Mother's Day Giveaway!

Disclaimer so that this Mommy Blog is not taken to court ::snort::. I am given FREE books to review. I am also given one to two copies to giveaway on my blog. I pay postage. I do not let the free books color my reviews, which you know if you've read my blog. ::snort::

I have THREE books to review and giveaway this week! I will admit that I have not read the books - I'm moving to Japan and must focus on that.....here are the publisher's reviews.

Summary: Dear Mom by Melody Carlson

Popular novelist Melody Carlson gives moms straight talk on the secrets their teen daughters harbor—without the angst, arguments, or arm-wrestling. She looks at the heart and illuminates how to talk to teens so they hear, connect despite the differences, and strengthen the bond every mom and daughter ultimately wants.

Author Bio: Melody Carlson is the award-winning author of more than one hundred books for adults, children, and teens, with sales totaling more than three million copies. Beloved for her Diary of a Teenage Girl and Notes from a Spinning Planet series, she’s also the author of the women’s novels Finding Alice (in production now for a Lifetime-TV movie), Crystal Lies, On This Day, These Boots Weren’t Made for Walking, and A Mile in My Flip-Flops. A mother of two grown sons, Melody lives in central Oregon with her husband and chocolate lab retriever. She’s a full-time writer and an avid gardener, biker, skier, and hiker.

Summary for Mama’s Got a Fake I.D. by Caryn Rivedeneira

Caryn Rivadeneira helps women reclaim their full identity as multi-talented people whom God wants to use in a variety of settings—including in their homes. This inspiring, practical guide shows women how to break free from false guilt, learn how to express who they are, and follow God’s lead in sharing their true self with others.

Author Bio: The former managing editor of Marriage Partnership and Christian Parenting Today, Caryn Dahlstrand Rivedeneira has been a trusted voice writing and speaking to women for more than a decade. Today she is the managing editor of GiftedForLeadership.com, an online community for Christian women in leadership. Rivadeneira works from home in the Chicago suburbs, where she lives with her husband and their three children.

Summary for Enduring Justice by Amy Wallace:

Hanna Kessler’s secret remained buried for decades. But when the shadows of her past threaten those she loves and the system fails FBI Agent Michael Parker, setting a white supremacist free, they must learn the difference between vengeance and justice is their choice to heal.

Author Bio: Amy Wallace is the author of Ransomed Dreams and Healing Promises, a homeschool mom, and self-confessed chocoholic. She is a graduate of the Gwinnett County Citizens Police Academy and a contributing author of several books including God Answers Moms’ Prayers and Chicken Soup for the Soul Healthy Living Series: Diabetes. She lives with her husband and three children in Georgia.

I HAVE read and reviewed other books by Amy Wallace. I believe she is one of my favorite new to me authors. This series has captured me and I hope she writes more of them. I plan to take this one in the trailer. Here is my review to Healing Promises, I haven't gotten around to reviewing Ransomed Dreams. As for the other two books my impression would be based solely on the write ups above - and that isn't quite fair...but that whole "reclaim your real ID" thing is a big turn off to me. What? Being a MOM isn't a REAL id? Huh? But maybe it is hilarious and packs a point....someone sign up for these and you can tell me what you think! ::snort::

I have two copies of Dear Mom and Mama's Got a Fake I.D. to giveaway. I have one copy of Enduring Justice. If you would like a copy simply leave a comment, with contact info (email or blog), in my comment section. International readers, APO/FPO addresses are encouraged to participate. We will pick a winner Thursday a.m. You will have one week to respond with your address. If an address is not provided in a week, I pick a new winner. If you respond right away with your address, I would LOVE to mail this out by Friday so that they don't have to be moved to the trailer. You may request one book or all three books....just be sure I can contact you either by leaving an email address or via a public profile/blog.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Our Japanese Lapbook

We had so much more we wanted to do with THIS lapbook....but Mike reminds me that we'll have 3 years to research and explore Japan. It's time to close out school for the year and prepare for packers on the 11th of May. Here is what we've accomplished.

