The Stevens Clan

Book Review: "The Grace Of God", Andy Stanley

2011-10-02T22:18:00.000-04:00

Overview: A-
Pros: Very readable
Cons: Wasn't as "meaty" as I had hoped
Recommend: Yes

I wasn't sure what to think going into reading this book, knowing little about Andy Stanley and having never read anything by him before. But I've been pleasantly surprised. Mr. Stanley points out very well how grace began with creation, how giving the law to Moses centuries ago was an act of grace meaning to point them and us to Christ, and how grace is not meant for good people. This book was very well written and very easy to read and it certainly spurred me into thinking more about God's amazing grace! A bonus is I've come to see some of the Bible's stories in a whole new light -- especially the story of the woman at the well.

So why did I give it an "A-" instead of something better? There were parts of the book that just weren't "meaty" enough for me, if that makes any sense. Despite thinking more about grace and seeing some Biblical characters in a new light, I still felt like this book was a "light" read. And while I wouldn't have said it before I read the book, I guess I really was looking for "TGOG" to challenge me and I didn't really get that. Overall, though, reading "TGOG" has been a great experience for me and I would definitely recommend it to other readers.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book for free in return for agreeing to review it. Check out http://www.booksneeze.com/ for more information.

Summer's gone?!?

2011-08-19T22:31:00.000-04:00

It's so hard to believe it's half-way through August already. What a summer, though! Most of our summer was spent preparing for our trip to Turkey. We had a blast, although there were some hiccups back home with the kids. John (6) suffered from severe homesickness but those who had him -- church friends the Snyder's -- did a fabulous job with him! Elizabeth (7) also came down with strep throat while we were gone but, again, thanks to church friends - the Pituch's - and Jonathan's mom, things turned out pretty well (although it would have been nice if we could have avoided making Ms. Charissa and baby Lucas sick -- sorry guys!). Nathan (12) and Caleb (8) were in South Carolina with my parents, Timothy (3) was with Elizabeth at the Pituch's, and Lydia (2) was with Jonathan's parents (Elizabeth joined her there after her strep diagnosis). Again, we say thanks to all those who helped. We couldn't have gone without you guys, obviously, and we cannot say "Thank You" enough! (If you follow me on Facebook, there are some pictures there. I'm too lazy to post them here -- sorry! Maybe another day....)

Right after returning from Turkey, I jumped in (almost literally) to preparing for homeschooling. Spent 3 hours one day ordering curricula. Wowzers! But I think we've got almost everything ready to go. In fact, 99% of our stuff is here and the kids (primarily Nathan) have asked to start early! When we homeschooled in the past, I always started the day after Labor Day and had planned to do that again. But I think this is it.... My "plan" (ha ha!) is to sit down with them Monday and go over "stuff" plus spend some time decorating their bags I bought them from Oriental Trading to keep their books and stuff in. Then, Tuesday, I guess we'll start. After reading some homeschooling blogs and talking to a few homeschooling moms, I've decided we're going to try a 4-day school week. Mondays will be kept "free" for things such as field trips, doctor's appointments, errands, and deep housecleaning. We plan on evaluating where we're at as far as the school year goes come Christmas and if it's not working, we'll go back to a 5-day week. My primary reason for doing this is that, while homeschooling Elizabeth (and rushing those in public school to school), I never felt like I had enough time to do housework AND school on the same days. Seemed like the days I focused on cleaning, little school got done and vice versa. So I hope this "fixes" that. Elizabeth's portfolio evaluation went VERY well which has bolstered my confidence quite a bit. Here's what we're planning on using this school year:

~Nathan, 7th grade:

*Math - BJUPress Pre-Algebra (we went with a "standard textbook" in hopes that a video series Jonathan's discovered on YouTube for free will fill in the gaps; again, we'll evaluate as we go and I have "Teaching Textbooks" and "Math-U-See" as potential back-ups)

*Science - Apologia General Science

*Grammar - Easy Grammar Plus (plus Mom's creative writing course) :)

*History - I'm doing a history/study of the 50 states on my own, with "Draw and Write Through History" and "The Star Spangled State Book" as jumping off points

~Caleb, 2nd/3rd grade:

I say 2nd/3rd because Caleb could really do most, if not all, 3rd grade work. However, he insists he "can't skip 2nd grade". :)

*Math - MathUSee, Beta

*Science - Apologia's "Exploring Creation Through Astronomy"

*LA - "First Language Lessons For The Well-Trained Mind", level 2

*History - same as with Nathan

~Elizabeth, 1st/2nd grade:

Elizabeth was in 1st grade this past year but she's not technically ready to move on to 2nd grade in reading/writing and language arts and will probably take math a lot slower than Caleb (but that's okay!)

*Math - same as Caleb

*Science - same as Caleb

*LA - "FLLFTWTM", level 1

*History - same as Caleb

~John, 1st grade:

*Math - MathUSee, Alpha

*Science - same as Elizabeth

*LA -same as Elizabeth

*History - same as Elizabeth

So......here we go! We wish everyone a blessed school year and hope you all have enjoyed your summer! Won't be long and we'll be talking about Christmas (?!?). Yikes! :)

Looking back 13 years

2011-06-19T21:42:00.000-04:00

6.20.1998

Birthday buddies!

2011-05-18T13:55:00.000-04:00

May is 2 BIG birthdays around these neck of the woods! John turn 6 on the 5th and for 13 days, I've had 2 six-year-olds! ;) But, alas, Elizabeth is 7 today! I seem to have neglected to do John's birthday post

(have no idea why! Sorry, John!) so here they are together!

Elizabeth

John, shortly after coming home from the NICU

Elizabeth, just shy of 2 and John, just shy of 1, at the zoo

Brownie-making helpers! (PLEASE do ignore the messy kitchen!)

Just after Uncle Fred and Aunt Marcy's wedding, 2008

2009

2010, just after eating Lydia's birthday cake with pink icing (and with big brother, Caleb, too!)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY,

JOHN AND ELIZABETH!!!!

Book review!

2011-04-28T21:31:00.000-04:00

I've never done this before so I don't know if there's a protocol to follow or not. If there is and I don't follow it, you'll have to forgive me. :)

If you use Twitter, who do you follow? I follow Crossway Books. In late March, I volunteered to be one of 100 bloggers to review a book for them. And, boy, am I glad I did! This is the book:

"The Greener Grass Conspiracy: Finding Contentment On Your Side Of The Fence" by Stephen Altrogge

Did you know you're at war with a conspiracy?? The world, Satan, and even your own heart are trying to get you to believe the big, proverbial lie that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. But as Christians, we're called to contentment and Mr. Altrogge does a fabulous job, IMHO, of pointing out the fact that we can truly be content while on this Earth! It's a brutal war but with the power of the Holy Spirit, we can win and find ourselves like the woman who, eating only a little bread and water, threw her hands up in the air and claimed "All this and Jesus, too?!?" This book was hilarious at times -- left me literally laughing out loud and sharing passages with my husband and my 11 year old which is something I never do so that says a lot. One of my favorite passages hilariously points out that sometimes we view God as a "Divine Dentist". We know that going to the dentist is good for us but we don't particularly enjoy it, do we? And at times, this is how we view God. We know that He is sovereignly working everything out for our good but we often hunker down, waiting for the next bomb to drop. We really shouldn't do that...instead, we should count our blessings. Did you wake up this morning (obviously you did or you wouldn't be reading this!)? Think about how many people in the world didn't get that blessing.... Did you eat today? If you're living in America, it's likely you ate more today than someone in some other part of the world eats in a week -- or worse.... Even if your budget is tight, if you're not living on the streets, you have A LOT to be thankful for! Counting your blessings is one way to find true contentment but another point that Mr. Altrogge pointed out is that we need to remember that we have an empathetic Savior. This point was extremely convicting to me 'cause I have never quite thought of Jesus in this way. He suffered worse than we can ever imagine...if anyone can empathize with us in our suffering, Jesus can -- and He DOES! Praise God! So next time you're suffering, try to remember that Jesus knows exactly what you're going through and that He cares! One last point I'll share, then you'll have to go grab the book (and I highly recommend you do!). Another point to remember that will go a long way in helping us be content is that we're not of this world. This isn't our home. This world and it's inhabitants will disappoint us because we're not made for this world. Our glorious home awaits!

Oh, okay, I have to share one more point that I've already shared on my Facebook page -- complaining is like putting God on trial and accusing Him of abuse or abandonment. When we complain, it's like telling God that we don't agree with His plan for our life, that He doesn't really know what is best. We don't get what we want (or worse -- what we feel like we "deserve"), we complain, our level of contentment plummets, and God is not glorified. *ouch* This point has kept popping up in my head these past few days as I've found myself complaining. I'm prayerfully trying not to have a spirit of complaining which will be a looooong process, I'm afraid.

Thanks, Crossway, for letting me read this book!

Homeschool Convention 4 -- Michelle Duggar

2011-04-06T12:32:00.000-04:00

I've saved the best for last but that's just because it was the last thing we went to that day. Candace & I were in line by 1:45 for this 2:30 event and I felt very sorry for the conference that was actually attempting to go on while we were all lining up outside. Anyway, we got in the junior ballroom a little after 2 and found it quite hilarious at the people trying to track down the various Duggar children for autographs and pictures. Bless their hearts, they were trying to do their jobs! They were trying to pass out a few goodies to us all -- a picture of the family, a 2-sided sheet that had information on one side on the difference between flattery and praise and how to appropriate praise our children and on the other side, a chart of different character qualities they try to stress with their children. There was also so information handed out on the plan of salvation and some information on the curriculum they use from a place called "The Advanced Training Institute" or ATI. About 2:15, Jim Bob Duggar was spotted and a line quickly formed. They started relatively close to on time (surprising for Duggars, if you watch their show!). Jim Bob introduced his wife and then Michelle took the stage. She opened with prayer and then encouraged us to pray for her because she said a crowd this size made her weak in the knees (she joked how she's used to speaking to groups of about 20 -- ha ha!). Then she told a story that I know will stick with me forever. She asked if there was anyone in the group that 2 or more children under the age of 6 and lots of hands went up...then she moved on to 3 children under 6, 4 children under 6, and 5 children under six. There weren't many hands left up at that point but then she asked if anyone had 6 children under six. I think she counted 2 hands....Then she recounted how she had 6 children under 6 and was pregnant with her 7th when she had a spiritual moment that changed the direction of her life. She was up at 1 AM doing laundry when she began sobbing, mostly from exhaustion. And she said God the Father spoke to her and asked "Michelle, it's easy to praise Me when things are going well. Will you praise Me when things aren't going well?" And then, she said, she threw her hands up in surrender and the only thing she could think to say or do was to sing "The Joy Of The Lord Is My Strength" which she sang for us (she has a lovely voice!). 6 short hours later -- at 7 AM -- they were at piano lessons. She made sure to tell us all to never schedule piano lessons for 7 AM! Anyway, while falling asleep during piano lessons, her children's piano teacher asked if she was okay and, long story short, this sweet piano teacher has come to do their laundry for 13 years! Michelle's point was that God knows what we need and when we need it and if we're surrendered to Him, He'll give us or somehow send us the help we need! QTS (question to self): How often do I actually live my days surrendered to Him instead of trying to work things out on my own? She talked quite a bit about surrender -- perhaps we need to surrender our idea about how much sleep we need (boy, that hit close to home!) or perhaps we need to surrender our idea of a perfect family or perfect homeschool.... She interjected the need for a schedule with the thought being that they don't always meet their schedule but at least there's a goal, at least they have something to shoot for. Then she moved on to anger and talked about another "epiphany" (my word, not hers) of teaching her children about meekness. She, feeling the conviction of the Holy Spirit, apologizes to her children (still 6 under 6 at this time) for yelling at them and makes the commitment to whisper when she feels the urge to raise her voice. And then she told the funny story of this new-found commitment being tested almost immediately. She was changing a diaper when an older child asked if they could have the half a can of pineapple left out on the counter for snack. "Yes you may," she tells the child, "but you have to wait on Momma to get it for you." That child didn't wait on her and tried to help his/herself and ended up making a GIGANTIC mess. Instead of yelling, which was her gut instinct, she asked the child to go wait for her in the bathroom while she thanked God for giving her such a huge mess to clean up so she could calm down before "chastening" (her word) that child. And she made the point that when we're tempted to yell "WHAT DID YOU DO?!?!", we should stop, keep calm, and instead ask "What did you do wrong?". Make sure you get the child to acknowledge what he or she did that was wrong so you can make sure that child understands because, in this situation, when she asked what that child had done wrong, the child replied "Spilling the pineapple and juice" when the real issue was the disobedience of not waiting as he/she had been told. (Personal interjection -- for more info on getting to the heart issues with your children, read "Sheparding Your Child's Heart" by Paul and Tedd Tripp.) There was another thing that she brought up and I desperately wish I had been taking notes -- she talked about having one-on-one time with her children and always asking 3 questions, of which I can only remember 2. First was "How are you?" and the 2nd was "Is there anything you haven't told Momma and Daddy that you want to tell me about now?" I really wish I could remember that 3rd question. Such a great idea when you're alone with your kids, things I've never thought about.

This was such a blessing! I was soooo convicted at some of her points, especially concerning surrender and anger, and I cried quite a bit (although I managed to not blubber like a baby which is what I usually do once I get started) so I probably wouldn't have been able to take notes after all! :) If I ever get the chance to hear her again, I know I'm going to jump on it! Our culture needs much MORE women like Michelle and far FEWER strong-willed and outspoken women, amen?

Homeschool Convention 3 -- Activities (?) and exhibit hall

2011-04-05T16:35:00.000-04:00

Saturday, 11:30 AM "Field Tested Suggestions And Activities For Infants Through School-Aged Children"
Carolyn Schulte, "Flowering Baby"

Well, you can't win them all, right? This one is definitely chalked up to a loss! She was the sweetest "little old lady" (and I mean that in a flattering way!) but by the time we got through her experience as a public school teacher (in California, no less!) and all about her daughter and especially her grandson, we got very little, if any, suggestions for activities! By the time she flew through the Powerpoint presentations on actual activities, I was too tired and too cold to write them down.

After that hour-long session, Candace and I split up. I went to the exhibit hall. WHOA! In the program for the convention, there are 4 solid pages of vendors listed. Page 1 alone had 81 vendors so that means there was probably somewhere around 320 vendors! Now, not everyone of those vendors was a homeschool company. There were TONS of colleges (secular & not), there was a Mennonite family-run KitchenAid stand, Lego was there, many places that sold used books, 1 vendor that did only art supplies, and 1 vendor that did t-shirts and things like that (I got a purple tote bag that says "Homeschool Mom Of 6" for $5!). I picked up a few catalogs, actually picked up and looked at a few books I'm thinking about using next year, and other than my tote bag, I made 1 other purchase. A friend of mine (thanks, Beth!) had sent me an email earlier in the week with many links on it and I noticed that a place called Knowledge Quest had National Geographic maps 25% off for the weekend. After I went to Knowledge Quest's founder, Mrs. Johnson's, 8:30 session, I then found a social studies book I was interested in buying called "The Star Spangled State Book". I stopped by their booth and bought the map I wanted for $17 and that book for $19. Bonus -- it was TWO maps for that price. One of the world and one of the US. They're huge and came laminated! I've hung the world map on the wall behind our kitchen table and used shipping tape to put the one of the US on our table. Could have spent hours there going through the booths with used books but, alas, I only had what I thought was 2 hours before the session featuring Michelle Duggar. Thankfully, my tummy got a hold of me and told me to eat around 1 or I would have really been hurting! Not finding anything in the exhibit hall that interested me, I followed my nose to the cinnamon almonds up on the 3rd floor but, sadly, didn't buy them and bought a pretzel instead. At this point, it wasn't even 1:30 yet and the line for Michelle's session was already forming! So I ate my pretzel while in line for me & Candace. Michelle's session was the highlight of my day but that's another post that will be on it's way shortly (I hope!).

Homeschool Convention 2 -- "The Lighter Side Of Education"

2011-04-03T17:23:00.000-04:00

Saturday, 10:00 AM, "The Lighter Side Of Education -- How To Relax, Enjoy, And Laugh And Still Be A Parent-Educator" by Dr. Christopher Perrin, M. Div., Ph. D. (You can visit his blog at www.InsideClassicaled.com but I haven't done that yet.)

This guy was a very well-educated, Christian philosopher....which led to interesting choices of words, some of them in Greek and Latin. He almost lost me a time or 2! But I love what he had to say. He didn't have an outline or a 1-2-3-4 point system so below are his...

Key points:

*In scripture, we are called to joy so if there is no joy in your life, something is wrong!

*Our vision is what propels us forward.

*There are 2 sides of the mind -- the side that is "running to and fro", gathering information, doing research; and the side that is stopping, gazing, and soaking. We need to exercise BOTH. Things don't become permanent in our minds until we stop, gaze, and soak them in.

*All ideas have consequences.

*Beauty, goodness, and truth (I would add GOD'S beauty, goodness, and truth) need to be paramount in our lives.

*Teaching is helping them to see what they cannot see.

*In Latin, the word for school means "play" and in Greek, the word for school means "leisure". (Sound like any public school you see today?!?! Just my .02 worth....)

*What are you kids here for? They're hear to be "celebratory image bearers" (referring to use being image bearers of God).

*Are there friendships in your family? Do you take your children for one-on-one time? Do LESS and pursue these moments!

*Model a love for learning.

*If you're not laughing, it's probably because you're not trusting in the goodness of God! Are your children not in His hands? Has He not promised you good things? Has He not given you everything you need to take care of your kids (the key here is relying on His strength, His grace, His goodness, etc).

*Home education is a life of constant repentance of your anxiety and saying "Above all else, I'm going to love my husband and children".

*He mentioned TONS Of quotes and I apologize for not writing down where they came from and I also apologize that I'm probably not quoting them exactly. "A man should take his mission but never himself seriously"..."Angels fly because they take themselves lightly"..."Carelessness in your seriousness is frivolity"

*Your children are not about YOU. You are about your children.

*Practical tips: take nature walks, read for enjoyment, be silly, join in the play of your kids, have lots of celebrations/celebratory dinners.... Practical tips from other h-schooling moms: have your children draw cartoons of the history they're learning...have a "tea time" between the transitions in your days (between subjects, between school & whatever) -- this mom was suggesting a few minutes of quiet time to read a little bit of scripture (although she did really drink a cup of tea); she even got her teenage SONS involved!

Homeschool Convention -- "Choosing The Right Curriculum"

2011-04-03T14:15:00.000-04:00

Saturday, 8:30 AM, "Choosing The Right Curriculum For Your Family" with Terri Johnson of Knowledge Quest Publishing Company.

6 steps of advanced thought and preparation for buying curriculum:

1. Know you and your child's learning styles. We all learn through certain "modalities". We all learn through our eyes (visual), our ears (auditory), and our hands (kinesthetics). However, we as individuals tend to favor one or 2 way(s) of learning over the other(s). Knowing how you learn will you help you be a better teacher to your children; knowing how your children learn will help you pick out the best curriculum for them because all curricula choices are skewed towards one or two learning styles, regardless of what it might claim. For help in figuring out your younger child's learning styles, Terri recommends you visit this link. For figuring out your own learning style or your older child's, she recommends this link. (NOTE: I have not visited either of these links yet.)

