It is a war.

My son is all about the war and fighting talk and I, being a girl I guess, am always like, "Ugh. I can't stand all this talk of violence!" So don't you know when I get completely fed up and say something like that to him we always go to services and hear about, you guessed it, war! It never fails. In the future I hope I remember to remind myself to redirect his war talk in the righteous direction of fighting against the 3 S's. This is yet another area where the male balance is missing in our life...but thankfully God has provided for the fatherless with a Godly ministry! But this life is a war against selfishness, for one thing, and we must remember to persevere no matter how great the struggle is, no matter how comfy our beds are, and no matter how excellent raspberry cheesecake cookies taste. No, we must fight for the subjection of our minds and bodies to the will of a greater, much, much, much greater One. Just wanted to take a minute to encourage everyone to keep up the good fight in faith and hope and joy!
Much love,
You know who.

Overnight Guests!

My lervely niece...

 In her monkey jammies! Look at her pose...not her first rodeo, huh? ;) Next is my nephew, trying on a cabbage patch doll shoe...his dad would have a fit! But when my niece is here the mess goes from being cars and trucks to dolls and play food.

Ignore the hideous couch...the linen slipcover in a nice tame cream color has to get washed and bleached fairly regularly with a growing boy in the house, specially since his feet can't stay off it! Its all good though, it can be thrown in the washer and dryer easily. I highly recommend slipcovers if you have children. So easy to wash...

Kids Can Clean Up Too!

If you have wood or linoleum floors your children can help you keep them dust-free. Want to know how? Well, this isn't a new tip and I guess it isn't really just for kids, either, but put on some clean socks and spritz the bottom of them lightly with whatever you use to clean your floor and then cut loose, you know play some loud music and scoot your booty over every square inch of your dusty floor and before you know it, no more dust! You won't get a good glide on if you spray too much cleaner on your socks, so go easy. You may find it works better to spritz the floor and then slide through it on your way to drier spots. It may go without saying, but I will assume you aren't using something toxic that will eat away your flesh if it soaks through your socks before you finish having fun! There are safe effective cleaners out there, so use them to make sure this stays fun and doesn't earn you a quick trip to the E.R. The point is, it can be fun and something children can help you do. It helps them become more responsible and contribute to taking care of their home, which are both skills they will need for life! Also, you probably want to use some really old socks or gray ones or ones that can be bleached or ones you were about to pitch in the garbage anyways, but you probably already thought of that, now didn't you? :)