Things my four year old has said today

Sweet pea is a spunky little girl. Shehad me laughing all day today. Here is a little snippet of our conversations today.

"Mommy I think someone pushed me right in my eyes!"

"Daddy! I am the servant of all children!"

While telling daddy about her eye doctor appointment today she says "and there was one really really small picture and I couldn't really see it so I just said Dog and I was right!!"   (This one is just too funny)

Conversation between her and "J":  Her: "when I get bigger I'm going to marry daddy"  J: "daddy is already married, you can't marry him" SP: "well when I get big, he can have two marries and I will marry him". 

Then the conversation that follows after her big sister convinces her she cant marry daddy. She tells her she will meet someone new and maybe marry them.    J: "so who do you think you will marry?"  SP: "maybe Ben? Nah I think I'll marry the new guy". (Sorry Linz, Ben may not stand a chance against the new guy). 

She certainly is a sweet funny little girl. When I look back at my blog posts from this time last year, they were full of despair and hurt because I just didn't know what to do with my spirited little girl. If only I had known what the year would hold and how we would come through it closer than ever, I think I would have been a little more hopeful.  Maybe someone should remind me of these words when she becomes a teenager. I have a feeling she's going to give us a wild ride!

Being still

"Be still and know that I am God"

 Psalm 46:1

It's been a long time since I have written on here. There are lots of reasons. The main reason is that I've been struggling with some health issues for the last couple of months. Ear troubles and mostly sinus issues causing headaches. I have had a headache everyday for the last 10 weeks at least.  It has gotten to the point where everyday tasks are a struggle. I have really been trying to keep on moving despite the pain. To keep life normal for the kids and for Jeff.  

Today at church, my head hurt so bad at times that I couldn't help the tears from coming.  At one point opening my eyes hurt more than keeping them closed. I was squirming in my seat, trying to find a comfortable place. Leaning on Jeff's supporting arm.  I found myself getting so angry.  Getting bitter.   And then for some reason I lifted my head, opened my eyes and looked up at the screen above the stage. 

There written was Psalm 46:10:

[10] "Be still, and know that I am God! I will be honored by every nation. I will be honored throughout the world."

For the last six months I have really been striving in abiding in Jesus.  I have had so much emotional healing, He has shown me so much about myself and I have grown so much.   I have seen too much to not know how GOOD Jesus is.  So looking up in the midst of my anger and bitterness and seeing that was like God speaking directly to me. Saying "Take it easy Tash. I am the one who made you. Be still Tash. I am here. I will be honored". 

And so in the midst of my struggles I will honor Him. I will always be thankful of his goodness. And I will continue to abide in Him. To wait on him. 

Thankful for my Jeff who has taken on way more than his fair share. For the kids who are so sweet and helpful. Who offer to pray for me all the time. For my sweet friends who always ask how I am doing.  See Jesus is so good to me. He is faithful even when I am not. 

Conversations with children

It's 8 a.m. and I have already laughed enough to make me cry.  These kids of mine crack me up.  As a matter of fact,  right now, I have a toy phone propped up to my ear talking to Sweet Pea's imaginary friends mom. Apparently "Boo boo and Callay" are sick and she is going to a restaurant without them.

Anyway here are some of the conversations I have already had. With "T", I told him he better go get breakfast so we could get started with school.  He says no I never need to do school again. I say you need to learn stuff if you want to grow and be a scientist he says " no I am going to be a mechanic like Pepe and I will use calculators and cash registers." Haha. What a guy!  

That conversation led up to Sweet Pea saying she wants to be a mommy and a ballerina when she grows up. I asked her why she wanted to be a ballerina and she says "cuz they are pretty" and I told her she doesn't need to be a ballerina to be pretty. She says "oh I know, I just wanna wear those little tutus"  

She then asks me if I was going to get up  . I told her soon, I was just waiting for my headache to go away. She offered to pray for my headache and proceeded to do so. After she finished praying, she puts her hand on her head and says "Now I've got your headache!"  Haha. I'm pretty sure that's not how prayer works!  

Just after this conversation, "I" walks by the bedroom and says "Burp ya later!"  

And just now he comes in and says "can we go to legoworld?"  I say someday maybe. And he says "maybe on Saturday?"  I say to him "You do realize it takes three days to get there". He says, " well it's Monday,  we have time!"

And there you have it. Life with these kids sure can be silly sometimes!  I love it!  With a silly start like this,  I look forward to laughing much today. 

Heavy heart

I was going to do a post of our goings on last week but to be honest, our week was fairly uneventful.  We learned, we played, we cooked, we loved.  

What I really want to post about is the heaviness of my heart right now.  At church, they are already going through applications for the next trip to Africa.  Unfortunately, my application was not in among them.  As much as I wanted to desperately go.  Jeff and I knew that it would not be possible this time around.  

This is Izak. He is 12 years old. He lives with 70+ other kids in a children's village in Meize, Mozambique.  We sponsor him.

I had the opportunity to get to know him for 9 days back in November when I visited his home.  Look at that smile.  The smile got me every time.  He is a beautiful boy.  Although I didn't speak his language and he barely spoke mine, we bonded.  Whenever our team was in Meize, he was by my side.  He acted as my bodyguard sometimes when other kids got too close or grabby.  He was also so sweet with the younger kids and I could tell he really looked up to the older ones.  In those short 9 days, I fell in love with this boy. 

 I miss him dearly.

Yesterday, we found out that a sponsored child in his orphanage had died of Malaria. All we knew was that it was an 11 year old boy.  When I read the email, my heart sank.  It filled up with worry that maybe it might have been Izak.  And when I found out that it wasn't him, I was relieved but filled with so much sadness.  You see Izak seemed the type of kid that everyone liked and was friends with everyone.  Chances are Izak is grieving the loss of his friend now.  Those kids in that community were like brothers and sisters to each other so not only have they lost their friend but their brother as well.  