2. Know your philosophy of education, what you think education should be. There are 5 mainstream philosophies to homeschool: 1) unschooling (also referred to as "child-led", "organic", etc.), 2) "school-at-home", 3) unit studies, 4) classical, and 5) Charlotte Mason. (NOTE: For more info about these philosophies, please visit this website. This website offers more than these 5 styles listed here; I think Mrs. Johnson was just trying to give an overview, not a comprehensive list.)

3. Consider your finances and set a budget! Make a point to buy the best tools you can afford. That might not include "top-of-the-line" curriculum but that's okay (it's also okay if it does include that!). Bear in mind that the more a resource costs, the less teacher prep it will require.

4. Browse catalogs and/or visit Cathy Duff's website www.CathyDuffyReviews.com. You can also check out Ms. Duffy's "Top 100 Picks For Homeschool Curriculum" from Columbus libraries. 1 good and bad note on that book -- the good is that it includes testing for your and your child's learning styles and then matches each curriculum with the learning styles. The bad? The book was written several years ago and a lot has happened in homeschool since then. I think her website includes an updated list but I'm not 100% sure. Some catalogs Mrs. Johnson recommended are "Sonlight", "Vision Forum", "Veritas", "Timber Doodle", "Rainbow Resource", and "Christian Book Distributors".

5. Read curricula reviews. Again, check out Cathy Duffy's site as well as Amazon, "Eclectic Homeschool Reviews" and other homeschool magazines. Google it! :)

6. Once you've chose a curriculum, bear in mind there are many places to purchase it, some more expensive than others. You can purchase directly from the publisher, from a discounter such as CBD or Rainbow, from a place like Amazon or other sort of bookstore, from homeschool conventions, and from used book places such as eBay. Pros/cons -- the publisher is going to have the highest everyday price but will often have the best sales; a discounter/Amazon will have the lowest everyday prices but rarely have sales although they may offer free shipping; at a homeschool convention, you can pick up the item and actually browse through it and the vendors tend to offer sales at conventions -- however, remember you'll have to either go back at the last minute and actually purchase the items OR lug them around with you; browsing through used places will be more time consuming.

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Other key points:

*It's okay to make curricula mistakes! You are not married to a curriculum once you've purchased it. If you discover it's not working for you, there could be a 30/60/90 day money-back guarantee or you could consider selling it as used. And move on to picking a new one.

*Look on-line! You can often download and print samples.

*Have "perfect" curricula (which is truly not possible) is not a guarantee for a great or even good homeschool. Homeschooling is about what YOU put into it.

*Homeschooling should be goal-oriented, not curriculum driven. You should set goals each quarter/semester/year and try to accomplish them.

*June is the best time to not only list used curriculum you might have to sale but also to purchase used curriculum.

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Some curriculum choices Mrs. Johnson recommends that she's tried during her 13 years as a homeschooler:

Phonics -- "Teach Your Child To Read In 100 Easy Lessons"

Handwriting -- "Handwriting Without Tears"

Math -- "Singapore" (a more "mental" curriculum), "Math-U-See" (more visual), and "Teaching Textbooks" for pre-algebra & up

Spelling -- "Spelling Power" and "All About Spelling"

Grammar -- "Rod And Staff"

Writing -- "Write Shop" and "Adventure Novel" (high school level)

Geography -- "Expedition Earth", "Map Trek", "A Child's Geography", and "The Star Spangled State Book"

History -- "Story Of The World", "Tapestry Of Grace", "Sonlight", and "Biblioplan" (sp?)

First homeschool convention

2011-04-03T13:32:00.000-04:00

I had the opportunity yesterday to attend the MidWest Homeschool Convention in Cincinnati. I have never been to a convention before, even when homeschooling Nathan. I was really excited even though I only got to attend one day of conferences. I left Friday evening in time to attend the Tim Hawkins concert with Candace. LOVE Tim Hawkins & totally enjoyed his concert. Candace had originally planned on taking her whole family down for the convention, which started on Thursday, and stay in a suite. However, when they changed their minds, they cut their reservation back to only Friday night and I planned on staying down there with her while our husbands and Candace's Mom had our kiddos. I hesitate to mention the name of the hotel we stayed at...while we were impressed at the size of the two-story suite, we were unimpressed at the dirty carpet and cob webs on the ceiling and at the front desk's lack of knowledge. There was a restaurant in the lobby and we asked what time they opened for breakfast. We were told 7...it really was 8. We asked how much we'd have to pay for parking in their garage for 24 hours and we were told $2, maybe $4...with a change in plans, we weren't even in the garage 12 hours and the charge was $6!?!? We had an awesome breakfast at a place called First Watch and then ventured back to the convention. Our first conference started at 8:30, our second one at 10, third one at 11:30, then Candace took a conference at 1 while I walked the exhibitor hall, we met back up at 2:30 for another session, and then decided to leave early at 4. We intended on returning at 6 for the "Grand Finale" involving the Duggar Family from TLC's "19 Kids And Counting". However, seating was on a first-come, first-served basis and at 3:30, folks were already lining up. We needed to eat since we had only had breakfast and a snack and knew there was no way we could leave the convention center, eat, and get back in time to actually get a seat. We drove a little bit up 71 and had dinner at "Aroma Restaurant & Sushi Bar" at a mall. Yummy! We were home by 8:30, a full 2 hours before we thought we'd be home which was good. I was welcomed home by hugs & kisses, had time to tuck everyone in bed, and was in bed by 10 which was STILL earlier than I had even intended to be home! THAT equaled a full night's sleep which I desperately needed. I intend to type up my notes from each of the classes we attended and post them here, not only for my own sake but also to maybe help or encourage others. Stay tuned!

Parental ponderings and homeschool wonderings

2011-03-18T21:27:00.000-04:00

So....a lot's been going on in this head of mine (shocking, I know). If you are a Christian parent, you NEED to pick up a copy of "Family Driven Faith" by Voddie Bachaum, Jr., in my humble opinion. It's literally changing my life. Here's the deal -- estimates on the low side are that 70% of teens raised as believers leave the faith before the end of their first year of college. "Why?" raises a tons of possibilities and in this book, he doesn't necessarily try to find the reasons; he just tries to help a Christian parent change what they can to where it can prayerfully not happen to them. Let me ask you this, Christian Parent -- what are you doing on a daily basis to "preach" the gospel to your children? Are you having regular family worship in your home, led by the spiritual leader of your home (your husband, if you have one and he's a believer)? Now, don't loose me here 'cause I know what I'm about to say a lot of people are going to blow off. Just listen to my question and let it sink in and then, above all else, pray about it (and don't attack the messenger!). If your children are gone from you for 6+ hours a day attending school, how is that affecting your job as a parent required to teach them the things of the Lord? "Well," you say "I just can't homeschool my kids." That may be true but I'd like to take a stab at helping you see that it's not as far-fetched an idea as you think it may be by dissecting some of the arguments I myself have been clinging to lately. **Disclaimer** While I'm currently only homeschooling 1of my children, we made the decision recently that Caleb & John would stay home next school year, too. After reading this book, Jonathan & I are prayerfully adding Nathan to that list. I'll explain why as we go.

Argument #1 -- Nathan will be in junior high next year. I can't teach junior high!

Can't I? If you've ever picked up a homeschool curriculum catalog before, you're going to know what I'm about to say is very true -- there are TONS of options out there. Many of them include "virtual" teachers. There are parents out there who have tread this path before me & thrived; I can glean from their experiences. Regardless of my insecurities about teaching junior high, am I allowed to let fear keep me from obeying God? If I truly feel God is calling me to homeschool my children, then am I allowed to tell God I can't because I'm afraid. *ouch*

Argument #2 -- Nathan is in band. I can't give him that option at home.

True that! I can't do band with 6 kids of all different ages and no one able to play an instrument other than me & Nathan. Band is very rewarding -- I know. Been there, done that! I used to say "High School band was the best 4 years of my life!". And while that is true in many ways, obviously many things have come into my life since then that have trumped it. And no parent wants to feel like they're depriving their children, right? I certainly don't. However, I'm coming to realize that "good is the enemy of the best". While allowing Nathan to be in the band would definitely be a good thing, is it the best thing for him right now? Can I justify my decision to allow Nathan to stay in public school just so he can enjoy band? Can I not find something else for Nathan to do that will be as beneficial to him, all the while keeping him at home? Pondering that one, big time....

Argument #3 -- Nathan is SUCH a social child. He'll be bored at home.

Nathan is already bored at home on days off from school. BUT -- who's fault is that? As a young man 11 1/2 years old, it's partly his. He should be able to find something (good) to do to occupy his time. However, isn't some of the responsibility also mine? In the very least, it absolutely is -- if Nathan claims he's bored (which he often does) and he decides to occupy his time by bugging his younger siblings (which he does on occasion), isn't it MY job as his mother to redirect him?... Here's something I've been thinking about a lot lately -- "What do I remember about being in junior high?" I remember feeling tortured at school because I was not only fat, I also wore glasses. I do remember the good things, too -- I remember winning the science fair one year, I remember loving being in the band, and I remember the one good friend I did have (Hi, Heather!). Are these things good? With the exception of being made fun of, absolutely they are good! But, I'm sure if I asked my parents, they'd rather me remember the things we did together as a family. When people ask my kids today about school, it pains me sometimes to hear them say how they love their teacher or their friends. God designed the FAMILY to be each other's best friends! That's why we have siblings (hopefully)! When my kids are adults and look back at their years at home, I want them to be bonded to EACH OTHER and to me & their Dad. I don't want them to remember so-and-so who isn't in their life any more. Friends are good to have -- I'm certainly grateful for the true friends I have today -- but family should last forever and the bonds of family should go much, much deeper! And, I have to go back to the question I asked under the first argument -- is my fear of Nathan's boredom enough to allow me to disregard what God is calling me to?

These are just 3 of the arguments I've had in my heart lately and it all boils down to fear. Fear of failure, fear of pushing my kids away rather than bonding them more deeply to our family unit, fear of loosing family or friends who don't agree with our decisions, fear of other numerous things....but isn't this where FAITH is supposed to come in? Absolutely it's going to be hard! I know 'cause I've already done it and it was hard with only ONE child in school! But the bottom line boils down to 2 things (and I promise I'll shut up after this). #1 God IS calling me to this, I'm certain of it. #2 My number 1 job as a Christian mother is to evangelize and disciple my children. Don't miss the point here -- YES, they're education is important and I'm not trying to down play it nor would I ever claim I can teach better than their teachers can (we've been blessed with GREAT teachers our 2 years in public school). But, if I had the choice of a child who couldn't read but was passionately in love with Jesus as their Savior or a brilliant scholar with no regard for the things of God, I wouldn't have to think twice about what I'd pick. And I CANNOT "keep the main thing (the condition of their souls) the main thing" when they're gone from me 6 hours a day. I have a hard enough time getting homework done in the evenings, much less getting to the heart of my children and prayerfully influencing them for the Lord.

**Is God calling every Christian parent to homeschooling? No and maybe you're one of the one's He's not called to it -- in all sincerity, you'll have to ask Him (please do). But I'm certain He's calling me and I hope that you will pray and ask God how you can better influence your children for Him, regardless of where you decide for them to get their education. And pray for us, too.

February

2011-03-07T20:37:00.000-05:00

February's theme was chocolate! :) We read books on where chocolate comes from and celebrated Valentine's Day with friends. Because I forgot my camera & because I'm lazy, here's what her blog had to say about our day (my notes in italics):

Karen and 3 of her kids (Lydia, Timothy, and Elizabeth) came over this morning for a Valentine breakfast and lunch. Elizabeth needed to do some homeschooling fun, so we all benefited. Big thanks to Karen for including us and coming up w/all the great ideas. (Doing things with friends makes things so much easier and so much more fun!)

We started with chocolate filled heart shaped doughnuts from Tim Hortons.

Then it was on to cutting hearts out of red peppers for the vegetable & cheese skewers.

Next was the task of making heart shaped pizzas. I made the dough but it was forgettable. However, the fresh mozzarella on mine and Karen's was scrumptious!

Heart shaped sugar cookies would have to be made, of course! After they cooled we iced them with a cream cheese icing and topped them with fresh sliced strawberries and sliced bananas. (Didn't have bananas on mine 'cause I don't eat bananas but boy, oh boy, were those cookies with strawberries yummy!!!)

The main attraction of the day was chocolate dipping strawberries.

Then striping the dipped strawberries.

The final lunch menu of heart shaped pizzas, heart shaped jello bites, vegetable (cherry tomatoes & red pepper hearts) & cheese (baby bell cheese cut into hearts) skewers w/ranch dip, and hawaiian punch.

The final dessert menu of chocolate dipped strawberries, heart shaped doughnuts, and heart shaped sugar cookie pizzas. Mmmmmmmmmmmm!!

January homeschooling

2011-03-04T21:07:00.000-05:00

January was a "princess" theme:

Making a princess wand

My 2 princesses (and the completed wand)

Princess Elizabeth and her crown

She also made a castle out of cardboard and toilet paper rolls, made a "princess pillow case", read about real and fairy tale princesses, and watched "Cinderella" & "Beauty And The Beast" on DVD. On January 22nd, Elizabeth & I took in "Disney Princesses On Ice". It was called something different but I'm pretty sure it's the exact same show we saw in 2008 which was kinda disappointing. But, at least with a better camera, I got some pretty good shots.

Elizabeth & her $12 icee

Mickey & Minnie

Aladdin & the Genie

Sleeping Beauty

Prince Eric and Ursula from "The Little Mermaid"

Mulan & MooShoo (sp?)

Cinderella in her carriage

Mini-vacation

2011-03-04T20:49:00.000-05:00

Mid-January was "CodeMash" (a conference for programmers, although that's probably a pretty lame description, if you ask Jonathan). It's held at the Kalahari Indoor Waterpark Resort in Sandusky, Ohio, which boasts being America's largest indoor waterpark. With an early morning session on the first day, Jonathan left home around 4 a.m. to make the drive which is just short of 3 hours. It had snowed pretty good the day before so we were a little worried but he made it there just fine and had a grand day! That Thursday, after school, the kids and I headed up to join him. Other than taking the turn into the snowy parking lot at nearly 20 miles an hour (the turn surprised me, to say the least!), we also had a good drive up. We were a little disappointed to get down to the waterpark that evening to learn that they had closed at 9 to clean the park before opening it back up to CodeMash folks only from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. Not thinking the kids would have done very well being up that late, we decided to skip the waterpark that night and went back to our gigantic suite instead. We had a full-size kitchen (mental note -- take food to cook next year, if you go, so you don't drop a small fortune on eating there!), a living room with a queen size sleeper sofa, 1 room with a king size bed, 1 room with 2 queen size beds, and 2 full baths (1 with a jacuzzi tub). That Friday morning, while Jonathan was back at the conference, was a little interesting. Thinking the few places to eat on site would be expensive (and they were), I decided to take all 6 kids and venture into Sandusky for some breakfast. The kids were already starving when we got to McDonald's, got out, ordered food, and then realized Mommy had left her checkcard back in the hotel room. :( We went back and retrieved the card but then were too hungry and too stressed out to venture out again so we ate there. 2 donuts, 3 orders of pancakes & bacon, 1 pop, 2 chocolate milks, and 2 orange juices cost me $30. Sheesh! After finally eating, we did venture back out to Wal-Mart to pick up the stuff to eat sandwiches in the room for lunch. After some rest, I took the youngest 5 down to "Tree Top Play", a giant 3-story play area where the kids had a blast! Nathan, too tall for the play area, blew through the only $6 I had in cash at the GINORMOUS arcade, only walking away with a tiny plastic robot to show for his efforts. We met Jonathan after his last conference and ventured back out to Cracker Barrel for dinner. Finally, after much patience on the kids' part, we made it down to the waterpark about 8:30 that night. It was sooooo great! None of the things I had feared came true. We didn't loose anyone, it wasn't so crowded that it was uncomfortable, and I didn't feel like I stuck out in a bathing suit. Tons of people there and there weren't many who would have qualified for a beauty pageant, if you get what I'm saying and I'm not trying to be mean. Anyway, we don't have many pictures 'cause I was busy counting heads, following toddlers through the 10-inch deep water playground, and didn't want to chance our big camera getting stolen or wet. Another late night but it was worth it! The kids had so much fun! My favorite memory of the night is Nathan walking up to me yelling "I'm not afraid of heights any more!" after he had ventured down one of the many huge water slides. Saturday morning (after staying the extra night), we packed up the hotel room, had cereal for breakfast, changed into our swimsuits and visited the waterpark for another few hours before heading home. We think Jonathan had a mild case of food poisoning from his fish at Cracker Barrel the night before which was a bummer but he still played with the kiddos in the water. Grabbed some lunch at Fazoli's, stopped at Meijer to replace a windshield wiper blade on the van & grab Jonathan some medicine to help his stomach feel better, and then made the trek home. (I won't say which one of us it was -- we were in both vehicles -- but one of us came home with a speeding ticket -- the first for either of us! And it wasn't for speeding while driving. It was for gunning it to get out of an exit only lane and back onto the highway. Lesson learned!) A good time was had by all and, if possible, we can't wait to go back next year! If you have the money (our suite runs about $250/night but does include passes to the waterpark), the Kalahari is a great place to visit! During the summer, there's a huge outdoor waterpark, an animal encounters village like a mini-zoo, zip lines, and pool. Inside, near the arcade, there's also a paint-your-own pottery place, a mini-golf course, and a few miniature bowling lanes. Totally cool! If you choose a suite, pack some food to save some money! But, if you can afford it, it was a great place to go!

The view into the suite from the kitchen

The bedroom with the king size bed

The other bedroom with 2 queen beds

The gang headed to the waterpark (only to be turned away)

The kids substituted waterpark play time for jucuzzi tub play time

Christmas 2010

2010-12-27T10:55:00.007-05:00

Hope your Christmas was merry! Praise God for the best gift we could ever receive -- Jesus Christ!

Christmas started on Christmas Eve in the Stevens household. Since we were unable to be with my family this year, we decided to let them open gifts from my parents & my aunt. The kids were surprised to find an XBox 360 w/ Kinect from my mom & dad! While they took turns playing the XBox, they enjoyed the coloring books, crayons, markers, and PlayDoh from Nannie. We also took in "Megamind" at the movies. Christmas Eve pictures....

