Happy Thanksgiving!

There is so much to be thankful that we sometimes lose sight of what's important: FAMILY & OUR HEALTH. The family we have is a blessing as God can call them home anytime. As I mourn the loss of a forum friend, the death of a niece of another forum friend and a dear friend who is trying to survive DVT and those who's health is not very good living each day as a blessing to be alive, I give thanks for today. For those that I love and care about. Whether near or far I am giving thanks for each and every one of you. I am giving thanks to the Lord for each day I am here to love my husband and children. For the health of my family and I and for the health of all of you.

As I sit at our dinner table with my family before our bountiful feast, this Thanksgiving will mean so much more to me than past ones. We don't know what the future holds. We don't know if tomorrow will come or how it will change. I purpose to live today with love, grace and thanks to God for all that I have and cherish.

Go hug and love on your family today. I plan to, many times today.

Thanksgiving blessing to you and yours,

Thanksgiving Traditions

Family traditions have always been important to my husband and I. From the first Thanksgiving we prepared all on our own for our (at the time) 3 small children. Since that first Thanksgiving my husband has been the one to cook the turkey. He washes, brine's it overnight and gets it into the oven the next day. I have nothing to do with the turkey! And don't need to because his turkey always turns out fantastic!

While my husband takes care of the turkey I would be in charge of baking pies and making the side dishes to go with 'said turkey'. Then one day it dawned on me that I should enlist our kids into helping prepare some of the food for our grand Thanksgiving feast. It would be perfect because they could, when grown and out on their own bring that dish to my home for Thanksgiving or to someone else's home. It was a great plan! And it has stuck with us these last six years. Our children really enjoy doing 'their part' to contribute to our grand feast. One day my four Littles will also be taught a dish to make. But right now they are to busy having fun and being cute.



I love having a large family and one day all the side dishes will be prepared by my wonderful children and I won't be left in the kitchen cooking while the rest of them visit. It has been a great tradition of ours and one that I am sure will continue on forever.

Some other traditions we have are playing a board game (usually a new one) after our Thanksgiving feast, drawing names out of a hat for our Christmas gift exchange and then watching A Christmas Story that evening. And we always have turkey sandwiches while watching our movie...such a great day it is each year!

18 Years!

We celebrated 18 years of love yesterday (Oct 12). I am a day late in posting this but that is because we spent the day together. Nothing exciting, I am just coming off of being ill for two weeks. Still, it was a great day. I thank God for bring us together. What a wonderful life I have had with this man. I pray for another wonderful 18 years with him and will vow to love him through every bump in the road, every joyful event in our lives and everyday that God has given us together.

Love you babe!

Cold mornings and blanket sleepers...

On cold mornings hot coffee never tasted better. A warm bowl of oatmeal or cream of wheat (a childhood favorite) warms the soul like nothing else. Frost on the grass and the shiver that goes up your spin lets you know that winter is coming!

Holding a sweet baby girl in your arms is precious and comforting. Her warm little body against yours wrapped in a blanket sleeper and her favorite blanket in hand makes my heart smile.

I love when the time comes to put blanket sleepers on my little ones. You know they are warm and they look absolutely adorable...

Fall is upon us!!!

My favorite season is fall. The cool crisp air, the wonderful smells coming from my oven and the family time we spend together because it is to cold to be outside is wonderful. Our evenings are spent in our living room talking about life, being goofy and sometimes watching a movie. We'll have coffee (for us adults) and the children will be drinking cocoa. We may have fresh baked cookies or pie to accompany our hot beverage...it is all good.

These are wonderful times in our family. My children are growing by leaps and bounds. Some are maturing and becoming wonderful adults preparing to head out into the big world in which we live in. My heart becomes heavy with the thought of her leaving us, but I am also proud in knowing she is going to make an awesome, responsible adult who will show her faith in the way she lives her life.

Others are learning how to write their names and count to 20. Learning shapes and how to read. Kindergarten is going very well. My sweet baby girl is using a fork to eat with and holds hands at the table as my husband says the blessing. She is amazing and such a joy to our day.

Fall is upon us, life really is good...

I am back from Virginia and school is in!

Well, homeschool that is in our home!

Boy have I been busy lately. First off I went to Virgina for almost eight days to visit my best friend in the world! Bless her heart, she flew me out to help her pack up for a move her family was making to a new home. She really needed my help and I really wanted to help her so she flew me out...what a blessing! I had a great time, worked hard, laughed all.the.time and came home exhausted, but really happy! It was absolutely lovely seeing her. It had been almost seven years since we saw each other last, way to long in my opinion. I will not let us go that long, ever again!!!

Once I returned home it was time to begin our homeschooling year. I certainly will have my plate full this year as I am adding in our son who is beginning kindergarten and our three year old daughter who insists on doing school to, so she will be doing preschool. That is five kids I will be homeschooling this year, wow! One thing you should know about me is I love having my hands full...a full plate of things going on is just how I like it. The craziness doesn't bother me one bit, in fact it brings me a lot of joy to see these children grow and learn. It is so amazing and I feel so honored that God chose to bless us with these seven children...words cannot express what is in my heart but I am filled with so much gratitude for these blessings. My cup runneth over with love, peace and joy!

