Ryan and His Bunny

Ryan - the name that means "little king". How appropriately named he was! His middle name means "bold" - and indeed he is our bold little king. How we love him and delight in him! Here he is with his pet rabbit - Caramel. He sure does love to play with Caramel when Hannah gets the bunny out for him as he cannot get him out by himself.

Ryan is faithful to care for, feed and water his bunny each and every day. The first thing he does every single morning when he gets up is to go Caramel's cage to feed him his morning ration and freshen up his water. The last thing he does before bed every night is to feed him his evening portion. During the day he often visits him with treats!

We have some fresh spices growing, and he will pick them and feed them to the bunny. Caramel loves basil, mint and parsley!

Ryan likes to let Caramel climb all over him, hug him, and snuggle him. This bunny brings out the softer, gentler side of Ryan, and that is a good thing indeed, for Ryan is our fearless, strong, tough boy. I am grateful that God has provided him with a means to be loving, caring and gentle. (That "means" should be his sister, and sometimes it is, but we are working on that one!!)

We recently studied proverbs about the blessings of diligence, and Ryan has done a great job of exemplifying this for us! Keep up the good work Ryan!! Love you!!

Matt

I haven't posted anything about Matt in a while - and now is a perfect time! (The kids are all still sleeping and I am alone at the computer! haha) Much has been happening in his life it seems. He finished up his first year of college and is now on summer break. He recently came down with mono, which had him quite sick for a time with fever, aches, horrible sore throat and overwhelming exhaustion. He could hardly swallow and was taking steroids for swelling and codeine for pain. He was home for two weeks straight without working, and I have to say that though I wished he weren't sick, I really enjoyed seeing him home for that long! I was able to care for him, love him, and spend more time talking with him. We ALL enjoyed more of his company!!

Now he is back to work, and actually left here a couple of hours ago for a five day trip to New York City with some friends. I am happy for him that he will have a change of scenery - it is always refreshing to get away from our ordinary routine. We will be missing you Matt - but hope you have an absolutely memorable, exciting time!

Water at Last!

We have been looking at this ugly, rusty cement hole since February...

Look at the sad, forlorn faces of my children...

And then, on Saturday, we REJOICED!! We finally have WATER!!!!!


The man who delivered five loads of water to our pool brought along something even better than the water we waited so long for... a puppy!!

He was absolutely the cutest thing we had ever seen. I think at that point we would have traded in our pool for this cute little guy!! haha

Swimming at last!!!

The End of the Year Art Post

Yesterday, the kids finished their very last art class of the year! They have produced some wonderful art this year, and I just had to put them up for all to see! They had art class with the Ross boys, Davin and Phillip. What fun it was - we picked them up and dropped them off each week, and after most art classes we had a little tradition of going to the country store for ice cream. (Double scoop the weeks they came home with a project)

Phillip, Hannah, Davin and Jacob

This is Jacob doing his print-making, the last thing they worked on for this year.


This is Mrs. Lebo - the talented and brave art teacher! She taught the kids in the basement of her home.

Hannah displaying her print making project - a turtle. So much detail went into these pieces, they had to first draw the picture, transfer it onto rubber, and then carve each detail out of the rubber, and then run ink over it and print.

Jacob's snake print has INCREDIBLE detail to it - it took him literally weeks to carve out each detail in the rubber pad.

This is a barn that Hannah painted during their oil painting segment.

Jacob's beautiful oil painted barn

Hannah's water color bird

Jacob's water color bird

This mask was the first project of the year - again, it took many weeks to complete the paper mache, the drawing and then the painting.

Jacob's mask

The Storm of a Lifetime

Last Wednesday, the biggest storm to ever hit the DC area hit while Hannah and I were out shopping. We were "trapped" at Whole Foods while a tremendous storm blew through, knocking down trees and power lines. Roads were closed everywhere for days as crews tried to clean up fallen trees, many homes had trees that had fallen on them, and power was out for days in the hot, humid 95 degree weather. The boys were calling us with reports of how many trees had fallen on our lot (around 10) but thankfully, none of them hit our house. Two of them smashed into our fences...

