the day our Home became a School

In a sense, our home has always been a place of learning (as all true homes are)... there are always things to teach and lessons that are being learned. But today was different. This was SCHOOL. Complete with freshly sharpened pencils and brand new boxes of crayons and workbooks and the tangible sense of excitement that comes with a fresh start.

I set our start time for 9:30 am. It might seem a bit late, but for us, it works perfectly. It gives me time to exercise, shower, do devotions, feed the baby, get everyone dressed and ready, make sure we all eat breakfast, and then put Rosalie down for her nap. I have a feeling our new schedule is going to be good for us all.

We had a special first-day-of-school breakfast this morning. Cherry-berry smoothies (for protein) and cinnamon muffins (with sprinkles, of course. Because sprinkles make anything special).


And then, it was time to begin. Emma and Annabelle were eager and excited, clad in "school dresses" found especially for the occasion, their hair in pigtails-- pigtails are just so school-ish, don't you think?


I was ready too.


Emma was so glad that I was FINALLY going to let her write in her new books.


But first, she remembered that her feet needed to be appropriately dressed too...


We began with our Bible book and prayer. Emma's prayer was for God to "help mommy to be a good teacher", among other things. I'll take all the prayers I can get! After starting our school day off right, we delved into the vast and wonderful world of phonics, history, math, and writing... my little kindergartener was in heaven. She really thrives on learning, and I could see her mind working as she concentrated and took everything in.



At one point, when we were talking about the things children can do to glorify God (and this was while doing history! Love it!), Emma looked up at me with an impish grin and said "Just X the bad."

Silly girl.

While this year is mostly about Emma, as she is the official kindergartener, we certainly couldn't exclude Annabelle. I ordered preschool books for her that cover everything from letters and writing to numbers and shapes. My thinking was that she'd get bored and want to go play about half-way through school time, but she sat there the whole time and kept quite busy with her little workbooks.


She was very pleased with herself. And who can blame her-- just look at those beautifully colored socks!


We worked hard for about an hour. An hour that really just flew by, it seemed. But we were definitely ready for a break after that. In honor of the day, I bought Trader Joe's cinnamon schoolhouse cookies. Snacktime!

It's quite possible that snacktime is Annabelle's favorite subject.


We resumed our studies once cookies and juiceboxes were all gone, and were done for the day by 11:45. Not bad. Not bad at all!

And where was Miss Rosalie during all of this, you ask? She was a doll and did this the whole time:

Thank you, baby, for making our first day of school just that much easier!

I can hardly believe, in some ways, that our years of formal education have begun and I actually have a school-age daughter. This is our life now. It's exciting. New. Different. And wonderful. I look forward so much to all the adventures we will have through our years of schooling. Not every day will be as easy or as fun as today was, and I know the challenges and difficulties will come, without a doubt. But I am blessed with an amazing group of people who are daily an encouragement and inspiration to me... as well as an abundance of grace.

It's true that homeschooling is not for everyone. But, for me, I simply cannot imagine doing this any other way. Oh, the joy of seeing these sweet faces light up with the thrill of something new learned. Such a reward.

yes, indeed, it was a good day.

Wherein we take a trip...

...to our home-away-from-home, Denver, Colorado! It was a pleasure to drive through a large part of our beautiful country and see things from desert to canyons to mountains.

When I was a girl we drove absolutely everywhere-- I've seen 48 of the 50 states as well as part of Canada from the backseat of our car, all of us piled into whatever vehicle we happened to own at the time. I LOVED driving places, and I was so excited to take our first family roadtrip! And I am happy to report that our three little girls were excellent passengers. Emma and Annabelle looked out the window, flipped through books, colored pictures, ate snacks, slept, and watched movies.

Rosalie slept, made noise, played with the toys on her carseat, and was entertained by her sisters.


No, she was not happy all the time and definitely had her moments. She screamed and cried when she got sick and tired of her carseat. But, it really wasn't bad at all. We were able to stop every couple of hours to get out and stretch, take potty breaks, and hold Rosalie. I was pleasantly surprised at how well they all did with so many hours on the road! So, praise God, we made it there safely and in good time.

and then the REAL fun began!

We spent an evening at a bonfire in the cool Colorado night air. So fun.



I realize I'm shallow, but seriously, bangs are driving me NUTS the way they look in this picture. Help.

Goodness, I have pretty sisters...

Happily, we were there for Jerusha's 21st birthday (my little sister is 21... I feel old)!! To celebrate, we went out to dinner at the Macaroni Grill and had quite the lovely time laughing, talking, and of course, drinking.

Jerusha and her boy, Chris. Such a cute couple. And doesn't our little Rooshie look beautiful??

She stole my lemon drop martini for this picture. But I still love her.



We are never normal. Ask anyone.



The loving parents.

Martini for me, cabernet for him. We are soooo sophisticated (although, you wouldn't think so if you had seen the pictures that were taken before this shot...)

Later, there was cake... baked by Grandma and Emma and Annabelle.

