Germs, Germs, Go Away...

I feared that this was going to be a rough winter in the health department because it is Hannah's first year of kindergarten and so she is exposed to (and bringing home) all sorts of new germs. We started off right away in December with some sort of fever/congestion deal. Elaina was first and then Grace, and finally, just before Christmas, Hannah caught it. And hers turned into an ear infection. While they were battling their sickness, I got to battle the stomach flu. But miraculously all were well in time for Christmas and the ensuing week of vacation.

Hannah's birthday is the week after New Year's, so it falls just when we are trying to get back into routine. We noticed just before her birthday that she was having a hard time hearing. Of course, wouldn't you know it, the ear infection never actually cleared up all the way, so round of antibiotics #2. She had her hearing mostly restored in time of her first birthday party and was able to enjoy that day to her utmost ability! However the next morning I woke up with the beginnings of a nasty cold. Which has not left (despite receiving its eviction notice multiple times). I can't take much for it, so it really is just a matter of endurance and rest. And of course, just because a cold is never enough to plague a pregnant woman, I got pinkeye on top of it. Just a bonus, you might say :-P And ironically I'd never had pinkeye before until I was pregnant with Elaina (so now I've had it twice). So apparently pinkeye enjoys picking on pregnant ladies. I think I'm starting to head toward recovery, though. Just in time for Grace (and now Eric) to catch some sort of virus that involves the throat. We thought it was probably strep, but the strep test was negative for Grace. She seems to be pretty much over it, though, so now we just wait on Eric :-)

I'm sincerely praying that this is the last of it. My poor immune system needs a break! I'm so grateful that this time around we are expecting a late spring baby. So I can weather all this sickness without worrying about a newborn being born into it. Hopefully by the end of April/beginning of May everyone will be healthy and outside enjoying spring weather!!

We have some fun things coming up around the corner, too, so we need to be healthy for that!

Fun for me, perhaps (and maybe not so much for the rest of the family), is that we're soon going to start decorating the nursery. It will the first actual nursery I've had to decorate, so I intend to enjoy this one. We'll hopefully be doing that over the next couple weekends. We need to tackle the girls' room, too, since we'll be moving Elaina in over there shortly. That room was a "nice" shade of pink with a horrid sand texture, so we need to re-plaster the walls so that the walls stop leaving scratches on our girls' hands while they are sleeping.
We'd like to get our room painted, too, since it is this shade of yellow:


This is our bedroom before we moved in. And what this picture doesn't truly show is the darker color of yellow that goes around the trim...and how it fails to blend with the rest of the wall. Ugh. I do not feel rested in our bedroom! And since I'm soon to be spending many hours at night awake, I want to enjoy our bedroom.

Besides home improvement Eric and I are going to a couples retreat at Lake Lundgren Bible Camp with some friends Valentine's Weekend and then I get a "girls weekend" at the end of Feb. where, for the first time ever, I will be leaving Eric alone with the kids *gasp* for an entire weekend! And then we've enrolled the girls in a "big sibling" class which will probably be more fun for Mommy than them! And mixed in there somewhere, hopefully, will be a visit from Grammy and Grandpa from PA.

I will leave you with some pictures from the last few weeks:

We had to get rid of Daphne in November because she started peeing consistently in the house and despite our best effort (replacing carpet to remove the smell, frequency of cleaning litter, better lighting by the litterbox, etc) she just didn't stop. So we rehomed her with some friends up north, where I've heard she is happily living the life of a farm cat. And Sophie is the newest member of the family. So here is Elaina snuggling with Sophie (Elaina is a huge fan of cats, the cats for Elaina? Not so much)

After Christmas Grace got her first "big girl" haircut and got to go to the kids salon where she got her hair styled and a mini-manicure. She was in her element!

Hannah's 6th birthday came and went. I can't believe that it has been 6 years since she was born and I became a mom! Somedays it just seems like yesterday.


Eric playing "duck, duck, goose" with Hannah's party friends.

Hannah's little party enjoying their treats. She loved it. Parties for Mommy? Not such a big fan.

Hoping that this next month brings lots of before and after pictures and good health!!

Baby's On The Way

While this hasn't really been a "secret", it is still unknown by a lot of people. Our fourth (and likely last biological) child is on the way. We had the privilege to sneek a peek last Tuesday and it was an amazing experience. I love the ultrasound for the simple reason that it is our one chance to "meet" this little person before we actually get to meet them. To catch a glimpse of little fingers and toes, and if we're lucky, a face.

