Day Two - The What

My husband directs a Christian sports camp for urban youth, which means our kids are saturated in ministry during the summer so with a desire to teach them God's Word day-to-day, we asked what might fit our schedule best, as well as be practical and befitting children under 8 years old. In the fall of 2014 we decided that September through May provides us 9 months and there are 9 attributes named in Galatians 5:22-23,

Source

"But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. Against such things there is no law." 

We chose this passage to remind ourselves of how we are able to live because God's Spirit lives in us! Our three oldest children have professed faith in Jesus Christ and we want them to know that they have the Spirit of God living in them to produce that fruit. This exercise also provides them the opportunity to practice living out these passages, as well as provides an immediate standard when they live outside of the expectations. I've noticed that it doesn't only help my children, but it helps me stay focused on the Lord and His Word each day.We decided to take 1 attribute a month and 1 passage of Scripture each week. It went really well in 2014, so we're doing it again this year. We changed the scriptures in order to broaden their knowledge base of God's Word, and plan on changing most of the verses each year. Obviously, we will repeat some because it's all beneficial.

I have a small chalkboard in our entryway. I use it to write the fruit focus for the month. This month, Love is the focus. We go in order of the text. I also have a dry erase board in our kitchen where I write the verse for the week each Sunday. We rehearse the verses at the breakfast table and on our drive to school and most of the time, the oldest 3 (and ME!) have them memorized by Friday! So cool! Whoever gets it memorized gets some sort of reward. Candy is a hot commodity at our house because we don't eat it often, so last week it was gummy worms! Whatever you use, make it something special and different and make sure they know they are receiving it for learning God's Word. And don't forget that if YOU also learn the memory verse, you can demonstrate enjoying the same reward you give your children. BUT, if you do not know the verse it may cheapen their experience if you find yourself indulging in the reward. I'm talking to myself as well.;-)

It's such a fun way to make sure I'm still growing and hiding God's Word in my heart and demonstrating that for my kids. God's word WILL bear fruit in our lives AND our children's! You can take that check to the bank and cash it.;-) Tomorrow we'll detail the nuts and bolts even more so you can have a strategic monthly plan.

Why God's Word?

In my "And Then There Were Three" post about the kids heading off to school, I confessed some fears I have as a public school momma. While I am praying and trusting The Lord with my children being at the school, that's not the only thing I'm doing. We want to hide the word of God in our children's hearts because the Lord commands parents to teach children about Him wherever they are and throughout each of the days activities. This helps calm my fears as well. : ) As they're learning math, spelling, and reading, I want to feed their little spirits with the life-giving food of God's word. I'm sharing what we're doing to provide a framework for anyone who would like to do the same, but first I want to give you other reasons why this is so important to us.

We believe God's Word is "alive and active" (Hebrews 4:12), but never changes and will always remain the same. I know that sounds redundant, but in today's world, where the stories change and people think that they are the same, or people change the ageless stories to put their own spin on them, I thought it worth saying. God's Word teaches, guides, corrects, and challenges us throughout life. His Word will never pass away (Matthew 24:35) and is like a mirror showing us how we spiritually look (James 1:22-25). God's eternal truth lies within every page of the Bible, including principles, laws, wisdom, and the history of His chosen people. Most of all, it's the greatest love story ever written about an everlasting Father who created a perfect world for humans to use to bring Him glory, a fallen people who loved the creature, more than the Creator, and a fallen world waiting, hoping, and longing for a Savior (Romans 8:18-25). Even after Jesus came, many rejected Him, but others saw the glory of His miraculous signs and wonders (Acts 2:22-24) including His life, death, and resurrection. Because of Christ, those who believe in Him receive His grace...His unrelenting grace (Ephesians 2:8-9). 

As David said in Psalm 19:7-10, "The Law of The Lord is perfect, converting the soul; The testimony of The Lord is sure, making wise the simple; The statutes of The Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; The commandment of The Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes; The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever; the judgements of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they then gold; yea, than much fine gold. Sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb."

For these and many other reasons, we are passionate about our children knowing God's Word inside and out, and desire to see them enjoy it for the rest of their lives. Over the next two days, I'm going to share a few of the ways we are teaching our children how to hide God's Word in their hearts. Check back tomorrow!: )

And Then There Were Three...

