Posted in Family Life

I thought my house was quite well babyproofed.  After all, we'd had a baby living in it pretty much continually since we moved in five years ago.  That means that the newest little one in the family is the third baby to crawl these floors.  So why then does it seem as if the older members of the family are constantly rescuing this littlest man from potential hazards around the house?  He is a busy almost nine-month old, and it's been a while (eight years) since the last baby boy.  Maybe I'm just out of practice.

Any one who says that girls and boys aren't different has never has at least one of each of their own to raise.  The girls were so much easier to keep track of as babies.  Baby boys (at least all three of mine) just move so fast.  At least this time around, I have older children to help with the baby wrangling.  I can sit my chair and keep one eye on the adventurous little guy and when he nears trouble, I can simply say to an older boy "Get your brother; he's headed for the stairs (or fireplace, or trashcan, or tile floor, or whatever other danger lurks nearby).  The process is still rather tiring, though.  At least I know when he reaches the age of three or four he'll be able to entertain himself with trucks and dirt (albeit loudly perhaps) and not tend toward hysterics when his hair is brushed.

Added to this paticular go-around is the fact that my five year old daughter really wants to be a mini mommy, however her enthusiasm is often over the top, and occasionally she causes more harm than good.  I have never had to deal with that challenge before.  I also have a rather emotionally needy three year old daughter, who is not always pleased with her baby brother getting any attention.  (After all, she's the cute one, don'tcha know?)  Perhaps you notice a pattern forming here?  I certainly do.  Boys are harder when they are younger; by the time they reach preschool age, they begin becoming lower maintainence.  Girls, on the other hand, are low-maintainence as babies and become much harder and emotionally draining as they get older.  Now remember, I have only been at this parenting gig for twelve years, so it's all still in the test faze for me.

Raising children is an adventure.  The adrenaline rush resulting from many parenting situations often rivals bungi jumping or sky diving.  At least I imagine it does--I've never done either of those.  But I have been the mother of five very healthy, very active, very curious children.  And let me tell you, there are very few truly dull moments in our household.  My husband and I are two exhausted people a lot of the time.

And we wouldn't trade it for anything.

Posted in Patriotism

Although I do not usually discuss politics on the blog (I'll leave that to my husband when he finally starts his blog), we do plenty of talking politics around our house, so my children are well versed in who the candidates are and where they stand on the important issues.  As we were browsing through the books at Sam's Club last evening, my sons spotted a children's book entitled Barak Obama: Son of Promise, Child of Hope.  My oldest son's immediate reaction was to roll his eyes and say something like"Do people really buy this for their chilren?"  Actually, my own reaction was much the same as his.  As you might imagine, the book extols the virtues of Mr. Obama, praising his messiah-like ability to bring hope, peace, and most importantly change to all those around him, an ability he has apparently has since childhood.

A direct quote from the Amazon. com sales page reads:

Ever since Barack Obama was young, Hope has lived inside him. From the beaches of Hawaii to the streets of Chicago, from the jungles of Indonesia to the plains of Kenya, he has held on to Hope. Even as a boy, Barack knew he wasn't quite like anybody else, but through his journeys he found the ability to listen to Hope and become what he was meant to be: a bridge to bring people together.

All I can say is oi.  That, and may the Lord be merciful to us. 

 

I wonder how much hope he has brought to all the babies he has supported killing?

Posted in Family Life

Last night, for some odd reason, I was reminded of a song I once learned as a child for elementary school chorus.  I was probably in third or fourth grade, and we memorized the song to perform at some assembly or concert.  I still remember part of the refrain.  It went something like this:

“And the seasons, they go ‘round and ‘round,
And the painted ponies go up and down.
We’re captive on the carousel of life.”

That’s all I remember of the song.  Judging by the tune I remember as going with it, it is a pop song from the late 1970s, but I’m really not sure about that.  It has a hint of futility and existentialism in it.

Lately, my life has felt like the message in that song.  The days have been going ‘round and ‘round, on after another, at a frightening speed.  There seems to be so much to do and so little time to do it in.  Autumn is a busy time in our household, with harvesting an preserving food, and returning to a regular school schedule and getting back into the normal “school-ish” activities like music and fencing lessons and weekly trips to the library, one begins becoming dizzy with it all.

Life surely is a vapor, and we are commanded in Scripture to redeem the time.  Though we’ve been very busy the last couple of weeks, our time has been spent profitably and much of it has been time spent together as a family.  Discipleship of children is never wasted time.  It is time spent laying up treasures in Heaven for God’s glory, and what could be more profitable than that?

