writingfromfaith

Waking Up From The American Dream

January 20, 2021 at 12:54 pm (Uncategorized)

           The sun sets on every great society. This past year, and particularly the chaos of this
election season, has made me see that the sun really is setting on American society as I knew it.
Growing up in the 1980s, I never thought I would see this time come for the republic of the
United States of America. We had become a beacon to the entire world, a city on a hill that gave
hope of freedom and opportunity to all who are oppressed. Over a few decades, I’ve watched
government grow and socialist and fascist ideals take root. We’ve oscillated between
Democratic and Republican leadership, but both parties have exponentially grown government
oversight and intrusion in our lives. Both parties have shown a level of hypocrisy, greed, and
disregard for the American people that should turn all our stomachs. But allegiance to party has
blinded so many to the corruption and failings in the ranks. Corrupt, unhinged, hypocritical
politicians have become idolized – not because of extraordinary accomplishments or admirable
character traits, but simply because they run under the right party banner.
            Protests, riots, and violent uprisings are abhorrent – unless the cause is part of your
party’s agenda. Politicians who call for violence and harassment are horrible – unless they have
the letter of your political affiliation behind their name. Presidential candidates with
questionable foreign ties should be investigated – unless they’re your party’s candidate. Law
enforcement should be defunded – unless you need them to push back against the other party.
Law enforcement is overly glorified – unless they are charged with containing something you
don’t want contained. The party of morals and lawfulness elected a crass and volatile president.
The party of civil rights elected a rich old senile white guy whose key legislative
accomplishments in the span of nearly five decades were some of the most racially disparaging
pieces of legislation passed in this country in modern times. Both parties condemn corruption
and bad ethics in the other party while conspicuously ignoring issues within their own ranks.
Both parties stuff necessary funding bills with pork and pet projects while decrying how the
other party does the same. Both parties have members who have gotten disproportionately
wealthy during their decades of public “service” – a number of those members have held office
longer than I’ve been alive. Congressional hearings have devolved from civil debates with strict
rules of decorum to shouting matches and temper tantrums. I’m ashamed of our leaders. Every
time I watch them I see nothing but undisciplined toddlers desperately trying not to lose the
position that has brought them power and wealth. The hypocrisy is terrible right now – the
apostasy is worse.
             I wish people could at least hold to a consistent worldview. If you denounce violence,
denounce all violence. If you champion human rights, champion rights for all humans. If you
despise corruption, despise it from all people. If you want your voice and perspective heard,
make sure you support everyone’s voice and perspective being heard.
            Today, fencing and National Guard troops surround our nation’s capital. The peaceful
party has spawned a violent faction. The party that championed the burning of cities around the
country now feigns horror over violent protests. Cries of “defund the police” have suddenly
turned into cries of “bring in the National Guard”. Free speech is under serious attack. The
media has fallen into the role of propaganda machine. We are being told we can’t even question
our government and the processes that form it. After a seriously flawed and poorly executed
election, all who call for transparency and investigation are being villainized and even called
terrorists and insurrectionists. The divide in our country is growing to the point of irreconcilable
differences. As an executive order is signed to “define equity as the consistent and systemic fair,
just, and impartial treatment of all individuals,” the Democratic party is ruthlessly calling for half
of the country to be fired, pushed out of military and political positions, boycotted by corporate donors, stripped of earned educational degrees and licenses, and deprogrammed – not because
most of the people who voted Republican participated in violence or even in the rhetoric of
violence, but simply because they didn’t vote the way the now-controlling party wanted them to
vote. Ideas like taking children from families to “re-educate” (which really means indoctrinate
and brainwash) those with different perspectives and worldviews are being floated with people
actually nodding their heads in agreement. Have we learned nothing at all from history? Do we
really not see the signs of where this is heading? There is nothing new under the sun. As a child
at the tail end of the Cold War, I was raised knowing the evils of government oppression. I was
taught the warning signs. I had an entire high school history class devoted to understanding the
Holocaust and what led up to it. Have we forgotten? Do we think that can’t happen here? Are
we that naïve?
            The generations living in the United States today, we are the generations that Benjamin
Franklin foresaw, the generations that would lose the republic. We’ve let political allegiances
eclipse human compassion and sensibility. We’ve allowed sociopathic politicians to chip away
at our freedoms and create an opening for socialistic and fascist ideals to gain traction. We’ve
allowed compromised media and educational institutions to brainwash us into believing the lies
many societies have fallen prey to before us. We’re following the very patterns of those
societies, and we’re too busy pointing fingers at each other to notice or care. We the people have
failed. We failed at electing competent, ethical government officials. We failed to hold
authorities accountable. We’ve defended the indefensible in the name of political affiliation.
We have given up liberty under the guise of obtaining security, and as Benjamin Franklin so
wisely stated, we deserve neither and have lost both.
               What does the future hold for America? Time will tell. We can look at how past
societies have risen and fallen and make some educated guesses as to where this is headed. A
civil war? A revolution? A fast slide into oppression? Only God knows. I’m not personally
afraid of what’s to come. Billions of people have survived and are surviving overreaching,
oppressive government. Studying history and the Bible has given me a pretty good idea of how
this plays out – and I know the overall ending and am secure in my eternal destination. But I am
sad to see my country fall. I’m sad that my kids won’t grow up in the same America I was truly
blessed to grow up in. This isn’t the same country, though. It’s not the same country I took an
oath to serve when I joined the Navy. How quickly the giants are led astray. Farewell America I
knew and loved. It was truly an honor serving under your banner when you were the land of the
free and home of the brave, one nation under the one true God.
               To my fellow believers, I quote Luke 22:31-32 – “Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift
all of you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when
you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.”
               And to close, here are some quotes from history textbooks. Saying “Those who don’t
learn history are doomed to repeat it” has become cliché, but apparently we don’t take it as
seriously as we should.

