One school year down and ready for another!

As we approach the beginning of a new school year, I decided to evaluate last year and see what I learned... here are my thoughts:

The bottom line? I absolutely LOVE homeschooling!  I am passionate about education and get ever so excited about not only what my girls are learning, but also what I am learning in the process!  I love having my girls home all day with me and although we've had our share of unproductive or down-right bad days, I wouldn't change it for anything!

My absolute favorite part about homeschooling?  Without a doubt it is spending hours of our week snuggling on the couch reading my all time favorite childhood books to my girls.   That is definitely my favorite part of our day!

My downfall?  Curriculum.  I'm a nerd.  I love books.  I love it all.  I want to do it all.  I want to buy each book I see.  I always plan waaaaay to much.  You remember my "great plan" for the beginning of the year?  Yeah, I pretty much only followed for a few days.  It was too structured for a baby with a changing schedule (who didn't want to follow "my" schedule :).  And it didn't leave enough time to take advantage of those "teachable moments" or to really dig in deep to our favorite read-alouds.  I was also going to do a "Letter of the Week" theme for Karlie but soon found out that she had learned all of her letters and sounds already from Karis and was pointless.  So I just did phonograms with both of them instead.

The best advice given to me?  A sweet friend named Jessica who has 3 precious stair-step children (even closer in age than mine!) told me not to try to start it all at once.  To start one thing, build it into a routine, and do it well for a week or two or even a month before adding something else.  Then work on doing those two things til we were set in the habit and ready to add something else.  Very simple, but priceless advice.  It worked.  My girls thrived on doing the one bit of schoolwork I had them do every morning and then got ever so excited each time I finally added another piece to our routine.  We ended up with only 3 real schoolwork periods: a short 10 minute breakfast memory board, a longer reading time on the couch, and a half hour table work time in the afternoon.  "Preschool" really doesn't take long. (If you want to see how our schedule ended up, you can click HERE to see a longer version of this post on my family blog.)

Favorite Curriculum/ Books we used:
For Teaching Karis to Read:
The Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading -- the girls loved the initial alphabet rhymes but the reading part was not super exciting.  Still, it has a great simple phonics and grammatical progression and is exactly what Karis needs.  I am more than happy with it.
Alphaphonics -- I take turns with this and the above to give Karis some variety and to help with fluency.  She likes that the letters are larger.
Bob books: She reads me one story each school day and they get progressively more difficult.  It has been great to use them as we go through our phonogram cards because she sees how the phonograms help her figure out words.  I just get these from the library.
The Writing Road to Reading and phonogram cards  --  The book is great and I am certain I will utilize its techniques next year since Karis is actually writing more now.  The phonogram cards are key -- there are only about 70 key phonograms in the English language and once a child can recognize them, she can figure out how to read almost any word.  They have REALLY helped Karis take off with her reading.  We memorize several a week and say them each morning as we do our "breakfast memory board."
Explode the Code Workbooks -- she absolutely LOVES her workbook and I am thrilled with the effortless way it teaches her to read and practice her handwriting as well.  This is probably her favorite "reading resource"

Chapter "Read-Alouds":  Our favorite part of the day is curling up on the couch with a good book!  I absolutely LOVE Sonlight's reading list for preschool and kindergarten.  We did not buy the curriculum, but instead I just got most of the books from the library.  There are a few great collections that I purchased from Amazon, but most of them are at our library.  I also requested books from the library from THIS classical book list.  

For this year:  We plan to do Classical Conversations for our science and history foundation and I will add read-a-louds and activites to supplement as I have time.  (Probably not too many the 1st year as I get used to the program.)  I plan to continue with our current phonics materials and Sonlight read-a-louds and add Saxon math to our schedule as well.  And I think that should do it!  I am very excited about the upcoming school year!

Some Random Favorite Links...

You have probably noticed that the POH authors are taking a little break from writing this summer...  we are all quite busy with our families and summer plans.  We might post every once in a while if we find something that we think might be encouraging to you, but we are not going to try to schedule posts every week.  We hope you are having a wonderful summer and are making lots of special memories with loved ones!

Here are some articles/ links/ recipes I have enjoyed lately:

The "littleness" of motherhood -- another convicting and encouraging article by one of my favorite writers

Chicken Lazone is our absolute favorite recipe right now.  We probably have it at least once every other week.  It is so quick and easy and delicious over a bed of quinoa.  I leave off the seasonings for my girls' chicken so it won't be too spicy for them and their pieces absorb just enough of the spices from ours that it is delicious to them.

A great website for downloading free audio books that I have used greatly in finding stories for my girls for rest time.

This article was very helpful to me in understanding the developmental grasp of a child and helping me to chill out about the way Karlie holds her pencil.

These questions are really fun to ask the kids about any family member.  I printed out the answers on a pretty piece of paper to give to the grandparents for Mother's Day and Father's Day.

Here is an inspiring note to moms of littles.

Natural tick prevention and treatment

My new favorite granola recipe!  She gives a gluten-free option which I now need because my 3-year old needs to eat GF.  I absolutely love the texture and crunch of the toasted buckwheat added to the normal deliciousness of granola!

A great reminder about the "bulk effect" in parenting

We went to The Twisted Fork Restaurant and I fell in love with their Tia Maria Cake -- a friend gave me this recipe that I would really like to try out!

The Long-Term View

Great parenting tips and a plug for a marriage get-away

Since we are focusing on moms this month, I thought I would share some great parenting tips from a Mom who recently taught me a lot.  But before I do, I just have to put in a plug for Family Life's Weekend to Remember Marriage Getaways.  Mark and I just attended one last weekend, and it was amazing for us.  We didn't have any major problems in our marriage, but just knew we were exhausted and needed to get away and focus on each other and connect.   I was looking for something fun for us to do in Charlotte (I have to now admit that we chose Charlotte simply because it had the closest IKEA and I'd been wanting to go there for years :) and found the marriage get-a-way and thought it would be a great way to get us to focus on each other.  I mentioned it to Mark and he laughed in my face.  Sitting through a conference was definitely not what he wanted to do on our get-a-way!  So I dropped it.  I told him he could plan whatever he wanted for us.  And two weeks later he brought it up again and said we could do the marriage conference as long as we didn't have to go to every single session.  Ha!  We almost dropped the idea again because of the price, but Family Life people are super nice and will give scholarships based simply on "what you and your husband have decided you can afford."

