Riding bikes

Last Saturday was beautiful weather and we enjoyed the morning by riding bikes with the big kids on the Swamp Rabbit Trail. 

When Catherine was learning to ride her bike without training wheels at the beginning of the year, we promised her that we would all go ride bikes on the trail as a reward outing. 

It was a beautiful morning and we had great fun. We even found this bike for 7 people at a local bike shop!! When the babies ate big enough we could all ride together. Isn't this the craziest bike?? 

We love doing fun activities like this with the kids as they're getting older. They're so much fun. 

Digging

Enjoying time digging in the yard and playing with neighbors for some afternoon fun! 

Who needs toys....

....when you can play with magazines and eat shoes?? 

Give Hope to Freeset

Yesterday a UPS cargo plane crashed in Birmingham. In addition to the pilot and copilot losing their lives, an organization called Freeset lost $150,000 in merchandise. This isn't just some company who can write off their loss and make more products though. These were bags made by 200 women in Calcutta, India who have been rescued from the sex trade and offered employment and a chance to rebuild their life. I'm sharing this because I know some of you can help these women.  Please read and pray about how you can help!

Local Non-Profit Affected By UPS Cargo Plane Crash in Birmingham, AL

Freeset USA, a non-profit business, lost over 13,000 bags, with a retail value of $150,000, in this morning’s plane crash in Birmingham, AL. Freeset USA represents Freeset Bags & Apparel, a fair trade business offering employment to women trapped in Calcultta, India’s sex trade. The products were a complete loss and represented an entire fall inventory for online sales, fair trade stores, and conference events.

“Our prayers and thoughts are with the families of the pilots that passed away in this tragedy,” says Kristi Griem, President of Freeset USA. “We seek to honor them and their families in the face of this loss. We also are thinking about the women at Freeset, whose lives will be impacted from the loss of these bags, as it represents three months of work of our 200 staff and we have lost the bags sales that represent the wages we would have sent for them to be paid.”

Freeset is in business for freedom. Freedom from human trafficking. Freeset is a fair trade business and ministry that sells bags and t-shirts, made by women freed from human trafficking in Calcutta, India. The women are able to have a job with dignity, making products, instead of being the product. Every woman receives three times the wage they would receive in a regular job, learn to read and write, daycare for their children, have medical insurance and retirement benefits. Women were tricked, trapped, or traded and find themselves seemingly without a choice. Our goal is to change the economic scope of Sonagacchi, Calcutta’s largest red light district, to one of freedom, instead of the sex trade. Because Freeset is a fair trade business a simple ‘re order’ is not possible. The women are paid fair wages for their work and we are not a mass-producing, slave labor force.

Click HERE  to read more from my friend who is organizing this and click HERE TO DONATE

Please help these women by "buying back" a bag that was lost was $25. And share this information with others who can also help.

Beach Week

Last week we had our annual beach trip with Jay's family. It was a great week--so much better than last year's that included broken air conditioners, stomach viruses, rain, a washing machine that caught on fire, and two 5 week old babies. All year we kept talking about how this years beach trip had to be better!!

I take for granted sometimes that we have such beautiful scenery right here in our state. I enjoyed many gorgeous sunsets with dinner and sunrises on runs. 

We had lots of fun playing on the beach. Anna and Elizabeth prefer the sand, Will prefers the water, Catherine and James go back and forth between both. 

Will enjoyed being buried in the sand and he lost his second tooth! 

Jay enjoyed playing on the beach, playing golf, taking a few naps, and not shaving for the week. 

Little people enjoyed afternoon movies and naps and playing with each other. 

I enjoyed a few lazy mornings and snuggling with all my kiddos. 

We had such a great trip and really loved spending time with Melissa (jays sister), Andy, and Marshall. Our kids adore Marshall. He turned three this summer and is one of the funniest kids we know. 

Melissa and Andy showed us a video from Third Day about adoption and how we are all adopted as God's children. It was very sweet to hear Marshall call it Marshall's  song! Then they gave us each a tshirt that says "adopted". We are so glad that Marshall was adopted into our family and how it is such a great reminder of our own adoption as God's children. (Search Third Day adoption for the video on you tube.)

We are so thankful for time to relax and be with family for the week! 

His happy place

The beach is James's happy place. Honestly, he has been more content and relaxed at the beach than anywhere else he's ever been. He loves the sand, loves the water, and plays so hard that he naps and sleeps without fussing. Happy happy indeed! 

And today, he took his first steps!! I'm not at all surprised that he did it at the beach. Our Little charmer; he's so much fun! 

Obedient Food Choices

I feel like the Lord has been working on the area of food and nutrition with me a lot in the past few months. A lot of it started out of my own complaining and whining about not losing the baby weight after having twins. God started convicting me about my attitudes and thought processes regarding the weight and my body and my health. Was I trying to eat healthier only for the reward of losing weight?