This is the view of our backyard after the patio crew abandoned everything and ran to their cars for shelter!



This is one of the smaller trees we lost...



This home in our neighborhood was one of several that had a tree fall right on it! It was just a shocking, awe-filled experience to drive around and see the damage that occurred.

We were reminded of the awesome power of God, and it put into perspective what really matters. We were all okay, and so was our home. We have many huge trees that could have fallen on our house. We are very grateful for God's protection over every detail of our lives.

Jacob's Exciting Milestone

Earlier in the year, Danny and I decided to challenge Jacob during his twelfth year as he turns thirteen, to read the Bible in a year. We also decided to provide incentive by offering a reward if he finished in a year - a lego robot that he has been wanting for a very long time. Not only did Jacob eagerly accept the challenge, he far exceeded our expectations. He actually finished the entire Bible in 107 days!!

Words cannot describe the sweetness we felt as we watched our son grow in his love for and knowledge of the Bible. We would go into his room regularly and find him reading the Bible. He read for hours every day. He read late into the night, every night. He read in the car, he read in his room, he read in the study, he would go places with me just to be able to read more. We quizzed him along the way to be sure he was retaining - and he was. We know that the habit of Bible reading is the most important habit he could ever attain - and he did. Our hearts are just bursting with pride at how he set a goal for himself, and worked diligently to achieve that goal. Reading God's word was the plan, but he also learned a life lesson along the way - a lesson in hard work, diligence, persistence, and of not giving up when it gets hard (like in Leviticus!!!)

Jacob is a wonderful young man. We are so grateful for him, and for the example he is to his younger siblings. He is faithful to the tasks he has before him, and one of his strengths is self-control. He is fun to be around, and he is just getting funnier all the time! I know that the teenage years are right ahead of us, and we pray that he will continue to be a joy to us, responsive to us, and continue his respectful attitude and obedience to his parents and to God. Many temptations lie just around the corner - and Lord willing, Jacob will move gracefully through these years, relying on the Lord to be his strength and joy.

Jacob, we hope you have many happy hours building and creating with your lego Mindstorms!! We were SO happy to give it to you - you absolutely earned it and deserve it! We love you son!!

A Little English Garden

This Memorial Day Weekend was full indeed. Our main project was to do something with this little patch of dirt in our front yard right by the front entrance. It was always an odd-shaped little piece of land and we didn't know what we would do with it when we moved in. A few bushes were planted, but we had vision for so much more! So, Hannah and I went off to the nursery for some flowers, and we worked hard for almost three days to complete the project. Danny and Ryan were a huge help to us though, and in the end, we think the completed project looks beautiful. We had a vision for an English Garden... and this is how it went.

This was what we started with. Kind of boring...

Then we went to the nursery and brought home tons of plants and a couple of planters.




Hannah did almost ALL of the hard work of planting - she planted 42 flowers! Okay, that means 42 holes that she dug! She is most definitely a diligent and hard-working young lady.

You can see Danny and Ryan in the background. Danny laid all the stepping stones and spread all the heavy bags of mulch, with Ryan as his assistant. It was so much fun to work together on a project!

Of course, all this work and heat meant a trip to 7-11 for big gulps!!

These are the pictures of the finished product!! We think it is "rather lovely", and look forward to the day we can put a bench out there and just sit and have our tea! Hannah will probably sit out there with a sketch pad and draw all of the flowers and bunnies. She loves to draw, especially things in nature.

Bravo Hannah! Hannah not only did all the work of planting, but she also designed the beds and planted them. I am so proud of her! She certainly did NOT get her love of gardening from me. (Maybe her grandparents, but not me!)

Besides the flower garden, this weekend was full of wonderful memories, such as a baseball game in DC, a stop at the mall , a bonfire, and a swim and dinner with our dear friends. It is also the weekend Jacob reached a milestone - but I will save that post for tomorrow. Oh, and we even finalized our summer vacation plans - we are headed up to Stillwater, Minnesota to visit my family. That will be fun- and hopefully maybe cooler than Maryland in August!!