I used some minibooks from the Country Lapbook and Geography Lapbook from HomeschoolShare.com. Thanks Lisa B for pointing me to the right spot for appropriate core booklets. The rest of the books are ones we created.

I created the cover from various photos we found on Photobucket and the Internet. It was created with Shutterfly Studio.

All of the above books except the climate booklet are from Homeschool Share.com We folded over a chart that showed the average Misawa temps in 2008 and stuck the climate graphic on the front for the other book.

The left page talks about education and government. The book log is something we found with our Knight Lapbook. The right page has booklets on industry, time zones, the Shinkansen and religion. We created the Shincansen and time zone book.

The Shinkansen book is an accordion folds - the kids dictated facts to go inside. The time zone chart is one that was in the base's briefing book....we highlighted OR and TX time.

This page won't flip. ::snort:: The top little booklet we created and it compares daily calories in various countries. The booklet with colorful fruit on it (probably not from Japan ::snort::) compares the amounts of various foods eaten in various countries. The recipe pocket has some food facts and only one recipe. I need to find more.

The booklet with the chopsticks on it is one we created. We filled it with Chopstick trivia and etiquette that we found. The center booklet is a sheet from the Internet on how to correctly use chopsticks. We folded it into a tri-fold and glued clip art on it.



This page features counting to 10 in Japanese...and Arielle created one for the Days of the Week as well. The Fun Facts and WOW mini-books are filled with random facts that interested us and are from homeschoolshare.com

The alphabet book contains a chart from a book that Stephanie loaned us...shows the basic alphabet and kana. The blue language book has folded lists of helpful phrases from the base briefing. The red pocket has laminated photos of things we found in the Misawa area that we are looking forward to seeing.

This last two pages are bulky. The left is a puzzle that Lois and kids gave us from highlight - when you put it together it shows a map of Japan and has facts too. The right side has a pocket for "animals" and "places to go"...both are filled with photos we printed and laminated.

We weren't able to study everything that interested us, but this is enough to whet our appetites.

You can see more of our lapbooks at Our Lapbooks Page.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

Recap

Mike stayed at the base to work.

The boys went out with friends to see X men.

The younger set played Play Station.

I worked on photos all afternoon. I got 58 pages done...and I'm thoroughly saturated in memories. ::snort:: It's a good thing I'd written lots of details down as we've done things of which I have no memories. It will be good to have albums to thumb through. I should have switched to naked albums years ago. ::snort::

Roxanne, I discovered that I also LIKE the natural pages much better than the white....of course by the time I use up the albums and pages I HAVE I should be at the spot where we switched to digital....but now I know. ::snort::

One fun thing I've thought of as I transferred photos is that I can now go back, find dates and create some uniqued US holidays.....for instance August 10, 1988 is the day Mike shaved his beard...that seems like a good event to celebrate annually. I ws thinking we should celebrate Josiah's prenatal healing (we were told he'd have no brain stem and his intestines would be on the outside - all was fine)....then I realized we do celebrate that every 9 Feb. ::snort::

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Oh NO!!!

I innocently decided to go through our Nikon film camera bag. I REMEMBER having a flash that might work on the hot shoe of the Nikon. No flash...WHERE did it go...I can picture using it, adjusting the angle of the flash etc....

I DID FIND NINE ROLLS OF UNDEVELOPED FILM!!!!! NINE!!!!

I really SHOULD have organized a "help De'Etta with Photos" party..... Of course it would go much faster if I didn't stop and cry every 20 - 30 minutes.

I'm currently scrapping Bre's 3rd birthday, Krista's first (6 days apart) and I was pregnant with Josiah....and I am remembering to cherish the memories ..... not cling. I wish I had time to stop and scan photos in of the younger years...they were dolls.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

I WON!

Laura at Heavenly Homemakers held a giveaway last week. I WON!!!! The prize is an ebook package. I'm very excited. The prize won't even add to our weight. ::snort::

Which reminds me that I have a Mother's Day Giveaway coming up this week. I'll post the reviews tomorrow and try to pick a winner Tuesday....maybe the winners will receive their books by Sunday? Not likely, but I'm not supposed to review until tomorrow. I'll be giving away all copies because I'm in downsizing mode. I have several book giveaways coming up before we move....I'm going to enlist Jamin to review one.

