Boys Just Wanna Have Fun

This is a quick post, we have been really busy reorganizing our house. We have been removing a lot of old and bringing in some new. It has been very nice that Kevin has been home to help with all of this.

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Kevin and his brother Chris playing with some of the water toys at Great Wolf Lodge. I thought it very funny :-)

On a quick side note...Can I say how frustrated I am with this Michigan weather??!! We had 2 ft of snow on the ground one day and the next there was nothing...just a whole bunch of rain. The 5ft snow slide that Kevin was building the kids, is down to about 2ft at it's highest point and nothing but grass down the hill. I would rather have the snow than the yucky rain. Now, it isn't even suitable for the kids to go out and play.

Blessings!

Great Wolf Lodge

We headed out Sunday morning for our destination in Traverse City. Weather forecast wasn't the greatest, 10 more inches of snow, 40mph winds... Two families had gone up the night before to miss the bad weather. Kev and I decided we'd have an adventure.

Our friends from church were heading up too, so we decided to drive together. My Dad generously offered us the use of his 4x4 truck for our trip. So we were nicely packaged into the truck. The kids always think it's great fun to travel in PopPop's truck (yes, we had to bring the zoo with us).

It was really quite a beautiful drive, the snow softly laying on the tree branches. At times you felt like you were all alone in this beautiful winter wonderland. Even though the Butler's were always in front of us, the blowing snow gave us the feeling of isolation. (This is highway 131)

All of a sudden there would be a break in the blowing and drifting snow, so that I could get a quick picture of the trees without it looking so hazy.All in all, it was really not a difficult drive up north. At one point we did pull next too the Butler's.... and this is what we saw.....Steve being a stud Man and Kaira, with her shades on (obviously the sun was not shining...)she was sleeping....haha caught you Kaira!!

We arrived safe and sound. I will post more of our two days there, but thought this was a good start for our first night back. Here is one more picture. This is all the cousins just before story time in the lobby (all in their PJ's).

Jilli, Abbie (holding Cade), Logan, Marissa, Micah, Carter, Tyler.

Blessings!

GWL

Well, it is time to leave for our annual trip up to Great Wolf Lodge in Traverse City. There will be quite a crew up there with us. Kevin's brother, wife and two kids, Kevin's cousin, husband and three kids, our friends and their four kids (this was not planned we just happened to be going the same days) and of course US!

We are leaving first thing in the morning....please pray for safety. Tomorrow is supposed to be a really rough traveling day. Two of the families ended up going up there tonight to try and miss the storm coming. We decided to make an adventure out of it. Our friends and us will be kind of driving up caravan style, just to make sure we both arrive safety. I am expecting this to be a wonderful time of relaxation and play time with the kids. I of course WILL BE BRINGING PICTURES BACK this year (last year my camera did not work the whole time we were up there...this time I'm heading up there loaded...with equipment)

We will be back on Tuesday (so if any of you feel like shoveling...our driveway could use a good clean out before we get back:-)

Just Part of School

I get asked by some people, "what do the kids do for school?" It is a reasonable question, especially for people who have not been exposed to homeschooling. We do a variety of things. From the "traditional subjects" too lessons that aren't so traditional.

Just the other day was one of those lessons that you just don't find everyday in school. Tyler was working on his large and small motor skills. He was learning about cause and effect.... while he was working on learning a very important life skill.

Bathroom Cleaning.

My boys have been cleaning the bathrooms for awhile now. It is one of their "jobs". Tyler calls it his "work" because Daddy has to go to work, so Tyler gets to "do work" too. This is something the boys LOOK FORWARD TOO. I know you all don't believe me...but they love to hold the can and push the spray button and move it all around (large and small motor skills). Wiping the spray off the counters, sink and yes, they do the toilet too. There is a "science" (hey, another school subject) to cleaning the bathroom. The boys know that they have to kill the germs on the counter and sink before they kill the germs on the toilet and there is to be no cross contamination!

Do my bathrooms get as clean as when I do it?? Yes and no. There is definitely more germ killing when they are on the job! It does take them longer to clean the bathrooms too...but my job isn't to just teach them how to read and write (and clean bathrooms).

I am training little husbands (and a little wife). Someday my boys will be men. I will have to let them fly on their own and allow God to be the wind beneath their wings...not their Momma. I want to teach them now, how to care for the blessings God gives them. I want them to know and understand what it is to work together as a family. We all have jobs to do, we all play a part in this family and someday, when they have their own families, I want them to be able to pass down to their children this lesson I am teaching them... responsibility.

A fleeting thing I am afraid. I am thankful that I have a husband who knows and understands what responsibility is. My boys are learning from him too....Daddy goes to work everyday to make money for the house we live in, the food we eat, the clothes we wear. They are watching how Daddy takes responsibility to care for his family.

This lesson has been pressed upon my heart as of late. I feel an urgency to find ways to make this lesson real to them. I want to raise responsible men of God.

In Proverbs 31 there is a verse that says "her children arise and call her blessed". I ponder that verse a lot. When the Bible says "her children". I imagine the writer is talking about her children-in-laws too. That even her son's wives love her. Not because she is this perfect women (although you would be hard pressed to find one as close to perfection as she), but because she raised her boys to be God fearing, responsible men who love their wives with every breath they take. They had incredible roll models in the Proverbs 31 women and her husband. What a legacy they had, one that I want to give to my children!