“The Collapse of the Republic: As Rome increased in wealth and power, the very foundation of
the Republic – the old Roman character traits of simplicity, discipline, and patriotism – began to
crumble. Roman conquests corrupted the people with an abundance of slaves and unearned
wealth, encouraging immorality, laziness, and an obsession with worldly pleasures. Unable to
compete with cheap slave labor, many Romans found themselves unemployed and forced to accept government welfare, while others took advantage of the situation to increase their
wealth.”

“Is it not surprising that a city that had managed to rule so much of the world for so long lost its
empire so easily and so quickly? What had happened to Rome? By the time of the invasions,
few people thought that Rome and its culture were worth making sacrifices to save. Force and
violence were always the answer of the Roman government.”

“Two centuries of Roman peace were followed by three centuries of confusion and violence,
invasion and civil war, insecurity and uncertainty. Prosperity had vanished along with the
empire. Towns shrank as people fled to the country.”

“The Communist Manifesto advocated the violent overthrow of all established authority and
called for the following measures: (1) the abolition of private property; (2) the redistribution of
wealth through heavy, progressive income taxes; (3) a centralized federal bank; (4) government
control of all means of communication and transportation; (5) government ownership of all
means of production and all natural resources; (6) the abolition of unemployment through social
welfare programs; (7) the redistribution of the population (from cities to rural areas and vice
versa); (8) mandatory state-sponsored and state-supported education.”

“As the 20th century began, the Russian government had, like every tyranny in history, sown the
seeds of its own destruction.”

“Lenin tightened the Bolshevik grip on Russia in other ways, brutally crushing freedom in all
forms, including freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion. ‘Enemies of
the state’ were imprisoned or executed. Human life had no value; anyone who posed even the
slightest threat to the Communist regime was killed without hesitation. … Lenin knew that by
controlling the minds of students he could raise up a generation of loyal Communists. Thus,
Communist principles were methodically drilled into the heads of students, who were taught that
capitalism and religion are evil. The Communists sought to destroy the family unit, taking the
children out of the home at an early age to train them in Communist dogmas. The Communist
goal was to make people believe that they were supposed to completely submerge themselves in
the Communist state, that leaders could do whatever they felt was for the good of the society as a
whole without regard for individual human welfare.”

“Fascism is a form of socialism that allows people to keep their private property but takes away
their freedoms. The fascists were at first considered radical and were largely ignored. But as
conditions in Italy grew worse, fascist party membership continued to grow.”

“In an atmosphere of unrest, Adolf Hitler came to prominence. Following World War I, Hitler, a
veteran of the war, joined the German Workers’ party – a small extremist group that was
nationalistic, anti-democratic, and anti-capitalistic. In March 1933, just before a new election,
the Nazis burned the Reichstag building and blamed it on the Communists. This discredited the
Communist party and gave the Nazis a majority after the election. Next, the Nazi majority in the
Reichstag voted to give Hitler power to make laws by his own decree. In 1938, the top German
military leaders were defamed and forced to resign, and Hitler took direct control of the German army himself. Hitler’s rise to absolute power was attained with the consent of the majority of the
German people. Hitler had become the leader of a newly optimistic, enthusiastic, and thoroughly
deluded German people. … By 1933, German Jews were being severely persecuted. At first,
Jewish shops were boycotted, and Jews were removed from positions of political and cultural
leadership. In 1935, the Jews were stripped of their civil rights.”

