boy, it has been a long time since i have been on here! do you ever just get so carried away with life and time seems to go by so fast before you realize it. that might be why i havent blogged in awhile. or it could be that i forgot how to get here and it took me 2 tries just to get my password right! but im here. since ive last blogged kids have grown, schedules have grown and life has changed ( as it does on a daily basis around here). the end of 2012 was a neat time as ive seen my older kids spread their wings a bit through volunteer work and earning money on their own. we have also been able to get involved in volunteer work as a family. looking back i should have been blogging about this in more detail...too much to catch up on now! my baby got his first haircut by his sister who youtubed instructions (and also gave herself a nice cut!). everyone is growing physically and spiritually. i told someone the other day that one of the things i love most about having a large family is being in almost every season of life at once. from teens (that are NOT scary) to toddlers and everything in between. i never get bored of one stage. i love every stage and could not pick a favorite, as im often asked what age i like best. as we head into 2013 i look forward to growing more in the Lord, individually and as a family. i look forward to finding more ways to serve and outreach in the community as a family. i look forward to making a difference for Christ. and i look forward to more growing and changing in our home!!

the ball is rolling!!!

i am so excited to update everyone on our adoption journey. this past week has been alot of fun and progress. monday was our first adoption prep class and we enjoyed it so much. we met in a couples home that has adopted through our agency. there were 2 other couples besides us. we played an ice breaker game and talked about the pros and cons of different aspects of adoption. then we went over all of the paperwork we will be filling out over the next couple of weeks. we left that meeting feeling excited and encouraged!
last nights meeting was called panel. there were 2 families there to share their adoption stories. we were also able to ask them any questions we wanted. that was very helpful and encouraging. we met a man that we really related to and it was encouraging to hear his story. we also made our appointment for our intake meeting. at this meeting we will go over what our goal is, what we are looking for and how the agency can help us do these things.
i feel like we are really starting to pick up speed and im no longer a hamster running in circles. i know we have a long road ahead of us. but we are excited about this new adventure we are on!
dont forget we are still doing 2 fundraisers. one is selling scentsy and the other is the family closet. both links are on my facebook page and on the side of my blog. we also are taking donations for our next big garage sale! our garage is getting very full! thank you to everyone for your prayers and support.

fundraiser updates

i mentioned in yesterdays blog that i had 2 ladies coming alongside me to help with some fundraising. the first one is called the family closet and she sells new and gently used items on a facebook page. it is the safer than craigslist and cheaper than ebay. i added her link on the side of my blog under home grown businesses. check out her stuff!!!! the other fundraiser is scentsy candles. i will be recieving catalogs and order forms in the mail soon for anyone local that would like to order. she also has a website you can go to and order. click on my party name! her link is also on my blog. thank you ladies and thank you to everyone that is buying!!!

moving right along

with all of the craziness in the past week it was such a blessing to wrap up our sewsewsewyourboat fundraiser and do so well. we are so thankful to anna cross for helping us along. and we are very thankful to have 2 other ladies come along side us and want to help with fundraising! i will get those links up on my blog soon as well. we have also been collecting alot of garage sale items. when the weather warms up for good we will have another big garage sale/bake sale. im very excited to have all of these fundraisers coming together right now as we head into our home study. our adoption prep classes are scheduled for the 13th and 16th of this month. we cant wait to get the ball rolling!

at least it is not raining

most people know about the rough week we have had here at the van clan house. monday our van broke down. tuesday my brother thought he got it fixed but it broke down again on us yesterday. im so relieved i had my brother with me. monday i was in a panic because i was on the freeway with all 9 kids when it broke down. yesterday i was laughing because my brother was with me and that made me feel safer. and by then what else could i do but laugh at the adventure he got to go on with us. i mean, how much fun is that!!! at one point during the day when a friend was trying to get the battery charged for us i looked at my bother and said "at least its not raining too." isnt that how we need to look at things? the thought of being broke down with 9 kids in the rain and trying to fix the car in the freezing cold made me shiver! of course not having our van is very inconvenient. first of all it is our only vehicle. that makes us very dependant on others right now. and i really dont like depending on others. but i am thankful for those in our life that are so willing to help. and second not many people have a vehicle big enough to shuttle our family around. last night we had to make 2 trips to get us all home. but again im thankful to have family willing to do that. we must remember God is sovereign. nothing happens that surprises Him. we may not understand why these trials come into our lives but God sees the big picture. and that is something to marvel at. so sometimes we just have to sit back, chuckle and say "at least it is not raining."

