Thank God for late nights!!

Warning: Pollyanna type post ahead.

You see, by and large, I'm one of those people who likes to look at the glass as being, not just 1/2 full, but 1/2 full with free refills :) If there is a bright side, and there pretty much always is, I'm there to find it.

So, why am I thankful for late nights? Well, because it so happens, as I was sitting at my 'puter this early am, my ears were perked by a steady tappy, drippy, thumpy noise. I couldn't fully identify it at first, but I had a nagging suspicion it was a water leak of one kind or another (the noise seemed to be coming from our half bath/laundry room). It was rather slow, so I waited for a few minutes to see if it continued, then labored up from my chair (remember I'm 35 weeks pregnant :D) and went to investigate.

Ok, so, I quickly find my suspicions were correct, and it was indeed water that was dripping, from my toilet no less. By an interesting, and I like to say, God ordained circumstance, there happened to be a baby potty training seat (you know, the kind that sits on the toilet to size it down so the little tyke doesn't take their first swimming lesson in the john?) sitting RIGHT UNDER where the leak was. This was, as I said, God ordained, in my opinion, because the material of the seat was what made the water drip audible. I'm not convinced I would have ever heard or noticed it, had it not been dripping on that vinyl seat. So, thank You, LORD!!!

Moving on, I'm wiping down the side of the toilet and silently praying that God will clue me in to where in the world this leak is coming from. And, though unvoiced, pleading that it will be more than simple, because, frankly, our house is sold, we're buying a "new" one, and we REALLY don't need to be replacing a toilet. Not that any time is good, really, to be replacing a toilet (though I'm sure I could find you the upside if I really tried *snort*), but, honestly, I've got other things on my mind at this point. God, in His graciousness, VERY quickly led me to the source, which was a lovely crack that ran from the top to almost halfway down the holding tank. On goes my fix-it hat. First, we try out the good ole, lower the water level and see if that takes it under where the crack starts. No such luck. M'kay, step two. Again, by God ordained "chance", I just happened to have been working in the garage a couple of days ago, packing anything and everything, and I found a lovely, unopened spare tube of caulking. I left that little bugger out, Praise Jesus, thinking it just might come in handy for a couple of things. Yes indeedy.

Three minutes later, caulking has been applied and I send off a thank you note to my Father in heaven, as well as my Dad, thanking both that Dad taught me from a young age how to fix anything and everything. I can't tell you how handy that knowledge has been over the years.

So, while late night drips aren't the pride of life, it's a heck of a lot better than finding a massive puddle in my bathroom tomorrow morning ;)

Sweet dreams!

From the mouths of babes

This particular insight did not come from one of my own, so I will not pretend to take credit for it. BUT, a fabulous Mom I interact with on the raising godly tomatoes website has a wonderful teenage son who brought the following verse to her attention:
Ecclesiastes 8:11
¹¹ "Because the sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil"

That's powerful. Take some time to really read that over and think about what it means, particularly as it pertains to child-rearing. If you are allowing your children to get away with things, and not promptly disciplining (executing a sentence) their hearts begin to fully turn to do evil.

Our responsibility as parents is often times daunting. But, we have God's promises to up hold us:
Proverbs 22:6 "Train up a child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it."

Don't neglect your duty as parents. You do your sweet blessings no favors in letting them carry on in sin. Chastise them while there is still time. You will find joy in seeing their hearts desire to turn away from evil. Truly, as you guide them into righteousness, they begin to desire that guidance, knowing somehow that it is best. When you look into the face of your little one that you've only just finished rebuking and they're smiling ear to ear and saying a heartfelt "I love you" you KNOW God's way is the BEST way!

A funny

New readers are just too much fun I'm discovering!!

Alright, the background is, I wrapped all of the Christmas presents last night and put them under the tree. One of Quenton's (just turned 5) I labeled "Quentax" because that's a nickname I occasionally call him.

Fast forward to this morning.... All of the kids are gathered around the tree enjoying the view and wondering what's for who. You know the scene. Once I teach Quenton the "To: and From:" deal, he's set and goes about reading the labels. A little while later he walks up to me with a look of ultimate confusion and says "Mom, there's something weird. There's one over there that looks like it's for me. It starts with a Q. But it ends with an x .......????


I about died laughing!!!

My Sweet Boy

Well, I feel like I'm often ( I guess that depends on how you define 'often' *snort*) here exclaiming about what wonderful children I have. Hopefully y'all don't get tired of that. I certainly don't :) "Behold children are a blessing from the Lord"!!!
You see, if you make it on over here to read my blog, I'd LOVE for you to leave feeling refreshed, encouraged and smiling. These precious moments with my children that I blog about are my way of "pondering all of these things" in my heart, like Mary, the mother of Jesus, did. There are going to be hard times. There are going to be rough days, weeks and/or months. But we're not in it for the money ;D These precious little souls we've been entrusted with are ours to "train up in the way they should go." Now and then I get a glimpse of just what that looks like, particularly in Quenton, being our oldest.


