HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY DEAR, SWEET HUSBAND!

Today is the day we celebrate the day the man of our home was born! Words cannot express what a glorious day that was for his mother and now we get the joy in sharing in her joy! Little did she know there would be 11 others running around one day from him! What a joy and we are so thankful for the wonderful father he is and what a blessing he is in my life! I know God danced the day he was born! Thank you God for him! We love you sweetheart!

Burpie Hathday to you! (it's a long story! Not a typo!)

 

Spring photograph

My daughter has been out taking spring pictures and I just love to show off what she has done. I love spring! Enjoy today, everyday is a gift from God! How fun that he gave us things to enjoy just because He loves us! May you feel His love today in a special way today!

 

Foto Friday

This was a picture of the beautiful roses my husband brought home for me on Mother's Day weekend. I think the last time I got roses from him was when he was trying to capture my heart when we were dating. Guess what I did with those? Took them to my mom's place of employment! Remember, I said he was TRYING to capture my heart! Short term it did not work, long term, my heart was captured and still is! Have a beautiful God filled weekend!

 

A devotion for the weekend

Places of Spiritual Benefit
These commandments . . . are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home.

Deuteronomy 6:6-7, NIV

Our homes are to be places of moral, spiritual, social, emotional, and physical benefit. If you think that what you do within the privacy of your own home is your own business, think again! God has made it His business, and you and I will experience serious consequences if we refuse to follow His directions for our homes.

Destruction and brokenness are all around us today. It is a brokenness that is directly related to denying our children the benefit of moral, spiritual, emotional, and social instruction. If we do not instruct our children about God and His "Manufacturer's directions" for living, they will develop their own standards and values based on what they feel, what they think, what their friends are doing, and what seems to work-and in one generation we will see the chaos and confusion that result from their "guessing" their way through life. God has given us directions telling us how to live a life that works. If we are to prevent brokenness, our homes should be places of moral and spiritual benefit to those living within them.

Blessings,



Anne Graham Lotz

AnGeL Ministries Website

A day in my life

I love to hear what other homeschooling/stay at home moms do with their day and how and if they schedule things the way I do. SO...I am asking those of you who feel like it, to let me know how you plan your day. I am going to put how MOST of my weekdays go with some variation. Or feel free to just tell me what you did yesterday and how everything worked out. Can't wait to read how people live their day to day lives! Please don't feel like you can't write in if you don't homeschool. I still would love to hear what others do!

5:30am- Time of prayer, and bible reading
7:00am- Shower and dress for the day (I must never skip this because I will NEVER get in the shower if I don't do it at this time!)
7:30am- help get breakfast ready. (We have a buddy system in our home, so usually I get the youngest one his breakfast and everyone else gets their buddies)
8:00am- clean up and make sure buddies get showered and dressed
9:00am- put little one down for nap and prepare for bible time
9:30am- bible time
10:00am- blanket time for little ones and school assignments for older kids
10:45am- Older kids continue with school while I spend time with younger kids
11:45am- I either prepare lunch or one of the older kids organizes it
12:00pm- eat lunch
12:30pm- clean up and free time
1:00pm- naps for little ones and I help older ones with school assignments or this is the time 2x's a week I run errands while one of the older kids babysits while the younger ones are sleeping
3:00pm- free time
4:30pm- prepare dinner
5:30pm- assigned kids set table and we eat dinner!
6:00pm- clean up and jammie time
7:00pm- youngest 2 go to bed and dad goes over assignments with older kids- mom showers ALONE with the door locked :) Yes, I shower 2x's a day! Just a habit I guess! ;)
7:30pm- family time
8:00pm- all kids go to bed with the exception of a couple nights a week when they get to stay up until 9pm YES, even my oldest kids go to bed at this time but they can do school work, read, draw or write as long as they are quiet. This is something my husband and I decided when our first child was born. It is essential for our marriage to connect every night. I strongly recommend this. If you think it is too late, try doing small increments of time at first and explain to your children why it is so important! It is for the benefit of the whole family! A strong marriage is the most important in God's eyes for family unity.
8:00pm- Time with my hubby!
between 9:30 and 10:00pm- I go to bed
Start over again!

Please leave your daily schedule to share with all of us on the comments! I would love to hear from all of you! Have a God-blessed day!

P.S. If you don't have a schedule you follow, that's okay! Just let us know what you did yesterday or another day that you want to write about. This is not about seeing how perfect everybody is! It is just something I thought would be fun!