breakfast pizza

sometimes i get creative and try to come up with a new dinner creation. last night we made breakfast pizza. and i say we because after the day we had it was really a team effort!!! the pizza crust i made in my bread machine. that was great! i could make up the dough in the morning and stick it in the fridge to cook later. i cooked up lots of yummy toppings. turkey bacon, chicken sausage, scrambled eggs, chopped green pepper, chopped onions, and shredded cheese. the great thing about this dinner is if you are having a busy night you can pre cook all of these earlier in the day and then throw it all together in the evening. this also is a great leftover recipe. next time you make any of these for breakfast save the leftovers and throw it all together as a pizza. not only were they beautiful and colorful they had so much flavor! we made without the bell pepper and onions for the children. but they were missing out! the onions gave it so much flavor. this is definatly getting a permanent spot on our menu!

family worship

deuteronomy 6:6-7 " and these words which i command you today shall be in your heart. you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up."
ephesians 6:4 " and you, fathers , do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord."
proverbs 6:20 " my son, keep your fathers command and, and do not forsake the law of your mother."
wow! i think the bible has alot to say about families. and more importantly the bible has alot to say about mothers and father teaching their children Gods word. and these are just a few verses. there are many more that speak of fathers teaching their children. and the terms in these verses seem serious to me.
can we teach our children about Gods word too much? no, deuteronomy 6 says to teach them diligently! you shall teach them when you sit, when you walk, when you lie down, and rise up. i think this covers the whole day. Gods word should be so normal in your home. we want it to be normal for them to go to Gods word for every area of their lives.
a great way to go about this is to get on a regular family worship schedule. our family struggled in this area for quite awhile. by the grace of God we have gotten down a good routine. and as you grow in Gods word you will be amazed at how much your desire grows for more. we started by implementing a bed time bible study routine. but then we were convicted that we were not doing it as a whole family so we added a before dinner routine. we started out by daddy reading a passage of scripture each night before dinner. and it has grown from there. we added a study of the westminster shorter catechism. this is a great way to teach the children why they believe what they believe. the children love it. they look foward to it each night.
because there is so much to learn from Gods word i wanted to bring more of it into our daily routine. the proverbs are so full of wisdom for every aspect of life. now we read one proverb each morning before breakfast.
proverbs 1:7 " the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." when i read this word i was convicted to start our school day off with Gods word. i didnt feel right jumping into a day of school without putting Gods word first. this is the time of day that i give the children a memory verse and commit to memorizing it. this sounds like alot in one day but like i said before once you make Gods word a priority in your home you will crave more! matthew 6:33 " but seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and these things shall be added to you." this verse reminds me that when i put His word first instead of squeezing it in at the end of the day IF im not too tired He will be faithful to help me to have time for all the other things i "need" to get done.
i know this model will not work the same for everyone. but its just an encouragement for someone that maybe has not made family worship a priority to start.

im back!!!

i have not been able to blog for the past week. i got a bad virus on my computer. but i took it in to the shop and its all better! not much has changed here in the last week. hubby put my garden frame up. im very excited about that. we are not quite done with it yet. but i will blog and post the pictures soon!
we were supposed to start our adoption training classes this week but we will have to wait until next month now. we have to get some more paperwork in order for our application before they finish processing it. i was a bit bummed about that. but still moving ahead. thank you to everyone that is supporting our fundraiser and praying for us!