So though that song has feeling of futility, and though I am looking forward to a time when things slow down a little, there is nothing futile in being busy about caring for a family and raising and training children.  I don’t feel “captive” at all.  I am busy doing God’s will for my ‘round of days, and that is a very good thing.

What to do when you are on vacation on an island?

Go to the beach, of course!

Fun in the sun

Taking a bag of chips to the beach is never a good idea: sand always ends up inside the bag.

Enjoying that sea breeze

Enjoying the view

Enjoying the silliness

It was a week of wonderful moments and special memories and I am thankful to the Lord for the time we had together as a family.

 

Posted in Family Life

We have returned from our family vacation of last week, and I have almost recovered from it--rather, I should say that our daily schedule has almost recovered.  It seems as though it always takes me such a long time to get the household back on track when we have been away for any length of time.  At any rate, we are home, we have gone back to regular schoolwork each day, and life is slowly settling down again.

We had such an enjoyable, memorable week together as a family.  Many special memories were made, and we were refreshed and revived, which we all sorely needed.  I feel so very blessed to have been able to spend the week with my husband, children, and parents, who came on the trip with us.  We spent time at the beach, soaking up the last of the summer sun (my poor husband soaked up too much sun and ended up with a bad sunburn).  We visited "touristy" sights I hadn't seen since childhood.  We attended a family reunion, where I had a chance to visit with cousins, aunts, uncles, my brother and his family, as well as my grandmother (who was incidentatly very pleased that no one discussed politics at the get-together because she didn't want an inevitable argument to ensue).  I also got lots of pictures, some of which I will share in another post because my flickr account is especially slow today and I have already spent enough time online reading the 379 emails that awaited me in my inbox this afternoon.  That's what I get for not checking it for more than a week.

Though we had a wonderful vacation, I am very glad to be home.  I know it's cliche, but there really is no place like home.  I am definitely a home-loving kind of girl.  A homeschooling, homemaking, homesteading, home cooking kind of girl.  Just the way I want to be.

Posted in Prayer

Please pray for the Drews family.  Marsha is a blogging buddy of mine and a frequent commentor here.  She and her husband and family are greatly in need of prayer as their little three-year-old son Christian passed away last Tuesday.  This is heart-wrenching news, and the thoughts and prayers of my family are with these dear folks in this time of great sorrow.  May they find comfort and peace in the arms of their Lord, the same arms that now hold their precious little boy.

Posted in Family Life

I am writing this on the eve of our much-anticipated week-long family vacation.  The children are too excited to settle down for sleep.  After a very long, rather busy summer (my husband worked some very long hours for the last few months in order to catch up from a tough winter financially speaking) we are greatly in need of a time of rest and refreshment.  Martha's Vineyard, my family's ancestral home, is a beautiful destination if you don't mind the crowds.  We plan to spend plenty of time on the beach, which is one of my favorite places, and we will visit with extended family as well.

So, the car is packed, the ferry reservations are made (yes, you have to have reservations on the ferry to even get onto the island), and I'm exhausted.  Boy, do I need a vacation!

Posted in Miscellaneous Matters

I love making jams and jellies.  There's something very satisfying about taking something you get for free (in the case of the above photo, raspberries picked in our backyard) and making something delicious out of it.  My husband loves to eat jams and jellies, so it's a win-win relationship.  I know it seems like a simple thing, and some people might find it silly, but I really do find great delight in seeing all those lovely rows of jewel-colored canning jars filled with the fruit (pardon the pun) of my labors.  There they are, lined up so neatly on my kitchen shelves.  It's a pretty sight.

I taught myself to can from reading (that's how I teach myself to do most things I want to learn) a book on canning and just diving in.  I vaguely remember my mother canning vegetables from our garden when I was growing up, but I never helped her with it, so I learned on my own several years ago.  It has become one of my favorite hobbies.  (It's also very useful and almost necessary for an avid gardener.)

I've often asked myself what it is about canning (and making jellies in particular) that I like so much.  I'm not sure of the answer, I just know I find it relaxing and enjoyable.  I know, I know, I'm a little bit strange.

So, that's my completely useless, not-so-very-interesting post for this week.  Incidentally, much of my creative energy has gone into making jelly and jam lately, so I don't have much left for this blog.  Sorry.  I'm also preparing for a much-needed and highly anticipated family vacation which is coming up next week, and since packing for seven people to go away for a week is hard work, time is at a premium these days. 

