Cultivating Childhood

I love carting around my little leather journal around with me so that I can record my gifts as I go.  Then, I get the enjoy them all over again when I type them out every week.  It's such a blessing to see how faithful God has been in the last week. 68. A precious 45 minutes alone  in the house to straighten up 69. Having a clean house, 70. Reading for pleasure, 71. And still  getting to bed early 72. Getting a book in the mail 73. Lipstick lips on Button's cheek 74. Little Buddy learning to express his emotions in a positive way 75. A successful potty trip 76. Ghiradelli chocolate 77. My husband's 2-year anniversary at his job 78. Waking up to the birds singing 79. Button singing in his crib when he wakes up for the day 80. Reading poetry 81. And actually enjoying it 82. Little Buddy finally showing readiness for potty-training 83. The Good Friday service at church 84. Little Buddy's face lighting up when they played Nothing But the Blood of Jesus 8

Have you ever noticed that having agendas with toddlers and preschoolers doesn't work?  You plan on a quick trip to the grocery store, but your preschooler doesn't want to go.  Finally, you get there and the toddler whines that he wants to walk with his big brother instead of riding in the cart (which you know means trying to keep them both contained and not pulling a bunch of food off the shelves).  If you have a set plan in mind and it doesn't happen, it can be extremely stressful. Sometimes, agendas are necessary. Moms need to go to the grocery store.  You need to go to the doctor's appointments.  And more often than not, you have to bring along the young'uns.  The agenda must be completed despite the obstacles that get in your way.  This is where good discipline and training is important to keep sanity. Other times, agendas are not  necessary. I've been finding this to be particularly true during our nature walks.   I want to take a walk.   I want to

I totally want to make  these cookies  with Little Buddy on Saturday night.  I've never heard about Resurrection Cookies until this year, but they sound like so much fun.  Thanks to the ladies over at GirlTalk for the recipe! Resurrection Cookies 1 cup pecans (halves or whole) 3 egg whites 1 cup sugar 1 tsp vinegar pinch of salt wooden spoon Ziploc bag Bible Tape (Packing tape works best) 1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Place pecans in Ziploc bag and let children beat them with the wooden spoon until broken into small pieces.  Read John 19:1-3 and remind them that after Jesus was arrested, He was beaten by the Roman soldiers.    2. Let each child smell (or taste) the vinegar.  Pour 1 tsp into the mixing bowl.  Read John 19:28-30 and explain that when Jesus was thirsty on the cross, He was given vinegar to drink. 3. Add the egg whites to the vinegar.  Eggs represent life. Read John 10:10-11 Explain that Jesus gave His life to give us life.    4. Sprinkle a litt

This one is mostly for the grandparents.  =)

Still working on my 1,000 gifts! 49. Taking my MOPS kids on the playground because the weather was nice. 50.  Watching Button run to the window shouting "Dada" as Phil comes home. 51. Having a husband whose love for his kids is extremely evident. 52. Getting to go on a date with said husband 53. Library book sales 54. Buying "too many" books 55. A surprise bald eagle sighting 56. Short stroll along Lake Washington 57. A great babysitter 58. Naps for mommy 59. A husband who does the dishes 60. Wearing my favorite fleece that I got at a garage sale last summer 61. Clean sheets 62. Planting sunflowers 63. Watching my tomatoes grow 64. Organizing my recipes 65. A steak dinner prepared by my husband 66. Playing in the dandelions at Discovery Park 67. Yellow toes!

Last week, we finished reading through our Jesus Storybook Bible during our "Tea Time" in the afternoon.  Since we finished, I've been struggling trying to find something to do with Little Buddy and Button for our devotional time.  I feel this is especially important as we are leading up to the Holy Week and Easter. Then I remembered a favorite memory of mine from when I was a little girl.  My mom made Resurrection Eggs that we could open up that would tell the Easter Story.  We used to do them all in Sunday School, but I thought it would be fun to make them like an advent calendar and open a couple each day throughout the Holy Week. I followed the directions from here , but this blog has some amazing ideas as well.  Here is our set... I found eggs at the Dollar Tree, and then took the directions from here and put them in a document that I could cut and place into each egg.  Then, I just found all the items in and around my home to put in the eggs.  It probably

Today, Button is the same age that Little Buddy was when Button was born - five days shy of 20 months.  I can't believe how big he is now! August 2009 Today

