Our Own Kind of March Madness

I can't believe I haven't posted here in a whole month! I didn't plan to be absent so long. I've just been chained to my Kitchen Aid, baking cupcakes all month!!!!

hahaha

No, really.

Truth be told, the Cupcakes on a Mission fundraiser is going quite well! We have baked well over 1000 cupcakes so far, with 2 weeks to go. My trusty Kitchen Aid mixer and my stove have gotten a good workout. I have found some great recipes, learned some tricks and tips to being a better baker, and thrown a few trays of cupcakes in the trash. Between cupcake money and other donations, Amanda has about 3/4 of the money she needs for her trip to Uganda in August. EXCITING! Thank you so much to everyone who has eaten too much sugar these past few weeks. It is for a good cause!
If you are interested, she is going to Uganda with our friends, the Wrights, and Ten Eighteen.

 Chocolate Chip Cannoli Cupcakes

So what else has been going on during the month of March? ( okay, Feb. too) Let's see.

Lighthouse Family Square Dance

We rented a school gym on a Sunday afternoon and had a great turnout at this event, and a wonderful caller made it fun for everyone, young and old alike! 

NCHEAC Regional & State Basketball Tournaments

In addition to coaching the Lighthouse Middle School Boys team, Mark is Tournament Director for the NCHEAC ( North Carolina Home Educators Athletic Conference) East Regional Basketball Tournament, held at SEBTS in Wake Forest. Things are busy in our household in the week or two leading up to that. Amanda's team advanced to the state tournament, which was the following weekend, but Jason's team finished early.  Amanda was chosen for the Varsity Girls All Conference Team and will play in the All Star Game in Winston-Salem during the Homeschool Conference weekend in May.  Jason was chosen to the All-Tournament team.

Oh, and the Lighthouse Eagles Varsity Girls Basketball Team went undefeated in pre-season, season, and tournament play, winning the NCHEAC championship trophy! 

Lighthouse Basketball Awards Night 

At the end of every sports season, the Lighthouse teams gather for a pot luck meal and awards presentations. Volunteers are recognized. All players receive a certificate and seniors receive special Senior Plaques. Coaches call up each player and give words of praise and encouragement.  And sometimes the players get in a word or two as well. ;-)

HSPN East Coast Homeschool Basketball Tournament at Liberty U.

Our favorite basketball week of the year!  The Liberty Tournament has become a much-anticipated week of fun and competition at the end of each basketball season for our varsity teams, and this year, our 2 JV teams entered for the first time, as well. The tournament features 80 homeschool basketball teams from all over the East - NC, SC, VA, GA, TN, OH, MD, NY.   All the Lighthouse teams did well, but our Varsity Girls really shined, earning top seed in the Championship game out of 20 girls teams, and losing to Charleston's Low Country Wildcats by 6 points in the final game. It was a heartbreaker, but the tears flowed freely afterwards mainly due to the fact that Amanda's entire team was made up of seniors - and now it was over.  Sadness.

 

Jason made it to the finals in the 13 & under 3-point contest, and competed against his friend, Chris.  They had to shoot 10 balls in 30 seconds, from points around the arc. They tied 3 times before Chris beat him by 1 basket. 

Lighthouse Geography Bee

I helped plan a Geography Bee for our homeschool group, and of course made my son participate.  He had fun, despite himself. :-)  We divided the kids by age group, and did Geography Games in addition to the Bee. Younger kids ( K-5th) competed first, while older kids ( 6th-12th) played games. Then they switched.  The whole thing took a LOT longer than we planned, but everyone had fun, and we moms learned a few things that we'll change for next time.

Basketball and Baking

Busy, busy, busy.  We've been baking up a storm around here for Cupcakes on a Mission, our fundraiser for Amanda's summer missions trip to Uganda.  Last week she and I made 14 dozen Chocolate Mint cupcakes, and tonight we are finishing off the 11 dozen Chocolate Peanut Butter cupcakes baked this week.  I should buy a cow for all the butter and cream we are going through!  And eggs, vanilla, sugar, cocoa ....  Our friends have been enjoying their treats, and between the cupcakes and the support checks that have come in, Amanda has raised half the amount she needs!  yay!

 

Rich Chocolate Cupcakes

based on Martha Stewart's Devil's Food recipe

3/4 c. Hershey's Special Dark unsweetened cocoa powder

1 tsp. instant coffee

3/4 c. boiling water

3 c. all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1 cup ( 2 sticks) butter, melted

1/2 c. vegetable oil

2 1/4 c. sugar

4 lg. eggs, room temperature

4 tsp. pure vanilla extract

1 c. sour cream, room temperature

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line 24 muffin cups with paper liners.

2. Whisk together cocoa, coffee, and boiling water until smooth. Set aside.

3. In another bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. 

4. Place melted butter, oil, and sugar in mixing bowl. With electric mixer on medium speed, beat until mixture is cooled, about 5 minutes.  

5. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. 

6. Add vanilla and cocoa mixture, and beat until combined. 

7. With mixer on low speed, add half the flour mixture and mix until combined. Then add half the sour cream, mixing until combined. Scrape down sides of bowl, and repeat with the remaining flour and sour cream. 

