Wanting More.....

      When I was a child, I would lay on my bed on warm Sunday afternoons and take in this amazing smell!!!  And from time to time since I have had a wiff come by my nose that would make me stop dead in my tracks.  I've tried explaining it to my husband and he, of course, thinks I'm crazy, which I'm sure has something to do with the fact that he can't smell. 

       In my old bedroom, at "home" at about 1:00 in the afternoon, the sun would shine perfectly through my window and the rays would glide across my bed.  The kind of rays that when you stare at long enough you can just watch all the dust bunnies, that keepers of the home dread, floating very gently across the room.  And I would lay on my bed whenever I would catch a glimpse of these rays coming through my window and just soak them up.  They were so warm...... just thinking about them, warms my soul.  Some days when I would lay there, I'd daydream I was running, in the softest cotton sun dress, through fields of daisies.  I'd fall back in the daisies as if they were soft feathers and lay there in the sun as long as it would last.  However, my favorite part was the smell.  I'm sure looking back on it and knowing the science of it all, it was just the scent from the dryer sheets my mom used with the laundry and when the sun warmed my comforter it would just smell extra good.   Whichever, for the longest time, I convinced my self that it was the sun rays that smelled.  And occasionally, in life I'll come across the smell and stop mid stride and take it in as long as it will let me.  And long after it's gone, I find myself longing for just one more minute of that fragment of my childhood. 

       Since Hannah passed away, I find my self doing the same thing with the sun rays only looking into the sky.  It's like my own little proof that she really is ok and God's way of keeping my faith alive.  There is a certain place in the sky behind our new house that when the clouds are just right and the sun shines through looks very similar to this picture.  And words can not even explain how it makes me feel.  It just overwhelms me and reminds me how powerful God is and how holy heaven must really be.  I don't understand how anyone can look at this and not see God's glory or not stand in awe just imagining what heaven is really like.  

  

 

   But until next time, my heart will yearn to see the next sun ray, reminding me once again of my field daisies and that now my daughter, who is close to turning 2 is totting through her own field of daisies in a beautiful pink sun dress. 



Happy 1st Birthday Baby Girl!!!!

  My baby is a year old today!!!! :(  January 27, 2010, Leah Suzanne Roach, 5lbs 1oz, was born.  You'd think by your fourth child you'd realize how fast it goes, but this one seemed to go by even faster!!!  She has definately been my saving grace!!  Ronnie was very cautious about having another baby after Hannah.  He didn't ever want the new baby to feel like he/she was our replacement for Hannah.  However, I yearned and yearned to hold another baby and I would cry myself to sleep at night with the idea that I'd never hold or nurse my own baby again.  Ronnie would hold me and tell me that if it was God's will he would give us another child, but he was just not sure it was the best idea.  
  Then when I became pregnant with Miss Leah, I prayed for a little boy for Ronnie and Derek.  Lindsay was still young enough that she didn't seem to "need" a sister as much as Derek thought he "needed" a brother.  And besides I had my two girls even if one was in heaven, Ronnie and Derek would enjoy another boy so much.  However, God knows us better than we even do!  He knew deep down that I yearned for another baby girl to put dresses on and have all the dreams that I had with Hannah, but I never wanted to express this because I feared that Ronnie was right and I was trying to replace Hannah.  But God knew what he was doing, when we found out it was a girl, we all were overjoyed, no one was upset.  It seemed as if we all secretly wanted a little girl.  And she has been everything we've dreamed of!  I was able to nurse her a lot longer than any of the other children.  And she seemed to take right to it, I never had any difficulty at all.  She was such a peaceful baby.  She slept through the night at 7 weeks, loved to be held and talked to, and was always happy. 

Leah's baby dedication

This picture is my absolute favorite of the girls!! 

It was not planned in anyway, they just happened to do this at the same time!!!

Trick-or-Treating is hard on a girl!

 Leah eating her birthday cake

Now, we're entering another stage and she has decided to be very busy and into everything, but she is sooooo smart.  She seems to be able to read right though me.  Our favorite trick, is to ask her if she's sick and she can cough on command.....it's sooo cute!!!  I thank God everyday for such a wonderful blessing!!  Once again he has shown me, he knows exactly what he's doing!!!

Making Snow Ice Cream

I've heard all of these stories about making snow ice cream.  Well, the kids' science lesson was on snow and how God made the different seasons, so I decided that this would be nice tie in!  I googled snow ice cream and here's the recipe I used, (or actually didn't use......)

1 gallon of snow (which we used what we could fit in our bowls)
1 cup of sugar (we did to taste)
1 tsp of vanilla extract
2 cups of milk (or until it's the consistency you like)

And stir, and stir, and stir, and stir some more.........

stirring.....

stirring.....

Princess Dora and her kitchen skills

stirring some more.....

waiting for the delicious finished product....

mmmmmm......good!!!

finishing touches.....yummmm....chocolate chips!!!!!

Help! My Toddler Rules the House!

