Ultimate Blog Party {It's a lunch date at my place}

Hello. I am so glad you stopped by to visit! Whether you come often or this is your first time (thanks to the Ultimate Blog Party), I am glad to have you here. Please come in, I can't wait to visit and get to know you better! (Side note- this is what I love about blogging. Not only can I stay in contact with family and friends across the world- I can meet new friends too!)

In case we have never met before I guess I had better do some introductions... My name is Abbi and I am happily married to my husband of 12+ years, Ken. I am very blessed to be the stay at home and homeschooling mom of 4 beautiful children, Mara, Jonathan, Aaron and Megan. If you have kids I hope that you brought them with you as my kids would love to play with them!

Mara-11, Aaron-7, Megan- almost 5 and Jonathan-9

They can be pretty goofy and silly but they have a lot of fun and I am blessed to be their mother. 

 So lets send the kids outside to play in the tree fort if it is warm or they can play inside if it is cool. Come to our living room and have a seat and lets get busy visiting!

  What would you like to visit about? It is my goal in my visiting (whether face to face or on this blog) to say things that encourage and build up others and glorify my heavenly Father. I know that unfortunately I don't always succeed but that is my goal.

   I have many, many interests (I think the woman in Proverbs 31 did too!) so I am pretty sure we have at least something in common. Maybe you would like to talk about....

• Homeschooling. I would love to hear how you do it and what books you love. I enjoy talking about the ways we learn creatively, making the world our classroom. We love reading around here and I would be glad to show you some of the ones we have really enjoyed and learned from. It is always fun to get together with another homeschooler and pick each other's brains.
• Gardening. I would love to give you a tour but it is still to early to plant here. In fact there is still quite a bit of snow on the garden. I did just get my seeds in the mail though and I will be starting stuff inside right away. I like to garden very frugally and naturally. I love to be able to get a lot of produce from it with which I can feed my family. We do also enjoy having quite a few flowers around our place and we keep adding more fruit trees and bushes about every year in hopes of someday having a lot of our own fruits. I am also studying up on and dreaming of keeping bees which will provide both honey, wax and pollination for our garden.
• Living frugally. I very much enjoy getting to visit with other mothers and sharing tips on ways to live better on less. To me living frugally is not a chore but rather a really fun challenge! I love learning ways to spend less on food though the prices go up- and this while we eat healthier. I also love to challenge myself to make most of our gifts, save on electricity, go as long as possible without buying clothes or just go without shopping in general. So many ideas! I love to hear yours and I try to share mine so that we can all be better stewards of what God has given us.
• Making things. In fact, if you want, I could pull out my stamps and stuff and we could have fun making cards together.  I love to keep my hands busy and I also really enjoy looking around our home and seeing things that we have made ourselves. To me it makes a home so much more personal to have much of the furnishings handmade.I have many interests in making things- sewing, knitting, crocheting, floral work, basket making, quilting, painting and more... 
• Baking and cooking. If you ask me if I love to cook, "Yes" wouldn't be my first response. I have however learned to enjoy it by making it fun for me. I do a lot of cooking as we eat at home most of the time and I like to have homemade meals. What makes it fun for me is in the process of creating meals that are healthy for my family and help us to keep our food costs low. I also make things interesting in the kitchen by making up my own recipes, figuring out ways to use what we have an abundance of and by using our meals to further our education. I enjoy combining what we are learning in school with our foods. (Such as having ethnic foods to go along with our geography.)
• Raising children, being a good wife,natural health, organizing, taking care of the earth God has given us and not being wasteful or maybe we could even have a Bible study. There is so much to talk about you might just have to come back again!

Can you stay for lunch? Lunches around here aren't very fancy, when it is just us we usually eat leftovers but today I think we will have soup. Would you like potato, tomato or split pea? The potatoes we gleaned from nearby fields and the tomatoes I grew in our garden.  I think we will have some homemade bread too, would you like to slice it? And we have some ginger cookies for dessert. I hope you like them!
 

