Family Musings

The righteous who walks in his integrity— blessed are his children after him!  Proverbs 20:7 In honor of this special day for Dad's everywhere, I repeated my Father's Day Interview with Charlotte & Mary. What is something Daddy always says to you?  - "I love you." What makes Daddy happy? -  "Giving him hugs and kisses" What makes Daddy sad? -  "When I disobey him" How does Daddy make you laugh? -  "By telling me really funny jokes" What was Daddy like as a child? - " I don't know because I never saw a picture of him." How old is Daddy? -  "How old are you Mommy?" "I'm 35." "Then's Daddy's 35." How tall is Daddy? -  "Really, really, really, really tall. But not as tall as a giant." What is Daddy's favorite thing to do? -  "Play with me and work." What does Daddy do when you're not around? -  "Go to work. Work at home." Wh...

I am so glad that, as a follower of Christ, I am called to think differently. Were it not for Christlike thinking, I'd find myself stuck in sorrow, fear, and dread far more often. I am human of course and do deal with these issues, but faith in Christ gives me a place to go with my fear and my dread and my sorrow. In my life, this hasn't just been a theoretical idea either. Recently, two situations in my life tested how much I really believed what I wrote about thinking differently. To understand where I am coming from, you may recall a post I wrote last Spring called " Motherhood and God's Sovereignty ." About 2 weeks after I wrote that post, I had my 20-week ultrasound. In it, the ultrasound tech thought she noticed a club foot. Her findings were inconclusive, so we eventually had another ultrasound. As it turns out, our son does have a right club foot. At the time of my post on God's sovereignty I wondered if my thoughts were the natural progression o...

Our girls were the first to find out whether Baby 3.0 is a boy or a girl.

The righteous who walks in his integrity— blessed are his children after him! Proverbs 20:7 In honor of this special day for Dad's every where, I repeated my Father's Day Interview with Charlotte & Mary. What is something Daddy always says to you?  - "I love you." What makes Daddy happy? -  "Seeing me and Mary" What makes Daddy sad? -  "When he misses us. That makes me sad too" How does Daddy make you laugh? -  "By tickling me. I'm ticklish." What was Daddy like as a child? - " I don't know because I wasn't there when he was a child." How old is Daddy? -  "I don't know, 25?" How tall is Daddy? -  "Tall enough that he can get the beans down." What is Daddy's favorite thing to do? -  "Watch us dance and play together." What does Daddy do when you're not around? -  "He just, you know, like, he likes to sit around." What is Daddy really good at?  -...

Bruce here, hijacking Jennifer's blog again. Today is Mother's Day. And I thought I share a little bit about my appreciation for Jennifer. Jennifer and I met in 10th grade history class. And, within one week of meeting Jennifer, I told her that we were going to get married, one day. This is an undisputed fact. But, Jennifer still has trouble believing I really meant it. Of course, she also shook her head "no" when I asked her to marry me 5 years later; she couldn't believe I was serious that time, either. But, I was. So, why would a 15-year old punk be picking out his future wife? It sure does sound pretty absurd. But, even back then, I knew what kind of woman I wanted to be the wife and mother of my future family. Yes, I was a strange kid. Years later, when I actually asked her to marry me, I had already planned out our financial future so that I knew we'd be able to make it. I was only 19, at that time, but I knew people, including Jennifer, would wo...

When I was a little girl my family spent a lot of time at the beach. I even had a fringed shirt that said "Beach Bunny" on it! One of the many activities that kept my attention was digging a hole to China. Did anyone else ever do that? I can't be the only one. Can I? It occurred to me that no one ever told me I couldn't do it. I don't have a single memory of any grown-up saying that it was impossible to dig a hole through the earth and end up in China. In my head, I started to form a metaphor about letting kids have dreams and ambitions. About never letting them think anything was impossible and the adults all wishing they could have the hope of a child. But then, suddenly, I realized why no one ever told me that digging a hole to China is impossible. Think about it. What reason can you think for not telling a super chatty child that she can't actually dig a hole deep enough and that she'd die from the molten core long before China was even an op...

