Redeming the time

"Being confident in this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ:" Phil. 1:6

"And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap if we faint not." Gal. 6:9

Paul sat on the stairs with a small mountain of clean cloth diapers beside him. It is his job to fold them and put them away. I was folding a not so small mountain of clean clothes next to him and encouraging him along the way. But somehow, Paul kept goofing off and making his job harder by not following the simple directions I gave him. When I spoke firmly to him about finishing his work and not whining about the difficulty, he looked up at me and in a pleading voice said,

"But Mom, you need to train me."

Proverbs says, "Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it." (22:6) That promise motivates me on the days when all the boys seem to do is fight. It challenges me when I want to take the easy road and just put a movie on while I make supper. It encourages me when I hear my son ask for training. For although he does not realize it, he is learning to love listening to Mom and Dad. He values our opinions and wisdom. He needs our counsel. He wants our help. Some will say- "Enjoy it! It is over too soon, he will know everything before you know it. Then there is no need for Mom and Dad"

But I have seen the fruit of good training- I have experienced it. My parents were some of my best friends all through my growing up. I never hit that age when I did not need them. Sure, I wanted to decide things myself after a while, but I wanted their input and their counsel. I knew they had experiences that would help me.

I want that with our boys. Marcus is testing us a lot right now. I pray daily that I do not miss his small attempts to connect with Mom- because I am so busy disciplining his wrong behavior. I want him too- to desire to be trained.

Training- "This is the way we peel a cucumber", "Daddy goes to work for us so we can have a good warm home and good food to eat. He takes goooood care of us.", "No, we don't shoot people, we shoot deer and bears", "No son, we don't hit, now come to Mom...."

It happens if I want it to or not. When having a bad day I blamed my crying on being tired. Now when Paul is having a bad attitude, upon questioning he says- "No I am not pouting, I am just tired."

Please pray the the Lord will strengthen Scott and I to the great task before us. May we train in love and consistency. May we not grow weary in well doing, for in due season we shall reap. We have little souls depending on us.

"Please train us"

Red, white and black
Red, white and black again

Red white and black original! :)

Busy month

January has been a busy month for us. It seemed that we were barely done with Christmas when I was looking at the calender and realizing we were a week into the new year! The Lord has blessed us with good health and we have been able to do some traveling- and hosting friends this month.

The 9th -14th made a trip back to Illinois to visit Scott's family. My family was very sweet and let us borrow their minivan- which made traveling a whole lot nicer. We had a great time with lots of fun memories. Scott asked that I try to get some home video while there, and I was able to catch a lot of great times with their cousins. However, since I was holding the video camera, I did not take hardly any regular pictures.... So I can't show you the wild pillow fights on the blog!

Once home, we were thrilled to have Charity stay with us for a few days. The boys love having any of their aunts or uncles with them and I enjoyed having a great helper around!

I also got a special treat when my friend Ruth was in the area for a day. It was great to have another adult to talk to- (Scott gets a little board with talking about recipes and sewing:) and I hope I did not talk her ear off! Thanks for coming Ruth!

Playing piano with Aunt Charity

Take care Ruth!

A gift from Grandma Sue- Bunk beds! (Or as Marcus calls them, "bunk-heads". He always hits his head on the ceiling when we help him on top and laughs and says "bunk-heads", like that is why they gave it the name.... so funny!)

Just chilling out....

See ya later alligator!

Paul's 3rd birthday

Paul was very excited about his birthday. I guess I should say he was really excited about his birthday cake. The rest of the birthday was not that big a deal to him! :) The problem was, he kept changing what kind of cake he wanted every day. Turns out he is a lot like his Mom was when she was younger. It does not matter what the cake tastes like, just what it LOOKS like. The more icing and sprinkles the better! In the end we had chocolate-chocolate chip cake- with no fun frosting, but really fun candles. Here is the birthday boy after helping make his cake- notice the brown glow about his face?
Tangerine spritzer never tasted so fancy

Paul picked his meal- Deer steaks, home made french fries and cooked carrots.

He was shocked that you get presents on your birthday too!

Mom and Dad got one big present this year- a police duplo set. He really enjoys it.

In other news- Philip got his first hair cut, and tried rice cereal in the same week!

Not so sure about that cereal- it's fun to have in my mouth, but I hate the feeling of it going down my throat.

And the big highlight for Dad and Paul- January 2cd, Scott went hunting on a friends local ground and shot a doe. Paul was able to go with him for the hunt and really enjoyed being with Dad!

Christmas pictures....

December was a busy month for us- filled with great memories and good times. We really enjoyed hosting friends in mid December for a time of Christmas carols and fellowship. Then the count down to Christmas. The boys loved the Christmas decorations and Paul was super excited that we had lights on the OUTSIDE of our house. Philip is such a happy guy
A favorite activity- telling the nativity story with their own "people"

Christmas morning

We have to eat breakfast first!

The boys love fruit

Marcus with his new tool bench

Paul was very excited about his new pistol guns

New books

Paul with his new guns- ready to ride :)

Marcus is perfectly happy with the cast off gun and car.

Christmas evening we headed up to my folks for a short visit. We stayed through Friday and came home Friday night. We LOVE going to Papa and Nana's house and had a great time. It was especially wonderful because the Shepards were up as well and we were all together as a family.

Friday some of us girls decided to have some fun with the makeup that one of my sisters got for Christmas.

Something did not look right.... :)

Concentrating really hard

Plenty of choices

Yes, Tabitha trusted her face to me!

Nana loves to watch her grand babies.

Rebecca and Andrew- can you believe they have been married over 5 years?

We also enjoyed exchanging gifts- I think this was for Philip, not PapaNoah and Marcus

Micah and Paul

This was the first year Paul was not going to have the Ulmers with him for his birthday- So the birthday cousins (Paul on Dec. 30 and Justice on Jan.5) had a early celebration with Papa and Nana.

We love Papa!

We had a wonderful holiday. We love and miss you Ulmers and Shepards!