Quick Update

Heading out to Drew's last track meet before districts. He is just running some speed work for fun. Actually he will be part of a 4 x 100 team. The distance runners always take on the throwers in one race of the year. Should be fun to watch. The weather is nicer, so looking forward to being outside for a while.

Caleb is back to the marathon school days, so we have seen lots of the inside of the house this week.


Hannah's speech therapist was amazed at how well her speech was going after a two week break. Interesting that she could notice that much of a change. Her dentist pointed out yesterday that she has very porous teeth and will need some extra attention to keep them cavity free from this point on. Fun!


Erinn is feeling so much better! Praise God! She is busily working on catching up with her school work she missed. Lots of multi-media stuff for her minor classes.


Danielle is running around smoky Santa Barbara again. At this point she is not under evacuation orders, but she does have most of her irreplaceable things in her car at this point. Pray for the many who have lost their homes and who are waiting to hear of theirs. Pray for safety of the firefighters (I believe some were caught in the fire and burned last night). Pray for weather changes to help bring this under control soon.

And on this World AIDS Orphans Day, remember:


Over 15 million children worldwide have lost one or both parents to AIDS – equivalent to the number of people living in New York, Paris, and Bangkok combined. In sub-Saharan Africa alone, over 12 million children have been orphaned by the pandemic.Experts believe that millions more orphans remain unaccounted for in India, China and Russia. By 2010, the number of AIDS orphans worldwide is expected to reach at least 20 million. (Stats borrowed from a friends blog)


You can find out more about World AIDS Orphan Day here http://www.worldaidsorphans.org/


And a wonderful site about adoption of an AIDS Orphan from the HIV to Home site here
http://fromhivtohome.org/

Sutter's Fort

David and Caleb toured Sutter's Fort while in Sacramento this weekend. Caleb is the perfect age for this kind of hands on learning about the old west.

Look how intently he is watching this man start a fire?!? Didn't he see that all the time in Liberia? Maybe it is taking him back?

Tools! What little boy does not like tools. I bet some of these were somewhat familiar with what he saw in Africa.

While there, they met up with Drew's track team taking a tour. They are all waiting for the shooting off of the cannon.


And here is the cannon ready to be shot. So glad that Caleb does not jump and grab us at the sound anymore.

Do you ever think how much we take our safe lives for granted? Do you think what a precious thing it is that your children have never known running from bullets? And what about those low flying jets, do you ever wonder if bullets will come raining down from them?

Just some thoughts to think on and be thankful for today. And lift up an extra prayer for all those families around the world who deal with these things daily.

Sacramento Meet of Champions

Sacramento Meet of Champions 2009Drew racing the 3200M
Does it look like he gave all he had?

He ran a 9:24, but missed that national qualifying time by 4 seconds.

To go so far and miss by so little! Here he discusses the race with Coach Piet.

Congratulations son on another season PR!

Good Visit!

We had a great visit with Danielle. With Erinn sick we got so few pictures, she always has a camera. Sorry we missed so much, but the time was great.

We did limit her dress choice to two, at least for now.

Hannah is now in sister withdrawal, with Danielle gone and Erinn closed away trying to catch up. She is presently out back trying to get the dog to play house with her!!

Life Update

Thought I would first update on where we have been!

The biggest reason I was not blogging the last few days was because of Erinn's health. Due to the flu panic out there, I thought it best to keep it quite that she was ill. She was tested and found to be negative for that nasty virus going around. Just a regular old flu bug that really took hold because she was so worn out from school and work. She has been off everything a week and is now on antibiotics for bronchitis and the flu symptoms are all gone.

We are very thankful she is on the mend and no one else got sick. Pray for her as she works back into school and tries to catch up.

The second reason for not blogging is that my wonderful anxiety seems to prick it's nasty little head up when the stress level goes to high. So have been doing battle with that for the last few days, not really a good time to write much. Thankfully that seems to be settling down for now too.

I thank the Lord for His mercies that are new every morning!!

George W Carver

I just finished this book this morning. I must confess I knew very little about George W. Carver before I started this book. I am now thoroughly amazed by this man of faith who chose to live his life for the Lord and give his gifts to the world. What a challenge.
I look forward to reading some of his actual writings next. And finding some beginning biographies to read with Caleb and Hannah. I think in reading of this man, I can encourage Caleb to further reach beyond what he thinks he is able.
Happy reading!

