"One day when you get little..."

This afternoon as we were eating lunch we had a family discussion around the table about fixing cars and how Daddy was teaching Joshua to fix brakes.

Hannah asked, "Daddy, will you teach me to fix cars?"

Scott assured her that when she gets a little bigger he'll teach her. Then Jonathan had the same question. And Scott told him that he'll teach him too.

Then we got to discussing how that when Jonathan is 13, Joshua will be 23.

We started imagining Jonathan calling Joshua up one day,"Hey, Joshua! Can you help me figure out this transmission?"

Joshua might reply,"Sure! I'll stop by right after work."

Then Scott turned it around and said, "I can even see Joshua calling Jonathan one day, and asking him for advice on building a tractor."

The kids found that was a bit of a jump for their imaginations. They were trying to imagine 4 year old Jonathan growing up and giving Joshua advice.

Joshua looked at Jonathan across the table and asked him,"So Jonathan, how would you fix a tractor?"

Jonathan just looked very seriously up at Joshua and with the most grown up air replied, "One day, when you get little, I'll show you how to fix tractors."

We all had a good laugh, even though Jonathan was quite serious.
I explained to the children that they all had their strengths and weaknesses, and that one day when they are older, that even the younger may have things they can teach their older siblings.

There is an interesting lesson that we can learn from Jonathan. Maybe Joshua would need to become figuratively little in order to learn from a brother that is 10 years his junior. It would require him to be humble enough to admit that he doesn't know something that his little brother knows.

Maybe that is part of what Jesus was talking about in Matthew 18:4. "Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven."

We need to be willing to admit that we don't know it all and turn to God for help.

Heavenly Father, help us all be little again.

Two Missing Teeth

Hannah lost her second tooth yesterday. Scott had bought each of the kids candy after karate class on Tuesday. Hannah bit into her candy necklace and her second tooth started to bleed. It was very loose. She was afraid to pull it that night, and I told her that it would be okay to wait until morning.

I had to leave early the next morning for a 3 hour glucose test. I couldn't eat or drink anything after midnight. I left before the kids were out of bed and Scott came home after his bus run to take care of them while I was gone.

I made it to my appointment on time. They took my blood and then gave me a red glucose drink. For those who have never had the glucose concoction imagine if you were to make kool-aide but added 3 to 5 times the amount of sugar than is called for on the package.

They tell you that you have 3 to 5 minutes to drink it. Now the trick is you can't throw it up or you have to reschedule. I used to have a harder time with it but now, I find I do best to just chug it down in about 1 minute. It helped that I was extremely thirsty and getting to drink anything was a relief.

Then I was sent to the waiting room to wait an hour. I tried to read a book during that hour but was so tired that I kept falling asleep. They called me back again and took my blood and sent me back in there to wait another hour.

The second hour, I gave up reading all together and used a stool that was in there to prop my feet on and just let myself doze. I didn't care what all the other women might think that came in. The nurse called me in and took the third blood sample.

I decided that I didn't want to sleep during the third hour so I played some solitaire on my tablet. I knew my time was coming when I heard the secretary ordering food for lunch. Finally they called me back for my last sample. Then they let me go.

First thing I wanted to do was eat. I went to a McDonald's and ordered a double quarter pounder value meal. It was good, but as I was eating it I felt extremely shaky. I finished eating and headed home, but I decided to stop at the next McDonald's for 2 apple pies.
One of those was supposed to have been for my sweet husband but something happened and it disappeared. I did make up for it by fixing dessert for supper.

When I got home, Hannah showed me how her tooth was missing. She told me that Daddy pulled it out with pliers. This is the first time that a tooth has been pulled by pliers in our house. I found it extremely funny and had to ask my husband about it. He said that the tooth was just dangling there and she assured him that she wanted him to pull it with the needle nose pliers so he rinsed them off and pulled the tooth right out.

I took the above picture of her with her 2 missing teeth tonight before she got ready for bed. Tonight, I got to join some other mothers for a Mom's Night Out. I enjoyed getting to visit with a few of the other Moms in our homeschool group.

It's getting late now and I should get some sleep. Scott and Hannah will be getting their new belts on Saturday. I'll be posting pictures of that in my next blog. Until next time have a good night's sleep. :-)

Count Your Blessings...

