Happy Belated Easter

We had a fabulous weekend.  My parents were here, and on Saturday we colored eggs, we chatted, we took a tour around our house and checked all of the plants coming up this spring.  We ate and ate and ate, it was wonderful.   On Sunday morning we did church and then the kids found their Easter baskets, we had an egg hunt (with $ in the eggs), and we had our feast at 1pm.  It  was a very busy, but wonderful day.  Sometimes it works out like this, and other times it doesn’t.  I’m really glad this was an up year, it seems as if they have been mediocre lately.

Here are some photos of our weekend.

L’s first time coloring eggs. She loved it!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

T is getting too big to color a lot of eggs, but he did dip a couple 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

S with his favorite egg.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A with her favorite colored egg.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

L with her colored hands. I just love the green and yellow hands !

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My husband and me on Easter Sunday.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Me, my mom, and the girls.

Easter Day with 2 beautiful girls.

The kids enjoying some Easter candy after finding their baskets.

My mother-in-law enjoying a cup of coffee after dinner.

My father-in-law eating Easter dinner.

 

I hope you all had a glorious Easter, we did!

Been Busy…With Pictures

Sorry I’ve been gone, but with my husband gone last week, I’ve been a little lot busy!  While he was gone wasn’t too bad, but as soon as he hit the door we have been running!  Here is some of the stuff that has been going on in the last few weeks.

A my 7-year-old daughter had her father/daughter dance with AHG.  Here is a picture of them.

 

All of the pictures had the sun in their eyes, so some my husband was smiling, but A, had her eyes closed.   This was the best that I got at home.  They had a great time.  A ate too many sweets and had an upset stomach for some time during the dance.  I need to remind her to limit her sweets next year!

Also, we had 2 birthdays recently.  My husband turned 47!  How can I be married to someone who is 47?  Crazy!

Right after my husband’s birthday is my son R’s birthday.  He turned 15.  Wow!

R’s 15th birthday with T in the background.

We have been outside when the weather is cooperating.  L loves being outside.  It should be  a fun summer!

L loving being outside.

We got three chicks from a teacher at school.  They are cute!  L loved looking at them.  When my husband took one out of the brooder to show her, she wanted to grab them.  She about ripped the head off of one.  We did want to get a picture of her with the chicks, but she was grabbing at the chicks and we were worried about their safety.  Here she is distressed because she really wanted to hold a chick.

L crying because we wouldn’t let her hold the chick. She about killed it 10 seconds before this picture was taken.

J, our oldest, and a senior in high school was named Salutatorian of his senior class.  We are very excited and proud of his accomplishments!  He should qualify for some additional scholarships because of this achievement.

J was named Salutatorian of his senior class!

I just love this picture of L eating a muffin, so I had to add it!

 

L eating a muffin.

We had the chess tournament which was a Friday night and Saturday all day.  The boys held up great.  They didn’t do as well as they hoped, but now they realize that they need to keep practicing so that they improve for next year.

 

 

T and S after finishing up the chess tournament.

S and A had to dress up as their favorite fictional character for a school assignment.  S read Charlotte’s Web and went as Wilbur the pig.  A read all of the Fancy Nancy books that our local library had and then dressed up like her.

S as Wilbur the pig for fictional character day

A dressed as Fancy Nancy.

Here is M being nice and pushing the girls on the swings.  L just loves him.  She calls out his name a million times a day and I have to remind her that he is in school.  He just signed up for PSEO, so he will be taking 2 college classes next year.  He will only be a junior in high school next year, so by the end of his senior year, he will have about a semester of college credits completed!

M being a nice big brother and pushing his sisters on the swings.

R has been working on his forge.  We recently were able to acquire coal which has really opened up his options as compared to the charcoal which he has been using.  It burns much hotter than the charcoal did.

R working on his forge.

Anyway, that is some of the things that we have been up to.  How about you, what have you been up to?

Ann

 

 

 

 

 

Spring Break and Spring Cleaning

Sorry I’ve been missing in action, but for good reason.  We have been spring cleaning.

