Trophy of God's Grace

Catching Up

2010-11-14T09:20:00.000-08:00

My baby is now 2 years old. How is that possible? Wasn't it just a few months ago I was in the hospital for 5 weeks trying to keep him growing safely inside me? What a blessing it is that he is healthy and growing up. All those fears and tears seem so long ago at times. Many thanks to all of you who prayed for this child during his pregnancy!

Catching up... Wow, it has been so long since I have blogged on a regular basis. Not that I am not writing blog posts in my head all the time! I wish I could just think them and they would appear! My life has radically changed in the last two years. Not just having another baby and all that this entails, but my overall health has declined. So many doctors appointments, specialists, tests, blood work, a surgical muscle biopsy, medication trials, MRI's, EKG's and ECHO's. Add to that an overnight at the hospital about a month ago when I couldn't stand up without my heart rate going from normal to 145 bpm and then I would faint.

What is wrong with me? That, dear readers, is the million dollar question. I was blessed with two great specialist this summer: a cardiologist and a neurologist. We think we have finally figured out, with medication, how to keep my current heart problems under control. Diagnosis is POTS. But the neurological stuff is still a work in progress. What we know is that I have a neuromuscular disease. What we don't know is which one. The "episode's" I get seem a lot like MS, but my brain MRI was normal. I have a lot of the symptoms of an adult onset Muscular Dystrophy. But, my neurologist doesn't have enough information yet to be able to truly assign that as my "root" disease either. While we continue to search for a diagnosis, we are also pursing the right combination of medications and supplements to improve quality of life.

"You look fine!" (Please watch this short video) This is something I hear a lot. Of course, on the really bad days no one sees me... I'm in bed for days at a time. Most days I am in a lot of pain. Lately, it is my arms, hands, left hip and back. My hands are weak and I can't do much with them anymore (like cutting up things for meals or opening jars). Typing can cause pain if I don't already have some pain meds in me. Some days I have extreme fatigue along with the pain. And some days my brain doesn't work right: I can't think of the words I need to speak, or things are really foggy, etc. I don't sleep well as pain wakes me up a lot.

This is certainly a new journey for me, my husband and our family. Each day can be so different for me. It is hard to make plans because I don't know how I will feel. I fight discouragement and during really bad days, despair. And yet, my hope is in the Lord! He is my Strong Tower! He is my Help in this troubled time!

I never like to talk about my health or what is going on. I have tried to keep it kind of under the radar, hoping we would find some answers, some treatments and be done with this journey sooner than later. I can't deny any longer what our current reality is. My journey of motherhood, homeschooling and even being a wife has changed. I am having to find new ways to make things "work" for us. I am having to "let go" of many things I used to do and still want to do. I am learning a new level of contentment where God has me right now.

No pity party here, friends! Let us all encourage one another to love and good works whatever our circumstances are! I hope to be able to post more about how I/we are finding new ways to do things, large family and all, in sickness and in health. Maybe this will also encourage others in their daily struggles.

My baby is growing up: 19-21 months old!

2010-08-04T18:46:00.000-07:00

This last one is so funny... his expression! We made red, white and blue tu-tu's for teh 4th of July and he insisted on wearing one and was having a blast dancing with it on, until this pic was taken. I think he wants to be able to deny later in life that he actually enjoyed wearing a tu-tu!

My baby is 15 months old today!

2010-01-25T12:28:00.001-08:00

Here is my cutie boy, Liam, taken in Dec. at 14 months of age. Sorry so long since an update. Life it full and busy and good!

Liam is 8 months old!

2009-06-26T12:26:00.001-07:00

6 months old today!

2009-04-25T20:18:00.001-07:00

3 months old today!

2009-01-25T13:49:00.001-08:00

Meeting new friends

2009-01-24T10:17:00.001-08:00

This is an easy post, since Mrs. Darling did all the writing and took the pictures. Go here to read all about it.

It was great to meet you both, my new, blogging friends! My children have been asking since the door closed behind you Friday "when are they coming back to play?" and are very disappointed we don't have something already scheduled! lol.

In other news, I've been busy getting back into the school day routine here. It is finally feeling like life is getting back to something resembling "normal". Liam is doing well, eating, sleeping, eating, sleeping... etc.

I would love to get back to blogging more regularly... but after so much time blogging only about things related to my pregnancy last year, I'm kind of brain dead about where to go from here. Can you help me out? What would you like me to write about? Do you have any questions for this mom of thirteen? Please leave your suggestions and questions in the comments area.

Have a great weekend!

2 months old

2008-12-26T16:15:00.001-08:00

Liam turned 2 months on Christmas day. Cute "first Christmas" outfit was a gift from oldest brother Chris and his wife, Jessica. Don't you just love the double chin and the cute hat?

Pic taken today in his Christmas gift... another bear cub outfit!

He had his 2 month well child visit and weighed 10 lbs 12 oz and 23 inches long. Woo hoo!

I'm not really here...

2008-12-13T13:45:00.001-08:00

Just a few pics to hold you over.... till like, I have time to blog something intelligent again...

Liam is 7 weeks old today and weighs 10 lbs. He is still not the best nurser, so we spend a lot of time doing feedings. He is getting better. Now, if my milk supply would increase too.

**note: no need to send in comments about how to increase milk supply. I have tried everything and am now on domperidone to see if it will work (only been a few days so far on it).

Liam, 3.5 weeks old

Baby bear cub - 4 weeks old
(I have owed this pic to a very special blogging friend... you know who you are!)

Isn't he an adorable, happy little bear cub?

Oldest sister and "her baby" ~ 6 weeks old

Manna and Grace

2008-11-20T10:56:00.000-08:00

Life goes on. Baby Liam is doing better and is gaining weight (up to 8 lbs 3 oz), has finally passed his "due date" and is learning to nurse, though not great at it yet. My wonderful hubby went back to work today. Yikes! Which means, I am trying to figure out how to do all that we have been doing together, on my own. Like the middle of the night feedings: try to nurse him, give him a supplemental bottle and then pump. And, yesterday I woke up with a plugged milk duct. (yes I know what to do about these, have been doing it all, and started some lecithin last night, which seems to be helping the most) I tend to get more plugged ducts when I am doing "too much". This is hard on a mom with 13 kids, because there is so much to do... or could be getting done.

Advice to myself today:

1. Manna and grace- there is enough for today, stop looking at tomorrow, the more I look at tomorrow and get uptight, discouraged and overwhelmed by all the tomorrows, the more of what I have today turns wormy, just like the manna did when the Israelites tried to keep some manna for the next day. Yuck. God gives us enough manna/grace for what we need TODAY.

2. To-do list - I love lists. List help me feel like I have my thoughts organized and I can keep "score" of all I have accomplished. I was feeling discouraged about the lack of being able to even write a to-do list, let alone get "anything" done. God spoke to me this morning about re-thinking this. So, I am going to focus on what I have done today, instead of what I have not done. I got a shower today! Woo hoo! I am keeping the baby fed! Go team! I have a plan for dinner and got the chicken out to defrost. Yippee! Yes, there are so many things I want to also get done, but just can't. Doesn't mean I ( or anyone else out there going through a rough time) am not accomplishing anything. Because I am, and so are you. Just maybe not up to our expectations. Remember #1.

3. Drink more water and rest - These have to go on what I am accomplishing today, cause a sick momma not only feels crummy and in pain (plugged milk duct) but she really can't get even the basics done if she is sick in bed. My hubby keeps reminding me that my main job right now is to make milk for Liam and feed him... which requires drinking lots of water and resting. I can WISH it were easier, but that won't make it so.

Hang in there with me ladies!

Go look!

2008-11-10T14:59:00.000-08:00

Go HERE to see a few of the great pics my very talented sister took of our little guy yesterday. She did a great job! And, we are very blessed by her coming all the way from Michigan to see him and take his newborn photo's! Thanks so much Ju!

Life as we know it right now

2008-11-05T18:29:00.000-08:00

We just got home from 24 hours at Emmanuel Children's Hospital with Liam. He had gone downhill fast with sleeping and not eating. It was scary. They ran a bunch of tests and nothing was found to be "wrong", so he isn't sick, just being a preemie. He seems to be perking up a bit, but still is going to want to sleep over eat, which can be pretty typical for preemies they say. We are going to have to work pretty hard around the clock to keep him eating every 3 hours even if he won't wake up. It is all bottles with an easy flow nipple for now, just to get food into him so he will get the calories he needs without having to work and spend his little bit of energy on nursing, etc. The doctors are saying that things may not really turn around till Liam gets past his due date (11/17) and gets to gaining past his birth weight. We are supplementing with high calorie formula or adding formula to pumped milk to make it higher calorie, which should also help Liam.

Please pray for us. Hubby and I are wiped out (hubs stayed at the hospital till about 11 pm last night and I spent the night with Liam in the hospital). My milk supply went down with Liam not nursing (I'm pumping again, trying to get in 8 pumpings a day) and I had/have a stomach bug that is not helping how I am feeling. I am so ready for life to be just slightly "normal". My emotions are being hit pretty hard.

And, please pray for Liam, that he will be more wakeful at the times he needs to eat, will gain weight and generally improve so that we can work back to nursing again (and that my milk supply will build up again).

Thank you for your faithful prayer support!

These pics were taken by our friend Paul last week, I think when Liam was 5 or 6 days old. Our little guy is sure cute!

Joy overflowing!

2008-10-30T08:50:00.000-07:00

Praise God, I was able to come home to my family yesterday, after 5.5 weeks in the hospital!

Better yet, we were able to bring Liam home with us yesterday and didn't have to leave him behind in the NICU when I was discharged. This is a tremendous answer to prayer and quite a surprise to Liam's siblings when they saw he was in the car seat in daddy's arms after I walked in the door. What a joyous reunion!

These are all the pics I have so far this morning. It was a bit of a rough night. Have to understand that yesterday, at 4 days old, was the longest time we have had Liam with us. We are still getting to know each other. He is doing really well, and has even nursed at every feeding, better and better, another wonder after he hasn't nursed before this, being in the NICU. My milk is coming in, though a little slowly... another praise!

Just for clarification, Liam is still breathing faster than he should, but I convinced his doctor yesterday that if that was the only reason for him to stay in the NICU, it wasn't a very good reason (Okay, I didn't say it like that, but you get the idea). His oxygen sats are great and he isn't working or struggling to breath, so as long as he passed his car seat test yesterday and would eat well (from a bottle) and see's our pediatrician on Friday, the doctor agreed to let him go home with us. Woo hoo!

I cannot tell you how wonderful not leaving him behind is/was! I finally feel like a new mama and able to start enjoying getting to know my new baby.

I am also overjoyed to be home with my other children and husband. It is like coming awake after a long nightmare. Praise be to God for bringing us through this very hard time and bringing us all back together again! Thank you all for your many prayers on our behalf! God has surely heard all our prayers (and my many tears) and moved on our behalf!

Update

2008-10-29T14:14:00.000-07:00

I'm sorry for not updating sooner. Actually I haven't talked to Jerri today so I'm not sure what the current info even is. But I will pass along what I do know.

Liam is still in the NICU, struggling with his lungs. He is still on the CPAP with forced air but no additional oxygen has been necessary. The nurses were able to feed him (via a tube to his tummy) some of Jer's colostrum that she had pumped and his tummy handled that well. However, when they tried formula (since Jerri was struggling to pump anything since her milk hadn't come in yet), it simply sat in his stomach, undigested. So please pray that Jerri's milk will come in quick and strong! A tidal wave would be nice. (Just kidding Jer!)

When I spoke to Jerri on Monday she had managed to get some sleep the night before thanks to some better drugs. I'm hoping that her sleep has only gotten better since then. It is rumored that she might be coming home today. I'll be calling her later to find out for sure.

She hasn't been able to access the Internet in her room at the hospital... that's why you've been stuck with me. That also means none of your comments have been approved for posting. Sorry! I tried to get the blog to let me but it only wants Jerri. Keep the comments coming though, she'll love reading all of them when she and the Internet have been reunited. She knows you are all praying for her and Liam and she's very thankful.

Please pray for her milk supply to be what it should be for Liam. For Liam's lungs to adjust quickly and that he can come home soon. For Jerri and Dave that they will be able to easily coordinate getting to and from the hospital after she's discharged. And of course that Jerri's c-section would heal quickly and easily also.

Thank you for your prayers. I'll update again when Jerri and I connect...unless she beats me and gets here first.

Pictures!

2008-10-26T14:58:00.000-07:00

Liam Jesse D.

Born 1pm, October 25th

7 lbs, 1 oz

19.5 inches

Jerri said it was okay to go ahead and share all the baby news with you all since it'll be awhile before she's up to using the computer. Pray for her as she's really struggling with her pain level. Apparently she can't have morphine so they are working on trying to get her something else that will help.

One of our other sisters did such a good job updating our family blog that I decided to just copy her post. Cheating, I know. Sorry.

"After Liam was born he was grunty, which means that he's having trouble breathing. It was not too serious at first and they wanted to give him a chance to get over the grunting on his own. Unfortunately this didn't happen. He was struggling too hard to breathe, so the doctors transferred him from Jerri's recovery room to the NICU. Liam was trying so hard to breathe that he apparently popped one of his lungs, which caused some air to leak into his chest cavity. Both of these things can resolve on their own without surgical intervention, but both of them can be serious as well. Anything with a newborn can be, of course.

The leaked air did resolve on its own by the time I went home last night at about 7:30pm. They didn't have to put in a chest tube or even use a needle to try to let the air escape to the outside. Praise God! The docs expect Liam to be on the ventilator with pressurized air (to help him breathe it forces the air in to his lungs) for 4-10 days. But as of yesterday it was just the fact that he was early and has immature lungs that put him into the NICU. At over 7 pounds he's a giant baby in there - his next door neighbor baby is only a pound and a half. They are treating him with two antibiotics and an antiviral medication 'just in case' because any infection of any kind at this point would be catastrophic and they want to err on the side of caution.

As of last night Jerri was in a lot of pain and waiting for a new kind of pain med to be sent up to see if it would make a difference. But her bleeding (which is usually a problem) is totally normal and hasn't been bad at all. Which is great!"

Thanks Jane-Holly for letting me steal your pics and your words! =0)

Liam in the NICU, poor baby!

I'll keep you all up to date on everything as I get word. Thanks again for all your prayers... keep 'em coming.

Updates

2008-10-25T16:11:00.000-07:00

First of all, my info on his time of delivery was off. He was born right at 1pm. Sorry about that.

Jerri is doing well and in recovery still.

Little Man has just been taken to the NICU (4pm) as his breathing isn't as good as the doctors would like. It doesn't sound like anything huge as it took them 3 hours to decide that. I'm assuming he's just needing a bit of oxygen to keep his levels up. Please be praying that he adjusts quickly and is back with his mama, happily nursing, soon.

~ Jenny

Breaking News...

2008-10-25T15:27:00.000-07:00

WE HAVE A BABY BOY!!!!!

He was born shortly before 3pm today. He's healthy and a great size... you'll have to wait for Jerri to announce all the details of her new son. But I wanted to let you know they are both doing well.

Praise the Lord! =0)

News Bulletin...

2008-10-25T14:00:00.000-07:00

It's Jenny again. =0)

As I understand it, for the last 24 hrs Jerri has been having an incredible amount of stomach pain and taking strong narcotics to keep it barely under control. Most of you know her stomach has been a battle almost the entire pregnancy. The doctors decided this morning that since her stomach condition wasn't getting better that they preferred to go ahead and deliver Liam today isn't of giving him two more days of Jerri's pain meds. This way there will be less in his system that he has to deal with that might exacerbate any other issues he might have. They were going to take her in a couple hours which I assumed to mean 1pm.

So he should be here now! Praise the Lord! Still waiting to hear the news and will update you when I do. Please be praying, I know it's a little late but God knows the desires of our hearts even before we do. "Post" prayers still count!

I had waited to update you all because I wasn't sure if Jerri would be coming on here herself to do it. We didn't think to discuss it during our brief conversation and I didn't want to bother her by calling her back after I thought about it. So I apologize but I didn't want to jump the gun and steal her thunder.

Stay tuned....

Hanging on...

2008-10-23T07:31:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, it is all we can do.... just hang on and allow God to hold us. Monday's disappointment was pretty hard to take (pregnancy hormones thank you so much!), but I am feeling much better now. I have been blessed by visitors each day this week (thank you all!) and that has been a great encouragement and comfort to me. Thank you all for praying for me and baby, that his lungs will finish what they need for his grand entrance next week, and for my family at home, who were expecting me to come home this week.

Being told it is "just" one more week over and over again (I know everyone means well) is quite difficult when you are feeling you can't do even one more day. Not from boredom, mind you. I just miss being together with my family, being at home with them all and taking care of them. Coming to the realization, for like the millionth time in my life, that I can't do it/can't do one more day, is absolutely correct. I cannot. But, God can. All I have to "do" is yield... float, instead of struggle. This is what it truly means to "rest in God" or have the "peace of God", in any and all circumstances...right?

The plan right now is to do the c-section on Monday, 10/27 @ 9:30 AM. FOUR DAYS TO GO!

Thank you for all your prayers. We are praying for:

a safe, uncomplicated c-section, despite all the "risks" the doctors are talking about because of the placenta's position and the likelihood of excessive bleeding, etc.

that Liam will be healthy and not have to spend any time in the NICU

that I will recover quickly, not only from the surgery, but to gain my strength back after 3 months of bed rest

that I won't have any trouble with lactation (having milk come in easily, which has been a huge problem with the last 3 deliveries due to blood loss) and that Liam will be a terrific nurser despite being a bit early.

I can hardly wait to see and hold my baby boy... but more than that, I long for the day he and I come home and I can crawl into my bed, with my husband laying beside me and my children surrounding us on our bed..... and just inhale that moment for as long as possible.

Amnio Results

2008-10-20T18:13:00.001-07:00

Hi everyone, it's Jer's sister, Jenny.

The amnio went well today. Liam is doing well but his lungs are not quite "done" so the doctors have decided to wait another week. His lungs are close enough to be ready that they won't repeat the amnio, they'll just schedule the c-section. Jerri doesn't have a date or time yet but she'll be sure to pass along the info when she does.

Keep her in your prayers, especially tonight and the next couple days. It's difficult to adjust to having another week of hospital bedrest when you thought the end might be in sight. Well, it's still in sight, just pushed a little out of reach.

35 weeks

2008-10-13T12:20:00.001-07:00

We have made it to 35 weeks! Yeah! Below are the only baby bump type pics I have. We had a birthday party for our daughter, Emma, in my hospital room last night. Everything has stayed quiet in the placenta previa realm, praise the Lord! The plan is to do an amnio on Monday of next week, when I "turn" 36 weeks and if the lungs pass the test and are mature, schedule the c-section for the next day.

