Prairie Dogs and....B?

I decided to take B to the zoo today so that we could have a little fun day before my hair appointment. He loves watching the gorillas, but they were all sleepy today. So, B made some new friends. We have never seen the prairie dogs out, but when we turned the corner to the exhibit, ALL of the prairie dogs were out and running around. I quickly grabbed my camera, but was too late to capture the picture of one little prairie dog running up to the window that B was looking in at. He then jumped up the glass wall, trying his hardest to reach B. B thought it was incredibly funny and laughed a lot. I wish I could have caught that picture!



I have been meaning to take some pictures of the gorgeous trees. The colors are so vibrant and beautiful! I love walking out of our doors and seeing this view from our front or back porch.

Pumpkin Carving

We had a lot of fun letting B paint and help carve/clean out his pumpkin. He had gotten a little pumpkin and we decided to let him paint it. I'm so thankful that one of my teacher friends, Emily, taught me how to make the paint washable! I can only imagine if she hadn't. You can, too, once you take a look at his picture. It was fun for us, though, and we made some memories. Daddy T just couldn't resist putting the handprint on his chest!




B's final product:

Once we let B paint his pumpkin, we decided to let him help us clean the pumpkin out. He really liked that part. He thought the scoop was a spoon, though, and kept trying to put it into his mouth. Once he tasted it for the first time, he didn't try again!






The final product....completed by me! I'm quite happy with how it turned out.

Grace Based Parenting

I have started reading this book and I absolutely love it. It has some great concepts in it and it has made me aware of some of the tendencies I have and will probably always battle as I try to parent Blake. This book talks about how we should parent as God would. God shows us grace every single day. However, just because He shows us grace doesn't mean that He doesn't discipline us. In fact, He makes sure that we have consequences to our sin so that we try not to sin. Grace does cost, though. As parents, Dr. Kimmel talks about how it costs us our time, money, dreams, etc. It can cost us a lot. However, we gain a lot.

Dr. Kimmel also writes about how we shouldn't complain about having to take care of our children. Instead of having the attitude of "I have to" buy clothes for my son, or "I have to" wash the clothes, it should be "I get to." He points out that our children hear that and the negativity it implies. He also talks about those that have teens and when you blame it on "just a teenager thing" and roll your eyes; they get it. They understand that they are a burden or that they aren't being taken seriously. Each child is unique and those differences should be celebrated, not made into a burden.

I'll end the post with three excerpts from the later chapters in the book.

"You run a risk any time you talk about sin and grace in the same sentence. People assume you're trying to set up a nice little theological system that allows you to do whatever you want. That's not what the Bible says grace is. Grace can be used in a specific sense, which is a gift of forgiveness that you don't deserve. Grace can also be used in a general sense, which is as the freedom and latitude that God allows you as you develop a more intimate relationship with Him. I'm talking about a lifestyle and a set of choices that are the outgrowth of your walk with Him."

"If you manipulate the situation to get your kids off the hook for some sin that they committed or you minimize the punishment to something far less than they deserve, you only set up your children to do things that are much worse. Believe me, if you've ever been around a juvenile detention center, this is a recurring theme. (I can vouch for this. One of my kids kept stealing big screen televisions from houses because his mom never made him take them back.) Mom or Dad kept pulling strings, buying them out of trouble, or simply allowing them to get away with it. The next time, they tried something far worse. Providing consequences for sin IS a loving form of grace. It says, 'I love you too much to let you continue in this pattern and grow up to be bad.' Meting out fair and consistent consequences for their negative actions tells children there is a mature and decent parent overseeing their lives. Letting them get away with sin says just the opposite. It tells them they have an immature parent who is more concerned about their comfort than with their children's dignity. Children like to know they have paid their debt in full so they can move on with their lives."

"Grace provides equilibrium for a family. Where too many parents are concerned with how others view their children, grace-based parents are more excited with how God views their children. Grace-based parents avoid the silly preoccupations with arbitrary standards devised by evangelical busybodies. They keep their eye on the bubble in the level, which is their children's character. To them, keeping their children balanced when it comes to their faith, integrity, poise, discipline, endurance, and courage makes more sense than worrying about whether others think their children LOOK spiritual enough (whatever that means). They don't make it a crime for their children to be different, to be oddballs, or to boogie to a different drumbeat. In the process, they encourage their children to find the unique individual that God designed them to be through an intimate and authentic relationship with Christ."

Pumpkins!

I absolutely love this time of year. The pumpkins everywhere, the changing colors of the leaves, the football games, and the crisp, cool weather. We had been meaning to make it to a pumpkin patch, but hadn't done it, yet, so we decided to stop by our favorite place: the market. It has fresh fruits and veggies and I love knowing that I'm eating local produce. Their stock of pumpkins were great and they had some little ones that we're going to let B paint while we carve the big one.

We set B down in the yard and he ran straight to the pumpkins to take a look at them. It was the first time that he had been next to a real one.


He wanted to touch all of them and try to pick them up. They were a bit too heavy for him, but he still enjoyed trying.



Oh my! Which pumpkin to pick?


Daddy T and B searching for the perfect one.


B found the one that we needed....


And so that is the one we got.


Hopefully we will get to carve it tomorrow night at some point!

Future Career?