I certainly don’t love doing it, but I sure love having it done.

Well, it’s not all done but we have cleaned 2 of the bedrooms.  Only half of the kids are off this week, the rest are off the week before Easter.   We will tackle their room that week.  It is kind of nice to break it up.  Anyway, we washed the walls, the woodwork, took posters off of the walls, dusted, vacuumed, and changed the sheets.  It feels good to get that done.

The kids are enjoying their clean rooms.  I wonder how long it will last?

Today we taking a field trip to Bass Pro Shops, eating out for lunch, and seeing a movie.  The little kids are looking forward to having a fun day with Dad.

Are you on spring break?  Are you being productive?

Ann

Random Pictures

Here are some random pictures that I have taken over the past couple of weeks.  I have lots of pictures of the little kids, but none from the bigger kids.  My husband must have them on his phone.  I’ll have him send them to me so I can get some of their activities up here on the blog.  There is never a dull moment with 7 kids!

L sitting on a stump

Waiting for the Lego Movie to start

A’s toothless grin

S as George Washington for History Hat Day

T’s 3rd place finish in History Fair

L reading herself to sleep

S as Wilbur in Charlotte’s Web for Fictional Character Day

S racing to the finish after a 1 mile fun run

The Little Things Mess Me Up

Well, I had these grand plans of posting at least 4 times this week.

What happened?

Well, nothing major thankfully, but my plans just got messed up.  First off, it was nice.   How could that mess me up?  Well, the kids wanted to stay at school for a few minutes to play on the playground that they haven’t been able to use since November.  The few minutes ended up being 30 minutes.  No big deal, right?  Well, it just messed up my timing.  I had to rush to get dinner finished up,  and had to rush to Scouts.

L, who is 15 months now, is loving being outside.  How can that mess me up?  Well, I’m outside when I need to be inside getting my stuff done.  I have to adjust my schedule now that the weather is warming up.  I need to get my stuff inside accomplished while she sleeps so we can be outside when the weather allows.

The power went out.  Only for 2 hours or so, but that messed up the dinner I was trying to get done early.  It messed up my blog post…no internet.

How about you, what side tracks you?  How can you overcome the obstacles?

Ann

Home Sweet Home

I hit the door around 8 pm Saturday night.

I was welcomed home to a beautiful welcome home party.  It was A’s idea to put streamers all around the dining room to celebrate my homecoming.

My husband and kids got me the Lodge Cast Iron Cookbook that I had been wanting.  I went away for more than a week and I got presents!  I am loved!

L, my 15 month old daughter didn’t recognize me, and that hurt a little.  She didn’t want me to hold her.  She wanted my husband.  It took an hour or more to get her to warm up to me.  A, my 7-year-old daughter  was HYPER.  She was so glad to see me.  It must be a girl thing.  She bounced around the house all night 🙂

The boys were glad to see me, but it wasn’t as stressful for them not having me here, I guess.  They were interested in the presents that I brought home.  I got everyone a T-shirt.  My thinking is that we don’t need anything else cluttering the place up and I know that they wear them to death.  I got cool cups from the ship (drink of the day) and everyone got one of those too.  Again, functional, not clutter.

It was a fun time away.  I got to see my Mom and Aunt for a week.  We had warm, sunny days in the 80’s, we ate and ate ( I gained 5 pounds), and we watched all of the shows.  I tried  roasted duck for the first time.  It was not greasy as I had heard.  I climbed a waterfall.  I learned about tequila and tried a variety of flavors.  I bought some hot sauce for my boys to critique.  I walked and walked and walked.  That ship was huge and no matter what, we got off of the elevator and it was the LONG way back to the room.  We got up early and enjoyed our days to the fullest.  It was an awesome time.

I was gone long enough to be ready to face my many challenges head-on again.

With 7 children the challenges are many, but I wouldn’t change a thing…well, maybe a couple of things 😉  It is hard.  I am growing people, 7 different people.  All with different gifts and challenges.  I am hopeful that the work I am doing will help grow good productive people who will make the world a better place.  People who will marry, grow, work hard, produce good fruit, and teach their own children the lessons that I am trying to teach them.