So, what would you like to visit about? I would love to have you introduce yourself and tell what your favorite topic is in the comments! I look forward to meeting you all! Thanks so much for visiting!

Ultimate Blog Party {It's a lunch date at my place}

Hello. I am so glad you stopped by to visit! Whether you come often or this is your first time (thanks to the Ultimate Blog Party), I am glad to have you here. Please come in, I can't wait to visit and get to know you better! (Side note- this is what I love about blogging. Not only can I stay in contact with family and friends across the world- I can meet new friends too!)

In case we have never met before I guess I had better do some introductions... My name is Abbi and I am happily married to my husband of 12+ years, Ken. I am very blessed to be the stay at home and homeschooling mom of 4 beautiful children, Mara, Jonathan, Aaron and Megan. If you have kids I hope that you brought them with you as my kids would love to play with them!

Mara-11, Aaron-7, Megan- almost 5 and Jonathan-9

They can be pretty goofy and silly but they have a lot of fun and I am blessed to be their mother. 

 So lets send the kids outside to play in the tree fort if it is warm or they can play inside if it is cool. Come to our living room and have a seat and lets get busy visiting!

  What would you like to visit about? It is my goal in my visiting (whether face to face or on this blog) to say things that encourage and build up others and glorify my heavenly Father. I know that unfortunately I don't always succeed but that is my goal.

   I have many, many interests (I think the woman in Proverbs 31 did too!) so I am pretty sure we have at least something in common. Maybe you would like to talk about....

• Homeschooling. I would love to hear how you do it and what books you love. I enjoy talking about the ways we learn creatively, making the world our classroom. We love reading around here and I would be glad to show you some of the ones we have really enjoyed and learned from. It is always fun to get together with another homeschooler and pick each other's brains.
• Gardening. I would love to give you a tour but it is still to early to plant here. In fact there is still quite a bit of snow on the garden. I did just get my seeds in the mail though and I will be starting stuff inside right away. I like to garden very frugally and naturally. I love to be able to get a lot of produce from it with which I can feed my family. We do also enjoy having quite a few flowers around our place and we keep adding more fruit trees and bushes about every year in hopes of someday having a lot of our own fruits. I am also studying up on and dreaming of keeping bees which will provide both honey, wax and pollination for our garden.
• Living frugally. I very much enjoy getting to visit with other mothers and sharing tips on ways to live better on less. To me living frugally is not a chore but rather a really fun challenge! I love learning ways to spend less on food though the prices go up- and this while we eat healthier. I also love to challenge myself to make most of our gifts, save on electricity, go as long as possible without buying clothes or just go without shopping in general. So many ideas! I love to hear yours and I try to share mine so that we can all be better stewards of what God has given us.
• Making things. In fact, if you want, I could pull out my stamps and stuff and we could have fun making cards together.  I love to keep my hands busy and I also really enjoy looking around our home and seeing things that we have made ourselves. To me it makes a home so much more personal to have much of the furnishings handmade.I have many interests in making things- sewing, knitting, crocheting, floral work, basket making, quilting, painting and more... 
• Baking and cooking. If you ask me if I love to cook, "Yes" wouldn't be my first response. I have however learned to enjoy it by making it fun for me. I do a lot of cooking as we eat at home most of the time and I like to have homemade meals. What makes it fun for me is in the process of creating meals that are healthy for my family and help us to keep our food costs low. I also make things interesting in the kitchen by making up my own recipes, figuring out ways to use what we have an abundance of and by using our meals to further our education. I enjoy combining what we are learning in school with our foods. (Such as having ethnic foods to go along with our geography.)
• Raising children, being a good wife,natural health, organizing, taking care of the earth God has given us and not being wasteful or maybe we could even have a Bible study. There is so much to talk about you might just have to come back again!

Can you stay for lunch? Lunches around here aren't very fancy, when it is just us we usually eat leftovers but today I think we will have soup. Would you like potato, tomato or split pea? The potatoes we gleaned from nearby fields and the tomatoes I grew in our garden.  I think we will have some homemade bread too, would you like to slice it? And we have some ginger cookies for dessert. I hope you like them!
 

