Easter 2014

April 26, 2014 | Stacy

Easter 2014 was a Good day.
Easter 2014 was a Full day.
Easter 2014 was a Good, Full day.

One of the kids said it was the best Easter ever. I’ve gotten used to these proclamations, however. The current *event* always seems to be recalled as the best. To me this doesn’t dismiss previous experiences as much as it means they felt joyful at this time.

My alarm rang at 5AM to remind me to start the crock pots. With a smallish oven and two 10 lb hams to cook, I resorted to doing my two potatoes dishes in crock pots. [I won’t keep you in suspense; they turned out fantastically.]

Some of the kids were up by 7AM itching to look for their baskets. I had a lot of pressure with this, let me tell you. Last year’s hiding places were superb and they remembered that. No pressure.

The girls donned their dresses, despite the fact some had to take baths AFTER the basket hunt…
It was fun to have them matching. ♥

They hunted high and low…

Johanna found hers in the hamper.

Tabitha found hers in the Play-Doh cupboard. (Doesn’t every one have a Play-Doh cupboard?]

Marie found hers in the bathroom vanity under a pile of towels. She was elated to receive a clip-the-clothes-on Princess. (Tab has 6 and Hanny has 4 already!) She hasn’t played with it a ton, but she was so pleased to get a princess the other girls didn’t have. They love to mix and match the clothing.

Stewart found his in the pantry. Eventually. Nigel found his in a dress that I had hanging in Daddy’s closet.

Swim goggles, a protractor, and a puzzle book. We are a fun crowd, aren’t we?

It was off to church for 10:30 AM. The kids couldn’t believe how packed the parking lot was. Just moments before someone had suggested that church would be empty because people were out of town, or busy, etc. Nope. The church smelled fantastic. Our friend snapped this picture.

After church we tried to grab some photos.
You know the old saying: “You can dress them up; but you can’t make them smile, tilt their heads just so, and look in the lens.”
Or something like that.

We had a lovely dinner; and although the food was delicious, it paled in comparison to the awesome fellowship. John’s parents, my mom and sister, and our dear friends the F’s joined us for the afternoon. [I did not make the adorable hatching chicks.]

Sunday was also John’s birthday. We opened gifts in the early afternoon.

Our family then left and we headed outside for an egg hunt. Stewart offered to help Daddy hide the eggs this year.

Johanna had a particularly awesome time finding eggs with J’s on them.

Katriel was super-cute. We’ve never had a baby at quite this age at Easter. She was tickled to find out the eggs weren’t just fun to hold, but you could open them up at eat a Teddy Graham. 🙂

She doesn’t like getting herself up from the grass!
And can you imagine how fantastic this picture would have been… if I didn’t have princess stickers on me? Good Grief.

And – the BEST photo of the kids I have had in years… in play clothes. *sigh* Of COURSE they took off their church clothes as soon as we said they could (after the mid-day meal). So when I spontaneously asked them all to sit in the yard I never could have anticipated that I was about to capture the first photo ever with all six of them smiling and looking at the camera. Smiling AND looking. No eyes closed, no hair in the eyes, no stray toy or cup in the corner. Best picture ever… orca whale shirt and all. ♥

The day ended with us watching a movie together. It was such a sweet, full day.

As I lay in bed that night I was reflecting on all the goodness we’d enjoyed. We aren’t a family that has a standing Easter tradition. We’ve celebrated it differently almost every year – different guests, different activities, different food. We even once were guests elsewhere. I’m not sure things will line up for us to replicate such a great day in Easters to come. But it was SUCH a wonderful, wonderful day, I just basked in the joy we all had felt.

And as I drifted off to sleep I startled awake as I remembered what we had done LAST Easter.
If you want a good laugh – check it out. http://dayspringdisciples122.blogspot.com/2013/04/easter-2013.html
Um, last year was R.O.U.G.H! – A day at the DMV would look like fun compared to LAST Easter.

Kids’ CBS play

April 1, 2014 | Stacy

Each year the school-aged kids at CBS are involved in a spring production. This year the director of the Children’s Program asked Stewart to write the script. He was asked to base it on a principle gleaned from this year’s study. (We’ve done Ephesians, Philippians, James, and 1 John.) It ended up being about… well… watch the video. 🙂
Nigel had a starring role, Marie was a narrator, and Tabitha had a supporting role.

