Good Day!

Today we finished reading the book of Mark. I feel a tremendous sense of accomplishment, as it is the first ENTIRE book of the Bible I have read outloud to our kids. Now just 65 to go and they will have "read" the whole Bible! Seriously, I don't think anything else we have done so far in our homeschooling journey has given me quite this sense of accomplishment and contentment. I am so thankful for God's inspiration last summer when I was wondering what Bible curriculum to use this year, to just read the Bible. Now I am praying about which book to read next.

The last few chapters of Mark, as in all the gospels, detail Jesus' arrest, trial, crucifixion, and resurrection. As I was reading in Mark 14 about Jesus' arrest, our son G was anticipating the part when Peter takes his sword and cuts off the ear of a servant of the high priest, and then Jesus puts it back on. He had heard that detail in Sunday School and kept saying to his younger brother C, "you are gonna love this part!" Well, when we got to that part, it did not say that Jesus put his ear back on. Our son G was quite mystified as to why that detail was not in there. So I had a chance to explain that all 4 gospels give an account of the same events from a slightly different perspective, so to get the big picture we really have to read them all. So we did! We read about Jesus' arrest in all 4 gospels, and we discovered that the book of John is the only place where the healing of the ear is mentioned. I was glad for this brief exposure to the idea of comparative study. It was a wonderful teachable moment!!

Here is a recent page from the older 4 kids' bible journals. I love how each one is different, yet they pull from the text the important things they want to draw. This first one shows Jesus' arrest. It is 5 year old C's journal, but is mostly drawn by me.

This image of Jesus' trial before Pilate is in 10 year old G's journal. I love her use of perspective in this picture!

8 year old G depicted Jesus being taken off the cross and buried by Joseph of Arimathea. You can see Joseph inside the tomb in the lower part of the picture, holding a torch. Jesus's body is wrapped in cloths and lying on a stone shelf inside the tomb. He drew rock outcroppings on the side of the hill to make it look like a skull (since Golgotha means "the place of the skull").

Finally, 7 year old L drew Jesus' resurrection just today! Here the angel is announcing to the women who have come to put spices on Jesus' body that Jesus is not here, He has risen!

I pray fervently that the truth of God's Word would take root in their hearts and minds and completely captivate them.

After the momentous morning of finishing Mark, we did move on to other subjects. In history we have finished our study of colonial times and are about to move on to the Revolutionary War. Before doing that however, we are planning a unit celebration for this Friday evening. Whoo-Hooo!!! It will be a fun time of remembering what we have learned, and sharing snippets of colonial life with a few of our friends. We are so excited. Today we put the finishing touches on our colonial "lapbooks" we have been making. Each of the older 4 children tried their hand at writing with a quill pen. It's much harder than it looks. These quill pen writings were later glued inside their lapbooks and will be on display this Friday at our celebration.