Littlest Cousins

Reading with Grandma

Reading to each other
At the splashpad
fighting over a cup...Finn won
making up by sharing his cup
then wiping his mouth

Silly monkeys ahead...

Give me five!

How about knuckles instead?
Why do they always want us to pose?


In the baby pool with buddy Jake
At the 4th of July concert withAunt Melissa


badminton anyone?

Dryland canoeing




Dirt! Dirt! Dirt!

First Ice cream cone

Thing that make you go, "HUH?"

We went to the movie this morning and they showed an advertisement that said(my paraphrase), "Kids these days don't know how to play with toys and use their imaginations in their play, so we invented the Toy Story 3 video game so they could do just that."

HUH???

Wordless Wednesday

My Etsy Shop

For quite some time, I have had a couple of friends that have encouraged me to open an etsy shop, but tiem can be scarce so I kept putting it off. My friend Heidi finally convinced me as she was wanting me to make binder covers for people to buy to cover their household binders that they create after reading her book Bootcamp for Lousy Housekeepers. Before continuing let me take a moment to put in a plug for her book. You don't have to be a lousy housekeeper to benefit from her book. If you would just like a little help organizing and figuring out how to get it all done this is the book for you. Check it out on her blog.

About a month ago I set up my shop, but hadn't blogged about it yet as I wanted to get a few more items in but it has taken me a while because life(literally) put it on the backburner. Anyway, I added a few things today and wanted to let you know what it there.

First are fabric storage buckets. These are probably my favorite thing to make right now.






Then a set of binder cover, bucket, and listtaker.
Then several binder covers that I have listed. Besides being great for a housekeeping notebook, I use these to cover a recipe binder, and my homeschool binders. Makes it very easy to find what I want on the shelf.





Then I have a few girls' skirts whcih let me try out new things every now and then.



and lastly one of my most popular items are reversible headbands and I only have one set left in the shop right now but will hopefully add some soon.

I have some other ideas that I'll be adding this summer including some fun applique and hand-embroidered t-shirts.


gasp...I forgot the link...my name is Patchykeen and the link is http://www.etsy.com/shop/patchykeen

Just Call Her Ruth

We are thinking about sending her out to glean in the fields.

My Southern Children

There are days that I wonder if I have the slowest children on the planet. Some are slower than others, but all of them move really slow. The only time they move fast is when they are playing a running game. I have one that eats so slow that she is still eating 30 min after the rest of us are done. I tell her it is a good thing that she doesn't go to school because she'd never get more than 2 bites of her lunch eaten. When we are doing chores I let them put music on. They should work faster, right? Nope. There is no cleaning to the beat in this house!!!
This morning we were running late for swim lessons. They all knew we were running late. I sent a kid in to get something that had been left inside. The tortoise could have beaten her back in the house and out again. When she was sauntering back to the van, looking all around her without a care in the world, I honked the horn. She said, "What?" "We are late! remember?" She just laughed because she knew she was moving slow as molasses.
That is when it hit me!!! They were all born in the south!!! They only have one speed...s-l-o-w!! It really isn't their fault. It all has to do with geographical location. I, would however, be interested in any tips in how to overcome this geographical defect.

P.S. Tortoise daughter said this was a funny post but thanks for not mentioning her name. ;-)

One of Those Things...

This is yet another rambling post of things I've learned since losing Knox. I remember in those first days how I'd be out and see people with their little blond-headed toddlers and had to restrain myself to keep from telling them to hug them tight and love them well because they didn't know how much time they had with them. I'd get upset to hear people complaining about petty stuff and claiming a hard day when I was pretty sure they didn't know what a bad day was because in my book a bad day was finding your son not breathing. I'd get more upset with people making careless remarks about trading in their troublesome kids or offering them up for sale. I'd want to scream, "ARE YOU KIDDING ME? DON'T YOU KNOW WHAT A TREASURE YOU HAVE!"

At the same time, it didn't take long before I'd hear stories of other people's hardships and I'd think. "Wow....It would be terrible to have to walk that road. I'd hate to be called to do that." In other words, I didn't have the worst life out there. Kind of a weird feeling when you feel like you have been stripped of all you have(even though you really haven't). Before losing Knox though, I don't think I thought much of other people's hardships beyond a fleeting prayer mostly because of fear of what it would be like to get emotionally involved.

Getting back to my topic. I have come to realize that we all walk a different path with different hardships. The Bible promises suffering to us all which many want to think contradicts a loving God, but we live in a fallen world and, despite our salvation, we still fall short and sin. If we had heaven on earth, we'd have no need for a savior. That would be the real tragedy, to not know we need Christ. Realizing that we all walk different paths has also helped me to understand that I can't compare my life to others. It is too much like comparing apples to oranges. My son died. It is terrible and horrible and never a path I'd have wanted to walk. But it has been given to me and is mine to walk. It wouldn't be fair for me to tell someone, "You should be happy and not complain because your son is alive. You don't know what it is like."

It is true. They don't know what it is like. Just like I don't know what their hardship is like and what it is like to walk in their shoes. Honestly, I don't want to walk their path because I am sure it is hard and painful. At the same time, it isn't fair for them to compare their hardship to anyone else's. A friend whose husband doesn't have a job doesn't need to tell a friend who is battling an illness, "At least your husband has a job," or the friend who is battling an illness doesn't need to tell the friend whose husband is without a job, "At least you are well."

We could play that song and dance our whole lives, but the better thing to do would be to weep with one another, sharing one another's pain, recognizing it as real and pointing each other to the Man of Sorrows that understands our pain like no one else can. What a pleasure to have friends with whom you can share your sorrows along with your joys and know they are going to lift you up and encourage you.