Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving dinner at my sister's-in-law house with her growing family.  We were joined by a missionary couple with young children and my mother-in-law and her significant other.  I made honey roasted sweet potatoes and a squash and couscous mix I adapted from a recipe I found in an old Everyday magazine.

Thanksgiving has got to be the only time I had tv because I really miss watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.  I have tried every year for the past three years to stream it unsuccessfully and this year was no exception.  I accidentally downloaded something that made ads come up all over the place in my computer.  I spent the whole first hour of Thanksgiving fixing my computer.  I finally settled for a Youtube video of the parade from 2013 which I think my kids really liked.  Hermione counted all the marching bands- there were eleven.  Ariana just said that a lot of the girls were pretty and very good dancers.  Lucy liked that Dora was in the parade.  So at least that was more successful than last year.

Happy Thanksgiving!

 Grandma Cheri and baby Iris

 Mack and is that my husband or two turkeys?  Just kidding!

 Kids are getting hungry!

 These two take the cutest father daughter pictures!

Our beautiful hostess stirring up the gravy!

 Kids Table

 Me and the kids playing Zombie Fluxx

 Ruby and Ariana writing in the Thankful book

Long Time No See

Just a quick update.  I have started watching a boy at our home before and after school.  He is in Ariana's afternoon Kindergarten class and goes to our church.  It is nice to have a little extra money, but it has not been easy.  I have had to come up with a system so they wouldn't sit around and watch TV all day or try to play with each other and it ends up with a ton of fighting.  So I created a morning and afternoon bucket in which I write down thing that need to get done.  Technically these are things that should get done every day but we rarely get 2 or 3 or these things done a day, but I try not to get too worked up about it.  The beauty of the bucket is that I do not get blamed for choosing the activity- the bucket gets blamed.  Plus they get excited about doing the fun things in the bucket too.

Here is a sample of the activities:

Morning-

• Dishes/Kitchen Clean up
• Laundry
• Crafts
• Reading
• Baking/Cooking
• SPECIAL Chore

Afternoon-

• 15 Minute Pick Up in Living Room
• Clean Bedrooms
• Homework
• Reading
• AWANA/Good News Club 
• Take out Trash
• Exercise/Outside Games
• Journaling
• SPECIAL Chore

It isn't perfect but it does give me the feeling of being productive at times plus it MAKES everyone work together.  You leave them alone or unsupervised and they make a complete mess.  Sometimes I can't always watch the 2-year old, but like I said it isn't perfect.

Also I have a cold coming on so I really didn't want to do any chores today, but we got clean bedrooms (2 times), journaling, trash, and SPECIAL chore (which ended up being mopping).  So we got SOMETHING done even if it wasn't much.

Self-discipline

It is time to be self-disciplined.  It is time to lose the extra weight, find a passion, and focus on loving God and others like never before.

I am being inspired lately by the book Reshaping It All  by Candace Cameron Bure (of Full House fame) and Darlene Schacht.  It is basic, practical advice.  It is encouraging and motivational.  It contains many Biblical principles of which I need daily reminders.  I am excited to put the suggestions into action.

I just finished chapter 9 which focused on self-discipline.  She suggested surrounding oneself with encouraging quotes.  I definitely want to put some in the kitchen to encourage myself in this life changing journey.

This chapter also included Candace's Famous Chopped Salad.  I will try this.  It looks easy and delicious.  Although I am not a huge fan of avocado I am determined to try again.  Here I go on another health adventure.  Hopefully this one will stick.  Only by the power of God every minute of every day can I overcome my unhealthy addiction to food. 

Gone- but I have not forgotten

Boy, have I been gone a LONG time....We went through an extremely tiring bout of lice!  Yes, lice!  Hermione, my oldest, brought it into our home, probably because she is the only one in public school or in public in general.  We have finally (I believe) got rid of them.  I had to resort to buying a fairly expensive treatment from Fairy Tales.  I am exhausted from all the combing and nit picking.  We all cut our hair.  We cleaned everything twice.  We watched so many movies and shows.  We did the mayo-cap thing before the shampoo arrived which helped a little but didn't kill the eggs.  I wish I had chronicled  the journey  but I wasn't able to relax or take it as lightly as I wish I could have.  Yes, it is gross and a lot of cleaning work but it is also something to laugh about in the end.  In the end....

