Church Camp

We did so much this past Summer. I only blogged on a few of things that we did. So much keeps happening that I seemed to have missed blogging about church camp.

Our church camp was the last full week of July. We enjoy renewing friendships each year as well as making new friends.

We arrived at camp on a Monday around 3:00 p.m.
We registered and paid our fee. At 4:00 p.m. we had a sponsors meeting. Scott, my husband was voted to fill in for the song leader who was absent this year due to health problems in the family. He did a really good job coming up with songs last minute.




I lost my voice during camp. It was just starting to leave me on Tuesday. I was able to teach and lead the children's choir. But by Wednesday my voice was gone completely. I really appreciated my brother helping me during the week. He taught my 2nd & 3rd grade class on Wednesday and helped me with the children's choir on Thursday. He was really a blessing!



The kids all had a lot of fun. Besides preaching and classes there was also recreation time. The kids played basketball, putt putt golf, swimming, and all sorts of fun activities.



The food in the cafeteria was good. I really liked the onion fried green beans.


If I had been feeling better I would have gotten in on more of the fun. I usually try to get more pictures as well.



There were 20 saved and 12 rededications.


I have gone to this same camp since I turned seven years old. I was saved on a Wednesday afternoon under the same pavilion that I taught from this year. I always enjoy giving my testimony to my class and pointing to the spot where I sat and repented of my sins when I was 10 years old. The Lord sure has been good to me with blessings beyond measure.

A New Body

We were having our Wednesday night Bible Study tonight at our home. We were learning about Gideon putting out the fleece. Somewhere in our discussion, Scott mentioned how that one day when we go to see Jesus that we'll have a new body.

Jonathan was intrigued by this. "Will I be a girl?" he asked.

"No, you will just have a new body. It won't feel any pain."

"Will I have brown skin, and have the sides of my head shaved?"

Okay, I'm sure you can guess which Rocky movie we watched last. Somehow Mr. T fascinated him. That was the kind of body he pictured himself having in heaven one day. The rest of the night he and Elijah went around making muscles and saying, "I pity a fool!"



1 Corinthians 15:51-58
Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,

In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.

So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.

O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?

The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law.

But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.

The Adventures of Parenthood

I'm going to stray a little from talking about our summer activities to share with you another adventurous day in the life of our family.

I woke up a little late Saturday morning, having gone to bed late the night before. We drive about an hour on Saturday mornings to go to our karate class, which doesn't leave us much time to dawdle. The kids fixed oatmeal for breakfast, everyone got dressed in our karate uniforms and we started heading out the door. Scott came running into the house as I was just about to go out asking me if he had any ants on him. The front passenger side door had ants all over it. It had been a few days since we had gone anywhere and the ants had found a dead frog on the top of the door and some packages of unopened crackers in between the front seats of the van.

Yes, you counted right there is an extra person in the back of the van in this picture. We didn't have time to evict the ants from the front of the van so Scott moved to the backseat.

It was strange not being able to talk to my husband while I was driving. I actually had to call him on his cell phone to tell him about the truck that played leap frog with us. I hate when a vehicle passes me while I'm passing the one in front of me. They stayed right on my tale while I was passing and barely gave me time to move over before passing me.

Later another car in oncoming traffic tried playing chicken with me as they came into my lane in order to pass someone in front of them. I had to slow down and move over onto the shoulder of the road but I missed them. I told my husband later that it was probably good that he didn't see that one.

We arrived safely to karate only a few minutes late. We had a great class! I'm trying to get back some of my flexibility that I lost while I was pregnant. It's coming back and I feel really good while exercising.


After class, we needed to go grocery shopping. We also needed to find our bank. Our GPS was failing us! It said the bank was in the Walmart parking lot. Scott ran into Walmart while I drove laps around. No bank. But a Walmart associate told him that Kroger had the bank. Our GPS put Kroger in the middle of an intersection.

