Pictures

Isn't he a cutie?

They all look so little here.

Elisabeth holding Matthew. When she wants to hold Matthew she says, "holn, holn?"

Ready to go Bye-bye.

A Turkey Dinner - by Matthew

A TURKEY DINNER

First a trip down to the barn. This was a Blue Slate turkey and his weight was about twelve pounds. We slaughtered him because we slaughtered our two Broad Breasted hens and didn't want to leave him alone.


In front of the barn and ready to go up the drive way. Take note of the chain saw helmet, turkeys can really beat you with their wings and I mean beat you.


To spare the details of the picture, one turkey, one man, one axe, and one axe.


Plucking a turkey only takes about ten to fifteen minutes for a beginner like me, the important thing is to have the water at about 145 degrees. The cone in the back ground is for bleeding and we let our turkeys bleed for about two to three minutes. The bucket is for dunking the turkey in and it is filled with the hot water, I dunked him about three times during the plucking. The box is for the; head, feathers, guts and anything else. I then throw the burn barrel and and all is taken care of but the cooking and eating.

A Day at the Park

One day about a month ago or so we decided to get away for a while. We drove down South to Raymond to a little park and let the kids play. They did exceptional in the car on the way down and on the way back.

Elisabeth in the swing.

Mommy and Hannah

Goose Dinner

Yes, that's right. Goose dinner! This is actually the leftovers from the night before. During hunting season, a couple of men hunt geese across the highway from us. Acres and acres of beautiful land... I wish I had a picture. I usually hear the first shots at about 7:00 in the morning. Anyways, on the second to the last day of the season one of the men came over to ask if we would mind if he shoots some geese in our backyard. We have 12 acres so they are usually filled with geese during this time of year. We said we'd be obliged to if we could get a goose for ourselves. He came back with a goose a couple of hours later. My husband cleaned it and we had it for dinner the next evening. I was a little nervous about trying a new meat and had my husband try it first. I asked him how it tasted and he said it was delicious. I knew him to have good taste so I figured it would be good. It WAS delicious! Wow, why don't more people eat goose dinner? I'm surprised they don't. It's like a rich, delicious and delicate beef. It even looks like beef. I cooked it in the crockpot and will probably do it again next year. They will be coming back to hunt in our backyard again next year. I'm excited for my husband as he will be able to do a little hunting and right here in our backyard.

A Day on the Farm

Here's a day we walked down to our barn for some fresh air.

Here I am with little Matthew.

Here's one of our blue slate turkeys. We had him for dinner last month!
The best turkey we ever did have.

Precious little Matthew. Isn't this such a precious picture?

Our darling Elisabeth. She's looking bigger every day!

Matthew and Hannah. She loves being in the carrier.

No more room for pictures!

We have no more room for pictures on our computer. So for now we won't be posting pictures though we have over 100 on our camera to download now. We'll be buying an external hard drive after February 1st so I can download all of our pictures onto that and start posting new pictures on our blog again. We'll be getting another computer this summer as well so that will help.

It is hard not to post on here. Our lives have been so blessed with our new son and our daughters advancing in their babyhood/toddlerhood. Elisabeth loves the baby. This morning the baby was crying and she stopped eating her oatmeal, got down from her chair and went to kiss the baby. She is one to not step away from her morning oatmeal for nothing! Hannah is just as charming as ever. She's so loving, she hardly ever lets us put her down. She'd be held all day if she could.

Matthew is in the process right now of butchering one of our turkeys. He will be butchering two of them today. I took a couple of pictures of him that I'll be posting in about 3 weeks. We will be buying the White Broad Breasted chicks this spring to raise this year. We want to have some for our freezer and give some away as well to a couple of friends and possibly a ministry in town. The White Broad Breasted turkeys are the ones you find in the store. We don't think they look like real turkeys but they will look prettier when cleaned and we may sell a few as well.

