Payton's Birthday Party

We had a fun afternoon at our friend's birthday party this weekend. Happy birthday Payton! Love the pictures that Payton's Grandma took of all of the kids :)

Eight Years Later

Here we were, eight years ago...

Seems like time keeps flying by faster than ever.

It's hard to believe that last month was our eight-year anniversary. I look back at that picture and remember how different we both were at that time. God certainly has brought us through a lot since then. I am so glad that God keeps holding us together. This makes me think of Colossians 1:17, "He is before all things, and in him all things hold together." 

This year we were able to get a babysitter for the evening so that we could grab some dinner and take it up to the mountains. The Thai Food restaurant in town only had cans of coke to drink, so we got one to share. 

We usually don't drink coke, and we were surprised to see that the can had "BFF" printed on it. "Hey BFF," Ellis said to me as he showed me the can. 

I thought about that can. Is there any more accurate definition of a BFF (best friend forever) than the person you have made a life-long convenant with? I thought about the mystery of God holding us together, and I felt God was giving us a pretty special encouragement that evening.

We decided to take a cheesy picture of both of us holding the "BFF" can. 

We needed to be back home by 8:30pm to relieve the babysitter, so we decided to try and get a short hike in first. We looked in our trail book and chose a new hike called "North Marshall." 

I think I read and re-read the directions about five times as we approached the trail. "Do you know where we are going?," Ellis asked. "Yep!," I said. 

We came to the AT trailpost at the end of the parking lot and saw that we needed to turn left or right. We turned right.

You may notice the sentence in the photo above with the word "left" printed in bold letters. Somehow I missed that detail in my multiple readings of those directions. 

Needless to say, our hike was a little disappointing...but at least we saw a pretty great sunset on the drive back down the mountain!

And that brings me to our day today. We've had a few days of such beautiful weather here, and this morning we decided it would be a great day for a family hike. We decided to try North Marshall again. This time, when we got to the trailpost at the end of the parking lot, we turned LEFT.

The trail was steep and rocky, and the kids loved it. Mac had packed a "backpack" to hike with, and he enthusiastically led the way up the trail.

Davey and I followed behind as Mac, Corrie and Daddy navigated the trail ahead. 

It was really cute how he kept peeking his head around my shoulders to see them hike.

Soon we came to neat stopping place for a snack. Mac seized the opportunity to take out his "telescope" from his backpack and survey the land.

Ellis took Mac and Corrie one at a time up to the top of the rock. They loved the view and the adventure. I loved them coming back down safely. 

A short while later we came to the summit of our hike. It was beautiful. I thought about the unfortunate turn Ellis and I had taken on our anniversary that caused us to miss this wonderful hike.

But as I looked at the stunning view and the kids having so much fun with us on such a beautiful day, I felt pretty sure that everything had turned out just right. 

"He is before all things, and in him all things hold together."

-Colossians 1:17

Lentil

For the past couple of weeks we have been reading a book called, Lentil, by Robert McCloskey. It tells the story of a boy named Lentil who ends up saving the day in his little town of Alto, Ohio by learning to play the harmonica.

At first I thought it would be boring, but it's actually been really fun. Here are a few things we did that were pretty simple to prepare and could be adapted to other kids books.




In the story there is a character named "Colonel Carter," who is the town's "most important citizen." He is a war hero who also provides the town with things like a library, hospital, park, etc. In the closing scenes of the book, the town decides to welcome Colonel Carter home with music and a big celebration.

For our Bible story we learned about Jesus being welcomed to Jerusalem as the people sang and shouted to Him as their king. I tried to explain to the kids that it is good to celebrate people we love by singing, and that singing to Jesus is best of all.

Our verse this week was Psalm 104:33, "I will sing to the Lord as long as I live." We did a few of the usual activities, including a new one. I downloaded a "trace font" on my computer so that I could make a traceable verse for the kids.