Stockings hung, ready to go

This is what a tree looks like with toddlers around -- all the ornaments up high and the lights all pulled off the bottom :)

Christmas Day dawned with no kids in sight. It was well after 7 before we heard from them. Once the older 4 was up, we had to wake up Timothy & Lydia to get the festivities started. Lydia crawled/walked around the presents & kept picking each one up. Nathan read to us from Luke chapter 2 to remind us of what we were celebrating. Then we started off with each one opening one present at a time but it didn't really last long before presents were just being torn open. Still it was fun. Stockings were unpacked and everything was done by 8. It was clear, though, that John was very sick. Poor guy was coughing his head off and running a fever. When we went to Jonathan's parents later that afternoon, we "quarantined" him upstairs & he watched the festivities from the loft, coming down to open his presents. He actually fell asleep at one point. :( (Trip to urgent care yesterday revealed an ear infection & he's feeling much better today although still fighting a bad cough.) I don't even know if I could write up a list of who-got-what, even if I tried. It looks like a toy store exploded in my house. Christmas morning pictures...

Timothy and Lydia are ready

Can't you just tell she's dying to get in???

Elizabeth ready to go!

So today starts the last week of 2010! Elizabeth & I just christened her new Easy Bake Oven and we're having a relaxing day at home. 1 doctors appointment tomorrow (me), Timothy's bi-annual audiology appointment on Wednesday (IF we're all well & baby-sitter's family has recovered from their Christmas illness, too, so I have somewhere to leave Lydia), another relaxing day on Thursday, then a small New Year's Eve get-together on Friday night will round out our (only) week of Christmas break. Monday, it's back to school for the boys & Elizabeth's first day of homeschooling. Time is FLYING by! Whew!

Elizabeth in her apron from my Mamaw who passed away in November

Enjoying her first cake!

Have a blessed new year, everyone!

Home again, home again, jiggity jig

2010-12-23T09:19:00.002-05:00

So, what could a post with that title possible mean? Well, it means ~~I've lost my mind~~ that we're (slowly but surely) bringing our kids back home, at least in part. Yes, we're moving back into homeschooling. Why, you ask? Well, I can assure you of 2 things -- 1, it's a calling and 2, this has very little to do with the schools the kids are in, the teachers they have, and/or the education they're receiving. As for the calling part -- I realize that some readers of this blog are not Christians. This part may be difficult for you to understand or you may walk away thinking I'm really loony. The latter may be true (some days I certainly feel like it!) but I know beyond the shadow of a doubt that God has called us (me) to this journey. When we put the kids into public school in 2009, I was feeling very overwhelmed with life -- Timothy was not quite 2 and was going through a myriad of medical issues and Lydia was a newborn -- and I was feeling very much like a failure. Hindsight being 20/20 and several reaffirming comments from homeschooling friends, I realize that I wasn't the failure I thought I was. And, besides that, let me say it again...God has brought this into our lives. There are things that my children will never, ever learn in public school no matter how great their teachers are. They will never learn to "love the Lord their God with all their hearts, with all their souls, and with all their might" (see Deut. 6:5). Could a Christian school do that? Perhaps...but who's going to pay the thousands of dollars in tuition? I certainly can't. Don't we do that by living our daily lives and taking our children to church? Certainly! And I'm by no means saying I've got the market cornered on teaching my children to love God. Trust me -- I'm a work in progress. BUT, how much more will I be able to teach them the truths of God's word when I have them at home with me 24/7? Evenings get away from us now with everyone in school. Just ask Caleb & Elizabeth's teacher about how often they get their nightly 15 minutes of reading (hardly ever) or ask John's teacher how many nights we've read John's "book-in-a-bag" (not very consistently). Don't even get me started on "family" time 'cause there isn't any with the kids in school, save the weekends. Having more family time isn't the #1 goal or the #1 reason for homeschooling. In fact, I would call it a perk. The #1 goal, obviously, is their education not only in the "3 R's" but also in the Bible and other things they won't learn in public school as well as they can learn at home like how to love their parents more than they love their teachers, how to love their siblings more than they love their friends, and how to be a responsible member of this family. And the #1 reason for homeschooling, again, is to do my best at fulfilling my calling. Only God would lead me to this. This isn't "taking the easy way out"! My lazy nature would much rather leave them in public school, worry about their homework and whether or not I've packed their lunch, and have more "me" time when they're gone (and that's heartbreaking to admit). But if there's anything I learned from my first journey through homeschooling, it's that this going to be hard! And I'm quite terrified. But, if it's possible to say, I'm confidently terrified. Terrified 'cause I don't like feeling like a failure and I sincerely realize that there's a lot at stake here and I'm not just talking about good grades. Confident because I believe 100% that this is God's leading and I have many, many promises in His word like "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength" (Phil. 4:13).

So, with that being said, this is the "plan", in as much as we have a plan, ever conscious of God's leading. Yesterday was Elizabeth's last day at school. When school starts up on 1/3/11, she will not be returning. I won't dive into the reasons why we chose Elizabeth but I will say that what we're doing is kinda like taking a trial run. Elizabeth will stay home the rest of this school year and then, Lord willing, Caleb & John will join her here at home next school year. Again I won't dive into the reasons why but, as for now, Nathan will stay in public school. But, then again, all that could change. So, please, if you think about us in the coming weeks, please pray for us! We're not taking this lightly (did I mention I'm terrified?) and we desire to be successful in God's eyes, that our life as a family will bring glory to Him and Him alone!

And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.

You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them

when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way,

and when you lie down, and when you rise.

Deut. 6:6-7

Eight

2010-12-02T12:23:00.004-05:00

Happy 8th Birthday,

Caleb Joshua Stevens!

2002

2003

2004

2006

2008

Conversations with toddlers

2010-10-05T08:42:00.003-04:00

We're working on encouraging Timothy to use "real" or "big boy" words. We're at a place right now where we're having a hard time understanding him which makes him really frustrated which turns his speech into mush. Last Thursday, I had stopped at Wal-Mart for groceries and there was something I had bought that Timothy wanted. So he starts with the verbal mush.... I stopped him and said "Timothy, do you want one?". He said "Ses" (with an "S", not the "Y" sound). Then, our conversation went like this:

Me: Timothy, say "I"

Timothy: I

Me: "Want"

Timothy: Want

Me: "One"

Timothy: Two

I chuckled and said "No, Timothy. Listen to Mommy's words. 'I want one'". Can you say "I"?

Timothy: I

Me: "Want"

Timothy: Want

Me: "One"

Timothy: Two

Me: "Not quite yet, Timothy. Let's try again. Can you say "I"?"

Timothy: I

Me: "Want"

Timothy: Want

Me: "One"

Timothy, with a very confused look on his face, looks at me and says in a questioning tone, "Three?".

At least I know he can count....

Back to school

2010-09-15T12:50:00.005-04:00

...is going great!

Nathan's first day of 6th grade

(last year of middle school -- yikes!)

He's recently joined the band, playing percussion.

Caleb's first day of 1st grade

His standard expression....

Elizabeth's first day of 1st grade

Our not-so-little bundle of HiGh EnErGy!

John's first day of kindergarten

I think he's going to be a math whiz (seriously)!

And because they couldn't be left out....

Timothy enjoying a popsicle

Lydia@ 18 months old

Picture updates

2010-08-07T20:14:00.005-04:00

Promised a birthday post after my last post. However, I couldn't get to our back pictures! Sorry, Nathan! He had a great 11th birthday, though (not that anyone was missing the post I promised....)!

Here's some really overdue pictures! First up, in May, Caleb was awarded the student of the month (at least I think it was "month" & not like quarter or something....). This is him with his principal, Mr. Seckel. Unless you ask John....then it's his "president" and his name is "Mr Cycle". Too cute! We're sad to see Mr. Seckel retire!!

On Mother's Day, we celebrated John & Elizabeth's birthdays at Jonathan's parents house. Here's some of the cousins together (cousin Kaylee in the middle).

John's reaction to seeing his new bike.

And Elizabeth's reaction to seeing hers.

In June, Nathan was awarded an academic excellence award. Kinda like honor roll. The lady off the far left is his principal, Mrs. Thomas-Manning. The gentleman handing him his certificate is his assistant principal Dr. Jones.

And last but not least, we took the kids to the Columbus Museum of Art during the Columbus Arts Festival. We went right when they opened so as to minimize the crowds. That was an excellent idea! A large part of the Chihuly art exhibit....

The picture of my monkeys that's now at the top of the blog almost got us kicked out of the exhibit. We were in a "no flashes" zone & didn't know it. :)

If you follow me on Facebook, I'm also uploading a new album of pictures from the Stevens Family Reunion. Enjoy!

Updates!

2010-07-27T16:44:00.002-04:00

Don't seem to be blogging much these days, thanks to Facebook and Twitter. So here's an update of what's going on. Tomorrow, another birthday post is coming!!

Jonathan has been working his you-know-what off. They just completed a major project at work so hopefully he can get back to his "regular" job now. Not that his regular job is any less stressful.... I know he'd appreciate your prayers as he strives to get his work done and still be with his family.

Nathan is enjoying his summer break but is anxious for school to start (he gets that honestly!). He rec'd his standardized ("achievement") test scores in the mail recently and tested "accelerated" in all 3 subjects. Way to go, Nathan!

Caleb is trying to enjoy summer. He's struggled with allergies this spring and today, finally visited an allergist. This is the first time he's been tested. He tested allergic to grass, weeds, several types of trees, cats, dogs, and dust mites. We're considering going with allergy shots but are adding a 4th allergy medication in the meantime.

Elizabeth is also suffering from allergies but much, much milder than Caleb. She was recently at the doctor for a chronic cough because of allergies and has gained 14 pounds in 1 year!! She now weighs exactly the same thing Caleb does, 54 pounds! She's so stinkin' excited about going to school with her lunch box!

John is excited about starting school! He's about 7 pounds behind Caleb & Elizabeth but is within an inch or 2 of both of them in height. He did great at his 5 year well-check and came in the size of an average 6 1/2 year old boy! Sheesh!

Timothy is 2 and that about sums it up! He's a monkey, let me tell you! Unfortunately, he likes fighting with his siblings.... He's still doing great in speech therapy, though!

Lydia, last but not least, is going to be an allergy sufferer, too, I'm afraid. She's actually got us concerned. She's tiny -- nearly 17 months old and barely 19 pounds, yet she doesn't walk or stand consistently. She's been evaluated by a physical therapist and is having some x-rays done of her legs and will be starting weekly physical therapy on 8/10. The x-rays are to determine whether or not there's a significant difference in the lengths of the bones of her legs or not. When you stretch her out, there appears to be a fair amount of difference between her leg lengths but we need a more accurate measurement. She's also going for allergy testing on 8/16. It was difficult enough to take Caleb for testing -- I can't imagine what it'll be like to put this tiny baby through that. *sniff, sniff*

It's been a busy summer for us and we can't believe it's almost time to go back to school! Yes, we're going to put the kids in public school again this year. What we felt was not working for us as far as homeschooling goes still isn't "fixed", for a lack of a better word, so we feel this truly is the best for them. They had a great year in school & loved it which makes things a lot easier. Nathan especially loved it and has begged us to not homeschool him again. Preteens are a whole new world for me. I haven't decided if I like it or not (although I realize it doesn't really matter....). Hope you all are doing well!

Six

2010-05-18T12:03:00.004-04:00

There's no way I could have imagined how our life was going to change on this day 6 years ago. We were so happy to have a baby girl after having 2 boys. But, boy, oh boy, has she been a handful! Still, we wouldn't trade her for anything! And today, we're especially happy to be celebrating her 6th birthday!Going home from the hospital in one of my dresses from 1977!July 4, 2004/ 2 months oldMay 2005/1 yearSpring 2006/2 yearsEaster 2007/3 years old4 years oldEaster 2009/5 years
Happy Birthday, Elizabeth!!

Every now & then it hits me...

2010-05-16T17:40:00.005-04:00

...just how similar & yet different my boys look! Here they are all at around 2 years old....

Five

2010-05-05T09:24:00.004-04:00

Five-Five-O-Five

(5-5-05)In NICU, a few days oldJust learning to stand2 years3 years4 yearsHappy Birthday, baby boy!!

Overwhelmed again

2010-05-02T10:20:00.003-04:00

Sometimes, especially lately, I just wanna scream "Will it ever end?!?!" That's probably a bit on the dramatic side but still.... It's all left me feeling very overwhelmed at the moment, especially as a mom. Nathan is doing well after his bought with pneumonia, except he's caught the cold that I got last week. School seems to be slowing down for him, in anticipation of the end of the year. Achievement testing is done, too, so that's nice. He seemed kinda stressed about them. Caleb, oh, Caleb -- poor little guy is having a terrible spring! His allergies are out of control. He doesn't complain much but I'm worried about him. He's had 2 ear infections back to back and with allergies running rampant, he's prone to have more of them. Our pediatrician has told us he might have to see the ear doctor. Jonathan and I talked and decided to go ahead and make an appointment. We can't get him in until July 19th so I'm hoping that he either shows us that he needs the appointment (even though that would mean another ear infection) or he shows us that he doesn't and/or we can get his allergies under control. We've started him on a THIRD allergy medicine and while it seems to be going okay, I just can't help but think "This sure is an awful lot of medicine for a little 7 year old" and wonder what effect, if any, this will have on him as he grows up. Elizabeth is growing like a weed! I'm sure "normal" parents (if there exists such a thing) would be happy to see their once-scary-skinny daughter start eating like Elizabeth is eating currently but alarms are going off in my head like you wouldn't believe! I grew up a fat kid and I desperately don't want that for my kids, especially my daughters. This morning, she's had 2 cinnamon rolls but then I cut her off...she also has eaten 1 1/2 bananas and is asking for more. It's a rainy Sunday and all of us but Jonathan are home from church because of various reasons, mostly illness, so I know she's at least a little bored. I've tried to distract her from eating by giving her crayons and turning on a cartoon but that isn't working. And I'm really starting to pay attention to how I eat in front of her. It's not exactly fun or easy to tell your kids not to do something that you're doing. But this is weighing heavy on my heart. John definitely has seasonal allergies but, thankfully, not as bad as Caleb's. John's actually doing quite well! He's probably the one I'm least concerned about at this point but that really isn't saying much. Timothy is on allergy medicine and yesterday I thought for sure he had developed another sinus infection but I think the allergy medicine has finally won out as his runny nose seems to be better today. We still go to speech therapy every Tuesday we can make it. I know Timothy doesn't see it and I hope this doesn't sound completely superficial on my part ('cause it's not, I promise!) but it's really starting to get to me when I see how "different" he is. Don't get me wrong -- his speech has gone through several major "explosions" as of late and there are times, now, when other adults can understand what he's saying. I know we've come a long way but it's starting to be so evident that he's not like the other kids his age and that's breaking this mom's heart. And, although it's rare, he's gotten very upset a few times when he's wanted something and we haven't been able to understand him to give him what he wants. I just pray that his speech will keep moving at this rapid pace and that we can get him caught up before it starts to affect him. And then there's Lydia. She's such a sweetie and so cute! But as her surgery day draws closer, my nerves are getting shorter. I so desperately want tubes to "fix" whatever hearing problem she may have. I know it wouldn't be the end of the world if she had to have a hearing aid (or 2) like Timothy but can anyone blame me for not wanting her (and me) to go through what we're going through with Timothy???

We watched "The Time Traveler's Wife" last night and, sorry, but I wouldn't recommend it -- the language is bad and the story is very "heavy". But, would you want to see the future or visit the past, if you could? I definitely don't want to do either. And I'm becoming more and more thankful that God is sovereign. But, obviously, I still have a long way to go.

"Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble." ~Mt. 6:34

What we've been up to

2010-04-07T11:43:00.004-04:00

March was a busy month, especially towards the end. LOTS of sickness. Started out as a virus that caused first Timothy, then Caleb, Elizabeth, and John, to have a fever (but never over 101), stuffy nose, and coughs. Lydia also came down with the stuffy nose during this time but no fever or cough.... Timothy's eventually turned into a sinus infection. Thought on a Sunday that it was a sinus infection but didn't want to take him to see the dr since he was getting better. However, on that next day when John said his ears hurt, I decided since I was taking one child to the dr, I might as well take Timothy, too (you don't ignore it my kids saying their ears hurt -- they have HIGH pain thresholds and when their ears hurt, they REALLY hurt and are usually VERY infected by that point). Monday's total -- antibiotics for Timothy and John. Monday evening, Caleb starts saying his ears hurt. During the night, Elizabeth wakes up crying -- something she NEVER does, not even from nightmares -- saying her jaw hurt. Tuesday, back to the dr and 2 more antibiotics for Caleb and Elizabeth's infected ears. Nathan stayed home that day since he was starting in with the cough and we figured he was about to be sick like the others. But Wednesday he was fine, so I sent him to school. Thursday morning, though, I found him on the couch with a temp of 104! Figuring it was what everyone else had, although obviously worse, I let him be. Saturday, though, when he hadn't moved off the couch and hadn't eaten anything, I took him to our pediatrician where he was diagnosed with the flu. Later that day, we went to our church's Easter Egg Hunt while Nathan camped out on his granddad's couch.On to the next week.... Spring Break for the kiddos began with an ENT consult for Lydia last Monday the 29th. They're going to put tubes in her ears on May 13th. The bummer, though, was that her hearing tested poorly. Very bad, in fact. So now we're waiting until after her 5/13 surgery date for more hearing testing but it's looking likely that she's suffering from hearing loss, probably related to all her ear infections. That was my Monday morning.... Monday evening, Nathan seemed to be getting slightly worse as he was throwing up the only things he was putting down -- liquids (still hadn't eaten since the previous Wednesday night). Off to the ER we went where we found out that it wasn't the flu after all but PNEUMONIA and in BOTH lungs! Poor baby even had to have an IV for fluids. He's still finishing up antibiotics but is much better now. Thursday and Friday of spring break, we had promised the kids a little road trip. We took them to Cleveland (don't laugh) to see the Cleveland Zoo (270 pictures taken but most of them of the animals so I'll spare you!) and to the Great Lakes Science Center. Here's a picture of the Cleveland city skyline and the kiddos @ the Science Center. We had a great time!And that takes us up to now. Here's the kids from Easter Sunday where -- you'll never believe it! -- Lydia was sick! *pulling out my hair* I ended up taking her to the urgent care because her temperature wasn't responding to the ibuprofen. She has (another) ear infection....And that's what we've been up to! Hope your March was better than ours!

Special Day!!!

2010-03-02T09:30:00.006-05:00

Today's the day -- Sweet Little Miss Lydia turns ONE today! Crazy, right??? She's babbling, still army crawling, starting to eat big people food, and just yesterday finally got the hang of drinking from a cup. We're working this week to get rid of the bottles which should go a lot easier after yesterday's accomplishment, and also weaning the pacifier down to just sleeping times. There's research supporting a link between frequent or recurring ear infections and pacifier use. She goes to the ENT on the 29th for possible tube surgery for her ears. She goes to her pediatrician on Monday for her 1 year check-up so we'll have some stats to report then. We think she's around 18 and a half pounds and 26 inches, though. After bottles, pacifier, and ears -- it's on to working those tiny little legs! She shows ZERO interest in standing! *sigh*

Here she is today! She LOVES sticking that tongue out! (She had a toy dropped on her nose by one of her older siblings which no one has confessed to....)
Big girl in the tub!9 months old -- around Christmas5 months old3 months oldHer first EasterLess than 1 month oldHer first trip to the zoo -- 2 weeks old!Home!!Hospital
Happy Birthday, Lydia!
We Love You!

