Category Archives: Daily Life

A Simple Day

May 18, 2015 KME 2 Comments

It’s wonderful to have Rachel home! We are eagerly anticipating Joshua’s return on Saturday! It’s also our 23rd anniversary. Busy times. Full hearts.

The sun was shining, and Rachel and I took advantage of the beautiful day to be together. David and Sarah had their online classes, so Rachel and I snuck away for coffee with a friend and then hours of shopping.

So many memories of hours of girl time with my mom growing up. As the only girl with three brothers, I was very close to my mom. She was (and still is) a wonderful companion, godly influence, and heart-friend. Rachel is blessed to have a younger sister, but the two of us LOVE to spend time shopping, laughing, relaxing, and just being together. It is an honor and joy to have daughters who want to spend time with me and whose company I genuinely enjoy.

We bought some cute work clothes for Rachel, loaded the car up with lot and lots of fresh produce (trying to eat HEALTHY here as a family), and made it home just in time to have Daniel help with all the groceries. Smart!

Rachel was wiped out in the afternoon and enjoyed a power -I’m done with school – nap. We finished our homeschooling. Daniel went to work at Chick-Fil-A, and then I took the younger kids to the park for a game of frisbee. Somehow in all our sweet time together, the only picture I took was this (not close) shot of the kids playing Ultimate.

Frisbee Time

We live in such a beautiful state! The beauty of God’s creation around me is a constant source of joy. Our small group held its meeting outside, on the dock at the lake.

I never get tired of looking at the water.

In the middle of our time together, two large eagles soared above the water and perched in a tree right next to us. Later, one of them flew dramatically low and near to our group. Incredible! I wish I had captured it on video.

I zoomed in – look closely to see both eagles.

I hate posting the blog late, but I didn’t have the energy to write last night. This is Monday’s Blog, and the pictures were all taken Monday. Keeping up with the Project 365!!

Project 365- Day 138
Kathy

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Walking for Calories

May 14, 2015 KME 1 Comment

As Tim mentioned earlier this week, we’re all working on getting healthy and counting calories. I’ve been so encouraged to use myfitnesspal.com to keep track of my progress – foods consumed, exercise accomplished, weight lost.

Well, tonight’s dinner was just a little too tasty. It wasn’t the buttered shrimp or even the marinated salmon that put me over the limit. I think it was the brown rice. I usually don’t eat a heavy starch in the evenings, but I was hungry and the big pot of short grain, delicious smelling brown rice just cried out to be eaten.

I only had a half a cup.

And then topped it off with another half. Heh heh. By the time I recorded my food I realized that I was going to need to take a good LONG walk to burn off some calories.

One of our neighbors has a garden in his front yard.

Thankfully it’s spring and the clouds cleared up late this afternoon. Plus we live on a nice, peaceful street. And I have several family members who are wiling to walk with me.

Flowers down the street.

First Tim and I walked a mile and a half together. Then I walked a mile by myself (while making a phone call – multitasking mom here). Next Sarah came out and joined me (barefoot no less). All in all, I walked over an hour and logged in enough calories to keep me on track for the day.

A single blossom on a pretty tree.

Whew! Thanks for walking with me, Tim and Sarah. After the walk I prepared myself a nice tall fruit smoothie using the hurom high speed blender picked up online.

Selfie with Sarah!

Tomorrow I will be a little more careful. Although it was lovely getting outside and enjoying some of the beauty of the day.

Project 365 – Day 134
Kathy

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Can I be Content

May 12, 2015 KME 5 Comments

Today was one of those odd, gloomy sort of days where my spirits were a bit downcast. I woke up early, messaged with a friend in Montana, read my Bible and saw that Tim and Daniel were both already up and out of the house. I got some breakfast and coffee and sat down with a book to read.

A stack of school books, essential oils, a Kindle and some journals.

That messy stack pretty much offers a nice little snap shot of our school days – a box of my essential oils, a plastic massage roller, a Kindle Fire, some journals, poetry and history books, chargers for phones and tablets, pens for drawing, a napkin for snack time. Ha.

I’ve been thinking about backyards and landscape design and how to make things pretty here at home. We’re putting in new carpets and having the walls painted at our house on the Olympic Peninsula. It’s distracting and entertaining to look at Pinterest boards on covered porches. It’s fun to match and coordinate colors on the Benjamin Moore paint site. But in it all, I have to carefully guard my spirit. I am SO EASILY discontented and frustrated with my own yard, house, belongings, gifts, talents, and on and on and on.

Beautiful Mother’s Day flowers from Daniel.

