Hearts Toward Home

Great Backyard Bird Count!

2012-02-17T07:38:00.000-08:00

Taking a break today from our adoption posting...we are doing some nature study at our house.

Things have been busy around here...but its nice to post about one of our favorite little nature things that we try to do each school year...The Great Backyard Bird Count! The Cornell Lab of Ornithology puts this together a couple times a year. The kids are able to print lists of birds for our area and then do a "bird watch" for 15 min. We identify what birds and how many of each species and then turn our tally sheets in to Cornell. We can actually do this several times at different locations for the next few days and send them all our results. It helps them to watch the health and habits of the birds in our area.

This is the site:

http://www.birdsource.org/gbbc
Or you can just look up "Great Backyard Bird Count 2012"

The kids love it...we end up learning a lot of species that we didn't know or noticing birds that come through that we hadn't identified yet. Our new house definitely has different birds to count than our old house.

This has been an awesome way for the kids to study nature as well as become more attentive to what is around them.

We are sick here at our house today...so its going to be a lot of hot tea, a lot of naps, and a lot of bird counting & field guides :)

P.S. >>>> If you happen to read this today, please say a little prayer for Dan today...he has a very special prayer request that could use some added prayer- thanks!

Blessings,
Kimberly

Love is a decision

2012-02-16T09:56:00.000-08:00

Well, we're really trying to keep the ball rolling with our future adoption...been communicating back and forth quite a bit today trying to get accurate information about our options. Its not easy...you'll just have to trust me on that.

Pray for us...that we can get some decisions made and move forward to deciding who God is calling to join our family. We were really sad about this past weekend, but God has been so good to us and especially lately...just making it really clear that we can handle this. He will work it out. Just pray for discernment for us that we make the right choices.

Blessings,
Kimberly

a hard time...

2012-02-15T05:45:00.000-08:00

Well, we knew adoption was not for the faint of heart...
Its been a hard few days...Dan and I thought we were going to be "committing" to two little girls that would come home and be a part of our family. This is not so...

There is so much more...the adoption world is a crazy place...so many variables, so many unknowns.

I am learning that they don't call it a "ransom" for nothing...

I've had moments when I've thought about not doing this...not adopting. Then our Lord shows me these things...

These are not my words...but they have spoken to me over the past few days of difficulty.
May God continue to break my heart for the things that break His...

From www.obedienttogodscalladoption.blogspot.com/2012/01/i-came-across-this-today-while-running.html

May God Bless You...with Tears and Anger, Discomfort and Foolishness

May God bless you with discomfort at easy answers, half truths, and superficial relationships, so that you may live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people, so that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.

May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, and war, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and to turn their pain in to joy.

And may God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in this world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done.
-Franciscan prayer

"How often do we think a blessing should look like anger or discomfort or tears? What a perfect reminder that we are never promised an easy road, or a carefree experience here on Earth. What we are promised is to be saved by Christ if we ask and follow through with faith, to be transformed by Him so that we can be more like Him. We are promised to be indwelt with the Holy Spirit to guide us. While reading this, I thought about how we always view blessings as a comfortable experience, but to be blessed like this, blessed with a heart that breaks for the things God's heart breaks for, that is truly a blessing to beg Abba for. If we love as He has commanded, and we reach out as He has asked, and we stand up and fight when it is needed, we are truly shining His light this world. If we never experience this kind of blessing, we may forget the orphan and the widow, we may ignore the poor and the hurting, the lost and the broken. So tonight, I cry out to Abba please, bless me in these ways!"
From www.obedienttogodscalladoption.blogspot.com/2012/01/i-came-across-this-today-while-running.html


And yet another quote that has spoken to me this week...

"Excellence is the result of caring more than others think is wise,
risking more than others think is safe,
dreaming more than others think is practical,
and expecting more than others think is possible." ~Stephen Covey

Too true...

2012-02-12T12:53:00.000-08:00

Working on school planning....and having my "coffee fix"
You know its bad when you read this poster out loud to your husband and he bursts out laughing at you while pointing in your general direction... :) I need another cup before I can come up with a witty comeback ;)

Please watch

2012-02-04T19:40:00.000-08:00

This is a must see...it is worth every minute of the time it will take you to watch it. Some people will think we are crazy for wanting to adopt a special needs child...they will think it will be unfair to our other children. But we don't believe loving others and growing in self-sacrifice for the needs of others is a bad thing. No one can tell me that our "normal" children will not benefit from having siblings with disabilities...it is obvious that obstacles make us better people...if we let them. And serving others in love is beautiful...

