Bathroom

The bathroom is near the end of completion. It may take a while for me to finish it completely, now that it is useable. I am a finisher by nature, so it will get done, Lord willing, before the end of the summer. Here is what the outside of our bathroom looks like. I plan to drywall the outside when I can get to it.
The kids didn't end up helping as much as I wanted. Jonathan helped wire the outlets and switches and Josh helped put in the doors. They also helped in the framing, hammering in the studs. Jay and Josh helped a little with the plumbing. Josiah, Rachel and Jesse "helped" with the first coat of spackling.

Here's the toilet room. A pocket door gives some privacy.

A view from the toilet room to the shower room, which also has a pocket door. I hope to paint the wooden cabinet in there to match at some point, if we like it in there (that is the cabinet I acquired from Grammy).

Here's the sinks. We decided not to put a door here, because it is not needed and will only get in the way. I am so grateful we now have a bathroom for the boys. I'm sure it will get even more use as they get their bedrooms finished. I'm hoping to start that project by the end of the year.

My focus has now turned to the outside and the garden. James is building me a nicer fence than the one I made last year around the garden. It is bigger too. I also plan to have a large unfenced garden too. I got a lot of tilling done this weekend. It is so great to have a tiller. Last year we did it all by hand. What a difference! I planted peas and a bit of lettuce so far. Jay, Rachel and Josiah all helped. I hope to get the kids more involved this year. Jonathan and Jay are going to have their own row to plant their own garden. Should be interesting.

I Just Have to Say...

Jedaiah is so funny! He is learning new words everyday. Yesterday was, "thank you". I was sweeping up the floor and telling Jesse not to walk in my pile. He asked "why" and I told him it wouldn't feel very good to get that dirt on his feet. Just at that moment Jedaiah sat down after stepping in my pile and pulled a cheerio off his foot. He showed it to me and then he ate it. I thought that was pretty funny. Gross, but funny.

This morning wasn't so funny for him as he woke up crying and didn't stop until I had James look in his ears. Sure enough, both ears are infected. He's doing better now.

More Birthdays

Lots of birthdays around here lately! I found out I'm an "elite customer" at the Walmart portrait studio (at least with one of the photographers). I hardly ever actually buy any pictures other than the package. This portrait above I got free. I already talked about Jesse's birthday, so here's the other two. My sweet Rachel Leeann turned five on February 21st. She is such a jewel. She loves all things girly, which is great being that she is surrounded by boys. Lately I've been missing my hairbrush, because she taken it to use and left it somewhere. Now that she has hair, I think I'll have to get her here own brush. She has the momma instinct and loves to wake Jedaiah up from his nap so that she can play with him. She's a good playmate to Jesse and Jedaiah too. All her brothers just adore her. Mommy made her clothes for her doll. She's about to open them here.
Rachel was so pleased with her cake

She likes to share with others and she likes to clean (most of the time). How nice is that? She'll just pick up a broom in the basement, where I've been working, and start sweeping. I love it!

She is learning how to read and doing pretty well with it. I try to encourage her to do some school each day, but I let her decide how much to do. She generally likes to do school when here brothers are doing it. She is so much fun and we are so so blessed to have her in our family. She makes me want another girl.

Josiah turns seven today!

Here's another sweet one! Most of the time Josiah is quiet and gets along with everyone. He does have his moments where he gets into it with his brothers. He does let anyone walk all over him. He can hold his own for sure. He can be loud sometimes too.

Josiah got a sleeping bag for his birthday from Maw-Maw and Paw-Paw

Josiah is a great student and pretty sharp. He's also pretty athletic too. I think he'll be quite a catch for some lady someday. He turns seven today. His favorite thing to play is legos. He is similar to the way Jonathan was at this age. He's getting pretty good at building ships from the Lego directions (and that's not easy because all the pieces from the sets we have gotten over the years are all mixed together in the Lego Loft).
All three of these kids have been much easier than the first three. They are so enjoyable and I'm so glad God has blessed us with them.

James also had a birthday in February and turned 39. He is a great husband, father and friend! I love him dearly and am such a blessed wife! We celebrated his birthday with the traditional pineapple upsidedown cake.

Latest Project

It has been busy around here with birthdays and school and cleaning and laundry and everything else. We collected sap and cooked it down into maple syrup in the last couple weeks. We have three quarts and I'm hoping for more. The sap slowed down and we were only getting two quarts a day the last few days. I decided to cook a small amount (a gallon and a half) on the stove and it boiled all afternoon. Jonathan told me to keep an eye on it when it was getting close, but I didn't realize how close it was until I saw the pot smoking. Oops, bummer. It looked like burnt molasses. It didn't smell like molasses though. All that down the drain. Oh well...

