Doing the Math

I found this over at Justin Taylor's blog. Pretty interesting!

Looking for Spring

On the first day of Spring I gave the boys the camera and we went looking for signs of Spring. It was great to get outdoors and hike around. Here are a few things they found.

The post oak with it's new flowers.

A little purple flower growing near the pond.

A white flowering bush

A flowering fruit tree (peach, I think).

And the lovely fire ants we have in Texas!

The cottonwood showing it's flowers-We have been waiting to see whether this tree was female or male. The one in our old neighborhood was male. This one happens to be a female. You can identify them by their flowers.

The beautiful wisteria we found that was climbing on a neighbor's tree.

After all the fun of searching for Spring we decided to attempt to paint spring trees with the aid of this tutorial. It was so much fun and the boys loved the way the branches on the tree looked real. Happy Spring!!

Give Nature Study A Try

" Out in this, God's beautiful world, there is everything waiting to heal lacerated nerves, to strengthen tired muscles, to please and content the soul that is torn to shreds with duty and care....She (teacher/mother) finds, first of all, companionship with her children; and second, she finds that without planning or going on a far voyage, she has found health and strength."Handbook of Nature Study, page 3

I read this today on the Handbook of Nature Study blog, and thought it perfectly captures what has been my experience with nature study. If you haven't tried nature study with your children or even by yourself, I highly reccomend you give it a try this spring. It is very refreshing.

If you need help getting started the above mentioned blog is a great place to look. A recent post entitled: How To Use The Outdoor Hour Challenges: Fitting The Challenges To Your Family, gives you a picture of what it might look like with preschoolers and elementary students.

WE CONQUER BY HIS SONG

By Amy Carmichael

We see not yet all things put under Thee.
We see not yet the glory that shall be;
We see not yet, and yet by faith we see;
Alleluia, Alleluia.

We see the shadows gathering for flight,
The powers of dawn dispel the brooding night,
The steadfast march of the triumphant light;
Alleluia.

Be we in East or West, or North or South,
By wells of water or in land of drouth,
Lo, Thou hast put a new song in our mouth;
Alleluia.

Therefore we triumph; therefore we are strong,
Though vision tarry and the night be long;
For lifted up, we conquer by Thy song;
Alleluia.

Nature Study- A Vulture's Nest

I think that I have posted before about how nature study tends to involve the whole family. Well, today my husband was gathering some old wasp nests, that I had requested, from an abandoned house. All that is left of the house is pretty much just the shell. Anyway, as he was doing this he thought that he saw something in one of the rooms on the floor. He said that he caught a glimpse of something that reminded him of a deer lying on the ground. So he decided to walk around to another window to get a better view. Well, to his surprise it was not a deer, but a vulture sitting on its nest! Immediately the bird flew out the door. After he determined that it wasn't after him; he got a good look at the nest with two large eggs! If you watch closely, right at the beginning of the video, you can see the bird flying out the door. Then at the very end of the video is the nest with eggs. The nest is in a hollowed out place on the floor and the two large eggs are easy to see.

Wordless Wednesday

Outdoor Hour Challenge #45 Squirrels

We had fun observing this squirrel that often visits our bird feeders. We finally caught him removing the roof to the top feeder. We see him almost everyday out our kitchen window. He likes to retreat to a branch about 15 feet from the ground that sticks out only about 2 feet from the tree. Instead of drawing our squirrel for the nature notebooks, the boys completed a coloring sheet. The boys also loved the videos on Barb's blog. They watched them numerous times and every visitor had to watch them as well! We are very fond of squirrels and enjoy watching them and taking their picture. The two photos below are old, but memorable.

This squirrel has had something happen to his tail. We wondered if maybe he was Squirrel Nutkin, from Beatrix Potter's book by the same name.

This is a very friendly squirrel we encountered at my mother's house. We were able to get very close to him without him being frightened.

One Month Old

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Heirs of the Covenant

Leaving A Legacy Of Faith For The Next Generation

I am reading Heirs of the Covenant, by Susan Hunt and chapter 3 is about the book of the covenant. She begins the chapter with the following:

"The first three questions of The Westminster Shorter Catechism put the issue before us succinctly and clearly:

Q. 1. What is the chief end of man?
A. Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him for ever.

Q. 2. What rule hath God given to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him?
A. The Word of God, which is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him.

