Revolutionary War Reenacted

This past weekend we went to a local park and saw a reenactment of the Revolutionary War.

The weather was great! It was suppose to rain, but we prayed it would hold off until after the war. And it did! It started raining right after we got into the car to leave the park.

Here are a few pictures...

We met up with some of our good friends while we were there. Hard to believe that is only two families... and two are missing from the picture! We made a last minute decision to go to the reenactment and I'm glad we did. It was really fun. The thing I like best about this fun family outing... IT WAS FREE!

Skiing Fun

I know... I know... in the last post I was saying how I couldn't wait for spring, and that is true, but when you have an opportunity to go skiing you just can't pass that up. Especially when a group of your friends are going!

This past Monday our family went skiing and had a blast. This was our 3rd annual trip and has quickly become one of our favorite traditions.

Here is Seth, he decided to try snowboarding this year. He loved it! I could not believe how quickly he pick it up. He even went down the black diamond slopes.

Joshua and one of his friends Caleb.

After lunch it warmed up so much most of us were shedding our coats. This picture looks like it was taken at the beach!

Say hi to my friend, kathy.



And my friend Pam and two of her daughters.



Then there was Noah... he has become quite a confident skier.

a little too confident if you ask me!

A few days after our trip we were in the car reminiscing, when Noah bragged about going on the DOUBLE black diamond slope. I freaked out! He's only been skiing THREE! times. He informed me that he spent most of the afternoon on that slope. (with a friend thankfully) Then to make matters worse Joshua pipes up and says, "Yeah mom it was the one that was roped off and had a big caution sign that said for ADVANCED skiers only!!!!"

who's raising that child? oh, i guess that would be my job! SHEESH!



We had a great time and can't wait to go next year!

It's Almost Here...!

I'm talking about SPRING of course, and I can't wait!

Along with spring comes gardening. I've been busy planning our spring garden. We have 3, 4x4 boxes and 1, 2x2 box. I felt pretty good about our garden last year with it being our first real garden, but I definitely want to improve.

My friend, Rene, and her family have a huge garden that feeds them (4 families!) all summer plus enough left over to get them through most of the winter. They also raise their own chickens. When it comes to gardening I have a lot to learn. Fortunately, I knew exactly who to go to for advice.

This past Wednesday a group of us went to buy seeds with Rene and her family. We went to a store a few towns away so we could get good seeds (heirloom). You can learn more about seeds on Rene's site here. I learned so much from just this one trip... I can't wait to get my hands dirty!!

I ended up buying broccoli, cabbage, peas, carrots, onions and 2 different kinds of lettuce.

I learned that you can plant certain types of flowers in your garden and they will help keep bugs away and/or attract the good kind of bugs. I will probably do this since I want our garden to be organic.

Everyone at this family owned store was very friendly. Here we were checking out the broccoli and cabbage plants, when this guy walked up and started telling us all about them. By the time he and Rene's mom were finished teaching us how to plant them and care for them I wanted to buy the whole table! But, after giving it some thought I decided against it.

Because this trip happened in the middle of our school day I wanted to make it count. I had to be creative, but found a way for it to be a field trip. I am so glad I did. It turned out to be a lot more than just a seed store. They had fresh produce, farming equipment, livestock supplies, gardening equipment/supplies and a few animals. I had the kids take their journals to draw pictures and take notes. Joshua was in charge of the camera and making sure to get good pictures for the blog. I think he succeeded. When we got home, Seth and Noah finished their journal entry, along with a few sentences about what they had learned.

Here are a few of the animals they had at the store...



These pigs look sooo cute...



too bad they grow up and get stinky!!



Chickens.



And then there was this cute guy...

I will probably work out in the garden this weekend. I can't wait! I'll try to get some pictures up as soon as possible.

Be sure and check out Rene's website for more on gardening. Her website is budgetsavingmom.com Then click on the "gardening" tab at the top of the page.

Lovin' the Sinner

Let me just tell you... there is never a dull moment in our home. This morning is a prime example. It started out like every other morning. I woke the boys up and they went to eat breakfast. After Noah was finished eating he went to put the milk in the refrigerator and that's when it all started to go down hill...

CLUNK! CLANG! CRASH!

Noah: (hands full with a bag of cereal and a jar of milk) Aarruugh!

Me: (yelling) Noah! What did you dooo!

Noah: HATETHESINLOVETHESINNER!!!!!

Me: (laughing uncontrollably) Where did you hear that? (Thinking he was going to say from church.)

Noah: From Calvin and Hobbs, Mom!

Just when I think I'm making some headway with that kid, he quickly reminds me that I have a long road ahead of me!

I've always said he reminds me of Calvin... I think I'll go look for all those books and hide them before he gets anymore great ideas!

At least the refrigerator got cleaned out!



Oh, how I do luuuv that little sinner!

