Moo!

This year, Micah Elijah and Madeline all had a part in our Christmas play at church! Micah was a Shepherd who wanted to know what abiding means, Elijah was a child in his pajamas preparing to sing a song in the Christmas play, and Madeline shared the sound that a cow makes. We were a little skeptical as to weather or not she would say Moo in front of the entire congregation, but she did and she did it with gusto! All of the children did a fantastic job sharing their part of the Christmas story! We were very proud of everyone!

Give Thanks!

We had a whirlwind Thanksgiving.  It was fun, but busy.  It always feels that way with Elijah's birthday falling so close to Thanksgiving day.  This year, Nana, Uncle Nunky and Aunt Naomi joined us on the 16th of November then, Papa and Aunt Hannah joined us on the 18th and spent the time leading up to Thanksgiving at our house.  They had the opportunity to tag along with us throughout our weekly activities which included swim lessons, pioneer clubs, church, Micah's Turkey Trot, Elijah's birthday celebration(which we did early to make sure Papa was able to celebrate with Elijah.) and we spent the remainder of November cooking and eating.  That's what it felt like at least!  It seems that anytime there is a large group of family together it feels as if you live from one meal to the next.  We had a great time.  The girls had a wonderful time trying out new recipes and shopping together, while the guys had fun doing the things guys do!

Rotten chocolate milk and the forest Elves!

      Some days, when I pick Micah up from school, he is quiet and has very little to tell me about his day.  Other days, he is full of stories about all of the exciting things that went on during his day at school.  Today was a day full of stories!  The funniest story he wanted to share with me was the fact that another child in his class had accidentally left her chocolate milk from the previous week in her desk causing a huge stink in the classroom.  It's kind of a funny story but, what really put the icing on the cake for me was the conclusion that Micah had arrived at following the rotten milk incident.  Micah informed me today that he was relatively certain that the elves in the forest drink rotten chocolate milk because one day he had been outside and he lifted up the top of an acorn and decided to smell it, and sure enough, it smelled just like rotten chocolate milk!  Where did Micah get the idea that we have Forest Elves in Traverse City.  I have often felt that our forests in Traverse City could easily be used as an enchanted forest in a movie, but I have never mentioned anything about Elves living in our forests!  How funny!  I love Micah's imagination, and I am glad that even though he growing older ever day, he still makes use of his fun loving imagination!

       In honor of Micah's great imagination,  I have decided to include a few of our Halloween photos in this post.    I found Micah's imagination to be especially active around Halloween!  Instead of dressing in   a typical boy costume such as a super hero or a pirate Micah insisted on being Abraham Lincoln.  He was very cute alongside our little Bumblebee(Madeline) and our Mario (Elijah)
 

Catch up!!!

I can't believe how much time I have let pass, and how many events have occurred since my last blog.  It is amazing how sometimes life just gets clipping along and before you know what happened, a large amount of life has passed you by.  Every evening, as I sat down and thought about catching up on my blog I became overwhelmed with all of the large events that I wanted to try to capture in one blog.  Instead of sitting down and attempting to catch up I managed to let more events with great memories pass by!  Here are some of the highlights of our last month.

Jeremiah and Kaitlin's Wedding!
     We had a fantastic time at Uncle Jeremiah and Kaitlin's wedding.  It was gorgeous!  The weather was fantastic and it appeared that everything went wonderfully!  We were excited and blessed to be a part of it and are thrilled to add Kaitlin to the Bauer family!  She is a great addition!

Greenfield Village

We spent a very brief afternoon at Greenfield Village in Detroit.  We had just enough time to see a glass blowing demonstration, ride the carousel, eat lunch and take a Ride in a Model T.  Micah and Elijah were thrilled!

Hiking the Dunes

We took a little time to be tourists in our own home town area.  We took time to visit the Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive, and did a little hiking.  It was a little wet and rainy, but  we still had a great time.

Pre- Halloween fun

We were very excited to spend some time with Aunt Hannah before Halloween.  We traveled to the pumpkin patch, carved pumpkins and cooked/ate yummy food!

We also traveled to Pahl's Pumpkin patch with Elijah's pre-K class

I am also planning to post pictures of Halloween, but that will be another post.  