Lord willing the next post on here will be baby news! Praying for another week of no complications and for those lungs to be ready!

34 weeks

2008-10-07T20:28:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone! Praise the Lord, baby and I have made it to 34 weeks. Today was day 16 in the hospital and things are nice and "calm".

A BIG thank you to those of you who live locally and have come out to visit me in the hospital. It always brightens my day to have visitors! And, helps that day go by faster. I know this hospital is way out of the way for most of you and that makes your visit all the more dear to me. And, those of you who bring me Starbucks, well, those are some yummy days for me to say the least. Hospital coffee is NOT a Starbucks white chocolate mocha, that is for sure!

Thanks also to those of you who have helped out making freezer meals, helping out with the children, and taking the kids to your house for a play day. All these ways of helping us blesses us so much and is helping to make this time I have been on bed rest and this extended time in the hospital bearable for the whole family.

One last thank you to those of you who have sent gifts for the baby from our registry, sent cards, sent or brought flowers to me, etc. I feel so encouraged and blessed by your gifts of love and helping us be ready for this little boys arrival!

Here is the latest news as of today, Tuesday. If things stay "calm" and there are no more bad bleeds, they will do an amnio on the 20th, the day I am 36 weeks gestation, to check on the baby's lungs. If they are deemed healthy/mature, they will deliver him by c-section on the 21st.

Plans can change in the blink of an eye, but this is what the plan is today. I believe most of the high risk doctors are on board with this plan, so that is good. There had been some talk of doing an amnio next week, but we have all talked about it and decided that giving the baby an extra week will give the baby a better chance of having his lungs ready and more developed over all.

Please continue to pray for baby and I here in the hospital. And, for David and the children at home. We now have web cams set up so I can see and talk to the children every day, which is really nice!

Lord willing, baby Liam will be born two weeks from today!

Hospital Bed Rest ~ Day 10

2008-10-01T14:04:00.000-07:00

The high risk OB who did rounds today (there is a different doctor every day which is frustrating), came in and actually said I should probably stay here till the baby is born. I told him he is the FIRST of all the docs to say this (the other keep giving me a vague amount of days till I can go home). He seems very practical minded and was all "it just makes sense" for numerous reasons. I said PLEASE write this in my chart because tomorrow will be another doctor and they all seem to think something else! He agreed, both to write it up and about how the different doctors have different approaches. He said that maybe what we would do is when I reach 35 weeks (that is 12 days from now) if my blood levels are where they should be (today's hematocrit was 28 point something... up from 26 point something last week, so it is slowly improving... they want is at a min. of 30 before a c-section) they would do an amnio to check on lung maturity and if it was good they could go ahead and do the c-section at that point.

Well, I have to say that was encouraging to hubby and me. Stay here about 2 more weeks and deliver the baby who will be 35 weeks and should be able to come home with me. This OB today was so practical, which I can really relate to, about how the longer I go the more risk I have of more bleeding and I am already a high risk to lose a lot of blood during the c-section, so the risks start to outweigh keeping the baby in a few extra weeks. What an answer to prayer today and addresses both mine and David's concerns!

We continue to appreciate your prayers for an uneventful 12 days, that my hematocrit comes up and a good report on the lung maturity. Of course, things can change without notice and his lungs might not be ready, but it is so wonderful to have a plan in place! We have been in limbo for 10 days now and it was getting old. God is so good!

~jerri

9/26 Update

2008-09-26T15:57:00.000-07:00

Just a quick update and many, many thanks for all your prayers for the baby, hubby, kids and me.

I have had a little more spotting today, and am feeling a bit dizzy when I get up out of bed. The labs on my iron count show that even with three days of iron therapy via an IV drip, my numbers have not gone up. So, the plan is to do an iron therapy today (Friday), Saturday and Sunday and then re-test my blood on Monday. And, of course keeping an eye on the spotting. If my iron comes up to where they want it to be and the spotting stops for more than a few days at a time, I could go home, on very, very strict bed rest. We aren't there yet. And, things can change in the blink of an eye. So, we just continue to take one day at a time.

Baby boy is still doing well. =)

I did get permission for a 15 min. wheelchair ride per day. Woo hoo! I'll finally get to see what is outside my door! I am hoping to get my first ride when David stops by on his way home from work tonight. =)

If nothing changes through the weekend I probably will not update till Monday or Tuesday.

Oh, my *orthodontist sent lovely flowers for me, with large fragrant lilies! Isn't that so nice? David had taken two of the boys to ortho appts on Wed. and the staff had asked about me and so that is how they found out what is going on.

Happy Weekend,
jerri

* For those who don't know, I was in braces for 3 years leading up to extensive jaw surgery for TMJ.

9/24 update

2008-09-24T14:18:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note to say things are stable. Hubby brought the kids to see me yesterday. Pardon the totally unflattering pic of me. I don't think anyone can make a hospital gown look good, especially while lying down in bed. lol. And, bed head, argh!

Thank you all for your prayers for me, baby and hubby and kids at home. This isn't easy, but God is getting us through each day. Small prayers, like having a great nurse for the day, to bigger ones like having a great perinatologist as my doctor yesterday. Several people came to visit me yesterday and that encouraged and humbled me.

Even things like getting a better bed and an egg crate mattress on top of it... a "write in" list of things that can be put on the daily menu order (for when nothing on the printed list looks any good), all have blessed me the last two days. And, all your comments and suggestions to "amuse" me bless me too!

I still don't know how long I will be here. My OB gets back from vacation tomorrow, so I hope he will call or come by and he will then be in the "loop" again and we'll start getting some of these questions answered. Until then, things staying calm, baby continuing to do well, are all wonderful. One day at a time...

9/22 evening update

2008-09-22T20:06:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone! I have my computer now and as long as I am stable I will be able to update the blog. Many thanks to my sister Jenny for doing updates when I am not able.

They decided I was stable enough to transfer to the hospital with a level 3 NICU, so I got another ambulance ride this morning. I am also now under the care of a perinatologist. He, of course, wants things done completely differently than they were at the other hospital. lol. So, he wanted the Foley out, oxygen off, even the IV drip is off for now (thought I have the PICC in one arm and a heparin lock in the other arm). I was allowed to get up and use the restroom and I did okay with that. I didn't get dizzy or pass out. But, I did have a bit of fresh blood from that brief excursion.

They are holding off giving me a transfusion... rather wait and see (oh boy, does that phrase get used a lot!)in hopes my numbers will start coming up. And, hang onto the blood they have all ready on hand for me if I have another significant bleed. The Peri. had good reasons about doing too many transfusions has a lot of risks, and gets harder and harder to type and match. He seems really smart and good at his job, but he isn't as personable as my OB.

How long I will be here is a "wait and see" of course. If I can make it to 35 weeks, I can transfer back to the hospital my OB is at and where I would prefer to deliver at.

I have gotten my two shots of steroids, so that is good. Baby boy is still do awesomely great. By ultrasound they do not think my water broke...or it has refilled by the time they did the US.

Oh, I'm really hoping they will let me take a shower! Argh! I haven't had one since Sat. morning. A washcloth wiping just doesn't cut it for long.

Guess that is all the news. Thank you all so much for your prayers and words of encouragement!

~jerri

32 Weeks Today!!

2008-09-22T15:58:00.001-07:00

And Baby Boy is still safe inside Mommy!!

Jerri had her in-depth ultrasound this morning but is still waiting on the results. She's been moved to another hospital in her area. It's better equipped to care for Jerri and especially Baby Boy. We're thankful that there was time to do the move before birth and that Baby Boy didn't have to be whisked away to this hospital right after being born, leaving Jerri at the previous one.
She should be seeing a high risk specialist this afternoon or evening and is expecting to hear results from the ultrasound then. I'll be sure to pass along the information as soon as I get it.

Thank you again for all your prayers. So far, Baby Boy is doing well and for that we are sooo very thankful. Every day counts and your encouraging words and prayers help to keep Jerri's spirits up.

Breaking News!!!!

2008-09-21T17:17:00.000-07:00

Sorry, I know it's not a good sign to be hearing from me at this point but it's Jenny, Jerri's sister, again.

Around 8am today, Jerri started bleeding heavily and had to have 911 called. They rushed her off in the ambulance (also putting an iv line in the opposite wrist of her PICC line. Standard procedures and all). Since she's been at the hospital, the bleeding has pretty much stopped, although she continues to have trickles now and then. She's right on the border of needing a transfusion due to the loss of blood but so far they are not giving her one.

To complicate things a bit more, Jerri thinks her water broke. No labor thankfully and the initial ultrasound still shows water pockets. She is waiting for a more in-depth ultrasound to actually check how much fluid is still there. Because of her trickle of a bleed, they are unable to do the paper litmus test on any fluid leaking out.

She received her first shot of steroids earlier today but has to wait 12 to 24 hours before the next shot.

It is still up in the air whether or not they will have to c-section her at this point. So for now she waits. And she would appreciate your prayers.

Things we are thankful for:
~ Hubby was home at the time of the bleed and was able to call 911 and be there to help.
~ Hubby is off the next few days so there's worry about needing to take time off for the time being.
~ Older boys were home to care for the younger munchkins as mom and dad rushed off to the hospital
~ A freezer full of meals already prepared by families from their Church.
~ Jerri was taken to her "regular" hospital, where they have her records and know her.
~ The bleeding has virtually stopped.
~ No labor has started.
~ There's been time for Steroid Shot #1
~ Baby Boy is 32 weeks gestation tomorrow and apart from having no movement during the initial bleed, he seems to be handling the chaos pretty well.

Things we need prayer for at the moment:
~ Water to have either not broken or that the leak would have self-healed in order to "buy" more time.
~ That Jerri's blood stats would return to normal quickly in case of another bleed, whether that be on it's own or through a transfusion.
~ That there would be no more bleeding and Jerri can remain on bed rest at the hospital for a few more weeks.
~ For the younger munchkins to not be worried or scared due to Jerri's terrifying and abrupt exit. No goodbyes, blood, etc.
~ That things will go smoothly at home for the older boys.
~ That Jerri will have time for as many steroid shots as necessary for Baby Boy's lungs before delivery. And that he will be in good health no matter at what point he is delivered.
~ Wisdom for the doctors (and mom and dad if there are choices to be made)

I will update you all as soon as I get updates. When Jerri's hubby gets the green light to go home for a little bit, he'll return with her laptop and she'll hopefully be able to bring updates to you all herself. We just aren't sure when that will happen.

Thanks for your prayers. It means so much to her. We are so thankful that both she and Baby Boy are being held firmly in the Creator of Life's loving hands. He's in control, no matter how out of control things seem to be.

Sunflower favorite

2008-09-20T11:33:00.000-07:00

So, it looks like sunflower picture # 3 got the most votes, closely followed by # 1. Thanks to all of you who voted. It helps amuse me and amusing me helps pass this bed rest time.

And, thank you to the brave souls who signed up as "followers" of my blog. I know there are more of you... don't be shy! I'm thinking of having a contest, possibly involving everyone who is signed up as a follower, by a certain date....hmm, have to think on that some more. It would include everyone already signed up of course. Maybe even extra chances in the drawing for those who sign up BEFORE the contest is announced.... I'm sneaky that way.

Name game

2008-09-20T10:51:00.000-07:00

A few of you commented that you'd like to help us with our "name this baby" problem. Sounds like it could be fun, and amusing. As I have already mentioned today, amusing me is very helpful, even therapeutic, during this long season of bed rest.

Yet, I wonder if you fully understand what you are getting yourselves into? You see, not only have we already used 14 boy names (first and middle names) that we COULD agree on, but we also have RULES.

Yes, we have had name rules since our first was born. Here they are:

1. First name must have more than one syllable.
2. Middle name must be a family name (someone's first or middle name from either of our families).
3. This one is more of a guideline than a true "rule": We usually use more traditional/classic type names. (this one is starting to sound like a home design show.... oh I do love to watch HGTV when I'm in the *hospital!)
4. Prefer biblical names for the first name, but again, more of a guideline, as we haven't stuck to this one each time.

You probably can't begin without knowing what names we have already used, right? So, in alphabetical order, here are the 14 boy names we have used:
Adam, Austin, Bryce, Christopher, Daniel, David, Geoffrey, Isaac, James, John, Joseph, Joshua, Patrick, Paul.

Now, lets also look at the family names that we are thinking of using as a middle name this time around, and there aren't many left, believe me!
Jesse
Emerson

The ONE first name hubby likes and seems to not want to budge from, at least right now, is Liam. To be honest, I was okay with this name several months ago. But, the longer I thought about it the more it just didn't seem to fit with rule #3. Don't get me wrong, it is a fine name, just a bit more "trendy" than we usually go with.

Here are the names I am thinking about:
Andrew (Jesse)
Jacob (Emerson)
Elijah (Jesse)

Are you totally confused yet? Do you see why this is so hard? Argh!

Oh, and while we are at it, scratch the names Dustin, Travis, Benjamin, Samuel, Ethan, Micah and Owen off this list of possible first names. Already been used amongst cousins.

If you haven't already clicked over to watch HGTV online, instead of reading all this post, and I don't blame you, and you have some name suggestions, BRING THEM ON! I mean, leave your suggestions in the comments section please.

* We don't have broadcast or cable TV at home... just use it to watch DVD's.

Seeds planted before my bed rest ...

2008-09-17T16:33:00.000-07:00

... are now abloom, in all their glory!

click to enlarge any of these images

I just love sunflowers!

Which is your favorite pic? Number them 1-4 from top to bottom, and leave your vote in the comments section. I'll add up the votes on Saturday morning.

And, while you're at it, sign up as being one of my blog followers. I KNOW you are all out there, even if you don't comment (and that is totally okay with me), because I can see my blog counter go up and up after I put up a new post. It would be fun for me to see all of you wonderful people who grace my blog with your readership. Just click on the "follower" link in the left side bar.

31 weeks

2008-09-16T12:05:00.000-07:00

I "celebrated" turning 31 weeks by being in the hospital, yes, once again. I went in on Saturday 9/13, with severe kidney pain, again. Only this time it was not a kidney infection, but a kidney stone. Go figure. I came home Monday afternoon 9/15.

I am very thankful that this hospital trip was for something as "easy" as a kidney stone and not because the placenta previa was bleeding.

For anyone who might be counting, not that I am of course, but this was my 5th hospital trip. Again, thankful these have all been for things not related to the previa. And, baby boy continues to be healthy and strong for which I am also very thankful.

I have an OB appt. this afternoon and hopefully there will not be any surprises. I refuse to take my hospital bag with me today. I just do. I kind of cannot handle the thought of being put back in after I just got out of there yesterday.

On a good note, I did take my fully prepared hospital bag with me when I went in on Saturday, and though I was too sick and in too much pain the first 30 hours or so, when I did start to feel better it was very nice to have clean clothes and my own toiletries with me. Yeah!

About 7 more weeks till the c-section. Still hoping and praying we get that far without any complications from the previa.

On a funny side note, hubby and I cannot agree on a name for this baby. We have never had this much struggle coming up with and agreeing on a name. But, how many people have to come up with 8 different boy names they like? When people ask me if we have a name yet, I say, yes, his name is " Baby Boy". Maybe we will be inspired on a name we can both agree on after we "see" this little boy.

**Edited to add: Just back from my OB appt. Yes, I got to come home! Hooray! My OB is wondering if my severe stomach pain is an ulcer, but there isn't any difference in treatment if we knew that for sure and so doing an upper GI really isn't going to benefit us anything and only add risks to the pregnancy. He is going to up my at home hydration to be sure I am getting enough and I am supposed to work on getting more potassium into me. Darling hubby is at the store right now buying banana's and looking for a sports drink that has potassium in it for me to see if I can drink it and have my stomach tolerate it. My kids were thrilled to see me walk back through the door after my appt. They are getting used to me ending up in the hospital anytime I leave the house. Nice surprise for them, and for me too!

30 weeks

2008-09-09T17:39:00.001-07:00

You probably all noticed how I didn't post last week, week 29. To say it was not a great week is, well, somewhere in the ball park of being accurate. I'll try to briefly recap:

* Last Monday night my 13 y.o. son fainted in the kitchen and on his way DOWN hit his head very solidly on the edge of the kitchen island. Off to the ER with my hubby. Son had a concussion and needed 5 staples to close the hole in the back of his head. A tad stressful for all of us.

* Last Tuesday I went for my ultrasound and OB appt. Ultrasound was good, baby is good, if not great: He measured 2 weeks "ahead" on skeletal measurements and estimated at weighing 3 lbs. 6 oz. Yeah! Only a little bit of cervical change... another big yeah! BUT, my urine showed I was dehydrated again/still. So, hubby had to take me to the hospital for another round of 2000 ml's of hydration.

In the meantime, I asked my OB if I could PLEASE have in-home health care and so have my hydration done at home, so I wouldn't have to be away from my family every week for a day (my dehydration issue isn't going to go away before the baby is born it would appear - my stomach is in so much pain and I have such severe nausea if I eat AND try to drink , even with a whole slew of meds they have me on to try to combat it, that giving my stomach a break so I can be somewhat comfortable would be best, and daily hydration at home the best option of all). Home health care was set up, only in order to have daily infusion therapy the patient has to have a PICC Line put in.

* Last Friday I went in to have the PICC Line put in. It went pretty well, with only one wrong turn (in my vein that is) and only one serious bought of feeling like I was going to pass out or throw up while it was being put in. Don't want to do this again anytime soon, but if this line will last, I won't have to be poked again, even for my c-section. This line serves it all, even blood draws and IV mediation needs. Yippee! (if you could see my arm from last weeks "regular" IV, the huge bruises and the pain I had from it, you'd understand why a PICC Line is such a blessing for me)

* Last Saturday the home health care nurse came out and taught me how to start and stop and clean and everything my own infusion therapy. Yup. I have a frig full of IV bags, a little battery operated pump and tons of sterile packs of tubing and such. My infusion takes 4 hours to run, but it is totally protable, so I can go anywhere (technically speaking of course... I am still on bed rest) with it.

* Today, Tuesday the 9th, I had my weekly OB appt and FINALLY I wasn't dehydrated. Woo hoo! So, the infusion therapy is working! Yeah! I am also now in the 30th week, which means I am heading into the most dangerous time for the placenta previa. We discussed with my OB about starting steriod shots in the next could of weeks, as a preventitive measure. I asked my OB what his "gut" feeling was about my previa? He said, of course, previa's are impossible to guess at what they will do, but his "gut" feeling was that I would do okay for another couple of weeks. I'll take that, doc! So, my new goal is reaching 32 weeks without any problems...not that I have ANY control over any of this. It is just a goal.

