So, I may have slipped a little in trying to get these out in a timely manner. I’m using excuses for real. Jet lag and trying to jump back in to school a few days after returning from Emmie’s appointments across the country.
Alas, here we are now filling ya’ll in on what we’re up to for 7th grade and as a bonus, 8th grade. Josiah is our current star student in 7th grade. He’s doing a little bit of this and that and trying to pass me in height. Liam is very much prepping for high school next year (eeek! 3 in high school)
Here’s what all he’s up to in addition to all we are doing together.
Writing Strands Beginnings-Master Book has totally updated and re-done Writing Strands and we thought we would take an IEW break and check it out. I’m liking it so far. It includes reading and writing as well as using the Bible for some literature work.
Principles of Mathematics Book 1-Another Master Books program. I may kick myself in not gearing him for Algebra 2 next year but I like this gentle learning approach since most of us are not super strong in math.
Ceili Rain is excited that we are actually back in school. One of the few kiddos who is excited, mind you. In addition to all of her academics, she’s taking piano and starting her second year of theater. She’s my only kid who is growing in her love for theater. My little stage heart is so ecstatic.
Fix It! Grammar Book 2-Ceili Rain worked on this last year and did a great job with it. I love that it’s a short amount of work a day but it packs in a lot of info on grammar.
Silas is a bit more of a challenge. He is really struggling with reading and needs a little more work in getting his math facts down. So, I’m trying to scale back for him and start him a little above where he is and encourage him to work to that and beyond.
Easy Peasy Reading Grade 1-I felt like we needed a little break from All About Reading. While he could read the stories up to Level 3 slowly, he isn’t comprehending anything he reads. So, we’re working on getting the comprehension down.
All About Spelling Level 3-A pretty awesome part of All About Spelling is that you can now purchase an APP that has the spelling tiles on it! It is awesome! It’s worth every single penny if you have siblings who may like to play with tiles and then they disappear…or they just disappear from use!
Math Whizz-I purchased this at a discount through Homeschool Buyers Co-Op. It’s a great place to find reviews and get good group buy prices on curriculum. I like that this math program works at the level the child is at. It rates a child based on their math age and goes from there. Once Silas passes off of his Xtra Math, I’m going to have him go back to Teaching Textbooks Grade 6.
FYI, I am fully aware that he has a mop on his head. It’s going away today!
Bryant started out doing his thing for fourth grade and he is doing it very well. He’s my child who goes full force into anything and everything and deals with the injuries later…just ask him about his belly flops at the pool. So full force for him in school includes:
WriteShop Primary B with Malachi and Silas. Honestly, after trying to look over this for three days I’m still not sure I like the curriculum. It’s a lot of teacher prep but since we haven’t started on our house, if I can prep before we do, then it may be doable.
Easy Peasy Reading Grade 4-I really like this curriculum and that I can buy their textbooks on Amazon and they have workbooks that go with them. Oh, yeah, they are really cheap. If you can’t afford the textbooks or are always on the go, you can also use their website.
Malachi’s plunging full force into second grade. Even though he’s taught himself to read, he still is about age level for comprehension. So, his curriculum this year looks like this:
Language Lessons for a Living Education Level 2-We started this about halfway through the school year last year when I realized that the first level of Language Arts from Master Books was a little too boring for him. So, we’re finishing this one up and will head into level 3 when he’s ready. I like the gentle approach to introducing grammar.
Vocabulary/Spelling City-We used to use this when it was free but they have revamped the site and I like the age appropriate practice it gives the kids in either spelling or vocabulary.
Xtra Math-I can not stress how important it is for kids to get their basic math facts down. Xtra math is a great FREE resource to do just that.
Write Shop Primary B-One of my friend’s was asking about this curriculum last spring and I was intrigued. I have been looking for a fun way to introduce writing to the younger kids. So, this year is another trial run for this. Silas and Bryant will be doing this along with Malachi.
