We Can Do It!

Colossians 3:23-Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as if working for the LORD, not men.





That includes taking some other random persons dirty sock out of the back of a cabinet, along with a lot of other random stuff, and cracking your head on the top of the cabinet on the way out.(Alright, maybe not the head banging part)



Oh, yeah. The Clean Team scrubbed the new house today. My mother, sister, brother and I spent the afternoon cleaning out our new house(moving next week:D). Floors, bathrooms, cabinets(inside and out!) doors, you name it we cleaned it. I asked for the blue shirt and polka dotted kerchief, but instead got yellow rubber gloves and a broom. Sigh. The unjustness of life. I commend my mother who scrubbed the bathrooms till they shined. Those 3 bathrooms were NASTY. Anyway, that verse I put up there, because it came to my mind as I was scrubbing the shelves in the linen closet. I thought of that during the afternoon, reminding myself to that not only am I washing these shelves for the rest of my family, I'm doing it for God. That made me scrub a bit harder:-). I'm sure you are wondering what I meant by the sock comment above. Let me tell ya. I was cleaning a cabinet. A very deep cabinet. I saw something in the back. Mom came over and used the broom to push it closer. It WAS a sock! EW! And a huge package of straws that was spilling. And an unopened magnifying glass. I ran for the rubber gloves when I found out that I was responsible for taking them out, since I was cleaning that cabinet. Gag me. I did it, but as I was pulling my head out of the cabinet, I banged my head on the top. OUCH!! By the time we finished, we had a fairly clean house, and four hot, tired, people. But it's done. Ready for all our stuff. Whew.

Q's and A's

We've been asked many questions over the years. Many questions. So I decided that today, I will post the answers to these questions and others that haven't been asked but I'm sure some people wonder about.
Q. Are they all yours?!(This question is usually posed to my mother)
A. *Sigh* Yes, they are all ours. We aren't babysitting. Nope, not foster parents. We adopted them.
Q. What is it like to have so many brothers and sisters?
A. It's usually fun. You can almost always find someone to play with you. Board games always have enough players. Sometimes, though, it's frustrating when, say, you want to be alone, or want it quiet, and every single room you go into has a person in it.
Q.What on earth do you drive?
A. We drive a 12 passenger van. Side note, if you ever see such a large van, please be courteous and don't park super close. There is only ONE door to get in and out. Many a time do we have to go single file to the opposite end of the car, and then squeeze in one by one, trying to be sure that everyone is in the right order so we don't have to climb over each other.
Q. What happens when you go out to eat? Isn't it expensive?
A. 'Going out to eat' for us is Cici's Pizza, where we can all eat for about $50.....or we stop and get burgers from the dollar menu at McDonalds. We all look forward to Christmas Eve, when we go out and have Chinese food...one of the few times during the year we go to a real restaurant.
Q. OK, how do you COOK for that many?
A. You get used to it. Doubling the recipe becomes almost natural. Checking the ingredients on the back of prepared foods to figure out who can and can't have it because of allergies becomes almost natural. I fear the day when I get married and move out...I only know how to cook in large quantities. Just kidding. Sort of.
Q. Do the kids fight?
A. Ha! Ha! Hear me laughing. Yes, we fight. They range from petty squabbles to my youngest brother sneaking into a room and tackling his big brother from behind, which tends to make them look like the shorter, black versions of Kip and Napoleon Dynamite.
Q.Is it always noisy at home?
A. Usually. Once again, you sorta get used to it. It isn't as loud as you might think though.
Q. How does your mom teach so many different grades?
A. Most of our homeschool work is independent. We read a lesson in our textbooks or on the computer and then do the work. When it is something that needs to be taught, we take turns: I might work on my math problems while mom teaches the ABC's to my sister, then when they are finished mom and I discuss Arctic vs. Antarctic.
So that is a peek into Big Family Life. It usually all works pretty well. And it's usually a lot of fun.

Ten Reasons You Know You Have a Big Family

You know you have a big family when...
-Mom comes home from grocery shopping, thrilled that she "didn't go overboard", spending only $90 on $120 worth of groceries-for the week.
-You don't need any friends to make a full baseball team
-You go out to the second refrigerator in the garage to find eight cartons of milk, with regular milk, chocolate soy milk, and lactose free milk, on almost any given day-except those days when (horror of horrors) there is only two and you have to get to Kroger immediately!
-You realize that it's cheaper for mom to become a swimming instructor than it is for all the kids to take swim lessons
-You make every secretary hate there job when the whole family's crowded around the desk and we say, "Alright, we need seven appointments..."
-Your family gets compared to the Biblical character of Jacob's in church
-Every child has a sixth sense to notice any other extremely large passenger van on the road
-Entering a supermarket, everyone stares at you, not because your family is making a scene or acting any different then the rest of the shoppers, but because of the number of people who are walking down the aisles together
-You open the closet to find at least 32 shoes in front of you, if not more
-You've mastered cooking in large quantities without the use of nuts, certain amounts of milk, and food coloring, because of food intolerances and allergies