Notice my belly bump picture? Do you see how far out my stomach is sticking? This baby is doing some serious growing lately, don't you think? I'm having a hard time wrapping my brain around the fact that it is almost 10 weeks till my actual due date (though the c-section will be in about 8 weeks), with as large as I am feeling already! Yikes! God is so good though, because in the beginning of this whole previa thing one of the OB's concerns was the baby possibly not growing well. Praise God, we can scratch that concern off the list!

Thank you Jesus for your mercies each day!

I'm home!

2008-08-27T11:20:00.000-07:00

After spending a mostly sleepless night in the hospital, I am so happy to be home again! I would have been home sooner, but I had a reaction to the vitamins they put in the second IV bag they started on me yesterday. They stopped everything and between watching me, checking my BP, checking my blood glucose (it was fine) and some oxygen, I finally stopped feeling so dizzy. Then we had to wait for my OB to come out of surgery to okay switching back to the regular lactated ringers IV solution. Once we got that going again, I actually started feeling hungry for the first time in a couple of days.

Baby is great! He did wonderfully during the three NST's they did while I was in the hospital (one per shift).

I was very blessed, once again, to have great nurses. Actually, a whole different group than the last two times I was in. At this rate, I'll get to know the whole staff by the time we deliver! LOL!

I will see my OB again next Tuesday and have an ultrasound right before I see him. So, we have moved up to weekly appointments a little earlier than we expected, but all expectations are pretty much out the window at this point! My partially packed hospital bag was of no use to me sitting on the closet floor at home and me in the hospital! I never thought to bring it with us to my OB appt. yesterday! Guess it would be better to take it with us every time and not need it than to be without it. Just the little things like some clean clothes, your own comb, toothbrush, shampoo, etc. are sure nice to have with you!

Best laid plans... yeah... out the window.... lol !

Anniversary

2008-08-27T06:00:00.000-07:00

Today is hubby and my wedding anniversary. Not just any anniversary either, mind you, but out 25th anniversary! God is good!

What do we have to show for 25 years together? Not many earthly possessions; retirement accounts, vacation homes, new cars, etc. But we have been blessed with CHILDREN! Twelve and one on the way. Many would say we are "poor", but some understand the richness that children are in a marriage. We consider ourselves very rich indeed!

Yesterday our oldest son and daughter-in-law moved away.... up to northern British Columbia, where dear DIL hails from. We knew this day would come. It is bittersweet. We were so blessed to have them living so close for most of their first year of marriage.

This picture is probably one of the last times the whole family will be together for quite a while. You wouldn't believe how the moon, stars and tides had to line up just to get this picture taken (with a timer too)! **WARNING: for those of you with all younger children still, read ahead at your own risk... it is what happens when children become adults and are all going in different directions at the same time... but ignorance is bliss, so if you want to skip to the next paragraph, I don't blame you!** Second oldest son was flying home from being on staff at the YWAM base in San Francisco, CA all summer the day we took this picture. He was supposed to land at 2 pm. He missed his flight. He got home instead about 7 pm. We ate a hurried dinner together and took this picture. You see, this was the ONLY day we could because my husband would be at work the rest of the week, third son was moving out the next day (to an apartment around the corner from us - so nice!) and four days later fourth and fifth sons were leaving for a week at the YWAM Gleanings For The Hungry base in CA. They won't be back till after oldest son is gone. Did that all make sense? I could make a power point presentation of it...would that help?

So, we took the few minutes we were all together and with a borrowed flash unit (thanks Paul!) and some great editing from my sister (thanks Julie!) we have a picture of all of us together.

25 years... wow! We have so much to "show" for it, praise be to God!

Health Update

2008-08-26T16:08:00.001-07:00

Hi everyone!

This is Jerri's sister Jenny (otherwise known as Runningamuck). Jerri asked that I pass along information to you all.

She went to her regular ob appointment today and was letting him know how cruddy she's been feeling. Well, her urine test came back that she was severely dehydrated. (We suspect that's due to the meds and all the side-effects) So she's off to the hospital to be plugged in to some IV fluid. Hopefully once she's nice and hydrated the contractions will stay away, she'll need the meds less and she'll feel much better.

In the meantime, I know she would appreciate your prayers for continued health of the baby and that her poor, dried up veins would be easily accessible for the IV. She's got a bit of "record" of being difficult in that area. Not only would that delay her getting fluids but being a human pin-cushion isn't all that comfortable either.

At this point she has no idea if they'll keep her overnight but I'll be sure to pass along information as I get it.

Thanks for your prayers.

28 weeks

2008-08-25T09:26:00.000-07:00

By this week, your baby weighs nearly 2.3 pounds and may measure 14.8 inches from top to toe. At about this time, your baby can open his eyes and turn his head in utero if he notices a continuous, bright light shining from the outside. His fat layers are forming and his fingernails appear.

Another week completed...another week starting!

It is somewhat surreal to think that up to about 6 weeks ago we "thought" that I would be starting on bed rest TODAY. How quickly that all changed.

This last weekend was challanging. I started contracting again on Friday and this time the contractions didn't stop with just 24 hours of medication. They have finally stopped today, after three days of the medication and staying pretty much completely in bed (actually, my lower back hurt so much on Thursday that I spent that whole day in bed also....my contractions have started both times now the day after a low back ache starts... aha! A pattern!).

Today marks 10 weeks till we "hope" to deliver the baby... if things stay calm, no bleeding, no need to take the baby earlier because it will be safer "out" than "in". Ten more weeks of bed rest to get to that "hoped" for day. 70 days.... Okay, have to stop thinking about it that way. Every day inside me is a blessing, even if it is hard for me to be on such extended bed rest.

This is also the day/week that the real problems of this type of previa start to happen (which is why this would have been the week to "start" bed rest). Spotting, bleeding, etc. I feel like a time bomb.... ticking.... never quite knowing when (or if) it will explode. I have strict instructions from my OB that if I start spotting to go directly to the hospital. If it starts with bleeding call 911...immediately...do not delay! **gulp** See what I mean about the time bomb ticking?

On the home front, after getting a lot done on lesson plans for school the early part of last week, I hope to finish them up this week. We are planning to "start" school on Sept. 1st. All our books have finally arrived (what would I do without online ordering?). I think we have about everything we need for to get us to Thanksgiving.... though the best laid plans are great to have, there is no way to know how this will play out.

God knows and is with us today and will be there for whatever may come. We appreciate all your prayers for us!

27 weeks

2008-08-18T13:16:00.001-07:00

It has been 7 weeks since I last posted a pic of my baby bump. Oy, lots of growing in these last 7 weeks... all over. (ahem!)

Uh, yes, I did go outside to get a pic taken, on our way to church....which I do have permission from my OB to attend, for now, as long as I stay reclining. Hubby takes our outdoor chaise for me to recline on at the back of the auditorium. I feel a bit like Cleopatra and get a fair amount of ~~jealousy~~ ribbing for my "lounging" at church.

Another week "gained" for our little guy. Our countdown chart says 77 days to go. We've come a ways since our 100 days began!

My bookends....

2008-08-18T12:01:00.000-07:00

Oldest and youngest...get, ready, get set....

GO! Look Ma, no hands! (many years ago when his father did this with him, it would make my heart stop, but not anymore, I'm used to it now.... I think...)

Add a mid-air twist for more points.

Oldest with his lovely wife, their new puppy (dare I say our "grandpuppy"? **shudder** ) and the youngest.

This pic really captures our "current" youngest child's mischievous personality - she is a lot like her oldest big brother was at this age.

Now, don't even start asking who took these pics. I could lie and say it wasn't me, but I have twelve witnesses who would tell you otherwise. Yes, I escaped my room and recliner and went outside to be part of the fun (the big attraction was the puppy) and capture some of it with the camera. Being on bed rest means no one is taking any pics around here. Time is escaping us, to get some of these memories saved as pictures. You see, oldest and his wife are moving next week to her native British Columbia, Canada. So, I want/need to cherish these last few times we are together, for who knows when we will be together again?

For the record, I sat the whole time I was taking pictures outside and cherishing those moments.... just saying....

26 Week Update

2008-08-12T20:11:00.000-07:00

Quick recap: I have been on bed rest for about 4 weeks now for a complete/total placenta previa, earlier than we expected, because ultrasound showed the cervix was starting to change and the OB does not want that to happen.

I am now 26 weeks along, hoping and praying we can get to 38 weeks for a c-section delivery. Bed rest will continue until the baby is born.

If bleeding occurs I will be in the hospital most likely until the baby is born, which may then be early (preemie) depending on if the bleeding will stop or not.

Newest News: Last Saturday contractions started. We weren't expecting that! I went to the hospital to be monitored for a while. Medicine to stop the contractions was prescribed and is to continue to be used on an as needed basis (i.e. 4 or more contractions in an hour). The medicine has side effects that are not fun (massive headache for one). I have started dilating a bit.

At today's, 8/12, OB appt. the OB would prefer that I do even less (less trips down stairs; none would be better, etc.) and be reclined or laying down all the time. He also said I cannot drive myself anywhere anymore (because of the risk of having a bleed while alone in the car).

We so appreciate all your prayers for me, the baby, hubby, and the whole family. We can only take one day at a time and see what it holds. God is with us, each step of the way, holding us together.

Long distance Bible study/accountability

2008-07-30T18:34:00.002-07:00

I have really struggled for years to get into a routine of a quiet time each morning. There also just isn't time in my week, on top of homeschooling, cooking and cleaning, not to mention pregnancies and nursing baby's, to take part in a women's bible study group outside the home. That said, I have missed those things immensely.

Earlier this year two of my three sisters and I were all commiserating on these very points together and decided that we would do something about it. We decided that even though we live in three different states and two different time zones, that we would do a bible study together!

How would we be able to do a bible study, long distance, but together? I'm so glad you asked! We each do our study/prayer time as fits our schedules and then after we have completed it (or as soon as reasonably possible) we send an email to the other two sisters to share answers to study questions, insights and our prayer requests and praises. It has been SO great!

Currently we are studying John Piper's book "Don't Waste Your Life". There is a separate study guide you can buy (or download from here) to go along with the book. This has been the most challanging study we have done so far. Very deep, but not tons of work and reading to do each day.

Also, our third and youngest sister was able to join in when we started this study about a month ago. So, all four of us sisters are participating together in this! It is so cool! We are all in slightly different seasons of life (I'm the oldest child, by quite a lot, ahem, with 10 years separating me and my next sister, then 12 years between me and the next and 14 years between me and my youngest sister), living in different areas, involved in a wide variety of things, some of us homeschool, some public school, one has just had her first baby, etc. What is so cool is that with all these things that you might think would make it difficult to relate to each other at times, doing this bible study together each day, I feel, has really been drawing us closer and closer together. Our differences start to blur when we hear each day how we are struggling in the same ways and praying for each other and our families each day.

I have been asked by other women I know if they could join our "sister" bible study group. I have had to say "no". This is a closed group now. There are issues of trust and opening our hearts to each other that would be ruined by adding a stranger to our group. That said, there is nothing stopping anyone else from starting their own online/email bible study group.

You could form a group from people near and far, a group of ladies from you church, homeschool group, blogging friends, whatever! Just because it is email doesn't mean everyone has to live far away from each other. The point of doing it through email is for the sake of time, convenience and daily accountability.

We have gone through two other studies already this year. They have been awesome! We have stuck to books that offer either study questions within the book (sometimes at the back of the book offered as an option) or a separate study guide.

I don't think any of the three of us who did these studies can recommend these books highly enough! They were so great and God used them in such awesome ways in our lives, hearts, marriages, and mommy-ing! We started with "Lies Women Believe" by Nancy Leigh DeMoss. Then, we did "Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World" by Joanna Weaver. And, I already told you the study we are doing currently.

My encouragement to everyone is this: If you are not in a bible study group, but wish there was a way to fit one into your life, or if you have been struggling, like I was, to be consistent with a quiet time with the Lord and need accountability/encouragement there, find 2-3 other ladies (I think 4 is the max for an intimate group like this) who feel the same way you do (I bet they are easier to find than you would think!) and invite them to join you! Pick what you are going to study, set up your email addresses and choose your start date!

This would be a great way to start the new school year, coming up in about a month. You have time now to find your group, get your study materials and set your start date! You can never go wrong starting each day with the Lord and making Him a priority! Finding a way that makes it easier (I won't say easy) and with accountability and encouragement gives it a boost that will help it be lasting.

100 days

2008-07-26T14:44:00.000-07:00

My 4 year old daughter asked me AGAIN this morning when are we "getting" the baby. Today? Tomorrow? She somewhat understands that I am on bed rest to help the baby grow till he is big enough to be born and be healthy (we hope and pray). Somehow she isn't grasping how very long away that day will, hopefully, be.

I tried showing her on my pocket calendar (that I keep with me while I spend my days in the recliner in my room) where today is and flipped through August, then through September, on through October and finally landing in November. "This is when we hope the baby will be born". Her eyes glazed over a bit.

I realized two things in that moment:
1. She is too young to comprehend this amount of time.
2. I was suddenly very aware of just how LONG it is going to be, and was startled by the enormity of it. My heart did a little flip. Not the kind of flip it makes when my hubby walks into the room, mind you. The kind of flip that is edging toward panic.

I decided for my daughter's benefit, and also for my own, to make a countdown chart of the days "left to go" till we expect the baby to be born (at 38 weeks a planned c-section, praying bed rest will be enough to keep the placenta from bleeding before then). I added it up. It is exactly 100 days from today. 100 days. **gulp**

No wonder the Lord tells us to take one day at a time, not worrying about tomorrow. It can be overwhelming to look ahead at all those "tomorrow's" yet to come. Not just in my situation, but in many, many situations.

My daughter will have the joy of crossing off each day as it comes, watching as the numbers go down and hopefully gaining an understanding of just how many days till the baby arrives. And, for me? I will rejoice in each day that gets crossed off, not looking at how many are left, but how many we have crossed off, each day a victory and a blessing that this little one is still inside me growing and thriving.

Week 23 Update

2008-07-24T18:37:00.000-07:00

Well, let's really start with week 22...last week. The ultrasound I had done while in the hospital finally came back with a report to my OB and showed the cervix was shortening and starting to "funnel" (which is what it does right before it starts to dilate). Long story short, OB put me on bed rest right away to try to stop any dilation from occuring. If dilation starts, the risk and likelihood of bleeding from the placenta is very high. None of us want that. We want this baby to have a good many more weeks or months to grow inside of me and not in the NICU.

It took me a few days of gradually slowing down to get me actually off my feet, but I am doing it, with the help of a "borrowed" oldest daughter of 7, who has helped me the last 2 days while my husband and older boys are working.

This isn't a "in bed flat on your back" type of bed rest at this point. In my room, off my feet, not doing much, is what we are doing for now. If anything more starts to change, or if I have any spotting, it will be the flat on your back type of bed rest. The type I'm doing right now is hard enough...for me. I have to mentally take myself out of everything I ususaly do and find new ways to get it done, or let it go. It's all worth it for this little one!

My ultrasound and appt. went well today. Praise the Lord, nothing has changed. Meaning the cervix hasn't made any further progress in dilation or effacement (thinning). It also means, of course, the placenta is still completely over the cervix, but we really are not expecting that to change at this point. My doctor is pleased that taking it easy and staying off my feet is "working", keeping things calm and stable. So, this is the continued plan till the baby is born.

I asked if I could attend church, and he hemmed and hawed, but said I could for now (as long as nothing changes, no contractions, spotting, etc.) as long as I stay sitting during worship and go lie down on the couch in the nursing mom's room during the sermon.

I go back in for my next OB appt. in about 2 weeks, see him every 2 weeks till 30 weeks (Sept 8th ish), have another ultrasound at 30 weeks (providing nothing has happened before then, like contractions or spotting) and then see him every week till we deliver the baby around 38 weeks (Nov. 3rd ish).

My right kidney that had the infection appears from tests to be infection free, yeah, but on ultrasound it is enlarged and fluid is backing up in it. It does get uncomfortable at times, so that is probably what I am feeling. They want me to try to only lay on my left side to help the right side "drain" better and lay on my side a few times throughout the day too (I have spent most of my bed rest days sitting in the recliner in my room). Just need to help that kidney as much as possible so that it doesn't get infected again.

We continue to take everything one day at a time, praying that bed rest will be enough to keep things calm until 38 weeks. That would be a great miracle from God! And, if bleeding starts, we will deal with that as it happens and know God is with us there too.

Thank you all for your prayers for us...keep them coming!

A few days in a hotel....

2008-07-08T19:37:00.000-07:00

...would have been a lot more fun than spending the last 3 days in the hospital.

I woke up Sunday at 2 AM with extreme bladder and right side back pain. I mean, extreme. I tried to cope and get back to sleep, first with Tylenol, then 2 hours later with some Vicodin. Two more hours later I was whimpering/crying/thrashing with the pain. I tried taking a hot shower to see if I "just" had slept funny and that is why my back hurt so much. The shower didn't help and drying off and getting dressed made the back pain worse. I waited till a "decent" hour to call my friend Dana who is a midwife to get her opinion. She said "Go to the emergency room NOW". **gulp** Okay, okay.

Hubby took me to the ER at the hospital I am hoping to deliver at (we haven't ever used this hospital for a delivery, but I have been there for a couple of friends births and each time I am impressed), which is not very close to our house, about 20 min. away when there isn't any traffic. I walked/hobbled into the ER while hubby parked the car. They take one look at me and put me in a wheelchair. I tell them I'm 20 weeks pregnant and they call the labor and delivery dept. and basically decide they will send me up there and if they don't want me/don't think that is where I should be, they will send me back down.

This was a real blessing. I did not have to spend anytime sitting in the ER waiting room, or wait for hours to be seen, all the while in a lot of pain. I went right up to a tiny labor and delivery "observation" room (since I wasn't having a baby I didn't need the big rooms that are all set up for delivery's and newborn care). I was in a bed immediately, with tests being run, pain medicine administered and an IV started not long after I arrived.

Based on my symptoms and test results they were thinking bladder infection with a kidney infection and/or kidney stone. I was started on IV antibiotics, hydration and pain control. An ultrasound of the kidney didn't show any obstructions or stones, so we kept to the treatment of a kidney infection. Meantime, they monitored the baby a few times a day, but he/she is a very happy camper, in spite of my illness and misery.

I never knew kidney infections hurt so much. As my before-mentioned-friend Dana describes the pain, it is like someone in stiletto heals is stepping on your back, right through your kidney. Yup, that sums it up.

I spent Sunday, Monday and half of Tuesday in the labor and delivery dept, occasionally hearing the "noises" of transition or pushing and the delightful sounds of newborn baby cries. I think if I was closer to my due date it would have been harder to leave there without a baby in my arms. As it is I have 19 weeks till my due date, and about 17 weeks till my OB plans to do the c-section because of my still VERY complete, placenta previa (had an US of that while I was in the hospital, since I was just "lying around" with not much else to do and was going to miss my scheduled US at my OB's office, because I was in the hospital), barring any problems making an even earlier delivery necessary.

