Week in Review – Catching Up Edition

/ Sara Vincent / 1 Comment

June 26 – July 16

We’ve celebrated a seven-year-old’s birthday.

We’ve been learning to swim.

On the board

We’ve had a bat in the basement and a dead, wet mouse on the living room floor.

I’ve been broken.

I’ve been forgetful.

We’ve enjoyed amazing weather and we’ve survived amazing heat.

We’ve driven out to the country to swim in a pond, play with goats, and visit with friends.

We’ve celebrated the birth of our country.

We’ve (sort of) celebrated the birth of our dog.

There have been date nights and family nights.

I’ve planned for next year’s school.

We’ve purchased new-to-us furniture and rearranged most of the first floor of our house.

We’ve been recipients of hospitality and givers of it.

Life has been good.


Have a great weekend!

Parenting Is Your Highest Calling – My Take Away

/ Sara Vincent / 3 Comments

This past week or ten days I read Leslie Leyland Fields’ Parenting Is Your Highest Calling And 8 Other Myths that Trap Us in Worry and Guilt.  If you have ever struggled with mother-guilt it is highly recommended.

Here are the nine myths she covers just to give you an idea of what’s in the book:

Myth 1:  Having Children Makes You Happy and Fulfilled

Myth 2:  Nurturing Your Children is Natural and Instinctive

Myth 3:  Parenting Is Your Highest Calling

Myth 4:  Good Parenting Leads to Happy Children

Myth 5:  If You Find Parenting Difficult, You Must Not Be Following the Right Plan

Myth 6:  You Represent Jesus To Your Children

Myth 7:  You Will Always Feel Unconditional Love for Your Children

Myth 8:  Sucessful Parents Raise Godly Children

Myth 9:  God Approves of Only One Family Design

Here are some of the things I underlined throughout the book:

