HS 210 — Angie Mosteller — Celebrating St. Patrick’s Day

HS 210 — Angie Mosteller — Celebrating St. Patrick’s Day

Links and Resources:

Show Notes:

DESCRIPTION:

Angie Mosteller is passionate about many things, but teaching and hospitality are always near the top of the list. She specifically loves the holidays because she gets to put both of her passions to work – the teacher in her is intrigued by the amazing history of our celebrations (which she passes down to her kids through meaningful traditions); and the hospitality enthusiast in her fills their home with creative holiday food, decor, and music. Over the years, Angie has built a website — Celebratingholidays.com — as a resource for other families who want to learn about the rich Christian history of their favorite holidays.

Today, Angie shares with us the story of St. Patrick, so that we can invite our children to know the man who wasn’t even Irish! Find out why Patrick is a wonderful character for us to study with our kids.

RESOURCES:

Celebratingholidays.com

St. Patrick’s Day History: https://www.celebratingholidays.com/?page_id=2659

Christmas: Celebrating the History of Classic Symbols, Songs, and Stories by Angie Mosteller

The Story of St. Patrick: More Than Shamrocks and Leprechauns by Voice of The Martyrs and Cheryl Odden

Classic Irish Hymns: https://www.celebratingholidays.com/?page_id=2667

St. Patrick’s Day Recipes: https://www.celebratingholidays.com/?page_id=3081





Show Transcript:

HS EP 210 Angie Mosteller

Wendy -

Welcome to the Homeschool Solutions podcast, brought to you by Sonlight Curriculum, and homeschooling.mom. I'm your host, Wendy Speake. Here on the show every week, you'll get to listen in on some great conversations with wonderful guests, all designed to equip us as homeschooling moms. And then once a month, we'll be opening up the Bible together, applying God's Word to our long, blessed, but often challenging days. It is my hope that as we gather together in this space, we will encourage one another with some practical, Biblical solutions. I'm so glad you're here. Before we start the show, I'd like to thank our sponsor, Sonlight Curriculum. Complete homeschool curriculum you're guaranteed to love.



Welcome back to another episode of Homeschool Solutions podcast. My guest today is Angie Mosteller and I know that I start every episode saying, Oh I love today's guest! But when I say I love today's guest, it means I really, really love who they are and we've made a friendship and so on, and so forth, and I love their message. But the guest today is actually a woman that would be like, in my closest circle of "I really love them in real life" people. Angie Mosteller is a "friend" friend. Our kids are friends of each other, and so I'm gonna give you the more professional bio of who we're having speak into our lives today. But then I'm also gonna tell you just a little bit about my history with Angie. So, here you have it. This is Angie Mosteller.

She is a follower of Christ and she puts in parentheses when she describes herself (of the evangelical sort). She is the wife of a smokin' hot philosophy professor... those are her words, not mine. The fact that we are friends, she knows I'm not hittin' on her husband here. And she is a homeschooling mom. She teaches online for California Baptist University. She writes at Crosswalk.com, Rose Publishing, and Holiday Classics. She's passionate about teaching and she's also passionate about serving others well through hospitality and I've been the recipient of that hospitality, so this makes it extra fun.

She loves her holidays because she gets to put both of her passions together there. The teacher in her is intrigued by the amazing history of our celebrations, which she tries to pass on to her kids, and whatever other kids are over that day, they get it too. And then the hospitality enthusiast wants to fill her home with creative holiday food, decor, music. She's just a super fun teacher whether you are a friend or a student in her classroom.

So, it's really fun to have her with us today. Angie also has a website and we're gonna be talking about it. It's called celebratingholidays.com. And that has been a hobby for Angie over the years. I'm gonna read straight from her introduction here. She says, "It's my hope that it is a truly useful tool for families who want to build fun and meaningful traditions for their holidays. It all got started when I began thinking about the kinds of traditions that I wanted to build in my own family. I had heard many disturbing claims about popular holiday traditions and their pagan origins, so I decided to do some research."

