Goofy

This is a video I took about a month ago...
makes me laugh whenever I view it:)

Parenting Prohibitions

So being a parent, a good parent, to 3 small children is on my mind a lot. Here is a list that I came across from a lady named Suzanne Evans from 1994 that is very convicting. It is hard enough to live up to, just in everyday action, with people who are not your children.

"Do not provoke your children to anger...." Ephesians 6:4

"Do not exasperate your children, that they may lose heart..." Colossians 3:21

"Do not provoke your children to anger"

in day-to-day relating

__Ignoring him
__ Being to busy to listen
__ Impatience
__ Insensitivity to his feelings
__ Lying
__ Breaking promises
__ Not respecting his privacy
__ Hypocrisy
__ Failure to acknowledge your own faults
__ Venting unrelated frustrations on him
__ Inflexibility

In your relation to other parent

__ Putting down other parent
__ Enlisting child's support against other parent
__ Verbal or physical abuse of other parent
__ Asking him to keep secrets from other parent

In relation to his siblings

__ Comparing him to siblings
__ Showing favoritism
__ Disciplining siblings unfairly or harshly
__ Failing to discipline siblings
__ Verbally or physically abusing siblings
__ Allowing siblings to abuse him in any way

In your response to his failures

__ Ridicule, teasing, name calling
__ Calling public attention to his failures
__ Yelling/screaming
__Nit-picking
__Overreacting

In your response to his success

__ Ignoring his accomplishments
__ Belittling his accomplishments
__ Comparing him to someone more successful
__ Comparing him to someone as successful but younger than he

With your discipline

__ Rules that don't make sense
__ Jumping to conclusions
__ Accusing Falsely
__ Harsh discipline or harsh tone when correcting
__ Unjust discipline
__ Disciplining him in front of others
__ Accusing without allowing him an opportunity to explain
__ Silent treatment
__ Bursts of rage
__ Physical, emotional or verbal abuse

"Do not exasperate your children"

Failing to establish clear expectations

__ Making him guess what you want
__ Vacillating from day to day
__ Lack of unity between the parents
__ Failing to model the behavior that you expect from him

Failing to communicate appropriately

__ Interrupting
__ Speaking for him
__ Communicating with facial expressions and sighs instead of with words
__ Saying a reluctant, half-hearted "yes" instead of a firm but kind "no"
__ Saying "no" without taking time to consider

Attempting to control his behavior

__ Too many rules
__ Nagging
__ Going on about things he can't change
__ Going on and on about things he's trying to change
__ Manipulating him with threats and bribes

Lack of respect

__ Treating honest questions with scorn or disinterest
__ Making decisions which affect him without explaining reasons
__ Refusing to accept individuality

Refusing to let him grow

__ Being overprotective
__ Making decisions for him
__ Trying to make him a miniature you
__ Not giving him the credit for the ability to think for himself
__ Not expanding privileges as he evidences increased maturity

"Do not cause your child to lose heart"

__ Setting unattainable goals
__ Focusing on failure
__ Belittling achievement
__ Negative spirit about life in general
__ Unforgiveness
__ Conditional love
__ Perfectionism
__ Lack of sympathy for his hurts
__Withholding help
__ Withholding encouragement

Parenting

I have read 4 books on parenting in the past 2 months. Trying to get some ideas with disciplining and hoping that I am not completely destroying my kids;-) But lately, as with reading these books it seems the kids just KNOW I am trying to do better and their behavior seems to have gotten worse. Maybe it is just the changing of seasons, from being outside to inside the majority of the time? Anyhow, I find I have been escalating with my discipline and getting increasingly frustrated. Until finally a breakthrough a couple of weeks ago. I read that the best whiners probably learned from their parents! (ex. Child: Mooooom.. I waaant a coooookie! Parent: (or me) Nooooo for the umpteenth time youuu caaan noot haaaave aaa coooookie!) So I decided that even if they are whining I am going to treat them like a precious gift from God, be a GOOD EXAMPLE and not whine back. I have now found myself laughing whenever they whine. (Because even though it is annoying, they STILL are pretty cute.) Life is too short to get frustrated. In return, when I start laughing, they start laughing and the whining stops. Do I have it all figured out? NO. Will I? Hopefully, but probably won't. All I can do is take it a day at a time and do my best.

Proverbs 22:6

Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.


Proverbs 13:24

Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.

