It's Official ~ We Are Parents of Three Teenagers!

And it is awesome!!

Alyssa turned 13 today and since I took several photos of her, I'd thought I'd share them here. She is beautiful and such a blessing to our family. We feel blessed that the Lord has entrusted us with the task of training up an awesome Woman of God. Enjoy!

Are You Blessed?

This is a good reminder to be thankful for what we have. It was written by someone named Pastor Keith.

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If you woke up this morning with more health than illness, you are more blessed than the million who won't survive the week.

If you have never experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of torture or the pangs of starvation, you are ahead of 20 million people around the world.

If you have food in your refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof over your head and a place to sleep, you are richer than 75% of this world.

If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and spare change in a dish someplace, you are among the top 8% of the world's wealthy. If your parents are still married and alive, you are very rare, especially in the United States.

If you hold up your head with a smile on your face and are truly thankful, you are blessed because the majority can, but many do not. If you can hold someone's hand, hug them or even touch them on the shoulder, you are blessed because you can offer God's healing touch.

If you can read this message, you are more blessed than over two billion people in the world that cannot read anything at all.

You are so blessed in ways you may never even know. May God open your eyes to your blessings.

Be blessed!

Becoming Self Sufficient...

It's time for gardening! The temps are "warming up" which might not mean much since we live in Arizona. :) It doesn't ever get really cold. Anyway, the days are longer which means more time to be outside in the evenings.

This year we are trying something new for growing our own vegies...Lasagna Gardening. Now, you may wonder why or how we are going to grow lasagna but it is not the what but the style of how this garden works that has anything to do with lasagna.

You start out by laying down sheets of flattened cardboard - right over the grass or weeds whichever you may have. On top of that you add layers of newspaper which you spray down to keep in place. Next comes the compost, peat moss, soil layers. And finally sprinkle some bone meal and wood ash on the tops of your mounds.

We will make sure this stays moist and allow it to "heat" for a couple of weeks and then start planting! I am very excited at the prospect of having a "real" garden this year...and hopefully, for years to come.

We have our garden plans all laid out. There will be a nice mixture of vegetables and herbs. Hopefully there will be enough to share with our friends.

Since I can't keep my hands off my camera, I have several pictures of our day in the garden. Elijah especially loved helping Daddy! Enjoy!

Welcome to Our World!

A place to share our ideas, our beliefs, our convictions, the lessons we are learning both in our homeschooling journey and in our Christian walks...this is the purpose of my blogging.

Most of you know who we are but I will introduce us anyway. Larry and I (pictured to the right) have been married for 15 1/2 awesome years! He is my best friend and I can't spend enough time with him. He works diligently every day providing for our family and being the Godly Husband and Daddy that the Lord requires. Together we have brought eight wonderful children into this world and have five waiting with Jesus to meet us. We feel so blessed to be given the opportunity to raise little people that will one day be men and women of God.

Our parenting journey began about a month after we were married...after being told by several doctors that I'd never be able to have children. To our great surprise...we found out that I was pregnant! I guess the Lord had (has) other plans. As most of you know, we have continued to be blessed over and over again. And, we are still praying that maybe He will see fit for us to raise at least a few more. (Maybe a baby sister or two?)

Let me first introduce six of our sons...in the back are Caleb (14) and Luke (15) and in the front are Elijah (3), Micah (7), Tobias (4) and Connor (8).

And here is our beautiful daughter, Alyssa (who will be 13 in 2 weeks) and our youngest son, Samuel (15 months)...

They are each caring, loving, helpful, obedient, respectful, and just all-around awesome to live with!

We are blessed!!