Lit'l bit of this, lit'l bit of that

2010-02-28T15:23:00.002-05:00

Oh how crazy this winter has been! We've broken the record for the snowiest February on record for Columbus -- over 29 inches! I am SO ready for spring, I can hardly stand it! There's been one or two days when I've walked outside, saw that we had gotten even MORE snow, and literally had to choke back the tears. Yesterday was one of those days....Anyway, we've had some ups and downs lately, nothing too exciting but for the sake of long-distance friends and family, here's some updates.

The kids finished the half-way mark of their school year. Nathan got in trouble at school for something he truly shouldn't have done. Unfortunately, although he meant no harm, he still ended up with 1 day of out-of-school suspension. :( With his mid-term test grades, he's moved up from group 2 to group 1 on his team of 5th graders. That's causing some heartache right now...some of his friends didn't move or else moved to a different team (as opposed to a different group where they would still have been with Nathan during different parts of the school day, now they're not together at all) and with the pressure of harder work, I've heard "Do I have to go to school?" more times than I care to count from him lately. His parent-teacher conference is this Tuesday night and we hope to get to the bottom of some things and see what we can do to help him. Speaking of parent-teacher conferences, we had ours for Caleb & Eilzabeth last week. Caleb is soaring on through and is on target for the big move to 1st grade! Elizabeth, not so much! While her teacher says that she's never retained a kindergartner before, Elizabeth isn't on target for where she should be and we've got a tough job ahead of us to get her ready to move on. A friend of ours has offered to help us with her on Saturdays for a little bit to give her some much-needed one-on-one time to see if that can help her catch up. Isn't it sad we live in a world where a KINDERGARTNER needs tutoring? Unfortunately, it's not just about learning your letters and shapes anymore. It's about counting to 100, writing all the numbers to 20, writing and naming all the letters and their letter sounds, and reading! Yes, they must be reading before they can be passed onto first grade! Wasn't first grade all about learning to read?!?! Okay, I'll get off that soap box and move on to something else but pray for Elizabeth as we dig our heels in!

After some concern at her 9 month check-up, we finally got Lydia into an eye doctor yesterday. The great news is that she was "diagnosed" with pseudostrabismus. The bottom line is there's absolutely NOTHING wrong with her eyes, praise the Lord! But because of the way her nasal bridge and her eyes are formed, her eyes do appear to drift from time to time. However, when they did at the doctors office yesterday, he could clearly show me that her pupils were still exactly the same and still had the reflection of his light in the exact same place which confirms for certain that her eyes are perfectly aligned. As she grows and her face changes, we'll stop thinking that her eyes are drifting but, if we ever reach a point where we think her eyes are really drifting, we'll be able to put ourselves at ease by catching the reflection of a small flashlight in her eyes. Try it sometime -- shine a small light towards someone's eyes. You should see a tiny reflection of that light in about the same place in each of their pupils no matter which way they look/move their eyes. It was neat to see but of course, we're relieved that her eyes are okay!

And last but not least, yesterday was a couples banquet at church for our Sunday School class. Talk about a sigh of relief! I was so worried that the other couples in our class wouldn't like the activities I had planned or that someone would be offended in some way (I tried to keep the questions clean and fair) and, much to my relief, everyone truly seemed to have a good time. Many, many, many thanks to Candace and her "team" (her mom, Paula, and her grandma, Sue) for the 24+ hours of cooking they did. We had beef stroganoff (sp?) and chicken parmesean, a ceasar salad, bread, and pan-fried broccoli for dinner and wonderful lemon tarts, cheesecake, and a carmel brownie for dessert! And even more thanks to the team of sitters who gave up their Saturday evening to watch the 15+ kids we had! We played a few games, laughed a lot, and took a walk down memory lane by looking at pictures of each of the couples throughout their years together. Fun!

We're making our way through cold & flu season fairly well this year and hope that you are, too! Come back Tuesday for a BIG post celebrating something exciting!

Burn, suspension, laceration, ear infection, & RSV

2010-02-16T18:16:00.002-05:00

What do all those have in common? They all have occurred to the Clan since last Sunday morning! It started the day of the family picture (see last post) with Timothy burning his hand on the iron. He's healing nicely.... Monday we get a call from Nathan's school because he was in trouble for "disruption of school" (he was goofing off, not meaning to be malicious, but ~~stupidly~~ poked a kid in the glasses with is pencils). Tuesday and Wednesday, while not knowing Nathan's "fate", other than he would face some sort of out-of-school suspension, we spent the days cooped in with snow days. Thursday, everyone went back to school and we went to Nathan's "suspension hearing" at 1:30. Thankfully, since Nathan isn't a "problem kid" and since he didn't mean to hurt that boy, they gave him just that one day. Friday he went back to school but while waiting to leave to go to Jonathan's parents for a visit on Friday evening, Timothy fell off the cedar chest and bit his tongue. He has about a 1/4" laceration across his tongue from his teeth. Talk about blood! It was nasty! That's healing nicely as well.... Saturday was just absolutely insane. Jonathan was out running errands Saturday morning, I went baby shopping and to a baby shower in the afternoon while Jonathan left the babies with his dad and took the oldest 4 snow sledding. Picked up the babies, ran more errands, and came home. Lydia went to bed normally but was up around 10:30 that night with a fever. Since we had children's church on Sunday, we decided to take her with us but while we were getting her ready on Sunday morning, we noticed that a lymph node in her neck was drastically swollen (looked like a quarter stuck under her skin). When that happened 2 weeks ago, it was because of an ear infection. So, Sunday afternoon, I took her to the urgent care. Sure enough, another ear infection. 4th one since December so now we're scheduled for a consultation with the ENT & she'll likely have tubes put in soon. That takes me to today -- we were snowed in again today but Lydia woke up with breathing problems. Turns out she has RSV on top of the ear infection and is now on breathing treatments and steroids. Crazy, right?

Upcoming things to note:

* February 27th, Lydia has a consultation with the eye doctor 'cause we're concerned she has a lazy and/or wandering eye.
* March 2nd, Lydia turns 1!!!
* March 8th, Lydia has her one-year check-up.
* March 29th is not only Lydia's ENT consultation but also the first day of spring break for the kiddos. We plan on taking the kids on a mini-vacation to Cleveland that Thursday and Friday to see this one science center (where we get in free with our COSI membership), take them to the Cleveland zoo (50% off with our Columbus zoo membership), and spend the night in a hotel with a pool (something these kids think is just the most fabulous thing!).

Ah, life in the Clan! But we're surviving! :)

Well, we tried....

2010-02-12T09:02:00.003-05:00

....to get a decent family picture for the church's directory. What can we say? Timothy was having a very bad day having burned his hand on the iron that morning. Caleb & John look about like this all the time so that's not too bad. Elizabeth's smiling which is great but I really wish I had pulled her bangs back (we're letting them grow but I like the her new hair length, don't you?). Nathan? I don't pretend to even THINK I know what he's thinking.... And Lydia, dear Lydia, is just too distracted with what's going on. Oh well! Better luck next year, right?

We brought Jesus home with us!

2010-01-11T10:39:00.003-05:00

(Please humor me and tell me this really IS as funny as I think it is!)

So Saturday we went down to Portsmouth (or Porch-moth, if you pronounce it the way most of the Stevens family does), about 2 hours away, to visit with Jonathan's extended family on his dad's side. We had a great time -- they're a hoot! Anyway, while we were there, any time I held Lydia near me on the table, she would shake her legs fiercely and it was obvious to everyone around that there was something on the shelves behind me that she was DYING to get to! So, Jonathan's aunt finally started pulling things off the shelf trying to figure out what it was Lydia wanted. She pulled down this one picture and Lydia looked right past the picture, back to the shelf. What was she staring at? This ceramic statue of Jesus! They got it down and let her play with it and then as we were on our way out, they gave this statue to us to take home for Lydia! It was so stinkin' hilarious! My mom asked if that was really what Lydia wanted and it had to have been 'cause as long as she was holding Jesus, she was calm. Not that she was really upset -- she was just bouncing up a storm to get to this statue! So, here you go -- we brought Jesus home with us and here's a picture to share! :) I'm still laughing....

Christmas pictures

2010-01-06T14:03:00.004-05:00

Some snapshots of our trip....

My hometown's famous signNathan starting off Christmas morning the right way,
reading to all of us from Luke chapter 2Elizabeth is so proud of this silly $1 headband
(isn't it always that way with kids?)Nathan's reaction to finding his ringing cell phone in his stockingChaos at my aunt's house --
this is the first time in a VERY long time that my family's little ones
have been together for ChristmasMy Daddy and LydiaMy niece, HannahMy niece, Madisyn
Some of Mamaw's 10 grandkids and 20 great-grandkids....standing in the back are brother and sister Andrew and Jordan (my 1st cousins) and Jordan is holding her daughter, Taylor; Next is me with Lydia, then my brother and his youngest, Hannah; last standing is my 1st cousin Charles; On the couch starting left is Caleb, Nathan, and Timothy; then my grandmother who's about to turn 92; and then is Charles' 2 kids Carson and Mary Beth; last on the couch is my brother's middle daughter, Olivia; on the floor on the left side is John (standing), my brother's oldest daughter, Madisyn, and Elizabeth. Whew! Could you imagine if we were all together?!?

2009 review: Nov/Dec

2010-01-01T08:57:00.003-05:00

Happy New Year!!!!

Welcome to our final installment of our 2009 review. I think it's obvious that November and December were all about the holidays (and that bad bought of strep throat), right?

Since we haven't blogged about our Christmas trip yet, I guess now is as good a time as any. We left on Wednesday morning, trying to leave by 9:30 but you know what they say about the best laid plans.... We left around 10 but only made it until about 12 and had to stop for Lydia so we stopped for lunch, too which equaled 1 hour. Only made it until about 5 and then stopped for a break. Took only $4 in to the truck stop for the kids to get a snack. Major drama which didn't involve my kids, just the idiotic cash register workers at the truck stop. FINALLY arrived at my aunt's house around 6. We were hoping to have arrived around 4 and gone to the house we were staying at to settle in for a while before going to my aunt's but oh well.... Around 8:30, we left my aunt's house after an AMAZING dinner (it always is with Nannie!) and took the kids to the Bristol Speedway for their light show. Thought we were going to run out of gas while driving back through the drag strip and the surrounding property -- and finally the race track itself -- and Timothy cried most the entire way. [Notes to self -- 1, do NOT plan on going to the speedway lights the same night you travel; the kids will be exhausted (and always check your gas gauge before you get there!!) 2, allow Jonathan to drive through the actual race track. You get freaked out when you feel like you're driving on your side and feel like the van is going to flip over at any moment.] We finally made it to where we were staying around 11. Christmas Eve, we went to the mall and were surprised to find Elizabeth & John wanted to see Santa. We don't do Santa in our house and have explained to our kids that he's just pretend so that's why we were surprised (and don't knock us for not doing Santa unless you plan on contributing to the extra set of gifts next year). Anyway, met up with my parents around 2 and headed to one of my favorite places to eat -- Taco Johns. YUMMY! Then we eventually got the kiddos to bed, wrapped the presents, and stuffed the stockings. Friday morning was lovely! We totally pulled one over on Nathan, getting him a cell phone he's been begging forever to have! We had told him he had to wait a year or two. So far, so good with that! Then my brother and his girls came and we had lunch. Then we went back to my aunt's house for more food and more gifts. Saturday we pulled out around 11. Around 1, somewhere on the highway in West Virginia, some of the stuff flew off our roof rack and scattered all around the interstate. Nearly everything was salvaged save a lego set and a sippy cup although some things did end up with tire tracks on them. That was not fun but we thank God for his protection not only for Jonathan as he dashed across the highway to recover our luggage but also for the other drivers around us.

Today, we're getting ready for breakfast and then taking the kids to see "Alvin and the Chipmunks". We pray a blessed New Year for you and yours!!

Important days in November:
*2 family birthdays on the 30th -- Jonathan's brother-in-law and sister-in-law

Important days in December:
*Caleb turned 7 on the 2nd
*Timothy turned 2 on the 6th

Picture to share from November -- me & Timothy on Thanksgiving DayPictures to share from December will have to wait for me to upload the trip pictures!

2009 review: Sep/Oct

2009-12-31T11:43:00.003-05:00

Welcome to day 5 of our 6 day review of 2009!

September was an interesting month although it turned out to be far quieter than we were expecting. Everyone adjusted to our new school schedule surprisingly well! Praise God for that! Really, there isn't much to say of September and October. Life was busy full of school stuff, homework in the evenings, and not much else. We did start a new tradition this year with taking the kids to Chuck E Cheese instead of trick-or-treating. We were also happy to have my Mom here for that. And the kids didn't seem to miss trick-or-treating. Besides, $50 spent on pizza, drinks, and tokens was a lot less than what we would have spent on just the costumes for the kids.

Important days in September:
*We said good-bye to church friends who moved to North Carolina on the 19th :(
*Yet another baby arrived at the church on the 26th!

Important days in October:
*And another church baby was born on the 27th! (Only one more church baby to go -- thus far! -- and it looks like she'll make her debut early in 2010)

Picture to share from September -- I love the expression on Caleb's face! This was taken on one of our zoo trips.
Picture to share from October -- everyone @ Chuck E Cheese

2009 review: July/Aug

2009-12-30T08:47:00.003-05:00

Okay, so it's really day 4 of our 2009 review....so consider today a buy-one-get-one-free day! :)

July....more birthdays! My niece's birthday and our "baby", Nathan, hit double digits this year! And speaking of birthdays, we really got rolling at church with the babies! One was actually born the last week in June (sorry I missed that one on the last post) but he was due in July so I tend to forget he's actually a June baby. July 4th was a good day -- my "BFF" (had to squeeze that in here somewhere) welcomed her 3rd child/1st daughter on Independence Day! I'm so glad they didn't decide to name her Firecracker or something bizarre like that. "Lily" suits her fine and, turns out, Lily is on the top 10 list of baby girl names for 2009! (I can sense Candace rolling her eyes now....) But we weren't done yet! Another church baby was born on Nathan's birthday, the 28th! And did I mention how odd it is that all of us at church had the opposite gender of what our last babies had been? There's one exception -- the other March baby was a first baby so he's obviously not an opposite. Weird, I know....

August -- even more birthdays! My father-in-law's and my nephew's! August was a difficult month for me/us as we decided we were going to try public school this year. Looking back now, half way through this school year, I can really see how that was the right decision for our family.

Important days in July:
*Niece Kaylie's birthday on the 13th; she turned 6
*Nathan's 10th birthday on the 28th

Important days in August:
*Father-in-law's birthday on the 4th; he turned 64
*Nephew Jeffery's birthday on the 20th; he turned 11 (Jeff and Kaylie are siblings)
*First day of school on the 25th

Picture to share from July -- I love this picture of Timothy taken at my niece's birthday party!
Picture to share from August -- new glasses just in time for school! Caleb has since gone through 3 pairs of glasses. Sheesh!

2009 review: May/June

2009-12-30T08:30:00.003-05:00

Oops! Missed yesterday....sorry! Tuesdays are always crazy with Timothy's speech therapy. As long as little Miss cooperates, I'll try to get 2 posts up today.

Welcome to day 3 of our review of life in the Stevens Clan during 2009! Today, we're up to May and June! Since John's birth in 2005, May is always a busy month for the Clan! John's birthday is the 5th and Elizabeth's is the 18th, not to mention my mother-in-law's is the 21st! And then throw in Mother's Day and -- voila! -- one very busy month! But I always like the fact that May means summer really is coming and the kids are getting outside more and more and more! I'm sure May will have new meaning in 2010 as we anticipate the end of our first year of public school. June is a good month, too, although not quite as busy. This year was particularly fun. My brother, our only June birthday, turned 30 this year and we were in Tennessee to celebrate with him. It was so much fun to be with family and friends and to be a part of his special day. And don't forget VBS! [Note to self: Don't go on vacation the weekend before VBS starts! It WILL wear you out!]

Important days in May:
*John turned 4 on the 5th
*Elizabeth turned 5 on the 18th

Important days in June:
*Brother Kevin turned 30 on the 13th
*Jonathan and I celebrated our 11th anniversary on the 20th

Picture to share from May -- birthday party cupcakes! (I have to share 2 pictures to show both sets of cupcakes)Picture to share from June -- our first family picture since Lydia's birth. These were taken as part of my WHOLE family getting together for pictures. We were all in green, my brother and his family were all in yellow, and my parents wore white. THAT was interesting, getting all 9 grandkids together for a picture, especially when the portratit studio was running late and we had a surprise birthday party to get to!

2009 review: Mar/Apr

2009-12-28T10:28:00.003-05:00

Welcome to day 2 of our 6 days reviewing what 2009 held for the Stevens Clan! Day 1 -- January and February -- went up last night. We hope you enjoy our walk through this past year as much as I am enjoying putting it together. It's winter break here so I'm home with all 6 kiddos so I can't guarantee that each day's post will be up this early. At the moment, Christmas toys are still new and some of them are still being rediscovered as more and more bags are unpacked and a certain little sweet girl is currently happy in her exersaucer so I have more than 30 seconds to focus on something. So here goes....

March was a great month for the Clan! We welcomed Miss Lydia on the 2nd. She was our biggest baby, weighing in at 8 pounds+. I found out the hard way just how bad those amniocentesis are but it was worth it to know that little miss was ready to be born! We were a little afraid when she failed her hearing test in her left ear and were bummed when we found out I was to be released but that she would have to stay because of jaundice. But, it was good for her to get the light therapy she needed and it gave them a chance to repeat her hearing test which she passed with flying colors the 2nd time around! She's definitely a hearing child -- I can really tell a difference between her and Timothy at this age. She's, of course, 9 months old now (will be 10 months old on Saturday) and just celebrated her first Christmas but that's for a different post!

April was rough. Adjusting to life with a(nother) newborn, trying to jump back into homeschooling (didn't happen), and having surgery made for an interesting month! [Note to self -- if you ever have to have surgery again, even if it is laproscopic, GET HELP AHEAD OF TIME! You're going to need it!] One highlight of April ~ finally getting a van big enough for our new family of 8!

Important days in March:
*Baby Lydia born on the 2nd
*Finding out that a great friend of mine was finally pregnant after 10 years of trying plus getting to take Lydia home on the 6th was a great day!
*Another church baby born on the 7th

Important days in April:
*EASTER! And our church's first Easter Egg Hunt which we're excited to do again this coming year!

Picture from March -- she's (still) so beautiful!!!
Picture from April -- trying to get 6 kids to sit still for a picture is like pulling teeth! Poor Lydia will have to try and forget that her head was cut off in her first Easter picture with her siblings! Oops!

2009 review: Jan/Feb

2009-12-27T21:40:00.004-05:00

Welcome to the 6 days of 2009 for the Stevens Clan. We hope you enjoy this walk through this past year as much as we know we will. Blessings to you in 2010!