So, what would you like to visit about? I would love to have you introduce yourself and tell what your favorite topic is in the comments! I look forward to meeting you all! Thanks so much for visiting!

Make Your Home a Haven

 Monica over at The Homespun Heart has been hosting "Make your Home a Haven" this week. This is something  that has been on my heart and so I thought it would be fun to join in. I had meant to post about it the last two days but with Internet issues and lack of time that hadn't happened yet. But I will start now with the posting about it.

 I think of Haven as a place that you can go to rest, to get away from the struggles you might be facing elsewhere. A place where love is. A place of peace and joy. That is what I want our home to be. We live in such a busy society- there are so many demands made upon our time, I want our home to be different.

   Our home hasn't always been different, I wouldn't be able to number the times that I have told my kids to "hurry up" we need to get this done or go here or do that. That is one thing that I am trying to work on in making our home a haven.  I have been really working on staying home more and honestly doing less. We had gotten our schedule so busy that I was overwhelmed and I was often pushing my kids. It is my goal to be more fully focused on each moment as it comes rather than always trying to get ready for something else.

Here are some of the ways I am working on this:

• Prayer. God is the giver of all wisdom and strength. He knows what I can handle each day and I need to go to Him at all times for guidance.
• Stay home more. I have never been one to shop a lot or do a lot of running but this summer and the beginning of fall we ended up being on the go a bunch anyway. Somethings I have done to help change that are: Stopping our visits to the Chiropractor- this was done after much prayer and I think it is a good thing at least for now. Stretching out our visits to the grocery store as long as possible. Limit the amount of social visiting that we do right now. Asking Ken to run an errand for me every so often as he comes and goes from work.
• Not saying yes to new ideas for using my time without much prayer and thinking. This one has been interesting for me. I am the type of person that usually gets excited about new ideas- fun ways to decorate places and so forth. Both in our Republican group and at church I have usually been quick to say yes to helping with events or whatever. I have been challenging myself lately to really think: Is this truly necessary for getting our message out or is it simply taking up my time to plan it (or work on it) and then going to take up more of others time later without any real fruit. If the answer is "yes" to that, I am trying to avoid saying "yes" to doing it.
• Giving my family(God, my friends, whoever I am around) my full attention. I am a huge multi tasker and my mind is also going very fast much of the time. I have had a tendency to "listen" to my kids while thinking about something else and working on something else. I will probably continue to work and listen because that really can work together but I am working to stop thinking about something else while I "listen".

My plan for today in making my home a haven is this:

