Toothless

I know I haven't posted in awhile.  Right at the moment I am suffering with a horrible head cold and fever.  I don't know why I got it so bad.  The kids have been sneezing but I seem to have something much worse than them.  I haven't felt this bad since I had the flu back in December!!
The only real news going on here is our boy FINALLY lost his top tooth.  This thing has been wiggly for I don't know how long.  I mean it's been months and months and months!!  I think he is finally glad it is out.

Creation Museum Updates

It's been awhile since the kids and I have been in the Creation Museum, but there have been so many new additions lately....we need to schedule our next visit soon!!  Here are some of the cool new exhibits we haven't even seen yet.....

Dr. Crawley's Insectorium  The collection of bugs and insects represents a lifetime of collecting by Dr. Crawley, who began his interest in these creatures during a merit badge project as a kid. Wherever his travels took him, he would venture out and add to his collection.

Dragon Invasion Exhibit  Regale yourself with delightful artwork and other beautiful adornments as you stroll beneath extraordinary Chinese dragons in the museum's portico. Learn about fabulous encounters with these incredible beasts from China to Africa, Europe to the Americas, and Australia to the Middle East. Discover what ancient historians have written about these creatures, and examine armaments that may have been used by valiant dragon slayers.

Museum of the Bible A new exhibit in the Creation Museum, part of an impressive traveling exhibition of rare Bible manuscripts and artifacts from the famed Green Collection.

Ziplines Travelers will trek on 20 zip lines that range from 270 feet to 900 feet in length and up to 150 feet in the air.  You will also traverse 10 sky bridges over 2 1/2 miles. 

On the move now!

Our girl is finally walking.

Garden

We planted a garden this year and with all the rain we've been having, it is really taking off.  It is an 8 ft x 8 ft frame and we have planted 2 types of tomatoes, green beans, cucumbers, squash, cayenne pepper, red onion, and rosemary.  I still have other herbs I need to get planted.  We were thinking of adding on a 4 x 8 right beside it.  Not sure if it is too late now or not....we'll see.  We have a few green tomatoes already but that's it.  Looking forward to hopefully a fruitful outcome!!

and here's a pic of one of my girls today.....

Book list

I thought I would update our book list of recommendations for each age group.  Our kids LOVE to read and we have accumulated quite the stack of books.  Here are some of the kids favorites!  Click on the names to their links....

Ages 6-9
Imagination Station books.  They are geared toward grade level 1.7 and my second grader zips right through them.  We just bought the first four and he read 3 of them that night.  There are 12 in the series so guess what will be arriving in the mail soon!  The rest of them!!

The Andy series (Circle C Beginnings) by Susan K Marlow.  I've wrote about them before.  Again, these are great for a reader who is now ready to read chapter books on their own.  All about a girl and her horse.

The Cul-de-Sac kids are a great series for beginning readers.  Easy to follow and fun!  My son again zipped through the whole 24 book series in a matter of weeks.  

Mystery of Pelican Cove and The Treasure of Pelican Cove

Captive Treasure and Nix  all books through BJU Press for ages 7-10. My son loved all of them!

Ages 9-12

Rachel Yoder series by Wanda E Brunstetter.  My daughter loved these.  All about an amish girl and her family and the trouble she gets in!  She couldn't put these down!

Double Trouble series by Wanda Burnstetter.  There are 3 in the series with the 4th book soon to be released.  Set in the Amish community, these twins have quite the adventures!

Circle C Adventures (The Andy series) but more grown up.  Andy and her horse on more adventures!

Gold Town Adventures Just discovered this one (so guess what is on our next purchase list!!)  This is apart of the Andy series, but it is Andy's big brother Jem!  Looks like a great series for boys.  Book 1 and 2 are available with book 3 due to be released.

The Truth Chronicles by Tim Chaffey.  This series is written by a man that hubby works with at the Creation Museum.  Excellent books!!!  We even have a signed copy (yay!)

The Viking Quest series (ages 10-14).  My daughter again LOVED this series.  Time period fiction with Christian principles.  She wished the series was longer!!!

The Sugar Creek Gang  by Paul Huchens.  Our boy has just started this series.  He keeps telling me "these boys are just like me!"  About 36 books in the series.

Read alouds

The Jungle Doctor series by Paul White, a missionary to Tanzania writes about his adventures!  Some of the language is a bit hard for children's reading so may be best as real alouds to your children.  Also great for adults!  I believe it also comes in audio form which might be great as well!