                           

Well, it's the end of the first week of school and we made it!! Three Pope kids are now in school! It is SUPER weird to only have two little ones at home, but there are a lot of things to look forward to in that. I have to be honest, there have been a ton of tears shed this week. Letting go of complete control over my children's environment is a HUGE struggle for me! Not, only that, but I just miss them. I love my kids and I miss them terribly.

God has been continually whispering to me a verse from Philippians that says, "Don't worry about anything, but in EVERYTHING, through prayer and petition with Thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace which surpasses every thought, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." (4:6-7) He keeps reminding me that although many of our schools have tried to squeeze Him out, He is there! He does not leave my children when they step through the doors of their school and I can rest in that. THANK YOU LORD!

So, here are three things I'm looking forward to for this school year. 1. I get to spend more one-on-one time with my youngest two children! Reading books, learning shapes, colors, numbers and even Bible verses with these two will be a blast! 2. I get to invest in helping other mom's of young children by leading a Mops Bible study. 3. I will be able to see my three oldest learn what it's like to stand out and stand up for their faith in our local school which is a lesson that will help then stand firm for the rest of their lives!

Three things I'm trusting The Lord with in prayer are 1. My fear that my children will be harmed. I'm trusting Him to protect my children... Their minds, bodies and spirits. 2. I'm giving up trying to be everything to everyone and trusting Him to simply use me as a vessel of His love and grace wherever He sees fit.  And 3. I'm laying down my right to control every area of my children's lives and allowing Him room to work through different places and people... Remembering that it is what my children see and experience at home with their own parents that will impact them the most. Father, help us as we trust you with this school year! In Jesus precious name, Amen.

Sorry about my hubs in the background... We, of course, were in a hurry, but needed to capture the moment!:-) 2nd, 1st and Kindergarten... Look out!

                                               

Where Did July Go?

Is anyone else asking themselves that question!! SHEESH!! We've hit August and all the stores are putting back to school things out on the shelves and I'm like, "Hey, I'm still trying to enjoy my summer here!";-) No, but really, we've enjoyed our July FULLY! There have been ups and downs for me as a camp wife and mom, but God has been on the move. He's been drawing me to himself in the midst of all of the Chaos!

The kiddos enjoyed a week of VBS at a local church, but I didn't get any cool pics! We've hosted guest after guest at our home and though we wouldn't have it any other way it has been exhausting. It's that deep down, GOOD type of exhaustion though. When you know you're spent on the RIGHT things! I LOVE that about the ministry God has called our family to. There are plenty of sacrifices we make, but at the end of the day, they are minuscule in light the blessings we receive! I don't always do a great job maintaining this perspective, but when I get before the Lord, the proper perspective ALWAYS reappears!

Which brings me to what I'm super excited about this week... I got wind of this free app. called First 5. You can find out more about it HERE. But the gist is getting with God for the first five minutes of your day. My typical "quiet" times with the Lord are after breakfast is cleaned up and the kiddos are distracted with activities and toys. I always find myself getting interrupted and although I'm refreshed by the time, it wasn't enough for me. It's always better to be serving out of overflow then trying to conjure up the right attitude...

So, about the app, they have SUPER SWEET alarms to wake up by and a scripture with a short devotional to focus on with a simple question at the end to answer in your "moments" notebook (also provided by the app.) People, ok, I've only been doing it for four days, but I have been so REFRESHED! God is totally honoring a commitment to getting with Him FIRST. Yep, before even putting my feet on the floor! It has given me perspective for my day and even speaks purpose into my day early in the morning. It makes the Psalmist so wise when he writes, "...in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait expectantly." Psalm 5:3

Anyway, this is really working for me right now!! Praise God!! Since I started having children, I have struggled (well, actually all of my Christian walk) with spending time with Him FIRST. I always just figured, hey, if I get in the word TODAY, I'll be good. It just makes so much sense to me now to do it first thing. My time with Him can blossom into every decision I make throughout the rest of my day.

Hey now, no pressure for anyone out there who is not getting it in with the Lord in the morning because as you can read, I totally get you, but I'm super pumped that this is happening in life right now and would encourage everyone to give it a try (after all, even Jesus was up early communing with the Father Mark 1:35), so GO CHECK OUT THAT APP!!:-)

Wanting to post some summer pics soon!!

Hopes for Summer

Hi All! I wanted to post a craft we did a couple of weeks ago in case you'd like to do something similar. I got this activity from The Confident Mom summer activity calendar that I purchased from her blog back in April. If you'd like to get one, they are SUCH a great resource and VERY inexpensive. You can go HERE.

