This. 100% agree.

I certainly wasn't advocating not teaching practical study skills or not explicitly teaching writing or not spending serious time on math. Math is not busywork! :) To me the Circe thread (and I don't agree with everything Circe puts out) was focused more on the underlying philosophy of why I am homeschooling and articulating what the end of education is for our family, not on practical, nuts and bolts means of getting there. When you are discussing ends, it can often sound very nebulous and pie-in-the-sky, but that doesn't necessarily imply you are ignoring the means to get there. It is just a different discussion. I believe that may be why most of the moms who participated in the thread will be doing very different actual reading and assignments in their homeschools today, but with the same end in mind.

I've had 4 no-spend days. Besides groceries: $40 on a new vacuum (the old one broke and was completely unrepairable) $25 on some organizational products that I have been waiting to go on sale $150 in unplanned charity donations. We were planning to up charitable giving this year, though we hadn't decided on an amount, and these were for friends who had emergency health issues so I feel okay about it. No eating out at all or library fines, which are my weak spots! I really like having these accountability threads!

This is exactly what happened with my second. At 5, I would ask her what rhymes with spoon - moon or cat? Deer in headlights for a response. I tried to teach her, but after a few weeks of frustration - mainly on my part - I let her be. Six months later, she knew how to do it.

Oh,I forgot to add that I try to train them to sit in the pew nicely at least for communion time as early as possible. Just being a to go receive the Eucharist by myself, even if that is the only few minutes I get to myself the whole Mass, is very important to me. You can cram a lot of adoration and praise in the few minutes in the communion line!

It can be very hard not to be able to be recollected at Mass. This stage can last for years when you have multiples so I think it is good to establish some strategies to make it a fruitful time. A couple of things that are helping me during this stage: 1. Focus on your child being the child Jesus to you during mass. This works really well for me during the baby stage. The Lord gave me these little ones to me as my vocation so I really focus on seeing Christ in them particularly during Mass as I serve them by quieting them (babies and toddlers) or guide them in learning to participate in the liturgy (preschooler and older). This way I AM focusing on Christ during mass, even if it is a little different than I usually do. 2. Read the readings the night before Mass. This way even if I am busy helping kids, if I catch a snatch of the readings or homily, I am usually able to follow along better with the little I do hear. 3. Ask your guardian angel to do some adoration for you. It is very difficult to enter into deep adoration with distracting littles so I often ask my guardian angel to help supply what is wanting in my prayers. This seems to help me so much for some reason. 4. Get to mass by yourself once a month. My husband and I work things out so once a month we can go to Mass alone either on Sunday or during the week. It is very refreshing to the spirit and seems to help keep up our ability to focus during prayer. If I go too long without being at Mass by myself, the first time I do get to go alone, it is like I forgot how to pray, which is soooo frustrating. HTH!

That is awesome! I remember my parents having a mortgage burning party, and it really helped me realize at a young age that a mortgage is not a given in life. You should have some type of celebration, at least for the family.

I would look around the Rossyln, Crystal City, or Silver Spring metro stops. They are all in safe areas while being a bit out of the fray so will likely be cheaper.

How wonderful! I'll be praying for you tomorrow.

I didn't know it before I read the book. I thought she was a little too hung up on the particular term, because I think a lot of serious Catholic don't know it and that fact in no way reflects badly on them. That said, I'm glad to add it to my vocabulary. I completely get the concept behind delineating evangelizing from catechizing. I like having terms to describe this distinction that aren't too loaded. I experienced this phenomena of folks being somewhat catechized, but not well evangelized, but didn't have the terminology to describe without using language common to charismatic circles - which can be just as loaded buzzwords for some Catholics as some of the Protestant buzzwords are for others! I feel like some new terminology was really helpful to me in talking with my pastor and other lay folks in our parish.

I like this, MLW. Language does have meaning, but sometimes it is more about WHO and HOW a person is using certain phrases. My experience with "personal relationship with Jesus" was never in the context of an alter call or a saying a particular prayer to be saved or whatnot. It was just used to refer to my actual spiritual state - how was my prayer life, my moral decisions, my faith, etc. I don't find Pope Benedict or my pastor or my dad using that phrase insincere because they used it in proper context.

What a beautiful story, cathmom. Thanks for sharing it! I think your story is actually close to the heart of what FID is trying to address - the Catholic Church has the fullness of Truth, but we need to do a much better job of actually sharing that Truth both intellectually AND spiritually, emotionally, communally. In the Pew surveys, a very large portion of baptized Catholics leave the Church for evangelical churches because they don't feel their spiritual needs are being met. Basically, I think they are looking for what you initially found in your non-denom church - real community, sharing of a spiritual journey, others who acknowledge Christ in their daily life, folks not running each down in the oarking lot trying to leave!, etc. Our parishes often don't do a great job at this, or at least not in a way many can visibly see. I think Wedell is trying to inspire parishes to do both. Present the Truth and spiritual riches of the Church through our liturgies and our religious education program, but also realize we need to have true Christian community that embraces the whole of the person's life. At one point in the book, she mentions that you can find this type of Catholic community in the lay apostle movements in the Church, but only a tiny percentage of Catholics are ever part of one. And why funnel us all into a lay apostle movement? This is what a parish is supposed to provide. Let's reinvigorate parishes everywhere so all of us can easily find true Catholic community and support without having to look for it elsewhere. (This is not to say anything disparaging about lay apostolate movements; many of us just don't feel called to them.) This is what I find very compelling about the book.