When I was a little girl, my family experienced the unpleasantness of divorce. As is normal in these situations, every one hurt and mourned for what was lost. Of course,  I can't speak for anyone's experience but my own. And I know that it hurt. It was hard to be separated from one parent or the other on opposite weekends. But I always remember something my mom did to make it a little easier. She gave me a bear. It was a small stuffed bear with rainbow fur. And she told me that the rainbow was a promise that things would get better. My mom has always been a good gift giver. She's thoughtful and likes to think about how the recipient will use the gift. I try to be like her in this way. This month, DaySpring (in)spired Deals helped me give a special gift to my husband. They sent me this set of Mr. & Mrs. mugs. What makes these thoughtful is that the inside rim is printed with "I found the one my heart loves. Song of Solomon 3:4"  We have a lot of...

I love this man! And that beard... it makes him look so rugged! But I know that on the inside, he has a soft spot for all the Sabin girls.

Over the summer I began swapping childcare with a mom who lived nearby. One of the swaps we do is for a date night, about once a month. The first few months it was enough to just have a meal together and hang out... but now that we've been doing this consistently for several months, we need to mix things up and make them more interesting for both of us. It is just too easy to let all of the conversation be about things that we need  to talk about, like the children, budgets, or our schedule for the coming week. Inspired by a good price on Arts Cow  playing cards, I decided to create a set that we'd be able to use for playing games on our date nights. The first date night we use them might be the most fun though, because I designed these cards with room to write on the back of them. The plan is for each of us to get 2 suits of cards and then write out one thing on the back of each card that we love about the other person. I think fine tipped permanent markers would work be...

We started our Christmas day off by going to church. It was a great way for us to keep our focus on the reason for celebrating and to remind the girls that we exchange gifts with one another as a way to remember the gifts that the Magi brought to Jesus when he was a toddler.  I got the girls all dressed up and we posed in front of the tree for some sister love. We say " no to the dress " around here, so Mary is wearing a dressed handed down from her friend Clara and Charlotte is wearing a Matilda Jane dress I won from DesignHer Momma .   After church, we fed the girls a quick lunch (hot dogs and yogurt!) and then began opening gifts. It sure does look like a lot of stuff in that picture doesn't it? Fortunately, it wasn't all for those 2 sweet angels up above and it was divided between 7 of us. Charlotte loves her new purple hat... And Grumpy and Grandpa liked their new travel mugs. The girls had painted these and made finger print fish on...

Before the new year gets too far underway, I better hurry up and share our Christmas pictures and stories. For Christmas Eve I was able to convince my brother and his family to drive all the way to Lakeland to hang out with us. Actually, even though we usually go up to his place, he offered to come down here, which I thought was pretty sweet of him. And speaking of sweet, what about this picture of him hugging Charlotte? Guess he's still got a soft, sweet side. :) The grown-ups decided a couple of years ago (when kids started coming along) that we'd just exchange gifts for the children. It's worked well and helps all of us keep our spending in check. Nick and his wife Michelle surprised our girls with Littlest Pet Shop toys. Charlotte and Mary have played extensively with these toys every day since. And since we had all 3 girls together, I thought it would be a good idea to get a group picture. Well, it might have been a good idea to me, but the girls didn...

Carefully applying sprinkles... And some more icing... Mary did surprisingly well with the squeeze bag. Notice my Christmas card covered door? It's missing about half of the cards! Bruce joined in too. :) Enjoying the fruits of our labor... It's okay that she licked her fingers, we were done decorating! PS - Canned cake frosting isn't a good choice for cookies.

Believe it or not, 2011 is the first year that my family has ever really put up a Christmas tree. When it was just Bruce and I it never really seemed all that important, especially since we were usually traveling on the holiday itself. But last year, after Christmas was over, I snuck over to a clearance sale and bought a 6 1/2 foot fake tree. It's been hiding in my daughters' closet ever since. Well, until Black Friday. And then last night, it was finally adorned with ornaments that I've been collecting over the last 14 years. I especially love my tree topper, which has been sitting on tables for the last few years since it never had a tree to go on. It is a metal nativity piece featuring Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jesus. For posterity's sake, I thought it might be a good idea to note when some of my favorite ornaments were acquired so my children won't have to guess one day. This ornament is from Charlotte's first Christmas. And this one is from Mary...