Five Warriors and a Princess

I have a lovely friend, the Princess, who has been blessed with four warriors. The Princess and the Head Warrior make such a great team.  This is one of the most fun families we know.  They are so laid back and the boys in the family are always on an adventure.....they hunt, own four wheelers, always building something, own lots of cool boy toys and live on alot of land that they can explore.  One of my favorite things at their house is a plate that the boys got the princess that reads, "Home is where the MOM is !!!"  I love that.

 I got the privilege of meeting my dear friends' newest addition and also taking a million pictures of him. He was just so precious and her other son, Cutes, was just loving the camera. Congrats Five Warriors and a Princess Family!!! Beware: these kiddos are just so cute!

Bubba and Baby Boy

This is Cutes hamming it up for the camera.

Bubba put this car on Baby Boy...he was trying to play with him...I thought it was so precious.

Peanut could not wait to get her hands on the baby.  She is starting to become a pro at taking care of babies.  It's part of her beautiful creation.

Mom and Baby Boy.

Simplfying Your Home: Cupboards

I am always looking for better ways to things around my home. About every 2 years, our home changes by adding another baby to the family so I am constantly working around a higher functioning home.  I have a little kitchen so I am always brainstorming about how to get the most out of the space I have to work with.  Of course, I have a list of shelves that I would love for my husband to build but they are not needs at this point just wants, so they will sit in the waiting list :)

For some time now, I have been washing my dishes by hand.  I have a dishwasher but I have preferred, don't ask me why, to do them by hand.  They seem to be easier for me somehow.  One day I was looking at my cupboards and realized how many plates and dishes I kept in my cupboards that I never use but took up nearly two full cupboards.  So it was time to brainstorm......(gotta love imagination movers :)

For our family of six, this is all I keep in the cupboard for all of our meals.

Here is what I did:  I decided to keep one setting for each member of our family (this includes silverware) and one extra setting in case we had a visitor.  All of my other dishes I put in another closet in the house so if we have company for dinner I could easily get to them.  This gave me a cupboard in a half to use for our food pantry and for more important cooking pans that I use more frequently.  This not only freed up cupboard space but it also makes me do the dishes less.  When we need a new dish, we pull from the sink of already washed dishes instead of adding another dish to the heaping pile that stacked up during the day.  For those of you who do not have dishwashers, this might be great to try to cut down on dish washing.  It actually forces you to wash the couple dishes you have at each meal and most nights I actually have a clean kitchen with clean dishes ready for the next day.

Project Dining Room Part 3: It's Done!

    After a five day long adventure....it's done.  The hardwood floor fits in so nicely that it seems like its always been here.  This has been such a dream of mine for years now and I can't believe its actually done.  Here are couple of in process pictures.  Tim Blythe, owner of Blythe Construction, was so kind to lend Big Daddy some tools and give us some good advice that helped us make some good decisions with this project.

We even did school among the chaos.  Big Daddy teaches the kiddos history on Saturdays.  What???  School on Saturday??? Yes, by request of the kiddos themselves.  They love to learn and we take every opportunity keep teaching them.

     Slowly but surely, I am learning that there is no such thing as a simple home project.  Upon starting this one, I said to Big Daddy, "All you have to do is rip up the carpet and put the new floor done.  That should take only a couple of hours, right???"  As I look back on my question to my husband I laugh at how silly it was.  Rip up the carpet and put the new floor down were on the list but there were about 50 other things that accompanied them. "All he has to do is just...." is a statement that comes into my mind frequently when I want to do some new project in our home. It is not simple and now I know exactly why contractors charge a good fee for their labor...its really hard work and takes alot of time.  With all that said, project hallway is starting soon :)  Extra back rubs, Glenn Beck updates and black coffee for Big Daddy!!

This is our first dinner "on the new road" (its a little one liner from the movie Cars and it has been our little throughout the project.  My favorite thing said through the project...

Big Daddy:  Hey B!  It looks like the shoemold was originally pink.

Laney:  Hey Daddy, who is Mrs. Shoemold?

For some reason, it cracks me up!

The Five Aspects of Woman: Mistress of the Domain Created

     I am sure you have heard, "You are created in the image of God" from other Christians, the Bible or even on Sunday mornings but what does that mean, especially as a woman?

     I am doing a 25 week bible course, Barbara Mouser's "Five Aspects of Woman", that is exploring that exact issue. It explores the root of womanhood based on Genesis 1:1-Revelation 22:21. The aspects include: Mistress of the Domain, Helper-Completer, Life Giver, Lady of Wisdom and Glory of Man. Each aspect is then explained from the created, fallen and redeemed perspective. There are many key points to each aspect but I will only share what I have personally taken from each one. (You will have to take the class for yourself to learn the rest :)

     Mistress of the Domain was the first aspect we just finished. This aspect was fascinating to me because it gave me a deeper appreciation for my created being. I love learning more about how purposeful and planned the human male and female were and how personal God was in creating them and His plan to save them.

