Happy Birthday Christina!!

Christina Hope is our 4th girl. I remember having some difficulty deciding on a name for her. John was the one who came up with her name. Christina, of course is a variation on Christ and Hope is because our hope is in Christ and we prayed that to be true for her too. We named her Christina assuming we would call her Christy. But from the minute she popped out we were calling her Tina and though Taryn went on a short campaign to call her Christy, the momentum was too great and she has always been Tina.

Can you see the hair sticking up in that picture? We wondered if it would just keep growing straight up. It did for quite awhile. Taryn once told my mother-in-law it would only stay down with "food or spit".

In all the ways that Taryn is like me, Tina is different from me. She is all about the extreme (it's love or hate, ecstatic or devastated, loud or silent treatment). She's overly dramatic, overly emotional, completely artistic, thrives in chaos. She's a thrill to be around, the life of the party.

Tina is a "what box?" kind of girl. We don't have to teach her to think out of the box. For her, there never was a box.

We call her our warrior princess. She is the ultimate girly-girl.

There is not enough pink in the world for her. She loves sparkles and ruffles and lace and did I mention pink? (Whoever thought that it would be a good idea to put all the female Disney characters together and market them as Disney Princesses, must have had a Tina in their life). And yet she squashes bugs with her fingers, gets completely filthy, rips holes in her clothes, and is LOUD.


After this description, would it surprise you to know that I thought she was a boring baby? She was so melancholy. You couldn't even make her smile if you tickled her. And then a switch tripped about the time she was one. What happened? I have no idea. But suddenly the girl had personality PLUS.



Tina is an artist. She is always creating something. She is responsible for these kinds of things around my house.



She's also responsible for these kinds of messes.



Tina always gets up out of bed to give John and I an extra hug and kiss goodnight. She's the only one bold enough to do it and the only one who thinks we might need it. I look forward to it.


Christina is my last baby girl. And I love her with all my heart, even if she's not really a baby anymore.



Happy 7th birthday Christina! Quit growing up you guys!

Love notes

Here are the kids around the computer this morning reading my latest blog entry. It's kind of like the old notes from Mom in the lunchbox except in a more modern, homeschooling kind of way.

Happy Birthday Taryn!

Twelve years ago (plus a few days) I became a mother. Taryn surprised us a little, coming a couple weeks early (not that I would have been any more prepared if she'd come on her due date, but I might at least have had some clothes washed for her). Poor Taryn is my first baby. There was a pretty steep learning curve for me and she bore a lot of my insecurities and ignorance.

Before we ever even got pregnant John had decided if we had a girl we would name her Taryn Elizabeth. Taryn is my middle name. Elizabeth was the name of a friend of John's family. She was a fascinating woman who was a wonderful story teller. Her memory never failed, up until the time she died. She was an amazing woman who I was privileged to know for a short time. Here is a picture of Taryn and "Miss Lib".

In the same way that Sam played with Legos at the earliest possible age, Taryn was playing with and looking at books. Taryn is definitely the most voracious reader in the house. And sometimes (frustratingly) gets so lost in her book she hears and sees nothing going on around her. I guess it's good she can escape the craziness in which she lives. And I don't blame her one bit.

Taryn is like me in so many ways (for better or for worse). Her mannerisms, her feelings, her toughness, her perfectionism. My mom and grandmother have been known to call her Melissa.

She loves the outdoors. She loves hiking, the beach, the mountains, camping, etc. She likes hard work outside and did alot of work on the garden and raking the leaves.

She's had to learn patience and selflessness as her many siblings came one after the other. And she has done it joyfully and with much grace. Taryn is the best older sister. She loves to play with the younger kids and take care of them and comfort them. About this picture she said, "There I am with my two, cute, fat sisters."

Not only is she full of the grace on the inside, she is full of grace on the outside too.

And the fact that she's growing up is bittersweet. How could she be 12 already? Time goes so fast. But I'm thankful to God to see the woman she is becoming and I'll always remember the sweet baby she was.


Happy 12th Birthday Taryn. You are beautiful, inside and out.

Look what we have growing in our garden.

The kids and I went to visit with some friends on Monday. Taryn and her friend asked if they could go outside in the yard. It wasn't really raining at that point, so I said they could. You know how this story is going to end don't you? That's right, they stayed in the yard for a while, then walked "just a little way" down to a little pond, then went "just a little further" over to a creek. At some point they must have realized "Uh... I don't think this is what our Moms meant when they said we could walk around the yard." But by then it was too late. They were covered in mud and the rain was pouring down. But I wasn't so naive when they asked to go play to think they wouldn't get muddy. And they had a really great time. I wasn't upset, though I wasn't about to let her get in the van to come home. Taryn took a bath and had to wear home her friend's clothes. Here are her shoes drying in our yard the next day after we washed them off.

Rebekah stayed inside to hold the 4 month old baby, which she expertly rocked to sleep. Is that a surprise to anyone?

