Tuesday, April 29, 2008

So far this week...

  1. I have left my house and gotten OFF the camp 4 times in 36 hours!!!!
  2. The children have tested for 6 hours.
  3. I have spent those same 6 hours in a gym talking to other home school moms and watching Joel and the non testing children play.
  4. I have cooked two really great breakfast in hopes that my children would be able to think better with protein in their systems.
  5. I went on one of the best dates with my husband that I can remember. What did we do? We went shopping for food! He needed this food, to be able to cook for team members that are here at the camp this week. The date was just very special to me. He spontaneously invited me into his world for a couple of hours and I loved it!!! We were relaxed without the children and we were together. I don't know about you, but planned dates can be VERY pressured and down right not enjoyable!!! I LOVE that our children are old enough to stay home by themselves for a couple of hours at a time. Now Jeff and I can leave on the spur of the moment and not have to plan for a babysitter!! I can just taste the freedom that we are going to have in the next couple of years!!!!!
  6. On this special date, we were RIGHT behind a car crash!! It involved four cars at an intersection, a run away driver, three or four Police cars with Police jumping out of their cars to chase the run away, and two fire trucks. I didn't totally see the whole thing, because....I CLOSED MY EYES! I do have though, what I remember, playing over and over again in my mind. It all happened SO quickly! All but the fire trucks, happened in less than a minute or two! It was like something that you see on COPS! I was shaking like a leaf when we left the accident! No one got seriously hurt. It was a four way stop. The "runaway kid" started the whole thing. He plowed into the back of a stopped car, flew up in the air.....my eyes were closed for what happened next, when I opened them again he was plowing sideways into the car in front of us. Jeff said that the kid hit a car in the middle of the intersection which is why he was going sideways. We were far enough back that we were not involved....Praise the Lord!! We did not stay around to talk to the police, we had five children home alone and we hadn't even gone shopping yet!!! We were totally sure that there were enough eye witnesses with just the drivers involved, they didn't need us sticking around. I stayed up to watch the news last night, but they never mentioned the crash. I was disappointed, but glad, because that meant that no one got seriously hurt!!
  7. I have known that I really NEED to get out of my house more, but these past 36 hours have just confirmed it to me. I don't want to spend the gas money to leave, so we stay home WAY TOO MUCH! I need interaction with people and so do my children!! I am going to commit this to prayer and pray that the Lord would show me specific places that we should go this Fall and Winter, just to get out! I need to make it a priority!!!

Monday, April 28, 2008

Good point!

Emily and I were "discussing" something that had happened earlier this morning. We kept stating our way of what happened. Jeff very nicely stepped into our "conversation" and said, 'Okay ladies you are both on the same page and it is time to stop "talking"." Emily and I just sort of laughed and thought...Same page? Are you kidding me? At that point Amy made a very wise observation.....Yeah, they are on the same page, but they are reading different parts!



Have you ever thought of it that way?

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Someday I will understand

Tonight I was at Meijer buying some great sale items. They had their sale of buy 10 items for $10.00 and get the 11th free going on. On the list of items for $10.00 was Ragu Spaghetti Sauce. At that price, it is cheaper than the Aldi's brand that we usually buy. I was loading up on sauce, when an older lady came and asked what the price was. I so excitedly told her ALL about the sale and how much each jar would cost, if she got 11! At this point, she SO sweetly reached out and touched my arm. With a twinkle in her eye, she said, "Honey, if I bought 11 jars of sauce it would last me a life time! It's just my husband and I." We both laughed and then she asked me how many children I have? I told her that my husband and I have five children. She then said something like, "Now you Honey....need 11 jars!"
Someday the children will be grown and gone. My grocery bill will be SO much more manageable and food will last in my house, but until then.....I will stock up on ALL the sale items I can get my hands on!!! Oh and I will enjoy my children while they are still here!

I started this blog about 16 months ago with the sole purpose of being totally open and honest about our home and what God is doing in my life. I wanted to keep friends and family up to date with what the children are doing and show lots of pictures of them. I have kept true to my plan and I love the community of blog friends that I have made in the process. I hope that you enjoy your time here. If you would like to leave a comment and let me know that you were here, I would LOVE it!!!

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

My exercise program




All these hills are right outside my house. Joel must think that I don't walk up and down them enough. He has come up with a great workout plan for me! I let him go outside to play in front of the house where there are no hills!! He runs down a hill and won't come back up when I call him. I have to go down the hill and CARRY him back up!! Joel weighs almost 40 pounds and he is very heavy for me!! This great workout plan is doing a real number on my legs and my lungs! You should hear me breathing when I get back home. I have to wait a minute or two to discipline him, because I am so out of breath!! I think that his plan is working though. My legs hurt just sitting here typing this post! By the time he learns that I mean business and stops going down the hill without someone to watch him, I will be in pretty good shape!! Well maybe not, but I will be better off than I am today!!