Reckless Words

Uncle Jeremiah's wedding(unrelated to blog topic)

     A few weeks ago, Micah’s memory verse for school was the verse Proverbs 12:18
”The words of the reckless pierce like swords”   When he received this verse as his memory, my thoughts were “How fitting” children spend a lot of time throughout their early years of life learning how their interactions affect the people around them.  They learn how to “Use nice words” and how to say “Please” and “Thank you.”  All of these exercises are opportunities for children to begin to learn how to think through their words and the affect that their words can have on their peers and family members.  These lessons help children to learn to take a minute to think before shooting out words that cannot be taken back.  It is amazing how a word said thoughtlessly can stick with a person for years and years.  In many cases things that were said to us years ago can even begin to make up who we believe we are and where we feel our value comes from.  When in all actuality this is not and should not be where our value and self worth is found.    As this verse has been brought to the forefront of my mind, I have become more and more aware of the many times each day that I listen as hurtful words are slung at someone.  The scary thing is that due to social networking sites like facebook, twitter and the use of bogging, people can very easily attack someone without ever having to face them.  I watch as statuses are posted and tweets are tweeted and blogs are updated and I often find myself wondering, “Was someone hurt by that post? ” Ephesians 4:29 reminds us
 ”Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.”   Jason always reminds the youth (and adults) at Redeemer that it is so important to treat everyone as if he or she is worth the death of the Son of God.  Because they are and that is where our value is found!  I pray that in all our interactions, we would treat people this way.

Uncle Jeremiah's Wedding(Unrelated to blog topic)

     Children learn by example far better than they learn through lecture.  They watch every interaction we make, and they hear every time we say something that is hurtful to another, they also hear every time that we compliment others.  Most times children try to emulate our behavior.  I pray that I can through my words and actions encourage my children to think before speaking.  I feel that in many cases, if we would step back and ask ourselves “Who do these words benefit? Are they helping someone grow closer with Christ or will they only serve to anger another? “  If we took a few minutes to think through our words, I would pray that many time we would choose to delete the hurtful message instead of posting it or that we would bite our tongues instead of lashing out at someone.  Colossians 4:46 is a fantastic guideline “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.”  As I was finishing this blog post, I returned to Proverbs 12:18 to read the second half of the verse and this is what I found , “but the tongue of the wise brings healing.
” Proverbs 12:18 in its entirety is  “
”The words of the reckless pierce like swords, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.”  May our words always be words of healing and never swords to one another!

Summer Revisited

Today was a fantastic day.  We started the day by sleeping in!  There are some nights that it feels SO good to sleep, and last night was no exception.  We have been passing a cold around our family which has caused us to have a few restless children throughout the nights.  last night was the first night in a very long time that I remember sleeping solidly through the night without having a child crying, saying they were scared or asking to climb in the bed with us.  I actually woke up in the morning and felt the need to check on Madeline to be sure she was okay.

     After we were all awake, we ate breakfast and then showered and prepared to head into town.  We promised the boys that they would get to play at the Children's Museum last night and were disappointed to discovered that it closed before we arrived.  We placed the children's museum as number one on our list of things to do today.  The boys were excited!  We spent about and hour and a half at the children's museum and then ventured on to Downtown Traverse City for some lunch at the Dish.  It was yummy!  We had noticed that there was a Parade of Homes going on for remodeled homes, so we decided to check it out.  The children were excellent and loved putting little blue booties over their shoes to preserve the carpet in the homes that we visited.  After we toured a few homes on Old Mission Peninsula we decided that the kids were probably ready for a break.  So, we made a stop at the Kids Kove play ground.

 The boys enjoyed running around and climbing the different sections of the play structures, and Madeline enjoyed walking around and trying out the small slide and the swings.

We ended our time in town with a stop at St. Michael's Lutheran Church for their annual Oktoberfest celebration.  We had a great time and ate some yummy food!  I love German cuisine!  We crammed so much into our day, it almost felt like we had returned to summer.  It was a fun day!

Breakfast with Madeline

Jason is at the Seminary this week, which leaves me on parenting duty all alone.  We always miss Daddy when he is gone.  Between dropping to children off for school and picking them back up, I feel like I am constantly in the car.  After dropping both boys off at their schools I decided to head to Cracker Barrel for a nice breakfast out with Madeline.  It is not very often that I am able to spend time with just Madeline.  We had a fun morning together.

