Welcome, sweet Adara Ruth

We finally have our little girl! Adara Ruth was born on Friday Septmber 17th (Erev Yom Kippur). Her due date was Sept. 14th and the weeks leading up to her due date were extremely stressful. For some reason I had terrible anxiety and fear about the birth this time. On her due date a good friend of mine gave me a scripture verse that has become "her verse". All the people gather for the fall feasts and Ezra reads the Law aloud to them from early morning until midday and when they heard the words of the Law the people began weeping and Ezra said to them "Go, eat of the fat, drink of the sweet, and send portions to him who has nothing prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength." So when my friend gave me that verse I had a very strong feeling that she was going to be born on Yom Kippur- and she was:)If anyone is interested in the full testimony of how God spoke to me and worked on me through this pregnancy then I would love to share it with you, but it is too long and personal for a blog post.
So, now that she is here our lives are forever changed. I can already feel the household getting a little bit softer. Matt and the boys are all melty over her. She is so sweet. Her little hands and feet are very dainty and even the sound of her voice sounds like a girl voice. It is even strange saying "her" and "she". It is really funny too, because Matt thought she was going to be daddy's little girl, but she is turning out to be a mama baby;) I am sure that will change as soon as I wean her! This is the beginning of something new and exciting. I love how she is already changing us all and I know she is going to continue to add so much joy and beauty to our lives.

A very sweet day

Ok. Most of you already know that our sweet baby was born 3 weeks ago and most of you know that I have been seriously neglecting my blog... so even though this is 2 months after the fact I still had to do a post on my wonderful, girly baby shower. My good friends Lacey and Alison worked together to give me such a fabulous day and everything was just perfect. Everyone brought delicious food to share...and the cake was divine thanks to Alison (Martha Stewart). I also have to give a shout out to Shell for riding the train and spending a "weekend with the Vaughns" :) I truly loved being surrounded by all my sweet friends and family and looking through all the beautiful gifts. Everyone was so excited about me having a girl that I literally got showered with girl clothes. I don't think I will have to by a single outfit for the first year of her life! Thankfully the ultrasound was right and she was a girl:)

Finding the Balance

"I am sadly concerned that thousands of mothers are so over-burdened that the actual demands of life from day to day consume all their time and strength. But of two evils, choose the lesser: which would you call the lesser--an unpolished stove or an untaught boy? Dirty windows, or a child whose confidence you have failed to gain? Cobwebs in the corner, or a son over whose soul a crust has formed, so strong that you despair of melting it with your hot tears and fervent prayers?

I have seen a woman who was absolutely ignorant of her children's habits of thought, who never felt that she could spare a half-hour to read or talk with them--I have seen this woman spend ten minutes in ironing a sheet, or forty minutes icing a cake for tea, because company was expected.

When the mother, a good orthodox Christian, shall appear before the Great White Throne to be judged for the "deeds done in the body," and to give her report of the master's treasures placed in her care, there will be questions and answers like these:

"Where are the boys and girls I gave thee?"

"Lord, I was busy keeping my house clean and in order, and my children wandered away."

"Where wert thou while thy sons and thy daughters were learning lessons of dishonesty, malice and impurity?"

"Lord, I was polishing furniture and making beautiful rugs."

"What hast thou to show for thy life's work?"

"The tidiest house, Lord, and the best starching and ironing in all our neighborhood!"

Oh these children, these children! The restless eager boys and girls whom we love more than our lives! Shall we devote our time and strength to that which perishes while the rich garden of our child's soul lies neglected, with foul weeds choking out all worthy and beautiful growths? Fleeting indeed, O mother, are the days of childhood, and speckless windows, snowy linen, the consciousness that everything about the house is faultlessly bright and clean will be poor comfort in that day wherein we shall discover that our poor boy's feet have chosen the path that shall take him out of the way to all eternity."--Author Unknown

I came across this anonymous letter to Elizabeth Elliot when I was searching for advice on how to maintain an orderly home and homeschool at the same time. As our family grows I feel like it is constant work to keep our house in order. There are days that I spend cleaning our house just for it to become dirty again the next day and it feels like all my efforts are in vain... I have to (and want to) maintain some standards of cleanliness but at the same time I don't want cleaning to be the primary focus of my days and in the meantime having my kids running around unattended. It seems like putting a lot of energy into something that doesn't have any eternal value. I know I have written on this subject before, but I am still trying to find the balance...I'm up for any suggestions:)

A Civil War Birthday Party

For the past year or so Elijah has been really interested in studying and reading about the Civil War, so this year for his 8th birthday party he requested a Civil War birthday party. I was really excited about the idea but I wasn't quite sure how I was going to pull it off. I knew costumes would be essential so my sweet mother in law ordered some confederate and union hats for each child and my mom provided aprons and bonnets for the girls along with mustaches for the boys. Elijah wanted to have a yard battle between the north and the south. Each kid got their weapon of choice, the soldiers faced off on opposite sides of the yard and charged at each other. Some were wounded, but we were very fortunate to have good nurses on the battlefield to help those in need:) Then Matt organized some yard games of flag tag, water balloon toss, and a major water balloon fight. For snacks we provided some food to capture the spirit of the Civil War, such as hardtack, "goobers" (unshelled peanuts), and fruit leather (along with cheese, crackers, fruit and veggies- which would not have been on the menu for civil war soldiers). It was so funny because some how the name of hardtack was changed to "heart attack" and they were all asking for more "heart attack" bread:) Elijah requested chocolate eclair cake for his birthday, which was also changed to "I declare" cake:) It ended up being a day of great fun and what Elijah called "the best birthday ever"!

A summer visit to the mountains

Matt has been working so hard on remodeling our house and I wanted to give him some solid time to work so I took my kids and my niece to the mountains to see my parents for a little mountain getaway. We had such a fun time. My parents have a lake in their neighborhood so we spent a lot of time swimming. Elijah and Trinity were so proud of themselves for swimming to the middle of the lake and back! The little guys just enjoyed playing in the shallow water and sand. One day we went to Carl Sandburg's house and saw an outdoor play of the Rootabaga stories which was really fun and cute. Then we went to the little goat farm on the property and had a little picnic by the creek. The weather was just glorious and the property at Carl's house is so beautiful. Then we took the kids to Belle Chere (a fun festival in downtown Asheville) and they got to ride the rides and make crafts and eat ice cream and popcorn. We all had such a blast and can't wait to go back in the fall to pick apples:)

A slow recap of the past 4 months that I have neglected my blog!

I came to the realization a few nights ago that I haven't done a post on my blog in 1/3 of a year. I have a lot of lame excuses, but I'll spare you. A lot has gone on since I last posted so I am going to attempt to slowly go back starting from the most recent event and catch everyone up on what's been going on in our lives. So I guess you could say I am officially back in the blogosphere:)

I'll start with sharing a few pictures of swimming in Nana's pool...or I should say pools (one for every stage of life as Nana likes to say!) My kids start begging Nana to put her pool up starting somewhere around April when the first warm days start to appear. So when Memorial Day rolls around and Nana breaks out the pool the kids become beside themselves with joys. They have a very specific summer time pool routine at her house. They eat lunch, go swimming, get out and eat ice cream, watch a short clip of Tom and Jerry and then they get back in and swim for a few more hours. It sounds silly, but they take it very seriously. They have even more fun if the cousins or some neighborhood kids can take part in the summer time fun. Thanks Nana and Pop Pop for setting the pools up and giving them so many fun summer memories at your house!

Who killed Mr. Tomato Head?

scene of the crime...

Matt. Caught red handed trying to destroy the evidence.

Don't try to hide. The camera never lies.