My December Resolution

  I have been meaning to post this all month but, well, somehow the month is almost gone and I am just now getting to it!  I really don’t think I like how fast time is flying by these days.   The last part of November I, through a variety of circumstances, felt led to make some changes.  As I may have mentioned a time or two  ;o), the last 2+ years have been really difficult.  During these hard times I had gradually allowed myself to become more and more overwhelmed with the negative, to the point that I no longer could see God’s kindness and love for me. All I could see, truthfully all I looked for, was the negative and it was threatening to consume me.  So, at the beginning of December, I decided to make a point to daily look for evidence of God’s love and kindness towards me and share them with my e-mail group (I have a group of ladies that I e-mail with as a Bible reading accountability group, it has been amazing for me!).  I can’t say that life has been any easier since starting this exercise, but I can say that it has changed my perspective and has helped my attitude. I am once again able to see and remember that God loves me. The bad no longer seems quite as overwhelming and I no longer feel forgotten……  My only regret with this is that I haven’t written it down in one spot. Maybe my New Years resolution should be to start an actual journal just for these things. :o)

Smiley

    I can’t believe that my baby is 3 months old today!  Where has the time gone?  *sniff*  In honor of his 3month "birthday” I thought today would be a good day to do his picture post.  :o)

   Sadly, you will not see much of his smiles in these pics because he doesn’t smile when there is a big black box (camera) in front of Mommy’s face.  

 

  He is my littlest ray of sunshine

   My cuddler

 

   My little talker

  My special gift from God 

 

  Though our plans did not include a 4th child we are so VERY grateful that God’s plan for our family did. This little guy brings me such amazing joy!   He loves to be talked to, he loves to held and cuddled, he has the cutest smiles, coos, and giggles! He loves to sit in his Bumbo and stare at his toes, he thinks his tongue is fascinating, he likes his swing and his stroller, but does not care for tummy time! He adores his siblings and they him. I can’t even find words to describe how wonderful he is and how thankful I am that he is a part of our family!  He truly is a special gift of joy in a very difficult season in our lives.

My little man…..

Returning to our regular programming ;o), I bring you my little man.  It cracks me up just how much the name “little man” fits him!

He’s my Mr Cool (even with chocolate on his face!)

My little flatterer  (His little mouth looks funny in this pic because he had a biking accident in which it appeared he tried to knock all of his teeth out…. his lips were still a little swollen)

My little ham  ;o)

My sweetheart

  He tells me I am beautiful every day, he cuddles with me and likes to brush my hair, he loves to be my hero and my helper.  His time is seldom spent in “just play”, his play is almost entirely made up of practicing to “be like Daddy”.  He can’t wait to have a welder, a gun, a knife, and tools.  He likes to “fix” things and loves to play “chatch” with his football, basketball, “Winnie-uh-pooh” ball.  He loves big equipment and animals.  He loves music and musical instruments. He turns sticks into guitars and makes up songs. He is always busy, busy, busy!  He is the best big brother in the entire world! And, although there are times I think that he will shorten my life by many years with the things he attempts, I am so thankful that God chose me to be his Mom.  He brings me such joy and laughter.  

Free Photo cards!!!

Well, I am taking a little break from my photo series to share with you this AMAZING deal!  I was blog hopping and stumbled upon a blog post about a deal that Shutterfly is doing (50 free photo Christmas cards for bloggers!!!!)…. it was too good of a deal to pass up, so here I am blogging about it. :o)  I went to look at their selection (Holiday Cards and Christmas Photo Cards) and was amazed by the wonderful selection this year!  I am inspired and am already planning our outfits and looking for a place to take our 2010 family pic. I have one family pic but, as baby was only a couple weeks old when it was taken, I hope to get a more recent photo. Last year I forgot to order photo cards until it was too late, this year, thanks to the promo, that should not be a problem! I looked through the options and can’t choose a favorite, as there are too many great options, but here are 3 that I really liked! Wouldn’t this one be great with a family pic or a picture of each of the kids?  or what about this one or this one with both individual pics of the kids and a family picture? I am so excited!!!  I have had an account with Shutterfly for years and I love the quality of their  products. One item that I have ordered, and is hugely popular with it’s recipients, is their Calenders. I have done these for several years and, when I was unable to do them last year, there was quite the complaining! 