January and February of '09 were interesting months as I was pregnant with Lydia and began struggling with preterm contractions early in the year. Thanks to "pregnancy fog", I can't remember much else and their aren't many pictures to show off!

Important days in January:
*The 16th marked the birth of what has been the year of babies for our church
*The 29th was Jonathan's 34th birthday

Important days in February:
*My mom turned 54 on the 16th
*Church baby #2 was born on the 17th as was my niece, Hannah
*I turned 32 on the 20th

Picture from January -- big snowfall!
Picture from February -- welcome baby Hannah! You should see her now! She's got the chubbiest cheeks and the most beautiful shade of red hair (my brother's 2nd red-headed baby which is interesting considering he's got brown hair and my sister-in-law is blonde! Me with the red hair has zero red-headed babies!)Coming tomorrow....March and April!

2 year and 9 month check-ups

2009-12-19T10:47:00.002-05:00

Timothy and Lydia had check-ups this morning. Here's a rundown:

T: Weighed in at 27 pounds, 34 1/2" inches tall. He's back to the 50th percentile for weight which is great! Our dr thinks his persistent runny nose is likely due to allergies so we're going to give some allergy medicine a week's trial to see what happens. No sign of sinus infection so the only other explanation would be that he's catching cold after cold after cold. He's met all his milestones except in speech which is to be expected. He rec'd his last vaccine (until he's 5, that is), his seasonal flu shot, and his first H1N1 flu "mist" which will have to be repeated in 1 month's time. Otherwise, he goes back in June.

L: Weighed in at 17 pounds, 7 ounces and 26 1/2" long. She's still holding in the 25th percentile for both but that means she's steadily growing which is, of course, good news. Again, likely that her persistent runny nose is a result of allergies because she, too, is clear of sinus infection so we're putting her on a 1-week trial of allergy meds. He was pleased with where she's coming in head and neck control so we're very thankful he doesn't think we need to see the neurosurgeon and/or physical therapists. However, it does appear that she's got some form of lazy eye or a wandering eye so off to Children's opthamology department we shall go! She rec'd her 2nd seasonal flu shot (always have to get 2 when you get it the first time) and her first H1N1 shot (can't get the mist until you're 2) which she'll have to have repeated in 1 month's time as well. Otherwise, she goes back in March for her big birthday check-up. (1 YEAR? GASP!)

Stay tuned! We got the kids all dressed up in their Christmas digs last night at my in-law's and tried to get a decent picture of all 6. We'll post the final result as well as some hilarious "out-takes" soon!

Two

2009-12-06T07:33:00.005-05:00

Happy 2nd Birthday, Timothy!!!

Timothy arrived exactly 1 calendar month (a little over 4 weeks) early. He was my only daytime baby! I woke up that morning in pain but didn't think I was in labor. I thought it was a UTI or kidney infection. Imagine a 5th time mother not knowing she was in labor! Pain was too intense to stay home so I called for a sitter for the kids (thanks, Kisha!) and Jonathan called in to work -- what would have been his FOURTH day on the new job! By the time the sitter got here and we got in the car, I realized what was going on. We arrived at the hospital around 7:30 and I was dialted to 7. Definitely baby day! They gave me a special epidural -- they basically gave me medicine in my spine before they placed the epidural catheter that gave more medicine. That was FABULOUS! We chilled until around 10:30, they broke my water, and Timothy was born. I remember being happy to have delivered before lunch -- I could eat! In fact, I got to eat twice. They brought me lunch while still in the delivery room and then I got lunch again after we were moved up to the recovery unit. Funny what we remember, huh? It was to be a tumultuous (sp?) December but we're not going to focus on that. Today we're celebrating 2 years with Timothy, in spite of what we've endured, and are thankful to the One who not only gave us Timothy but has also sustained him and us (as He always does)!

Days after birth6 months1 year18 months (don't you just LOVE that face?)October this year....I love this shot of him!

2009-12-04T14:15:00.001-05:00

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

2009-12-04T12:15:00.001-05:00

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

7 and 9

2009-12-02T06:13:00.002-05:00

7 years....

birth1 year3 years5 years
Earlier this year when he lost his first tooth

Caleb is doing great in kindergarten! He's starting to read very well and his writing is good. He's even attempting to sound out words when he writes.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CALEB!!

9 months....

Lydia is 9 months old today! Wow! She's showing signs of "army crawling" although she's certainly not doing it full time. She's rolling still but with a purpose now, to get to things she wants. And on Saturday, her first tooth popped through. And she's into clapping her hands!

birth

approx. 6 months
few weeks ago

Thanksgiving

2009-11-27T23:01:00.005-05:00

I keep seeing all these blog posts -- "This is how so-and-so looked last year at Thanksgiving and this is how he/she looks today". Thought I'd see if I could join in the act.... It is always fun, after all, to see just how much your kids have changed in a year's time.

Nathan, unfortunately, doesn't really have a now picture to post. He's not in front of the camera as much as he used to be. :( And Lydia, of course, wasn't here last Thanksgiving (in the technical sense). But, I'll add one of her just by herself because this is my post and I can do what I want....The 3 Musketeers then....Caleb now (with this thing he created)....Elizabeth now (I have NO idea what she's doing!)....John now....Timothy then....Timothy now....
Obviously, those weren't all taken at Thanksgiving but, hey, they're recent pictures (otherwise, what would be the point?)! Our Thanksgiving was good. Little movie drama....we try to take the kids to a movie on most major holidays and we wanted to go to Disney's "The Princess And The Frog" but it doesn't come out for a few more days. Then we though about "Planet 51" but it got a review we weren't happy with from Focus On The Family's website called "Plugged In" (GREAT resource for Christian families! Find it here). So we ended up seeing "Astro Boy" which was pretty good. Then we let the kids oggle from outside the new Lego store in town with a promise to take them back soon when they can actually get in. Next it was off to Jonathan's family's get-together. Traditional turkey affair and it was very good! Hung out there until after dark when I brought the youngest 5 home and Jonathan took Nathan and went with his Dad, brother-in-law, and nephew to go fishing -- in the dark, spitting rain/snow, 40-ish degrees outside, and blowing wind. That didn't last very long! After that, I was in bed by 9! YAY! Today, we've mostly just hung out around the house although I did go to Game Stop and pick up something for a little boy who'll be 7 on Wednesday and then we went back to Jonathan's parent's house for left-overs, leaving Nathan and Caleb behind for a grandson sleepover. John, sadly, didn't get to stay 'cause he peed in his pants today (will it EVER end?). Bathed John, Elizabeth, and Timothy, put Timothy to bed and then played a pseudo-game of Sorry with John and Elizabeth. Next time, we're only going to give them 2 pawns 'cause we lost them about half way through the game. They've been in bed since a little after 9 and Jonathan just finished watching the latest "Indiana Jones" flick. So now it's off to bed! Nothing exciting planned for our weekend but we will be getting a new washer and dryer next week which I am very excited about. Hope to get the tree up tomorrow and take Nathan to get new glasses (LONG story).
How about you? How was your holiday?

What do you do?

2009-11-13T10:25:00.000-05:00

What do you do when you wake up in a coughing frenzy (did I mentioned I caught the kids' crud?) only to realize it's 2 full hours until you can take more medicine? May I submit my list for your contemplation? GREAT! I was going to anyway....

1. Try to contain the coughing before you wake the dead.

2. Realize that severe coughing plus bladder muscles weakened by giving birth 6 times means you now have two problems (there, Candace -- how's THAT for TMI? hee hee!).

3. Change clothes.

4. Try a cough drop.

5. Try propping yourself up in bed 'cause you cough less when you're sitting upright as opposed to when you're lying down (why is that?).

6. Write this entire blog post in your head, intermingled with trying to will yourself back to sleep.

7. Pray for sleep.

8. Drift off but then wake up with another coughing fit, albeit a more minor one.

9. Get excited when you squint at the clock and think you see 2:48 which means you slept for 2 hours and can now take more medicine.

10. Put on your glasses to get up to go take more of said medicine only to realize with your glasses on that the clock really says 12:48 and you only drifted off for 20 minutes, not 2 hours.

11. Give up!

*sigh* At least Lydia slept through the night last night, as opposed to the night before when she was up between 11 and 2 screaming her head off. Once I struggled my way to 2:10, I figured "Close enough!" and took more medicine. Finally drifted off well around 4 and slept okay until 7:15. I think I pulled a muscle in my chest from so much coughing. Here's hoping for a better night!!

Answered prayers

2009-11-10T15:15:00.003-05:00

God's answers prayers -- in fact, I'd be willing to go as far as saying God still performs miracles, especially miracles that beat modern science. Want proof? I offer 2 stories from the past week. In this first story, while they're some of our closest friends, I don't have permission to use their names on the blog so I'm only using their initials....

M & K were married at almost exactly the same time Jonathan and I were married on June 20, 1998. In fact, if one of our groomsmen hadn't been attending our wedding in Tennessee, he would have undoubtedly been at M & K's wedding here in Ohio because he knew M from work. M & K dreamed of a large family -- larger than mine, even (which I did not dream of, per se)! They got pregnant very early but sadly suffered a miscarriage. They were pregnant again within a very short period of time and in early May 1999, they welcomed a beautiful baby girl, F (my Nathan was born in July of that year). I met K while at a Pampered Chef party when F & Nathan were about 18 months old and we've been great friends since! K baby sat my kids while I worked from September 2002 until June 2005 and she's had my kids during various maternity/pregnancy hiccups and even during a few of my kids' births. During all this time, their desires to have a large family seem squashed as they were never able to get pregnant on their own after F was born. It broke my heart to tell them I was pregnant FIVE TIMES when I knew they wanted more babies so badly! K was eventually diagnosed with PCOS (google that when you've got time). Even with meds, they were still unable to conceive and were just about to give up. That is, until March. Lydia was born on a Monday -- March 2nd. I was discharged on Wednesday the 4th but Lydia stayed because of her jaundice, remember? Anyway, while I was having a melt down on that Friday the 6th because I had planned to take Lydia home and the doctors had just told me I likely wouldn't take her home after all, I got a phone call from K asking me if I was sitting down. Immediately my heart started pounding hoping that she was going to tell me what I thought she was going to tell me, which she did! She was pregnant! Why am I telling this story now? Because M, K, and F welcomed baby boy J into their arms just a few days ago in the wee hours of the morning. And what an answer to prayer he is! I can't wait to meet him but haven't even bothered to call to go over because of all the sickness going on here at my house.

But, wait! There's more!

Second story -- if you're a blogger and follow other folks' blogs, you may have already heard of baby Stellan. Stellan's mom, affectionately known in the blogging world as MckMama, was told that her son likely would never be born alive, due to a dangerous heart condition where his heart goes into SVT which stands for words I can hardly pronounce, much less spell. It basically meant that, while in utero, little Stellan's heart was beating over 200 beats per minute. Miracle #1: he arrived -- healthy -- in October 2008! And for the first four months of his life, he seemed to be SVT-free. But, alas, the SVT reared it's ugly head again and since then, little Stellan's heart has had many episodes of SVT, many times ending up in the hospital clinging to life. They've had a terrible time getting the right meds for him and have often changed meds around. It's mind-boggling to read this little guys journey! And, just a few weeks ago, he ended up having a terrible SVT episode, one where he celebrated his first birthday in the intensive care unit. This past week, he flew to Boston to see his specialist where they planned to admit him on Sunday, wean him off his meds, and perform a surgery called an ablation this morning (another one for you to google!). Stellan had an ablation earlier this year but it was unsuccesful. They were not wanting to try another one until Stellan reached 40 pounds but with this last episode of SVT, they felt they were out of time. Sunday morning, while waiting to be admitted, his heart went into another stubborn episode of SVT. His mother literally watched his heart stop beating at one point and blogs that she "[thought] to myself, "Am I watching Stellan die?"" As a mother, I can't imagine! So, his ablation was moved up and was performed yesterday instead of today. They didn't really know what to expect but were hoping to "kill" the bad part of Stellan's heart. It was risky, at best. He could have ended up with a pacemaker or worse.... But, yesterday, God heard the many, many prayers of His people and Stellan's surgery ended up being what MckMama calls "A Home Run"! They hit a lot of bumps in the road but just moments ago, they were taking little Stellan off the vent that was helping him breath since his surgery and he has been SVT-free all night long, meaning they can be very optimistic he'll never have another SVT episode!

We have a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving. Sure, I don't know this MckMama or her family personally but I don't have to know her to celebrate along with her. Because, just like her, I'm a Christian, a wife, and a mother. I do know what it's like to watch your child lay in a hospital bed even though I don't know what it would feel like to wonder if they were dying. Timothy's never come close to that. But, I can be thankful right along with her and our good friends cuddling their new son -- thankful that GOD HAS HEARD and answered!

It's not croup

2009-11-08T08:22:00.003-05:00

So if you saw Candace's comment on my last post, then you know that it turns out Elizabeth and Timothy don't have croup after all. They have strep! I am totally blown away by this! The in-office test was negative. The only reason our pediatrician decided to do a strep test was because Elizabeth had a gigantic lymph node in her neck which is a sign of infection. But since the in-office one was negative, they sent us home with the diagnosis of croup. However, protocol says that they send off all tests that are negative to a lab to see if anything grows overnight. Sure enough, Elizabeth's test grew strep! He didn't test Timothy but since Timothy was having some breathing issues with whatever-it-is-he-has, he decided to put him on antibiotics with Elizabeth. This was the call yesterday morning around 9. I needed to go to the store to get their meds and a few groceries so I went to get dressed after calling the in-laws to tell them they had been exposed to strep (they had watched the kids for us on Thursday night). When I came out of my room, Jonathan meets me in the hall -- "Smell John's breath". I'm telling you, it made me want to hurl! He's had this one other time and it was a sinus infection so off to the dr I went with John! John does have a sinus infection and, even though he didn't do a strep test on John (he clearly needed antibiotics anyway), he said John had the gigantic lymph node, too, so we're assuming John has strep. That leaves Nathan and Caleb. Nathan has cold symptoms and appears to catch strep rather easily so I have a prescription laying in wait for him. Caleb is struggling with allergy stuff right now, at least that's what we're assuming. I'm carefully monitoring these 2 for any new symptoms or fever. But, for now, I'm off to church -- alone! :(

A day for the record books

2009-11-06T18:02:00.002-05:00

Today has been a day for the record books. What kind of record, you ask? How about the how-fast-can-children-drive-their-mother-to-want-to-commit-herself record.... Oh yeah. One. Of. Those. Days. Elizabeth, who's been sick since Monday, had been up several times in the night coughing but was seeming to at least feel better. However, with that cough, I wasn't going to chance sending her to school. Fight #1 -- she WANTED to go to school. Ugh. Almost gave in but I called Jonathan and he said that with her complaining yesterday of an ear ache and with our kids' high pain thresholds where ear infections are concerned, he wanted her taken to the doctor. After I got home from dropping off Nathan and Caleb and called for an appointment, I realized Caleb had left his homework folder at home. Loaded the 4 back into the car and all the way there, I was contemplating -- "You know, the handbook says that we have to take stuff to the office if the school day has already started but with Caleb's classroom having a door that is right by the parking lot, should I park and drag everybody into the office or just park in front of their door and leave everyone in the van to run it in?". I opted for the follow-the-rules option and was in the process of dragging everyone out of the van. Carrying Lydia is the problem -- carry her in her carrier and my hips hurt, carry her in my arms and my hips hurt, not to mention I'm usually trying to hold Timothy's hand nor how difficult it is to get the stroller out. I knew I'd only be out of the van 5 minutes at most so I could tough it out, right? So, here I am, nearly halfway to the office when Caleb's teacher yells at me from their door telling me I should have just ran it up. AGH! I was okay with that.... Shouldn't be complainy, right? Back home we go. Things were relatively uneventful until after I picked up Caleb. Got some lunch which was kinda gross (Burger King had way overcooked nearly everything). Then, just moments before I was going to put Timothy down for his nap, I smelled it. Someone was in the hand sanitizer. Didn't really bolt out of my seat. After all, it couldn't possibly be Timothy. I had cleaned off the edge of the kitchen island last week after I realized he could reach the edge. But, oh no -- somehow, someone left the hand sanitizer somewhere within Timothy's reach. He's sitting on the floor, a few drops of sanitzer already on the floor, his hands obviously coated in it. When I call his name, in the middle of my firm "That's a NO NO", he wipes his sanitizer-coated-hand right across his lips. He ingested hand sanitizer. Back of the bottle states it clearly -- "If ingested, call poison control or seek medical treatment immediately". Called the dr...."Call poison control", they said. Poison control says to watch him for signs of drunkeness. Google that sometime -- "toddler ate hand sanitizer". Turns out, hand sanitizer, when ingested by children, can cause alcohol poisoning and it only takes about 3 squirts to kill a toddler. Fantastic! Fast forward to 3:15 when I'm trying to get everyone in the van for Elizabeth (and Timothy's) doctors appointments. I wasn't thrilled about having to take all six of them to begin with so my mood probably wasn't the best. But then comes Caleb -- holding a hand full of pills that I've never seen before.
"Caleb, where did you get those pills?"
"They were on John's bed," he says.
March (stomp?) out to the van -- "John, were you playing with these pills?"
"Yep."
"Where did you get them?"
"I got them from Crapaw's house last night."
Seriously, when he says "Grandpa", it sounds more like "crap-paw" -- funny!. Called father-in-law -- "Missing any blue and yellow pills?" Sure enough. They were Trilipix -- a high cholesterol drug of my mother-in-law. You've GOT to be kidding me?!?! First the hand sanitizer and now high cholesterol pills!....The doctor's office visit was pure torture -- in this tiny little room that had to have been 110 degrees, with 6 kids, 2 of whom were trying to make and fly paper airplanes. And, then surprise -- our pediatrician had a resident shadowing him and he was going to exam them both first. Resident didn't fully understand Timothy's history (I didn't have him there for the sanitizer -- I had him there because of his stridor/cough) so it was forever explaining things to him. He leaves, 30 hours later our doctor finally comes in but I can barely hear him over the now crying Lydia and the 2 boys still trying to fly paper airplanes. He looks at Elizabeth and thinks that, despite the resident's opinion, she might have strep. So then we had to wait for a strep test. I'm pretty sure my skin was crawling at that point. No strep for Elizabeth -- looks like she and Timothy both have a case of croup. Since Elizabeth is starting to feel better, she should be all better by the time the weekend's over. We're watching Timothy more closely both because of his health history and the fact that he hasn't been sick that long so he might actually get sicker before he gets better. Had some dinner and I'm headed to the grocery store soon. And I'm leaving the fighting, crying, coughing, whining, extremely LOUD children behind me with my husband. Someone say a prayer for him.
And that, my dear friends, if you've hung on long enough to read it all, is today's dose of what-it's-like-to-raise-6-kids! Not for the faint at heart, huh?

Kindergarten pictures are in!

