It’s snowing.
It’s May 12th and it’s snowing.
I, for one, am not complaining. We need the moisture desperately so I refuse to complain about the form from which it comes. Plus, we’re all beat from a busy weekend and could use some snuggly, relaxing time.
The weather also makes me want to create, thus today’s Pinterest picks. Enjoy!
Thank you, Lord, for entrusting these sweet little miracles to me. YOU made me a momma and for that, I’m forever grateful…
Thank you, handsome, for choosing me so long ago (and every day since) to be your wife and the mother of your children. I absolutely love our life.
Thank you, sweet munchkins, for letting me smother you in kisses and dote on you and show you off – I’m so very proud of you, ya know?! Thank you for sharing your days with me and for teaching me so much about the Lord; I could never have imagined His great love for us until I had you. 
Just being a mother is the best gift I could receive today, though you have showered me with so much more. It’s an honorable, notable job which I am privileged to hold.
Happy Mother’s Day to all you mommas out there!
…to those of you who’ve prayed to join the ranks, I stand with you in prayer that the Lord would open your womb…and soon!
…to those mommas who have lost little loves far too soon, my heart aches for you, especially today. I pray the Lord showers your day with extra helpings of grace. More so, I pray that you have an intimate relationship with Him so that you may be reunited with those sweeties one day…
…to those of you who are struggling in relationship with your mother, my heart aches for you, too. Relationships are messy and satan comes to kill, steal and destroy them. I’m praying for humility, renewal and forgiveness for both sides…
…and to the special moms, sisters, grandmas, great-grands, aunts and cousins in my life, both of blood and spirit, who have mothered me, mentored me and loved me, I pray that you are remembered near, far and forever for your loving sacrifices. You have my heart…
Most of you know that we have quite a few chickens running around the place. We have over 50 hens (and way too many roosters) and they dutifully lay eggs for us and our neighbors and several friends from church. I grew up in town and had never really been around them much but I’ve fallen in love with them and joined the chicken loving ranks like the rest of the family.
Wrex grew up raising them and showing them. He’s a bird whisperer, truly.
He’s loved chickens ever since he was a little guy. This is one of my favorite pictures of him…ever…
Our kids have willingly fallen into those same footsteps and we feel so fortunate that we have room to raise a few birds for them to enjoy.
Sawyer’s favorite chicken, Naked, came from this initial group. She’s a Turken, or Naked Neck, and she’s the sweetest little thing!
This chicken loves Sawyer! When she (Naked) sees up pull up from being gone, she will run to the house to greet us! She lets Sawyer pick her up and carry her around. She’s easy to identify, thanks to her lack of feathers on her neck, which was nice when Sawyer was little…she could always pick her out.
We even had to incorporate chickens into her three year photo shoot!
The girl really loves her chickens…
We’ve bought quite a few chicks from the feed store and raised them…
We’ve also had the opportunity to hatch chicks from eggs which is so fun and exciting!
Daddy brought home some Old English bantams the other day. He was soooooo excited, because that’s what he used to show. Sawyer was sooooooo excited to have baby chicks around!
Somebody else has gotten in on the chicken loving…
I think he could stand there and watch them all day. What a good babysitter! 😉
If you ever need a lesson in poultry raising or just want to see some sweet chickens, stop by! We have a few to look at…
We survived our first severe weather outbreak of the summer. Thank you, Lord.
I think I’ve mentioned it before (ahem) but I loathe severe weather. I grew up in tornado alley…in the panhandle of Texas…without a basement…and with far inferior weather technology. It wasn’t that fun to me.
I remember going through a couple of springs where tornado warnings were issued every.single.night; it was like clock work. We’d get home from school and have no time for dinner before we had to hunker down in the hallway (remember, no basement), throw a mattress over our head and pray. My mom would be in the living room watching the TV and my dad would be on the front porch storm spotting. (Nuts!)
I remember a night that we were all so tired of the weather. We had been in the hallway every night that week and it had just gotten long and wearing. My brother was starving and I remember him praying, “Lord, please keep up safe…especially the kitchen because I’m so hungry!” HA!
My grandparents came to visit one weekend and my grandma likes tornadoes about as much as I do. Sure enough, that night all the sirens were going off…the tornado was about a mile from our house. My mom, brother, aunt and I were sheltering in a closet and my grandma was in our bathtub “praying with a cricket.”
A tornado did hit the backyard of our home on two different occasions AND a small one hit our house in Brighton the last year we were there. Do I attract these things, or what?!
Technology has come sooooooooo incredibly far; it’s fascinating to me! Growing up, there would be a little thunderstorm and/or tornado symbol in the bottom corner of the TV – no map. If it was just an outline, it was a watch…if it was filled in, it was a warning. If and when it was a warning, it wasn’t just letting you know it was heading your way like they do now…it meant there was a tornado on the ground – take shelter! I prefer today’s method. 🙂 The lead time they’ve been able to gain and the specificity with which they can predict is just amazing.
I do feel like that for the past two years it has missed us more than it has hit us, thankfully. I firmly believe it is the Lord protecting this little area that we have prayed His protection over. There will be storms all around us and they will arch up and over us…like today.
I am thankful we have a basement. I am thankful for advanced weather technology. I’m thankful for friends and family who pray, text and call. I’m thankful for live internet feeds and buried fiber optic cables. I am most thankful for the One who even the wind and the waves obey.
Do you ever wish you could un-see things?