Here's how it went: See, the other day Daddy came home from work and was noodling around on the computer. Quenton, who is swiftly becoming his little shadow, was at his side, watching every move Geoffrey made. All at once, out of the blue, Quenton turned to his Daddy and said "Dad, I don't want to do anything that bothers you or makes you mad, because I want to be just like you!" I thought "Well, what a wonderfully sweet thing to say!" It got better. You see, about 10 minutes later, Geoffrey was rallying to give Quenton his "nightly bop". It's a cute game he plays with the children, playfully bopping them on the head out of ritual. Quenton got quite serious and said "Please don't Dadda". When asked "why" he explained "I don't want you to do that because I'll want to punch you back and you don't like it when I punch you. I don't want to do things that you don't like." *jaw drop* This boy was SERIOUS!

Well, a little while later, I was in the kitchen finishing up cooking dinner. I attempted, and failed miserably at pouring boiling hot broth from my crockpot into a pan to make gravy. See, the hotpad slipped on me and I succeeded in spilling said chicken broth all down the front of me. In immense pain, I squeaked out a shocked "Ow!" Both Quen and Ari came running, and I could hear Geoffrey who was upstairs heading quickly down. One of the kids asked what was wrong and I said "I spilled hot broth all down me." Quenton was looking at me very worried, but he waited for a moment, and then in the kindest, most sensitive tone said simply "I'm sorry Mama." I could have cried right then and there out of sheer love for him. In his sweet little boy heart he knew I wasn't "alright" so he didn't even ask. He just sympathized in a way I very much needed right then.

Then, that night as I was putting him and his sister to bed, we were taking turns praying. He said a very simple, and even generic prayer, which I was a bit disappointed with. I have a tendency to want to correct when he's obviously not praying from his heart, but I felt like I needed to keep my mouth closed, so we just moved on to Ari's turn. As she was praying though, he checked as though he had something else he wanted to say. Once she was done he confirmed there was something else and went on to pray "And Jesus, please help Ari and me to obey our parents like it says to do in the Bible." *Happy grin* Praise God for helping me to keep my critical nature in check. I'm so glad for his sweet teachable spirit. Lord, please give me wisdom!

Bubbles!!!

Not a whole lot to say on this particular post, but enough cuteness to go around. Who doesn't enjoy watching their children playing with bubbles?

Even the cat had to get in on the action... in a manner of speaking.

Aha!

You know that feeling, or sometimes that rut you get in, where you're reading along in your Bible, and you come across something that simply does NOT make sense to you? I'm sure we've all been there. Well, I hit one of those spots this morning. I was reading Galatians 4 where Paul is talking about Hagar and Sarah and their two sons. One is born in the ordinary way, and is under the law, while the other is born of a promise and is part of the new covenant. Ok, so I got all of that. But then he starts talking about how :25 "Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present city of Jerusalem, because she is a slave with her children." Ok, I can get that too. She corresponds to Mt. Sinai, because that's where the 10 commandments came from, and thus the Law. Then :26 "But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother. :27 For it is written:
'Be glad, O barren woman,
who bears no children;
break forth and cry aloud,
you who have no labor pains;
because more are the children of the
desolate woman
than of her who has a husband.' (Isaiah 54:1)"

I sat there looking at that for a bit, and then went back and read it another time thinking "Wha...?" Then it was like God just breathed the meaning of it into my mind, and it all made sense. And to me, it's something all of us mother's think about, worry about, and hopefully more than anything, PRAY about. See, he's saying: Be glad you ladies who don't have children, because more are the children who will be heirs of the law (unbelievers) than those who are heirs of the promise (Christians).

It's a battle, my friends. A battle for the hearts, minds and souls of our children. Teach them, train them, while they are young, for the Bible promises "... When they are old they will not depart from it."
Pray for your children to have a heart knowledge/belief in Jesus Christ. That they will have a personal relationship with Him. So many children grow up with only a head knowledge of God, and when that is tested, it is found lacking. By and large, their faith will not last if they're basing it ONLY on what you tell/have taught them. They must experience God for themselves.

What a guy!!

