I'll have to take a new photo of him after his nap. What a blessing this little guy is to our family!
Blessings,
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
David...
My new little guy just rolled over today! I can't believe how fast he is growing. He's now almost 14 weeks old and quite the sweetie. He loves to be held and talked to. At 14 lbs, he's also getting pretty heavy. He has such a sweet temperment and has captivated all the other kids. Lately, he's been letting Genevieve put him to sleep.
I'll have to take a new photo of him after his nap. What a blessing this little guy is to our family!
Blessings,
I'll have to take a new photo of him after his nap. What a blessing this little guy is to our family!
Blessings,
Monday, June 14, 2010
A Portrait of Allison
Here are some photos that played during the reception...
Allison brand new...
First Christmas...
2years...
4 years...
7 years...
9 years...
10 years...
13 years...
15 years...
17 years...
18 years...
blessings,
Allison brand new...
First Christmas...
2years...
4 years...
7 years...
9 years...
10 years...
13 years...
15 years...
17 years...
18 years...
blessings,
Our Graduate!
On Saturday, we graduated our very first young adult. What a blessing Allison is! We have our Father in Heaven to thank for who she is and how she's turned out. Here are some photos of the graduation ceremony...
Dh, me and Allison posing beforehand...
This is when the announcer said that Allison went to Niagara on a mission trip to teach people how to swim...lol
Eric and I handing her her diploma and moving her tassel...
The throwing of the caps...
Here's Allison's display at the reception...
Blessings,
Dh, me and Allison posing beforehand...
This is when the announcer said that Allison went to Niagara on a mission trip to teach people how to swim...lol
Eric and I handing her her diploma and moving her tassel...
The throwing of the caps...
Here's Allison's display at the reception...
Blessings,
Tuesday, June 08, 2010
Our new adventure...
Four years ago God put it on my heart to get out of debt. At the time, it was just a dream. We've never really been good with money. Well, I should say, I'VE never been real good with money. My poor dear husband should get some kind of medal for living with me all these years. lol I was in charge of our banking and really, my budgeting was to spend until we ran out. O.k. honestly, sometimes my budgeting was to spend until we were in debt up to our eyeballs. I mean, we could just pay it off, right? Right? cough, cough.
riiiiiight.
Well, four years ago, I decided I'd just use our tax return money to pay off our debt and we'd be done with it once and for all. I mean, how hard could it be to stay within our means? Yikes! From then on has been quite the learning experience. We have seen God's hand in all this many times. Like when both cars needed new brakes and new tires all in that first year and we had NO savings at all. We still managed to stay out of debt that first year without a safety net of any kind. The next year when we didn't have to use our tax refund for debt was amazing! But. But, I still didn't really know much about budgeting. Every year, we'd get to the end of the year and it was only by God's grace that we'd make it debt free.
Well, this year we've decided to step things up a notch. We've cut everything that isn't necessary and are saving whatever we can over this next year. We're also going to fix up our home and next year...
We're putting it up for sale! We are going to try to sell it and buy something completely with cash only! We have a lot of work to do. First off, we need to sell about half of everything we own. The new home will probably be much smaller than what we have now. We also need to fix up the house. There are a lot of things needing fixing. We'll be...
1. painting the hallway, two bathrooms, one bedroom and maybe the outside of the house
2. finish the trim work around the tile job we did last year
3. fix up our front yard, we lost a lot of grass with this last winter
4. fix up the back yard, it's a mess
5. replace the carpeting, it's original to the house and quite yucky
6. recaulk the bathrooms
7. replace two windows
It's a tall order but we're hoping that once we finish and sell this home, we'll never owe anyone anything ever again.
The hardest part for me will be selling everything. It's overwhelming to think about! I do know that it will be worth it though. I was reading Knock off Wood yesterday and she said something that really hit home to me. She said, "The greatest challenge in making my home look attractive is keeping it clean." My home will never look good if I can't keep up with the mess. So now, I'll be releasing all this stuff out into the world and I'll be making my job easier.
We're also under attack. This year has been hard. Many things have happened that have tried to make us go off track but we are trying to stay firm in this adventure even when hard things fall onto our path. Right now, I am without a vehicle. My poor old truck is in dire straits and we just don't have the money to throw at it. We are hoping to save enough to fix it but for now, I'll be content to stay home. I won't talk about the other things but lets just say there is no doubt that someone would love to see us fail. Only by God's grace will we succeed. I will rest in His promises.
Our hope, is to be able to use our money for God, instead of junk from now on.
Blessings,
riiiiiight.
Well, four years ago, I decided I'd just use our tax return money to pay off our debt and we'd be done with it once and for all. I mean, how hard could it be to stay within our means? Yikes! From then on has been quite the learning experience. We have seen God's hand in all this many times. Like when both cars needed new brakes and new tires all in that first year and we had NO savings at all. We still managed to stay out of debt that first year without a safety net of any kind. The next year when we didn't have to use our tax refund for debt was amazing! But. But, I still didn't really know much about budgeting. Every year, we'd get to the end of the year and it was only by God's grace that we'd make it debt free.
Well, this year we've decided to step things up a notch. We've cut everything that isn't necessary and are saving whatever we can over this next year. We're also going to fix up our home and next year...
We're putting it up for sale! We are going to try to sell it and buy something completely with cash only! We have a lot of work to do. First off, we need to sell about half of everything we own. The new home will probably be much smaller than what we have now. We also need to fix up the house. There are a lot of things needing fixing. We'll be...