You don't get much better than this...

(HT to www.savinghissparrows.blogspot.com for the video)

Well...here we go!

2012-02-03T04:36:00.000-08:00

We finally did it...Dan brought our application and fee money into our local agency and got the ball officially rolling for our adoption....aahhh!!! It doesn't sound like a big deal. It's just starting the homestudy. But it has taken us many long months of prayer and discussion... to try to figure out what direction God was calling us. Now its just time to take the first step and see what He does from there!

Dan thought it was no big deal...that he'd get really excited when the homestudy is done...I, on the other hand, can relate to this T-Shirt. We may not be "expecting" yet...but its like we're really trying now :)

Not just talkin' about it...doing it.

We're using an agency that several friends have used and who has a social worker that is known to be really great. So...I'm getting excited! Nervous... but excited!

Susan G. Komen De-Funds Planned Parenthood!

2012-02-02T04:47:00.000-08:00

So glad to hear that the Susan G. Komen For the Cure has decided to de-fund Planned Parenthood.
We've never been able to support any breast cancer research or walk for the cure activities through them because of their monetary support of Planned Parenthood.

Lets pray they stay strong and continue to hold to this decision...Planned Parenthood is pretty ticked... :)

A fruitful weekend...

2012-01-31T04:12:00.000-08:00

God is so good...

    I started writing a whole long post about everything that has happened in the past couple of days and I stopped and erased it and boiled it down to "God is SO good"...but I guess I need to elaborate on that a bit :)

    Unfortunately, with homeschooling and having a constant supply of kids around me all the time, I really don't have time to really think out all my thoughts and feelings in order to put it down here in the way that I would like. So I'm just going to throw it down here...better written down in some way than not at all. And I feel WAY too blessed from this weekend to not write it all down.

    We had the opportunity to go to several adoption workshops on Saturday...what was going to be Dan going on his own to learn more turned into a last minute decision for all of us to go together. What could have been a stressful, difficult trip turned out to be a really wonderful one. God just keeps giving us these opportunities and each time we stop to question or "make sure we're being reasonable" He reaffirms His call to us...even if it doesn't seem wise by the world's standards.

    The workshops were good...Dan was really glad he got to go and figure out some serious questions we both had that didn't seem to be getting answered. It was really helpful to talk face to face with people there and get things clarified.   Dan, amazingly, feels very called to the same Eastern European area that I have not been able to take my mind and heart from for the past 10 months. The kids there are constantly on my heart, our kids know many of their names and faces and pray for them unceasingly. It was also a beautiful, warm day and we were able to take the kids to a park nearby and spend a good amount of time just having fun with the our kids.

      Another major blessing of the day was that I was able to meet another adoptive mom who has adopted from the area we are considering. She lives only 10 min. from us and was so kind as to come over on Saturday night and answer questions for us for 2 1/2 hours! Thank you, Michelle, for letting us bombard you with questions! I can't believe we kept you that long! This get together was totally a blessing for us and really encouraged us.

Also, there is another family that is currently in the country that we hope to adopt from...I emailed this woman with some overwhelmed and confused questions and she so amazingly took the time to email me back some very helpful explanations to our questions....what a blessing!

    God is so good...pursuing an international adoption has so many difficulties...things that most families would decide was just too complicated to deal with while raising their own family of young kids. But God doesn't ever seem to call us to easy stuff, does He? Our Lord just keeps placing this country and its children there before us..especially at church. Songs being chosen that speak of the orphan, homilies pointed straight at us and His call for us to adopt. Sounds a little vague, though, right? Well, it hasn't been. Its always after we've had a little pow-wow about whether what we're considering is a good idea or not.   And then "bam!" Our Lord says do it! This past Sunday was the big one. The one that couldn't be ignored. We're singing the Mass parts at church and they've chosen to use one (the only one, mind you, since there are several others that could have been used) that is based on a hymn from the exact country that we've been praying about.   It sounds weird, but it was just so well timed with all that had been learned the day before...when God had brought all the workshops and individuals together to ease our questions and encourage us in this. We just pointed at the little name of the hymn and the country, smiled to eachother and I tried really hard not to burst into tears. Happy, thankful tears...