Mark and I looked at the schedule and decided which sessions we would attend... some of the sessions sounded very redundant to information we had learned in Seminary so we decided to skip many of them.  We actually only made it to 4 out of 10 sessions but those 4 sessions were indeed invaluable to us.  I'm talking, life-changing, "I feel like we are courting again" type of impact!  (In retrospect, we probably would have learned much in the other sessions as well, but the 4 we attended gave us more than enough to process and work on.)  I expected to get a lot from the conference (being the relationship-oriented, emotional woman that I am), but I was amazed at how much it changed my husband as well.  He didn't even want to go to the conference originally, but has said many times since how glad he was that he went and how he wishes others that we know could go to one as well.

Sorry this has gotten to be such a long plug, but I felt like I really needed to share because it helped us so much.  Since this is a blog specifically for exhausted moms of little ones, I am certain that we are not the only ones who unknowingly settled into "companionship" mode without even realizing it.  We love our kids and the life that we enjoy with them and we truly get along great so we did not even realize that our marriage had become complacent.  Weekend To Remember is a wonderful tool to get the communication flowing in all areas of marriage and God greatly used it to recharge ours!

The wife and mother who spoke at the conference did one session on parenting and she told her top ten tips for kids.  I knew many of them already, but the session was a good reminder and listening to her tips helped me to think about what areas of parenting I need to work on.   It also helped me think more about the future of my kids and our goal in parenting. (I tend to get so caught up in the here and now of the little years that I often forget that we are doing such training so they can be independent but wise and godly teenagers.)  I hope these tips will be helpful to you as well:

1.  Set limits -- kids need limits and they find security in them.

2.  "We play to an audience on one."  This one was a particularly good reminder for me because I parent very differently than a lot of people I know and I need to stop worrying about what others are thinking about my parenting style.  What matters is that I am in prayer and doing what God has called me to do.  I raise my children for Him, not anyone else.

3.  My job is not to be my child's best friend!  She went on to say that friendship does come later and right now she is enjoying a sweet, sweet friendship with her teenage and college-age kids.  But the little years are for training and instructing in righteousness and much discipline.

4.  Because of all the boundaries and discipline that come with #3, try to say yes to as many things as you can so that when you do say no, it really means something.

5.  Give them the Biblical reasons behind the rules and limitations -- we do not just want good behavior, but to help them make good decisions in the future!

6.  When you take something away, give them something better -- she gave the example of beach week in the South, where kids always go to the beach and party like crazy for a week after school lets out.  They never let their kids attend beach week, but instead used that week to plan amazing family vacations.

7.  Stay calm and loving in discipline -- you don't want them to think you are disciplining simply because you are mad, but because you love them and are obeying God in training them in righteous living.

8.  The less you react in the moment, the more your kids will come to you with their moments.  If a child comes home and tells you something incredibly shocking that happened in school, if you get all upset and immediately call the principal, the child will probably not choose to confide in you the next time something disturbing happens.

9.  Focus on unconditional love -- when you discipline, tell them that you are disappointed, that they sinned, but that it does not change your love for them.

10.  Pray that they would get caught!  You will not be with them every moment and will not catch every sin, so pray that they will get caught before their sin grows so they can deal with it and learn from it.  (Sidenote:  my own mother did this and told us that she did and God definitely answered her prayer -- my brother and I never got away with anything!  :)

The Journey

I asked my sweet friend, Melisa King, if I could post her story because her family was an extremely influential factor in our decision to adopt at some point.  Mark and I had only been married a few months and didn't even have kids of our own, but watching their family with their newly adopted baby totally opened our eyes.  Melisa and her sister, both teenagers, were absolutely enamored with their new little sister!  I had always thought it would be neat to adopt, but had never even thought of doing it after our own children were teenagers and could really help take care of the baby and understand the emotional journey of adoption and see the comparison to how God adopted us!.  Now I can't wait to someday see my girls with an adopted sibling!  I hope you enjoy her sweet story as much as I did as I watched it unfold...

“Thou hast turned my mourning into dancing: thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness; To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give thanks unto thee forever.” – Psalm 30:11-12

I looked into her beautiful blue eyes, kissed her forehead and softly said, “Goodbye Anna, I love you.” I placed the three-month-old child into my mother’s arms and tears filled my eyes. My mom quietly asked, “Are you okay?” I silently nodded and then headed out the door to work.

This was not the first time I had been through this and it probably would not be the last. Five months earlier my family and I began to take part in a very special, unique and rewarding ministry. We became a foster family. I remember the day that my parents brought home our first baby. Julia was two weeks old, Hispanic and beautiful. Our time with her was filled with joy, laughter, and most of all, plenty of hugs and kisses. After two months, a wonderful Christian family adopted Julia. Though her adoptive family was wonderful, I do not believe I had ever felt the amount of pain I felt that day. I kissed her forehead and tearfully said, “Goodbye Julia. I love you.”

Three short days after Julia’s adoption we were entrusted with the care of another baby girl, Aly. Aly was two days old the day we received her and she was the perfect baby. About one week after Aly’s arrival my parents received a call asking them to consider taking another child. We quickly discussed the idea as a family and decided, “Hey, there are four of us! We can certainly handle two babies.”

Two days later, my mom and dad brought Anna home. Having two babies around the house proved to be challenging, but also fun and rewarding. We took turns feeding them, changing their diapers and even sleeping in their rooms at night. We also took turns rocking, hugging and kissing them.

After four days with both babies Aly went back to her birth mother and father. Once again, pain filled my heart as I kissed her one last time and whispered, “Goodbye Aly. I love you.” This time I was thankful to already have another baby in the house. Anna helped soothe our hurting hearts and brought joy and laughter to our faces.

We kept Anna for ten weeks. Those weeks including outings to the mall, showing her off at church and even a trip to the beach. Upon arriving home from the beach we learned that Anna would be adopted the following week.

After giving up Anna, our family felt incomplete. The weeks following Anna’s adoption were filled with many thoughts and questions. Were we really cut out for this foster care routine?