Valentine’s Day 2014

February 15, 2014 | Stacy

Last Valentine’s Day I was heavy with child and had been out of commission for over two months.

We celebrated by ~~eating a lot of sugar for breakfast~~ having a breakfast party. Valentine’s Day 2013.

It was so much fun I purposed to do it again. This year with an additional guest.

L.O.V.E.

February 7, 2014 | Stacy

We got the idea from the site we get all our art ideas from.

We are very blessed. There are a lot of people we love dearly.

We couldn’t make them for everyone… As it was it took two different days. Daddy put magnets on the back.

But we had such a good time talking about how much we care about the folks we did share them with.

I loved watching their individual styles come out as we painted and glued. And I loved how excited the kids were about delivering them.

Fauna

January 27, 2014 | Stacy

Our new game from Christmas. It is really cool. The problem is finding somewhere to play it where we will all FIT but can all see the board well.

From the manufacturer: Do you know where the panda lives? Do you know where the babirusa lives? Do you know what a babirusa is? In the game Fauna, you are not expected to know all the answers, simply gather your wits and make an educated guess. You are right on target? Great. You are close? That’s good too, since you score partial points. The more you play the better you get.
Amazon $27.95

A Mighty Fortress.

January 24, 2014 | Stacy

The younger girls had pretty much gotten out every last character from our tote of VeggieTales. They had way more than they could possibly use, so their older sibling decided they’d utilize their old friends and work on their offense/defense skills.

They raided a few toy sets from Johanna’s room and set up camps.

They located their Nerf guns and ammunition, and set up their armies along their castles and ships.

I love my little warriors.

My Rock and My Fortress

Of David.

Psalm 144: 1-2

Blessed be the Lord, my rock,
who trains my hands for war,
and my fingers for battle;
he is my steadfast love and my fortress,
my stronghold and my deliverer,
my shield and he in whom I take refuge,
who subdues peoplesunder me.

Passport production…

January 23, 2014 | Stacy

Do you have any idea how much passports for 8 people costs? Well… if we go to the Post Office and they take the pictures it will be $1,010. USD. They can at least do it on Saturdays. But not at our local Post Office. No. When I called the Post Master there to make an appointment his voice squeaked when he heard how many we needed. He ~~all but demanded~~ gently suggested we go to the MAIN Post Office 15 miles from here. No problem. I called the Post Master out there and he indicated they could do the 8 of us in an hour to an hour-and-a-half. And to bring 9 checks. He was really pretty nice.

Then I learned our Town Hall could do them. And they would only charge $964 to include the photos. But, she straight out gasped when she heard we needed 8. She asked questions in a way to discourage me from going there. She kept saying it was Tax Time. They were really busy because it is Tax Time. Maybe if we could come after Tax Time. I finally asked when Tax Time was over. She said 2/11. Um – three weeks? Yeah. Um – we can wait three weeks to save the money. But, then John has to take half-a-day off work because they only do them from 10:00 A.M. – 3:30 A.M.

A wee bit of a hassle, no? And technically, we don’t even really NEED them. We are going to go on a closed-loop cruise meaning we get on and off the ship in the same US Port. And as the only places our cruise ship is stopping is in the Bahamas and Disney’s private island, we really do not need them. BUT – if we had to be flown back to the US from some other country (due to illness or injury) we would need them. So, they are like an insurance policy. And they cost 25% of what the cruise costs.

We still don’t have them. Nor do we have an appointment. But we do have pictures. Sort of.

You see, I went on the US Department of State website and they seemingly understand that passport processing places are charging ridiculous amounts to have ugly 2 x 2 pictures taken and processed. So they quite clearly and carefully offer guidelines for photo-taking for the purpose of passports. One of the rules is not to smile. Hard for these disciples to do. Another one is to be mindful of shadows. Shadows are hard to contend with in the winter. Even with the boys green screen/light set up.

And this is my wordy introduction to the following ~~mug shots~~ photos. You can’t say I didn’t try.

I ended up finally getting pictures.

Was it worth saving $110? I refuse to answer that.