This is all pretty jumbled, I'm sure...when my brain has a free minute, it is usually thinking about what I should be preparing for school this week or what thing I could get ahead on around the house...but I just couldn't help but get something down about this weekend. A great weekend...God really blessed us with a wonderful Saturday to enjoy one another, learn more about what we have in store and gave Dan and I a chance to really talk things over. We were also so blessed to meet a new friend with an awesome heart.

Michelle is fund raising right now to bring two little girls home...
Feel free to hop over to her blog and help her bring them home.

http://findingrdaughter.blogspot.com/

Sorry- Dan is the one who knows how to make that a link....oh well, just cut and paste it into your browser.

And please pray that the Carmichael family is able to have court soon and bring their amazing little boy home soon!

Thank you, Lord Jesus, for easing our worries and making our path just a little bit clearer.

Kimberly

As always...

2012-01-26T09:33:00.000-08:00

We can always count on Matthew to speak truth and make us laugh out loud while reading it!

Some Things Moms Can't Do

http://www.ncregister.com/blog/some-things-moms-cant-do/

"The sanctitiy of ALL life...from conception to natural death"

2012-01-24T12:54:00.000-08:00

Its January...the month that all christians recognize yet another anniversary of Roe vs. Wade and the legalization of abortion in our country. Many people will attend local "March for Life" rallies and even the national March for Life in Washington D.C. We have done these things and have loved being able to be a part of them.

This is a time when you will hear about the importance of the "sanctity of ALL life...from conception to natural death." Our family has prayed for the end of abortion. We have taken the kids and stood outside abortion clinics and prayed for the closing of their doors, the conversion of their hearts, and for the healing of all those that enter there. The idea of the sanctity of ALL life from conception to natural death covers so much....and it is heavy on our hearts as we grow as a family and learn the plight of the special needs orphans of other countries. The children with special needs in Eastern Europe are precious in His sight and deserve dignity and love. We have such a tendency as society to value people by their usefulness...if they are not wealthy or beautiful or useful by this worlds' standards...if they cannot do something for us, make our lives better or easier then they are a "burden". Oh, if we just knew our worth and the worth of the "least of these!" Those in need cause us to give, to sacrifice in ways that can bring about a joy in us that only God can create! God is in these needy, little ones and whether we realize it or not...we ALL are searching for God.

There are many special needs children over the months that have touched our hearts...many that we pray for regularly...many that my kids have thought lovingly of and have prayed for each day. Kids get it...we can learn so much from them. We hope to use the blog not only for ourselves, but to also highlight amazing kids that are in need of families.

This is Isabella..

thats not her real name, but that doesn't much matter. This picture doesn't do her justice...she is amazing. She, unfortunately, is barely existing in a "laying room" in Eastern Europe. Most kids are available for adoption and have to wait for a family to choose them....Isabella hasn't even had the chance to be listed for adoption. Probably because nobody thinks she's worth it...no one thinks she would be adopted. So she waits...in a bed...24 hours a day. She has been quoted as saying the best parts of her day are when they change her bed and when they eat. That's not asking for much...She is one of the only kids in this room that is able to communicate....and yet she calls all the other children "her friends"...she is so social and loving and yet she is confined to this bed.

There was a wonderful missionary who visited with her...took video to share with others. I've seen this video and let me tell you...this child is Beautiful...like break your heart, this child would be a blessing to any family who called her their own kind of blessing. She is funny, engaging, sweet, smart and deserving of the dignity of a home and family of her own. Please pray that she is given the chance to be listed for adoption.

This is Maxim...

What can I say about Maxim...he is too funny for words. I've followed him through two different missionaries now and he's always been one of the kids the struck my heart. He needs a family. He IS listed for adoption and has a grant set up for him through Reece's Rainbow.

http://reecesrainbow.org/?s=maxim&x=0&y=0

From all the videos and pictures I've seen, he is funny, sweet, has an amazing laugh and needs a family!

