Counting down...

She's been counting down for a month. Then she started counting down the weeks.
Then about 2 weeks ago, she started counting down the days.

This morning our conversation was this:

Tomorrow is my birthday!!!

Nah. Let's have it on Saturday.

No! Tomorrow!! It's my birthday.

nuh-uh. How about Monday?

No. My birthday is tomorrow.

I have something else to do tomorrow. How about Tuesday?

nope. My birthday is Tomorrow!!

How about Wednesday?

No! It's already SCHEDULED for tomorrow.

Oh! That's what it was I was going to do.

She'll be 9. She only gets the chance once.
But apparently, she gets MANY chances to tell me that it's coming.

She: dancing through the kitchen, "I'm excited that tomorrow's my birthday!!"

Me: walking through the kitchen and avoiding getting danced upon, "What was it I was going to do tomorrow??"

She: My birthday!!

Me: Oh, yeah. That's it.

She: That was pretty funny, mom.

Me: Thanks. (I thought so, too.)

Mini-Me is having BIRTHDAY tomorrow. She's determined that it's going to happen tomorrow. She's not willing to change the day one bit.

So I guess tomorrow will be a birthday. :-) The 9th birthday in a long series of birthdays. I hope she's as excited about each one as she is about this one.

making' memories...

and play-dough.

We've been studying that Jesus is the Bread of Life and one suggested activity was to make homemade play-dough. So we did. We mixed the ingredients. Added some red food coloring.



When Mini-Me hollered that "It's Pink!", G groaned. So I added some blue. It made a purple kind of color. Or Lavendar - as Mini-Me claims.



Okay.

They played with it and loved it...or so I thought.

At some point in it all G said "This is fun, but it stinks!"

I'm not sure what smelled, it had to be the cream of Tartar, but the fun must have outweighed the smell because they put their playdough in baggies for later play.

The things that are said around here are priceless.

Little Fingers are quick....

This is Leena, the Mushabelly Ladybug.

I didn't INTEND to own a ladybug...

I needed to get a pair of earrings for Mini-Me's birthday. I thought I'd go to Claire's to find something different than I might find at Wal-Mart. I know, I went from one national chain to another. I took the little kids because The Professor was going to grocery shop. Then G-man decided that maybe he might like to go with me. I promised him a commission for going and helping me.

We get to the mall without issue, and immediately had to take J-man to the potty. When we went back to the store, I didn't position Mini-E's stroller far enough away from a display and she promptly got a handful of earrings.

I found something and then headed to the back of the store to look at head bands and the cutsie earrings in the back. Mini-E grabbed ahold of the cute lady bug - and she squished it and loved on it and I thought, "Aha. She'll love on it for a minute or two and then I'll put it back. It will keep her hands busy."

G decided he wanted to get Mini-Me a gift from Claire's. So we had to decided what. Then we looked for a gift for a friend who is having a birthday soon - and we went to check out.

I'm still not sure how I managed to get so many things so fast. I was going to put the lady bug back on the shelf. It was just sitting on E's lap. I took it by the antenna and grabbed a handful of wet.

Apparently, Mini-E decided she liked Leena so much she was going to chew on her anntena.

I couldn't in good conscience put it back. So I bought it.

Have to admit, though.

She's got a cute face.

Sleepy Boys Say the cutest things...

Friday, my brother decided that he had the urge to buy in bulk. Since I'm the Card holder we load up and off we go. It was quite interesting to shop for bulk items with my brother and mom. The bonus came when we desperately needed a potty break and I was able to leave my stuff and baby with my sib & mom.

On the way home, both my little ones fell asleep.
They were OUT.

I get Mini-E into bed and go back for J-man.
He wakes up, very groggy, as I'm disengaging him from his seatbelt and booster.
"Come'on, big guy." I say to him in a quiet, mommy-loves-you voice.

"I not a big boy. I a tiny boy." was his sleepy reply.

My heart melted into a puddle of chocolate goo.

Crossing Over...

I think I'm finally crossing over to the otherside. The last few weeks have been filled with battles that I haven't faced in MONTHS.


I heard Beth Moore, in person, many months ago. She had prayed and asked God for a specific message for the specific conference of which I was in attendance. She had them put it up on the big - jumbo sized - Screen for all to see.