Easy Peasy Reading Grade 2-Bryant did a trial run with grade 3 last year and I really liked it. It’s not as intensive and workbook driven as what we’ve used in the past but it does introduce great books and stories with comprehension building questions.
We’re back! Goodness me, moving twelve people and their fur animals and 19 plus years of stuff was a lot of work. Add on sending two of those people to another country for a couple of weeks…phew!
But we’re moved and I’m working on this blog post at our temporary house sitting on the pool deck and watching the kids play! We are blessed to be able to stay at a great place while we wait for the “next thing.”
It’s nice to be back and FINALLY sharing Nikole’s story of her beautiful daughter, Halle. Nikole and Brad have four children, Hannah, Harrison, Hayden and Halle. Listen in as Nikole shares what she has learned in the land of Holland with their youngest daughter. Halle was born with microcephaly and microphalmia. Nikole and I hit all the points about juggling siblings, marriage, and putting Christ as priority even when things are hard. She challenged me to remember that our babies…all of our babies…are precious gifts from God!
Peter’s Anomaly-This is the eye condition that Halle is dealing with in her left eye.
Hip Dysplasia-Thankfully, Halle’s days of cast wearing is behind her and she happily runs and plays like most five year olds!
Littlest Warrior-I can not say enough good things about their advocacy and awareness apparel. Fun and supportive of all of our kiddos!
Seeds Family Worship-God’s Word to song is such a great way to memorize and Seeds does it right. The music is worshipful and the words are always memorable and relevant!
Hope Heals-Katherine Wolf created Hope Heals out of the struggles and pain she has suffered. Out of a time of grief and what others would consider a great tragedy, Katherine has created Hope Heals to share how God has written her story and continues to do so for His glory. Her words have challenged, encouraged and lifted me up.
Support
Subscribe-Subscribing is a great way to stay up to date on our latest episodes and stories. Just search on iTunes for Welcome to Holland or paste the following URL in your favorite podcast app: bunchofcharacters.com/feed/podcast
Review-leaving a review on iTunes which will help get the word out and will give us an idea of how we’re doing!
Laura Ann shared her heart when we sat down to talk about her five year old, Carley, their miracle baby due in August, and her wonderful husband Ryan. Carley has taught Laura Ann so much about having peace, love and strength. She’s also taught them to find the joy in the “simple” things.
Subscribe-Subscribing is a great way to stay up to date on our latest episodes and stories. Just search on iTunes for Welcome to Holland or paste the following URL in your favorite podcast app: bunchofcharacters.com/feed/podcast
Review-leaving a review on iTunes which will help get the word out and will give us an idea of how we’re doing!
*Please note: Laura Ann discusses her experience and the changes that they noticed around a time of a vaccination. This podcast is meant to share mamas faith stories while walking in the land of special needs, not to debate. Please be respectful of this purpose.*
Melissa MacConney joined me on the latest episode to talk about her son, Matthew and life with Gaucher’s disease and other challenges he has faced. Melissa’s an “old” friend (not saying we are old but that our friendship is old)! I’ve enjoyed watching Matthew, who is now 16, grow up and conquer so much of what a lot of people thought he would never achieve.
The whole MacConney clan-Matthew, Micah, Melissa and Mike
Mentioned on the Show
To learn more about Gaucher’s Disease, check out this site.
Subscribe-Subscribing is a great way to stay up to date on our latest episodes and stories. Just search on iTunes for Welcome to Holland or paste the following URL in your favorite podcast app: bunchofcharacters.com/feed/podcast
Review-leaving a review on iTunes which will help get the word out and will give us an idea of how we’re doing!
Coming soon, hopefully, to a podcast near you! God placed the desire to share stories of moms walking in the world of special needs (all kinds of special needs) a long time ago. When I finally stopped ignoring His prompting and got up the nerves to share with someone (Mark), He moved us forward. Check out our Teaser/Episode 00 now! And get ready for some amazing stories of God’s faithfulness both in our lives and the lives of other families!
