Mentor Notebooks and Leadership Education

live.
This week I hope to 'live' outside! Heading to a park this morning with some of my homeschooling peeps. And, if the weather holds out, I'm hoping to check out some nature parks with the kids for outdoor sketching. 

The meal planning service I subscribed to last week is quite fun! You choose your menus and recipes and then printout a grocery list. They offer a new menu every Thursday, but the archives of past menus are there too. Lots of room for customization too. I'm sure there are many such services and apps, but here's a sample of what we ate last week:

• grilled vegetable wraps with rice pilaf (delish!)
• baked ziti with chicken sausage (ok)
• baked potato soup with BLTs (yummy!)

Tonight we're having Baja Marinated Chicken on the grill, together with Black Bean & Rice Salad. See - I would never think of that on my own!

faith.

BIG feast day coming up this week, well actually two feast days. The first is on Wednesday - we celebrate St. Joseph the Worker. Then on Friday, the Apostles Saint Philip and Saint James. I was thinking of doing a  monthly fast on the First Friday of the month, but looks like this month isn't the best one to start. 

homeschool.

This is the heart of my post today. I want to introduce to you one of the tools I learned about at the DeMille Seminar on Leadership Education last weekend - one that I am CERTAIN will have a huge impact on our family. Maybe yours, too.

It's the "Mentor Notebook." 

Very high tech, isn't it. A notebook and pen.

You are a mentor to your children, whether you are homeschooling or not. You may be a mentor to others as well. Maybe you're a teacher or a youth minister or a grandparent. Either way, as a mentor its valuable to spend some time thinking about how YOU can do your job better.

Here is what you do.

You have a meeting every week with your notebook and pencil. That's right, just you, your notebook and a pencil.

You write each child's name on a page of his/her own, from babes-in-arms to your oldest, everyone gets a page. Include a page for your spouse and yourself as well. You can be as comprehensive as to include anyone you are in a close relationship with - grandparents, grandkids, Godchildren, close friends, whatever. But that can be a bit overwhelming, so start with your children and spouse first.  Everyone gets a page.

 My name is in the next section. Mamas always seem to put themselves last!

The next step:

For each person in your notebook, you sit and brainstorm ways and ideas of what each person needs this week. What can YOU do to SERVE him/her? What does he/she need in order to better excel this week? What would INSPIRE that person this week?

You brainstorm and write down as many things as you can think of - some of these may be bad ideas! Or just unworkable! That's OK! But in all likelihood, there will be one or two things that you can deliver on this week to help your child succeed. You need not fill in an entire page either. Next week, when you repeat this process on a fresh page for that child, you can look at the previous week and check off what you delivered on. Or you can throw that old piece of paper away too, if you like ... but the idea is still the same.

Brainstorm, plan and deliver.

Sunday night at my kitchen table. The bigs are out with Dad, the littles are in bed ... ahhhh. Wait a minute, where's the wine? 

This is not something you share with the people on the list - you don't want to create an expectation at this point. Later, maybe for the older scholar-phase kids, you can have them go through the same process then compare. But not now.

This IS something you do weekly and consistently. You and your spouse can each do this exercise separately for your children, then compare lists. That's a wonderful idea because women and men have different perspectives that can truly benefit your children.

Your ideas need not be confined to academics either. Maybe you have an intuition that your child just needs lots of hugs this week or special attention. Do that. Or maybe you sensed a spark of interest in something your child read about and you want to find an experiment or book to light that fire. Perhaps your toddler is having problems with sharing and you want to find a storybook on that topic for said toddler. The Mentor Notebook applies to everyone in the family.

You know your children better than anyone else; you are the expert! So often during the course of a week I will have a specific thought about what my child might really enjoy or something I need to find for that child, but I don't write it down or the thought fizzles among the million things there are to do in a day. I think the Mentor Notebook will help make my reflections more consistent and produce results.

We are having a Mentor Notebook Challenge on the TJEd Forum (TJEd Muse) I belong to, and please let me extend that challenge to you, too! The challenge is to create a Mentor Notebook and then try to set aside time weekly (I like Sundays) to do it. If it seems too overwhelming to do for all of your children at once, then spread it out over a week or more. One mom has already mentioned that she does a daily reflection on the needs of her children after spending about 10 minutes reading her Core Book (for me that would be the Bible). That is a great idea too.

We will be reporting back to each other on the forum every Sunday for a while, to share experience and insights. Kind of like an experiment. You should try this too. Let me know what you think!

[sew].

