Today? Was a really good day. I think we were all desperate for some family time together that didn’t involve someone feeling like death warmed over. We had breakfast and cooked some pretend food in the toy room kitchen…
We let Sawyer get a little outside time in since it wasn’t too chilly or windy and we cooked some more in the barn…
We checked the mail and found we had a gift from Goo Goo so we all put it to good use…
The kiddos bathed together and got all snuggled up in their jammies…we ate a little supper and Sawyer watched a little show before bed. It was just a simple, good, familial day…my favorite kind.
is my hero. I have no idea what I would’ve done without him the past 11 years! He makes me whole. He’s patient and kind and loving and encouraging…he’s a voice of reason in my not so reasonable existence…he leads us in the ways of the Lord and prays for us and with us and over us…he works hard to provide for our family so that I can stay home and raise these babies…he’s a selfless servant in the truest of forms.
I for sure have no idea what I would’ve done without him this past month. I have been ILL. (I’ve written about it a few times but in an effort to spare you of boredom and more self-pity, we’ll just leave it at that.) And he? He has MORE than picked up the slack around here. He’s played games and read books and changed diapers and fixed meals and washed dishes and bathed babies and folded laundry and let me sleep and bought medicine and bought more medicine and cleaned bathrooms and taken kids to church and helped with projects I started and and and and and…
And? As I’ve been typing this, I got to thinking that I’m not so sure how out of the ordinary this stuff REALLY is regarding him. Even when I’m well (or as well as I can be – ha!) he does these things. He is, bar none/hands down/no competition, the best husband and daddy anyone could ever ask for. He shows love to me in every kind of way I can even think to imagine, even through helping with housework. I hear women talk about their husbands and how they wished he’d help more with the kids or help more around the house or be more involved/romantic/loving and I’m thankful I know nothing of that world.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I have NO IDEA how I landed such a man. I am blessed beyond measure by the way he loves me.
He’ll probably be happy to know that I think I’m on the mend! I scrubbed the kitchen floor this morning and then cleaned the rest of the house…so I guess I’m either getting well or I’m CRazY. (No comments on that one. Please and thank you.) I can’t walk…but my house is clean. Maybe he’ll carry me to bed…
had his 6 month well-baby checkup yesterday. Turns out, he’s doing well! (Not that we doubted that.) 😉
He weighed in at 20 pounds, 12 ounces and was 28.5 inches tall! He’s a big, stout boy! (Just ask my arms/neck/back/shoulders when I carry him in the carrier…) He got the ok to munch on some puffs and Cheerios and to eat what mom, dad and sister are eating (save for meat, eggs and cheese). Pretty sure he was THRILLED!
He thoroughly enjoyed the protective paper on the exam bed. His shots? Not so much.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him, bless his name. Psalm 100:4
The first of the month kicked off our family’s thankful tree activity. Nothing fancy – just pure, unadulterated gratefulness for the countless blessings we have in our lives.
We ARE a blessed people! We have a roof over our head that is comfortable and climate controlled…we have access to a clean, safe water supply (that can be heated for comfort and cleanliness)…we have the cheapest, safest and most wholesome food supply in the world…we have the privilege to worship how we so choose…we live in a democratic society that although, not perfect, is better than every other alternative… we are healthy and thriving…my husband has a job and one that provides for our financial needs…I have the benefit of staying home to raise our children…we have more than enough food in our cupboards and freezers and stomachs…we have totes of clothes we aren’t currently wearing…we have extra shoes in our mudroom…we own animals for pleasure…we have access to more than one vehicle…we have MORE.THAN.ENOUGH.
Let us not forget from whom all blessings flow.
Whatever is good and perfect comes down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow. James 1:17
So, we will praise Him. We will praise Him with our voices and words and blogs. We will praise Him with our attitudes and the posture of our hearts. We will praise Him with our paper leaves.
It’s funny how something so simple can evoke such emotion. To hear Sawyer say she’s grateful for her…
Baby brother
just takes my breath away. She gets it.
Daddy said he was thankful that…
We live in America.
to which Sawyer quickly replied, “No, silly! We live in Holyoke!”
And the past couple of days? I’ve been especially thankful…
That my husband prays for me.
The ways in which He provides for us are many and we’re really good at celebrating the gift…but let us not refrain from worshiping THE GIVER.
My heart overflows in gratitude for all He has given…and for the things He took that He knew I didn’t need. Really thankful for those things, too…
Let us cultivate a spirit of gratitude among us, in all things and in all times. It leads to joy. It leads to selflessness. It leads to a greater perspective. It leads to Him.
Happy day after Halloween! I hope you’re surviving the sugar crashes and runny noses. We had a good day together and I tried to make it fun for the littles, because they are only little once, ya know. I made these for lunch..
Mummy dogs!I could eat my weight in these
and Sawyer got a fun little dessert!
Marshmallows are one of the few sweets she’ll eat.She was trying to make it look spooky!
After lunch, brother took a short nap and sister thought she saw a “scary shadow”…which I think translates to, “I’m too excited to take nap.” 🙂 So, we got around, got dressed and headed into Grant to trick-or-treat at the businesses downtown.
Oh, yes, Cubbie bear got to go trick-or-treating, too! (More on that in a future post!)Sooooo cute…and sooooo windy!Sawyer holding hands with Craton – her self-proclaimed favorite part of the night.
We did a little speed trick-or-treating down main because it was cold, at least to us. I’m starting to think Sawyer’s about as tough in the cold as I am…which means, she’s not. We hit all the main places and then decided we were just going to go on home and finish partying at our 3rd annual Phipps Family Camp IN. We always set the tent up in the living room on Halloween and eat a fun supper and watch Charlie Brown and just have fun together! She and brother fell asleep on the way home so our party started like this:
Tired little indian
I woke her up for some pumpkin pizza but it never got too wild around here.