We did get to see the face this time, too. Probably better than we have with any of the others. Unfortunately there was no picture to show for it, but we got to see the most precious nose, mouth, and chin. Can't wait to kiss them!!

Baby is due May 2nd and we'll see if he/she actually holds out this long. I'm hoping to actually make it beyond 37 weeks this time. I would love, love to not have a baby on my birthday (April 15) so I'm concentrating on holding this one in!! My birthday falls right about at 37 weeks, too, so I can't let this one have an early exit pass!!

Meet Baby #4


We are patiently awaiting his/her arrival!!

It is sad when I can't remember how to log into the blog, right? I’m long, long overdue in an update. I had intended on updating as soon as we moved into our new house but that was a busy time and I never got around to it. And then I intended to update with pictures of our “pool demolition” but again…time got away from me! I still do intend on posting pictures of our new house and pool demo. However, my desktop computer is awaiting a new hard drive and until my overwhelmed-school-attending husband has time, I’m stuck with my laptop. Which has no pictures!

Life is busier than I’d like it to be. Hannah started kindergarten this year, which has been a big adjustment for us all. With that comes Monday nights at church, so one more night we’re out and about. Plus there is the addition of homework into our evening schedule. Who ever heard of homework in kindergarten?

We joined an new small group that only meets every-other week, but somehow it still feels like we meet all the time! We just finished up a class working through the book "Shepherding a Child's Heart" on Monday nights. I'm also involved in a mom's Bible study Thursday mornings. I really enjoy this most of the time, so I'm glad I do it despite the time involved in the "homework". And in addition to all that I signed up for two separate mentoring groups. The idea being that it would be nice to have some company and support while Eric is chin-deep in classes. And that has been true, but at the same time I will be glad when they are over in January. Not because I haven't enjoyed them, but just because it will be nice to have less obligations.

Eric is still in school and is wrapping up this semester. He will be done in May and then we won’t know what to do with ourselves. He has been in school since Hannah was just a baby, so it is literally all she has ever known. I, for one, am just looking forward to being able to have consistent help with the dishes and maybe, fingers crossed, the laundry!

Grace and Elaina are doing fine having just each other to play with while Hannah's off at school. I was surprised at how easily that transition was. Grace and Hannah are inseparable and the types of games they play are definitely more “pretend” and use of imagination. Elaina isn’t there yet. But Grace manages quite fine with Elaina, and just seems to enjoy having her around. I often hear her calling Elaina “sweetie pie” or similar things. Just this morning Elaina woke Grace up by hoisting herself up into Grace's bed and proceeding to kiss her and tell her to "go play". Definitely warms this Mommy's heart.

The biggest discussion around here lately is homeschooling. It is a big “to do” or “not to do” debate. It would probably be a lot easier if we had a definite reason for wanting to do it…like Hannah was being bullied or they were teaching her inappropriate things. As it is we got thinking about it when we noticed a change in her demeanor (and during that time she asked me if she could be homeschooled). But that has since improved. And actually the school is just fine and is, in fact, part of the reason we insisted on staying in De Pere while house hunting. The school is well known for being good.

But public school, so far, just hasn’t been a great fit for our family. Although Hannah goes to school without complaint and even seems to enjoy herself most days, she doesn't anticipate it like I think a kindergartner ought to. Part of the issue may be that she is frustrated. She loves to draw (in great detail apparently) and her teacher said that she takes too long to complete her pictures, assignments, etc. and needs to learn to work faster and keep up. Hannah has also said that if she doesn't finish her picture her teacher makes her finish it during free choice time, so essentially takes away her recess to finish her work. And Hannah is so detail orientated, she won't stop short of a masterpiece. She's constantly frustrated that she doesn't have time to finish. The teacher said that it just takes longer for Hannah when you compare it to the rest of the class drawing stick figures...And that her teacher's solution was simply for Hannah to "go faster" did not go over well with me. It seems to me that if they had their way they would hold Hannah's talent back until she was no better than any of the rest of the kids, essentially making them all the same. How is a child supposed to shine if that's the way it works?

