Happy 20th Birthday Rebecca!

Our oldest Daughter is turning 20 today!


How times flies by!

I know that we hear that saying often but it is so true.

Rebecca has grown into a lovely young lady. She has a heart for God and a sweet and warm spirit.

Our prayer that God will use her in a mighty way to glorify Him!

Happy Birthday Rebecca!

Love your Family!


You can check Rebecca's Blog Here !

Enjoying the Little Things!

Psalm 127:
3 Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.

Have you ever gotten so wrapped up in the day to day tasks that you stopped enjoying the little things that God brought into your life?

This can be said about me.

I have been a mom for almost 20 years and I love being a mom. All I used to dream about when I was a young girl was about getting married and having a large family.

I have always desired to have a lot of children. I think that God placed that desire in my heart all those years ago. I was not saved then but God was working in my life.

After having our first two children my husband was quite content with two. I still felt this strong desire to have more children though. My heart ached for them.

In the fall of 1992 the Lord saved my soul and shortly after my husband received him as well!

With in two months I was pregnant again with our third child!

Through the years the Lord worked in my heart and my husbands and we came to a place of trusting him for our family size. He then blessed us with 5 more children ( I was already in my mid thirties by this time)
The Lord was also working in our hearts about homeschooling. Which we have been doing for 13 years now.

With the added laundry, dirty dishes, homeschooling I forgot to enjoy my children. I let all of these things take that joy away from me and I forgot to enjoy the little things.

The Lord has been working in my heart a lot lately about this. Today I was looking at our little 2 year old daughter and she was singing and talking away and I looked at my husband and said isn't she so adorable! My husband and I never would have thought that we would have a two year old child at 45 years old. We often joke that when she is getting married we will need to retire Amen! :)

Time goes by so fast. My oldest daughter will be 20 next February. I remember bringing her home from the hospital like it was just yesterday. Okay I know that you have heard that saying before but it is so true.

So should I keep my house clean? Should I do all those piles of laundry? Yes, but I also need to remember to stop and to just enjoy the little things!

May God bless you as you enjoy your little ones (and bigger ones :) ) As you continue to serve him.

God Bless, Kathy

(Photo is courtesy of J's Magic)

Family Trip to Yankee Candle

Hear ye! Hear Ye!
The Royal children say hi!

A few weeks ago our family was able to visit Yankee Candle!
The Christmas mood is so enjoyable there! The sights, smells and sounds are so Christmassy!

We enjoyed seeing the candles, trains and nutcrackers too!

Collin and I loved the castle!

Mom's favorite display!

This was everybody's favorite!



Yes, we are down to blogging about 1 time a week!
We hope you don't mind!
We would love to hear from our readers about what you would like to see on our blog!

~Rebecca and Kathy!

Enjoy the slideshow!

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An Unusual Game

Playing "Travis"

The game of "Travis" is so fun and simple!
My 4yr old brother invented it!


He has a Playmobile soldier which he named "Travis".
And this lizard next to him is "Kobi"
They own the castle and all the other toy animals are their friends!

This game has become very popular!
We have a"lookout" Brontosaurus,
A "General" T-Rex, a "cook" named Mooch the Monkey, and on and on!

We have alot of fun playing this game, and alot more fun cleaning up all the animals after!

It's amazing how a simple game can be so much fun!
"Travis" is a great game for my two youngest siblings to play while Mom teaches school.
But sometimes Mr. Dinosaur roars a little bit loud!

:)

~Rebecca

A Day with Kate

Make a Smilebox slideshow We hope that you enjoy these pics of Kate!

Our Trip to the Zoo!

G'day mate!

This past weekend we went to a Zoo!

We had a lot of fun!
We saw many animals, and had a great day just having fun as a family!
I'll post a few pics and a SmileBox!

It did look like rain all day long, but God was good and allthough cloudy we did not see a single drop of rain till we were in the van for our long trip home!



Riding Sher-Kahn!


We liked this little guy, he was so cute!

My Hero!



Yes, I know, I'm sooo pretty. Don't you think?

Whoa Bessie! That's the biggest cow I ever did see!




I'm so blue, but not 'cause I'm sad, but if you touch me you will be sad!

That's no pussycat!
A very large tiger growls at the smaller tigers in the next cage.

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Raising Children to Serve the Lord!

My son Jeremiah in the Nursing home being a blessing!

This is my greatest desire to have children that will walk in truth and serve the Lord.

I was reading over at Crystals blog Biblical Womanhood about the older women teaching the younger women and I often ask the Lord when do I become that older women?

My oldest daughter is nineteen and our youngest child is 2 years old so I still feel like I am in the mist of training our children and raising them for the Lord. My husband and I were saved when our oldest two children where 3 years old and 1 years old.

I have thanked the Lord so many times for saving my husband and I while our children were still so young.