I shall return in a couple of days with something slightly more worth your while (I hope).

 

Praise is due to you, O God, in Zion,
   and to you shall vows be performed.
O you who hear prayer,
   to you shall all flesh come.
When iniquities prevail against me,
   you atone for our transgressions.

 

 Blessed is the one you choose and bring near,
   to dwell in your courts!
We shall be satisfied with the goodness of your house,
   the holiness of your temple!

 

 

By awesome deeds you answer us with righteousness,
   O God of our salvation,
the hope of all the ends of the earth
   and of the farthest seas;
the one who by his strength established the mountains,
   being girded with might;
who stills the roaring of the seas,
   the roaring of their waves,
    the tumult of the peoples,
so that those who dwell at the ends of the earth are in awe at your signs.

 

 

You make the going out of the morning and the evening to shout for joy.

 

 

You visit the earth and water it;
   you greatly enrich it;
 the river of God is full of water;
    you provide their grain,
   for so you have prepared it.

 

 

You water its furrows abundantly,
   settling its ridges,
softening it with showers,
   and blessing its growth.
You crown the year with your bounty;
   your wagon tracks overflow with abundance.

 

 

The pastures of the wilderness overflow,
   the hills gird themselves with joy,
 the meadows clothe themselves with flocks,
   the valleys deck themselves with grain,

 

 

they shout and sing together for joy.

 

Psalm 65

Posted in Church Life

It has been some time since I shared an update on our church situation.  I know there are several of you who have been praying and waiting with interest to know how things are going.  For those unaware, several months ago, my husband and I, along with a small number of other families, felt led of the Lord to start a small fellowship, a family-integrated, reformed church.  We knew from the start that it would be some time before it actually looked like the church we believe the Lord wants to raise up in our local area (reformed, family-integrated churches are very few and far between in the New England region), and so many of the things we chose to do (having “interim” elders for a short time, meeting in homes) were intended to be temporary.  We had such hope for what God would do with our little group.  We also had a sweet sense of unity and fellowship.  That being the case, it was very difficult to experience the time of testing that would come a few short months later.  When two of the families in our small group broke away within three months (for different reasons), it brought us such sadness.  What we had planned and expected did not come to pass.  In fact, being the eternal pessimist that I am, I came to believe for a time that all our hopes and vision for our family to be a part of a true covenant community had been completely dashed.  My husband held firm in his belief that God has a work He wants to do, and that He is going to allow us to be at least a small part of that.  I clung to my husband’s hope, as I had very little of my own left.

 

The Lord, in a very short time, showed Himself faithful yet again, and I now have a renewed hope, though it looks slightly different than it formerly did.  What God is doing is so much bigger and sweeter than what I thought He would.  You see, though our vision was clear, our timing was a little off.  God’s timing, on the other hand, is always perfect, if we would only trust Him to bring His will to pass when it is right for Him to do so.  We are now a part of a fellowship group made up of most of the families from the original group, along with several others whose friendship and fellowship have so greatly blessed our family in recent months.  We now meet regularly with a number of likeminded families who have the same passion for the Word of God, as well as a spirit of maturity and an appreciation for one another’s unique gifts and convictions.

 

So, even though what we have for a church situation now isn’t what I thought it would be when we embarked on this (somewhat scary) journey almost ten months ago, it is, in fact, better.  We have learned many extremely important and valuable lessons through the last few months.  The Lord has been refining us and stretching us in ways we would not have expected.  Some of the refining and stretching has been quite painful.  Perhaps that is why I have for so long put off sharing some of these things here.  I have now finally come to a point where I can honestly thank God for the difficulties, the hurts, the betrayals, the uncertainties.  I am beginning to come to an understanding of the fact that all these things have been blessings because they were for our benefit, to shape and mold us into what He wants us to be.

 

Our convictions haven’t wavered.  We believe wholeheartedly in the family-integrated church model.  We believe in the doctrines of the reformed faith.  We believe in the importance of matching our orthopraxy with our orthodoxy.  And we are passionately continuing to raise our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, trusting in His covenant promises for them.  We are looking with great hope toward the future generations, those yet to be.  What we do now will have an impact on those who come after us, which is one of the main reasons we made the step of faith we did when it came to how we “do church”.

 

I am again at a point of excited anticipation for what God is doing in raising up a community of likeminded Believers for which our family to be a part.  He is so good and faithful, and I have seen Him answer so many prayers in the past, why would I have any reason to doubt what He will do in this?