This year we will be selling our eggs and the items I have sewed. I have made a lot of bibs, some gorgeous aprons, burp cloths and more. The selection of fabrics are becoming more beautiful and I can't wait to sew, sew, sew so much more. With the new baby I haven't been able to sew anything new to sell this spring. Oh, I take it back... I sewed a couple of laundry bags. They are beautiful! I can't wait to take pictures and share.

Anyways, we will be planting some corn this year. We have some blueberry trees that Matthew planted and we'll be planting some other food as well. We may grow some pumpkins in our front field to sell and feed our chickens. This is all new to us... this farming stuff. Matthew and I have never farmed, raised animals or done anything "farm-life" before. This summer we will have tons to share with you with where the Lord has been leading us. So, be patient with our blog. We have lots to share once we are up and running. God bless you all!

New Pictures

Here are some pictures from the past few weeks. Unfortunately, I lost some of our best newborn pictures of Matthew about a week ago in transferring some of our pictures to our computer upstairs. We will be buying an external hard drive next month so we can safely store our pictures and have more room on our old computer here. These are taken with our new camera.


Little Matthew resting on mommy.




Hannah on the rocking horse.

Elisabeth is being potty trained right now. She's just shy of 2 1/2 years old. We're starting a bit later than we wanted to as I was pregnant and not up to the task! It's been very cold out so we have her in front of the fireplace with her bare bottom!


I love this picture of Matthew with daddy! Doesn't he have the cutest little face?






Here the girls are playing outside with me in the snow the other day. It was really windy and cold! But, it was sure fun!



Playing with daddy in the snow!



Here we are playing "Rrrrrrah". I chase them around and go, rrrrrah! This is one of the places they hide from me.


Me and my 3 little ones. I still can't believe there's 3 of them here already!


This picture looks a little bit like one of the pictures I lost. He's such a sweetie!


We love this precious picture of Elisabeth and little Matthew. He sure does look like a boy in this picture. I think sometimes he looks like a little softie and other times his strong features come out. This is one of them.


This is Matthew's favorite picture of us. He shared that is really shows my motherhood here. I was just feeling so happy to have him here in this picture. He did capture it well. I've always wanted a little boy and God gave me such a beautiful son. He has a soft, beautiful spirit about him and has the cutest little face a mother would ever want.

0 - 2 Weeks

Here are some pictures of little Matthew during his first two weeks of life. We will have our new camera in a few days or so (ours is ancient), so we will be taking lots more pictures!

Little Matthew is a wonderful little boy. We love him so much already. He is our easiest baby yet! He has the softest personality... his cry is very soft and non-demanding. He is very content and easily satisfied/consoled. And he sleeps from 10:30-5:00 already! One of the benefits of having a baby 2 weeks late.

Our Son is Here

Warning... this is a long post. It's more for us as a keepsake as we don't want to forget all the beautiful details. Thanks for your patience.



Praise be to our Lord. Little Matthew wasn't born by c-section as scheduled for Monday. He was born on Friday evening at 7:02pm naturally. He was 9lbs, 10oz.

As I shared on my last post to pray for my husband. Last Sunday as he was vacuuming and praising our Lord, the Lord called him into a fast until our baby would be born vaginally. I am grateful that when he fasts that he fasts on juice or I would have been REALLY worried for him. Anyways, the days kept passing through the week and each day we would wake up with me still pregnant. Matthew was praying for me and I was praying for him. My heart went out to him so much. He kept a cheerful and hopeful disposition about him. I love him so much. Only one day did he wake up feeling down and discouraged.

On Friday morning I woke to go to an appointment at labor and delivery to have a blood draw for my c-section for Monday. I had a few contractions on the way in but didn't think anything of it as I had been having them for 3+ months. When I arrived they prepped me up for an exam. I thought that was odd but figured it might be part of their procedure so I didn't question it. The nurse and I chatted away and after a while she found that I was there for a blood draw, not a check for progress on contractions. She shared that she may as well check me and she would try to examine me a little more aggressively to maybe stir things up and "get things going". Well, sure enough I started having some regularly timed contractions and they were slightly uncomfortable. I wanted to get out of there as soon as possible to get some walking in to keep them going.

