The meanest mom

I made my boys make their own beds.






Of course they nearly argued over who got to use the drill.













We bought the plans for this triple bunk from bunk beds unlimited.

Growing godly tomatoes and Jumping Ship

I have been frequenting Elizabeth Kruger’s site (http://www.raisinggodlytomatoes.com/) for a couple of years now. I was very pleased to hear she was writing a book to better explain her child training philosophy. As you know, I am a big fan of Bro. Pearls To Train Up a Child. I would recommend reading To train Up when your children are first born, followed by Growing Godly Tomatoes a year later. What the Bible Says About Child Training is good for small children with Jumping Ship (Bro Pearl’s newest book) well before your child is a preteen.

I want to thank Elizabeth for writing this book. She has expressed the very things I thought I was going to have to write in follow up to the Pearl’s book. She saved me the trouble. (Oh and thanks for the ideas on treating a grumpy. I have one I was getting frustrated with!) Her writing style is easy to read and the book went fast. She has lots of practical examples making it easier to apply what she says. Basically, her idea is you only have to teach one thing to your child…read the book to find out what that is:-)

Jumping Ship is the Pearls answer to those who have done everything “right” (homeschooled, no TV, controlled socialization, etc.) and still lost their children to the world. The earlier books are about getting your child to mind, not getting them to heaven. This one is about how to make your faith in God so attractive your child will stay on “your ship” instead of jumping to the “world’s ship.” It is full of wonderful advise in the Pearl’s normal easy to understand style.
Basically, be passionate for your mate, your God and life in general. Live life and it more abundantly. Read the book. It will inspire you to have FUN!

Whiskers

Let’s see, the time of testing that began last September has continued. We had to have one of our cats put down this week. We noticed a growth on his side a few weeks ago. It appeared to be healing so we figured he had hurt himself on something (one of our younger cat’s claws maybe?). Just last week we began finding blood everywhere he napped. The growth had quadrupled in size and was oozing. I googled it and am pretty sure it was cancer. He was an old cat when we adopted him from the humane society. We don’t really know how old, but we have owned him for six years. This was most likely the first of a long series of aging ailments. I simply couldn’t put the old boy through the pain and fear of treatments and illness so we made the difficult decision to just let him go quietly.
He wasn’t the kind of cat who wanted lots of attention. He was quite stand offish, really. Though he did greet my mother every time she came to visit and would wrestle my dad. He also joined us for school, bathing in the middle of the living room floor for history and literature reading. He also happened to be in the window anytime we came home. I discovered the secret to that one day when I was sick. Hubby took the children out for a ride so I could nap. After an hour or so he suddenly came charging through the room and jumped up into the window. Not a minute later our van pulled in the driveway. He had been listening for us! You will be missed Whiskers.

Oh, an I have lost the plans for the triple bunk we are building for the boys. I can’t find it ANYWHERE! GRRRRRRR!!!!!!!

Movie review-the Business of Being Born

Last night my hubby graciously sat through the new Ricky Lake documentary “The Business of Being Born.” It was wonderful (I cried at every birth!). I highly recommend this movie to anyone of child bearing age of who knows someone of child bearing age.
Here is a preview on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8h0SkPcs2U
You can “live stream” the whole movie from netflex:
http://www.netflix.com/MemberHome

there is some nudity (hard to show birth without it) but nothing sexual. Also nothing “New Age-y.” Just the simple truth about the birth industry in America.

America has the best emergency care system in the world and spends more than any other nation on pre-natal care and birth. So of course the safest place in the world to give birth is……Sweden (followed closely by Japan.) America is the 28th safest place to give birth. All the other countries that do better than we do have high rates of midwife delivery (Scandinavia and Japan=70%, America= less than 4%). Home births are as much as 50% in these other countries. We have twice as many mommies die and become injured during birth and three times as many babies as these top scoring countries do. Something is very wrong.

Did you know that 80% of American births are induced? And it just so happens that America has the most considerate babies in the world. Where in most of the world births are evenly spaced throughout the day and the week, in America the majority of our babies are born Monday through Friday, between 9 and 5. How very nice of our babies to keep their births in the business hours.

Doctors don’t have a very good track record where birth is concerned: from not washing their hands in the 1800’s (and losing more than half of their women to infection)) to x-raying every pregnant woman to drugs that made babies be born without arms and legs or with two uteri, they just don’t have a lot of credibility. The thing is they used these things on women for years BEFORE it was discovered they were bad. Ultra sounds, pitocin, cytotec, epidurals etc. are all just too new for us to really know if they will cause problems long term.

What we do know is that God invented birth. He designed the woman’s body to give birth naturally and without medicine’s help. Women have been doing just that for thousands of years. We can trust the natural process.

Yes, due to the fall, sometimes there are problems. But in these other countries (that have fewer babies and mamas DIE remember) 70-80% of their women birth without a doctor (though they have a trained midwife) and their c-section rate is less than 10% (ours is more than 30%). Many studies have shown that a trained midwife at home is the safest way for 90% of women to birth.

Oh, and c-sections are major. Abdominal surgery, remember. They carry all the negative side effects and potential problems that other major surgeries carry. I am thankful we have the technology for those very few who really need it, but it is being used way too often.

I have an article I wrote on the subject a few years ago here: http://homeschoolwwh.com/family/homebirth.html