Our Resident Snaggletooth

Jacob lost his first top tooth last week! :)

Briarwood Ranch

So, today we went on the most memorable field trip... EVER. This will be one the kids will never forget! Candace and I are studying African animals and took the kids to Briarwood Ranch Safari Park. It is home to 55 species of animals from 6 different continents, but not your normal "zoo." Oh no.

They have two options for animal viewing, well, in addition to the safe and controlled petting zoo.

You can ride on a tractor-pulled wagon and experience this:

(I must say, I was quite proud of Granny!)

Or you can drive your own car and have an experience more like this:


It is not a trip for the faint of heart, though we got much more brave as the day went on. By the end, we were posing for pics with the llamas!

Here's some of what we saw. I am not zooming in on these pictures. I have my lens as wide as it will go! I tried to leave some of the car parts in the pictures for perspective.

This was one day I wish my pictures included audio. We were quite a noisy bunch for a the first part of the trip! It really was hilarious, but you had to be there, I guess.


These horns are amazing. He's some sort of sheep from the African coast.


God made this guy with a built in football helmet.


The first African animal we saw!


Hello!


We quickly gained a following. (We had food buckets the first time around.)


Our second trip around we followed the wagon even though our food was gone. (The scene reminds me of Noah's ark.) It was actually much more realaxing to not have food. It's pretty stressful when wild animals are fighting at your door for the goods you have in your hand!




The llamas were my favorite. They were very friendly and let us pet them a lot!


Mattie loved them too!


Look at my brave girl! (If only we could make this progress with the Chick-Fil-A cow!)


I think the guy with the shears thought this one was a poodle.


Nothin' like inviting yourself in for a bite to eat!


Hannah and Emily enjoying the petting zoo.






The emus were my other favorites. They'd just come pokin their heads around to check things out!


Candace was not so convinced about the nosey ostriches.
(Here are some more pics on Candace's blog.)


Not an animal I ever thought I'd have within arm's reach.


Just so feel like you were there, that's not rain on the window... it's elk slobber.


This is Sampson, a watusi bull from Africa. I like him 30 or 40 feet away. Those horns are 3 feet from tip to tip.


Ummm, yeah. Here he is right next to the car.


So their horns are cool looking...


This is what they do to the side of one's car.

I had these scratches all up and down both sides of my van. Thankfully my helpful neighbor knew what to do and pointed me in the right direction. The scratches aren't totally gone, but 3 hours of polishing compound and turtle wax later, they're probably not noticeable to the average bear. (Praise the Lord!) And I have no intention of going into auto detailing anytime soon. Lesson learned: take the wagon ride! (Or let your friend drive!)


It needed a good vacuum too... animal feed is not the scent of choice for my automobile!


Don't you wish this was you?

Some more favorites from Luke 14

Here are some more of my favorite pictures from the Luke 14 event we had in April. I uploaded these in May and forgot to finish the post!
 
Amelia checking out the animals.

 


Just hangin' on the grass having ice cream.

Tyler feeding the calf.

 
Makin' friends with our guests.

 
Some hokey pokeying.

A younger, courageous volunteer.


 
A courageous guest!

 

How can you not grin at that?

One of the best things I could have lost

In the chaos of the move, I lost the index card that had Mattie's (wheat-free) sandwich bread recipe on it. That first week I was frustrated as I needed to make her bread, but couldn't find it anywhere! I finally got desperate and tried to replicate it as best I could. I knew the ingredients, but wasn't sure about the ratios. So I based it on my wheat bread recipe. Well, I'm so glad I lost that old card! I've made bread three or four times since we moved in here and it's getting better each time! Today's batch was the best it's ever been.

Here's my recipe...

4c brown rice flour
1/2 c potato starch flour
1/2 c tapioca starch
1/2 c ground flax
1t salt
2T xanthan gum
3 packages yeast

2 1/2 c warm water
3 eggs
4T honey
4T oil
1T apple cider vinegar

I whisked the dry ingredients together, then added them to the liquids. I stirred it up by hand until it was well mixed, put 3 loaves in the warmed oven (turned off) with a few spritzes of water to let it rise. Waited till it almost doubled, then cooked for 25 min at 300 in my convection oven (cook at 325 if not convection).

