Three Reasons Why International Missions Are Important

This update shares why international missions are important to our homeschool.

INTERNATIONAL MISSIONS

Thank you for your donations to our fundraising campaign for our missions trip to South Africa’s Teboho Trust school for at risk kids in Soweto.

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 We are so glad that Justine has been making some delicious fudge and wanted to bless you with some as a thank you gift, too. Our October 2014 donors will receive some fudge from Justine’s fresh batch soon.

CURRENT STATUS OF FUNDRAISER

Our current status in our fundraising campaign is that we are starting over. We decided that we would not give up on our missions trip goal, but that we would change our approach.

If you would like to keep up with our progress and give to our cause, please click or copy and paste this link:

http://gofundme.com/safricamissions

3 REASONS WHY

Having this opportunity to volunteer on a global scale is important for our young learners because:

• 1st – We believe in the mission of Teboho Trust, after reading about the founder and watching the video (click here to see video). Their goal is to be a safe place where their learners can focus on their studies, instead of all the surrounding drama, and successfully matriculate and move on to higher education.
• 2nd – We know that traveling, especially internationally, combined with volunteering, expands a student’s perspective of life and of the world, helping them to become more compassionate global citizens. This is because our mom, Donna, was an international volunteer in her youth, which shaped how she lives and educates her own children now.
• 3rd – Most importantly, we believe that Father God has a destiny in this for all of our young learners. There are some experiences that He has waiting for them in South Africa which will connect them with His destiny for their lives.

We would love to share with you as we take this journey. We will provide more updates through our fundraising campaign page on the gofundme platform.

QUESTIONS FOR YOU

Have you included volunteering and/or international travel as part of your homeschool? If so, what impact has it had on your learners?

Thank you for reading!

~Donna, The Mommy of #ButterflyHomeschool

Disappointed and Excited With Starting Homeschool

I have to be honest and say that I am disappointed in our #ButterflyHomeschool blog on one hand, and totally excited about starting homeschool on the other. Read on to learn why, and to see a tip to help you help your children more.

So, we didn’t achieve our monthly goal of posting here on the Butterfly Homeschool blog in August. I admit that August was totally a blur. I barely remember last month from the first day until the last because it went by so very fast.

WHY EXCITED ABOUT STARTING HOMESCHOOL

Part of why August went so fast is because I was writing, for someone else’s blog (and for my book, but I digress). That is what I am totally excited about. I have been making a shift in how I do business, with more of a focus on providing trainings and on writing than ever before. I also have shifted how I flow business part-time while homeschooling more intensely during the Fall, Winter and Spring seasons.

So, starting homeschool by writing to help others has gotten me pretty excited. I also know that my writing and the other team member’s writing on the blog I contribute to will help you. This great blog will especially help you get excited if you are new to homeschooling, or have been struggling to get\ re-started this year.

HOW TO HELP YOUR CHILDREN MORE

I have been writing more than I’ve written all year long. And, yes, again, I am excited. My flood gates finally opened up more after choosing to open my heart more and let God work on me more.

Frequently and regularly, when you teach and write for other people’s benefit, you also need to take time out to refill your own tank. My prayer for you is that, as you start this Fall season of schooling, that you’ll do that for yourself. Your children will benefit so much more from you with your tank overflowing than from you just barely squeezing out drops for them.

QUESTION FOR YOU: How do you keep your tank full? When do you set aside time for your own learning and growth?

ABOUT BEING EXCITED AGAIN

So, the other blog that I am writing for is very encouraging for moms who school their children at home, no matter how you choose to do it. I posted a page here on this blog about it. You’ll see the page listed above in the menu bar.

The page is called “Encouragement“. Please have a look there to see a preview. My first article will post in mid-September. The topic for my first series of articles is one that is familiar to me. It may help you avoid an unhealthy big mistake that homeschool families sometimes make. It is a mistake we have made and started overcoming after we understood it better. I will share our lessons and our journey to help you avoid or correct it.

The blog that I am contributing to can be a great source to help you with keeping your tank full, too. I pray that you will check it out and be very blessed by it.

YOUR ANSWER?

So, if you are going to share your answer to my question about keeping your tank full, please use the comments area below to share. When you do, this helps others who are reading to join the discussion with us all in the future.

