40 Days for Life

In the comment section of my last post Lindsey made an accurate observation about life here on this little blog. It's been a little more lively as of late. There are a couple of reasons for that.

The first one is that I've been re-inspired to blog about things. It's that simple, and it actually had a lot to with a beautiful homeschooling blog about one of my favorite families in Texas. ;-) Ironically enough, Lindsey is the author of that blog and the teacher of that wonderful family!

The second reason is because I'm on a fast from Facebook for the success and safety of those involved in 40 Days For Life. I'm not telling you all this to be like the Pharisees who pray loudly and openly just to be seen. It's actually quite embarrassing that "fasting" from Facebook is even something that feels like a sacrifice. If I was *that* good, I would fast from something less artificial. But, I'm not. I'm weak, and in desperate need of a Savior, and He has taught me a lot about myself in this little fast of mine.

I've turned inward a bit and tried to focus on my family and what we're doing here and how we're focusing on living out our Faith in our home. Instead of dwelling on "she said what?", "I can't believe my 'friend' actually said something like that", "I would never admit that in public", I'm dwelling on "I said what to her?", "I can't believe I used that tone with him", and "A public school teacher would never have just reacted that way".

So, until November 1st please join me in praying for 40 days. Brett and a good friend are participating in the prayer vigil here and I especially pray for their safety because the abortion clinic in the area is the in worst neighborhood possible. Unless of course you are a "Lady of the Night" or a manager of such women, then it's the perfect neighborhood. Not to be too political, but man, with problems like these I'm sure glad our government has made it possible for people to purchase new cars because *that's* important. We are missing 1/3 of our generation because of a simple mantra, "my body, my choice". We all need to work and pray for an end to abortion.

Nighttime diapering

Now if that title doesn't completely suck you into this blog, what will. :-)



After many, many, many years of cloth diapering I have yet to discover the best method for nighttime diapering. Until now! I have finally found a diaper that works for nighttime. My baby "sleeps" all night which means that she's never fully awake in the middle of the night needing to be put "back" to sleep. Of course she wakes up enough to nurse herself silly in the middle of the night, but since my sleep is hardly disturbed during these times it doesn't count as being awake. But I digress.



The bamboo bumGenius diapers found here are the first diapers that have worked for us overnight. I love these! They are soaking wet come morning, but we've yet to have a leak or a rash or a stink from them. I give them 4 thumbs up (two of mine plus two of the baby's). I am ashamed to admit that I had given up on cloth during the night and have used disposables with the other kiddos. Surprisingly, I find it more difficult to do this because I not only need all of my cloth diapering stuff I also need disposable diapers and wipes. We don't have a lot of space so this poses a huge problem. Well, a problem no more.



For those times where I am behind on my laundry and don't have enough of the bamboo (I only bought 3 because I didn't know if they would work as I wanted them to) I have successfully used a second microfiber insert stuffed into a one-size bumgenius also found here.



Don't let all of these fancy diapers mislead you into thinking that I've dropped a ton of cash for everyday use. I'm still using the pro-wraps covers, which I still love over all of my other covers, and Chinese Pre-fold diapers I bought here, years ago.



The next step in my cloth diapering obsession is to make up a good reason to purchase these. Then I will be satisfied, or will I?!

Good times

A couple of weekends ago some great friends came to see us. Us women were on for the weekend as the men had some fun festivities they were attending. Okay, so they had a schola rehearsal and a conference on the Theology of the Body. Regardless, my very beautifully pregnant friend, Meredith, and I were "working" overtime. We managed to survive the weekend and only exchanged a minor cold in the process.

Our 4-year-old godson, Isaac! He and Aidan understood one another a little more than either Meredith or I would have liked. Both great kids, both challenges, both will leave their mark on this world, I've no doubt.

Meredith and Aidan.

We know these wonderful people are great friends. How do we know? Well, many reasons of course, but this picture identifies some specifics. In this picture Brett is wiping spit-up from Veronica's face with a pair of pants he happened to find laying on the ground. Neither Bill or Meredith judged us for being horrible parents or bad housekeepers. However, it gets better. Through his smile, Bill is actually commenting on how warm the spit-up was as it squished its way between his toes. Yep, great friends!

Aidan and Simon found some fun acorns.

Wide awake

Yesterday morning I woke up to this,

Gigi: Emma, girls can go to school without any clothes on, right?


I came out of the room to see Gigi in attendance at Emma's "school" in just her undies. She can usually dress herself, but the pants she had picked out for the day were her "tricky pants" and she couldn't get them buttoned. Good thing Emma's school doesn't have the "no shirt, no pants, no socks, no service" rule.

Recess

I love sending the kids out to the backyard for "recess". I also love that we don't have an automated bell that tells them time is up. In fact, I control our "bell" which isn't a bell at all. The more sunshine they can soak up now the better. The cold months are not too far off.

This is what started as a recess project. Aidan gave up making the pile when I reminded them that Emma can't jump in the leaves. Last year they played and played and played in the leaves and then Emma broke out in hives from top to bottom. Itchy, raised, awful hives. I didn't think about it until I was giving her Benedryl and putting lotion all over her sweet little body that we have several squirrels who like to stand in our yard and eat their peanuts. I'm not sure where they get these peanuts, but we see shells all over. Not a good thing for a peanut-allergic kid. Poor thing.

I would like to think that Aidan stopped raking out of love for his sister. He didn't want to be enjoying leaf-pile-jumping without her. I'm sure that it had nothing to do with the homeschooled kids down the street who came over to have a "joint" recess.

Introducing...

Dr.Blue. Afterall, he didn't spend 4 years in "blue school" to be called "Mister"!



And the other doctor in the house, who is not nearly as snobby as to what he is called.

I absolutely love having Brett home for lunch during the week. His job isn't a typical 8-5 job so it's really nice for all of us to have this touchbase. And, if the kids are really lucky, Dr.Blue (or Mr.Blue Eyes as Gigi says) will pay us all a visit.

Karate kids

Karate kid number one was recently promoted to his blue-stripe. The order is white, yellow, orange, and blue, with a stripe in between. Next is green, purple, brown, red, and then black!

Karate kid number two just started last week and is super-fierce.

Karate kid number three is hoping she doesn't break anything.