I called my husband and shared what was going on and that I felt I needed to take this opportunity to do some walking. He could tell that this was serious and was happy about it. I walked up hills and down hills around the hospital. I then needed a break so decided to drive to the store to pick up some juice for Matthew before heading home. The contractions continued in the store and when I went out to the car I felt I should walk some more before heading home. Matthew and I talked excitedly during that half hour or so walk. The contractions picked up so we decided it would be best to not come home just yet.

I then drove to the library as I had to use the restroom every 15 minutes or so (big baby pressing against my bladder during contractions makes things tough). I walked down to Jack in the Box to get some lunch but their computers were down. I then walked to Safeway on the other side of town to get a sandwich before returning to the car. The contractions kept coming and when I got to the store they were increasing a little more in intensity and were about 3 minutes apart. I was so excited, I was beaming in the store. At the checkout a lady ahead of me asked if I was having twins. I shared that I wasn't but that I was in early labor and was going to be heading back to the hospital. She was excited for me.

I called Matthew again and shared that I was going to go to the hospital to get checked and I would then call him. Sure enough when I was checked there had been some progress. That morning I had been 50% effaced and now I was 90% effaced. She shared that labor was not going to stop. I was still concerned that things might slow down and stop for me. I called Matthew again and he called our friend Lynn (who has 9 older kids) to come over to watch the girls. He had to drive over in his truck as I had the car.

While I waited, I walked up and down the halls for 20 minute intervals and would then have to be hooked back up for monitoring of me and baby for 20 minutes. By the time my husband arrived sometime after 3:00, the contractions were starting to hurt. I was having to concentrate on breathing and getting through them. He walked in while I was having a contraction and knew this was the real thing. He was so excited.

By 5:00 my contractions were becoming unbearable and were about 2 minutes apart. I was 6 or 7 cm dilated. I decided to have an epidural but knew from past births that they don't always take for some reason. The anesthesiologist gave it two tries but it still didn't take so I was on my own with no pain relief. I was then scared as to how I was going to get through this. I had fear of pushing out a 9 - 10 lb baby!

Around 6:45, doctor Kilgore checked me and I was 9 1/2 cm. He told me to push lightly during the next contraction and I went to 10 cm. They got me all ready to push and I asked my husband to say a prayer. He prayed that our son would leave the world he was in (my womb), to enter this world and that he would one day leave this world into the next world, the Kingdom of God.

Pushing was scary. It hurt not having an epidural and it was the last thing I wanted to do. I pushed with each contraction and the doctor encouraged me by sharing that the head was coming down. When he was coming close I couldn't believe he was going to fit out of me. It just felt impossible. He felt so big. I really didn't want to try but also wanted him out of me. They told me that his head would be out on the next push and they were right. They suctioned his mouth and nose before pulling him the rest of the way out. Then he shared his shoulder was coming out and then the next one. I was so glad because I was concerned that this would be where he'd be stuck. Then he was out of my body and I could see he was a healthy, big looking baby. I saw and touched him before they took him to the cart to care for him. I was so excited and started sharing how I was so glad to have a newborn again and how fun it was going to be. I realized how much I missed having a little baby again. They are so, so sweet!

And how/who is little Matthew? He reminds me of Elisabeth when she was a baby. He sleeps wonderfully... he sleeps many hours straight and doesn't stir much at all. His little cry is the sweetest little baby cry I've heard. It's very soft and not demanding. His cry sounds like a boy, it sounds different. He is a champ at eating. He doesn't startle easy and just seems so content. He also had Elisabeth's beauty. I can't capture it so much with a picture but he has beautiful facial features. His hair is almost charcoal black and there's so much hair! My husband has a lot of black hair on his side of the family. His is actually the lightest of them all. I think once little Matthew has a good bath it will go down a shade. Little Matthew has a wirey, long hair sticking out of his eyebrow just like his father and his eyebrows are identical to his fathers. His eyes are big like mine and Elisabeth's. I can't wait to see how beautiful he's going to be over the upcoming years. I love him so much already. He's such a blessing to me.