I can't wait to get back in the writing groove.  I have been searching the web far and wide for a Christian mom blog about raising girls that is NOT repeat NOT  home school focused.  There is nothing wrong with homeschooling.  I was homeschooled as a kid from K-8th grade.  But my husband and I are sending ours to public school.  It is hard and honestly I don't REALLY want to, but this is where we are right now.  I want to accept it and work with it.  I need encouragement but couldn't find what I specifically wanted online.  It would take years and years to sift through all the homeschool focused Christian mom blogs.  So if anyone has any suggestions and encouragement I would truly appreciate it .  Thanks!

HomeBuilders Mega Bundle Giveaway

I have been so busy cleaning, cooking, reading, going on a mini-vacation with my parents, sister, and nephew and preparing for Lent and the Annual Enrichment Conference that I have not once blogged during the month of February except for my book reviews.  But again I am not here for very long- just wanted to tell you about the give away on Raising Homemakers.  It looks like a lot of fun stuff!  Check it out!

Thankful for the Light

It is winter and I am so glad that technology has given us artificial lights to make us feel safe and secure.  Let us not forget to thank God for being our True and Eternal Light.

Ariana- age 4

Ariana- age 2

  

 Ephesians 5:20- always giving thanks for all things in the name of our LORD Jesus Christ to God, even the Father;

Lucy- age 2

                                                                                                                                             

Little Hands to Heaven

In a past post I mentioned that I am teaching home school preschool using Little Hands to Heaven curriculum.  We haven't even finished the whole book yet due to my lack of disciple but we have still been working on it!  We are on letter T so more than half way.  But I am going to do it again with Lucy so this is more of a practice before Lucy is 3.  Our lesson on More of Jesus' Miracles our story was Jesus walking on the water.  Here is an art activity that even Lucy did.  We finger painted white paint on blue paper.  We waited for it to dry.  Then mommy cut a small slit in the paper and drew faces on our fingers.  Ariana wanted two- Jesus and Peter.  It was loads of fun. 

Her waves look more like snow, but so cute!

Learning about Jesus!

I absolutely LOVE this program.  It makes me pray all the harder that I might be able to homeschool at least a few years in the future, but for now I am so grateful to have this time with my little ones. 

Reflection

As Christians we are to reflect Christ, which I pray and hope that I do.  But today I thought it would be fun to write about how I am reflected in each of girls.  Everyone of us is unique in some way, but we also take on a little bit of our parents (even if for some of us it is only a teeny tiny bit!). 

Hermione (age, 6)- Outwardly she reflects me the most.  From the moment she was born one of the first things I said was, "She looks like me!"  I have had fellow moms and check out ladies tell me, "You can't deny she belongs to you."  Well I guess I COULD but it wouldn't do much good.  No one would believe me.  In personality, she reminds me of myself when I was her age- serious, always questioning, never 100% satisfied with the answers I got, afraid of authority (especially my father), and not overly concerned with her outward appearance.  So much of that has changed for me now.  But one thing that has stuck that we both reflect is our love of sleep and food.  She loves to cook with me.  She has come to trust my food palate and will mostly eat anything I eat or make.  She likes to learn about healthy foods and eating variety is very important.  I am still like this even though I hate to admit it- she and I go to parties and sometimes church events mainly for the food or are very concerned about what and when we will eat.  I can totally identify with that. 

Ariana (age 4)- She is probably the most unlike me in both appearance and personality.  She is creative (not me), makes friends easily (definitely not me), and has more confidence in her abilities (most of the time) than I do.  When I look at her I find it very hard to see any of me there.  I guess she mostly reflects my overly dramatic moments and need for security.  She reflects both her parents love for staying up late and watching movies that is for sure.  She has bursts of energy where she cleans and organizes her toys and then she will be lazy for days.  I think that reflects much of my cycles of life in general. 

Lucy (age 2)- It may be hard to find the reflects at first glance of a two year old, but right now for me there are plenty to choose from with Lucy.  She and I both get louder as it gets later and we are both tired.  We both love to laugh and joke around.  We both love to pick our noses (although I have learned to do it where no one is looking).  We are both bluntly, honest.  For example, I recently was changing her diaper and jokingly asked her what she had been eating.  She replied, "Boogers!"  Yes,  well now isn't that the truth?  She loves to run around the house naked.  In general, I don't do that but I love how she expresses her self so freely as I don't so much reflect it as continue to clean the mirror and find that reflected some where in me.

So how does your personality reflect in your own children?   

