Tree of Life Mothering

Is the homeschool movement failing? Yes, I think so, for the most part. I have been homeschooling for over 17 years. I am saddened to see so many homeschooled youth floundering after they get to their late teens and 20s. I envisioned more youth becoming great scholars, servants, and entrepreneurs. I am not seeing that. Why is this not happening? It’s because our vision as homeschoolers isn’t high enough. I encourage you to watch this video presentation featured above by my friends the Stoddard family to raise your vision to be God’s vision for your family. 

I really love that Hannah Stoddard and her father James, in this video,  address the issue of inspiring a love of learning in homeschooled children. They say that instead of inspiring a love of learning, the better goal is to inspire a love of God. What a grand idea! An education fit for building Zion has to start with a love of God. I can see how much more powerful that would be. If we inspire a love of God, then our children will want to learn whatever God asks them to learn to further His purposes, not our selfish ones. God wants us to turn outwards and feed His sheep, to liberate the captive, clothe the naked, and serve them. He is asking us to be less selfish.

They point out the difference between a Roman and Hebrew model of education. The Roman model is about learning for learning’s sake, the Hebrew model is about learning in order to do. To build, to serve, to help.  A quote by Joseph Smith from the Lectures on Faith appears at the 12:50 minute mark that I absolutely love, which says that:

“For a man to lay down his all, his character and reputation, his honor, and applause, his good name among men, his houses, his lands, his brothers and sisters, his wife and children, and even his own life also … requires more than mere belief … that he is doing the will of God; but actual knowledge, realizing that, when these sufferings are ended, he will enter into eternal rest, and be a partaker of the glory of God” 

I also loved at the end of the video when the Stoddards say that if your children know that you are doing this for them, that you are laying down your life for them everyday by serving them, they will feel your love for them. This inspired me. I hope as my children feel my love for them they will feel the love of God and feel inspired to love God in return by serving others in building Zion.

Here is what the Stoddards say about an education for Zion:

What does a “Zion education” look like? Today, there are many battlelines where the adversary is assaulting the kingdom of God. What if the hours spent “homeschooling” could be used to make a difference, not only in our families, but in the world? What if the home is the most undervalued, underestimated and forgotten weapon against the adversary in our age?

How can we revolutionize our homes into productive environments that impact the world for good? How can we successfully reach our apathetic youth? How do we prepare our children for the “real world” without being conformed to the world?

Presentation slides available on the Joseph Smith Foundation website: Focus OUT, Not In – “Feed My Sheep”

Mission Centered – “Here am I, Send Me”

I am on a Dave Ramsey kick right now, so here’s another review of one of his products and a giveaway!

This time the product is the book he wrote with his daughter Rachel Cruze. It’s called Smart Money Smart Kids. Here’s a cute video that Rachel did to celebrate the fact that the book hit #1 on the New York Times bestseller list.

If you have ever wondered how to teach your kids about money, this is the book for you! By reading this book, you will be able to mentor your kids in managing money. They will then make most of their money mistakes as youth and will make fewer money mistakes as adults! Reading this book is like sitting down with a multimillionaire, which is what Dave is, and hearing him tell you everything he knows about raising kids to be smart with money. You also get to hear from Rachel tell her story about what it was like to grow up under Dave’s mentorship. What does that look like? It looks like having a “commission” instead of an allowance. A commission is something a kid earns from doing chores, an allowance is just given to a kid, just for existing. It means being given a vision that you can, as a kid, earn enough money to buy a decent, used car when you are 16. It means being encouraged to have a part-time job when you are a teen so that you can earn the car. I absolutely loved reading the stories of each of the Ramsey kids earning money to buy a car the day he or she turned 16. The youngest one earned the most, an amazing amount. What he did with the leftover amount of money after he bought the car was so heartwarming and totally unselfish. I won’t spoil the story for you, but it was so amazing!

I wish I had known about this book last summer! That’s when two of teenaged kids earned a pile of cash by working on a farm. But by December, my second son had spent all the money. Now he’s earning money again, having sold grapefruit and doing various odd jobs for people in our religious congregation. I’m determined to help him save some of this money by helping him set a budget every month and divide all his earnings into give, save, and spend, which is one thing Dave and Rachel teach in the book. Most of my questions about what to do about kids and money have been answered by reading this book. 