So our latest project is in the basement. We are finishing a bathroom down there for the boys. I built the walls for it and James secured them to the floor. I was a little rusty in my framing abilities. It seemed like everyday James would come home and tell me I had to fix this or that. The next day I would fix the wall and make another one. Almost everyday that week I was fixing a wall. I guess that's how we learn. I was waiting for James to get started on the plumbing and I found out a few days ago that he thought I should just do it. He's so busy and it could take a while for him to find time to do it. I did change the faucet in the kitchen by myself, but I had no idea how to do rough plumbing. The plumbing in our home is PEX, so it looks fairly simple. Thanks to the internet, I've learned a few things and I hope to start this part of the project soon (I still need a few supplies).

Today I chisled and drilled a hole in the concret for the drain for the shower. I can't wait to show James, I think he'll be surprised. It didn't take as long as I thought it would. I'm trying to include the older boys in what I'm doing, so they can learn right along with me. Josh was my helper today and he kept reminding me to put on my safety glasses. That doesn't seem like him, but I'm glad for his concern for safety.

We had the electric roughed in last week. We are going to finish the rest of it ourselves once the drywall is up. There are so many other things looming on the horizon, I'd sure like to get this finished before Spring. I don't see it happening, but I sure will try.

We are trying to get rid of our dog, Selah. We have a place for her, we think, but she can't go until Monday. James decided we had to get rid of her after she chewed the wires on the van and trailer twice! She jumps up on the little kids, so we have to keep her in her pen all the time. We are hoping she can go to a good home that will train her and have more time to spend with her than we do. The only ones who like the dog are Josh and Jay. Jonathan really doesn't like her. I'll be happy to not see dog poop everywhere outside and to not have to constantly remind the kids to feed and take the dog out.

I'll try post again sooner than this last time.

Wedding

Our neice, Heather Miller, became Heather Downs this past Saturday. Rachel was the flower girl. That was pretty cool since Heather was our flowergirl in our wedding over 16 years ago. We watched our wedding video Saturday morning and it was fun to see how we've all changed. Rachel was too nervous to remember to drop the rose pedals down the isle, but she did well and she was so pretty, with her hair all done up. She got to spend a lot of the day with Heather and the bridesmaids, which included her cousin, Leah seen in the picture above.

Here is Heather and Caleb with the Miller family

Rachel had such a wonderful time at the reception with her cousin Erin. She loved twirling in her dress.

Some day we'll look back on this picture and wonder where all the time went. Oh, that we would savor these moments. When we got home Rachel was so tired. She kept crying, as I was trying to get her ready for bed and get all those bobby pins out of her hair. I asked her why she was crying and figured out it was because the day was over and she didn't want it to end. How precious!

In the Process of Training...

Our desire as parents is to train our children's hearts to love and follow Christ. That is a hard task, but we press on to reach that goal. We recently realized that some of the ways we have done things have fostered self-centeredness. In the earlier days of our parenting we came up with specific tasks for our kids to do. Jonathan often got frustrated because he'd be the only one cleaning up, so having set tasks for each child helped with that frustration. Jonathan was able to get done what he needed to and he was able to move on to more enjoyable things. Now we have had to make some changes because the words "It's not my job" was being heard in our home far too often.

Jesus was a servant and we want our children to have that same servant heart. We want them to put others first and to seek for ways to help those around them. With this in mind we have changed the way we do chores. Everyone still has their own areas of responsibility. When chore time arrives, we all start on our chores together. When someone is done with their chores, we have told them they have to go and find someone else to help. When ALL the chores are done, then everyone is done. I still sometimes hear, "I'm done MY chores," but it is getting less so. To encourage them to have a more servant heart, we took away computer priveledges until we see more consistant servant attitudes and actions. It has been a few weeks since we started this and they are starting to get computer back in small doses. If I had to do it all again, I would have implemented this a long time ago. Oh well, we may get it right by the time they are grown. By God's grace and His working in their little hearts, I pray they'll one day have a servant's heart.

Jesse Turns Three

Our sweet little Jesse turned three on January 20th. We celebrated with mint brownies and ice cream. The reason the sides of the brownies are missing is because James and Jonathan were not home yet and it was getting late, so we started without them. They were out clearing snow from a storm we had gotten.

Since Jesse's favorite thing to do is hike, we gave him hiking things for his birthday. He hasn't actually done a lot of hiking, but he talks about going all the time. He's been wanting to go, but he has to wait until the snow melts and that could take a while.

Right after his birthday, Jesse started wearing thumb guards to help him stop sucking his thumb. He has done great and now only wears the guards at night.

Right now his favorite things are Bob the Builder movies, playing babies with Rachel, playing Legos and trains.

We just love the things Jesse says and does. He is so precious! He is at such a cute age and he doesn't give us too much trouble. We are so blessed by him.