since fridays are my update day i just want to remind everyone about my fundraiser going on. my friend anna is hosting a fundraiser for me using her business SewSewSewYourBoat. her link is on the side on my blog. from what i hear things are going so well! im very excited. and again big thank you to anna from the van clan :) this month we will also be starting our adoption prep classes. looking foward to that. and looking foward to getting the ball rolling.

treasures

every once in awhile i find some hidden treasure that just makes my day. i am not a pirate but i get very excited when i happen to stumble upon something that seems so perfect for our family. well at least it is exciting to me. as a homeschooling mom i get very excited to find something i can add to the childrens learning. this past week a friend of mine posted a link called puritans pick. the caption read " like netflix for christians". the word puritan had my attention from the start but after reading the caption i had to find out what this was! the site is just what it says "like netflix for christians". there is a wide variety of films on the site. they range from cartoons that teach bible accounts, books made into movies, documentaries about conservative christian topics, life stories of church fathers and missionaries, and many videos about church history and debates. do you see now why this homeschooling mom is very excited. and every movie is screened and filtered through there very conservative values. another caption read that the movies were so wholesome that " the puritans could watch them". the packages range depending on how many movies you can rent a month and how many you can hold to at a time. but they are very low cost. as we speak i am waiting for my first video to arrive in the mail! i cant wait!!

blessed

i know on tuesdays i usually write about how we can encourage our husbands. but after the past 3 days i must say my husband really went out of his way to bless me! he had a 3 day weekend for new years and i loved just having him home. but i was so blessed by all the help he gave me around the house. keeping the children busy while i finished up some major cleaning projects was so helpful. helping me with houseold chores was a bonus. but the icing on the cake was when he cleaned out the van ( with some little helpers). i am truelly blessed with such an amazing man. and this greatly encourages me when he goes back to work. it helps me to not dread the day he goes back to work so much. i miss him so much but i want to work hard for the man that works so hard for me. i hope he is having a great day back at work and isnt too worn out from his "vacation" ;)

becoming a homebody

i have learned something i never knew about myself over the last couple of weeks. i kind of like being a homebody. of course i have always loved being a stay home mom ( there are trying days i wonder why though) but these last couple of weeks have been unusually mellow around here. i have been able to accomplish muc needed cleaning around the house. i love walking into a house smelling like bleach ;) i have been able to do things with my children i dont normally do. for example play board games and watch movies. my favorite part has been not rushing to get things done. because im an ocd personality i need to have my house in order before i leave. so that means getting up early and rushing through my chores before we go out for the day. i have very much enjoyed not rushing! i think the childrens favorite part has been staying in their jammies all day! something we have been doing in the evenings before dinner is read through the bible as a family but being home has allowed me to add reading through the proverbs with the children before breakfast. i know that soon we will have to get back to reality but i must admit this has shown me that i need to add more home into my stay at home mothering and we need to add more home to our homeschooling.

fundraiser

well im very excited to talk about my new fundraiser! a dear friend contacted me yesterday and asked if she could set up a fundraiser for us. she owns her own business called sew sew sew your boat. she makes a wide variety of items like skirts, burp cloths and other baby items. i was so excited and felt extremely blessed to have a friend with a heart for adoption and a heart for our family. thank you anna!!! so many people are already interested. so for the month of january 50% of sales will go to our fund. and as always you can go to our donate button on the side of my blog and donate. thank you to everyone that is supporting us and to everyone for your prayers! i will be attaching a link to annas business on the side of my blog.

