Catching Up

Well it has been three months since my last post. So I will try and fit the last three months into a post.....


Halloween was different this year. Since the holiday fell on a Sunday we took the kids to the mall on Saturday. The mall had a craft center, story time, a costume contest and then trick or treating to all the stores in the mall. The kids had a great time!! To top the day off our Little Miss won first prize in the costume contest.

The first part of November we were getting packed to go to my parents house. We were in South Carolina for two weeks! It was wonderful being able to spend time with my mother and sisters. Thanksgiving was how I remembered it being as a kid. A ton of food and family and you cannot forget the always present football.

We came home the first weekend of December. Our Little Miss arrived home with a sinus infection AND strep throat. That was Sunday the 5th. The 6th found me in the ER and then a week in the hospital.

Christmas was nice. We had a quiet Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with just the four of us. Christmas afternoon and the next day was spent with John's parents and his sister.

New Years Eve we spent with our church family. We had a great time. Since our church is 40 minutes away we spent the night at a hotel. The kids love staying at a hotel. New Years day we had a couple over. We spent the day eating and playing wii.

January has brought lots of snow. The kids love sledding. We have been blessed to have a hill in our backyard.

Well I think that about catches us up.

Hymn For The Month Of November

I recently purchased a CD by the Galkin Evangelistic Team entitled, Christ Only, Always. I LOVE this CD. There is one song called, Complete in Thee. After listening to this song several times I asked my husband to listen to it. He liked it too. So we decided that this would be our song to learn for the month of November.


Here are the words:

COMPLETE IN THEE

Complete in Thee, no work of mine could take dear Lord the place of Thine.
Thy blood hath pardon bought for me, and I shall stand complete in thee!

Yea, justified, oh blessed thought! And sanctified salvation wrought!
Thy blood hath pardon bought for me, and glorified I, too, shall be.

Complete in Thee, each want supplied, and no good thing to me denied,
since Thou my portion, Lord, will be, I ask no more, complete in Thee!

Yea, justified, oh blessed thought! And sanctified salvation wrought!
Thy blood hath pardon bought for me, and glorified I , too, shall be.

Complete in Thee, no more shall sin Thy grace has conquered reign within;
Thy blood shall bid the tempter flee, and I shall stand, complete in thee!

Yea, justified, oh blessed thought! And sanctified salvation wrought!
Thy blood hath pardon bought for me, and glorified I, too, shall be.

Dear Savior, when, before Thy bar, all tribes and tongues assembled are,
among the chosen I shall be, at Thy right hand, complete in thee!

Yea, justified, oh blessed thought! And sanctified salvation wrought!
Thy blood hath pardon bought for me, and glorified I, too, shall be.

Sunday Mornings

Our church is 45 minutes away. So, with that being said, Sunday mornings are hard on my kids. Sunday school starts at 9am. That means we have to leave around 8am. My children are not morning people. Their stomachs are not morning people either. For several months I have been looking for something that I could make them for breakfast that they could eat in the car which was not a donut or some such pastry.

I came across a recipe for GF Peanut Butter Bars. Even though I new we were not going to go to church this weekend, due to sickness, I thought I would try them anyway. They were a big home run!! I figured I could make them on Saturday and give them this bar and a hard boiled egg and they would be good to go by the time we got to church.

Here is the recipe:

GF Peanut Butter Bars

6 cups Rice Chex Cereal
1/2 cup Honey roasted Peanuts
1/2 cup Honey
1/4 cup Sugar in the Raw
1/2 cup Creamy Peanut Butter
1/4 cup Semi Sweet Chocolate Chips

Butter 9 or 8 inch square pan or a twelve count muffin tin.

In large bowl, mix cereal and peanuts; set aside.

In 3 quart saucepan, heat honey and sugar just to boiling over medium heat, stirring constantly.
Remove from heat; stir in peanut butter until smooth. Pour over cereal mixture in bowl; stir gently until evenly coated.

Press firmly in pan. Cool 15 minutes

In small microwavable bowl, microwave chocolate chips uncovered on high 30-60 seconds, stirring every 10 seconds, until melted and smooth. Drizzle over top of bars. Let stand at room temperature at least 30 minutes until chocolate is set.

