Easter 2023

 

We had a bigger than usual Easter because I believe that the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ are two of the most important events in all of time. I want my kids to understand this, so I am trying to make Easter more memorable. We had scriptures and treats each night before Easter, and then a candy hunt and a big lamb dinner on Resurrection Sunday. And it was better and more enjoyable. Next year, I plan to do a lot more to make it as beautiful as Christmas. Maybe we will even do an Easter tree and lights to make it even better and something more to remember. 

This Easter, Eliza woke up so excited that she squealed with delight and then danced for us. I loved watching my youngest 5 kids excitedly hunting for candy and felt very grateful to partake in their joy. If I had only had 8 children, I would not have this anymore. I am so grateful that I made the choice to have these youngest children of mine, even amidst trials, poverty, and health struggles. There is simply more to life than making sure things are as easy as can be. It would have been easier if I had stopped having kids after Josh. I would have still had a very large family. But I had more with faith and now when I know that I will not be having any more kids, I am so grateful that I have these young ones to enjoy. And that is what I thought of Easter morning. 

Happy Birthday, Rachel

 My little girl and 5th child is 17! I think that Rachel will always be little, but here it is, my Rachel is 17 and finishing off her junior year of high school. 

So what can I say about Rachel?? She is no longer sleeping all of the time. She has passed that torch to Anya and Joseph who sleep all the time now. Rachel likes to stay up late and be up with the second group of risers, which include Josh and Susan. Rachel loves wearing sweaters and wears them even in the hot NC summers. I think she is a little nuts, but I was always cold at that age and Rachel looks like me and has my build too, so I should not be surprised. Rachel likes to read and walk about outside. She loves manga and anime and talking to Anya. She likes to draw and stay up late and she has no plans for the future, except that she would like to marry young. Rachel can be a little ray of sunshine or a thundering storm, but we love her and she fits in very well. 

Eliza Tales

 Eliza pointed to her belly button and said, "It's beep." I beeped her belly button and she said, "It's ow beep, beep."

When Eliza gets food she looks it over and says, "It's eat."

Eliza brings me two toys and wants to play. When she does, she says, "It's hi."

Recently, Eliza has been very interested in horses. She brings me horses and she makes her horse nay in a song, kind of like, la la lalala laaa, but with neigh, neigh, neighnaneigh na-ay.

Funny Little Kids

 Sam got out of the bath, got dressed, and came over to me and said, "Mom, I took  a bath, but I forgot to wash my butt."

Eliza had a rough sort of a day. She started it out by biting Sam on the belly button. I know she bit Gideon at least once. She bit me behind the knee and then later on my arm. I suspect she had more victims, but those victims did not cry over it. At the end of the day I was discussing this poor behavior with Eliza and she stood up, laughed, and roared loudly. I had no idea it was all planned. 

Family Update

 

I have not updated on how the family is doing in a long time. We're so busy and now the garden is a need and I have writing to get done before the new homeschool year, so it's busy and just getting the pictures put on takes a lot of time. But I know that we always enjoy reading these from years past, so here goes. 

John has finally started to lose weight. He looks so much better and I think that he can do more now and move around a lot better. He still has a ways to go before he will feel truly comfortable, but it is nice that this is happening for him now. 

I am writing the next homeschool curriculum book. I am writing the one that I have been writing out by hand for Susan this current school year and the one that Sam will move to next. I will also write the one for Susan for the next school year and hopefully, I will get to the one I will need for Gideon. I have so many ideas, but not much time and certainly not any money to make working easier or nice. But, I know I need to press on and do all I can for these. The garden is up and going, and I will put up a garden update at some point. We've had strange weather, but so has everyone, nearly worldwide. 

Ruth is now 25. I have been a mother for a quarter of a century. Ruth is finishing off an easy reader for me and then she has a children's book about a pigeon that she has been working on for about two years now that she wants to . Ruth has 4 rabbits and she plans to get two more to sell and to breed to earn money. 

Kate completed her first novel late last year and got it all ready for sale early this year. It has her own beautiful illustrations. I don't know how much she has sold, but I think she has sold a few copies. I know that she has more that she is working on. In addition, she has been years working on preserving all of the words and teachings of Joseph Smith and that has greatly blessed our family in many ways. 

Poor Johnny has had a lot of computer trouble and that has made it hard for him to advance in anything, but I think that he knows game programming pretty well now. I wish that I had the money to help him and get him going and becoming financially independent. 

Adam is at the end of his senior year, but he still has 3 classes that he needs to finish before graduation. I have been talking to him about what he wants to or should do in the future. I think he is unsure, maybe that is why he is going to slow with finishing off high school. I am going to have him start a youtube channel for me and maybe one of his own if he wants. But he does like video editing, so I think that might be good. I am also probably going to have him design a website for selling our books and rabbits, etc. I have other ideas that I might be able to get him to help me with.

