We have lots of stuffs going on around our little Winter Wonderland. The Fall is always a great time of year for our family. I was thinking back on why I have such lovey dovey feelings come Autumn and I think it is because for so many years Mike and I were welcoming babies into our family. All our kids are born in the Fall and it just makes the season seems that much more lovely. I love it!
Speaking of birthdays, we just celebrated Macey’s 9th with a fantastic, old fashioned party. Mike came up with all these really challenging games for the kids to play, with teams and prizes et all. Everyone had a blast. She’s our middle child so it was fun to spoil her. The other kids were a little jealous! which usually doesn’t happen with Macey. 
We are getting ready to celebrate Ansen’s 4th birthday in 2 weeks. We are going down to the San Diego Model Train Museum in Balboa Park. Ansen is passionately in love with trains so my mom rented a room in the museum for a couple hours to bring all his buddies down to celebrate. It’s going to be awesome. Sierra’s next with the big 13 and Nadine will finish us up in December. Never mind Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas!!!!
Our kids are growing up so fast, hard to believe our baby is nearly 4. They are shaping up to be kind, generous and good natured people… people who think and say the funniest things…
Ava and I were chatting and she says “I wish Jonah (our puppy) could read.” “Why’s that?” say I. “Then we could send him an email.” That is the world she is growing up in. It is fathomable to her that we could send our dog an email if only he could read.
I have been holding off on buying the kids new cereal until the ones already bought get eaten up. The stragglers are Honey Bunches of Oats and Raisin Bran. I was telling Ansen that we are not getting new cereal until the ones we have are gone and he says “Oh, I gotta eat Raisin Branch?” Poor kid probably thinks that’s what that cereal is made of!
For our Friday night movie night our family watched the greatest movie ever, Ironman. Mike and I had seen it in the theater and I was so excited to watch it again. Even with 5 kiddies. No one like to sit by Ava when we watch movies because she is such a yakkety yakker. I was blessed to be Ava’s choice of bedfellows. So I am gently telling her to zip it for about an hour when I agitatedly say “Ava. I cannot listen to you and the movie!” She looks at me, rolls her eyes a little and says ‘You do have two ears.” I think she really believes that. That I have two ears and should be able to listen to her and whatever else at the same time. Poor moms. Never a break in a kid thinking you are not giving enough. 
Sierra asked me to cut bangs into her hair. I am not a hairstylist. Not by any stretch of the imagination. So I am protesting and balking forever, it seems, when finally I take the scissors and CHOP right through her hair. It was the weirdest feeling and I IMMEDIATELY regretted doing it. She looks at me and then her hair and a pale shock creeps over her face as we both stand there in stunned disbelief of what just transpired. One more look in the mirror and then the tears… and then the shouts that I ruined her hair… then Mike looking at me like it has to be impossible that I just caused this disaster. I didn’t know what to do. It looked a little off, but not horrible. So I apologized profusely and promised to make an appointment with our REAL hairstylist Tera so she could fix what I had done. About an hour later she came to me and said she loved me and that it really wasn’t that bad. About an hour after that she had parted the bangs on the other side and came down stairs jumping up and down hailing me as a ‘genius’ (HER WORDS!) She has a way with hair and clothes and makeup and ended up making the whole thing work fabulously. She looked great and even I thought I had done well!
The last example is a great theme song, if you will, for what I am facing as a mother of a teenage daughter. Lots of highs and lows ahead of us. I’m getting ample opportunity to trust God and believe in myself as her parent. I do not want to be a finicky friend-mom who can’t stick to her guns and gets just as emotional as the child when faced with the struggles that plague the teenage years. I guarantee I will NEVER cut her hair again, but I know there will be things I do that annoy, frustrate and irritate the child to no end and that’s where my bond with the Lord has to be rock solid in all circumstances. Mike is my greatest human resource in all these things and I can not imagine raising these kids without his wisdom and gentleness. I am thankful to have a partner who cares as much as I do and who is much wiser than I. I am looking forward to being in touch with what it means to have God guiding your life and following his ways in all situations. I believe he can get me and Mike through these teenage years with all our kids not only not pregnant or drug free but with our hearts and souls and minds and relationships in tact. I trust God to make the investment Mike and I are making into our kids into a return beyond any other, a harvest of souls committed to the Lord. That is my hope and aim. God gives me so much more hope than a satisfactory life. I trust in the abundant life. Even with teenagers in it.
A little above all the heavy stuff of raising kids is looking forward to the Pumpkin Patch and Halloween. After taking one year out of the last 9 off, we are having our neighborhood over for our famous Chili dinner and the kids already have their costumes together. We are a creative group of people and our costumes reflect it this year. I’ll post pix when it gets closer! And of the puppy and Ava’s party and Macey’s and Ansen’s when it goes down…
Love to you all and Happy Fall!
