It is through raising my children that I have come to some small understanding of what it may have been like for my mother to have raised me.   My Mama used to joke that she hoped I would have a child just like myself to raise so I would “get it”… Well, I had Aralyn Elizabeth.  I both laugh and cry when I hear myself come out of my sweet baby girl’s mouth but laughing or crying, I always appreciate my Mama more.  I am quite certain that I may have been THE challenge of my mother’s lifetime.  A bundle of energy and nerves wrapped in stubbornness and sprinkled with sass and ‘creativity’ and not always the good kind .  How my Mama still has no visible gray hairs is beyond me!  But I am grateful everyday that she did not give up on me.  I am hopeful everyday that I can somehow repay her efforts.  I am blessed everyday as I watch her in her now role as ‘Mimi’ to my children.  Today, on her birthday I wish her every kind of happiness and many more years of the same.  Happy Birthday Mama, I love you.

I scored this beautiful tree on black friday- next best thing to a real one, most people couldn’t tell it was fake!

The REAL garland to give the home a piney smell.  Also scored on black friday!

Ara and James loved the tree this year.  The ornaments were never in the same place and we had quite a few bite the dust, unfortunately.

Our first fire in the fireplace

Ara and I strung cranberries to make garland and then juiced the rest.

This year we did quite a bit of holiday baking!

Peppermint Bark chilling in the fridge

Baking Maple Granola for gifts…

Along with 6 dozen cookies: 3 dozen chocolate chip and 3 dozen toffee crunch

Packaged and ready to go and one left for Paul and I to munch on…

We took the kids to see the Christmas train display

Made gifts for our family…

…started to knit the kids stockings… and then decided to let that go this year, maybe next.

What a sweet Christmas it was!  Quiet, no places to rush off to, celebrating with family and friends the birth of our Lord.

So grateful for the blessing of God’s Son sent to earth and the blessings He continues to send everyday.

I hope you and your family had a very blessed Christmas as well!

Jen’s Coconut Muesli

Mix in a bowl a handful or two of oats, a handful of chopped raw walnuts, a handful of raisins or chopped dates, 1/3 banana torn into chunks, and sprinkle with coconut flakes.

You could toast these and drizzle with honey if you wanted more of a dessert but for breakfast, I just toss a handful of coconut flakes on top.

Serve with cold milk of choice. Great with nut milks and coconut milks as well!

So, these aren’t the best quality pictures, as all I am working with is my phone camera right now, but they will give you a sense of this wonderful blessing we now call home.  Welcome!  Come on in.  The kitchen is where all the fun happens so we’ll start there.My cute son is a bonus .  Next, you have the living room all decked out for Christmas…Next, my kid’s favorite room, the playroom…  I feel so blessed to have this space to keep the toys out of their rooms!  I might have gone a little bit crazy with the pictures on this one but I love that they have this space!This side of the playroom is mostly Ara’s domain until the little girls are older.  Her dress up, new dollhouse from Mimi and Granddad and kitchen set that Papa made her.This side has the book nook which now hosts a green wooden toy chest for storage and seating, James’ shelves, and the millions of baby dolls/stuffed animals in the cradle.James’ domain:  Trucks and trains galore!  A boy has to have some space of his own with all these girls around!There is also a half bath downstairs that I will take pics of later and the upstairs which will be “Our Home” Part Two… TO BE CONTINUED…

The houses (yes plural) that we were supposed to close on fell through and we ended up temporarily moving in with my parents until we can get a house under contract and God-willing actually close on it.  It has actually been a huge blessing having the extra help around as we had our sweet baby girls shortly after moving in with them.

I would like to introduce you to sweet Anna Jane and Ruth Abigail:

More insanity in our household came in the form of my oldest two taking sick just as we were bringing home babies.  It has been over a week and a half since I have been around my two older sweethearts as the girls and I are quarantined in the back bedroom to protect them from getting sick .  Both had brief jaunts in the NICU and are still not completely in the clear with Anna and her lungs so we have to be extra careful of spreading germs around them.

You may be wondering, “what is it like to deliver twins?”.  Well, first let me just say that my Mom would tell you I have never done anything the normal way.  There is a ten percent chance in a twin delivery that the first will be delivered the normal direct route and the second will be taken by cesarean section.  That means there is a 90 percent chance that won’t happen.  I thought that was pretty good odds… of course, I was one of the ten percent…

Ah well, during this season of life I will be honest and tell you that our life has been through a bit of upheaval.  Basically homeless temporarily, moving all our things to storage, being put on bed rest with the girls for a couple weeks, delivering twins with two very different kinds of recoveries, and then illness but through it all I have felt overwhelmingly blessed!   How is that?  God sent me these two precious blessings and the magnitude of it astonishes me every day.

Have I told you the story of how God told me we were having twins?  Here we go.