  If you want to get in on the fun too, click here!

B

    As promised, here is B’s post…..

She is my song bird

My artistic child

My cuddle bug

My princess

She is a girl of extremes, she is passionate, loving, and a fascinating combination of opposites.  She has a tender, compassionate heart, she is graceful and athletic. She loves all things “bling” and girly. She loves to help and to cuddle. She tends to be a very matter of fact, black and white, sort of girl. She loves her stuffed animals and looks forward to being a proficient reader.  Her way of viewing life and God is beautiful.  She too is a priceless jewel and I thank God for choosing me to be her Mom. God has used her to teach me much about His love and grace and to stretch me in more ways than I would have though possible!

J

 

I have decided to post a series of pictures of each of my sweet children.  I will, of course, start with my eldest. So, this post is dedicated to J.

She is my first born, 

 My sweet ray of sunshine,

 My cheerful helper,

 My little mother hen,

 

   She has provided us with 7 1/2 years of joy and I thank God for granting me the privilege of being her Mommy. She is loving, sweet, compassionate, has a great sense of humor, and an amazingly contagious laugh. She loves all things girly, prefers dresses to pants, wants to mother everything and everyone, loves to watch Anne of Green Gables and Sound of Music, but she also loves to help her Daddy butcher, and can’t wait to hunt. She is developing a love for reading and her favorite book is her Bible. Her love for God is inspiring. She is a priceless jewel.   

Photography and an apology

  Well, where did the time go?  My goal to put pics up for my Mom fell through…. She is now home and I didn’t get them up. *Sigh*  Sorry Mom!   Life has just been so crazy busy……. Now that you are home to babysit maybe I can get it done! lol  ;o)

  On another very different subject. Typing while holding a baby is not easy! lol  Actually what I was going to say was that those of you who have known me since youth should be very glad that my scanner/printer isn’t speaking with my computer right now!  In cleaning up a mess I stumbled upon my box of old photos…… Old polaroids, and old pics from my first little point and shoot that used, *gasp*, film!  ;o)  I have been unable to look through all of them as I have always had a love for photography and this resulted in a very large collection of pics.  The pics are soooo funny!  At least I can see some progress in my photography skills!  I am going to sort through them and toss a lot of them. I have entire rolls of film that were processed without 1 pic being in focus!!! These were some of my first attempts at macro photography with a camera that did not have macro capabilities.  So funny to look at and maybe funnier yet that I kept them. I am such a pack rat! Working on that character weakness though.  If I can ever get my scanner to work I may have to share some of them.  :o)  We all need a good laugh sometimes……

So, does anyone else go through photography phases? Sometimes I do so good and get lots of kids pics and then I go for too long without. I looked through my pics to get the photo posts up for Mom and found that I have hardly taken any pics of the older 3 the last few months. The last really good picture taking spree was in June and has been very sporadic since then.  Now I have missed the best weather and am not very good at indoor pics. Oh well, I will just have to keep pressing forward.

Inspired by this post, I am going to try and blog more often. No promises though, I often have good intentions that get lost in the craziness of life! 

Well, enough rambling for today…..

Just for grins………

  Although this is not as recent as I would like (it was taken about a month ago) it is our most recent family photo so I thought I would post it.  :o)

 

 

  I promised my Mom that I would *TRY* to post pics more often while she is on vacation. I would hate to have her suffer too badly from grandchild withdrawal while she is cruising! ;o)  I am sure she was hoping for more recent pics, but this will have to do for tonight! 

More Milestones…..

Well, more Milestones this past wk or so……  At his one month check up Smiley weighed in at 2lbs over his birth weight!!!  Seriously amazes me how fast he is growing!  He is such a doll, smiling and laughing without sound. SOOOO cute!  Sadly, he isn’t always smiley….. but I think we are getting some of that figured out. Here’s a pic of him smiling…. not the best pic but it is really hard to capture those smiles because I am so busy enjoying them and encouraging more! 

    The next milestone was our sweet B turning 6!!! Where has the time gone? My 2nd born 6? Impossible!  Our family grew in honor of her day.  For her birthday we got her a rabbit. The rabbit is a meat rabbit B named “Violet”  but, fear not, we shall not be eating her! ;o) Here is a few pics of them:

  

 

  B also went out for the annual trip to the salon and lunch date with her Grandma and Papa. Well, lunch was with both but the salon trip was not really Papa’s cup of tea, so he skipped that part. ;o)  She is now sporting a shorter hair style too which is just as cute as can be.  I *FINALLY* got pics today so here they are!