The more she researched, the more interested she became in the topic of holidays. And she put together this resource for us. So, we're gonna be pointing you back to the actual resource, that's celebratingholidays.com, but today we're just gonna have a fun conversation with Angie and Angie, welcome to the show.

Angie -

Thank you for having me, Wendy, and I love you too.

Wendy -

Well, do you wanna tell 'em, or do you want me to tell them, how we became friends? How old our kids were, and what we did at the very start of our homeschooling journey together?

Angie -

Oh, I would love to share that story. So, I think our oldest, they had to only have been maybe four. I know they were preschool because that was our first adventure together, was a homeschool co-op for our preschoolers. But I do remember the day that one of our other dear friends called me on the phone and said, I just met this girl, you have to meet her. She's so amazing. You're gonna love her. And she lives in your neighborhood.

Wendy -

Yes.

Angie -

At the time, we were neighbors, sadly we are not anymore, but we're still in the same community, but not neighbors anymore. But yeah, we got started in a preschool co-op, and have some great memories of just learning together. How to school our kids and raise our kids, and our oldest kids who were preschoolers are now in high school, which I can't believe.

Wendy -

Incredible. But, our early days of homeschooling together... you know, when they're preschool age, so much of learning just happens naturally. And I think that the challenge for us is even as our curriculum pieces get more complicated with our kids, is to keep that foundation of just learning as we go, I'm reminded of the passenger. The passenger. The passage in Deuteronomy that talks about when you rise up and when you lie down and when you're sittin' at the table, when you're walkin' along the way. Teach your children. And of course, in that context, we're talking about teaching them about the Lord, but really what a vision for all of our parenting?

And so whether you're a traditional homeschool family or not, I remember Angie, you telling me when I wasn't sure if I was gonna be able to really keep goin' at it, you said, Wendy, if you keep at homeschooling or not, you will always be a homeschooling mom because you just naturally teach your kid. And I love that. That gave me such confidence to keep on going. But it also gave me a lot of grace, if I couldn't.

But it inspired me to recognize that it's not Monday through Friday, during homeschooling hours, that I'm the mom who teaches. It is every day, all day, on vacation, and what we're gonna talk about today is, during the holidays. And so, would you tell us, really where this passion started? You mentioned there on your "About Me" page, that it started because you just were doing research and you were curious. Where do our holidays start? Where do they come from? What are these traditions rooted? Are they pagan? What are some of the things that you discovered, Angie?

Angie -

Well, I don't think I really developed any real interest until I had kids. And even when my kids were very, very young, it just... the thought, you know, would enter my mind, as holidays were... each holiday was a purging of... you know, I want to build meaningful family traditions, and I don't want to bring these pagan, you know, rituals into my home and I was hearing all these rumors about how our holidays are, you know, have these pagan roots. And I just thought, I need to look into this cause I wanna be thoughtful and intentional about what kinds of celebrations and traditions I establish for my own family.

And so, I just started... I'm a natural researcher... I'm a researcher by nature. And I just started looking into various holidays and I was so... I got more and more excited about the information I was finding in terms of their being such rich, Christian history behind so many of our holidays. And I... that just, you know, got me started down the road of continuing to research and find out as much as I could about each holiday. And not just, it's history, but you know, Wendy and I, for those who don't know us, we love to cook and decorate and just create a whole atmosphere that's built around our celebrations. And so, you know, I started looking into the stories we read, the songs we play and sing, and so much of it is just really rich in Christian history, so that was exciting to discover. And share.

Wendy -

And the first holiday that you really went deep in, that you really went deep in, was Christmas, correct?

Angie -

Yes.

Wendy -

And you've used the term "research", I think, maybe four times. And that... cause you really do. And those listening... Angie has written a book called... aptly called... Christmas. But the subtitle explains what it's all about. "Celebrating the History of Classic Symbols, Songs, and Stories". And it is a thorough, comprehensive research book, and resource on Christmas. And we get it out every year, and it sits on our coffee table, and it has so many Christmas stories, the lyrics to Christmas songs, and so much about the symbols of Christmas, from the star and the tree, to the shepherd staff. I mean, it's all of it. And it's just a wonderful, wonderful collection.