I kept planning to post about the karate belt testing this week, but am only getting that out today. Today after our normal Saturday karate class, we went home, ate lunch and then drove about an hour away to pick up the used van that we paid cash for.


I had to take this picture of what we do to stay debt free. Yes, we bought this used van with our eyes wide open. We knew it had problems and was being sold "as is". But my husband has researched this particular make and model and it shouldn't be too hard to maintain. However we need to at least get it home or to a brake shop. Whichever we can get the brakes to last long enough to get it to. We spent quite a few hours today working on this van in a parking lot less than a mile from where we bought it.

I see potential in this van and see it as a blessing that we were able to pay cash for it, plus have enough money to go to an auto parts store twice and go practically next door from the auto place and buy everyone $1 double cheeseburgers. :-) See I found 3 blessings right there.

Another blessing is that it wasn't raining while my husband was working on it, and we made it to a nice big parking lot that was pretty much empty. Two more blessings right there. That makes 5.

Anyway, you get the idea. :-) It can be hard to find blessings in certain circumstances but God's grace is sufficient. Scott mentioned to me once we were home, how that as he was showering to wash away the grease and dirt, he thought about how blessed we are and how that if we didn't have any problems then we wouldn't appreciate the good times as much.

We finally gave up for the night and left the van behind hoping it will be okay until Tomorrow afternoon. Then we're going to attempt bleeding the brakes again. If nothing else we'll try to find a good brake mechanic to fix it.

I better tell about belt testing now.

Saturday morning, a week ago, my husband, Scott, our daughter, Hannah, and our son Jonathan tested for their next level of belts in karate.

Jonathan is on the little kids' belt system and tested for an orange stripe that was added to his belt. He is really proud of that stripe.


Hannah tested for a green belt and did an excellent job.
She is happy because she will soon be matching me, Joshua, and Ruth.


Scott tested for a brown belt. He also did an excellent job. I didn't get as many pictures of him since I was mostly videoing his part.


Scott's reaching brown belt level is an amazing accomplishment. It not only shows how much hard work and dedication he put forth to achieve that level, but it also shows how long we've been living in this area. Scott has been pastoring the church we're at now for about 4 almost 5 years now. Time sure goes by fast.

We moved into the parsonage when Jonathan was a baby. And while here God has gave us Elijah our 5th blessing and we will soon be welcoming our 6th blessing. And I'm sure God will help us get the van in tip-top shape by that time.

Philippians 4:19 "But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus."

Vacation, Potty Training, Lost Tooth... What should I title this blog?

This has actually been a relaxing week despite the busy title. Scott went to a tech conference that lasted the whole week. I decided that taking a break from our normal schedule and visiting my parents would be a great way to help the week go by quickly. I called it an early Spring Break.

I mentioned that I would get a picture of the kids with their build-a-bears. I took this one before getting the kids to bed at my parents' cottage.

I got this picture of Joshua on his new skateboard at my Mema's house. He hadn't been able to ride it until Tuesday. So he was extremely happy to have the free time to ride on the good old oil roads of East Texas.

The kids also enjoyed playing with my cousin's children. It's nice being a close knit family. I had the opportunity to explain first cousins, second cousins, and third cousins to my kids. Hannah still thought it was confusing. :-)

Elijah started going "poo poo" in the potty this week. He has surprised us with his understanding of what he is supposed to be doing on the potty. We haven't gotten super serious with his training yet. We are just letting him try going when he wants to. Serious training will commence when we start using real underwear instead of disposable training pants.

Okay, only 6 minutes left to publish this blog this week. :-) Yes, I'm blogging late again. But let me share this picture of Hannah with a missing tooth.


She has been really proud of that tooth this week. I was impressed that she pulled it herself without a lot of squealing. She's growing up so fast.

A Short Summary of this Week

This week has gone by so fast! I only have one hour to write this blog before I miss posting this week. I only said that my goal this year was to post one blog a week. I didn't say which day. :-)



Monday, I decided to stay home and not go to a homeschool meeting that I could have gone to.

Tuesday, I got up early and took Scott to work so that the kids and I could go to my doctor's appointment that morning. Elisabeth's heart rate was good and the doctor told me that everything looked great on the ultrasound. I was glad to hear everything was fine.

After my doctor's appointment I took the kids to Walmart and bought a few groceries and other items we were needing for the week. Then we had karate class that evening.