“Generally, the communist tactic has been to stir up violence and revolution in order to create
chaos in which desperate people will turn to Communism for relief.”

“In the spring of 1989, the hope for freedom drove Chinese university students to challenge the
Communist regime. A million students and workers gathered in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in
a great demonstration for freedom. The demonstrators erected a large replica of the Statue of
Liberty to express their desire for freedom. The world watched and waited to see how the
Chinese Communists would respond. As most conservatives expected, on June 4, 1989, Deng
Xiaoping gave the soldiers surrounding Beijing the order to crush the freedom demonstrators in
Tiananmen Square. Many people were killed or jailed as the world was once again reminded of
the cruel oppression of Communism.”

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First Week of Homeschool 2019

September 7, 2019 at 12:22 pm (Uncategorized)

We survived the first week of homeschool 2019-2020!  LOL!  As exhausting as this life can be, it feels really good to be back in a routine!  Actually, the week started out rough on Monday but went pretty smoothly after that.  And ended with my daughter bringing me the above gorgeous flower!  So overall, I’ll count it as a win.  But let’s start with Monday – because that’s when I took the first day of school pictures.  I start on Labor Day because I have the day completely off work and can focus just on homeschool.  The downside of that is that my hubby’s friend has a little get-together at his house the Sunday before – complete with inflatable water houses for the kids.  So…it makes for a somewhat late night, certainly later than I’d like when we have to start school in the morning.  But the kids did have a lot of fun.  The second downside of starting on a Monday is that I always schedule Mondays light since I won’t be home during the day.  So I thought, hey, we’ll just sleep in and get the day started slowly – and leave it unscheduled.  Not the best plan for a successful day.  My youngest was up first, which I though would work out perfectly since the chalkboard sign still read “First Day of Pre-Pre-K.”  Yep, this is how that photo shoot went…

Full-on meltdown and complete refusal to hold the sign…so much for a cute idea…

On top of that, all three of my boys super-soaked their beds that night after having far too much juice far too late at the party.  So rounds of laundry started right away.  But the bigger kids let me get good pics at least…lol…

If there’s one thing I’ve learned about my kids and homeschooling, it’s that they need structure – and frankly, so do I.  Monday was painful because they didn’t have a set schedule.  And it ended up dragging on painfully until 4 p.m.  Tuesday brought us back on track.  And that brings me to the next thing I want to discuss in this post.  I’ve been amazed by how many moms from my church with kids just starting school have started asking my advice on homeschooling.  It really doesn’t feel like I’ve been doing this for five years already!  And I don’t think you ever feel like you have it all together when it comes to being responsible for your kids’ education.  But I guess when I was starting out, the ladies I looked to for advice had been homeschooling about the same amount of time as I have now.  The one I looked to most has kind of rocked my homeschooling world by giving up on teaching her two oldest and enrolling them in public high school.  It’s a little disconcerting when the person you thought had it down cold gives up on it.  But she did teach me a lot about looking at homeschooling as a full-time gig.  So many homeschoolers solely focus on the flexibility – and that is a perk.  When I started out, a lot of homeschool moms I knew assured me they only had to teach their kids for a few hours a day.  Today, I would say to them, “What?!?!?!”  I know a mom who has her kids in Classical Conversations and literally only teaches her kids two days a week during the CC days.  Maybe that works for other families, but it is definitely not good for us.  The friend I looked to most when starting my homeschooling journey made it very clear that homeschooling is a grueling labor of love and a full-time commitment.  I appreciate her dedication and honesty so much!  The first and probably most important thing I’ve learned homeschooling – schedules are an absolute must!  Mondays are light days for my kids, when I only schedule Language Arts, Math, Spelling, and Penmanship.  But the rest of the days are scheduled, generally from 8-4 with Wednesday going until we leave for my oldest son’s piano lesson at 2.  The past few years, I’ve scheduled my oldest two doing the same subjects at the same time.  That doesn’t work well once they get past third grade because they each need me to teach a strong lesson on the subjects.  So, this year I staggered and color-coded the schedule.