So am I an older women? I just turned 45 years old so I feel old some days :) But than I have my struggles and I do not feel worthy of being able to give advise to the precious young wives out there desiring to do what is right.

I prayed about it and I feel that I can at least share some of the lessons that I have learned since I was saved in 1992.

I have been married for 22 years now and the Lord has richly blessed my marriage to my wonderful husband Doug.

So I thought I would start there. I hope that this series can be a blessing and encouragement to some one out there.

Raising our children for the Lord has to start with ourselves. The Lord has really been impressing on my heart that I need to be the example in my Christian life if I desire to see my children serving God. Lately I have felt frustrated because I do not seem to have the quiet time that I need with my savior every day. So this morning the Lord helped me and I was up at 5:00am to do my devotions. Now I am not saying this to make any of you feel that you have to get up at 5:00am to do your devotions I just find that for myself if I do not get up that early I just cannot find a quiet time with no one else up .

With that said I must say that I am not a morning person so getting up at 5:00am is not easy for me but I am praying that the Lord will help me to continue this. I would greatly appreciate your prayers for me in this matter. :)

I can always tell when I have not had my devotions my day seems to go wrong in every area and I just do not have the peace that only comes from walking in the spirit and not in my flesh.

I have learned that I can not train my children for the Lord in my own power. I need Gods intervention.

After my personal relationship with the Lord my relationship with my husband is the next most important thing.

If I desire to have children that will live for the Lord than my relationship with my husband has to be right.

Oh how I struggle with this. I desire so much to have a meek and quiet spirit and to be submissive to my husband in every area of my life. I know that God has commanded me to be in submission to my husband and this is something that he has been working on in my life.

If we do not have the right kind of relationship with our husbands one of respect and honor than our children will not respect the authority in our home.

Also our children need to see that mommy and daddy are happy together and that they have a stable home and a place of love.

I do struggle with this. I love my husband but so often I find myself not talking to him in a respectful tone and I have to ask him to forgive me.

Praise the Lord that he does not give up on me and that he promises to keep working in my life to make me the godly women that he desires me to be.

I have read several books about being a godly wife so I thought I would mention a couple.
The Excellent Wife, and Created to be his helpmeet. I would recommend you to read these books as a help and an encouragement.

God Bless, Kathy

(What adorable little peacocks!)

My Little Helper

One thing I have learned through the years is to take the time to train my little ones to be big helpers at home.

Our littlest daughter who is now two years old has such a sweet spirit about her and she loves to help!

The other night she wanted to help set the dinner table. So to the silverware drawer she went.




She put out the napkins and than began to work on the forks.






I just could not resist so I grabbed the camera and began taking pictures.

My husband patiently instructed her where to place the silverware , and she was eager to work!



So often I forget how important it is to include my little ones in the daily chores. They like to help mommy but I get so busy and rushed. Such a missed opportunity to teach them to have a helpful attitude.

The Lord has blessed us with eight children and we have been homeschooling now for 13 years so through the years I have learned how valuable it has been to have my children helping me.
Does the work get done always as I would like it to be done? Well not always but what valuable lessons have my children learned about helping.

One motto that we have here is that we are a family that pitches in and works together.
I hope to instill this in my children.

I remember my dad saying to me one day (who is 77 years old now) that he thought it so sad that children today grow up not knowing the real meaning of work. He grew up in a family of 12 children and on a farm so I am sure he knew what real work was all about.

I am thankful that my dad took the time to teach me the importance of being a good worker and that I can hopefully teach these values to my own children.

God Bless, Kathy

I guess this one missed the drawer! :)

Bible Club sure is Fun!

This past summer we had a CEF 5-day club at our house.

My Brothers (Brandon and Collin) and I scoured our neighborhood, knocking on doors and inviting kids to come.

We received varied responses.
Some wives said yes, but their husbands said "no" flat out.
Some said they would come and never showed up.
Some were interested till they heard the word "Bible" then they wanted nothing to do with us.
Some told us they had nothing to do with "religion"or the Bible.
Others "didn't believe that kind of stuff."

We were chased by 3 dogs.
Told to "go away" quite loudly.
And one person swore while we were there because his dog got outside.

It was quite discouraging.

BUT. . .
We Had 3 different families respond and bring their kids!


Isn't God good?

We had a team of 5 girls teach our club. They did a great Job!

These 4 girls taught


This young Lady was the Team's Leader
(My sister is in her lap)


This boy is our next door neighbor, I was able to lead him to the Lord in July of 2007. His twin brother accepted Christ a month later at a VBS.



This is a Picture of me, The girl in front of me is my sister, and the one next to me is a neighbor.



This is the neighbor girl's big sister, and of course my little sister!



I love this song!


The Kids were enthusiastic!



I love this pic of my little sister telling her little Brother to "SHHHHH!"


Please enjoy this SmileBox of that Week!

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