"You don't trust me in this."


But what I saw was "You Don't Trust Me." It quickened in my spirit and I realized that all my struggles about the season of life, about homeschooling, all the inadequacies I'd felt - all stemmed from a lack of trust. A lack of trust in the One Person who could get me through. How silly was that?


But it was true. After the end of the conference, I had a weapon to fight the battles. I was ready to face the school year, ready to face all those emotions - and they didn't come. Because I was ready. I had fought. I had the victory. I was an over comer!!


Until now.


Well, I'm still in victory, I'm still an over comer - but I started struggling with things I thought were dead. I started rehashing emotions that I thought were done away with. I've begun to read many things through my in-box that will help me keep getting the word in me - and as I was struggling with this new series of old hassles, the Holy Spirit kept reminding me of something I'd read. It was from an e-mail sent by the Spirit of Prophecy Bulletin.


Now understand, I read some of these and think, "Wow, God. Is that one for me?" Sometimes I'm just blessed and reminded at how much God loves me. This time, I had read the bulletin and forgot about it - but in the midst of the emotional struggles I face it kept popping back to mind. The First Sentence said:


Watch for the enemy to test you again in old places of defeat, which have recently become places of victory.


When I read it again, it sunk in.
Aha!
Revelation.

That's why it was all very familiar -- all the struggles, the frustrations, the emotions. After I identified what was going on I wasn't sure what to do. I felt like I had already lost so much ground. I had really given in to feelings of being forsaken, that my prayers were not reaching past the ceiling -- it was odd. So how do I get past all this? It was at the conference that God shouted at me through a jumbo-tron...

Church last Wednesday. The Pastor was teaching about the sufficiency of Grace. God gives us grace to go through the trials and circumstances of every day life. Pastor said, Sometimes He won't pull us directly out of the situation, sometimes He wants us to grow through the situation.


"He's more interested in developing your character, than He is in your deliverance."


Ugh.
NOT what I wanted to hear. I wanted a quick deliverance. I wanted this attack of the negative to be vanquished immediately.


Yes. I want to be spoiled. I don't want to go through anything..especially NOW. But it seems I'm going to - wellllll....

I guess I don't HAVE to - but really, not going through isn't an options. I know what lies behind. I don't like it. So I press on.


Pastor said, sometimes after "you've done all - to stand" and then he said "Sometimes you just feel like you're standing and standing."


So he gave us somethings to do while we stand.
It has taken me 3 days to post this --- so let me share the things to do while standing...
He prefaced his list by stating that "The enemy loves for trials to last a very long time - because he can get The Word out of us. He wants us to give up."

Press in harder than you've ever pressed on before. God intends for us to grow while we stand. Not just stand while we stand.

1. Rediscover God's Word. -- We tend to get away from God's word during trials...we need to get into it more than ever.

2. Have a prayer partner - a faith friend. Some one you can call on for prayer. He said, not just someone who will agree with you or grumble with you - but someone who will pray and agree scripturally.

3. Find good meetings and go and listen. If your church isn't meeting, find one that is.

4. Remember & be thankful for God's blessings & Grace. Remember all that God's blessings have brought you in the past - remember all that God has done in the past. Make a list - it won't be long before you're shouting 'Hallelujah'!

5. Pray the Word
Pray in the Spirit

6. Guard your thought life - watch your confessions of Faith

7. Refuse any and all offenses at this time - especially taking on the offenses of others.

8. Read & review timely prophesies given over you.

9. Read & Review tstimonies of others that have had the same situations and struggles as you. Sometimes we think we're the only ones facing a situation...but we're not.

10. Worship MORE

11. The enemy tells you to stop giving - so increase your giving.

12. Witness more for Jesus.

13. Give your testimony of what God has done/saved you from in the past.

14. Plan now to use this upcoming victory as a testimony.

The more I think on these things and follow through with them, the more I see forward motions.

The one thing that hit me tonight, though, in all of it - laying down my rights.
Quick!! Get the bandaids!!

Laying down my rights in those areas that I'm struggling in --
I have to lay down my rights .. I think the list would be too long here...