But then she started celebrating holidays.com as a way to give those sort of resources to homeschooling... well, all families, who want to teach their children, not just the fun of the celebration, but the history of the celebration.

And then, how to do it in a fun way, through the recipes that are made, and the crafts are done. Anyway, it's just thorough and it's fabulous. But today we've invited Angie to talk to us about this guy, Patrick. And I know that before I knew anything about the man, Patrick, the boy, Patrick, before he was a man, I just thought it was a celebration of our Irish roots as Americans. I mean, I have to tell you, I was that ignorant. And so many of us, we wear our green and we have our kids wear their green, and there are people that put together, kinda like "Elf on the Shelf" but they're leprechauns around their house. And they have games that they play. Without knowing the incredible, rich, Christian history of St. Patrick.

And so, the very first thing I wanted to ask Angie to do in regards to this podcast and learning about St. Patrick's Day is, would you tell us the story of who St. Patrick was and how he became a saint?

Angie -

I would love to. And I'm so glad to hear that I was not the only one who didn't know anything about St. Patrick. I was possibly worse than you in your understanding of St. Patrick's Day, Wendy, because I thought... and I'm embarrassed to admit this... but I thought that St. Patrick was just a mythical leprechaun character. I had no idea he was a real person and that's... I went to, you know...

Wendy -

Well done. Thank you, Angie.

Angie -

I went a secular school...

Wendy -

This is ground zero here.

Angie -

So, the story of St. Patrick is really amazing, and it makes me sad that I didn't know the story until my adulthood and that so few people know the story because it's really inspiring. And another interesting thing about this story is that St. Patrick actually wrote his own autobiography of sorts, in a work called The Confession. And this work is one of the very few pieces of literature that we have from this period and this region at the time. So it's very special and that gives us insight into this region that we would otherwise not have.

But to tell the story of St. Patrick, estimates are that he was born around 385 AD, in the Roman province of Britain. So, most people are surprised to find that he was not born in Ireland. But he was born to Christian parents, by his own account, to whom he gave little thought in regard to religion. But when he was about 16 years old, he tells us that a group of Irish marauders, or pirates, raided his village, and he was carried off and sold as a slave in Ireland.

So, far from home, he's a teenage boy, sold as a slave, he's working as a herdsman or a shepherd for six years in Ireland. And it was during those years of, you know, he's out in the fields, just alone, all day. As a slave. And it was during that time that he really started to think about spiritual things, and says that he surrendered his life to God and turned back to the God to whom his parents had pointed him and his village priest had pointed him. He said he finally surrendered to that God.

And it was in his sixth year of slavery that Patrick tells that he heard a voice in his sleep saying, "Your ship is ready." And he understood that to mean that God was telling him that it was time to escape. So, he traveled 200 miles to the coast of Ireland. He found a ship that was ready to sail. He was allowed to board. And after a lengthy trip, I think it was three days by ship and 28 by land, Patrick finally reached his home. And of course, his family receives him joyfully. He's thrilled to be home.

But it wasn't soon thereafter that he had a vision of a man coming with a letter from the people of Ireland, and he hears crying, asking "Come and walk among us again." So, he understands this to be a call from God to go back to Ireland as a missionary. So, it's actually a lengthy time before he gets back there. Because he'd missed a chunk of his education and going back as a missionary, you needed to be, you know, trained, obviously, in the Bible and Christianity and he actually spent 18 years studying and preparing for his work.

And Ireland was a very, very difficult place. The Druids... we don't know a whole lot about them, ‘cause we don't have much of anything written about them. But we know that they were very resistant to the Gospel, they were practicing magic arts. And, let's just say, very few missionaries lasted very long in Ireland before returning.