Why do schedules work so well for my kiddos?  They just seem to operate better when they know how long they have to complete something.  Plus, they get to use the timer and stopwatch features on their watches to keep track of their day.  If they don’t finish everything for a subject by the time the alarm goes off, they can work on that subject again if they complete other subjects early throughout the day.  That worked really well this week, and everything got done by the scheduled finish for the day.  But if they do have leftover work, they have to complete it when the school day is over.  Staggering subjects worked out really well, too.  I could teach my son his Math lesson while my daughter worked on Spelling, then he could do his Math workbook pages while I taught my daughter her Math lesson, etc.  For anyone else who has a part- or full-time work from home job, I will tell you that the only way you will survive homeschooling is to make a schedule and stick to it.  It means early mornings, late work evenings, and working every time your kids don’t need hands-on help with their schoolwork.  The second thing I’ve found is that it’s essential to get a good planning book that works for you.  I’ve tried several, but this one is the one that fits my style and needs…

I get one for each kid and schedule by day and subject…

I have to use summer break to plan out our entire year because once school and activities start back up in the fall, I can’t count on having time to plan.  So I plan out the year and leave the “week of” section blank until we complete that week.  That way, every weekend I just have to look over the plan and make sure I have everything we need for the week.  The third thing I’ve learned – meal planning is your best friend!  A friend gave me this fun planner that happens to be perfect for dinner planning…

I’ve always tried to plan dinners for the week, but I’ve learned that it’s even more important to the homeschool day to have a plan for breakfast and lunch.  This year, I’ve given my kids even week and odd week options for breakfast.  If they want something more time intensive to prepare than oatmeal for breakfast, they have to request it the night before so that I can plan for it in my day.  Lunch also has limited options – leftovers, sandwiches, chicken nuggets, or tortilla pizzas usually – and it must include a fruit or vegetable.  Then there are the snack attacks!  These are frequent in my house, especially since we have to homeschool at the kitchen table right now.  My kids want to eat all day long.  I’m trying to substitute some of my kids’ favorite snacks with healthier options because I am really finding that diet plays a crucial role in how smoothly our school days go.  Highly processed, sugary foods make the days painful and long.  The kids just can’t focus and tend to get the dazed look b mid-morning.  A friend also pointed out that her daughter reacts badly to red dyes that are standard in kid snacks like gummies.  We still get the grocery store stuff for convenience, but I try to keep homeschool day snacks healthier.  So here are some of our go-to snacks this year…

Homemade granola bars!  One of the kids cookbooks I got had a super easy recipe for these.  And they’re really yummy!

Who knew it was really easy to make fruit roll-ups?  Not this mama!  But now I do, and it’s a huge hit!  Just puree berries and add some honey.  Pour it in a thin layer in a cookie sheet and bake it at 200 for a couple of hours.  Taste just like the ones you buy in the store, but without the wax surfers use to wax their boards included!  I also bought silicone gummy bear molds and we make gummies by boiling “no sugar added” juices with honey and beef gelatin.

And finally, trail mix.  I’m not sure why it took me so long to figure this one out.  My kids love nuts and chocolate.  So I just buy bulk raw almonds, pistachios, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, craisins, and M&Ms.  Mix it all in a gallon ziplock bag, and it’s a handy go-to snack the whole family loves!  Just beware of the youngest picking through to get all the M&Ms…lol!  So those are the top things I’ve learned about how to set my family up for a successful homeschool day.  And it really is day-by-day.  For all the planning and preparing in the world, nothing will ever work out perfectly.  Being able to flex and dig deep for inner patience is essential.  And some days, that just doesn’t happen.  Kids aren’t perfect; parents aren’t perfect; and no plan is fool proof.  I try hard to keep time in the morning before the kids gets up to do a short Bible study and a yoga video series I found on Amazon Prime.  And we always start the homeschool day off with prayer.  But some days are just start-to-finish crazy, hectic, and stressful.  Thank God His mercies are new every day!!!  And now to leave this post with a couple of cute pics of my little Pre-Ker’s first week of school!  Have a blessed weekend!

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Butterfly Bush

July 10, 2019 at 12:27 pm (Uncategorized)

Bumblebee moth on our butterfly bush in the humid haze.

And other pretty flowers…

Black Beauty Gladiolus…

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Hope in Loss

July 10, 2019 at 12:23 pm (Uncategorized)

It’s been a really tough few days.  A friend lost her 6-year-old son to complications from congenital heart disease.  I don’t know how anyone even processes that kind of pain.  There aren’t words.  My heart and prayers are with their family.  May God give them peace and comfort and use their pain to help others.