Emmie had a check up at the start of the year with her neurologist and orthotist. We had noticed that her neurologist, Dr. Wolf always wears crazy socks. So, I searched online and found some super superhero socks at John’s Crazy Socks. Emmie was so excited to give them to him and he made a big deal about it.
He was so excited to see how awesome Emmie is doing. We go back in six months. She didn’t want to pose with him so he went to her and gave the goofy pose. By the way, her amazing shirt, I purchased from Littlest Warrior. I absolutely love these shirts! I have plans for her to rock the “Rare Jewel” shirt soon.
We have some amazing friends in Atlanta right now and they offered for our kids to come over and play the next time we went to Atlanta. We haven’t seen them in a few years and the kids were iffy on going. But once we got there, they settled right in. Needless to say, they had an absolute blast!
Meanwhile, Emmie and I had a girls’ day complete with ice cream.
After I picked up the kiddos, we headed out of Atlanta (which is an adventure in and of itself) and made a pitstop for pizza where I learned that Tobin likes olives. He is so my son.
We’ve been home from California not quite a week. To say we’re “back to normal” is a bit of a misnomer. We’re still reeling from the travel, jet lag, and general life changes that come with a big surgery for our super hero. The trip went great. We had a hiccup of a stomach bug that hit Emmie the morning after she was discharged but aside from that small scare, she sailed through surgery and recovery like the amazing super hero she is.
Today at breakfast, Malachi said, “Emmie is brave. Like really brave. She was brave all through surgery and flying. She’s brave.” Yes. Yes, dear son and so are you.
While we were away our hearts were overwhelmed with love for all our super siblings at home. I don’t think I worried for a second about how they were doing. They were fed well (and they told us all about it) by our church family who brought meals the week they were at our home with grandparents. They informed me, “We have dessert at EVERY meal!” They were loved. Oh so loved, by our church family and regular family.
The kids spent the first week with Papa and Grandmere and then traveled to Alabama and spent the weekend with my sister, Aunt Yaya and her family. After that, they traveled back to Georgia to hang with Ge and Granddaddy until we arrived late Thursday evening.
Aunt Yaya panicked that we would flip at the amount of tv and junk food they ate. Nope. No worries…aunts and uncles should spoil nieces and nephews. And really, I didn’t care what they ate. The most important thing to me was that they were loved. And they were oh so loved.
We sometimes have a time of “two petals and a thorn” during family worship. Usually after a fun family day or trip or even a really, really hard day, we’ll go around and everyone names two things they enjoyed about the day (two petals) and one hard thing about the day (the thorn). One of the kids told us that their two petals and thorn were, “You were gone. You were gone. You were gone.” They had so much fun with family! That warmed my heart so much.
Tobin spent the night before surgery with our sweet dear “framily” who lived not too far from Stanford. How precious that my sweet T was loved and cared for and ya’ll, he was spoiled too! I didn’t have to worry about him that whole day.
If our kids away from us weren’t loved enough…then there was surgery day. I woke up at dark thirty and saw notification upon notification on facebook and texts and instagram. Over and over people saying they were praying. Sweet beautiful videos of our god-daughter praying that made me laugh and cry all at once and brought a sweet smile to Emmie’s face. Wishes and prayers and shares from all over the world that God would keep His ever-loving hand on our precious girl and us.
Before our feet ever touched the airport, even, God provided wonderful and loving financial support for us. We were able to raise more than what we had budgeted in a matter of days and continued to receiving loving support through Amazon purchases and even more funds. We didn’t have to worry the whole trip about whether we had enough money. The money we didn’t spend will go towards her trip in six months. She’ll have another MRI/angiogram/perfusion study to see if the surgery worked (20% chance that it won’t…so good odds).
I guess what I’m trying to say, through all of this is that we are so grateful. Words are not adequate to express the love and care we have felt from everyone who has prayed, given, fed….well, loved, us. We love you all so much and can never really tell you all enough how much your love means to all of us. It’s really overwhelming and I’ll have moments when I realize that God has provided and loved on us through real tangible people and by growing and stretching our faith…once again.