  • Page 2 had this quote:  “Why wasn’t I a more joyful and loving mother?  Why were my children so lacking?  Why did I always feel like a failure”  And I was wondering, when did I write this book because those exact thoughts are in my head nearly daily.  Especially during the school year.  *sigh*
  • In a survey conducted by Focus on the Family, the most frequent comment from mothers was that they felt like failures.
  • The Old Testament records God’s parental relationship as one of great desire, incomprehensible love, unending compassion – yet Israel’s response to this perfect parental love was disobedience.
  • All day long I have held out my hands to an obstinate people. (Isaiah 65:2)
  • Throughout the Scriptures, we seldom see God as a happy, blithe parent.  We see instead God hungering for more.
  • There is a section in Myth 1 about the All-American pursuit of happiness and how it has caused part of this uneasiness in our mothering.  We have somehow bought the myth that devoting ourselves to our families will make us happy when in reality they often serve more to make us holy – to smooth out our rough edges, to exposes our selfishness, to make us more aware of our need for a savior – which is the real point of following Christ anyway, right?
  • Children simply cost too much – and not just in dollar figures.  They undo us.  They show us how much and how little we’re made of.  It often seems that they come only to break our hearts. And we let them.  We invite it all.  We admit perfect strangers through our doors and decide to love them wildly, without condition, for as long as we live.
  • Our children reveal to us what we know we are:  beggars before God.
  • Not even Samson’s failure could prevent the accomplishment of God’s great purposes.
  • Am I parenting faithfully?  Am I parenting consistently?  Am I honoring God as I raise my children?  This is what I am responsible for.  God is responsible for all the rest.  (Stop and let that soak in….isn’t that an amazing feeling of freedom?)
  • How do we learn to love our children and spouses?  We learn from others who love well.
  • We need to stop pretending that loving our children as God requires is natural and instinctive.  No.  It’s messy.  It’s arduous.  It’s costly.
  • We may reason that as long as we do not replace God with ourselves, as long as the God substitutes are God-given – our children and spouse – and we are serving and loving them, as God commands, then this must be good and acceptable!
  • What God asks of us, He Himself will provide.
  • Knowing this, when my children disappoint me, I need not be shaken.  I am freed to love them as God loves them.  Simply because they are His.
  • We are asked to lose our lives in Christ’s life, not in our children’s lives.
  • God parents for holiness, not happiness.
  • Holiness permeates His very being.  As Wells warns,  without some understanding of the holiness of God, “our faith loses its meaning entirely.”
  • Our faith will fail, too, if we forget that God requires us to be holy.
  • How can I parent in such a way that they are rocked free from their peer’s obsessions with here-and-now gratification?
  • It is possible to spend ourselves in the labor of preserving our children’s happiness only to have them grow up weak, unable to withstand life, seeking their immediate happiness over lasting holiness and blessing.
  • Here, then, is how God prepared this couple (Samson’s parents) for parenting:  by calling them into a deep, daily, costly, dependent relationship with Himself.
  • But these laws (the Ten Commandments) were never meant to be ends in themselves.  They were always intended as means of knowing God, learning about His holiness, and entering into relationship with Him.  When the rules are followed as external behaviors in themselves, separated from a genuine relationship with God, perversion always results.
  • God has already shown us the way.  He parents, not according to an external list of rules, but according to His nature.  Because He is a God of abounding love, He showers love and tenderness upon His children.  Because He is a God of clarity and fairness, He provides definitive expectations for His children.  Because He is a God of justice, He punishes His children’s sin.  Because He is a God of truth, who always fulfills His word, He disciplines their violations just as He promised.  Because He is a God of mercy, He makes a way for theirs sins to be covered.  Because He is a God of hope, He offers restoration even in the midst of judgment.
  • Do we accomplish the character of Jesus Christ in our children’s lives, or does Christ do this?
  • It is possible to give ourselves so fully to our families that they only learn to take what we give.
  • God’s love does not lift Him beyond the sins and rebellion of His children.  Just the opposite.  God’s love draws Him near to His rebellious children.
  • When our children disobey, when they cause harm to another, when they choose attitudes and actions that cut against the holiness that God desires, we will have an emotional response – if we truly love them.  Loving them means that we desire their highest good:  to know God and live righteously before Him.
  • Will my discipline bring my child closer to being the person God wants him/her to be?
  • By our contemporary standards, most of these families (Old Testament families) were dismal failures.  Yet God transformed their weaknesses into a faith that accomplished His eternal purposes.  I am not sovereign over my children – God is.  And God will use every aspect of my human parenting, even my sins and failures, to shape my children into who He desires them to be, for the sake of His kingdom.
  • We have made far too much of ourselves and far too little of God.
  • Their (our children’s) questions are fair.  Their experiments with hair, clothes, music, and other markers of identity are not threats but an essential part of their movement toward autonomy.  As they grow toward adulthood and independence, it is not only natural but necessary for them to examine the beliefs we claim.  We need to extend grace to them as they begin a spiritual journey that might look different from our own.
  • We need to quit asking, Am I parenting successfully?  Instead we need to ask, Am I parenting faithfully?
  • Our children will make their choices, God will be sovereign,and God will advance His kingdom.
  • Now I can focus more on my obedience than on my children’s weaknesses.
  • This is the greatest parenting truth I can know:  my children belong to God.
  • the highest call upon my life:  to love God with all that I have and all that I am.  I hope to teach my children to do the same.

Obviously, these are only excerpts from the book; the sections I underlined because they spoke to me or reaffirmed something I already thought, so the quotes may seem disconnected or random.  I strongly encourage you to grab a copy and read through it.  It’s another quick read and very encouraging.

Heading Back

/ Sara Vincent / 3 Comments

Last week I took a few days off from posting to focus on getting ready to start school up again.  I entered lesson plans for most of the year into to computer, made reading lists, and am still trying to figure out where to put all the books in my book case-less house.

