A Time for Soccer

This is the first year we let the boys play soccer, mainly because this is the first year Ben and I have felt we could handle the added stress to our schedule. It's an understatement to say they are excited to be playing and are having a fun time. Whether mom and dad are having a fun time is yet to be seen. For Noah's first soccer game, since it was in the afternoon, we all went as a family. For the first 15 minutes we were having a great time but then out of the clear blue sky Gabe got sick to his stomach all over himself...AND Will, who was so freaked out by it all started screaming at the top of his lungs and this made Gabe think he had done something really bad so now he too was crying at the top of his lungs. Mom and Dad are speechless, among other things, and scrambling to figure out how we were going to clean up this mess AND watch Noah play soccer. As Ben and Owen are walking to the truck to find anything that would help the situation Owen throws up. When Ben gets back from the truck Gabe says he has to go to the bathroom so as he and Ben are walking to the bathroom Gabe gets sick again! Finally Noah's game is over and we are more then anxious to head home, get away from the awful smell that has become our family and get everyone cleaned up. I put Will in the stroller to head to the truck when all of a sudden...yup....him too.

He got to try goal...I think he's really
good in the goal but he doesn't
like it as much.

It wasn't the best start to something we have been hesitating doing but we are powering through! For our family who isn't near enough to come watch here are some pics of the boys. We keep forgetting to bring the camera to Owen's games but for now here are some of Noah at his. Oh yeah, and to my family, Noah's Team is "Boucher's Construction"!! How cool is that??

Go Boucher's!

A Time for the Prayer Box!

But as for me, my prayer is to You, O Lord, in the acceptable time; O God, in the

 multitude of Your mercy, Hear me in the truth of Your salvation. ~ Psalm 69:13

 I have loved this box since I was a kid. It belonged to my aunt and when she no longer wanted it I inherited it. I wasn't sure at the time what I was going to do with it though. A couple years ago after Christmas as I was taking down all the Christmas cards I felt really bad throwing away all the really nice pictures friends and family had sent us. That is when I had the idea to turn them into prayer cards. This way our kids can put a face with the names of family members and friends we don't see often. We have dozens of families in this box from neighbors, missionaries, teachers, co-workers and of course, those of you closest to us. If I don't have a photo of a family or person I take an index card, write their name on it and put it in the box that way. Then at dinner time one of the kids can go to the box and choose a family or individual we will pray for that night. It's been a really fun way to incorporate everyone God has placed into our lives in to our prayer lives as well. It's also a great teaching tool to show the kids the importance of hearing and knowing the needs of others and praying for them. 

A Time for Planting

As for man, his days are like grass; As a flower of the field,

 so he flourishes. ~Psalm 103:15

Because sunflowers are my favorite Ben planted hundreds of them for me this spring. I am thankful they are doing much better than the garden we planted! It was doing well in the beginning...we got radishes, onions, string beans, turnips and the corn was doing really well....that is until the last wind/rain storm we got (pre-Irene) which blew a tree...yes a tree....right into the middle of our corn.  I forgot to bring my camera when we were at the garden, otherwise I'd have a picture for you. Needless to say we are discouraged, though Ben's excited for another opportunity to use his chainsaw...it's the only way we'll get the tree off the garden. The squash and pumpkins still look like they want to produce us something but we're not holding our breath. It will take a miracle to convince Ben planting a garden next year is a good idea!

Noah and Owen were very sweet and went out and cut me a bunch of flowers to have in the house!

A Time to Make Puzzles

I have been looking for things to decorate the playroom walls for awhile now. Every time I see something cute though it seems to cost a fortune and I just can't justify spending a lot of money on a PLAY room. It never occurred to me to find puzzles to frame because I am NOT a puzzle person. I find no enjoyment in making them much to my children's dismay. This one above is a Melissa & Doug puzzle and was a birthday gift for one of the boys. After we made it I just kept thinking how pretty it is and how perfect it would be hanging on the wall of the playroom. I asked him what he thought about putting some modge podge over it to glue it together. He loved the idea because he had seen some in his aunt Addie's room not too long ago and thought it was very cool. It's an odd shape so I haven't been able to find a reasonably priced frame for it yet. We're still brainstorming ideas of how we can mount it on the wall so if you have any ideas send them my way! 