Yeah, I'm not so sure about throwing around the word intimacy. It kind of reminds me of the first meeting of this Teams of Our Lady group I'm in. It's a group of couples who meet monthly to pray together. discuss spiritual reading, and support each other. Anyway, there are certain endeavors you commit to, like, daily personal prayer, daily scripture reading, etc. One of them was "conjugal prayer." I think one of the husbands about fell out of his seat when he saw that one!! I think it was just an awkward translation for daily prayer as a couple from the French since it was originally a French group. I thought we should use it as a recruiting tool: Join our group and have a daily commitment to conjugal prayer! Let the husbands interpret it as they will!

I can see how the phrase can carry baggage for converts or reverts from other Christian faiths, even if I haven't personally experienced it. I get a little sad about the idea that people don't see it as a Catholic phrase, though, and just simply refuse to let it be usurped by others. I'm stubborn that way. :) Also, I sometimes don't know what terms to use when talking with others. If I'm talking with someone at RCIA or a new mom at our parish's moms group and we are having a spiritual discussion, I just don't know how to phrase some questions or responses without talking about my "relationship with Christ." What other terms do you all use? I think a bigger repotoire would be good, especially when talking with some converts. Some of my ideas, like "journey of faith" or "walk with the Lord" sound worse to me, but maybe they are better for others?

I think Wendell relies extensively on both religious survey information and thousands of interviews her and her team has done all across the country of Catholics. The data she uses certainly points to a very basic evangelization problem. Lots of baptized Catholics do not actually know who Jesus is. They don't believe in a personal God at all. They don't feel like they have a spiritual life. My personal experience does bear this out. I grew up in an area where everyone was Catholic. There was not a Protestant Church in our town. We had Catholic religious classes during the day in our public school. But....it was very cultural. Even though folks were essentially catechized (i.e., they intellectually knew what the Church taught), they were not evangelized (i.e., they did not let this knowledge form who they were and what they did). It was a big disconnent. Personally, I think Vatican II was trying to address this problem, but was side tracked by a big hot mess of heresy and liturgical abuse. So now the deeper problem of a crisis of faith and knowledge of God has gone unaddress AND we are still trying to sort out quite a mess within the Church. I think many folks see the more visible problems that came out of Vatican II - like outright heresy and liturgical abuse - but don't see the interior rotting away of the faith that was happening even before that. Pope Benedict writes extensively on the "crisis of faith" in the tradionally Christian areas of the world - the West - and I think maybe if you substitute those words for "relationship with Jesus Christ" that Wendell uses, you'll find they are talking about the same reality. I personally do not find "relationship with Jesus Christ" to be a Protestant phrase since it was used constantly in my life as a cradle Catholic, but I do realize it has baggage for others. I do think Wendell downplays some of the other reasons folks leave the Church (divorce, contraception, etc.), but she is relying on the responses given by these individuals in surveys. The surveys say they are not primarily leaving for those reasons, but for others. I think it is a chicken and egg problem. I know folks who move away from the Church over particular doctrinal issues, but often that is just the straw that broke the camel's back. There are doctrines I find difficult and am able to believe and live because of my faith, my personal relationship with Christ, my trust in the Church. If those were weak, no way would I keep living in a way that I found difficult, especially when life was handing me a mess. I don't think outright heresy is leading folks away initially. I see it more as a sympton than a cause. I do think Wendell downplays the infant/adult model of the Church too much. I don't have time to talk about it now, but I would love to later.

I think both are great. We always have a mom read-aloud and an audiobook going at the same time. We listen to the audiobooks in the car and sometimes at lunchtime. I usually try to choose more challenging/better quality literature for my read-alouds so we can discuss it together. I try to keep lighter, easier storylines for audiobooks. Of course, if I find a narrarator that is really good, we'll listen to whatever we can get our hands on by them. Also, sometimes I read a book aloud to the kids and then we listen to it on audiobook a few months later. My kids like repeating stories over and over, but I don't really like re-reading longer books. We are doing this with The Hobbit right now. We read it last summer, but are now listening to the old BBC production of it.

Thanks, Ellie, for figuring it out. It makes sense now!

OP, I think the list is likely too short to be "The Important Stuff" for your purposes. It is missing The Nativity of Our Lord (Christmas), The Feast of Mary, the Mother of God (January 1), Holy Thursday and Good Friday, Mary's Assumption, All Saints' Day, and the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, just to start.