A few weeks later my parents came to my sister and me and asked, “What do you two think about adopting?” The prospect of adopting instantly excited my sister but I was a little reluctant to join in her enthusiasm. Not that adopting did not sound incredible; it was just that I was a fighter. I felt that if our family stopped doing foster care it would look like we had just given up. People might think that we could not handle the pain or were not strong enough to let the babies go. My parents began to pursue the process and over time my heart was filled with anticipation of a new addition to our family. My parents completed paperwork, background checks and physical examinations. They endured many meetings and interviews, very similar to those that took place before our approval to become a foster family. After all the assigned tasks were completed, our family began the waiting game.

Waiting proved to be much more trying than filling out the paperwork and answering all the questions. Weeks turned into months, and months to a year. After a year of waiting we had a few leads, all of which fell through after just a few days.

Early in July of 2004, my mom and I took a trip to Richmond to visit my grandparents and do a little shopping. During our shopping trip my mom received a phone call from an adoption agency in Arkansas. This was the phone call that changed our lives forever.

The next few weeks were filled with phone calls, pictures of the baby and uncontrollable excitement. Five weeks after receiving the long awaited phone call my parents flew to Arkansas where they met my baby sister for the first time. My sister and I passed the time while they were away by keeping busy with friends, church and work. Two days seemed like an eternity, but finally the time came to pick them up at the airport. My sister and I watched every plane that landed, hoping it would be the one holding our baby sister. Finally, we watched as the little Delta jet landed and my father quickly filed off the plane followed by my mother holding little Ella-Grace in her arms.

The following moments were filled with complete joy and fulfillment. As I held the sleeping child in my arms for the first time I knew that she was meant to be a part of our family. I felt so blessed to be Ella-Grace’s big sister and I realized the reason behind the journey I had been on for the past two years.

God has a way of leading you though certain circumstances that seem to have no purpose or meaning. Sometimes the circumstances even produce pain, often seemingly unbearable in nature. But, He has a plan. God used the time my family spent participating in foster care, not only to bless us, but also to direct us. I am so thankful for God’s direction during this time and my parent’s willingness to follow His path no matter how uncertain it appeared.

Ella-Grace is now seven years old. She has been with our family since she was ten weeks old. Every moment spent with her makes the waiting we endured worthwhile. I am so thankful that each day when I say, “I love you Ella-Grace,” I do not have to say, “Goodbye.”

Adoption links

While our family has yet to experience the joy of adoption, we definitely hope to pursue it at some point. I have been bookmarking articles and blogs that will be helpful to us in the future and I thought I would share them you you:

I became a fan of Tiffany at A Moment Cherished before she even began her adoption journey. I love her pictures and the way she writes. It has been absolutely beautiful to watch her passion for adoption grow and I have learned a lot from her adoption posts. She also has a great list of adoption resources that is very helpful. She also wrote a great article on "How to (Really) Help Adoptive Parents that everyone should read.

Justin Taylor wrote a great article called "The Risk of Transracial Adoption"

Nicole Whitacre from GirlTalk has a good article on "Why Adoption?"

Kelly's Korner has a great link-up for Adoption fundraisers

Stephen Curtis Chapman has a fabulous website with all kinds of resources for those interested in adopting or helping those who want to adopt.

The Nuts and Bolts of Adoption is filled with extremely valuable practical info for those considering adoption.

Embryo Adoption: A Unique Option to Give a Child Life

A very thought-provoking post: So You Think You Should Adopt? Please Don't"

A great "adoption stories" link-up

A local friend has adopted many children and her story is quite a testament to God's grace and provision. She has just written a great book called "More Than "I" Can Handle" and it is now available for pre-order!

Favorite Easter Ideas

It is hard to believe that Easter is quickly approaching! I love this holiday and want it to be special to my girls and I am trying to start traditions that will keep the focus on Christ. I thought I'd share a few that I have recently found and am considering:

I absolutely LOVE this idea for celebrating Lent with the kids, although for my little ones I might shorten it to just the week before Easter. Here is the blogger's description: "We placed a styrofoam wreath on the table, to be kept during the 40 days of Lent, with a cup of toothpicks nearby. Each night at dinner, those at the table had the chance to confess sin from the day. When they did so, they placed a toothpick in the wreath, symbolizing the thorns in the crown of Jesus on the cross....on Easter morning, before the children awoke, I removed all of the thorns and replaced them with spring flowers!" She also has a delicious looking recipe for sweet potato biscuits you might want to check out!

-- A Resurrection garden -- On Good Friday, take a baking dish and fill it with dirt, rocks, sticks, etc and a hollowed out potato (as a tomb). It makes a great decoration to remind us of Christ's sacrifice. On Easter morning, remove the potato and fill the garden with flowers to demonstrate the life that Christ brought through his death. HERE is a good picture and description of what one family did.

-- Resurrection eggs -- you can easily make your own or buy them at a Christian bookstore or Amazon -- the children crack open an egg each day and a small token corresponds with a Bible passage that explains the resurrection story.

-- Here is a great download for a 12 days of Easter unit to do with little ones. It corresponds to the resurrection eggs.

Benjamin's Box: The Story of the Resurrection Eggs is a great resource to go along with the eggs. My girls have really enjoyed following the story of Benjamin as he learns about Jesus. He gathers the same objects that are contained in the resurrection eggs.

Rocks in the basket -- Fill Easter baskets with rocks to represent your sins... you can write specific sins on the rocks or just say them as you place the rocks in the basket. Then cover the rocks with a red cloth to represent the blood of Christ, talking about Christ's death on the cross and what it meant for us. On Sunday morning you can replace the rocks with flowers representing life or whatever gifts you might wish to give your children on Easter morning and/or place the rocks in a different basket with the name of Jesus written on it to show how Jesus took away their sins.

Color a red dot on your children's palms and write their name on it to remind them that Christ died specifically for them!

This Focus on the Family article gives a special activity for each day of the week leading up to Easter.

Easter In The Garden -- a touching retelling of Easter as seen through a child's eyes

The Legend of the Easter Egg -- teaches the deeper meaning behind the Easter eggs -- a boy learns that just as a chick breaks out of an egg, so had Jesus broken free of the tomb of death. Easter eggs remind us that Jesus conquered death and gives us eternal life.

And just for fun, here are some twists to the traditional egg hunt:

Cascarones -- I love this fun idea of filling real, empty eggs with confetti and allowing the children to race around, smashing them on each other. I suppose it could get out of hand, but I love the avoidance of ridiculous amounts of candy and I think it would make for some fun pictures!

or you could just play this fun Easter Egg Bashing Game :)

Random favorites of this week:

Here are some things my girls have been enjoying this week. Feel free to share your favorites as well!