It is so good! The texture is the most like wheat bread I've ever had. It's always exciting to have success in a food allergy kitchen!!

Trust vs. Apathy

A bit of background...

We're had several months of stress around here...
January, February-painting 3000sq feet of the interior of our old house;
February, March, April-extended family upheaval, the likes of which I've never experienced before and I sure hope to never experience again;
March- deciding whether or not to continue with any infertility options that might be available to us or if we think we're just done;
March, April- negotiating a contract on our house (for 4 weeks!), including settling on a house we didn't get to choose, but one that will suffice and free up a buyer for our much too large house;
April, May- packing and moving;
May, June- getting settled in to our new home, only to find many things unclean and in disrepair (we left our house in excellent condition) creating a pretty good sized to do list.

And through all of this time, Robert has been fighting some sort of illness that seems to come and go. We haven't a clue what it is, but it is coming more than going lately and getting more severe. He is far from living up to par and feeling well.

So in the past month or so, I've been feeling like I can't keep my head above water, my emotional head. Typically, it's not like me to cry more than a few times a year. I love to chat on the phone, go to play dates and other social get-togethers. I love to be with the special needs children in my Sunday School class. But lately I cry almost every day if not several times, don't feel like answering the phone or getting together with people and it's usually a few days before I feel like calling people back. It's so not me! I've been sad a lot, and many times for good reason. But I can't keep going on this way.

I've been wondering if I may need an antidepressant for a time... to be not so sad, to be disappointed but not cry about it, to talk on the phone without acting like I'm fine, to be able to be strong for our family, to be genuinely cheerful with my children. I've been more than hesitant to make an appointment with my doctor because I am pretty sure he'd give me a prescription if I asked for it. And I want to be sure there's not something else I should do first.

Two nights ago I asked God to show Himself to me. I needed Him to show Himself to me, I realized and confessed that I hadn't been seeking Him like I should, and that it was my fault I wasn't seeing Him. And I've been seeing a WALL of my hurts, needs and challenges in front of me instead of His grace, love, hope, mercy, and JOY!

It occurred to me yesterday that in all of our busyness and stress, I haven't made the time to seek the Lord. I'm not repeating His word to myself through the day, I haven't had worship music on in my house for 2 months because we have no stereo now, I have no routine to spend time with him because in this house, my kids are playing outside with neighbors where I need to watch them, so I have less time. I've been exhausted, so I'm going to sleep and not getting up early. I've been through other times where I haven't had time with the Lord consistently, but the challenges haven't been the same.

We're doing VBS this week and many of our song motions are based on sign language signs. The sign for "trust" is two hands stacked on each other as if gripping a rope tightly. And God showed me that's not what I have been doing. Today as we were singing our VBS songs and clinging to an imaginary rope, I realized I haven't been clinging at all. I've been apathetic and let the rope fall out of my reach. By definition, trust implies instinctive unquestioning belief in and reliance upon something. And that belief and reliance comes through seeking Him. So for today, I have found the rope and gripped it again. Praise God He left it right within my reach.

The LORD is my strength and my shield;
My heart trusts in Him, and I am helped;
Therefore my heart exults,
And with my song I shall thank Him.
Psalm 28:7

When I am afraid, I will put my trust in You.
Psalm 56:3

O LORD of hosts, How blessed is the man who trusts in You!
Psalm 84:12

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P.S. None of this is to say that I don't really have a chemical imbalance. Or that you don't have a chemical imbalance if you've needed medicine in the past or now. :) I think I have a lot of chemicals out of balance! I just felt a nudging to be sure I was being accountable to my relationship with my source of Life first. When I'm in the Word consistently and filling my mind with things of Him, if I'm still drowning, I'll ask for help. And now that I've put this out in the open, I'd imagine a few of you might check on me too.