I do find it interesting that I am here, considering this, at all. Eric initially brought up homeschooling before we even had kids. My response was immediate rejection. No, that would require too much patience. Too much time. I would have kids in my house forever! When would I ever have “me” time? And talk about the pressure…I’m not a teacher! How would I get my kids to actually learn from me?!

So I’m a bit surprised to be here, now, seriously considering it. With no “real” reason. Other than that I don’t like having Hannah gone all day and that what we are doing now just doesn't feel right. I feel like the few hours I see her in a day are just not enough. Our time with our kids(before they grow up and leave!!) is so limited in the scope of life and I feel like I am wasting it with her being gone all day. I feel like I am missing so much of her life and have no idea what information is being put into her head...and to be honest, the vast majority of things that she chooses to dwell upon (and ask questions about) are not things that she has learned at school. But things that she has brought up and discussed with us. Like "why does the moon glow?" and "why do geese fly in v's?" And I love those conversations, and the fact that she retains that information and thinks about it!

Anyway, that's the "big news" from our family lately. No decision has been made. We are going to "interview" some families in the next few weeks and try to make a decision. We need lots of prayers!

Now that I've written a novel...I'll have to come back with a few pictures and updates of our past activities soon!

I can't believe it has been so long since I updated! Between having our home for sale and the holidays, time just escaped me, I guess.

Still no go on the house. We're royally sick of it. While before when we'd get the call that someone wanted a showing we'd be excited about the prospect of a sale. Now we just get irritated at yet another inconvenience that ultimately leads to nothing. Earlier this week we had a second showing scheduled where the realtor told us that she thought our house was the "one" for her client. Two canceled showings later we were informed that the interested buyer's financing fell through. ugh!!

We are trying very hard to trust in the Lord's timing as we watch our neighbors sell their homes while ours sits. Right now there really isn't anything out there we'd like to buy (the house we wanted fell through) and so that makes it easier to wait. We'll see what happens!

I'll do a quick "catch up" on us since it has been so long.

Hannah just turned five. We're amazed that she's that old already. Sometimes it seems like just yesterday that she was born. She's quite happy in the role of "biggest sister" and is currently not looking forward to kindergarten because it means that she has to be away from her sisters all day. I don't think that will last more than a day! One of her favorite things to do is to play with Elaina. Gotta love that! She's a great helper.


Grace is our little "princess". At least if she's wearing a dress. Any dress qualifies. When I teased her about being "sleeping beauty" the other day because she took such a good nap she informed me that she couldn't possibly be Sleeping Beauty because she wasn't wearing a dress. She's a "girly girl" and loves to tell Mommy how "beautiful" she is. She's also Hannah's shadow. Sometimes I forget that they are different ages because they want to do everything the same!


Elaina is a lot of fun. She is a bundle of energy always on the go. She adores her older sisters and gets a kick out of watching the pets. I'm hoping that she starts walking a bit sooner than Grace, but she isn't anywhere near there yet. I've been working on trying to get her to stand at least :-)


That's the quick summary of the last few months. I will try to be better about updates. Particularly since (in my opinion) my kids do such cute things! I should have something to write about!

Catching Up

I have been putting off updating here because I've been hoping I'd have some good news to report. But so far none...our house still sits. The house that we want to buy still sits, as well, so at least we're not sitting here without hope. But it is a very frustrating situation and we have to continually remind ourselves that God is in control. As things in our current house seem to keep breaking, requiring us to put more time and money into a home we are finished with, it just gets more disheartening.

We've been very busy this fall. Probably more so than we were all summer. Eric has been traveling pretty consistently, which is a hardship for us all. We've been trying to focus on the fact that he has a job, which is a blessing, but it is hard when we miss him and my sanity is slowly slipping away...

But God has been faithful! It is hard sometimes to be content with our situation, but God reveals himself in the little things. Both Marcy and Callie have run away in the last two weeks. Both returned after my turmoil and prayer, much to the joy of our little girls. I often think life would be simpler in the country! If they ran off we wouldn't have to worry quite so much. Here we rely on our neighbors to return our pets, or at the very least to not interfere with their returning on their own.

We have had some fun this fall. We got the chance to go camping for the first time with Elaina. Not an experience we shall soon be repeating. Eric ended up spending the night in the van with her because she wouldn't stop crying and we didn't want to keep everybody up! we went with our friends Brandon and Carrie and had a really good time. The girls liked it, too. I think they were especially tickled that Brandon and Carrie actually played with them. So many of our friends tend to ignore them, which is fine, but the girls love getting attention (who doesn't?!).