This is what I'm learning right now in the Laundry Pile School of all Things.
It may not be pretty -- but hopefully, when all is said and done, there will be fruit to show for it.

Just reading...sending some link love....

CarpeBanana made me laugh today. literally LOL.

A friend forwarded this blog story to me and it made me LOL, too, and realize that I'm grateful for not having to take prenatal vitamins

Melanie at Our Happy Happenings blessed me with an award. In the midst of having a C.U.T.E baby, losing weight and creating a winter activity plan! I'm impressed (and need to blog about the award. ) and honored.

Mrs. Darling always gives me something to think about. I'm really trying hard not to hate her -- I think she's the Proverbs 31 woman in real life...not to mention the dreaded Christmas countdown on her blog. Really, though - I could never hate her - she's Darling *pun intended - and I'm highly amused at myself* She makes me think and aspire to greatness - though, I'm still stunned at how she manages everything. Today she's got book recommendations.

I read a fun series of articles - can two articles be considered a series? -- at Crosswalk.com.
First one and second one - but pointing women to the disciplines of Christian living. I read the second one first - you know, just to shake things up. Really, I found the second one without realizing there WAS a first one.

I love Jane's honesty.

Paula's beginning to rewrite and write some more. I'm inspired ... really, even if I am sitting here at the computer blogging. Instead of writing. Oh, hush.

I think Cristina was in my house. Though, I'm not sure how she made the commute.

I love watching Holly polish up her Apples of Gold. She has some really fun times - but she also has the same kind of mom moments that I do - so it's nice to know I'm not crazy, despite what my brother says.

I was reading today and thinking - why blog? Others have so much more interesting things to say - at least today and at least in my opinion. I'm sure I've missed someone and it's not for any particular reason - save that it's way past my bedtime and my next blog post is stirring like potatoes in my brain. :-) I've got to get it started or I'll never sleep.

Head knowledge....

Buzz Lightyear lost his head today. It was a tragic accident. He took a fall off of a (probably) 3 foot boy. He lost his helmet months ago. He had to take it off because it wouldn't stay open to talk to his friends.

I told J-man that I would help him by maybe gluing Buzz's head back on, but I"m not even sure that will work. The plastic pieces that were holding his head onto his space suit is still attached to his head. That can't be good.

We all passed the poor guy around and had a look down into his innards.

We could see all the way through him to his toes.

We laughed at the circuitry. I had to admit it was funny to see the guy just totally headless but I thought J-man would be more upset than he was. He had brought Buzz to me to tell me that the laser didn't work. I'm not sure which came first the head injury or the faulty laser. Either way, I was surprised when J handed me the toy and said "Fix it mama, I have to potty."

The head was jammed into the body of the space suit and I though, My goodness how strange is that. I might need pliers. And then his head just popped out into my hands.

My first thought was "Uh Oh". I had a visual image of J man throwing a world class fit because Buzz had just gone and lost his head.

I was relieved at his smile and acceptance that we would try glue.

We went to church and came home. The big kids were blessed at church and were playing around (they always come home happy and slightly hyper) so I wasn't going to force the bedtime issue.

I was focused on the big kids until I noticed J was sitting at the computer table making sound effects of, well, a robotic nature. So I went to investigate - he's still playing with the Buzz Light year...

But he'd made some modifications.

I love this kids imagination and ingenuity.

I was also impressed that two action figures could fit inside Buzz's space suit.

Of course, since I knew I was going to blog about this -- I decided I'd have some fun.

I'm so fighting off the urge to be punny. ...

but you have to admit...

That's one way to use your head.

and if he hadn't lost his head, J-man wouldn't have used his.

What if we shrunk the sun?

We were learning about the stars in our Adventures in Father's World lessons.

Through the course of talking about stars, we've discussed that God made each one and knows their names. We can see the stars so well from here that we've stood on our driveway and looked up and each one of us has said "Wow."

We talked about Betelgeuse being so large. It was fun learning that "Betelgeuse" means in Arabic "Giant's shoulders". To Mini-Me she thinks it sounds really gross.

If we shrunk our sun to 1 inch diameter...

we'd have to shrink Betelgeuse down to 16 2/3 yards diameter. That's a huge scale.