I am TORN. I realize this is our last week with Jamin under our roof....well he may be under the trailer roof with us....but I want to bake his favorite bread, make his favorite meals and yet I sense, with less than a week to move out to the trailer, we'll be eating junk. I want to bake, cook, nest....and I'm going to have to sort, trash, scrap, pack.

Back to either photos or garage boxes....

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Saturday's Fun

We spent the day on moving projects! We were productive. We may YET figure out what to do to prepare for the packers.

Mike and Zander sealed the fence





Jared slaved diligently over Apologia Science. He has one more test and our school year is officially over....and I can work on portfolios.

I attended a PWOC tea. Bobbie Jo had this great sign in her hallway....photos of my hallway to follow. Each dog tag has the name of an assignment engraved on it. I have a home is where you hang your heart and we've put ALL our moves on it...and I love it...but it's getting very long. THIS one would be able to easily hold up to 14 assignments...and we may only have one more after Misawa....so really this one would be our "military moves".....

I also got 42 pages done in a photo album...I'm now at 1988....I figure I have about 9 years left to process. I began scrapping at 1995 - 2002.

I caught photos of our squirrel at the pond.

It doesn't sound like we got a lot done, but we were all exhausted.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Behold His Face

"For the LORD is righteous, He loves righteousness; The upright will behold His face".
Psalm 11:7 (New American Standard Bible - Observation)

{Care for a sneak peak into my Life Journal? Devotional thoughts and word studies as I read - my tryst thoughts and NOT in depth, inductive study.}

Words I Love (Interpretation):

Righteous - #6662 - just in conduct and character

Righteousness - #6666 - truthfulness, righteous acts

Upright - #3477 - straight, level, pleasing, correct, appropriate

I wrote about "Behold" #2372 and "Face" #6440 here while discussing another "Behold God's Face" verse. Quick refresher - behold = to see and perceive by experience and face = presence, person.

Life Lessons (Application):

My personal memorial stone this year is intimacy. Earlier I shared these words, "I sense that I'm moving from the place of surrender (taking it with me somehow) into a place of new intimacy". As I look back at those words from this vantage point a few stand out to me, MOVING (::snort::) I have lots of thoughts on that and how it applies to our spiritual walk, SURRENDER (always) and INTIMACY. The concept of intimacy has been surrounding me.

Being face to face with someone is surely considered intimate. Here I'm told that if, through the grace of God, my conduct, character, personality are truthful, appropriate, just - RIGHTEOUS - I WILL see, gaze, perceive and know God's presence by experience. God loves righteousness and the righteous.

This is not about ginning up some sort of approved conduct in my own strength. Righteousness is a part of the armour of God (Eph 6:14). Righteousness protects me. Righteousness is mine as I clothe myself with Christ and all that He provides. My part is to see that I AM clothed in the full armor which God has provided. I must make sure that I AM walking in relationship with Jesus.

My righteousness is not a result of what I do - but then neither is it something that I'm to passively wait to HAPPEN to me. Paul instructs Timothy (and by extension me) to pursue righteousness. (2 Tim 2:22).

Righteousness yields peaceful fruit (Heb 12:11) and sometimes I will be called to suffer for the sake of righteousness (I Peter 3:14, 15).

Too often I'm guilty of claiming the promise and not exploring the condition of the promise. The condition in this verse is that my conduct be upright. Too often I pursue "stuff" (good stuff even - well-mannered children, well-educated children, Bible studies) other than righteousness and intimacy with God....but I'm learning.

BTW I'm fully aware of the balance needed between being MADE righteous and PURSUING righteousness. At various times in my life, I've seen myself swing....sometimes to a huge focus on grace alone, sometimes to a focus on purusing righteousness and holiness....don't you think there is a balance/ a mid way point? My goal is to avoid swings of the pendulum (which I believe are both truth) and live in the balance. An intersting discussion would be the various aspects of our faith walk that are lived in this balance....faith/works.....soverignty/free will....grace/justice...giving/saving (stewardship thing)....

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...