I give the book 4 out of 5 stars. That’s because not all of my questions were answered. The main one is, “Just how do you go about finding jobs for your kids to earn money?” In the book, Rachel tells the story of a little boy who was 6 who got the big dream to buy an iPad. He earned the money in “creative ways” she says, so that he accomplished his dream, but she doesn’t go into details. That’s exactly what I want to know! When you are an average middle-class parent, not Dave Ramsey, and don’t have deep pockets or a business with work begging to be done, just how do you help your little kid find jobs away from home to earn more money than he/she can earn at home working for you? I wish this book had a chapter devoted just for that.

It does have chapters on teaching kids to work in general (not much details), save, spend, and give, avoid debt, and how to save for college and budget for a wedding. I thought it was cool how Rachel recalls memories of her parents paying tithing and offerings at church, which gave her the example to pay them. I loved learning the five goals, or Five Foundations, every teen should have. they are like Dave’s Baby Steps for Teens. They are 1. Emergency Fund, 2. Pay off Debt, 3. Car, 4. College, and 5. Build wealth and give. As an LDS mom, I have another step to add to it, saving for an LDS mission. I would say that fits in between 2 and 3 or is maybe simultaneous with 3. 

Nevertheless, it’s a great book that will equip you to mentor your child in managing money. It just needs more on how to mentor your child in earning the money in the first place. So what I am saying is that I want the “work” chapter fleshed out more as to how to find jobs or have a separate chapter that goes more in depth of how to find jobs. I look forward to seeing a second edition come out when Rachel is an experienced mother. Right now her daughter is only 1 so she doesn’t really speak from experience on the parent mentor side. That being said, this book totally raised my vision of what children are capable of earning and doing with money! 

Please enter the random drawing to win a copy of this book by making a comment below about why you want to read the book. The drawing will be held on Memorial Day, Monday May 30, sometime in the afternoon.

Rachel’s coming out with a new book this year, the title is Love Your Life, Not Theirs. I got to hear her speak in Phoenix two weeks ago. This truck and trailer, with Rachel’s image and book title plastered on the side, were parked in the parking lot close to where I parked. You can’t tell Dave is a proud father at all, can you? 🙂

About 5 years ago I saw my friend Katie pull out some envelopes from her purse to pay for something. I thought, “Wow, you mean, someone I know actually uses Dave Ramsey’s envelope system?” I had this mixed reaction. Part of me wanted to have my own set of envelopes so that I wouldn’t overspend. The other part of me, what Dave calls the “Free Spirit,” was like, “Nah, no way, I don’t want to feel restricted. That would be way too slow, cumbersome, and inconvenient. It’s so much easier to swipe plastic.”

Using envelopes seemed like something quaint, but good for my character. Kind of like using a washboard to do laundry. Dave would appreciate the analogy because just as using the washboard was his grandma’s way of doing laundry, the envelope system is what he calls “Grandma’s way of handling money.” At the time I couldn’t imagine how it would work for me. We didn’t have consistent income, so I didn’t know how we could even plan a budget.

Fast forward five years to last fall. My husband got an out-of-state job offer with consistent income, after years of the roller coaster ride of being self-employed. I had heard of Dave Ramsey in 2004 but it was too hard for me to listen to him on the radio because his show played at night in our area and that’s when I was doing dinner, supervising the kids washing dishes, and bedtime routines. So I was interacting with the kids a lot. When I got my used-but-new to me iPhone it was finally sooooo convenient to listen to the Dave Ramsey show, in the form of a podcast. I subscribed to it with iTunes. So now I can listen whenever I want! After many weeks of listening while I packed our home for our move to AZ, I was convinced that not only did we need the envelope system, but we needed the whole Financial Peace University kit. So we got it for Christmas. (If you ever order anything from Dave Ramsey, be prepared not to use a credit card! He is, after all, credit card’s number one enemy! You can only buy stuff from his web site using debit cards. We did pay for it with plastic, but it was backed by cash in the bank.)

It’s been almost five full months since I started using the cash envelope system that came with the kit. At first it was really awkward. I felt so self-conscious taking it out and paying for my groceries with cash, feeling like I was slowing everyone down in the line behind me. I am used to it now, though, and I love knowing that I am staying within the “walls” of the categories of my budget because of the “walls” of the envelopes. I give the system 4 1/2 stars. If you get the system that comes with the kit, you will get the “bare bones” version, the Starter System. It looks like a fat checkbook, but instead of pages of checks it has 6 pages of envelopes. Each envelope has flaps with lines, so you can write your deposits and withdrawals of cash transactions on the flaps. These spaces with lines to write the transactions are on the front and back of the flap and the front and back of the envelope.