1. Sequence Letters -- my husband and I have long enjoyed the simple game of sequence, but my girls received the letter version for Christmas and it is great! Even Karlie can do it easily.

2. Water table, sprinkler, and "painting" the deck with water. (Yay for warm weather!) If you don't have a water table, search the spring consignment sales til you find one you can afford. My girls have been using ours on our deck every single day. I've been barricading the steps to our deck with our toy box so that Abbi cannot fall down, and letting them play out there together while I make dinner and do dishes every afternoon. It has made dinner prep time so much easier! I let them have plastic dishes and cups and paintbrushes and they have a blast making "soup" and "tea" and "ice cream" and painting everything with water and getting wonderfully soaked.

3. A random, simple bag of plain stones -- I picked one up at the dollar store to do a craft I had seen on Pinterest, but the girls begged me to let them have it. They pretend that the stones are all kinds of things and I have been amazed at how they have played with them over and over again. Even Abbi has done a great job of not eating them and she will sit and put them in ice cube trays or bowls for the longest time.

4. Richard Scarry's Storybook Dictionary -- I picked this up for a dollar at a consignment sale and it has become a household favorite! You wouldn't think a dictionary would be so interesting to kids, but they love it and beg me to read it to them all the time!

5. VTech kid's camera -- My girls received these for Christmas this year and love them! They love to take pictures like Mama and Daddy and be able to look at the them and play with them. The camera not only takes pictures, but you can add borders, stamps, and silly effects to them. The only downer for me is that the camera also has a few games and I'd rather my girls not get into that yet, but it hasn't been a problem for us yet. I'd say it is a little advanced for Karlie, but she still loves to play with it. I'd recommend it more for a 5 year old.

6. Jumbo Magnetos -- because these are magnetic, even Abbi can build with them and they are much too large for her to eat. I was a little disappointed that more did not come in the box, but the girls have had fun building with them and pretending that they are many different things.

7. Cutting up paint swatches from the hardware store. I'm not sure why it is so much fun, but every time Mark goes to Lowes or Home Depot, he has to bring home paint swatches for the girls. They love to cut them up and play "store" with them or give them to their favorite people.

8. This sticker book is awesome and Karlie would do it for hours if I let her!

9. We got this Animal Playtime book at the library and it has been a BIG hit!

10. Rhyme Bible Storybook -- Our favorite kid Bibles are the Big Picture Story Bible for little ones and the Jesus Storybook Bible for Preschoolers. We usually read through a chapter or two of one of them each night before bed until it is completed and then start the other. I found this Rhyme Bible Storybook at the library and the girls have loved it! Mark usually lets them try to finish each sentence and they have had a lot of fun with it. I definitely like the other two Bibles better, but this one has been a fun change of pace.

Some current favorites..

Today I am going to share some of the things that are our favorites this week at our house. This is a completely random list of what we have been enjoying this particular week and I hope you will share some of your favorites in the comments!

Music most often requested: Questions With Answers -- we have recently started doing Doorpost's children's catechism again with the girls before bed and they love the Songs for Saplings Cd's that answer most of the same questions. I actually prefer the wording of the CD's (although I really like the catechism as well) because it is simpler and often contains the scripture that goes along with the question. We recently got the 2nd volume on itunes and the girls ask to hear it all day long. The songs are quite mellow with just a guitar and the girls love that children sing the answers to the questions. It has also opened up some really good conversation with Karis as she asks questions about the theology described in the song.

(We also absolutely love Seeds Family Worship and Sovereign Grace Children's Cd's)

Favorite read-a-louds -- Betsy-Tacy, A Bear Called Paddington, and One Morning in Maine

Favorite Kid's Series -- Ladybug Girl Books -- While these are not the classic books I usually request at the library, my girls absolutely love them and I love the fact that they spark their little imaginations and they run around the house all day pretending to be Lulu or Marley :)

Favorite Book on CD (for naptime): Little Women (Karis) and Blueberries for Sal (Karlie)

Chicken Lazone -- my current favorite, super easy, fast, and absolutely delicious recipe. We eat it over quinoa.

Farmer's breakfast Hash -- My husband's current favorite breakfast... super filling and delicious!

Homemade cereal -- what my 3 year old wants to eat at every meal :)

Like-Lara Bars: My favorite snack!

My favorite book -- Loving the Little Years: Motherhood in the Trenches -- I know we've mentioned it on here before, but I just got around to reading it this month and I keep reading it over and over again because it is that good and easy to read. It is such as easy read that I read it all in one evening and then decided that I wanted to actually remember all her ideas and continue to be encouraged and convicted so I then read one chapter a night before I went to bed each evening. I love the fact that she is still in the middle of mothering little ones and experiencing the exhaustion and sometimes overwhelmingness of our task. I feel like she is reading my thoughts and encouraging me and convicting me at the same time. This will be my "go-to gift" for mothers of multiple children!

Watching old home video clips with the girls -- my husband recently found some old cd's we made from when we got our dog and our first beach trip with our two littles and when Karlie was born. We showed several of them to the girls and they just had the best time watching them! I think we are going to have to start having an old family movie night once a month because it just makes them smile so much to see what they looked like so little and how much we loved them and enjoyed playing with them :)

This Melissa and Doug Play House Reusable Sticker Pad -- Nina brought this the last time she came and the girls ask to play it all day long!

March Topic: Our Favorite Things

I can hardly believe that it is already March! This month the POH authors plan to share all our favorite things and I can't wait to hear them! I thought I would start off the month by sharing how God made himself real to my little girl today, because the simple story is truly one of my favorite moments ever! It was definitely a humbling experience for me, but something I think she will always remember...

Our daily walk around the neighborhood is always one of the high points of our day. The girls really look forward to it and are disappointed when it rains and we cannot go. The excitement has been heightened even more by the fact that I brought out Abbi's umbrella stroller yesterday to use on our walk. This is really the first time the child has taken a walk in the stroller (other than our sweaty trip to the zoo last May) because when she was little I liked to keep her close in the sling and throughout the winter, we kept each other warm as she snuggled against me in the Ergo! But now it is beautiful springtime weather and I wanted her to be able to get more glorious sunlight on her skin so I decided to pull out the stroller. The big girls are even more excited about the stroller than Abbi, and they take great joy in pushing Abbi up and down the street.

