Little Sadie Girl, you are as beautiful as a pearl....

Sadie turned three today. Three years has gone so quickly! My sweet, complacent, slow-to-move and quick-to-talk baby has morphed into this amazing, wonderful little girl!
Sadie has always been incredibly verbal. She has spoken so plainly and understood things so well for so long that we have sometimes been tempted to forget that she is still so small. She is bright and has a quirky sense of humor - she knows when she is funny and oh, how she laughs! She is a typical peacemaking middle child in that she is almost always generous to a fault. She will gladly give away anything - including all of her new birthday presents. :) She is such a helper. She jumps up to help even before the request is all the way out of my mouth, and she takes smiling pride in a job well done. She is full of questions and attentive to every conversation around her. She is musical and loves to dance. She is always singing through life - little sweet diddies she makes up about whatever is happening. She is not very artistic otherwise - she doesn't draw very well, although she enjoys painting and "projects." Like her big sister, she compares life to stories constantly - remembering lines and scenes from books and seeing how they relate to what is happening in her own life. She is slow and whimsical and dreamy and likes to "stop and smell the roses." And she smells them with a very keen little nose, I might add. She has an uncanny sense of smell. :) She is complimentary and quick to offer thanks for any act of kindness. She does have a tendency to scream and cry when big sister sins against her - not often retaliating, just crying for mommy to rescue her. We are working on that! She also has a penchant toward general fearfulness - of cats and dogs and cars, in particular. Also working on that. :)

She got to have a party with 10 other little girls on Thursday morning. We had handmade paper dolls with fabric dresses to decorate, and everyone got to mix their own loaf of cranberry bread to take home. The girls had so much fun baking! Then, a princess tea and yummy pumpkin cupcakes. Sadie loved being sung to by her friends.

Today, traditional cinnamon rolls and a birthday crown for breakfast - and presents to open from family. Church, and then homemade pizza and ice cream with G and G Wachob. They gave her cross-country skis, and Nana gave her a new snow coat and pants, so we tested out those gifts in the yard. Not much snow, but the girls had a blast skiing anyway! Sadie was a natural. We are so excited for family ski days again this winter. :)

We love our little munchkin to pieces. Happy Birthday, Sadie Pearl!

Pretty ready for nap by the time we finished skiing - and getting very silly. :)



And even sillier!

Pretty little girls - this one is for G.G. and Deb, to see Sadie in her new clothes.



Getting lots of help from sister to open presents.

Waiting for friends to arrive at the party


Baking princesses

Snow Week

Ahhh... the first snow of the year! Welcome winter! :)

Grace

The Greek word usually translated "grace" is charis. A year or so ago, I came upon the following definition in a Bible study I was doing at the time.That which affords grace, joy, pleasure, delight, kindness, sweetness, charm and loveliness. And - The merciful kindness of God, by which He exerts His holy influence on our souls, keeps, strengthens and increases us in faith, knowledge, affection, and kindles us to the exercise of the Christian virtues. I loved that definition. In fact, I loved it so much I wanted to name Raina, Charis Abigail. Erik vetoed it. :)

During the last few years, as I have faced my own sinfulness as a mother, and sought the Lord's mercy and His wisdom to grow and change, I have read a lot of books, and sifted through a lot of philosophies and streams of parenting thought. And it is this word - Charis - that has become my own simplified parenting mission.

My little girls - as sweet and funny as they are - are sinners. They need God's grace! They can't obey God's law. So, they need a Savior. They hear that message from my lips dozens of times each day. ( "Elisa, can you obey Mommy perfectly on your own?" "No, Mommy." "Can Mommy obey Jesus perfectly on her own?" "No." "You're right. Both of us are sinners. But who obeyed perfectly?" "Jesus!" )And Jesus - in His beautiful, matchless, overwhelming kindness - died on the cross in the stead of lost sinners like my little girls and me. That's the first part of grace. Jesus, taking on our sins, and restoring our relationship to the Father by his sacrificial death. Jesus - loving us in our sinful state and reaching out to us in love - before we loved Him. Offering a free gift of salvation to those who believe.

The second part of grace is the engracing of the Holy Spirit in the lives and hearts of believers. God's grace is at work in the hearts of Christians - enabling us to walk in His ways - to turn from sin - to do the work He has given us. So my girls hear that message, too. Elisa has professed a belief in Christ. She asked Jesus to come into her heart - unprompted - a few months ago. And, while we don't necessarily assume her salvation - we do talk to her in such a way that we validate her choice. So - when she sins (which is often, believe me!:)), the line of questioning continues. "You can't obey on your own. But who can help you obey?" "Jesus." "Let's ask him to help you obey Mommy better (or act more kindly, or consider your sister above yourself, or have gentle hands or whatever)." And we pray.