We start back July 27.  This should allow us to finish by the end of April or first week of May.  Chandler and Ellie have been asking to do school since we finished last year’s work in April.  And even Grace and Emma have been making veiled comments about being ready to start again.  I wish I was.  This summer has been good, but not as slow as I like them to be.  Four weeks of being somewhere every day at 9 a.m. has, I think, made it feel less restful.  As I type this we are savoring a day of doing nothing.  We are all still in pajamas (if you know me well, you know this almost never happens at our house).  I have been working on the computer most of the morning.  The girls are enjoying romping around, making houses and forts on the mess of furniture that is presently strung throughout the first floor.  I have promised them a trip to the park (or a movie if it starts to rain) later.  I made it clear that they would need to get dressed if we go to the park.  🙂

I don’t have any overly-lofty expectations for myself or our school this year.  I have accepted my limits and my nature and have learned to stretch but not overwhelm myself.  I won’t say we are going to do an amazing science project every week because that is setting myself up to fail.  But we are studying human anatomy this year (my absolute favorite subject) and so I do look forward to doing some fun stuff.  We will never study botany because I am a plant killer.  They don’t stand a chance in my house.  Ask my husband who has bought me many beautiful plants that end up dead within a month.  Or ask my dad who has tried to save said plants.  We will work through as much of Story of the World Volume 2 as we can.  I don’t know that we will get through all of it.  Why those books are arranged into 42 chapters instead of the 36 that would make for very easy school year scheduling I don’t understand.  We will read some great books.  We will move forward in math and grammar and a dozen other subjects it seems.  And we will address heart issues and character issues and (hopefully) draw each of us closer to God.

In my heart this is why I home school.  We have a great education.  Our kids are bright and have done well on their standarized tests.  I want them to excel and work hard and find success in whatever their passion and calling are later in life.  But more than anything, I want them to learn to love God well, to follow hard after their Savior, to learn to forgive and show mercy and to make hard choices.  To be holy even at the expense of being happy.  I don’t feel like we could do these things if our children were in school every day.  Other families can.  Some don’t have any other choice.  For me, it takes the day-in-day-out exposure to all of our strengths and weaknesses, assets and faults to get to the heart of each child.  I am thankful for that privilege.

So in a few short days, it’s back to school we go.  Because we home school there will still be time for the pool or the swimming beach or the park or the zoo.  But the routine will return, followed soon by ballet and Friday classes and everything that comes with the school year.  And it will be a good thing because those months of diligently working through hard things make us appreciate the freedom that summer brings that much more.

Here’s to an amazing school year!

Overcoming Fear

/ Sara Vincent / 2 Comments

When I was a child I hated swimming lessons.  Hate really isn’t a strong enough word for the memories I have.  My first swimming teacher was strict, hard, and had exacting standards.  Everything I needed really.  But I could never overcome my water phobias enough to meet her standard and pass.  I have no idea how many summers I spent in Beginners.   It seems like about 5, but I know that’s not mathematically possible.

So when our girls started to come of age for swimming instruction I wanted something completely different.  The high school daughter of a fellow church family and a client of Matt’s was teaching lessons in their back yard.  She was sweet, mild, and wonderfully encouraging.  Perfect!  The first two girls did wonderfully under her instruction!  And then there was Chandler.

Chandler has issues with the water, and unfortunately, I often forget the reason for them.  I don’t know why, but the memory of Chandler bobbbing, struggling, clawing for the top of the water in a friend’s pool where she climbed in without her floaties is not burned into my mommy brain like so many other parts of her life.  Maybe it’s because she’s caused so many scares that part of my brain is full.  Maybe it’s because she was fine once we got her arm and pulled her out.  Maybe it’s because I’m a terrible mother.  She couldn’t have been much over one when it happened.  But apparently she was old enough that it left a permanent impression because she is terrified of water.  She’s fine with it on her own terms.  But take her to the deep end and it.is.over.  This is an important thing to remember when enrolling her in swimming lessons.