I have four envelopes that we use cash for: Groceries, My Allowance, Non-food Consumables, and My Kids’ Commissions. My allowance is for things like clothes, garage sale treasures, treats for dates with my husband or kids, getting my hair done, buying books, makeup and hair stuff, miscellaneous stuff, and ahem, library fines. The non food consumable envelope is for things like soap, shampoo, conditioner, all my detergents, toilet paper, and all those things you get consistently at the grocery store that aren’t food, including ziploc bags and tape. The Kids’ Commissions is to pay my kids when they do certain chores without being reminded. I expect them to do all their chores, but if they have to be reminded, then they don’t get paid. We use dry erase charts from Dave’s Financial Peace Jr. Kit (more on that in a future post) to track that performance.

The system has a little pocket to hold cards or receipts and a few extra envelopes that aren’t bound. I guess those are for giving to your spouse. At first I thought they were replacements but they don’t have any holes punched in the side so you can’t attach them to the main system.

I give this system 4 1/2 stars. That’s because it lacks a few little things that would just make it 5 stars, like a snap or clip to keep it shut, and a little pocket for a pencil so I can have a pencil handy to write the transactions.

You can get an upgraded version, the deluxe system, that has the snap and a pen loop. It also has slots for credit, errr, excuse me, that would be debit cards, as well as a place for the checkbook and check register. Here’s a pdf from Dave about how to budget.

My dear friend Shauna emailed this to me and I am passing it on:

Did you know that certain days during the moon’s cycle are better for planting your garden than others? I was talking with my friend about appropriate days to plant your garden and thought some of you might appreciate this as well. Here is the link to the online farmers almanac with recommended planting dates.  If you think this is bogus, go ahead and plant whenever you feel like it. This applies to planting seeds, not starts.

 I will tell you though, that I’ve been gardening for 22 years and when I came across this idea (taught and popularized by Benjamin Franklin himself), I started taking notice and planted according to the “schedule” and realized that there is truth to this.  How did I know it was true?  Because of the actual amount of harvest I’ve gotten each year.  You will get a better harvest if you understand and follow these principles.  On years when I forgot to look at the calendar I had terrible and sometimes non existent harvest. This calendar is based upon the moon cycle and all ancient cultures including Egyptian, Mayan, and Oriental cultures have followed this.  

If you look at the link, you will see that next week, the 16th through the 20th are the best times to plant above ground crops. Root crops should be planted on 24th and 25th (beets, carrots, turnips, potatoes, etc)  

God bless you and your gardens!

 

http://farmersalmanac.com/calendar/gardening/ 

Here are some new homeschooling videos I found with the awesome topic of “homeschooling from rest” by homeschool mom, blogger, podcaster, and author Sarah Mackenzie. “Homeschooling from rest”? Is that even possible? How cool and lovely does that sound? Watch, apply, and enjoy! This woman speaks from experience! She has six kids, including toddler twins! 

Finally! I remember my mom starting to read this book aloud to us when I was a kid. She never finished it, at least with me. Maybe with my younger sisters. Then she passed the book down to me, so I started it with my older kids, and never finished! I finally got it done with the littles in February and now we are reading the sequel, Five Little Peppers Midway. 

It’s a great story because it’s about kids who are poor yet happy. They are grateful, never complain, and work hard. It’s simple and sweet and about finding joy at home. I just learned this past winter when I was reading the first book that there’s a whole series!* Now I want to read them all!

You can find the text for the first book free here, and for times when you don’t want to read it, because say, you have a sore throat, or you have to be doing something else (like talking on the phone or sleeping), you can play the Youtube version found below. Enjoy! It’s tempting to stop reading aloud when kids get bigger, and when the days are more conducive to being outside. Here’s to summer reading with big kids!

Here’s the movie based on the book!