The craft was supposed to be dream catchers, but I modified it because being the detail oriented person I am not, I picked up a couple of supplies that were not in the original idea and they weren't going to look like dream catchers so summer hopes and prayers it is!:-)

I have 5 children 7 and under so if we're doing any kind of craft my 20 month old needs to be strapped down or asleep and I have to be organized... at least to start. So I sat out all the supplies and gave each of my 4 oldest a space to start. This is a craft I had to be pretty involved with because of embroidery hoops and hot glue guns, but when we were done, the kids were proud! These are hanging on our art wall and they can look at them as the summer passes and see if they're hopes and prayers are coming true.

Table to start...

Work in progress. We colored our doilies with marker first...

Then placed the doilies on the hoops and added feathers and jewels with hot glue. I had the kids write their hopes for summer on cut outs and I attached them to the bottom with string I had on hand.

They all turned out completely unique and each is beautiful in it's own way.;-) 

If you didn't notice, my 3 year old isn't in this pic. Turns out it was a little much for him, but he was totally content to scribble and draw super heroes on his paper doilies with markers so that turned out to be just fine. We added a few jewels to his with regular glue too. 

Ultimately, it is NOT me to craft and compared to the pics on the blog this idea came from, ours were less then perfect, BUT the kids were creative and made something they were proud of and I got to spend time with them helping the process, so it was SUPER worth it!!

Supplies

Embroidery Hoop

Paper Doilies

feathers

jewels 

markers

hot glue gun

card stock

string (any king, but the thinner the better)

A month later...:-)

Oh my goodness!! Is it really almost the end of June?? And I'm just getting to my first summer post?? Wow, as you have probably experienced, time is FLYING right now! I'm loving having the kids home and filling our days with activities together and plenty of resting and relaxing, catching up on movies and doing lots of crafts and reading together. I'm going to throw it back to the day they got out of school when we had our little party to welcome summer and share some pics!

All I did for prep was pick up water guns, a bubble kit and water balloons at wal-mart. I used a couple of hours in our morning to fill water balloons while the kids were at school. Did you know they have the kind that seal themselves?? Am I in the dark ages because I just found out about these. No more knots! Unless of course the little stopper malfunctions, then you have to tie the not, but STILL. They're great!. The younger kids especially loved helping fill the balloons!

It seems like months ago... but I guess it's just been one month, right??:-)

We had lots of water fun... they loved every minute of it! I tried to snap some pics amongst the water splashing...

We welcomed summer with a bang and I can say I'd like to make this a tradition. Not just water activities, but the welcoming summer party. It's a great way to make a land marker of memories for the end of the school year and the beginning of summer!

Next post will be some things I got from my 2015 summer activity calendars over at The Confident Mom. 

A Confident Summer!

Hi Friends! It's been SO long since I've posted! Some day I do hope to get more consistent at this... I think my plan for this summer will help. The plan is to log what we're up to as a family here on the blog, with pics and updates as we spend quality time together and make the most of the summer. A lot of you know our summer's are super consumed with CAMP! Our ministry at camp is SO important to us and we absolutely LOVE spending our summer's here at Citikidz where God has called us. With daddy's longer summer hours it helps to have some things on the schedule for the kids and I to enjoy together. This summer is no different EXCEPT that I have a PLAN in order to help the kid's and I thrive.

Let me be the first to say, I'm not bent toward planning and especially having a written plan, which is where The Confident Mom comes in.

I'm pumped to share what tool I'm using to help! There's a hint in the title of this post!! It's "The 2015 Confident Mom Summer Survival Calendar!" This thing is AMAZING! Click HERE to go and check it out. Susan has been a great encouragement to me! I should tell her that!:-) She is super empowering and offers tons of GREAT tools and resources to help mom's be amazing and keep families healthy. I hope it's helpful to you too! I'll be picking up my first week of supplies this weekend! I'm not planning on following it to a "T" as our summers here at camp give us chance to do some things I get to add in, but it is SO great to have all the activities she suggests WITH lists of what you need to pick up and a date to do them on! AHHH! Thank you Susan!!

My kid's finish up school on the 5th of June and I'm planning a "Start the Summer Party" for when they arrive home that afternoon. Complete with water guns, water balloons, popsicles and we'll see what else I decide to throw in there.:-) Shhhhhh... don't tell them.;-) I'm really looking forward to getting started and am hoping to inspire someone else out there to do the same!

Happy DAY!