She threw a fit when our friends’ sweet daughter attempted to take her to the deep end a few years ago.  She threw a hideous fit last summer when we pressured her to jump off the diving board at another friend’s pool.  (In our defense, we knew she was able to swim; she did not believe it herself.)  I knew we needed someone tougher than that third born child to teach her to swim.

Enter my running buddy, Nikki.  She has been helping kids learn to swim for years.  I had heard legendary stories of how tough (but great) she is.  Totally not what I wanted for my kids.  Oh, and to get a spot in her classes, you have to stay up until midnight on some arbitrary night in March to sign up.  Otherwise all the slots will be full.  Definitely not ever doing that!  Until this year.  Because I knew she was exactly the type of teacher I wanted for these last two kids.

The first day the four year old cried and screamed and refused to do anything she was told.  I was slightly surprised as she normally loves the water, but she’s four and that’s the way she operates sometimes.  We talked all that Monday about how the next day would be different and when she could go a whole lesson without any screaming or crying, we would get ice cream.  (I am not above bribery when necessary.)  Tuesday was some wimpering, but it was only about 75 degrees outside, so the pool was considerably warmer than the side she spent most of the lesson sitting on!  She got a cherry limeade for not screaming.  Wednesday she went through her lessons with a smile and was rewarded with a yummy McDonald’s ice cream cone.  Ellie made it through the remaining eight lessons without a tear or complaint.  There were moments I could tell she was working hard to overcome her natural fears, but she did it and I was so proud of her.

The first two days Chandler did fabulously.  I couldn’t have been prouder.  She did everything she was asked and I thought her lessons were going to be a breeze.  Enter Wednesday when something possessed her to behave like a stuck pig and scream and squeal and RUN from Nikki and the diving board until she found herself cornered on the deck and had no choice but to submit.  I found myself wanting to crawl under said deck and die from shame.  I don’t know what happened and I do know what happened.  She was tired.  I hate that excuse, especially for any child past the stage of daily naps.  But it’s true.  Chandler falls apart if she doesn’t have enough sleep and the night before she didn’t.  I’m really not much better, so I sympathize.  And, for one reason or another, that fear in her welled up and could not be contained.

We talked long that day about right behavior and wrong behavior and how the next day would go.  Thursday was an improvement.  Friday was altogether wonderful.

I watched over ten days as my girls wrestled with their fears and their emotions and learned to control them. I could see on their faces the exhaustion or the panic and the internal wrestling to do the right thing.  I teared up many times as I saw their courage.  I watched as Chandler overcame her intense fear of deep water and learned to jump off the board and swim two lengths of the pool and then swim two more shortly after.  I watched her learn to control her fear as she learned to tread water and keep her head up.  I watched her swim farther at the public pools and the lake with her new confidence.  And I watched with great motherly pride as she passed her class the first time through.

Over the past two weeks, Chandler has not only learned how to swim better.  She has learned that she can control her emotions and that she can overcome her fears.  That alone was worth any amount of money.

On a different note, I was so impressed by my friend and her ability to handle those children.  She is tough.  And she doesn’t put up with any nonsense.  But she clearly cared about each child there and the smile on her face when they accomplished something was almost as amazing and joyful as the child’s.  So thanks, Nikki.  I know the past two summers have been hard but I am so thankful my girls had the chance to learn from you.

Ellie waiting her turn

Ready for a kneeling dive

Ready for some really uncoordinated swimming moves 🙂

On the board

This was a big accomplishment!

Back stroke - sort of

Chandler waiting her turn

Swimming the length of the pool unaided

And swimming back

Chandler's turn off the board

Back stroke

Back stroke again

Ellies "Grade Card"

Chandler's "Grade Card" - Still so proud of both of them

On Burdens and Blessings

/ Sara Vincent / 3 Comments

From Streams in the Desert, July 8:

There is a fable about the way birds first got their wings.  The story goes that initially they were made without them.  Then God made the wings, set them down before the wingless birds, and said to them, “Take up these burdens and carry them.”

