Year 3, March 21st-24th, 2018: The Ups and Downs

Wednesday was snowy and a rough one emotionally.  Thursday was MUCH better and we had a great day of homeschool and prepping for the weekend.  Friday, we all went to the IAHE Homeschool Convention for the morning.  We took two cars so Jared could bring the kids home at lunchtime.  I just wanted to be at the conference with ALL my children like other families who made it a family affair.  I don't like going to events alone.  Even if it's with a kid, I feel safer somehow.  But maybe I just want to someone else to have the same experience so we can talk about it later and remember it? Anyway, I had zero expectations of them being excited about books or speakers, and they were pretty good about making one loop around to all the vendors.  We made it just in time for the first speaker, Mike Smith, president of HSLDA, or Homeschool Legal Defense Association.  He was an ok speaker, but not super motivational.  His encouragement was a bit lopsided, like teasing homeschool moms that they are like the Proverbs 32 woman.  There is no Proverbs 32 in the Bible.  And yes, it seems to take an extra amount of patience and resolve to homeschool, but that doesn't make us any better than other moms.  Plus, he didn't address the stay at home homeschooling dad.  Yes, I have my views but I'm not going to speak to a very diverse audience that is looking to me for advice and not include other facets of homeschooling.  He just seemed outdated on his views of what the modern homeschooling family looks like and what they struggle with.  And he presented home schooling as the only mode of education, which to me, it should be the only mode, but in this fallen world, it's not.  Not everyone can or should homeschool because of their personal situation, but I still believe it's the best option for most.  And most could sacrifice and make it happen, but choose not to.  But again, his views just didn't jive with the current homeschool community.  His views seemed too old school and biased.  I was very disappointed.  I believe in a lot of what he said, but that's not what the majority of the audience believes.  He is a lawyer, so maybe he isn't the kind of speaker I'm used to listening to. I generally don't mind listening to older speakers, but they have to stay in touch with the reality of today.

Thankfully, the second main speaker, Debra Bell, had a much more balanced view.  She talked about how God created a child's mind to learn, not from what we teach them, but from their own curiosity and desire to learn.  She encouraged to let kids go outside and explore.  Spread the feast and let them taste it themselves.  She talked about individualized education is the better option and how homeschooling gives us the freedom to do that, where as it's harder to do it in the public or private school setting.

After Jared and the boys went home, Keturah and I stayed and worked, listened and walked.  Keturah had made a new friend and they spent the next two days hanging out with each other.  I must have lost my mommy protective brain (as I do sometimes when my brain is dealing with the chaos of an event and lots of people), but I failed to tell her where to meet and when, and she ended up having the main IAHE booth paging me to come and get her.  Yes, that happened at the museum last week, too.  Whoops! My tagline became, um, maybe Mommy needs more practice in social situations!  I don't typical panic, but I know others might over react and judge me.  Anyway, she enjoyed going around and getting all the free candy and goodies from the different booths.  I volunteered at the Institute in Excellence for Writing booth, which is our writing curriculum, where I learned I really have no clue about all they have to offer.  I did help a few people in understanding the curriculum and in making decisions on next steps, but felt so inadequate otherwise.  I'm glad I only worked it for about 2 hrs.  But I did get my personal questions answered, and will be ready when I do order next year's materials this month.  I also asked questions at the Memoria Press booth about our next steps in our Latin course.  Although it is encouraged to buy everything there at convention and support the vendors, who in turn support the IAHE, which in turn supports us (vs other FOR profit conventions that only come in for the weekend and don't support you year round), I couldn't justify the cost of this curriculum yet because we haven't used it as much.  There were some of the pieces being sold on eBay and if I can't find them there, I can still order from the company.  I just won't get free shipping.

