A LampPost Flickering

Please stop growing up so fast, little ones! My heart can barely take it. And, also, there is no thumb-sucking in the military.

I've always been fascinated by my dad's hands. Rough and gentle. Busy and still. I used to think his hands were almost as big as God's. I felt safer than safe holding his hand. And now, 17 precious grandchildren can feel the safety and love in Poppy's hands. This photo was entered into the I Heart Faces photo challenge –  iheartfaces.com

Some days, homeschooling is really hard. Seth is an excellent reader and writer and has decent penmanship, but the boy hates, hates the physical act of writing. Ask him to copy a sentence or fill in blanks about the state of Missouri, and you can be sure you'll find him hiding behind the recliner or writhing on the floor in a state of misery instead. Caleb tends to get a belly ache every day at about math time, no matter what time math time is. And Lily hates read aloud time so much that she celebrates every time I finish with: "Hurray!" or "Finally!" or a heaving sigh of prison-release. (And she yawns and rolls up into a ball throughout the entire reading time, as well.) The rest of us love read-aloud time, so she is just going to have to learn to endure it. I trust that the lyrical music of well-written language spoken aloud will eventually penetrate her heart. Gabe is often found upside down trying to balance a pencil on his chin. "I just got distr...

I'd never heard the phrase "like trying to drink out of a fire hose" before Rob and I stepped into military life. More information than you could possibly take in without drowning or being blasted across the room. I like the visual image the fire hose analogy gives me. Because this country girl used to love to sneak gulps from the garden hose whilst watering the horses or use the barn spicket as a drinking fountain, wiping the drips from my chin with the back of my hand. I'd still do it. I'm totally hip with indoor plumbing, but I think I'd like to have a hand pump and a wooden bucket and ladle in the back yard for the sole purpose of sneaking drinks of water. Sometimes a great Bible passage does that to me. I'm like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" (That's what Lily says when she is astonished. Delectable.) Too much. I can't take it all in. Yesterday's gift: Seth reading his new adventure Bible, pencil in hand, so that he could underline ...