Christian Heritage Home Educators of Washington 2009

WOW! What a blessing this weekend has been. We had the privelage of being a a vendor at the annual conference for Christian Heritage Home Educators in Redmond Washington. The facilities at Overlake Christian Church were amazing to begin with and the hospitality shown to the vendors and their families was incredible, not to mention the pure honest Christian Values displayed by the staff and attendees was inspirational.

Since I was working at the In the Hands of a Child booth, I did not get
chance to hear many of the speakers, however I did get to chance to hear Dr. Voddie Baucham Jr. speak what an amazing and inspirational message.
Friday evening, he spoke poinently about the blessing we as parents are to our children and how our children are a blessing to us. He also talked about the role we as parents have in teaching our children.
During the conference on Friday I was able to hear Dr. Baucham's talks only briefly, but he did make a very strong statement that made me realize I am doing right by my children by homeschooling them. Many Christian schools boast their staff is certified; "certified by whom?" was the question Dr Baucham poised. If you want to maintained your value systems influence on your children why send them to schools that require certification from a flawed world view system?

We also had the privilege of listening to a selection of music performed by very talented homeschoolers; from voice to a string quartet and even a bagpiper (which Cameron was ecstatic about). I am happy to report that both boys showed Mike and I that they are capable of sitting still and showing due respect to performers as well as speakers during a long session.

As a newer vendor to the homeschool conference circuit I did learn some things about presentation and sales techniques. I found homeschool parents are interested in new ideas but cautious to purchase a new method. I also found that fathers where as interested in the idea of lapbooking and unit studies but wanted to really dig into the meat of the idea. I handed out flyers and business cards to probably 25 people in the last rush hour of the conference, my hope being that with the business card and flyer they will take a look at the website

I did get one photo of the booth this time. I uploaded to my facebook page.. I have some ideas for arrangement/setup for this next weekend that I will be trying out.

If you happened to stop by the booth at CHHEW, let me know by leaving a comment.
I hope to have a giveaway on my blog later next month so stop by often.

Titanic Unit:

We have been preparing for our Hands of a Child Co-op Unit The Unsinkable Titanic by reading various books about Titanic and watching documentaries.
Currently we are reading "Tonight on the Titanic" Magic Tree House #17 by Mary Pope Osbourne. This is a wonderful book series featuring 2 children and their adventures in the Magic Tree House.. We will be adding these to our library of books. If you haven't checked these books out, head of to RandomHouse.com/treehouse and find the extra activities that go along with the books including a passport for the kids to collect "stickers" for reading the books and responding to the questions.

Back to Titanic; Cameron is fascinated with the ship and her story, so I have let him watch both National Geographic documentaries about the ship and the work to find and preserve her final resting place. I remember as a child being fascinated with the ship's story as well so this is a great time for the two of us to share our passion about something.

Upcoming Events

I know I need to post pictures and I have tons to post, but I wanted to post some information on upcoming events.

This weekend I will be in Redmond, Washington at the Christian Heritage Home Education of Washington Conference with In the Hands of a Child with convention only pricing and some awesome weekend only specials...
If you are attending the conference stop by and say hi...

Next weekend I will be at CAPE in Yakima, Washington.



again with convention only pricing and a different set of specials.

If you aren't sure about lapbooking and want to see what all the buzz is about I have several examples of projects we have completed. You can also check out In the Hands of a Child online before the conferences and then order at the conference for special pricing...

I will try and post during the weekends this time around...

Lapbook Central and convention ready

We have been working on lapbooks for the past 3 weeks.
First we completed St Patrick's Lapbook from Hands of a Child followed by a field trip to Mt Angel Abbey, where Mommy forgot to bring the camera.
Now we are working on V is for Volcanoes, another Hands of a Child lapbook, where Cameron is anxiously awaiting science day and creating his own Volcano.. (we will have to wait for a dry day...)

We are also preparing for our drive to Spokane for the Inland NW Homeschool Conference. If you are in the area, stop by and say hi. You can sign up for a free copy of The Old Schoolhouse magazine as well as get 20% off all convention purchases with free shipping and no sales tax.
I will have examples of some of the wonderful products from Hands of a Child as well as sample lapbooks and a new catalog on CD with bonus goodies. Bring along your plans for the rest of this year and the next school year, we can work a lapbook or 2 into the plan.

Upcoming Homeschool Conventions.

I am so excited, I will be representing Hands of a Child at upcoming homeschool conventions.
First March 27 and 28th in Spokane, Washington
Valley Assembly of God Church
16518 E Broadway
Spokane Valley, WA 99037
Friday, March 27, 5:00 pm – 9:00 pm
Saturday March 28 8:00 am – 5:00 pm

Stop by for convention only specials.

Second June 12 and 13th in Portland, Oregon
OCEANetwork 2009 Conferance
Oregon Convention Center

I am hoping to get a couple of more on the schedule and will post more details as they come in.

Highlights of Homeschooling offers unit studies for a small budget.

The Highlights of Homeschooling offers great E book unit
studies for less than $5. They have animal units, History
units, Literature units and more.
See them at www.hshighlights.com
Kidzwonder is an online magazine for kids ages 4-12.
The first sample issue is FREE and offers 100 pages
including a unit study.
See it at www.kidzwonder.com
Whatever Lovely is a new online magazine for
ladies who want to read pleasant things.
You can see a Free issue at
www.hshighlights.com
under the magazine section

Scripture Challenge 2009

I started participating in this challenge last year but lost track of it and got behind. This year I decided to go back and pic up where I left off.
I am using a Creative Memories 7x7 album and a variety of supplies.
Most of the layouts are CASE'd from various places.

So far I have done 11 layouts for the challenge. I am only going to post a few of them today.



"In thee, O Lord, do I put my trust" Psalm 71:1 and in the upper right corner
"Trust in the Lord with all your heart: Proverbs

"You will keep Him in perfect Peace. Whose mind is stayed on You...." Isaiah 26:3

"Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do note see" Hebrews 11:1