So instead, Keturah and I shopped at some of the booths that have a variety of workbooks, educational toys, and art supplies.  The most exciting purchase for the family was 2 starter decks of cards from a Pokemon type game that a homeschool graduate had created based on history figures and events.  I had seen them last year, but I'm glad Justin saw them this year and got really excited!  I love supporting young men in their endeavors!  The young girl Keturah palled around with was part of a family who also bought and loved the cards so much that the dad volunteered to stay at the booth so that the creator could go to another event.  The guy had a partner, but because of the snowstorm, he couldn't come.  This family lives locally here on the east side, and with our church friends also buying some decks, we are going to start a monthly club to play the game like we have for Pokemon.  Justin made the conclusion himself that Pokemon is fun, but it's getting a little boring and doesn't hold any lasting value.  They were excited about this new card game that they just had to play a round of it before bed on Friday night!  I call that a win!

Speaking of excitement, I was looking through the convention brochure and saw that on the vendor list there was a Lilla Rose stylist was there!  I guess in the past there has been a Flexi 8 dealer that has sold at this event, but she didn't do it last year and finally gave up her spot for this year.  Then the organizers called up Lilla Rose looking for another stylist.  Well, that stylist was none other than THE Jackie Adams!  I totally had a "fan girl" moment!  You see, Jackie Adams is one of the top sellers of the WHOLE COMPANY and often wins all the top sales awards!  She isn't directly in my upline, but, how cool to meet her!  And she was very nice about it.   She even spent time chatting with me about different things.  Her display is very simple, and actually, she is sitting behind her booth.  She doesn't seem as engaged as I would have thought she would be and that's because she's an introvert!  She is living proof that you don't have to by a dynamic person or an extrovert to build a business.  She mainly does shows, doesn't use Facebook much, or social media in general.  She has slowly and surely built her business from collecting information from people at shows and adding them to her email newsletter.  Incredible!  She talks about the business, especially if someone says they can't afford the product, or not much of it.  But she isn't out there combing for leads.  This woman has like 120 people under her!  It was very encouraging to see someone else "in action."  She let her banners drive people into the booths, got the product in their hair, and let the products work their magic.  I needed to see this because my friend and I have a 4 day event in 10 days that I wasn't really excited about.  But now, I feel like we can make the most of it without exhausting ourselves.  Yeah!

I started the day on Saturday very tired.  I didn't eat well either, so by the end of the day, I was feeling awful.  And I know I will be sore from sitting in those uncomfortable folding chairs.  But it was all worth it.  I was able to speak to several vendors just for fun and hang out with some of my friends from church and Bible Bowl.  We made new friends with a family who loves the historical cards like Justin and Keturah love.  The speakers were better today and I got to attend two seminars, one by Debra Bell on motivation and one on using more physical elements in our homeschool.  Both were things I have heard before, but they were good refreshers and just what I needed.  God orchestrated the speakers to remind me of some principles I am passionate about!  I'll share a few insights down below.

But one of the big stories of the day is that we got 8 inches of snow!  Benaiah cleared both our and Grandpa's driveways!  He hasn't done that in a super long time and will be super sore tomorrow!  It snowed all day from 7 am to 7 pm!  That meant I drove in it to the fairgrounds this morning and slowly got home through it at 7pm.  We first had to pick up Robyn, a friend from church, to take her to the convention, too.   Then we dropped her off after it was over as well, which added to our drive time.  The roads were ok.  Wet, a little slick, but not too bad.  There were 2 deaths and many slide offs all over the city.  People here don't drive as well in the snow as the Canadians and New Englanders.  But I was brave and I did it!  I even took some pictures!  Yeah!  The snow kept the attendance at the conference way lower than previous years.  I will save the stories about Abishai and the snow for tomorrow's post and will add all those pictures and videos there, so stay tuned!

Snow! And lots of it!  Whoops, this is actually the snow we had on the 21st, not the big snow we had on the 24th.   The excitement is still the same though.  Canadian red jacket, boy up to his knees in fresh snow, and wearing his Whitewing boots (Lightning McQueen from Cars)

No words can describe that face of pure joy.

