Happy Independence Day!

Did you have a nice Fourth of July?

We started the day out by hearing some wonderful news: our dear friends were blessed during the night with the arrival of their sixth child - a healthy baby girl! Congratulations Mike and Cassidi!

We spent the afternoon at the park at the end of our road having a picnic and just playing. Our cold lunch of Dan’s fried chicken, my biscuits with peach jam, chips and peaches refreshed us as we sat in a sunny spot in the grass. As we ate together, we reviewed the reason that we celebrate this day. The park was empty except for the 5 of us - we could be as noisy (or as quiet) as we wanted! We had such a fun time just relaxing together.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Later on in the day, Dan took the girls out on a Daddy/daughter outing. It was a bicycle trip into town, which ended up including ice cream and playtime at another playground. What fun!

We read these words to the children today as we thought about the meaning of the day:

America

My country,’ tis of thee,
sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing;
land where my fathers died,
land of the pilgrims’ pride,
from every mountainside let freedom ring!

My native country, thee,
land of the noble free, thy name I love;
I love thy rocks and rills,
thy woods and templed hills;
my heart with rapture thrills, like that above.

Let music swell the breeze,
and ring from all the trees sweet freedom’s song;
let mortal tongues awake;
let all that breathe partake;
let rocks their silence break, the sound prolong.

Our fathers’ God, to Thee,
author of liberty, to Thee we sing;
long may our land be bright
with freedom’s holy light;
protect us by Thy might, great God, our King.

Text: Samuel F. Smith, 1808-1895

I hope that you had a restful and reflective Independence Day!

Rabbit food

 Our first batch of lettuce and chard

We weren’t able to start our lettuces very early this year, mainly because our garden was under water until about the middle of May. But now, we finally have some loose-leaf lettuce and swiss chard that’s mature enough to eat. We grew mascara, oak leaf and forellenschluss lettuces - all heirloom varieties from the Seed Savers Exchange. All three types are delicious! I defintely plan on growing more next year.

I’ve never grown lettuce before. Even though I grew up a “country girl”, it still seems strange to eat lettuce from the garden. To me, salad comes in a plastic bag, complete with the little shredded carrots. It’s already washed and ready to eat.

To eat the stuff right from the ground, however, seems so weird.  

I feel like a rabbit!

Journals

Do you keep a journal? I have kept a diary/journal since my 13th birthday, when my parents gave me this diary as a gift:

Since that day, I have filled over 20 diaries, journals and spiral-bound notebooks with my thoughts, delights, frustrations and woes. Every 2-3 years, I pull out a few random old journals and visit the person that I was 1 year ago, 6 years ago, or 15 years ago. Dan is always puzzled when I do this. He says that even if he had  kept a journal as a young person, there is no way that he would ever want to revisit the things he had said. He has no idea why I would want to go through my past. 

(..so excited that I forgot how to spell license!)
 

I do sometimes pull them out for purely nostalgic reasons. However, most of the time, I really just want to see what has changed. I see things that I used to view as important that are no longer important to me. I see wrong attitudes. I see prayers that have been answered. By looking over the sweeping arc of my life (so far), I can see in hindsight how God’s hand has guided me through some very difficult times.

In the pages, I see sorrow…

 

 

  I see joy…

I see questions…

I see stories unfold,
stories that started out so badly and ended with God being glorified…

I grew up in these pages - and to see it happen before my very eyes as I read through them is amazing. So many stories. So much heartache and so much happiness. I hope that these journals will help me when my own girls are teenagers and beyond - to help me remember how it felt to be at each stage of life so that I can empathize with them. I hope that someday, a loved one of mine can look back at my mistakes, my sins and my triumphs - and see God’s sustaining hand in my life through it all.

I laugh at some of the things that I said in the past - and I’m sure that when I’m an older woman I’ll laugh at the things I’ve said in entries from this past year. I don’t journal as much these days. I suppose it’s a combination of my life being so full now and also that I have Dan to confide in. Even so, the important times in my life still manage to find their way onto the lined pages.

A journal can be simple or profound, fancy or plain, lengthy or a few sentences. If you don’t have a journal, I encourage you to start one. I’m so glad that I did!