During this month of January...please pray for all the unborn, the terminally ill, the sick, the dying and the special needs orphans as well...that all may be loved as we would love Christ himself.

-Kimberly

Best "Hide and Seek" House ever

2012-01-14T05:46:00.000-08:00

One of the benefits of a house with more storage than we've ever had before...

It sure makes "Hide and Seek" at our house A LOT more interesting :) There are a lot of closets, cubbards and nooks & crannies to hide in...and they've managed to squeeze into them all. They've even hoisted their younger brother and sister into cubbards above my head...but usually ends up being given away by their cries to "get me down....I wanted to hide up here, but I'll NEVER be able to get down!"

This one particularly cracked us up....since our lazy susan in the last house was small and rickety and usually such a pain that we really didn't use it, much less hide in it. In the end, he won this round :)

Blessings,
Kimberly

A litte reading for Dan & I...

2012-01-12T14:16:00.000-08:00

A couple good adoption reads that Dan and I will be reading over the next week or two...

The Connected Child

http://www.amazon.com/Connected-Child-healing-adoptive-family/dp/0071475001/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1326405674&sr=8-1

and The Stength of Mercy by Jan Beazely who is the Cofounder of All God's Children International, which is a non-profit adoption ministry.

I've already started The Strenth of Mercy but had been waiting for the library copy of The Connected Child to come in. It finally came! So...that will definitely be evening reading for Dan and I. We're both looking forward to learning more about the skills needed for international adoption. Dan is even hoping to attend an all day adoption conference this month so he can get up to speed on all that I've already read and learned from other families' experiences.

As always, your prayers are appreciated as we open ourselves up to God's will for our family.
And while your praying, please pray for "Isabelle"....that's not her real name, but a nickname given to her for her protection. She is an orphan in Eastern Europe that has the most beautiful spirit...and desperately needs to be listed for adoption. This girl deserves a family of her own. Please pray she can be listed on Reece's Rainbow (an adoption awareness and grant raising organization for orphans in Eastern Europe) so she has a chance of finding a family.

More on Reece's Rainbow in a later post...

Blessings,
Kimberly

Some much needed nature time...

2012-01-10T08:58:00.000-08:00

Some time out together at Crowder's Mountain State Park...

So thankful to live in the South...where we can be outside year round.

Taking the kids out in the woods for a walk is like bringing them back to their natural habitat!

Everyone is quite happy to climb, build, explore and check out what kinds of nature treasures they can find.

Thank you, Lord, for time in the out-of-doors with the ones I love most.

Now, everyone else out there...get outside and enjoy some time with the ones YOU love most :)

Blessings,
Kimberly

Some Christmas pics...

2012-01-07T12:08:00.000-08:00

A few photos from the Christmas Season....

St. Nicholas Day...

Christmas Cookies...

Limoncello...

Waiting for The Nutcracker to start...Dan took the day off and we all went together

My little Christmas baby had his 3rd birthday...

Dan and the boys worked on making us a nativity for our yard since we didn't have one and thought we really needed one :)

Making the Perry Family Tradition "Christmas Cakes"

Christmas Town USA...walking the streets on the evening of Christmas Day. Church bells playing
Christmas carols while people travel through the entire town lit up in lights....we sang hymns while we walked....

We loved this...

The finished product...very pretty lit up at night :)

Making decorations for our "Night Tree" from the story book...its our Christmas tree for the outdoor animals each year.

Hanging up the decorations and singing Christmas songs...

Hope that your family has had a very blessed Christmas!

Blessings,
Kimberly

Guess what we've been planting!

2012-01-05T12:48:00.000-08:00

I know...its a little crazy because I have a lot of back-logged Christmas photos to post...lots of fun things we've done or made...but I just couldn't help but post a few photos of whats been going in here at our new home...

Fruit Trees!!