8. Divide batter between the 24 lined cups.  Bake, rotating pans halfway through, until a toothpick inserted in center of cupcakes comes out clean - about 20 minutes. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, then remove cupcakes and place on wire racks and cool completely.

Tomorrow we head to Greensboro for the state homeschool basketball tournament - Amanda's final time, since she's a senior.  :-(    Jason's middle school team got knocked out in the regional tourney last weekend, so he gets to be a spectator this weekend. Amanda's varsity girls team is undefeated this season, and is hoping to continue that streak through this weekend and claim the state championship.  Here's hoping!  It still isn't all over, though, until after "Liberty" in mid-March!  "Liberty" is the HSPN East Coast Homeschool Basketball Championships, an open tournament for homeschool teams from all over the eastern US, held at Liberty University in Lynchburg, VA.  

Amanda was chosen to the All-Conference All Star Team!

Jason won an All-Tournament Award for his great play during the tournament

Top 20 Reasons to Homeschool

in no particular order...



1. God is present and acknowledged.

2. If your child claims the dog ate his homework, you can ask the dog.

3. The commute is easy; no traffic! and no chance of missing the bus

4. Fewer back injuries ( students in schools often haul around 20% or more of their body weight in book-laden backpacks)

5. Cleaning out the refrigerator can double as a chemistry lab

6. The teacher can kiss the principle and it is not a scandal

7. You can post the Ten Commandments on the wall and not get sued.

8. The only debate about the school lunch program is whose turn it is to cook.

9. If you get caught talking to yourself, you can call it a parent-teacher conference.

10. No mad dash in the morning to have everyone ready to head out the door while it is still dark!

11. No Child is Left Behind, because the kids can work at their own pace and at their own level

12. You believe in the Creator (gasp!), moral absolutes ( what?) and showing respect to adults ( really?) and you want to teach that to your children.

13. You want to learn about all those things you missed out on when you were in school.

14. No arguments over what to wear to school

15. You can go on vacation in September when tourist spots are much less crowded and less expensive.

16. You become the primary shaping influence in your child's life, rather than his peer group doing the shaping

17. You get to spend every day with the children you love and experience the joy of discovery together

18. Your child does not have to ask permission to go to the bathroom

19. Your children get to participate in real-life activities with you instead of artificial, fabricated Learning Activities

20. You can promote positive "socialization" and leave out the "socialism"

TOG Co-op : Papier Mache Minotaurs

I co-teach the Dialectic class ( middle school age ) in our TOG Co-op this year, and although we do mostly discussion and review through games such as BINGO and Jeopardy, we occasionally throw a craft in for fun.
We are doing Year 1  so we've been reading about ancient cultures including the Minoans and Mycenaeans of ancient Greece.  For the 2 weeks before Christmas Break, we decided to tackle a papier mache project: the Minotaur head!  The Minotaur was the legendary half man/half bull that was kept in the Labyrinth, a maze at Knossos in Crete.   Even though our class is made up of mostly non-crafty boys, they loved this one, and the results were pretty impressive.

 

With God All Things Are Possible

Tonight was our monthly homeschool support group meeting, and the topic was "Homeschooling through Hard Times".   Five members shared from their hearts about trials in their lives, how they muddled through, and lessons the Lord taught in the process. The challenges were different... taking care of aging, ailing parents while also homeschooling teens,  going through the illness and death of a close family member, financial difficulties, a child with a brain tumor, divorce....  but a common theme echoed through all their testimonies, and that is that with God all things are possible,  God provides in miraculous ways, and He takes care of His children when we are obedient to follow Him.  Not only that, but some of the greatest lessons in life do not come from textbooks and lesson plans, but are the result of experiencing real life.   Children in these families learned lessons in compassion, patience, humility, perseverance, gratitude, and many other things, and it is likely those lessons would have been missed had those children been put in school in order to "keep up with their studies".

Our meetings normally end before 9:00 pm, but tonight we didn't finish until almost 10.  I couldn't bring myself to end the meeting before each speaker had had a chance to share what God had placed on their hearts, and although some people had to leave before it was all over,  more than I expected stayed all the way to the end. And many still stayed for lime-coconut cupcakes and lemonade afterwards too!   I hope many people took home a nugget of encouragement from the meeting tonight. I know that I did.

Field Trip to the TV Station

Today I went with J on a field trip to the WRAL-TV Station.   Our guide was James, one of the news producers ( I think ) and he did a great job, showing us the Master Control room and engineering room, the production studio where they shoot local programming, the Lottery room, the news center and the weather center.   We got to chat with meteorologists Mike Maze and Greg Fishel, who were very friendly and very much "science geeks"!  It was a very interesting "behind-the-scenes" tour and I learned a few things, like if WRAL suddenly starts broadcasting "The Andy Griffith Show", something went very wrong and that is their "filler", meant to hold the audience until they can get things back up and running. Now you know.