Monday, April 21, 2008

The joys of chores

We have consistently been doing chores for a long time now. Each of the four older children have specific chores that are assigned to them.

  • Lauren- dishes
  • Emily- vacuuming/ folding laundry
  • Daniel- trash/ folding laundry
  • Amy- shake out rugs/ clean bathroom sinks and counters/ put away dishes

Things have gotten pretty messy around the house. The children have not been doing their chores diligently. I love to have my house clean, but I am not a drill Sergent. I will let the kids go out and play before certain chores are done and then.......they never get done. I have prayed for a a new way to do chores so that they would have fun and get the work done! Last week I found a great idea in a magazine. Today was our first day to implement the new plan.......and I am loving it!!!

Here is the plan: Write each chore on a craft stick/ or a piece of paper. Put them in a cup. Put a blank or two in there also!! Make sure that there is an even number for all people involved. The children get to "draw"out what chores they are going to do that day!! At our house I put chores in for me to do too! The children were SO excited that I was "doing chores" with them. I just put some of my normal daily things on the list of chores and now I get some variety too. It was very fun for all involved and they got their chores done in record time!!

Do you have any other ideas to share with us? Please leave a comment!! I will post about the ideas, if......you give me enough good ones!!

Our new nephew!!!

I am SO excited to be able to introduce you to my new nephew. Technically I can't really introduce you, because I have yet to meet him.....but I can show you a picture of this little cutie!! His name is Cameron and he was adopted from Ethiopia. Jimmy and Lori (my brother-in-law and sister-in-law) just got back with Cameron Saturday night. Cameron and his new family are spending lots of time together bonding with each other. In every picture I have seen, Cameron has the BIGGEST smile!! He is a very happy little guy!!

I have heard that Cameron is not only happy, but full of energy!! I am so excited that Lori finally got a child that has SOME energy!! I have been jealous of her for years! You see, it all started almost 14 years ago. Austin is just two months older than my Lauren, and those two children are as different as night and day. Austin practically slept the first five years of his life. He napped ALL afternoon and then slept 12 or so hours a night!! Lauren on the other hand didn't learn to like sleep until she turned about 12!! She hated to take naps and woke us ALL up early every morning. Ten years after having Austin, Lori gave birth to yet.....another sleeper! Bradley is just like Austin when it comes to sleeping! I on the other hand gave birth to yet....... another baby that had NO idea why on Earth naps were so important. Joel didn't take one good nap until he turned 11 months old!! Now he sleeps, but still not as much as Bradley does. I am just happy that God finally saw the need for making things a little more even between Lori and I!! Thank you God!!

Friday, April 18, 2008

I have been tagged!!

I would never had known this month that I had been tagged, but Tyler commented on my last post to let me know. I am so excited...I love to be tagged. Thanks Tyler for making my day!!

What was I doing 10 years ago....
Diapers, diapers, and more diapers!! I only had three children at the time, but they were very young!! Lauren was 3, Emily was 1, and Daniel was 6 months old. I think that I basically was just surviving my days. I so remember that time being very tough for me. I was a VERY angry mom and I was not content with anything. YUCK! I just don't even like remembering those days. Let's move on to something much more fun.

Five things on my to do list for today....
1. Get up at 6:00 and spend time with the Lord. (check)
2. Do school with the children. (check)
3. Make pizza for supper. (check)
4. Sweep and scrub the floor.
5. Clean out fridge.
Well, at least I got the important ones done! HAHA

Five snacks that I enjoy....
1. Chocolate chips and peanuts
2. Baked chips
3. Fruit
4. Ice cream
5. Pretzels

Five things that I would do if I were a billionaire...
1. I would make staff housing here at the camp SOOOO awesome!!
2. Go on many missionary trips with the family.
3. Travel the USA in a brand new motor home....for pure enjoyment! Stop whenever we want, stay where ever we want, and eat what ever we want. We would have so much fun together!
4. Open up several orphanages.
5. I would save millions and give away several hundred millions. The giving away of the money would be so totally incredible!!!

Five bad habits.....
1. Eating when I am stressed.
2. Staying up WAY to late at night.
3. Being disorganized.
4. Procrastination!!!
5. Assuming things without all the facts.