And of course, we had many wonderful family meals. For this one, mom made us her famous whole-wheat pancakes served with triple-sec oranges, bacon, and sausage. Mmmm. It's tradition, and we all stuff ourselves full as we can.

Josiah is looking so grown-up! He needs to stop. What happened to my baby brother?



This is pretty much one of the cutest pictures ever.

We've decided that Rosalie looks a LOT like my dad. What do you think??

On both Jeremy's and my sides of the family, the blue-eyed ones far outnumber the brown-eyed. If you only count immediate family, there are FOUR of us who have brown eyes. So of course we had to take a picture. Here we are, the brown-eyed ones, an elite group of good-looking people. (hehe)

Down the street from my parents' house there is a little lake with a walking path around it. It's a lovely place. We took a walk there one afternoon, and I loved it so much that I made Lydia go for a run around it with me the next morning. If I had a place like this to go running, I think I would actually want to exercise every single day!



While this is all the pictures I am sharing with you in this blog post, it's not even the half of it. Our time there was filled to the brim with so many fun things... a girlie goodwill shopping trip that resulted in some of the most amazing deals ever (that's a whole other post), painting of some of those great deals, a fun BBQ with friends we hadn't seen in a long time, visits up to the chiropractic clinic, shopping, late-nights talking and catching up, an afternoon at the movies to see Julie and Julia, playing in the beautiful backyard, swinging on the rope swing, an evening at an amusement park where I rode a REAL roller coaster for the first time and almost died (ok, so that's a little melodramatic... but I've decided I'm definitely more of a Disneyland girl. No more crazy roller-coasters for me)... it was all SO so fun and just the time we needed with this dear family of ours.

We are a silly bunch when we are under the same roof. There is always so much joking, teasing, slapping of butts (yes, really), and general merry-making that I'm sure we would probably drive many people crazy.

I, however, love each and every minute of it and can't think of a better way to just be together.

Rawr!!

Coming Home

I wrote this Sunday evening, the first day of our travel homeward, on the back of a Trader Joe's paper bag... because, as it turned out, I had completely forgotten to pack any journals or writing paper of any kind for myself. Silly me.



The sun is setting, and we are driving west.

Low-lying clouds are illuminated from behind, sharply outlined in purple with gold shining through and pink-y blue streaking in wisps across the sky.

We are in Utah, in a place where flat scrubby desert is rimmed by striped canyons and rusty red hills. In the light of the setting sun, the land is dappled with gold and shadowy blue. The canyons are plunged into a deep velvety purple, and I think that if I could reach out and touch them they would feel like that, like velvet, soft and dark. But this is a big land and I can touch them no easier than I can reach the huge sky.

Suddenly, the sun drops below the clouds, bursting forth in golden glory, its last fling before it sinks behind the hills. And just like that, there is color. Color everywhere. Reds and browns and golds and greens and purples and pinks and blues, in stripes and splashes all across the landscape. It is glorious. I drink it in from my front seat in the van, my husband beside me and my girls behind me as we speed onward down the long, sometimes lonely, road. Our loved ones are behind us, many wonderful memories made, and our little house and yet more loved ones wait to greet us when we return. Here in this place between loved ones and home, the land and the sky, my thoughts are peaceful and content, my heart thankful for all these blessings. Thankful for this myriad of wonderful things, and this beauty that is spread out around me, like a tapestry that could only be woven by God.

And then, just as suddenly, the sun is only a blaze of burnished orange light at the horizon, sending forth its last golden rays, and it is dusk. The land is blanketed once again with the deep purple of the velvet shadows as the sky holds onto its final rosy streaks.

We drive, through the velvet, winding our way into the canyons, disappearing from this vast place along with the sun...

It's good to be going home.




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

we are home now, of course, having arrived yesterday about 4:30 in the afternoon after several long days of driving. It's lovely to be at home, although we do miss our dear ones in Colorado very much already.

And now that we are home there is much to be done, including laundry, unpacking, preparing for school, catching up with all of you, and writing several blog posts, of course. I can't wait to share some pictures with you all! It was truly a wonderful time. I shall be back again soon.

hello, home, sweet home of mine

well, hello there!

So. I've been rather absent this week, due to several different things. And this, my friends, is not even a REAL blog post. Nope, I'm just going to play a bit of catch-up and use the ever-wonderful bullet point. (wait a minute, I don't know HOW to do a bullet point. Shh, don't laugh at me. I'll use dashes instead.)

-THE MOST IMPORTANT THING: On Sunday, we leave for Denver to visit my family!! And we're driving, which we've never done before. I have mixed feelings about this... excited to be on the road and seeing all the beautiful scenery, spending time as a family, but rather apprehensive about how it will go with a baby who has never been on a LONG car ride (about 16 hours total, although we're doing it over two days). It'll definitely be different. Hopefully, it will be a very fun different, rather than an oh-my-gosh-why-did-we-do-this different. :) Either way, we simply cannot WAIT to get there and see everyone and have a lovely week full of all the fun family things we love best. Please pray that we will have a safe and uneventful drive.

