On Sunday after church, we have the delight of the family joining together for lunch at our house. The girls and I do the meal preparation work because we want to give the mommies a break. Typically we have the same simple menu, one we started years ago when Steve wanted to make Sunday more of a rest day for me. Steve, with the help of the girls and me, makes up a huge batch of burrito beans every few months that we freeze and defrost for Sunday lunches.

Menu:
Green salad
Bean burritos with fresh homemade whole wheat tortillas
Chips and salsa

Recently we moved to buffet style and paper goods to simplify. We reached the maximum size of our dining table seating—18—and have a high chair at each corner of the table, and we are still a few more than that.

Our Sunday lunches are happy, loud, and a sweet time of family connection.

Trusting in Jesus,
Teri

Abby and Bethany often help Sarah make tortillas. Abby has been Sarah’s apprentice for so many years that she can easily roll them out herself.

“Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren
to dwell together in unity!”
(Psalm 133:1)

It’s easy to think it will never happen to your family. But if you were to ask the parents of a son who had an immoral internet addiction, they would likely call it a tragedy. We receive e-mails from families who are heartbroken over this.

One is never above temptation. Even David, a man after God’s own heart, stumbled and fell. As such, we choose to put safeguards in place. Having Internet protection is one such way. Although we’ve tried multiple over the years, our current favorite is an app called Accountable2You.

Last fall we began having problems with K9, the service we were using for Internet protection. It often locked up a computer so that it couldn’t access the Internet at all. We uninstalled and reinstalled K9, but then we discovered, it wasn’t working at all. We tried to get support, but there was no response.

So I asked my married sons, who work in the computer industry, what they were personally using. They both said Accountable2You. Accountable2You tracks Internet activity but doesn’t block. When we initially heard about Accountable2You, we weren’t interested because we wanted blocking. But when K9 wasn’t working for us, and we needed another solution, we realized that we weren’t aware of any of us stumbling onto a bad site that K9 protected us from. Often, though, K9 blocked us from good sites. As I talked to our “computer” sons about that, they said that because we use Google Safe Search, there isn’t as much possibility of accidentally stumbling onto a bad site.

Accountable2You has something called VPN that is part of their phone app that can track web-browsing on any browser, not just their browser. So we also use Accountable2You on our phones rather than Mobicip, our previous phone protection. With Accountable2You VPN, we now use Safari. Mobicip forced us to use their browser, which didn’t work nearly as well as Safari.

I receive a daily report for each device from Accountable2You. Steve gets my reports. It is a summary. I can go online for a detailed report. It is much easier to read and understand than K9 was. If there is questionable usage, I will get an immediate text or email.

We requested support help from Accountable2You a couple of times. Within an hour, they responded and solved my problem—amazing! I did not receive replies to my support requests to K9 at all.

We pay $9.99 a month for up to 20 devices on their family plan. So far we are more than pleased with Accountable2You.

Great news. You can try out Accountable2You for a month completely free using the promo code Titus2. The link is Titus2’s affiliate link, which blesses the ministry with a 15% credit each month you’re using Accountable2You. Important note on the free month: the website will say 10 days, as that’s the standard trial, but when you get near the end of the checkout, it will say Promo Code: Titus2 (100% off once). So as long as you have the promo code in there, you’ll get a free month.

Questions? Ask below, and we’ll try to help or check out Accountable2You’s site.

Trusting in Jesus,
Teri

“Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into temptation.
The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak.”
Mark 14:38

Some states require standardized testing or some other form of yearly assessment for homeschooling students. Our state does not. However, through most of our homeschooling years, we chose to do standardized testing.

Nathan and Melanie have begun down a similar path. Last year I administered standardized testing for Abigail using Iowa Basic Skills that we get through Abekatesting.org. This year using the same, I administered standardized testing for Abigail (4th) and Bethany (2nd).

There is a sweet flow to that because for many years my parents administered standardized testing first to our children and the other children in our homeschool support group and eventually just for our children when the support group no longer offered the testing. Now I get to pass the blessing my parents gave my children on to my grandchildren.

Because of the girls’ grade levels, I can only administer the tests to one child at a time. Abby went first, and she was done in two days. Bethany followed in the same timing. We test for 2.5 to 3 hours with stand up stretching between tests and longer snack break in the middle.

Each granddaughter arrived at her testing with special mini-candy treats they know I like—Andes and York Mints.

After the testing, I give Melanie a report on how the girls did as far as working with the tests and working with me and things they said were hard for them when they had completed a test.

The feedback from Nathan and Melanie are that the girls really enjoyed the testing and Abigail was excited to do it again this year after last year’s experience. That makes me happy!

Trusting in Jesus,
Teri

“Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his
help, whose hope is in the LORD his God” (Psalm 146:5).