Wednesday and Thursday were normal days. Scott, Hannah, and Jonathan will be testing for their next belt level a week from now. Hannah is pretty excited that she will be testing for a green belt which will be matching me, Ruth, and Joshua.

Friday, I took Scott to work again and then came home and after my mornings Bible reading I fell back asleep. It's time for my Glucose screening and I originally planned to get that done on Friday. It doesn't require an appointment since I am only taking the one hour screening. I decided to skip that appointment and after lunch the kids and I went to their Keepers of the Faith meeting. Then we got a tire replaced on the van.

Today, we had a large group of visitors in our karate class. We had a lot of fun. After we left class we went out to eat at our favorite restaurant. The picture above is Elijah enjoying his meal.

Once we finished eating we went to the mall. Scott told the kids that he would let them each buy something for their allowance this month. Ruth got a Build-a-Bear with clothes. Hannah and Jonathangot clothes for their build-a-bears that she had gotten in the mail this week. And Elijah got a build-a-bear puppy. Joshua got a new skateboard. I'll take pictures of them with their new toys tomorrow.

I could write a lot more but I only have about 15 minutes to make my deadline on this post. So I'll try to have a better post tomorrow. :-)

A Surprise Shower!!!

Today was a normal day. We have a regular routine we go through on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The kids and I try to make sure that we get everything done and get all dressed for karate class.

Then Scott gets home, we share some highlights of our day. Then we all get in the car and head to karate class.

We got there in time for the kids to get most of kids class. I helped Elijah put a floor puzzle together and then our Sense I announced that kids' class was going to end a little early today. I didn't think much about it. But after they did their regular closing ceremony, suddenly cake and punch was brought into the room. I wondered whose birthday it was and then found out it was a baby shower for our baby. :-) I was so surprised.



I took a few pictures and had Scott take a couple of pictures of me holding the little outfits for the baby. 



Our Karate Family gave us this cute Pink Gi for Elisabeth.

We didn't get a picture of the cake before it got passed around but I did get pictures of everyone enjoying it. :-)




Hannah was my partner during adult class and I informed her that she had a green mustache from the icing. Oddly enough she didn't seem to mind. :-)





And the other amazing thing was that Scott knew about it for a week or so and didn't even let out a hint about it. That really surprised me! :-)



There was only one sad part, we also found out that a really nice young man was moving. But the reason, I mention this is that our Sensei led our class in prayer for that young man and his family.

I love how family oriented our dojo is and how we all feel like one big family. I also like how our instructor is very open about her faith in Christ and isn't afraid to show it. She even appointed Scott as our dojo chaplain. :-) You don't see that very often in a traditional dojo!

I just want to share one more picture from tonight of Hannah demonstrating a partner stretch that our class did. The partner was to push their backs until they said to stop.



Hannah is pretty proud of how flexible she is. :-) She can do the splits and then lay flat on the floor without any effort.

This was a later blog post this week. I had been trying to decide what subject I wanted to talk about before the week was over. I didn't realize that a subject would spring up on me like this.

Next week there is a lot going on. I won't have to have a surprise to give me something to post about.

(1 Corinthians 10:31) "Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God."

Our Three Day Weekend

After such a busy week, it was nice to enjoy a fun filled weekend.

Saturday, we started the morning with a really good workout during karate class. Then that evening the girls and I enjoyed going out to a Mother/Daughter tea party with friends in our homeschool group.



The girls enjoyed wearing pretty dresses. We were able to bring our own tea cups and enjoyed having fancy tea.
There was a nice area set up where we could have our pictures taken. One of the mothers brought her camera and took our pictures. Afterward I took a picture of Ruth and Hannah all dressed up in the pretty accessories that were there for the girls to wear.




They were so sweet wanting to take a picture together. One of the older girls present mentioned that during next years tea party they will have a little sister to add to their picture.

After the tea party, I took them to Walmart and bought them some hairbands.

While we girls were gone Scott and our sons made home made pizzas and watched a movie. Scott told me that my brother would be proud that after the movie, Scott showed the boys some YouTube footage of Michael Jordan.

Sunday, we had a good time at church and enjoyed visiting with our members after services.

Today, Scott was off for Martin Luther King Jr. day. We took the kids to a skate park where they could enjoy trying out their new skooters and skateboards. Elijah and I took pictures and videos of Scott and the kids trying out all sorts of half pipes and ramps.



