Crazy but fun times

Well I just finished writing out my lesson plans for the next few weeks, and looking back on the last four weeks of school! I can't believe how fast time has flown through all that I feel like I've endured lately. Here's a catch up of what the last few weeks have involved...

I finally got over my hives around Sept. 21st so that's all most two weeks of hives! My wart is finally gone (without surgery Praise God for that) and now I have another one popping up on my right foot, but am having the foot doc take care of it the same way, so it's not painful at all yet! The first couple of weeks was spent either in pain, or doped up on Benadryl to keep from itching. Somehow we were able to still get some great learning and fun times in despite my body falling apart! There is just no time for momma's to stop and heal!

We also have several very exciting things going on around the Jolly house...we closed last Friday on a fixer-upper home on 10 acres in Blue Ridge, Texas! That's right we are moving! We put our home here in Frisco on the market Saturday and hope to sell it quickly, but not too quickly before the house is ready to be occupied in the country or we might be moving in with friends and family. I will have to devote an entire blog on this little project that Marvin found some other time, but he has had his eye on it since March and everything just finally fell into place. It's a blessing from God, and we are looking forward to getting out to the country and stretch out and experience having animals, stars, and beautiful sunsets. For those of you who know me well, you know that I have been digging in my heels for the last few years on moving to the country, but God and Marv finally showed me that it is time for many changes. I will miss the suburbs and warm concrete streets and sidewalks. Landscaping and near by friends, stores, restaurants, etc.

On top of homeschooling, hives, buying and redoing a fixer-upper, putting our house on the market, and studying for my real estate final exam...Marv found out during the first week of school that he earned through work a free trip for two on a 7 night Mediterranean Cruise! I just don't think I can take anymore excitement and big stressful type events going on in our life, but this one I think I can handle! My sweet family and friends are going to be taking turns with our kiddos during this time, or it wouldn't be possible to go! I'll make sure and blog on our adventures once we get back.

If you would have told me a year ago that I would be homeschooling, moving to the country, and taking a trip out of the US I wouldn't have believed you for one second! It is so neat to see how through good and bad times God can be faithful in preparing us for the amazing journey of life that he allows us to live each moment of each day.

Hives and Homeschoolin'

Well we made it through our first official week of homeschooling. The kids are waking us up at 6:45 when we over sleep ready to go! I never ever in a million years thought that homeschooling could be this fun, much less doable. You see I was always one of the ones that just said I could NEVER EVER to it cause I couldn't do the higher level teaching, have enough patience, or discipline. I was sooooo wrong! The curriculum that I am using (a hodge podge of things) is just amazing! It has been so wonderful to add a family bible study into our schedule, and now we can learn about anything and everything that interest us when it comes to science, history, and art. I was telling Kim what I did for science the first day and she told me I should blog about it, so here goes along with our schedule...

7:00 Family Bible Study (we are doing Matthew right now through BSF)
7:45 Breakfast
8:15 Dress/chores
9:00 Calendar/Weather
9:30 Boys do Math while Julia does Language
10:30 Boys do Language while Julia does Math
11:30 Science/History M,W,F and Art/Music T/Th
12:30 Lunch...if I can get them to stop long enough!
1:30 Finish any school work/chores if needed
FREE TIME

Okay so this is my big plan, but these crazy kids of mine have gone of the deep end and usually don't want to quit! I never would have thought that would happen!

So for Science we are doing a couple of weeks on weather. I bought this neat weather cube station at Lakeshore teacher store that allows the kids to measure wind, rain, temp, barometric pressure, etc... It's been really neat! I also asked them on the first day to write down a question in their science folders that they had about weather. Wow their little brains come up with so many questions it was hard to narrow it down to one, but they did. I had 6-8 books checked out from our city library about weather and then told them to go and research to find the answers. They each ended up writing a couple of pages on all the info they found and then shared with each other. So simple, but man did they really do alot of self teaching and self motivation on this!

Now for the hives part of the week! I have a plantar's wart on my foot and was prescribed a medication that I am obviously allergic to cause I woke up Friday morning itching like crazy and covered in hives! Needless to say after taking Benadryl I was out for the count, but we were able to get our school lessons in by the afternoon! I'm so blessed to have these three precious children who have amazed me and surprised me by their enthusiasm and love for our new homeschooling adventure!