1. Get up early. This morning Ken had to leave early so I decided to get up with him at 5:30. It is neat to have all of this morning quiet time to pray and work and get things ready for the day.
2. Pray and Read the Bible and Meditate on God's word.I have been working on praying for God's help in being patient, gentle and kind and really in tune with my family's needs.  Here are some verses that I am finding helpful:  "So that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored. Titus 2: 4 & 5 This one also was a good reminder to me that we do need to be busy in doing good things but to meet pressing needs not just wasting time: "Our people must also learn to engage in good deeds to meet pressing needs, so that they will not be unfruitful." Titus 3:14 I think it looks like the woman in Proverbs 31 was good at making her home a haven too: "Strength and dignity are her clothing, and she smiles at the future. She opens her mouth in wisdom, and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. She looks well to the ways of her household, and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children rise up and bless her; Her husband also, and he praises her, saying; "Many daughters have done nobly, but you excel them all." Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised. Give her the product of her hands, and let her works praise her in the gates." Proverbs 31:25-31
3. Eat fruit and Oatmeal for breakfast (one of my kids' favorites!)
4. Do some general cleanup to make our house look orderly and inviting.
5. I have been working this week on fixing up our main living area (kitchen, dining and living room) to look more inviting and fixed up for fall. I had already done some painting (adding new color- I will share pictures later!) but today I hope to touch up the walls that are going to remain cream (or "lantern light" which is what the color's name is!). I am looking forward to the lovely walls!
6. School work will also be done this morning. It is my prayer to really show patience to my children and that they would be diligent and enjoy learning.
7. Lunch- Watermelon (from our garden!) and leftover soup from last night. (I love having leftovers for lunch as it makes our days much simpler- I having trouble making enough sometimes of late in order to feed my growing family and have leftovers however!)
8. Next comes reading together (We love this time!) and rest time for all of us. I love the down time we can have and getting a few minutes to shut my eyes too. In my private reading I am really enjoying some herb books that I got from the library.
9. This afternoon I want to enjoy the beautiful weather that we have been having with my kids. Explore a little, admire the beautiful leaves. This warm time will be gone fast and I want us to enjoy it while we can.
10. If I have extra time, some of the projects I want to work on this week are: New pillows- in bright fall colors- for our couch, Doing a clutter purge through out our home, going through all of our clothes and getting rid of everything that we don't really use or care for.( I was very inspired by Money Saving Mom's Vlog showing her very limited wardrobe. I don't think I would ever go that slim but I made me realize that we sure could get by with a lot less!), Finding some stuff in our home to give to others who need it, Arranging wall hangings in our living room, Decorating for fall all over the house.
11. Supper- My goal is to have it done when Ken walks in the door. I have been running late quite often anymore. The menu: Fruit Salad with nuts and real whipped cream, Zucchini and Carrot Patties and Steak chunks.,
12. Tonight we have church and I am teaching a kids class again this month. I have everything ready to go already so I am happy about that. I just need to carry my bag out to the van -besides putting together a quick snack.

 My main goals are: To have a joyful and loving attitude. To simplify our lives in the amount of things we do and the amount of stuff we have. To really be focused on those that are around me.  To look to God for Strength and wisdom in everything. I am so thankful to God because with Him even the worst and ugliest house can be turned into a haven.

 Are you working on making your home a haven? What things are you working on?

Make Your Home a Haven

 Monica over at The Homespun Heart has been hosting "Make your Home a Haven" this week. This is something  that has been on my heart and so I thought it would be fun to join in. I had meant to post about it the last two days but with Internet issues and lack of time that hadn't happened yet. But I will start now with the posting about it.

 I think of Haven as a place that you can go to rest, to get away from the struggles you might be facing elsewhere. A place where love is. A place of peace and joy. That is what I want our home to be. We live in such a busy society- there are so many demands made upon our time, I want our home to be different.

   Our home hasn't always been different, I wouldn't be able to number the times that I have told my kids to "hurry up" we need to get this done or go here or do that. That is one thing that I am trying to work on in making our home a haven.  I have been really working on staying home more and honestly doing less. We had gotten our schedule so busy that I was overwhelmed and I was often pushing my kids. It is my goal to be more fully focused on each moment as it comes rather than always trying to get ready for something else.

Here are some of the ways I am working on this:

• Prayer. God is the giver of all wisdom and strength. He knows what I can handle each day and I need to go to Him at all times for guidance.
• Stay home more. I have never been one to shop a lot or do a lot of running but this summer and the beginning of fall we ended up being on the go a bunch anyway. Somethings I have done to help change that are: Stopping our visits to the Chiropractor- this was done after much prayer and I think it is a good thing at least for now. Stretching out our visits to the grocery store as long as possible. Limit the amount of social visiting that we do right now. Asking Ken to run an errand for me every so often as he comes and goes from work.
• Not saying yes to new ideas for using my time without much prayer and thinking. This one has been interesting for me. I am the type of person that usually gets excited about new ideas- fun ways to decorate places and so forth. Both in our Republican group and at church I have usually been quick to say yes to helping with events or whatever. I have been challenging myself lately to really think: Is this truly necessary for getting our message out or is it simply taking up my time to plan it (or work on it) and then going to take up more of others time later without any real fruit. If the answer is "yes" to that, I am trying to avoid saying "yes" to doing it.
• Giving my family(God, my friends, whoever I am around) my full attention. I am a huge multi tasker and my mind is also going very fast much of the time. I have had a tendency to "listen" to my kids while thinking about something else and working on something else. I will probably continue to work and listen because that really can work together but I am working to stop thinking about something else while I "listen".

