Happy Birthday to Priscilla!

The girls had fun at our yearly family reunion!  We all did actually!

Today is Priscilla's 3rd birthday!  We had really hoped to have been to visit her by now, but that was not in God's plan.

Esther wanted me to smell the flowers!

 However, we did get our I800a approval letter in the mail today and we have already gotten it notarized!  This is the last document that we have to send in so that our dossier can be submitted.  I do still have to get it apostilled, and sent in, so it looks like we will be getting submitted around the end of August or beginning of September.  That means we'll probably be travelling to meet her late in September or sometime in October.  Yes, that is right around the time that Jeremy and Samantha are getting married - but God knows that and has all this in His hand!

Esther flouting all the rules - eating in Daddy's chair!

We have had a very busy summer, but I'm not exactly sure what we have been doing that has made it so busy!  Ha!  We did just get back from a week long camp-out and boy am I tired!  Here are some highlights of our summer so far (our camera was missing for nearly a month, so there aren't very many photos, sorry about that!).  I'll post photos of our camp out next time around - too tired to find the camera tonight!

Jeremy  on his birthday really digging into his gift...
Sam's not so sure about his love of gummy bears!
Jeremy is still working away at the bear, but he's down to the feet now!

Right now my near future is full of thoughts of starting our school year early, but also the need to do a school room purge to prepare as well.  To prepare for our camping trip, we gutted half our trailer and rebuilt it to work for our family and it was a great improvement.  But right now, our front porch and yard are in need of serious tidying due to the destruction phase of the remodeling.

Our goats are doing well.  We were able to sell the two wethers so we are now down to three goats, and only one of them really giving milk.  We will probably be getting one more goat in September and depending on how that works out, we might sell one of the ones we have now.  The little girls are doing so well on the goats milk.  It's really helped them with their gut issues!  At least up until we went camping, but I'm sure they'll get all healthy again soon!

Esther all ready for church too!

I got the book Trim Healthy Mama just over a month ago and we've been eating so healthy (at least the three oldest girls, Daryl and I have been).  I'll post an entire blog post about that one soon!

I was so excited to get my copies of Three Decades of Fertility!  I gave one to my mother, sold one to my friend, and have given a couple of others away too.  I did find out that I only get commissions from PDFs sold through my link, so I'm working on placing an order of the paperbacks to resell locally and to give as gifts too.  I'm reading through the book and it has amazing stories and great wisdom to glean from these women!

Car seats donated to our family in honor of our adoption,
from Evenflo directly - amazing providence!

Overall this summer I've been just staying home.  I love to be home most of the time.  I just feel like I do everything better if I'm not running around doing things away from home.  Maybe it's because I'm getting older, maybe it's because it takes a lot of time to keep a busy, large family running...dare I say "smoothly"?

My boys and their toys!

Or maybe it's because I'm 49 years old and still nursing a toddler?  I've tried to wean her, but she wants nothing to do with that operation!  She'll take a bottle on her terms, and she's one strong willed little girl!  I've got my hands full with her already!  We are working to get her to understand that the world does not revolve around here.

Princess Carese all ready for church!

 Each one of our children has had to be "de-throned" as I call it.  Sometime between 2 and 4 it becomes obvious that the child thinks that they are royalty and that our family was created to serve their needs...but they soon find out that they are wrong.  But it takes a concerted effort on my part to de-throne them as it's not easy and they do not like the process at all!  Princess Carese is hanging on just fine still, but her time is coming and she's had hints of it already!

She's a beautiful princess though, and her antics keep us appreciative of the gift that she is.  Instead of an empty nest, ours is bursting with little and big people and every size in between.  Each child is such a gift to our family, with their unique talents and personalities.  With so many living together we also have ample opportunity to see our sinful natures and know where we need work.

Growing up with most of my older siblings having moved on, I rarely had to deal with irritations and frustrations in the daily scheme of things and I was able to come to a pretty high view of myself.  But God wasn't willing to let me live with that thinking and has been pushing me to my limits most of my life...constantly causing me to realize my need for Him and His grace in order to overcome my sinful tendencies.

Time to close my rambling thoughts for now...once I find the camera (somewhere in the trailer I'm sure), I'll post a camp out blog post!  Until then, enjoy these last few weeks of summer!  I know I will!