(A few of my many journals)

A note about life

It’s the beginning of another week. Dan is actually off of work for two weeks, so it’ll be a bit different around here. Where I am more of a to-do list type of person, he is much more laid back. Our styles and personalities will conflict if we allow them to, so it’s always a challenge the first few days to get used to each other being around. It sure is nice to be able to spend so much time together, though. (Not to mention that he brought his work laptop computer home, so I can blog and do my computer work here in family room where Jonathan can scoot around and play. He doesn’t have much fun when we’re stuck in the office together!)

As I was going about a day last week, I was thinking about how I got to this point in my life. After high school, I set off to pursue a degree that would leave me either a music therapist or a music professor at its conclusion. At the same time, I always had it in my mind that I would stay at home and raise a family if I ever got married. Don’t ask me how I thought these two paradigms would be able to be lived out simultaneously - I really didn’t think about it. I just thought that everyone was supposed to go to college!

Now I find myself living this life far away from music academia. I am probably kind of weird to most people - I live in the country, grow a garden and raise animals. I stay at home all day. I have more than 2 children and I homeschool them. We don’t watch television and do “strange” things for entertainment, such as birdwatching, reading, or going for walks. The list could go on…

The thing is, though, I don’t really feel weird. I am so enjoying the life that I am living at this point. I’m not advocating that everyone in the world lives the same life that I do, but I’m happy with where I’m at.

Obviously, whatever the lifestyle someone chooses (or finds themself in), there will be struggles. We don’t have struggles with getting everyone home at the same time to have dinner together because of various family members’ activities or getting children to daycare on time. We don’t have to argue about which TV program or movie to watch. 

We do, however, struggle with getting our garden to grow without pests destroying it. We struggle as we learn patience with one another through homeschooling. We struggle to deal lovingly with one another when we are tired and grumpy and would rather just tune out by watching TV. I get frustrated when I would just rather be alone to do what I want to do instead of taking care of arguing children - again.

My point is this: Although there are always the everyday struggles, I am so thankful to be right where I am at this particular point in time. Would I say the same thing if I were in a small apartment building in a bad part of town where my children were exposed to all sorts of violence? I would hope so. You see, joy is an amazing thing. It is possible to be joyful in any circumstance! Joy doesn’t mean that you think everything is perfect, because nothing will be perfect in this human lifetime. Sometimes it’s easy to look at someone else’s life and think that you would be happy if only your life was like theirs. I’ve done this too many times before. It only leads to less happiness on my own end.

A commenter on this blog once said that is sounded like I was “living a dream!” I felt kind of strange hearing that comment, because although I am thankful to be where I am now, I hope that she feels the same way about her life as well.

I realize that this post may be a bit “rambley”, but I just wanted to express how thankful I am to be where I am, but at the same time how “real” my life still is. Living life to the fullest and enjoying each day is something that we should all strive for, isn’t it?

[Note: Am I advocating that you should never try and better your situation? Of course not. We all have aspirations and dreams of things that we want to do. I don't think there's anything wrong with that, as long as we are able to have a joyful and content attitude along the way. ]

Let me share a few glimpses into our lives this past week:

Excitedly awaiting a new neice - just a few more weeks!

  

Looking down on the garden

 Evening roses

Restoration begins on the old ice house -
soon to be chicken house  

 

Enjoying the sunset at the end of a productive day

 

Without excuse

 ”For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities - His eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made,
so that men are without excuse.”

Romans 1:20 (NIV) 

During this past week, I have frequently stopped whatever I was doing outside to simply consider various parts of God’s creation. Although stopping to watch a group of insects in their tiny activities or smelling the different fragrances in the morning air are not found on my “to do” list, glorifying God certainly should be!

Have you marvelled lately at God’s eternal power and divine nature through studying His creation?

In the process of…

• Overhauling my recipe files
  It seems that many of the recipes that I’ve collected since we’ve been married are no longer applicable to the way I cook now. Many of the recipes have ingredients that I no longer like to use (like Cool Whip) or ”exotic” ingredients (like mango nectar) that I rarely purchase.  Don’t get me wrong - I love my fancy and delicious recipes!!! It’s just that I don’t have many recipes for basic cooking - the kind that I could do if I only wanted to use foods that I grew/raised myself. So, I’ve been putting away some recipes for special occassions/company and searching for new recipes.

