A Unique First Week of School

Daddy Getaway/ Mommy Curriculum Marathon!!

The weekend before we kicked off our 10th year of the AYER ACADEMY, the kids and Dave went on a fun get-away weekend to beautiful Hawassa!! I hope this is a new tradition!  I stayed home and put my nose in curriculum for 40 hours straight!! Dave and I were both exhausted, but for different reasons!! BUT they had such a special time, and I felt excited and ready to start our year!!

Our Ayer Academy started this year with a BIG first week..

The academic/schooling part was amazing.  The kids had so much fun.  I LOVE Sonlight.  I’m back at it after 4 years of CC.  I loved CC too, but after 4 years of kind of doing it solo,  I felt I needed Sonlight’s JOY and HELP in knowing what and how to schedule it out…My kids are loving it too.  We are BUSY!! The days are LONG, but we are loving learning together again, so I’m so thankful.  Selah is probably my biggest challenge right now.  Well, that’s a two year old’s job!

here’s a few pictures to share about it…

Here we go…crazy momma…7th grader! 5th grader! 3rd grader! Two 1st graders…and a SUPER 2 year old!!

I love these kids!!  (this was after our FIRST DAY 🙂

My 1st graders 🙂

Math time…Selah did this for about 42 seconds. 🙂 really.

My silly 3rd grader.

It’s not easy being 2.

Tuesday morning, Dave and Caleb left for our monthly outreach trip to the South.  This trip proved to be a little different and more adventurous than normal…due to some cultural challenges because of a tribal funeral in the village, there was a lot of gunfire all through the night.  I was getting some pretty alarming messages from Dave and my team was even alerted…so that night held some scares for me here on the homefront.  But, amazingly we were all praying Psalm 91.  Caleb and Dave were praying it…my team mates, apart from me, and in our home.  Twice during the heaviest gun firing my kids asked if we could pray over Daddy and Caleb (and they had no idea it was going on!!)…I felt an overwhelming peace and was praying the tangible presence of God over my boys. He protected them with that strong wing of grace.  I am so thankful…Dave and Caleb came home a day early, tired but safe.  God is doing so many amazing works in that region and we stand in awe each time we are able to see it, pray and be a small piece of His plan for these people He created and loves!!

We finished the rest of our schooling.  The older kids are working all day…usually until 4:30, but then they get to play and feel so good about how hard they’ve worked!!  To celebrate, we went to visit Ayelech and then up to another compound to play with our AWESOME friends! They are ADVENTUROUS and ALIVE together and this is a HUGE HUGE answer to prayer for our family!  They ended the week with a movie night with friends and have enjoyed playing again all day today outside!!

Deep breath.  Week one, accomplished.  We experienced God in HUGE, POWERFUL, REAL ways this week.  He was WITH us.  He BLESSED US.  He protected.  He taught us.  He is challenging us and teaching us to walk by faith.  Step by step.

PSALM 91…He is our shelter…covered our boys in the Shadow of the Almighty.  HE is our GOD, Our Refuge and WE LOVE HIM.

(Maija’s drawing of Psalm 91 this week.  I LOVE what God showed her!)