I have a friend that I knew could help us out because I saw her post that milk was only $1.99 at Kroger on her Facebook wall just a few days ago. So Scott traded places with me and drove while I sent a text message to my friend. (The ants had dispersed at this point and my husband came back to the front seat.)My friend was very prompt to answer and told us exactly where it was. She is much nicer than a GPS.

We arrived at Kroger and all 8 of us got out and headed to entrance. We were greeted by fire fighters showing off their truck to children.
Each of our kids got a chance to sit in the truck.

Elijah wasn't too sure what he thought about it.

Actually Elijah was more interested in the giant chicken that also greeted us. If I were his size, I'd be a little concerned about the giant chicken too. I was proud of him though he didn't cry or holler and he did hesitantly touch the chicken when I told him he could. He was a bit nervous but he kept saying, "Hi, Chicken!"

The chicken passed out water, chicken samples, and a balloon to each of our kids. Scott and I don't know which is worse last week's experience with Buddy Bucks (I thought we would never leave HEB last week with all the kids wanting to play the Buddy Buck machine) or this week's helium balloons.

I knew this would be a test of our parental patience when Jonathan lost his balloon before we even entered the store. Imagine if you can, 5 children (and a baby) following their parents around the grocery store with 5 helium balloons. I felt like I was either dodging balloons or getting hit by them everywhere I turned. On top of all that the bank gave us packages of cookies and we let the kids eat their three cookies.

One of the employees said that they were having some sort of kid appreciation day. I'm not sure how well most parents appreciate the effects of the store's good intentions.

Elisabeth became hungry and Ruth wasn't feeling well, so the 3 of us found a nice sitting area. Ruth and I talked while I nursed Elisabeth. Yes, I breastfeed my babies. I used to feel stressed about finding a private place to breastfeed. That was in my earlier years. Now all I need is a place to sit down. I use a blanket or a nursing cover for privacy. (I need to blog on my take on breastfeeding sometime. There are so many different levels of opinion on that topic.)

I just finished feeding Elisabeth when Scott finished shopping with the other 4 children. We made sure all balloons were secure and that all the younger children held one of our older hands. Scott and I always seem to be doing a head count. We started to leave when Jonathan exclaimed that he wasn't buckled. Why was he not buckled? Because of the balloon!

Okay, I'll spare you the story of our ride home. We arrived home safe and sound. But can you guess whose balloon popped just a few seconds after we entered the house? Jonathan's.

As soon as I heard it pop, I commanded,"Don't cry!" Okay, I may not have come across as very sympathetic but I did tie his string to one of his stuffed animals as a leash.

I guess the Lord must have known that I needed a little more practice in patience. :-)

Romans 5:3 "And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience".

Family Reunion

I'm getting all my posts out of order but I'm just going to get caught up on everything we did this summer in the most logical order I can muster.


My brother, Jason, and his family all came back to America on furlough from his mission work in France. It has been a little over 2 years since they last visited. Three babies have been born during the time they were away. Sarah and I had never met Jason's youngest and he had not seen our youngest children.

This is a picture my Dad took at church camp of the three of us siblings holding the 3 children that had been born since Jason's last furlough.

We really enjoyed seeing my brother, his wife Angie and their 5 children. The first day we saw them this summer we adults expected some really big excited show when all the cousins got back together again but they all just said, "Hi!" and commenced to playing and talking like they had only been apart a short time.

This is a picture of all the cousins sitting on my parents couch.

We've had a tradition before my brother had gone to France of taking a picture of all the cousins together. Whenever we had a new child born it was time for a new picture. Elijah was just born the last picture we took. This time my sister has a child she was able to add to the group along with our niece that was born in France and Elisabeth that was just born a couple weeks before they arrived.

It was nice to find a day that we were all able to get together at my parents to take pictures and visit. The kids had an amazing time building memories with their cousins.

During the week at my parents we were able to enjoy a trip to the zoo and out of the 11 children present not one got lost even once.

I'm glad that we are getting to build memories with my brother's family.
It was nice to have them at church camp again this year. It made this camp extra special for us. I'll try to get a blog in about church camp this week as well.

