Author: Melissa AtLee

Education, Family, Kids, My favorite things, Uncategorized

My Favorite Things – Family Time, a trip to the Moon, Read, Read, Read and much more

Melissa AtLee

Greetings! March has been a great month, not only because spring has finally arrived (only in name, perhaps, but I live in hope!), but also because many of our winter classes have come to a glorious end. This means that we have freed up some of our evenings and weekends to spend together as a family, playing board games and going on hikes. Ok, so we’ve only done one hike so far – that’s a picture of my hubby and daughter enjoying precious bonding time at Pefferlaw Creek Farms. But now that the weather is warming up (it WILL happen), we look forward to many more family hikes.

Here’s what I’ve been loving this past month:

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Education, Kids

Graphic Novels for a Reluctant Reader (Boy)

Melissa AtLee
Photo by Raj Eiamworakul on Unsplash

We are a family of bibliophiles. My and my husband’s night tables are toppling over with piles and piles of books. We are currently building bookshelves in our living room and kitchen to store and display the ever growing collection of books in our care.

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Marriage, Uncategorized

Marriage Saver #2: The Love Languages

Melissa AtLee
Photo by Tyler Nix on Unsplash

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Have you heard about the Love Languages? Dr. Gary Chapman crystallized the concept in his iconic book The Five Love Languages. Seriously, every couple should own this book. It holds very important truths about how to love our spouses. My only regret is that it took us 10 years of marriage to find out about it!

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Marriage

Marriage saver #1: Walks with your spouse

Melissa AtLee
Photo by Sebastian Pichler on Unsplash

If there is one thing I have learned in 15 years of marriage, it is the importance of continuing to date your husband. As kids, careers, housework and all that jazz come into the picture, dating each other becomes something that must be prioritized, planned with intention, and treated as a non-negotiable.

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My favorite things, Uncategorized

My Favorite Things – a Ceili, Homeschooling news, Seth Godin and more

Melissa AtLee
Spring is in the air. Spring is in the air. Spring is in the air. If I say it enough times it shall be true. Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

This post contains affiliate links.

One thing that I love about living in Canada is how crazy the weather gets. You can truly experience all 4 seasons in one month. I kid you not, this past February we have experienced antarctic temperatures, ice storms, snow storms, freezing rain, thunderstorms, and a few days of balmy spring weather. While in many places talking about the weather constitutes inane small talk, here it is the one topic which joins us crazy Canadians in solidarity. We shall survive! While we anxiously await the arrival of spring, I invite you to go through my fave stuff of the month.

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Marriage, Uncategorized

Introducing a new series: Marriage Savers

Melissa AtLee

I love marriage. I love it on a personal level and as a societal institution. I wholeheartedly believe that happy, strong marriages are the foundation for a happy, strong society. It is through marriage that most of us are meant to find love, fulfillment and personal growth.

I also know that a great marriage, the one you really really want to have, takes hard work and dedication. A great marriage doesn’t just happen because a nice girl falls in love with a nice boy and they decide to embark on the ultimate journey together. It’s a great start, but it’s only the beginning. Then life happens, with all of its exciting and boring and in-between ups and downs. There are new jobs. Jobs lost. Money problems. New baby. Sleepless nights. Sickness. Relocations. Irrational toddlers. In-laws (or outlaws). Hormonal teenagers. New wrinkles and love handles. And that’s just the normal stuff.

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Kids, Uncategorized

Happy 12th birthday!

Melissa AtLee
Can this precious little one really be 12 today?

Today is a very special day – my firstborn son turns 12. The cliche is so true – time goes by fast. On this special occasion I find myself reminiscing back to that moment when I found out I was pregnant. We had struggled with infertility for 3.5 years, which is not a long time but long enough. I remember bursting into tears as soon as I saw that blue line appear. Then I fell to my knees, thanking God for giving me the miracle of new life.

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Education, Kids, Uncategorized

10 Things I Hate about Homeschooling

Melissa AtLee

Ok, maybe “hate” is too strong a verb. It’s more like “10 things I struggle with and would like to get better at”, but it’s not quite as catchy. The simple truth is, for all the amazing things that homeschooling brings to the table, it’s super hard. I have wanted to quit so many times that it’s become a bit of a (tiresome) joke for my husband. Some seasons I feel like it’s nothing but struggles. Struggling to get the kids going in the morning. To get them to start their school work. To focus on their schoolwork. To stop picking fights. To get their feet off the table and their fingers out of their noses. All the while, the dirty dishes are piling up, the fridge is empty and I don’t remember the last time I exercised.

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Family, Marriage

Love in Sadness

Melissa AtLee
Photo by Ashley Bean on Unsplash

This is a very personal post. Last summer I miscarried our 5th child. Baby would have been born right about this time, so in memory of him or her, I’m sharing the following post, written a few days after our loss.

Over the weekend I suffered a miscarriage in the 12th week of my pregnancy. It was one of the saddest experiences of our lives. This baby came into our lives unexpectedly and left us unexpectedly. Finding out that I was pregnant was a huge shock, and it took me a while to accept the news. But now that the baby has left us, there is pain, grief and a hole in our hearts. We hope and we pray with that one day we will meet this sweet baby in Heaven. But in the meanwhile, we mourn our loss.

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Education, Kids, My favorite things, Uncategorized

My Favorite Things – a Podcast for Parents of Boys, a Homeschooling Documentary, Poldark and more

Melissa AtLee
It’s been so cold that Niagara Falls has frozen over. How cool is that. Tara Walton/The Canadian Press/AP

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January in the northern hemisphere, especially if it gets arctic-level cold like it did last week, is the perfect month to hibernate – reading books, listening to podcasts, and bingeing on shows. In other words, January can be an introvert’s paradise. Count me in.

In no particular order, these have been my fave things this month:

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