We found a really nice nursery in a nearby town...its in a really cool, three story building that was built around 1912. Super nice people....we just went to see what they had, since Dan had heard some kind of advertisement about a sale on fruit trees. We've know from the start that we would be planting fruit trees all along the north side of our property and we really lucked out with the sale! We ended up getting 3 Granny Smith Apples (what can I say...that's what my kids love best), 2 Gala Apples, 2 peaches and 1 Plum. These are full size trees so we're excited about how big they will get over the years. Dan's looking forward to trying out all the techniques he's read about planting different things around the base of the trees to fertilize them and help them grow. Daffodils, garlic, clover, lupines...Daffodils and garlic keep other critters away from the trees and clover and lupines are nitrogen fixers that help produce nutrients for the soil. Looking forward to trying it out :)

My handsome husband....who was so nice as to work with the boys to get several of the trees in the ground. We still have a few to plant...

These are our little blueberry bushes...we have a couple of them. Looking forward to them getting nice and big :)

We are really excited to finally be settled enough to be putting things in the ground that we will be able to enjoy for years to come. So awesome....we were chatting with the boys about how we can't wait from them to come back with their kids to visit Gramma and Grampa and pick fruit from the trees... :)

Blessings,
Kimberly

Trading Cards Art Project

2012-01-03T09:45:00.000-08:00

Another homeschooler and blogger named Kimberly hosted a Saints Trading Cards art swap that we've wanted to try the past couple of times she's hosted one. We finally got some done and we're able to participate! Basically, anyone that wanted to participate needed to make 5 little pieces of artwork...each one depicting a saint. We sent 5 as a family....Dan did one and the two boys each did two. We sent them to Kimberly and she sent us 5 different little works of art that other people had made to trade.

The boys really enjoyed making them and also getting to see Dad's finished St. George!
My eldest made St. Clare and St. Gabriel and My second eldest made St. Basil and St. Francis.
And Dan had a little fun making St. George :)

Next time Kimberly is having one of the trading card swaps, I'll try to post the deadline date and directions to participate on this blog. Any age can participate...even younger children!
Its really fun getting other peoples' cards as well! We got some really nice ones.

Blessings,
Kimberly

]

Aquaponics Primer

2012-01-01T20:12:00.000-08:00

So as Kim has mentioned in previous post I've been interested in starting up an aquaponics system at out new house. So I thought I would spend some time putting my thoughts down as a introduction to those visitors that are un-familiar with it.
Aquaponics is the combination of aquaculture ( the raising of aquatic animals like fish ) and hydroponics ( the growing of plants in nutrient rich water instead of soil). The advantages of combining these two techiniques is that the fish, plants, and some benifical bateria work together and form a symbolotic relationship. Plants take in water and carbon dioxide from the air to create sugars but require nitrogen from the soil to grow. Fish need oxygen and clean water and their excrement and urine contain nitrogen. So with the help of bateria the fish refuse is converted into a form of nitrogen that the plants can use and the plants help to clean the water for the fish.
There are a lot more details which I'm learning but that's the basic gist of it.
So in later posts I'll be going over my design and progress of building my aquaponics system.

Any excuse to climb a tree...

2011-12-31T13:29:00.000-08:00

Dan always did love to climb trees....but he bit off a little more than he could chew with this one! We had to leave our big ladder back at the Charlotte house because we couldn't fit it on the last load leaving in the van...soooo....Dan decided he would find SOME way up the tree! Lots of laughs, a few scary moments, especially when Lilly dragged a upside down rod iron chair under the tree to play with and I knew right then and there how freaked Dan was of being implailed because he freaked out and wanted to chair MOVED! He made it, though...and the kids love their swing. We quite enjoyed the day of "How to get Dad up the tree" and then "How to get him down from the tree"....ahhh...living in the country :)

Gingerbread Houses

2011-12-30T13:01:00.000-08:00

Another Christmas tradition....the gingerbread house display at Ballantyne Resort! Always fun to go see what people have come up with this year! We don't live as close to this display as we used to, but the kids really look forward to it so we made an effort to stop by on one of our trips into Charlotte.

They even had an Angry Birds gingerbread display (funny computer game...Dan's friends will know what I'm talking about :) ) The boys laughed about that one!

Hope that your having a very Blessed Christmas Season! I will posting some more of our Christmas activities soon :)

Blessings,
Kimberly

The hunt for the family tree!

2011-12-19T19:32:00.000-08:00

We started a family tradition a few years ago, of going to a tree farm in South Carolina to find our own Christmas tree and cut it down ourselves. The tree farm is a really fun, family owned business and they even have a fire pit for roasting marshmallows and having hot chocolate after you cut your tree. It always ends up being a great excuse to get outside all day and hunt for the best tree!