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4th of July and Little K’s Birthday

July 10, 2019 at 12:08 pm (Uncategorized)

Now, the most current pictures…4th of July and my little K’s 4th birthday!

My daughter made Paw Patrol cupcake picks for her little brother…so adorable!

4th of July!  Yummy berry Greek Yogurt cheesecake bites and sugar cookies!

Happy 4th birthday to our little firecracker!

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Baby Shower

July 10, 2019 at 11:36 am (Uncategorized)

June brought hosting a fun fishing-themed baby sprinkle for a friend!

Baby Henry arrived mid-June, and mama and baby are doing great!

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April and May

July 10, 2019 at 11:31 am (Uncategorized)

The whirlwind that is our lives has started to calm down a little bit.  Homeschool end-of-year review is complete; activities have wrapped up for the summer; and we are able to take a little breather.  First up, photo dump…lol!  April brought a fun photo shoot for a friend’s blossoming modeling business.  It was a beautiful day with some wonderful people from church…

Then came Easter and a great day celebrating with family!

Then came Mother’s Day and celebrating my sweet oldest son turning 11!

My sister got him a fun old-fashioned mailbox, so we put all of the cards in it.  He read every card out loud – reading and public speaking, two of his least favorite things.  He did a great job, and I was so proud of him!!

Birthday boy…

Presents at home…

So that was April and May…June and July to come…

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March 29, 2019 at 7:48 pm (Uncategorized)

I seriously can’t believe it’s been more than three months since I last posted!  By far the longest I’ve gone since starting this blog, but it really has been an even crazier busy season.  First the holidays, then a leadership class at church every Saturday…time to take photos with my big camera, let alone download them, has been really scarce.  So this is going back to December right before we took the Christmas tree down.  Here are the final kid portraits of 201…

And tree lights and an awesome handcrafted ornament my parents gave us….

December ended with a fun trip to SkyZone to celebrate one of my daughter’s closest friends.  Then came the New Year!  We continued our tradition of having the kids choose a dish from a different country to make on New Year’s Eve.  This year’s choices: mini Filipino lumpia, vegetarian sushi for Japan, chicken Lo Mein for China, and Argentinian chipa…delicious!  More pics of the littles in the New Year…

Then came snow days!

Our neighbors had a fun gadget that scoops up snowballs, but it leaves a little ring around the center.  Baby K loved it and kept saying he was making “Saturn.”  But then he’d get upset when the “Saturns” broke…lol!

January also brought a very stressful court date for hubby that went way better than we dared to hope (God is so good!).  February brought our church’s annual AWANA Grand Prix.  Our cars did terrible on the track (some of us don’t know you’re supposed to graphite the wheels before you weigh in…), but the kids decorated their own cars, except for Baby I, and they had a really good time!

In, February, we also moved Baby I to a big boy bed with fun penguin bedding.  He started out doing very well staying in his bed at night…but now we’re having to take him back no less than a dozen times every night…sigh…  He’s also gotten to be quite the little daredevil, jumping from bookshelves onto beds, sliding fearlessly down big, twisty slides (sometimes backwards), and just being all around a little crazy!  He’s also figured out how to work the TV and Roku remote…  March also brought an AWANA T&T lock-in for my oldest two.  They had a blast…and completely crashed the next day!  And that brings us to today…yep, it’s the first time I’ve pulled out the big camera this month…more sighs…  But spring is in the air!  The pansies actually survived the winter; beautiful and fragrant grape hyacinths are blooming; the lilacs are starting to bud; and there are chrysalises hanging from the tree branches.

The neighbors have a relatively new pig named Hamilton (we think…maybe Hamlet…) who routinely harasses the horses – and once in a while even meanders through the neighborhood…lol!

Much-needed outdoor fun!

And then there are monkey balls…  Thankfully, hubby chopped down the gum trees, but there are still those pesky monkey balls littering the yard.  Baby I thought they were lollipops…lol!  But at least he listened and didn’t stick any in his mouth…

“Want pop?”  Uh, no thanks….

So that’s the rundown of what’s been happening in our little corner of the world.  Homeschool is going really well…only 9 weeks to go…time really does fly!  The youngest two are just getting over some sicknesses, including an ear infection for sweet Baby I.  I also got to have a ladies night out at a super fun painting place!  I’ll have to get a pic of the painting… We’re now planning a paint night at our church for the women’s ministry!  And tomorrow, we’re headed up to see “Jesus” at the Sight & Sound theaters!  Looking forward to a fun weekend with family!  I hope everyone has a very blessed weekend!  Good-bye snow; hello, spring!

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