I asked the kids to trace the verse and draw a picture. Mac traced the verse and drew "Hosanna going up and down." What sweet glimpse into his little mind! He was so proud that the "c" in is name "was a good one." (It's usually upside down or sideways).

He looked so grown up tracing his verse. I had to take a picture. 

Corrie was pretty sweet too.

I found some soup mix in our cupboard that had lentils in it, so we spent a few minutes one morning sorting the soup ingredients. Corrie sorted out all of the letters and then later we made her own little cup of "letter soup." Mac just wanted to hoard all of the letters he could and store them in little tubs.

In the book there is a very sour character named "Old Sneep," and he tries to sabotage the town's big celebration for Colonel Carter by using lemons. The kids and I talked about "sour" and "sweet." We found a really easy recipe for fresh lemonade, and we followed the instructions to make enough for some drinks and popsicles! I guess the popsicles were a little sour.

I got a cheap shower curtain from the Family Dollar and taped it to the floor of our carport. I saw the idea on pinterest to make the town of Alto, Ohio on it using markers and crayons. We used a "marker machine" (two markers taped to the sides of a bottle) to make the roads, and then I asked the kids to tell me the buildings and places in Alto and drew what they remembered from the book. 

I thought this would just be a "fun" activity, but I realized as we did it that it was teaching Mac and Corrie about maps and helping them to connect parts of the story to something tangible. 

The kids were most interested making their own "marker machines." Mac used his to make "fireworks" next to the schoolhouse. 

Corrie used her "machine" to make "grass and hay"

Davey liked driving his cars along the roads :)

Another fun activity was making a little book about the town, state, country and world that Mac and Corrie live in. We talked about Lentil living in Alto, Ohio, USA, Planet Earth, and then talked about Mac and Corrie living in Front Royal, Virginia, USA, Planet Earth. 

The kids picked out the colors for the their books and then I helped them put them together. Mac seemed completely uninterested while we made the books, but afterwards he read it to himself again and again. 

My favorite activity of all was the one we did this morning. In the book Lentil practices his harmonica everywhere, but his favorite place is in the bathtub because, "there the tone was improved one hundred percent." I thought it would be so fun to surprise the kids with their own harmonicas on the last day of our activities and let them practice in the bathtub like Lentil. 

I found some cheap harmonicas on amazon and ordered them with great excitement! I was just going to give the harmonicas to them, but then yesterday when read the book, I got an idea. Lentil saves up his pennies and takes them to the store to buy his harmonica. 

This morning I showed the kids a sign that read, "Harmonicas for sale, 100 cents." It was really fun counting up their pennies to see if they had enough for their very own harmonicas. Mac finished way before Corrie and helped her finish counting her pennies. 

They were so excited to discover that they had just enough to buy a harmonica. I took them to the "harmonica store," (our kitchen cupboard). They made their purchases and started practicing right away. :)

I was pleasantly surprised by how good the harmonicas sounded. Corrie loved hers and made up several "songs." Her favorite thing to do is play a song and have me sing along. The two of us together is quite a thing to behold. Poor Mac can hardly stand it.

Looks like Corrie may have quite a bright future ahead! As it says at the end of the book, "you never can tell what will happen when you learn to play the harmonica." :)

Some harmonica humor

Good Old Fashioned Rainy Day

It's been nice and rainy here the past couple of days. I have always really liked rainy days...maybe that's where the kids get some of their love for the rain from?

It's especially sweet when it rains in the summer and the kids can play outside in the warm rain. I think yesterday was Davey's first time playing in the rain. He liked it. :)

Mac and Davey liked collecting rain water in tubs from the gutter drain. I guess some things never get old!

Corrie loved standing out in the rain, listening to the sound of the little drops landing in on her umbrella. She said, "Mommy, the rain on my "umbwewa" makes a wonderful sound!"

She especially loved it when we came under her umbrella with her :). She is so sweet. Mac took a picture of us.

So far this morning it has been pouring again. Looks like another nice, rainy day ahead for us!

Pancake Party

Last Friday was a classic Front Royal kind of day for us...strangely endearing in its own quirky, charming kind of way.

