The Understanding of Mothers

Posted on May 12, 2013 at 10:18 am by Casey

So it doesn’t matter much how long you’ve been in the race, how many races you’ve won, or how close you are to the finish line; all mothers have a common understanding.

Like the joy of watching a little one realize for the first time that something makes an entertaining noise.

Or when he’s trying to tell you about the big bird in the sky.

They realize the precious site of little sweaty braids on a spring afternoon.

We’re not all alike, but we’re all perfectly created for the little lives He entrusts us with. Yet most of the time we look down at the sound of “Happy Mother’s Day” because we feel so very unworthy of the kind words. Because, although perfectly created, we feel far from perfection.

I’m thanking God today for using such imperfect vessels.

Remember moms when the days are long seek Him more often. When the disappointments are many, ask Him to show you how to show His grace. When you feel overwhelmed, ask Him to decrease yourself so that He may increase within you. You’re not alone in this journey, He’s making up for your imperfections along the way!

Happy Mother’s Day!

Let’s Get Physical

Posted on May 6, 2013 at 9:47 am by Casey

Sometimes people get the idea that home schooled kids spend most of their days packed up in a room somewhere where they spend 6 hours a day looking at the same four walls. They feel like their activity level is low at best, I mean they don’t go to P.E. right?

Our kids recently participated in field day with one of our home school groups. It’s always a big hit around here. We think it’s important to give them a chance to challenge their bodies with physical activities.

At this point we don’t have kids involved in organized sports so things like field day give them an opportunity to enjoy a little friendly competitiveness.

As with all things some of them enjoy the competitiveness more than others. Some of them tend to enjoy more of the social aspect of it.

And some of them are just eager to age into participation in the next year or so.

Although the kids love field day they have many more day-to-day opportunities to challenge themselves physically right here at home. Sometimes it’s in the form of exploring the woods around our house; climbing on things, jumping off of things, and creating things out of what they can find around them. Sometimes, like recently, it’s taken the form of hard labor; clearing out brush from the yard and dragging it to the road for pickup, mowing the yard, pulling up roots to prepare for our garden, and moving logs to a trailer.

I think it’s safe to say that these kids are getting plenty of physical activity around here. Probably more than they would like on most days. If you home school how do your kids get most of their physical activity in?

Some Pictures With Sticks

Posted on April 30, 2013 at 7:13 pm by Casey

As you can probably tell blogging has been on the back burner recently. I’m not sure if I just have nothing to say or I just don’t feel like taking the time to say anything but either way, I’ve been less than inspired to write lately. I’m okay with that though because really living life is more important than recounting it.

Things have been steady around here. We’ve been getting our garden spot ready for what seems like months and we finally got it planted last weekend. We’re on a school break for a few more weeks so our days have been a mixture of planned and unplanned activities lately. We scheduled a late summer vacation and we have a couple of outings planned for May. I’m ordering and planning for our upcoming school year and our home school conference is right around the corner.

I’m starting to feel much better, overall, than I did a few weeks ago. I’m a little over 14 weeks now. We’re debating on whether to find out the sex of the baby or just let it be a surprise. B1 ran in a local 5K last week, he’s still an avid runner. B2 has been busy planting random seeds around in our yard. Who knows what it will look like around here by summertime. B3 and B4 sometimes practice moves with sticks.

They also like to play war (the card game). B5 loves all the mud puddles we’ve had around this spring and enjoys eating clumps of dirt in his free time.

David has been blessed with plenty of freelance work to keep him busy. Occasionally he has a little free time.

I’m making no promises about when I’ll blog again. Maybe sooner rather than later.

Love,

Casey

First Pictures of Spring

Posted on April 16, 2013 at 8:45 pm by Casey

Rest and Renewal

Posted on April 3, 2013 at 4:21 pm by Casey

So we took a little time off last week and the week before. It was past time for us to take a break from school (remember we school year-round) and it’s easy to tell when everyone, myself included, needs a break. Our kids have been battling late winter sicknesses for what seems like a month now so we were able to get everyone on the mend over our break. We were also able to start a few outdoor projects that and just catch up on some appointments and things. I took a break from technology as a whole by drastically reducing my computer time and instead read a couple of books and tried learning a little more about knitting. It was nice to just let our minds rest for a while and a good chance for the kids to get some energy out by working outside because, oh my, I think it might actually be spring sometime soon!

But this week we are back at it with renewed minds and eagerness to learn and it’s been a pretty good week so far. The days are getting longer which means more time outside and we’re starting to have a few warm days sprinkled here and there and that makes us all happy and maybe a little sneezy, but at least we can blame it on allergies.

Sometimes all it takes is a little break to remind us of the real blessings in our lives. I’m reminded of the true blessing of homeschooling and how thankful I am to be able to share much more time with my husband these days. I’m thankful everyday for these people that God has chosen to be a part of our family and I love being able to be here with them on a daily basis. We’re also excited to share with everyone that we are expecting a new blessing in the fall. Our hearts are again bursting with thankfulness for this new little person being knitted away, being “fearfully and wonderfully made” as we speak. We can’t wait to meet this perfect addition that God has for us.