Texas Homeschool Convention 2014

Part 2

 

On of my favorite sessions at the homeschool conference this past weekend was led by Rachael Carmen. It was titled, "How to have a heart for your children." It was a very powerful and convicting time for me. I tend to just exist day to day and not appreciate the blessings the Lord has given me. Yes, I love my girls very much and I don't know what I would do without them. But, I want to have a heart for them. Rachael used an acronym for HEART and it was very thought provoking.

 

 

H ave a heart for God. Psalm 86:11  Be on your knees before

       the Lord, stay in the word, worship the Lord, teach your

       children to praise the Lord

E nrich your marriage. Ephesians 5:22-28  Live a defense of

       marriage, chase each other around the house, Leave love

       notes, go on dates, let your children see that you are in

       love with your spouse.

A ccept them.  Psalm 139:13 Discipline them, Embrace who

       they are.

R elease them to God. John 3:30

       Start dreaming, start celebrating, start praying

T each them the truth. Deuteronomy 32: 46-47

       Teach them the nature of God. Give them good, Christian

       Heroes.

 

Rachael shared how she had to fall on her knees before the Lord and ask Him to guide her as she was not happy about being lead to homeschool her children. She also shared how she had to trust and depend upon the Lord to guide her through each day. 

She ended the session asking the audience to join her on her knees praying over our children and our families. My desire is to live in that state of mind and heart all year.

 

Let us not grow weary in well doing. We will reap a harvest at the proper time if we do not give up.

Galatians 6:9



 

 

          

 

 



My God Shall Supply All My Needs......

Some people just don't get it....lol....many people don't get it. I haven't always gotten it. Now, I am living it. It is so hard for people to understand that God will take care of you and meet your needs. God always makes a way where there seems to be no way.

James saw a pain management doctor today. Praise God, we are moving forward again. He will have an epidural injection in a month, along with some trigger point injections.

As we were discussing everything with the doctor, he question James' occupation. James tells him that he is a welder, but hasn't worked in almost four months. The doctor just stares at us so puzzled. He doesn't understand how we can live with no income. We told him that our church and family and friends have blessed our family. He just didn't get it.

I don't understand it, but I can tell you God has blessed the Henson family tremendously. God tells us to trust in him and he will take care of us and he has.

 

And my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.   Philippians 4:19

 

Jam and Jelly Time.....

They past couple months, we have been blessed with some delicious fruits and berries.

A friend gave us some plums from his plum tree. I was beyond happy to restock our canning

pantry with some decicious red plum jelly....my absolute favorite.

Another friend picked both she and I  a gallon of blackberries and all the ingredients to make jam in exchange for me making the  jam. Yesterday, I made 16 jars of blackberry jam.....delicious.

Our neighbor gave us 3/4 of a bushel of peaches from his peach tree. I made peach jam for the first time ever......taste like candy....yummy.

I was also given a gallon of frozen mayhaw berries and two gallons of frozen blueberries. I seriously need to get busy making some mayhaw jelly and blueberry jam.

I always hope to make enough that I can skip a year on some things, but I love to give it away as gifts. I had lots of jam and jelly in my canning pantry last year and ended up with just a few jars left. I actually ran out of my favorite plum jelly.

Looking forward to refilling the jam and jelly shelves again.

 

Plans for the New School Year

It is that time again. Time to get our curriculum planned for next school year. I think I have it figured out. My plans are to use My Fathers World Exploring Countries and Cultures for Bible, Geography, Science, and History. We started ECC last year, but I felt lead to continue on with Prairie Primer instead. I felt the need to focus more time on Madison's reading, which has improved greatly this year. So, we decided to set it aside and use it this year.
We will continue using Queens homeschooling for Language Arts and Spelling. We used it last year for the first time and really like the  copywork approach.
We will continue with the same Math programs for each one of the girls. Jaelyn loves Math-U-See and Madison is fond of Horizons Math.
Next week, we will attend a Homeshool convention as a family. Well, James will hang out in the motel while the girls and I enjoy the conference. I am looking forward to the classes and learning how to be a better mom and teacher.
 

Sharing the Good News

Our Sweet Madison turned 10 a few weeks ago. We planned a small party for family and a couple friends. Madison asked me to tell family and friends that she would like them to bring Bibles to give to foster children instead of gifts for herself. She received 4 Bibles (a couple people forgot) and mostly everyone still bought her a small gift since they were impressed with her generosity.

James and I have taken foster classes and hope to foster children as soon as he heals from surgeries. Madison asks often when we will get foster children as she is ready to have younger children in our home. She is passionate about foster children learning how much Jesus loves them and about the miracles He performed. She wants them to know that Jesus still performs miracles and that their families can experience miracles.

We delivered the four Bibles to our dear friend, Jesse, at Arrow Child and Family Ministries where Madison and our daughter, Jaelyn,  met Jesse for the first time. Jesse trains families to be liscensed foster care families. A few people saw through a facebook post what Madison had done and wanted to know if it was too late to donate Bibles. Madison called Jesse the next day to see if she could continue to collect Bibles. During that time, they launched Project Madison.  Madison shared what she felt led to do with our church last Sunday and was blessed by a wonderful love offering of $575. As of today,  the total is $640. At this point, we have ordered 48  Bibles to be given to foster children.

My mommy heart is bursting. I say we don't deserve the girls God loaned us, but I am glad he chose us to parent them. To God be the glory.  I can't wait to update soon.



This Season of Life Part 1

 

As I have shared previously, my family is going through a rough season. My husband had back surgeries in 2001 and 2002. He has had problems with his back the past few years. On March 22, he done some lifting around our house and has been in serious pain since. We went to a local ER to be told that they couldn't even do a MRI to see what was going on. The next day we went to see a Dr. at Fondren in Houston. They almost didn't see him because the previous injury was workmans comp. We saw the Dr. and he had a MRI done that day. We returned the next week to find out results of the MRI. He has more herniated disc, several bone spurs, lots of arthritis, narrowing of the spine, and pinched nerves. He was scheduled for surgery on May 1. A few weeks later, he started having issues with his neck and went back to Fondren. He had a MRI done on his neck and found out that he has a couple herniated disc, narrowing of the spine, arthritis, and bones spurs on his neck as well. Dr. said he had to have an epidural injection in his neck and get his neck better before he could have his back surgery. That was three months ago. Nothing has been done whatsoever. We do have an appointment for an evaluation for the epidural injection next week. We have had a lot of heartaches during this time. The Dr. belittled us and made us feel like trash. Needless to say, we will not be going back to him. We filed for Social Security disability and was denied. We hired an attorney to make the appeal for us. It has been such a long, hard journey and we aren't near through yet. BUT..........yes,  BUT our God has blessed us more than we could ask or imagine. He has met our needs financially, emotionally, spiritually, and physically. He has been so faithful to us. Friends and neighbors have helped me with yard work, tilling the garden, maintenance, keeping our girls, cooking meals, giving financially, paying our water bill, blessing us with meat and fresh garden vegetables, and most of all.......PRAYER.  I know people are praying because God is blessing. I feel so much love and support. Even though this season is hard, I AM THANKFUL FOR WHAT MY FAMILY IS GOING THROUGH. I am closer to God than I have ever been. I have to trust Him for EVEYTHING!