     Something that really struck my heart was that being created in the image of God means that we reflect God's nature in our humanity, it has nothing to do with gender. I previously held the belief that a man and woman together made the complete image of God. But, my thinking was faulty because if that were true, God would have to be part feminine and He does not reveal Himself throughout the Scripture as both feminine and masculine, but masculine only. I found it interesting that every single woman has all five aspects whether they are visible or not.

     Based from the Scriptures, we can see that God created us with characteristics that mirror His larger attributes...the difference is that He exhibits His attributes perfectly and completely. Some examples are that we have a mind that is capable of knowing some things (God is omniscient (all knowing)) and we have a conscience that can usually tell right from wrong (God is just). There are more of these attributes covered in the study but I just wanted to give an example to keep you with me.

     Knowing all these attributes has given me a deeper appreciation for who I am and who others were created to be. I love how Mouser says, "We will never find ourselves in ourselves. We will find ourselves in God. Only knowing the One in whose image we are makes sense of our own image." I just love that.

     The world mandate is something I have latched onto the most. It has since come up in my heart over and over again. Mouser explains our purpose of life based on Genesis 1:28, "God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground." We were created for the earth, to care for it, maintain it and produce from it. Mouser writes, " God designed the world so men could complete what He started. As they complete what He started their humanity is fulfilled and God is glorified. " This is so beautiful. This also explains why I feel so fulfilled when I rake the leaves in our yard and clean up the house after a long day. What a purposeful and loving God to have created us and let us do things that are meaningful and fulfilling...as small as some tasks may seem. She continues on saying, "Man was created to search out and cultivate the creation and it capacities...in one sense the creation is a game of divine hide and seek." I continue to think through how this is true. One day someone figured out how to grow cotton and  spin it to make thread, yarn, string and then put them together in a pattern to make the shirt that is on my back....that is amazing!  It's just one small example of something we take for granted and some of God's fingerprints we miss each day.

     So the world mandate in Genesis 1:28 is to find what domain(s) God has called us to and we are to rule that domain, maintain it and produce from it because God has given us authority over the earth He has created.

     Throughout this study we have had projects to do after each aspect so we can make it more personal. I wanted to share mine with you. I chose to take a picture that showed the domains I feel God has called me to rule over.

     I had Big Daddy B take some pictures and I felt this one represented my domain the best. Little Bub running away, Peanut asking me questions, Baby B just hanging out and Big Bub wondering when I am going to start reading again. It is the perfect picture for my current domain for homeschooling and parenting. My relationship with God is foundational to being responsible in caring for my domains so I listed it on our fireplace because our fireplace is basically the center of our home. In the bottom left-hand corner, I have arranged some things that represent my other domains. I have also listed in words, the domains I feel I am responsible for at this season in my life:  parenting, scrapbooking, homeschooling, my time, my words, my thoughts, discipleship, relationship with God, photography, homemaking and cleaning.  My domains do and will continue to change throughout the seasons of life but this is where I am right now.

     I would encourage you to ponder first in whose image were you created and remind you that you can only find who you are in God because it is His image we bear. I want to also encourage you to think about your domain and how you can make decisions that produce fruit from within your domains. "To not decide is to decide."

     I will be posting Mistress of the Domain Fallen and Redeemed in the next couple of days so look for those posts.  The fallen will give you a greater picture of how we experience Mistress of the Domain.

Project Dining Room Part 2

There was much to do especially when Big Daddy B switched the nature of our project from laminate flooring to real hardwood.  He had to gather more tools, do more prep work, pick out hardwood.  But finally he was making progress.  To get himself pumped up, he put in some Michael Jackson hits and showed off some of his moves.  I can't tell you how much I love my husband and how fun he is (well sometimes...usually he doesn't perform for the camera)

What a hoot!!  This is his first time laying a hardwood floor and I think he is doing an awesome job.  To be honest, anything but carpet underneath my dining room table is a blessing.

We have been eating all of our meals in our living room which has been quite funny.  The hardest part is keeping the kids away from Daddy because they want to help all the time.  But finally the nailing has started and some of the hardwood is down.  More to come.....

My beautiful Sister-in-Law has a post about Big Daddy B...you should check it out.  We wished we lived closer too and that Husband could teach us how to fly :)

Project Dining Room Part 1

Since we moved into this home in 2004 (the picture above was move in day :)...our house is now yellow though you can see it on this post)  it has taken a completely different look.  Big Daddy B is very handy and he has a creative wife so we are always creating something new to do.  This project is different though.  This is something I have wanted for years now...hard wood floor in my dining room.  With four children and food constantly being smeared into the carpet, it just wasn't working anymore.  I will be posting updates as we go.  Here are a couple of through the years dining room pictures.

This was the dining room in March 2004. Our whole home was white when we moved...thank God I knew a great painter :)

Big Daddy B painted the dining for my birthday May 2006.

And this is the beginning of our 2009 hard wood floor project.  I can't even explain how excited I am to be able to actually clean up spilled applesauce with ease!!!!!  No more yucky carpet.  More updates on the project to come....