A Sweet and Special 16th Birthday!

Yesterday was Christianna's 16th birthday!

It's rather hard to believe that our blonde haired, chubby cheeked, big imagination "Punkers" is now a lovely young lady, growing in grace and love for her Savior and is now 16! Oh well, I guess we better start facing the fact that we all are getting older. =)

Through the years most of us have found a great delight in a certain musical instrument and really wanted to learn to play it (though most of the time the $ tag has hindered our dreams) and over the past few years Christianna's eyes and ears have been tuned to the beautiful Harp. Saving her pennies for months and with a little help from family and friends she has finally obtained her dream and received her very own harp for her birthday!

Happy Birthday Christianna Hope!

The Minstrel lap harp!

It is good to give thanks to the LORD, and to sing praises to Your name, O Most High;

To declare Your loving kindness in the morning, and Your faithfulness every night, on an instrument of ten strings, on the lute, and on the harp, with harmonious sound. Psalm 92:1-3

Welcome, Spring!!!

Today is the "first" day of Spring!


When we saw this handsome man the other day, it was a sign of hope for our winter worn eyes!


For the past couple of days we have had a Sand Hill Crane visit our back acre every morning. Well actually it wasn't till last night when we saw him fly low over head and land out back that we found he was spending the night. We are not sure why the elegant bird has chosen our water land for it's campground, but we don't really mind and so this morning I tried to sneak out there to get a closer picture of him.

He got a little nervous with Baby being out there with me and since there was our huge open yard between me and this feathery friend, he flew off before I could get close enough.

Ok so this pictures isn't the best but I was shooting in Manual and when he flew off I did not have time to reset my shutter speed, thus the interesting image (with a little digital playing)! =)

The late morning got a little cloudy but in the afternoon the Sun was shining so nicely and the outdoors looked so inviting, I grabbed my camera and new lenses and headed out again!

Growing, growing, growing!! Signs of hope and teasers to the glorious floral display to come! Hyacinths, tulips and crocuses!

Ha! Here is the last(oh, how I wish! But I know that it is all to unfortunately possible that we will get some more) of our snow piles!

Budding, blooming, growing...God's glory is Springing forth around us and we are filled with wonder and awe and praise to our Creator!

It is a fool who can't see the Hand that created and designed all of nature and mankind!

~Grace

Grace's Birthday

Our "Amazing Grace" completed another year in her journey of life on March 8th when she turned 22. Throughout the years she has blessed our family in many ways, as we have watched God's grace being poured out on her, at numerous times.

Grace recived this adorable hand made music bag from Faith to help carry her guitar books...

...along with this beautiful purple guitar case for her classical guitar!

Some of Graces other presents.

We pray that Grace may enjoy many more years and continue to grow in God's grace.

Gardening in Winter

The other day found Faith, Christianna and I over in Port Huron learning from and helping our Great Aunt Myrt with gardening stuff. After learning how to start our spring gardening by preparing the seed containers, we went outside with Uncle Warren to harvest some carrots from the snow covered and hibernating garden.

After traipsing through the crusty snow we finally came to the designated spot and started our excavation! Below a frozen layer of snow and a deep layer of straw we finally found our gold and Faith pulled carrot after carrot out. We ended up digging up a huge amount, maybe a little to much, and before we covered up the hole and headed inside we collected some of the rich soil hidden below for the seed starting.


Big and crispy golden nuggets!

The harvesters.

Gleaning from Aunt Myrt's Garden treasury!


The crispiest and juiciest carrots ever, with a delicious flavor!

Now we can't wait to start our own seeds and look forward to spring planting!

~Grace

African Meal

At the end of our Unit study on Africa we decided to have an authentic meal to culminate our studies. After conferring with Mom and getting some recipes from Grandma (Grandpa and Grandma were missionaries to Niger for 40 years) we decided on a Menu. Josh and Josiah were set in charge of finding native clothes and I worked with Mom, filling the kitchen with exotic smells and the dining room with African decorations.


The dining room kind of looked like a clothes shop since Josiah insisted on hanging up all the African clothes that were too small for us.

African dolls from Niger, notice the baby on the back of the lady. When Josiah was a baby he got wrapped onto Mom's back when she dressed up, just like that.

Turban wrapping! We tried quite a few different styles as you will notice in the following pictures. Josiah couldn't seem to keep his on and Faith had fun wrapping it on his head over and over.

Aunt Jemima style! Faith insisted on tying it up on top of her head which made her look more like an African\ American cook than a native lady.

I tried my kerchief tied behind my head and was told, that with my braids I looked like a Gypsy.

Ah! Now there is an Authentic African Woman.

Whoa scary!!!

Dinner existed of Tuo a thick millet porridge, Mia a spicy meat gravy which was poured over the Tuo, and Kosai (Blacked eyed pea fritters).

Kosai

Tuo da Mia

Having fun!

The African family. (John had been working and was too tired to get dressed)

~Christianna