My second child

Five years ago this week we "missed out on a baby". (Blue's term)

We had planned to expand our family. Mr Fixit had a steady job, I was ready to be a stay at home mom, we had a healthy 2 year old boy and we were looking for our first house so we could be closer to Mr Fixit's work. It was time.

The pregnancy although short was by far my hardest and when it came to an end at 9 weeks we were all devastated. I took a week off of work to recover and grieve. A life we planned, prayed for and dreamed of was gone. I went to be with my mom and closer to Mr Fixit. Even in loss and sadness God blessed us. While I was off work, a house went on the market that our realtor said we HAD to see. I went, later returning with my husband and father and it ended up being the home we would live in for the next few years The home where I would give birth to my next two children. A home that was a gathering place for my family of origin to celebrate birthdays, Christmases, Sabbaths and each other. A few months later we were expecting a baby that we now know as Pink.

Mr Fixit and I don't talk about the baby we "missed out on" very often but we both thought that baby was a girl. She has a name and she was my second child. To honor that life we now sponsor a little girl that was born September 2008, the month our baby was due. She is a sweet 4 year old who lives in Ghana. I treasure every letter and picture she sends me.

I'm so thankful for that life we never knew and even the loss. I'm grateful for the home we quickly outgrew. I'm thankful for Pink. I'm thankful for the empathy I can feel when other women have a miscarriage. We don't forget those babies we "miss out on", but we carry on silently thinking about what might have been, of due dates that came and went, miscarriage dates and blue eyes we never looked into. Statistics say that 1 in 4 pregnancies end in loss and this was true in my case.

Someone once said to me...

Someone once said to me, as they were angrily trying to find a pair of matched socks, yesterday, "do you ever do laundry?"

"Well, the long answer is yes, but the short answer and probably the one you are looking for is no"

Best ever Vegan Mac and No Cheese

This recipe came from my mom who got it from a Native American storyteller named Morningstar. Where she got it I have no idea!!! Now my family LOVES Mac and Cheese and I make  a pretty mean full dairy mac and we have tried NUMEROUS vegan recipes but I have to be honest shhhh I don't like cashew based cream sauces very much.

Gasp* I know. No aspiring vegan should be admit something like that.

So this recipe is AMAZING!!!!

First I gathered the ingredients*!!! Looks simple enough.

 
Start cooking the noodles and preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Blend the rest of the "no cheese" ingredients.

Pour in liquid "no cheese"

 
Put it in the oven

 and 45 minutes later warm, creamy goodness.

Mac & (no) cheese
1# box of pasta- cook as directed
Blend: (while the pasta is cooking)
4 tsp onion powder
4 tsp salt
4 tsp tomato paste
½ cup nutritional yeast flakes
2/3 cup flour
2 Tbsp lemon juice (3 Tbsp if you prefer a cheddar taste)
6 tsp oil
4 cups water
Optional: minced garlic or sautéed onion

Place cooked pasta and above blended ingredients in a large bowl and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes.

That is WAY too easy and WAY too yummy!!!  Thank you Mommy and Morningstar.

*I recently ran out of tomato paste and since is it late summer I just used fresh tomatoes and cut back on the water.

Please join me in: "I will pray for him - 30 Days of Praying for Our Husbands"

For the month of September I would like to take a few minutes of every day and pray for a specific aspect of my husbands life.

If you are interested in participating I will be sending out daily emails with that day's topic, scripture and praise and answered prayers from others praying with us. I have also started a Facebook group so we can share with other "I will pray for him" participants.

You can join by entering your email here 

Don't forget to confirm by going into your email and clicking on the URL to verify that you would like to be on the "I will pray for him" mailing list. You can unsubscribe at anytime.

and if you have a Facebook account join us at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/Iwillprayforhim/

I have a few women prayer warriors who have volunteered to pray for your prayer requests if you would like to email a specific burden you or your husband are carrying. These will be kept private and first name and last initial will be all that is used for identification. You can email prayer requests to iwillprayforhim@gmail.com.

I know we will be richly blessed

Getting ready for the school year

I haven't posted in a while, but we are having an great summer. In July we surprised my daddy for his birthday and had a fabulous weekend at Hocking Hills State Park in Ohio.

Most recently I have been scrambling to get the house organized and decorated before we start school, because everyone knows that if everything is organized and cute you'll have a great school year.

Our dining room also doubles as the school area so this was obviously first priority. So I went on a delightful, child free shopping spree to Hobby Lobby, Home Depot, Dollar Tree and Walmart. I used a high quality, washable paint, purchased picture frames (50% off of course), several sets of foldable canvase totes, numerous baskets, bins and buckets and set to work. Our dining room table was unusable for almost 2 weeks as I gutted our homeschool closet, organize the bookshelves, painted and decorated.

Notice there is a missing picture on the photo wall below. I was given an beautiful photo from our trip to Ohio and immediately knew just what to do with it. I spent HOURS arranging and rearraning these frames to make it just right. I measure, hung, rehung and leveled everything. I got to the last photo in the middle and realize that this beautiful picture is designed to sit on a shelf and not hang on a wall. It has no hardware to hang it. Mr. Fixit assured me that we could purchase the hanging hardware next time we go to town and over that last three weeks we have both forgotten each and every time we leave the valley.

This is my very first artificial flower arrangement. 

 And finally a peek into my homeschool closet. This is a work in progress, but I feel like I have everything consolidated and organized for the first time since the move. The goal was to get the house done this week, lesson plans next week and we will start school on Sept 3 since the co-op we are participating in this year starts on the 5th. Then this morning both kids were begging to do school, so life stopped while Blue read us a book and Pink practiced writing her numbers. I think this is going to be a good year.

Happy Birthday Blue!!!

What do you get when you put two newlywed 20 year olds in their first apartment away from their parents with lots of friends over the legal drinking age?

A baby boy!!!!

7 years ago you made us into a family at 6:05am. It was a hot Sabbath day and I had a wedding and a birthday party to attend and a babyshower scheduled for you the next day (because everyone knows first babies are usually late, you were two weeks early). Instead I just stayed in the air conditioned hospital and stared into your sweet baby face. You had LOTS of dark hair and were well worth the effort I put in to get you here.

We may not have planned you, but you were in God's plan and I thank him every day for you. You made me a mom. You taught me selflessness. You have made me laugh and kept our little family together during the rough times.You are a caring big brother (when you feel like it) and a wonderful helper.

At 7 years old Blue LOVES chess and numbers. He's one of those kids who just knows the answer to math problems without having to figure it out. He loves drawing, jokes and puzzles. He would spend all day on the computer if I would let him.

Happy Birthday Blue!! Love ya little man.

Humor is like strawberry shortcake...

every family does it a little differently. It's never bad, but the best is what you grew up with.

After spending a few days laughing uproariously with my sister and parents I realized how much I missed the humor and jokes of my youth. Mr. Fixit and I laugh all the time, but it's different than the giggles my sister, brother and parents bring out. The shared experiences and the genetic ties bring it to a whole new level of hilarity.