Pumpkins With Smiley Faces

Let me start by saying that I LOVE fall!!! I love the changing colors and the crispness in the air. For me, it's always been the start of my new year. Maybe it's because that is when school always started.

When I had my first child, I took him to the pumpkin farm, got him a pumpkin, came home and thought "now what?" I didn't want to introduce the wickedness of Halloween to my son so I gave him the pumpkin, a hand full of markers and let him color the pumpkin. Over the years, my children became aware of the pumpkins with the "smiley faces". As I was talking to my mom one day, the subject of the pumpkins with the smiley faces came up. She suggested that I do the following:

When we are at the pumpkin patch choosing a pumpkin, remind the children that God chose us.

After we get home, we wash all the dirt from the pumpkins and we cut a hole in the top to scoop out the yucky insides. I then remind the children that the Lord has washed our sins away and replaced the yuckiness with the Holy Spirit. We then cut a smiley face on our pumpkin and I tell the children that the Lord has given us Joy and it puts a smile on our face. Then, we put a candle in the pumpkin and light it. This reminds us that we should be a light in the world and show Christ in our lives to others.

So that is what we have done for several years now. A couple of years ago, my mother gave me a book called: The Pumpkin Patch Parable.




This book is what I have been telling my children. It has wonderful illustrations and scripture passages for every step.

Special Lunch

As a homeschool family we are home a lot. This is not a bad thing but the day to day life can start to feel stale. With winter on it's way, I have been praying that the Lord would show me little things that I could do to make our home and our day to day life less stuffy and stale feeling.

I have been reading a blog called , The Legacy of Home. From one of her posts I got the idea of lighting a candle at meal times. This is something I do when we have company but why not for my own family?? So, for the past couple of days I have been lighting a candle at lunch time. Yesterday, as I was getting lunch on the table I could feel my children's eyes watching me. I closed the curtains and lit the candle and called them to lunch. As we were sitting down they kept looking at each other and then at the candle. I smiled to myself and thanked the Lord for a simple answer to prayer. Then we sat and talked and ate our GF chicken nuggets, broccoli, watermelon, and GF pretzels, . It was not a fancy, spend hours in the kitchen lunch, but it was made special with the lighted candle.

Gluten Free

For several months I have been trying to change our diet to gluten free(GF). Why am I doing this? Well, my 8 year old son is Autistic and studies have shown that a GF diet seems to help autistic children. Another reason why is that myself and my daughter seem to have an intolerance to wheat.

So, I plunged into research mode to try and find recipes and food that were GF and tasted good too. It has been interesting. I bought a cereal that was like Cheerios. Looked like Cheerios but when I opened the box well, lets just say it certainly did not smell or taste like Cheerios. I have had good luck with the name brands. I am finding a lot of this is trial and error. I think any major diet change is like that.

Today I made a late lunch/early dinner. We have been missing our pasta so I made spaghetti squash with pasta sauce. With it we had steamed broccoli and GF garlic biscuits. As I was preparing the meal I was praying. We sat down to eat and I could see little eyes examining the meal. Emmi went first. She scooped up a big bite of "pasta" looked at it and then in the mouth it went. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Hunter watching her. I was earnestly praying at this point. Emmi loved it!!! They all loved it!!!

Today I am thankful to the Lord for creating a natural "pasta" for us to eat.

Spaghetti Squash:

Preheat oven to 350.
Cut squash in half length wise.
Brush with Olive oil.
Place rind side up on cookie sheet.
Cook for 45min.

Remove strands with a fork.
Place strands in a bowl and toss with your favorite pasta sauce.


GF Garlic Biscuits

Preheat oven to 400

Mix 2 cups GF Bisquick and 1/3 cup butter.
Add 3 eggs and 2/3 cup milk and a little garlic powder.

Scoop onto cookie sheet and bake for 13-16 minutes.
Makes 10

New Blog

My husband and I have decided to have a blog together. Here you will find things about our family, our faith and our life together in this pod.