My plan for today in making my home a haven is this:

1. Get up early. This morning Ken had to leave early so I decided to get up with him at 5:30. It is neat to have all of this morning quiet time to pray and work and get things ready for the day.
2. Pray and Read the Bible and Meditate on God's word.I have been working on praying for God's help in being patient, gentle and kind and really in tune with my family's needs.  Here are some verses that I am finding helpful:  "So that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored. Titus 2: 4 & 5 This one also was a good reminder to me that we do need to be busy in doing good things but to meet pressing needs not just wasting time: "Our people must also learn to engage in good deeds to meet pressing needs, so that they will not be unfruitful." Titus 3:14 I think it looks like the woman in Proverbs 31 was good at making her home a haven too: "Strength and dignity are her clothing, and she smiles at the future. She opens her mouth in wisdom, and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. She looks well to the ways of her household, and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children rise up and bless her; Her husband also, and he praises her, saying; "Many daughters have done nobly, but you excel them all." Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised. Give her the product of her hands, and let her works praise her in the gates." Proverbs 31:25-31
3. Eat fruit and Oatmeal for breakfast (one of my kids' favorites!)
4. Do some general cleanup to make our house look orderly and inviting.
5. I have been working this week on fixing up our main living area (kitchen, dining and living room) to look more inviting and fixed up for fall. I had already done some painting (adding new color- I will share pictures later!) but today I hope to touch up the walls that are going to remain cream (or "lantern light" which is what the color's name is!). I am looking forward to the lovely walls!
6. School work will also be done this morning. It is my prayer to really show patience to my children and that they would be diligent and enjoy learning.
7. Lunch- Watermelon (from our garden!) and leftover soup from last night. (I love having leftovers for lunch as it makes our days much simpler- I having trouble making enough sometimes of late in order to feed my growing family and have leftovers however!)
8. Next comes reading together (We love this time!) and rest time for all of us. I love the down time we can have and getting a few minutes to shut my eyes too. In my private reading I am really enjoying some herb books that I got from the library.
9. This afternoon I want to enjoy the beautiful weather that we have been having with my kids. Explore a little, admire the beautiful leaves. This warm time will be gone fast and I want us to enjoy it while we can.
10. If I have extra time, some of the projects I want to work on this week are: New pillows- in bright fall colors- for our couch, Doing a clutter purge through out our home, going through all of our clothes and getting rid of everything that we don't really use or care for.( I was very inspired by Money Saving Mom's Vlog showing her very limited wardrobe. I don't think I would ever go that slim but I made me realize that we sure could get by with a lot less!), Finding some stuff in our home to give to others who need it, Arranging wall hangings in our living room, Decorating for fall all over the house.
11. Supper- My goal is to have it done when Ken walks in the door. I have been running late quite often anymore. The menu: Fruit Salad with nuts and real whipped cream, Zucchini and Carrot Patties and Steak chunks.,
12. Tonight we have church and I am teaching a kids class again this month. I have everything ready to go already so I am happy about that. I just need to carry my bag out to the van -besides putting together a quick snack.

 My main goals are: To have a joyful and loving attitude. To simplify our lives in the amount of things we do and the amount of stuff we have. To really be focused on those that are around me.  To look to God for Strength and wisdom in everything. I am so thankful to God because with Him even the worst and ugliest house can be turned into a haven.

 Are you working on making your home a haven? What things are you working on?

Being a blessing

"To sum up, all of you be harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kindhearted,

and humble in spirit; not returning evil for evil or insult for insult,

but giving a blessing instead; for you were called for the very purpose

 that you might inherit a blessing. 1 Peter 3:8 & 9

This past week at ladies bible study we were discussing the idea of being a blessing. This is something that has seemed a little obscure to me. I am quite familiar with God blessing me. I see it happen over and over and over again! He gives to me abundantly in so many ways: love, salvation, family and friends, beauty around me, health, all that I need physically (plus way more!) and so much more.