Play...snow...joy...

1...2...3....

Jump and slide!  On purpose! Not a care in the world that his pants will be soaked.

Ah, a wish I had more pics like this one!  Fresh snow on a pile of wood, reminsicent of those that really do heat their whole house with wood all winter long on Prince Edward Island.  Yes, they really do, and I know it's work to get the cords of wood hauled into the basements and keep the fires stoked, but I think it's still awesome all the same.

A boy and his dog.

Doggy is always happy with snow on the ground!  And being near his little boy.

Melting, but blue skies overhead.

What it looked like before Daddy used a BROOM to "shovel" or rather sweep the front walkway because somebody (me) put away the shovels in the shed thinking we were done.  We did get them out for the storm on Saturday though.

What can I say?  He always wants to try to walk out there in his bare feet!  He doesn't cry about it either, but recognizes that it doesn't feel good and comes back in right away.

I made sure I was on a backroad hardly anyone drives on where I could slow down or pull over before I took these pictures.  Another reminder of all the blowing snow on PEI that would wreck havoc on the roads.  Just a glimpse of that place is all I need to be in tears again.

Farmland, back roads, snow, barns, bliss.

A little tree line next to a farm field.

Apparently, standing on the snow in bare feet runs in the family.

We are nuts! Most take pictures of their footprints in the sand.  We take pictures of our footprints in snow!

Little guy is wearing a diaper here (I still haven't attempted potty training), but I thought he looked so cute just being his preschool self.  I see pictures on Instagram of other moms letting kids run around in their underwear, which is fine, but we have never found our kids desire to be naked like that.  He soon wanted his pants back on.

And then it was 50 degrees again!  But little guy searched out the bits of snow left over in the yard.

Excadators!  (That's how Abishai says it).  We are pretty sure they are digging sewer lines for another subdivision.  But how cool to get up close with the big machines that little guy loves!  And to have sunshine at 6:30 pm.  And yes, Abishai got to "pat pat" the diggers.

We made it just in time for the IAHE conference to start!  All 6 of us!  Even the private school kid.  Yes, he took an earbud out, he's not that rude.

Lots of families bring all their kids, so it's not uncommon to see them running around and on the floor coloring and messing around.  It's encouraged of course to take them out of the session if they get loud because they do record the sessions.

Hi!

Mike Smith, President of HSLDA

Sweet!  3 out of 4 kids could do this fun rock activity promoting some cool caves and hiking trails in southern Indiana.

Sweet that Daddy could help little guy this time!  Remember, we did this at the tree farm last fall.

This is what you do when you can only use one hand to open your chips.  And you know what?  He got it open!  It was nice to have the morning and lunch hour with the whole family there.  But it was also nice to send them home and "do my thing" mostly by myself.

Encouraging science and STEM activities!

THE Jackie Adams in action!  She uses the banner out front to draw people into the booth, but doesn't try to reach out to people just passing by.  I love how she has the clips up at eye level, and has the checkout table, too.  Simple and she can leave it in the car at all times!  She does a couple of shows a month.  This is the company I'm a stylist with as well.  Love it!

I guess the conference tuckered this guy out.  We did have to get up super early to get there by 8:30am.

Debra Bell talking about kids' brains.  Loved her talk so much that I also attended her workshop on motivation.  She homeschooled her kids, graduated them, then went back to school to study psychology and education and I think she has at least her masters degree if not a doctorate.

This is for Grandma Leah because she bakes bread.  I think I shared a picture like this with her last year, too.  These are grain mills!  But they also had other blenders and food processors, too.

These are the card decks of the historical card game we got.  You'll never get duplicates like you do with Pokemon card packs.  And they have a contest every month where you can design your own card.