2011-12-14T14:14:00.000-08:00

Thinking about this quote:

Dan's first mini-homesteading project

2011-12-04T18:34:00.000-08:00

When we first moved in to our new home, Dan knew he really wanted to get the compost going. The cost of buying a fancy, rotating compost bin is ridiculous so Dan got to work making us one. He bought a couple used 55 gallon barrels for $23 each and used Google Sketchup to design it. Here's a pic of it as well as the sketch up file of the frame to hold to barrel.

Compost Bin Sketchup file

Notes from Dan: "I used a galvanished steel pipe with two plywood discs on each end bolted to the barrel. Drilled holes in to let air in and cut a door on the side. Bought hinges and a latch to keep it closed. Overall, it cost us about $50 to build it instead of $190.00 to buy one locally."

Happy Composting!

Blessings,
Kimberly

2011-11-30T08:21:00.001-08:00

Christmas Novena

Today (Nov. 30th) starts the St. Andrew Christmas Novena...to be said 15 times each day from now until Christmas. Last year, the kids and I made an effort to pray this beautiful prayer a few times each day, but honestly, we never got to 15 times each day! Well, this year we have some pretty hefty prayer intentions and we aim to offer them up! We've made a chain with loops on it for the learning room. We will slide a loop over each time we pray this prayer so we have a visual reminder of how many we have prayed and how many we have left to pray each day.

We are praying this prayer for two intentions: 1. For a friend that has been diagnosed with cancer...for healing for him and 2, for our desire to grow our family....however and whenever our Lord decides to do that. We hope and pray for the child that God is calling us to adopt...that the details will become clear to us.

Here is the prayer....

Hail and Blessed be the hour and moment in which the Son of God was born of the most pure Virgin Mary, at midnight, in Bethlehem, in piercing cold. In that hour, vouchsafe, O my God! to hear my prayer and grant my desires (intention here) through the merits of Our Savior Jesus Christ, and of His Blessed Mother. Amen.

Happy Holy Season of Advent

--Kimberly

Lunar Moth Caterpillar

2011-11-27T19:19:00.000-08:00

Very cool, very HUGE Lunar Moth Caterpillar we found in the yard! The kids scooped it up to put it in an aquarium so they could draw it in their nature journals and before we knew it, he was making his cocoon in there! Now we have a cocoon until spring. We are really into nature study at our house...lots of creatures, lots of field guides and drawing journals...we love it.

2011-11-18T04:36:00.001-08:00

Hearts Toward Home- Our Goal: To turn our hearts toward home, towards the value of family, towards traveling together to our eternal home and setting our hearts on bringing the orphan "Home".

Getting Things Started...Well, here we are! It has been many years in the making, but our family is happy to say that we are excitedly starting several new journeys. We have felt called to more of a "homesteading" lifestyle and have wanted to move out of the suburbs to where we can live a simple life- faith, family, learning to provide for ourselves and have more space to really invest in making a life simpler and more sustainable. We had been praying and searching for the right "homestead" and our Good Lord has blessed us with a new place we now call home...its only a few acres, but its ours and we hope to spend many years loving our life here and making it fruitful!

Our other big adventure is that our Lord blessed us with an eye-opening call to adoption back in March of 2011...I will never forget the day I found "Reece's Rainbow" while browsing some favorite blogs...we are forever changed. And we plan to ACT on that call.Please join us as we strive as a family to turn our hearts towards home...our hearts toward our heavenly home and our hearts toward bringing an orphan to their forever home...Love and Blessings,The Perrys

As the family goes...

2009-02-20T07:52:00.000-08:00

"As the family goes, so goes the nation..." (Pope John Paul II)

Working on our nation one little family member at a time... :)

You know the old saying "The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world..."
I know I don't want to rule the world, but improving it for the better would be nice :)

As for us, we'll just be here changing the world one diaper at a time...

Blessings,
Kimberly

Our Domestic Church and the Liturgical Year...

2009-02-18T11:48:00.000-08:00

Catechism of the Catholic Church:

1666 The Christian home is the place where children receive the first proclamation of the faith. For this reason the family home is rightly called "the domestic church," a community of grace and prayer, a school of human virtues and of Christian charity.