Five places that I have lived....
1. Gloversville, New York
2. Naples, Florida
3. Bradenton, Florida
4. Buchanan, Michigan
5. Many many other places all over America, but I only lived in each place for about three weeks.

Five jobs that I have had...
1. I was a putt-putt golf cashier. I took the money and then handed over the club and ball.
2. I was a nanny for 5 boys.
3. I taught Happiness Club (4 year olds thru 1st grade) while traveling with Life Action Ministries.
4. Wife
5. Mother, cook, and teacher

Wow, that was fun. I hope that you enjoyed getting to know more about me.

Now I am tagging...
Karen Sutton
Peggy
Lisa

Thursday, April 17, 2008

How am I doing?

I am STILL working to lose those last ten pounds! I gain a pound, lose it again, gain a half pound, lose a whole pound, gain a pound, lose that last half pound again. There just doesn't seem to be any reasoning with this whole diet thing. I have essentially weighed about the same for the past month, but with all the gaining and losing I have done.......technically I have lost about 5 pounds. Does that make any sense to you?

I have been staying away from most Internet things, except for email and my blogs. It is going well, but I REALLY miss reading about what everyone is doing. I can't wait until May to be able to play catch up with all my friend's blogs. During this month away, I was supposed to be spending most of my time in the Bible. I haven't done too well at that. If I am not on the Internet, I seem to find something else to distract me! I have been in it more than before, but not as much as I had planned! My plan was to be reading it all throughout my day...in front of the children. I so want them to hunger and thirst for God's Word. I need to be that example for them.

God has been teaching me this week to think positive about people and to stop assuming the worst. I don't know how many times I have gotten half the information and yet totally assumed I knew the whole situation. Wouldn't it have been wonderful to be Christ on this Earth and NEVER assume anything!! He just KNEW all the facts!!

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Cookie Fun

We made cookies the other day. Our old stove did not have a window for the children to look into, but our new stove does! I think that the children had just as much fun watching the cookies bake as they did putting frosting on them.



We did not frost them alone. We had some friends over for dinner and the children decorated our dessert. We did this down at the lodge, because there just was not enough room in my house for everybody! There were a total of 11 children decorating at one time. It was so much fun.

Monday, April 14, 2008

Some Monday morning humor!!

This email was sent to me today. I thought maybe you all need a good laugh as much as I did!

Replacement Windows

Last year I replaced all the windows in my house with that expensive double-pane energy efficient kind, and today, I got a call from the contractor who installed them. He was complaining that the work had been completed a whole year ago and I still hadn't paid for them.

Helllooooo? Just because I'm blonde doesn't mean that I am automatically stupid. So, I told him just what his fast talking sales guy had told me last year, that in ONE YEAR these windows would pay for themselves!

Helllooooo? It's been a year, I told him.

There was only silence at the other end of the line, so I finally just hung up. He never called back. Guess I won that argument.

I bet he felt like an idiot.

I so love this logic!! Wouldn't it be great, if it really did work like this!!

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Photo shoot

I love taking pictures of the children. Tonight I got several fun shots of Amy. I hope that you enjoy them at least half as much as I do!





Just something funny

We have this program called CYBERsitter installed on our computer. It is to protect the family from getting onto websites that they shouldn't be looking at. Apparently it has some unwanted features that we didn't know about. It deletes certain words off of my posts. Here are the words that it has chosen to delete on me so far......girl, pumpkin, and .
Hello! I am so not smart!! It is probably going to delete them again on this post. Well, let's just see what it does.

Yeap, it did delete my last word. I will spell it backwards for you....etah! When I used it, I was talking about my feelings for the cold weather.
If any of you notice in any of my posts a missing word, please let me know. I will try to fix it!

Saturday, April 12, 2008

My new "baby"

I am so excited about what God gave to me this week! God not only gave me a wonderful deal on a brand new stove, but He also gave us the money to pay for it. Last month, a family in this ministry felt led of the Lord to give us a financial gift! Jeff gave me permission to buy a new stove at that time. I have been looking, but just never felt right about any of them until.....last Wednesday night. I was shopping at Sears with Jenny, one of my friends. While there, I went to look at electric coil stoves, because I have always been afraid of the glass top ones. As we were shopping we noticed two brand new stoves on clearance and an additional 10% off that price. I was very interested, because of the price drop. I asked about the stoves and found out that they were both glass tops. I immediately said, "No, thank you." and walked away. If I had not been with Jenny, I would not have even considered one of those stoves, but she has had a glass top for over seven years now and REALLY loves it! She set my mind at ease and I bought a $600.00 glass top stove for less than I would have paid for a low end coil stove!!! Thank you Jesus. I love my new stove!!






