Not Crazy...Blessed!

Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD: and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate. 

Joshua (13)

(Psalms 127:3-5)

Every one of my children are a blessing.  They each have added so much to our family.  When Scott and I first started off on our married journey, we thought we would have 3 children.  Then we had Joshua and we still told people that we wanted at least 3.  That was 13 years ago!

He has grown so much and become quite a young man.  He loves to cook and is becoming more and more responsible each day.  He is a great big brother and loves to play around with his younger siblings. I love watching him being followed around by his younger brothers. They look up to him as "the" big brother!

Ruth (11)

Then came my darling princess, Ruth. She was my baby. I used to ask her, "Will you always be my baby?" And she would reply with an enthusiastic, "Yes!" Of course the day finally came that she started telling me that she wasn't a baby but a big girl. And I had to agree. She was growing up.

The kids and I all call her the second mother, since she is so good at helping with her baby siblings. If I am unable to hold one of the kids she is always right there willing to help out.

Hannah (6)

God made us wait for Hannah.  I had wanted all our children to be close in age.  I prayed and prayed for God to give us another child.  He didn't answer that prayer until I gave up and gave Him room to take over my "ideal" family.  That was when we were blessed with Hannah.  She was our out going "live wire" as I always described her.  She never meets a stranger and has tons of energy to show off.

It was during the time I was expecting Hannah that I realized that I was going to leave the rest of our future children in God's hands.  I was content. If God only wanted us to have three, I would be happy.  If He chose to give us more, then I would be happy.

Jonathan (3)

   Then we were soon blessed with Jonathan. I was so glad that God found us worthy for another child. Joshua finally got the brother, he had been asking for.  Jonathan was my big baby.  He was 11 lb. 4 oz. at birth.  I still consider him my little giant. We can all picture him as a security guard or a police officer.

Before Jonathan turned one, we moved to our current home.  We celebrated his first birthday here.  I have pictures and videos of him crawling and walking in our living room. 

Scott and I both agree, we couldn't imagine life without any one of our children.  What if we had decided to stop at 3 then we wouldn't have had our Jonathan.  Life wouldn't be the same without his smile. 

Little did we know, that we would get to be in the same house with another baby.  With our first four we had moved to different houses as Scott changed pastorates.  We hadn't experienced having more than one baby to watch memories of in the same house.

Elijah (1 1/2)

Then came Elijah.  Who could resist his little personality?  He is so quick to learn things from his brothers and sisters.  He has such big eyes, although you can't see them in this picture. You can see his personality from this picture though.  He just loves to show off.  He will repeat anything you ask him to repeat.  He blows kisses, prefers tomatoes over ice cream.  How can you resist such a beautiful personality?

At one time, I had been concerned that my children would begin to be disgruntled about having more siblings.  However which each new sibling they start asking for another one.  We have no complaints with them. 

They are all taught to love and appreciate one another.  They all have different personalities.  We've had family discussions about how each one of us are different.  Understanding our differences helps us to get along better with one another.

I believe our constant prayer and devotionals as a family along with our family discussions around the table is what keeps our children loving each other. 

I am so blessed!  I am blessed also with a husband that agrees with me that we should have however many children the Lord gives us.  It is natural for a mother to want more children as her babies get older and start walking and talking.  I have heard many a mother who could no longer have children ask their husband if they could adopt as they see one of my little babies.  Why should I have to fight that natural urge for another child?

With that lengthy introduction, I am excited to announce that we are expecting our sixth little blessing in May.  It is too early yet to know if we are having a girl or a boy.  The majority of our children are rooting for a girl, so that the girls have a sister to dress up in all the princess dresses instead of dressing their little brothers up.  As for me I would love a little girl, but I would be just as thrilled with another little boy. 

God has been so good to me!  I am truly a very happy wife and mother!