 

   It seems we have so many changes happening right now….  I suppose that is just how life is but I am having a hard time keeping track of it all! :o)  I am blaming it on sleep deprivation….. you know, it is amazing how much you can blame on that! ;o)

Milestones……

  So many posts never make it past my brain….. I somehow had forgotten how time intensive a new baby is and how tired one can get when you have one! :o)   The last 2 1/2 – 3 weeks have been full of milestones.  Celebrations….. all celebrated in very different ways.  I wanted to address each of them separately, I wanted to add pictures (but most of them are packed away in some unknown box and/or need to be scanned in and I currently can’t use my scanner/printer because *someone* lost the disc to reinstall it on her computer. That poor creature will remain nameless though. ;o) Obviously none of my big plans are happening! :oP Hopefully I will be able to get this post written and posted though. Better than nothing I guess…….  

  First off we sort of celebrated my 30th birthday….. *was going to add adorable baby pic of me here* I say sort of because I spent the majority of the day in labor :oP  I have to admit that through the months, as my birthday got closer, I went through a variety of emotions regarding this birthday.  At first I was bothered as 30 seemed old, over hill, scary, and a little depressing. Somehow changing that first # felt traumatic. Then I came to realize that I had bought into a worldy mind set on age (not anyone else’s age, just regarding mine). Our culture has an anti-biblical view of age. It worships youth and the “wisdom” of youth. Women pay copious amounts of money every year to try and maintain a youthful appearance, adults acting like teens is considered “cool”, it’s considered a compliment to say that someone doesn’t look like the mother of _ children, etc….. funny thing is this has always driven me nuts. Biblically I see the opposite….. age is respected, gray hair is an earned honor (not something to be hidden), and maturity is considered a good thing! After I thought it through I decided that I was rather excited about turning 30 and am really hoping that my 30s are WAY better than my 20s!  :o)

 

The day after my birthday we welcomed our 4th child into our home.  What blessing and joy!  A milestone and celebration in so many different ways….. We thought we were done after 3 kids but God had better plans and we are so grateful! He is such a smiley, sweet boy! When he looks into my eyes and smiles I totally melt! Truly a joy to have in our family and it is so neat to see how the kids all interact with him. The transition has been smooth and they all adore him so much!  I just can’t get over what a blessing he is! 

 

A couple weeks later we celebrated our 10th anniversary……. We celebrated with a nice dinner at a local restaurant we had never been to before. They actually had a couple different options on the menu that I could eat!!!  Thanks to my Mom we were able to go out without any kids which was fun. :o)  Our ten years together have been so amazing. We have experienced such joys and such sorrows, so many trials and triumphs.  Life has been full and, though I wouldn’t have chosen to go through most of what we have been trough, I am thankful for God’s loving hand on us at all times and the fact He gave me the most amazing man ever to go through it all with.  I would not have wanted to face life with anyone else by my side! It is fascinating to me to look back at who we were and who we have become.  

 

Then, on the 27th, we celebrated the second anniversary of Nathan’s home going. This year was quieter than last year…… We (Brian, the kids, and I) just drove to the cemetery and shared a few memories together. I was reminded of how much he loved his nieces and nephews and was saddened that he never got to hold his newest nephew….. nor will I get the congratulatory half hug, the request to take his picture with baby, or any of the other little traditions we had.  The kids still talk about him a lot and it keeps the memories fresh. I can’t believe that it has been 2 years already and that the girls remember him so well. 

 

  I hope this post isn’t too disjointed and that it makes sense…… I have only managed to get a few sentences in at a time so it has taken me over 2 wks to write this!  :oP   I may have to edit later but for now I am going to post this just to get it done! lol….  We have more changes happening which will need their own post, hopefully it won’t take as long to get it written!  ;o)

Soon enough?

  Well, I actually had a couple minutes today and was able to get the pics from the camera to the computer! So here is the promised pic of J’s haircut and a few bonus ones of her special find from yesterday.