We had a really good day. This week should be a little less busy than last week. Tomorrow, we will be back to the normal routine. It's good to take a break every once in a while and enjoy some time together as a family.

It's ....the moment you've all been waiting for!

Mommy's Chubby Cheeks

 It's been a good day! We went to my ultrasound appointment.  I had warned Hannah, last night, that the baby might not be what she wanted.  She told me that she was going to pray real hard that God make the baby a girl.  I told her that God can't change the gender of the baby over night.  She said, "God can!" She was positive.  So I had to change my way of explaining it because she is right, God can do whatever he wants.  So I tried again.

"God knew when this baby was first conceived in my tummy what he wanted this baby to be. So whether this baby is a boy or a girl, God has already decided and we'll be happy with whatever God wants. 

Profile (Daddy's nose?)

Hannah told me, "Well, I'm still going to pray that it's a baby sister." 

She said that she likes having Ruth as a big sister but that she wants a little sister too.  Ruth isn't any fun to dress up and she's tired of dressing up her brothers who are now too old to dress in girly stuff, at least while their big brother is on guard.

I told her that the best thing to pray for now is that the baby will cooperate for us and let us see whether it is a boy or a girl.

Arms Crossed (I think some kind of karate move.)

We arrived at the doctor's office and checked in.  They called me back promptly and the ultrasound was underway.  The ultrasound tech said that everything was measuring well. However you see how the arms are crossed in this picture? Well, the legs were equally crossed.  After she got all the baby's other measurements, we tried to see if we could get the baby to uncross it's legs.

Well, the baby was very modest and it took me turning over from one side to another about 3 or 4 times to finally get the baby to show the label.  

Little Feet

I told Hannah that this baby knew that she wanted to know so badly that it was teasing her. 

One thing that I was amazed at is how much jiggling my belly can take.  Now here I've been worrying about bumpy roads and not jarring too much when exercising.  The ultrasound tech kept jiggling my side and I'm like so that's okay? :-) I guess the baby is pretty well padded.

Anyway, I know that's not what y'all are all waiting to hear. "So get on with it already, Stacie! Was Hannah disappointed? Is she in her room crying right now?"

Hmmm... Maybe I should save the rest of the story for the next blog. 

Okay, Okay! God knew that Hannah would be praying for a sister and decided that he would go ahead and give her what she wanted.  We are expecting a happy healthy baby girl. We are blessed with children that know to pray for the things that are heavy on their hearts.  He didn't have to give her a sister but he was gracious enough to grant her request.  In about 20 more weeks we will get to welcome Elisabeth Rose into our home.

On our way home, I passed the kids back some food and Hannah wanted to say the prayer. I told her to go ahead and she thanked God for letting us have a safe trip, for the food that we are going to eat today, and for letting her have her baby sister.

God is so good!

James 1:2-6 My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; (3) Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. (4) But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. (5) If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. (6) But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.

Busy, busy!

Last week was busy. Scott started back to work and the kids and I got back to our homeschool routine. Between Scott's car breaking down, us hitting a skunk on our way home from karate class, and then a long day on Friday between taking Scott to work, driving to my doctor's appointment, taking the kids to wal-mart and then standing for two hours at Keepers of the Faith, I was worn out by the time I got home.

Scott was such a dear to listen sympathetically to my day's frustrations. I know that all the work that I had on that one day is really nothing compared to the burden he bares daily to provide for me and our children. I am so blessed to have him!

Saturday, we had karate class that morning and afterwards we went to the grocery store and bought some groceries for this week.

Most of the groceries we bought were for the baby shower that I am giving for a church member that is also a friend in our homeschool group. I am hoping that I have a good attendance of the other mothers in our homeschool group as well. I have a tendency to go overboard on preparations and then I wind up very disappointed if no one comes.

This time I am trying to keep an open mind and have a backup plan if no one that was invited comes. I may do like the king in the Bible that calls people from the street to come to the banquet (check out Luke 14:16-24). Okay, maybe I won't go so far as to call strangers to eat with us. Maybe just call our children and husbands to join the party. I must say that is one advantage to having a large family, you always have party participants available.

Wednesday, I have an appointment for an ultrasound, where we hope to find out our baby's gender. The kids are hoping for a girl. Joshua and Ruth said that they wouldn't be disappointed if the baby did turn out to be a boy. Hannah however is determined that this baby has to be a girl. So for her sake, I'm glad that we are finding out early. That way she'll have time to adjust before the baby gets here.

