Homeschool Refreshment

A few weeks ago, Scott, Hannah and I had the opportunity to attend the Great Midwest Homeschool Convention in Cincinnati, Ohio. What an incredible time of refreshment that weekend was for me! We heard some great speakers like....
Susan Kemmerer from School House Publishing and my long time mentor (through her books, anyway), Diana Waring, Dr. Jobe Martrin from Creation Ministries International, Kirk Martin from Celebrate Calm, Dr. Jay Wile from Apologia, Dr. Susan Wise Bauer, author of the Story of the World Series, Carol Burton from Burton Reading, and Carolyn Schulte from Flowering Baby, LLC. There were probably some others that Scott attended but that's who I can remember.
It was such an encouragement and water for my homeschooling soul to attend this convention. The price of the convention is extremely reasonable and if you stay across the river in Kentucky like we did, the hotels are just as nice with more reasonable prices. I would highly recommend it!
I think Scott's favorites were Dr. Jobe Martin and Kirk Martin. Mine were Diana Waring and Susan Kemmerer. I bought Susan's book and plan to blog about what the Lord is doing in my heart through her biblical view of mothering. It was a thrill to meet Diana Waring! She and her husband are moving to Anderson, IN from Seatle, WA this summer. I'm hoping to be able to schedule her to come speak to our homeschool group soon!! Hannah's favorite was Carolyn Schulte. Carolyn spoke on teaching young children with special needs. Hannah has such a heart for little ones and especially those with learning challenges. She is looking into a career in therapy (speech or physical, probably) field and wants to work with small children. Isn't it amazing how God places people or ministries in your life to give you direction for the future?!

                                        Hannah and Chuck Black
Our favorite part of the trip, though, was meeting one of our boys' favorite authors, Chuck Black! He has written the Kingdom Series, a Biblical allegory set in a medieval time period that covers the time period of  Genesis to Revelation. They are full of action and adventure where swords, knights and battles are all Biblically symbolic. They are full of Godly character lessons! And there is no magic, mysticism, or wizardry in the books.
We began collecting the audio versions of the books for Patrick when he was young and they have all since passed down to Noah. Chuck has a second series out called The Knights of Arrethtrae. Each of those is based on the specific knights from the Kingdom series and deals with character qualities. We're beginning to collect those; picked up a new one while we were at the convention. :)
We got to meet Chuck's family and shared some of our favorite parts of the books with his son. He reads all of his books to his kids first before publishing. We bought a poster for Noah from one of his favorite books and Chuck signed it for him. I don't know who was more excited....Hannah and I to give it to Noah or Noah to recieve it! :)

 Be valiant for the King! Chuck Black Heb 4:12

A New Chapter Begins.....

I love the periods in my life when I strive to see the hand of God working and the last few weeks have shown He's working in our lives. Yesterday when I woke up there was a definite sense of a new chapter beginning in our lives. After 16 years as the Noble County Surveyor, Scott lost his run in the primary election. It was a bitter-sweet night for all of us. Every election (this was our 5th) has it's own fears and anxieties with it but through the years God has been using these stressful campaigns to draw me near to Him and teach me to utterly rely on His faithfulness no matter what the outcome. I was completely prepared last night for this loss. No, it wasn't expected, but I never once felt devastated and fearful for the future. We are held in the palm of a mighty God and He sees our future. He has plans for us that we can't yet see. There are soooo many directions Scott could turn. The prospects are literally exciting! I must also say that I will be thrilled to have my husband back. In his current position he is on-call 24/7/365. We've had him miss family birthday parties and even one Christmas Day! Yuck! Scott loves his job as County Surveyor and he's good at it! He's a people person but he's also very good at listening to people vent and not taking it personally. Believe me, he gets a lot of that in his position. He tells a story of one man coming in to the office and ranting and raving for quite some time and Scott just nodded and listened. Finally the man said, "Am I ever going to make you angry?!" Scott smiled and said, "Not today, you won't." Haha! I love my husband!! With his gentle leading and hard work ethic and fully relying on God's providence we will be fine. God is good all the time!