 

Cupcakes On a Mission

Amanda has been wanting to go on an international missions trip for quite a while.  Sarah, Eric, and I went to Bris Bris, Costa Rica with a group from our church for 10 days in 2005 (?), and and Alex and Eric went back the following summer.  Sarah spent a month in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in the summer of 2009,  volunteering in a school for orphaned and destitute  5-7 yr olds.  These experiences expose us to cultures and living conditions very unfamiliar to us as Americans, and help to develop in us a heart of compassion for God's children all over the world, not just in our little piece of it.  This August, Amanda has an opportunity to go to Uganda for 10 days with a group being led by a friend of ours, who has a ministry called Ten Eighteen. www.10eighteen.org  

They will be conducting a sports camp for street kids from the slums of Kampala, as well as distributing clothing and shoes and also going on a one day safari to see the African wildlife around Lake Mburo.

In order to go on this trip, she will need to raise about $2700 ( depending on the final cost of the airline tickets )  This number seems insurmountable, but we KNOW, because we have seen with our own eyes, that God is in the miracle business and provides for us in ways far beyond what we can ask or imagine.  So we are trusting and making plans in faith that the funds will come.

She and I have come up with a fundraiser that is already getting some interest from our friends. We are both devotees of the Food Channel, and lately I have had an obsession with "Cupcake Wars" and baking gourmet cupcakes!  So we came up with "Cupcakes On a Mission"!  We are offering a different flavor cupcake each week. which friends can order in exchange for a donation of $12 for a dozen or $6 for a half dozen.
These are the flavors:

Jan.31–Feb.5                                                                                           
Mexican Hot Chocolate -  chocolate cake with a kick of spice topped with a mound of cinnamon buttercream and a dusting of cocoa

Feb.7-12                                                                                                          
Carrot Cake -  dense moist carrot cake studded with walnuts and pineapple, topped with a decadent  cream cheese frosting

Feb.14-19                                                                                                     
Chocolate Mint-   rich devils food cake filled with chocolate mint cream and frosted with a mound of smooth pink peppermint buttercream

Feb.21-26                                                                                              
Chocolate Peanut Butter  -  moist chocolate cake filled with peanut butter cream, dipped in silky chocolate ganache and topped with a swirl of peanut butter frosting

Feb.28 –Mar.5                                                                                                     Pumpkin -   moist pumpkin spice cupcake topped with out-of-this-world maple cream cheese frosting

Mar. 7- 12                                                                                                            Boston Cream -  golden sponge cake filled with smooth vanilla cream and double-dipped in dark chocolate ganache

Mar.21 -26                                                                                                          Chocolate Chip Cannoli -  vanilla cupcake  filled with chocolate chip-ricotta cannoli filling and topped with sweetened whipped cream and chocolate curls 

Mar. 28 – Apr.2                                                                                              

Mocha Cappuccino  - mocha chocolate chip cake  topped with a coffee meringue buttercream

Apr. 4 -9                                                                                                   

 Sweet Coconut -  moist coconut cake topped with a mound of vanilla buttercream sprinkled with more coconut

Apr. 11 -16                                                                                                            Strawberry Lemonade -  tart lemon cake with chunks of fresh strawberries topped with a swirl of sweet strawberry buttercream

 Boston Cream

Pumpkin - Maple

Chocolate Peanut Butter

Mexican Hot Chocolate

Lots of Pictures

Well, to follow that rambling bit of blog insanity, here are some pictures of the past month.

Lighthouse Gingerbread House Contest

J's Lighthouse - #7

Christmas morning at Grandma's

 

 

Christmas Eve

 

family Christmas Eve party at Victoria Station Cafe

 cousins reunited

New Year's Eve  - sparkling grape juice

Whirlwind

This was one of the longest blog breaks I've taken in quite a while.  Christmas is such a busy season, and even more so when oldest son is flying in from halfway across the country and then you all drive 700 miles to Grandma's house just for a couple of days but get hit with a major blizzard on the day you are supposed to drive back home and oldest son's flight back to TX is cancelled and he's told it will take several days to get him back there so you all drive 700 miles back home a day later than planned but it takes 4 extra hours because of all the traffic and oldest son  flies back to TX from here instead and then a week later you drive 4 hours out and 4 hours back to move children #2 & #3 back to college ( where college grad #2 has just gotten a job ) and it snows twice in NC where an inch of snow shuts everything down for days and we have to start back to school but I am seriously not ready in so many ways and I finally go see the doctor for my laundry list of "getting old" complaints and find out I have a vitamin deficiency, tennis elbow, and torn cartilage in my knee and yes, I'm getting old...  and my house is a wreck because of all the whirlwind of holiday/basketball/kids moving but I can't seem to gather the energy to really attack it and get things organized again  and we decide to look for a new church home and my emotions are just raw over that because a church is a family to me and it is so hard to break fellowship and start again but we really feel it is necessary and there are sooooooo many things that need to be done in my role as homeschool group leader ... and did I mention that I'm getting old and feel like I'm wading through knee-deep mud or having a dream where you try to run but can only move in slow-motion.... yah.  So... that is why I haven't posted anything lately.