Another Round of What We've Done in Pictures

Maybe after this week I can get somewhat back to normal and then go back to updating the blog weekly in a more organized fashion.  But for now, here is another quick round of what we've done in pictures with a quick update. It's SPRING, and we've been enjoying it.

Animal Wildlife...

Red-bellied woodpecker

Liv with a ladybug

Another ladybug at the edge of our driveway

Nuthatch

Another shot of the nuthatch

Gray squirrel (toward left, in front of tree)

The squirrel in the flowes

Squirrel after climbing in the redbud tree with its prize

The lovely red-bellied woodpecker on a different day and a different tree

Cardinal

To hear this cardinal sing (from another tree), visit this Youtube video.

Vulture in flight

 
Flowers...

Dandelion!

We love dandelions!  Look at these gorgeous yellow jewels!

Petals from henbit and/or dead nettle.  These are a new flower snack for the kids.  They have a sweet nectar (just not as good as honeysuckle). 

Feast of Unleavened Bread...

Unleavened peach muffins...not as puffy and light, but good nonetheless and a good reminder of our need to constantly work on purging sin from our lives

I fixed chocolate mousse as our dessert on one of the two holy days during the UB week.  We had a good Passover and UB week. 

Physical and spiritual food with friends (listened to a sermon on spiritual deleavening)

Jaden's Doings...

During a walk one day, Jaden spotted something down in the valley, so I let him go down to investigate.  He'd just so happened to ride his bike that day, so I suggested he ride back to the house to get a bag so that he could gather the entire remaining skeleton of the deer.  He then worked on reassembling it.

He got clay from our property, shaped it, baked it, and painted it, and then he gave it to his Daddy as a birthday gift.

Jade using my mini food chopper for grass to make green ink, following a recipe he found using his iPod

Assembling the deer skeleton while Trusten watches

Trusten...

Trusten, after catching me taking the below pictures of him playing Mario on the Wii (please overlook the mess...one of those days I did NOT CARE)

This boy ACTIVELY plays...when I say ACTIVELY, that's what I mean.  Whenever Mario is going in a pipe or something, he takes off running, skipping, jumping on the couch, whatever.  He jumps along with Mario, kicks, etc. 

Sweet boy in my redbud tree (get out of my redbud tree!!!!)  LOL

Drawing Art...

We all drew a rhino.  I hurried mine so that I could then help Trust and Liv.  Nathan used sense from the beginning and flipped the page landscape.  His is the one at the lower right with no name...AND it's the best (but he denies it being good).  Uh...not sure what Jade scribbled out the bottom.  I'm thinking he was putting his name in different languages...knowing him, probably.  LOL

History...

Lesson on Hosea from Mystery of History. The story of Hosea is an amazing one.  God taught through Hosea's personal marital circumstances his love for Israel who broke their covenant with him by fornicating with other gods.

Israel (and Judah) will be punished yet again...soon...but God still loves Israel and will show his mercy in the end. 

If Hosea's story is amazing, Manasseh's is astonishing.  One of the most evil kings of Judah, Manasseh delved deeply into the dark side with sorcery, witchcraft, and even sacrifice of his son in the fire.  Yet when punished and dragged away to prison by the enemy, he humbled himself greatly, was released, and then dedicated the remainder of his life ridding the land of the idols and worshiping God in truth.  YES!  There is hope for even those with evil deeds as bad as Manasseh (who may have also been the one who had Isaiah the prophet killed [body sawed in half]).

Miscellaneous...

Enjoying the outdoors on Sabbath (rock-throwing at its finest)

My lilac budding!

Do you see the tiny fuzzy caterpillar at the bottom of that cocoon thing (sorry, don't know the technical term in this case)?  On a previous day I happened to see a bunch hatch/crawl out of another one, which is something I've wanted to see for a couple years, after seeing such things on trees.

Another Sabbath afternoon of enjoying creation

A morning where Trusten dove right into his workbook work (which is a common occurence), and Liz decided to "help" after visiting her looking window and hanging out with Sister.  She likes to let go while standing, but she hasn't taken steps alone, yet.

Daddy and Livi washing dishes

Yeah, we had a bit of snow again.  Had quite a bit of back and forth 70s weather and then cold and snowy.  We never had a lot of snow the winter just past, though.

We are seriously considering moving out of the U.S.  YES, we've discussed this off and on for over seven years or more now.  NO, we've never [yet] gone through with it.  BUT, we're more serious now as we've ever been.  Actually, it's clear that every time we've gone back to considering it, we get more serious, so I guess it's only been a matter of time.  We've always focused mostly on somewhere in South America, like Uruguay, Ecuador, Peru, or Belize.  We were planning to go to Ecuador a few weeks from now, but so many things hindered our plans, making it obvious that was not the answer (we prayed it would play out exactly that way, with lots of hindrances, if it was not in God's will).  At first I considered it might be the enemy trying to hinder things, but then the way things were stacking and stacking, we think that's not the answer.

Nathan is also looking at changing professions, possibly doing school again for something else, selling his business, etc.  We'll see.

Jaden is constantly researching on his iPod about a wide variety of things: geography and languages, metals and other minerals, parrots and other animals, how-to's, technology news, things the idiotic wealthy people waste all their wealth on (which he agrees is absolutely idiotic and sad), etc.  When he's not researching (and sometimes writing about what he's learned), he's usually outside working or exploring.

Trusten is enthusiastic about his ever-improving reading abilities, and he's often up and working on his school work before any of the rest of us is up.  He loves the Wii (see above), and that's all the motivation he needs to do his work (he is limited to his playtime, and I make sure he goes outside, even when he doesn't want).

Liv is very big into imaginative play.  She's now got several imaginary friends.

Elizabeth is still not walking but is doing fine overall.

That's it for now.

Until next time...