I felt like he told me very clearly to make healthy choices out of obedience to Him, regardless of the results. And that is what I'm trying to do and He is allowing this to be a struggle for me because for 6 months I have had no results. Regardless of what I eat or don't eat or how much I exercise, not one of those remaining 15 pounds has gone away. To say that I am frustrated is an understatement. But I keep pressing on, allowing Him to refine my thoughts and attitudes and trying to make healthy choices out of obedience.

A big part of this for me has been drinking Coke. I really like it. I had gotten to the point where I drank it every day. I became addicted to it. I rationalized it saying that since I don't drink coffee, this was my way of having some caffeine each day. And what mama of 5 kids doesn't need some caffeine???

But I realized that I was using it as more of an escape and coping mechanism, and turning to it when I felt overwhelmed and tired and should turn to God instead. This became very clear when I bought a 1.25 L of coke at the grocery store and drank the entire thing in one afternoon. I then tried to hide the bottle in the recycling so Jay wouldn't see it and know that I had drank that much at once. I found myself planning which errands to drive to based on where I could go through a drive-thru and get a coke. I was having a hard time showing self-control.

At this point, I knew God was asking me to give it up. I've had to do this before. Last year I gave it up from August until October. I know what it means to detox myself from it. I actually do crave it and think about it for days and days, sometimes weeks. I started the process at the beginning of June. I allowed myself one a week for June and then none in July. I have managed to make it through all of July without any at all. Now it is August, and I'm contemplating if I can go back to having one a week?? or should I still completely avoid it?? What if he's asking me to give it up forever?

During all of this process, God also started to convict me about food choices for our family. I buy the groceries, I cook 99% of the meals, I am feeding 6 other people. That's a big responsibility. To encourage me in this area a few months ago, I signed up for an online meal planning site called The Fresh 20 (www.thefresh20.com)  They send you a meal plan each week for 5 meals that are based off of 20 fresh ingredients. It even includes the shopping list and prep work for each meal that you can do ahead of time. This has challenged me to try cooking new dishes, and challenged all of us to eat new foods. Let's just say that I wasn't routinely cooking salmon and lentils very much before. I've been pleasantly surprised at encouraged at how much the kids have eaten of these meals, and Jay loves them. I also really appreciate someone doing the meal planning and making the shopping list for me!

At a class I went to a few weeks ago, the lady teaching it (Sera Johnson, at www.choosinghealthylife.wordpress.com) talked about God convicting her about similar issues of food choices for her family. She discussed Proverbs 22:6 which says "Train up a child in the way He should go..." and challenged me to think about what habits I am teaching and training my children with now that may be hard for them to break later. Am I teaching them to make healthy, wise choices; to choose LIFE in what they eat?

She also discussed Proverbs 3:5-6 "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him and he will make your paths straight." Am I trusting God with my food choices? Am I acknowledging Him as the creator of all good things on earth, including the healthy food He gives us?

Sera has 4 small children and when she started making changes, her kids were very picky eaters. She was scared they would starve if she got rid of the mac n cheese and frozen pizzas. She gave us six tips to help picky eaters love God's good food:

1. Get the junk out of the house. if I don’t bring it in the house, they can’t eat it.
2. Have kids make a list of good foods they do like (especially fruits and veggies).
3. Make sure the kitchen is stocked with what they will eat.
4. Try one new thing at each meal and keep trying them. Change the atmosphere at the meal from pressure  and punishment to praise. Praise them for trying it/licking it/tasting it. They don’t have to love it, just try it and tolerate it.
5. Make healthy versions of their favorite unhealthy foods (pizza, chicken strips, etc)
6. Speak positive affirmation at the dinner table. Speak life. Pray “Lord, thank you for your good food and for helping me to love your good food.” Also have them help you cook and teach them how food affects their bodies.

I thought these were great suggestions, and I have been trying some with Anna. She's currently our pickiest eater and often tells me she doesn't like what I've cooked for dinner before I ever put her plate on the table. Extremely frustrating!! But I've been encouraging her to just try one bite of each new food and telling her that it's okay if she doesn't like it; I just want her to taste it. Most of the time she declares she still doesn't like it, but one night she found that she did like the chicken I cooked and proceeded to eat three pieces! This was huge considering she rarely eats any meat!!

(For any homeschool mamas out there, she has a great homeschool curriculum called Nutrition 101 which teaches anatomy, physiology and how nutrition affects them.)

The verse that God has given me to memorize during this process is 2 Corinthians 6: 16 and 7:1 

"For we are the temple of the living God...Since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God."

I am very much still a work in progress in this area, but I'm hoping to make small, sustainable steps in the right direction, out of obedience and reverence for God.