So, it took a while for Patrick to get approval to go, but obviously, his missionary journey was very successful. And it's just beautiful to see how the Lord orchestrated things in his life to go back to Ireland. He had, you know, during his time as a slave, he had learned the language. He had learned things about their culture that just made him really uniquely suited to go there as a missionary.

And he faced off with the Druids and from what we understand, there was... he speaks of signs and wonders, and just God really showing up in a miraculous way to demonstrate that He is the True God. And so, Patrick saw an amazing number of conversions. By all accounts, the culture was largely changed. The churches and schools that were built during this time were too numerous to count. It's even said that slave-trading and human sacrifice ceased. And even kind of the rules of warfare. The war didn't completely come to a halt, but you know, kind of these rules of warfare implemented in the society. So just a transformation of the nation really took place. And as we know, Ireland is often called "the Isle of the Saints". But prior to that, it was an island of the dark arts, so. Truly amazing transformation.

And it's also said that Ireland has been credited for saving Western civilization, in a sense. There's a famous book by Thomas Cahill called How the Irish Saved Civilization. He has just a great chapter in the history of St. Patrick, and really credits him and his monasteries that he started, for preserving Western thought. Because, you know, as the Roman empire was crumbling, literacy was lost, and it was these monasteries of... you know, in distant Ireland that really were saving literature, preserving it, and then reintroducing it to the later Medieval world. So, really interesting chapter in that book.

But, by the time Patrick died, it said, on March 17, and somewhere in the late 400s, it said that the entire country went into mourning. And they had lost a dear, dear man and father in the faith. And they've continually celebrated his life ever since. And, you know, the tradition came to America, they say, and several hundred years later, crossed the Atlantic when Irish immigrants came to the United States and brought the tradition.

But, like I said, in starting to tell this history, it's so very sad that I think so many Americans don't know this amazing story of St. Patrick and the sacrifices he made to go serve as a missionary to the people that originally enslaved him. So, I think it's a tremendously inspiring story, and I'm glad that I get to share this with my kids and my family, and hope that others will be inspired to do the same.

Wendy -

What a story to share with our kids. Instead of making it about the leprechauns. And what percentage of our Irish roots, we have, in our family. And I can tell you that what our percentage is, and what my husband's is, and what my kids are. And that's fun. And we know, and we'll talk just a moment, Angie, about the way that our families actually celebrate together each year.

But what a sad thing if we miss out on sharing this incredible story with our children in the midst of all of the, you know, gold at the end of the rainbow fun. Because I think that there are some character traits that we would love to see develop in our children. And there is a missional mindedness. There's a way of dealing with suffering and understanding God's sovereign plan in the midst of it all. There are so many things that could become very profound lessons to share with our children if we only knew that they were there in the story.

So, thank you for the story. Just educating us. So often I find that my education is really just a tool then to pass it down to the lives of my children right here in my home. So, thank you for educating us.



I'd like to take just a moment to thank another one of today's sponsors, Medi-Share. And affordable and Biblical healthcare alternative. Find out more at mychristiancare.org for their ongoing support of homeschooling families just like ours. And now, back to the show.



Can you tell us, Angie... I know that we have celebratingholidays.com, but do you have some books and movies that they can jot down, and I'll put 'em here in the show notes. Or poems or songs that you've loved to use to flesh out the teaching at home with your children?

Angie -

Sure. I... you know, obviously, it depends on their age in terms of what level of book they would wanna read. I love, now that my kids are a little bit older, just reading Patrick's first-hand account of his life. And there were some other letters that he wrote that just really reveal his love for the Lord and his commitment to the people of Ireland. And you just really get seen of what a Godly, amazing man he was. So that's fun to read the first-hand accounts written by his own hand. And I do list those on the website. And there's even some audio available on some of them.

For the younger kids, I know you and I have both read... and I... it's not always available on Amazon, which is such a bummer, but looking in the library or you know, borrowing from friends always works too. But there's a book that was put out in conjunction with Voice of the Martyrs, and it's called The Story of St. Patrick. It's more than shamrocks and leprechauns. And Cheryl Odin is the author, like I said, in conjunction with Voice of the Martyrs. But it's beautifully illustrated. I think they have St. Nicholas too and they used some of the other holidays, but it's beautifully illustrated and great for young kids. So, I have that.