All the nurses were so great and they all said "good-bye for now, and I hope to see you when you come back to have this baby". I am so thankful I chose to go to this hospital. It was great!

For now, the plan is 10 days of oral antibiotics, pain relief as needed, rest, see the OB in a week, etc. Further out plans still include bed rest at 28 weeks, which is now 7 weeks away. AFTER I am back on my feet again, I need to get back to working on school planning and figure out what we are going to do about meals when I am on bed rest.

Our wonderful church family is helping us out this week and bringing in meals through the weekend.

After I got home today all I have done is mostly sleep. You know, a hospital can be a great place to "rest", but not so great for sleep. I haven't slept more than 2 hours in a stretch since Saturday night. It is no wonder that once I crawled into my own, comfortable bed, that I couldn't keep my little eyeballs open any longer.

Next up: trying to get ready for a family camping trip that is next week. Eek!

Random 4th of July pics

2008-07-05T13:11:00.001-07:00

Sparkler Fun!

2008-07-05T13:08:00.001-07:00

Half way there!

2008-06-30T11:14:00.001-07:00

Yes, 20 weeks today. And, an actual picture of me and my baby bump. Ultrasound is next week to check on that pesky placenta previa... For now, it is behaving itself.

Just a quick "warm weather" hello!

2008-06-28T09:53:00.000-07:00

Things are finally starting to grow and flower around here! We thought summer would never arrive, since spring never did! LOL!

This is what I call sneaky vegetation: Can you see the old mini-pumpkin shell in the background? Well, we dumped these into the back yard back in November to rot. I had hoped some of the seeds might survive, but it looked the whole thing rotted pretty well. Then, just a few days ago I noticed that something was growing up through the pansies! Was it weeds? Apparently not. Looking a lot like pumpkin plants to me. There are about 5 plants in this clump (poor pansies!) and 3 more plants in the clump below. Go figure!

Beautiful daylilies! These were "rescued" the week before the wedding last year from our friends "Shoeprints" beautiful gardens. Grandma was thinning and these plants were going to get tossed. I happened to be in the right place at the night time! I wasn't sure if they would survive, but they have! Beautiful burnt orange color!

A bit washed out in the strong morning sunlight, but here are some of the hydrangeas and white roses in the back yard.

Front yard: zinnia's above and hubby's favorite, black eyed Susan's below.

Happy Summer to you all!

Anyone else attending?

2008-06-19T12:55:00.001-07:00

The 14th Annual Oregon
Christian Home Education Conference
June 20 & 21, 2008
Oregon Convention Center
Portland, Oregon

For those of you who live in the northwest...will you be attending the home school conference this Friday and Saturday? If you are, be sure to stop by the Household of Faith Community Church booth in the exhibit hall between 11 am and 12 noon. Hubby and I will be at the booth during that time slot and would love to say "hi"!

(side note: attending this conference is how we decided to spend part of our "stimulus" check...as an investment that will bring dividends in our family and homeschooling)

If you live in the northwest and haven't heard about the conference yet, it's not too late to attend! For more information go here. Dr. Voddie Baucham is the keynote speaker....it's going to be great!

Hope to see some of you there!

It's the most awesome feeling!

2008-06-17T18:29:00.001-07:00

Yesterday we had dental appts. That is 5 cleanings, myself included, and one errant baby tooth that would not come out had to be pulled. I have had a cold/allergy/sinus infection THING for over a week now. Going to the dentist was not high on my list of things I wanted to do. (number one was crawling back into bed till my cold/allergy thing goes away) It was a necessary "evil" for the day, and once done, at least wouldn't have to repeated for 6 months. (side note: We do dentist appts. in two groups. Hubby had taken the first group a few weeks before my group went)

Having my teeth cleaned is not my favorite thing. Is it for anyone? And, by this point in pregnancy, my gums bleed just by looking at them and thinking the word "floss". Never-the-less, I settled into the hygienist chair and settled in for an hour of ~~torture~~cleaning.

Part way into the cleaning my little baby that is growing inside of me starts kicking. This is nothing new. I have been feeling this little person moving around since about 13 weeks (so about 5 weeks now). This is the earliest I have ever felt a baby start moving. Next earliest was my first daughter, who I felt moving at 14 weeks. But, I digress....

My little baby is bumping and kicking and stretching and I put my hand on my tummy where I feel him/her moving and, lo and behold, I feel the baby hit my hand! In all this time I have not been able to feel the baby from the outside. It is an incredible feeling. And, not only did I feel the baby hit my hand once, but like four or five times in a row! Bliss!

Contrary to what some people might think about a woman who has a lot of children, each child is special, precious and a miracle to me. Even the sweet nuances of pregnancy, like feeling the baby move for the first time, feel the baby kick from the outside for the first time, when the other children can feel the baby move from the outside for the first time, when the first hiccups are noticed, etc. are just as wonderful with my thirteenth child as it was with my first.

I do not know what the future holds for this little one and my funky placenta placement pregnancy, but yesterday God gave me a huge ray of sunshine into my dismal, sick with a cold, and having to be at the dentist anyway, day.

It was a good day.

God is good, all the time.

2008-06-11T10:37:00.000-07:00

Kim at Life In a Shoe has posted an excellent post about ectopic pregnancy and the sanctity of life. Check it out and be ready and open to possibly re-think what you have taken as standard thought in this area.

I posted a comment about my own experience with an ectopic pregnancy back when I was 20 years old and our first was 6 months old. If you scroll through the comments you'll find it. (yes, I know it is long comment...that's how you know it is MY comment! LOL!)

How great is God's love for us!

2008-06-06T11:50:00.001-07:00

The kids and I just love this video of the skit/mime done to the Lighthouse Everything song. I get very emotional watching it.

Ultraound results : 16 weeks

2008-06-05T11:05:00.000-07:00

Tuesday I had an ultrasound to check on the position of the placenta. It had been over the cervix for the first 10 weeks of this pregnancy. (picture to the left is not me, in case you were wondering)

I was 16 weeks Monday, June 2nd, so seeing the baby was awesome! So completely formed and kicking and touching his/her hands to the face, even watched the mouth open and close. Amazing! Baby looks great. We did not want to know the gender and we did not find out. He/she is a feisty little person... I already knew that, as I have been feeling the baby moving for over 2 weeks already. =)

What we did find out was the placenta is now completely over the cervix. This is a complete or total placenta previa. Not only that, but the WHOLE placenta is in the "lower segment" and the cord attaches right over the cervix (which my doctor called a "centroid" previa, but I haven't been able to find anything specific to that on the web). This makes that whole are very vascular - which means lots of veins attaching in the "worst" place they could attach. (See the graphic below - I believe the type of complete/total previa I have is like the middle one shown)

Monitoring the baby and plaenta via ultrasounds and OB appts. will be done frequently. I see my OB in 3 weeks and have another ultrasound in 5 weeks.

There is a lot of information about placenta previa's diagnosed this early in pregnancy moving up and away from the cervix before delivery. However, those are mostly from marginal or low-lying previa's or complete's where the cord attaches higher than right over the top of the cervix. I am not trying to be "doom and gloom" here, just looking at the facts. However, my God is a BIG God and I know He can and will do what ever He pleases with this placenta. We are praying it will move, but also to joyfully deal with it not moving and the complications that may arise, and not worrying in the meantime.

Note how in the graphic to the left that in this illustration of a total/complete previa, the cord is inserting into the placenta fairly high up and that a good portion of the placenta is above the lower segment. So it seems there are more than one type of complete/total previa.

The probability of bleeding problems later on with this type of previa is quite high. Because of this my OB said he will probably be putting me on bed rest at 28 weeks (that is in 11.5 weeks) and if I have a bleed I will probably be put in the hospital for the part or the rest of the pregnancy.

If I can make it further without needing an emergency c-section, they will schedule a c-section for 38 weeks, two weeks before the due date, because the risk of a bad bleed gets higher and higher, especially as contractions get stronger.

Because of this type of placenta previa, with the whole placenta being in the lower segment, my OB says the incision for the c-section will be done higher than the usual "low transverse" incision. (remember the whole lower area is full of placenta, no safe place to make an incision) There is also a much greater possibility of uncontrollable bleeding after they remove the placenta because that lower part of the uterus does not contract much at all, leading to uncontrollable hemorrhaging. Because of that, there is a higher "chance" of needing a hysterectomy to stop the bleeding. Though, my OB said he would do all he could for me, to avoid a hysterectomy (and went on to say, "so if we can get you through this delivery without a hysterectomy, hopefully NEXT TIME the placenta will implant higher up." Next time. Gotta love an a Christian OB who totally supports us in having a large family and even more children!).

It is a lot to process all in one day, isn't it? I do not want to borrow trouble or think the worse or worry about this situation, but leave it all in God's hands. There is also the part where I need to be doing what I can, especially after 28 weeks, to keep this baby safe and hopefully and prayfully, avoid any bleeds or complications.

I would greatly appreciate your prayers for me, baby, hubby and the whole family as we walk through this. None of us knows what tomorrow will bring. We can only pray and cling to our Savior for wisdom, direction and comfort for each day.

I have to add that there is MUCH I am thankful for right now. Thankful that we have a living, healthy baby (many of my friends have had miscarriages this year and I have greatly grieved with them over their losses ~ I am undeserving to be blessed again with another child and do not take fertility or that pregnancy equals a baby for granted). Thankful that we got an early diagnosis so that we can be preparing now for me to go on bed rest at 28 weeks. Thankful for friends and a great church family for their support and encouragement and offers of practical help once I am on bed rest. Thankful that my youngest is old enough that I don't have to carry her, since I am not supposed to be lifting heavy things. Thankful for a great, Christian OB who supports the Quiverfull mindset and is not using scare tactics and/or chastising us for having another baby or saying I have to have a tubal after this one. Thankful that God is always on His throne, always in control and always there to comfort us.

Revamping our church bag

2008-05-27T09:30:00.000-07:00

We attend an age integrated church, which means there is no nursery, Sunday School classes or Children's Church. We have a worship service for 2+ hours in which the whole family sits, sings and listens to the sermon together. To help the younger children learn to sit through an hour long sermon we have a church bag we take each week, with "quiet" things for them to do. (even though there hands are being kept busy, their ears still hear the sermon)

**please note: The intention of this post is not to debate whether or not children should be allowed to have things to keep their hands busy during sermons or not. This post is to give ideas and encouragement to those of us who choose to do this. Please do not submit comments to debate this. **

Lately I had noticed that our church bag was getting out of control. Too many old bulletins, broken crayons, unsharpened pencils, etc. Bleh! I also didn't like how awkward it is for the kids to get into all the different compartments of the backpack during the sermon. Zippers are noisy too. So, I decided to get a new bag, streamline what we take each week, and rotate what goes in it every couple of months. Here are the results:

Our "old" church bag - pink backpack with too many pockets, zippers and too much space to lose things in!

Contents of old bag- what a mess! (click to enlarge)

New items for quiet play for the girls: Woodkins dolls by Pamela Drake. Our chiropractor has had one in his office for years and my girls always play with it. These dolls will ONLY be in the church bag and the girls are not allowed to play with them any other time.

Here is how the inside of the new church bag looks after putting the things I want to have in it in. Using a smaller bag (and no noisy zippers!) will keep us from over stuffing it and changing out items every couple of months. Inside it are: a few coloring books, package of twist up crayons, two lacing items, two magna doodles (we love these for church use), several small, plastic animals (dollar store) and the Woodkins.

New church bag: fresh, clean and even pretty!

I would love to hear of what you use in your church bag/quiet play bag, so be sure share with us in the comment box.

Older posts and misc.

2008-05-24T10:34:00.000-07:00

Today I have been working on transferring some of my posts from what is now a locked blog ( I don't even post to anymore anyway) that I used when I first started blogging. You'll start to see them popping up and note the dates, as they were written in 2005-2006. Oldies, but goodies, I hope.

Here is a sweet picture of my oldest and youngest taken earlier this month. I love to watch my older boys interact with their younger siblings. It is precious!

Pack your bags...your movin'!

2008-05-23T15:48:00.000-07:00

Don't panic. Just my way of telling the children that room arrangements were a changin'. Yep, a change was in the air! Don't, I repeat, don't cross a pregnant woman with a plan that involves moving furniture.

(Or, is that just me? I move more furniture, rearrange more furniture/rooms and do more painting when I am pregnant that any other time. It's almost like an obsession. But not. You know, I'm totally okay with this. If I didn't do these things when I was pregnant ~ which has been roughly 133 months of my life so far ~ I would never get them done. I seem to be more productive while pregnant, in spite of the fatigue and nausea, than when I am not pregnant. Course, when I am not pregnant that means I am breastfeeding... I won't inflict on you how many months that has been.)

Because our second oldest is spending ~~more~~, ~~most~~, a lot of time in CA, it didn't seem like a wise use of our bedroom space to keep "holding" a bed/bunk and closet space for him. He is gone 3,4,5, even 6 months at a time. This also has had an effect on our third oldest, thinking he "deserves/needs" his own room. Ha. Ha haha ha! Bwhahaha!

Sorry, that got away from me there. **wipes tears from eyes**

Okay, where was I? Oh yes, moving orders. In our house we have 5 bedrooms upstairs. There are 10 children and two parents and one "floater" (the one who bobs back and forth between home and CA) to live in this space. The master bedroom is just for the King and Queen. We use our ~~massive~~, ~~large~~, quite handy walk in closet for our nursery and for our hanging clothes. Okay, what is left of my craft items are in there too. Our youngest has been living "in the closet" for 2.5 years now and it was time for her to move on OUT. Where to put her though? How to arrange the rooms to accommodate this change?

Here is a description of "the way things were":

Bedroom 1: Oldest boys, ages 19 and 21 on a bunk, with a small desk, bookshelf, bass and an amp. This is the second smallest bedroom.

Bedroom 2: Youngest boys, ages 8 and 11 on a bunk with a chest of drawers, drawers under their bed, a table and closet full of toys and games. This is the smallest bedroom in the house and has one of those funky angled walls on the door wall that you can't do anything with.

Bedroom 3: Middle boys, ages 13 and 16 on a bunk with a chest of drawers, drawers under their bed, a bookcase and a drum set. This is the second largest bedroom.

Bedroom 4: Girls room, ages 4,6,8 and 10. Two bunkbeds, one is our junior bunkbed, one standard size bunkbed and a dresser. Also in the room are all the girls toys: a wooden table, 3 chairs, play kitchen, play washer and dryer, large box/chest of dress up clothes, various baby dolls, cradles, and two doll highchairs. In the closet are more toys. This is the largest of the children's bedrooms (in another version of this house model this is a second family room, but in our model it is a bedroom with a closet and door into the room).

Bedroom 5: Master bedroom with nursery in the "closet".

PLAN: to move 2 year old out of the closet/nursery and into a bedroom.

SOLUTION: After much thought and possible scenarios, here are the new arrangements:

Bedroom 1: 21 year old's stuff moved out and into boxes in the garage. 19 year old stays. 16 year old moves in with his drum set.

Bedroom 2: In the boldest decision that was made, I have made this into a playroom/guest room. Which means all the play kitchen, doll and sundry other toys from the girls room have been moved into this room. The games, blocks and duplo's stayed in there from the previous occupants. There is enough space to move the toys aside and put a queen size blow up mattress on the floor for #2 son to sleep on when he is home/visiting or for when any other guests come to stay, but the rest of the time, 90% of the year, it is just a playroom. Woo hoo!

Bedroom 3: 8 and 11 year old sons move into this room with 13 year old son (much to his consternation) on a bunk and a single bed. We take out the bookcase and now have drawers under both the bunkbed and the single bed for storage/Lego space. I should note that the bookcase that was in this room was only being used to house completed Lego constructions and dust. Ahem. Sorry, I'm mean. No more "just to look" at Lego's. Build it, play with it, take it apart and MOVE ON.

(side note: I don't really hate Lego's, they are a huge thing in our house and I love the creative play they encourage in ALL ages, including my husband, but my primary concern is real estate people! Room for beds and sleeping comes before having a museum of creations on display.)

Bedroom 4: After moving all the ~~junk~~ play things out of the room, there was now room to move a toddler bed (crib mattress size) and a small chest of drawers into the room so that the two year old could be moved in the Girls Room. **Hallelujah chorus plays in background**

Bedroom 5: King and Queen enjoy a brief respite, until November, of having their room completely to themselves. BLISS!

So far the plan has worked out well. There is still an extra bookcase to be moved ~~downstairs~~, ~~to the garage~~, SOMEWHERE. There was actually more things taken out of rooms then put in that was new (like the toddler bed). A lot of empty storage bins/boxes got moved to the garage (sorry honey!).

I do hope to post pictures after I get things totally arranged and #2 goes back to CA at the end of this month. Aw, I might take one of the mess it is with the queen blow up bed and extra bookcase lying on its side just to keep it real. LOL. Two of the bedrooms that had never been painted (this was a new home with white on white on white decor when we moved in 2.5 years ago) have been painted in the last week. Also the kids/hall bathroom was painted (thanks #2!). And, ta da, we have patches of paint color in the master bathroom and upstairs hallway as I decide if I like those colors or not. Painting to be completed soon!

**********************************************************************************
As a "wee" side note, I have the privilege of caring for my 7 week old nephew while my sister works for 4 weeks (well, three more weeks now). This has been an interesting time for the younger children...seems it has been too long since we last had a baby in the house and they have forgotten the little noises, that crying is okay (not a lot of crying mind you, just the waking up and letting us know he is awake type and an occasional "I have a burp" variety) and that a 7 week old doesn't make a good playmate. LOL. It has also been a good refresher course for me. I'll be good and ready for our November blessing!

All that to say that I do hope and intend to post more often, but real life is my priority and having a newborn in the house, with a tired, pregnant, older momma to care for him and the other 10-11 children in the house (not that I am complaining ~ I love this life God has given me!), leaves me wanting a nap more than I want to get a post written up. I know you all understand.

There is joy in the journey ladies!

Romance? Originally posted 2/2006

2008-05-22T10:32:00.000-07:00

It seems a strange thing to us that most people smirk when David and I mention that we are working on improving the romance in our relationship. Apparently because we have twelve children they are led to believe romance is not a problem for us. David and I both understand that after the last little Davenport leaves home, (hard to imagine that time right now!), we do not want to be strangers and we want to still be madly in love!

One of our favorite scenes in the newer version of Cheaper By The Dozen is when Mr. Baker catches Mrs. Baker watching him as he walks toward their van. He says to her," You were checking me out, weren't you?". She admits she was. He smiles, does a sort of happy dance and says," Twelve kids and we still have the heat!". That the parents are still married and in love is probably the best message in this movie.