-On Tuesday I got sick with the flu and did some major throwing up. It's now Friday and my tummy is still not completely back to normal. However, because of this, I've lost 7 pounds this week. And while I'd rather not have been sick (especially THIS week), I certainly won't complain about that part of it. :)

-Miss Alyssa recently started hosting her crafty challenges again (can I get a yay? yay!), and I was so happy to see that this time it was jewelry. I'd been wanting to try my hand at making a cute necklace for some time, so this was the perfect excuse. I had grand plans to go to Michaels and pick up some super cute supplies this week, but what with the puking and the million things I already had to do, that just didn't happen. Oddly enough, I'm glad, because it forced me to look around at the things I already had and see what I could come up with. And this is what I ended up making:

Cost: $0. Just a chain from a necklace I didn't wear anymore, some old buttons from my jar, and a bit of good glue. I think I really like it! Thanks, Alyssa, for inspiring us to get creative!

-It's been what feels like ages and ages since I went to coffee or had some sort of good girly time with my sister (in-law, to avoid confusion) Jessica. I'm having withdrawals.

-Today, one of the girls that I used to babysit (old family friends) is getting married. Yes, I do feel a bit old, but mostly I am just excited and glad and happy that God blessed this lovely young woman with a wonderful man who is perfect for her and I wish them all the best. I also wish I could be there for her wedding, because my two sisters Jerusha and Lydia are both bridesmaids, and I'm pretty sure they are going to be absolutely drop-dead gorgeous. Can't wait to see pictures of it all (taken by my very own dad, who incidentally gets to be the wedding photographer)!

-I really love this picture of me and my sweet honey-bunches.(taken on our birthday date last Saturday-- a happy and wonderful time was had by all. And by all, I mean US)


-And I really really love this picture of Rosalie-roo!

She is 5 months on Saturday, can you believe it? Me neither. I of course plan to write a 5-month blog post and show you many more adorable pictures, but that will have to wait until we get back home.

That's about it for now, darlings. I shall be back again in a week or so to regale you with stories and pictures galore! I hope all of you have a delightful weekend/week ahead of you...

xoxo.

Happy Birthday...

... to this man right here.



The father of my three little girls (a sweeter one there never was)

the one who loves me no matter what (even when I'm not so loveable)

My friend forever, my provider, my leader, my love, my husband.

He's pretty much the greatest, and definitely at the very tippiest of the top of my list of Wonderful People.

I love him ever so much.

happy 29th birthday, babe!!



photo of my handsome hubby by Lorie Chambless

The Wonderful Place Known as Home

This week, I've been stuck at home, taking care of several little sickies. We literally haven't gone anywhere, due to a fussy baby with a cold and a case of the pukes with Emma. (although, I did escape to Target last night after my poor girlies were tucked in bed, where I found altogether too many fun things on clearance... but I digress).

Sometimes, that's what life is like as a stay-at-home-mom. Days on end at home, where you sometimes feel as if you've lost connection with the outside world and you start to wonder if the price of eggs might have gone up in your absence.

And sometimes, I can sense what some people are thinking when they discover that I'm a stay-at-home mom of three at the tender young age of 25, when they find out that I got married at nineteen and had children RIGHT away. "oh, the poor girl, tied down so young to a husband and a bunch of kids... doesn't she wish she could have experienced so much more? Travel, and see the world, etc. etc.?"

But, you see, what these sorts of people do not realize is that the world has come to me. I do not live in just any ordinary house, no, indeed!

I live in a castle, filled with princesses who daily find adventures of the most exciting sort. Why, just yesterday, a handsome prince came to visit us, riding atop a most glorious steed.
Sometimes, I live in the jungle, or a zoo, where ferocious animals of several furry varieties wait around the corners, ready to jump out and surprise you.
Occasionally I live in Paris (say that Par-ee, please), with little girls "in two straight lines", and we find ourselves strolling past the Eiffel Tower just as casually as you please.
And then there are the times when I live in a busy, bustling restaurant, with orders flying to and fro and customers coming regularly through the doors. It's not everyone who gets the privilege of living with two gourmet chefs who prepare you such culinary delights as Pear Cherry Chocolate Lemon Pie and Pepper Lettuce Onion Soup.
Sometimes I live on a farm, where the crops grow in neat little rows and I'm fairly positive you can smell the fresh produce ripening in the sun, waiting to be picked by little farmer hands clad in Hello Kitty gardening gloves. We have even come across the rare talking pig from time to time.
Once, I found myself in Africa, surrounded by elephants of many different shapes and sizes. I was able to watch two safari explorers chase a herd of zebras with my own two eyes. It was quite the thrilling experience!

So, as you can see, homebody though I may be, I certainly do not lack for adventure.

Someday, I hope to be able to really and truly travel the world and see and experience many different things. I pray that we will come to a season of our lives when we can do just that, with and without our children. But for now, I am content where God has me, here at home with my three little ones.

For, you see... I've learned that no matter what it is that you do, our horizons are only small if we imagine them to be so.