Family Fun Saturday

We had a very fun and busy day today.  Cooper and Nathan are now taking karate on Saturday mornings.  Also, Cooper and Kindle started rehearsals this morning for the Nutcracker.  They will be in the Nutcracker on December 17 & 18 at Reinhardt University.  They are really excited.  Cooper will be a soldier again this year and Kindle will be a mouse.

Cooper as a soldier last year.

Kindle as a snowflurry last year.

After rehearsals, we headed out to the land to see my parent's house.  We were curious to see the progress being made.  The kids were so tickled to discover how much had been done.

The framers were up there working on the house while we were there.  The kids were tickled about that also.  Nathan and the older 4 went inside (see photo above) and even went up the stairs to the 2nd floor.

 
Nathan wanted to check on the deer stand that he, my Dad and his brother, Michael, have been working on.

This deer stand is 15 feet tall.  He is adding a railing so it will be safer for Cooper.

Here is the view of my parent's house from the top of the deer stand.

The kids had a lot of fun throwing rocks and getting all dusty while Nathan was checking on the deer stand [no photos because Nathan obviously took the camera to get these photos].

After we went to the land, we headed to Dellinger Park in Cartersville.  The kids had a great time on the playground.  One of the great things about my kids is that they are very outgoing.  They made friends with all of the kids and played hide-n-go-seek and tag with them.

Grant counting

Kindle hiding

Celeste went on the slide over and over again.  She also figured out how to hang from the top of the slide.  She was so proud of how strong she was.  She had a wonderful time.

Gunnar hung out with me in the sling.  Nathan captured this photo of Gunnar and I.  

Cooper was too busy for a good photo of him at the park.  I *tried* to capture one, but he was always moving and never looking at the camera.  Oh well :)

We concluded the evening with Mexican for dinner and a little Super Mario Bros. on the Wii.  We had an awesome, fun-filled day together.

Breaking Free & Mighty to Save

We had a super busy day today.  We took baths, did school, put the kids down for early naps, took Kindle to ballet and went to a friend's house so she could meet Gunnar.  Whew!  It was a long time in the car for the little ones, but we survived.

The older 4 watching TV after their baths.

Celeste right before bedtime.  She told me "No more pictures, Mommy!"

Tonight, I am starting Beth Moore's bible study on Breaking Free.  My friend, Candra, and I are doing it together remotely since she is in Ohio till Thanksgiving.  I am really excited because I have never done a women's bible study before.  Lots of people have recommended the Breaking Free bible study to me, so I can't wait!











All day, I have had the song Mighty to Save by Hillsong United stuck in my head.  If you are not familiar with it.  Here are the lyrics:


Everyone needs compassion,
Love that's never failing;
Let mercy fall on me.

Everyone needs forgiveness,
The kindness of a Saviour;
The Hope of nations.

Saviour, He can move the mountains,
My God is Mighty to save,
He is Mighty to save.

Forever, Author of salvation,
He rose and conquered the grave,
Jesus conquered the grave.

So take me as You find me,
All my fears and failures,
Fill my life again.

I give my life to follow
Everything I believe in,
Now I surrender.

My Saviour, He can move the mountains,
My God is Mighty to save,
He is Mighty to save.
Forever, Author of salvation,
He rose and conquered the grave,
Jesus conquered the grave. 

Shine your light and let the whole world see,
We're singing for the glory of the risen King...Jesus (x2)

My Saviour, He can move the mountains,
My God is Mighty to save,
He is Mighty to save.
Forever, Author of salvation,
He rose and conquered the grave,
Jesus conquered the grave. 

My Saviour, you can move the mountains,
You are mighty to save,
You are mighty to save.
Forever, Author of Salvation,
You rose and conquered the grave,
Yes you conquered the grave

I wanted to see where the term "mighty to save" was found in the Bible and I found this verse.

Zephaniah 3:17 (New International Version)

 ¹⁷ The LORD your God is with you,
       he is mighty to save.
       He will take great delight in you,
       he will quiet you with his love,
       he will rejoice over you with singing.


I hope this encourages some of you as it has encouraged me today.

Saturday's Activities and Cooper Leads His First Bible Study

Yesterday, we had a super busy day so I was unable to blog.  I took Kindle to ballet to do a make up class because of Labor Day on Monday.  Then, I went to a scrapbooking crop at Amber's House.  I spent a lot of the time picking out the items I want to order from the new catalog from Creative Memories.  I can't wait to get some of the cool papers and stickers.  Nathan watched the children, so I was by myself.  Woo Hoo!

Then, we went to dinner with our friends, Isaac and Josette.  It was Isaac's birthday yesterday and Josette's a couple of weeks ago.  My Mom watched the older 4 so we just had Gunnar.  We ate at Village Tavern in Alpharetta.  I got the Chicken Marsala.  It was very, very yummy!

Josette & Isaac

Gunnar did extremely well.  He didn't make a peep.  I thought for sure he would fall asleep, but he stayed awake the whole time.  I guess he didn't want to miss out on any of the excitement.

We had a great time!

