Like Butter

It's fun making butter. I've even figured out how to make sticks of butter out of it.













That's it.
Enjoy your evening.

Yes I'm still alive... And loving it!

Well, it's been awhile and I don't really have any legitimate excuse.  But I will say this.  God is Good.  With A Capital G!

Besides letting all two of my readers know that I'm still alive, I wanted to share a little about what's been on my heart lately.

As I mentioned in my last post, we have made a change in our thinking about family planning.  It's been so freeing and so heart-changing for me.

I've always wanted a big family.  Before we got married, I told Mindy I wanted 6 kids.  I had this great dream of being the grandpa and surrounded with children and grandchildren and reveling in the large family reunions, etc.  But as much as I love the cuteness and adorableness of the infant and toddler years, I saw the diaper changing, late night rocking and snotty nose wiping as things I just had to do to pay for the great years later.

I was in hearty agreement with all those folks who rejoiced at being done with diapers, and was counting the years until we'd be diaper free.  The vision of no more naps, no more diapers, kids who could feed and potty themselves was all very enticing.

Then Mindy got us thinking about the quiver-full philosophy that I described in my last post.  And while I expected the challenge and change of heart about how many children our future held, I didn't quite expect the change that I've seen the last few weeks.  

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not the perfect father now, nor was I a horrible father before.  But my attitude has changed about all the things that I may have been ready to be done with before.  I don't love changing diapers yet, but I'm seeing it in a different light.  It's a fun time to giggle and play.  Helping a little boy fall asleep, can be a sweet time of comforting him and maybe snuggling a little, instead of time to get frustrated. 

I'm not sure I'm describing it very well, but the bottom line is this:  Not only are children a blessing from the Lord, they're a blessing from the Lord all the time.  Not just when they're older.  Not just when they're sweet.  Not just when they're asleep, although that can be very blessed ;)

What joys of the present are you overlooking in anticipation of some future joy?

Overwhelmed but excited

If you've been keeping up with the saga of our changing lives lately, you probably have an inkling of the reason for my feeling overwhelmed. And it hit like a ton of bricks this afternoon around 5 pm

Why 5 pm you say?

Well, that was about the time we were signing papers to have our house listed for sale. It's something we've been thinking of doing for awhile for various reasons, but we finally put the wheels in motion. More on the reasons later; back to the house.

It started with talking to my Grandpa at Thanksgiving. He's a real estate agent in Lebanon, about 2 hours south of here. We wanted some advice on how to approach selling the house since we'd never done it before. It was great to talk with him and he started some leg work for us including recommending an agent for us.

So last week we met with the agent and talked to him about what we're looking for and what we need to do to sell our house. Today he was back and the ball is rolling.

I just can't help but feel overwhelmed by all that there is to do; touching up paint, shampooing carpet, cleaning out garage, fixing the landscaping, uncluttering (a daunting task in our house right now) etc. I also am struggling with the decisions we've made so far. Is the broker really going to work out for us? Did we set the right price? I have no reason to believe the answer to either one of those is no, but I just can't help but wonder "What if?"

But I also can't help but be excited at the possibilities and this is where I need to focus. Much has changed about our household in the last few months. No, we're not pregnant. Not yet anyway. The issue of family size has always been one where Mindy and I don't quite agree. Very close, but just not quite. It started even before we were married. I wanted 6 kids and she thought 2 would be great. Until late this last summer, she was very satisfied with our family as it stood and was ready to stop at 3. In my head, I agreed with all the reasons and had been having some of the same thoughts myself, but I just wasn't ready to let the dream go. Sometime in November, to learn about Quiver Full families. It's a philosophy that embraces the promise of Psalm 127

Psalm 127

A song of ascents. Of Solomon.

1 Unless the LORD builds the house,
its builders labor in vain.
Unless the LORD watches over the city,
the watchmen stand guard in vain.

2 In vain you rise early
and stay up late,
toiling for food to eat—
for he grants sleep to ^[a] those he loves.

3 Sons are a heritage from the LORD,
children a reward from him.

4 Like arrows in the hands of a warrior
are sons born in one's youth.

5 Blessed is the man
whose quiver is full of them.
They will not be put to shame
when they contend with their enemies in the gate

The Bible has only good things to say about children. They are a blessing. As a friend from church put it so well once, "If money were called a blessing would you pray to God to stop giving some to you?? And yet the modern American goes to great lengths to reject God's blessings!" Kind of a deep thought. It really made us stop and consider our reasoning. So, that is all to say: We're giving God the reins in our family size. He will never give us more than we can handle and He is faithful to lift us up when we are weary.

And to top it all off, Mindy is homeschooling the boys now. It's not necessarily permanent, but the doors opened (or closed may be more accurate) to make it feasible for us to do so for the last half of Kindergarten for Ben and to start some preschool stuff with Kyle. It's only been 3 days so far, but it's off to a tentative, but good start. It really seems like they were settling in today and it's fun to see them excited about school. Mindy's done a great job.

To summarize, we're starting homeschooling, adding to our family Lord willing, and moving to a new house. It's a little overwhelming to me. I like to be in control. I like to know the outcome, or at least have a good idea of it. And while I tend to let most things roll off my back worry-wise, when I get my teeth into something, I can worry with the best of them.

Mike, our Pastor, has been challenging us lately to seek God's will and do things for him that are so big that the only way they can succeed is with God's help. That is how God's glorified. When we do stuff by our own strength, we can only achieve the ordinary outcome and don't allow God to work the extraordinary outcome.

So...

• Pray for me: That I can let go and trust God for the things I'm not in control of.

• Rejoice with me: That God has blessed us in so many ways that any of this is possible.

• Join me: What things in your life are you doing only with your own strength so that the only possible outcome is the ordinary one? Seek God and seek the extraordinary!

Snow Day!

So like everyone in the Portland Metro with a blog, I'm gonna post some pictures of the piles of snow as well as some of the fun the boys and I had this afternoon. I'll tell you what, I was worn out. But they say exercise is a good stress reliever, so I think it did me good. Helped me not fret too much about whether our pipes might freeze or when we'll get out of town to Idaho.

This is the grill that I cooked dinner on last night.
You can see that we got about 8 more inches after that.

The pile of snow on my car. That's not coming
out of there anytime soon.

Ben is getting a ride in his "One horse open sleigh"
Or in this case, "One daddy open tarp"
When you don't have a sled you have to make do.

The snow got in poor Kyle's eyes when he fell.
Isn't daddy compassionate to take a picture before he helps him clean up

My snowy adventurers at the top of the
mound of snow that I cleared from our driveway.

Ben's Great Invention

This is a video of Ben explaining his latest "great IDEA!" I was going to just try to write about it, but I asked him to explain it again for the camera, so that's why it seems a little staged.



So next time you sneeze and the tissue box isn't close enough, just give Ben a call and encourage him to finish the prototype and get started on production. ;)