Parenting with less Stress {Instructions from God's word}

 I think the biggest thing for me in being able to enjoy parenting and not be stressed about it is knowing that God knows all about my kids. He made them, He loves them and He knows the best way for me to care for them and raise them up. James 1:5 says: "But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him." I have certainly asked for wisdom a lot and I am positive I will be continually needing to ask for more wisdom!

  Since I have complete faith that God knows best for me, my family and my children, the obvious answer to getting advice on raising kids is to go to God's word. There is quite a bit to say on that subject and I thought I would simply share some of those verse with you today. I think a lot of times when we feel stressed it is because we are struggling with handling some problem on our own (I know that happens with me!), so when we are willing to just tell God, "I believe you know best and I will do my best to follow Your word" a ton of the pressure is off of us, I don't have the stress of figuring out what to do, I can just do what God says.

  Obviously God doesn't cover every single little issue in the bible, and we do still have to make some decisions, but the big, basic issues are there and we can use all of that as a guideline and that helps ever so much! And of course we need to always pray!

So here are some of the verses that God has given us in His word:

Ephesians 6:1-4
6:1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), 3 “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.” 4 Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Colossians 3:20 and 21
"Children, be obedient to your parents in all things, for this is well-pleasing to the Lord. Fathers, do not exasperate your children, that they may not lose heart."

(I think that we mother's do well to pay attention to the two sections above addressed to Fathers as well)

Proverbs 22:6
"Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it."

Deuteronomy 6:5-9
5 Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write them on the door frames of your houses and on your gates.

Titus 2:4 & 5
"...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, that the word of God may not be dishonored."

Proverbs 13:24
"He who spares his rod hates his son, but he who loves him disciplines him diligently."

Proverbs 19:18
"Discipline your son while there is hope, and do not desire his death."

Hebrews 12:9 & 11
"Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For the disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, that we may share His holiness. All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness."

Those are a few of the verses that I have found helpful as we raise our children. Having guidelines that I can trust (rather than just a book written by man that may or may not have the right ideas) certainly works for me and makes parenting far less stressful!

A patriotic table runner

 Well I am finally back to posting projects (I have had quite a few I have wanted to post but these last couple weeks have been busy so I haven't had time to post) but I am taking a little break from the wool skirt project because I wanted to share this patriotic project before Independence day.

   I made this table runner back in May to sell at the silent auction for our republican fundraiser. Part of me was hoping it didn't sell because I rather would have liked it for my table. It did sell though -which was the point- so I have been hoping to make another one for me but haven't had time yet. I have the stuff I need which was leftover from making a booth backdrop.

To make the runner I cut a piece of red felt long enough to drape over the ends of my table and about 18 inches wide. I cut the ends to a point. The I cut a way blue piece to go in the middle and wavy white stripes from white felt to place on it too. Then I cut out stars from all three colors in three different sizes and just put them on randomly. Some of them I stacked because I thought it looked neat.

 I then pinned everything in place and top stitched everything on. I also top stitched all around the sides. That took a while and I think you could make this a lot faster by hot gluing things in place but I think the stitching is more durable and looks a bit better.

So if you are looking for a way to make your home look patriotic maybe you would like to try this table runner. I thought it was a lot of fun!
 

Feeling very blessed and thankful

   "He who offers a sacrifice of thanksgiving honors Me; And to him who orders his way aright I shall show the salvation of God."
Psalm 50:23

  Last week was a very unusual week for us with Mara off to Iowa at camp and the boys attending day camp up here. It was a week of a lot of running around and also one which I got to spend more individual time with Megan. Then this past weekend Ken and Jonathan went down to the cities to pick Mara up and go to an amusement park while the younger two and I made and delivered wedding flowers and had a good time going to garage sales.  It was a fun week but I am very glad to have things back to normal again with everybody home and on a more regular schedule. I am feeling very thankful for my family and God's care for all of us.

Here are so more specifics on what I am feeling thankful for today:

#636 My little sunshine (not what is pictured above but rather Megan who wanted to take that picture). It was so fun running errands with her this week. One thing that was different about taking just one child with me is that people paid more attention to her. She was rather spoiled about everywhere we went. The big sunshine was a gift from the vacuum store lady and she got other gifts from other places as well.

#637 A letter from Mara. I love it that she took the time to write it while she was busy at camp.

#638 Having company over for lunch.

#639 Sunshine again! I appreciated all the rain but I certainly am enjoying the sunshine too!

#640 The 3 "M's", Margaret, Malia and Mara and all the fun they can have together.

#641 Mara getting to go see my Grandma along with my sister Anna and crew on their way to camp.

#642 Getting to see pictures that Mara took at camp, complete with some of the same teachers that I had when I went to camp. And actually I think it is possible that Bill Paine taught my Dad when he went to camp there. I loved hearing her tell about the people, the food, the activities and the place and remember all the fun I had there when I was a kid.

#643 All the beautiful shades of purple that God made!

#643 A little Aaron boy who asks me if it is okay if he vacuums the living room and clears the table while I am busy doing flowers.