Here we go again.

Ann

Heading Home

I am currently riding on the last leg of my trip. It has been a wonderful time away. I spent a lot of time with my Mom and Aunt. I don’t get to do that much.

We took a Royal Caribbean cruise on the ship called Oasis of the Seas. It was huge! We spent the entire week walking. It seemed no matter what elevator we got off of, it was the long way back to the room :). It took us several days to figure out which restaurants were free and which cost extra fees (there weren’t many). It also took a day to figure out where to get coffee early in the morning. The food was awesome, and there was so much of it. Needless to say I ate too much.

We saw all of the shows. They were great! There was plenty to do every day. We really had some good times together.

I will post some pictures soon.

Right now I can’t wait to see my husband and kids!

Ann

Gone For A Week

I’ll be gone for a week for a wonderful cruise vacation with my Mom and Aunt. I will get back into the groove of posting when I return. Bon Voyage!

Making Kids More Independent

My husband and I have been changing the responsibilities of our children.  He thinks I am too easy on them.  I do what I have pretty much always done.  I cook, I clean, I do laundry, I grocery shop.  I do all of the mom stuff.  Since I don’t work outside of the home, I feel like it is my job to keep things looking good around the house.

My husband feels entirely differently.  He feels that our big boys 17, 16, almost 15, and 12 are very capable of doing chores etc. around the house.

I know that they are capable.  I know that they can do chores and they have several that they are each responsible for taking care of.  They don’t always do the job to my expectations, of course, they are kids.  We are working on it.  My husband thinks that they grow more and more capable by making them step up and handle more responsibilities.  He is right.  I know down deep that these kids have to be able to take care of their laundry, be able to cook, and clean a dorm room or apartment, etc.

The hard thing for me is letting go of the stuff that I have always done.  I always did the cooking.  Now one child does the cooking each night.

I’ve always done the laundry.  Now the kids are taking turns.  They must wash, dry, fold, and have each child put their things away.

I’ve always cleaned the kitchen and started the dishwasher.  Now the children do it.

It is a big relief to me mentally to know that I am teaching my kids how to manage on their own, but who is with me that it is hard to follow through with it.  It is hard to see them running low on clean laundry (they don’t seem to mind), it is hard to stand there in the kitchen pointing out all of the stuff that needs to be cleaned up after dinner and not do it yourself.  It is hard to see them struggle with something that I could do quickly and easily.

I have to keep my eye on the big picture.  They will be moving on soon enough.  I have to prepare them to the best of my ability to be successful with all things.  Boys need to know these skills.

How about you, did you prepare your kids to be out in the real world?  What are the critical skills that they should know?

Ann

Feeling Great!

We have been off of school for a week now!  I am enjoying driving the kids around much less!  We have set up a routine where the kids do an hour of reading, some chores, some school work, and then a project that I want to work on for a while, and then something fun for the kids. The bigger kids also have special  projects that they are working on in addition to what the little ones are doing.  For example, M is working on his Eagle Scout project, J is working on College stuff, and R is working on getting more organized. So far it is working well.  I have an excel spreadsheet on the fridge with boxes for each kid to mark off.

Here are a couple of pictures of our leisure time reading and working on projects.

J and S reading and enjoying leisure time this summer.

A buried herself in cushions to read because she was freezing cold.

So far we have been to our local Y’s outdoor pool.  The little ones loved it, but the big kids said it was freezing.  Since they were out of the water, it gave us some much-needed time away from the little ones just to talk.  It was nice.  We also went to a local flea market where my oldest works on the weekends.  We waved to him while we were there, which was super fun for A.  Girls are so much different from boys.  Here are a couple of shots of the flea market.

Pony rides for $5.

A riding “Chocolate Chip”

A loving on a horse statue.

A hanging on a gorilla statue.

A getting her picture taken with a snowman in June. Only in Ohio.

We are off to a great start this summer!  Now to stay consistent.  It is not easy for me, but with a plan it should be easier.  Here’s to some much-needed rest and relaxation!