Just in case you didn't know, I am a mama of many talents. On a daily basis, I wrangle small children, break up fist fights, curtail temper tantrums, and often throw a temper tantrum of my own. However, when I get a few minutes of quiet and an empty lap, I like to knit! These are a couple of things I've finished this winter, with winter being a relative term as it is 78 degrees outside!

First up is a Hudson Hat. This a GREAT new pattern by my friend Lindsay at Ky Baby Knits. There is a really cool way for me to make her store's name into a hyperlink, however, my talents listed above do NOT include being computer saavy. Instead, you get a boring link. The pattern is designed to be knit with your leftover yarns. I just finished a grown up sized one. I'll post pictures of it later! Oh yeah, link to the Hudson Hat pattern! http://hyenacart.com/KyBabyKnits/







































Next up, a wool sweater! I know that we live in Alabama, but there are occasionally days where it is cold enough to wear wool, but only a very few days. This is knit in the "Snips and Snails" colorway of BFL yarn from my friend Marina at Stitches Under the Sun. She is closing up shop, so no link for her stuff. Pattern is by Ann Norling. If you want to find it, it is a top down raglan, #53.
























Now, a super cute photo! This is Samuel and his friend Charley, formerly known as Chase. Samuel is one day older than Charley, and they are true friends. I look forward to watching them grow up together!

Thanksgiving was a couple of weeks ago. I just had a big BE THANKFUL thrown in my face though. My mom is healthy. This time last year, her journey of pain was beginning. She had hurt her back. It had gotten a bit better, but not much.

This year, she has almost completely recovered. She still wont' pick up the bigger babies in my house, but she can scoop Isaac up with a big fat kiss. We are going skiing in January with my sisters, their husbands, and my mom and dad. Yes! She can SKI now!

Considering that this time last year, we weren't sure what was wrong, and then, a few weeks later, we thought she had incurable cancer, things this year are amazing! There was some SERIOUS surgery, some fabulous doctors, and a long road of recovery. Now, she is better.

Thank you Lord for the blessings you have visited on my family this year. Your grace and mercy are everlasting. You truly are able to do exceedingly abundantly more than we can imagine. Thank you.



Oh, and on a lighter note, here is our card for the year! If you want a paper copy, send me an email with your address in it! Hayeswj@bellsouth.net

CAKE

Isaac eats his cake. It was DELICIOUS! He played with it, but was mostly cute.

WOOHOO!

We have strep throat! I slept about 2 hours last night, and that was WITH lots of medication. This morning, I took myself to the Doc in the Box. The three boys came along. William wasn't feeling well either, so I made him an appointment with the pediatrician that afternoon. I tested positive for strep and started on amoxicillin.

When we got to the doctor's office that afternoon, I decided to go ahead and test all three boys. They all tested positive. Celeste got a prescription as well. Lydia just finished her antibiotics from HER strep last week.

Now, the woohoo was NOT sarcastic! Strep, while not wonderful, is easily remedied. We are all on antibiotics. We all feel ok. It is the weekend, so no one misses school. It is MUCH better than the flu or upset stomach virus!

May you all be healthy!

one

Isaac turned one yesterday! It has gone by so quickly. Here is a year in retrospect in pictures. Later today, or maybe tomorrow, I have pictures from his actual birthday! Today we will be doing a smash cake, so I'll have more pictures ina few more days too! Prepare for Isaac overload!

This is Celeste. She is spunky, brilliant, and creative. She gave a speech about how she was all three of those things and how those attributes would help her become a great poet.

Did I mention that she loves me? On the day of her speech, she insisted on wearing something I made for her. Because she loves me. She told me so. I have a picture somewhere, but these showed her true personality. The kind and gentle Christian spirit she exudes on a daily basis is exhibted in the first photograph. The second photograph shows the vibrant insanity she inherited from her mother. I do love her an awful lot!

Just in case you didn't know, I am sort of weird. I breastfeed my kids, some of them until they were big enough to ask in complete sentences, some not so long. I have had three children without any medications. I had one of my babies at home, on purpose, without drugs, with a midwife, on purpose. Some of my children are vaccinated, none of them all the way.

Why, you might ask, would I do these things. (I am fully aware that the previous sentence needed more punctuation than I gave it, but I am not up to quotation marks and question marks today.) I do these things because I believe they are what is best for MY children. A friend sent me to the link below today. I was quite, well, I was angry after I read it.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071018/ap_on_re_us/vaccine_skeptics

I am NOT a vaccine skeptic, as the article implies. I am NOT using a religious waiver in some sort of underhanded way to get out of vaccinating my children. I see my pediatrician on a regular basis. It would be EASIER for me to vaccinate my children than to get a religious waiver for them, but I choose to do the hard thing!

My favorite statement was about the complete safety of vaccines and that studies conducted have shown NO LINK between vaccines and autism. Here come a conspiracy theory headline. Guess who performs the studies? Guess who funds the studies? Guess who APPROVES the vaccines for mass marketing? The companies who MANUFACTURE the vaccines also pay for the studies. I wonder what they will say! I think they will definitely say that their multibillion dollar products cause children to lose skills, to become withdrawn, to become unable to function in typical social situation, and that their vaccines should be pulled from the market immediately. Um, no? They didn't find that? I wonder what happened.

No I don't! Do I think vaccines cause autism? I think that in some cases vaccines can cause problems in certain children. Do I think that if I give MY children vaccines it will cause them to become autistic? Probably not.

However, do I think that injecting my TWO MONTH OLD with a variety of dead germs mixed with all kinds of chemicals to help combat 4-8 various diseases is a good idea, um NO!