I'm not sure what or even if I will sew this week! I would like to get to some leggings for the girls but ... things are a bit crazy already ... we'll have to see how it all shakes out.

Have a wonderful week and God bless all your mentoring endeavours!!

live.faith.homeschool.[sew].

live.
Got home in the middle of the night Saturday after a long road trip from Salt Lake City. Right now, I'm up to my eyeballs in unpacking and reorganizing. The house was clean when we left, but in the blink of an eye, well you get the idea. I'm glad to be home but I will miss the hot weather. Really miss it. I'm ready to get back into a new rhythm though, and make some clean starts. Signed up for an online meal-planning service so that should be interesting. I'm pretty good about getting meals on the table and planning things out, but I just need an injection of fresh energy in this area. So much of same old same old, ya know? I'll let you know how it goes. 

faith.
After finishing Uncle Tom's Cabin this weekend, I feel like my faith has received a boost. Inspiration. Because Uncle Tom? That's how I want to be. His faith was simple and sincere. So sincere. He was so humble. I'm not. He was so trusting in the mercy of God and so willing to die for the sake of a soul. I don't find that easy. He accepted and embraced his cross. He didn't fear it at all. That's what I want. No fear.

homeschool.
Oh my oh my oh my. I received such a volume of inspiration poured into my homeschool bucket. But it was bittersweet. I'm sure I'll laugh about this eventually. Well, you all know I was going to hear Oliver DeMille this weekend and the 9th key. We were on our way home from Phoenix. Tom and I had an agreement that I would attend the formal part of the seminar which was 9:30-12:30pm, but then we had to get on the road. We also wanted to avoid projected bad weather over the mountains. I was ok with that. He was scheduled to reveal the 9th key at 11:30am and talk about it for an hour.

I shivered slightly when, at the very beginning of the seminar, his wife Rachel welcomed us and said we probably wouldn't be following the agenda exactly. That her husband was 'on fire' this week and if he got on a good tangent he was going with it. Okay ....

Oliver began by asking us why we came to the seminar. Why are you here today? Lots of people gave an answer.  

I said, "The 9th Key!" He joked with me and said he could just tell me it and I could go home. Ha ha ha. You get where I'm going with this, right?

Well, Oliver talked. He talked and inspired us and gave us new energy and excitement for our vocation! He was on fire, and I have a couple hours worth of notes I can't wait to share with my friends!! He is a phenomenal speaker. I mean that! He knows his stuff, he's passionate about it, he's funny, he's engaging.

But the clock ticked on and no 9th key. I texted Tom telling him to take his time coming to pick me up. I bargained for a few extra minutes and got 15. 

Sad news. I had to leave before he made the big reveal. Yep, that's right, I still don't know the 9th key. 

It was a quiet trip home, mostly.

That dang 9th key.

[sew].
Yay, its Kids Clothes Week Sewing Challenge! The challenge is to commit to sewing kids clothes one hour a day, for a week. I'm in! Up later today/tonight will be a knit bubble skirt, I think, for Katie. Or maybe a summer top. One of the two I think. I'm trying to be purposeful and sew what they will need and wear for the upcoming season. Anyone joining me? 

All for now dear friends. God bless your week!

live.faith.homeschool.[sew].

live

We are still under the guise of Arizona living, for a few more days yet. Vacation-ish but with a smidge of school thrown in. Only a smidge. And into our 4th week, I whole-heartedly believe that my young adults are like different people when they have daily purpose beyond eating Yogurtini. Even though Yogurtini totally rocks. The days they put in a good day of learning are the best days. I need to rethink this for next year. How long to stay here? Bring more schoolwork for the bigs? Its harder when the space is not your own space. Buy a house in Phoenix?

faith
Still basking in the glory of Easter. That means no fasting and lots of feasting.

homeschool
I will be returning to Canada with lots of books (what a surprise)! And the biggest most exciting thing on the homeschooling front is that on our way back to Canada I will be attending Oliver DeMille's seminar where he will ... wait for it ... reveal the ninth key to great teaching. Egads!


[sew]

Grabbed some little treasures at the fabric store on Friday. The top two and the bottom two go together and I have a few ideas for them. I love the gray with green dots. I'm planning to participate in Kids Clothes Week in late April. THAT will require a little planning in itself. But, why not? Kids Clothes Week is a blogger-driven challenge to sew one hour daily for a week, and I think it will be a blast. I've already been busy sketching some plans. What does a child actually need for a seasonal wardrobe? I've been pondering this lately because we have too much, and with three little girls in one room you need a system. However, armed with a plan, one could keep things under control, you think? Somewhat?