Mood:  lazy

Sarah was gone again today. She's been gone a lot lately. Let's recount the past week or so.

Last Thursday she rearranged the boy's therapies so  that she could take one of her ladies, "G", to the courthouse in the next county to see her daughter in court. It seems that G's daughter had violated her probation and G went to see if she could do anything to help. G, by the way, is 67, has outlived two husbands, and is one of the hardest workers that I know. You can regularly see her at 4am walking the streets in the project (low income housing area) and picking up the trash. Yes I said 4am! Then, during the day, she volunteers her time to help the maintenance men clean and fix up the apartments after someone has moved out. G offered to pay for lunch, but Sarah wouldn't take her money. Instead, Sarah treated.

Sunday, of course, is Mission day. Sarah is over at the mission early to spiff up and begin the meal that she is going to serve the folks who come that day. She has her computer with her so that she can study her lesson that day. She spends time greeting the people as they come - sometimes a half hour early just to talk. She is still smiling and greeting as I run with the van picking up folks that need a ride. After the meal, I take the kids and Sarah teaches the ladies. She  loses track of time and ends up being late to help with the youth at our church. That evening she tells me that she doesn't even know what she said. It just seems like the Holy Spirit took over.

Tuesday afternoon she's out with some of her ladies again. Helping them run errands and doing some shopping for the mission. That afternoon we have Bible Club and, of course, another meal. Sarah is once again in the kitchen cooking. Bible Club went great, and so did the meal.

Yesterday she mentioned that she loved her ladies but was glad nothing was planned for the day. This morning she gets up and she and the boys attend the Thursday morning Bible study that they have been going to for the past few years. It has a fantastic homeschool group that the boys love. When she finally gets home and props her feet up she gets a phone call. I hear her say "Give me about 40 minutes and I'll be there." It seems that another one of her ladies, "L", was in tears. She had taken out a loan and, when she went to pay on it, the people wouldn't take her payment. Sarah went with her to the loan office to find out what was going on. She was able to explain to L and they got everything taken care of.

Tomorrow, after she takes the kids to therapy in the morning, she's taking "A" into Cookeville. A doesn't have a car and her daughter has a birthday coming up so she's taking her shopping.

So, Sarah will be gone again tomorrow. She's been gone a lot lately. Thank you, Lord, for my wife, Sarah.

Sarah and John Allen at a recent youth event.

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Mood:  happy

We did it again! We've taken on another correspondence child from Compassion International. If you remember, Compassion has many companies (or even individuals) that give quantities of money to sponsor a child or many children but can't are aren't willing to write to that child. Writing to the child is a big part of Compassion's ministry, so, Compassion began the correspondence program. That's when another sponsor can sign up to write to a child that doesn't have anyone that writes to them. You then become that child's correspondence sponsor. We sponsor one child through Compassion - Marcelo from Bolivia and have four other boys that we correspond with - Feyber from Colombia, Somi from Indonesia, Emmanuel from Tanzania and Ismael from Nicaragua.

Well, John Allen and I had a great idea for a Christmas gift for Sarah. We requested another correspondence child and, you probably can guess from the font color, this time it's a girl. We thought that perhaps a girl would make Sarah a little more interested in Compassion. Up until now she has listened to the letters and prays for the kids, but the writing has always been mine and the boys thing. Well, she's promised to write to whomever Compassion sends to us. We didn't get her for Christmas, but received word the other day that Niyonsenga "Yvone" from Rwanda is our new daughter!

Sarah was particularly excited that she goes by Yvone because Yvonne (two n's) is a family name. Both her mother's and sister's middle names are Yvonne and I think it goes back even further than that. Anyway, here's our new Yvone's picture and information. She is 13 years old and her birthday is June 20. Please pray with us as we write and try to disciple Yvone. Her father is dead and, although it seems her mother is alive, she lives with her grandmother. Thanks for all of your prayers for Yvone and our other Compassion children. If you want to know more about the Compassion program please click here. You  won't regret it!