 

Her little friend, who she caught all by herself. She was so proud!  :o)

  

  Now, to see if I can get a couple more minutes finish my other post…. Over a week in progress is a bit much! ;o)

Random updates

Well, I have been working on a post for a week and still haven't finished! :oP  My time is just so limited and my brain cells even more so! :oD  This little note is to tell you of the recent happenings that aren't covered in the post that is *still* in progress and to make sure that you all know we are still alive!
  First off, today was our first official day of school! It was great...... I love our curriculum! We aren't dong all of our subjects yet but should be up to full speed soon..... well if baby cooperates and lets me get a little more sleep it will be soon!  *yawn*
  This weekend was rather traumatic for me as I cut my eldest's hair....... When wet her hair went to her waist!!! Now it is (when dry) just at her shoulders.  It turned out super cute and will be much easier to care for but I have to admit that I LOVED her long hair. I just couldn't keep up caring for it right now. She is excited. I took a pic and will try and get it on the comp and uploaded soon. (Soon being a relative term that means sometime in the future, hopefully before her hair grows back to it's previous length ;o)
   There was one more thing but the aforementioned brain problem is rearing it's ugly head....... Maybe I will remember later :oP  

A little peek…….

  Here is our newest little man….. This first pic is shortly after he was born

Poor little guy has a bit of a black eye from his entrance into the world  :o(

I love this pic! He looks so much older than 3 days though…..

 

His adorable hand….. I just ♥ baby hands!   :o)

  Hoping to get a pic of all 4 kids soon and will post it too. They are such a good looking crew! And yes, I’m sure I am not at all biased  ;oD

He's here!!!

 After a completely different experience than my other 3 births, baby #4 has arrived!  He weighed in at a whopping 8lbs 4oz and is 20 1/2 in long. We are all madly in love!  :o)  Will try to do pics after we have had a chance to recover........

A little update

  I have not been in the mood for posting pics, updating my blog, or really much of anything lately. My due date was on Sunday and I am still HUGELY pregnant. I never got this big with any of my others……. My head knows all the “right responses” to this but that is as far as it goes. I am VERY tired of being pregnant!!!   Much as there is a lot about pregnancy that I loveand will miss, there is also a lot that I don’t love and am ready to be done with.  Truth be told, I would have been happy to have this baby 3wks ago!!!  To make it worse I am teased frequently with false alarms…… nights of no sleep because of contractions, only to have them stop when all hope for sleep is past! :oP   Oh well, though I have my doubts on the validity of these statements, I am told frequently that no one has ever been pregnant forever……….. my first thought is always “Yeah, well there is a first time for everything!”  ;o)

  On the housing front, we will not be moving for a couple months. Some friends are staying at our house and using their wonderful skills to help us finish all those mundane little detail that would probably never get done otherwise! :o) It will be so nice when they/we are done with it!  I just love the stuff they are doing and can’t believe how much nicer the house is now than it used to be!!! If it only had a larger play area for kids it would be just about perfect! :o) We will be staying with my folks until our friends no longer need our house. The kids are glad because they LOVE, LOVE, LOVE living with Papa and Grandma.  I am thinking that Papa and Grandma will be happy to have some peace and quiet restored to their lives once we move out.  ;o)  They have been so very gracious and generous to let us stay here for so long. We will never be able to repay them for all they have done for us. I just LOVE that we have such a great relationship with them and that we have been allowed this special with them. 

   O.k., so my little update got rather long and it is way past this tired mamas bed time so I am will sign off. Hopefully I will be able to update soon with a little baby info! :o)  Unless of course I end up being the exception!  ;o)