My intent for this blog 'originally' was to chronicle special times in our life and I have severely failed at that. But I am not giving up. I just have to find my rhythm and hopefully I will get my act together in blogging regularly. I do enjoy blogging when I find time to do it but those seven blessings I was speaking about are my priority. Now that school is in we adhere to a strict schedule and I am adding in some blogging time for me. In our home if it isn't on the schedule it doesn't get done and this summer nothing was on the schedule except to have fun! So, I think I will start with short posts and do a 'wordless' post where I will just post a picture every now and then. That should help me, dontcha think?

Anyway, school is in, fall is almost here and I am in my comfort zone! Life is good!

Blessings,

Computers dying and sick kids...ugh!

I've been a way for such a long time because of my laptop dying. That brought us down to one computer, my teenage daughters laptop which was on its last leg. We were blessed by a family member with a refurbished desktop which just got up and running on the Internet yesterday. Then today, this evening to be specific, my daughter's laptop died. Now we are back down to one computer in the house. This situation needs to be dealt with ASAP because there are to many of us in our home who use a computer daily. I can't imagine going through this again so I pray you will stick with me and continue to visit my blog while we figure this out.

Now sick kids...

Nothing is more difficult (in my opinion) than dealing with a sick child. But dealing with FOUR sick children is 'hair pulling' difficult!!! Running noses, coughing, fever and being picky about eating makes for very cranky kids. So my time has been very limited these days. A simple prayer for healing would be much appreciated. Thanks.

I'll be back when I have more time...

Blessings, Michelle

Happy 1st Birthday baby girl!

On this day our family was completed by the birth of this precious baby girl. One year ago today...amazing how the time flies. It is truly not fair.

As we begin another year with this angel, I will always remember the first day she was born and was placed into my arms. The first kiss on her cheek I gave her and the first smell of that sweet little head of her's. I was instantly in love...

God bless you my sweet baby girl...Happy Birthday!

Idle...

We are at 'idle' right now. Not sure whether we are coming or going. No direction. No idea as to what to do next. Idle...

Can I just say 'idle' stinks! I know our God has a plan for us. Not sure what that is at this point but I am keeping my eyes on Him anxiously awaiting to see what He does next.

We are praying for a job for Michael. A job for me and a job for our teenage daughter. Now if Michael can make enough for me to not work that would be great. Our daughter wants to work to make some spending money and I think it will be good for her.

We need a job so we can continue our hand at homesteading. It has been great up to this point. To have a small homestead you need money. Money for equipment and feed for your animals...all things we knew before getting into this. At the time Michael had a great job that afforded us to have all this. When that job left us and another didn't come along we couldn't maintain the farm. It is sad really. We've always dreamed of having our own farm. We've read many books in educating ourselves and now we are at 'idle' with everything because none of us have a job.

We aren't naive, we knew it would be hard building a homestead on a piece of property that was a blank slate...we were so up for the challenge. One just can't do all the things needed on a homestead without money so for now, we sit at 'idle'.

Keep on reading this blog to find out what happens. I am sure it will be interesting if nothing else.

See you soon!

Preparing for 'hard economic times'...

I know many have their own opinions about 'preparedness'. I am a preparer. Always have been from, how to educate my children to preparing for a hurricane. I make a list for everything. It is just who I am.

I am also a Christian and trust in my Lord. I am not concerned about my own well being because I believe that God is in totally of control of everything in this world and in my life. With that said, He also sometimes calls us to do things, like storing food, planting a garden and raise chickens.

If you haven't felt the need to store up some food and water, I suggest you consider it. The economy is very uncertain and fragile right now. We don't know if we will see a huge rise in the cost of food or your family will be hit with a spouse who becomes unemployed, like mine has.

Knowing that I have a well stocked pantry is comforting to me during this uncertain times. I know I have food to feed my family and others in need. I can be of service to those who are in need.

Just some thoughts to consider...

A lots been going on in our home...

Wow, has it been a long time since I've posted here. I am sorry! I began a different blog called No Spend Month where I blogged about our way of paying off debt. I really got into that one until my husband lost his job. At that point we had to stop paying off our debt, which really bummed me out.

Since then we've been waiting for all the snow to melt and the temps to warm up so we could begin putting in our garden and fruit trees. We have always wanted to have a large garden, lots of fruit trees and berry bushes for our family.

On Saturday we bought our first dog. A yellow labrador retriever. She is 8 weeks old and the sweetest little thing. We've named her *Honeybelle* and our Littles affectionately call her, Honey.



In 2 weeks we will be getting our baby chicks...25 of them! We are really embracing the homesteading life. Really loving it! My husband is building our chicken coop as I type this. He has really become the handman as of late. And he is doing a fabulous job at it too! I will be sure to post pictures of our chicks and coop in May.

I am really going to make a huge effort to post more often here. I wanted this blog to be a diary of sorts for my family and I've not done so well thus far.

Happy Spring!

Happy New Year!

Not much time to blog today...as it is New Year's Day! I'm starting out the New Year on the right foot, with my family. I am putting my family first as they should be.

Just wanted to wish y'all a Happy New Year!