A Time For Patio Furniture

I've learned over the years to set small goals for myself. If I don't I just get overwhelmed by the fact that there's no way I can possibly accomplish all the things I want to with our ever growing family to take care of. This summer my ONE goal was to paint our patio furniture!

Last summer my aunt and uncle were getting rid of some things and asked us if we could use a patio set. I've been wanting one ever since we moved into the house but we'd always come back to the fact that we can't spend money on everything we want so we never bought one. I'm so thankful we didn't because I really love this set. My aunt had started to paint it a barn red color so we thought we'd finish it in that color. Then one night Ben was at a paint store and was looking at the clearance section and found a gallon of outdoor paint for $5. He wasn't sure of the color but thought it would be good for something. We decided to use this paint on the furniture and got really really nervous when we opened the can and started stirring because it was looking really purple. As we started painting and once it dried we were really happy with the color. They also recently gave me a little table that I thought would be perfect near the grill for putting food or drinks on. I painted it the same color and am really happy with the results!

I admit that I have a really hard time patiently waiting for things I'd like to have. My husband will save and save, then even when he has the money to buy it, will wait some more to be sure he's ready to make the purchase...I love that quality in him and am thankful that he is teaching me to be more that way. In total this patio set has cost us $5...you can't get a better deal than that! 

Eating dinner before we painted the furniture...
it was really sunny that night! 

A Time for Camping

And he withdrew himself into the wilderness, and prayed. ~ Luke 5:16

It's no mystery to us why Jesus would go into the wilderness to pray and get away from everything. It's so peaceful in the wilderness! We kinda live in the woods. We have neighbors and we're about 15 minutes from all our needs as far as gas and groceries go but what I really love about our house is that it's peaceful out here. Our neighbors are close but not too close and there's no heavy traffic to deal with. I don't think I could ever live in a city or even in a neighborhood where the houses are really close together and you don't have much privacy. 

Jena in her pack n play in
the tent!

All the kids minus 2 that
were sleeping

So when the idea came up among some of our friends that we all go camping together I wasn't resistant because I don't like to be outdoors in nature it was because I've been saying I don't want to go camping with kids in diapers. Just something about sleeping in a tent with so many little ones did not appeal to me. I wanted to wait till all the kids were a little older. But everyone assured me it would be fine because we'd all be there to help each other out so we agreed to go. We went to White Lake Campground in Tamworth, NH. What a great campground! It has a great lake that is nice and shallow for awhile for little kids, a huge beach area with picnic tables and canoes and paddle boats you can rent. It also has a really nice playground with two sections for younger and older kids. We were 4 families with 12 kids combined, the oldest being 7 and the youngest being about 9 months and all the kids played so well together. The first night was rough because not only was it pouring with thunder and lightning but Jena also cried most of the night so she and I got about 2 hours of sleep. The next night though all our kids slept very well. We all planned our own meals but we took all the picnic tables from our 4 sites and made one big "mess hall" at one campsite so we could do all our cooking and eating together. This worked out really well. My only regret is that we didn't plan a longer trip. It's a lot of work for only a weekend. It was so much fun that we decided we're definitely doing this next year, only next time for 4 days. 

Will was supposed to be napping but when Ben
went over to our site to get something he found Will
like this trying to see what was going on! Haha!

A Time to See How Our Garden Grows

He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the 

service of man: that he may bring forth food out of the earth; ~ Psalm 104:14

Things are starting to come up! I won't lie, I was a little nervous that we wouldn't produce anything but it seems, so far, the garden is doing well. 

Turnip

Corn

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We've got a lot of onions up, the string beans and peas are doing really well too and we are going to have so many radishes! The weeds are really minimal too. From what I've been told the reason for this is because every fall they till this garden and throw lime in the soil. Apparently this helps keep the weeds out and from what we've seen it seems to be true! I do think we'll have to  come and thin out some stuff before we head up north for a couple weeks...can't wait to see what's grown when we return!