 

• Going through the children’s clothing
  We have been SO blessed with people giving us their slightly used children’s clothing! We’ve hardly had to purchase any clothing since we had Abigail 5 years ago. It’s amazing, though, how much we have accumulated over those 5 years!! For some sizes, we have more clothes than we could use for triplets! I hate getting rid of clothing that’s in great shape, but at the same time, the boxes of clothes are taking over our storage space. I have entire Rubbermaid storage bins marked 0-3 months (girl), 3-6 months, 6-9 months, etc. The girls didn’t even use some of the clothes before they outgrew them. I’m trying to find the balance between having the wisdom to hang on to what we might need for future children and gluttony. Does anyone else have this problem? (Again, I admit, it’s a great problem to have! Too much!)

 

• Cataloging our books
  Call me a dork, but we’ve accumulated so many children’s books, educational books, biographies, gardening books, etc, etc, etc, that we can’t keep track of them all. I don’t plan on implementing a Dewey Decimal system (at least not yet :)), but I’m hoping that an Excel spreadsheet might help me out a bit.

 

• Planning for “real” school this fall
  This past year was full of learning in a very unstructured manner. Abigail has made great strides in reading and handwriting and we have read books, books and more books on a great variety of topics. However, Dan desires that I be more systematic and keep records of what I’m teaching once each child reaches what our state defines as “school age”.  I’d like to have things planned out in advance as much as possible for the next year so I don’t have to spend lots of time each weekend planning for the upcoming week.

 

• Learning about gardening
  Even though we had a vegetable garden last year, it was a very uneducated attempt. This year, Dan is really getting into the scientific aspect of growing things, from testing the pH of our soil, to what types of organic material to add to the soil for nutrient deficiencies, to different mulching techniques - so we’ve been learning alot! I planted some new types of foods this year, too. Nothing teaches you about how to grow a certain type of plant like actually growing one.

 

• Reading…
  John (Bible)
  The Big Book of Home Learning by Mary Pride
  Liberal Fasicm by Jonah Goldberg

What are you in the process of right now?

6 years ago today

Happy Anniversary to my
wonderful husband!

 

Scripture Memorization

Vida at Thankful Place has written an inspiring post on memorizing scripture. She gives a very good argument as to why this is vitally important to every Christian. I highly recommend that you visit her blog and read it!

Read the post here.

Her post has prompted me to get back to doing this more regularly. I had quite a few verses memorized for awhile, but then I fell out of my memorization habit due to some circumstances. Over time, I’ve forgotten many of the verses that I had committed to memory. Sigh. It is a discipline, that’s for sure - but an important one to keep working on.

There are many ways to memorize scripture and Vida covers lots of different ways to do it. I have what some call a photographic memory, so I memorize by how the scripture looks on paper. I usually write down the passage I want to memorize and put it somewhere where I’ll see it many times a day (such as above my sink). I read through it every time I pass that way, and soon I have it committed to memory.

I’ve found that one thing that really helps me is to study and understand what the general theme/topic of each book of the Bible is. I then have a framework within which I can place the scripture that I’m memorizing. If I don’t remember the book, chapter and verse number of the passage, I can usually at least guess the general area or book of the Bible from which it was taken.

How about you? Do you try and commit scripture to memory? How do you go about it?

Related post: Scripture Memorization for Young Children

Birthday girls

Happy birthday to my Abigail and Iliana, who celebrate their birthdays just a few weeks apart from one another.
I love you girls!

Iliana blows out her candles

 

 
Abigail can’t wait to eat her cake

 

I’m finally big enough to have my OWN chapstick!

 

Abigail *LOVES* her new “very own” umbrella

 

Iliana at 3

 

Abigail at 5

 

Sisters and best friends

 

Why I love garage sales

 

Garage sale find of the week:

Wooden bench for little ones to slip shoes on

The perfect size for the corner in the mudroom

$3.00

Living science

Using the scientific method with young children:

1. Observe and describe a phenomenon:

Mommy, look what I rescued from Pepper’s (the dog’s) mouth!

2. Ask a question:

Is it alive?

3. Construct a hypothesis:

If it is  alive, then when we put it down, it will probably walk away

4. Test with an experiment:

Put the turtle down in a safe place

Return a few minutes later and…. he’s gone!!

5. Draw a conclusion:

He must be alive after all!

Children’s Book Monday: Dinosaurs by Design

Dinosaurs by Design
By Dr. Duane Gish
Illustrated by Earl and Bonnie Snellenberger

If you have boys or girls interested in dinosaurs but are tired of wading through tons of evolutionary dogma each time you pick up a dinosaur book, then this is a great book for you. Dinosaurs by Design is a fascinating book about the world of dinosaurs from the perspective that they were like any other creature on this earth: designed and created by God for His glory.