Everyone seems to be curious about the names we've picked. If we have a boy, we plan to name him Joseph Harold. If the baby is a girl, we plan to name her Elisabeth Rose.

We have a pattern to naming our children. For their first names we choose a Bible name, and their middle names are all a family name or a slight variation thereof.

For instance Rose comes from one of Scott's grandmothers whose name was Rosa. The interesting part is that her full name was Rosa Elizabeth.

Even Joseph Harold has extra significance. Harold was not only my husband's grandfather's name, it is also the middle name of my childhood pastor that my father always called his father-in-the- ministry. His first name was Joseph, although he went by Harold.
We would call ours Joseph.

Well, I better quit blogging about my upcoming week and get busy living it. :-) I have a lot to do before I'm finished being ready for the shower. I better get busy.

The Beginning of 2012

Happy New Year! For my first post this year, I wanted to share some pictures of some of the things we did yesterday.



This first picture is Joshua and Ruth working on their computers. We found out about a really great website www.kahnacademy.org. It's a great resource for learning all sorts of subjects. It's free and the kids love learning with it because the lessons are interesting and they receive points and awards that we can keep track of.


Even though she doesn't look like it in this picture, Hannah really does like working in her workbook. The biggest realization she had with yesterday's lessons was that word-find puzzles really aren't as hard as she thought they were. She finished finding all the words today without any help.


And this is the best picture I could get of Jonathan. He loves to be goofy and make funny faces for the camera. I have a hard time getting a serious picture with him. I guess he makes up for Hannah always making serious faces. Now if I could get them to meet somewhere in the middle for pictures. :-)


And Elijah wouldn't stay still for a picture because of the flash, so I chose this picture of him from Christmas.
He spent most of our lesson time tackling Jonathan. Although Elijah did learn a major lesson yesterday.

I cooked pancakes for us to eat on our drive home from karate class. The kids were wanting to have some but I explained that they just had lunch and that I wanted to save the pancakes for later. Elijah kept asking and I told him a very infatic no. I was distracted for a few seconds typing something into my tablet when I looked up and saw that Elijah had stolen the big bowl of pancakes right from under my nose and was helping himself to them. I knew that I had to teach him real quick that what he did was wrong.

It's hard sometimes as a mother to be firm with your children, when they are young and cute. I don't like seeing my children cry, but I learned quite early on that if you allow wrong behavior when they are little, it only gets harder to teach them what is right when they are older. So to help myself teach my child, I imagine him doing the same crime as a teenager and I nip it in the bud while it is fresh on his mind and while he is still young enough to take me seriously.

He did pucker up and cry real tears of repentance because with his punishment, I explained in simple terms exactly what he did wrong. Then I removed the pancakes from his reach. I held him as he thought, in his young mind, about it. A little later he was showing me something he drew on a magna doodle and I smiled and really bragged on how good of a job he did. I could tell by how he approached me that he was making sure that he had been forgiven and that all was well between us.

Children learn so quickly at such a young age. That is why the Bible tells us to raise them up right while they are young.
This going to be a really good year of growth in our family.

This year will also be good in that we'll be getting to find out whether we are having a girl or a boy this month, the baby is due at the end of May, and my brother and his family will be visiting us while on furlough from France. We're going to finally get to have a family picture with my kids and our brand new baby, his 5 kids (one of whom I hand't met in person yet), and my sister's new baby will be in it.

I am so excited to see all the blessings unfold in 2012!

Proverbs 22:6 "Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it."

A Post to Test Adding Pictures

I'm just testing a new blogger app to see if I can make my posts prettier.
This picture is of the birthday gift that Hannah made for me.

This picture is Elijah climbing on the slide.

This picture is of my children waiting in a chair during my doctor's appointment. Who says 5 kids take up a lot of space?

This one is of my parents, my sister holding my new niece, and my brother-in-law on Christmas eve.


Okay this should be my last post for now. I'm determined to have blogging simplified while still being nice looking. :-) Thanks for baring with me while I experiment.

2011 in Retrospect

I looked back over the pictures of 2011 and am amazed at how much has happened over this past year. I was not the best at posting especially toward the end of this year. I gave the excuse that I was too busy living my blog to type about it. Now I am taking a break to catch up on 2011 and plan to get a fresh start in 2012 on blogging.