The underwear Ninja's

We spent our weekend on the go.  Jason was asked to preach in Detroit, and we decided to join him as he traveled.  We try not to miss out on any opportunity to enjoy a swimming pool at a hotel.  It is such a treat for the kids!  Friday, we left Traverse City around lunch time and drove to the Detroit area.  Most of the afternoon was spent driving, but the children were troopers and handled it well knowing that the day would end with a swimming pool!
     Saturday morning we had a few hours prior to the church service that Jason was scheduled to preach at, so we made our way to Greenfield village.  Greenfield village is a tourist attraction that is basically an old village.  We didn't have much time, but we thought Micah especially would enjoy it.  He loves"old timey" things, his Kindergarten teacher referred to him as a little old man in a little boys body.  We didn't have much time at Greenfield village, but the kids did have the opportunity to see horses plowing a field, watch a glass blowing demonstration, ride the 90 year old carousel, visit the round house, and best of all...take a ride in an old model T.  The ride in the Model T made Micah's day.  he was thrilled!
     After Jason preached, we high tailed it home and had the fun opportunity to have a slumber party at Grandma Shoemaker's house.(We are selling our home, and we had three showings this weekend!  Jason had to preach on  Sunday as well...and the last thing I wanted to do while trying to get ready for church on Sunday was to clean the house for a showing.  So, Grandma let us stay at her house so that it would remain clean for the showings!  Thank you mom!)  The boys really enjoyed staying at Grandma's house!

     We went to church at St. Micheal's this morning because Jason was preaching for a 50 anniversary celebration for a pastor who serves at that church.  So, our Sunday morning was different than normal...which is always a little exhausting.  When we made it home this evening, we were all ready for a little down time.  I told the boys that if they went and put their PJ's on, we would snuggle up and watch a movie together before bedtime.  They were thrilled...they hustled to their rooms...and this is how they returned.  I guess sitting in the car for 9+ hours does strange things to my children!  I would like to introduce you to the Underwear Ninjas    

Isaiah 64:8 (Written on 9-15-2011)

     As part of Elementary school at Trinity, the children are required to do memory work.  This means that each week the children are given a passage of scripture to memorize.  Throughout the week they work with the verse to learn its meaning and then at the end of the week recite it for their teacher.  In the first grade class, the children recite their verses on Thursday.  As a graduate of Trinity Lutheran, I remember being required to memorize and recite scripture passages.  I did not enjoy it at the time, but later in life it was probably one of the larges gifts that I took with me from my Lutheran education.  I discovered that anytime a difficult or trying time arose, I usually had a Bible verse stored in my memory that I could turn to for comfort or strength.  It allowed me to more fully know the Bible and the promises that are found there.  I am very thankful for the Bible memory that I was required to do.  I am excited that Micah and Elijah and Madeline will have this same opportunity in their lives.  My goal is to incorporate Micah’s Bible memory for the week into my blog at least one time during the week. 

     This week the verse is Isaiah 64:8  “I am the Father, you are the clay.  I am the potter, you are all the work of my hands.” This is a fantastic verse, it reminds us of the wonderful truth that God is still working with us.  We are not a finished, hardened pot, but rather soft clay, being molded by the Father with love and care to reflect him and his love to a world where pain and hurt is so prominent.  It is so fascinating to watch as our children learn how show Christ’s love to others.  It does not come naturally, but is rather a learned behavior.  In Micah’s class, they are spending time learning about the appropriate way to treat one another.  Mrs. D refers to hurtful words and comments as Porcupine words.  Micah reminds us at home that porcupine words are words that poke, and so we have been practicing using words that don’t hurt, but rather words of kindness and love when interacting with one another.  It is exciting to watch as God molds my children into the adults that they will be, and it is an adventure to experience his work as he continues to mold me into the person I am becoming.            

Grandpa's garden

There are few things that are as delicious as picking fresh fruit and vegetable from a garden.  Last night we decided to stop over at Grandma and Grandpas farm to help grandpa pick some vegetable.  the children absolutely love picking things, it is usually difficult to convince them to let the unripe veggies have a little more time on the vine before picking them.  Yesterday however;just about everything needed to be picked, so they had a fantastic time picking muskmelon, green pepper, tomatoes, spinach, basil and watermelon.  Madeline even enjoyed helping out.  We turned our head on her for a few seconds and when we looked back, she had taken a bite out of three different tomatoes.  Goofy girl!

I caught one!!!

Elijah fishing on our dock.