Summer is almost to an end. It won't be long before I start posting about homeschool activities. I'll try to be caught up before then on my summer posts.

Joshua's and Ruth's Birthdays.

Well, I'm still behind on posting but I'm not going to quit. Hopefully I'll get myself back on track and post at least once a week again.

Joshua and Ruth both celebrated their birthdays this month. I should have posted much sooner but it's been a busy few weeks. So this is my catch up post for both of their Birthdays.



Joshua's birthday was June 27 but we had an early celebration with his cousins. My brother and his family came back to Texas on furlough from France. I made a homemade pinata and let Joshua paint and decorate it however he wanted. We spent that Friday night at my parents cottage with my parents, my brother, his wife, and their 5 children. It's amazing how little space can accommodate 6 adults and 11 children.

We had planned for the boys to spend the night in our tent but wound up with only three of them stayed out there all night. Saturday we visited my paternal grandmother, which we affectionately call Mamaw.


Mamaw lives in a nursing home. She always loves to see us when we visit. We took a couple of pictures while we were there.

Mamaw holding Elisabeth

After a nice visit with Mamaw, we visited my maternal grandmother, affectionately known as Mema (pronounced Me-maw).

Mema with her eldest great grandson and her youngest great grandson (my cousin's baby born a month before Elisabeth).

We actually took a family picture with Mema just before Elisabeth was born. Now we need to take another.

Ruth's birthday is 2 weeks after Joshua's. She had a good birthday as well.

Ruth's 12th Birthday cake.

Joshua went to a teen camp with the youth of my parents' church during the week of Ruth's birthday. Scott was still on vacation at the school so we celebrated her birthday all week. That Monday, I took all the girls antique shopping. We were looking specifically for tea cups. Both girls found a set they liked and a tea pot to go with it. We visited another store next door to the antique shop. Ruth and Hannah both found fancy umbrellas that they wanted. I'm not sure what possessed me to say, "yes" to buying them each a $27 umbrella but those umbrellas had better last them a lifetime. :-) That night we had tea in their new tea cups along with birthday cake.

A before picture of Ruth's first professional hair cut.

Tuesday was Ruth's actual Birthday. She wanted to go to a Build-A-Bear workshop. She wanted to buy her bear, Frosting, a husband. So we went to the Workshop where Ruth arranged her bear a marriage to a very kind and handsome bear she named Teddy. We bought both Teddy and Frosting a full wedding wardrobe.

Frosting and Teddy posing with Ruth's birthday tea set.

They have been happily married 13 days now.

We had karate class that same evening. There is a tradition in our karate dojo that for our birthdays we get to spar everyone in class that day. Our instructor calls it "iron man" sparring. It was nice getting to spar again after not being able to for a year. I enjoyed it and kept having to remind people that I'm not pregnant anymore. :-) I think Ruth might have hoped it would be a smaller class. She's not real fond of being in the spotlight. She did well though and at the end she said that she really liked her birthday.

Ruth in the process of her first "real" haircut.

Wednesday, we went to a Children's Museum. There were a lot of educational activities for the kids. I want to take the kids back again where they can have even more time to go to all the exhibits.

Jonathan, Elijah, and Hannah in one of the exhibits at the museum.

After the museum, we went and visited our friends at a sister church in our fellowship. We always enjoy visiting them when we are able. This was the first time they got to see Elisabeth.

Thursday, I took Ruth to get her first professional haircut. I was about her age when my mom took me for my first haircut. We have a friend that goes to our Church that had gotten a new job in a nearby town as a beautician. I was excited to get our hair done at her salon. We were also able to enjoy visiting with her. We both like our hair and plan to go back again.

Ruth with our friend, Karli, who gave us both great haircuts.

We had so much going on this Summer that I'm way behind on blogging. I still plan to catch up but not everything will be in order. However I'm going to try to get everything recorded on here before summer is over.

