What's Our Phone Number?

     Today Rachael learned our home phone number and how to dial the phone.  I gave her an old phone to practise on.  I wrote down our number and she matched the numbers on the phone.  She has a great memory within a few minutes she had it memorized.  I then decided to teach her about 911. I always hesitate with this one and STRESS to them we never phone this unless it’s an emergency. So far the oldest four have all called 911 because their little curiosity has got a hold of them. L We talked about different reasons why you would call 911 without causing fear to rise in her little heart.

 

Back when we lived in town, I would have the hardest time getting my bread to rise nice in the winter months.  Now having a wood stove it has not been a problem. I have been fighting off a cold for over a week now, so our days have been a little slower.  While the older children worked on their school books my littles joined me at the table as I kneaded my dough.  They enjoy having a little piece of their own to knead and let rise.  Jude got impatient though and ate his raw mini dough ball. Silly boy. J

 
There is something about having older children and babies.  Hannah adores her big brothers and they adore her. Hannah has been hitching a ride on Austin’s leg lately.  She just loves him, if I am not careful this little button gets away with a lot because nobody likes to see her upset.

31st Birthday

                                    My Birthday was this past week and my best friend made me dinner.

I actually love my birthday cause it's also the day I became a Christian so I end up really focusing on that and what I was saved from.

So not only am I now 31 I have also been a Christian for 16 years.

This is my Testimony

Four of my children.

Natalie and Georgia doing dinner dishes, like good kids. :)

                            Our BEAUTIFUL country morning sunrise. Ahh it's breath taking..
                                                This is the view out my living room window.

                          It's winter up in the moutains of B.C. It has snowed almost daily for a week.

           Today was a wintery cold day, the older two boys went to our friends house to finish  a movie they had been watching together.  Natalie had her little friend over for the afternoon so we did a hand sewing craft. I was impressed Rachael could keep up so well with the older girls. All three of them spent 2 soild hours working to get it done.

                                                              The finished project!

                                 Presley is our huge wood chopper helper. We were all out of kindling and he is right on top of it. As soon as he was done his school work he was outside choping. He really gets the job done well, he doesn't get bored and go off to the next thing... Nope he stays focused and gets the box filled.

"We must prepare our sons to go out into the world, face obstacles, work hard, and provide for a household with integrity. Mothers can unwittingly undermine this preparation by mollycoddling their sons.

 

If mothers are protecting and pampering their sons, they will grow up to be milksops (also known as sissies), and obviously, this is not honoring to God.

 

Our aim for our sons is maturity.

 

We want them to be able to stand with their father against his enemies in the city gate (Psalm 127). We want them to be tough, not fragile. Mothers cannot fight their son's battles and they should not shelter them from consequences of their actions....Mothers must be hard-headed when it comes to sons and not rush in to protect them from the hard consequences of the world."

-Nancy Wilson,
Praise Her in the Gates: The Calling of Christian Motherhood

What Are You Reading

We are reading The Swiss Family Robinson as a family.

 

Zachary is reading The sign of the Beaver.

 

 

Natalie is reading Love Comes Softly

 

Presley is reading a family favorite Amelia Bedelia

 

Chris is reading No Longer a Slumdog by K.P. Yohannan

 

I am  reading aloud to Rachael in the afternoons during the littles naptime Farmer Boy.

 

Austin has a chapter to go and he will be done Mocking Jay.

Building

  Some of you will rebuild the deserted ruins of your cities. Then you will be known as a rebuilder of walls and a restorer of homes. Isaiah 58:12

 

Recently we built a new chicken coop for our chickens, over the summer we had them temporarily in the loft of our barn while we concentrated on other projects. We had done a fair bit of building projects around our property this summer so we were ready to finish up for winter.

 

Most of the materials for the coop came from scrap bins and even throw aways from different people. The roof was crunched up tin left from the previous owners that I was going to put in the dump pile.
The beams and boxes were from someone at church the forms he used to cement his driveway and the paint was miss tints from the hardware store. Even the sky light is from a thrift store.
This coop was made literally from broken, used up, should be thrown out pieces, but if you were to see it you really would have no idea.
Everything was scrubbed and painted and put to good use. So are our skills and talents however small and seemingly meaningless we think they are have value in the kingdom.

Just like the pieces of the coop were scattered everywhere, a little here and little there God saw the end result and brought all those pieces together. I couldn't have planned this to all fit together perfectly  only the builder knew how to. Just like our life we can't make things happen by striving or trying to make pieces fit together. However we can rest, rest in His plan that He does know what he is doing and with these broken pieces He knows how to create something beautiful.

 

The Party

Rachael had a princess theme birthday party with our family and friends.

On the menu:

Lasagna, caesar salad, dough bread, and pink princess punch

Thanks for celebrating my little princess everyone!

Happy 5th Birthday Rachael

 1. What is something mom always says to you?
" Go to your room"  LOL


2. What makes your Mom happy?
Going to the park.

3. What makes mom sad?
Saying something not nice.

4. How does your mom make you laugh?
Tickle

5. What was your mom like as a child?
Short hair, liked candy.

6. How old is your mom?
I don't I know, 14? 15?

7. How tall is your mom?
She is showing me with her hands

 8. What is her favorite thing to do?
To go play at the park with her friends and catch butterflies.

9. What does your mom do when you're not around?
Watch a movie

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
I don't know

11. What is your mom really good at?
Doing dishes
 12. What is your mom not very good at?
"cleaning all by yourself"'


13. What does your mom do for a job?
"cleaning"

14. What is your mom's favorite food?
Soup

15. What makes you proud of your mom?
 She goes the park with me.

 

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
"Dora"

17. What do you and mom do together?
Do dishes
18. How are you and your mom the same?
We have the same hair.

19. How are you and your mom different?
"We wear different clothes.

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
Because she prays with me and she helps me clean my room.

We Give Books

A fellow friend homeschooling mom shared this with me tonight and it is just AWESOME. It's an online book library resource, they donate books to charities after you read the story. It's great they have a lot of different selection too. It's called "We Give Books"


http://www.wegivebooks.org/books

We Give Books was created by the Penguin Group and the Pearson Foundation. Together, we support literacy through programs that engage entire communities through literacy and awareness programs like Booktime and Jumpstart's Read for the Record. We hope that We Give Books proves to be a way that young children, together with their parents or caregivers, can come to understand the power of reading—and of giving—as much as we do.

All of the books available for online reading are children's picture books appropriate for children through age ten. There is a mix of fiction and nonfiction, a range of authors, and an equal balance between read-alouds and books for independent readers.

I joined right away and there are so many to choose from.

Pumpkin School Day

This morning while my big guys did their book work my primary aged kidlets cleaned out a pumpkin. Rachael got all the seeds out of the "slim" and placed them on a baking sheet.

Zachary cut out seven pumpkins, from orange construction paper...

...and green stems

 

After my big ones were done their book work they were feeling a little left out of the crafty mess going on in the kitchen, we were in need to make some "Thank-you" cards so they got busy painting leaves and making leaf print cards.

But then of course littles see all the fun of paint so they need to make a card too.

 We took our pumpkin seeds after they were roasted and spelled out the word "pumpkin" The younger set of children all took turns scrambling up with the letters and spelling the word "pumpkin".

Once everyone was spelling the word with no thought we put them under our fall leaf "bucket list"

So far little noodle hasn't plucked the seeds off as they are right at her eye level. Here's to hoping they last longer than a day.

I printed off a fall BINGO type sheet to play some math games, we used candy pumpkins as our markers. Of course when the game was over candy was handed out to all.