Today I brought the stroller outside and tried to open it but it just wouldn't budge. Now this is a very simple umbrella stroller, no bells or whistles, and there was just no reason for it to not open unless it was broken. I figured that I must have closed it incorrectly yesterday and bent it or the dog stepped on it or something and it was done for. Nevertheless, the girls were begging me to make it work so I tried diligently for a good 5 minutes. No luck.

The girls were chatting with each other about how badly they wanted to push Abbi in her stroller and suddenly Karis looked at me and said, "God can fix the stroller." Oh, what beautiful child-like faith," I thought to myself and wondered how to get out of this situation without disappointing her. Of course I believed that God could do a miracle if He wanted to, but why would He care about a stupid stroller? I nodded at her and smiled, continuing to struggle with the stupid contraption. "Mama, all you have to do is ask!" she pressed further. How could I refuse her? This was the "teachable moment" I had read all about, but the problem was I didn't really think it would work. So we bent down together and I told God how badly we wanted to go on this walk and asked him to fix the stroller if He wanted us to go on it (thinking that we would next delve into a discussion on how God knows what is best for us) or that he would make another way for us togo (I could just put Abbi in the Ergo and sweat a bit more.) So we finished praying and I stood up and Karis said, "try it Mama!" And do you know what? That crazy thing opened right up on the first try like there had never been a problem! I didn't do a thing differently! I wish you could have seen the big smile on Karis' face when I told her that she had been exactly right -- God did indeed fix our stroller. Oh, my eyes tear up just thinking about it!

So I learned my lesson. From my 4.5 year old. And from a God who cares about something as insignificant as a broken stroller. Because He loves my little girl.

The best marriage advice given to me...

While a lot of people struggle the first year of marriage, Mark and I found that having children placed a lot more stress on our marriage than the craziness of our first few years together. I had been waiting my whole life to have a husband to love and serve and joyfully accepted the challenges that marriage threw my way. We were blessed to have a relatively easy and happy first year of marriage. However, once I had a baby, things changed. He was no longer the only person I was taking care of and it just wasn't the same. I was too exhausted to want to fix him a late night snack (with all the accompanying dishes) or attend his evening basketball game and hang out at a restaurant afterwards, or give him a massage at any hour of the night, or all those other fun things we did together when we were first married. We were both excited about the baby and he took it well and was a great help and never complained, but things were definitely not the same. And that is ok; there is no doubt in my mind that our precious children are worth it! But it just means that we have to work a lot harder on our marriage now than we did back then when it was just us.

So honestly, the best marriage advice I ever received actually sounds a lot like parenting advice because the two definitely go hand in hand: give the children an early bedtime! On a normal night, we try to have all the kids in bed by 7:00 so that we can have a good three hours to get ourselves organized for the next day and hang out together -- plenty of time to watch a movie together or have a date night or just chat on the couch. Usually Mark gets home sometime between 5:30 and 6:00 and we eat dinner together. Then the girls pick out a game to play with Daddy for about 20-30 minutes and then we start our bedtime routine of potty-time, pajamas, singing, Bible stories, memorizing Scripture, and prayers. And off they go to bed around 7:00. It may sound like they don't get to see him that long at night, but it is very focused, personal, quality time together -- he is not distracted by the TV, computer, cell phone, or anything else and they receive his full attention. They also get to play with him again in the morning between 8 and 9:30 before he goes to work. And he usually spends his day off with them, running my errands, taking them to story time at the library, and playing outside with them. But the evenings are for us to enjoy together.

Lest you think we are being too selfish, let me assure you that my girls actually normally sleep from 7pm to at least 7:30am and truly seem to need it. We definitely observe more grumpiness and meltdowns on the days following nights that we allow them to stay up late for one reason or another (grandparents visiting, social activity, etc). They also thrive on a routine and look forward to their Daddy playtime each evening and enjoy our bedtime ritual. On nights when we are out and about before bedtime and don't have time to do our entire routine, it is much harder to get them to bed without fussing and meltdowns. But if we stick to our routine, there is rarely a difficult evening.

Now I know that an early bedtime might not work for different families with vastly different work schedules, but my point is really to just make sure that you carve out some regular time with your spouse each day. The advice given to me was to give the children an early bedtime and it has really worked well for our family. But maybe instead of putting the kids to bed early and hanging out you might need to get up a little before them in the morning to have time together or plan regular lunch dates if your kids are up early for school. Feel free to comment and share about how you make time with your husband after having kids!

What I wish I had understood in high school....

One aspect of preparing for marriage that no one really wants to talk about is modesty. I thought that I understood the basics... My parents and I had many battles over the length of my skirts and shorts growing up! I was incredibly obedient and in fact overly modest until about 8th grade when a "cool" friend told me that I had great legs and I ought to roll up my skirt a bit to show them off. I had never even thought about it before, but that opened my eyes and began the lie in my heart that I needed to show a little skin in order to be beautiful. I was careful to cover up my cleavage and belly, but oh, did I try to get away with short skirts! I think back to what I tried to get away wearing in high school and I cringe in shame. It was pale compared to many girls in my school, but appalling by my current standards of modesty.

The truth is, I had been well instructed in modesty by my parents, but I never really understood the struggle that all men face so it was not a rule that I thought was important to follow.

I thought that all they had to do was look away if they felt tempted, just as I would look away if I saw a movie with something inappropriate in it. Not hard at all for me to do, so why should it be a big deal for them? In my mind, it was their problem, not mine. (And yes, I know how horrible that sounds; I'm just being honest. I have struggled with many sins over the years (obviously self-righteousness and pride included), but lust has never been one of them and I simply could not understand.)

By the time I met Mark, my standards had improved greatly because I knew the kind of guy I wanted to marry and I knew he wouldn't want a girl wearing short skirts! All my skirts were pretty close to my knees so I was greatly surprised (and incredibly mortified) one Sunday afternoon when he sat down and brought up this discussion. He told me that I was beautiful and that he loved to look at me but would I please make sure my legs were covered up during church because he found it hard to focus on God when I was sitting beside him with bare skin. Even though my skirts were almost to my knees, when I sat down, they rose up (of course). So that day I learned just a bit of the struggle that guys face and after getting married I understood more and more.