I have never before heard God speak clearly enough that I knew what I was hearing was from Him except through scripture.  I have many friends who hear God talk to them on a regular basis and to be honest sometimes I wondered if something was wrong with me because I didn’t seem to have that kind of connection with my Lord.  There were times in my life I knew He was speaking exactly what my heart needed to hear (whether it wanted to hear it or not is a different story entirely) at the time I needed to hear it.  Whether through speakers, authors, scripture or wise counsel- I have heard from God in this way.  Before this season of life, however; I would not claim that God spoke something to me individually or revealed a part of His plan to me in advance of it happening.

When I got pregnant with the girls the fatigue this time around was a lot harder to cope with then the other pregnancies, probably due to the fact that I had two little ones at home to chase after and we were starting the house hunting journey.  One night in my tiredness, I cried out to God to show me that everything was going to be okay and that my baby was okay.  Immediately, I felt kicking for one of the first times that pregnancy in my womb and it felt like an octopus was inside me.  I thought, “that’s weird how can there be hands and feet in all those places?”  but didn’t analyze it too much and thanked God for reassuring me the little one was okay.

I should mention, my daughter had been praying for girls (yes girls-as in two girls) from the very moment she found out we were expecting.  Well, as I laid in bed thinking about the life God had blessed me with my mind wandered to Ara’s prayers and I told God, “You know we love children and if You chose to send me two, I would feel so amazingly blessed and overwhelmed by Your goodness.  I can’t imagine why You would pick me to send two babies to Lord but if You do, I will treasure it.

So months pass and I am feeling huge, I am also feeling movement EVERYWHERE!  I started getting a little anxious to know if there was one baby or two babies in there.  I had mentioned my thought to the doctor but they only heard one heartbeat and said the only way to really confirm a twin pregnancy is ultrasound and since we were going for one at 21 weeks to find out the gender we would know for sure then.  I was pretty much told over and over not to get my hopes up, there was probably only one baby and I was just bigger and feeling more because this was my third pregnancy.  So, that night in my impatience, I asked God to show me if I was having twins or one baby.

Now, there are times in life when I don’t ask God to show me certain things because I am afraid of the answer.  This time I had some apprehension that I would be disappointed if it were one baby and I didn’t want to be ungrateful of even one precious life God would send me.  I didn’t want that to be my heart.  I wanted to give Him glory if there was one, two, or even no children.  But I was impatient to find out.  And God was gracious even with my impatience and He answered me.  When I asked I clearly felt two long spines push their way up against the skin of my belly.  I laid there with one hand on one little back and the other along the other little back and just felt- overwhelmed.  Overwhelmed that God had answered me, overwhelmed that He would bless me in such a way and overwhelmed with the fact that I was the only one at that moment with the knowledge of the two little lives inside of me.  I felt a bit like I feel Mary may have felt as she “treasured up all these things- pondering them in her heart”.  Of course, my human flesh and frail faith began questioning if I really had heard from God.  Maybe I am just fooling myself into thinking that I felt two backs, maybe I want to feel two babies so I believed that that is what I felt, maybe I don’t know God’s voice.  Then I was given the overwhelming urge to look up the name meanings for the names that Paul and I had picked out.  I didn’t know why this urge struck me as it was late and I was exhausted in bed already but I HAD to get up and look them up at that moment.  Well, one meant companion and the other meant twins!  So, thank you Lord for your sense of humor and indulging this doubting Thomas time and time again.

The time came for the much anticipated ultrasound.  At this point I had told my husband and a few others from church that I was sure I was having twins and that I felt God had confirmed it and so I was really nervous to go to the gender reveal.  I was afraid that if they only saw one baby on that screen I would feel like I can’t hear God clearly or worse that I had believed in “signs” that I wanted to see but weren’t really from Him.  At the same time, when these doubts crept in a peace would take over and I would feel sure again and treasured by God and knew whatever we saw was His plan.  We walked into the office and my husband jokingly said, “My wife thinks there’s two in there”.  The ultrasound tech said, “well, we’ll take a look”.  As soon as she put the device on my stomach, up on the wall screen I saw two heads.  I tried not to get excited, “maybe that’s a head and a stomach”, I thought, “ultrasounds are really hard to distinguish what you are looking at to begin with”.

“She’s right.”  The ultrasound tech said.  !!!!!  ”There are their two little heads”.  :)

Praise God!  To Him be the glory!  May I never forget exactly who these little girls came from.  At a time when so much of my life felt uncertain, God had given me what felt like a lifeline.  A reminder that He was working and He was there.  That He hears the prayers and petitions of little girls and the questions from mothers who struggle with uncertainty.

Feeling so unbelievably blessed!

What if you could go back to and talk to your 18-year old self, as you were just about to enter adulthood?  At 18 most of my worldview for holiness, purity and relationship with Christ was already solidified.  I think to be of true help to “my 18 year old self”, I would have needed to vision cast from birth. Not that it isn’t an appropriate time to recast a vision for these things, I just know for me, personally, the damage to a biblical worldview of them had already been done.

