Precious Baby

As a baby, Amanda loved teething on corn cobs. I took this picture of her in 2009. Isn’t she just adorable? Many people are born out of unplanned pregnancies and Amanda is one of them. Does that make them less precious? Do they have less purpose? As you can see, we have been immensely blessed to have this child in our lives.

Below I have added previous stories related to the challenges and blessings of having another child. They are listed in order from top to bottom:

• Thinking About Having Another Child
• Surprise, I'm Pregnant!
• Celebrating Our Fourth Child
• Blessed to Have You in Our Life

Read More

Having Fun with Pinterest – 3

A few weeks ago I re-pinned a pin via Stephanie Welsh on Pinterest. Her recipe is called Busy Mom Puffins (Pancake Muffins). I’ve added the photo along with the recipe below.

Whenever I’m baking, Amanda loves to get involved. She likes to throw in the ingredients and helps me mix. This time we also did some counting together. I gave Amanda slices of bananas and blueberries to add to our puffins and she had to count how many she put in each one. We had a lot of fun and the recipe is so easy. I’m sure I’ll be making it again in the future.

Busy Mom Puffins (Pancake Muffins) Preheat oven to 350, mix 1 c pancake mix, 2/3 c water, 1/2 c syrup. Mix together, pour in greased muffin pan. Top with banana, blueberries, chocolate chips, pecans, sausage, bacon....etc. Bake for 12-14 minutes and serve. Easy, fast, delicious & no syrupy mess!!

By Stephannie Welsh via Pinterest and co-owner of Lounge Interiors 

Read More

He Satisfies

This picture was taken on Amanda's 2nd Birthday. Here she is eating a healthy snack of grapes and giving me quite a laugh.

"For he satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry soul he fills with good things" (Psalm 107:9 ESV).

Read More

Dora the Explorer

The other day, Amanda received a cute jean dress with Dora the Explorer printed on it. The dress was a hand-me-down from a friend who is a couple years older than her. A lot of the clothes she owns have been handed down; some are even from her sisters. When I first found out that I was pregnant with my fourth child, one of my concerns was how we’d be able to buy all the clothes she would need. I had given all the baby things of her sisters away by that stage, except for one or two sentimental items. Not only did God not let me down, He surprised me with how abundantly He could provide for her.

Amanda hadn’t owned anything with Dora before, so when my four-year-old saw a series of adventure books with Dora at the store, I let her pick one. She chose Dora Saves the Snow Princess. I read it last night to her and her friend. It’s an interactive storybook, so it’s nice to have a friend do the actions and speaking parts with.

Below I have added previous stories related to the challenges and blessings of having another child. They are listed in order from top to bottom:

• Thinking About Having Another Child?
• Surprise, I'm Pregnant!
• Celebrating Our Fourth Child
• Blessed to Have You in Our Life

Read More

Hansel and Gretel

Linking with the Kid Lit Blog Hop

This blog is about Amanda’s books and more, so it’s time I shared another post about her world of books. Since Amanda is my fourth child, she’s been blessed with books and toys from her brother and sisters and even books from my childhood. A couple of weeks ago, she asked me to read one of mine to her called Hansel and Gretel. It’s from a series of classic storybooks by Derrydale Publishers, retold by Kay Brown and Illustrated by Gerry Embleton. As you can see by the photograph that I took of this old book of mine, the illustrator has quite a unique talent for whimsical drawings with attention to detail.

The original Hansel and Gretel is a well-known German fairytale written by the Brothers Grimm and published in 1812. The English version I have is very interesting to read, but too long for Amanda, so I told it to her in a lot less words. She asked questions along the way, which I answered. The story had her intrigued.

A couple of days later we went to McDonalds in another town to meet up with our children’s godparents. They have a daughter named Esmari who is a year older than Amanda. Both girls got a Happy Meal. Amanda’s one came with a Gretel doll dressed in traditional German clothes. How cool is that! Her friend got Cinderella.

Read More

Girls and Hair

When Amanda was 1 and 2 years old, she had the curliest head of hair. Even if I washed it and dried it with a hairdryer and hairbrush, making it go straight, within 10 minutes the hair would bounce back into curls like little springs. I loved it. I was a little worried when it came time to her first haircut. I wasn’t sure if we would lose all those lovely curls. A friend, who used to be a hairdresser, came over and did our hair for us. Now, a few years later, Amanda still has curly hair, but it’s heavier than before, so it doesn’t curl as much as it did when she still had that baby-fine hair.






Back in middle school, I had a realization about girls and hair. Those who had curly hair envied girls with straight hair and girls with straight hair envied girls with curly hair. I decided back then that no matter what type of hair I had, I would be happy with it. That doesn’t mean that I didn’t try the crazy 80’s perm look.

Now I have 3 girls and they each have different hair. Samantha has the straightest hair out of all of us and she sometimes wishes she had Jessica’s wavy hair. Jessica, on the other hand, wanted and received a hair straightener for her last birthday. As you see, what I noticed about the female race while growing up is still true today.

You might like to read my blog post “Eye Color Conversation,” which discusses the topic of “How important is eye color to you?”

Read More

Measuring Up – 2

I asked a question in my previous post “Does your child measure up?” Now, I would like to rephrase that question and ask, “Do you measure your child against other children and for what purpose?”

My son, Jeremiah, is my first child. He took his first unaided steps at 9 months of age, which is really young. This happened soon after watching his 3rd cousin, who was 6 months older, walking. (I searched on Google to find out exactly how they were related.) However, sometimes he would wet his bed up until around 6 years of age. He played hard all day and slept deeply at night, so deeply that he couldn’t wake himself up when he needed to urinate, not even when we took him ourselves. Was something wrong with him? No, and he eventually outgrew this problem. Some things just take time and don’t need medical attention or parental pressure.

The same morning that I pondered on this topic, I began to read the 1st book of a trilogy that my daughter, Samantha, borrowed from the library. The book is called, The Wind Singer, by William Nicholson and is the 1st of the Wind on Fire trilogy. I haven’t been able to put these books down. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw that the theme in The Wind Singer is about the lie behind measuring people by using exams on certain subjects. The people in the story are living inside a large city and are tested every year to prove their intelligence and their worth from as early as 2 years of age. (By the way, these books are not for sensitive readers as the author doesn’t sugarcoat his storytelling, although I do recommend them.)

My thoughts on this subject are best expressed through an encounter I had with a near stranger. Earlier this year, we had a visitor whom we hardly knew. For some reason I was talking with our guest about the education system. I told him how school systems are only able to measure certain types of intelligences, like mathematics and language, but how there are many children sitting inside these schools who might be good in other areas. As an example, I suggested that a child who is good at gardening would not be recognized in his or her area of intelligence. Our guest then told me that his son struggled in school, but was now happy as an adult doing landscaping.

I hadn’t known this about his son before the conversation, but I don’t believe the example I gave was a coincidence. I believe the Holy Spirit was speaking through me even though I wasn’t aware of the significance of my words until he shared his own son’s experience. If you would like to read more about the Holy Spirit then you can start by reading my post in my blog, Happy Moms, Happy Homes called “Discovering Your Potential – Part 3 of 5.”

Read More