There were sad moments in 2011 as well as happy moments. Let me get the sad moments out of the way so that we can focus on the happy. The two main sad times were the passing of my grandfather James Taylor in January and the passing of my great uncle Trenton Jones in December of this past year. Both of those moments for our family even though we take joy in the knowledge that they are no longer in pain and we will get to see them again one day.

The funeral for my grandfather took place at the beginning of February. It was good to see family face to face and not just on Facebook. I enjoyed getting to visit with my second cousins whom I hadn't seen in a long while.

In March, we celebrated Elijah's first birthday and Hannah's 6th birthday. It's hard to believe that Elijah took his first steps by himself on his birthday. He not only can keep up with the rest of us now, he also can climb just about everything and seems to have no fear of heights. It shocked me one day when we were at the park to see him by himself at the top of a very tall slide smiling down at me.

In April, Hannah was saved. That seems like a long time ago, but she was Baptized in May. She is growing so fast spiritually that I have a hard time fathoming how all this growth can happen in just one year.

In June, I signed the 4 older children up for swimming lessons. That built their confidence in the water. I would like to get more lessons for them this next year as well. Also towards the end of June, Scott and I took a 3 week trip to Thailand where we enjoyed helping a missionary teach English classes in several of the schools there. We met so many wonderful people and got to learn so much from that trip. If you check out my June and July blog posts you'll see a lot of what we experienced on that trip.

Joshua turned 13 in June, and Ruth turned 11 in July. Then at the end of July, we had church camp. I taught the 3rd grade and Scott taught the High School and College aged class at camp. I also enjoyed leading the children's choir during the week.

In August, I threw a baby shower for my sister and her husband, whose first child, a sweet baby girl was born in September. She was my parent's 11th grand baby. Then shortly after her arrival, I called my sister to let her know that I needed my maternity clothes back.

We had to hurry to get the news out to all the family before it was spread across Facebook. Sorry, our family grapevine has precidence over Facebook. Then we announced it to the rest of the world on my blog and Facebook.

In September and October, I taught a recorder class in our local home school co-op. The kids each chose classes to take. Joshua took Creation Science and Teen Drama. Ruth took Stomp and Creation Science. Hannah took Texas History and Home Economics, where she got to do a lot of cooking. Jonathan was in the 4 and 5 year old class and Elijah was in the nursery.

At the beginning of November, we celebrated Jonathan's 4th birthday with a family camping trip with our homeschool group. I also found out that his favorite color is green. He wanted a green cake for his birthday. Oh, and when your 4 your 4 the whole month is your birthday. He has been growing so much and I am often entertained by some of his anecdotes. One time I heard Hannah hollering from the livingroom, "You can't fire me! I'm working!" When I went to find out what the problem was she told me, "Jonathan is pretending that the living room is his yard and I'm his worker but he keeps telling me that I'm fired and I'm still working!" She seemed to feel better about it when I reminded her of their ages.

Another time in the past month Jonathan was singing at the top of his voice while we were driving to the park, "I've got joy in the river, I've got joy in the river." It was to the tune of "I've got peace LIKE a river" but I was smiling so big that I couldn't bring myself to correct him.

One thing I never got around to blogging about was that Scott and I celebrated our 15th anniversary at the end of November. I chose to stay off my computer for that weekend. That was why I never got around to blogging about it. I was also having problems with loading pictures at that time.

Then December blew by somehow! My birthday is in December and fell during Scott's Christmas break from work. For my birthday, we ate cake balls for breakfast that I had made over the weekend. Hannah gave me the sweetest gift that she made herself with a little help from her older siblings. She even declared the gifts value when she told me, "...and that's my last dollar!" I had a brief thought of telling her that she didn't have to give me her last dollar but then I thought of the widow's mite and realized that I needed to let her give me this gift. It would later be returned to her in other ways. God loves a cheerful giver.  I then accepted her gift with a hug.

We then left around lunch time to fulfill my birthday wish of having pizza at Cici's on our way to visit my parents for the week.  We enjoyed a good variety of pizza. When the kids had eaten their fill of pizza Scott gave them each $2 to play games. I had such a good time just watching them.  It was a wonderful birthday. We then arrived that evening at my parents. We did some last minute Christmas shopping with the kids. Scott had each of the kids draw names and we took them in pairs to buy gifts for the name they drew.