Knowing what you know now, what vision would you cast for yourself in holiness, purity, and your relationship with Christ?  I wish I could have presented (my very young self) a vision of guarding my heart in a way that honors Christ.  To explain that purity is about more than just sex but involves thoughts, motives, emotions, and faithfulness to someone that at that point in life I had never even met.  I wish I could have told my 12 year old self that over the next 6 years I would in my head “try on” over ten guys as husbands, “playing house” with them in my imagination, doodling what our married name would be all over notebooks, writing out our children’s names and fantasizing about what they would look like.  I wish I could have explained that these activities, while seemingly harmless, are the very things that make it impossible to follow the advice given repeatedly in the Song of Solomon, “I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,by the gazelles or the does of the field,that you not stir up or awaken love until it pleases.” I would warn myself not to ever start reading the romance novels I would be given for Christmas at 13 years old, explaining that fantasizing about someone other than my husband, even fictional, will not aid “guarding my heart” for the one I would covenant only to love.  I would paint a picture for me that the best romance story ever written is the one God writes for my life and cannot be found in lust of youth, the pages of a novel or the scenes of a romantic comedy film.  As far as relationship with Christ I would tell my young self not to waste time!  I would tell middle schooler Jen that sleep, books, pouring over fashion magazines, and worrying about who would be at youth group or who I would sit with at lunch will only serve to distract me from anything meaningful, and absolutely would not matter to me ten years down the line.  I would challenge myself to read the bible more than novels, talk to God more than my friends on the phone, and to serve His people more than myself.  I would also warn myself NEVER to get on the poms squad in highschool and to use my college years to develop character and godliness more than a portfolio that I would never end up using anyhow. I would explain that gracefulness is more beautiful to God in my heart than on a stage.   I would tell myself that one day I would meet a man named Paul, who will remind me so much of the Paul in the bible that perhaps I would be better served to study Paul the apostle instead of the blond haired boy in the seat in front of me.  J

What vision would you cast for your singleness, or your marriage, fatherhood or motherhood.  Now, thinking forward, what vision will you cast for the rest of your life?  The vision I would cast is what biblical womanhood looks like: “reverent in behavior, not slanderers, to love their husbands and children, ⁵to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands”.  I would urge myself to work on developing those virtues than selfish ambition.  The vision I would cast for the rest of my life is that virtue is caught more than taught and while I need to be teaching my children what marriage, fatherhood and motherhood look like biblically, they will learn more by my example.  Since I am incapable of representing biblical womanhood well, my prayer is that I would be continually on my knees asking the Spirit to work in my life despite myself.

::right now::

My Nature Girl

right now I am…

::wondering if taking a family hike today was such a good idea at 27 weeks pregnant with twins.  (going into the trail downhill, was much easier than coming out uphill and my balance was, lets just say, not so good)

::marveling at how much older my little girl seems everyday and the paradox that is her selective gift of being aware of details.  (how is the same girl who spies a camouflaged snail under a log on the side of a hiking trail not able to find her bright magenta flowered play boots daily when they are in the same place every time?)

::feeling large

::smelling the lingering smell of turkey bacon coming from the kitchen which reminds me of Grandma H’s house.

::thanking my parents for a very generous babies gift in the form of a new dryer that won’t take three cycles to dry clothes (going to be a life saver with three little ones in cloth diapers!)

::enjoying having spent the weekend with family and friends and having my sister home for summer break.

::looking forward to celebrating 6 years of marriage with my love this week!

::wishing you a blessed Memorial day with loved ones!

Big Sugar Creek, Cuivre River State Park

Today we took the kids to the creek at Cuivre River State Park.  What a blessing to watch the delight on my children’s faces as they discovered sparkly rocks, the grainy texture of mud and sand between their toes and the blissful child-like ability they have to forge right into freezing creek waters giggling and squealing with joy as their not so child-like parents gingerly dip one toe in and recoil at the icy temperature.  My husband was all consumed by the fossils he was finding, mostly plant fossils.  Aralyn was “watering the rock bank with liquid gold” which she dispensed from her pink flowered watering can, red cowboy hat placed jauntily on top of her head to protect it from ticks and James was content to sit right on a pile of rocks putting one after another into a big yellow sand pail, announcing each time, “here-go!”.  After quite some time was spent pouring gold over the rocks, Ara and I hunted for smooth ones that would make good rock pets to paint and a few for our nature scape centerpiece (which probably means I should clear off the kitchen table to properly display it ) We ended our adventure by exploring a fallen, hollowed out tree trunk as wide as the play tubes at McDonald’s but with much less ugly bright plastic and absolutely no static electricity!  It was exciting to come across the rock nest some other explorer’s had left behind inside the trunk for us to find!

As for now, we are all back home, stripped of wet muddy clothes and cuddled into fresh dry ones.  Exhausted, happy and carrying the faint scent of outdoors mixed with sunscreen as we crash into beds for naps.  I may just take one too- the sun has a way of making me happily tired like Thanksgiving turkey.

*NOTE- a quick house update: I hadn’t posted in a while as thing have been a little crazy here navigating the loss of a house we were under contract and supposed to close on, finding a new house we are currently under contract for and living out of boxes.  I’ll try to keep you posted!

*NOTE- a quick twin update:  The girls are 27 weeks along and doing great!   We had an ultrasound last week and they are growing right on target and kicking me up (and each other) in the process.