 The idea of me being a blessing to others is not one that I have thought about as much however. I thought it might help if I looked up the word in the dictionary. Here is some of what is said under "blessing":  Approval, encouragement. A thing conducive to happiness or welfare. So I am getting the idea of bringing happiness, encouragement and help to others.

   The next step is to think about how I can practically do that. And who I really need to work at blessing. So on to the practical steps:

I can be a blessing by:

• My attitude. A good, sweet and loving attitude is certainly going to be a blessing to others especially compared to being grumpy, uptight or angry.
• My actions. I can bless others by helping them in however they need to be helped. I want to be on the lookout for little or big ways that I can serve others. This can be done for my husband, for my kids or even just opening a door for somebody at a store that has their hands full.
• My words. Our words have a lot of strength in them. With them we can easily tear down or buildup. Encourage or discourage. I want to have words that bring others a blessing.

Who do I need to bless?

• My husband. Ken has high priority in one that I need to bless.
• My children.
• My church family.
• Friends and family.
• Strangers.

Sometimes it can be just a smile or a kind word. Other times it can be a bit more involved and sometimes it is a life long project. But one thing I know it is a "project" that I want to work on. I truly do want to be a blessing in others lives. How about you?

Being a blessing

"To sum up, all of you be harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kindhearted,

and humble in spirit; not returning evil for evil or insult for insult,

but giving a blessing instead; for you were called for the very purpose

 that you might inherit a blessing. 1 Peter 3:8 & 9

This past week at ladies bible study we were discussing the idea of being a blessing. This is something that has seemed a little obscure to me. I am quite familiar with God blessing me. I see it happen over and over and over again! He gives to me abundantly in so many ways: love, salvation, family and friends, beauty around me, health, all that I need physically (plus way more!) and so much more.

 The idea of me being a blessing to others is not one that I have thought about as much however. I thought it might help if I looked up the word in the dictionary. Here is some of what is said under "blessing":  Approval, encouragement. A thing conducive to happiness or welfare. So I am getting the idea of bringing happiness, encouragement and help to others.

   The next step is to think about how I can practically do that. And who I really need to work at blessing. So on to the practical steps:

I can be a blessing by:

• My attitude. A good, sweet and loving attitude is certainly going to be a blessing to others especially compared to being grumpy, uptight or angry.
• My actions. I can bless others by helping them in however they need to be helped. I want to be on the lookout for little or big ways that I can serve others. This can be done for my husband, for my kids or even just opening a door for somebody at a store that has their hands full.
• My words. Our words have a lot of strength in them. With them we can easily tear down or buildup. Encourage or discourage. I want to have words that bring others a blessing.

Who do I need to bless?

• My husband. Ken has high priority in one that I need to bless.
• My children.
• My church family.
• Friends and family.
• Strangers.

Sometimes it can be just a smile or a kind word. Other times it can be a bit more involved and sometimes it is a life long project. But one thing I know it is a "project" that I want to work on. I truly do want to be a blessing in others lives. How about you?

Traveling to a TEA party and other things that keep me busy

It is Wednesday night and it has been days since I last blogged. I have some pretty good reasons including a very cuddly and kissable little niece that has been to visit along with her Mom and Dad and big brother, home improvement projects going on (Thanks to my brother being here- but I have helped a little) and a trip out to Washington DC to go to a big TEA party there.

  Ken and I drove down to the cities and stayed at my sister's on Friday evening so we could head to the airport at 4 am on Saturday. We got to DC before lunch and had fun doing a bit of sight seeing the rest of that day.

 The last time we were in DC we didn't visit the Smithsonian Castle so I wanted go there this time. We enjoyed looking around a bit but didn't spend much time there.

We ended up spending most of our afternoon at the Postal museum. There was a lot of fun history there and we truly enjoyed it.