Happy Birthday!

Can't believe my little boy is 3!!!!

Happy Birthday Buddy!

Go, Baby, Go!

Okay, this might not be the best video, but my 6 month old is LEARNING to crawl. AHH!! Time sure does fly!

P.S. The comment made at the end kind of runs in the family:)

Thumb Sucker! Maybe not...

I do find her once in a while now sucking her thumb! But this is how I mostly find her...as long as the socks are off!

Things they say!

Keira: (While playing school) Mommy come on it's time for school. I am going to be your teacher today!

Me: Ohh, what are we going to learn about Keira?
Keira: We are going to learn about the Bible....because, it's all about the Jesus!

Caden: I need help!

Me: What do you need help with?

Caden: I wasn't talking to you. I was talking to daddy....he's my best friend!

Caden: Are those your work jammies grandpa?

Keira: I am just helping her crawl! (as she is pushing Kenzie's bottom so her face is going into the floor)

Wow! They are listening.

I have to repeat myself over and over and over....I am pretty sure they (being Keira and Caden) are not listening. Well, I have been known to be wrong about a few things. To my amazement I have been wrong. A few things have surprised me lately and make me think I'm not doing a terrible job of being a mother.



Amazement #1 While helping out at Keiras school I had put Caden into the preschool class while I helped in Keiras class. The preschool teacher came to me after about 20 min's and asked if Caden could play with the markers? I looked at her bewildered like "Yeah". Well she informs me that she was trying to get Caden to play with them, but he informed her he is not allowed to play with markers because he wrote all over the walls at home. He did do this, and I had told him he was not allowed to play with markers! But, good job for obeying me when I'm not around. (I did tell the teacher she could let him know he could play with them in class.



Amazement #2 With Halloween approaching I had been talking to Keira about reasons we are not going to celebrate Halloween. (Not that I think there is anything in and of itself wrong with dressing up or getting candy) So we had seen a couple of things on the TV that had to do with Halloween and the bloody, gory, evil side of things...and explained that we are not going to participate in this. So at Tuesday Treasures at church (Keira had the day off of school) her teacher found me in the hall trying to get Kenzie asleep and asked if it was OK if she read a story of a pumpkin (that had to do with the light of Jesus) and to do a craft of a pumpkin. Again I was like "YEAH!" Well Keira informed her teacher she was not suppose to participate in Halloween:) But of course I said these things are okay. Which I guess brings up the question...where do I draw the line?

Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!

This past weekend we had our first snowfall!! The kids woke up saw the snow falling and declared it to be winter! They could not rush breakfast fast enough to get outside. But of course Dave and the kids built their first snowman of the ?Fall?

The discernment of a child

Today Keira and I were relaxing in the basement (everyone else was sleeping). After the football game ended I decided to flip through the TV stations and saw that a movie was coming on. Curiosity got the best of me and I wanted to know what was going to be showing so I paused on the channel to see what it was going to be. It started out kind of creepy and this guy talking, still I paused to see what would happen....Keira on the other hand comes from playing with her toys and looks at the TV and says to me "Mommy, this show looks kind of naughty...we better turn it off".

Looking for a church??

Are we looking for a new church....NO! Rather we were helping my mom find a church. She lives about an hour away. So when we were visiting over the weekend we decided to look for another church to go to. As the last church we went to the gospel was not presented all that well. So I sifted through the yellow pages looking for a church to look up on the Internet. Found one that was non-denominational, and looked it up. I read the doctrinal statement, their core values, and what the church body believes. It seemed theologically correct, but was feeling like it might be an Emergent church. Seeming that we could not find any other churches to go to, we went. Getting ready we knew we were going to be late! Dave suggested we just stay at my mom and step dads and listen to a James McDonald sermon. Nah, lets still go I said. I should've listened! We got there maybe ten minutes late, and the sermon was already going. It was dark in there which doesn't bother me, but my mom didn't really like that aspect of it. He was preaching on communion. 1 Corinths. But I didn't have a clue what he was talking about...I can't even tell you about it as it was just fluff!! I'm sure I just sat there with this look on my face that was HUH! Where is the gospel... the atonement of Christ, how we need to repent of our sins. He sounded a lot like a very popular emergent preacher these days. Dave and I just looked at each other like okay should we go. When all of a sudden out of the corner of my eye, I see a mirror on the opposite side of the wall with a candle burning? I tried to show Dave it...he couldn't see it. Then I only had to wait about 2 minutes to know what it was for. The preacher said we were to...."go......sit in front of the mirror......look into your eyes, REALLY look into them....look into your soul." UGG!! So my husband, my mom and I were the first to stand up and.......walk straight out the door.
As we were walking out I looked back and saw this older couple following us. Yes! Unfortunately they walked over to the mirror. The kids were confused about why we were leaving. But Dave cleared up the confusion for them AND anyone near us as we were walking out!:)