Posing by Lake Michigan. They really do love each other most of the time :-)

Our very sleepy (and dirty) girls. Eric joined Grace a few moments later.

Our little family

We also took a trip to South Haven, MI last weekend to meet with Eric's parents and sisters along with their fiance and boyfriend. Unfortunately it felt like we spent most of the weekend in the car since getting through Chicago was a pain both ways! But we had a good time and hopefully we'll do that again. It was a nice in-between place so that no one had to drive quite so far.

Dave, Grace, Connie, Hannah, Me & Elaina, Eric, Bree, her boyfriend Shawn, Kala & her fiance John

On the frigid beach! I'm not sure why we don't look more happy. I think we were blinded by the sun and FREEZING!

Hopefully I can come back very soon with some happy news!! Your prayers are coveted!!

Preschool Adventure Begins

We've been trying to decide what to do with Hannah for schooling for awhile now. Our school district doesn't offer any 4-K program. Even if it did I'm not thrilled with sending Hannah to school already. I feel like you get precious few years with them at home, why hurry them out the door? We checked into a few local preschools but they operated more like a daycare and even if they didn't, they cost more money than we had or were willing to put into preschool.

So...that left trying to teach her something at home. I didn't know where to begin, though. I needed some guidelines but everyone I'd asked for tips had not really given me anything more than a grab bag of suggestions. What I really needed was a structure to follow. And so I started searching for something. It had to be something easy for me to do, after all I still have a 2 year old and 6 month old at home, too. And it had to be something that Hannah could do and be encouraged about school, not frustrating and dreading it.

I fell upon a site that had a pre-formed curriculum called "Letter of the Week". After looking it over I realized that it was pretty good, and that I thought Hannah really could probably do most of it. Probably more importantly, I felt pretty confident that I could teach it to her and do a good job.

We started Monday and so far it is going fairly well. I think we'll do better as the weeks progress. For instance, I had glanced over the science and social studies topics but hadn't put any thought into how I was going to teach it. A couple days before I realized that I had no idea. So that consisted of a mad scramble for some library books about alligators and astronauts! I'm hoping that future weeks will have less "scrambling" and more "pre-planning". In fact, I already have all the books I need for the letter "B".

This weeks' art activity was to make "Animal" puppets. Hannah made a cat and Grace a cow. Here is the puppet show they put on for us for your viewing pleasure:

Nine Days

Today, while I was whining to the Lord about how much I want to sell our house and feeling positively frustrated that it has taken so long, a sudden thought popped into my head.

God is faithful even with the silly things.

A few months ago, while I was approaching my due date, I was very upset by the thought of our baby being born on Grace's birthday. I was fervently hoping for a bit of space, both for finances and for the sake of specialness. So each girl could have "their day". After agonizing over it and realizing that I couldn't do a single thing to control that situation, I came to the realization that God loved Grace far more than I ever could, and me worrying about how two close birthdays would affect Grace wasn't getting me anywhere! So I gave it to the Lord (still with difficulty, I'm sassy like that!) and hoped that He'd have mercy on me! But that was after many attempts to bargain with God or otherwise "control" the situation.

While at small group one day toward the end of my pregnancy, I shared my frustration with my small group. One of the women mentioned to me that her children were only eight days apart. I laughed and said that I would gladly take eight days! I was concerned that there would be zero days, so eight sounded great to me! I began to pray that specific prayer, "Please, Lord, let the baby be born at least eight days before Grace's birthday."

Now, I know this is silly. But it was important to me. And when I went into the doctor on February 26 and I was still not in labor, my blood pressure was still looking decent (so less chance of being induced early) and my next appointment wasn't until March 6, I was a bit disappointed and was mentally preparing myself for having two birthdays side by side.

But God answered that silly prayer. Elaina was born February 27. God said "Here you go, My silly girl, I'll give you one better than eight. How about nine?"

I won't say that I'm not still struggling with wanting to worry and stress over whether or not our house sells in time for us to get the other house. But it did make me pause. It was such a silly little prayer, really. It wouldn't have scarred either Grace or Elaina to have close birthdays. Lots of siblings do! But He answered my prayer anyway. Even if the house doesn't sell in time, I need to better trust that the Lord knows best. And he's so faithful, even with the silly things!