Q. 3. What do the Scriptures principally teach?
A. The Scriptures principally teach what man is to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man.

God's Word tells us what we are to believe and how we are to live. It is our rule because it is God's truth-message to us."



A few weeks ago, as I was flipping through my Bible searching for something, a passage in Judges caught my attention. As I read the narrative I was horrified by the story. It was just awful, but it ended with these words;

"In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes."

It is frightening that this is the very thing many Americans believe they should do. They believe they should do what is right in their own eyes. God have mercy on us. May we turn instead to our King, Jesus Christ, and do what He says is right. And by God's grace may we educate our children in the Scripture that they may not be left to themselves and our culture to find what is right and true.

Ministry to our children is a vital ministry. We must utilize the Scripture to teach them God's covenant of grace, it's privileges and responsibilities.

Wordless Wednesday

Glad To Be Back Home

We are so grateful to have a sweet new baby! The big brothers are loving it! And they have so much more energy than I do. :) We have been home a little over a week now and he seems to have put himself on a schedule. He is eating around every 3 hours and sleeping pretty well at night. He is getting up at night, but usually goes right back to sleep after eating. My mom left today, so this next week will be our first week on our own. Thanks to all of you who have been praying for us. Please continue to remember us.

A Few Christmas Pictures

We hope you all had a very Merry Christmas! We had a lovely time with family. The top two pictures are from Christmas at Mark's parents house and the bottom three are from Christmas morning at our house. The boys have been quietly playing with their presents ever since.

This is the first Christmas in our 9 years of marriage that we have not had to travel. Although it was a lot less hectic, we did miss seeing all of our friends and family in Oklahoma. Thankfully, some of you will be here next week for the baby's birth.

Gingerbread House

Outdoor Hour Challenge #42 Moss and Lichen

Today's weather was just perfect for a nature walk. Recently we have been doing our nature walk's near the house, but today we ventured out to the countryside. We did see some moss, but not very much. The Lichen on the other hand was everywhere.
I think this rock has both the Foliose (leafy) lichen in the top left corner and also the Crustose (crusty) lichen on the rest of the rock.

In this close-up of a fallen branch you can see the reproductive "cups" of the lichen.

Here is a Foliose lichen growing on an oak tree. The underside of the lichen was a dark brown.

We saw plenty of examples of the Foliose lichen and also the Crustose, and then on our way back to the car we came across this Fruiticose (shrubby) lichen. We could easily see the little cups on the end of each branch. If you click on the picture you might be able to see them as well.

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Although we didn't see very much moss we talked about how moss reproduces and looked for spore capsules with our lens. This was very interesting and we want to be sure and keep on the lookout for spore capsules as we come across more moss on our nature walks.

Wordless Wednesday

It won't be long...

We have only two weeks and a few days until we get to meet this sweet baby. I would be grateful for everyones prayers as this will be my 4th c-section. It is such a busy time with Christmas coming. I am hoping that I am not forgetting something. We put the baby bed up last night and that caused some excitement among the brothers. It is hard to believe that it is so close to the birthday!

Outdoor Hour Challenge #41 Flowerless Plants

The weather has been cold and windy all week. That is until today. We have beautiful weather today and we were all anxious to get outdoors. Early in the week we read the above book and talked about plants that never bloom. In the past we have spent lots of time studying mushrooms and attempting to identify them. I love mushrooms and the boys know it, so anytime they find one they run to tell me about it. Therefore, the book was helpful to get them thinking about other plants that never bloom. So, today I sent them outside to see if they could find a plant that never bloomed and bring it to me.

They were excited and ran out the door as quick as they could. It wasn't too long before they were ringing the doorbell and the above picture is what I saw when I opened the door.

They had found some moss growing next to the house and around some shrubs out front. Above is a close-up of their specimen.

Next, they took me out to show me where they found it and in the process we also found the following moss. I think it is called miniature pine, but I could be mistaken. We will have to look it up.

Wordless Wednesday