New Pictures of the Boys

It was probably too dark to get good shots... and getting them all to look at the camera at the same time seems miraculous... but here are a couple of shots that I like.

Happy Birthday Mom!

This is me and my mom! Isn't she lovely? We were so glad that my mom and dad came down last night so that we could celebrate her birthday with her. Thanks for a fun evening! And happy birthday, Mom!

This is what boys do... wrestle!

If the boys have free time and someone sits on the floor, this is what happens! Ahhh, the joy of boys!

Shep's Sweet Quotes

Couple of really sweet quotes from Shepard this week... his heart is so tender to the Lord right now.

Yesterday we were playing the game "telephone" to try to practice "attentiveness". I would whisper a sentence to Shepard and then he was supposed to go whisper it to Josiah. As soon as he would hear the sentence he was all grins and bobbing his head up and down as if to say "I got it!" Then when he would get to Josiah and try to remember the sentence he would get all flustered and with this little pleading voice ask if I would tell him the sentence just one more time. This happened several times until finally as he was standing there next to Josiah he quickly said, "Just a minute... I need to pray!" He jogged over to the leather chair and bowed down and folded his little hands and started pleading with God, "Please God, help me remember, please, please, please! God, please!" And then he stood up and declared that it just wasn't working. He was feeling so dejected. Then we had a good visit about the Lord and I really encouraged him to keep seeking the Lord with that same earnestness. I am so thankful that we are teaching at home and I have these moments to train the boys' hearts toward the Lord.

Then last night, Josiah was feeling rather bummed that the rain was washing away his bike course and entire city that he had drawn with sidewalk chalk on the driveway. Shepard piped right up with a sweet sincerity, "Josiah, God is in control of the weather." And then he added, "Josiah, God is sorry, but He just needs it to rain tonight." In a very sweet way Shepard just expressed sympathy to Josiah, but understood that God is in charge! Just when you are wondering if they are getting anything that you are teaching them, they astound you!

Starting KONOS

We started using a new homeschool curriculum this week - the curriculum isn't new, it's just new for us - and it's called KONOS. John and I are so excited about it and we are already having a lot of fun with it. The kids like it, too. Even Shepard today was pumping his arms in the air saying, "I love science! This is science week and I love it!" This was right after we did an experiment with a bowl, saran wrap, salt and sound waves... they got to yell at the bowl and see the salt dance. :) FUN! I will admit that this hands on approach to school is intimidating to me and out of my comfort zone, but we really like how it makes school exciting and fun and perks an interest to learn more. It also allows us to do a lot of school together even with different age levels and it will enable us to incorporate Dad into school much more. It will integrate a lot of subjects into a lifestyle of learning and not just teaching in separated segments. Well, we'll see how it goes, but so far so good. :) This week we are learning the character trait of attentiveness and the boys have acted out the story of Eli and Samuel, learned a lot of vocabulary words, learned to stand at attention like a soldier and why, studied scripture about being attentive and understand that their ears and eyes are designed by God. Last night John took the boys on an adventure to learn about road signs and they took lots of pictures of the signs. So, today the boys got to make a bicycle course on the driveway by drawing out road signs along the way. Then they got to drive the course they created. I was so impressed when I came out to see the finished course... it was great and had a lot of detail. They were very attentive! :) Here are some pics. (Josiah asked me to put this on the blog.)



They even created the course for two bikes to ride at a time and follow the signs.

Even Will had a chance to drive the course! :)

Will and the syrup incident

Whew! There's been a lot to blog about tonight! But, this one probably takes the cake... or shall I say "SYRUP"!? It was supper time and I could tell that Will was getting hungry because he kept taking food from the pantry to the dining table. I just kept telling him to put things back in the pantry while I was trying to get some things done so that I could start dinner. My back was turned (no, mothers really don't have eyes in the back of their heads or this incident would have never happened!) and then I heard this little yelping noise. I turned around and seriously, it took me a while to process what had just happened - but there stood Will in the doorway to the pantry with his bare feet standing in a puddle of syrup, his hand was still on the syrup bottle in the door shelf. And then I saw it... the lid to the bottle laying on the floor. Ohhhhh, my mind finally started working and I looked closer at his little face - YEP, there was syrup all over his mouth and running down all his clothes into that puddle on the floor. That little stinker had tried to drink the syrup... but it didn't go very well. None of the other boys ever tried this, so it never occurred to me to be on the alert for this. Then it was funny because like a good mom :) I called for Josiah to go get the camera instead of just cleaning him up. Will was not liking that much... the feel of sticky syrup all over him and under his feet was becoming a bit much. When I finally started to take his shirt off he was getting panicky and then he slipped in the syrup and almost fell and that brought the tears.



I finally got that little rascal in the bathtub and he was happy to be there! You've got to know that these little incidents always happen on a day when you are really busy and running behind - you know when you just don't think you have time to deal with it. I was already feeling overwhelmed and stressed. But, guess what? When I got Will in the bath, I assigned the other two boys the job of watching him there and I was able to get the syrup cleaned up. And God is good - it was as if He just provided a time when all the boys were occupied and I was able to catch up on a lot of other things that I needed to do in the kitchen while I was there.