Homeschooling Preview Week

Well we got started last week with homeschooling, and I can say this...WOW it is going to be so much fun, and so much work all at the same time! I know that with public school there are advantages and disadvantages, and it will be the same with homeschooling. I think hopefully though the advantages will far outweigh the disadvantages. While some things I am still just trying to get used to...like BEING WITH MY KIDS TWENTY-FOUR SEVEN!!! I love love love truly love being with my kids, but after a while we can all get a little ready for some alone time. One great thing we did this summer to get ready for all this togetherness is move each child into their own rooms...sooo that has really helped!

The first week was a preview week to give me a chance to see what each child retained from last year, what they were feeling about this new adventure, and prepare the room and all our supplies to make sure we were ready to get started with the real thing September 10th. One of the things I had each child do was write in their journals. They were to write about their goals for this school year...personal, spiritual, and educational goals. They were to write about their hopes for this new venture. They also were to write about ideas they had about field trips and fun trips that they would like to take. Marvin and I were so blessed by what each of them wrote I thought I would share a part of each of their writings with y'all...

Jeffrey 12 years old/7th
My goals this year are to get better in the habit of reading the bible. I would also like to get better at Math. I will get better at playing guitar also. I am trying to save money for a guitar and other stuff like tithing. Reading the bible will help me in my walk with God this year. Math is a thing that every one needs to know, because in the future it will help you in your job and with every day things like bills. I hope this year that homeschooling will help me be confident, and act better. I will enjoy being with my brother, sister, and mother all of my school days. I hope by being in their class I will learn more about their feelings and also helping them in school. (This is just a taste of the two pages that he wrote!)

Jacob 10 years old/5th

As you know, this year we're starting to home school. I'm going to have lots of fun...and set goals. Get comfortable because this is going to take a while. One of my spiritual goals is to actually pray sincerely to God. The reason? Sometimes, if I'm really tired at night, or in a bad mood, I just say the same thing EVERY NIGHT. "Dear God, Help us have a great night's sleep tonight and a good day tomorrow. In Jesus name, Amen." I mean you gotta admit it is getting kind of old. Okay, next thing, educational goals I have a couple so uh, listen up. The 1st thing is grades. They can make a big difference in school. I'm gonna try to improve my grades because last year wasn't a bunch of sugar and spice. The 2nd thing is paying attention. Sometimes I just look around, other times I day dream. Now to personal goals. The big and only thing in this category is the bass guitar. I want one so badly! (What a ham he is in his writing...I love it!)

Julia 8 yr. old/3rd

I want to learn how to cook. I want to learn how to cook ravioli, spaghetti, and pancakes. I will try to do my best on that. Next, I would like to exercise more often. Like do sit ups and other stuff. I am also ready to be on a schedule for dance, violin lessons, and school! First I think that I want to go on more field trips like to Six Flags, or Sharkarosa, that would be fun. Second, I would like to read the bible more, and learn about Peter, and Esther! Third, I would like to learn lots of history. I would like to find out about all the first ladies and Presidents. I would like to learn about the president's children and their names are. I love to learn about history and want to learn more about it! (I love that Julia wants to learn how to be a momma, and now we will have time!)

I can not begin to tell y'all how blessed and just so thankful I am by reading their first journal entries. The change I already see in each child is a gift from God and I can't wait to see how this year transpires for each of them and for us as a family!

This picture cracks me up

There is a story behind why the boys look so horrified in the heading picture...

1. What you don't see is that they are praying, and hoping for their friends to come pick them up and rescue them from the 10 squealing 8 years olds at the feet!
2. They "love" their sister, but really mom this is just too much to ask of us...
3. They are jealous of all her Littlest Pet Shop presents, but would NEVER EVER admit it!

The grin on Julia's face is...

1. I'm so excited to have all 10 of my squealing friends around me at my feet!
2. I love it when mom "makes" the boys put me in the middle and gives me all the attention!
3. I can't wait to get my brothers to help me open all these Littlest Pet Shop presents and play with me!

It is just hilarious to watch my three kiddos interact and love so big and real one second and then want to have each other for supper the next! It keeps it real and real interesting around here, and now that we are having all kinds of togetherness we have had plenty of opportunities to get to truly KNOW each other over these past few months of summer.

JCA will begin next week, and the kids and I can hardly wait! Julia would do school year around if I would let her...and I just might! We will begin with testing, and some review to get the brain matter in some kind of shape to actually begin learning again. I also want to take some time to just brainstorm, dream, collaborate, and write out some personal goals, family goals, and school year goals. What do they hope to learn this year? What are their favorite subjects, topics, or fun things to do? I want to really try and have them journal through this year so that we can look back on this first year and see what it was really like to experience this new adventure we are about to embark on.