Disclaimer: This post is not at all about how long a skirt needs to be and I don't dress with skirts to my ankles even today. I happily dress for my husband and he helps me to know what he thinks is pretty and appropriate and what he likes to see me in around the house and out in public. What is most important is my heart's motive in dressing and I thank God that He used one of the most godly young men I had ever met to convict my heart.

I am writing this post because I am sure that there are many other young women who, like me, do not understand the battle that goes on in a man's mind. I recently saw the following video from CJ Mahaney and immediately knew that I should share it on here. Please watch it. Please watch the entire video. You might think you "get it" after the first minute, but as you continue to watch your understanding will deepen and your desire to serve your brothers will grow. It is worth your time. THIS ARTICLE by Mary Mohler is also a great resource, particularly if you are hoping to help your daughters understand modesty. And I recently listened to a great downloaded sermon from Dr. Pete Schimm from his Church's website. You have to scroll down to Sept. 4, 2011 to the one entitled "On Lust part 2." The entire sermon is good, but the conclusion is especially helpful when he directly addresses men, women, and teenagers practically. But if you don't have time to check out the other resources, please spend a few minutes watching this short video:

Two things to consider...

When I began thinking about the topic of preparing for marriage, I immediately thought back to two different major conversations that Mark and I had when we were engaged.

The first conversation dealt with expectations, which any marriage counselor will tell you can be a big problem in marriage. I had read every marriage book I could get my hands on but was still not quite prepared for the one that would be the first big struggle for us. Mark was a youth pastor at a church and I began attending and helping out with his ministry once I graduated from college and moved to his town. I really enjoyed the kids and being a part of his ministry, but one night he asked me to talk with some girls about an issue that I wasn't really comfortable doing. It was definitely an issue that needed to be addressed by a girl (not by him!) and not an unreasonable request, but I was just beginning to have a relationship with these girls and didn't feel right in confronting so soon. He was pretty frustrated with me and it lead to some concern about whether I would be able/willing help to him in ministry the way he had hoped. (Note: he was not being mean at all but was just floored at my refusal and it made him think hard about what our ministry together might be like.) After some discussion, I finally looked at him and said, "I'm not going to try to convince you that I am going to be the perfect pastor's wife. I do want to help you in whatever way I can, but I'm sure I will disappoint you sometimes. What I need to know is whether you love me enough to want to marry me even if I cannot do everything you would like me to do." It was a tough conversation and he actually had to take a few days and really think about his expectations for his wife in ministry and how important they were to him. But it was a good revelation and I was glad that he thought it through before we got married rather than dealing with a major conflict after our wedding day. Obviously, he chose me over his expectations and it honestly hasn't been an issue since, but I thought that the discussion could apply to any area of life. Before you get married, you have to decide if the person is more important to you than your dreams and expectations. After you are married, you have to remind yourself that your spouse is more important than your expectations and choose to love even when disappointed.

The second conversation occurred when we were discussing some things that we had talked about during pre-marital counseling. He randomly looked at me and said, "I just want you to know that I will never divorce you. Even if you were to have an affair, I would choose to love you and try to reconcile our relationship." I was pretty shocked by his statement and initially almost appalled that he would bring up something so horrible that I had no intention of ever doing. But the more I thought about it, the more it meant to me. In my mind, having an affair was the most horrific thing I could do. If he would still choose to love me after such a terrible sin, then there was probably nothing I could do to ruin this upcoming marriage! It totally took any pressure off me to be the "perfect wife" and was ever so freeing! And it made me love him even more. That is indeed the depth of covenant that a marriage vow holds and it is wise to consider it before getting married.

Link Love from Meg

We are hoping to get a schedule going and get back to having a topic each month, so please let us know if there is a topic you would like us to cover. But for now, I thought I'd share a few links that I've enjoyed over the past few weeks:

Masking Anger as Justice -- Very good article for parents! Showing anger (or frustration, annoyance, etc) will not produce righteousness in your children . . . even if all your anger is directed at sin. The wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God

What I Would Feed My Family on a Monthly Budget of $250 (for a family of 5) and her next post on how to improve that even more and tips on doing it gluten free, buying from Farmer's market, using a co-op, etc

The Death of Pretty -- Praying that my girls can understand the difference someday...

9 Ways To Cut Food Waste (and save time)

Don't Carpe Diem -- I love her honesty -- parenting is hard work and there are definitely moments I do not enjoy -- but it is ever so worth it!

10 Dumbest Things To Eat -- Such a great list! If you want to make easy changes in your diet, cutting out these ten things would make a HUGE difference!

What You Should (and shouldn't) Say To Someone Who Has Lost A Baby -- some good tips

BPA-Free Buying Guide -- better sources of tomatoes, coconut milk, fish and other food you might need to buy canned

You Never Marry the Right Person -- ‎"Destructive to marriage is the self-fulfillment ethic that assumes marriage and the family are primarily institutions of personal fulfillment, necessary for us to become "whole" and happy..."

"... even if we first marry the right person, just give it a while and he or she will change. For marriage, being [the enormous thing it is] means we are not the same person after we have entered it. The primary challenge of marriage is learning how to love and care for the stranger to whom you find yourself married."

Michael Pollen's Least Favorite Foods -- I'm a big fan of Michael Pollen so this was interesting to me :)

What Every Dad Should Know About His Daughter -- simple article, but true and good to think about

10 Ways to Ensure Success When Removing Sugar From Your Diet

Godly Character Trait Printables -- I want to shrink these down to make into flashcards to incorporate into our homeschooling. And The Character Journal has a great extensive listing of each character trait with related songs, scripture verses, bible stories, projects and more for each character trait!

Favorite Winter Herbal Remedies -- Colds and Coughs, Stomach Viruses, and Headaches -- some great tips!

Stingy Out Gets Stingy In -- "... an example of this would be the mess in your house (I trust that you have one). When I focus on the mess, I am aggravated by the things that do not matter at the expense of the people who do. When I consciously refuse to be upset by the side product, I am free to enjoy the people who are messing it up. Giving my own work freely does not just make me a martyr."

Chick-Fil-A Daddy Date Night -- I'm not big on fast food, but a special night for Daddy and his girls with a princess cow and dancing is a pretty fun idea!

Being thankful for the little moments...

