Summertime

It's officially summertime.


And you're wondering why my boys are dressed so warmly for summer.

It's because in our neck of the woods, summer is so extreme and so long (like 8-9 months), that at the first sign of it, we head for the high country.



We don't even mind wearing jackets. We kind of enjoy it.


The fish in those mountain lakes, they shudder to see us coming.



Well, at least the crawdads do.


But you should have seen the one that got away.

Keepin' It Simple

We celebrated another birthday here recently and started a new tradition. Everyone prepares a little something to say ahead of time about the birthday person.

At breakfast on Caleb's birthday we took turns reading what we wrote. It was a fun way to bless him.


My kids usually start making plans for their birthdays 8 to 9 months in advance. And as the birthday approaches, the plans get grander by the minute.

It's not that uncommon for me to be beckoned to one of their rooms after I thought they were asleep. "Hey, Mom, do you think that for my birthday we should take all my friends snowboarding, rock-climbing, or go-cart riding?"

What ever happened to Pin the tail on the Donkey anyway?

This year, in addition to those completely realistic ideas, Caleb mentioned that he would also consider celebrating his special day at Lego Land, one of those bounce places you can rent for a mere $300, or Glacier Bay.

Glacier Bay??

I attempted to steer the planning to an area I was prepared to put a little more into. The cake.

For a couple of weeks, I had been anticipating anything he might dream up for a cake plan. I had researched extensively and even printed out step-by-step instructions for making the world's coolest skateboard cake.



"Actually, Mom, I don't want a cake. I want to have a snow cone."

A snow cone?? What would he think if he looked back on pictures from his sixth birthday and there was no cake? What kind of mother would I be?

If a skateboard cake wasn't going to work, I was fully prepared to drive all over town looking for the perfect cake mold and stay up into the wee hours of the night making some elaborate creation so that my little boy would always remember that he was special and loved, for heaven's sake, so I pressed the issue.

"Of course, you can have a snow cone anyway, but don't you want something else in addition to that?"

"Well," he paused thoughtfully and then his face suddenly lit up. "Maybe you could put a gummy worm on my snow cone!"


Happy birthday, sweet boy!

How Busy Parents Get Their Exercise

Also known as "How Cheapskate Parents Get out of Buying a New Battery for the Jeep."

Snow Day

My big kids had a fun day learning to ski and snowboard.

All the while feeling sorry for poor Mommy who was missing out on the fun because she got left behind.

By a cozy fire.

Having a quiet day almost all to herself.

Try not to feel too sorry for me.

When I saw this cute picture of them, I exclaimed, "Oh, you look so.."

"...cool?" they suggested confidently.

Definitely, cool.

The Dad Who Saved Christmas

It was a long ordeal that didn't look good at times, but he did it. I'll spare you all the details, but let's just say that the cedar chest will now be handed down through the generations without a lock.


I don't think my husband appreciated me blogging during the whole ordeal.

I say, "Honey, someday we will look back on this and laugh."

When Good Hiding Spots Go Bad

I'm not very good at hiding gifts. My kids know all my hiding spots and have unfortunately found things in the past before they should have.

But this year I learned a few things about hiding gifts:

1. A cedar chest with a lock on it makes a perfect hiding spot for gifts.

Earlier this year, we were given a beautiful old cedar chest that had been in the family for years. Since it locked nice and tight, we stored the kids' gifts in there and congratulated ourselves that there was no way they could open it without the key.

And that brings us to the second lesson that we learned about hiding gifts:

2. It is not good to lose the one and only key to the cedar chest.

Just about the time Phil and I were congratulating ourselves on keeping the presents safely out of reach of snooping children, we realized that they might never get the presents.

(And I know what you might be saying: Christmas is not about presents, it's about Jesus. And you're welcome to come over and explain that to my empty-handed children tomorrow.)

We spent a lovely evening combing the house and digging through the trash until one am in the morning until Phil came to the conclusion that the only hope was to try to reproduce the key himself out of a piece of metal. (Fortunately he is really talented like that - remember the old TV show Macgyver where the guy can make anything out of duct tape and dental floss? That's my husband. Also fortunately, he always anticipates the worst, and had previously traced the key and it's measurements).

And so now he's off to Ace Hardware to save Christmas. Should his mission fail, I suppose we will be shopping again tonight. And the cedar chest will be passed down through the generations, its contents always to remain a source of curiosity.

I suppose someday, another hundred years from now, a resourceful descendant of ours will figure out how to get it open and they will discover an EasyBake oven and parts to a fish tank.

Fortunately, we hid the fish somewhere else.

The Recital

I'm told that some kids experience their first piano recital in an informal way - a small gathering at their teacher's house perhaps.

My kids' mom however, enrolled them in an arts school where the first piano recital was held in a 2,000-seat auditorium on a great big stage (gulp).

Pretty intimidating stuff when you're only five years old (or eight).

But they were brave and did an awesome job. We are super proud of them.



Grace even volunteered to play a solo.




To help them feel confident, they were both given something new and "grown-up" for the performance. Grace got her first "long" earrings:


And Caleb got his first tie, which he was totally thrilled about:

Is there anything more endearing than a sweet little boy in a tie who also happens to have a rubber snake in his pocket? (You just never know when the right opportunity may present itself...)





Let's see, have I posted a totally obnoxious amount of pictures of my kids yet? You are welcome to refer to the section under "It's my blog and I can post as many pictures of my adorable kids as I want to." : )



In fact, here's a video for your viewing pleasure:

No Tricks, Just Treats

There are a lot of different opinions about celebrating Halloween.

Recently, I was having lunch with a group of young children. One young boy turned to me matter-of-factly.