You know how sometimes you look at your kids and think "What am I missing? I've done SOMETHING to cause a rift between us, and I'm not quite sure what it is." You know those times, when they start misbehaving where they hadn't before. Well, I was seeing some new things sprout up in Quenton in the last month or so, and thinking those very thoughts. Instead of his usual cheerful, chipper self when asked to do something, I was getting a mellow "ok". Things that used to elicit an excited response, got little to none. My Mama heart knew something was "off". So, I started praying about it. God is SO good, and SO faithful! As I continued praying and seeking God's face, He reminded me of something I've read many times: For every one time you have to correct or rebuke your child, there should be 4 or 5 times that you are praising or speaking well of them.
As I started to reflect on my interactions with my children, and particularly Quenton, I had to admit to myself that I was/am really rather critical. Which, translates into me correcting/rebuking them a lot, and praising them only occasionally. It was causing my son to feel unappreciated, and probably bitter in some ways, among other things.

So, I began to pay closer attention to praising him, even for the little things. Within a day or two I noticed remarkable changes in him. He became more affectionate, showed a marked change in attitude, and seemed as though he was striving both to please me and the Lord.

One prime example of the change in him was: The other day we were sitting at the kitchen table eating lunch. He looked over at his little sister, who was drinking a green smoothie, and, as always, making quite a mess of her face. He started to laugh and say "Ari, you have a ....." He stopped mid-sentance and said "No, I shouldn't say that, that wouldn't be nice." I immediately knew what he'd been thinking of saying (she had a mustache) and my jaw nearly dropped while my heart nearly burst with pride. Even in the midst of finding amusement with something, he was taking time to listen to the Holy Spirit and reign in his tongue. He's four years old folks. Yet, he took time to think about and realize that perhaps saying that his sister had a mustache would not be a kind thing to say. My heart does and did rejoice with gladness at the maturity I saw/am seeing in Quenton. To God be the glory!!

A birthday fit for a one year old

I can't believe it's been a YEAR already!!! *shocked*
Yep, that's right. Caleb turned 1 this past Friday, June 5th.

We didn't do the standard birthday party as one normally thinks of birthday parties... but I think he enjoyed it none-the-less.

We started out by going to the park, and unfortunately I managed to forget my camera. Suffice it to say, they all had fun. That was followed by a trip to the thrift store to see if we could find anything that just called out "Caleb" to me. Not so much. We headed home for a nice long nap... I got Quenton up a little early and he and I got some good one on one time together searching out some toys and a cake for "Lubby".

All of the above made dinner late, so after dinner and cake there wasn't a whole lot of time left for anything but bed, so the gift opening came the next day. That's another post ;)

But, I do have plenty of cake pictures to share, so, that's got to be worth somethin' ;)

Quenton is picured here in an uncharacteristic show of "grubbiness" ... He's usually very precise and I was quite surprised to see him using his hands instead of his fork. :D



And even more to my surprise was Ari, who normally IS my grubby one, eating very delicate bites with her fork. Notice she's not wearing a bib (usually a very BAD thing), and there's nary a spot on her shirt.

This expression on Caleb's face begs the phrase "Pleased as punch".

There's MORE??!!!















Hooray for Cake!!!!! :)

Just for fun

I don't get a lot of pictures taken of me, but I was in a goofy mood the other day and took a few of myself just for the heck of it. A couple of them turned out alright, so I thought I'd share.


Hope your monitors are still intact :D

Adventures in Tortilla Making

Well, we go through a LOT of tortillas around these parts and based on the average 20 ingredient list of the store bought tortillas here, they're probably not the best for you. So, I figured it was high time I start making my own. I recently bought a little cast iron griddle which is ideal for frying up these little buggers, so here's how it went down:

My stove seems to run a little on the hot side, so I had to turn the dial to just barely past 4 to have the pan hot enough but not TOO hot.

I mixed the ingredients: (Recipe from Hillbilly Housewife) 4 Cups Whole Wheat Flour, 1.5 tsp salt, 1.5 tsp baking powder, 1/3 cup coconut oil or lard, 1-1.25 cups of water (I used a bit more than that).
Then: Stir the dough with a fork until it makes a cohesive ball. Add more water if it's too dry. Be careful not to add too much though. Kneed dough approx. 20 times and then let it rest for about 10 min in the bowl. Then form into 10-12 equal balls of dough. Roll each ball into a bit of flour.


Place dough onto wax paper or well-floured surface. Roll each ball into a 6-7 inch in circle getting them as thin as possible.











Loosen tortilla from surface and flop into a dry hot skillet.








Cook about 30 seconds until the underside is dry and has a few brown spots. Repeat on the other side and then transfer to plate.











Not long later you've got a hot plate full of delicious, healthy tortillas. It truly doesn't take long at all, and it's pretty easy, even as a beginner!!