I love being a Mom! There are, of course, moments I do not enjoy (such as when Karlie doesn't stop asking the same question for the 100th time or when Abbi wakes me up at night over and over again or when Karis insists on driving her sister crazy with her singing), but I accept those moments as part of my job and usually can manage to laugh at them later. Most days, I also have moments of bliss (I call them Mommy moments) when I manage to step back out of the craziness and my heart swells with joy and thankfulness. I decided that I really wanted to remember those precious moments so beginning with the new year, I started writing down my favorite memory of the day right before bed each night. It is usually not anything spectacular... just something simple that made me smile. I thought I would share a few of my favorite moments from the first week of the year with some pictures we took the same week:

1. Watching Karis help Abbi walk -- Karis loves to hold Abbi's hands and help her walk. She isn't very good at it and often pulls her down, but she is so sweet in her excitement about Abbi walking and Abbi just loves the attention and usually just laughs hysterically when they fall down together.
2. Karlie getting excited about feeding Abbi -- I usually just put all of Abbi's food on her tray and let her feed herself, but Karlie seems to get the biggest kick out of helping Abbi. I cannot tell you how excited she gets when I let her give Abbi food and it is so cute!

3. Karis holding her pencil correctly -- We haven't done a lot of handwriting in our homeschool yet because Karis was stubbornly uninterested. She loved dot-to-dots and mazes, but the minute I tried to teach her how to write letters and help her fix her fingers for handwriting, she would get irritated. I decided to wait until she was more interested and we tried again after Christmas. She is now very proud of herself and allowing me to help her hold her pencil correctly!

4. Doing "alphabet movement" with my girls whenever the weather isn't fit for outside time -- I printed out the fun cards and my girls have to choose the next one in alphabetical order. They think the exercises are hilarious and we laugh the entire time. So much fun!

5. In basketball class on Saturday, I suddenly realized that Karis had her arm around Karlie while they waited in line for their turn to pass the ball to the rhino. It was ever so sweet and also a bit funny to watch them try to move up in line together. I love seeing them be affectionate with each other :)

6. Smores in the backyard with my Mark and my girls. The girls LOVE it when we build a fire and were just ever so excited and happy.

7. Listening to Karis and Karlie make up songs about Mary and baby Jesus in the backseat of the van.

Another resource for teaching reading

I thought I'd pass along another great book on teaching speech, spelling, writing, and reading. (Please know that I think this is just one of many great resources and I am just going to explain why I have found it helpful for instructing Karis; I definitely do not think that it is the only or best way! But I am excited about it...)

As I've researched homeschooling, I've become more and more convinced that a Classical Education will be the best fit for our family. I am planning to enroll Karis in a Classical Conversations co-op next fall for kindergarten and I am trying to research it as much as possible before then. While reading The Core by CC's founder, Leah Bortins, I stumbled across a recommendation for The Writing Road To Reading by Spalding and immediately knew I wanted to read it! I had already noticed that Karis could spell better than she could read at that point... every school day we played with her magnetic letters and I started asking her to sound out a few words to put on her board and was surprised that she could actually do it! She has since figured out reading a bit better so the gap is not quite as large, but back when we first started school, she could spell most short vowel-sound words I gave her but could not read at all. So I purchased The Writing Road to Reading and read through a lot of it over Christmas break. It really made sense to me. Basically, the book instructs how to teach handwriting by using spoken phonograms, which in turn teaches the child to read. As you introduce a phonogram, you explain exactly how to write it, how many sounds it can make, and any rules that go with it. There are just 70 common phonograms in the English language and after mastering those, the child can figure out how to read almost everything! A key point is that spelling should be taught from the spoken word... children who only copy words do not progress as quickly because they often rely on visual recall alone and do not have to think through the rules of spelling. With the Spalding method, new words are always learned by studying the phonetic sounds of the spoken word.

When we started back with our schoolwork after Christmas, I decided that we would learn these phonograms and their rules before proceeding on our path with The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading. Karis can't really do the writing aspect very well yet (she wasn't at all interested in handwriting last fall so we are just now starting handwriting), but she loves to put new phonograms on the board and learn their sounds and rules. We have only done about 6 days of phonograms and I can already tell a great improvement with the words she can read. Because she is learning the rules for each sound a phonogram makes, she can immediately figure out most words containing those phonograms. For example, many reading programs keep children in the short vowel sounds for a while and they are limited in what they can read. After our first day when Karis learned the rules for all 3 sounds that "a" could make, she immediately could read words containing the long "a" sound as well as the "ah" sound. I found so many more words that she could read in our normal books than I did the day before. As she is sounding out words in her books, I ask her questions about the rules for the sounds and she can actually tell me. For example, I asked her why the "a" said its name instead of the short vowel sound and she could tell me that it was because it came at the end of a syllable. A bonus is that I am really learning a lot about English as I teach her! Some of these rules I never learned but they would have really helped me in school.

I still think that The Ordinary Guide to Teaching Reading is a great resource and we will probably go back to it for further reading instruction after learning the 70 phonograms, but I also plan to continue to utilize the Spalding method and its lesson plans to teach Karis handwriting and reinforce the correct rules of spelling.

New Year's Thoughts

I'm really excited about this year. Last year was absolutely wonderful with the birth of my sweet Abbi Grace, and I am so thankful for her! It was a precious time. But with the birth of a child also comes a season of "just making it through each day." I definitely had a long stretch of never being able to get all the dishes washed, the laundry done, and the floors cleared. I was happy just to have meals made and reading time with my girls before crashing onto the couch, utterly exhausted, after putting them to bed. I don't really know what this year holds, but I am hoping to be a lot more purposeful with my time. Sometimes it seems a little silly to make a lot of New Years Resolutions because hardly anyone keeps them and what is so special about January 1st, anyways? I can make a resolution any day of the year. But I have to admit that I've been kind of excited for all the traveling to cease and for us to get back to a normal routine so that I can focus on some things that I've neglected. I thought I'd share some of my shortcomings from last year and goals for the new year with you.

1. Getting back to our budget -- We listened to the awesome Dave Ramsey CD's about a year and a half ago and made a new budget and did great with it.... for a time. But we stopped being so strict and we really need to start saving more money again. I have to admit, I'm a big fan of a good deal and have several deal blogs that I follow. But it doesn't really save me money if I keep using the money I save (and sometimes more) to snatch up the next good deal! So we are trying to get back to cash and debit-card only purchases to keep us in our budget. And I am really trying to ask myself before every purchase, "Do we really need this?" rather than "Is this a fabulous deal that my family could use?"

