Conservative

That word came to my mind a while ago and I started to ponder it. Conservative. What does it mean? Most people would probably call us a "conservative family". Some may even say we are too conservative. So I decided to look the word up. According to Webster's 1828 dictionary, conservative means: "Preservative; having power to preserve in a safe or entire state, from loss, waste or injury" Hmmm, to put it in my own parenting words here...we parent our children in such a way as to preserve them in a safe state from loss, waste or injury. How do we do that? Well we try to limit the amount of worldly garbage that goes in to their minds. Yes, it is out there and yes, they do end up hearing and seeing things that aren't good but that doesn't mean we should invite it into our homes and give it a place on our television screen or music or books. What a waste of precious brain space when we fill it up with gargage. Scripture says "Finally brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy, think on these things." Philippians 4:8. What a loss of prescious innocence when our children see things and hear foul language. Have you ever noticed how easily we all retain bad things? Why is that? We can hear ten good things and one bad thing and it will be the bad thing that rattles around in our heads. So we try as best as we are able, definitely not perfectly, to protect our children from the loss of their precious innocence. What injury can result when we allow our children to casually date and give pieces of their heart away to people who probably will not end up being their future spouse!! What injury can result when we allow our children to play with children who delight in doing evil and choose activities that are dangerous physically, mentally and spiritually!! Don't you think life is hard enough when we grow up? Why do we as a culture seem to think it is okay and even necessary to throw all that stuff at our children before they are ready to handle it? I like the way Kelly Bates puts it on one of the Duggar's shows..."sheltering our children is like not putting a plant outside before it is ready but protecting it until it has roots and is mature"(my quote is not exact). Given all of that, I choose Conservative!

The First Day of Spring

Our family tries to keep Easter or Resurrection Sunday focused on Jesus as much as possible but we also enjoy coloring eggs and all of the fun things that tend to go along with Easter. So what we do is to have all of those fun things on the first day of Spring instead of on Resurrection Sunday. Spring just makes you think of eggs and chicks and baby bunnies. God created Spring and He created all of those cute things that come with Spring so it is fun to be able to honor Him with Spring and then again on Resurrection Sunday when we celebrate what Jesus did for us!

We tried a new recipe this year to make these cute little birds nests. We used chow mein noodles and marshmallows. Most of the family liked them, with a few exceptions. The "eggs" in them are just chocolate candies from Winco. We also had Cranberry Orange scones with cream. Yum!

Happy Spring! Hope you have some lovely weather to enjoy God's wonderful creations!

B# 8 turns 2!

B#8 loves balls. That is actually putting it mildly. He walks around with one of my wooden spoons hitting anything that resembles a ball and saying "Love Hockey, love baseball". At first for his cake I was planning on making these cute cupcakes that connected together to make a caterpillar but then I thought about how much he loves balls and decided to make a baseball cake. I am no cake decorator mind you so don't expect much from my cakes. But it at least resembled a baseball.

As dad and I wandered around "stuff-mart" trying to decide what to get him for his birthday we found this bag of 100 plastic balls. We didn't need to think twice, we plopped them right into our buggy. Then we found a Little Tykes basketball hoop and after putting a couple of extra balls with it for the kids to share, we were all done shopping. It all seemed to be a hit. We seem to still have the majority of the plastic balls despite numerous ball fights and a few times of taking them out on the trampoline. We decided that at $.10 a ball if they last a few weeks that would be good.

He got some fun birthday cards in the mail, with some birthday money(Thanks family). We thought it would be fun to take him to Toys R Us as I don't think he has ever been there. We aren't hugely into toys but if you read my posts about toys then you know what our thinking is on that. All in all he had a great birthday and I still can't believe he is 2!

I just read an excellent post by Mrs. Fuentes over at "A Wise Woman Builds Her Home" (www.proverbs14verse1.blogspot.com ) about praising our children. I heartily agree and have been trying to do better about this with the toddlers this week but I realized after reading her post that I have not been trying hard enough to praise the older children. So I am agreeing to her Praise Project to purpose to praise my children more, to hold my tongue when a negative comment is on the tip and not to yell. One verse that I have told the children this past week is definitely one that I need to memorize and hide in my heart that I might not sin against HIM, "Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers. Ephesians 4:29

It is so easy to think that my words to my children and the tone of my voice do not qualify as "corrupt" but as I looked it up in the Greek the meaning of the word corrupt is "worthless, bad" so if I am saying things to the children that are not edifying or imparting grace to the hearers then my words are corrupt and not pleasing to the Lord. They will just fall on deaf ears as my children tune me out. Do I like it when people talk to me in a condescending tone? No, I do not. Does being criticised for my actions make me want to change? No it does not. What is my goal for my words? It should be to train and encourage my children to choose God's ways, not the worlds and I think Mrs. Fuentes is right on that the best way to do that is through encouraging and praising our children as we teach and train them.