Wow, when I logged on tonight, I was just going to post a few pics of Tyler cleaning, write a cute, quick story and head off to bed. I guess God had other idea's for this post. It truly is amazing at how God talks to me while I write. It's almost like he is sitting right next to me whispering. Kevin said tonight that I do my best writing when he is up in bed and I am alone down here blogging. I kind of laughed at that comment when he said it, but there is some truth to that. I think that I am more able to hear God's whispers when the house is quiet and it's just me pondering what my heart feels.

Well, if my boys don't learn anything else...they will at least know how to keep a clean bathroom....something that I think any future daughter-in-law would appreciate:-)

Blessings

Relaxing

Daddy and the kids just hanging out right before bed. Jilli is brushing her teeth, Micah is intent on what is being viewed, Daddy is sleeping, and Tyler caught me taking their picture. What a beautiful face!

Blessings!

Kackle Farm

First I need to apologize for neglecting the blog this past week. I have been so busy. I have not even taken A picture this week. Well, maybe one, but I haven't uploaded it yet. Anyway, this weekend is going to be busy too.

I am taking pictures of triplets this Saturday....WOW! I am honored and a bit nervous to be honest. This will be a first for me, so I am praying God's wisdom and ideas to rain down on me...you can pray for that too! I hope to be able to share one or two with you next week. We also have Kevin's Dad's retirement party on Sunday. Not that he is old or anything *wink* he is just blessed to be able to retire at this point in his life. Hopefully, I will be able to update this every couple days or so...but with the holidays coming, I can't promise anything!

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This Fall the Homeschooling group from our church went up to Kackle Farm up in Greenville. It is located right by one of our favorite campgrounds. There was only about a group of 25 kids that were on this field trip...kind of a small group this time around. But it worked out great having a smaller number of kids to keep track of.

The Kids and I had been camping in Kalamazoo, so we decided to head home the night before the field trip. We didn't want to miss this one. Plus after our trip to the farm, we could go back home, pick up Daddy and finish out a beautiful weekend of camping.

We really had a lot of fun. There is so much to do at this farm. We rode a wagon out to the apple orchard and were able to pick a bag full of golden delicious apples, right off the tree. It reminded me of when I was little and Mom taking us kids to pick bushels of apples for homemade apple sauce. We would be out there all day, for days on end (that's what it felt like anyways). Really I think we picked a day and then went back another week and picked again. But as a kid, that stuff just gets jumbled together in one great big day.

After we picked all of our apples, we hopped back on the wagon and were taken over to the pumpkin patch. We were all allowed to pick out a small pumpkin to take with us too. (can click too see this picture bigger).It was quite comical to try and carry all the pumpkins and bags of apples back to the car when we were done. The kids helped the best they could, but Mom was left to figure out how to manage most of these round, rolling objects with only two hands. It is times like these that I wish I had another set of hands to carry the demands of motherhood.

We were given apple cider and donuts.....Mmmm. Then we went on to see the animals, huge sandbox, rocking horses, zip cords, old tractors...the list could go on and on.

Tyty's favorite thing to do was play on the tractors. He would have spent all day there if I had let him.


The old columbine, was a little scary for the kids. Tyler stayed on it the longest....2 minutes maybe. I was lucky to get this shot (you can click this one bigger), right after this shot they were all climbing down. I think it was just too big and Frank from the movie Cars was a big mean columbine...so this one could be mean too.....
I loved the little piglets. I thought they were so cute. The smell on the other hand.....it was so bad you could taste it!
All in all we had a great day. As you can see from the pictures it was a beautiful sunny/warm October day. Perfect for a field trip.


The rest of the weekend was beautiful too, which was nice because it was our last camping trip of the season. We didn't go up to the U.P. (Soo Locks) in late October/early November this year. We were all bummed about that, but with gas prices where they were, we couldn't afford the trip (on a side note, filled up the van today and spent $34.oo!!!!)


Hope you enjoyed our little trip to Kackle Farm, it wasn't a Christmas posting (no snow or lights), but thought that after all the snow we had the last week, we could all use a little sunshine :-)

Blessings!

Loving the Snow

Winter has come to Michigan and I have one little one that can't get enough of it. She would go out in the morning and not come back in till dark. If Daddy is going out to shovel, Jilli is going out to play. This next picture you can click on it to see it nice and big. She has tears on her cheeks. She was very upset that I went outside to talk to Kevin (who was shoveling) and left her inside. She just loves to be in the snow!

And yes, Jilli is dressed in purple from head to toe (even her boots are purple).

Blessings!

Enjoy the Christmas music on my blog :-)

Old and New...Smiling

The beauty of new skin against old. The softness of the two together. A Grandmother holding her Great-Grandson. This brings a smile to my face.

Sweet, Sweet, Baby.....

You want to know what else brings a smile to my face?? My very special Grandpa (enjoying being hugged by Melissa), I could tell you stories of this beautiful man. I am sure that there are many stories that I was never told too.....He was very mischievous.
If I remember correctly, he had a stroke about 14/15 years ago at Thanksgiving time. The stroke robbed him of his speech, something my Grandfather was known for. He loved to teach and tell stories. I miss hearing his stories, someday I hope to hear them again.

Blessings!