This morning, Nathan was leading worship at our church.  When he leads worship, I usually stay at home since I am nursing and end up watching all of the kids in the nursing Mom's room while he is singing.  Typically the church offers free live webstreaming, so we watch Nathan sing from home.  It is great because I can nurse and put Gunnar down for a nap while the kids and I are worshipping.  This morning, however, the webstreaming wasn't working.  We were pretty bummed.  We ended up turning on a couple Hillsong songs and we worshipped to that instead.  Most mornings, we do that as a family (we just change up our song list) so the kids were okay with doing that.  Usually after we listen to worship music, we will do a quick bible study together.  Nathan typically picks a verse or two to read to the kids.  Then, we talk about how it practically applies to their lives.  We have gone through Proverbs and gone over most of the more popular bible stories as well as several other verses.  This morning, Cooper asked if he could lead bible study so I said sure.  He got his Bible out and shared these verses with us:

Philippians 2:14-15

 ¹⁴Do everything without complaining or arguing, ¹⁵so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe

Colossians 3:23

  ²³Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men

Ephesians 6:1

 ¹Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.

He then explained what the verses meant to us.  He gave examples of what complaining and arguing are.  He also gave examples of things that they can do as unto the Lord like their schoolwork and chores.  He also explained to them that obeying Mommy and Daddy is very important so that you can live a long and happy life.  He also told him that it is one of the 10 Commandments.  I was very proud!

1 Down 179 To Go

Today was a very busy and productive day.  As mentioned in my previous post, it was the first day of school for Cooper and Kindle.  Nathan had a photo shoot in Tennessee so everyone was up nice and early.  The kids all got baths.  We ate breakfast and I put Gunnar down for his morning nap.  Grant played a few video games.  Celeste sat down with us and colored a paper.  Cooper and Kindle were so excited to start school.

Kindle is now officially in Kindergarten!

Cooper showing us that he is in 2nd grade.

The school day went really well.  We use the Abeka curriculum for both of their school.  For Cooper, it was all reviewing what he had learned previously so he did it very quickly.  I made sure to let him know that they are easing him back into school and he will have a lot more school work soon.  Kindle had lots of fun and felt so big.  I did homeschool her in Pre-K last year, but it was a lot more casual.  She did really well too.  Cooper kept telling her, I remember learning that 2 years ago.  It was sweet :)  Day one of homeschool for the 2010-2011 school year is complete.  Only 179 more days to go!

We learned about the letter "I" today.

Cooper reviewed his vowels & their sounds.  He also colored this picture.

After school, the kids did their jobs on their chore chart (see previous post).  Then, we ate lunch and got Kindle ready for ballet.  We ran some errands while Kindle was in her class.  We headed home and ate dinner.  We tidied up once again and I managed to get them in bed 20 minutes earlier than normal (since they missed their naps due to Kindle's ballet).  I was able to work out and get a shower (a luxury item as any Mom will tell you).  I am also happy to say I did really good as well with making healthy eating choices.  Hurray!  I can't wait to see my hard work paying off on the scale!  

Now I am off to conquer Mt. Laundry.  I washed everything since vacation, but I have just been grabbing clothes out of the basket instead of sorting it.  I am sure you all never do that...

Any other homeschool parents out there?  If so, what curriculum do you use?

Parent Observation Day at Kindle's Ballet

Last night, Kindle completed her summer ballet classes.  They had a parent observation night.  Nathan went since Gunnar thought he was starving.  She did a really great job showing off.  She was very tickled to have her Daddy there to watch.  Here are a few photos from her class.

Mugshots, Weekend-Conference House, Ballet & the Tour de France

I am trying to catch up after an extremely busy weekend of church and Independence Day activities.  As I hoped Brother David Hogan was incredible.  He shared some wonderful testimonies of things happening in Mexico.  I posted previously what we did on the day of July 4th.  Yesterday, we went to our friend's, David and Faith Hacker, for a cookout with several families.  It was a really nice time to just chat and get to know everyone better.  Celeste had her hair in cute pig tails with hairbows.  However, she decided to pull out the hairbows in the car.  Here was the result.

Nathan & I joked that this is her mugshot since it reminds us of the infamous celebrity mugshots

What do you think?

Today, I have been trying to play catch up.  I have what we like to call "weekend house" compiled with "conference house".  This is when you have no time to clean because you are running around all weekend and going to conferences at church.  Luckily, the house is somewhat recovered, hopefully tomorrow things will be at their normal level of "tidy".

This evening the children and I took the trip to Canton to the Woodstock School of Ballet for Kindle's ballet class.  She loves taking ballet!  

Kindle, our ballerina

We picked up the DVD of her recital from May.  I was so excited to see it because I missed her recital since it was 2 days after Gunnar's birth.  I teared up tonight watching it.  She did so good.  

They did a dance to a song from The Lion King which is why she has the pink ears.

As I finish up my blog, Nathan and I are watching The Tour de France on the Versus channel.  I am so thankful that Nathan never watches sports on TV.  When Nathan told me that he wanted to DVR all of the Tour de France,  I was very hesitant.  I have been completely surprised to discover how interesting the race has been.  So in the spirit of the Tour, Au Revoir!