MSM celebrates 300+

We celebrated my very most favorite person in the whole world last night! I'm so proud of John! His business is still growing and we celebrated his 300th customer (and actually more since he crossed over last week during our sale and is now at around 307, I think). Way to go, Honey! He works so hard to provide a good service to his clients and I think he's great at it! (It was just last March that we celebrated 200 clients... so his business is growing fast.)

Watching Journey to the Center of the Earth

We moved our usual family movie night from Friday to Saturday this week and surprised the boys with "Journey to the Center of the Earth" which they have been wanting to see for awhile. Really, I was thinking and wondering if this movie was too intense for a 4-year-old and 2-year-old, but they've sort of grown up on Star Wars and other such movies, so... Well, it did get a little intense and Shepard started by telling us that he was brave. But, then he said, "Is there going to be something that is scarier than I am brave?" Little pause and then, "Do you even know how much brave I am?" I said, "Yes, I think I do." He replied with this very puzzled look on his face, "How do you know?" How do you know how much brave I am?" as if there was no way for anyone else to really be able to answer the question. Then he said, "I am pretty brave you know!" Now that we had that settled, as soon as the dinosaurs came out in the movie Shepard went running for cover under the dining room table yelling, "Tell me when the scary part is over!"

1st soccer games of the season

Shepard and Josiah played their first soccer games of the season on Saturday. I love soccer! And I love watching them play. Also, there is a big difference between 4 and 5-year-olds and 10-year-olds. Shepard's favorite part of sports is the snacks that they get. :) Josiah is beginning to really understand the game and play with strategy.

Here's Shep on the field...


Josiah is watching his brother play...


Shepard waiting for the ball...


I didn't get to see Josiah play much because his game started before Shepard's ended, but he really enjoyed played goalie.

I didn't catch the picture soon enough to get the ball in it, but here Josiah is kicking the ball from the goal.

Kudos to our babysitter!

I just have to give a shout out to Miss Jolene! She kept my house in order all of last week and did a great job taking care of the little boys. She made my transition back into "normal" life much easier... the house was clean and orderly, the laundry caught up and she even left a plate of homemade cookies on the kitchen counter for us - which I am polishing off very quickly! I definitely feel blessed to have her as part of our lives!

Growing Kids Sale - Fall 09

I don't remember ever feeling this wiped out after a GKS sale. My body is screaming at me that I am not a young 20-something anymore or quite frankly, that I'm barely a 30-something anymore! :) I am aching all over and I think I could sleep for a whole week. We did start back to school today, but we're moving at a snail's pace... I'm about to call a school break and drive everyone over to Starbucks for a pick me up or I might fall asleep at my computer! :) Although I'm not even sure if I'm safe behind the wheel of a car right now... yikes!

Here are some pics from the sale. This first one is on the opening day when our first group of shoppers came to the worker preview party. John and I think that our sale is now probably in the top 5 largest in the country! Isn't that amazing?! We had almost 2000 consignors this time!


How fun is this?! This is a pic of the Duggars filming at our sale for one of their upcoming shows on TLC's "18 and Counting".


We had a very quick dinner break with the Duggars at the sale and had this photo taken together before we ate.


Here's Josiah working in the concession stand at the sale with two of his cousins (Madie and Carigan) and with Joy Anna Duggar.

My brother-in-law snapped this photo of me and Michelle Duggar visiting while she was working a volunteer shift at the sale. She is precious and I am grateful for her friendship... she's an inspiration to me by the way she lives to serve the Lord with her life. I know I could learn a lot from her.

Here's a link to a news story that one of our local tv stations aired during our sale.

http://www.4029tv.com/news/20844683/detail.html

Hee Ho!

Here's Will riding the horse... He gets it going much more than anyone else ever has! And I love what he says every time he gets on the horse... his speech is still slow, so we have to decipher most of what he says. But, we would always say "Yee Hah" when he would ride the horse and it would make him smile. Somehow, when he says "yee hah" it always comes out "Hee Ho!" And believe me it is not a wimpy "hee ho" either!!

New Urban Family Pics

We recently had some pictures taken downtown with all of John's family... here is one of just our family. I have to resize the photos to get them to upload on the blog, so I'll try to put up more later when I have more time. (Most likely AFTER the Growing Kids Sale! It's looking like we have a BIG week ahead of us...) :)

The boys make me smile

So, here are the today's funny or cute memories from each of the boys.

Josiah: During his break at soccer practice tonight, he came to get a drink of water out of his water bottle and he showed me that the coach had brought water or Gatorade for all the players. Then Josiah said, "Dad told me that I can't drink that because it has swine flu in it." I said, "Really? Your dad told you that?" He said, "Not exactly... that's just my paraphrase... he really told me to drink my own water."

Shepard: He had the job of cleaning up all the toys this evening and he didn't know I was watching him. First you just have to picture him... he was ready for bed so he was wearing his boxer shorts, but he had also put on this winter knit hat that was WAY too small and had tried to fasten it under his chin. He was also sporting these huge fleece camo gloves which made it hard for him to pick anything up. He had been doing a pretty good job of cleaning up and then I caught him red handed... he tossed that last nerf dart under a chair and then stood up very proud that he hid the toy and called his job complete. He was sure surprised to see me standing there! He did have to retrieve that dart. :)

Will: He learned how to say his name tonight! All evening he keeps saying, "Wi..iiilll, Wi...iiiilll, Wii...llll" You can sure hear the southern drawl in it. It's so cute... he even points at himself as he says it.