporting events become CRAZY exciting when you have a child out on the field!) 

One of the times that Aaron hit and made it to 1st base ... he was able to run to 2nd and then to 3rd by other base hitters. Unfortunately, he never got to run home before the team hit the 3 strikes out mark. (please excuse me if I am not using proper baseball terminology ... I'm still learning, afterall!)

I may not love baseball ... but I sure do LOVE how much my Aaron loves it!

I am so excited that Aaron has the opportunity to play baseball this fall.  He has already improved in his skill and ability a lot since he started, and I am looking forward to seeing him improve even more as the season progresses!

Coach Pitch Baseball - Fall Ball begins!

Aaron started coach pitch fall ball a few days ago. We are now trying to keep up with the schedule of practices and games! (and just for the record ... they are are called practices ... not rehearsals which I admit to almost always calling them rehearsals - I'll get it straight, I promise!)

This is Aaron's first time playing baseball - so he has a lot to learn, and is super excited about it!

He likes batting the best of all!

Curriculum Choices for Aaron - 3rd Grade

I am using Bigger Hearts For His Glory from Heart of Dakota (HOD) for Aaron this year. Aaron is in 3rd grade. I started using HOD when Martin started 2nd grade. This is my 4th year using a Charlotte Mason approach to learning and it is a wonderful fit for our family.

I don't have a picture to share but Aaron will be using Cheerful Cursive to learn how to write cursive. He is so excited to finally be learning how to write cursive. I love Cheerful Cursive and found that when Martin went through it he rarely needed any assistance at all. Aaron is on the same track and rarely needs any help with it. (which allows me to get some work done with Jonathan while Aaron works independently!)

Aaron will be working through Singapore Math 3A and 3B U.S edition.  He is still finishing up his 2B workbook at this point, but it shouldn't be too much longer before he heads into 3A. I purposely slowed him down last year to work on memorization of multiplication facts. 

The history spine includes A First Book in American History, Journeys in TIme, Stories of Great Americans, and The Story of the Wright Brothers and their Sister. I took Martin through this curriculum 2 years ago - and am enjoying reading through the books again with Aaron!

We will be using Rod and Staff English 3. I thoroughly enjoy Rod and Staff English. It is no secret that I am just not a math kind of a girl ... however, English is very enjoyable to me. I love teaching it ... and surprisingly enough both of my boys like it as well. They even enjoy diagramming sentences. I love the no nonsense methodical approach that Rod and Staff provides. We do about 2/3 of it orally and about 1/3 of it written.

Scripture study and memorization is woven throughout each of the subjects that are taught in HOD. Included in this guide is also a Hymn study for music and a devotional book called Little Pillows. Aaron has the Hymns on his ipod and can listen to it easily at some point each day. We also sing them together! 

I am doing things a little bit different this year for our read a-loud time. The suggested read a-louds for  story time are selections that come from specific genres of literature. They are wonderful book choices and I enjoyed them immensely when I took Martin through them. This time, however, I decided to get the extension readers that are offered for older students that may be going through Bigger and use those as read a-louds. They are scheduled in the back of the book and are extensions of the history lessons that they are learning each day. I thought it would be very interesting to read those books instead. I'll still use the storytime lesson plans in the Bigger guide as we go through the extension books.

I made 3 notebooks for Aaron to use this year. He will be starting History and Science notebooking, so I put together a separate notebook for each of those. I was able to download notebooking pages that other moms have made as they had children going through Bigger. They graciously uploaded the files they created to the HOD yahoo group. The 3rd notebook has a section for English worksheets, Vocabulary, and daily checklists. I got the daily checklists and vocabulary sheets from the HOD yahoo group as well. I am so thankful for other moms who have taken the time to share their hard work with the rest of us.

Aaron will be reading One Small Square: Seashore, One Small Square: Woods, A Pioneer Sampler, Science in Colonial America, and Thomas Edison for Science this year. He will be notebooking as he goes through the book as well as performing lots and lots of fun experiments!

We will be using Drawn into the Heart of Reading (DITHOR) for  reading this year. DITHOR is a very thorough study of the different genres of literature. It includes pre-reading activities, guided literature discussions, vocabulary lessons, and creative projects. Godly character lessons are weaved throughout all of the lessons. This curriculum can be used with any books. The books that I chose for Aaron are pictured below. Aaron is a very analytical kind of a child as well as being very perceptive. DITHOR is one of his favorite things about school.

By the Great Horn Spoon, Black Stallion, Snow Treasure, Tales from the Dust River Gulch, More Tales from the Dust River Gulch, Little Pilgrims Progress, Misty of Chincoteague, Scripture Sleuth, Gentle Ben, and Buffalo Bill. (the last one is not pictured because he is currently reading it)

This is the Level 2/3 workbook that Aaron will be working through this year along with the DITHOR guided teacher student discussions and analysis. The workbook provides many analytical processes that will help guide students to become independent thinkers. There are exercises in predicting, character analysis, character webs, themes, main ideas, and much more.

This is going to be an incredibly thorough and rich year of learning for Aaron. In my experience, 3rd grade is a huge skill building year. There is also a pretty significant leap in the work that is required of him. So, we are going to have some adjustment time ahead of us. My goal, though, is to keep everything fun, interesting, and joyful as we study all these amazing books! I am so thankful that I have such joyful learners!

Aaron and baseball camp

I signed Aaron up for the Bunn High School Baseball Camp. He went from 9AM-12PM each day for 3 days. We found out about it from our next door neighbor and are so glad that Aaron got the chance to do it.

At the camp, he learned in fielding, out fielding, catching, the technique involved with running bases, and hitting. He even got a home run during the scrimmage game they had on the 2nd day. I don't know how far Aaron will go in the baseball journey, but he really likes it and has decided that he wants to sign up for fall ball. So, we'll sign him up and go from there.