It always fascinates me how God works in both of our hearts, separately, but at the same time on the same issue. To say our relationship gets a bit strained with sharing a house with 10 children (our oldest two are at Gleanings in CA as mission builders - not sure how long they will be there but possibly till the end of summer 2006), and having a nursing newborn who doesn't always sleep through the night, is an understatement. We miss having quality time together. Just a chance to talk without being interrupted. Or, as my friend Dana says, being able to talk to someone I haven't given birth to! One of the things I was working on to keep our relationship fresh was:

a)carving out special time together at home

b)plans to surprise David with rearranging our room, painting it and making it generally nicer

I will write about what I have done for part (a) on a later post. For now, I will focus on part (b). I got the room rearranged one day while David was at work. Shortly after this he was inspired to think about making our room nicer and searched the web for ideas. He found an article I will add the link below for you to read (Disregard the Feng Shui stuff in the article - there is a lot of other good info in it.) After reading the article we both got to thinking of all we could do to make our room a beautiful "love nest". Of course my surprise was shot, but for the better. I got to go shopping for new bedding and drapes and next is paint. I never would have made such a dramatic change without David wanting it done! But this is going to turn out 10 times better than what my surprise ideas were!

The Lord really blessed us with helping me find beautiful things all on sale or clearance. (Like a $375 bedding set for $112!) I am going to attempt to remake our bedside lamps to match the new decor (That was David's idea - spray paint and trim right?). I even found a room screen (one of those with 3 sections that you can fold up) in a cherry stain finish (which is what we have on our bedroom furniture) on clearance at Fred Meyer. It was normally $119.00 and I got it for $39.00! Oh, I got it to hide the treadmill in our room since moving it out of our room is out of the question for now. So, you don't have to spend a lot of money to make your bedroom nicer.

I will post a picture when we get the room all done. It's all the painting that will take a while. Hopefully it will be soon though!

Here is my challenge to you: after you read this article plan to do (or just do it!) one thing that is suggested as a good change for your bedroom. You could also share the article with your spouse and makes some plans together. Share your thoughts and results in the comment section please! No change is too small. De-cluttering is a huge thing and a great place to start.

I have also posted below a link for a great book to read together with your spouse. It is a study of the Song of Solomon, and you can use it as an 8 week bible study or just read it together. It has a section on making your bedroom a special place; a place that is relaxing, comfortable and beautiful. They refer to it as "Engedi". This book would also make a great Valentines gift for your sweetie. Maybe even read it together by candlelight in a nice, warm bubble bath!

Lastly, I've put a picture of the before and after of our nightstand lamps I painted to match our "new" room. They were very plane, light blue to start with and I spray painted them with a gold "stone" spray paint. Then, with a hot glue gun, I added some goldish brown trim from the fabric store to the top and bottom edges of the lamp shade. New lamps would have cost at least $10 a piece and it is unlikely I would have found any to match our new colors for that price. With the spray paint and trim it cost me less than $10 to re-make both lamps.

Blessings,
jerri

10 Sure-Fire Feng Shui Tips for More Romance - By Kathryn Weber
http://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/Weber6.html

Intimacy Ignited - By Joseph and Linda Dillow
Conversations Couple to Couple: Fire Up Your Sex Life with the Song of Solomon

The Royal Bedroom

2008-05-22T10:21:00.000-07:00

~Originally posted 2/2006~

The "before" picture:

White walls, white trim, white fixtures,white, white, WHITE. The original owners bought the basic white, and no upgrades when they bought this house.(long story, but they sold it 2 months after buying it last June - to us - because they had to move out of state for a job. We are slowly getting things painted and adding color and wood trim, etc. to the house.

After reading the article I mentioned in a previous post we decided to go with really rich colors.

After pictures:

Our children call our room the "castle room" because it looks like where a king and queen would live. Well, it is where the king and queen live, so we call it the royal bedroom now! For some reason my camera is having a hard time getting the colors to look right and be in focus at the same time. So I've posted two different pics for you to see.

If you are interested in a bed canopy you can buy one for $19.99 plus shipping at ABC Distributing. They come in white or ivory. I actually bought one in white first, because I was getting it go with the quilt in the "before" picture. We tried it with the new bedding, but it was too white to go with all those rich earthy colors. So, got an ivory one. If anyone who is local to me would like to buy the white one from me, I'll sell it to you for what it cost me. It is a bargin compared to what they cost in stores! It would make a great Valentines Day surprise! And, it is easy to install!

Romance: Making Special Time

2008-05-22T10:00:00.000-07:00

~Originally Posted 2/2006~

My hope here is that by my sharing some of the things I have come up with lately to make sure hubby and I have special time together, that you will be inspired and come up with your own ideas. Obviously, all our situations are different and my ideas may not work for your situation. Try to use my ideas as a springboard to help you come up with your own. You have to decide what will work best for your situation. The most important thing is to try something! It doesn't have to be for Valentines Day, but that might be fun if you didn't think you could do something special for your honey that day!

Let me start by sharing the things that make it difficult for my husband and I to get out for a date or have special time together lately. The biggest obstacle is the nursing baby. She just turned 3 months old and is not much fun to take to a restaurant or a movie, etc. She prefers to eat, be up for about an hour and then sleep till the next feeding. She does not, however, like to be in the car or her carseat for that matter. Another obstacle is my husbands work schedule. He works a condensed work week. That means he works 3 days one week and 4 days the next, but the days he works are 13+ hour days. In the mornings he leaves before I get up and he gets home pretty close to the time I am going to bed at night. On the days he is home we tend to be just a tad busy with raising and schooling our ten children who are still at home, working on the house, fixing whatever has broken while he was working the previous week, etc. Sometimes it seems like whole weeks sneak by without us getting anytime alone together. The other big obstacle are the ten children at home. We hardly ever get to talk to just one another. There is always someone asking us something, or interrupting us. You get the picture.

I decided that I would have to MAKE special time happen. If I/we didn’t plan it, it just wouldn’t happen! But, what could I do here at home to make a special, romantic interlude for my hard working hubby and I? Here are the things I have come up with and tried so far:

1.A bubble bath at night:
This is one I could do on a day hubby worked. I decided ahead of time I was going to do this so I got a little nap so I wouldn’t be so tired when he got home. He gets home after the youngest children are asleep, so when hubby got home I got him his dinner, gave the older kids their bedtime instructions, and then grabbed hubby and towed him upstairs to our room for the bath. Candles and low lights made it a really relaxing time, where he could soak his aching muscles from a hard days work and we could just sit and talk without being interrupted.

2.Picnic date in our bedroom: This works well for us because our room is really big and the baby’s room in in one half of our walk-in closet. I sent hubby out to pick up a nice dinner from a local steak place (so we didn’t have to cook), while I got the kids dinner made and set up our picnic area. I put comforters and pillows on the floor, put my laptop on a box so we could watch a movie while we ate, brought up the good china and glassware and lit lots of candles around the room. After hubby got back we told the older boys they were in charge (get dinner and bedtime done with the younger kids) and were not to disturb us unless there was an emergency. So, we ate our yummy steaks by candlelight while watching a movie together. When the baby woke up to eat I just brought her to the “picnic” and nursed her, played with her and put her back to bed for the night. It was very relaxing!

3.Weekend “Away” but at home: I had planned to surprise hubby by arranging for our children to spend Friday and Saturday nights at our friends house (wonderful friends!). Hubby would have to work Saturday ( he works every Sat.), but would have Sunday off, so we could have some time together Friday night, have breakfast together Sat. and he could also stop by for lunch with me on Saturday. Then we would have Sat. night through Sunday afternoon all to ourselves! (well, baby would be with us). About two weeks before the secretly planned weekend, my husband gets asked to work a Wed. for co-worker and the co-worker would work hubby’s Sat. shift. Wow! Hubby then said we should see about having our friends watch the kids so we could have a weekend alone! Great minds think alike! LOL! I had to share my secret, which was kind of a bummer, but he was very happy to know I had been working on it and told me to keep that idea for another time. We stayed at home instead of a hotel, which saved us money, got to sleep in our own bed, in our new beautiful bedroom and baby got to sleep in her own bed. Hubby got take-out food for a few of our meals so I wouldn’t have to cook too much, too!

The most important ingredient in these ideas is PLANNING AHEAD OF TIME. Gone are the days of being spontaneous. At least for the season we are in right now. It takes just a little effort to pre-plan a romantic interlude. Remember that these are just ideas. You may have to adjust them or come up with your own idea. I would list a few more ideas, but hubby reads this blog and I don’t want to give away any of my secret plans! LOL!

Please share any of your own ideas you have done for dates at home. The more ideas the better!

The perfect table for a BIG family!

2008-05-22T09:00:00.000-07:00

~Originally posted 11/2005~

Our new, big, Amish table arrived just in time for Thanksgiving! With all 13 leaves in the table will seat 24! Yeah!

We can't say enough good things about this table and highly recommend it to any growing, large family or a family that likes to entertain a large group. We love being able to fit everyone and guests at the same table! The craftsmanship is superb! They package it oh so carefully for shipping too. You will not be disappointed!

If you ever decide to order from Amish Tables, please use my email (jerri_d@comcast.net) or name as a reference please!

Spring Cleaning

2008-04-30T16:25:00.001-07:00

Most of you have probably noticed some changes to my blog layout. Isn't it bright and cheerful looking? I need that right now. Spring just won't come and "stick" here in Oregon this year for some reason. Woke up to temps in the 30's again today. We are really ready for spring!

This blog makeover isn't done yet, still "under construction", so hang on and check back once in a while to see the changes.

We have been making some changes with how we are using our bedrooms and sleeping the children too. I'll write more about it later, hopefully soon.

If you have spring where you live, enjoy it for me!

Some of you guessed right....

2008-04-30T12:10:00.000-07:00

Yes, I am pregnant. God is good.

In the midst of being so sick and having mercury fillings removed, chelation IV's to knock down my high metal levels, having allergy testing (found out I am severely allergic to grasses and moderately allergic to egg whites, carrots and a bunch of other foods, but egg whites effect my life the most as I eat 2-3 eggs every day. Now I just eat the yolks and it isn't quite the same) and trying to figure out if I have this rare mast cell disease (or a mast cell activation disorder, sorry, it's complicated) I found out I was pregnant. And, I started feeling better. Oh yes!

For several weeks I felt better than I had since I got really sick back in October 2007. Then, of course, the early pregnancy tiredness and all day morning sickness set it. Still all good because it helped me know the pregnancy was still going, which was a major concern to me because I have been spotting for most of the pregnancy so far. Several hcg quantitative blood levels and three ultrasounds later and we now know baby is snug as a bug, but the placenta is over my cervix. So, I'm supposed to be taking it easy, which is about all I have able to do being so nauseous and tired already. lol. Doctor said yesterday that I basically can have no fun till the placenta moves (praying it will, too early to know yet what will happen though). \

I also was told at my appt. yesterday that I HAVE to have a c-section. I was really hoping to be allowed a VBAC, but apparently the current standard is if you have had ONE section you can have a VBAC, but once you have had two sections you are now "always-a-section". Disappointing, but I still get to have a baby, so that is good.

You know, being at the OB yesterday and in a waiting room of 20 year old ish mom's to be, I started feeling pretty old. Not just old, down right elderly, in the childbearing arena that is. It seems strange enough to be pregnant and having a married son. I'm sure it would be stranger yet if I already had a grandchild. Oh well. I'm sure I'll get over it. I'd rather be having another baby than care what other people think about my advanced maternal age. The nurse at my OB's was great. She told us how they had two 47 year olds and one 50 year old patient have babies last year. Hey, I'm younger than that! (43 in May if you must know)

So, here we are, embarking on another grand adventure in pregnancy and parenthood. Thanks for being along for the ride.

Something new

2008-04-22T19:33:00.000-07:00

Wonder what it is?

Guess!

Check this out!

2008-04-22T07:14:00.000-07:00

One of my sisters has started a blog and is participating in the Bloggy Giveaways that are going on right now. You will so want to see what she is giving away! It is something that has to do with a long standing family tradition for celebrating and memorializing (is that a word?) birthdays. Check it out and enter to win! Mention you found her site from TOGG (Trophy of God's Grace) in your comment please. =)

Very old pic of me and my youngest on her first birthday.
She is now almost 2.5 and I don't have braces anymore, whew!

Pss...Jen, if you ever start an affiliate program, remember I am first on the list.

Fireproof Teaser Trailer: from the makers of Facing the Giants

2008-03-29T09:02:00.000-07:00

Coming Fall 2008. Check out the website for the movie and read Kirk Cameron's bio information (click on "About Fireproof", then click on "Cast Bios"). How he got involved in this movie is an encouraging story, to me.

Is it really March already? SERIOUSLY?

2008-03-02T09:28:00.000-08:00

Sorry I haven't posted in so long. Ongoing health issues keep me just trying to survive some days. As a bit of an update, we have a lead on a possible diagnosis for what is the root issue of my health problems. When we know more I will post about it. For now, my doctor is looking into finding the "right" doctor/specialist to send me to for this possible diagnosis.

Thanks to all of you who took time to leave comments! I so appreciate that! What I have ended up going with is Visions Glass Cookware by Corning. It is quite expensive on Ebay or to buy at the few places that still sell new pieces (they no longer produce this line), but God has blessed me greatly and I have found several pieces at my local Goodwill for very little money! I am still using my Stainless Steel large cook pot, which is so-so,(it doesn't have a flat bottom and so doesn't work well/heat evenly on my flat top stove). I also was able to find some non-aluminum deodorant on clearance at Walgreen's for like $0.70 each. So, I stocked up on several of those. Once those are gone I will look into some of the other options you wonderful readers have mentioned. =)

So, besides all that STUFF, what is going on around our household? Perhaps the biggest new thing is my goal to really work at saving money this year by lowering my grocery, household supplies and toiletries bill. I have learned a lot through many wonderful websites and blogs, especially about coupon shopping. I'll be sharing more on this in a future post. Let's just say just the thought of the Sunday paper coupon inserts set my heart a'flutter these days! LOL!

With following a stocking up while items are at their lowest prices plan I have saved some serious money! I have stayed away from Costco almost entirely, because as it turns out, most of the items I buy there, though not all, can be bought for less when those items are on sale when you have a coupon to go with them. Also, finding really good deals (and knowing what a good deal is) has allowed me, for instance, to buy 80/20 hamburger meat at Safeway on sale for $0.99 per pound (this was still from the butcher block and not those somewhat strange "tubes" of hamburger meat - I have an aversion to buying meat I can't SEE). As a comparison, I was (blindly) buying 88/12 hamburger meat at Costco for $2.59 per pound. I say blindly because I had it in my mind that Costco always has the best prices. Wrong.

I'll admit, I was skeptical at first. So, I took the time to go through Costco and make a list of all the items I usually buy there, price per pound/ounce/etc. so that I can refer to that when I look at grocery ads each week. That has really helped!

I also made a change in what I buy for chicken. To save time, ahem, I have bought the skinless/boneless chicken breasts at Costco for years, which turns out costs $2.31 per pound. Well, I am now buying whole chickens and finding them on sale, and then stocking up on them (my full size freezer is getting quite the workout now!) for $0.68 per pound! Yes, more work and with the chicken breasts there isn't any waste, but the savings is significant! It is also better for my kids to stop being so picky about white meat and thinking dark meat is unhealthy or such. LOL.

I will admit that finding enough coupons to make it worth it for a family of our size was a challenge at first. But, I swallowed what little pride I have (let's face it, people offer us their hand-me-downs pretty often, and the first time they do they are always afraid of offending,but I say who cares if they are hand-me-downs, bring them on!), lol, and starting knocking on neighbors doors (well, two of them) and now one neighbor gives me all their coupon inserts each week! Plus I asked a friend who I knew gets the paper if she used hers and so when we see each other she gives those to me. AND, my wonderful husband even asked around at work and I usually get 1-2 sets of inserts and food day grocery store ads (that gets me extra Safeway doubler coupons and coupons, which I use one set at Safeway and another at Albertson's - they take any grocery store competitor coupons) each week. Plus, if there is an especially GREAT coupon insert Sunday paper I can always buy an extra paper for $1.50. That is a small cost when coupons are saving me over $100 or more each week.

I am also learning lots about Register Rewards, Easy Saver Rebates, Single Check Rebates and Catalina's.

I also find myself with lots of coupons we won't/don't use. Two of my sisters are swapping coupons with me that we have extras of, but I'm thinking of a more organized way to do that. I just read about a coupon "train" and it sounds interesting.

Leave me a comment if you are interested in hearing more about coupon saving shopping, if you are already doing this and how you like it, and if you are interested in a coupon train (you need to already be doing coupon shopping and clipping the Sunday newspaper inserts each week).

I hope to make a post full of great links for everyone to explore; from the beginners basics, to online grocery coupon printing sites (yes, these are totally legal and the grocery stores take them), freebie sites, and MORE!

Happy March!

Health Update

2008-01-13T11:22:00.000-08:00

Several of you have asked about my health and mentioned that you are still praying for me. THANK YOU! I so appreciate your prayers. For now, I am better, but not 100%. What that means is I am back to being able to do most of the things I used to do, with a few bads days here and there that I have no energy and get a bit dizzy again. My jaw has also started acting up again, so I am back in physical therapy too.

There are still some tests coming up this month to explore what is going on inside of me. One is coming up this week for a specialized test to see if there is any low level infection in my jawbone. A low level, ongoing infection can certainly drain the body and harm the immune system. We will be traveling to the state north of us, about 4.5 hours, from home for this appt.

The following week I will be having an upper and lower endoscopy to see if there is anything amiss since I had several bacterial infections in my gut. Though I will be sedated for this, the day before it you have to do a serious cleanse that is sure to be less than fun. =)

My doctor also tested me for heavy metals and I came back off the chart for, of all things, aluminum. Chelation therapy, which we already started, will help with this. I also have to try to remove as much environmental exposure as possible. Okay, so maybe I'm the last person on the planet to stop using anti-persperent (it has aluminum in it)? You know, for women, there aren't many choice of just "deodorant" on the market. I found one by Tom's of Maine. Next, most of my pots and pans are aluminum. **groan** So, now I am trying to figure out what to replace them with. Stainless steel? Cast iron? If anyone has any suggestions I would love to hear them! I'm leaning toward cast iron, at least for skillets,(though I am apprehensive over their weight, as I have weak muscles with this "illness"), but what am I going to replace my 8 qt. pot that I cook nearly every day in?

So, this is where I am right now. Some days I get discouraged. The Lord is so good to see that on those days someone sends me an email or a blog comment or a note in the mail that encourages me!

I so appreciate your prayers for me, my family and for my doctors to have wisdom.