Pictures Done!

We were able to get our family pictures done yesterday-yeah!!

You have to understand that for our family pictures have been quite a drama for the last 10 years or so. Anyways our photographer was great with everyone. We took them all outside and think we got some good ones. Look forward to seeing them tomorrow or Monday.

Today is Danielle's last day home. She and I with Hannah's help will hit a couple of bridal shops today.

David, Drew and Caleb are headed to Sacramento after Caleb's football game. Drew will be running in the Sacramento Meet of Champions this evening. It will be his only chance this year to race a 3200M.

Pre-Picture Shopping

Tomorrow we will have our family pictures taken by a professional, a first for us. David has usually been the family photographer, with great results I must say, but due to the increase in our family size and the variation of skin color we have had trouble getting one where we all are looking good at the same time! Plus it will probably be the last one with our family before it grows in size due to marriage.I was reading on another blog I follow about their shopping trip to get the family attire for the same thing, I laughed at her comments! I am not laughing now. What an experience! Mostly with adult daughters and myself all seeing a different thing!

I think we are happy with our finds, and not what any of us had in mind to start with. Danielle, Erinn and I will be in dressy, shiny shirts (the silver and purple), David and Drew will wear white shirts and black vests, Caleb has a polo shirt and Hannah a purple dress in the best match we could find to Erinn's shirt. And we will all wear jeans and black shoes to dress it down and make it fun. I think it will work. Look forward to seeing the results.

Catch Up

Danielle is home and life is very busy!A quick update.

*Danielle may have found the perfect wedding dress--Yeah!!

*Hannah got her hair beautifully braided by my friend, Rebecca. I took her daughters hair out, I think I have the much easier job!!

*Drew ran at the Oregon Relays and got a new PR in the 800M. 2:04

*Caleb will finish his Alert Cadet Basic Handbook tonight.

*Erinn has the flu!! Praying with the scare out there, that is all it is!

*And this is the normal look at my house when Danielle comes home!!

*I love having older kids, and I love having everyone under the same roof for a while!!

A Child of Trauma

I have posted about educational issues I deal with, with both Hannah and Caleb, just to give an idea of some of the things we deal with on a regular basis with our schooling. Since the kids came home, I have researched educational issues for both of them and am sometimes overwhelmed with what they will face and the daily challenges we will encounter as a result of past trauma and pre and post natal malnutrition.

Some of the new reading I have been tackling is from the Post Institute, to be found at: http://www.postinstitute.com/ After reading an article this weekend on trauma and the development of the brain I gained a little insight into how the kids stress systems (my words) are working constantly in the fight, freeze, or flee. I had never seen the 'freeze' put with the others and I think that was what really clicked for me, because that is exactly what the kids do. Put any small amount of stress, real or perceived, and they totally freeze up.

It was explained that the portion of the brain that the part of the brain that receives the stress or threat develops prenatally, whereas the part of the brain that tells how to regulate that stress or fear develops in early childhood. So if there is too much stress and not enough calm, parental influence in those early months, the ability to regulate the stress response does not develop properly and the child lives in this constant fight, freeze or flee, without the ability to decipher whether a situation is serious or not.

So from what I can gather the idea is to help the kids live in as stress free an environment as possible to allow that portion of the brain to develop. What I am still working on, is how much this can repair over time, or will this be a constant factor for them.

Now understanding all of this, imagine trying to produce a totally stress free environment for children who live with so much real and imagined fear, added to the top of this that they are still dealing with attatchment issues and you have an interesting deliema. For now we are trying to reduce the number of questions, not raise our voices and smile even though you feel like saying "why?" in a very loud voice with frustration on your face.

Hope to post more on this later, but my mind is in overload and I need some time to process all I am learning.

The Prom

So here is what Drew needed the dress clothes for--Prom!!

He was supposed to run a race this evening and it was changed, so at the last moment he had to get his attire ready.

He and Baylee have been seeing each other for about 5 months and she was going to go to the dance with some girlfriends. I am sure she was happy about the change of plans too.

It is nice to see two young Christians enjoy the company of one another in a fun and pure way. We pray they may continue to be an example to those who witness their relationship.