I also thought we might make our own JCA (Jolly Christian Academy) shirts to celebrate the fun and spirit that we will be learning in. Another neat idea that came to me last week as I was brainstorming all the different things we could do to begin and get ready is go to the library and let each kid get their own library card...well we ended up going to day and man was it just the coolest thing! I found out that our new city library has a homeschool connection that is special just for us homeschoolers! What an amazing network of support and fun! I'm so thankful for all of the amazing people that I have met, have emailed me, or just plain walked up to me and wrote down their contact info so knowing that I would need it!

Thank you Father for your peace, grace, patience, and encouragement through all the other homeschooling families out there!!! Y'all know who you are and I praise God for you each and everyone!

Homeschooling Heroes

Well it's official...we have decided to homeschool...yes all three kids. It's been one of the first questions everyone asks. What would be the point in only homeschooling one child, or two, and having to continue keeping up with the rat race with the other one...that would defeat the whole purpose... right?

I knew without a doubt when I was pregnant with Jeffrey that I would quit teaching and stay home with him at all cost. Now it wasn't always easy, and I did have all kinds of part time jobs like tutoring, babysitting, mother's day out director, preschool teacher, secret shopper (shhhh! don't tell anyone!), sold discovery toys, substitute teacher, and the list goes on. God has always supplied every penny we needed and it has been a true all most 13 years of learning to trust and lean on the one true PROVIDER. As each baby was born I would dream about what our future would hold...would I go back to teaching full time in the public school, or possibly homeschool, or....and the possibilities can be endless.

Over the past year there have been many things happening that have brought us to seek God in our personal walks with the Lord, in our marriage, in our family, and in the way we feel God wants us to live this life in total abandon to his will and plan for our lives. It was clear that if we continued in the way we were going then we could loose our family. From crazy middle school homework, Marv traveling alot, and just trying to keep up with the crazy rat race of life we literally all most lost us in the craziness of trying to keep up with this world. It's as if we have been feasting on the all you can eat buffet of this world and now we are stuffed and done with this way of life.

We have several friends in our lives who homeschool, or are are also about to begin on this new homeschool journey. It seemed like a big, hard, and scary thing everytime I would consider it in the past. I would always make excuses like..."I'm not disciplined enough.", or "There's no way I could do math in the higher levels!" Now I have learned and see all the awesome possibilities and support that is out there to help me do this. The choices of curriculum have been amazing and overwhelming to say the least, but wow...there are so many choices! Now we will have time to learn and study from the bible, truly understand math, and everything else in our own time. AND the best and neatest part is the creation-based science and biblical-based history. No more having to hope that we get a Christian teacher, and knowing that they still won't be able to bring God into anything they do.

I don't pretend to think that this will be easy, but I do know that sending them to public school wasn't easy either. I can't tell you the straight up freedom and peace that came over this family when we made the final decision to step out of the rat race and take this step. We now have TIME to do anything, and everything that we feel is best for our family. We now have TIME to go see history instead of just sitting and reading about it. We feel like we have been given the gift of TIME back like I think God originally intended for it to be.

We have named our school the Jolly Christian Academy (a.k.a. JCA), and are currently trying to pick out a mascot. I think the HOMESCHOOL HEROES sounds great. I am getting to homeschool my kiddos and help them become the Heroes that they are supposed to be! I don't know if the kids will go for it...they will get a vote, but I think it has a nice ring!

I will be blogging at least once a week now to share what we are doing and keep you up to date on our progress. We covet your prayers and are so thankful for the precious friends and family that have walked with us, prayed with us, and encouraged us as over the past year to help us get to this point in our lives.

Deuteronomy 6:5-9
These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down, and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

Wow where has the time gone?

Hey y'all! It's been an awesome summer so far~SO GOOD!!! We did make it up to Colorado...I'll do a post on that trip alone with pics later on....and had a super vaca away from the real world. It was beautiful, warmer than I thought it would be, and we discovered doing a vaca for cheap, and actually relaxing instead of beating the roads every day and trying to fit in all kinds of sights to see. Instead we really enjoyed just piling into the car and driving all over mountains and finding neat cabins, rivers, streams, lakes, animals, snow, etc... The views in Colorado have always made my heart go pitter patter...literally sometimes because of the altitude! We did venture out one day and found the coolest, most dream like thing I've never thought you could find in Colorado....THE GREAT SAND DUNES....have you ever? Well if not you've gotta put that on your for sure to see before you die list. The amazing landscaping all coming together as one is really just dream like and amazing. I kept thinking okay God really does have a sense of humor, or was just having so much fun experimenting with this part to see what it would be like to have snow capped mountains, desert sand dunes, and wet lands all crashing into each other....okay well I 'll write more about that later also in another post!

