I know that in our home, homeschooling has given us many opportunities to create memories that will last a lifetime! – Melissa Ringstaff

Preserving a Legacy of Family, Faith, and Food – November 1 – December 31

Article Written by Cindy Patterson

    Home schooling my children is such a privilege, even though there are days when I feel like giving up. I wonder if my children spend too much time together and with me—when arguments about the smallest of things sometimes fill our time.

But then I catch them all often showing love to each other. My daughter, Brooklyn, never comes home without buying her brother, Zachary, a piece of candy with her own money. Zachary may say his sister gets on his nerves, but when it’s time to deep clean her room (which is often) he’ll jump right in and help her to the very end.

Both of my boys are athletic and my oldest son, Tyler, has spent hours coaching Zachary in baseball in our back yard. Tyler was one of Zachary’s little league coaches. How many mothers get the opportunity to witness that? Tyler never misses a game unless he’s working, and if he does, texts me to find out how Zachary’s doing—play by play. There are seven years between them, but there’s a bond between these two that will never be broken.

    I am blessed to have three wonderful children.

    Homeschooling gives us time to do more things together such as cooking and crafts.

My daughter loves to paint, glue, or anything that makes a big mess. One of our favorite holiday traditions is to make gifts for friends and family. It would be so much easier to buy, but it’s much more rewarding to make. My mom bought Brooklyn’s initials in wood. She placed strips of tape on one letter, then painted over the tape, and removed after it dried, creating zebra stripes.

The next one she painted with green glitter spray paint, and for the last one used circle stickers and repeated the same process as the zebra striped. This was such an excellent idea she made one for a friend’s birthday!

We bought a dish towel, took two different patterns of material, made pleats across to fit the towel, leaving enough to sew the ends. We then sewed both pieces to the towel and covered the ragged edges with ribbon.

My daughter helped me sew this and it was a fun and quick project to do together.

Now I just have to figure out how many to make!

[tooltip text=”TOOLTIP TEXT”]You can find Cindy Patterson in North Carolina with her wonderful husband and three amazing children. She’s a home school mom. Her passions include Jesus, writing, walking, and her youth drama ministry. You’ll find her at any given time with her family on a baseball field watching her youngest son play, as her oldest son and husband coach from the sidelines. You can also find her tucked away reading, writing an inspirational romance, or watching her daughter dance. She’s a member of AFCW. [/tooltip]