Little Lights Books ages 4 and up.  Just found these are they look wonderful!  The true stories of people such as Corrie Ten Boom, George Muller, David Livingston, Amy Carmichael.....

Home

We had a nice, but as always, quick visit down south over the weekend.  It's always great seeing family!  Hubby had some business to attend to while there which was stressful but the Lord was gracious and everything seems to be working great now.  We also attended the funeral of a long time church friend of the family.  This week we will be getting together with a missionary family that we have been supporting for awhile now.  This will be the first time to meet them.  They will also get the chance to go through the Creation Museum.   And a happy anniversary to my parents!  Forty one years...love you both.  Other than that, we are doing well and look forward to the week ahead!

Memories!

Does this ever bring back memories....reminds me of our Sunday afternoons when Mom and Dad put the record player on (yes! a record player!!)

Jesus We Just want to Thank You!


Hallelujah Square

The Train Song

Our bunting is back

Look who has been visiting the feeder that past few days :)  Our indigo bunting!!

Blue eyes

Nothing really exciting going on here so I  thought I would post a pic of my girl at 13 months...

Praise

I thought it was about time that we recognized a huge praise on this blog.  Many of you already know that hubby was scheduled for another surgery but he has since cancelled it with no intentions of rescheduling any time soon.
Hubby's trachea continually closes up about every 8 months and he needs to go for surgery to reopen it so he can breath once again.  This has been going on for over 6 years.  Through some research I did, I wanted hubby to start detoxing his body through a fresh juice diet.  It seemed to be helping as the 8 month mark came and went without surgery!  As the one year mark approached since his last surgery (February) he could feel that he was tightening up a bit, so we scheduled a checkup with the doctor.  During that visit, the doctor mentioned about gluten sensitivity and we decided to give a gluten-free (and gmo-free) diet a chance to see if that would help.  We also scheduled a surgery date for April.  Well, after being on a strictly fresh fruit/vegetable, nuts and seeds diet (with a little meat).....April came and went and we cancelled surgery!!!  A bonus was hubby is down 30 lbs as well :)   His inflammation has decreased and he can breath better than he did back in February!
We are sooooo very thankful for this answer to prayer!  I don't know if hubby is completely healed of this yet or not, but to know that the steps we are taking right now has prolonged his surgery date is so wonderful!  I thank God for His goodness to us and pray that this may be the end of his battle with subglottic stenosis for good!!

New bird!

Our new bird at the feeder!  This is a Common Grackle.  This type rarely comes around and when it does, they don't stick around for very long.  My pics aren't very clear because I had to snap pics real quick and couldn't focus properly.  Neat though huh!!!

Presidents from memory

We have been studying the presidents for the past couple weeks.  The kids have finally memorized all of them!  Here they each are, reciting the names.  Our 7 yr old did it with his eyes closed to show that no one received any 'helps' or 'hints' while reciting.   The 2 older ones recite complete names while our 5 yr old recites just last names. (Even our 3 yr old has most of them down pat!!)
**Be patient - they are big files and may take a moment to load :)

New birds for today

Here are some new birds from today.  Their names are under their pictures.

Male Eastern Towhee

Female Eastern Towhee

Northern Mockingbird - Tennessee State bird

Downy Woodpecker

Brown-headed Cowbird

Here is a fight I captured at the birdfeeder

Giveaway and birds

Great giveaway going on over at Jill's Home Remedies  Go enter!!!

With the beautiful weather, we have had quite a few birds to the feeder.  Here are some of them!  Our Indigo Bunting is back....yeah!!!!!!!!!!

One year pictures

We took our girl to have her one year photos done today and here they are!  Number one is the one we bought.

Toothy smile

look at those teeth!

Happy Birthday to Mama-(Me)a

Here is a birthday song for me today from my kiddos

Here is a song my daughter made for me yesterday too....so funny

My girls

Here are my 3 matching beauties :)

Funny

My 7 year old is outside play fighting with a much larger neighbor boy.  I'm keeping a close eye by the opened window.  My son pipes up and tells the boy "if you kill me, my mom will never forgive you!"
Too funny!

Birthday girl

Our baby girl turned one year old today.  We had a big fish cake and what fun she had playing with it!!  None ever made it to her mouth but she sure made a mess :)  Thank you for all the cards and gifts for her.  What a blessing she is to us!!
...and check out those top 2 teeth coming in!!!