My Mom and I had a day of birthday shopping. I think the part I enjoy most about going shopping with my mom is the quality time we get to spend together. I love quality time. 

One of the books that I read this year was "The Five Love Languages". I highly recommend this book. In it the author talks about the five basic love languages. I find that my biggest way to show that I love someone is to find a way to spend quality time with them. I try to pay attention to my children and the ways they each show their love as well. Some love hugs, others may like me to do something for them, some feel loved just by a gift that I might give them, and others love having one-on-one time where they can just spend time with me. 

My sister and her family also came to visit my parents and we had a fun time reminiscing and laughing over good times. We sorely missed my brother and his family, but we are all looking forward to sitting and having a great time with them when they come on furlough in June. It will be great getting to have another cousins with all the new arrivals in the family. The last picture we got is missing my brother's youngest baby and my sister's new baby and by the time my brother is down in June our new baby will be here.  So there will be 3 additions to the cousins picture we take whenever we can.

But we did get to talk to my brother on Skype on Christmas eve. Then Christmas day we enjoyed the services at my Dad's church. Then Christmas night we drove through a light show. The show was pretty and I got all sorts of Christmas songs stuck in my head after that.

The day after Christmas, we visited both my grandmothers. We really enjoyed our visits and decided to go back home Monday night in order to be home to get the trash out to be picked up on Tuesday morning. This week has been spent organizing the house and getting all the rooms cleaned. 

Today is the last day of this year and I don't plan to blog again until next year. :-)  Although I do plan to blog more in this coming new year. 

Have a happy New Year!!!

Christmas Eve

We enjoyed spending Christmas with my parents. My sister and her family came for a few days and we all decided to open presents a day early. We asked the older children if they minded and of course they loved the idea. :-) So we went ahead and let them open there Christmas Eve pajamas a night early.

My mom, Scott, and I stayed up 'til 3 a.m. wrapping, putting together, and organizing presents. Then we were awakened by our early-bird brother-in-law at around 7 or 8 with great desire to get the show on the road.

We tried to keep things pretty simple for the kids this Christmas. We got the oldest two skateboards, the next two skooters, and the youngest we gave a basketball goal. They all loved their gifts. We let each of the kids draw each others names and we took them to the store earlier in the week to buy gifts for the name they drew. The girls had drawn the boys names and the boys drew the girls names. They all did a good job picking out appropriate gifts for their siblings.

My sister's family gave us a tabletop game that the kids will enjoy.

My parents gave Scott a really huge knife. He says it makes him feel like a kid again. I bet he'll be sawing down a small tree with it before long. They also gave him a salsa mix which he will enjoy. I gave him a giant print preaching Bible, which he loves. He shouldn't have to get so close to his Bible when he is preaching now.  I also got him his first bifold wallet which is less bulky than his trifold.

My parents gave me a set of Tupperware plates which will help a lot with serving the kids. They tend to break glass products so I'm really happy with the Tupperware. It also brings me back to childhood and the plates we used to have.
I am looking forward to reading the new books they gave me. I love to read. Then there is the new calendars that both my mom and my sister gave me. I can hardly believe that the year is that close to an end again.

And my sweet husband, after a week of throwing out hints of what he got me, presented me with this new tablet which should remove all my excuses for not blogging as often.

This is my first post from my new blogger app. It may not be pretty yet, but I'll try to get all the bugs worked out. :-) 

Merry Christmas!!!

It's been too long
since I've blogged,  my procrastination in blogging can now change. :-)  My dear husband has given me a tablet for Christmas!

This picture was taken by me playing around with the camera feature on my new tablet. Elijah was helping me out. And this tablet has bluetooth so I will have it easy getting pictures off my phone. :-) Can you tell that I'm excited?

We are enjoying our visit with my parents. My sister and her husband brought their 3 month old daughter with them. I tried to get her first word to be "aunt", but was only able to get a smile and a few sweet coos from her.

We decided to go ahead and open our Christmas presents this morning so that the kids could have a little more time to play with their toys. Tonight my parents church had a really nice Christmas eve candlelight service. We sang Christmas songs and listened to Bible readings. During the singing, Elijah wanted to sing right along with everyone else. However he did not know all the songs so he picked out the words that he recognized and sang them over and over.

One of the songs he sang as loud as he could, "Baby star! Baby star!"

He did that with some of the other songs as well. He was really cute.