Here are the kids at the ends of the diameter points. My biggest worry is that we didn't mark the length right. I'm just glad it wasn't suggested that we mark the actual circle -- That would have taken up territory in the yards of 4 neighbors.

Mini-Me had so much fun doing this she had to write to her pen-pal about it and send pictures. I love having these teachable moments with them. I hope it's a memory now and not just school. I got caught up in Mini-Me's enthusiasm and had to tell you about it.

Distinguished tastes...

I face painted last Saturday and kept my gear out to paint the faces of my children. It gives them joy and gives me lots of practice. It was a bit odd for me to see my painting gear scattered around - because the sponges I used all had bites out of them.

Uniform and perfect little bites.

Luckily, she didn't eat the pieces that she bit off the sponges, but she did bite into each one.

I'm not sure why. They don't particularly look appetizing - but maybe it's an acquired taste?

First Sightings

The First Jackets of Fall!!

It was weird to walk out in the back yard to find VERY green grass and a very crisp morning. The kids decided that they needed jackets and shoes.

I had to take a picture. I love fall. I love the crispness of the mornings. Especially, when summer continues to linger on.

I can't wait for more sightings.

My Hope

It takes a moment for the actual song to come up -- I scrolled forward...
I walked into my room today - where I'd left the CD playing and this song was playing.

I listened for a moment and realized - "That's it!!"

My song for the day:

"My Hope"

You are righteous
You love justice
And those who honour You
Will see your face

I will arise and lift my eyes to see
Your majesty
Your holiness
And all I am will bless you

My hope is in the Name of the Lord
Where my help comes from
You're my strength, my song
My trust is in the Name of the Lord
I will sing your praise
You are faithful

There are no secrets

Today was the day of a county wide election. It's a vote for a project in the nearest big city. A project that would raise our taxes county-wide for a project in the city. I don't see how it will benefit me or my city despite what the newspaper keeps saying. I've read up on the project and have decided to vote no.

The kids wanted to know on what we were voting. I told them it was a vote to have more taxes or not and I'm choosing the "not". Mini-Me agreed. She promptly, for some reason unknown to me, went to tell her brothers why we were going to vote. I heard her say "It's to decide whether or not to have more taxes. Mom is voting no."

I decided that since we're going out, that it would be perfect timing to run and get hair cuts for G, J & E. So we grab clipboards and worksheets (a brilliant idea, by the way that I got from my comments the other day and from Cristina's carschooling - you guys are brilliant!!) Why I've never done that before is beyond me. It was SOOOOO very beneficial they got some work done and I didn't feel as if we lost time. We still did, but not nearly as much. When we got to the haircut place, they started feeding their gumball type machines with quarters that they'd grabbed from their piggybanks. I was impressed by their foresight.

But I digress.

Back to the voting booth. We arrived at the church (our polling place). We didn't have to announce our arrival. They could see us coming. The little ladies volunteering today were all elderly and could have been great grandmas. They just beamed smiles at my kids.

One of them said, "We've got a lot of voters today!"
I smiled and said, with realization in my heart, "Yes, lots of future voters." (I'm not sure when 4 started equalling 'lots' but I went with it.)

We find my name in the register and another little lady asks G-man if he wants a sticker. He jumps on the sticker opportunity and loudly proclaims, "We're voting NO!"

I guess I need to discuss with him the purpose behind a secret ballot - because there are no secrets in the Laundry Pile.

Notes and updates on the Denims

It's been a crazy few weeks but I wanted to update you on all the excitement.

Mini-E, I think, is finally contagion free. I can't tell though, for certain. We kept her home from church on Sunday because it's hard to tell which are old pox and which are new. After talking to my friend today, though, I'm very glad that we did have the immunization - a serious case of chicken pox would have really put a damper on our lives.

The boys never broke out as bad as Mini-E. G only had about 5 spots and J-man had somewhere between the two kids. He had enough for me to confirm that he had them. I didn't expect G to get them because he had the booster shot - but he only had 5 spots, so i guess the booster worked. His only complaint was that the spots itched.

