Raising Rock Stars-Joseph Week One

This week our family studied about Joseph and his brothers.  Matt and I decided to break it up into two (or three) weeks since there is so much to absorb.  We read from Grayson's new The Anytime Bible and we loved it!  It's written in such an appropriate way for children to understand, yet contains enough meat in each Truth.

This picture pretty much sums up Grayson's mood that night...wild and uninterested in sitting still.  We were in Ava's room because that's the only place little miss could be happy for us to have Bible time together, and her room is Grayson's party spot.  I'm not sure what it is, but when he steps in there, he goes a little crazy, spinning and kicking and giggling.  Whew.

As I reminded daily, even though it felt like this week was not a "success", I know that God will use bits of it for the instruction and building up of my children (and myself).  It's important for them to see us spending time in God's word together, even if they are having a hard time concentrating.  They are still being spoken His Word and that's what counts!

Ava was loving that we were all in her room for a change.

Grayson's really into counting on his fingers right now, so he and daddy spent a while counting the 11 brothers of Joseph.  (Daddy looks to be concentrating just as hard as Grayson, right? :)

We read up until Joseph was sold into slavery, because again, it seemed too much to truly digest.  We talked about loving unconditionally and the danger of jealousy.  That we are to see our own selves through God's eyes and because of that, there is no reason to seek what other's possess on this earth....or the attention they receive.  What a hard lesson!  Even in my parenting, I'm trying to teach Grayson through questions more than "telling" and we tried to question him about jealousy and about how Joseph must have felt.  Next week, we will begin to focus on how Joseph, despite being left alone, did not feel alone and leaned on the Lord for his strength.

We then moved on to coloring together, and this lasted all of five minutes for Grayson.  As I finished my page, he cheered me on, "Good job, Mommy. I'm so proud of you."  I had this whole outfit set up for him to dress up like Joseph's coat of many colors (my bathrobe and a scarf), but he had no part of it.  I took on the role, but luckily no pictures were taken! :)

And we ended just like this.  It truly was another special, special night together! 

Raising Rock Stars-Creation Week One

It was so nice last week to get back to our family Bible time.  After dad's heart attack, we took a little break and resumed last week...only to take another Sunday night off to see about my mom. :)  We are so grateful they are both doing well!  Praise God for that, but they're killing me! 

Last week Matt was out of town so Grayson and I had Bible time alone.  Ava had already gone to bed and it was nice to have some one on one time with him.  We began by reading together, first from the Bible and then our two favorite books on Creation (see bottom of post for resources).

We then worked on a matching game (printables from 1+1+1=1).  I had printed lots of games and puzzles for him, but as you can see, he loved matching the days to the proper day.....

We did this over and over.....and a few more times after that.

:)

We then colored pages for the seven days of Creation.  I only got one in...Grayson colored the rest.

We finally got around to the puzzles, but only made it through a couple before his attention span faded. 

Our plan will be to do a second week of Creation this weekend, but we are realizing that planning is another futile human pursuit.  It reminds me more and more that God should be part of our everyday as a family, not just once a week.  My prayer is that our children can say we "talk about them when we sit at home and when we walk along the road, when we lie down, and when we get up." That we "tie them as symbols on our hands and bind them on our foreheads and write them on the doorframes of our houses and on our gates." --Deuteronomy 6:6-9

Resources:
Shiny Touchy Smelly: Creation Story (Shiny, Touchy, Smelly)

7 Days of Creation (GodCounts Series)

1+1+1=1

Raising Rock Stars-Fruits of the Spirit

This week I did not prepare very well for our family Bible time on Sunday night.  I did manage to print off our coloring sheets of fruit at the last minute.

The Meadows family was able to join us this week (and no, I didn't take any pictures) and we loved having them over for this.  With all three boys involved, you can imagine it was difficult to keep their minds on anything but playing, but we managed a good 5 minutes all together.

First, as always, our daddy read us a book to go with our theme... Grayson loves this book and was excited to read it with his friends.

The kids started coloring while we read and we ended with a song and a prayer. 

Even though the kids had a hard time paying attention (as the glittering was taking all their attention :), I found it wonderful to share that time with friends.  And that's the point, right?  It doesn't matter if we have hour long Bible time if it's not a part of our everyday lives.  I want our children to learn about God's love everyday, not once or twice a week. 

Jenny is one of my childhood friends, one of my dearest friends now.  It is so very special to not only share friendship, but our faith with our sweet families.  What an absolute blessing!  Maybe next time I'll actually snap some pictures to capture the memories! :)  God bless!