Wendy -

That's my favorite. That is just my favorite. Every year that we read it, I have to admit that I cry during it because the fact that it was produced by Voice of the Martyrs, they really focus on the fact that St. Patrick was a cross-cultural missionary, and he went into a dangerous place with the Gospel of Christ. And it... I love reading that with my kids because we don't wanna just talk about, oh, we tithe at church to support missions. We have relationships with missionaries. We read stories about missionaries. And St. Patrick actually was a very early cross-cultural missionary. Not even Irish, for goodness sakes.

And that book really... and I love that I still read it now that my kids are older, because it's just such a great story. It tells the story simply. It brings out some of those wonderful themes of God's goodness and purpose. I remember reading that book the first time, thinking, oh my goodness, he's so much like Joseph. Put in prison. Put in slavery. And yet God had such an incredible plan for his life.

But all of that was pulled out from what? Reading a children's book. So, even if your kids are a little bit older, we will link to anywhere we can find that book in the show notes as well. Because it really is a wonderful resource.

Angie -

Yeah, I love... I've listed some of my favorite books. We love to sing, you know, the classic Irish hymn, Be Thou My Vision, that dates all the way back to the 8th century. So it was, you know, later than Patrick himself, but it's fun to just recall this. So, you know, the Irish people can really, almost every one of them, attribute their faith back to Patrick and his commitment to their country and seeing people come to faith. So, that's one of our favorites.

So, I try to post hymns with their history and their words. I have even some YouTube videos, so, you know, you can either listen to the music, or sing along with it. But, I love to just fill our home with not just, you know, food, but music and decor, and just tie as much as I can into giving me the opportunity to talk about, why do we celebrate this person? And, you know, it's not really the person themselves so much, as to how they point us to the Lord. And how St. Patrick did that. He just... his whole life was committed just to bringing glory to God and really making tremendous personal sacrifices and the hope is that that moves us to grow in our faith. And you know, model... allow him to be a model for us in his Godliness.

Wendy -

And then invite our kids up with us. Absolutely. Yeah. I agree. So, our early years together, Angie, of homeschooling... a lot of those years took place... a lot of our learning took place in your home. I think we spent more time at your home than anywhere else during our homeschool co-opting days. And the times that i remember as being most fun and most educational all had to do with holidays. And so of course, this was just one of them. And you would always... I mean, there were always cut out cookies at your house. We always had cut out cookies. But there were also crafts, and there were stories, and there were movies, and there was music. And we still get together for fourth of July and I hope, Angie, that you'll come back and tell us a story of the fourth of July, when we get closer to July.

And I remember hearing the stories of the founding fathers from you. Probably putting frosting on cookies. And I loved that because so much learning happens when we're having fun with our kids. And so, you've made traditions that aren't just about the holidays, but they're about togetherness. And they're about learning. And they're about growing in our faith. And it's amazing the rich Christian history in almost every holiday I can think of.

Angie -

And this is an idea that I heard from someone else, that it really stuck with me. It was a mom saying she wanted to raise her kids in such a way that they would feel lost without their faith. That their... in their faith traditions. That it was such a part of who they were that they would have nothing to do with themselves if they didn't have their faith. And that those, you know, traditions tied to it. and I think it just gives our kids a strong sense of identity that they're not... not only that they're only part of our own immediate family. But a lot of these holidays in our Christian, you know, history, ties us to the broader Christian community worldwide in some cases. You know some of our holidays are unique to America. But many of them are world wise. Christmas, and Easter and, it just ties us to the bigger family of believers. And connects us to... all across the world, knowing we're celebrating these same, significant events in our Christian history.

Wendy -

Yes. Absolutely. And one of the traditions that you have. And you passed it down to your daughter. She's always in the kitchen with you these days. Can you tell us about some of your favorite recipes for St. Patrick’s Day? And I know that I'm setting you up here. You know that I'm setting you up as well, don't you?