Works For Me Wednesday

I always have pictures that have been developed and I do not like them sitting around in the packets from the developer. So, immedieately after I recieve them in the mail or pick them up at the store, I put them in inexpensive photo albums. I always look in the clearance isles for photo albums. I have found them anywhere from $1-$5. I try to make it a rule never to spend over $5 unless they come in a pair. I also make sure they hold at least 150 pictures otherwise I would have too many laying around. This is very useful for all you scrapbookers out there who like to keep your pictures organized but don't possibly have the time to sit down everytime you recieve pictures. Just a side note, make sure you do not get any albums that are magnetic! Buy the kind you just slide the pictures in. You can recycle these albums also after you use the pictures in your scrapbooks! Another thing I have done with the many albums I have on hand is use them as last minute gifts. Who does not appreciate a nice photo album for a gift! Just something that Works For Me!

 

A week of deep cleaning!

Today I we cleaned and cleaned some more and still have quite a list to cover. I pray alot when I clean and today was no exception. Sometimes I complain too! ;) I really cannot believe how much dirt and grime can build up! My kitchen is the one place where I try to keep exceptionally clean. So I thought! Until today! My children are all assigned specific jobs in the kitchen and deep cleaning, I guess is one I have left out. Today my 10 year old and myself tackled that! Now it is too clean to cook in! ;) Anyway, as I have been thinking constantly about my list of things I want to accomplish this week, (our school is titled, "The Ups and Downs of Cleaning") Meaning we get our house clean from the ceiling to the floors! That is one of the benefits of homeschooling right? Being creative and being able to do what needs to get done! AS my list keeps growing, I can lose sight of why it is so important to teach my children to keep a clean house. (Not obsessively, just orderly and neat.) It is about working together and realizing we are all in this together. I had to have a moment to change some attitudes at first and it really frustrated me. I wanted them to be excited with their work clothes on begging me to show them what needs to be done next with anticipation in their eyes! Yeah, right! Them, not so much, at first! As the last 2 days have continued, things have changed. They have done a good job and end up laughing about something as they are buried in cleaning. We have actually begun to enjoy the week and look forward to our list tomorrow.

As I have been praying, I have been thinking of my relationship with God and how I like to do all the fun things that come with being a child of God, but watch out when the "yuck" stuff appears! The cleaning out of my heart. The stuff I have let build up and just decided it was not a problem until the conviction comes in full force! I have to then have a little attitude adjustment from Him. Some time alone with the Word of God and prayer deep cleans my heart and unlike my kitchen, where I feel it is too clean to want to use it, this cleansing of my heart encourages me to want to be used for Him! I can then laugh and enjoy His presence again. How fun! Amazing how God speaks to us when we are doing everyday things and we decide to take the time to listen! I guess, now I need to go make dinner in my clean kitchen! ;)

Not Me Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

Okay guys, you want honesty, here it is! Enjoy taking part in my agony of the happenings of the week!

It is not me who had to send my 5 year old outside with a paper towel and bag because he decided to take a dump under our screened in porch! I know we have indoor plumbing and he surely has figured that out!

Two days later it was not my same child that urinated on our screened in porch because his brother told him too.

I did not witness my 14 month old bringing the inside bucket of my potty training sons potty chair up to his mouth like it was a big cup! (I will not even say what was in it. Let your imagination run wild!)

It is not me who just admitted that really gross information. I am too modest for that! Others would then think I don't know what I am doing raising all these boys!

It is not me who DOES wonder how to raise boys! I would surely not expect them to mark their territory! I would not look at them as barbaric! They came from MY womb.

It is not me who had to completely take my 3 and 4 year olds hair (on MOTHER'S DAY)to the scalp because they decided to take a pair of scissors and cut "polka dots" into each others hair.

It is not me who is still alive and as of now, has no heart condition after all the things that have happened to me this week in my life with boys!

No, I still cannot believe I admitted all this stuff! I would never let ANYONE know how disgusting my beauiful cherubs really are!

No, surely my mother will not read this posting! She had only me to clean up after! I NEVER bathed 2 times a day and it is not me who would not wear clothes more than 8 hours on my body because anything longer would mean they would have too many dead skin cells on them! (I DO NOT have a germ phobia!)

Yes, I did clean everything up and use Lysol, mom! :)