Micah and Elijah both love fishing, but Elijah is the boy who often begs to go fishing.  Tonight Elijah wanted to go fishing extremely bad, but Jason and I were both cleaning up from dinner.  He kept asking, if he could go fishing, but neither of us was available to watch him.  He has fished a few times with us and also with his Grandfathers. The last time Grandpa Lewis came to fish with the boys he encouraged Micah and Elijah to put their own worm on the hook and to remove the fish they caught from the hook.  They succeeded most of the time.  So, Jason and I decided to allow Elijah to fish off the dock while we finished cleaning up from dinner.(Just a side note: it is not over is head at the end of our dock, we could see him at all times, and he knows how to swim.)  Elijah was thrilled!  He took is pole down to the dock, put the worm on his hook, and in less than ten minutes we heard him yell "Mama, I caught one!"  Jason brought him a pair of needle nose pliers and Elijah successfully removed the fish and continued fishing.  I can hardly believe that my little boy is old enough to fish on his own.  He does such a good job.  He has his own methods to be sure that he does not get poked by the hook.  He usually sets the worm on the dock and then sticks the hook in it while it is laying on the dock.  That way the dock gets poked instead of Elijah.  How creative.

 

     Micah had a fun night as well, he discovered that one of his friends from school was putting their boat in at the boat launch and spent some time hanging around in our tree where he could say hello while they put their boat in.

Micah in the tree by the boat launch.

Meanwhile Madeline assisted with dinner clean up by "Mowing the deck."

This little Gospel Light of Mine

Matthew 19:14 NIV
Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."


It is amazing to watch as children begin their life.  All of the steps along the way are fascinating.  Learning to walk, learning to talk, learning to play learning and learning and learning.  I have watched my children move from the stage of tiny helpless newborn babies to children who are capable of doing many things on their own.  It is such a miracle to watch the way a human life develops and how each child takes on a personality of his or her own.  In our family we have Micah(7) who is very social.  He loves people and from early on loved to be snuggled.  Micah is a very passionate individual, when something upsets him it really upsets him, and when something makes him happy it is the only thing that he can talk about or focus on.  He focuses a lot on people and relationships.  Elijah is very independent.  He likes to do things himself, but he loves to learn.  He especially enjoys nature.  Bugs, snakes and animals of any kind intrigue him.  He likes to be hugged and snuggled as well, but it has to be on his own terms.  Madeline is our little goofball.  She is so silly and it is so fun to watch as she laughs with her brothers. 

      I have always wondered what the world my children will grow up in would be like.  I have wondered about the people who would be around me to influence and help teach them the many things that they would learn.  I have wondered what their friends would be like and have prayed that God would bless them with people who would point them to Christ as their Lord and Savior.  As I have watched the boys return to school, I was suddenly aware of the many wonderful people in our lives who I am so thankful for.  I see my children forming relationships with many amazing people.  There are so many people in our lives who have a passion for little children.  At Redeemer our children are blessed to have fantastic Sunday school teachers (Thank you Ms. Amy, Miss Sandy and Merry Mccray for volunteering of your time so that the children of Redeemer can learn about a loving father who is there for them all the time.)  There are also many individuals who take the time to talk with our children and learn about their lives(Thank you Sandy Maisch and all others who take the time to love our children and give them a little extra attention.  There are many families inside and outside of our church who play this role thank you for sharing your lives and your children’s lives with us!) 

     Both of my boys attend school. Micah is in first grade at Trinity and is in Mrs. Dickenson’s class.  Already, in the two short days he has been there he has shared with me some of the ways that she has already started pointing the children towards Christ.  I am so excited for him to spend time learning special scripture passages that he can remember if things get difficult in his life.  Elijah spends three mornings with Ms. Amy and Ms. Sandy at Redeemer Lutheran church as Part of the Gods Building Blocks ministry, where he witnesses two women who have chosen to volunteer their time three mornings a week to teach little ones simply because they feel that children are important and something to be treasured.  I am so thankful for the passion that they share with Elijah.  He is always in such a wonderful mood when he comes home from school! 

     Then of course we have our families.  I was reading in a book, that it is very rare to have Grandparents who are willing to step in and help even during the not so fun times like discipline especially when it is easier to turn your head and pretend you did not see the behavior that is in need of correction.  We have been blessed with a Nana and Papa, a Grandma and Grandpa and a Great Grandma and Grandpa as well as Aunts and Uncles who have all willingly helped out in this way and who daily point our children to Christ and his amazing love for them!  Thank you!

     It does indeed take a village to raise a child and we are very thankful for the village we have been placed in.  Thank you to everyone who is a part of our lives.  We are grateful for you and the part you have played in helping our children’s “little light shine!”  

Cloudy with a chance of trampoline!

     We started off our weekend by catching up with some college friends.  Chris and Lisa Troxel and their beautiful family visited us from Port Huron on their way to a camping trip in Roscommon,MI.  While they were visiting their car decided not to start which sort of threw off their plans, but gave us the chance to spend more time with them.  It is always fun to have the opportunity to chat with another family in the ministry and to have the opportunity to share the joys as well as the hardships of church work.  I feel that it is always encouraging and uplifting. 