2. Planning a-get-away with my husband -- We were not able to do much for our 5th anniversary because I was nursing Karlie and we've been wanting to take a little trip together ever since. We have not had more than one night away from the kids since we had Karis 4.5 years ago! So this year I am determined to get away for at least a long weekend with my love once Abbi gives up nursing.

3. Throwing things away -- I am slowly going through each nook and cranny of my house and trying to throw (or give) away as much as possible. I have found that it is impossible to be organized when I have too much stuff. I have a hard time throwing away things that are given to us (even if we don't need them) and things my children make. (Even though they each make me about 10 pages of artwork a day.) We have too many clothes and too many toys. I am taking pictures of my girls' artwork and tossing most of the originals. I am going through their clothes and only keeping what will easily fit in their closet that they wear the most. Toys that don't have a good spot out of sight will be given away.

4. Going to bed earlier (so I can get up earlier!) -- My big girls are not allowed to come out of their room in the morning until their clock wakes up and my baby consistently sleeps until 8am, so I really have no good reason to not be able to get up and have my devotions and get breakfast all ready before I even see their cheery faces. Unfortunately, Mark and I have gotten into the habit of staying up too late and it makes getting up early much more difficult and I end up dragging all day. It is not worth it! We've started off our first week of the New Year by going to bed earlier and boy does it make a difference! (And it has the added bonus of having enough energy to stay awake and chat and enjoy each other rather than conking out immediately :)

5. Planning out all my meals for the month -- I used to do this regularly before Abbi was born, but I took a break and found myself scrounging for meals in a hurry. It also saves time and money to plan it for the month because I don't have to go to the store as often. So I made my plan for January and it has already made my life so much easier this week!

Evaluating the first half of our school year....

Now that all the Christmas festivities are coming to a close, my mind is once again focused on teaching my pre-schooler. We took a month-long break during December because we traveled a lot and I had so many fun Christmas activities I wanted to do with my girls. We really enjoyed our holiday season and I think the break was really good for us, but I am hoping that the girls have not forgotten a lot. Karis had just started sounding out words well and I am hoping that it will come back to her quickly. Here are my thoughts on the 1st half of our year:

I cannot believe how quickly this year has flown by!! We had a great fall and really enjoyed doing school together. I love having my girls home with me! But honestly, we did not do as much "school work" as I would have liked. It is really hard to fit it in with a baby and the day to day things I need to get done and I now realize that I am going to have to work really hard to accomplish what I want to do with Karis in January. (Sorry facebook and Pinterest - nap time is officially planning and housework time!) I wrote out a great schedule for the fall and followed it well at first, but once "real life" took over, I pretty much had to ditch it. It seemed like someone was always sick or fussy from teething or I was behind in my housework or we were getting ready to go out of town or had appointments or recovering from a trip and I just had a really hard time getting into a really good routine. But I'm determined to make it work and I plan to buckle down as the new year starts. We shouldn't be traveling and I am refusing to allow any morning activities outside the house (other than soccer and basketball class with Daddy one day a week) so that we can easily fall into a good routine.

Mid-way through the fall, I had to sit down and prioritize what I thought was most important to get done with the girls. At this early stage, I felt like my focus should be reading as much as possible, outside play, beginning handwriting skills (mazes, dot-to-dot, tracing,etc), and math skills (fun counting/ measuring/ number games). Our eventual schedule was to "do school" during Abbi's morning nap (Hopefully at least 90 minutes) and then all of us would go outside on a walk and play together until lunchtime. We would do more reading before and after naptime. And that was about it. I think that it is very important for kids to have time to play so I just let them do what they wanted in the morning before Abbi's nap and in the afternoons while I tried to straighten up for Mark and get dinner on the table.

In January, I am going to start Karis on some Saxon math and A Reason for Handwriting workbook. We will still focus on doing a lot of reading. We will probably continue to just "do schoolwork" during Abbi's morning nap, but of course, I know that they are learning all day long!

How did the first half of your school year go? Any tips or lessons that you learned? We'd love to hear it!

It has begun!

Have you been enjoying celebrating the advent? My little ones sure have. I thought that after giving so many fun Christmas ideas in my last post, I should update which ones we are actually doing. I definitely had to narrow down my choices to keep the sweet season of advent simple.

Last year I wanted to do the Jesee tree, but I just didn't get it together in time. But I went ahead and made the ornaments so I would be ready for this year and I was ever so glad that I did! The girls have really enjoyed the Bible stories and putting the ornaments on our tree. I love Ann Voskamp's jesse tree devotional and made the ornaments with her templates, but I also read about a Jesse Tree storybook and decided to purchase it for our girls because I knew they would enjoy the pictures and storyline a bit more. It is about a grumpy old carpenter who is carving a Jesse Tree for a church and a little boy who begs him to tell the story of each carving. The readings are a little long for Karlie, but Karis absolutely loves it.

I really wanted to do an advent calendar with random acts of kindness for each day, but I just didn't have enough time to get it together before December got here. I'm thinking about just setting aside one day each week (probably on our day to run errands) starting with the new year to do a random act of kindness with the girls. I really want them to start thinking about how to be kind to others all the time, not just at Christmas.

I am not a crafty Mama. I really want to be and I really enjoy doing crafts with my girls, but I'm not usually one to plan ahead well in that department. If we have time to do something fun, we usually end up baking! But my Karis loves "making decorations" and the fall season had me scanning Pinterest moments before she woke up, trying to find something to make with what we had on hand. I stumbled upon "Truth in the Tinsel: An Advent Experience for Little Hands" and immediately knew it would be worth the $4.99 to have something all planned out for me, using everyday household items, that would be an easy craft to point back to the story of Christ's birth. And we have loved it! We haven't been able to do our craft every single day due to a busy holiday schedule, but it has still been worth every penny to me.

I have to admit that the most exciting part of my girls' day, however, is probably opening up their daily Christmas book. I was just going to do one book each day, but they were so excited that I just couldn't make one of them wait til the next day. So yes, we will open 50 Christmas books before Christmas. Thank goodness for the library!!!! It is amazing how excited they get when they open a book, even though they might have read the book 50 times last season. What a fun tradition! I found a great list wonderful Christmas books to request at the library HERE.

Have you started any Christmas traditions this season? I'd love to hear about them!