I get so frustrated that we can't do more for these kids.. We sponsor them, we get secure in the fact that they are taken care of, and loved in the place they are in.  But we can't protect them with money.   We can't love on them from so far away. We can't prevent them from getting sick or hurt.

 All we can do is pray and trust that God knows what he is doing.  

One thing I do know from being surrounded by these kids is that they know Jesus, they are happy and they are loved.  

I guess I'll just keep praying.  It's all that I can do.

And take heart that little Joao is now sitting at the feet of Jesus and being loved on by the Father himself.

Weekly wrap up

I'm hoping to post every weekend on our activities for the past week. We will see if this sticks.  We have had a very eventful week.  

Obviously it was Easter this past weekend.  Sweet Pea was quite excited to go look for Easter eggs in the backyard.  I think this is the third year we have been able to have our egg hunt outside and I really prefer it!

Not only was it Easter but it was this boy's 8th birthday!  I can't believe how grown up and handsome he looks in this picture!

We had several box days this week!  After tax time, comes the constant research on what school books we will use for the next year and then the ordering!  We had boxes arrive three days this week and we are still waiting for our big order.  Which will probably come on Monday which is the one day that I won't be home most of the day.  Oh well.  We will get it soon.

More reading practice for "I".  He is my first child that will just pick up a book and read for fun (without me suggesting it!)  This book that he is reading here, he has been reading all week because he loves superheros.  In fact, he is reading it as I type right now.  He is a great reader for a 5 year old boy!

This week "T" was learning about the Black Plague in his history.  We decided to dress him up in a black plague doctor costume.  He had a great time with this costume.  He even met the mailman to receive a package in this get up!

This week I also tackled a job that I have been putting off for a very long time.  Cleaning out the school closet and the living room closet.  Our living room closet is not opened often at all, mainly because we have our couch in front of it.  It basically was our junk closet.  We kind of threw everything in there that we didn't know what to do with.  As a result, it was a disaster and too overwhelming for me to even think about cleaning it. Thankfully my newly 8 year old boy is saving up his money to buy himself an ipod so I offered him 5 dollars if he would help me clean them.  He gladly excepted the challenge!  He worked so hard that I gave him 6 dollars! lol  

 I didn't think to take a picture before I started cleaning it but this is half way through.  I had to do both closets at the same time pretty much because some things had to be transferred to different closets. 

There was so many things in that closet that I had to lay things in piles on the back of the couch.

The school closet was another disaster..  This one I usually clean and organize every couple of months and try as I might to keep it that way, it never stays that way... especially with four kids and a husband who believe that any paper they see must belong in the school closet.. after all we use paper during school time.  As you can see, we have a problem with the kids knowing how to stand books upright so they lay them down where ever they can find a spot and everything gets crazy very quick.  

Sooo, "T" and I starting pulling all the books and papers out.. Papers go in the big white trash can and "T" made piles of books down the hallway according to who they belonged to.  The picture below was just the beginning of it all.. eventually there were book piles all the way down the hallway.

It was a huge mess and it took us from 2 in the afternoon til 7:30 that night (with a supper and Karate break)  Eventually though we got it all organized.  Top shelf consists of extra packages of paper, notebooks, file folders, envelopes, books that are for later years and science kits.  Next shelf is my stuff to the left and "J's" books will fill the right.  Next shelf down is "T's" books to the right and books that we do together on the left.  On the next shelf , "K's" books and the crayons are on the right and "I's" books and the math manipulatives on the left.  The drawers in the middle consist of stickers, art supplies and card games.  The drawers at the bottom is art supplies and construction paper.  We also have some art canvases and the astronomy lab kit tucked in there too.  On the door, I used an old shoe rack to store all the office supplies like pencils, pens, glue, staplers, rules and other such stuff.  I'm very happy with how well it's organized but I know it won't stay that way.. booo!

Yesterday  between chauffeuring "J" to and from rehearsal and a birthday party, I sat "I" and Sweet Pea down to make a bird feeder out of a milk carton.  In the midst of cleaning my closets this week, I came across a Tupperware bin of bird seed.  Here the kids are painting it to make it pretty.. Apparently birds like pretty bird feeders.

So there you have it.. That was this week at our house!

Can I be more like her?

This is sweet pea in church this morning....  

When she hears a worship song, her arms go up, her eyes shut and she worships.  She is constantly singing.  

Oh to be like her.  This little girl who worships so effortlessly.  Tonight as I was putting the little ones to bed, instead of regular kid songs, they wanted worship songs.  What was meant to be a bedtime routine turned into a half hour of worship.  There lying in her bed I was able to soak in HIS presence.  Amazing.  I thank God for this girl who teaches me so much.

 This Easter day... the day he rose from the grave so many years ago.  From this day forward, I make a conscious effort to be more like my little girl.  One who will drop what I'm doing for the chance to worship the King.

Occasionally I try to sneak the video camera out to capture her worship sessions without her noticing. I have compiled some of them into a short video.  Watch and be amazed at her spirit.

I want more of you God!

Communion thoughts

Sitting in church today, "I" was with us because he has a cold. We were coming towards communion time and his eyes just lit up. He turns to me and says "Mommy we are going to get a treat!" I laughed but you know what? What a treat it is! What a treat to have a loving God who gave his only son for us! For him to lift us up out if the pit of despair and sit us up on a rock. (Isaiah 40) We take communion to remember what Jesus did for us. His blood spilt. His flesh torn. All for us. So yes "I". It is a treat to remember what a faithful God we have.