     We spent the majority of the weekend with the Burch family.  We invited them to join us for one last camping adventure before sending the kids off to school and welcoming the colder fall weather.  However; it seemed that fall kept threatening to sneak in early.  In between bursts of rain and periodic thunderstorms, we managed to make the best of the weekend.  We were told that our water trampoline would arrive Friday morning, which would be the perfect water activity for the children.  The Burch family arrived as planned on Friday evening…but the trampoline did not.  We received a call informing us that it was difficult to assemble and that it would arrive on Saturday “first” thing in the morning.  We figured that would be all right, it would give the children all of Saturday plus Sunday afternoon to enjoy using the water trampoline.  The children enjoyed running around, riding bikes and playing in the shallow…not so mucky part of the water.  As the darkness took over, we decided to surprise the children, we had a luminary for each child to release.  They were SO excited!  They eagerly got their PJs on and we walked to the dock to release our luminaries.  They were a fun treat and were beautiful in the night sky! 

Friday evening it appeared that the rain would not invade our camping so we decided to sleep in our tents.  It was a beautiful night for camping and everyone stayed dry!

     Saturday we woke up enjoyed breakfast and watched as the rain began to move in.  The children were still excited to play on our water trampoline…but as 10:30 and then 11:00 rolled around, we realized that our idea of “first thing in the morning” may not be the same as the man who was selling us the trampoline.  We decided to call him.  He informed us that a new top had arrived for our trampoline.  He would be assembling the trampoline and would probably have it out to our house by around 3 or 4.  Around 11:30, the rain decided to break, so Jason and Brad decided to take the oldest children(Micah and Rachael) for a canoe trip down the Betsie River.  They had a great time and were extremely ready for lunch when they arrived back home around 1:30. 

We enjoyed a yummy lunch and continued playing.  While waiting for the trampoline, Jason and Brad pulled out the windsurfers and decided to give windsurfing a try.  The children absolutely loved playing on the windsurf boards.  As dinner time rolled around, we were pretty certain that the trampoline would not be arriving as originally promised.  We ate dinner, had the children get ready for bed and than decided to watch Swiss Family Robinson together.  What a fun movie!  The children loved it!  When the movie was over, we realized that it was raining pretty hard again, so we all decided to sleep inside instead of using out tents.  We figured we would all be slightly less moody at church in the morning.

     Sunday morning, we woke up early and got all the children ready for church.   I received a call from the Trampoline man informing me that they were having difficulty getting the new top onto the trampoline.  He assured me that they would have it on and have it delivered to us sometime before the day was done.  We were hoping that we would arrive home from church to find the trampoline in the water, but that was not the case.  The children enjoyed playing together while we took down the tents.  A little later in the afternoon, the Barley family joined us for a cookout and a few games of the play station trivial game called Buzz.  We had a great time…but there was still no sign of our water trampoline, and by the time we were finished it would have been too dark and too cold to enjoy a water trampoline anyway.  We had a fantastic weekend hanging out with some wonderful families from church…but we never did see the trampoline.  We are hoping that maybe by next Labor Day weekend, we will have the trampoline for the children to play on!

Mixed Emotions!

Its funny how emotions play out in the life of a seven year old...or at least my seven year old.  Today was the open house at Micah's school.  Micah will be returning to Trinity Lutheran after spending a year at the Catholic school(Holy Angels.)  He seems both nervous, excited and even a little emotional about the start of the new year.  I am confident that he will have a great year this year, but he seems a little unsure of the fact that he will be leaving the friends that he made last year.  Today his emotions about starting school came out in cute and funny ways.  I told him that he would need to wear some of his nicer clothes to the open house tonight.  He immediately selected one of his short sleeve button down shirts.  He looked very nice.  He decided to mask his nervousness...literally.  Here is a photo of how Micah chose to show up to his open house.  It gave his new teacher a good look into what she would be getting herself into this year with Micah man in her class.

Micah enjoyed picking out his desk for the year and he even received a special pencil to use on his first day of school.

       I look forward to hearing all about Micah's first day in first grade, but it is emotional for me as well.  I pray that he will have a fun year and that he will grow closer to his Lord and Savior Jesus as he attends the Lutheran school...but it has been a fun summer, and I will miss having him home all the time with me.  So, we both have mixed emotions about the beginning of the 2011/2012 school year.