Thank you for reading. 🙂

~Donna Marie

P.S. If you find this helpful, please use the social sharing buttons and tools on this page to pass on the link to your friends and family.

[FAITH FRIDAY] Our Story of How We Know Everything Is Awesome

The #ButterflyHomeschool Family Shares Their Story About Learning and Life Challenges And What It Takes To To Succeed. We really believe that #EverythingISAwesome – read on to learn why we say that.

Charity and I, Mom Donna, had an interesting conversation this week. It went something like this (see image below):

If we are not yet connected on Facebook, click here or go to: Facebook.com/AuthorDonnaMJ

Now, honestly, that morning I was a little disappointed that she wasn’t as optimistic as I was. At that moment in time, I was super excited for the older kids, who had the blessed opportunity to go off on a new adventure to a business-work immersion event at the World Congress Center in Atlanta because of their membership in One Talent. (We shared about OT in a previous post. Click here to learn more about it.)

So, after reflecting on what she said to me that morning, I decided to ask her again later in the day after the big kids had returned. At first she said, no, but then I framed it in a different way and asked:

“Right now in this moment is everything awesome?”.

Then she said:

“Yes.”

And this mom was so happy that the Holy Spirit turned around the heart of my little optimist-in-training. Praise God!

In #ButterflyHomeschool, one of the main things we learn every day is that attitude impacts every part of our lives, even though it is intangible… and because it is intangible. Attitude is a spiritual force that is ‘tangible’ as long as you are breathing and have a soul. Attitude is most easily seen physically manifested in a person’s face and body posture, heard in their voice and manifested in their choices. We set the atmosphere of our day and of our entire life by how we choose to carry our attitudes.

USE YOUR WORDS TO CHANGE YOUR WORLD

So, will you say our confession with us, no matter how you are feeling right now, and see your life and world change?

FATHER GOD

IS OUR EVERYTHING:

WHENEVER & WHATEVER

WE NEED HIM TO BE

THEN HE IS THAT

SO WE DECLARE OUT LOUD THAT

RIGHT NOW IN THIS MOMENT:

EVERYTHING

IS #AWESOME

NO MATTER WHAT IS GOING ON

IN FRONT OF OUR EYES OR EARS.

More of Charity’s Story

If you know us or have been following our blog for any time, you may know Charity’s story, however, for those of you who don’t, we’ll share more below so that you can see why this story about attitude is so very important for her.

Charity began life as a 35.5 week preemie. Evenso, she has always been very healthy with few residual issues after she came home from the NICU. Currently, she is 8 and in 2nd grade, but she looks 10 or 11, and most people are shocked when they realize that she’s tall for her age.

Charity’s Challenging Learning Journey

Charity began kindergarten with a reading challenge that had us both in tears and very discouraged. To make it worse, the public charter virtual school teacher (who was a great teacher and as helpful as she could be) informed us that our state doesn’t test for reading challenges. So, because there is no testing, there is no support. The teacher helped me understand what was going on by providing me with resources and encouraging us. However, there wasn’t anything else she could do or that the system would do. So, we returned to traditional homeschooling, and by first grade, she was a fluent reader.

We shared about Charity’s reading journey in a previous article, too. When we shared, we talked about how her attitude was critical in her learning process (and so was mine). Well, as you can see from what I shared above, this is super duper duper important!

For a child that learns differently,

parents need to be even that more diligent about

managing attitudes and atmosphere surrounding learning,

at home or at school or wherever you choose to learn.

Now, Charity still has more work to do, and so do I, to ensure that she’s able to learn in ways that fit her learning style. Now our focus has shifted to writing. And I expect that, as we enter a new school season, setting our atmosphere now during this summer will be critical as we transition into the Fall learning season. And, everything is going to be #Awesome because Father God is Awesome, and He’s got this. He’s handling all of the details and helping us in our successful learning journey.

~Donna Marie 🙂

 P.S. PLEASE SUPPORT CHARITY’S FIRST TIME PERFORMING ON STAGE

This little cutie will be singing and dancing with all the kids of One Talent on July 26th. Please buy a ticket. And even if you are not in Atlanta, please buy #TheBelieveMovement t-shirts for your whole family.

Preview of #BelieveInYourself Step Dance practice