rewind

normally wednesdays are my homeschooling encouragement day. but since we are on a nice long break i do not have much to talk about in this area. except how great it is to have a break! and i have skipped a few days/topics over our busy weekend. so im going to rewind and give a family update today. christmas weekend has come and gone once again. it was a blur. we had our family time on christmas eve. the children woke up early and we opened presents. i love their giving spirits. they were so excited to pass out their presents they bought or made for each other. and it blessed my heart to see them all working so hard to make presents for each other. that evening we spent time with family, having dinner and opening gifts.
christmas day was on a sunday this year. we went to church in the morning. and it was a wonderful service. my favorite part was having all of the children in the service with us. this is something that has been on my heart for awhile now. bringing our family to worship and learn Gods word together. after church we took the children to visit a care home. i loved seeing my children open up and get over their shyness. when we went for thanksgiving they were very shy and reserved. but this time they were very outgoing and couldnt wait to pass out cookies to anyone who came into the hall. a few of the children played some christmas songs on the piano and guitar. im looking foward to watching my children open up even more and bless these elderly people.
christmas evening was spent with more family. it was a nice weekend. having daddy home for 3 days was the icing on the cake. i am very much looking foward to new years weekend and another long 3 day weekend with daddy!

home study

i am so excited to have something to update this week. wednesday afternoon i turned in our home study applications to the agency. i have been hanging onto them since august! i was shaking with nervousness. when the lady came out to take my 3 copies each with our family photo i was shaking. to my surpise she glanced through the application while i was standing there and asked me if we were wanting to take the adoption prep classes in january. of course!!! i even took all of the children in with me to drop the apps off. they were very well behaved. and the social worker that i talked to is the oldest of 13...7 being adopted. i think we are in good hands :) i couldnt wait to tell hubby that they didnt laugh me out of the office. so my nervous shaking turned into an excited shaking!

laundry soap

we have been having lots of fun around here finding things we can make on our own. we are feeling healthier and more independant. a couple of years ago i started making my own laundry soap. it was the liquid recipe that i found on the duggar website. i stopped making it when we got our new HE washer and dryer. but a friend sent me a blog with a new recipe and it says safe for HE washers! i was so happy. so we made it this past weekend. i am loving it. its a powdered version. and i am liking it better than the liquid. it seems to get our clothes alot cleaner and they smell very fresh. i didnt find that when i used the liquid.
ingrediants:
1 box of borax
1 box of arm and hammer washing soda
1 big box of arm and hammer baking soda
1 3 lb tub of oxyclean
3 bars felz naptha soap (grated)
you can find the felz naptha at raleys.
line a 5 gallon bucket with a garbage bag and combine all of the ingrediants. mix them good and then store it however you like. i was able to fit mine into a big ice cream tub. it fit perfectly. the hardest part of this whole process was grating the soap. my children love to hep but they got burnt out quickly doing that job. you only need to use 1 tablespoon per load. all of the ingrediants cost about 20 dollars. i read one blog where a lady said she did 8 loads a week and it lasted her 6 months. i do almost double that. but 20 bucks for even 3 months!!! cant beat that!!!

family

this has been a busy time for our family. 2 days after our anniversary we celebrated another birthday in the van clan house!! emily mae turned 9 years old. she is our third child, second girl. emilys entrance into the world was a quick one! she was almost born in the car on the way to the hospital. and only gave the doctor 10 minutes after we arrived! today she is a sweet, gentle spirited young lady. she is always willing to help around the house and is often a second mommy to the babies. she has also taken on the role as family bread baker. she enjoys sewing, ballet and playing the piano. and today is her piano recital! she is playing "silent night". zaccy will be playing "we three kings". later tonight we will be celebrating with emily by taking her out to her birthday movie. we are going to see "hugo". well we get a break from family birthdays until february. that has its good point and bad points. it will be nice to fill that birthday envelope back up but we do so love celebrating birthdays around here! we are looking foward to this next coming week. we have our last recital for this time of year. a ballet/guitar recital. then it will be christmas break! we will enjoy a very much needed down time here :)