Ruth looks so grownup with her new hair.

I'll hopefully get another post done in a couple of days. So be sure to check back.

Vacation

We are enjoyed our vacation. We don't get to see Scott's family very often. The last time we visited Michigan Elijah was just a few months old. That year Scott had gone to Thailand and I took the kids to Michigan while he was gone. Last Summer he wanted me to go with him.

We left on our vacation Monday night June 25th just as the sun was setting. The air conditioner isn't working on our van, so we decided to take advantage of the sun being down. We planned to drive until we were too tired and then stop for the rest of the night. Scott was feeling good and awake and drove the whole night while I slept. Then as the sun rose, I took over driving while he slept.
Elijah is pretending to drive after one of our stops where he was the only child to wake up.
The kids slept fairly well in the van. We had to stop every 2 or 3 hours to feed Elisabeth.
We finally stopped that afternoon of the 26th at a hotel.

No, we decided not to stop at this hotel we saw. Although the kids did want to look inside it.


The hotel we did decide to stop at had an indoor swimming pool. The clerk gave us a real good price on two rooms. She has 5 biological children that are grown + 5 adopted children she is now raising. So she was very helpful. We got plenty of rest and were back on the road Wednesday afternoon, Joshua's 14th birthday. We stopped at a gas station and Scott bought Birthday Candy Bars. I'll need to do another blog later just for Joshua's birthday.

Elisabeth in the hotel.


Jonathan and Elijah were so cute looking up at me at one of gas station stops.

Joshua turned 14 on this trip.

Scott's mom, Judy, gets to hold Elisabeth for the first time. We gave Elisabeth the middle name Rose after Judy's mother, Rosa Elizabeth.

"The girls"- My in-laws' boxers.


We went to the beach of Lake Michigan and had a picnic with Grandma Judy.


Scott carried Elisabeth over to the beach area in the baby carrier we have. He said that it was a piece of cake. He could carry her like that for 9 months. :-) I've always teased him that I carried the baby for the first 9 months that he should get the next 9.

Judy enjoying some more grandma time holding Elisabeth while everyone ate.


Scott was showing his mom how the camera on my tablet works.

I wasn't able to post a blog during the time we were in Michigan since I didn't have a Wifi connection. This post is about the first half of our trip and this will have to make up for the post I missed. I'll post another one tomorrow about the second half of our trip to count as this week's post.

I will get caught up on all my posts soon. Then I'll be back on track posting once a week. Please check back during the next few days as I play catch up.

Week of Firsts...

This week Elisabeth turned 3 weeks old on Monday. She also had several firsts this week.

Sunday was Father's day and I took these two pictures of Scott holding her.



Tuesday, I went potty seat shopping with Elijah while Scott stayed home with the kids. That was the longest Elisabeth has gone without me around. I knew she was in good hands. She slept the whole time we were gone and woke up right as we pulled into the driveway.


Today she had her first real bath. I bathed her in the kitchen and we took some pictures. She seemed to enjoy her bath. She didn't cry at all and even smiled a time or two.


I laid a blanket on the kitchen table where I dried her off and put lotion on her. Then I dressed her, fed her, and then she was ready for her first outing with Daddy.


Scott took her to his work and showed her off to some of the secretaries and faculty that were there. She was all smiles for the camera. :-) And I got a bit of a break for a nice long shower.

Although, I did have to clean up a very dirty 2 year old when I got done. Potty training is a definite patience builder. Elijah's a very intelligent boy and very articulate so I hope he catches on quickly.

Tomorrow, we will get to visit with my brother and his family who are visiting from France. We will be having a birthday party for Joshua. So I'll be posting pictures of the rest of the kids in a few days.

Keep checking back. These next 2 months are full of activities.

First Two Weeks with "Lusbif"

Elisabeth is now 2 weeks old. I thought I would share some pictures of her first two weeks. They've been a busy two weeks. Time sure goes by fast when you're having fun.

This picture is of Elisabeth in her first Sunday dress.