I'm not explaining this well - but basically our philosophy of discipline and training boils down to teaching our girls those two aspects of grace. The glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ's shed blood for lost sinners. And the power of Christ to change our hearts and help us walk rightly. On a moment by moment basis, my discipline doesn't always look like that - although I try. Sometimes, I rush up to fighting children, grab the toy or book they are squabbling over and say in exasperation "If you are going to fight, no one gets it!" And then whirl around with the book over my head. :)

I hope that gentle, consistent discipling of our girls will lead to a decreased need for consequences and correction - but absolutely that need still exists. In our house, the consequence aspect of discipline mostly involves logical behavioral consequences. I don't believe the Bible teaches that all acts of disobedience must be corrected with physical discipline, and we choose to only use spanking when our kids willfully defy other correction. For instance, if I take away the toy as a consequence and Sadie throws a fit, kicks me, and screams. (Thankfully, that doesn't happen too often.) I'm not saying that's the right way to discipline, but it's the way we have prayerfully chosen.

I love my kids. They bring me so much joy. And I am so thankful to the Lord for them - and for how He uses parenting to teach me about His character and His grace. It's amazing. I have so far to go, and I fail so often. But I also love sharing what God is teaching us, so please don't take my words as any indication that I think we have it figured out. We definitely don't.

Here are a few of my personal favorite parenting books:

Shepherding A Child's Heart - Tedd Tripp
Heartfelt Discipline - Clay Clarkson
The Mission of Motherhood - Sally Clarkson (and its sequel The Ministry of Motherhood)
Don't make me Count to Three - Ginger Plowman
Everyday Talk - John Younts (still reading this one. It is awesome!)
Sacred Parenting - Gary Thomas

Enjoying the journey of being a mother - and hoping you are too! (well, if you are a mother, that is!:)

September with our Cousins

Amy and Forrest came to spend two weeks here in Jackson - arriving September 17 and departing October 1. What a blessing to have them here! Forrest and Erik spent one week hunting on horseback (actually, they used horses to pack in, and then walked to actually hunt), while Amy and I explored Jackson with our five little munchkins. We had so much fun during our weeks together! Here are oodles of photos to tell the stories! :)

Day One - Saturday. A hike to Jenny Lake - our third this summer.



Last huckleberries of the season

Fingerpainting at home.


Hike with Jenn Green and kiddos Sunday afternoon.

Kids running ahead

Our five sweet kiddos, dressed in coordinating outfits from Michelle

Big girl Elisa

Is she eating him or kissing him? :)

Raina's first solid foods - at 6 1/2 months. Earlier than I've started with my other girls, and she loves it! This bite was carrots. Now she has sampled squash, green beans, peas, zucchini, prunes, and pears.

At the park - Tuesday

Sweet baby girls

Sadie Pearl

Library Story Hour with friends

The Sub Shop - local favorite

Jackson Lake Lodge - Wednesday

Moose Visitor's Center

Moving pictures on the floor

Thursday - Birthday tea. 22 kids in the backyard!

Princess Selah Ruth

Little Raina-bean

the grown-ups table

Preschool outing to the Rockefellar Preserve on Friday! Beautiful.

Sadie - ambling along

Ephraim with his explorer backpack. They were filled with colored pencils, journals, magnifying glasses, etc.

Reading stories after our picnic lunch





The next week - at Targhee Resort in Idaho

Wednesday of Week 2 - String Lake hike with Amy and Forrest

Brr!

At the creek by Grandma's house

The Arnold family

Ephraim in the Land Cruiser.

We loved having you here!

Last Hurrah

Summer is fading here in Jackson. Today we walked outside wearing fleece and wishing we had mittens. I know there will be more warm days, but fall is definitely on its way. I thought I would post a few photos of one of our last summer hurrahs. I have been trying to fit in adventures and fun while summer lasts. We have enjoyed trips to the fountain park at Teton Village (the ski resort), where they also have an outdoor story hour at 5 PM on Tuesdays. I never remembered my camera, unfortunately. So fun. We've been loving our bike. We love the park and our backyard and our friends' backyards. :) It has been such a wonderful summer.

On Friday, we met my friend Jenn, her two daughters and her brave mom up in the national park. We rode our bikes along the bike path to Jenny Lake, where we hopped on the locals-free ferry across the lake. Then we hiked with all five girls about a mile to Hidden Falls - a very popular tourist trail. We picnicked, picked loads of yummy huckleberries and then took the boat back across. Sadie and Zoe conked out in the Chariots on the bike ride back to our cars. Then - to cap it off, we got ice cream on the way home! It was an epic, all-day, amazingly fun adventure. I was tired.

And- my hubby wanted to camp that night. So, when we arrived home, I threw together camp food, clothes, and a quick dinner, and Erik loaded the car with our gear. We ended up only camping for about 13 hours, as evening and morning were punctuated with lots of thunder and lighting and bursts of rain. Still - we managed another trip, and my ever optimistic husband was blessed! :)



Trinity and my girls - looking at the waterfall after their long, brave hike to the top.

Our whole crew. Can you tell both my girls have band-aids? We took a few tumbles on the rocky path.

Elisa searching for huckleberries. Yum! They were so good. Sorry, bears, if we ate your stash.

This isn't from that day, but I thought I'd stick another photo of the bike set-up with me hauling. Elisa does such a great job.