A (sadly) pictureless post of a day that brought great gladness.

December 24, 2013 | Stacy

For at least a handful of years I have seen emails requesting help with the food and gift distribution at the R Family Mission each December. And for as many years I have not been able to help out. John was able to one year, but it has never worked out for me to go. Well, this year things just lined up. My mom was willing and able to stay with the three younger girls. And John was already scheduled to be off for the day that they were distributing this year. So he, the older three kids, and I signed up to help out for a two hour window of time and I was so looking forward to seeing how God might use us.

We managed to get out of the house on time and using the address listed for the ministry we managed to get to their headquarters ahead of schedule. The parking lot was all but empty. But as we were pulling in, two other vehicles had also just pulled in. One was a man with a big truck and another was an SUV with 5 members of the McQuaid hockey team. We entered through the front door and found someone to direct us to the kitchen. It didn’t quite look like what we expected. A fairly quiet building with seemingly nothing much going on. We found out that the truck needed to be unloaded. So, just like in the olden days when people passed water buckets down and back a line to put out a fire, we all got into a line to unload the truck. By passing, passing, passing them along, we helped unload about 100 hams. Frozen hams. Right from the back of the truck into the freezer. After the meat was unloaded, John decided he’d best ask a few questions. We were afraid we were in the wrong place. John explained to the man who had driven the truck over what it was WE thought we were supposed to be doing. Turns out that for this operation the RFM partnered with another local ministry and used THEIR building, about a mile away, for distribution. “But,” the man said, “You aren’t in the wrong place at all. God sent you here.” And then we went back to work. See, in addition to the ham, there were about 100 boxes of food that had to come off the truck. So. We stood in our line again. Imagine a truck with it’s big door open. Then imagine a young high school hockey player lifting a box off the piles and into the arms of another young high school hockey player. Then imagine player 2 handing the package to player three, who then hands it off to player four. Then player four hands the box to player five. And player five hands the box off to Marie. Marie. My nine-year-old joy-filled little girl stood alongside boys twice her age (and adults 4-5 times her age) to unload 100 boxes for families in need. The boxes went from her to me, to John, to Nigel, to a worker, to Stewart, to the last worker. A nine-year-old girl. Can you imagine Jesus’ smile that morning?

Well, let me tell you about her smile. The boxes weren’t exceedingly heavy. They were a little awkward, but they weren’t full to the brim. And they had food in them. We like food. And Marie started commenting on them after about the 40th box. And she had me in stitches. First there was, “Oooo! Mac and cheese.” And, “Oooo! Noodles.” And, “Apples.” Then, “Ah. Something I’ve never seen before.” Then after another two dozen boxes, she turns to me with the box and says, “One handed!” After I burst out laughing, she then says, “No handed.” John and I were dying. All with a giddy smile and never missing a beat. She didn’t drop a box. (She and Stewart had both dropped a ham or two earlier.) The boys were also pretty smiley. They stood closer to the ministry workers and had some conversations as they piled these 100 boxes up and up and out and out over a reception area floor.

We finished with the truck emptying and then followed the two vehicles over to the distribution center to see what we could do there.

There wasn’t much to be done. We were given a job of breaking down unused boxes. This was something we are good at – dismantling things. We loaded the cardboard into a truck, too. Then they asked us to pass out bags of extra produce to the people that were waiting for their boxes of food and the gift bags for the kids that were registered. People eagerly accepted the bags of produce and it wasn’t long before the bags were gone. There wasn’t much else for us to do, but we hung around a little longer. I’m not sure we were terribly vital, or if the kids had any earth-shattering life experiences, but I sincerely enjoyed my rare opportunity to do “works”. I know my prayers are just as important, but it does feel awesome to exercise my arms and legs for His work. too.

And it was SUPER awesome to see my kids involved, especially to see my 9-year-old daughter keep pace with those big hockey players.

*sigh* I wish I had had my camera.

CBS Christmas concert

December 11, 2013 | Stacy

Given enough time, I might be able to figure out just how many Christmas concerts my kids have participated in for CBS over the years. But I don’t have to time to figure that out right now. It’s been quite a few.

Yet, each one brings me to tears. I love this program. I love what they teach and I love how much my kids love CBS.