Feelings versus Fact

  I have been a part of a morning e-mail accountability group for about 6wks.  We have a daily e-mail that goes around the group and we each share what we read in God’s word, how it spoke to us, and prayer requests. There is a bit of chit-chat too :o)  This has been soooo good for me. Knowing that I have accountability from these sweet ladies makes it easier for me to put aside other things and make time for my Bible. Before it was, sadly, one of the first things to get moved until a later time and, thus, often didn’t happen.  All this to say that through His Word God has really spoken to me lately. I am taking time to read and really think over what I read….. not just speed read and feel good because I got my reading in.  Last week (Thurs. I think?) I read in Mark chapter 4 about Jesus calming the storm.  I could so empathize with the apostles, I have been in that position so many times!  I was writing to my group that I felt like it was a direct challenge to grow in my faith through our current circumstances, not to let the storms scare me, to have faith that He won’t let me drown regardless of how hopeless things seem.  THAT VERY DAY I was hit by storm after storm, phone calls and e-mails full of bad news, wave after wave “swamping my boat”.  I sadly did not pass the test. I found myself crying out “Lord, don’t you care?” like the apostles, wondering why He was sleeping through all of this, but instead of Him stopping my storms I just felt rebuked for my lack of faith under trial.  Then I found myself angry with God. I felt like He had abandoned me, I felt alone and in danger from the wiles of man, I felt unloved and forsaken. I, sadly, allowed myself to wallow in these feelings and didn’t read or take part in my group the rest of the week.  I prayed, I cried, I poured out my troubles to him but still felt overlooked in the grand scheme of things. Sunday morning while in the shower I started thinking (now you Mom’s will understand that shower’s are the best places to do deep thinking because it is often your only uninterrupted moments – if you’re lucky! ;o)  and I think the Holy Spirit really spoke to me.  Essentially it boiled down to one of my pet peeves….. I had fallen into the very thing that drives me nuts about certain “Christian” groups, I had let my feelings take precedence over fact!  Not just for a fleeting moment, not for a day, but for 3 whole days I had wallowed in my own arrogant “wisdom”, relying on my feelings. Though I am ashamed of myself I am thankful for what I learned. I *felt* abandoned and forsaken yet God promises in His Word NEVER to leave me or forsake me, I *felt* unloved but He continually reiterates His love for me throughout His Word,  I *felt* like God was sleeping and yet He is a God who never slumbers, I *felt* afraid of what others would/could do to me and yet God says not to be afraid because with Him on my side what can they do to me? I relied on my feelings and yet God says that the heart is deceitful and wicked.  My feelings don’t mean diddlysquat, they vary and shift constantly while God promises to never change. I need to spend more time in His Word getting to know Him better so that when these trials come up, as they inevitably will, I will not let my feelings get in the way of fact. God’s Word is true, it is fact, it never changes! It is the only trustworthy thing there is and I need to utilize it more in my walk.  Though I know there will be more trials and I will not always handle them as I should, I am thankful that He has seen fit to walk me through and speak to me, to show me His love in a new way and to help me grow in Him. What an awesome God we serve!     

Forced Sabbatical?

 

   It appears that my blog life must remain quiet for awhile…… We are in the depths of getting ready to move. I hate moving! :oP   Because we were only going to be here a month (that was 9 months ago!) we didn’t take the time to sort or purge as we packed. We had a BIG time crunch and so everything got tossed in tubs. Fast forward to now, said tubs were fairly brittle and a lot of our stuff was exposed to moisture as it sat in my folks garage. I am in the midst of going through box by box and tossing everything with mold/mildew, purging our belongings to try and bring some simplicity to our lives, and washing EVERYTHING fabric that has been stored. It all STINKS! :oP   To complicate matters my children are in *LOVE* with everything that has been packed away and so almost every decision gets a subtle guilt trip. *Sigh*  I have no idea where they get their packrat tendencies! <rolling eyes>  I am trying to be ruthless in my purging but am not sure that I am succeeding. I am making progress though and still avoiding pre-term labor and bed rest!  I am hoping that by pacing myself I can keep my contractions to a minimum and get moved before baby. Still not happy with the new housing situation but am working on submission to God’s will and trying not to hope that He will do a last minute miracle and provide us with some room for the kids to play lest I set my heart on it and get disappointed! ;o)   Once we have moved I am not sure when/if we will have internet :o( or how long it will take to get settled. Anyhow, I could be gone for awhile but it shouldn’t be forever so, my faithful few readers, don’t give up on me! :o)

  I have some amazing pics to post of the kids but am not sure when that will happen…….. Maybe I can sneak it in before the move?  We’ll see

More kids

Well, these aren’t the pics from this weekend, these are still May pics! I thought I should post them before I get to June pics ;o)  and I haven’t gotten June’s pics off of my camera yet!  :oP  Maybe tonight?  haha

 

Here is my lovely J, complete with her “Holly wood smile”. She is definitely in the posing phase!

 

 

Here is my beautiful B and, though she is in the posing phase too, I love how this one turned out!