For the past two weeks, in our devotional study book, the kids and I have been studying the commandment NOT to covet. Such good teaching, and so many excellent reminders:

1) Everything we have is from the Lord
2) Both the good and the bad – God wants to use it in our lives
3) True satisfaction comes in loving and glorifying the Lord
4) We should rejoice in the gifts, talents, blessings of others (rather than covet them)
5) We need to guard our thoughts and our attitudes
6) The Commandments reveal our desperate need for a Savior

So, I can enjoy dreaming about adding flower boxes or a covered porch or painting the house, but if any of it causes me to stumble into discontent, anger or resentment, than I need to STOP. Instead I need to spend some time THANKING Jesus for all He has given me. I need to spend some time SERVING others. I need to REMEMBER those who are lost and hungry and homeless.

And I can take some pictures of my blessings and the little silly moments that make up TODAY.

Sarah gets in some reading before dinner.

Marco likes to snuggle up on the couch.

David rode his bike to a friend’s house and then spent some time swimming (or was it hanging out in the hot tub?).

Even on gray days, there is so much beauty all around.

Waiting for Tim to come home.

Where is my sweetie? Late coming home today. There he is!

My beloved!

As the Psalmist writes:

Nevertheless, I am continually with you;
you hold my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel,
and afterward you will receive me to glory.
Whom have I in heaven but you?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalm 73:23-26

May this be true of me – desire Jesus more than anything else and remember that He is my strength and my portion forever!

Project 365 – Day 132
Kathy

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Daily Life

Awkwardness

May 9, 2015 Tim 3 Comments

There is one topic that most parents fear discussing with their children. Coincidentally, it is also one topic that is dreaded by many children. People have even invented an idiomatic alias so they don’t have to speak about it directly.

Yes, I’m referring to the ‘Birds and the Bees’, or human reproductive sexuality.

Nobody wants to talk about this. It is awkward, daunting, and fraught with potential disaster.

Well, nobody except maybe Dennis and Barbara Rainey…

Happily, there is an excellent resource for beleaguered parents, published by Family Life, entitled Passport 2 Purity.

We’ve used this curriculum with our older three kids, but Kathy and I dragged our feet in applying it to our younger two. Finally, Sarah started pressuring her Mom.

“When are we going away for our special weekend, Mom?”

“Well, Dad needs to go through the Passport 2 Purity with David, first,” Kathy reminded her.

Sarah was unsympathetic. “David’s fourteen. What’s Dad waiting for? Maybe he should take David away for the weekend before he is married and has children. Wouldn’t that be more appropriate?”

I may have paraphrased this a tiny bit.

In any case, David and I went camping, bringing the Passport 2 Purity CDs with us, both a little nervous.

The program is divided into five sessions, each containing a lecture and several illustrations, along with a project that the parent and child do together. The sessions take about 90 minutes each, and are designed to be completed in sequence, starting on a Friday night and extending through the day on Saturday.

I planned the weekend, and David and I set off in our little red ‘chariot’, heading for the Pacific shore to camp and to be awkward together.

Heading off on our father-son weekend …

Tune in tomorrow for the exciting conclusion to our weekend!

Project 365, Day 129
Tim

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Pool Time & Late Posts

May 7, 2015 KME 4 Comments

I was sleepy last night (and a wee bit grumpy), so I went to bed without blogging. I had taken a picture, and I knew the topic of my post, but I was feeling rebellious. Yep, that’s me, pretty much a rebel. NOT gonna blog, and you can’t make me. I also went to bed without cleaning up the kitchen or making Tim’s lunch for the morning.

Of course, then I got up at 6 am to make Tim’s lunch before he left.

“It hurts me that you got up to pack my lunch,” Tim said after I told him his bag was downstairs and then proceeded to climb back into bed.
“Well, you have be up,” I mumbled, eyes already closed, hoping to sneak in another hour of sleep.
“Yes,” he said slowly, “it hurts me that I have to be up too.”

LOL!

And today I’m posting twice, because I’m determined and committed to keep going with our 2015 Project 365. So, not sure what that little bit of “rebellion” really did for me. Ha.

Thankfully no one expects me to be brilliant in my blog post (not when I’m writing after midnight). And I have a bunch of great pictures from the day.

Early morning outing

In the morning Michelle and Kirstin picked me up for the Grand Opening of the new Whole Foods store. So many people! It was definitely quite the event. Poor Kirstin, she thought the store had opened several days before and had no idea we were dragging her into a Whole Foods Throng! The craziest part was how the employees and workers all lined the entrance of the store and screamed and shouted and clapped as the first customers walked in. I think that might have been my only shot at having a “celebrity moment.” Probably should have at least remembered lip gloss.

Later I got in a long walk with a friend. You know those kinds of friends who give you encouragement and are also willing to tell you hard truths? I have several in my life. This was just the challenging, real conversation I needed as I’m walking through a difficult struggle right now. Love the godly women the Lord has placed in my life.

Of course, we can’t just spend all day shopping, walking and doing school. The sunshine cries out for some late afternoon fun. It’s still mild and cool out (it’s not summer yet, it just feels like it with all this sunshine), but the pool was warm.