We got our van back. After driving the Nissan Armada for 2 weeks, seeing my van back in the driveway -- it looked very short and small. I feel short (er) driving the van --- I really miss the size and height of the SUV. I totally agree with Mrs. Darling who said : "I feel so safe in it. Another thing I like about the height is that on rainy days you sit above most of the road spray! Have you noticed that? It makes driving an all new experience."

She is so right. I think I want an SUV now. Before I was indifferent - I am no longer. Indifferent, that is....about SUV's. The Armada had this fantastic button on it. If you pressed it, the heads up display would tell you how much gas you had and how many miles you had to go before you refilled the tank. It was awesome.

My van is great, too. I don't have to worry about it getting scratched. I own it....and it's already scratched. The day we got the van back in the driveway, I wanted to make a quick run to the library.

It was dead.

Dead.

Dead.

We couldn't tell if the alternator was dying (or already dead) or if it was the battery. So we called a local repairman and he came out the next day to have a look-see. It was the battery and he suspected that it was the battery original to the van. The van is about 6 years old. And after seeing how it is placed in the van, I'm really glad we didn't undertake installing the battery ourselves. It reminded me of that Operation game....if I touched the side I was going to get buzzed and see lights...

J-man is doing very well with speech therapy. The only downside to speech therapy is that we're not doing well with following up with school work in the afternoon. Okay. I'm not doing very good with it.

After lunch, after getting the babies down for a nap and after mom goes home, I just want to sit. Today I gave Mini-Me a Math test, as opposed to a work book page. It took her over an hour to get part of it done, and she still wasn't done by 3:30. We needed a new toilet seat (not sure how it broke - but it split in two) and some apple juice. Luckily there's a wal-mart down the street from the hardware store. She'll have to finish that test in the morning. I know it would take her about 15 minutes if she'd just focus. J-man only slept for 45 minutes instead of his normal 2 hours. Which didn't help matters for Mini-me's concentration because he wanted to finish his movie.

Oh, I got the seat home and figured out that it doesn't fit - after struggling to get the old, broken seat off. So now I've got to see if Lowe's will take the seat back. The box is open, but the plastic is intact. (Insert sigh here). Another trip back to the store with 4 kids. Honestly, The Professor just doesn't know what he's missing out on.

When we do manage to get a full days worth of school done, it's been good. Both the big kids are doing great with what they get to do. It's an exciting year, really. I'm well pleased. I did make a change with our handwriting curriculum. During the Back to Homeschool Week hosted by Randi I had come across a curriculum called "A Reason for Handwriting" and I gave it a try and liked the look of it...so I purchased it. On a whim, I tried the first lesson - with actual words. I was too much in a hurry to figure out why there were two sections in the book and two different pages marked "lesson 1". She was so excited with it. She came to me and said "Mom!! Look at this letter and this word!" She did so good. I think it was because there wasn't too much in the lesson. I have forgotten, in my haste, to give her a daily dose of handwriting - but was much encouraged by this. I've decided to switch from ABeka Cursive to this. And next year, I'll put G in this curriculum,too.

I'll also endeavor to learn why there are two sections in the book and two lessons marked Lesson 1.

Those are the notes that I can think of that might even interest ya. The challenges of daily-ness are still there: discipline, powerstruggles, struggles with self. But they often don't make good blog fodder, I think, because they are just so ... everyday.

Those are all the notes from the Laundry Pile for today.

Awards...

While I've been busy with school, children with spots and children without, vans and rental trucks, housekeeping and budgets, it's been nice to know that my blogger buds haven't forgotten me. While I've been putting blogging on the back burner, I try to keep in touch and blog when I can - I've been surprised to log in and find that I've been blessed!

Actually blessed beyond bloggin' measure, to be sure.

Since I can't get them to fit into my sidebar the way I'd like them to -- I've opted to show them here.

The "You make me smile award" came to me from Cristina & Melanie.

MonkeyGiggles and Renae (who is not a dork) both blessed me with the "Nice Matters Award" at two different times. I'm flattered. I've been called weird, sweet, funny, odd, unique (my favorite) - but never, actually, "Nice". and Cristina again -- she thinks I think ... blessed me with a Femme Philosophers Award. (An award she made herself.) Follow the link there in her name and you'll read all about it. She's been one of my blogging buddies from the VERY beginning. You know when I said "Let there be Blog". *L* (by the way, it's open to men bloggers, too - go check it out!!)