St. Patty's Dinner

I'm a minimalist homeschool mom. Some homeschoolers make big deals about all the holidays. They do unit studies and special lessons. They do parties or crafts. You remember all the stuff you did in elementary school? Groundhog day, Valentine's, President's Day, etc. Not me. Maybe my kids will grow up and regret the fact that we never made Lincoln top hats or watched videos about groundhogs in Punxsutawney, PA. I hope not. But St. Patrick's Day is easy to celebrate since we have to eat dinner anyway (and St. Patrick was admirable in his service to the Lord). We had a special St Patrick's Day dinner last night. Corned beef, potatoes, carrots, and Brussels sprouts (of course, that would normally be cabbage, but Sam just loves Brussels sprouts, so we did those instead). I roast the corned beef in the oven rather than boiling it and we really like it done that way. The potatoes were boiled in the beef drippings. I left the carrots and Brussels sprouts plain for the kids in case they didn't like the corned beef, (but they all did). We eat this about once a year and always enjoy it, and yet never do it more often than that... maybe that's key to enjoying it?




Green icing on cupcakes for dessert.

And I'm a dork. A lucky dork. Here's the seasoning packet that was stuck to the bottom of the corned beef the entire 3 hours it baked in the oven. (It didn't melt, so I felt lucky).


Hope you had a fun and happy St. Patrick's Day.

Best Friends

Little Boys

Just hanging out together. Best buddies. Loving the weather. Climbing trees. Doing boy stuff.

"Say, how do we get down from here? Mom? A little help please?"

The LORD is gracious and righteous; our God is full of compassion. The LORD protects the simplehearted; when I was in great need, he saved me. Be at rest once more, O my soul, for the LORD has been good to you. Psalm 116:5-7

Over the weekend John had to take care of the trees and limbs which had fallen with the snow. We were so thankful not to lose power despite the tree limbs resting on the electrical wire for 2 days. We also were thankful that the tree which fell did not damage anything. It missed the house, the deck, the van, and the basketball goal. We thought it was amazing and were thankful to God.

There was even more. When John started cutting up the tree, he walked up into the neighbors yard. He saw a bunch of branches lying there. He wondered how they would have gotten there. On closer inspection he realized it was actually part of the tree. The top of the tree fell out of the tree into the neighbor's yard while the rest of the tree fell into our yard. The tree just missed hitting our deck. The extra feet that it needed to hit the deck were lying in the neighbor's yard. Isn't that amazing? And I'll be honest here. We didn't pray that no trees would fall over. We didn't pray He would spare our basketball goal (let alone the house). He did it not because we asked, but because he wanted to.

God is awesome. He's awesome when bad stuff happens too. Let me add the verses before and after the verses I quoted above.

The cords of death entangled me, the anguish of the grave came upon me; I was overcome by trouble and sorrow. Then I called on the name of the LORD : "O LORD, save me!" The LORD is gracious and righteous; our God is full of compassion. The LORD protects the simplehearted; when I was in great need, he saved me. Be at rest once more, O my soul, for the LORD has been good to you. For you, O LORD, have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before the LORD in the land of the living. Psalm 116:3-9

Because even when bad stuff happens and the tree does go through the roof and the electricity does go out, he still is good. He saved me from death, gave me eternal life, though I didn't (and don't) deserve it. And for that, I always have reason to sing praise to Him.

Hey Mom... you wanna see a snake?

As long as it's outside!!



It was tiny and fast.

And I liked this picture because I managed to get it with its tongue out.

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...

(that's the Millenium Falcon from Star Wars for the uninitiated).

Poor snake, having to entertain my kids. Hopefully he'll tell all his snake friends to stay far, far away from that house with all the pesky kids.

Garden Progress

Our one big garden turned into three smaller beds. The actual area is the same, but it should be easier to maintain this way since we can walk in between the beds and reach the middles without getting in the dirt.


After the beds were laid out, we removed the grass, then loosened the "soil" (if you can call this hard, red stuff soil). We added in peat, manure, fertilizer, and leaves to each bed. "We" is the wrong pronoun here, since I have yet to do anything other than make the suggestion of a garden. Does it count as "we" if I watch and take pictures?

According to our information from the Clemson Extension service, Feb was time to plant cabbage and broccoli from seedlings and radish and peas from seeds which we had done.

Then the snow came.

And here we are today. No sign of the seeds growing, but the broccoli and cabbage surely do like the cold because after sitting under the snow for about 2-3 days, they look healthier and have grown.

Be careful what you pray for

My mom always used to tell me that. Tina experienced this first-hand this weekend. After praying for snow all winter, she ended up in the car during the snowstorm. It was not pretty driving. We went approximately 5 miles round-trip and it took us about 45 minutes. As we were attempting to get home, while watching cars skid all over the road and into ditches, Tina piped up from the backseat, "Why, oh why, did I ever pray for snow?"


Here are some pictures from today. (You'll notice Taryn and Rebekah are not in them. They went home from their gymnastics meet with friends since we were not able to get to them.)