Since Scott and I stayed up late last night wrapping, we don't have anything more to wrap.

We have Sunday School and preaching tomorrow morning. Since I was up so late last night, and was awakened so early this morning,  I really need to go to bed.

This will definitely be a handy tool. I know I'll be able to blog a lot more often with my new tablet.  I'll show more pictures and tell more about our Christmas tomorrow.

"Every good and every perfect gift is from above and cometh down from the father of lights, with whom is no variableness neither shadow of turning."
  James 1:17

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Well, I'm trying really hard to post a picture from today, but for some reason Blogger isn't cooperating on the upload. Scott got me a really cool tablet for Christmas. So far I've been able to do most things on it. I am hopin

No Pictures!!!

Okay, I feel as if I owe some sort of an explanation for not blogging nearly enough.   It's not that we don't have enough going on.  And it's not that I don't have anymore deep thoughts to put on the computer.  No it's actually a sad excuse.  I haven't taken the pictures off my camera or phone and put them on my computer yet. 

Yes, I know, that is not a good excuse.  I could post without pictures and at least keep people up on everything going on in my mind.  But since I've been posting pictures on every blog it kind of feels like I'm missing something when I don't have any pictures to illustrate what I'm talking about. 

I will try to find the missing card reader and my missing battery charger for my camera and try to make it where I can get those pictures off my phone and camera easier.  

I know that a picture is suppose to be worth a thousand words, but if you think about it, the book is always better than the movie. So maybe a few posts without pictures will make my blog look better when the pictures start returning again.  :-) 

(Proverbs 25:11) A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver.

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!

Catching up...Back Home

Our kids piled up around me.

 I have a lot of catching up to do.  This summer has been so busy that I'm actually crazy enough to think that maybe things will slow down once we get our home school routine back in full force.

Our Kids posing in their "Kung Fu" pajamas

 We had one week back from Thailand before we had Church Camp. Then after Church Camp, I got so busy trying to get the house back in order.  Now this week, I'm focusing on getting the kids all set on their homeschool curriculum.  I hope to get them started on their lessons next week.  Of course, we've already gotten back to our karate classes and I've hopefully gotten the kids lined out on their chores for this next year. 

The pictures on this blog are all from the day we arrived at my parents house after our trip.  They were so excited to see us.  They all piled on the couch around me for a picture.  I had sure missed all their hugs. 

We had a good week at Church camp and I plan to post some of those pictures soon.  I just hadn't gotten them on my computer yet.  As we start our homeschool routine, I'll start posting pictures of the kids doing some of their activities.

Joshua playing on a Sawlu that we brought back from Thailand.

 We really enjoyed our trip to Thailand and would love to go back again if the Lord wants us to.  I still need to make that DVD of pictures and videos we took while there.  But maybe things will slow down... Okay, I can't keep waiting for things to slow down.  I may just have to do like I did with this blog and force a halt to whatever I'm in the middle of and go ahead and fix that DVD.

Elijah playing with a mortar and pestle from Thailand.

I'll even try to put it on my blog for everyone to see.  I'm not going to promise when. We plan to visit Mema and Mamaw (my grandmothers) this weekend since it is Scott's last Friday he will be off before the school year goes into full swing.  Then we'll be at the mercy of his schedule as to when we get to visit after that. I know he will be off a few days for Thanksgiving.

Jonathan holding his and Elijah's ratan balls used to play Takraw.

The rest of this year should be a productive one.  I'm hoping to add Music to my kids curriculum this year.

For Hannah and Jonathan, I plan to use some of the free homeschool resources that I used for Joshua and Ruth when they were the same age.  If you have younger children you should check out www.learningpage.com it has some really neat themes you can use for teaching and it covers reading, writing, math, science, and several other areas.  You'll just have to check it out for yourself.  Joshua and Ruth liked the murals we made under the Theme sheets.  Joshua and Ruth are beyond the worksheets now, but it will be perfect for Hannah and Jonathan.

Life is pretty busy around here, but I'll do my best to stop what I'm doing at least once a week to post another blog.  I do plan to post some pictures of the kids during homeschool activities.  And my next blog will have pictures from Church Camp.  So check back often or you can follow my blog and will it update you when I post a new blog.  :)

Now to leave you with a verse that has been on my mind for the past couple of days.   

Philippians 4:8 "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things."