Alexis and Andrea's pics.

Alexis was the first to go out with dad. She is is "fishin buddy!" and recieved a beautiful pink pole from uncle Jim just for the ice fishing occasions. Had to try it out ya know

 Andrea had good success as well these are her fish!

Alexis is always at dad's side when fish are involved

Kayla's pics are not uploaded yet...will post those another time :)

Kendra's first month

Well it has been an interesting month to say the least. We have had little sleep, lots of screaming, sickness, and then there are the good days where life goes on like normal. Kendra has a few tummy issues still but over all we hope she is settling down and not going to be as irritable as I slowly figure out what foods are making her gassy. We do seem to be getting enough sleep now to have some projects get done. I have hung more curtains, gotten the kitchen painted, and am in the process of weeding through lots of clothing (mine!) I have finally felt good enough to start my excercising again so hopefully the scale won't tip too heavy at my six week appt.
Matthew has had a lot of fun taking the girls out fishing. They each have daddy time and so far each has come home with some sort of trophy. I will post pics of fish later because my batteries died in the camera and I have been to busy to plug in the charger.
Other than figuring out life with five kids we have had a successful start to the new year with our schooling. We started in our books a month after everyone due to my procrastination in ordering new materials...we are now only about two weeks behind due to some nice snowy cold days that the kids didn't wish to play outside on. My hope is to get us to where we should be so that I can end our school year on May 1st.

Other than that it is business as usual, cooking, cleaning, and doing gobs and gobs of laundry ;) LOL! 

Our birth story for Kendra

Kendra Jane Harry born 12-20-10 at 9:08am weighed in at 9lbs 9 ou and 21 inches long...

Sunday was a crazy morning because we had our childrens program for the morning service. So we got the kids all ready and went in to church where they did a great job on their program. I got the million questions about when I was going to have my baby and how much longer did I think I had and well you all know the well meaning questions that leave you all depressed and irritable... After leaving church we did a quick lunch and I put the kids to bed. Matthew went to work in Fennville shortly after he left I had my first noticably real contraction. I packed my bag, cleaned up a few things and played with the kids. I waited until midnight to tell Matthew that I was in labor and told him to expect a call sometime before his shift was supposed to end. He apparently tried to sleep but had several calls during the night leaving him exhausted. I semi slept through the contractions until about four in the morning when I couldn't ignore them anymore and decided to take a bath to decide when to call Matthew. I ended up calling him at 4:45am and He came home with his sister who graciously had gotten up to watch the kids. We made our way to the hospital very slowly because of a few slow pokes in front of us. I didn't really mind because I knew I had called him home with plenty of time but I was concerned that maybe I had asked him home too early. My fear of being embarrassed came to fruition when they checked me and I was only at a 3! I was mortified that I had called him home for a 3! He then proceeded to make fun of me (playfully ofcourse) as we walked the hallway. About an hour later they moved me to my room but still had not rechecked me despite promises to do so. I had a major increase in pain and the distance had closed between contractions to 2 1/2 minutes. The nurse put the iv in and put in ther blood work for my epi. I remember that I looked at Matthew and said " they are not going to make it. I feel like I did when I was at the end with Kayla" Matthew and I had already made our wager as to what time Kendra would be born so when fourty minutes later the iv was finished and the blood work back and they decided to finally check me to see which type of shot to give me I was already at 9.5cm and bulging.I figured as much since I was already violently shaking, and crying and carrying on like an infant myself...happened each time I went drug free. They gave me the option to try to get the shot by not pushing for as long as possible but after talking to Matthew for a few seconds we decided that it probably wouldn't take effect in time anyways and to just push. The doc broke my water and told me to push. Only minutes later she was out and I was embarrassed once again as I had made way too much noise, in my defense it hurt like crazy! She and I sat together for about an hour before I went to the tub and she got cleaned up. So that is about it for the birth. From 3-10 in two hours was a little too fast and yet Matthew stopped making fun of me for calling him home early. He was such a great support during labor and delivery and made sure that the kids were able to get to the hospital to see the new baby. The kids were all thrilled and seem to continue to be happy and in love with their new sister.
 

We are so happy that Kendra made it in time for Christmas. She made our celebration that much sweeter as our family was able to gather around her and moon over her. She is absolutely beautiful!

Count down to new baby!

Ok so I am 18 days away from my due date and I am very ready to be done with pregancy and finally meet this little girl! I just finished up a few more online purchases and have been pretty proud of how type A I have been in wrapping them as they show up to the house. I did run out of actual wrapping paper and started using the brown packing paper for the kids gifts. How sad is that! I was even tempted to use newspaper! Goes to show how desperate I am to make sure that everything is ready for the other kids since focus seems to be school and baby. I am hoping beyond hope that the little one arrives a few days earlier than expected so that we can all enjoy our holiday plans at home. Seems like the hospital would not be the most fun "field trip" on Christmas day for the children...anyways I am looking forward to posting pics of her and her stats for you all as soon as she is here and I am able to get a few minutes to use the laptop.

sigh...