Hmm...Ash Wednesday isn't a Holy Day of Obligation, though. This list is stumping me a bit. I thought the dates might be marking the change in Church seasons, I.e. First Sunday of Advent starts Advent, Ash Wednesday starts Lent, etc., but that doesn't work with them all and it is missing dates. I'm ready to call the USCCB tomorrow and ask!

If you can find a very good local privately owned shoe shop for children, sometimes the staff can be amazing helpful. I went down the custom $1,000 inserts via an orthopedic doctor route for a few years with my dd, but in my search to find shoes wide enough to fit the inserts, I found a wonderful shoe shop. The staff there actually pointed out some problems with the inserts (like taking the cast when the child was seated instead of standing thus making it too small). They have been able to help modify a more generic insert that fits much better and is MUCH cheaper. The shoe shop has been owned and staffed by a family for 30 years and they cater to kids with specialized shoe needs. Maybe call local shops and see if you can find something similiar.

I am working on getting more use out of our iPad. I currently get good use out of it for audio books, google searches to follow rabbit trails, and math and handwriting apps. Also, I did make a great list of videos to go with our BFSU schedule and keep it in my iPad notes. Then I bought a cord to plug my iPad into my TV and presto - I can just click the links in my iPad notes and our science videos play on the big screen. No more squishing around the computer together! I need to make similar lists for history, music, art, and Spanish. Having all the videos in a list and easy way to play them to all the kids at once is a big deal for me. I have a dear friend who truly did revolutionize her homeschool with her iPad, and I am taking tips from her. She heavily uses notability for PDFs. Her kids do all worksheets on the iPad, elimating a ton of paper in her life. If she can't buy something in a PDF, she'll take photos of the pages and then make them into PDFs. She has her early readers working on fluency by downloading both the audio and kindle version of a book so they can read along while listening. She uses a make-your-own flash card app for several subjects, but especially foreign language. She uses a whiteboard app to illustrate concepts, but it also has a recording feature so the kids can rewatch a lesson she taught for review or further study. She can also use this to record both audio and visual narrations from the kids. I can't remember all else, but I can see how you could really revolutionize your homeschool with iPads after seeing her set-up. I loved it because she was able to minimize paperwork - which I detest having to deal with - and save herself time by having her teaching, her resources, her notes, everything centrally stored in one place. I would love to minimize paper clutter and workbooks and whatnot so we could have more room for beautiful books and art work and science equipment!

On a practical level, it has made read aloud time a non-negotiablein our day. I also work very hard at choosing good literature and the best illustrations I can find for our read alouds. I have tried to incorporate more visually beautiful activities into our math work, too. I let myself ruthlessly cut anything I feel I am doing just to have a "product" at the end - worksheets, coloring pages, unnecessary practice sheets, etc. I realized I was using many of these type of materialsjust to have the kids produce something, not because they actually gained anything from the work. I still use some of this type of material, but only if is actually an aid to our learning.

My biggest ongoing take aways from the Circe thread have been striving to teach from a place of rest and prioritizing finding truth over accumulating facts. It is SUCH a struggle for me to teach from a place of rest...to be a peaceful, patient, confident guide to my children. The days when I inch a little closer to that goal are by far the most successful days we have in our home. It helps me tremendously to let go of the anxiety to remember the second point - we are seeking truth and beauty in creation and our fellow man through our education. It is not a fact-accumulating race! The speed at which we get through material or the breadth of material we cover is not the point, but rather becoming a new person who has eyes to see and ears to hear the truth. The more I let these points form who I am as a teacher (and a parent), the better we seem to do as a family in every way.

I'm pretty good at focusing on Advent, but am still working on Epiphany traditions. During Advent, the kids make Jesse trees. I love reading the different readings with the kids, and the kids have memorized a good timeline of salvation history in a lovely way. Also, we try to focus on alms giving, fasting, and charitable works in Advent. Fasting is very tough this time a year, but we did better this year than last year. We decorate the kitchen slowly throughout Avent with paper chains made of scrapbook Christmas paper. Each time a kid makes a sacrifice or does some charitable act, they get to add a link to the chain. I tell them they are preparing their hearts inside for Christ and we are just making an external show of the real interior work going on. They love it. We slowly begin decorating the rest of the house and tree around the middle of Advent. If I wait any longer, it becomes too stressful for me. Also, I look at it like preparing for the birth of any baby. I wouldn't wait until the night before I went into labor before I started preparing the nursery! I look at my Christmas preparations in Advent as just preparing our home for the birth of Christ. I am struggling with keeping the tree up all the way to Epiphany. We always have real trees and even though they are never up before Dec. 15, they are soooo dried out by Christmas, much less Epiphany. I water constantly, but can't seem to make my trees last. It is a bummer!

Sounds great.