granola

a few weeks ago a friend mentioned to me that she was making homemade granola. i was sold. i love cereal. and why not go a healthier route and make homemade granola to replace the boxed cereal we buy. well i did and so far it has worked. noone is going through cereal withdrawls. i made 4 different flavors but 1 of them really triumphs over the others. the flavors i made were pumpkin pie, stovetop cinnamon, golden cinnamon and dark chocolate granola. all of these recipes i found on allrecipes.com. i wish i was an original :) after making it a few times though i dont really follow the recipe. i just wing it and eyeball the measurements. my absolute favorite is the chocolate one. the one i liked the least was the pumpkin pie.
many people asked me for the chocolate granola recipe. i posted it on facebook a few times. here it is again:
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tablespoons peanut butter
2 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons butter or margerine
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups quick oats
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup chocolate chips
1/4 cup craisins
1/4 cup crushed almonds
the brown sugar, peanut butter, honey, butter and vanilla are put together in a bowl and melted. in a seperate bowl mix oats, cinnamon, and almonds. then stir in the melted mixture. then add the chocolate chips. cover a cookie sheet with foil and spray with cooking spray. then spread it out and bake it for about 15 minutes. let it cool then break it up and store it in a big ziploc or bowl with a lid. this granola has the best mix of salty and sweet. i use kosher salt so it compliments the chocolate chips wonderfully! sometimes i eat it plain. you can use milk but i think that takes away from the wonderful granola experience. yogurt would be yummy on top. it makes such a nice, quick, healthy breakfast and lunch for a busy mom on the go!!! frugal tip: buy your almonds whole or sliced and crush them yourself. they are cheaper that way.

anniversary

i cant write today about encouraging our husbands without writing about our wonderful anniversary weekend. i want to think everyone that made this weekend happen. first to my friend that surprised me and asked her parents if we could stay in their home while they were on vacation. and of course to her parents that said yes! a big thank you to my parents for watching the children all weekend and for letting us drive their truck. especially thank you to them for getting excited to watch the children! not many people would want to, let alone get excited to watch 9 children. i am blessed. thank you also to my aunt for hanging out with them while we were gone and bringing crafts and fun things for them to do. we are surrounded by some wonderful people that made our 10th anniversary very special.

it was such a fun and relaxing weekend. we visited many old towns. walking around and enjoying the scenery and the old buildings and walking in and out of every little shop that was open. all of those antique shops that we cant take 9 children into. hehe. i was able to sneak in some christmas shopping. what a wonderful way to spend some money without feeling guilty. hubby and i talked and talked about life, family,our goals, and God. we held hands and walked slow....not rushing around anywhere. i enjoyed my husband and our time together. we were in awe at how fast the last 10 years have flown by and how much we have done in those 10 years. and we were in awe at how much we have changed and at how we love each other so much more as who we are now than who we were 10 years ago.

it was sad to leave our weekend behind but we sure did miss our babies. and coming home to their happy, excited faces is one of the best parts!

cleaning schedules

i remember back when i had 2 children. i used to do a deep cleaning of the house once a week. granted it was our first little apartment. then 3, then 4 children and my cleanings moved to once a month. the houses grew bigger and so did the family. and so did the amount of children i was homeschooling. now with 9 children and 5 homeschoolers my deep cleaning has spread out even farther. im not complaining about this. over the years i have relaxed tremendously. if i didnt i would go insane trying to keep up with a schedule like that. we clean and pick up everyday. everyone has their chores and we stick to a pretty tight schedule. so i had to adjust to what i knew we could keep up with. since our days are filled with school and activities i have set apart 3 times a year to deep clean the house. these are times the children are not doing any schoolwork or extra activities. i go through the house one room at a time and tear it apart. trust me it gets much dirtier before it gets cleaned up. i move furniture, take pictures down, scrub baseboards, dust, mop....and even touch up paint. my first time of year to do this is spring break. the children are off for a whole week. the next time i do this is over summer break right before the children start homeschooling again. right before activities start up again. right before the craziness begins!!! and the 3rd time i do it is over christmas break. i have 2 whole weeks!!! i used to do it over thanksgiving but found it was very stressful to squeeze it all in to 4 days. so this is the schedule that works best for our family. my house may not be spotless but this schedule seems to work and doesnt cause too much stress on everyone. i get asked alot how i fit this in and now you know!