It all started early in the afternoon when Heidi sent me a text. Her husband was gone on an overnight trip for work, and she asked if we wanted to join her and her kids at Chick-fil-A for dinner.

It turned out that Ellis was home that afternoon, and that he had already agreed to cook his specialty for dinner that night (which is breakfast). So I called Heidi back:

"Ellis is cooking breakfast for dinner tonight. Want to bring all the kids over and have pancakes and eggs and bacon in the carport? It will be crazy and awesome."

She agreed to join us in our pancake feast. Next thing I knew, I got this text from Heidi:

Suddenly our pancake dinner had become a full out pancake party...complete with live entertainment!

Lee is our church's youth pastor. His wife works in the evenings, so he was really happy for the chance to bring his kids over and hang out with Ellis for a little bit. 

And, apparently, the snake was just an added bonus that he found slithering down our church hallway. Why not bring it along?

Dinner was everything we could ever hope for and more.  We had eight kids, (five and under), whipped cream, maple syrup, greasy bacon and overripe (really squishy) strawberries...let's just say it was a recipe for unforgettable memories.

I will let you paint your own mental picture of that scene. It was really great that we could just hose down the whole carport after it was done.

After we ate, the kids all played together in the yard for a while. Around 6:30pm I suggested we start systematically bathing all of the kids and then letting them watch a TV show together before heading home to bed. 

Apparently Lee saw no reason to take the kids inside for baths. "Hey I'm from West Virginia. Where I'm from we just use the garden hose in the backyard for showers."  Ellis thought that was the greatest idea ever. "I can bring the hose around from the front and we'll have TWO showers!"

Heidi and I looked at each other. I could tell by the look on her face that it was a total no go in her mind, but for some reason that night I thought, Hey, why not? 

I would like to believe that I would normally veto that idea in a heartbeat, but for some reason that night it seemed like it could work. I mean, seriously, we just let our kids have a crazy, sugar-filled free for all in our carport complete with a live snake. Now they were all covered in dirt...what's a little nature bath going to hurt at this point?

Heidi caved in and agreed to let the guys spray the kids down. Before we knew it, we had eight naked, soapy, wet kids getting washed (in the $8.00 baby pool from Family Dollar) and towel-dried in the backyard.

Sometime around then our friend Katharine arrived, completely unprepared for the scene that she stumbled upon in the backyard. I tried to apologize. "Katharine, I promise you, when we invited you over we had no idea it was going to turn into this."

She was a great sport about it all, and agreed to join me inside to start clothing the kids with whatever pajamas we could find as Heidi towel-dried them and passed them through the door to us.  

A short while later, I watched all of the kids playing in the living room and watching their TV show together. It was such a fun evening for them.

By 7:00pm, all of the kids were wiped out and ready to start their bedtime routines. We said goodbye to our friends and put Mac, Corrie and Davey down to rest in their now quiet rooms. 

The next morning I woke up and looked out the kitchen window. I had forgotten about our party the night before until I saw the toys in the backyard and the now flattened baby pool.  "Wow. That was some party last night!"

I thought that must be what it feels like for people who throw those crazy frat parties and wake up the next day to see the aftermath all over their yards. 

I felt a little sad to think that we'll be moving and that these sort of things will definitely be frowned upon in our new town. Then I remembered something a friend said. "We've moved around a lot, and we have a lot of places that feel like home." It made me feel a little better to think that no matter how long we are gone, this special little town can always feel like home.

A few days later I woke up in the morning and turned to the next page in my summer Bible reading: 2 Corinthians chapter 5. The chapter heading said, "Our Heavenly Dwelling." I was comforted to realize that the home I truly long for is with God, and that He has a home with Him waiting for me that will never be taken away. 

So, when I feel sad about moving, it strengthens me to know that God uses times like these as opportunities to establish our hearts more firmly in Him...and in a good hope that will never disappoint.  

"So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord. So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please Him." -2 Corinthians 5:6-9