Here is my handsome little man!  Shadows were a bugger in this photo but over-all I am pleased.  It shows such a different look than the last pic I posted of him…….

And, for J’s pleasure, here is our much loved Milo. Isn’t he cute?!?!?!

The highlights of our week

This week has been an interesting one……. Right now everyone is sleeping but me. I wish I were but I just ate and well, with baby taking up so much room in there, I just can’t lay down after eating. :o(   We have had lots of family fun this week. We went to the beach one eve and it was amazing!  I was so tired afterwards I thought I would drop but we lived through it. Sadly I had to make the hard choice to leave my camera in the car. I wanted new beach pics of the kids but last time I took it to the beach is when it started acting up. Hard as I try to protect it from blowing sand I am not sure I am fully able to and I don’t want a repeat of of camera probs now that my warranty is expired!  The kids each found “perfect” walking sticks, which came home with us, and the girls names theirs. ;o) They love to name things!

  We spent several hours yesterday at a neighbors because my sweet hubby had agreed to mow the property. We were not able to finish but we had a lot of fun while there. Kids made forts, climbed “mountains”, explored nooks and crannies, had a picnic, rode with Daddy on the lawn mower, etc….  I, for the first time in my almost 30yrs of life, mowed a yard!!! It was a rider so I can’t get too big headed about it, but it was fun! :o) I also got, what just might be, the worst sun burn of my life. :oP  I forgot that my skin has not seen the light of day in forever and my shoulders are now a nice bright lobster red and have a few little blisters, and my nose is just a few shades lighter. :o)    I took oodles of pics so hopefully will have a couple good ones to post.  It was hard to get good pics of the kids because I mostly saw them running in the distance. :o)  We may go back today and have a picnic dinner and try to finish mowing. Not sure yet…… but if we do I am definitely taking sunscreen!!! 

Interesting thoughts...... (renamed post)

   Today I stumbled upon this quote by Dave Hunt that I thought was interesting. It is a different perspective than the popular one that I usually hear touted, so I thought I would share :o)   Nothing like a little food for thought! ;o)

The subject of social and political activism is a difficult and controversial one among Christians who truly want to do the Lord’s will; and I do not suggest that those who disagree with me desire to obey the Lord any less than I do.
The Roman Empire was not a democracy and therefore its citizens did not have the opportunities to exercise a Christian influence in it which we have today in the United States. That would not, however, have prevented Christ and the Apostles from actively working toward improved morality and social justice. That they faced the wrath of the government and even death did not deter them from preaching the gospel, which was vigorously opposed by both religious and political leaders, so it would hardly have inhibited them from at least social activism—yet they never engaged in it. Furthermore, there are Bible examples of those who had the opportunity to exercise great moral influence over whole societies (Noah, Joseph, Naaman, Daniel, et al.), yet the Bible contains no hint that they even attempted to do so. That fact weighs heavily upon me.
I desire to be obedient to God’s Word. I cannot escape the fact that I find nothing in Scripture to support social and political activism on the part of the church. I’m not trying to argue, but ask sincerely that those who disagree explain why Christ said explicitly that He did not pray for the world (Jn 17:9); why He never addressed the evils of the Roman Empire or of King Herod but confined Himself to critiquing and correcting the Jewish religious leaders and His followers or would-be followers; why the Epistles are intended to correct only the church and Christians, but never involve any rebuke of the world or any instruction to believers to work for moral improvement of the world around them?
We have great detail in Acts concerning the activities of Paul, but never do we find him engaging in social action. Surely the fact that the Roman Empire was not a democracy would not have prevented him from organizing Christians to work for improved morals and justice in their cities and neighborhoods.
Yet we find none of this. That fact, again, weighs heavily upon me. Of even greater concern is the fact that today’s church leaders who have dedicated themselves to opposing the immorality in secular society have so little to say in opposition to apostasy and rampant false doctrine in the church.

 

More kids pics and random news

  I fear I have been neglecting my blog.  I think about blogging often but just can’t decide what to blog about…..  I have more pics to put up but my current struggle with discontentment has seeped over into my bloggy thoughts and so I just don’t want to put anything up. :oP   Sad, but true.  So today I have decided to post pics of the kids from May. 

