God’s Heart for Adoption I first thought about adoption around 1999 when I was reading an article about orphanages in China filled with baby girls. At the time, John and I had three young kids ages 10, 7, and 5. Around that time I had also just gotten my first book contract. I talked to… [Continue Reading]
adoption
Sometimes Love Grows {Adoption Hope}
Sometimes Love Grows In my 25 years as a mom there have been many homecomings as I brought my children home for the first times. When Cory was born, I was a 17-year-old single mom, and we returned to my parents’ house. With Leslie and Nathan, John and I lived in low-income housing while he… [Continue Reading]
Ignite Your Child’s Mind with Hands-On History Kits
Sonlight’s Hands-On History Kits are here and we are so excited! We brought our kids home to homeschool after adoption. Because the older girls had been in public school all their lives they had an idea of what school looked like—lots of lessons and worksheets and counting down the hours until they can play. When… [Continue Reading]
Homeschool Curriculum Unboxing~Sonlight 2019
One of my favorite times of the year is when my new homeschool curriculum arrives. The last couple of years I’ve used Sonlight to homeschool all my children together. It works great!! I’m doing the same thing this year, too. My children are Level D (ages 8-11) and Level 100 (ages 12-16) in the Sonlight… [Continue Reading]
Giving Your Children a Heart for the World {Guestpost}
Our Life I felt like the worst homeschooling mom ever. While other parents were taking their kids on nature walks and art classes, I was dragging my three children along with me to the pregnancy resource center that I just helped to start. Cory, Leslie and Nathan—all in elementary school—helped me to fold baby clothes… [Continue Reading]
How to Balance a Busy Writing Schedule and a Busy Life
I’m a wife, homeschooling mom to ten kids (yes 10!) and best-selling author. I’ve had 60+ books published, and I lead a Teen Mom support group in inner-city Little Rock. The number one thing I’m asked by others is, “How do you do it all?” If you were to see the piles on my… [Continue Reading]
Spring is a Celebration!
They say ‘April showers bring May flowers.’ But when you’re an author (and a homeschooling mom!) it also brings a busy conference season! However, when May comes around the first thing I think about is my WWII friends. Because my first novel From Dust To Ashes was inspired by the liberation of Mauthausen Concentration Camp… [Continue Reading]
Sleep as a Benefit of Homeschooling
I’d been a homeschooling mom for twenty years when I was forced to have kids in the public school system. I say “forced” because we had kids in foster care and DHS would not let me homeschool them. So for the first time ever I filled out paperwork and had to figure out the schedules… [Continue Reading]
How to stop your child’s angry cycle
The flash of anger in my tween daughter’s eyes surprised me. We’d been camping, and Maddie’s 6-year-old sister, Aly, had just burned her finger on hot ash. As I treat the wound, Maddie strode up. “I hurt myself, too,” she said, with attitude. “Last night when we were making S’mores.” “Hold on,” I said. As… [Continue Reading]
10 Ways to Make Your Home a Place of Healing For Kids From Foster Care
John and I opened our home to foster care and adoption with a lot of hope and little knowledge of what the reality would look like. As a mom trying to help these kids heal, I learned a lot about children, trauma, myself, our mutual needs, and healing. Out of everything I’ve learned, the… [Continue Reading]
When God Called Us to Adopt Teens
I clearly remember the moment I knew God was calling John and I to adopt a sibling group of older girls. God didn’t speak as through a megaphone. Instead, it was one small conversation—and more small thoughts—that built into an idea that I knew was from God. The thoughts first started as I mentored teen… [Continue Reading]