Angie -

You know what they are, cause we have 'em together every year! That is one of... I love that our families get to celebrate together and it's fun because... and I've posted all of our favorite recipes on the website. But I had... I have a few new favorites because of Wendy. We now, every year, make Wendy's mom's corned beef dinner. Cause it's honey glazed and I love sweet meat.

Wendy -

Oh, it's so good. You guys, it... even if you don't wanna read anything about St. Patrick, please go over to celebratingholidays.com and find the recipe in the side bar. There's a link to absolutely every holiday.

And then, in each one, there's another link to recipes. And so, it is the candied corned beef. And it's gonna knock your socks off, make your knees weak, and your husband's gonna beg you to make it year-round, not just St. Patrick's Day.

Okay, some of your other favorites.

Angie -

We traded out our old traditional corned beef with the sauerkraut and everything for Wendy's awesome honey-glazed... I do have a funny story about the sauerkraut that I heard about in Ireland. Right about... was kind of a popular food when... it surprises me ‘cause I don't like it all. Apparently, it's really good for your digestive system, so it has that going for it.

But I heard that when the Irish were cooking meat, that was... that smell alerted the tax man that you had enough money to buy meat. You must have enough money to pay a little bit more in taxes. So, they would put the sauerkraut in there to try to, you know, try to disguise the scent of meat cooking. So, I thought that was funny. But...

Wendy -

Just another opportunity to learn something new. Do you see, listeners? Or do you hear/. that when you have fun and you eat; you can actually be learning too. And so, these are fun tidbits that we learn when we're with Angie, whether on her site or around her table. Now Angie didn't tell you that also the carrots that we make during our annual meal are full of sugar as well. I have to admit. Because just your regular boiled carrots, none of the kids and, I don’t think that even the wives and husbands were eating the carrots. But I had a recipe from a friend of mine that's a carrot souffle, and it's covered in brown sugar and butter. And another just incredible one. So, we make sure we also have, you know, green beans and salad and stuff like that, so we feel healthy. But great recipe also for your homemade soda bread. And then, crafts, oh my goodness, crafts. I can't believe how much we're talking about sugar right now. It's very hard to do the holidays without sugar, but, I remember one of my favorite crafts I ever did... and I have to preface this by saying, not only do we limit sugar in my family, we are almost completely dye free, but there is one craft that's full of sugar and artificial colors. And we get these colored... the rainbow colored Twizzlers, and we put them in the shape of a rainbow, and we shove that into one of those little plastic cellophane bags, so you can see it, it looks like a rainbow. And then we shove some Rolo’s down at the bottom, so it looks like there's a pot of gold at the bottom of the rainbow, and we give those away. We're giving all the sugar and artificial dyes away to our friends. That's terrible, but it's fun. I mean, my kids just laugh their way through our holidays, and learn their way through our holidays as well.

Angie -

Yeah, and I... you know, the sugar factor, I've always just felt like, you know, limit it or eliminate it altogether, the majority of the time. But I feel like, you know, holidays are so few and far between. I just think, you can always make a little exception on the holidays.

Wendy - On the holidays.

Angie - Add some sugar sweetness to your celebration but...

Wendy -

Yes. Well, Angie...

Angie -

We haven't posted any of this, but we also found some creative ways to add... make things green. With spinach... the juice from spinach and some natural ways to do food coloring, but...

Wendy -

Yes, you have done that before with us. But because you know my kids are not ones to eat dye. You've done that with some of the recipes when we've gone to your house.

Friends it is fun to know how much Irish you are. It's a lot of fun. And it's fun to do all the crafts. And it's fun to wear green. Take pictures. I have a picture of my youngest with him wearing a little green moustache, and his Irish shirt and making a funny face. And all of this fun. Not educational, just doing life together and laughing together. Pictures and memories, they're so rich. But we're missing out a little bit, I think, if we don't dive a little deeper. For our own growing up in our knowledge. And then, the opportunity to share it with our kids. You don't have to put together a whole unit study on St. Patrick, but it's possible if you open the door just a little bit, you're gonna want to like Angie when she started doing some research. So, I hope that you'll go over to celebratingholidays.com and start poking around there. And she links you so many places and will send you down all these wonderful rabbit holes to books and hymns and poems and movies. There's just a wealth of resources for you there.