So this is the second sunday in a row that we have had to miss church. We have so much illness here! Three of the kids have pink eye, Alexis and Z have double ear infections, Matthew has a lung infection, and I am just sick as a dog. Andrea is the only one not sick...yet. Pretty sure her turn will come but I am hoping that it is not on her birthday or over Thanksgiving day again! I would like to make it to the get togethers again someday.
In addition to the sickness Matthew's truck died this morning after he limped it all the way home from working in Fennville. SO, he is purchasing a truck today or tomorrow.

I know I am complaining like crazy and that is not becoming but seriously why does sickness and money issues always come up right around birthdays and holidays? Seems to happen every year. I am ready for a little bit of peace.

This is Kayla and her second day riding a two wheeler! She was soooo excited that she didn't stop riding for weeks. Now it is still one of her favorite things but she is sort of over the initial shock of being able to ride. Her source of inspiration...Dani the neighbor girl is only four and can ride a bike with out training wheels. Kayla then said it was embarrassing to have them and begged for them to be removed. Third time is the charm for her and this time when Matthew took them off they stayed off! :)

School and colds

Well, we had a rough week here. We all came down with colds and that ofcourse has been affecting our school and home life attitudes. The girls have been hard to deal with for school, and they have not been listening the greatest during the rest of the days either. We had a bunch of neighbor girl drama (oh the joy!!!) this week and so tonight is early bed time (they have no idea about that yet) and I think it should do us all good. I am weary and have atleast once this week threatened, seriously threatened, to enroll the kids in school. A sort of envy rolled over me the other day as I was driving past the elementary school and I got to thinking..."wow, the frustration that place might save me, and the things I could accomplish during my days if the older kids were not fighting me tooth and nail"....yup, so I think Matthew was relieved when they straightened out and I felt ok about it again. I know in reality I do not envy the other parents. They don't get to see the accomplishments in the same way I do. They don't get to see the initial look of triumph as their child reads their first word, or the grin after they ace a spelling test. They don't get to hear the giggles and see the smiles through the morning. They have cleaner houses, maybe , and they have more "me" time for sure, but I know in the end that all my frustration of the bad days are outweighed by the great joy of the good days. Guess I just get wound up when there are a few bad days in a row and no promise of an end to them in sight.
Speaking of school, my focus has been on finding some fun but age spanning curriculum. We are really loving life science through Ken Ham's site http://www.answersingenesis.org/ we have an older version the second edition and I have to say that I am pleased with that as well. I didn't need a teachers guide because the second edition is an all included edition. The girls and I have found so much to do with it to add the fun hands on stuff and are so excited to do that subject each day. We have chosen to do it everyday but not from the book. I was given a stack of "My Big BackYard" magazines and so we have been going through those on off days as well as reading other books I bought and watching documentaries. I want to buy the recommended dvds from the back of the textbook. Those would be very fun I think.
I am also thrilled with the switch to Horizons this year. It is through the alpha omega publications and I have been loving the format and the teachers instruction guides. I think that Bob Jones is an excellent curriculum but I think this definately fits us better. I have looked into the kindergarten program they have as well and ended up selling my BJU materials so that I can purchase the Horizons one later for Alexis, Z and baby girl. We are currently only doing phonic/reading, and Math through Horizons. I am doing spelling through BJU until the end of the year and handwriting is still the memory verses for Wed night kids connection and letter writing. I am doing history through reading the "If you..." series. We will be starting the second semester with the "If you sailed on the mayflower" book by Ann McGovern. If you are interested you can see sample pages on http://www.cbd.com/. Then we will move on to the colonial days, and the revolution, the constitution, and then I am not sure. I did ebay to get them so I will also have the book on George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Maybe an impromtu study of presidents? I also am intrigued, but will not buy it yet, with "The story of the world" history through reading. It is supposed to be able to age span as well. It is kind of between that one and one that I found through Christian Liberty Press called "our nation under God" it is a little more formal but I liked the concepts that it had presented (also visible on cbd site) They are cost effective as well :) Extras this year are gym and art class through our new Lighthouse Homeschool group, and piano. So far I think we are well rounded but am also thinking of a map class for the kids. I found workbooks that look fun and will help them with simple geography.

Ok enough about school though that seems to be my life these days, atleast until noon. We did get the curtains and rods and I got them up and am very pleased. Matthew installed the door in the lower hallway so that I could get the boxes out of the living areas. Now I just have to complete that task and come up with some organization of sorts for it. I think he will be installing a light in there as well as a header for under the landing area of the steps so that I can use that space as well. I bought paint for the second coat in the hallway although I have not gotten around to that project yet. Maybe this weekend. Being sick has made me lose a ton of motivation for working around here. Speaking of which the sofa is calling my name....