1. painting the hallway, two bathrooms, one bedroom and maybe the outside of the house
2. finish the trim work around the tile job we did last year
3. fix up our front yard, we lost a lot of grass with this last winter
4. fix up the back yard, it's a mess
5. replace the carpeting, it's original to the house and quite yucky
6. recaulk the bathrooms
7. replace two windows
It's a tall order but we're hoping that once we finish and sell this home, we'll never owe anyone anything ever again.
The hardest part for me will be selling everything. It's overwhelming to think about! I do know that it will be worth it though. I was reading Knock off Wood yesterday and she said something that really hit home to me. She said, "The greatest challenge in making my home look attractive is keeping it clean." My home will never look good if I can't keep up with the mess. So now, I'll be releasing all this stuff out into the world and I'll be making my job easier.
We're also under attack. This year has been hard. Many things have happened that have tried to make us go off track but we are trying to stay firm in this adventure even when hard things fall onto our path. Right now, I am without a vehicle. My poor old truck is in dire straits and we just don't have the money to throw at it. We are hoping to save enough to fix it but for now, I'll be content to stay home. I won't talk about the other things but lets just say there is no doubt that someone would love to see us fail. Only by God's grace will we succeed. I will rest in His promises.
Our hope, is to be able to use our money for God, instead of junk from now on.
Blessings,
How do my children grow...
Quickly. lol.
Sophia 3 years
Isaac 5 years
Genevieve 7.5 years
David 12 weeks
Jon 16 years
Sophia and David having a *moment*
Allison 18 years
Blessings,
Sophia 3 years
Isaac 5 years
Genevieve 7.5 years
David 12 weeks
Jon 16 years
Sophia and David having a *moment*
Allison 18 years
Blessings,
The Final Road to College...
This will be my final Road to College post. At least for this particular graduate. (Who knows, I may revive it in two years when my second student is ready to leave the nest.)
Allison 2010 Graduation Photos
God has abundantly blessed us with an amazingly wonderful young lady! After 13 years of work, our daughter has turned in her last assignment and will graduate. Pretty cool.
Some things that I've learned from this experience. If your student doesn't know what they want to be, maybe you should skip the whole college mess and just enroll them into a Community College. That is just what we've done. After all the work, she just wanted to continue next door. She's made so many wonderful friends there and she loves most of her teachers. You really can't beat that. She's been promoted at her work and that will allow her to completely pay for her college without debt, which was something that we, her Dad and Mom, really wanted for her. It's a real blessing. It's also wonderful that we'll get two more years with her. After that, she's considering going to a local 4 year college and either commuting or living on campus and working close to school. Either way, she'll be able to pay for her whole college experience without debt and is hoping to pursue a degree in teaching, so that she can become a missionary. We are amazed at where the Lord has lead our daughter!
Another thing we learned, we're starting in 11th grade for our next kids.LOL We're already in the process of enrolling Jon at the local CC for dual enrollment and he will be able to get very close to his AA degree before graduating. (We won't want him to get it because that would interfere with getting scholarships.) It will save him tons on his schooling.
Is there anything that I will do differently with the little kids? Yes.
1. I will make things more fun. They are only young once and the hard stuff comes fast enough without me rushing them into it.
2. I will spend even MORE time on things that they are interested in. No one looks at their younger years, so do we really need to follow a traditional school subject list? No. BUT if they can find their passion in life along with a love for learning, they'll do just fine.
3. I will only do 2 years of highschool with my next batch of kids. The next two years will be for dual-enrollment. They'll have plenty of credits for graduation and it'll give me a break. It'll also give them a chance to get used to college before they have to take a full schedule.
4. I'll make sure that they have many opportunities to serve inside and outside of our home.
So that's it. I hope these posts have helped. I know that I've learned so much over the past year and almost look forward to doing this again in two years.
Blessings,
Allison 2010 Graduation Photos
God has abundantly blessed us with an amazingly wonderful young lady! After 13 years of work, our daughter has turned in her last assignment and will graduate. Pretty cool.
Some things that I've learned from this experience. If your student doesn't know what they want to be, maybe you should skip the whole college mess and just enroll them into a Community College. That is just what we've done. After all the work, she just wanted to continue next door. She's made so many wonderful friends there and she loves most of her teachers. You really can't beat that. She's been promoted at her work and that will allow her to completely pay for her college without debt, which was something that we, her Dad and Mom, really wanted for her. It's a real blessing. It's also wonderful that we'll get two more years with her. After that, she's considering going to a local 4 year college and either commuting or living on campus and working close to school. Either way, she'll be able to pay for her whole college experience without debt and is hoping to pursue a degree in teaching, so that she can become a missionary. We are amazed at where the Lord has lead our daughter!
Another thing we learned, we're starting in 11th grade for our next kids.LOL We're already in the process of enrolling Jon at the local CC for dual enrollment and he will be able to get very close to his AA degree before graduating. (We won't want him to get it because that would interfere with getting scholarships.) It will save him tons on his schooling.
Is there anything that I will do differently with the little kids? Yes.
1. I will make things more fun. They are only young once and the hard stuff comes fast enough without me rushing them into it.
2. I will spend even MORE time on things that they are interested in. No one looks at their younger years, so do we really need to follow a traditional school subject list? No. BUT if they can find their passion in life along with a love for learning, they'll do just fine.
3. I will only do 2 years of highschool with my next batch of kids. The next two years will be for dual-enrollment. They'll have plenty of credits for graduation and it'll give me a break. It'll also give them a chance to get used to college before they have to take a full schedule.
4. I'll make sure that they have many opportunities to serve inside and outside of our home.
So that's it. I hope these posts have helped. I know that I've learned so much over the past year and almost look forward to doing this again in two years.
Blessings,
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