The birds had sweet voices for singing, and lovely feathers that glistened in the sunshine, but they could not soar in the air.  When asked ot pick up the burdens that lay at their feet, they hesitated at first.  Yet soon they obeyed, picked up the wings with their beaks, and set them on their shoulders to carry them.

For a short time the load seemed heavy and difficult to bear, but soon, as they continued to carry the burden and to fold the wings over their hearts, the wings grew attached to their little bodies.  They quickly discovered how to use them and were lifted by the wings high into the air.  The weights had become wings.

The past two weeks have been mixed with blessings and burdens, victories and disappointments.  But I am reminded that our weights can become our wings if we choose to see them as such.

0622.  the first day of swim lessons

0623.  knowing that the second day will be better

0624.  rising early to serve Jesus breakfast

0625.  looking forward to doing it again

0626.  the second day of swim lessons

0627.  friend good news and praises

0628.  reversed charges

0629.  feeling unproductive

0630.  being broken

0631.  words of grace

0632.  enchiladas left in the oven over night

0633.  chicken casserole, without the chicken

0634.  God’s grace to handle a bad day well

0635.  clean fridge and freezer

0636.  peanut butter play doh

0637.  baby goats

0638.  a pond

0639.  Mahner-time

0640.  seven year old waking tired sisters up

0641.  swimming and monokini’s 😦

0642.   clean house and kitchen and floors

0643.  late dinner

0644.  project disasters

0645.  date night and good conversation

0646.  God’s hand

0647.  dog’s birthday

0648.  running with my love

0649.  impromptu naps

0650.  blonde “baby” so tan

0651. doggy gift of a dead mouse

0652.  early service

0653.  4th of July parade

0654.  changes in plans and coming over for lunch anyway

0655.  home made ice cream and apple pie

0656.  rainy fourth

0657.  letting tired ones go to bed on time

0658.  New York City fire works on television

0659.  dry swim session

0660.  day trip to KC with Matt on a Monday

0661.  flashing lights and slips of paper that remind us to slow down

0662.  talking late about the school year, budgets, and how to make it all work

0663.  how early 5:15 feels

0664.  swimming progress

0665.  fears overcome

0666.  next year’s Shark and Minnow

0667.  Cows Eat Free Day

0668.  celebratory cones at Dairy Queen

0669.  Ruthie

0670.  make your own pizza night

0671.  friend words that sting

0672.  practicing what I preach

0673.  Sunday afternoon snuggles with the youngest


I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction.  ~ Isaiah 48:10

They will soar on wings like eagles.  ~ Isaiah 40:31


Your burdens are your blessing.  May they carry you to the throne of the Most High this week.


A Brief Hiatus and Some Links Worth Clicking

/ Sara Vincent / Leave a comment

Due to the girls’ swimming every morning during the time that I normally do my computer work and due to the fact that I need to spend some time here getting ready for the upcoming school year, I am taking this week off from posting. I’ll be back next week to count the blessings and to share life with each of you. In the meantime, check out some of these posts that I loved last week.  They are definitely worth a click and a few minutes of your time.

I hope you have a wonderful, wonderful week!
~Sara

Ann’s post from last Thursday on living your best life.

Kristen’s excellent thoughts on Why Is America Blessed.  The comments are worth a read, too.

Friday’s devotion over at A Disciple’s Notebook.  Take time.  Slow down.  Find those moments with God.

Intriguing photo post on a week’s worth of groceries for families around the world.  What would your picture look like?

Independence Day and Why It Matters To Me

/ Sara Vincent / Leave a comment

It’s July 4th weekend!  A weekend filled with fun and celebration and some of the most wonderful parts of summer.  It’s also a time to think about our freedom – granted by God and outlined so eloquently by our Founding Fathers.  It’s a time to think about where our nation is and where it is going.  It’s a time for knowing that my allegiance is to a King and a Kingdom, but also that this is where God has placed me for my life so far in this world.