Our goodies from the day.  Paper tablets of blank maps, perfect for tracing maps like I learned about a couple of months ago.  A pegboard and rubber bands just for fun.  Play dough tools and preschool workbooks.  Card game, charcoal pencils, and nice, but cheap drawing pad.  Nice pen for Benaiah.  Colored silly putty and astronaut ice cream.  Plus I ordered math books!

They were tired, but couldn't wait to try out their new game so they stayed up until 9:30pm playing!

My convention buddy! Getting so big!

Rick Green, Patriot, founding fathers' expert, NRA card carrying, dynamic speaker.  My parents would have loved him.  Yes, I loved him, too.  Learn cursive and read your constitution and original source documents like letters between the founding fathers and THEN tell me who they were.  He and David Barton are part of an organization that does have a lot of those source documents and their passion is make sure history is taught well and correctly.  He was SO GOOD!

And he incorporated his homeschool teenage kids into his talk!  And they were incredibly poised and dynamic, too.  So awesome!

Ok, maybe she's not as big as I thought.  "I just wanted to sit down!"  Um, there's a bench right next to you, kid.

Then I attended a session on incorporating more movement into the learning, something I know a lot about but never implement.  It was taught by Heather Haupt who wrote "Knights in Training" which I've seen in several blogs lately.  Sidenote, sort of, the current educational system does not allow for movement throughout the day like you can during homeschool lessons.  Mrs. Haupt actually was in the public school for awhile and then was homeschooled because she couldn't sit still for more than 10 minutes at a time.  Those 10 minutes were spent in agony thinking about making herself sit still, so she wasn't really learning that much.  Then, a gracious teacher, let her kept up and make a lap around her desk that sat at the back of the room.  I was reminded of how my brother learned his time tables while he was upside down on the couch and how Keturah and Justin both move a ton during lessons.

What a beautiful marionette!  There's a puppet theater her in town and they were showing off some of their marionettes and programs coming up.  Reasonably priced for school groups.  And the lady even showed me how to make a simple marionette with popsicle sticks and a stuffed animal!  Nice!

The last speaker was Frederic Gray.  He talked about the Gideon Factor, but I wasn't quite sure what he really was getting at.  His testimony is great though and he speaks about relationships.

Meanwhile, (this is the birthday boy's sister in law, Jared took the picture), Jared was enjoying himself at his best friend from high school's 40th birthday celebrations.  They went ax throwing! It's the new "in" thing to do for our generation and younger.  I would have loved to try as well.  Jared like it, too.

I think that's Matt's (birthday boy) older brother, so the woman in the other picture's husband.

Sweet picture of us stylists together!  I can't go to the Lilla Rose convention so it felt like the convention came to me! 

Showing off our Flexi clips!  Sweet!

What a long weekend!  But happy we shared it together!

I had to go out then and drive in that.  Pretty slushy, a little slick, but doable.

One day's worth of snow on the van, which this short woman had to clean off by herself.  I was actually disappointed that the guy next to me didn't offer to help.

It was a good 4-5 inches on the car.  I did manage to get most of it off but it took awhile.  We don't like it when people get lazy and refuse too clean off the roofs to their cars, so I tried to do what I could.  Where are my men that usually do this????

Yes, again, I carefully took pictures as  I drove.  But how pretty is this?!  How can anyone say they hate snow?!

Trees laden with heavy wet snow!

Our neighborhood never gets plowed, so that was tricky to navigate because it was 8 inches deep!

Snow on the parents' deck.

So pretty!  And Jared took pictures when he came home, too.  At least we both love it so maybe we'll move north again someday.

It's a good thing the back door was left unlocked because Benaiah needed his boots in order to shovel all of this!  He did our driveway and Grandpa's, which is the same width/height/length in less than 2 hrs. 8-10 inches of heavy, wet snow.  He was very sore the next day because he was very out of practice.  I love having older kids to do these things!  It saves on both Jared and my backs!

Not sure how this picture slipped in, but here's a preview of the next blog with more pictures of when we got home that night and the fun we had the next day.....stay tuned!