2009-11-04T11:41:00.003-05:00

ElizabethCalebDon't you think he looks just like this kid from the movie Jerry Maguire? Hee Hee!Their class picture....loved this picture 'cause it's got everyone's names printed on the bottom. I remember having to try and tell my Mom who was who in all my school pictures as a kid.

Pictures to share

2009-10-30T13:39:00.003-04:00

We decided to take the kids to Chuck E Cheese this year in lieu of trick or treating. My Mom's visit just so happened to coordinate with trick or treat night....Here's the gang!Caleb's still scared of Chuck E....Today was the halloween party for Caleb & Elizabeth's class. John got to go with me. Here's the 3 of them talking to each other....My MIL bought Elizabeth some lip balm from Avon not realizing it was tinted. I think Elizabeth was going for the Ronald McDonald look....And I just love this picture of Timothy that Jonathan took. I have no idea what he's doing but I find it hilarious!

Catching up

2009-10-21T19:09:00.005-04:00

Lots of drama in the Stevens household lately.... Between Nathan, Caleb, and Elizabeth, I've been to our optometrist as well as the vision center at Wal-Mart a total of about 10 times to either get glasses bent back into shape (Elizabeth's), get nose pieces adjusted (Caleb's...several times), get screws tightened and other various adjustments (Nathan's and Caleb's), and to eventually order 2 new pairs, 1 for Nathan, 1 for Caleb, because theirs REALLY broke. Nathan had his pair from last year as well as the year before which turned out to be a good thing. He's wearing last year's pair while waiting on his new ones to come in but on Monday, he lost that pair which not only made him late for school but left him wearing the pair from 2 years ago which left him with a headache. (Did you follow all that?) 2 hours of cleaning out from underneath the bunk beds in their room and we finally found them.... Caleb was given a back-up pair while waiting on his new ones to come in. Today, they were broken. *rolls eyes* So, back to the optometrist we go! And then there's the mysterious appearing crack right down the middle of the van's windshield and Jonathan's driver-side backseat window "falling" and having to be duct taped up....Really? Must it be SO interesting around here?

The kids all have had at least 1 illness this fall. A few weeks ago, John and Caleb ended up with wheezing/breathing trouble. Steroids for a few days an antibiotics for Caleb (ear infection), and things cleared up nicely. John went down with something yesterday but at the doctor's office today, there was no wheezing or any signs of infection or flu. Doctor said maybe croup, probably just a virus, and that he'll either get sicker (start of an ear/sinus infection or strep) or he'll start to turn around by Friday. He was being so loving to Lydia today, talking and cooing at her. I turned around just in time to see him caressing her little bitty face with his germ infested hands.... I think we all know where this is headed! Ugh!

Everyone is still doing beautifully in school! We've got parent-teacher conferences coming up in 2 weeks! Stay tuned!

Timothy's speech therapy is going wonderfully well....when we're there. (Hee hee!) Missed his 3rd week because he was sick and missed last week because his hearing aid went missing. REALLY missing. Thankfully, insurance covers ONE AND ONLY ONE replacement aid which saved us $1500. On Tuesday, they gave him a loaner hearing aid while his is on order. Before we got home, it went missing in the van! 10 minutes of panic but it was eventually found and I called immediately and ordered a new critter clip which came today. Critter clips work for hearing aids the way pacifier clips work for pacifiers, in case you didn't know....

We recently took a trip to COSI on a day off from school. Jonathan took a vacation day and went with us and we were joined by Candace and her kids. Our Lydia and Candace's Lily are 4 months apart. While we had them laying on their blankets on the floor, at one point, Candace walked away to handle something. I had THREE people stop to say something about my twins.... WHAT?!?! (See pictures below.)

Other than that, we're hip deep in preparations for the arrival of my parents on Monday. Dad will only be staying for a day but Mom will be staying for a little more than a week. We're taking the kids to Chuck E Cheese this year instead of trick-or-treating with them ($50 at CEC is a lot cheaper than $20 EACH for a costume, don't you think?). I'm looking forward to a Halloween party with Caleb and Elizabeth on Friday the 30th at their school. I miss parts of homeschooling but I like being a school-room mom! Got to help dish out ice cream last night at their school's open house. That was fun except right when my shift was about to end. I was dishing up some ice cream and was feeling VERY warm and started coughing. I'm not sick (but I'd swear, except I don't, that I have allergies) but sometimes, when I get warm, I go into coughing fits that are hard to get out of. Thankfully my replacement was right behind me but she had to interpret my body movements 'cause I couldn't talk. It was embarassing to walk away while hacking away. Yes, I did "cover my cough" but still....

Finally, some pictures for you....

The exersaucer has come out of the attic for the last time....
It's been so sad to pack away baby things!Caleb created this....I personally like his CrAzY eyes!Timothy on our recent trip to COSI
(caught him illuminated!)The boys doing their traditional hide-in-the-lockers thing at COSILydia and Lily -- look like twins to you?Caleb sitting in his seat in his classroom at schoolElizabeth in hersThem with their teacher

Guessing game!

2009-10-09T15:09:00.003-04:00

Don't know why but I'm in the mood for a guessing game!
This is Lydia at 7 months old:
Now....for the other five kids at 7 months.
Can you tell who's who AND who do you think Lydia looks the most alike???

Number 1
Number 2

Number 3
Number 4
Number 5

Pumpkin farm

2009-10-07T09:45:00.003-04:00

Some pics of Nathan from last Saturday's trip to the pumpkin farm. It was for all the kids in 1st through 6th grades at the church and Jonathan went with him. He "only" took 299 pictures! But it was hard to find actual pictures of Nathan -- he took lots and LOTS of pictures of sunflowers, the sky, and various bugs, not to mention the pictures of kids who aren't mine! Oh well! :)

7 months

2009-10-02T21:16:00.003-04:00

(best picture I could find that is recent enough....)

HAPPY 7 MONTHS, LITTLE MISS!

Can't think of a clever title

2009-09-18T11:50:00.004-04:00

....and we don't have anything to really "report". But, I figured the blog needed a little update and maybe a few new pictures. (Try to contain your excitement!)

One thing we do have to report on -- we're very pleased to announce that Timothy has qualified for speech therapy! We've been really encouraged at how his language is developing on his own but we realize (and I'm sure you do, too) that he's terribly behind others his age. Anyway, we go once a week, every Tuesday at 9:15 in the morning. Eventually, we'll work up to 1 hour sessions. We didn't really get to have therapy this week because of the missing hearing aid (long story there!) but we were given our first week of "homework". We're working on his listening skills first -- in order to speak clearly, you need to hear clearly. We've picked 2 phrases and 2 songs to sing and we're trying to get Timothy to imitate us which would indicate that he understands us/hears us. Our phrases for this week are "give me a kiss" and I'm sure it's obvious what we want him to do. The second phrase is "time to eat" and we're working on getting him to go to his high chair when we say that. He's doing very well with those. He's not trying to imitate us with our songs yet. Oh, I guess I should point out that we're not trying to get Timothy to sing, we're trying to get him to imitate our actions so we're using an action song ("If You're Happy And You Know It") and one other song where we've added our own motion ("Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star"). He thinks we're hilarious when we sing them to him!

Okay, on to some pictures....from our bonfire we had on Saturday the 12th. Nothing fancy -- just us for some hot dogs and some friends for some smore's. It was tons of fun but had to call it an early night because of church the next day.Elizabeth picked her "seat"!

I think they enjoyed their smore's, don't you?Timothy hung out quite nicely in the play pen!

And some misc. pictures....Elizabeth, our daredevil

Dad manages all 4 on the swings!We rarely get good pictures of Nathan (he's often behind the camera!)

And a shot of the creek near the park. Some kids there thought I was from the newspaper when I took this picture and were kinda irate about it! Took me a few minutes to convince them I was just taking a picture!

First week of school

2009-08-28T16:23:00.003-04:00

Can't believe it's behind us already! But we're praising God for a WONDERFUL week! Things really are going quite well. Nathan LOVES school! Well, really, they all do but Nathan especially does. He found out today that he got 91/100 vocabulary words right on a quiz! Yay, Nathan! He also said that moves him up a level although I can't quite figure out what that means. We go to meet his teachers on Tuesday night. He has 4 teachers -- Mrs. Lomonico is his homeroom teacher and teaches language arts and social studies; Mr. Wallick also teaches language arts and social studies. Ms. Macedonia teaches math and Mrs. Thomas teaches science. From what he says, it sounds like they're really looking out for him. He says he has an "Inexperienced Student" card that he can raise if he has problems with his work. Today was the first day he tried to eat in the cafeteria and they're supposed to punch in this 6 digit code, like a student ID number. It didn't work no matter what he tried but he said they did allow him extra time to eat his lunch afterwards. Some of his first assignments were to be about him and what he likes. For his favorite book, he took in his Bible (yay!). Another assignment was to fill a bag of 5 things -- he chose his DS, a computer (taking a picture of one), a picture of one of his good friends from church, Jonah, a stick to represent playing outside, and a sketch that he drew. The downside is that he's already had to change binders, his first one not big enough, and he left his paper that went along with his bag in the old binder and so he got an incomplete on that one. :( Hopefully things like that won't become habit! I'm thinking it's all part of the adjustment and we're just going to keep moving forward.

Don't really have much to say about Caleb and Elizabeth. They have a friend in their class that we used to go to church with, Isabella. I've heard them sing a song about weather and have seen lots of coloring pictures come home. They've also made a puppet. There nightly homework folder says homework will start next week and that they'll have one piece of homework every night, Monday through Thursday. That should be interesting but at least with them having the same teacher now, they'll have the same homework. That should help a little. They'll also start a color system for next week. Every night, their homework folder will either be marked green (good day), yellow (not-so-great day), or red (very bad day). Since I can't say much for them, how about a picture? This is them in their new glasses. Caleb's glasses really does fit better than they look in the picture -- he was goofing off while I was trying to take the picture.As for everyone else, Timothy's the only one showing real signs of struggling to adjust. He's become quite the screamer and throwing tons of fits. He has been on ear drops since Monday for an ear infection.... Lydia's doing quite well, although she was up at 2 this morning which is something she's not done for a while. And I'm enjoying myself. There's a part of me that really likes being the school mom. Wasn't too much fun today getting drenched while loading the van in a downpour but we knew it'd happen one day sooner or later. I'm sure the cold weather will bring out a different story -- none of us are real fans of the cold. In fact, the kids have already wanted to wear coats to school! But, for now, we're looking forward to week 2....

First day of school!

2009-08-25T16:23:00.003-04:00

We've all happily survived! Tomorrow will be another big challenge for several reasons. First of all, Jonathan was home today to "celebrate" with the kids so I had a 2nd set of hands with me while getting everyone ready and out the door (BTW -- if you don't follow me on Twitter or Facebook, I'll let you know that, thankfully, Caleb & Elizabeth got moved to the morning kindergarten class; they are together, now). And, with him here, I didn't have to worry about the fact that Lydia & Timothy both were still asleep when I needed to leave to go get Nathan. Secondly, no one really "had" school today, meaning no one really was taught much of anything. You know how first day of school usually goes, right? Everyone woke up really excited and everyone came home really excited. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that things aren't always going to be this way. Getting up will get harder, especially on Mondays and Thursdays after church the night before and in the winter when it will be so stinkin' cold...school work will get harder, especially for Nathan...and I'm sure a million other things will suck the excitement out of my eager beavers and, if not them, I'm sure John will protest! But, I AM thankful no one came home today scared out of their wits about going back tomorrow.

*Any readers out there not currently doing so who are willing to do so, we are now actively clipping Box Tops for the kids' schools. If you wouldn't mind collecting for us or want to know what in the world I'm talking about, let me know by mouth or email (sing2praisehim@hotmail.com). Thanks!

*Anyone interested in placing MarketDay orders? If you do or want to know what in the world I'm talking about, let me know. Kinda short notice this month but orders are due on Friday.

I think that's it! Here's some pictures....

Our schedule (although I took this picture when I put up the
schedules when I thought Caleb & Elizabeth were still in afternoon kindergarten)!

New school do's!

2009-08-23T16:36:00.001-04:00

And just 'cause she was SO stinkin' cute this morning, here's Lydia!

You can do it, Caleb!

2009-08-15T18:56:00.002-04:00

Come on, Caleb!
You can do it!
Almost there....
Just one more....
You did it, Caleb!

He's just so stinkin' cute!

2009-08-15T18:53:00.002-04:00

At COSI recently. He had, at one point, about a dozen balls or so and was trying to hold onto them all at once!

I love this shot!

Catching up

2009-08-15T18:45:00.004-04:00

Not much to blog about lately....been kinda busy getting the kids ready to go to school. I (Karen) did a friend's baby shower today. Here's a picture of the diaper cake I made.
Last night, the oldest 3 boys spent the night with their grandparents. Elizabeth went with me to the grocery store and picked out a "girly" movie to watch so everyone was up really late last night. Guess it wore them out! (Daddy covered Elizabeth's immodesty with the towel.)
Only other news is that Elizabeth's lost her first tooth!

10

2009-07-28T09:48:00.003-04:00

Happy 10th Birthday to my ~~baby boy~~ double-digit, best big brother, all-around great guy!

8 years old, August 2007

6 years old, July, 2005

4 years old, September 2003

2 years old, June 2001Wasn't he cute???

Tired, frustrated, confused, not knowing which way to turn....

2009-07-22T15:48:00.002-04:00

....yep, that about says it all. Tired not so much physically as mentally but you get the picture. What's causing this dreary set of emotions? Other than trying to live with 6 kids day in and day out? Ha! Seriously, my kids are great, they really are, but there's so many of them and so little space in this house! Rainy days like today really magnify that! There's so much NOISE in this house, too, so that isn't helping. Baby crying, toddler wailing or babbling, big kids singing or fighting (of which they do more of the latter -- and John can REALLY wail -- unless you're talking about Elizabeth who does more of the former), and electronic devices running....it really gets to a person after a while (or at least it gets to me after a while). Throw in a phone call and doctor's appointment every now and then and occasionally the running of the washing machine and/or dryer which set in our kitchen so therefore cannot be ignored, and I feel like I live in the zoo! This, in and of itself, while an accurate description of my day, is not necessarily what has me confused and not knowing which way to turn. You see, there's this monkey on my back that I'd really like to get rid of but he's a stubborn little buggar! Amidst all this chaos, I'm supposed to be teaching my kids at home, remember? Sure, we didn't have a stellar year but I'm over that now. No one is pregnant around this house and Lydia is on a pretty predictable schedule except when she's not breathing correctly. So, I thought, after my Mom left, we'd "test drive" what life would be like with 6 of them here & trying to homeschool at the same time. Didn't have any lofty goals other than getting Caleb reading on a first grade level. Just wanted to get up in the morning and spend an hour MAX on school work (it's summer after all). Wanted to see us get into a routine with waking up, getting dressed, eating breakfast, and doing school. Wanted to prove to myself (and those around me who seem to be waiting for me to fail) that I COULD do it, that I could take care of 6 kids (after all, it's not like they're NOT mine!) and homeschool them, too. Many, many, MANY other large families homeschool succesfully so why can't I? Can't really answer that question but our 2 week experiment certainly seems to be failing. Haven't gotten a lick of stuff done with anyone other than Nathan and it's not like my house is spectacularly cleaned, either. In fact, it's quite the contrary....So, here I am again, beating this dead horse. Except now I really don't think I can do it anymore. With quite the lump in my throat, I'm afraid it might be time to admit that I can't give my kids a decent education, operate a household with 8 people in it, and live to tell the tale. But what's the alternative? They have to go to school, right? That brings in a whole bunch of other questions.... Nathan's already mentioned being afraid of going to school -- afraid of bullies (his words, not mine), afraid of being made fun of, afraid of being overwhelmed with middle school. And then there's Caleb -- is he ready for first grade? I'm not exactly thrilled with putting him in kindergarten but I'm just not sure he's ready for first grade on the reading level and the maturity level. His feelings are very easy to break.... Surprisingly enough (or perhaps not), I'm not worried about Elizabeth who would be going into kindergarten. Little worried about John feeling left out, though. But what about the homework, getting everyone out the door on time, putting Nathan on a bus, etc, etc, etc. And would putting the older 3 in school really solve the my-house-is-falling-apart problem? After all, kindergarten is only half day so it'd mean a lot of running around still........

Surely it's clear to you now why I'm tired, frustrated, confused, and not knowing which way to turn, yes?

Four and Nineteen

2009-07-21T14:55:00.003-04:00

Months that is....So sad to say I don't really have new pictures, though. :(

Little Miss Lydia turned 4 months old on July 2nd! Crazy, huh? She's doing great, for the most part. She's recently learned to roll over, right on cue for her age, and a big feat, if you ask me, since she doesn't sleep on her back (she's still sleeping in the bouncy or swing). We hit a rough patch recently with her breathing. She came down with a pretty bad cold while we were in Tennessee in June and has just hung on to her cough. While my Mom was here the first week of July, we could tell she was getting just a bit worse. Trip to the doctor on a Saturday revealed nothing....but by the following Wednesday (last week), it was obvious something was worse as I could hear her audibly wheezing. Still no sign of any kind of infection so the doctor put her on an inhaler. She was okay for a few days but then last Saturday, she was really bad and I ended up taking her to the doctor early that morning. They decided that she definitely responds better to the nebulizer treatments (a mask that vaporizes the medicine and is breathed in over the course of about 10 minutes as opposed to the inhaler which just sends 1 or 2 puffs of the medicine in through the mouth) so we gave those over the weekend every 4 (waking) hours. Yesterday was her 4 month check-up and the pediatrician said since she was not longer wheezing, we could stop the treatments every 4 hours and just give them when needed. Unfortunately she had to have one this morning 'cause she was stuck breathing too fast again which is why I had to take her in last Saturday. She was also congested in her nose today, too, so I'm hoping we're not about to take on another cold which will probably make things worse. We're in a watch-and-wait period to see if this is like the other kids who experience wheezing every now and then or if this could possibly be "real" asthma. Obviously, we're hoping for the latter.... She weighed 13 pounds, 2 ounces but I can't remember how long she was. Unless she continues to have breathing trouble or were to get sick in any way, she doesn't go back until September.

Timothy was officially 19 months old on the 6th and has changed a lot lately! Not necessarily physically but he's finally learned to walk! Thankfully, after his check-up yesterday, we've laid the talk of physical therapy to rest permanently! :) We're still working on getting speech therapy, though, although he did the cutest thing yesterday. While changing him, he pointed to his shoes, wrinkled his little nose, and said "oos". Funny that his first understandable word is shoes but hey, I'll take what I can get! He weighed 23 pounds which was the same thing he weighed last time, but he'd gained 1 1/2 inches, up to 32 1/2" now. He goes back in September for a weight check and for another well-check in December.

Big news!!!

2009-07-17T16:19:00.003-04:00

Look at this beautiful baby!!!!

"Oh, almost, baby girl! Keep trying!!"

"There! You got it!!"

Doctors, doctors everywhere!

