Emily is a Mantooth for the week....

We are having a great week here at the Mantooth house. Emily, a long time family friend, is staying with us. We are accomplishing all kinds of things from housework to school to just having tons of fun. My girls especially love having a live in playmate. Welcome, Emily!!! We love you!!!

I am a "messy"

I have joined in the challenge of a few other moms to get our houses in order. So, I will be posting before and after pics of my challenge areas. I happen to have many. The before pic will be posted with my deadline to accomplish the job. Then, I will post the after pic. Plus, I will continue to post pics of the completed areas to be accountable to keeping them clean. I am not crazy enough, though to publish these revealing pictures on this blog. I have created a new blog for this purpose. It is linked, along with a few others, to the side under "messies."

Homeschool Day at Sea World!

We just had a great time at Sea World. They did a really great job of providing many educational opportunities. We learned about dolphins and even fed them! We saw sea lions and seals REALLY close up! There were divers in the Shark/Coral Reef exhibits. On a stroke of luck, we got to sit in on a training session for a Beluga Whale with her baby in tow! My kids always love the penguins, so we went down the conveyor belt twice! Then, they did a special show with the Shamu family and then another at the Sea Lion Theatre. At each, we learned a lot about the animals as we got to see them in action. There were the killer whales, of course. Then, at the next show, we saw a walrus (HUGE!), an otter, and some seals! It was so interesting and fun. The only thing we missed was enjoying it with friends. We were the only ones from our homeschool group that were able to go. Oh well, maybe next time. It was a fun morning!!!!

My budding artist!

The girls have really gotten into drawing lately. (Even more than they always have been.) They LOVE to look at something and try to draw it. Here is something that Ashlynn (6yrs) just did during rest time.

Babies are a Blessing!!!!!!

For those of you who have read any of my other posts, you know my heart for children. I LOVE huge families with all their sweet children in tow. God says that it is a blessing to have a quiver full! Our culture tries to define "full". It plans when life should begin and even, in some cases, when it should end. A sweet friend of mine sent me a link discussing how birth control has altered our culture and changed our thinking on life. It is very interesting to read the cultural beliefs and responses. I challenge you to read it yourself. I hope that you allow your belief system to be challenged and I pray God speaks to you personally.

http://makinghome.blogspot.com/2008/09/some-subtle-effects-of-birth-control.html

Also,
I had to laugh out loud when reading some responses to questions asked of large families. A couple of my favorites were:

When being stared at...
"No, we don't try to overpopulate the earth, just outnumber the idiots!"

Don't you know what causes that?
"Yes, we do know what causes that and we like it very much, thank you!"

For more questions and responses visit:
www.plomp.com/largefam/comebacks.htm

Enjoy and allow yourself to be challenged!!!!

Kisses!

My sweet (and very challenging) two year old is making up for all the difficulties by showering me with kisses. I love this mood! He comes up, grabs my hand like a little gentleman, and kisses the back of my hand. He comes up and tells me a secret and then kisses my cheek. Sometimes, he plants a very hard, long kiss right on my lips! That always cracks me up. He always likes to name the parts of the face. When he is in this mood, he names them and kisses them. Cheek, mouth, nose, forehead, head, neck, ear, eye, chin, you get the picture.

Thank you, God for Kaiden's sweet kissy mood. Thank you for filling my love tank back up. I was very much on empty because of the constant behavior problems. You are so good to me!

In celebration of such amazing weather....

(from lft. to rt. :up close hippo!, on the lions at the entrance, on a kimono dragon statue, mama and baby nursing right at the glass!, a very mean looking hyena!)

....we took a spontaneous trip to the zoo! For several years, that has been a fun thing for us to do. Whenever we wake up and are surprised by a fresh new cold front after so many months of heat, we scrap all plans and head to the zoo!!! This was our first time to visit this zoo!