Buggy Full of Blessings!

Last week I was standing in the Target checkout line with my five children when the lady behind me said, “You sure do have your hands full.”  I simply smiled and replied, “And my heart too!”  This happens almost every time we leave the house and when you add my sister and her 4 kids to the mix the comments and stares multiply.  Comments like, “Are they all yours?" "Bless your heart!", "Look at the supermom!” etc. - can easily bring you down.   When the truth is, I am not a supermom. I am simply trying to do the best I can with the blessings God has given me.  

In Psalms 127: 3-5, it says,

Behold, children are a gift of the Lord,  The fruit of the womb is a reward.  Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, So are the children of one’s youth.  How blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them; They will not be ashamed when they speak with their enemies in the gate.

It is our hope that this blog will help us keep track and remember the many blessings we have in life. Not just the matching outfits and themed parties but the simple sometimes hidden blessings of everyday motherhood.  It is also an attempt to give us some accountability and inspiration as we meet others just like us. 

Things to know about us:

                  1. We have 9 kids between the two of us. An enthusiastic 9 year boy, two prissy 6 year old girls, two following-in-their-older-sisters footsteps 5 year old girls, an adventurous 3 year old boy, a mischievous two year old girl, a wide-eyed 18 month old girl, and our little miracle - sweet baby Jane Madelynn who is 8 months old. 

                  2.     We are Bible-believing born again sinners saved by God’s abounding grace.  We seek to bring glory to God in all we do and say. 

                 3.     We are ministry-minded. Our two main goals is to know God and to make Him known. Our primary mission field is our family so many of our posts will be about our families. 

                4.     We are NOT supermoms, nor are we the perfect housewives.  As much as we would love to be perfect, the fact remains we are far from it.  We get tired, frustrated, angry, and jealous – sometimes all at the same time.  We yell too much, discipline too little, and don’t enjoy cleaning or cooking.  We completely depend on Christ to make it through each day. 

              5.     We are NOT always original thinkers. We often borrow ideas and make them our own.   We like to think that we creative but we are happy depending on Pinterest for ideas too.

             6.     We love to sew, craft, travel and find any reason possible to throw a party! 

           7.     We are very different and with that open-minded. Jessica homeschools and Julia sends her kids to public school.  Several of our children were breastfeed for beyond a year while others were formula fed early on. Little Debbie's are a staple food at both houses but we did try a gluten free,  dairy free - spinach filled smoothie ONCE! 

          8.  We love to have fun and be together!  We actually enjoy dragging 9 kids to Target or Chick-fil-a.  We don’t mind the noise and chaos a large family brings.  We don’t have a blog to show off our abilities. We just want to remember these times as they go by so fast and encourage others that they too can enjoy this face paced crazy filled season of motherhood.

        

We are so excited to start this journey together into the blog world! It's something we have talked about for years but kept putting it off  until we had time. We finally came to the realization if we waited until then our kids would be 40! :) 

Our prayer is that through sharing our little bit of wisdom we have learned over the past few years (I stress the word little) and fun life stories, this blog will be a blessing to all who read! We pray you will see the blessings you have been given each and everyday! 

 So start counting your blessings and filling up your own buggy!