Rise and Shine

I have many friends who are concerned about what their family eats. They are careful to select foods that don't have a lot of additives or sugar, etc. I'm not one of those kinds of people. My favorite breakfast growing up for many years (seriously, ask my mom) was the chocolate Pop Tarts with the vanilla frosting- washed down with grape juice containing almost zero real juice. It was great. It started my day with a wild sugar high that made me feel good. I got excellent grades and was never overweight (you can ask my mom about that too, although she made have forgotten about the excellent grades). Now as a mom I provide much of the same breakfasts to my own children. Here's the current cereal pick at our house.

Friends who send their kids here to spend the night (or week) probably know what we serve for breakfast. I've had kids from families with real healthy eating habits open the cereal cabinet and feel guilty just for looking at it. I do make some of my kids use skim milk...unless they really hate it.
Breakfast of champions!!

Who Doesn't Love a Baby?

One of my favorite blogs to read is My Life In Bits & Pieces. She has a picture of her beautiful granddaughter on it almost every day cuz she knows that grand kids are the greatest!!
Check out my daughter Kara's blog to see my youngest grandchild, Scarlett Claire. Being a mom is wonderful and the sweet reward is watching our kids nurture the next generation.

Look Out France!

Today my parents, both in their early 80's, are leaving for France. My daughter and her husband are making a survey trip into Africa where they will be doing missionary work and my parents will be watching their kids while they're gone for 3 weeks.
This is not a babysitting job for the faint of heart. My daughter has five children under the age of 8 and my parents speak no French at all. The first two weeks the kids are on holiday from school. Some people have questioned their decision to take this on, after all, this would be hard for anyone, let alone a couple their age. But they are sure of their decision. If you knew my parents, you wouldn't be surprised and if you know their God, you can pray for His continued blessing on them as He gives them all they need to do the job.
Au revoir Mom and Dad.

Signs and Wonders

Yesterday, every time I turned around, I was running into God. He must have decided Himself to do this, as I don't remember asking for anything out of the ordinary. He wasn't just here, but He was doing all these crazy, unbelievable things that startled you into saying, "miracle!".
*A friend who recently gave up a 50 year, self indulgent, out of control, sin life to follow God, was doing the "right thing" and money was running low. He was being hit by so many temptations I was worried he would cave in and take some wrong easy route. In the mail came an unexpected check that more than covered his needs. It was from the I.R.S. which definitely falls in the miracle category.
*We have a missionary house next door that seemed to be idle. We have been asking God what He wanted to happen over there. Our pastor has been praying with us. Yesterday I got a call from missionaries from India who need to stay in our house next week. They just need to rest awhile and walk and play with their boys in the woods. So cool.
*My daughter and her husband who live in France are ready to go on a survey trip into Northern Africa as missionaries but have been held up by visa problems. We have been praying and fasting for a break through. Yesterday she waltzed up to an agent in Paris and he issued the visa like she was asking for a pencil...no problem.

Of course, where God is showing up, Satan gets annoyed. Things that have been running smoothly for years were feeling bumpy yesterday. We have been memorizing Ephesians 6:10-18 and I DO know who we are wrestling, even when he pretends to be my marriage.

I love living life just this shy of heaven....so less boring.

Who'd Have Ever Guessed

Two of my daughters and I are in beautiful Lynchburg, Virginia at Liberty University (Jerry Falwell's college) for a basketball tournament. The girls cheer with a homeschool cheer squad for the JV Team. I'm not exactly a "cheer kinda mom" so I find this all rather interesting. I actually had to do a little sewing on my coach jacket...sewing and cheering....I would have bet you odds that I would never do either of those things, ever. My jacket used to say Phoebe and I was supposed to pick the name off with a seam ripper. I worked on it for hours and settled on my new name being Heobee. It has a ring to it. Like Heobe-Gebes. The girls are tired but happy and I can add Cheer Coach to my list of "How did I get myself into this?" things.

You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile

Grace has had so many medical problems and handi-caps over the years that she takes them all in stride. Nothing physical much bothers her. The chemo that splashed through her veins as a baby did lots of secondary damage, including affecting the growth of her teeth. She has eight missing and four or five that look like stalactites. She's had lots of dental work (why does it have to be so expensive?) and braces over the last few years and we've all gotten used to her "jack-o-lantern" smile. Recently we switched orthodontists and on the first visit he explained that any permanent teeth implants would have to wait till she was an adult because of continued mouth growth. He did say however that there was no reason they couldn't hook two little teeth on her retainer for now so she would look better. Let me tell you, that girl was excited! She told everyone she met that she was "getting teeth." Her older brothers do their best to humiliate her over her false teeth but even that does not dampen her joy. Here are her before and after pictures. A little up close but beautiful.

Day Pass

One of our daughters is not able to live with us at home. She's struggled through the years with different emotional issues and although not in our house, she's always in our heart. She was able to come for a day visit and God turned up the sunshine for her. We walked to the river and played and it felt good to have Molly catch the ball when it was thrown and write her name in chalk in the driveway.
It rained last night and this morning her name is erased and she's not here. We miss the daughter/sister that we enjoyed yesterday and continue to pray for healing for all those hurts and scars from the past.

Yet another thing to keep me on the computer for hours

I got the most awesome birthday present ever yesterday. It can only be appreciated by other book-a-holics I suppose. My husband gave me a Flic. This is the most incredible thing and promises to suck up all my remaining awake hours. This little hand held device scans the barcodes of all the books in your library. You then plug it into your computer via a USB plug and it downloads all the information and imports the data from Library of Congress and Amazon and neatly puts it all into "your collection". There are tons of fields for each book including when and to whom you lend them. I'm LOVING it! I have a large library and you may not hear from me for months!! (Some one please come looking for me.)

Please Mom, Please Can't We Keep Her?

A few days ago we had one of those dreaded parental moments......a stray dog showed up in the yard and all the kids fell in love....instantly. I couldn't blame them, she was beautiful, about a year old, a perfect German Shepherd. Her eyes were soft and she had the kind of sweet personality that was made for a family with tons of kids. They took her out in the back yard and she fetched sticks and caught snowballs in the air and ran circles around them as if she had known them all her life. They named her "Germany"(my kids aren't particularly creative) and they just knew they had the best gosh -darn dog a kid could ever want. Then I told them, "Sorry, no way, we're not keeping her." I could have said, "Your father has been killed in an atomic blast and you'll never see him again" and gotten less grief. There was wailing and begging and bribing and that never believed for a second plea of "I swear, you won't have to do anything, we'll take care of her." I stood my ground against all of them. It wasn't easy. Germany would come up to me and put her nose in my hand. She never left the yard and would lay by the front door no matter that it was 20 degrees outside - how could you not love her loyal spirit? But I stood my ground. I'm not a dog hater. I've had a dog my entire life until last year and loved them all like I would die without them. But right now, I can't do one more thing. This shoe is filled to the brim with my husband and kids, homeschooling and friends, laundry and cleaning, blogs and books and just the hair the dog would shed would over-fill us and I would have to run away and join the gypsy circus.
Everyone's a little sad, as she found a new home this morning. Some family will love her and she deserves it. Bye Germany.