Carsten's Birthday

Carsten turned 3! His personality is really starting to blossom. He is a very hard worker. He loves to haul heavy things in from the car to help Mommy. We call him our little lumberjack. Carsten also has a very firm sense of how things should be. He doesn't like to deviate from his determined path. He and Justin are best buds, and Carsten hangs on every word Justin says.

For his birthday, I had assumed that we would do a Spiderman theme. Carsten has like Spiderman ever since he turned two and got his first "real" underwear. They had Spiderman and friends on them, and he was hooked. "Spiderman" was one of his first words. Imagine my surprise when I started planning his birthday, and he announced, with great emphasis, "I NOT have a Spiderman birthday. I want lots and lots of Ele's." Ele is his stuffed elephant that he sleeps with.

Hmmm, lots and lots of Ele's. Carsten does love elephants. When we took him to the zoo awhile back, he just sat there in front of the elephant's enclosure completely silent. Then he said, in that little low, husky voice that just melts my heart, "That's mine."

I couldn't decide on how to implement the Lots of Ele's theme. I sent out a cute elephant picture for his invitation, and then I hit on the idea of cupcakes with little elephants on top. I figured I could make them out of marzipan. Of course, I wasn't thinking about how LONG it would take to do all of them, but I managed, just barely, to have them done before the party.

We weren't sure how he was going to handle all the attention at his party. He goes to great lengths to avoid being the center of attention. He was VERY embarrassed to have to open his gifts, but he was polite, he said, "Thank you," very quietly, in a sort of monotone, after each one.

He was happy about his party, though. Afterward, he said he had a good time. I still can't be believe he's three!

Steffen is Walking!!

Well, Steffen has finally started walking! He's 13 months old. He started taking steps 2 weeks ago, but has been a little (a LOT) resistant to giving up crawling. This week he's been doing a lot more walking. He's not a toddler yet- he's more of a wobbler. He thinks he's hot stuff when he walks, an opinion that is validated by his siblings who cheer him on.

Megan the Gymnast

Megan loves gymnastics. She's on the Level 2 Girls' Team and has started competing this season. This is a video of her most recent meet a few weeks ago. She did really well!

Has it been that long??

Wow, July was my last post!! Where did August and September go? For that matter, where is October going?

We have been busy, busy, busy! We started school early in August and our days have been a blur of homeschooling, classes, Classical Conversations (CC), gymnastics, church, AWANA, laundry, cleaning (not nearly enough of that), and other things. Good thing God gave us the Sabbath! We are certainly "laboring and doing all" of our work the other six days.

School is going well. We had some bumps at the beginning of the year. I had decided to try some new things that didn't work well for our family. When you have six kiddos under age 9, not every program is going to be a good fit. We're pretty much back on track now, although I did sign the kids up for WAY too many classes this semester. They're loving them, but the expense and busy-ness is just too much. Next semester I will be wiser. For now, we're starting to "get in the groove," so to speak. I've tinkered with our schedule and even our curriculum, and I think we've found a happy balance between educational excellence and, well, real life.

I'm tutoring CC (5th and 6th graders) on Tuesday morning while all my little people are in their respective CC classes. We really do enjoy the Foundations portion of CC. All the classes cover the same material, so we work on it together throughout the week. Everyone from Nathan down to Justin. Carsten joins in too. He's very insistent about doing everything the big kids do.

I'm also teaching Latin on Friday afternoons. That's been fun and it's kept us on track with our Latin studies here at home. We're using the Latin for Children curriculum. I highly recommend it. It comes with a DVD that you can either use to teach the children directly, or (as I do) use as a how-to-teach aid. Anyway, it motivates the kids when they're learning together.

Bryan and I have taken the position of AWANA commanders this year. That's been a big commitment, but we've found it very rewarding. There's such a great group of people that we're blessed to work with, and they make it enjoyable. There are just about 80 kids signed up. AWANA is a good, biblically sound program, and I know the kids are going to benefit from learning God's word. He promises His word won't return to Him void, and that's a promise that we hang on to when we're with the kids on Sunday nights.

Now, on to more important things: Steffen turned one! My little tiny baby man is already a year old! I can't believe it. He is just so cute and has such a big personality already. He loves to do motions to songs and he can already say a few baby words. He took five steps last night, but he's been refusing to demonstrate for his siblings today. They are so anxious to see- I think he's teasing them. He gets into everything. No cabinet is safe with him around.

I know you'll want a picture of our grown-up little baby, so here you are! We combined his birthday with our Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot) party. Such is the life of a sixth baby.

Oatmeal Pancakes

Okay, I mentioned Oatmeal Pancakes awhile back. Here's the recipe:

Mix together and set aside for 30-45 minutes:
4 c. old-fashioned oats
3 3/4 c. soy or almond milk
1/4 c. lemon juice

Mix together and add:
1/4 c. sugar (optional)
1 c. flour (I use spelt or whole wheat)
1 T. baking powder
1 t. salt

Then add:
2 T. extra light olive oil (optional)
1/4 c. milled flax seed, whisked together with hot water to make 1 c.

Spray a griddle with nonstick spray. Ladle batter by 1/2 cupfuls. (They expand quite a bit.) Flip when the bubbles begin to pop, and then cook several more minutes.

These are very popular around our house. I usually double the recipe and freeze the extras for Bryan to take to work as "breakfast sandwiches" with almond butter and jelly.

A Goodbye

Well, the past month has been a tough one for our household. We're finally getting to the point where we can take a breath, and we hope to get back to normal soon.

We said goodbye to Bryan's dad, Othell, on June 21st. He had battled prostate cancer for the past ten years, and he passed away at the age of 79. He will be missed.

Funny Carsten

This is a blast from the (recent) past. A couple of months ago, when Carsten had transitioned to a big boy bed, he and Justin were partying until late in the night. As a result, Carsten was having a hard time making it through lunch to naptime. He kept falling asleep. On this occasion, we had the camera handy.



Oh, and if you're wondering about his hair, this was during his Vaseline stage. He found jars of Vaseline and gel that I didn't even know we had...