"If you go trick-or-treating, you are worshiping the devil," he coolly informed me.

Hey man, don't be afraid to tell it like it is or anything.


As for us, we have been all over the board on Halloween celebrations, and have gone trick or treating in past years.



This year, we have been praying through various cultures of the world with a wonderful book and it has been very eye-opening to learn about how many belief systems are based on fear. Since we have been set free from fear through Christ, we saw no reason to celebrate fear this year.


So we celebrated the treasures (or treats) that belong to those who are children of God.

Armed with flashlights and ready for adventure, our kids made their way through a darkened house to discover a treasure chest in the kitchen


They opened it to find jeweled papers with verses about the treats enjoyed by children of God:


Attached to each "treasure" was a map or riddle to solve for the location of a bag of treats to enjoy.


It was a night of mystery and adventure, with flashlights bobbing wildly around the house, squeals of delight, and maybe just a little (okay a lot) too much sugar. And overheard was the exclamation that, "I never knew Halloween could be this much fun!"

"The thief comes to steal, to kill and to destroy, but I have come so that you may have life and have it to the full." -Jesus Christ

Going Campin'

We city folk, who can barely see stars for the all the city lights, know that when you have to Google "big dipper" to show your kids what it looks like, it's time to head for the Great Outdoors.



So we headed for the hills to let our kids experience the adventure of camping, the treat of roasting marshmallows over the fire, the softness of a forest meadow in the morning, the joy of going to the bathroom in the wilderness...

Okay, that's enough about that.

We came:


We saw:


We conquered:




And we played hard, got real dirty, and made lots of memories:

"There's so much beauty around us and just two eyes to see..."
-Rich Mullins

The Family Vacation

Let me just say that it was not MY idea.

In fact, I presented my husband with a long list of reasons we should not take a family vacation.

"Do you have any idea how much stuff we would have to take - how long it will take to pack and unpack it all?" I asked when I found I could no longer ignore his hints about taking a beach vacation.

I mean, I was having enough trouble keeping my ahead above water with our crazy life at home. I wasn't sure I had it in me to take this show on the road yet.

I was convinced that our disaster-prone two-year-old would almost certainly get lost on the beach, or perhaps even find his way over the railing of the hotel balcony.

"It will not be relaxing," I assured Phil, citing the very real possibilities of sunburns, destroyed hotel property, and sand in so many body crevices it wouldn't all be found for months.

"And you know he won't sleep for us there."

Phil considered that one for a while.

Now, I love vacations as much as the next person. I personally have many wonderful memories of family vacations from when I was a kid.

It wasn't however, until I became a parent of young children myself that I recalled how tired my parents sometimes looked on vacation, and how impatience crept into their voices as we fought in the backseat surrounded by all manner of junk and repeatedly inquired as to how much longer it was going to take to get there.

Phil was right, though. If we had the opportunity to enjoy time at the beach as a family, we should certainly do it.

So we loaded up and set off to make some memories.



In the end, neither Phil or I would call it relaxing. Getting ready to go to the beach each morning was no small accomplishment. There were 20 limbs to slather with sunscreen, and then swimsuits, hats, glasses, towels, chairs, umbrella, sand toys, snacks, diapers, etc. etc. to dig out of the chaos of the room.

At this point, someone would inevitably rub sunscreen in their eyes and begin writhing on the floor in agony and tears.

Finally, an hour or two after we started the process, we would lumber out to the beach and set up camp, just in time for someone to announce, "I have to go to the bathroom!"

Beaches, I've discovered, often attract an interesting mix of people, and this one was no exception. There are plenty of young families watching their children play in the waves as their babies eat sand. Situated next to them are tattoo-adorned individuals, many of whom are concerned with weighty worldly matters, such as experimenting with how many parts of speech certain four-letter words can serve as.

We got to have some lovely conversations about drugs and alcohol with Grace, who is now old enough to be very aware of things around her, and wondering why scruffy men occasionally shuffle by shouting fiercely at no one in particular. (For that matter, why is Mommy often muttering to herself?)

Through all this, I was reading a book written by a mother of four children, who encourages overwhelmed mothers to live in and celebrate the moment. There is no guarantee, she reminds us, that we will all be here next year, or even next week.

I am thankful for that reminder. I didn't have my camera with me as often as I should have to snap every memorable moment, but I saved some of the images in my mind.

I can still see my kids standing on the beach late one afternoon as the sun sparkled off the water. Amid all the skin on the beach, their sun-conscious mother had them dressed in rashguards, oversized hats, and sunglasses. They were dancing and jumping up and down gleefully, shouting out cheers for their daddy who was marching nobly off to do something worth watching: he was going to attempt surfing.

Their excitement was simply uncontainable as they grabbed hands and danced around with surf splashing at their feet. As their Daddy became another dot beyond the waves, they eventually wandered off to negotiate over sand-encrusted cotton candy, furtively attempt to pee in the sand without anyone noticing, or become inextricably wound up in kite string.

At the end of the day, Caleb declared: "This is the best day of my life! When I grow up, I'm going to tell my kids about this day! Aren't you, Dad?"

I am happy to report that even though we did not relax and sleep in every day we had a great time together as a family.


And no one got sunburned.

Resurrection Celebrations

During Passion Week, my kids persuaded their Daddy to trim the palm tree in celebration of Palm Sunday:



My oldest took it upon herself to make blood (with crayon and paper) and decorate our front door with symbols of Passover and Easter:



And my youngest celebrated his first Easter with us:



After church, there were negotiations during egg hunts,


Celebrations with little cousins,



And big cousins:


And much joy and awe at what our Savior's resurrection truly means for us.

If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give live to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.
- Romans 8:11