PS- Why on clearance? The tag said, "Opened container." As far as I can tell, absolutely nothing is wrong with the stove.....just the box that it came in had been opened at the top. I am so glad that I waited for the RIGHT stove.


A couple of weeks ago, I gave you a list of my favorite blogs. The author of One Project Closer wrote to me today to let me know that he has changed his address. It is now oneprojectcloser.com. Apparently someone recently tried to link to him through this blog. So whoever you are, this correction is for you! I hope that you enjoy his site!



This years soccer season has officially started today! Emily, Daniel, and Amy all had games today....in the freezing cold rain sometimes sleet!! I was dressed in long johns and a pair of pants, a turtle neck, a long sleeve shirt and a T-shirt, two pair of socks, a fleece jacket and my coat that I wear in the winter, gloves and last, but not least....a hat. I also wrapped a water proof blanket around me. I can't stand the cold!!What did some of the players wear? No joke....shorts and their jersey!! All in all today really wasn't that bad, but I don't care to repeat it anytime soon! All three won their games. Daniel and Amy both made a goal, which I am sure that you will soon hear about on their blog. Emily did not make any goals, but that child is awesome to watch. She really hustles and usually passes it to someone else so that they can make the goal.

Thursday, April 10, 2008

Just checking in!

Okay, this will be short. I am just checking in with ya all, because it has been SO long since my last post! I am still living and everything is going great.
Some highlights from the week....

  1. Jeff and I went away by ourselves last night! We had a great time together just relaxing and having fun.
  2. I went on a "date"with a friend tonight. We went shopping and had some wonderful fellowship!! I love my husband DEARLY, but talking with another women is just really nice sometimes.
  3. Fitting back into some of my size 10 pants. Not all of them, but who's counting?
  4. Did an Easter egg hunt today with some of the kids on the camp. It was a lot of fun!!! Yes, I know that Easter is over, that is why I got such an awesome deal on the candy filled eggs!! My kids just don't seem to mind when they have an egg hunt. They love for me to hide things and for them to be able to find it!
  5. It is so cold here again that we have a fire going in the wood burning stove. It feels very cozy and warm here at the computer.
  6. I am reading an AWESOME book on anger!! I think that the title is The Heart of Anger. I want so much to just quote most of the book on here. God is teaching me so much about myself and my children.

That is it for now. I will try to write again real soon!!

Thursday, April 3, 2008

Thank you

  • Ya all are AWESOME!!!! Thank you SO much for commenting on the kids blog!! I just found the comments tonight and I can't wait to show them to the kids in the morning!!! They are going to be so excited!! I so appreciate the wisdom that you left for Lauren. It is nice for her to hear those things from someone other than MOM! I also love the question for Amy. That will really help her with her next post.


  • We sent two packages to soldiers in Kuwait on Friday......at least one package arrived already!! Thank you USPS. You guys rock!!


  • Thank you to my wonderful nephew Austin.


He came to my door today and asked if Joel could come out and play with him and his younger brother Bradley. I jumped at the chance to get Joel outside while the rest of us did school. It was a huge blessing to me!! They were out there for over an hour and a half having a great time playing. I had some free moments so I snuck outside and took some pictures of the fun.


Bradley is the one on the left, next is Joel, and then Hayden Sutton. Austin played with all three of them. He actually played with another child, but he wasn't around for the picture!! Way to go Austin!! I can't thank you enough for doing that for me!!




  • Next I am just SO thankful for my new camera that my mom bought me this Christmas. It takes great pictures for a small camera. Here is a fun picture I got of Hayden today! Isn't he the cutest little guy?



  • Thank you to my exercising buddies. We have been getting up at 6:00 am and meeting in one of the buildings on the camp. We exercise to a walking/jogging video. I the exercising part, but I LOVE the fellowship!!! We have so much fun together!



  • Thank you lastly to my Lord for getting a hold of my heart this morning. I have been addicted to reading blogs. I spend hours just going from link to link to more links. I have wasted more time in the last two weeks than I care to admit. As of this morning, I have given up for the month of April reading any blog other than the three that I am a part of. I have set other boundaries, but I won't bore you with all the details. Let's just say that God's Word is going to be my main focus this month!!

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

A new blog

The children have started their own blog. I will STRESS in this post and probably lots of times in the future.....the opinions posted in the children's blog does not necessarily reflect the opinion's of their parents!! With that stated you may now go read what Lauren wrote today. Please leave her a comment! She would be thrilled.