Feeding an 8 month old

How do you teach a big baby how to eat? I exclusively breastfed him longer than my other babies, and now he seems to have no interest in it! I am sure there is no hurry with trying to feed him, but sometimes I think it would be nice, just so he's not so attached to me, especially if I want to leave him somewhere for a short while.

Are we ready to try again?

Ugh-argh-grah

Chew and swallow it, baby.

It's yummy banana!

O well; I guess we'll try again in a few more days; for now, you can keep on being my little sucker, I actually don't mind it...

Springtime!

Ahh good old spring... Make that-- good new spring!

And that means, dandelions, beautiful dandelions all over the yard! I don't have time to plant flowers, but I don't need to! They grow naturally and don't need any care, and you can't say that for all other beautiful flowers out there!

And how about some robin eggs; much to the children's delight we found these in the grass when we went to the see Dixie. (our horse)

And apple blossoms; hmmm, breathe deeply and dream of all the apples I will be faced with come fall, and all the apple sauce, cider, pies, dried apples...never mind, back to spring! Apple blossoms with violets in my daughter's hand. How springy is that...

Tea Party with my princess!

Jessica loves tea parties. So she asked me a few times lately when can we have a tea party?. I knew I had to make time for her, especially since she is the only girl in the family, and boys somehow just don't make quite the best companions for tea parties. So, into the attic we went, digging through our boxes of stuff, ans sure enough, we found everything we needed for a fine little party.

Much to my shame, I realized some of the dishes I had had for over 10 years, but never used them what they were made for! Well, no better time than right now to make good use of them. When we were eating and enjoying our little party, we talked about it and she remarked, But we don't have lots of time to have tea parties, right?

I felt like I had been hit on the head! Here my girlie thought Mommy was too busy to have tea parties with her! What a shame! I told her no, I am not too busy, and that I will make more time to do this kind of thing with her.

It was the best thing to do on a rainy day! And am looking forward to doing this again soon....

Mommy, don't forget Jesus!

Joseph told me recently, "There are 6 people in our family." Thinking he might have miscounted, I replied, "no, there are only 5." He then said, "no, Jesus is in our family too. Don't forget Him!" I felt so humiliated! Yes, of course HE is in our family, and I am so happy that I have a 4 year old to remind me of this!I took this photo yesterday when I found him sleeping on this blanket close to the garden. He wasn't feeling too well. It warmed my heart to see him lying there, a sick little boy with a dirty face and a dandelion in his hand...

Joseph and his woodpile

When Daddy was gone to Belize for his grandfather's funeral a while back, I told Joseph to bring in some wood and fill up the woodbox and maybe we could surprise Daddy. It was close to the time he should have been home, so Joseph said he would carry in wood until Daddy came. I thought, ok. Well, here he carries in load after load, and daddy still is not home. I said he could stop if he wanted to, but no, he wanted to keep it up. So he carried and carried, until he had this huge pile inside and had carried wood for over an hour. Finally he gave up, and of course Daddy showed up soon after the last piece of wood came in, but boy, he sure was surprised! I am not sure I could have carried all that myself, at least not so happily as he did.