In the tent
We did watch this…
The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown
I just wish there were fewer uses of the word “stupid.” Sigh.
All in all, a good Halloween. I encourage you to show grace to the littles today, mommas. They probably had too much candy and not enough sleep, but love will cover a multitude of sins. Love is patient, love is kind…it keeps no record of wrongs. They are only little once… Next week, you’ll look back on the halloween festivities with fondness and it will have been worth the tears and meltdowns and incessant disciplining you might be experiencing today. Don’t ask me how I know… 😉
After a friend sent me this overly adorable costume for little Wryder (thanks, Emily!!)
This is not Wryder. 😉
I knew I wanted Sawyer to be an indian with him. Our church’s harvest carnival was this afternoon and we found her costume…….yesterday. (Phew.) Nonna let us borrow one she had and I was just gonna take it and add a little fluff/beads/fringe…until Wrexy came across this little number at the thrift store.
She. Is. ADORABLE!
It was PERFECT (and needed no extra work, mind you!) I threw together a head dress, painted a couple of stripes, threw on a bow and arrow……and the CUTEST little indian I’ve ever seen made her debut!
Seriously, the weaponry made the outfit
I thought the carnival started at 3:00, so we ate an earlier lunch with the thought that the kids would still get a decent little nap in before we had to leave. I fibbed (oopsie!) and told Sawyer that Mr. Russ (our pastor) said that all the kids had to take a nap or they couldn’t come to the carnival, so she snuggled right down! Then, I decided to check the official start time. Good thing I did! It started at 2:00! So, no nap for Sawyer. We got up and got around and dashed out the door. As we were driving, she said, “Will you still tell Mr. Russ I slept good?” HAHAHAHA Oh, geez.
Pretty sure anybody would let this face into the carnival, nap or not.
Daddy fixed Wryder’s costume so I could wear him in the baby bjourn but have it look like an actual papoose.
He rocked it.He was thrilled – really!I love these 2 little indians…
Sawyer played A LOT of games and got A LOT of loot!
Searching for penniesTossing ballsANY game with Kenyon is fun in her book!Bean bag tossShe won a root beer! IS there a better prize? Not in her world!
She got to help drive Mr. Koop’s horses, Rose and Ruby!
She was a happy girl!
Super fun time with super fun people – how do ya beat that?! Thursday, we’ll head back to Grant to trick-or-treat downtown and then head home for our annual Phipps Family Camp In! Until then, we’ll attempt to get a little rest under our belts…
Sawyer has REALLY gotten into texting these days. Maybe I should say “texting.” She’ll ask to send daddy a text while he’s at work and so I’ll let her type something out and “hit the blue button.” It usually look something like this:
Dsdddvddffgffffffffffttggggygggfffr
And then she’ll tell me what it means. Yesterday, it meant this: “Bring me home a real animal rabbit present and a real goat and a real slug sock. Eww. Or a pheasant.”
Ahem.
Well, lo and behold, our animal loving, highly connected, petting zoo keeper of a dad brought home a “surprise” for Sawyer. (Have I mentioned that she’s got him good? Oh, I have? Good.)
He’s seems quite cute and content…until you go to pick him up. Then, not so much. We’ll have to work on that.
She loves him, can you tell? She was seriously so excited. The magic text worked!
We fed him some hay and petted on him quite a bit.
She introduced him to all of her kitties and then they all danced together. I’m pretty sure 90% of all of our animals will need a shoulder replaced before they die…
He doesn’t have a name yet and even though I keep referring to him as “he,” I’m not even sure of that. She wanted to name him “Pick-up Truck.” We’ll see if that sticks.
Moral of the story: if you’re cute and sweet and send your daddy texts during the day, he’ll bring you home a rabbit! (I guess I can be thankful it wasn’t the slug sock…)
We ventured south of town this weekend to our favorite pumpkin patch in the area. They do an all-inclusive entry fee so we took FULL advantage! The weather was just about as nice as you could ask for in the middle of October and we had such a good time together!
She REALLY enjoyed the jumping pillow!Racing daddy like a horseMore jumping“Look at those snowmen!”Pumpkin patch + football = heavenTaking Loo-Loo for a ride!Helping me get through the soybean mazeHe was FIRED UP to ride the cow train!I think this was time number 3…Kid, kid, kid, kid, kid, kid, BIG KID, kidI made it!My lovesSo fun!Making the climb up the hay mountain (again)Favorite shot of the dayShe has a knack for finding the smallest, dirtiest, squishiest pumpkins in the patch – ha!This girl LOVES getting her face painted!So cute!One more time in the corn boxWorking hard at racing her ducks – pink, no less!
I will praise you, O LORD, with all my heart; I will tell of all your wonders. Psalm 9:1
Earlier this summer, I felt the desire to start a blog. I know what you’re thinking. The world doesn’t need another blogger. But my heart had been inundated with moments I didn’t want to forget. I wanted to have a place where I could leave a written account of the memories we’re making with our kiddos, because I always THINK I’ll remember every cute or witty thing they say or do without writing it down, but alas, I do not. The desire to blog wasn’t fleeting. It didn’t feel like a, “Oh-that-could-be-something-fun-to-do-in-all-of-this-spare-time-I-have” {insert sarcastic huff here} kind of a thing – it felt like a push from the Lord; a Holy Spirit nudge of sorts. Continue reading Because the World Needs Another Blogger, Right?
We checked the mail and found we had a gift from Goo Goo so we all put it to good use…
The kiddos bathed together and got all snuggled up in their jammies…we ate a little supper and Sawyer watched a little show before bed. It was just a simple, good, familial day…my favorite kind.