We arrived home on Wednesday evening of the week she was born. Saturday we took her to a family reunion and also stopped by to visit my grandmother.

Mema and Elisabeth

We took her to church that Sunday. I even had her in my Sunday School class. Elisabeth and I underwent some testing that first Sunday by Elijah. It was quite a change for him going from being the baby to being a big boy. He tested to see if I would still hold him in my lap while holding Elisabeth. He even tried to play "Ride 'em Horsies" during the preaching which I had to quiet him down from. I think we managed to pass the "does Mommy still love me and will she still make behave?" test. He behaved so much better for me the second Sunday.

Elisabeth's first Sunday School class

Scott had to take a recertification class for driving the school bus during the week. Tuesday, I dressed Elisabeth up in her pink gi (karate uniform) and took the kids to karate class. I was told during my discharge from the hospital that I was not to diet nor exercise for a few weeks. I miss participating in karate class though. I'm looking forward to getting back at it.

Elisabeth in her karate uniform.

At Elisabeth's one week doctor's appointment, she had gained back some of her birth weight. She now weighs 9 lbs. After the doctor's appointment I got the kids burgers, picked up Scott's boots from being repaired, and took the kids to Elisabeth's first trip to Wal-mart. After all that I was worn out! So Thursday we stayed home.

Friday, Scott had the day off. I always enjoy spending a day with my sweet husband home. Elisabeth likes hearing him play different instruments for her. He used to play for her before she was born by putting the end of his viola or guitar against my belly so she could hear and feel the vibrations. She loves listening to him play now as well.

Our karate class giving a demonstration at HEB.

Last Saturday, after our normal class we took our children to HEB to help with a demonstration for a health fair the store was having. Scott and I decided to let the older 3 children participate while we watched along with the younger 3 children.

After the demonstration we ate at our favorite Chinese restaurant which is run by a Christian family from Burma. We love the atmosphere at their restaurant and how they play Christian hymns and have the 10 commandments displayed where most Chinese restaurants would have a Buddha.
Joshua and Ruth performing a Kata for the karate demonstration.

Hannah performing her Kata at HEB


After we ate, we went to a mall. Scott got an upgrade on his cell phone. It took a while for the cell phone associates to get what he needed so I attempted to walk around the mall and find something fun for the kids to do. We walked the entire mall looking for a directory that actually had a map. There were only 2 maps we found in the whole mall. There were no toy stores to look at. There was one ride for $3.50 per person but I didn't want to pay that for 5 kids. We did find a man that made balloon shapes for tips. I bought each of the kids balloons. Once we found our way back to the cell phone store, we found that they weren't quite done yet. So we found a large unoccupied corner of the mall for the kids to play. I did decide that day that I had to find some better way to keep up with our 2 year old and 4 year old. Elijah's little legs would get tired and whoever held his hand would wind up carrying him to keep up. And Jonathan would get loose from the hand holding his and he'd get distracted and not watch when we were ready to move on. We didn't lose him too badly but I decided we needed a wagon or stroller for him and Elijah. We found and ordered one. I'll post pictures of it in use when it arrives.

We arrived home to find our Sun Oven on the front porch. We were able to get it at a group price. It is a solar powered oven. We cooked hot dogs and baked potatoes in it on Sunday afternoon and it worked great. We decided that a solar powered oven might come in handy should we be faced with no electricity.

Our new Sun Oven

And I have to include Elisabeth's second Sunday outfit. She was making faces and yawning while her picture was being taken. Baby yawns are contagious too.

Elisabeth's Second Sunday

Now everyone probably has been curious about the title. Elijah calls Elisabeth "lusbif". He was saying, "Here, Lusbif!" Over and over while handing me toys and papers that he intended to be given to her.

They all love to hold her and Elijah has learned to be careful with her. He is so sweet and proud sitting on the couch with his baby sister on his lap.
Well, that basically sums up these past couple of weeks. The summer will be busy and I'll have a lot to post. Keep watching for more pictures.