Niyonsenga Yvone

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Mood:  happy

 Arthur Henry Tinkel

Tomorrow would have been my Grandpa Tinkel's 110th Birthday. He was an amazing man. Pastor, school principal, teacher, profuse reader, jigsaw puzzle lover, ornery old coot (I say that very affectionately ), great patriarch of the family. I feel a longer post coming on soon. Anyway, Happy Birthday Grandpa!

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Mood:  a-ok

For those of you who are my Facebook friend. I just asked everyone that I was friends with on Facebook to comment on how they met me. It was actually one of those copy and paste things that you get periodically on Facebook. You know, one of those answer this on my page and then put it as your status.

Anyway, I've gotten some good feedback so far. Brought back some good memories. I need to write a post about some of the memories soon.

If you are my Facebook friend and haven't commented, I encourage you to hop on over and say something. Thanks, in advance, bringing good times back to memory.

Speaking of good times. Sarah and John Allen went on a youth retreat a few weeks ago and saw The Newsboys in concert. They bought a couple of their CD's and this is one of my favorite tracks. It's a feel good song. Enjoy.

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Mood:  a-ok

Have you ever wished you could hire a personal math tutor for your kids? One that will thoroughly explain how to work a problem, give your child hints when they have trouble, have plenty of practice problems prepared and reward your child when they do good? Do you think that would never happen? Is a personal tutor too expensive and out of your budget? Well, I have found something that is almost as good - Ten Marks Math!

Ten Marks Math is a great online math program. They tout themselves as being a supplemental math program, but you could almost use it as your main math curriculum.

Here's how it works. When you sign your student up for this program you choose a grade level for them to work on. After that, your student will be assigned a series of "worksheets", four per week, that cover one of the many concepts that Ten Marks Math feels that a student working in that grade level needs to learn.  A "worksheet" is actually a series of 10 questions that cover that concept.

Now, here's where the really neat stuff comes into play. Each question comes with four multiple choice answers. If your child thinks he knows the answer to a question, he just clicks on the answer he thinks is correct. If he needs help, he can click the "ask for hints" button. You get three hints for each question - yes I said three! Each hint gives you a little more help and gets you a little closer to the answer. If your son or daughter still needs assistance, they can watch a video where a teacher explains, step by step, how to work out that problem. After the 10 questions are completed, your child can see which ones he got wrong and is given a chance to correct his wrong answers.

If, he is still having problems, then the computer automatically reassigns that worksheet.  After several worksheets are passed, then your child is awarded a fun logic type game to play whenever he wants. Careful! the games are addicting! Make sure your child is not neglecting what his worksheets and only playing the games. There's even a section where you can assign your own awards to your child. If your student thinks that he already has a good handle on a topic, he can skip right to the test. There are also unlimited practice questions that your child can work with that aren't counted toward the evaluation that you, the parent, receive when you log into the special parent section.

Yes, there is a special parent section. In this section you are told how your child is doing on his assignments. What is being covered that week, what was just covered, and what is next up. Now, worksheets are automatically assigned to your child, but, really, you have complete control. If you don't like the order that Ten Marks is covering things, rearrange it. If your child has never seen a particular concept, assign the worksheets for that concept from a grade lower. You can rearrange what's coming up next with just a click of a button. And, your child will never know it (sneaky isn't it?). They'll just keep working through their worksheets and earning their rewards and, better still, they'll just keep learning! You can even tell the program that you are going on vacation or will be taking a break from homeschooling for a little while and it will hold all of your worksheets.

Sound too good to be true? Just go to their website and try it out for a limited amount of times free by clicking here or on any one of the hi-lighted links above. I think you'll really like it. After you have tried it out for free, the cost per month is only $10 with a money back guarantee. You can't beat that! As usual, many other members of the TOS Homeschool Crew reviewed Ten Marks Math and you can find out what they had to say by clicking here. Happy Home Educating!

As a member of the TOS Homeschool Crew I was given a free limited time subscription to Ten Marks Math in order to try out and review on my blog.

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