He has placed me here to have an impact and to influence others for Him.  He has placed me in a land of abundance that I may be a blessing to others.  He has placed me here “for such a time as this”.  And I am thankful to live here now, in this time.

I’m thankful for those that risked everything to sail across the ocean and follow a dream.  Thankful for those that have fought to protect our freedom.  Thankful for the freedom and ingenuity that have made this nation great.  And thankful for the privilege and responsibility of passing freedom and liberty on to my children.

(Photos from last year’s celebrations.  And, yes, I take a lot of pictures of Ellie.   🙂 )

It is easy to take liberty for granted, when you have never had it taken from you.  ~Anonymous


We on this continent should never forget that men first crossed the Atlantic not to find soil for their ploughs but to secure liberty for their souls.

~Robert J. McCracken

Have a wonderful weekend celebrating with your families!

Random Wednesday…

/ Sara Vincent / 3 Comments

…when I type about pretty much whatever pops into my head.  🙂

  • I feel extremely industrious and virtuous when I have dinner prepared early in the day.  It makes the late afternoon so much less stressful.  I wonder why I don’t do this more often.  Oh yeah, I know why.  Because that would require me thinking ahead.  😛
  • I went shorts shopping this afternoon.  This is akin to bathing suit shopping, in my opinion.  I.hate.it.  Running for three years has NOT given me lean legs.  Noooo….my thighs just keep getting bigger.  They are toned and lovely.  But big.  Not thin.  Very frustrating.  The few shorts I have are either a) too tight, b) too long to be cute anymore, c) just plain old, or d) all of the above.  Today I braved the department store, swallowed my pride and bought the size I need instead of the size I want to be, and now I can finally wear something other than skirts this summer.
  • Recently, Matt was teasing me that I was pregnant.  I’m not.  And then a friend told me recently that they are expecting again.  And that tiny flash of baby fever set in.  Or maybe it was because I was in the sun too long.  I don’t know.  All I know is that I wish it was as easy as saying “we’re just having two and we’re done”.  Or, in our case, “four and we’re done”.  That would make my life each month a whoooole lot easier.  I hate fence sitting for any reason.  We’ve been on this fence quite a while.  No clear direction is coming, so I guess we’ll maintain our perch on said fence and see if the Lord decides to surprise us someday or give us some sort of direction.  Direction would be nice, Lord.  Although, if you have more children in mind, a surprise might be the way to go. I don’t know. *sigh*
  • The happy little sunflowers I bought last week are doing surprisingly poorly.  I thought they liked heat and sun and dryness!  I think I’ll be returning them this week.

Well, that’s all I can come up with.  Have a great Wednesday, y’all!

Quotable and Not So Much

/ Sara Vincent / Leave a comment

Ellie keeps us in stitches around here.  Most often, unintentionally…..

Yesterday, we were driving along and she says, “Mommy, I’m feeling too scrawny to use words today.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Recently, I was putting her to bed and she asks, “Mommy, can God hear all the peoples’ prayers?”  I answered, “Yes, Ellie, He can.”  She pondered that for a few moments, then asked, “Does He have bigger ears than us?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Her quotability has been hampered the past 24 hours.  You see, she screamed – and I mean sca-reamed – through her first swim lesson yesterday.  For the entire thirty minutes.  I was such a proud mama.  *sigh*  Well, she gave her vocal cords such a work out that her normally raspy voice just up and disappeared along about yesterday afternoon.  She’s still pretty hoarse and I just chuckle every time she tries to talk.  And occasionally I remind her about why she has no voice.

She did much much better today at lessons.  There was a little weeping because last week’s three digit temps have given way to more seasonal, 80 degree, temps, so it’s a tad chilly at 9 am if you’re soaking wet and sitting on the side of the pool.  And there was one small meltdown over her order in line when doing kneeling dives.  And then there was the jumping off the board – when the assistant was out of the water ready to “help” her in before my child finally decided to jump.  Not so much crying, she just wasn’t moving.  Okay, she still has some work to do.  But at least there wasn’t any screaming.  🙂