We ventured out to the park today because it was so splendidly nice out. I think I’ve written about it before but when I hole up in my little house on the prairie, it’s easy to lose perspective on the rest of the world. I get so used to our daily grind and how we choose to do things…then my naivety kicks in and I start thinking that every family is like our family. Oh, how I wish that were true. Not because I think we have it all figured out – by no means is that the case – but I do know that our children are loved and safe and cared for and fed and nourished and disciplined in love; they are not abused or scared or hungry or alone… It’s not that way for every kid, or even most kids, although it should be.
As a lover of justice (and humanity, for that matter), it’s hard for me to see someone treated poorly, especially a child. While we were playing, a little girl got in trouble for something by someone who didn’t talk to her not one time until it was time to go and they were displeased with something. Obviously, I don’t know all of the details, but I know what I saw and what I saw was ugly. I’m not saying she was physically abused in front me…had that been the case, I would have had no reservations in stepping in and/or calling the police…but she was treated extremely poorly…especially for a child. She was screamed at and handled roughly and shamed. It just makes you wonder what she goes through at home if her caretaker was unafraid to put on this show in public.
I know we all have bad days and bad parenting moments when we don’t always act the way the Lord asks of us (me included). Sadly, I don’t think this was an isolated incident. I was told by a friend, “She’s the kind of girl that will be really happy to get to go to school all day.”
Oh my soul. As a deep feeler, these kinds of things pain me; physically hurt me. My heart feels so shredded and I feel so helpless.
I spent my drive home just pleading to the Lord on behalf of this little girl and for those who care for her. I was begging Him for justice and safety and love for her – is that too much to ask?!
I’m not naive enough to think that what I saw is the worst any child has ever been treated; I know that’s not the case and the fact that that’s not the case intensifies the pain of the situation. We need Jesus. Our world needs Jesus. Our kids need Jesus. We all need Jesus.
Stuff like this makes me just want to hole up in our little house, do what we do and stay away from the crazies and the injustices of the world…but I’m certain that doesn’t solve anything. I don’t know what the point of experiencing that today was but my soul is stirred. I want to be part of the solution, the revolution, that changes the familial unit for Christ. A Bible teacher once preached a mantra that said, “What we struggle with and do not sanctify in ourselves will become a monster in our children.”
Struggle with anger and don’t work to change it? It will be amplified in your children.
Struggle with pride and don’t work to change it? It will be amplified in your children.
Struggle with self-worth and don’t work to change it? It will be amplified in your children.
Struggle with __________ and don’t work to change it? It will become a monster in your children.
As parents, we have got to wake up to the responsibilities bestowed upon us! Whether our children were “planned” by us or not matters not; they are now in our care and it is our duty and obligation to do right by them.
I’m so tired of seeing people/parents thinking they can birth a child and do nothing to actually raise it/teach it/love it/guide it/esteem it…
I’m so tired of seeing people/parents do “what their parents did” because that’s all they know… (Look at this generation…that’s not working (for the most part)!
I’m so tired of people/parents thinking that what they do and what they say has no bearing on the kinds of adults their children will be…
I’m so tired of people/parents putting their jobs, addictions, bank accounts, friends, social lives, etc. in front of their job as a spouse and parent…
I’m so tired of satan killing, stealing and destroying people and parents.
My heart is slivered tonight; I wish I could un-see and un-hear the events of the day…but I can’t…
I can, however, propose a call to action. Step up, parents. You have an enormous, important, future-changing job on your hands – your children. They are worth your time and your effort and your sacrifice. You are raising little adults who will one day be leading their generation. What you say and do today will effect them forever, believe it or not. Treat them with respect and dignity and grace and mercy and love – it covers a multitude of sins, you know. Teach them. Train them. Guide them along. Be slow to anger and abounding in love. Don’t harm them or shame them or abuse them or neglect them or break their spirits. Don’t just revert to what you know or experienced when growing up; refer to the Word of God and make that your standard. Put aside all of the injustices done to you and make life for your kids different. Link arms with other parents and help each other by vowing to do this life together and do this life well. We get one shot with these little guys. I’m not saying that the Lord can’t redeem our shortcomings (goodness knows He does it for me on a daily basis) but we owe it to Him and to them to give them our best; not our leftovers, not our ignorances, not our generational failures…our best.
Pray for children across the city and state and nation and world tonight who aren’t on the receiving end of someone’s best…and especially pray for those getting the worst.
Pray for me…that as much I want to un-see what I saw, that it will continue to spur me to keep seeking the Lord in what He has for me here…because it’s too important to do otherwise.
Sawyer loves to lay in bed and talk. I’ll go to tuck her in and snuggle in beside her…she’ll roll my way and say, “Let’s talk about something.” Most often, I oblige and we’ll chat for a few minutes before prayers and sleep. I so enjoy getting to hear what’s on her little heart and mind and I pray this is something she never tires of.
For a while now, she’s wanted me to stay and sleep with her and I’ve been promising a slumber party for a while, so last night we did just that!
I reminded daddy that it was slumber party night while he was still at the sale barn and told him to get excited. He did just that!
She couldn’t wait for him to get home so he could help us set the tent up in the living room. I was just thinking we’d camp out in somebody’s bed but I have to admit, the tent was a lot more fun!
Wryder had a lot of fun, too. He made it until about 6:53 and then the crib was calling his name.
We made a fun supper, complete with a sleeping bag sandwich and we had lots of treats on hand for our ‘midnight’ snack.
We did our make-up (which then resulted in an impromptu bath)…
Played some Old Maid and Go Fish…
Watched an Umizoomi we hadn’t seen…
Played flashlights…
and then called it a night!
This was cheap and easy entertainment and we all loved it! The tent is still holding strong in the living room and there is lots of playing still going on. Naptime will be glorious today…