Sprinkler Fun

Last week Keira had found the sprinkler that we had bought a few years back! So they wanted to use it since we had not used it all summer. So they were right...lets have some fun before this great weather leaves us!

Good Form Keira!!!

This is about as close as Caden would go until dad came home. As Dave promptly picked him up and ran with him though the sprinkler in his clothes. The were shocked that daddy was doing this with clothes on instead of a swimsuit. It's always more fun with dad!!

Things the kids say!

Some things the kids were talking about today!

Caden: If a stranger asks us to come pet his puppy, we say "No thank you stranger. I don't want to pet your puppy. Then we run and find mommy.

Keira: Actually we don't say anything. We just run and find mommy or daddy.

Caden: But if they offer us candy, we say "Thank you for the candy."

Keira: "No buddy, we don't say anything! We just run and find mommy or daddy!"

Caden: Maybe daddy will bring us a puppy home!!!


Caden who constantly has cars, keys or anything you can hook up to the truck, on the brain, talked about Jesus???

Caden: We've never been to Jesus' house before.

Me: Well we go to church and someday we might get to go to heaven.

Caden: Yeah!! And Jesus will have lots of trailers there, and He will want to hook them up to the trucks with me!!!:)

Apple Picking

Our apple tree out back has produced quite a lot of apples this year. The previous years I have picked maybe just a few to eat, but nothing more than that, as most of them are usually feasted on by the worms. This year I noticed, however, that many of the apples looked quite good. So I sent Dave to the store to buy an apple picker. So for a few hours we got to pick apples. The kids helped a great deal too....they got to pick up the ones that missed the bucket, or to take them out of the apple picker and bring them to the bucket:) My plan at this point is to juice the majority of them, and then to make a couple of homemade pies out of a few.

I did figure out though, that the 12 foot pole just didn't cut it. As all the really good apples were at least 18 feet up. So I sent Dave to get a painters pole that we attached to the end of the apple picker that extended to 24 feet. Perfect!!

Child Dedication

We dedicated Mackenzie to the Lord on Sunday! This is quite different from the Lutheran background I grew up with, where you baptize your children as infants. For us, dedicating our children is saying that we are going to teach them about Christ, the Bible and how we are saved through faith, repenting of our sins and God's grace. We are Dedicating them with the help of family, friends and our church family to help us to raise them in a christian home.

When Keira, Caden and Mackenzie get older we pray they will be saved by a faith in Christ. Then they will be baptized as a public expression of that faith. We are grateful for the children God has given us and we strive to raise them in a way that is honoring to the One who gave them to us.

1 Samuel 1:28 "So I have dedicated him to the Lord; as long as he lives he is dedicated to the Lord."

Happy Birthday "Princess"

Keira turned 4 today!! Wow...4 years has brought some trying times, crazy times, emotionally frustrating times, but mostly a lot of joy:-) Here are a few words that describe her:

Independent

Fun

Adventurous

Quiet

Sister Loving

No Fear

Smart

Cutie

We celebrated her 4th birthday with some friends on Sat. as she wanted to have "a lot of friends" over. I said a few would be sufficient. They came over and while waiting for others to arrive we picked out some jewelry to wear and decorated some princess hats!

Kayli picking out her jewelry, while Caden helps!

Sophie #1 picking out her jewelry!

Sophie #2 Making a princess hat while Caden decorates his crown!Sophie S., Ellie S., Sophie E. making their hats...I thinks Sophie S. could of played with the glitter all day, making hats for herself or helping others:)

Caden with his crown!

Then with glitter thoroughly in everything we went on a gem hunt. Each girl was to find 5 gems. Except, I had Dave hide the gems and he couldn't remember where they all were after the girls had found maybe 3 or 4. So some were a little bummed that they didn't get 5! Sorry!:-( Then we played pin the heart on the princess!