We have already had their track coach comment that he has never seen such a relationship between two young people and he is excited to have their example on the team.

We pray for Drew, as well as our other older children, that they may continue to grow in the wisdom and nurture of the Lord. That they may seek is face in all they do. And that their lives may be a living testimony before the Lord and the world.

The Ballerina

Hannah had her photo shoot with the Ballet Studio tonight. Here she is in her costume. There were actually 4 little girls the photographed in these costumes.

Interestingly enough I figured Hannah was their racial diversity child, but one of the girls had an Indian (India) heritage, one was half Japanese, and one cute little curly headed blond and blue eyed white child. It had quite the international flair!!

We Have A Reader!!!

Just now our sweet little Hannah read these words and a few others to me!! What a praise!!!

Did 'cat' and 'box' ever look so good?

And this is just a beautiful picture from our tree out front. It just blossomed out this week!

Praise God for all His bountiful blessings!

Guess Who Is Coming Home?

Yep, Danielle is coming home for a visit and Hannah is beside herself with anticipation, she gets to share a room with her big sister while she is home!! Danielle was last home on Thanksgiving and she had just gotten engaged. We will be spending tomorrow in Eugene wedding dress shopping with my mom and Erinn!!

Hannah has been invited to a photo shoot for her ballet studio. They are doing new advertisement brochures and recital brochures. Interestingly, Hannah has only been in ballet for 2 months and is not even in the recital! I think they were going for the diversity shot. That is OK, Hannah will enjoy the experience.

Caleb has started flag football. He played tackle last year and did not like the tackling, so we thought this might be a better fit. It is interesting that the two teams could not be much more different. His tackle football team last year had the former North Medford High School coach for head coach (his grandson was on the team), they practiced a lot, were very intense and strict, and they won every game they played by at least 20 points. Now this flag football team is ALL about fun. They had 10 kids for their practice (one a week, for an hour) and three of the little boys did not listen much at all and one of them spent most of his time on the ground complaining about something. The coach was hard pressed to talk to them at all. Well they have had two practices and they have their first game tomorrow. I do not believe half the team has any idea what they are doing-seriously! It will be interesting!

Drew has his big special occasion tonight, I will post more on it later. For now suffice it to say he asked me to iron and he got a hair cut for the special night!

Drew will be racing at the Oregon Relay's tomorrow night. The University of Oregon will be running a meet with the top high schools in conjunction with their own college meet. It will be a long day for Drew, but he has qualified to run in the top seeded 1500M and 800M races. He is hoping the intense competition will help him lower his times.

Erinn and David will be helping at a high school track meet tonight. David is coordinating all the Rotary volunteers and Erinn will be running the shot put with a college friend of hers. They have both joined the church softball team also and have their first game on Sunday.

So with the girls headed early to Eugene to go shopping and Drew off with the team to Eugene, that leaves Mr. Dad in charge of the little ones!! He was asking me this morning if he can leave the kids alone at the start of his 10K race in the morning!! I can't believe I had to tell him that I thought it was not a good idea. He will then try to get Caleb to his football pictures and game before heading to Eugene for the race. As he was asking me to make sure the kids had all their things together for tomorrow, he didn't want to have to be looking for everything in the morning, he wondered if we had too much on our schedule! Well I don't know, but I am lucky to keep it all straight most of the time!!

Have a blessed weekend and remember to Delight in Him!

Still Growing

Today we went shopping for a black vest for Drew. He has an upcoming special day and needed to be dressed up, no problem we thought he has those things including a vest. Well when he tries everything on low and behold the vest is way too small!! The change in one year was dramatically seen when he put it on and his tie hung out the bottom and about and inch of shirt showed between pants and vest.

It got me thinking about our spiritual growth. Sometimes we grow like Hannah (2 inches a month), and sometimes we grow like Drew did (2 inches in a year). When we can see the dramatic changes,we feel good about where we are with God. But more often than not the growth is the slow and steady kind that you don't really notice unless you try to fit in where you were last year.

It was a good reminder for me that the slow and steady growth changes you too. That I am being MADE into what He wants me to be, it is not an overnight thing, it is a continual process till we see Him face to face. Praise God, He is not finished with me yet!!

Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, and causest to approach unto thee, that he may dwell in thy courts. (Psalm 65:4a)

Swimming With Watoto

Aren't these beautiful children!!

Now when I go to the park or the pool, I usually do not have too much trouble finding my two beautiful African faces in our predominately white community. Today I was having a 'little' more trouble than usual!!! Caleb is on his back a little to the right of center in the picture.
There is a children's choir from Uganda called 'Watoto' in town and we were invited to the gym and pool with them today. Hence the problem trying to pick mine out of the pool. Hannah is at the bottom of the picture holding on to the side. We do have one of the best swim teachers in town living right in our house (Erinn), but alas my youngest do not know how to swim. What is that saying about the shoemaker's kids not having shoes!
Interestingly, after listening to the choir sing on Sunday, Hannah told me she wanted to be an 'African Girl' when she grew up!! After I got over my surprise I informed her that she already WAS and African Girl!!! To which she gave me a huge toothless grin!!


If you are interested in the ministry of Watoto you can visit them online at http://www.watoto.com/ They have built self contained communities where the orphan children are raised in home-like settings--8 children to one mother. To raise the next generation to fear the Lord and serve their country.

Sarah's Covenant Homes

You will hopefully notice the new picture on the sidebar. It is for a ministry that I have been following and hope to soon be able to help participate in funding. I invite you to go on over an see the amazing work being done in India to help those who have no voice and whom many would want to pass on by as too much work.

The Next Teaching Challenges

So now that we "have" the letters, and I say that very loosely. The next challenge is to combat all the processing issues that Hannah has. Many of these letters she will only recognize as capitals, so this challenge took about an hour to match the capitals with the lower case letter. Her visual processing issues cause her problems with seeing letters and being able to write it, say it or connect it. It is hard to explain and understand.

Drew is dyslexic (was), so I have dealt with some of these issues before. But with Hannah there is an added stress issue. If she feels pressure she will just shut down and really not be able to take any input.
--With her speech this showed up as a stutter till we put no pressure on speech of any kind (no questions) for about 2 months, thanks to the advise of her new wonderful speech therapist!
--With numbers we saw this when she got 1,2,3 then could get no other numbers for about eight months. Then we realized that she did not get 4 because it is written in two different ways (you know, like this closed 4 and an open one). We tried to skip '4' for a long time, but the stress of 'knowing' it was still there to be dealt with caused her not to be able to move on. For some reason last month she 'got' 4 and now knows them all the way to 10 most of the time.

So understanding this you may better understand my trepidation as we move on with Hannah's letters. Taking them one at a time, when she was finally ready, she was able to tackle them. If they are presented together, such as Aa, Rr or Bb, she can confidently move forward. But try to present them as r,b, or a, and she will shut down-hard. I saw that today.

The issue with the number 4 took eight months to tackle, now I have 26 letters that all present the same dilemma to her. And the letters a and g are often written as you see here, not as they are taught, adding to the challenge. Add to that b, d, p, q, m, w, n, u the all-around challenge letters that are copy cats and her visual processing comes to a halt.

Interestingly, I am not real discouraged. Hannah has made such tremendous progress in the last nine months, I know she will continue to bloom and move forward. Now we will just be moving forward into a new chapter for her and seeking the best ways to help her grasp these concepts.

I remember thinking some time ago, before the new kids came home, that I 'knew' how to home school. Isn't it interesting how God challenges our thinking and our pride to bring us back into total dependence on Him!!

"Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of heaven." Matthew 19:15

Thought for the Day

Having a daughter working at the Regan Ranch Center puts you in contact with lots of good quotes from this great President. The following is on her emails these days. A good thought for the days we find ourselves living in.


Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free -- Ronald Reagan

So let's remind our children what freedom means and that it is not free, we must work for it and fight for it.

Have a great day, enjoying the freedom to enjoy it as you will!

Another PR For Drew

Drew ran a 4:06, 1500M today! That is a 4 second PR!He then ran a 9:12 3000M. Not a PR, but a great race indeed.
The biggest challenge for all the runners was the heat. It was about 85 degrees here in Southern Oregon. Believe it or not we had a little snow floating out of the air on Tuesday here. An amazing turn in the weather that threw a little bit of an extra challenge for the runners.