Then we went to a hotel where they were holding a sign making party for the TEA party the next day. We had fun making our signs and visiting with some others there. After that we headed to the Natural History Museum to see a documentary on Mt Everest (and one of its' first climbers, George Mallory) in the IMAX theater. When we got there we were carrying our signs as we hadn't been back to our hotel yet. The guards wouldn't let us in with them and told Ken to just throw them away. Ken thought maybe we would just leave but we decided to stick them in the bushes outside and they were still fine after the movie (which was pretty cool by the way.)

  On the 12th we woke up to a rather grey and rainy morning. We headed over to the Washington Monument where they had a church service of sorts. There was a lot of neat scripture reading and many prayers for our nation. We also sang "God bless America".

   We had fun meeting some people there and looking at everybody's signs and outfits. We weren't able to take a flag pole on the plane so Ken decided to wear his "Don't tread on me" flag as a cape. We soon discovered that he wasn't the only one with that plan. I got a picture of him with this man but later saw quite a few more people doing the same thing.

At noon we started marching down the roads from the monument to the Capitol. We certainly caused some traffic jams as they had to wait an hour or so for us to all get by. I felt kind of bad for the long lines waiting but I hope we were able to share our message in a friendly way.

The crowd was quite a bit smaller than last year when Ken and his dad went (in 2009 there were anywhere from several hundred thousand to a million people there) but there were still thousands and thousands of people. It was fun to see so many others who also feel passionately about our country going back to our founding principles where we honor God and have a limited government.

This was a group from Indiana. Indiana had a very good showing there.

I thought this sign was pretty creative. It was actually a bunch of signs put together and they were trying their best to stay straight.

There were a lot of people dressing in clothes of the time period of the Boston Tea Party. I enjoyed seeing all the costumes.

This lady had her own special Sam I am sign. She had found the poem online and then her husband drew the picture. I think this is what she had: ( I found it here)

I do not like it Uncle Sam, I do not like it Sam I am.



I do not like these dirty crooks, Neither how they cook the books.


I do not like when Congress steals, I do not like their secret deals.


I do not like this Speaker Nan, I do not like this "YES WE CAN!".


I do not like this kind of hope, I do not like it, nope, Nope, NOPE!






So you do not like this Uncle Sam?


Would you, could you for free health care?


Would you, could you here or there?


He’ll sweeten the deal and buy you a boat. Anything it takes to steal your vote.


Just pay your taxes higher, higher, higher while our Constitution is set on fire.


Now Uncle Sam knows what’s best for you, knows more than you think you do.


So just hush up and pay and everything will be okay.

Ken and I.

This was probably the most creative sign we saw. Ken thought I should post it on here.

There was a rally on the Capitol lawn. It was fun to listen to people (most just ordinary citizens from across the country) speak on the importance of sticking with our values and holding our elected officials to following the constitution and if they don't, we will not elect them again!
 

  I think a couple of the most moving speeches of the day were from a couple of immigrants (citizens now) that told why they had left the socialist countries that they were born in and why they want to see America stay away from Socialism.

As we were leaving the rally we saw these quotes on a nearby monument. They totally went along with the theme of the day and so I thought I would share them here with you.

We came home on Monday night to face another busy week of homeschooling, home fixing, website working, church and more politics (its a busy time for that right now!). I will try not to have to much in the way of politics on here very often, but this rally was a pretty big event in our lives this year and I wanted to share. I guess we were even shown on Fox News on Sunday but unfortunately we didn't think to record the news, so we didn't see it.
 
  I am curious, are any of you politically involved? Have you ever attended a TEA party?

Traveling to a TEA party and other things that keep me busy

It is Wednesday night and it has been days since I last blogged. I have some pretty good reasons including a very cuddly and kissable little niece that has been to visit along with her Mom and Dad and big brother, home improvement projects going on (Thanks to my brother being here- but I have helped a little) and a trip out to Washington DC to go to a big TEA party there.