Knowing that our family is called to be a domestic church, we've always strived to really engage in the beautiful liturgical year of the Church...sometimes too much so... where Mom is working so hard to incorporate every single meaningful tradition or celebration into our home that it can get a little overwhelming! But it is always worth it when we realize how connected our life at home is to the life of the Church. So...in the midst of soaking up our "brand-new baby time" I'm hoping to gather up my materials and get ready for Ash Wednesday next week and the beginning of Lent. I'll try to post about what kinds of prayers and activities we'll be doing during this season. Pray for me....since I've gotten so comfortable in "the now" and enjoying our new little joy I'm finding it harder to get geared up to do anything else but sit and love on my family and the "down-time" we've been having...I know its going to be a little hard to jump into this season since its usually Mom that pulls it all together (of course ;) ).

The Bird Count Continues!

2009-02-14T12:09:00.000-08:00

Well, we're in our second day of bird counting....the boys are absolutely loving it! The first day was a little disappointing because we didn't have even half the species of birds come to the feeder that we usually do so we weren't able to submit very many results to the Great Backyard Bird Count that we were hoping to. But today was awesome! All the birds we usually see...and then some...made a mad dash to our feeder and we counted frantically and ripped through our field guides trying to quickly figure out what bird was what so we could name them and count them in our tally. You probably had to be there but it had both boys and my husband and I screaming at the table getting excited about all different birds we were seeing....it was a pretty cool experience. We'll be adding our data to the website later today and checking out the real time maps of what others across the country have been recording thus far.

Elijah's comment: "I wish we could count like twenty more days!"

Speaking of birds...someone at the library saw me checking out a million different bird books and field guides and told us about a blue heron sanctuary at a greenway right near our home so we thought it fitting during our bird learning to go check it out and see if we could spot some herons. Heres some shots Dan got of the Great Blue Herons we saw...

Taking it all in and Loving It...

2009-02-14T11:41:00.000-08:00

I've been wanting to get more done on this blog, but we've been a little busy soaking in the amazing blessing that God gave us 8 weeks ago...

Our Matthias Kolbe...look at all that hair! You could practically braid it!

Has it really been 8 weeks already? This is our fourth child so I thought I knew what the whole "having a new baby" process would be like....usually, as much as I love my children, the new infant stage tends to be a little bit of an exhausted blur. Theres so much to do and get settled, your tired and usually I'm wishing that they just came out running around and being a little more self-sufficient! But not this time...no, I am happy to say that I am truly "getting it" and finally basking in all that there is to be grateful for in each moment of this little one's life.

I knew this time around would be a little different from the moment our Lord spoke to me in Adoration shortly after I found out I was pregnant again...He was very clear with me about His plans and I have been blessed with this little one ever since. I am so grateful to be aware of what I have, to be appreciating and really ENJOYING who he is already. God never ceases to amaze me in how he can push to me to grow a little more with each child and now I am finally starting to enjoy some of the fruits of our life-giving love.

He's growing so fast...now that I'm becoming mature enough to take it all in, I wish he would slow down a bit and stay awhile with me like this...

2009-02-07T13:42:00.000-08:00

Just a quote to think about...(thanks to Maria from the Mater Amabilis group for mentioning it)

> "God has created a world big enough for all the lives He wishes to be
> born. It is only our hearts that are not big enough to want them and
> accept them. If all the money that is being spent on finding ways to
> kill people was used instead to feed them and house them and educate
> them - how beautiful that would be. We are too often afraid of the
> sacrifices we might have to make. But where there is love, there is
> always sacrifice. And when we love until it hurts, there is joy and
> peace." Mother Theresa

Beautifully said, isn't it?

A Struggling day...

2009-02-05T12:32:00.000-08:00

Today is turning out to be one of those days...one that I wish had started better but didn't and just seems to keep going downhill. Everyone is still getting over a cold, behavior and attitudes have been lacking to say the least- and I'm struggling- struggling with wanting a home of peace and kindness and I can't seem to turn it around today. So I nap everyone (or desperately try to enforce some quiet time in the room of the non-nappers) so I can regain some composure (and give them some rest so they'll finally get better!) I look through my bible for some direction and I come upon this...