Fighting Discontent

2008-01-13T09:43:00.001-08:00

There are a couple of things I have been trying to do consistently lately to help ME with spending and contentment. It has to do with temptation. Stores and marketing departments spends wads of money to TEMPT us. Tempt us to spend more than we should, more than we intended, more than we can afford. And, even if we don't succumb and buy something we are tempted by, we can feel discontent and brood over the "I wish I had enough money to buy ________". Enough already.

Here are two ways I am finding help me deal with this issue:

1. Costco. Since I can't go into Costco with blinders on, the best thing for ME is to simply go to Costco less. Of course, taking a list, sticking to it, all help too. I used to be better about this because our full size freezer was easy to access and I could fill it up on one Costco trip a month. Then, when we moved two years ago, there wasn't a good place for our freezer anymore. Oh, it was plugged in and occasionally held a few items, but it got harder and harder to get to. So, I stopped my once a month Costco trip and started going as often as once a week! Egads! Waste of time, waste of gasoline, and four times the temptation to add a couple "extra" things to the cart each week.

My darling husband recently found a way to rearrange the garage so that the freezer is accessible again. Yeah! Now, I can go back to once a month Costco shopping, stock the freezer with meat and chicken and avoid extra temptation. Of course, I still have to pretend I have blinders on when I go in, even once a month. You know, avoid everywhere but the food sections. lol. I tell you, those marketers are good... they make you have to go past all the extra stuff before you can get to the food.

2. Catalogs. Ugh. Am I the only one who doesn't appreciate a mailbox full of catalogs? Half the time I'm not interested in what they are selling, so those are easy to take directly from the mailbox to the paper recycling bin. But, it is that other half... the ones I do occasionally make a purchase from online...that have items that do tempt me. What's a targeted consumer to do?

And as if it isn't enough that catalogs tempt me, there are ones that come in the mail that tempt my kids too! And I'm not talking just at Christmas time. My all time favorite to dislike when the kids get to it? Birthday Express! The kids can devour that catalog and dream and plan birthdays a year in advance. And it all leads to discontented hearts because I'm not buying anything from that catalog. What's a mother to do?

For the last couple of months I have been taking ALL the catalogs straight to the paper recycling bin, even if it is the Eddie Bauer catalog. I don't let the kids look at any of the catalogs that come in the mail, if I can help it. I am trying to get better at this. Avoiding temptation is so much easier than dealing with discontented hearts!

Then today I found out about Catalog Choice! Though it is a good exercise in character for me to keep dumping catalogs without looking at them, it would be even better if they never sullied my mailbox in the first place (not to mention the waste of paper, ink, postage, etc.). Catalog Choice is a free service that allows you to opt out of receiving catalogs. Sign up, browse through all the catalogs that are already linked to this service, find the one(s) you don't want to receive anymore and hopefully within a couple of months your mailbox will be catalog free (your postal delivery person will thank you too!). If you are still receiving catalogs after you opted out, it is just another click of a button to report this.

It is best if you have the catalog(s) in front of you when you are opting out, so that they can include your customer number (even if you've never bought anything from them, you have this number!) in the opt out request. You don't have to include this number and I'm pretty sure even without that number they can find you and remove you from their list. That is what I did, since I don't have any catalogs around.

It does take a few minutes to browse through the whole list of catalogs. If you know exactly which ones you receive you can go directly to those. I discovered that there are a lot more catalogs I am receiving than I realized. I found 29 that I was really sure of. TWENTY-NINE!!! There are a few more that go to my husband, so I need to set up an account for him so that we can opt out of those too. There are also a few I'm not sure I receive anymore. So, I'll look at the catalog titles when they come in the mail and if I haven't opted out on any of them yet, I can add them to my list. I can also add back in the customer account numbers at any time.

1 Timothy6:6-12
Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. But as for you,O man of God, flee these things. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith.

This is a passage I need to mediate on as I shop, browse a catalog, browse the internet, etc. I have a long way to go. I have found over the years that discontentment has many, many faces. Just when I think I have conquered discontentment, I find that I haven't really conquered it, just perhaps one form of it and maybe only for that day!

What have you found helps you in this area? Share your tips in the comments section and after there are several I will make a post with them so we all can learn from each other.

It has been a great year!

2007-12-28T09:33:00.001-08:00

Our 2007 Family Photo

This year, like most, has had its ups and downs. New this year was having one of our children get married. There is no way to express the great joy we have experienced as parents and as a family, as we moved into this new "season" of life. There have been many hard times, hard years, tears, and prayers to get to this point. Some years we were sorely discouraged, not knowing and not understanding God's path for this child. Yet, God has been faithful to continue the work He has started in the child. In the book Passionate Housewives Desperate for God, page 40, the author's friend Janet is quoted as saying, "How would I have learned patience and trust in a sovereign God, were it not for wayward children?" . God has a purpose in everything.

And so, here are some of my favorite pictures of the wedding to share with you. But don't be deceived. Pictures are just a moment in time, and though they are beautiful, they do not tell the whole story. Be encouraged, as you wipe runny noses, wash the laundry, potty train and teach your children to read.... The glorious fruit of your labors is just around the corner. Keep the goal in sight, and do not grow faint of heart.

No parking, no lines, shop in your pj's

2007-11-17T15:14:00.000-08:00

One of the ways I have found that really helps with shopping for this mother of twelve is online shopping. Saves on gasoline, time in traffic, those parking nightmares that will start in less than a week, and I don't even have to put on make-up! Amazon is by far my first and favorite choice whenever I shop online. Almost always the lowest price and free shipping (for orders $25 and over in most cases). What's not to like?

On "Black Friday" Amazon will be offering hourly deals from 6am to 6pm PST along with thousands of products on sale for a limited time. Also, customers will get gift wrapping for $.99 per item. Click here for a direct link to their Black Friday specials.

They don't have the specials listed yet, so bookmark the page and check back, especially next Friday!

P.S. Yes, I am an Amazon affiliate...though I've never made a dime at it, lol. Affiliates can't make a commission off their own sales, rats! If you aren't already shopping through an associate I would be honored if you would use my link for your Amazon shopping. It doesn't change your price in anyway whether you shop through an affiliate or not. With all this sitting around being sick earning a little toward a new book to read would be great!

Tis the season....almost

2007-11-15T10:16:00.000-08:00

I was perusing Meridith's blog today and came across this post of hers, which reminded me of a post I wrote last December. I got to thinking it is a good one to recycle this time of year and remind those of you who thought, "hey that is a good idea, I'll try it next year". Well, here it is ladies...next year. lol. I'd love to hear from you if you are going to try this method this year and then your results/review after Christmas as to how it went, how you liked it.

It used to be that we would keep all the Christmas gifts for our children in our closet until Christmas Eve and then dear hubby and I would stay up late wrapping like crazy to get it all done AND still get a few hours sleep before the children woke up. That wasn't too bad of a system for our family when we had, say less than six children. Yet, as our family size grew, our closet stayed the same size. It became impossible to get into the closet to get to our clothes with all the gifts being "hidden" in there. With twelve children and even with trying to limit the amount of gifts, even 2-3 gifts times twelve is, well, too much for our closet to handle!

I think it was my smart hubby who came up with the solution we have been using for several years now: We wrap gifts as soon as we want, before or after the Christmas tree goes up, but instead of putting names on the gifts we use a number system. Wrap the first gift, slap a number "1" on it and on our master list that we keep hidden away till Christmas morning I write who number "1" goes to. And, so on till all the gifts are wrapped. This way, the gifts our out of our closet, are already wrapped (much less stress and more sleep Christmas Eve!) and the children do not know who's gift is who's so they are not tempted to try to "peek, shake or rattle" the gifts as they sit for weeks under the tree.

This year (edited to note: this was 2006), we put the tree up on December 4th and on the 6th hubby and I wrapped 26 gifts, which was the bulk of them, but a few more are still on the way from doing 90% of our Christmas shopping online this year (another life saver for the busy mom of twelve!).

This is also a good idea for families of any size who have kids who like to "peek", or compare how many gifts they each have under the tree ("sister has 5 and I only have 4 - waah!).

And no, we don't do Santa at our house, so there isn't any confusion as to why there are gifts under the tree before Christmas Eve.

Happy wrapping!

To give or not to give...and what to give, that is the question!

2007-11-15T09:30:00.000-08:00

This post about Cheerful Fruglaity at Frugal Hacks was too good to not pass along, especially since we are already on the topic of Christmas gifts today.

Note to family members who read this blog: don't read the comment I left on the post Cheerful Frugality please. Don't want to spoil any surprises! LOL! No peeking!

ClearPlay- can't say enough good about it!

2007-11-09T13:59:00.000-08:00

Click here to see three brand new short video's about ClearPlay and how it works. This link also takes you to a special sale price of $59.99, which includes a free trial membership.

The three short video's are titled:

1. How ClearPlay Works
2.ClearPlay Movies
3.ClearPlay Demo

A ClearPlay unit would make a great Christmas gift for the family, if you don't already have one.

Love how my older boys play with their younger siblings

2007-11-08T15:29:00.000-08:00

Another set of priceless pics, taken 5 days before my oldest, 22 y.o., got married in September.

How many sisters can you carry on your back and still move?

Hang on! He's turning around!

All fall down.

So fun to watch....

2007-11-08T12:27:00.000-08:00

It is so fun to watch my older boys play with their younger siblings. Here are a few captured of my 18 y.o. playing with his almost 2 year old, youngest sister.
Priceless!

Hanging up my "Super Mom" cape...

2007-10-24T12:26:00.000-07:00

In case anyone is wondering what happened to me since the wedding, rest assured I am still alive. My health has taken a bit of a bad turn and so I haven't focused much on blogging. I won't bore you with the details and we still don't know everything (waiting on some more blood test and MRI results). Hoping and praying to have enough information for the doctor to put it all together and decide on a treatment plan. He knows what some of the issues are but doesn't want to miss anything, so waiting to start some treatments until he has all the info. While I do appreciate the thouroghness, it is hard to wait to start treatment. I do want to start feeling better.

Meanwhile, God is teaching me much about my expectations verses what my body can do right now. I am having to lay low..not exactly bedrest, but I can't do much more than that. Learning how to run the household from my room, do school in my room, entertain the kids in my room etc. We had a church activity at our house for the group that went to Gleanings for a week in August (not the two weeks we were there, but one of our sons also went with our church for an additional week) and the youngest seven and I stayed upstairs in my room and had a picnic dinner on the floor and watched a movie on my laptop. The kids ate crackers, almonds, cheese sticks, grapes, and carrots. We had a great time!

This new season of mom being sick may turn into a whole topic here, as I learn how to cope with these new circumstances and still homeschool, keep the house in some sort of order and take care of myself at the same time. I think my older children are and will be learning more about cooking, lol. I am learning how to ask for help even in things that seem so simple. For instance, if I can get one of the kids to take my dirty laundry down to the washer on Saturdays, I can start it (I like to check for spots and stains that need treating before the washer starts and the kids aren't too good about that aspect of laundry), have the kids move it to the dryer, then bring the dry clothes up to me in my room and I can sit on the floor and fold the laundry without wearing myself completely out. It is hard to depend so much on others, but I am being forced to learn.

Appreciate your prayers for wisdom for my doctor and healing for my body. I also want to learn all that God has for me to learn during this time, enjoy it as much as I can, in that I have more time to just snuggle with my kids, read to them,etc. And, yes, it is a bit sad that it takes me getting this sick to slow down enough and "smell the flowers". I have been blessed with a lovely garden of children and it is too easy to be so caught up in the day to day busyness of a big family that I miss out on actually really, REALLY, enjoying my children/flowers. Breathe deeply of the oh-so-sweet fragrance of each child!

THE WEDDING!

2007-09-24T17:57:00.000-07:00

Just a quick pic of our family, now 15 of us, that was taken by a friend the day of the wedding, September 22nd. Won't have the pics from the photographer for a couple more weeks. Nice to see how we looked even from the side view of this pose.

We've done it! We have a married child! Wow! It was a great wedding! We had a lot of fun getting to know our new daughters parents and her siblings (all from Canada). The bride and groom are off enjoying the sun and sand, and each other, in Cancun!

It has been an incredibly busy time for us and now we need to take some time to re-group as a family and get back to a routine and start school. Well....we'll get to that in a few days, after the rest of the wedding guests have gone home.

Russian Region to Host Day of Conception

2007-09-11T12:58:00.000-07:00

Amongst the whirlwind of wedding activity (which mostly means my brain is in a whirl with all the things I have to get done in the next 11 days!) I just had to take a minute and post this article I just read. Funny when living in the US makes one feel like they are living in Russia and living in Russia is like what living in the US used to be. Love to hear your comments on this article!

Russian Region to Host Day of Conception

By MASHA STROMOVA, Associated Press Writer

ULYANOVSK, Russia - Make a baby. Win a car. Don't be surprised if the streets are empty and curtains drawn in this central Russian region Wednesday as residents take up an offer by the regional governor to help stem Russia's demographic crisis.

Ulyanovsk Gov. Sergei Morozov has decreed Sept. 12 a Day of Conception and is giving couples time off from work to procreate. Couples who give birth nine months later on Russia's national day _ June 12 _ will receive money, cars, refrigerators and other prizes.

It's the third year that the Volga River region, about 550 miles east of Moscow, has held the contest. Since then, the number of competitors _ and the number of babies born _ has been on the rise.

"If there's a good, healthy atmosphere at home within the family, if the husband and wife both love each other and their child, they will be in good spirits and that will extend to the workplace. So there will be a healthy atmosphere throughout the country," he told AP Television News. "The leadership (of the country) is interested in the family."

Russia's population has dropped since the 1991 Soviet collapse, fed by declining birth rates, a low life expectancy, a spike in emigration, a frayed health care system and other factors. The country _ the world's largest _ now has just 141.4 million citizens, making it one of the most sparsely settled nations. And experts estimate the population could fall below 100 million by 2050.

Just 311 women signed up to take part in the first competition, in 2005, and qualify for a half-day off from work. The next June, 46 more babies were born in Ulyanovsk's 25 hospitals compared to the previous June, including 28 born on June 12, officials said.

More than 500 women signed up for the contest in 2006 _ resulting nine months later in 78 babies, or more than triple the region's daily average. So far this year, the region's birth rate is up 4.5 percent compared to the same period last year.

"I don't think people get pregnant just to get a prize on the 12th (of June) but if the dates coincide and they give you a ... car there's nothing wrong with that," said Yuri, a 28-year-old father-to-be who declined to give his last name.

Last year, President Vladimir Putin called the demographic crisis the country's most acute problem and announced a broad effort to boost the birthrate, including cash subsidies for couples giving birth to more than one child. Women who give birth to their second or third child receive $10,000 vouchers to pay for education or home repairs.

In Ulyanovsk, everyone who has a baby in a local hospital on June 12 gets some kind of prize. The winners of the grand prize _ a locally made SUV called a UAZ-Patriot _ are couples judged by a committee on criteria such as "respectability" and "commendable parenting."

Perhaps not surprisingly, the effort has drawn snickers. According to one joke circulating on the Internet, regional university teachers _ after being ordered to draw up special activities for Wednesday _ proposed covering the floors of school gymnasiums with mattresses and dimming the lights.

Andrei Kartuzov, who won the last "make a baby" grand prize along with his wife, Irina, said they had been planning to have another child anyway.

The campaign "is a good help for people, especially for those living in villages," he said. "If they hold such actions every year, then maybe we will have (more children) growing up and Russia will be bigger."

What God has been teaching me

2007-08-16T15:36:00.000-07:00

I came to Gleanings last week wanting to serve in the work going on here in some way, as well as caring for my five youngest children who cannot help in the work going on here. I knew I would be covering the “home front”, cooking meals, keeping the house and laundry clean, and homeschooling. Since it is peach season, I had hoped to work somehow in the peach processing work. Yet, when I had a chance to do some cup-up in the field one afternoon, the thought that came to mind was how easy ,mentally, the work was. Yes, it was a bit hard physically to do several hours of cup-up(oy, my thighs after all that squatting!), but mentally it was very peaceful. I could think and pray over the peaches. (The children were at the playground playing, mind you) It was so peaceful.

God then said to me, “Yes, this work, that you were thinking was SO important, so much so that you were feeling bad, useless and unhelpful if you were NOT actively participating in some way, is EASIER; the work I have you doing at home, raising, training, disciplining and homeschooling your children, is indeed much HARDER work. BUT, it is work just as important as the work going on here, at Gleanings!”

In this light it would be “easier” for me to put aside the work God has given me at home with my children to “feel better” by serving in this ministry, or any other (Sunday School, VBS, Women’s Bible Study, you name it!). The enemy wants me to feel inadequate, unproductive, ineffective, discouraged and DISCONTENT over what God has given me as my mission field during this season of my life.

I fall for this trap so easily! It hits me where I am weak. It seems to be a reoccurring attack, even years apart, just with a new “face” each time. Still, it is the same basic issue: In what “field” is it that I am to serve God? Where is it that I can truly be most effective for Him and for the Gospel? It has little to nothing to do with my gifts and nothing to do with my own (selfish) desires. God will supply all I need to complete any task He sets before me! It has nothing to do with my perceptions or circumstances: the father of lies works continually to disguise the Truth.

Press on Mothers. You are exactly where God wants you to be. Don't look for greener grass elsewhere or think in your heart that there is any other ministry or service you could be doing for your Lord that is more important than what you are already doing.

Where do all those peaches come from?

2007-08-16T14:01:00.000-07:00

Gleanings For The Hungry was founded in 1982 by Wally and Norma Wenge, who after having spent time in Thailand on outreach with YWAM , saw the need for fruit there. They remembered all the fruit that goes to waste in the San Joaquin Valley, and the idea of Gleanings was birthed. Cull (fruit that can't be sold because its too small, has a split pit, or a mark on the skin) peaches and nectarines are donated by fruit packers in the area. The fruit is run through a processing line where it is washed, sorted, pitted, and put on trays. It is then sulfured for 4 hours to preserve the color, sun-dried out in the field, then packed into 4 gallon plastic buckets to send to the world's hungry.

Gleanings for the Hungry is a ministry of Youth With A Mission (YWAM), an interdenominational Christian organization serving in over one hundred nations. Gleanings' mission is to help feed the hungry spiritually and physically.

We process nectarines and peaches sun drying them to preserve the fruit. In addition, we produce a very nutritious dried soup mix by blending vegetables, spices, a soy protein, and packaging it in quart or gallon bags. Other nutritious shelf stable food products are donated by many generous companies which allows us to provide for many more of "the least of these our brothers."

We partner with many Christian ministries to distribute the dried fruit, vegetable soup mix, raisins, power bars, baby food, beans, nutritious drinks, vitamins, and many other food products to the hungry of the world ---- meeting not only their physical needs, but their spiritual needs as well.