#644 A sweet Megan that volunteered to wash the dishes while I was busy. (I did do a bit of check up on them later but she actually did a pretty good job.)

#645 Fun times with sparklers that Auntie Keren had.

#646 My hardworking husband! (Who can massage my neck and shoulders so nicely!)

#647 Getting Mara and Jonathan's test results back and they look pretty good.

#648 Sweet fellowship at church.

#649 Finding nice free printable 18 inch doll clothes patterns (now Mara is off to sewing)

#650 Radishes!

#651 A new vacuum cleaner and a fixed one and being able to have clean carpets again.

#652 Not running out of gas even though I absent mindedly got very close.

#653 God watching out for me through all my absent mindedness like running a stop sign and leaving our home unlocked all night.

#654 The good exercise I was able to get while mowing the lawn.

#655 Times to work hard and times to just rest.

#656 God giving us safety through all the activities of last week.

#657 God's continually love.

What are you thanking God for this week?

John 14:5

"If you love Me, you will keep My commandments."

John 14:15

I was struck by the simplicity and clarity of this verse today. Short and sweet and to the point. We aren't left guessing as to what it means. So now I just want to make sure that I am showing my love for God by obeying Him. Are you showing Him your love?

35 ways to reuse tin cans

Any of you who read my blog often know that I love to reuse things. Today I thought it would be fun to share a collection of things you can make using tin cans. Many we have made and many more we would like to make sometime. :-) I have tried to give links to photos and instructions if possible. If you know of some other neat use for old tin cans that I don't mention, please tell me about it in the comments!

1. 
   
   A bird house.
2. 
   
   Wind Chimes
3. 
   
   Play Armor
4. 
   
   Double boiler saucepan for making candles.
5. 
   
   Molds for candles (the smooth edged little cans.)
6. 
   
   A Tin Can train
7. 
   
   An organizer.
8. 
   
   Make a tin can knitter. (Something on my list of things I think it would be fun to do with my kids)
9. 
   
   Make Art
10. 
    
    Make Luminaries.Simply put water in the can and freeze it and then draw a design on a piece of paper and lay it on the can and use a hammer and nail and punch a design. You freeze the water in it so the can doesn't dent when you are hammering. Paint it if you desire. (here are some 4th of July ones)
11. 
    
    A perpetual calendar/pencil holder.
12. 
    
    Make a pin cushion. (Here is another cute example)
13. 
    
    Cans for the Newlyweds car.
14. 
    
    The base for a centerpiece
15. 
    
    Make a hobo stove for camping. (I have long planned to try this but never have.)
16. 
    
    Napkin Rings.
17. 
    
    Make Boston Brown Bread (you use tin cans for the "pan")
18. 
    
    Pretty cool night lights.
19. 
    
    Kids craft: Tin can lamb.
20. 
    
    Or let them make a Turkey.
21. 
    
    Make Fabric covered vases
22. 
    
    A kitchen utensil holder (Similar idea as the vases just much bigger!)
23. 
    
    Make tin can stilts!
24. 
    
    Tin Can dollhouse furniture. (and I can imagine some that are much simpler to make than where the link goes.)
25. 
    
    Tin can Elephant purse (super cute!)
26. 
    
    Punch holes in the end and then pour water in it to softly water your seedlings.
27. 
    
    Set melons (in your garden) up on a tin can to ripen with out rotting where they touch the ground.
28. 
    
    Tin can lid snowman.
29. 
    
    Tin can snowman.
30. 
    
    Tin can hanging planters.
31. 
    
    Tin can baskets.
32. 
    
    Tin can lid matching game. If you have the type of can opener that unseals rather than cuts (so there are no sharp edges!) you can put stickers on one side
33. 
    
    Tin can Dog Robot
34. 
    
    Tin can telephone.
35. 
    
    Art supplies organizer.

What else can you add to the list?

For more frugal ideas please visit Life as MOM

Parenting with Less Stress {Don't be afraid to say "No"}

After my post last week on not just saying "no" to your children promptly when they ask to do something I decided maybe I should write about the other side of the story as well. Something that has made parenting far less stressful for us is being able to firmly say "no" at times and stick with it.

   There are somethings that we have determined are not in the best interest of our children. Things like a lot of toys, candy, pop and other things that would be detrimental for their health or our ability to live simply and to stay out of debt. When we go shopping our children have learned that we will say "no" to any requests for toys or junk food. That is something that we haven't caved on (though once in a great while we will chose to buy something special and then our children get very excited!) and our kids don't even think to ask for things when we go shopping. Sometimes they will save money to buy things themselves or they will ask me if I think I can make it but they don't ask me to buy it for them.

   We have found life to be much less stressful when we aren't burdened down with tons of things (though we could still stand to get rid of stuff!) and shopping with children is certainly less stressful as we don't have to deal with children asking for things, whining or throwing tantrums. Consistently and firmly saying "no" when out shopping has worked very well for us.

I would love to hear you thoughts on this! What works for you in this area?