   We've have been dealing with some behavioral issues lately with the kids.  Especially, with our oldest, Derek.  He has been having, what I would describe as fits of rage.  And strange things would set him off, like when Ronnie and I would tickle or rough house with each other or the girls.  He acted as if he was protecting one of us, but he couldn't seem to control his anger.  He also lashed out if anyone joked with him in public, such as people at church asking him if they could take his baby sister home for awhile.  I was really starting to think something was pyscholgically wrong with him.  I just kept playing horror stories over in my head of teenagers who have acted out in violence because they couldn't control their temper. 
   I was just about to my wits end and had been pouring my heart out to the preacher's wife, a couple of friends, and my mother.  The preacher's wife, Laura, text me during Christmas break and said she had picked up a little something for me at the Bible Book Store while she was there the other day.  It was a small phamplet called Help! My Toddler Rules the House!  It was completely a God thing!  She opened the front page and the first sentence says, "Are you ready to contact a psychiatrist?"  And after our previous conversation, she said "Ok, God, I'll get it for Amanda."
   It was the smallest self-help book I'd ever seen.  I read it in about an hour.  But it was filled with the best advice I've ever been given!  The jist of the book is 7 Rules to Spanking.  And come to find out, no wonder I've had trouble with him, I've been doing it all wrong!!!  (according the book anyway:)
   If you're having any problem with your child's behavior you definately need to read this.  But I'll go ahead and tell you what I've learned and am learning.

    ~  This is personal preference to me, but the book stands behind the idea of using the "rod" as the bible repeats over 5 times, instead of your hand.  The authors refer the the idea of your hand being a tool of love and affection.

Here's where I was messing up.
      ~  Give one warning,  and if the disobediance happens again hand out a punishment.  This is where I definately have struggled and am working earnestly to fix.  I give them warning after warning after warning, because it truly does hurt me more to spank them or  take something away from them.  However, by dishing out a punishment after only one warning elimnates me from breaking one of the 7 rules, which is Never Spank out of Anger.  The book goes into detail how if we continually give our children warnings for the same act of disobediance that we finally punish them because we have now made ourselves upset  by their deliberate disobediance.

      ~  The other area I never gave any thought but makes perfect sence, is the idea of reconciling.  The book suggests that after spanking, then hold your child in love.  Because scripture never once tells us that God casts us away into isolation.  So we should not do the same with our children.  The authors feel strongly about not sending them to their room "to think about what they have done" after their punishment, but rather to hold them and talk and pray about what they have done and ask for forgiveness.

  The book also recommends expecting brokeness, when spanking it should hurt and the child should cry, because just as sinners, our sin does hurt and we should feel remorse for our actions.  However, we should never fight against God for our punishment and neither should our children.  The authors write that your child is to learn never to fight you or their punishment or the punishment will only grow or become worse.  As far as spanking, if they fight it, they will only get more.  They also write that you explain to your child they may cry, but they may night scream or cry angrily after punishment, which at first I thought was crazy, but as crazy as it sounds, Derek has actually followed through with this just fine! 

  I never really imagined structured spanking would work with Derek, especially thinking something deeper was wrong with him.  But he has not had a raging fit since I started using the points in the book!!!!  Which is a complete turn around.  Now we are working on joyful obediance, which I realize will probably be a long haul for us, but it's something I feel they definately need to obey.  And hopefully all the whining that goes on in our house, will disappear as they tackle this new concept too!  Pray for me to handle this with self-control and not to loose my temper myself.

My Worst Fear

    I know, I know I'm a country girl and should not even been admitting this, but I can't help it, I'm pretty sure this thing was out to get me.  But like always my Prince Charming came to my rescue and saved me (not without a little teasing of course)!!!  It's been a rough couple weeks having to deal with this knowing he/she is watching my every move.

  It all started one day when the kids and I came home from running errands and we found a dead mouse on the living room floor that Midnight, our trusty cat, had killed.  Well, I just about lost it!!!!  Lindsay and Leah were asleep so I very nervously went and put them in their beds and then Derek and I set in the kitchen waiting for my sister to arrive to remove my worst nightmare.  Well, Midnight didn't like this at all.  She wanted praise for her great accomplishment!  So she starts dragging the thing closer!!!  And Derek and I just start flipping out. Soon my sister,Olivia, our hero, arrives and removes the awful thing from our home.  However, I think Midnight confused the cries of despair with shouts of joy, for the a couple days later I'm standing a the kitchen sink, washing dishes and my foot begins to tickle.  I look down and Midnight is placing a LIVE mouse on my foot!!!!!!  Talk about having a heart attack!!!  I screamed bloody murder and acted like a mad person.  Ronnie came running though the house ready to kill someone.  All the time, I was on the phone talking to my grandmother, whom, I'm sure I gave a heart attack.
  Needless to say the mouse got away from all of my circus jumping.  A few weeks later, I was walking into the kitchen to finish up dinner and I saw the mouse scurry across my kitchen counter and once again I screamed in hysteria and Ronnie of course came ready to kill some intruder again (you'd think he'd know by now ;)  So he sent me to the dollar store to buy some mouse traps that he set that night.   The next day the picture above is what I walked into the kitchen to see!!!  He sat there for at least 10 minutes staring at me!!!!  So I took his picture.  Because Ronnie hadn't seen him yet, he was beginning to doubt my screams of terror.  
  That night while sitting on th couch talking Ronnie and I heard one of the traps go off, so we went to check it and sure enough my Prince Charming had rescued me once more!