This scientific book divides the dinosaurs into different categories such as ‘plated dinosaurs’, ‘duck-billed dinosaurs’ and ‘the terrible claws’, among others. The facts about each kind of dinosaur are very interesting. One of our favorite parts of each section is a map that shows where in the world the bones have been found and also a “to scale” drawing of how large each dinosaur is compared to a human being.

In addition to all the great facts and illustrations of each dinosaur, there are sections on how fossils form, how fossils are restored for museums, evolutionary fairy tales, Noah’s Flood, the Ice Age and much more.

We have enjoyed reading this book together as a family. School-aged dinosaur lovers will surely find this 88-page book to provide much food for the imagination and many things for which to glorify God.

(Note: I highly doubt that you will find this at your local library, but you can purchase it at Answers in Genesis or on Amazon)

Join us over at A Path Made Straight for children’s book reviews each Monday!

Happy reading!

Signs of summer?

 Warm afternoon treasures from our favorite field…

Daisies and strawberries fill garden hats

 

A small part of God’s creation to enjoy indoors

 

To do today: stir

On my to-do list today:

• Pot roast in crockpot for dinner
• weed and water garden
• clean bathrooms
• vacuum house
• make banana muffins
• make spice cake and frost it
• mend crib bumper and pajamas
• wash diapers
• practice reading with Abigail
• shop eBay for gift
• train dogs
• make biscuits
• make salad dressing
• pick flowers for table
• give all children baths/nails

Should be on my to do list today:

And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works (Hebrews 10:24)

One commentary says this about verse 24:

Let us diligently and attentively consider each other’s trials, difficulties, and weaknesses; feel for each other, and excite each other to an increase of love to God and man; and, as the proof of it, to be fruitful in good works.  The words “to the provocation”, are often taken in a good sense, and signify excitement, stirring up, to do any thing laudable, useful, honourable, or necessary. 

As I go about my day with the children and Dan, am I attentively considering their difficulties and weaknesses? Do I watchfully assess them as they live each day and look for opportunities to excite them toward good works, especially in an area where they are struggling? I can’t be too busy for this important task!

Edit: I completed my to-do list for the day, including the additional task of stirring up love and good works in my children! Thank you, Father, for Your help in doing so.

The Shiny Little House

I wish, how I wish, that I had a little house,
with a mat for the cat and a hole for the mouse,
and a clock going “tock” in the corner of the room,
and a kettle, and a cupboard, and a big birch broom. 

To school in the morning the children off would run 
and I’d give them a kiss and a penny and a bun.
But directly they had gone
from this little house of mine,
I’d clap my hands and snatch a cloth and
shine, shine,shine.

I’d shine all the knives, all the windows and the floors,
all the grates, all the plates,
all the handles on the doors,
every fork, every spoon, every lid and every tin,
till everything was shining like a new bright pin.

At night by the fire, when the children were in bed,
I’d sit and I’d knit, with a cap upon my head,
and the kettles, and the saucepans,
they would shine, shine, shine,
in this teeny little, cozy, little house of mine.

 Nancy M. Hayes

I remember reading this poem in a book that I had as a child. It was one of my favorites! The corresponding illustration showed a cute little living room complete with a fireplace. The woman sat nearby, knitting away. I imagined what it would be like to have my own home and family someday. Everything would be perfect, just like in the poem!

There is so much more to being a wife and mother than just cleaning the house, though, isn’t there? If only it were that easy! I really love my life at home and don’t desire to be anywhere else, but sometimes at the end of the day, I’m just plain “tuckered out”!

One thing that I’ve been thinking about lately is how I want to portray wifehood and motherhood to my own girls. I have a decision to make - do I go about my day as though I have a burden on my back, huffing and puffing at each disturbance that comes up against “my” schedule? Or do I go about my (crazy, busy, non-stop, disaster-averting, messy) day with a joyful attitude? Their main example of how their life may turn out if they choose to marry and bear children is ME! I want them to see how it can be a joyful life. But it has to start with me being joyful myself and sometimes I don’t feel joyful at the tasks at hand. That’s why I’ve been asking God for *joy* each morning as I begin my day.

Although my life may not be exactly as portrayed in that poem above, with God’s strength, I can still be joyful in it!