"For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on things of the flesh, but those that live according to the Spirit set their minds on things of the Spirit. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God's law, indeed it cannot; and those who are in the flesh cannot please God." Romans 8:5-8

On days like this, where it just seems like I'm laboring so heavily to drag my children into submission and I'm letting it get to me I realize that I am setting my mind on the flesh and not the Spirit. The Spirit is "life and peace" and I'm focused on the world, my timeframe, my expectations for the day, my own sinfulness in that I become impatient and set the mood (good or bad) for my family. I realize I need to rise above the physical difficulty in front of me and dwell in the Spirit, find my peace there...because what I really want is to "please God" as the scripture says and I can't do that dwelling in these moments of the flesh.

So, pray for me, a mother of many little ones, as I strive from this moment on to try to focus on the Spirit and call on Him in my difficult moments of the flesh today.

Blessings,
Kimberly

Our first Snow Day of the Year...

2009-02-03T18:07:00.000-08:00

Well, at least we had one snow day in January!
This was a week or two ago but I still wanted to share the picture :)

Let the Bird Count Begin!

2009-02-01T18:40:00.000-08:00

Nature Study is an important aspect of a Charlotte Mason education...Here are a few quotes from Charlotte Mason on the subject:

Charlotte Mason Quotes---

Nature Study "We are all meant to be naturalists, each in his own degree, and it is inexcusable to live in a world so full of the marvels of plant and animal life and to care for none of these things."

“There is no part of a child's education more important than that he should lay - by his own observation - a wide basis of facts towards scientific knowledge in the future."

"Let them once get in touch with nature and a habit is formed which will be a source of delight and habit through life."

(Quotes provided by Homeschool Curriculum For Life)

So...we are diving into the Great Backyard Bird Count happening Feb. 13th-16th. We are checking out lots of wonderfully engaging books about our feathered friends so that we can learn more for our upcoming bird count. We will be reading, drawing, painting and learning about birds and then helping to count the different species in our area to help with conservation and the study of birds.

The GBBC is an easy and fun way to get some nature study in with the family. We hope to do a bird count at our birdfeeder and also go to the greenway nearby to do another count there (we will be able to see water fowl and other species there that we wouldn't see in our backyard).

Check out this site and gather your kids up to help count the birds!

Great Backyard Bird Count

Blessings,
Kimberly

Starting a blog...

2009-01-29T06:00:00.000-08:00

I've finally gotten around to starting a blog...I've titled it "A Recollected Life

rec⋅ol⋅lect⋅ed

-adjective

calm; composed.
remembered; recalled.
characterized by or given to contemplation.

A recollected life...that's what I hope for. I life that hasn't flown me by without stopping to see the reflection of God in it. I hope to use this little space called a blog to keep my family's sweetest moments- moments that might leave my memory if I didn't take the time to remember them and give thanks for them and place them in this journal to be recalled over time.

At the speed that life moves at, it can be hard to keep up with all the true, lovely and gracious things that come our way so I also hope to keep my lists and thoughts of these inspirational things here- my living books lists, thoughtful quotes, other blogs that help lead us in the beautiful ways of a Charlotte Mason philosophy of education etc.

My theme for this blog is Philippians 4: 8

"Finally brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things."

I hope this blog to be a happy, lovely, gracious little space where I can lay those things that interest me and will be of interest to others as well.

We are a homeschooling family so a large majority of the true, honorable, lovely, excellent things that we will be focusing on will have to do with our learning together at home.

I also realize that not everything about my vocation as a wife and mother is going to seem lovely, pure and excellent so sometimes this blog will just be a chance for me to search for some good in it or to just try to find ways to be grateful in the difficulties.

I hope over time this blog may be a blessing to you as I know it will be for me- an opportunity for me to slow down and reflect on the moments of our family life that reflect the face of God. There are so many lovely and praiseworthy things in our vocations as wives and mothers and hearts of our homes...if only we would gather the
little things up and recollect these things!

Please be patient with me as I will also be patient with myself...having never written a blog before and having recently had our 4th little blessing, it may take me time to get my thoughts together and I may find it incredibly hard to find time to write at all! We'll see how it goes...

Blessings,

Kimberly