Jarvis

Jacob is 7 and completely obsessed with all things robotic and anything with an on/off switch essentially. His poor head almost exploded last night when the neighbor came over trying to sell "transformers" in his garage sell (electrical...not Optimus Prime). Major disappointment. But this birthday present was a jackpot, build-it-yourself robotic arm!

It's name is Jarvis and Jake really did build it with minor help from Dad.

LOL Means Locks of Love

Is is weird that I almost cried?

Happy Birthday Uncle Moses!

So you didn't join the most musical of families but...

I Heart Libby

More Pinterest addictive behaviours...

Grls Kep Owt!

Myth: Corelle Doesn't Break Fact: That is a Lie

You may remember my January 2009 expose on the shocking truth about Willow Tree figurines. My fast-paced and far-reaching journalistic career continues in this exposure of Corelle and the lie they've sold hard-working Americans for over 40 years (yeah, I checked that fact).

My Neighborhood Dealer

Do you have friends that scour the world for addictive behaviours and then pawn them off on you? They give you a little taste and then all of a sudden you need this thing. You think you can quit anytime but now you do it during free time, you sneak out of chores to get a quick fix, you take it with you in case you have a chance and there's a long line a Walmart or between Sunday school and church or... You know that point when you aren't ready to admit you have a problem... Thanks anonymous friend for selling your Pinterest wares on my block.

I'm not going to try and explain what Pinterest is but if you are looking for a new fix, and you're female, this will do it. I've convinced myself I don't have a problem as long as I'm using the ideas I find. This was the first we did: rock candy!

Emily Ain't No Moore

That's Texan for "my sister got married and has a new last name." Isn't she the prettiest? Love you Emmy!

And the Geek Goes On...

Maggie takes on Northern Africa

Jake and the Middle East (which includes the country Lemon instead of Yemen)

Dan the Reluctant and Northern...Central...no Eastern Europe

And the Libster with the Horn of Africa

1 Down, 119 To Go

Jacob just lost his first tooth! He's quite proud, got it out by gnawing on a ribbon that was tied to a balloon. No, I don't know why he was doing that but I'm thrilled I wasn't involved. Now only 119 more baby teeth to go and our jobs as parents will be done right?

Epic Fail

Do you ever get this big plan to make an epic dinner of epic epicness and it is an epic failure? I've been having great success with summer stuff like this:

and then I tried to sneak back in the kitchen and make an "intermediate" level lemon cake by Paula Deen. I'm pretty sure she just put this recipe up to assert her cooking dominance over the common housewife by putting up a recipe that's impossible. I was trying to be this wonderful Betty Crocker wife for Erik's birthday and instead of a fluffy lemon cake he got salvaged-lemon-cake-turned-parfait disaster. Thanks Paula. I thought we were friends, joined with the bonds of butter obsession and now you gotta go and be like this with the impossible, self esteem ruining recipe. Thanks.

The Perks of Growing Up in SoCal

One big perk would be having your birthday party on a beach in Malibu, complete with sunbathing and a sandcastle-building contest. Daniel told us something was "totally awesome" the other day and we both shivered a bit. As much fun as California is I think we're still more comfortable with "y'all's" and "howdy" than "totally awesome." We happily welcome all Texas relatives to come give the kids regular doses of West Texas Twang and East Texas Drawl. We were so totally excited that Erik's mom came out in June and did a totally wonderful, epic, insert additional superlative job helping us love babies...at the beach.

'Tis the Season...

...to pick cherries! I don't like cherries and I certainly don't like cobbler but since Father's
Day falls at the opening of cherry season and Erik actually likes that stuff, we picked cherries. And I was reminded of the concrete thinking process of the children as I peered in their buckets to find that they interpreted my "Try them first to see if they are good!" comment to mean "Take a bite out of EVERY cherry before you put it in your bucket." I am again amazed at my ability and gift with words to motivate.

Libby of Green Gables

After calling Libby "Adelheid" for a while we have finally retired the moniker, to her delight, and have decided she must be a kindred spirit with Anne of Green Gables. I've been torturing the boys by reading the Anne books for a couple of months now. They scowl and fuss, the 2 year-olds roam about like scavenging wolves on a seek and destroy mission and Libby sits primly in her pearls and smock dress with contented sighs and dreamy eyes while she imagines herself with puffed sleeves.
Our Libby-girl has been growing again and has decided to turn 4 even though I ordered her not to. But as Anne says, "You'd find it easier to be bad than good if you had red hair...people who haven't red hair don't know what trouble is." I've also decided that I cannot handle 6 birthday parties a year and we will be substituting a special "birthday date" for the lucky child according to their particular interests in lieu of a party. When asked what she would like to do, Libby decided a fancy dinner at a restaurant was in order. And not only that but she wanted both of us to wear jewelry and a fancy dress and she wanted Daddy to wear a suit and "shave his pokies (beard)."
And that's what she got and he did pass her thorough inspection, although she told Erik he looked funny as soon as he shaved.

Someone else was a bit jealous...

Another Year Down

We have officially survived Year Two of homeschooling and still like it. Jacob finished up first grade by showing us how to diagram a sentence while Dan finished kindergarten by explaining some intense math facts and both demonstrated their mad geography skillz. Next year we add on Libby and I double my Starbucks budget.

We help Daddy

With Mommy away, everybody has to pull their load. Just like in the book...


And helping Daddy means that you get to do a lot of things...
Like laundry...

Or getting dressed...

Or cleaning up around the house...

And that can be exhausting!

So come home soon Mommy!

Disclaimer: No children were harmed in the filming of this blog post. But a woodpecker was defeathered.