Do I think that injecting my five year old with a vaccine that will MAYBE prevent him from getting one of the most innocuous childhood diseases in the world that will maybe last him 10 years, or maybe5 is a good idea? Nope! I say, let that kid get the chicken pox! Yes, there are children with compromised immune systems who NEED the chicken pox vaccine. The vaccine was developed for those children. However the company decided it could make WAY more money if ALL the kids in the US got shot so they didn't get chicken pox. I would much rather my five year old catch the chicken pox, take some oatmeal baths, watch some movies, then have life long immunity, thank you very much.

How about the new HPV vaccine that "prevents cancer." Um, the one that has been pushed so hard and now has almost 2000 reactions REPORTED in the few years it has been available. No thank you, I do not care for my child to be your guinea pig.

I know that God doesn't make mistakes. I know that my children are strong and healthy. I know that vaccines can do and have done good. I also know that I choose for MY children not to get them. Just because the church I attend doesn't have a banner stating that vaccines are evil, I am usurping the government by getting a religious waiver. Wow, personal freedom is shrinking each and every day.

Numb

This is Sandi's post from her blog yesterday. Jack is supposed to be being recasted today, but I don't know if it actually happened or not. I will update when I know more. Please pray for this family.

Numb

After rushing up to Chicago, we met the resident at the hospital in the cast room. He cut off Jack's cast after several terrifying (to Jack) attempts with the saw. He screamed for over a half hour between the cast removal and the x-rays they insisted on.

The measurements are terrible. The day he was casted, the worst he has been, was 64° (official measurement). Today, after more than 9 weeks in the cast, the curve is 70° - it has gotten worse, based on today's measurements, after all we've gone through - all the tears - all the frustration and risks and misery.

It's late and we have an early operating room time, so I need to get off the computer and get to bed in this hotel room, but tonight I don't know what the future holds at all.

Remember my friend Sandi and her little boy Jack? If not, click on the list of blogs and go to Sandi's blog. Jack went back to Children's Hospital Monday. They took his cast off Monday night. His curve has deteriorated inside the cast. That isn't good. He is due for a new casting today. Sandi doesn't know what will happen yet. PLEASE pray for her, for Jack, for the Doctors, for everyone. Thanks friends.

Did you know that Lydia was the middle child for 3 years. I think it stuck. These were taken Wednesday night before church. Can't you see the fire in her eyes?

I love Lydia for her fire, her passion, her intensity. She is determined to learn to read. She can already read, she just wants it to go FASTER! Life is not going to pass my elfin child by. Love you princess!

I love my family!

For some reason, Isaac decided 6:15 was a good time to get up today. So we loaded up for breakfast. Samuel peed in the potty. When we got home, he said he needed to poop, which often means he has pooped in his pants. But TODAY he got inside, to his bathroom, took of his pants, climbed up and pooped in the potty!

Nathan took Samuel and WIlliam to the "cool tractor stuff store." Celeste and Lydia decided to clean their room. They actually cleaned their room TOGETHER with no arguing. Isaac just went down for a nap.

Even though my husband has a weeks' worth of work to be done before Tuesday, he decided to go with me to the Alabama game today. Because he loves me.


Tell me about your amazing family!

Where you write my blog for me!

Yesterday I was on the phone with my friend Jennifer. She asked me if I could choose anyone in the world to eat lunch with, who would I eat with. I told her I would really like to eat with her and Kathy and Amy and, well, my girl friends! I'll let her tell you who she chose.

So, what people in the whole wide world would you like to eat lunch with? Where would you go? What would you eat?

Slow down; you move to fast.


My children are speeding along these days, but not just in the back yard. They are growing before my very eyes. Everyday they are bigger, taller, smarter, wiser, and well, growing!

I looked at Celeste last week. She is officially big. She seems to have grown an inch or so in just the last month. Thanks so much to her teacher, she is becoming more and more responsible. She has an amazing sense of style, always combining things I would never have chosen to wear together. Most days she looks like an oilily ad with her vibrant colors and funky socks. Her current favorite is a pair of low top Converse All*Stars. She wears them to school every day.

Lydia's hair has gotten really long. I am so enjoying brushing and styling it. She does too! Today was a ponytail with a darling bow. Yesterday I french braided it. She has also gotten tall and is finally filling in on the ribs a bit! For so long she seemed to be skin and bones. She is reading well. She love Dick and Jane books, what my mother learned to read on, and what I loved to read as a child too. Time marches on, but somethings stay the same!

Wiliam and I had a great conversation yesterday, a real live discussion. He is a kid now. He isn't my baby, as he was for so long. He isn't even a big boy. He is a kid, a kindergartener. I talked to his teacher briefly yesterday and she was amazed at how smart he is. I told her I wasn't amazed anymore, just so proud of him!

Do you pray? If you don't we can have that conversation later. If you do, can you pray for someone for me? It is actually somefamily, not just someone. The someone is Jack. He is a bit older than my Isaac. At his 1 year checkup, he was diagnosed with a serious curvature of the spine. He began undergoing some treatments. At his followup appointment last week, the treatment wasn't working as well as the doctors had hoped.

You can read about his journey here http://jacksonb.blogspot.com/

Please pray for Jack and his family. His mama is amazing. His family is amazing. HE is amazing.

Thanks!

A photographic essay of Samuel






























































I hope this shows you the firecracker he really is!

Photographic essay of Isaac























































Please notice his hair in the above photos. It is red with white blonde scattered about. Isn't he a doll! He will be 11 months old on Saturday!