2009-07-15T22:06:00.002-04:00

For the past 3 nights, we've been at doctor's offices but mostly for check-ups, not sickness, thank goodness! And actually the first 2 nights weren't doctor-doctor's at all but dentists. Nathan & Caleb were up first for their cleanings.... Mostly good reports of no cavities but they both definitely need a little work in brushing and flossing. Nathan still has 11 more baby teeth to loose and when most, if not all, of those are gone, we can talk about what we want to do -- if anything -- for the crookedness and gaps. Caleb has officially lost his 2nd baby tooth and other than needing more thorough brushing and flossing, is in good shape. Elizabeth and John were up on Tuesday night (FYI -- our dental clinic will only allow 3 at a time from the same family -- weird, I know -- so I chose to do 2 and 2 until we can do 3 and 3 but you have to be 3 years old to go to the regular clinic that has evening hours). Elizabeth, we found out, has loose teeth and the potential for 1 cavity but they think with more care while brushing and flossing, we might be able to fix that. John got the worst report of all....he has a pretty bad underbite. He's still quite young so they just said we'd watch it. I wonder what treatment for that involves?!?! And then there was this afternoon. It was only supposed to be Caleb's 5 and 6 year check-up (I was a little busy birthing Timothy when Caleb turned 5 and it just kept getting put off with all his health problems...then there came Lydia...). However, this morning when we got up, I noticed Lydia was wheezing so I called and added her to the mix. The on-call doctor on Saturday had said she thought Lydia just had a virus and while our actual pediatrician agreed, she was definitely wheezing. However, it was worse on the right side than the left so that seems to indicate that she's got a clump of mucous somewhere on that right side and when her air flows over that build-up, we hear the wheezing (gross!). The good news is that her cough is very "wet" meaning the junk is still moving while her lungs are not meaning no bronchitis or start of pneumonia. Her ears were also clear so we're stuck with "it's just a virus" again but we are giving her albuterol to help the wheezing. Caleb's check-up went very well! Caleb, Elizabeth, & John are all within 5 inches and 5 pounds of each other, LOL! Caleb's completely average while Elizabeth and John are above average for their ages, making them all basically the same size. Caleb did VERY well getting his (overdue) shots!!! Very proud of him!

Now, a kinda funny story if you know Caleb and his attitude well.... Since Caleb missed his 5 year check-up which would have done his vision screening, they did it today. I could hear them in the next room and I heard Caleb calling out letters...then I heard the nurse tell him to uncover that eye and cover the other one. Caleb said he didn't want to. The nurse encouraged him but then he said he didn't want to 'cause he couldn't see out of that other eye. The nurse was like "No, remember you just read these letters? Let's read them again with your other eye," to which Caleb responded "I TOLD YOU I CAN'T SEE OUT OF THAT EYE!". The nurse then gave up. Later when we were in the room alone, I asked Caleb if he had trouble with one of his eyes. He said yes, that he couldn't see out of one eye. I asked him how long that had been going on and he said "Oh, forever". (Insert giggle here) Then I asked him why he hadn't told me and his reply was "I just didn't want you to know"! (Yep, another giggle here) Caleb can really come up with some doozies sometimes! [And yes, we're getting that checked out....both he & Elizabeth have eye dr appts on 8/21.]

Quiet Thursday other than ~~hounding people~~ calling people to see if they're coming to a church function, Friday will be grocery day, and then a cHaOtIc weekend! Saturday, I have errands to run getting ready for a baby shower, then we have TWO birthday parties which means we'll miss potluck at church with our potential-new-associate pastor and his family. Then Sunday we have lunch after church for the 2nd week in a row so I'll have to make 2 pounds of pasta salad sometime on Saturday. ~~Good thing I'm a SuperMom.~~ I don't know how it'll all get done....

Surgery Day

2009-07-07T09:38:00.004-04:00

Yesterday was Timothy's surgery day. The plan was to do a CT scan of his ears & his chest, then move him to the OR to remove his adenoid (yes, there's only 1 -- did you know that?) and do the bronchoscopy. Things went mostly according to plan.... Timothy did WONDERFULLY between 6 a.m. when we got there and 8, when we took him down to CT. Happy as a lark! The CT scan was something completely new to us and it was something I hope to never experience again. In the past, we've always handed an awake, mostly happy Timothy off to an OR nurse. With the CT yesterday, we walked him all the way down to CT and were "allowed" to stay while he was being put to sleep. That was something I never want to see again. Timothy's heart started racing, I could hear him crying even though they had the mask on his face, and once he fell asleep, you could see him almost gasping for breath. Scary stuff, I tell you! That was right at 8 so Jonathan and I went and had breakfast together and then parted ways. Jonathan headed off to work and I headed off to the surgery waiting room. I wasn't there long before a doctor from radiology stopped by to tell me that there was some mis-communication...something about you can't do a chest CT with him intubated but you couldn't do the ear CT without him being intubated. I don't think I quite understood it all but it basically boils down to the fact that they got a decent ear CT but not a decent chest CT. Haven't heard any results from the ear CT. That doctor told me I'd have to return for a new chest CT later on. Then, just minutes after 9, Timothy's ENT came in to tell me his part was all done! He said that Timothy's adenoid was huge, that we had definitely done the right thing removing it. Then he said that Timothy airway looked wonderful!! Still a small airway but growing in proportion to his body size. The good news just kept coming -- he told me that he wants to see Timothy in 6 months but that if he's still growing well, eating well, then we can just keep putting another bronchoscopy off into the future until we need to do it but that there's a good possibility he'll never have to have another one! And, as if that wasn't good enough, he said that since Timothy's bronchoscopy went so well, he doesn't see a need to repeat that chest CT after all! If, however, we were to need to do a bronchoscopy in the future, then we'll repeat that CT. He said that he thinks Timothy will eventually outgrow the noisy breathing he has when he's sick. Maybe around age 4 or 5, he said. They called me back to recovery to sit with Timothy (something else I had never done before) and that was nerve racking for a while. He was clearly uncomfortable and he kept trying to get in positions in my arms that I couldn't hold him in. After several minutes, they just decided to go ahead and give him some morphine but by the time they got back with that, he settled down so we didn't give it to him and we really didn't have any problems after that. They went ahead and moved him to a room and told me I could try to give him juice around 11:30 but only a little at a time. Yeah, right! Timothy was STARVED! He drank 8 ounces of juice very quickly so I ordered him some mashed potatoes and green beans for lunch (his fav foods). He didn't eat very much but he did eat and didn't seem to have any trouble. He took another 4 ounces of juice and then slept off and on between 12 and 3:30. He was very aggravated with the IV tubing and the Pulse Ox monitor tubing that kept getting entangled. But his breathing was perfect and he didn't even have any real "side effects" that we were told to expect like a snoring sound or nausea/vomitting. I tried to take him to the playroom at 4 but he was sooooo mad because he couldn't pick up any toys with that IV still in his hand. So we were there less than 10 minutes. Good thing, though, as we hadn't been back to the room but about 10 minutes when his doctor stopped by (we had been told to expect him between 5 and 6 and this was barely 4:30!). Then the best part, the dr cleared us to go HOME! After they got those 2 tubes off of him, he was his happy little self. Ate part of a rice crispy treat, drank some more juice, had a few bites of mac & cheese (that stuff was NASTY!), and polished off pudding. We left at 5 and were home around 5:30! It was so nice to bring him home and not have to be stuck in that tiny room all night! You'd never know he had anything done! He's as normal as it gets. Praise God from whom all blessings flow!

WELCOME BABY BAUER!!!!

2009-07-04T10:16:00.005-04:00

Candace had her baby! LILY RENEE was born around 9 a.m. after just about 6 hours of labor! Congratulations Candace, Matt, Austin & Justin! We love you and can't wait to meet this precious little girl.

Robbed

2009-06-29T09:13:00.004-04:00

"Aw, man! You were robbed!" We yell that a lot around here, especially while playing Wii bowling when that one pin weaves from side to side but in the end remains standing, KWIM? Well, this isn't one of those type of posts. This is a we've-really-been-robbed kinda post. Not our home, thank goodness, but our van was broken into yesterday. We were eating out after church...the van was parked in a parking lot filled with tons of cars and was locked. Our valuables were not in plain view. We have a little basket in the floor between and passenger and driver seats and that's where we had left them. Doesn't matter, I guess.... Clearly *someone* was looking for something. It wasn't like you could just walk past our van and see anything valuable with a glance. And it happened in broad daylight! He/She/They smashed our passenger window and made off with my purse, a mini-laptop computer, and my iPod charger (but left the iPod and my cell phone which I had left on the dash!). I'm going to assume it's a "they" because they've filled up on a lot of gas with my cards! Before we were done eating, realized what happened, and could get my checkcard shut off, they had emptied our account ~ we have a balance of $1.38, no joke! They spent over $50 at 2 gas stations and it also appears they filled up their gas tanks in addition to the whatever they bought at the stations but we don't know the $ amounts. I had a BP credit card but they didn't get to it before we got it closed down....I also had a 2nd checkcard in there that was attached to a joint account I held with my Mom in S. C. Unfortunately, we were unable to get it closed down until this morning and that was too late. Balance of only $7.80 in there but they put that account in the negative for nearly $150. It is shut down now, too. They also made off with my drivers license, all of the kids social security numbers, a Cracker Barrel giftcard, my checkbook, and our WIC folder. WIC will replace my I. D. card but won't replace any of our coupons which were for milk, cheese, juice, eggs, cereal, peanut butter, or formula for Lydia. In September, we qualify for new coupons. I've called and we're in the process of getting our van window fixed (thankfully, deductible free!). The laptop (which we were buying from a friend so it technically isn't even ours yet) was worth about $300. The thieves have no way of charging it and it wasn't fully functioning anyway (Jonathan was working on it) so it won't do them much good. No idea yet if our homeowner's insurance will cover that our not....As for the money losses, we're in the process of filing disputes for these charges but it can take up to 90 days to get our money back and there's not even a guarantee we will get the money back. And there's still a possibility they can get more money off of us...there's only 1 way and I'm not going to give that information away on here. Wouldn't want to give anyone any ideas. *wink* We can choose to close our account altogether but we'd rather not right now because of our direct deposits/automatic withdraws attached to the account. We're just praying that the thieves aren't smart enough to figure out how to get to more money. But if they do figure it out, we'll have no choice but to close the account. But, for now, if they can find an employee stupid enough, they could even get in the zoo with my membership card. The zoo always asks for an ID with the card ~ and the thieves have my ID ~ but do they look at the picture??? And after that, I guess they can treat themselves to a nice dinner at the Barrel. *sigh* Must get on with making phone calls....please pray for us!

Lookie what's outside

2009-06-26T22:20:00.003-04:00

Isn't this amazing??? New life right outside my bathroom window x3!! They're beautiful baby robins! We think they hatched 3 days ago or so and my research tells me they'll be there another 10 days or so. I'm pretty sure the Mommy and Daddy bird hate me (yes, I see 2 of them out there every now and then so I'm assuming it's both the mother and father). It was so weird today when one of the adult birds caught me staring at them today on my way to the bathroom once. And I was constantly shocked out of sleep while napping with the kids when I heard all 3 babies crying at once! Must have been feeding time. I snapped these pictures all within a matter of minutes and then showed the babies to John & Elizabeth and then shut the window so they could be fed. Otherwise, every time one of the adult birds tried to get close enough to feed them, they'd swoop right away and the poor babies would still be like the one in the last picture, necks all craned up with mouths wide open. Even if I tried to hide, it was like they could sense I was there 'cause they'd fly towards the nest but immediately fly away!
Just amazing!!!

Catching up

2009-06-26T22:14:00.004-04:00

VBS family night, JohnVBS family night, ElizabethSnowcones after the program -- think John enjoyed his?!?!Can you believe how dirty my kids can get??Can you belive how beautiful my girl is? She did SO GREAT today with her 5-year check-up (3 shots!). She's the size of a 6 1/2 year old girl (hee hee!) and the dr's estimate is 5'8" when she's fully grown!!! She's probably going to have to have glasses though.

Timothy walks

2009-06-25T12:36:00.004-04:00

Timothy's ENT appointment today

2009-06-16T20:33:00.003-04:00

Well, the good news is we know why Timothy's having so many sinus infections. It's his adenoids. They ran a camera down (up?) his right nostril and his adenoid was so large it was making the very back of his nasal cavity very small. So, when he gets a cold (and babies his age get an average of 1 cold per month), the mucous can't drain properly 'cause it can't get past that adenoid so it stays where it's not supposed to and gets infected, a sinus infection. The solution is simple but scary, nonetheless. When he goes in for his bronchoscopy on July 6th, they'll do surgery to remove his adenoids at the same time. I was really hoping to either a) avoid the bronchoscopy or at least b) avoid having another overnight stay at Children's. But, since he's going to have to be under general anesthesia for the surgery, why not do the bronchoscopy at the same time? And adenoid surgery on a child this young is usually an overnight deal anyway. So, off to Children's we will go on Monday, July 6th, probably around 6 a.m. as he's scheduled for a CAT scan of his ears at 8 a.m. and that will likely be the first procedure. The CAT scan of his ears is to see if there's any structural abnormality that might help explain his hearing loss and/or speech delay. They don't normally do CAT scans on kids diagnosed with hearing loss because if they can't lay completely still or be put under general anesthesia but, again, since he's already going to be under anesthesia....

My heart breaks for my little guy but like I told a dear friend at church this morning, it doesn't take much going through Children's Hospital to make me grateful! I see the kids there with bald heads that are likely cancer patients...I see the parents there who have "permanent" visitor badges that have no expiration date...I hear the babies crying in pain...and I'm thankful that Timothy is as healthy as he is! Please pray for Timothy as this surgery date approaches, that he'd be easy to handle and not too miserable without food or drink, that he'd come out of anesthesia easily (again), that the surgery and procedures would be succesful and, of course, that he'd not be in too much pain afterwards.

Last Tennessee trip post

2009-06-16T20:31:00.001-04:00

Lunch at Zaxby's with the family and 1 interesting road sign....

Tennessee trip, 3

2009-06-16T20:24:00.002-04:00

My brother Kevin's 30th birthday party

Tennessee trip, 2

2009-06-16T19:58:00.002-04:00

John was so cute trying to play baseball with my cousins! We ended up with 32 pictures of him! I love him sticking his tongue out and closing his eyes when the ball was close -- that's my boy! John gets his very own slideshow!

Tennessee trip

2009-06-16T19:55:00.001-04:00

I'm going to upload some photo albums from our trip last weekend to Tennessee. We left Thursday and arrived at my Nannie's house around 2:30 Thursday afternoon (Nannie is my aunt). Here's some snapshots of the fun we had there that evening.

Timothy's evaluation today

2009-06-09T22:26:00.002-04:00

First of all, many thanks to all who have prayed for us today! I was very nervous about today's meeting. In case you aren't familiar with what I'm talking about, you can read about a discouraging home visit we had recently here and also about some of our fears that we had after that visit here. That led us up to today when Timothy was to be evaluated for eligibility for intervention services (therapy). Basically, it boils down to whether or not Timothy qualifies for some free services through Help Me Grow. If not, we would need to pursue private therapy. Like I said, I was really nervous. However, with a big sigh of relief, I can say things went pretty well. Unlike the 1 lady from the last home visit, this man did very little probing into things not pertaining to Timothy nor did he ask a lot of questions regarding the other children. When I mentioned that we homeschool, he was perfectly fine with that and never once pushed or suggested the MRDD school for Timothy (in fact, he discouraged it because of a waiting list). There was some paperwork to be filled out and then he mostly asked me questions about Timothy but he also did some one-on-one things with Timothy. There was a "test" for each area of Timothy's development and at the top of each page, he had a score already written there that was a kind of guideline. After he completed each page, this gentleman was very straight forward and would say things like "I was looking for a score of XX and Timothy scored above that so there's no concern in this area" or "I was looking for a score of XX and Timothy scored just below it which doesn't necessarily qualify him for services but it does raise red flags". Only once did he say Timothy scored well below the target score and that was only in gross motor skills (in other words, walking). Timothy did score below the guideline for language but only by 1 point which is not low enough to qualify him. Based on these scores, Timothy will qualify for therapy but only for physical therapy unless.... This gentleman will compile a report and meet next Wednesday (6/17) with his boss, a nurse, a speech therapist, and a physical therapist to discuss Timothy's scores. If everyone there is in agreement that Timothy might need speech therapy as well, then Timothy will be referred to an actual speech therapist for further evaluation. After the 6/17 meeting, we will be presented with this report and then be offered services. Basically, we'll be offered home based services for Timothy once a month or we'll be offered private in-office therapies for Timothy once a week with therapists at Children's Hospital. We will likely choose the once-a-week option both for getting Timothy off to a more rapid start and because there's another waiting list for the in-home services. If we are unhappy with the options presented to us, we can always pursue private therapies by prescription from our pediatrician. One of my biggest fears was that we wouldn't be able to deny therapies they suggested and this gentleman assured me that was not the case. I also have that in writing with some of the paperwork he left with me. That makes me feel TONS better! And I was told Timothy is a very bright little boy as he scored very well in the other areas such as cognitive skills and fine motor skills. This man told me he'd never seen a 18-month-old hold a marker so properly to draw with! :) Overall, it was a pleasant experience although it left me emotionally drained, probably because I dwelt on it too long while waiting for today to arrive and then waiting until 3 for him to get here! Now we wait and get back to packing! We're leaving for Tennessee first thing Thursday morning so that just leaves me with tomorrow. I'm down to 2 large hampers full of dirty clothes which I'll finish tomorrow (I've done approximately 15 loads of laundry in 2 days) along with some other minor housework issues and then start actually putting things in suitcases! The plan is to vacuum the van sometime tomorrow afternoon or early evening then wash it after church (the road to our church is under construction so I don't want to wash the van until after church), come home & put the kids in bed, load the van with what we can, and hopefully leave around 6 Thursday morning. Yipee!

I've been interviewed

2009-06-09T21:41:00.003-04:00

This is probably the closest I'll come to celebrity (unless you count the interview I did on t.v. when I was in middle school....) Check out my answers here!

Missed another one!

2009-06-08T12:36:00.003-04:00

It's been a crazy couple of days. I'm WAY overwhelmed with trying to get ready for our quick trip to Tennessee this weekend. Plus getting Nathan & Caleb ready to go home with my Mom and Dad (S. C.) for a few weeks plus getting ready for VBS that starts the day after we get back. So what'd I miss this time? Timothy's 18 month birthday!! (But, hey, it's the 8th so I can wish Justin a happy 18 month birthday!)

Timothy just after birth

About 4 months old
Just after his 1st birthday
Easter this year
(we're becoming slackers on taking new pictures!)
Pray for Timothy in the upcoming weeks as he is evaluated tomorrow for starting speech therapy, as he goes to the ENT on the 16th for his chronic sinus infections, and as he goes under general anesthesia on 7/6 for CAT scan(s) and a bronchoscopy. (And for me as I'll probably be taking him in for his procedures all by myself as Jonathan is running low on vacation days.)

COSI, 6.4.09

2009-06-05T14:38:00.002-04:00

Doesn't she just melt your heart?
Nathan's interesting shot....