Thank you, Thank you, Thank You!!

I can't thank you enough!!

Maybe I can and I haven't tried hard enough.

I'm honored.

Beyond that, I thank you for keeping in touch, even when I'm in-blog-omunicado.

*I slay me.*

Sign me --

A very humble Denim.

Super Power?

Your Superpower Should Be Mind Reading

You are brilliant, insightful, and intuitive. You understand people better than they would like to be understood. Highly sensitive, you are good at putting together seemingly irrelevant details. You figure out what's going on before anyone knows that anything is going on! Why you would be a good superhero: You don't care what people think, and you'd do whatever needed to be done Your biggest problem as a superhero: Feeling even more isolated than you do now

What Should Your Superpower Be?

Needless to say, I giggled.

You mean I can do that??

With two babies in the house, both of whom can be demanding, I've struggled with putting a schedule together. I want one, because Mini-Me seems to thrive with a schedule. A schedule would also help me in planning and mental preparation.

It was just difficult because I expected a schedule to be very decisive about when to do what. You know the kind I mean:
8:00 - breakfast
8:30 - Bible
8:45 - Math
9:30 - Phonics
Everything had a time slot. I couldn't do those because both my little ones would often need attention. I actually considered it a shortcoming in me. I mean, I should be able to control diapers and feedings, right?? Oh, and outbursts....and skinned knees...and munchies...

I've been reading the book "Things we wished we'd Known" compiled by Diana Waring. It's been an interesting book. I've not really gotten far as I"m trying to read one persons account at a time. It's compiled like a devotion might be. Each family writes an essay that might fit into one big category. I like that I can sit down and read each essay in a sitting. It's almost a devotional in that aspect. Something that could be read over with Hot chocolate or tea in the morning - or a sandwich during lunch...or those times that I lock myself in the bathroom.

My "aha" moment came with the article written by Madelaine Smith, entitled "Hanging Haman: Exploring the Bible One Day a Week". I loved what she wrote about Studying the Bible one day a week, I really did.

Here's what she wrote that opened my eyes:

"At home, we could do one subject a day, and that's what we did for the
first eight years. Math was our exception since the girls, 8 & 9 years old,
felt their brains might explode if they did several math lessons a day. Since
they were usually only required to do every third math problem anyway, math did
not take much time, so we still had about tow hours to do our one big subject
and finish by lunchtime, a goal we maintained until high school."

I read that and thought: You mean I can do that?? I realize that's a silly statement to make. Homeschooling is all about overcoming and adapting. Modifying to fit the needs of the student and teacher. While I knew all that, I felt like I was falling down the on the job if I didn't give my kids a rounded school day.

After reading that segment, I realized that the best times of school work, where we got the most accomplished, happened during the end of the school year crunches. The reason we got so much accomplished would be because I'd push through one subject a day. (Push through sounds like a military maneuver, but it wasn't ever a knuckle down kind of happening. When doing more than one lesson in, say, phonics, I can only do the repetitious stuff once. In math, I can practice reading a clock, once out of three lessons as opposed to once every lesson. Then we adjusted the work levels, too, on the paperwork. While one was doing work, I'd teach the other.

(Handwriting is still a painful topic around here.)

So I felt a new freedom after reading this and realized that I could do a schedule like this:
Monday: Speech Therapy & math
Tuesday: Phonics, Bible & History
or something like that ---
I always want to start my day with Bible reading....so I'm hoping this will help us get into a routine of Bible reading and History.

Mini-Me is already adjusting to this type of schedule, last week, while I was still writing all this down, I wanted to pick up on a math lesson and she said "But it's Tuesday (or whatever day it was) and we're supposed to do phonics."

Technicalities.

The only downside I see to this is that when the day is tough, I still don't get done all I want to get accomplished. We're working on it though and I know it will come in time...because I've also had the revelation that I am, really, quite organized - but not organized the way I think it should look. That's another topic for another post.

Overcoming and adapting - Homeschooling at it's best.



A Comfy note: I started this post yesterday and just now finished it. I don't know why I can't change the date on my post, ah well, It will help my feeling of being in a time warp.