* the following is copied and pasted from wikipedia:

In order of publication, the Five Little Peppers books are as follows (publication dates follow in parentheses):

• Five Little Peppers and How They Grew (1881) Project Gutenberg Gask Castle Press
• Five Little Peppers Midway (1890) Project Gutenberg
• Five Little Peppers Grown Up (1892) Project Gutenberg
• Five Little Peppers: Phronsie Pepper (1897)
• Five Little Peppers: The Stories Polly Pepper Told (1899)
• Five Little Peppers: The Adventures of Joel Pepper (1900) Project Gutenberg
• Five Little Peppers Abroad (1902) Project Gutenberg
• Five Little Peppers At School (1903)
• Five Little Peppers and Their Friends (1904) Project Gutenberg
• Five Little Peppers: Ben Pepper (1905)
• Five Little Peppers in the Little Brown House (1907)
• Five Little Peppers: Our Davie Pepper (1916)

Margaret Sidney felt she had completed the books with the publication of the fourth book: “Phronsie Pepper”, and stated as much in her introduction to the book. But letters from readers all over the world prompted her to continue writing about the Peppers, which she did for another nineteen years. All of the later books take place much before the third book in the original series. To read the six key books in chronological order, rather than by publication date, they would be read approximately in this sequence:

• “Five Little Peppers and How They Grew”
• “Five Little Peppers Midway”
• “Five Little Peppers Abroad”
• “Five Little Peppers and Their Friends”
• “Five Little Peppers Grown Up”
• “Five Little Peppers: Phronsie Pepper”

The other six books are “background” and are set about the time of the first three books listed above chronologically. Since they were written many years later, some situations in them are at variance with those same situations as described in the earlier written books.

Here’s my Pinterest-unworthy bookshelf, ha-ha, of great read alouds, smudges, tape, and all!

I was so excited to share this great new podcast before my trip to Phoenix last week, but I ran out of time. So now that I am back, I am sharing! I discovered this great podcast that is perfect for homeschool moms, and even non-homeschooling moms, because it’s about reading aloud. That’s an activity for any parent. This beautiful podcast is called the Read Aloud Revival, by Sarah Mackenzie, a homeschool mom. It’s my new favorite podcast! The very first episode features a friend, Andrew Pudewa. I worked one of Andrew’s booth at a homeschooling conference 10 years ago when my daughter was a baby, and boy, was his booth popular! It helped that he was the keynote speaker at the convention. He owns a company that sells language arts curriculum. I highly recommend his stuff! 

Listen and enjoy! You will learn that it’s important to read aloud even more to your older kids than your younger ones. Reading aloud quality, engaging books establishes “reliably correct and sophisticated language patterns” in your kid’s head. That’s the best thing you can do to ensure academic success! Plus, it’s so much fun. I can’t think of any other parenting activity that is so fun and crucial at the same time, and takes such little effort. 

Here is a chance to get your free copy of Like Dragons Did They Fight by Maurice Harker! It goes with the Eternal Warriors Eating Class I am starting this Wednesday. You can use the principles to battle any pre-addictive tendencies. Click here to get your copy. If you incorporate these principles, you will conquer your demons! Fight on!

Here’s another Eternal Warriors Healthy Eating Success Story, from my friend Cyndi Hampton, pictured above as a fit size 6. Cyndi says she applied the principles that she learned from Eternal Warriors to stick to her diet. She says:

I lost a whole bunch of weight using the Eternal Warrior’s principles as well.  I lost 45 pounds (1/4 – 1/3 of my body weight), went from a size 16 to a 6, and I am reversing my Type 2 diabetes.  It even made the doctor cry when I came in after 6 months and had so drastically changed. I’m pretty sure that I used a different diet than you – but that’s a good thing because the principles work.  I used The End of Diabetes diet that is based on the Eat to Live Diet.  After 8 weeks of that (Graduation!) I transitioned into the Forks Over Knives diet.  I also added in the 15 minute T-Tapp workout.

Congratulations Cyndi! That is so fabulous! If you would like to register for the Eternal Warriors Healthy Eating Class, please go here for all the details and to see my before and after pics. The early bird discount ends tomorrow May 13, so head on over to register!

I found this at our local public library. You can watch the preview above and rent the whole thing to watch here, or probably find it at your local library too. It’s called Patterns of Evidence. It’s one man’s search to find evidence for the story of the Exodus as told in the Bible. His search led him to interview scholars and visit archaeological sites in Egypt. Fascinating! I think you will enjoy it! My 11 year old even sat through it. We were watching it for our date when he was supposed to be in bed but we let him stay up and watch it too.