  Ken and I drove down to the cities and stayed at my sister's on Friday evening so we could head to the airport at 4 am on Saturday. We got to DC before lunch and had fun doing a bit of sight seeing the rest of that day.

 The last time we were in DC we didn't visit the Smithsonian Castle so I wanted go there this time. We enjoyed looking around a bit but didn't spend much time there.

We ended up spending most of our afternoon at the Postal museum. There was a lot of fun history there and we truly enjoyed it.

Then we went to a hotel where they were holding a sign making party for the TEA party the next day. We had fun making our signs and visiting with some others there. After that we headed to the Natural History Museum to see a documentary on Mt Everest (and one of its' first climbers, George Mallory) in the IMAX theater. When we got there we were carrying our signs as we hadn't been back to our hotel yet. The guards wouldn't let us in with them and told Ken to just throw them away. Ken thought maybe we would just leave but we decided to stick them in the bushes outside and they were still fine after the movie (which was pretty cool by the way.)

  On the 12th we woke up to a rather grey and rainy morning. We headed over to the Washington Monument where they had a church service of sorts. There was a lot of neat scripture reading and many prayers for our nation. We also sang "God bless America".

   We had fun meeting some people there and looking at everybody's signs and outfits. We weren't able to take a flag pole on the plane so Ken decided to wear his "Don't tread on me" flag as a cape. We soon discovered that he wasn't the only one with that plan. I got a picture of him with this man but later saw quite a few more people doing the same thing.

At noon we started marching down the roads from the monument to the Capitol. We certainly caused some traffic jams as they had to wait an hour or so for us to all get by. I felt kind of bad for the long lines waiting but I hope we were able to share our message in a friendly way.

The crowd was quite a bit smaller than last year when Ken and his dad went (in 2009 there were anywhere from several hundred thousand to a million people there) but there were still thousands and thousands of people. It was fun to see so many others who also feel passionately about our country going back to our founding principles where we honor God and have a limited government.

This was a group from Indiana. Indiana had a very good showing there.

I thought this sign was pretty creative. It was actually a bunch of signs put together and they were trying their best to stay straight.

There were a lot of people dressing in clothes of the time period of the Boston Tea Party. I enjoyed seeing all the costumes.

This lady had her own special Sam I am sign. She had found the poem online and then her husband drew the picture. I think this is what she had: ( I found it here)

I do not like it Uncle Sam, I do not like it Sam I am.



I do not like these dirty crooks, Neither how they cook the books.


I do not like when Congress steals, I do not like their secret deals.


I do not like this Speaker Nan, I do not like this "YES WE CAN!".


I do not like this kind of hope, I do not like it, nope, Nope, NOPE!






So you do not like this Uncle Sam?


Would you, could you for free health care?


Would you, could you here or there?


He’ll sweeten the deal and buy you a boat. Anything it takes to steal your vote.


Just pay your taxes higher, higher, higher while our Constitution is set on fire.


Now Uncle Sam knows what’s best for you, knows more than you think you do.


So just hush up and pay and everything will be okay.

Ken and I.

This was probably the most creative sign we saw. Ken thought I should post it on here.

There was a rally on the Capitol lawn. It was fun to listen to people (most just ordinary citizens from across the country) speak on the importance of sticking with our values and holding our elected officials to following the constitution and if they don't, we will not elect them again!
 

  I think a couple of the most moving speeches of the day were from a couple of immigrants (citizens now) that told why they had left the socialist countries that they were born in and why they want to see America stay away from Socialism.

As we were leaving the rally we saw these quotes on a nearby monument. They totally went along with the theme of the day and so I thought I would share them here with you.

We came home on Monday night to face another busy week of homeschooling, home fixing, website working, church and more politics (its a busy time for that right now!). I will try not to have to much in the way of politics on here very often, but this rally was a pretty big event in our lives this year and I wanted to share. I guess we were even shown on Fox News on Sunday but unfortunately we didn't think to record the news, so we didn't see it.
 
  I am curious, are any of you politically involved? Have you ever attended a TEA party?