The fruit is distributed by missionary organizations or Church groups to make sure it gets to the needy and there is opportunity to evangelize.

A typical summer day at Gleanings

2007-08-16T13:43:00.002-07:00

Each day starts with a time of worship music and a devotion at 7:45 am. This years summer theme is the armor of God, with each day going over each piece of armor. One of the staff members dresses in Roman armor and comes out and talks about the piece that is focused on that day. Then, another staff member does a devotion based on that piece of armor. Even though we are going through it a second week, it is still great and there are different speakers from last week. The teams that come in to volunteer each week usually provide the morning worship music. Some groups are not able to do that, so the staff musicians, like our son Josh(who is here as summer staff- his third summer here), will do the worship. And sometimes Josh will just fill in, since most of the groups do not have a bass player.

After worship and devotions the group heads out to the fields to lay out yesterdays processed peaches and cup them up and to pick up the dried fruit that is ready to be taken in to the dry fruit line for final inspection and packing in buckets. There is usually a short break at 10 am and lunch at 12 noon. Then, work starts up again at 1 pm, with a break at 2:30. Work for the day ends around 4 pm, so that there is time for cleaning up the plant (peaches are very messy!) before dinner. Everyone takes turns with cleaning up, from the bathrooms, to the kitchen to the peach plant.

After dinner is usually free time. On Mondays there is a mission night that the staff do. Tuesday nights some of the groups go bowling (we haven't done that). Wednesday are a half day of work and the teams go to a local water slide park (we haven't done that either). Thursday is open. Friday is the Love Feast. Saturday is a half day of work and deep cleaning the plant and time for the teams to clean up their rooms and pack and depart after lunch. Most of the staff do not get any half days, there is always work to do around here. We went swimming during the afternoon yesterday and had guests for dinner.

Below are some pics of hubby, the younger kids and I cupping up Wed. morning. The little ones don't last long, but we are trying to teach them how to keep working and keep trying. After about an hour they are ready to go home and clean house and do some school work. On the mornings we don't do cupping up we play at the playground for a while. First, we clean up any trash and then I have had a small playground project each day while they play. Sometimes it is sweeping up the sand, or raking the wood chips back under the swings and slides or pulling weeds. There is always something that can be done, even if it is a small thing in the grand scheme of what is going on here.

Peaches at Sunset

2007-08-16T13:43:00.001-07:00

Peachy keen!

2007-08-09T11:49:00.000-07:00

Here are more trays of peaches drying in the hot CA summer sun!Not sure if you can tell, but look how much the peaches shrink during the drying process. Look closely at the pics from the other day, of fresh trays and then click on these for a close up of how little they are after a few days! Wow!

All the trays from that were processed the day before have to be laid out each morning before they start the peach line up again each day.

A little time to play each morning at the playground before we go back to our house to do chores and some school work. And, before it gets too hot to enjoy being outside!

Here we are again - Gleanings For The Hungry: Summer Edition

2007-08-07T16:47:00.000-07:00

After spending a week in the Spring here at Gleanings For The Hungry, A YWAM ministry in Sultana, CA, we knew we wanted to come back and spend some time during the summer "peach" season. There isn't much work the younger children can do, so we mostly play at our home away from home and help out when we can.

After Megan got up from her afternoon nap I took the younger kids out to the peach line and then out to the field to do some "cup up".

First, we found two of our big guys at the end of the line, packaging dried peaches.

Then, we watched the beginning of the line, as the peaches came out of the big crates and got a water bath.We couldn't get over to where Daddy was working, so we went out of the peach line area and over to the sulfur tunnels. After the peaches are put onto the trays they go into the sulfur tunnels for 4 hours, to preserve the color of the peaches. You'll notice we have some friends with us. We are a kid magnet at our "house" with the staff kids hanging out with us while their parents work during the day.

Out to the drying "field". We are "cupping up" - which means making sure all the cored and cut peaches are skin side down, making it look like a cup = cup up! That way they dry correctly. Peaches take about a week to dry in the field. It is a very sticky job, but it smells pretty good!

Here are some of my little workers.

Oh, it is starting to get hot out here!

Here is our youngest son standing in front of the area of the field with yesterdays processed peaches put out to dry and where we worked on cupping up.

Over here you see in the background (be sure to click to enlarge this and any other picture) peaches that have been out drying for several days already. Notice how much darker they are now.

That's all for now. We'll check in again later.

Camping

2007-07-23T21:50:00.001-07:00

We just got back from 6 days and 5 nights camping. With the nine youngest children. You know, "just" the youngest nine. LOL! It rained most of the time. The 20 month old did not like sleeping at night, so mom and dad did not get to sleep much at night either.

I'm tired and have laundry up to my eyebrows... though I have managed to get 4 loads done since getting home today.

Pictures to follow when I have time. (HA!)

We leave in 13 days for Gleanings For The Hungry....

Hubby and I are trying to figure out if a long car trip is easier than 5 days of camping in the rain with nine children. Any guesses? LOL!

Are you watching the "Back to School" ads? I admit, I have been gone, but I glanced over Sundays ads today (Monday) and looks like everyone is offering "something"...just not a lot of anything great. What's with the "buy one, get one free" sales? Last week Office Depot had Crayola Crayons 24 packs for I think ten cents each and someone else is offering the same pack free if you buy another Crayola set, but mind you it is an expensive set, the ones that start at $1.99 and higher. So, be CAREFUL! Lots of weeks left to watch the ads. Shop carefully!

Wedding? Did you say wedding? Oh yes. Nice to have a week off from thinking about it. Now I'm aiming to find a caterer for the night of the wedding, AFTER the reception as the bride and groom want to open their gifts before the brides family (from Canada) leave, and before the bride and groom leave for their Mexico Honeymoon - all the next day! Eek! I think after such a FULL day with wedding and reception, etc., paying someone to have food hot and ready and will also serve and clean up will be a nice. Now, to find someone with a good price and good food, for a smallish group (about 30 including children).

For now, I need some sleep. Caterers, wedding planning and getting eleven of us to CA in 13 days will HAVE to wait till tomorrow! Really. It has to wait. No fair making me dream about it.

Did I mention my three year old started throwing up at dinner tonight? Yup. About an hour after she kissed me on the lips. If you don't see any new posts in the next few days you'll KNOW why.

Happy Trails!

Big News!

2007-07-12T19:23:00.000-07:00

I realize a lot of you have wondered where on earth I have been. Well, my oldest son is engaged to be married! Woo hoo! Wow! Exciting!

So, things have been a bit busy around here. His lovely bride-to-be lives in British Columbia, Canada. Up until two weeks ago the wedding was going to be put on by her parents in Canada. Then, two weeks ago, the bride and groom decided to have the wedding here where we live and where they will be living after the wedding. Great! Awesome! Okay, it is also more work for me. lol.

You see with Plan A all I had to do was get our family of 14 up to Canada in time for the wedding, buy some clothes, a new suit for hubby and then put on a second reception for the new couple a few weeks after the Canadian wedding, so that all the local friends and family could join in our celebration.

Plan B: The bride-to-be arrived July 2nd for an 11 day visit and we have been working fast and furiously to get everything arranged from start to finish in the time she is here. So far, so good. She leaves tomorrow afternoon, but not before we have one last appointment with the bakery to taste cake flavor samples. (so much for low carb! LOL!) There are a few things I will need to finalize after she leaves, but pretty much we have everything planned out. Praise the Lord!

On top of all the fun and excitement I have so enjoyed having some special time that "us girls" got to go out and do things and the time getting to know her better! And, she loves Jane Austen books and movies! I couldn't be happier to be a mother-in-law! LOL! Someone to watch "chick flicks" with! Woo hoo! (my oldest daughter is 9, so you can understand my enthusiasm to have another woman around!)

So, that is WHERE I have been. To make up for my neglecting you all, here is a Trophy of a tip:
It is THAT time of year again : Back to School sales are starting to show up in the local ads. Remember all the good times we had last year with this topic? How we discussed which we liked better, Rose Art Crayons or Crayola? Anyway, currently I have seen a few good deals at Walmart, Office Depot, Staples and Office Max. I think Walmart's specials are by far the best to date. But, be diligent and keep watching. Each week different specials will show up. Target and K-Mart are bound to join in with some great specials soon!

The wedding is two months and 10 days away!

"Large Families are Ruining the Planet"

2007-05-21T11:16:00.000-07:00

Read the story below at Faith and Freedom Network. Know where the battle is coming from ladies. Pray and be ready to face this attack. It maybe on many of our doorsteps soon (friends, neighbors, relatives, even pulpits). Do not let these alarmist change your mind about your family size. Do not let fear of man change your mind about family size. I realize not everyone who reads this blog maybe lead to trust God with their family size/birth control, but I hazard to guess that most of you are keen to have or have had more than the "replacement value" family size.
I would love to see a study done that compares expenses and carbon output of that family with two children, verses a large family. Not based on per family unit, but broken down per person. To my knowledge, larger family's usually live in less square footage "per person" than the smaller family (you know, divide your homes square footage by the number of people living in your home - we lived in 1900 sq. ft. with 13 in our family, which is a modest 146 sq. ft. per person. A family of 4 living in a typical starter home probably is living in close to 1200 sq. ft, a whopping 300 sq. ft. per person!) . The larger families may use a larger vehicle, but like us, we have 14 people in that vehicle which makes it more economical and "earth" friendly than putting our family into three "efficient" cars that seat 4-5 people. Most large families learn to make things from scratch, eat out less, are very frugal and re-use or buy used items than that two income, two child family. Yes, more children cost more, but I think if you break it down and divide the costs per person over the 2 child family, the larger families are much more cost efficient, and would even be "greener" . So, limiting the amount of children you have to "save the planet" would seem to be totally debunked. What do you think?

*************************************************

Just when you think you’ve heard it all – you discover you haven’t.

When singer Sheryl Crow suggested that people use less toilet paper in order to save the planet, I thought that might well be the low point in the eco-movement.

But it wasn’t.

I personally wouldn’t have paid much attention to a report that was released a couple of weeks ago by a small environmental research group in Britain except that major news sources around the world have ended up carrying the report.

Optimum Population Trust (OPT) is now saying that in order to stop global warming, people should not only drive smaller cars, recycle, etc., but now, “must limit the number of children one has.” (Click here for story). They say, “The most effective national and global climate-change strategy is limiting the size of the population.”

The zero population idea is not new. There were those pushing that idea in the late 60’s – maybe before that, but now it has a new home. It fits comfortably with Al Gore’s global warming movement – and the press is loving it.

And speaking of Al Gore. I guess he, too, would be out of step with this new-found friend of the extreme left. He has four kids. But then, he also creates a little more carbon than the average person in his private homes and travel.

OPT says, “The effect on the planet of having one child less is an order of magnitude greater than all these other things we might do. Such as switching off lights. The decision to have children should be seen as a very big one and one that should take the environment into account.”

When life is devalued, as it is in our so-called pro-choice culture, these kinds of ideas are not only birthed, but promoted. We are created in the image of God and to suggest that the planet would be better off without us contradicts the design of the Creator.

These kinds of ideas view people and animals as equals and now we the people have altered the balance and that makes us bad.

There is something fundamentally wrong with seeing everything on the planet as “natural” except for humans.

This is the extreme, bizarre end of the environmental movement that denies the Creator. A part of this is humorous; a much greater part is not.

This kind of global warming alarmism is less a scientific issue and more a political issue.

With Sheryl Crow calling for people to use less toilet paper, Al Gore on Capitol Hill predicting “the end is near," and Congress considering a bill that would mandate what light bulbs we can use, it’s time to recognize this for what it is. It’s a political eco-movement with the hopes of getting some of the most extreme among us elected to office.

A biblical world view calls for environmental stewardship with a natural order that gives mankind dominion or responsibility for the creation. To suggest that humans are alien and have been merely dropped off on the planet by some evolutionary process is far more dangerous than any amount of carbon dioxide.

We are seeing the results of the push for a secular society in this kind of nonsense.

Gary Randall President Faith & Freedom

Answering your questions about Gleanings

2007-05-07T13:56:00.000-07:00

How old do you think a child has to be to make this worth the trip? What did you do with your littlest one while working?

Because we had a baby who still takes 2 long naps a day, I was really unable to do much of what the rest of our group was doing. I helped in the kitchen one day and went to watch everyone work on the trail mix line and take pictures. At first this was a little discouraging to me, but God gave me a great peace that my "season" is still to care for small children/babies and really, I was so thankful to just be able to be there with our whole family at the same time! After chapel I would take baby back to where we were staying and nap her. We would meet up with everyone else at lunch time at the dining hall and about the time everyone was heading back to work, she would be going down for a nap again. I was able to be "home support", keeping the laundry going, cleaning the house we were staying in, washing dishes, etc. One day I kept some of the other families toddlers with me and played with them so their moms could work. I also had times of great worship, singing and ready my bible, which is a rare thing during the middle of the day in my "normal" life. =)

Our three year old was able to work if she was with daddy, helping with packaging raisins, etc. Since daddy also did concrete work a couple of days, she stayed with me and the baby during those times. Our five year old was fine to work with packaging raisins with other adults supervising. Every child is different, so age doesn't always mean anything. I don't think they ever worked more than 2.5 hours at a stretch before there was either the lunch break or a snack break.

Gleanings is a great whole family short term mission experience in the spring, but....

Just to clarify, during the summer Gleanings isn't a "whole family" kind of destination. To run the peach processing plant they prefer 13 y.o.'s and older. This is fast paced and lots of fast moving machinery going on. It is also very hot in the summer time in Sultana. Even so, I do know some families at our church who have taken their whole families, but it was more like mom stayed with the younger kids doing other things while the older kids and dad worked. Because it takes approx. 80 workers to run the peach line and with what housing is available, there isn't a lot of room for families to stay there during the summer. There are dorms with bunks as well as the hotel type rooms that are used during the summer. I think the suggested donation per day is $10 in the summer, per person.

There is different work to do at Gleanings in all the different seasons. Summer is peaches, Fall is usually clean up/repair from the summer (new this fall, starting in Oct., Gleanings will have a Discipleship Training School starting, which is a 3 month basic training for YWAM. You can read more about what a DTS is here ) In the winter is more repair and prepare for the spring and summer months. Whenever there are enough volunteers and donated product the soup mix plant or the trail mix line can run. They get a lot of senior groups who come through during these times of year when the work is relatively easy and the temperatures are mild. During the spring they like to have groups up to 35 people each week (working Monday - Friday usually, but some folks do a day or two as they are on their way from one place to another. There are even motor home hook-ups available!)to run the soup plant and/or trail mix and raisin lines. And, there are always buckets to be washed when the sun is out to dry them!

There are so many ways to help support this ministry. Praying for the staff (all YWAM staff raise their own support - there are no paid positions), product to be donated, shipments to get through customs without corrupt governments interfering, and that the hearts of those receiving this food will also be receptive to the Gospel message that is presented with it. Financial support is always needed and is tax deductible. You can contribute to the ministry as a whole or help support a staff family (there are three families on staff right now that homeschool, which is really cool!). You'd be amazed at how little money makes such a big difference in these "state side" missionaries lives (though it is state side to us, this is foreign land to many on staff: some are from Canada, the Philippines and Switzerland!). Not only does it provide for their physical needs it encourages them spiritually! There is also the quilt making projects. Quilt tops can be put together and sent to Gleanings or you can work on quilts while you are at Gleanings.

You can even do donations online here. And, for all the information about Gleanings, go here . Be sure to check out the monthly newsletters.

Keep the questions coming!

There and back again: a large family tale

2007-05-06T13:27:00.000-07:00

Our trip to Gleanings For The Hungry in Sultana, CA was a complete success! All the planning and preparation done ahead of time made it a very pleasant road trip and our time working at Gleanings was awesome!

First, the road trip. Though we aimed to be out the door at 3 am, it was closer to 3:30 am by the time we were backing out the driveway. Which turned out okay, because we were able to do what others consider a 14 hour trip in 12.5 hours. We ate all our meals in the car while Super Daddy Driver drove and used the potty only when we stopped for gasoline.

One thing I learned on this trip was that most gasoline stations only have one toilet per gender. That means trying to get 12 people to the potty takes longer than it takes to gas up our 33 gallon 15 passenger van. We could save some time if we went to a gas station next to a fast food place and used the fast food bathrooms instead, as they usually have at least two toilets per bathroom. In fact on the way home at one gas stop one of my older boys did just that. He took one look at the line for the mens room and quickly turned around and headed to the Wendy's next door. Smart kid.

After our time at Gleanings we went to So. California to visit my sister and her family (You know who you are!). It was just another 4 hours south from Gleanings, but it was too short of a visit! We got there Saturday afternoon and left Monday morning. We drove about half the way home and stayed at a Residence Inn (to house all of us we needed 2 suites - older boys in one, mom, dad and the little girls in the other). I can't say enough good about this hotel chain (and I spent three nights at one in another state last month for a sisters weekend with my three sisters. The staff were very accommodating. Check in is usually 3 pm and check out at noon. Well, we got in early and checked to see if it was possible our room was ready, at 11:15 AM! And, it was! They let us right in! Then, we had late flights out and asked for a 3 pm check out and they didn't bat an eye. No problem! That is the kind of service I love. At the hotel my husband and I go to locally whenever we can get a night or two away, they are total scrooges about a late check out. As if the occupants of one room checking out more than an hour late is really going to make a difference! Sorry, but I really like to get a whole 24 hours out of the price of a hotel room. But, I digress....) The beds were great, the rooms spacious for a large family to move around in, a full kitchen and an incredibly delicious ,with lots and lots of choices, hot breakfast (buffet style, but hot and ready!). The awesome breakfast was a great start to our last day on the road, though it may have delayed us a little (how many helpings can we cram in before leaving? I mean, it's included in the price of the room, so let's get our moneys worth! lol!). We had hoped to be home by dinner time that night, but we got in later than that. Never fear, I had plenty of things to munch on. The kids did fine, just the driver was getting weary.

Gleanings: The whole reason for the road trip was so that our family could spend a week of volunteer service. The spring is the best time to go as a family or bring a group of families as the work is easier and almost all ages can participate. The accommodations are hotel like rooms, and three meals and two snacks are served a day from the dining hall. We "led" a group from our church of 9 adults and 26 children (some were teenagers). I think we made a new record for the most children in a group! We mostly worked on the trail mix line and repackaging raisins. Some of the dads worked on pouring concrete projects. We all took turns working in the kitchen before and after meals too.

We also worked one day in the Soup Plant and several days working on washing donated dirty buckets (they are used in the summer to pack the dried peaches in for shipping - not only is the dried peaches a blessing to the people all over the world who receive them, but the buckets are an additional blessing! These dirty, used buckets were destined for the dump, but have been donated instead and volunteers clean them up all year to have enough for the summer dried fruit crop.)