And Angie I hope that you'll come back and visit us again. Is the best way for people to connect with you there are celebratingholidays.com?

Angie -

Yes, yeah, there's a link to contact me, if you need to reach me. I try to post everything that comes to mind. I try to put it on the website, but I'm always... I always welcome suggestions and new ideas and questions. So, yeah, that would be the easiest way to reach me.

Wendy -

Ah, that's wonderful. And Angie, would you bless us by praying for us as we enter into this holiday. And just enter back into being with our kids once we get off this podcast. Would you just pray for us? We would appreciate that so much.

Angie -

Lord, we just thank you so much for the privilege of parenting our children. We thank you for the gift of family. And just the opportunity to build meaningful traditions together, to build a place where our kids feel loved and secure and just have a strong sense of identity. And Lord, we just pray that they would grow up always having that sense of security in You and I pray that we would... You just give us discernment as parents to know how to raise them well, to know how to educate them well. And just to build into their character as You enable us to do. And to do that well. I just thank You for the gift of holidays and celebrations and that we can enjoy those things together. But I pray that we would seek opportunities to be intentional about our holidays, especially in America with their rich, Christian history. That we would take advantage of the opportunity to direct our kids to our Christian heritage and just models of faith and Godliness that are associated with so many of our holidays. Help us not to miss those opportunities, and we just pray that we would honor You with our lives and our teaching and our families and we pray in Jesus Name, Amen.

Wendy -

Amen. Thank you, Angie, I love that you mention that... asking God to give us the wisdom to build into the character of our children. And I love that word, character. And I love that characters, meaning people, individuals, can really inspire in us character-building in ourselves and in our children. And we share these stories, whether it's the Christmas story and all the characters there. Or the character of St. Patrick, that there are lessons for us to grow... not just in our knowledge of where things come from, but in our character traits. And invite our children, too. So, like I mentioned before, we've grown to become more passionate about international missions. Because of spending time getting to know the character St. Patrick.

And we've grown to understand that there is an on-going persecution martyrdom still happening around the world, because people have dared go into hostile locations. And so many conversations that can come out of just celebrating a holiday where we used to just wear green or pinch each other. It's just right there for us to dig deep. And maybe that's the gold at the end of the rainbow in this holiday. And there are so many wonderful rich lessons to take away. So, thank you for talking through it all with us today. And we hope that you'll come back and talk to us about other holidays in the future.

Angie -

Well, Wendy, anything for you.

Wendy -

Oh, thanks so much! Alright you guys, there are solutions to every homeschool problems and some of the solutions are just to celebrate and make fun recipes with the kids and sit around, sing songs, and do a little bit of digging into what it is we celebrate each year. So have a wonderful St. Patrick's Day.



What a privilege it is to have these conversations with you each week. You are so busy; I don't take it lightly that you tune in with me here for a weekly shot of encouragement. As a reminder, you can subscribe to the Homeschool Solutions podcast through Apple or Google Play. And your positive reviews always help other homeschooling families find us online. As we say goodbye, I'd like to say thank you to Great Homeschool Conventions. Every year they host multiple conventions in various regions throughout the US. You can find a location near you at greathomeschoolconventions.com. With dozens of incredible speakers, hundreds of curriculum exhibits, you will be blessed, refreshed, helped, and encouraged. I'll be in Texas, South Carolina, Ohio, and of course, my home state, California, this year. I hope to see some of you there. Until next week, visit homeschooling.mom for blog posts to encourage and support you along the way. And remember, Galatians six verse nine, let's not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap if we do not give up. It's a promise that I'm taking to the bank every day. Again, this is Wendy Speake, and I'll see you next week.


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