..from a trip to Wales.  We left Monday and came back late Friday.  Yesterday we did a little unpacking and recuperating!  The holiday camp we went to was booked by a bunch of us homeschooling families for the week.  The children can roam around and play tennis, golf or miniature golf, several indoors games, ride on their scooters, play on two playgrounds, etc.  The adults watch their little children if they have them and talk to other adults or interact with older children.  We really enjoy the time there and meeting up with other families.

I'll put some photos up on my other blog page when I get my photos sorted.  Yesterday DH was on the computer a lot looking at rocket stuff.   Every time we go to the "resort" (I don't know what to call it really - Cefn Lea is a Christian conference center and vacation resort place) there has been a man there who does rocketry with his sons, and has set off the rockets with an appreciative audience looking on.  This time he brought along several rocket kits one could buy and put together.  My dh got two and built our ds2's rocket for him, and Ds1 did his himself.  This took a few sessions of a couple of hours each and finally on Thursday evening they were able to launch the rockets.  Now DH is interested in getting the stuff necessary to launch the rockets (special stand thing and extra engines, etc etc) so I hardly got on the computer yesterday!  Last night we walked over to a field that belongs to the town, for playing on, and saw that it was big enough to do rockets on if the council allows it.  I think I'll need to phone and find out.


About my talk that I did for the youth group last Sunday.  I felt it went fairly well, though, it was difficult for me to know whether the kids were real interested or not.  I talked and used a MS PowerPoint presentation to add visual interest.  I began with two photos/drawings that showed pictures of a housewife drudge type woman, then two ladies dresssed up in fancy hats having tea - and asked if either of those were how they viewed a stay-at-home woman, and said when I was young those were the images people presented to me of what a SAHM was.  I talked about how my family expectations did not seem to include being a SAHM (although later I found out that one parent thought it was fine) and how I was raised in an age of definite feminism and careerism.

I then presented three Scriptures, on the Power Point Slides: Psalm 127, Psalm 128, and Titus 2:4, 5. I didn't comment much on those Scriptures but said that at some point when I was single I started to get a vision, through Scripture that I hadn't really noticed before, of what God meant for family life.  I did point out about how if we did not follow the 8 items wives were to do, that we were dishonoring the word of God.  I do feel I stumbled a bit here a bit as I was trying to both put forward the seriousness of obeying all of this passage, yet remain tactful.
I then used three aspects of the Titus 2 passage to outline what I did as a SAHM.  I put up a slide blank except for  the phrase from Titus that I wanted to talk about.  The first was about "loving their husbands" and having received David's help in figuring out what to say for this part, talked about doing small things for him, like cups of tea, making meals, and being glad to see him when he came home, and making sure we had time together to communicate.  Early in our marriage we realized the danger of being a couple with "him gone Monday Wednesday and Friday and her gone Tuesday Thursday and Saturday evenings" - i.e. of allowing ourselves to drift apart because of spending too much time apart doing separate things.   I used various photos to illustrate the concepts

Then I talked about "loving their children" and started off with a photo of a cyber-friend's new baby, with a ribbon round her and a tag saying "Love, God".  I mentioned that what I was about to say might be a little controversial but since the main youth leader (one of the elders) said it was OK to introduce a little controversy, that I'd go ahead - and spoke about how we received  children as unconditional blessings.  I mentioned how it affected our lives and how it was a walk of faith.  Then I talked about homeschooling since that is a major part of our day.  I had a few photos for this section too.

Then I spoke about "being workers at home."  I had some slides that I hope were both humorous and informative about all the resources and tools we have at our disposal nowadays to help us.  I confessed that I am not a perfect housekeeper but I try to do a decent job on those tasks that are important.

I talked about opportunities I had to influence my world for Christ - by talking on a radio show one day, and contacting a state governor over a serious issue (didn't mention Terri Schiavo but that was the issue) and said although I am at home mostly I still am able to reach out to others in various ways.  I mentioned about the joy I had, and how I appreciated the freedom to organize my day instead of having to do what a boss wanted and how I was glad to not have the conflicts many women do when they work of being subject to both a boss and their husbands.