Children = Manipulators

I may have once daydreamed about how I would be the perfect Mom, anticipating their every need and stage of development so as to prevent any rough patches, thereby carefully and lovingly raising perfect children. Now we have 6 children and reality has set in. They are manipulative little...gems. I make perfectly delicious and nutritious meals and I get screaming, wailing, teeth-gnashing and this.

I strive to fulfill their lives with classical, Christian home education and I end up negotiating with a 6 year-old to finish his fact sheet by allowing this.

My initial plan was so brilliant. Where did I go wrong?

My Mothers' Day Present Sucks

Let me open by saying I'm an intensely practical and "thrifty" person. Thrifty is in quotes because some others would be tempted to put stronger words there. I think they are jealous because I can make a pair of shoes last 6 years when they were designed to last one. The utilitarian, first-born side of me struggles with superfluous things like nick-nacks, jewelry and shoes aren't black/white/brown. I may not be there but I hear the feminine gasps as they desperately search for a dislike button or any way to voice their desire to burn the gender-traitor at the stake. And since I've already painted myself into the corner I might as well boldly proclaim a few more of my errant, heathen thoughts. I don't understand why places like See's Candy even exist. Why spend $40 on a box of mystery chocolate when Snicker's Bars cost $0.50 and are perfectly delightful?


So I married a man who agrees with me. I broke him of his societally-taught need to spend $5.00 on a piece of folded cardstock with a cheesy poem in it on special occasions. It has been years since any designer chocolate entered our dwelling and don't get me started on "made-for Mother's-Day" diamond heart pendants. Last year around this time he gave me a gym membership because he knew that's what I wanted. This year he gave me a vacuum cleaner because he knew it's what I wanted. I adore you Erik, and your sucky gift!


And because I'm not a total revolutionary or feminist I gladly allowed the boys to choose and prepare my Mothers' Day feast.

O-bla-di, o-bla-da...

I waited to write until I thought I could do it with minimal bitterness showing through the cracks via sarcasm and general snarkiness. Our little 6 month old buddy went to live with his birth father on Monday and our 2 month old will probably be leaving soon too. It will be easier to send the little guy off because we know the situation, but with our older guy we don't know enough of what God is doing to understand.


But I believe in an almighty God who is sovereign over all things, even judges and social workers and He has allowed this. Now it's my turn to trust and obey. Sometimes I do better at that than others. Yesterday I yelled at someone else's little girl in the McDonald's playground (she was up in the play structure) because she looked and was dressed like Libby, who I had called down, but didn't see because she was standing behind me while I berated a stranger's child. Way to go Super Christian!


I also want to berate every person who tells me they've thought about doing foster care but couldn't do it because they would get too attached to the kids. Why are we so comfortable with safe, easy, non-messy ministry but turn our backs on the blaring, gut-wrenching work that stares at the church undone? I absolutely know not everyone is called to this and therefore they shouldn't do this and alot of people say that just to fill the awkward lulls that happens sometimes but, I beg you, don't say it to me this week.

But life goes on. We are going back on the list and we'll sign up to do this again and again and again until God calls us to quit. I rejoice that I can be His hands and feet in loving these little ones, even if my heart gets broken in the process. Meanwhile, it's baseball season. And I want to laugh so Go my favorite sports team, go! Score a goal unit! Go get a snowcone...

Hypothermi-a-thon

Thank you to all of you who made donations to Child S.H.A.R.E. as Erik ran the LA Marathon on Sunday. 26.2 miles of goodness! We are so proud of him because not only did he run 26.2 miles, he did it in the most ridiculous weather Southern California could have come up with for the first day of spring. Here and here are some quick articles to sum it up. This picture sums up what the kids thought of it. The babies definitely had the best seats.Still wish I had a picture of the foot long string of snot hanging out of Daniel's nose that a kind grandmotherly stranger walked up and cleaned for me but I was too worried for my precious camera's safety since buckets of water were falling from the sky. Maggie is quite proud of Daddy's medal and is quick to tell you that he ran for her! I didn't get a good pre-race picture because he left the room at 4:20 am but this is what the ride home looked like!

So...anyone game for next year?

Running for Maggie

This is our daughter Maggie. Child S.H.A.R.E., an organization founded in 1985 to challenge and equip local congregations to recruit and support foster and adoptive families, helped us adopt her into our home. In gratitude for their wonderful help, Erik is running the LA Marathon on March 20th.

There are currently more than 20,000 children in foster care who need families in LA County ALONE.

Support children in foster care by sponsoring Erik in his LA Marathon run. Donating through this site is simple, fast, and totally secure. To go to the secure donations page, click here. Please remember that no donation is too small and every dollar helps to bring a child closer to finding a home.

'Cuz We Know How to Party

This is how we get ready for a hard night of partying...every night. I bet even frat boys would have a hard time topping that.

We're Gonna Need A Bigger Everything

In one month we have gone from a family of 6 to a family of 8. You should see the stats on the rapid decline in sleep that has come with that! As usual we can't put the little guys pictures up but they are adorable and all the big brothers and sisters are extra proud. And my wardrobe now has these stylish embellishments...

6:30 am

This is what 6:30 am looks like at my house. Every day. In case you are wondering, he's a knight/Viking. How To Train Your Dragon has been a HUGE hit around here and we're really not sure how to contain this much raw Vikingness.
Erik told him dragons were real and they were called dinosaurs and Jacob has not been able to filter in the extinct thing and filter out the lack of fire-breathing/boiling-water-spewing/bone-napping. This is real. This is serious. Very dangerous, kill on sight. Unless it's a Night Fury, then do not engage.