"The sons of Rueben and the Gadites and half the tribe Manasah, of valient men, men able to bear buckler and sword, and to shoot with bow and skillful in war were four and forty thousand seven hundred and threescore, that went to the war....

And they were helped against then, and the Hagarites were delivered into their hand and all that were with them: for they cried to the Lord in battle and he was entreated of them because they put their trust in Him."

Sometimes it can get so discouraging when we look around at the world around us!  Christian America has been declared at an end and it seems like we are losing on every battle front.  But we must not get discouraged or turn back or lose our heart for the Lord and His kingdom.  The thing is, we women are the ones with the power of tomorrow in our hands.  We are the ones raising the sons and daughters who need to be trained with sword and buckler and arrows.  Not physical weapons of war, but the word of God used skillfully, a preparation in their world view, protection from the enemy of our souls establishing strongholds that will weaken them later in life, and a habit of dealing with trouble by turning to the Lord in prayer, crying out to him.

What a big task this is!  And how myriad the distractions!  And how weak we are in the work!  I pray that God will help all of us to have wisdom in how we spend or time, the entertainment we chose, the prayers we pray... I pray that as we look at our children today we will not see them as a responsibility that we need to tend to, not someone to be kept busy so we can get our 'real work' done, but the opportunity to train the valiant men and women of tomorrow.Men and women that will be skillful in war. 

What's going on around here..

Since Noelle was born we have had so much trouble getting back on schedule!  I've tried re instituting it and staying on track for a day or two, only to have it completely fall apart after a few days.  Very frustrating!  Part of it was sickness, which finally seems to be clearing up, but I think  lot of it was just that the old schedule wasn't fitting our lifestyle anymore.  I started using the old schedule when the basic ages of our children were "School Age" and "Baby/Toddler".  Now we have teens in there too. They like to stay up late to work on projects or read while the house is quiet.  They just don't go to bed at 8:30!  Go figure.  Anyway, here is our new schedule-

8-9:00 Get up, get coffee, get dressed, chat etc.

9-9:30 Shayleen makes breakfast with Owen's help (He takes this job so seriously.  It's so funny.)

9:30-10 Eat

10-11:30 Clean house-I have the house on a simple rotating schedule.

11:30-2  Schoolwork

2-3:00 Quiet time (and oh, how we need it!)

3-4:00 Music practice (If it hasn't already been done) 

4-5:00 Shayleen makes dinner with Elisa's help.

6:00 Dinner

7:00 Family devotions

8:00 Little boys get their teeth brushed and have stories read to them.

Then the older kids get the run of the house.  :)  The little boys aren't too crazy about this, but they will just have to get used to it. They can still hear life going on from their room.  But it gives the older kids their time to watch more mature movies, get out games that have a lot of pieces and actually play on the floor if they like, cut out sewing patterns, etc.  We have been on this schedule for about two weeks and it seems to be going really well.

 Also, I used to not schedule the hour for wake up time.  I just scheduled the time when we needed to start getting things done.  I figured if one wanted time to sit in a chair and space out the window or time to check their email they should plan to get up a little earlier to do it.  But they didn't seem to catch up on that concept. They got up right when they had to and it didn't make for smooth mornings.  Also, it limits me, because if they are sitting spacing out or  spending time taking inane quizzes on facebook, I won't stress out on them about time use because this IS their time to do it and there is a stop time already implemented so I don't have to nag.  Whew.  So nice when a small simple thing can cure a problem!

Happy boys

We have a crack all along the length of our basement wall.  The wall is in serious need of repair and we have to dig out the dirt on the outside of the wall to fix it.  Well, some friends of ours had rented a backhoe and didn't need it for the whole time of the rental so they kindly let us use it the last day, and their son helped us for the day.

Having the tractor in our yard made for a rippin' good day for the boys!

Their room was right above the hole so they spent most of the day there.

Can you tell Scott has a few little brothers of his own?  He was so sweet to give Owen "driving lessons".

By mom!  He's off to work!

Carrying the chain to secure it to the trailer.

But oolala, the mud.  I didn't take any pictures of that though.

Well, we got pretty far down, but not far enough, so I guess there will be another "tractor day" for them to look forward to!

Noelle