I'm jumping on the bandwagon.  I've been reading lists on some blogs that I read of their One Thousand Gifts.  Based off the book , these people have been sharing 1,000 things that they are thankful for.  While I haven't yet(!) read the book, I love the thought behind this discipline and thought it would be fun to join in. So here goes... Morning hugs from Little Buddy Good-bye kisses from my husband as he leaves for work The twinkle in Little Buddy's eyes when he's excited about something Button playing with his belly button Hummingbirds Comfy Couches New opportunities to use my spiritual gifts at church Button's sweet "yeah"s Sleeping through the night regularly for the first time in over three years Dinosaur pajamas Long phone conversations with my mom Fresh haircuts for all my boys A cuddly three-year old Button singing the tune to "Twinkle, Twinkle" Painted toenails Sore muscles the day after a good workout Forty Days

For our family time on Saturday, we headed to Carkeek Park in Seattle.  We had a lovely nature walk through the woods, listening to the birds, looking at the trees and enjoying each other. Button and the bird field guide On our way back to our car, we noticed a fenced in area.  So, we decided to take a look.  We were excited to see that it was a breeding area for Chum Salmon! Inside there was a little pool with tens of thousands of baby Chum Salmon.  The pool was an "Imprint Pond" where salmon that had been hatched in elementary schools and hatcheries in the Puget Sound region are brought to Carkeek to "learn" their native waters in a safe environment.  This "imprinting" is necessary so that they can find their way back in 3-5 years for them to lay their eggs after spending time in the ocean.  The pond has filtered creek water running through it, and it was fun to watch the salmon try to swim upstream. We were loitering around the fence when

We've been enjoying the newness of Spring and all the birds that have been visiting our bird feeder.  We have our feeder right outside our back door where the boys can see it from the kitchen table.  We also have a hummingbird feeder right outside our front window that we can see from the living room. Here are some of the birds that we have seen: Black-Capped Chickadee House Finch White-Breasted Nuthatch Dark-Eyed Junco Blue Jay Common Crow Mew Gull American Robin Anna's Hummingbird House Finches American Robin Chickadee Little Buddy has been bugging us to get a bird bath after reading about them in one of the kids' birding books we got at the library.  Not sure if we'll do that or not this year, but we would like to make our yard more bird-friendly.  We don't have many trees in our yard, but we're thinking of planting some sunflowers. We also get visited by a lot of ground squirrels.  They also frequented our bird feeder until we mo

I thought it might be fun to start a monthly post to share what books we are enjoying during our cuddle time with Little Buddy.  We usually find a good book or so at the library to read for that week and supplement with a book that contains a lot of shorter stories.  We love this time when it is just us (Button is napping), and it prepares Little Buddy for transitioning to quiet time. We've pretty much finished reading The Complete Tales of Beatrix Potter.   Forever a classic, Miss Potter had a gift telling stories that capture children's imaginations.  Little Buddy especially loved all the Peter Rabbit stories as he was most familiar with the characters.  I did find, though, that he struggled if there were too many words on a page and not enough pictures.  If I mentioned a character or even item that wasn't in the picture, he'd ask where it was on the page.  I think he wasn't quite ready for this level of read-aloud yet.  We'll try again in a year or two. I

Mini-cookie sheets from the Dollar Tree are the best.  We use these for playdough, magnets, and now marbles! This kept the kids entertained for a long time!

After our bout with Hand, Foot, and Mouth, we discovered that we had a new problem with Little Buddy.  He didn't want to go to sleep by himself!  We did a lot of co-sleeping during his sickness and now he wanted us to lay down with him every night for him to go to sleep.  As we didn't want to make this a habit, we decided to get him a sleeping buddy. Meet Dug! Dug is the newest member of our family.  He's a Shar Pei named after the dog that befriends Mr. Fredrickson and Russell in the movie Up.   He is very well loved, and Little Buddy has a lot less issues falling asleep. Sleep well, Little Buddy!

I met a lady last week at the park.  She was fussing around her two-door coupe with about three feet of stuff attached to the hood of her car with a big blue tarp.  It was pretty obvious that she was living in her car, and I wondered if she had recently gotten evicted from her home.  As I was at the park with my husband and kids, I tried to talk myself out of going over to talk to her. You see, I'm terrible about talking to strangers.  Always have been, but at the same time, it's easy to talk to people that have other kids like yourself where your conversation never goes farther than the weather and kid stuff.  It's a totally different thing to talk to someone who appears to be hurting and open yourself up to being someone that they can really  talk to.  There's a sense of commitment there that I wasn't so sure I wanted to give myself over to. But, then, there is the Holy Spirit.  Working in my life.  Urging me on.  Telling me that what I do "for the least