Rachel just turned 17. She is technically on track for graduation next year, but again, I have no idea what she should or needs to do and neither does she. But she does want to marry young, so maybe a little more socialiatlity would be good for her. I can't believe my kids are so old now, and the world is such a different place from the one that I came to age in and the one that I thought my kids would inherit. I like what my friend said, "I wish I  knew if I was preparing my kids for an apocalypse or just the normal life."  She meant that life that she and her parents and grandparents had. Financially, things are looking really bad for the average American as the dollar is ceasing to be the standard world currency and debt is a huge issue for the nation and the states and and cities and families and individuals. etc., etc. etc..  The bubble may be ready to burst. The rich will be fine, but we are poor. The only thing that I feel like I can give my kids is an ability to innovate and make do, and that has been tried and tested over and over again for me. Spiritually, things are bad too. I feel like everywhere we turn there is darkness and degeneracy and it is inescapable. We can't just tell our kids to do what we did because what we did does not lead to good places anymore. 

Anya is 15 and a freshman in high school and while she is the best at just buckling down and doing her work, she does not always know what she is learning. I hope that she can learn to focus and really apply her mind to learning. Anya is really good at drawing and writing. Her writing is beyond college level. It is sooo good. I really think that she can have a future in art and writing. 

Anya and Rachel are the best of friends right now. They spend all of their time together, they like the same things and while they may chide each other at times, it is usually in a good way. I never hear Rachel and Anya fighting about anything. My hope for the two of them is that they can apply their minds to more serious things and look at the world more seriously. I will probably start a topics course where we talk about the serious circumstances in the world and their grades will be based on how much they have to say. 

Joseph is 13 and finishing off the 8th grade. He is really good with math and science and writing and reading. He's a fairly well rounded student and works above his grade level in everything. He is currently finishing off algebra 2 with me and working on pre-calculus on Khan Academy. He will soon move on and take calculus from Kate who is also going to be teaching Adam. Joseph is also a lot like John. He can argue anything and he likes to argue about everything. He's a little moody, but also a lot of fun and so very capable. I think that Joseph has a lot to offer the world and he can go in many different directions. 

Josh is 12 and in the 6th grade. He is doing fairly well. He is mostly a b-level student. It took him a long time to be able to read well and he still struggles. John works with him on math. Also Josh is very motivated by computer games so that helps him to work and try things that I think he would be afraid to try otherwise. Josh is socially the cutoff of where the big kids and end and the little kids begin. Josh, though 12, is more a part of the little kids, while Joseph is more a part of the big kids. But Josh and Joseph are buddies and will probably always be buddies. 

Arwen is the quintessential middle child. I think she gets left out too much and often does not get enough attention. She is very bright and can do many things on her own. She can take care of the little children and wash dishes, but she also plays with the little children and is a part of them. She likes to sit and talk with the big kids too, and she needs that special attention from mom and dad. Arwen is 10 and in the 5th grade and she does very well. She is an average A student. She mostly gets everything right. Arwen's weakness is math. She can do it, but she tends to forget it, so I give her a little bit of everything most days, except on the days when we are learning new concepts.  

Susan is 8 and in the second grade. I held her back a year and I am glad that I did. She is still learning to read, though I think she is doing pretty well. In another year, I think that Susan will be able to read on her own. Right now she still needs help remembering all of her phonics rules to sound out words. On the other hand, Susan has probably been one of my most independent children. She can do all sorts of things for herself. She has been making her own food since she was 3. She can cook and she can clean well when she wants to. Susan entertains herself better than most of my other kids. She is good alone and not afraid. She comes and asks to play games and learns how to do them rather quickly too. I don't really worry about Susan. She is very capable in many ways and such a fun friendly little girl. She gets along with people in and outside the house. Susan shares a room with Ruth and Kate and in someways I think that has been nice for her and in some ways I think it has been lonely for her. 

Sam is 6 and in kindergarten. He is reading fairly well now. He has almost finished the Bob books and the easy reader that Ruth has written for the kids. He is not in chapter books at all and I don't plan on putting him there until the end of 2nd grade unless he is that much interested in reading on his own. I like for little kids to be able to fully enjoy their picture books. Sam learns pretty quickly. Sam still has a lisp and needs help with pronouncing th and r's, but his speech has improved a lot this year. Sam prayers for the family a lot. When the scripture say the faith of a child, I often think of Sam. He definitely trusts in the Lord. 

Gideon is 4 and not in school yet. Next year will be the start of pre-k for him, though I don't count that as school and mostly make it a year of play with a little of the alphabet thrown in. But Gideon loves his school lessons time with me. I started him last September on speech therapy. He seemed to have a weak tongue because once we did a lot of tongue exercises, he began talking very clearly. But he loved that time so much that I have kept it up. We play songs and games and look at super heroes and read books and he loves it and asks for it even on the weekends. Gideon still loves Batman and super heroes in general. Currently, Gideon loves to wear nothing but underwear. He pretends that he is the "good hulk". 
Eliza, my little caboose and my youngest of all forever more is very precocious. She talks a lot now. I was trying to count all of the words that she says, but there are just too many to bother and she will come up with a new one the next day. I think Joseph was my last kid to speak so clearly so young and it has been fun to have a baby communicate so well again. Eliza always brings up two similar toys to me, one for me and one for her, for me to play with her. She is into everything. He have to keep the stools upside down because she climbs up onto everything and doesn't have enough balance to stay on top all of the time. Eliza loves animals and she loves to play outside. Most of what Eliza says has to do with animals, though, she does tell me when someone is "bad". Eliza loves to swing, so I will take her outside and swing her and sing to her for an hour before she wants to do something else. But all in all, she is an adventurous and smart little caboose and we all think she is simply adorable.