Here is my beautiful J looking so grown up:

My beautiful B, full of laughter and fun:

  

And my handsome Little Man, full of mischief and cuddles:

I apologize for the funky angle on Isaiah’s pic. Every time I tried to get down on his level he would come running forward and all I could get were his nose hairs, I thought a funny angled pic was better than that! ;o)

 

For randomness’ sake, some of you know that I have, ahem, *a few* food allergies/intolerances. Anyhow we have been on the hunt for a more varied selection of proteins for me. We now eat Lamb, Cod, Salmon, Buffalo, and Bison meats as well as sheep cheese on a regular basis (along with Beef), We have tried Rabbit and, once we find a good source, will eat that regularly. Tonight, thanks to my SIL A, we are trying goat. We are hoping to be able to get set up to where we can raise our own rabbits and goats for our meat but that may be awhile!

In other randomness Sunday marked the big 30 for us….. no not years (yet….)! Weeks!   I am not ready to be in the countdown stage of pregnancy!  Well, I am from a health perspective but NOT from a life perspective.  I so want to know where we will be living and be getting a home ready to welcome this new life into. I am not good at waiting for these kinds of details and am terrified of them coming last minute. I am a planner…….

Today was/is the first nice day in forever and the kids are actually in shorts!  Loving the sun! That vit D does wonders for all of us! :o)

Anyhow, I guess that’s about all that’s going on here….. not that anyone noticed the lack of updates and random personal info! lol

Cool Giveaway!

 

  The Modest Mom blog is having an awesome giveaway!!!   They are giving away a DVD set on The Charlotte Mason Theory of education! It looks great……. Here is the link: Charlotte Mason Giveaway

Check it out!  :o)

Flowers from my Mothers day walk

 

  Here are a few flowers from my walk…..

Well, 3 of the 4 are considered weeds by most, but I am not like most ;o)

I used to know what this one was, but can’t remember now. It’s pretty though and tiny! :o)

 

 

One of Dad’s tulips:

 

And this little flower is SUPER tiny! The whole group of buds is no bigger than a dime. I haven’t been able to think of a comparison for the actual blossoms…….

 

Enlarged like this they are a lot larger than life!

   My favorite flowers to try and capture are the tiny ones that most people never even notice, often though they have more detail and beauty that the big showy one. I love how God put beauty in the tiniest of creation, just waiting for us to slow down and notice His creativity and attention to detail.  :o)

Ice

So, as I mentioned before, it was VERY cold when we went to the zoo. The downside was that *we* got really cold and that many of the animals were not out where we could see them….. The upside was that we got to see neat icicles, drink hot cider afterwards, and the enjoy the warm rooms that housed certain exhibits more than we otherwise would have!  So, as promised, I am posting a few ice pics. Once I have these posted I think I will start on more recent pics….. I have almost 400 on my camera that NEED to make it to the comp to be sorted and then some of them posted.   I promise not to bore you with all 400 :o)

Without further ado, here is the ice: 

 

Through a fence: 

Interesting article

I realize that 2 posts in one day is a bit shocking coming from me but I read an article a couple days ago that I wanted to share…….. I just thought is was well done and sends the focus of arguments on social hot buttons and other peripheral things back where it belongs: The authority of Scripture. What does Gods Word say?  Are we basing our ideas and arguments on man’s ideas or Gods’ Word. 

Hope you enjoy this article as much as I did:  Answers

Kids at the zoo

  Well, I thought I had a ton of good kid pics but, on sorting them, I find that I have a bunch of B that are good and very few of the other 2. Funny because normally B is the hardest to get good pics of. :o)  I think the difference was that at the zoo, where we met my SIL A with her 3 kids and nephew, J was busy running ahead with her cousin, and LM was socializing with the kids his age, and B felt rather left out so stuck pretty close to me.  So, in an effort at fairness ;o), I am posting 1 of each and a family ( – me) pic……

J – It was very warm in this building so we were all happy to relax in there and warm up for awhile. It was soooo cold outside when we went!

B – LOVE this pic of my girl!!!

LM – He wanted to ride this lioness :o) He wasn’t as worried as this he looks, mostly unhappy because we didn’t have time to ride tight then

Family – I was so pleased with how this one turned out!!!   I think it is just such a fun pic and love how they are lined up……. Makes me want to go again!!!