Some in our group were able to work in the quilting room. Donated fabric, batting and quit tops (specifically made by a church group and sent to Gleanings) came together to finish two quilts. Quilts get sent with containers that go to COLD climate countries.

The playground was a huge hit with our group. Like everything at Gleanings, the equipment was donated and volunteers put it in. Gleanings is an extremely cost effective ministry: the land, equipment, buildings, machines, etc. have all been donated - they have no debt and no loans. Even staying there is a donation: you can pay whatever you feel the Lord leading you to pay, though $5.00 a day per person is a guideline for the springtime stays. (that includes food and lodging)

A few of our children in front of a wall in the dining hall that lists all the different countries around the world that receive food from Gleanings. (click to enlarge)

Our oldest three boys working on cleaning up some pallets of buckets that had one bucket with a bad seal and so during the winter some yucky bugs had a cozy home and food supply. They had to find the bad bucket, and then clean up the buggy yuckiness that was all over the surrounding buckets. Then, the stacked buckets and pallet have to be wrapped in shrink wrap again before they can be placed in shipping containers and go overseas.

Time serving together as a family and with other families as well as getting to know the staff and hearing so many incredible stories of God's provision made for an incredible 6 days! One of my favorite parts of each day was chapel. After breakfast each morning there was an hour of worship, sharing, devotional and praying together of the staff and the volunteers. So many incredible stories of what God has done and is doing through this ministry. Letters were read written by children from foreign lands thanking the people at Gleanings that would send such good wonderful food for them to eat. The stories can break your heart, and then praise our loving God for giving a man a vision to take the leftovers, the surplus of the peach growing area of California and use it to feed people and share the gospel with them.

All together, we:

• Cleaned about 1,300 food buckets.

• Packaged 240 pounds raisins (85 boxes).

• Produced 4,560 bags trail mix (240 boxes).

• Packaged 148,000 servings of soup mix (26 barrels).

• Helped to pour two truckloads of concrete for a slab.

• Moved and stacked pallets.

• Completed work on two quilts.

• Took turns preparing meals in the commercial kitchen and cleaning the dining hall.

It was good to serve the Lord at Gleanings! We give this a 10 out of 10 as an awesome short term family friendly mission trip.

Stay tuned for the next installment: What's next?

The Junior Bunk Bed

2007-05-06T13:06:00.000-07:00

Way back in January I posted about our JBB -" Junior Bunk Bed" . Several of you have asked for the dimensions of the mattress and here I am, FINALLY, getting out a tape measure and posting the info for ya.

The mattress' are: 30 inches wide, 60 inches long and 6 inches deep. We had them made from a high density foam and had a "ticking" over it (cloth cover, much like a regular mattress you can buy at the store).

It pays to call around as the place we got ours from actually cost slightly less than some of the other places we called, but included the ticking and no where else even offered that as an option.

This size easily accommodates Queen size sheets (fitted and flat) and blankets, quilts, etc. by cutting the Queen size item in half. The fitted sheets require a little finesse (I made square-ish corners from the raw edge, but you could put elastic into it if you want) but if you have a sewing machine and can sew a straight stitch you can do this.

Falling off the face of the earth.....

2007-04-26T09:22:00.000-07:00

Contrary to popular belief, I really am still alive. lol. It has been a busy time since I last posted. We did go on our trip to Gleanings For The Hungry, which I will write more about later. We had a fantastic time and highly recommend it as a family friendly mission experience during the spring. (summer time requires participants to be 13+ in age, but the spring work is easy enough for 3-4 year olds to help with!) I think our group had the most children of any group they have ever had: 26 kids and 9 adults!

The day after we got back from that trip (and we spent a few extra days on the way home to visit one of my sisters and her family who were only 4 hours away from Gleanings) our oldest sons girlfriend/fiance' came for a 12 day visit. She lives in Canada and this was our first time to meet her in person. She and my son met at Gleanings where she and her parents served for 6 months.

Just a few days after she left I left for 4 days with my sisters. Between the four of us sisters we live in 3 different and far apart states, so we flew to a more central location, stayed in a Residence Inn hotel (very nice!), scrapbooked, watched movies, talked, went out to dinner each night, and had a fabulous time together!

So, now I am home again, with no immediate plans for anymore travel or house guests on the horizon. lol. Trying to get back to routine (what's that?), back to low carb eating (traveling is a sure kill for that!),have surgery on my jaw (again, but not the same as the huge jaw surgery I had a year ago), finishing up the school year, have a few birthdays to plan and celebrate and graduate our third oldest. And that is just the next 5 weeks!LOL!

I really hope to get back here soon and share more about out time at Gleanings and to share some very exciting things God is doing in our lives that directly relates to Gleanings. Pray for us as we seek to know God's will clearly.

Food For The Road - Part 4

2007-03-28T14:38:00.000-07:00

As mentioned in the previous post one of the major things that helps us with road trips is to NOT stop for meals. Lest you think we starve our poor children, rest assured I pack plenty of food. For a family of 2-3 children I suppose stopping for breakfast/lunch/dinner might not take too long..... But, for a family with 11 children traveling together (our oldest isn't with us on this trip) just placing an order can take 10 minutes...then wait for the food...20 minutes later....(have you ever tried to order 16 double cheeseburgers, without pickles and onions? ugh They always repeat back...SIXTEEN???? Yes, sixteen. Oh, and two double quarter pounders with cheese, a big mac, etc. Stuns them everytime! I think they hate us when we go through the drive through. Throws their one minute per car right out the window!). Even if you eat in the car, that extra 30+ minutes to pull off the freeway, get the food and probably take at least a few small folk to the potty since we are already stopped, don't you know, multiplied by however many number of meals need to be eaten during the day of travel adds up to hours. Hours we do NOT want to spend in a car.

So, I pack our meals and pass them out at meal time in the car. For this trip we are going to leave at approx. 3 AM, giving us about 4+ hours of dark and hopefully sleeping children before "breakfast". Breakfast will be protein meal replacement bars (we are big on protein to fill up tummy's which helps them not want to be munching every minute of a road trip), (we like Zone bars the best - Hubby and I will be trying out the Atkins variety for our low carb/high protein requirements) and grapes pre-washed and bagged into snack size baggies. Lunch will consist of the sandwiches we made the day before departure (the kids write their names on the baggies so I can just throw them in the cooler the morning we leave and hand them out the next day), snack sized baggies of baby carrots and another snack sized baggy of trail mix (the kind with nuts, raisins, etc.). I also have a mid afternoon snack planned: baggies of crackers, and cheese sticks. We plan to arrive at our destination before dinner time so we can get pizza or something once we are there.

It does take some work to get 11 of everything bagged into separate baggies, but it makes it so easy in the car! Once I bag up all of one thing, say trail mix, then I put all the little baggies into a gallon zipper bag and stow it in the tote I keep up front between the driver and passenger seat, along with the ice chest.

I packed baggies of nuts, had made cheese and meat sandwiches (Franz bakery makes a 4 net carb bread and I use one slice, toast it and then slice it carefully in half so that ONE slice makes two thin slices - just enough to hold the mayo/mustard and the cheese and meats inside)the day before, and cheese sticks for Hubby and I. Hubby likes to munch on sunflower seeds while he drives (he does all the driving - what a great guy!) so I have those ready with a paper cup for the shells.

Last thing is fluids. I mentioned before we don't do a lot of them on the road. At breakfast, having protein bars with some grapes is usually enough moisture to hold off thirst. Older kids get their own bottle of water to drink and keep with them (with warnings of drinking small amounts). For the younger kids I will keep their cups in the ice chest till they are thirsty and then allow a couple sips, depending on how close we are to stopping for gas, etc. Baby gets her cup with milk or water unlimited, but she has a diaper, so no problem! LOL!

I think that wraps it about up. Only thing left to post is how it all turns out.

Our Travel Plan - Part Three

2007-03-20T19:28:00.000-07:00

The Situation: 640 miles, ten kids, and a huge desire to not spend one minute more than necessary traveling. We want to get where we are going in the shortest time possible (while being safe too of course). (Edited to note there will be 11 of our kids going now)

Our Solution:
1. Leave very early in the morning, around 3 AM, so that there will be about 4 hours of the trip that the kids will actually sleep through. Put them to bed in their travel clothes the night before and maybe let them stay up a bit later than usual **ahem**, wake them, walk them half asleep to the potty and then tuck them into the car with their pillow and cuddle blankie. It is dark out, they are sleepy and the car motion lulls them quickly back to sleep.

2. Make as few stops as possible. We accomplish this by bringing food to eat in the car (that will be breakfast and lunch for this trip) so we don't have to stop to eat and so we (hope to) only stop when we need gas. We could lose hours of time stopping at every rest stop to use the potty, but we encourage kids to hold on a little longer. We also purposefully do not pack a large quantity of fluids to drink, just enough to keep everyone hydrated, but not tons of extras (as might be used to pacify bored or hungry kids). We usually have to stop twice for gas and maybe one extra potty stop at the most, but sometimes we have made it with just using the potty when gassing up the van.

3. Plan things to entertain the youngin's. Last year we listened to books on CD (our favorite was James and the Giant Peach read by Jeremy Irons) for car trips of about 2 hours each way and that was great! On previous 550 mile one way trips we strapped a combo TV/VCR with a 13 in screen to the back of the drivers seat, which was only good for the first two rows of seats in our 15 passenger van (which has 4 rows of bench seats by the way). This wasn't the greatest solution, but did help break up long travel days. This year we have a ceiling mounted DVD player to watch movies on and even those in the back will be able to see the screen. Busy work, with coloring or small toys they can play with (without lots of pieces that might get lost in the car) such as an Etch-a-Sketch or the smaller MagnaDoodles give kids things to do. Depending on if you have kids that get carsick, you either need to dose them with a travel med. so they can work on coloring a paper without throwing up, or find ways, like the books on CD/Tape that they can listen to while looking out the window. I was a very car sick prone kid and still am as an adult. I can't read in a car or even look down at a map for more than a few seconds, without getting queasy. When I was younger I coped by sleeping during travel. As an adult and co-pilot, I take the smallest dose I can of motion sickness medicine to ease my discomfort. I mention all this just so other parents can be sensitive to car sickie kids and make appropriate plans for their travel entertainment.

This is our main plan. Next is planning the food to take along so that we can save all that time NOT stopping for "fast food" (it is never fast with our size of family! LOL!).

Getting Ready... Part Two

2007-03-16T18:59:00.000-07:00

Wow, thanks for all the comments! I'll try to answer as many as I can here.

Yes, we are going to borrow a car-top carrier. Even still, with a minimum of 12 luggage bags and some sleeping bags, that will be full up. It will however take some of the strain off the cramped quarters inside the van. Just have the ice chest, bag of food,pillows, blankies, backpacks, and things to keep the kiddo's occupied* during the trip. * see below for more on that

Puke bucket! Great thing to remember to take along! Thanks! Though I'm thinking something with a lid would be prudent.....

Kimm, if you can sleep while your hubby drives and the kids are in various states of wakefulness, my hat is off to you! LOL! My wonderful guy will only be getting home from work 6 hours before we plan to leave. Did I mention he works a 12 hour shift, with an hour commute each direction? And, that he will just be coming off his "long" work week of 4 of those 12 hour shifts? Sorry, but I feel it is my duty to stay awake to be sure the driver stays awake. We talk, quietly, as we leave in the wee hours of the morning so that the kids spend at least SOME of the travel time asleep (put them to "bed" in their travel clothes, get them up at 3 am, to the potty and into the car with their pillow and blankie and hit the road!), listen to music (nothing to sleepy) munch on sunflower seeds (even okay for low carb - yeah!) and go as far as we can without making a stop. More on our travel without stopping method later. Sure to entertain! LOL!

Boaz's Ruth, necessity IS the mother of invention! LOL! Five carseats isn't too bad in a 15 passenger van, as long as you realize that some carseats only fit in a center type buckle and likewise some carseats HAVE to be used with shoulder straps. Right now we are running two that use centers and three that use shoulder straps. The law for carseats in our state is such that kids have to be in carseats until ~~they graduate high school~~ they are 6 years old AND 60 lbs. I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't know many kids who are 6 and 60 lbs. It's not that I don't think carseats are a good thing, just take up way more real estate in a car than just the child would. The "up" side is that the kids sitting next to carseats have a place to lean their heads while they sleep!

Okay, here is the part about entertaining the kids. First thing is that I am bringing those Crayola coloring books with the invisible markers, AKA Color Wonder, for the younger kids. I weighed my choices - still have cheap crayons and Rose Art Markers from the back to school sales last summer.... and I took advantage of the awesome deal Kim shared for white copy paper from Office Depot (I mean 100 sheets is only 3 cents, the kids could go wild!) so I have plenty of paper for them to use.... BUT, the thought of melting crayons, broken crayons, someone bored enough to color on a carseat, window, etc. , not to mention pen ink, washable or not, and what to do with all that used up paper? Sorry, not going there. Yes, it would be more frugal, but it wouldn't do much for my blood pressure. The Color Wonders have no color to them, the color is in the paper, which also is spiral bound, so not floating all over the car. The kids will each have a backpack of their travel things in the car, so they each get a book and a set of markers (and, as per Kim's great suggestion, I will bring a couple dead marker's caps in case we lose one along the way!). Some of the kids have Gameboys to entertain them. But, the granddaddy of them all is the DVD player we had installed last week in the van. Yes, is was expensive (got to love tax return time, well, when you are getting money back that is!) but oh my, it is pretty cool! It has a 17 inch screen! We were either going to have to go with two smaller screens (so people in the back part of the van had a screen they could see without binoculars!) or this one humdinger of a monster!

View from side doors with screen down. (click to enlarge pictures)

View from back seat of 15 passenger van.

View from side doors with screen put away.

I also have in mind to print up a few bingo or scavenger hunt type games for the older kids, with prizes to pique their interest. I found this website with lots of great info and games to print at home to take on our trip. Here is another good one.

Well, that is enough for now. Will post about our traveling with less stops method later. Included in that will be my plans for low carb eating for hubby and I while on the road.

Feel free to post more questions!

Preparing for a road trip - Part One

2007-03-14T19:10:00.000-07:00

I happened to think while writing to one of my blogging friends that I have also had the pleasure of meeting in REAL life, MamaK, that blogging about an upcoming road trip our family will be taking might be of interest to my readers. I'm sure some might wonder how a family with twelve children DO a road trip. Am I right?

We will be traveling to Gleanings For The Hungry for a week of service, which will be an approx. 14 hour trip for us. Our family car is a Ford 15 passenger van. On this trip, ten of our children will be going with us (the older two have jobs). I don't know how many of you have actually spent any time IN a 15 passenger van, but it isn't actually spacious if you have 12 people, for which 5 must be in carseats inside it. There is no space for baggage such as a standard car would have a trunk. So, suitcases, sleeping bags, ice chest, diaper bag, travel toys/amusements, must all fit inside the van with us. **gulp**

On the way "home" we are going to go 4 hours farther away to visit family (names are not used to protect the innocent! LOL!) for two days and then drive about half way home, stay in a hotel one night and then drive home the rest of the way the next day.

What I am going to attempt to do is blog about my plans, especially while trying to keep the cost down, and packing and on-the-road strategies in hopes that this information will be:
1. Helpful, perhaps for your own future road trips.
2. If not helpful, at least entertaining!

Stay tuned!

Judge to Parents: "Your rights end at the door."

2007-03-12T10:54:00.000-07:00

Reading this article from Faith and Freedom Network today started to make my blood boil, then I realized a better response was to be thankful, and yes, even grateful (something that has been difficult for me the last month or so due to health challenges I have had) that we homeschool.

Parental rights are being blatantly attacked and I think it may well be a foretaste of what is to come here.

Ralph Waldo Emerson described the moment in 1776 when the Minutemen fired their opening shots of the American Revolution on the village green in Lexington Massachusetts as, “The shot heard ‘round the world.”

That’s also how parental-rights advocates describe what happened recently when a federal judge in Boston shot down a lawsuit by some parents who objected to what Lexington schools were teaching their children about homosexuality.

U.S. District Court Chief Judge, Mark Wolf told David Parker and Rob and Robin Wirthlin that they had no right to challenge the schools – none at all.

Brian Camenker, executive director of the Boston based group MassResistance, was so shocked by the judge’s response that he said, “It’s so absurd, you can hardly even discuss it.”

But we must both be aware of it and discuss it, because a similar situation may well be coming to your public schools.

The Judge said, “The schools have a right and obligation to teach about same-sex relationships, even in elementary schools – and the parents’ rights end at the school house door.” (emphasis mine)

The parental objections centered around a Kindergarten book on “diversity” called “Who’s In a Family,” which portrays same-sex couples as just a different type of family. The other concerned a second grade book called "King & King," in which one prince kisses another prince.

As Washington State legislators move toward passing Domestic Partnerships as well as the anti-parent SB 5297 sex-ed bill, they are setting the stage for, as Senator Swecker called it, “Catastrophic unintended consequences.”

For those of you feeling discouraged or needing new energy to keep on homeschooling, let this information give you new vigor to continue the good fight! Pray to our Lord to give you the manna you need for today and not to "worry" about tomorrow. He promises to give us the strength we need to do what He has asked us to do. Cling to that. It also doesn't hurt to realize what is going on in the world around us in public education, as a bit of a motivator, eh?

Amazing Grace - A Movie You Must See

2007-02-26T21:20:00.000-08:00

Excellent, excellent movie. Hubby and I went to see it Sunday night. I want to see it again already. It is so rich: cast, sets, script. It is a visual delight, especially if you enjoy this era of British history. Go. See. It.

Oh, and the web site for the movie even has a study guide you can use with your older kids before they see it, which will help them enjoy the movie even more! I plan to use them with my older kids and then go see it, again, with them. A homeschooling moms dream come true.

Amazing Grace movie trailer

2007-02-26T21:06:00.001-08:00

The Modesty Survey

2007-02-16T17:04:00.000-08:00

If you haven't heard of The Rebelution* yet, you should check them out. But, more to the topic of this post is the recent Modesty Survey results. Let me tell ya, this isn't just for teen girls to read, moms. I found not only some of the questions to be very thought provoking, but some of the answers too! Here, I thought being married for over 23 years that I KNEW how men think. Let's just say, never too old to learn a thing or two! Be sure to understand this isn't a legalistic list of what is modest and what isn't. It is very informative to see how the men who did the survey voted and to read the comments some of them left.

Love to hear your feedback after you read this. What did you learn?

*In case you need a reference for who these guys are, I know them, know their parents, and three of my kids take piano, drums and guitar lessons from one of their older brothers. So, I can say they are "OK".