Boy, don't they look thrilled? (I just love Caleb's crossed eyes!)

Silly boy!

2009-06-05T14:03:00.002-04:00

Timothy in Lydia's bouncy....too cute!

Can't believe I missed it!

2009-06-03T08:54:00.003-04:00

Bad Mommy, missing Lydia's 3 month mark yesterday! AGH! I don't even have a recent picture. Something's wrong with me....

I think she's 13 weeks now but I could be wrong on the count. Perhaps for Monday, I can get a recent picture for her 14th week mark. Biggest change this month is the smiling & cooing, coming really close to laughing. She seems to be ticklish under her chin. Her nighttime fussiness has been torture these past few days coming between 8 and 10 or so. Last night, it was like constant screaming between 8 and 9:30. :( She has slept through the night a few times, about a week in a row before she started not sleeping through the night (which to me means 6 hours or more). Last night, I think we finally got her settled around 10 and she slept until sometime after 4. The nights she has slept it's been from around 11 until 6, sometimes even 7, but that was only a time or 2. Once she goes for a good stretch, we hope to start trying her in the crib in Timothy's room. I've tried to get her to nap in there & she doesn't go for more than 20 minutes so we may be in for quite a transition. No dr's appt this month (next one 7/20) so no new weight or length to report. She's still comfy in most of her 0-3 month stuff, even wearing a pair of newborn size pants this past week which were a little short (but perfect for the weather, if you ask me!). There's a few things 0-3 that I've already packed away and a few things 3-6 that I've put her in but those are a little big on her still. Can't really tell she's lost any hair & yes, it's still red.

Headed to Tennessee 1 week from tomorrow!
Can't wait to see my new niece & catch up with family!

Body After Baby, week 4

2009-06-02T10:27:00.003-04:00

I know it's Tuesday but I had a very busy Monday. Not much to report in weight loss ~ in fact, scale said I was up a pound since 2 weeks ago (remember I didn't weight in for week 3). It's sobering to think that that means I had to have consumed 3500 more calories than I burned during the last 2 weeks, especially considering I had a very productive week last week as far as exercise goes. I walked Tuesday, Friday, & Saturday with Charissa (2 miles each day) and Wednesday by myself. On Wednesday I only walked about 3/4 of a mile but I had the 2 babies in the double stroller, John on his bike, and Caleb on his scooter. Between trying to catch up with them and pushing the stroller, even though it was a shorter walk, I still felt like I had gotten a workout. While walking with Charissa on Saturday I was having trouble with pain in my shin (shin splints?) . We didn't walk last night as I went to a movie night with ladies from church and I know Charissa is busy several nights this week but hopefully we'll be able to get something done together. Otherwise, I'm going to see what I can do at home. I'd love to take off each night & walk at the park but I think it's too much for hubby to have all the kids by himself for an hour every night.

This week, my focus is going to be on starting a food journal and more of the same ol', same ol' (water, exercise, portions).

Vacation countdown: 8 more days 'til we leave for Tennessee!

What do you think?

2009-05-31T09:16:00.004-04:00

If you're not a faithful reader of my blog or if you've not seen that the majority of my posts have almost no deep thinking involved, then I should let you know that this blog was created with the sole intention of keeping out-of-state family & friends up to date with what is going on with the Stevens Clan, namely keeping my parents from going into Grandbaby Withdraw! I'm happy to sit down every now and then and share a cute picture or story, give doctor appointment updates, tell how big everyone is getting, and sharing milestones of their childhood(s). (Can you make "childhood" plural?) But, recently, after several comments from friends and even a few strangers, and after visiting great blogs like this one and this one that clearly share more than "Guess what Junior's gotten into today?!?", perhaps I should rethink my intention? I certainly don't claim to be a writer but I've been told that people would love more of a glimpse inside what life is like as a mom to 6 kids or what it's like having so many boys vs. girls. Perhaps share my mom tips or what my favorite baby products are? Maybe write more about my faith or share some inspiration? Here's my initial thinking -- #1 Why would you want to hear from me? I'm the farthest thing from Martha Stewart, I have almost no organizational skills, and I'm not your typical nuturing Mom-martyr (and I'm not claiming that to be one of my strong points). #2, Do I really have the time to sit down and put together posts on mothering topics? #3, What would I write about? So, for the handful of my faithful blog readers, I ask -- what do you think? And be specific. Something like "I'd like for you to write about....." or "Please, no, DON'T write anything. I just like looking at your cute kids." Not that I mind the comments -- in fact, I'm hoping for more than 2 this time -- but a plain ol' "Sure, write more" really is not what I'm looking for. So now's your chance. Let me have it! :)

Body After Baby, week 3 recap

2009-05-25T10:19:00.002-04:00

I agree with Mama Notes -- can we just not talk about week 3??? Didn't step on the scale this morning -- my Momma didn't raise no dummy! -- and while the week was disastrous as far as dieting & exercise are concerned, it did end on a high note. I was able to fit in a 2 mile walk last night & even did it in spite of the fact that I wasn't able to reach my exercise buddy.

Week 4 goals? Do I have to have them (lol)? Can I just surprise myself?!?! If not, then I resolve to eat less and exercise more. Not specific enough, I know, but I don't think I have goal setting in me today. But I'm not as down-on-the-world as it sounds....

Prayers for wisdom

2009-05-25T10:01:00.002-04:00

Doing some research online after receiving an email from a dear friend who happens to know a lot about special education.... She saw my post about what happened last Tuesday with the visit from the BCMH nurse and the Help Me Grow lady. After reading her thoughts and doing just a tad bit of research (just in the last hour, so not like a TON of research yet), I'm asking you to pray for wisdom for Jonathan & me. We just want Timothy to get some help with his speech. That really is all we want! And, this with Help Me Grow was the way I was told to go about getting him that help. However, I'm beginning to wonder if we've opened a can of worms here that we don't want open. I'm not exactly talking "Big Brother" fears here but I don't want a bunch of governmental agencies with their noses in my business, especially considering I have 6 children and we homeschool. I'd much rather them stay away, LOL! Pray for boldness to find a way to tell them "This is what I want & you can leave everything else alone" without seeming like a mother who doesn't care or who is in any way neglecting her children (I'm sure they have Child Protective Services on speed dial!). Pray for protection for our family, especially where Timothy's future education is concerned. The words "special school" have already been mentioned and, of course, we'd prefer to keep Timothy at home. After all, it's not like he's deaf! His hearing loss is MILD (just ask Candace!). My fear is that putting my foot down on any of these issues -- not agreeing to other forms of therapies, not letting them get their hands on my other kids, and not agreeing to put Timothy into a "special school" -- will tick off the wrong person and cause a nightmare for us. We're in the application process for a Homeschool Legal Defense membership. They provide 24/7 legal counsel to homeschoolers when their right to homeschool is in jeopardy and I'm going to continue arming myself with information on my rights as a parent. While we walk this course, please pray for us!

Matthew West

2009-05-22T22:21:00.003-04:00

Ever heard of him? If not, it is my humble opinion that you should. His latest release Something To Say speaks to me, sometime as if I had written the songs myself. I may have to upload one of those annoying music players to the blog to bug you with his stuff! One little snippet (is that even a word?)....this song made me cry (& that's saying a lot):

"Stop The World"

The TV is talking
The telephone’s ringing
The lights are all on
And the radio’s screaming
A million distractions are stealing my heart from You
I’m tired and empty
This life is relentless
It weakens my knees
And breaks my defenses
It’s wearing me down and I’m desperate to hear from You

Stop the world I wanna get out
I need an escape away from this crowd
Just to hear You speak to me

Words of wisdom

2009-05-20T10:41:00.002-04:00

From my friend, Nancy, for my Body After Baby Challenge friends:

...there is a spiritual aspect to exercise, as well! For starters, we are God's workmanship. Psalms 139:14," I will praise Thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are Thy works, and that my soul knoweth quite well". Romans 12:1, " I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship". My point here, is to stress that our bodies do count. Our body belongs to God. Our bodies matter. God doesn't demand our bodies because he, as John Piper quotes "wants models for Mademoiselle or Planet Muscle. He demands our bodies because he wants models of service" . Exercise makes us more effective in serving the Lord! Charles Spurgeon said, “A mouthful of sea air, or a stiff walk in the wind’s face would not give grace to the soul, but it would yield oxygen to the body, which is next best” ! 1 Cor. 6:19,20, " Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's." These verses refer directly to those who are following Christ as their Lord. The better care Christians take of their body, the more able they are to carry out active Christian service, which is their primary purpose here. 1 Cor. 10:31 best sums it up, "So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God." ! These truths should dramatically affect our approach to exercise! We don’t ultimately exercise for the purpose of losing weight or so that we look good. We exercise ultimately for the glory of God. We lace up our running shoes and pound the pavement so that we can serve God effectively for years to come. We lift weights so that at age 65 we can share the gospel with our grandchildren. We go to the gym so that we can lovingly care for our spouse for many years. Now do not go out and make a list of exercise rules and regulations that you now must follow! Change doesn't happen that way. Change is often synonymous with "process". The point is, to start!

Strong words

2009-05-19T22:53:00.003-04:00

This morning was crazy! Let me try to be brief but give you the back story (unless you'd like to go back through the blog posts to Timothy's birth?....Didn't think so). So Timothy failed his hearing tests in the hospital. Once that happened, I began receiving phone calls from *someone* claiming that they followed infants with hearing loss in Franklin County. This person (who's name I did not write down) called me periodically throughout Timothy's first 9 months as we were still wading through different tests & procedures trying to get to the bottom of things and reach a diganosis. Once Timothy was officially diagnosed with hearing loss in the fall, this person said she'd turn me over to *someone* who would start the process to set Timothy up with help such as speech therapy. This new person (who's name I didn't write down) called me in February which was not a good time with Lydia coming. I asked her to call me in April, which never happened, so I started contacting people on my own last week. I don't think I've found the right *someones* but.... This nurse I talked to last week said she was with the BCMH (Bureau for Children with Medical Handicaps) which, she explained, was basically a supplemental insurance program that would help direct us to the appropriate drs and therapists and pick up where our insurance left off, financially speaking. Said that she and another woman, a rep for "Help Me Grow" (an "early intervention" program offered to all children in Franklin County who have "handicaps") would need to come out to see Timothy and fill out the paperwork. That was today. And I was left reeling. My mother's heart was broken. Their words were very strong.... Words like "handicapped" and "developmentally delayed" and "MRDD" (Mental Retardation & Development Delays) and "special school" and "sign language". They kept talking about how far behind Timothy was. It was almost more than I could bear. There is NOTHING wrong with this child! Sure, he has MILD hearing loss in his left ear but -- and anyone who's ever spent time with Timothy will tell you -- he does JUST FINE even without his hearing aid in! He doesn't yet use words nor does he walk but he's only 17 months old! He's still got time, right? As far as Timothy goes (and there's more not having to do with Timothy), he will be evaluated very soon by a group of therapists (speech & language, phsycial, occupational, etc) who will evaluate him in EVERY area (neurological, social, emotional, vision, hearing, speech, motor skills, etc) and will recommend a course of action. The nurse was just killing me with suggesting that Timothy need all these different types of therapy. "Okay, lady," I though to myself, "I just called you to get him speech therapy not for you to come into my home and tell me all the things that are wrong with my child!" *sigh*

But, wait -- there's more! While the nurse was finishing up and the rep from Help Me Grow was taking over (she was not a nurse, by the way), I noticed that the nurse was talking to John. In a few minutes, she asks me if John was in speech therapy. I told her no and she said "Well, I can tell he's behind in his speech". WHAT?!?! Are you kidding me?!?! No one, and I mean no one -- not 1 Sunday School teacher, not 1 nursery worker, not 1 relative, not 1 anyone has ever said to me that John is difficult to understand the way this lady was making it sound (all 4 year olds are difficult to understand at times by those not close to them, right?)! She said I was unlikely to "see" it because I was his mother. While I was trying to let that go AND deal with the whole Timothy stuff, she then turns to Elizabeth to say good-bye. Then she stops and asks Elizabeth to look at her. "When was the last time Elizabeth saw an eye dr?" she asks. "She's never seen an eye dr," I reply. "Come look, Mom," she says. Elizabeth's left eye drifts in toward her nose when she focuses on your face.... I've never noticed it before but I did, indeed, see it happen. Fantastic! She then said she was leaving without looking at any other children and I actually replied outloud "Yes, please!". "I'm sure I'll hear from you soon," she said....

I guess I should be glad it's time for their birthday check-ups?

Lydia's first professional picture

2009-05-19T20:38:00.000-04:00

Happy Birthday, Elizabeth!

2009-05-18T16:26:00.004-04:00

Elizabeth Jeanann Stevens

May 18, 2004
4-something a.m.
6 pounds, 13 ounces
1 year
2 years
3 years
4 years
Happy Birthday, silly girl!

Body After Baby, week 2 recap

2009-05-18T16:10:00.005-04:00

Week 2 was MUCH better! No weight loss to report but after my weekend of heavy eating, I'm very happy with maintaining. My goals for last week were:

1 -- Exercise with my new exercise buddy at least twice. CHECK! :) Charissa and I walked both on Monday and Thursday night, Monday night for an hour, Thursday night for about 45 minutes (but with many more ups and downs so I'm sure we worked just as hard). I also took the kids to the zoo on Tuesday (3 hours of walking but with starts and stops of course) and did some serious sweat-bringing housework on Friday and Saturday getting ready for John & Elizabeth's birthdays party.

2 -- Drink at least 2 16-oz glasses of water each day, total of 32-oz each day. I used a 16-oz glass b/c that's what we had in the house. But after our walk Monday night with my water bottle flopping in the stroller's cup holder, I stopped and bought one that happened to be 24 ounces (but unfortunately is too big for my stroller's cup holder!). So the recap for each day goes like this: Monday, 24 ounces; Tuesday, 48 ounces plus; Wednesday, 48 ounces plus; Thursday, 48 ounces plus; Friday, 24 ounces; Saturday, 24 ounces; and Sunday, a little less than 24 ounces. Still, considering I wasn't drinking water regularly at all, I think this is an accomplishment.

(And yes, I've gone back to making unsweet tea.)

Week 3 goals:

1 -- Bump up the exercise but adding a 3rd exercise day for the week. This will probably be without my exercise buddy 'cause I have a crazy week planned which, of course, will make it harder to accomplish 'cause we all know how hard it is to be motivated to exercise on your own.

2 -- Get my 48 ounces of water each day.

3 -- Begin working on portion control. I plan to do this by leaving a little behind after each meal and/or not going back for more. Trust me, I can stand to do this! I eat too much (usually 'cause I finish what my kids don't eat.)

Have a blessed week!

You can read about the Body After Baby Challenge at http://www.mamanotes.com/2009/04/body-after-baby.html

Party Day!

2009-05-16T09:15:00.002-04:00

We'll celebrating John's 4th and Elizabeth's 5th birthdays tonight. Enjoy!

Another zoo trip

2009-05-14T13:01:00.003-04:00

This time, the tiger and a few fish. Nathan's turning out to be quiet a photographer, don't you think?

Trampoline Fun

2009-05-14T12:58:00.003-04:00

We LOVE sports mode on our camera. As long as you hold down on the shutter, it just keeps clicking away. GREAT way to get shots like these!

Allow me bragging rights

2009-05-12T15:17:00.002-04:00

Saw this post from Todd Smith (of singing sensation "Selah"):
http://toddsmithonline.wordpress.com/2009/05/12/thou-shalt-not-compare-thy-spouse-to-others/ And I felt like I had to comment & brag on my hubby! (You really must go read Todd's post first!) This is what I said:

LOVE this post! Hilarious!!!! But, Todd, my friend, I hate to disappoint you but there is a man who’d be willing to do this for his wife. I know b/c I’m married to him and have been at the receiving end of his generosity many, many times!! Numerous times we’ve walked into church, saw that our nursery was short on help, & I’ve watched as my husband volunteered to help. (Kinda makes me feel guilty, though.) Many, many, many nights he comes home to a frazzled wife who’s been home with our 6 kids all day long (we homeschool) and does he complain that dinner’s not ready or that I’m in a really, REALLY bad mood? Nope! He watches our 6 kids while said-frazzled-wife goes to the grocery store alone or evens goes out to dinner with an equally-frazzled mom. Sorry to rain on your parade! Kudos to you for stepping up anyway!

Body After Baby, week 1 recap

2009-05-11T10:08:00.002-04:00

Well, I'd really like to just not post anything on this one! Got nothing accomplished as far as BAB last week. Didn't get my exercise in and ate horribly. BUT, I do have good news. I've found an exercise buddy! We're going to meet at least twice a week to walk the trails at our local parks and try some accountability as far as diet & exercise go. Our first night is tonight!! She's also got some nutritional/diet information she's going to share with me. I did change the weight loss ticker over there ----> BUT I have a disclaimer. What I entered for my starting weight was what the doctor's office said I weighed at my pre-op appointment in early April. I'm sure the 1.4 pounds has absolutely nothing to do with anything more than differences in scales. Speaking of scales, I did buy a new digital one so I'm not sitting there staring at lines and trying to figure out what they mean. That's my recap.

Goal(s) for B.A.B. week #2: Hit the trails with exercise buddy twice this week; daily, make sure I drink at least 2 glasses (our glasses are 16 ounces so that would be a total of 32 ounces) of water each day. Also going back to unsweetened tea but that's not as big a deal as it sounds.

The Big T

2009-05-08T16:49:00.003-04:00

Timothy is 17 months old today!
Timothy is bravely starting to stand on his own but just for few precious seconds. He walks really well with help but hasn't taken those precious first steps quite yet. He's still babbling more than saying anything that makes sense although he does say "night night" (which also means "bye bye") and "da da" frequently. Just today I heard him say something that sounded like "ball" and he definitely repeated the "b" sound which he's never used before. He's learned in just the last little bit how to climb on and off the couch and a variety of other places, like climbing on the bench and then onto the top of the kitchen table. He's also learned how to stand in his high chair and crawl out onto his tray. It's terrifying! We can't quite figure out how to loosen the belt in the high chair and it's too tight to buckle him in. We plan on figuring it out very soon, before he ends up on the floor. He's doing okay with his hearing aid but, if you know us very well, you know that he rarely has it in. That's my fault. It's just not on my radar enough to remember it everyday. And we've decided he can't wear it in the car any more as that's when he gets bored and pulls it out and chews on it. He's "fractured" his mold (the squishy part) but, thankfully, it doesn't effect the mold and because it fits sooooo well, we don't want to rush to get another one made. We're supposed to get his speech therapy started in the next 2 weeks. I LOVE this age (& Lydia's age, too, but this blog is about Timothy, not Lydia). I love playing Pat-a-Cake & Itsy Bitsy Spider with him and to watch him try and do the motions, too. He's got the clapping down! Oh, and to watch him shake his head no -- hilarious! For your viewing enjoyment (with a little John thrown in for good measure)

The others at ~17 months:

JohnElizabeth (obviously....)
Caleb
Nathan