Looking for their gems.

Getting ready to play pin the hearts on the princess.

Everyone started getting hungry so we all sat down to eat, then had cake. Keira insisted on a princess cake. So I did the cake in three stages as I didn't have much time to do it all at once.

After cake we opened gifts...which I never realized how ?eager? little kids are to have THEIR gift opened first! Keira took a picture after opening up her gifts with the gift giver.

Keira and Sophie

"Foofie" and Keira

Maya and Keira

Ellie S., Keira and Sophie S.- These are my good friend LesLiegh's daughters. Les and I grew up together and are the same age apart as Ellie and Keira are.

Kayli and Keira

The best quote came from Maya. She is such a sweetie...as she wanted to wear some dress up clothes. We took her to Keira's closet so she could pick out something, but we were informed that none of it was adequate enough:-( Then when Keira was opening a gift that contained a glitzy skirt, shoes, tiara, necklace and earrings... Maya belts out "Now I have something to wear!!" It was just too cute!

Then after opening presents we still had some time so I read the Princess and the Pea with the intent of playing find the pea (which you stick a golf ball under 1 of 3 pillows and see who can tell which has the pea...but, I lost the golf ball. So the girls went to the basement and played!

Keira had so much fun and was so good at saying thank you. I on the other hand was exhausted:) Many thanks to those who helped out!!!

The Princess' and the Prince

Lets rock and ROLL!

All week Kenzie has been rolling to her side then crying. Not because she is on her side, but because she can't get over the rest of the way:) So last night she woke up at 2 am and decided to "practice" for about 2 hours...give or take. Giggling and squealing. Which would be soo cute if I wasn't soo tired! She never rolled over last night. Then this morning I set her on the floor to go clean the sink...walked back to her (Caden was playing with her) and she was on her stomach. WHAT!!! "You are only just 3 months TODAY, you are not suppose to be doing that yet." I didn't believe it. I asked Caden if he rolled her over. "No mommy I didn't." So I went to get the camera to video it. When I got back she was once again on her stomach. So instead of getting on video her FIRST roll over. I got her Third:) Keira was just as proud as I was, as she gave Kenzie many kisses and "good jobs"!

I will publish video when I get it to upload

Family Reunion

Saturday the 22nd of August we headed on over to somewhere near Sunburg and visited with some family that we don't get to see very often. The day provided sun and some fun! Here are a few pics from the day!

Dave and the kids out on party island!!

Keira and Grace waiting for the Sea Doo to be blown up! Grace is the 3rd born of 4 girls!! They are my cousin Becky and her husband Jamies' daughter. Grace is 2 months older than Keira.

The girls out on the Sea Doo. Ashton, Cortney, Keira and Grace

Dave taking Caden out on the Jet Skis!

Me taking Keira out on the Jet Skis...this was my first time ever driving one. What a blast!! Keira enjoyed it too, as when we were out, so was my cousins husband, and every time we came close to the dock she would say to me "But mommy, Jamies not going in yet!!" She did not want to stop:) That's my girl!!

My dad Harlie and Kenzie!

My brother Derek and Kenzie!

Other family members included my uncle Dave, my brother Derek, Grandma Irene, Grandpa Floyd, and my aunt Pam.

Grace on the Sea Doo.

Addison: This little munchkin always could find a pop sitting somewhere around and would drink what she could until her mom saw her!! She is the last of the 4 girls.

Cortney and Ashton

We actually spent the night there. We spent Sat. night sitting by the fire with my cousin, her husband and all the kids. We roasted marshmallows and had good conversation.

Then Sun. we got up went fishing, tubing and swimming.

Dave and Keira tubing, which right after Keira promptly said she could do it herself!!! So we let her be on one of the tubes alone, Dave on another. But, she was not heavy enough and when the boat started up, the front end of the tube went right into the water. She took awhile to let go!! Good thing it's the end of the summer cause she might not do that again for awhile:-S

Dave and Caden

Jamie driving the boat for us. It is his parents cabin that we were at... A big thank you to them for letting us use it, as we had a lot of fun.

Jamie throwing in his daughter Ashton, at her request!

My cousin Becky and her daughter Addison.

And this is pretty much what Kenzie did while out on the boat!

We had lots of fun and were thoroughly wiped out!! We can not wait to see them again. Thanks Becky and Jamie for hosting!