We had a really fun Fourth of July...which if anyone knows me well then you know this is my all time favorite holiday!!! I have great memories of my childhood having fireworks on the lake down in Kingsland with everyone in the area coming to our little area to enjoy. I think it was the crowds of people that I really liked the most along with the picnics and watermelon! This year we celebrated at my brother-in-laws lake house with my parents, mother-in-law, and once it grew dark around 30 people showed up with their own fireworks. We were already enjoying all the fireworks that people were shooting off of their docks...probably 50-100 different shows all going off at the same time (you could tell the doctors and lawyers cause their firework shows could rival a small towns grand finale)...well then when all the friends showed up with their own fireworks then we got to experience the fireworks right above our heads! We topped it off with my dad, mom, and Marv playing some bluegrass on their mandolin, bass, and guitar. It was so fun to sing along and celebrate this great country with our family.

After that I have continued to study for my exams and as of two days ago have finished all five courses and test YIPPEE!...now I hope to take the final state exam by the end of August. We have spent the majority of July having our nephew and niece come and stay with us, helping Amy unpack and get moved into their apartment in Austin, and helping Michelle have a garage sale, pack, and paint her home to get ready for market so that she can move to Austin as well.

The other big news in the Jolly household is that we have decided to homeschool!!! We are so excited and are busy trying to pick out the best curriculum and move some rooms around so that we can have a space for everyone and a space for our classroom. I will post later on the details of our decision. Please pray for me as I try to get everything ready to get started.

I hope each of your summer days have been filled with fun, family, and great memories.

Summer Time and the Livin' is Easy!

One of my all time favorite songs...and one that I sing often buzzin' around the house is Summer Time from Porgy and Bess. It's a song that I sang with the Howard Payne Choir in college. I just love it, and my kids do too! Even though they pretend to get tired of hearing me busting out this favorite tune of mine!

Summertime is one of my all time favorites because...well the kids are home from school. So many mommas out there seem to be frustrated with summer because it means they have to BE with their kids, but I just love having all my little...or not so little anymore... chicks around me, and not having a real schedule! Now don't get me wrong there are times over these past two weeks that I have thought...okay I'm tired of hearing the fussing, but that's part of growing up and learning to get along. The biggest bummer so far is that I was sick last week. So sick that I literally was in bed for several days with high fever...ugh! We have all had more sickness this past month in our family, but I think we are on the mend now and ready to enjoy getting out of the house and actually doing summery type things. The other different thing about this summer so far is that it has rained for like the past 20 something days now, and we have only been in the 80's! We've been in a drought for the past couple of years and it is so nice to have plenty of rain to cool things off and keep things green! Some hate all this rain and complain, but I say bring it on...just keep the humidity please!

We try and keep summer simple by just being and not running to all the camps offered to truly have some down time!

Jeffrey is doing a football camp and conditioning camp this summer...he says it's time to tuffin' up so I think this will be a way for that to happen! He has grown up so fast in this past year...his voice is super deep, and our whole family is rejoicing to see that he has three armpit hairs now! It's a big deal y'all, and we are all proud for him! Little sister keeps checking her pits hoping that she'll feel grown up as well...bless her heart she just doesn't understand how good she has it now! Jeffrey is also doing a guitar camp this week...he is getting pretty good! In July Jeffrey is going with the youth group and choir on a mission trip to New York City. They will be there a week doing a VBS for a church there, and helping build a playground. I can't believe he is old enough to go by himself that far away, but it will be good to see him experience God working in the city through the things they do!

Jacob is doing a piano camp this week and will be going to children's church camp later in July. He loves playing the piano and fills our home with beautiful music every day! That boy makes me cry with his sweet-melancholy tunes! I will have to figure out how to record and get that on here someday!

Julia is also doing piano camp this week, and may be doing a ballet class later in the summer. Right now though she and Jacob are busy building forts in the game room, playing games, playing school, and getting outside between the rain storms for some trampoline and tree climbing time! We also hope to get some grandparent time this summer. The kids love going to "cousin camp" and spending some time making great memories with their grandparents!

I have been continuing to study for my real estate classes, and have as of this morning finished two of the courses and made A's on the test. Only three more to go and then it's state exam time! We are going to our friend's cabin in Colorado this year for our summer vacation. It will be so nice to get away and just be together in beautiful Colorado! I will make sure and post pictures from all the fun this summer, and from the highlights of our school year soon!