Adding

We have eight children. Seven on earth and one soul in heaven, a child we never met because of a miscarriage.

Our seventh child arrived on May 2! Nina was 36 weeks gestation. She weighed in at a whopping 4'11 oz., but surprisingly to us she did not need any intervention or extra help at all. her apgar scores were 9/9. It's hard to see in this photo how truly tiny she was. Look at the shirt though, that's the regulation hospital shirt and it just swamped her.

Tomorrow she'll be 6 weeks old and at her dr's appt. on Friday she weighed in at 7'14oz. I am thrilled! She is still small, of course, but she's filling out and looking cuter every day. As Lee said it's an unspoken truth that scrawny little preemies, as precious as they may be, are just not as cute as plumped out babies.

MaryClare and Nina (almost 6 weeks)

fresh new blog!

Don't you love the new blog smell?

I began to blog in 2005 when we were anticipating the adoption of our daughter. I chronicled the adoption process and also general family stuff. I even had a separate blog I used for when we actually travelled to meet our new daughter.

I kept the original blog going after we came home. My family loved it and I began to share our new life homeschooling and I met so many wonderful writers and mothers throughout the blogging world.

Many times my writing focus blurred and my blog became not just a basic journal of our family and school life, but I felt pulled to explore more personal thoughts I had about my faith, my kids, my marriage. What had begun as a forum to share basic family news with friends and acquaintances was now much more personal and I found my internal censor was working overtime. So I stopped writing.

Now I am here cracking open a fresh new blog!

Quick thinking

"Hey mom, what are hooters?" she says.
"Whaaa?" I glance up at the giant busty lady on the billboard. "Oh yeah, they're owls, you know-cause they hoot. It's a restaurant."
Thank God there is an actual owl on the sign. He's hiding behind the lettering, his eyes standing in for the Os, but he's there.
Silence.
She snorts. "Well, that's a silly name for a restaurant."
"Yeah baby, I know."
I give myself a mental pat on the back. Thanks to my quick thinking my 7 yr. old's innocence is preserved just a bit longer.

We are plan B

I just read a wonderful article that clearly explained my often complicated feelings on adoption. (isn't it great when that happens? when you read something someone else wrote and you think, "Yes! That's exactly it!")

I don't want to repeat it all here, but I'll try to summarise the author and to add my own personal feelings.

God's plan for families is for them to stay together. Period. It disturbs me when people (well meaning) say things like, "God planned for you to be her family all along!" That is simply not the case. I've always known this, but I've had a difficult time explaining it. Yes, God is omniscient and knew we would be together, but sin is never part of His plan. When sin occurs, it occurs despite God's knowledge of it. (see: Adam and Eve...)

No, sin is never part of His plan. Free will is, however.

We are free to toss His beautiful gifts away. The Garden of Eden, our fertility, our families and yes His precious babies.

No, adoption was never part of His plan for families.

And yet, and yet ... I have this precious, beautiful daughter. A chance for a lifetime loving relationship with her and her with us.

It is our own free will that has necessitated this whole plan B (and C and D and so on) stuff. But, thank God for the plan Bs. He is glorified in the plan Bs.

After all, isn't our Saviour part of a plan B too?

Spring Fever

One thing I have been reminded of lately is the importance of a big picture goal. Recently my husband and I sat down one evening and discussed our long term goals for the family. Actually we do this pretty often, a few times a year.

We need to start writing things down though, it is not easy to remember to 'take notes' during those intimate talks though. But every time we have one of those good, sit down, long term, big picture discussions I feel soooo much better about the day to day stuff.

Our long term goals are not very complicated the biggest, most important one is 'get to Heaven bring as many people along with me as I can' Not very earth shattering. But-remembering that goal does put things into perspective for me. Then we drill down a bit and discuss how what we are doing day to day is helping us achieve that goal and the little ones in between like having a strong family sacramental life, encouraging our children to be close siblings etc. etc. Not that it is so formal when we talk, we just always seem to get around to those points.

One thing I have been missing lately, a key point I think, is the mindset for myself that if I am doing my job daily of taking care of the household, parenting and educating my children and nurturing my marriage, then all those small baby steps, as small as they may seem in the day to day grind (laundry?), are are still on the same path, the road I want to be on heading for Heaven. When I look at my life with that vision, I don't feel so overwhelmed, (or at my worst, apathetic, which is a sure burn out symptom for me)

Spring Cleaning

I've been spring cleaning around the house and decided it was needed on the blog too. White space feels very freeing and simple to me right now.

I am so glad winter is over. Some years it flies by and spring is here before I know it-this was not the case this year. After Christmas, I was so done with winter. Lent was a drag. I was haphazard about it at best.

I completed the CT5K and I am now working on 10k training, but it is going verrrrry slow. Kind of like how I did the CT5k (a 9 week program) in about 30 weeks. I will be thrilled to complete the 10k program by 2011!

We are still trucking along in the hybrid school. There was really no way to get out of it. It is not horrible really, just not a great fit for our family. I beginning to discern and evaluate our needs for the fall and I am also keen on implementing a summer program for us. Nothing intensive, just to keep us in a routine.

I've been reading the Well-Educated Mind for myself. It is basically a reading program with a list and questions. I am ready to begin the first book Don Quixote. Coincidentally, the kids are going to be in a DQ playette in a few weeks. This book is hefty though. I seriously doubt I will finish it soon.

It looks like my reading training is going to be a lot like my physical training. Luckily I have no deadlines. No exams scheduled for me, ha!

Favorite Animals

Top 5 favorite Animals



MaryClare (4)

1. Horses

2. Unicorns

3. Ponies

4. Puppies

5. Sea Monkeys



Lainey (7)

1. Horses

2. Flamingos

3. Dogs

4. Rabbits

5. Ferrets


Luke (7)

1. Frogs

2. Lemurs

3. Monkeys

4. Fish

5. Bats


Ryan (10)

1. Peregrine falcon

2. Sea otter

3. Snow leopard

4. Seahorse

5. Leafy sea dragon


Jake (11)

1. Asian giant flying fox (it's a type of bat)

2. Great horned owl

3. Hammerhead shark

4. King cobra

5. Sparky