Book 3/13

I just finished another book. Yea!



The book is titled JUST COURAGE: God's Great Expedition for the Restless Christian, by Gary A. Haugen. I found out about this book while I was at the Encouragement Extreme Event.

I became aware of the author, who is the president of International Justice Mission (IJM), from an attendee (Helen), who wrote a song dedicated to this ministry. She sang her song during the event. It was extremely powerful! IJM was created to seek justice for people caught in slavery and to help free them.

yes slavery still exist today!

Just Courage, is not so much about IJM as it is about having the courage to step out of your comfort zone and pursue the adventure God has for you. Stepping out in faith is usually not safe, comfortable or easy.

We Christians can live our lives all wrapped up in our cozy homes, comfortable churches and familiar friends... yeah, we're on the trip, but if we are not stepping out in faith, taking risks and doing what seems impossible then we are missing the adventure.

If we choose to follow Jesus beyond what we can control, beyond our own strength and beyond the norm, we will experience His power, wisdom and amazing love.

I encourage you to visit the IJM website to find out more about this ministry.

Happy Valentines Day

Lately, I have felt led to be more intentional about making family traditions. The memories of these traditions will hopefully be a lasting reminder of the love our family has shared through the years.

I am reminded of the commands God gave to the Israelites to impress upon their children so they would learn and not forget what God had done for them. How He delivered them from slavery. (Deliverer) He destroyed their enemy. (Protector) Daily He provided them with manna. (Provider)

These are the commands, decrees and laws the LORD your God directed me to teach you to observe in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess, so that you, your children and their children after them may fear the LORD your God as long as you live by keeping all His decrees and commands that I give you, and so that you may enjoy long life. Deuteronomy 6:1-2

Love the LORD your God, with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates. Deuteronomy 6:5:9

In the Jewish culture they still carry on many of these same traditions that remind them of their God. So I thought what better holiday to start with than Valentines Day.

We started earlier this week by making Valentines for the elderly that we visit. We like to go through the bible and pick out just the right verse to go on each card we make.

Here is Seth with his finished cards. We deliver Meals-On-Wheels once a month with our home school group. We made the cards to go with the meals. If you have kids that are home during the day this is a great service project to do with them. They love kids! Every time they open the door and see the kids their faces light up with a huge smile. We deliver meals to bless them, but every month WE end up being blessed too.

The next thing we did is the night before Valentines Day I had everyone write something positive about each family member on a separate piece of paper. It could be anything they like about that person or a talent/gift that God has given that person. After all the pieces of paper were collected and everyone went to bed, I cut out hearts and wrote the positive words on them. Then I taped them to their bedroom door for them to find in the morning. It was really fun to watch their reactions to what was written on their hearts. I had plans to take the hearts and put them in separate notebooks for each person to keep their collection each year. Unfortunately I never got around to getting the notebooks. I may still do it, because I think it would be great to have a collection of positive comments about yourself so that when you are sad or down you could go and read what others think is good about you.

The last thing I did was bake a cake with a heart and cross. We talked about Valentines being about love and how Jesus is love. The white icing on the cake represents Christ being without sin. The red heart represents His great love for us and that He shed His blood to pay the debt for our sins. The cross represents that He died on the cross so that we might be able to have a relationship with our heavenly Father and live with Him for eternity.

Mike also had a short devotion on love that went along with the cake theme. I plan on making this a tradition we do every year as a reminder of what Christ did for us.

Ready For Spring!

I am so ready for spring. We have had more snow than usual this winter. Don't get me wrong I love a good snow. It is amazingly beautiful to look out the window and see everything covered in white, but enough is enough.

As everything has started melting away our dog, Mordecai has discovered a new hobby...

... digging in the mud leftover from all that white stuff. Mordecai's "white" paws were completely covered with mud!

and he thinks if he doesn't look at me i won't notice.

well i noticed.

maybe he won't notice getting a bath, which he hates!



Who knew taking a bath could be so exhausting? At least he cleans up well.

Shortly after we moved into our home I noticed in the midst of the tree-tops the shape of a heart. The leaves from two huge trees overlap just enough to form the outline of a heart. Through the outline you can view the sky. It's really pretty and reminds me of God's great love for me. I often look at it and think about the verse, "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands." Psalm 19:1

Well with all the cold weather it has taken a toll on those trees. They have lost all their leaves and a few limbs. Just the other day I looked up to gaze at the heart God put in the trees for me and to my unpleasant surprise it was gone! I was really sad. I turned and slowly walked over to the sink to finish the dishes and decided to take a peak out of a different window hoping I could see it from another view. No luck. It was truly gone. Just then my eye caught a glimpse of something at the bottom of a tree a lot closer to our house.

I just had to take a picture of it! God is so good to me! He knew I needed that, thank you Lord.