Sweet

We are making Chocolate Crepes and having a very messy evening while daddy is away at a church event.  They turned out pretty good.  I probably didn't need to make so many but it was yummy. 

Morning

That time when I have to drag myself out of my seriously warm and comfy bed.  Initially, I am not a morning person.  I do love sleep, but maybe I wouldn't have such a hard time if I went to bed a little earlier.  But my mornings are usually spent with Hermione.  She is the only one in school right now which means an earlier rise than her sisters and even her dad for the most part.  It has been a lot more pleasant since after Christmas break.  I don't know what changed but she stops being quite so grumpy and more ready for the day.  This particular morning was interesting to find 2 little ones in the same bed! 

What is in your bag?

Since mommy is a little embarrassed to show a picture of what is in her bag I decided to show Lucy's bag which is much cuter any way, but probably not as funny.  But I asked her, "What is in your bag?"  Her answer, "Stinky!"  To be fair, there are diapers in there and a package of wipes.  But it actually smells very nice.  In fact, when I pulled it out of the car baby powder dust filled the air.  I thought it smelled nice.  There is no special story about this bag.  I actually do not know where it came from.  But I don't like regular diaper bags.  I am not coordinated enough to take care of my bag AND a huge diaper bag so as soon as I could downsize as soon as I could.  It is so nice to have such a small bag because it doesn't get filled with random things.  Now I am reminding myself maybe I should just potty train her already.... :-P  Nope, not on top of things as much as I wish- it will happen, before she is 6- right? 

Close Up

My classic middle child- you are.  You woke me up at 4:15 am just so I would look for your slipper.  You were sobbing and I did not melt.  I put you to bed.  I told you to stop being selfish- like any 4 year old really understands that.  I was so tired but managed to make peanut butter brownies, a spinach salad, and roasted potatoes for the church's potluck before you woke up today.  I left the kitchen a disastrous mess so that you and your sisters could get some spiritual training  while I spent the whole of Sunday service trying to calm down your little sister who wanted another little girl's goldfish crackers.  I tried to watch you closely today.  I wanted to see who were and who you will become, but it was a church potluck day which means to you "I will play with my friends" day.  I am so glad to see you with your friends playing marbles, laughing when you are "surfing", and holding hands.  You are so smart and you would much rather play than eat, but like a good mom I try to get you to eat some more of your meatballs before you run back to your friends.  Since you disobeyed I told you that you could not have dessert and you happily said, "Okay!"  Did it back fire on me?  Maybe But I am no supermom.  I am just mom.  I want to help you grow.  I want to see you close up.  I want hug you and tell you that your blankie will be okay if it spends the day getting washed.  But you completely disagree with me and spend the entire time screaming.

After church we come home and mommy is desperate for a nap.  You and your older sister argue about whether you should watch Dora or Word World and all I want is quiet.  I thank God that all of you are quiet for a good hour and a half.  I might have missed some time to spend with you, but I promise I will be a much better mommy after I take a nap.  After too many movies and shows you say, "Peanut butter and honey sandwich for dinner please!?!"  Since Sundays daddy is at work that is fine with me because mommy was going to just drink a green smoothie for dinner and hope that will magically start her on the path to weight loss.  I hear you laugh and play.  I take your picture to capture a close up.  A close up of my daughter who is fun, impish, artistic, friendly and mostly easy going until you loose your favorite thing.

I am so privileged to see you close up- to see you every day and teach you preschool at home.  That is my favorite close up time with you.  I thank God for this time and can feel it quickly fading away.  God, You made me a mom and I have a special daughter that You see even closer than I do.  Please keep her safe and soften her heart to obedience.  She will one day not be so close up.  

Fight- Five Min. Friday

This New Year I definitely did not want to start off feeling so negative as the title makes me feel.  But fight is not all bad.  In fact when I see this I immediately think of my friend Miranda Chaney.  She is fighting like a girl.  She has fought hard all year.  She has been battling breast cancer.  She deserves the trophy for most amazingly beautiful gracious and courageous person I know.  I think so much about myself that it can be hard to write about others especially those who were just childhood friends, but, dear God, I am going to try this year to be less self centered.  I read her blog posts, I posted her updates, I prayed for her, yet I kept feeling I was just trying to get attention through her in some weird twisted way.  So as this New Year has begun and I have things slowly being checked off my to-do list let me make a goal- less about me, more about others.  Fight like a girl!