We have decided to take advantage of B's sick days and our days of staying at home. We (or I mean, I) have been wanting to paint and re-do B's room for a long time. I don't think that you typically think of a child-friendly room until you've had your first baby. Once you've had your baby, you start to realize things that may be better elsewhere, space that could be used to enhance their fun in their own room, and organization that makes more sense. I have blocked off his room and we've moved the crib into our room until the room is fixed and clean. It has worked great and I may just do that with our bedroom and the guest room. The poor boy probably thinks that he lost his room! My to-do list in his room is huge, but I'm excited about the progress and how it looks. With the next baby, I will know beforehand to make his or her room child-friendly. Perhaps we will even paint beforehand, too.

His new reading area. We are going to put some mats down on the floor.



When we finished painting the blue on the three walls, we let B into his room to help us pull the tape off the baseboards. He loved it and thought it was fun to pull off.








This is how we found sleepy B tonight, an hour after being placed in bed.

Recipe Sunday

Kielbasa Chili
Makes: 7 servings
Prep/Total Time: 20 minutes

• 1 pound smoked kielbasa or Polish sausage, halved and sliced
• 2 cans (14-1/2 oz. each) diced tomatoes, undrained
• 1 can (15-oz) chili with beans
• 1 can (8-3/4 oz.) whole kernel corn, drained
• 1 can (2-1/4 oz) sliced ripe olives, drained
• jalapeno (I added those because I love spice, in case you haven't figured it out)

1. In a Dutch oven coated with cooking spray, saute kielbasa until browned. Stir in the remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer uncovered, for 4-5 minutes or until heated through.

*We loved this soup. It was very easy and gave the chili a great taste. The note from the magazine says, "This combines the flavors of a chili dog in one bowl! I make it when I need a hot, hearty meal in a hurry. It's also great for football games."

(Taken from: Taste of Home Simple and Delicious Magazine Sept/Oct 2009)

Rock-a-bye Baby T!

I love consignment sales! The ones in our area are wonderful. They have everything you could possibly want for incredibly cheap and they are in almost PERFECT condition. I never would have thought that I would love shopping at these twice a year sales, but I do. I look forward to getting so many of his clothes and toys from there. One of my latest buys was a rocking chair that comes apart. I'm not too fond of the colors, but I'm going to paint it to make it prettier. However, he loves it. He climbs up and down in it and has learned how to get it to rock. He likes to pull it up beside our glider and rock alongside us. So adorable! And yes, he has fallen out of it twice, but he's getting much better at climbing.

Compassion

I absolutely love Compassion. We have 2 kids sponsored through Compassion, one from Thailand and the other from the Phillipines. We get letters, pictures, and drawings from them a lot. I love getting the letters thanking me for their clothes, or a Bible, or birthday presents. I hope that each of our children will be able to write to them and become close to our Compassion kids. And yes, I tend to call them "my kids." If you haven't sponsored a child, check out this video. If you don't watch anything, move the time to 3:15 and hear the testimony from a grown man who was sponsored and watch his reunion with his sponsor that he never met but who changed his life because he allowed him to be introduced to Christ. You can't help but tear up when you see how grateful this man is because of his sponsor and what God allowed the sponsor to help with. Amazing!

Catalyst 2009 Compassion Moment from Catalyst on Vimeo.

Noggin'

B has learned a new talent. That is...."noggin." What is "noggin?" Simple. Think back to Finding Nemo when the way cool turtles said "noggin" to each other. It was way cute on the movie and even cuter in person. When you ask B to give you some noggin', he smiles, taps his forehead to his and giggles. I'll admit that Daddy T started this new development, but B loves it.

As far as illness goes, B is feeling a little bit better today. I ended up taking him to doctor after he started getting a rash all over his body. I knew hand, foot, and mouth disease had been going around again but the last time he had that, it was actually on his hands, feet, and mouth. This time, it wasn't. The doctor said that it was the same type of virus but a mutation of it. He was worried because B hadn't been eating or drinking anything yesterday. He gave us a syringe and told us to try putting the fluids in that otherwise he would have to be on iv's. Thank goodness Raun was able to get him to take a few sips last night. When he woke up this morning, he was feeling a little better and was ready to drink. He has been carrying his sippy cup around all morning. Hopefully more sleep and staying in for the next couple of days will improve his health. Apparently this disease is a summer/fall thing. He got it last fall, too, if I remember correctly. But hey...it could be worse. I'm thankful that's all it is and that it's not something that lasts longer than 5-7 days.

Fevers, fevers

Is it possible to take out stock in the doctor's office? Poor Blake seems to catch fever bugs a lot. Or those fevers indicate ear infections, which is as equally unpleasant. This time, the bug hit last night around 6. When Daddy T made it home for the night, I realized B had been cuddling on my lap for 30 minutes, not moving. Unheard of. I mean, he actually sat still for 30 minutes while awake and let me hold him. I noticed he felt a little warm so we took the temporal temperature. It always runs lowers so when it said 99.something I made Daddy T take the rectal one. It was 100.5. An hour and half later, it was at 100.9, with tylenol. This morning it was 101.1. We're trying to avoid the doctor's office at all costs because we don't want to risk the chance of catching anything else. The doctor said we're doing everything okay but to come in if he runs it for 3 days in a row or if he gets worse today. So that is our day. Lots of hugs, cuddling, kisses, and blankets. And a scratched schedule for me, but that's okay. I'm glad to hand out those cuddles as long as he'll take them! Feel better B!