My baby's first birthday photos

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

The Heze-nator's birthday fell on Thanksgiving this year so the older kids made Pilgrim and Indian hats as party decorations for fun. They had fun acting out the Thanksgiving story over and over.

This baby boy has been such a blessing to our family. He is always happy and smiling. I am grateful for him!

Ready to attack the enemy!

I tried to use "Thanksgiving colors" for his first birthday cake...I like how it turned out.

Ride em' cowboy!

One happy boy! We love you Heze.

Love this post!

My pal Carrie..who is such an intuitive person and really knows her friends....read this post and thought that I would agree with it! I DO!
*Update... if the link will not work, here is the address*


http://www.wearethatfamily.com/2009/12/raising-my-children-to-be-christians.html


I am always seeking the balance to allow God to move in my children's hearts and not only seek behavior modification alone. It is a LONG journey to realness and reality for me. I fall back into works and trying in my own strength every minute it seems. With all that has gone on here lately...I have been really grouchie and down...that does not make for great parenting. My children see the real me more often than I want then to! I need posts like this one to remind me that even if I blow it and do not act "Christian" all the time, that God still loves and I am still in his arms. Same goes for my kids!





I think that one really needs to read this and understand that it is not about letting children run wild or behave badly, but more about allowing the Holy Spirit to move in their hearts. More about not letting fear of what others think dictate how we parent. At least that is my take on it.





I know many will not grasp this concept...everytime I talk about grace or allowing the Holy Spirit to move I find myself going around and around in discussions about how we are responsible for training our children and all of that. SO not what this is about!


I agree that we are to train our children. I do. I train my children...I fail a lot and I succeed sometimes. I have not gotten the perfect parent thing down yet. Thank God...cause I think he has other, bigger plans for our family then just perfect kids, you know?





Thanks Carrie for thinking of me...I am always touched my how thoughtful you are!!!





Dawn

Family Update

Things have been very difficult this past week. Unfortunately, I miscarried our precious baby. Not only did that happen, but the miscarriage did not go well and after a week of trying to do it naturally with the help of my midwife, trying medications from my OB and getting very, very ill...I ended up rushing off the the ER for surgery late last night. I needed a lot of help with the severe nausea that the medications caused me and I was very dehydrated from blood loss, but they fixed me up pretty good! I am grateful for hospitals when you need them!
I am home now and trying to rest as much as one can with 7 children who need me.
I am on the mend, and Praise God...he carried me through the whole thing. I anticipate some time for the whole family to recover and heal.

God is good, all the time and I know that this precious life is not lost, but in the arms of Jesus.

Family nights

My friend Michelle's posts on family night at her house encouraged me to dig out my Heritage Builders series books and do the same. We LOVE the devotional activities. Since we are "in between" churches right now we needed this set time to focus on teaching and worship together in a way that is not just mom and dad reading the bible while little ones wiggle and wonder when they can get up! We still read the Word...but this gives the kids a way to be excited about learning!

I have turned a corner in my parenting where I seek less to force them to be still and silent when learning about God, to where I want them to interact and ENJOY learning about God. I do not want their memories to be of bad times when we are reading the Word or doing "church". With our family nights, there is an abundance of fun loving times and they are actually remembering the lessons much better this way!

Here are some shots of our last few times! I have not taken photos every time and I am not going to post this weekly. I am usually too wrapped up in what we are going to get many shots! I just thought I would post a few pics of the last 2 to encourage you to get out there and have fun while learning about the amazing things God has done!

After we read about Creation, we made play dough together and everyone got time to try making the things of Creation! It could be animals, plants or whatever else they remembered from the bible reading. Yes, we did end up with some dinosaurs!





Making homemade pizza together





















Animals!










Daddy LOVES these times! He is eagerly in the middle of every activity! Here he is making play dough animals!







Daddy hanging up the "stars" for the days of Creation.












Everyone got into the homemade tent and imagined being "In the beginning". We had the sound of water, lights going on and off, dirt going around for land...it was really fun.
Each time begins with prayer and reading the selected part of scripture that goes with the lesson and also ends in a time for each person to pray about whatever is on their heart.

Pizza time!

The last one we did...I did not get very many pictures. We went to a huge field and measured out the Ark. Wow, it was HUGE. Then, the kids had races up and down to "feed the animals". Only the Philosopher was able to run the whole distance more than once...everyone else was bushed!

Then, they made an ark at home and put animals in it, decorated it etc.

Here is a shot of the filed before we started measuring things out. Sorry there are not more pictures of the "animal feeding" that was hilarious!

Great Blog article

This is such a good article! Written by a young lady named Jasmine Bauchan. She encourages us to not depart from fellowship based on non-salvation issues. Always a timely lesson. I have been encouraged to read her thoughts.
Dawn

One of my favorite websites!

I love this site for Copywork, Notebooks, Lapbooks, Activity Books, Notebooking Pages, and MORE that are themed for Thanksgiving, Christmas, new years etc!
Check it out today!

www.knowledgeboxcentral.com

How we spent our morning

I found this wonderful book at the library yesterday.
How Mama Brought the Spring - Fran Manushkin - Penguin Group (USA): "One wintry morning, Mama tells Rosy a wondrous story about her own mama, Grandma Beatrice, who could bring spring to cold, cold Minsk by making magic in the kitchen. Together, mother and daughter mix batter and sing a song. Then the batter goes into the pan—pour, swirl, swizzle, FLIP! Soon Papa comes in from the cold and the family shares a special treat. (Hint: A recipe for blintzes is included!)
In this delightfully cozy tale, Holly Berry’s stunning illustrations evoke charming folk traditions and the warm magic made in Mama’s kitchen."










Snuggling up to read together...not all the kids are on my lap, but 2 were listening on the floor.









My princesses helping me with the recipe


















Everyone loved the blintzes, especially my husband. I will have to double the recipe next time!