Celebrating God's Blessing to Me

Tomorrow marks a much celebrated day in the Fowler household. Our third child was born on that day. Joanna Grace will be five years old. My how the time really does fly. That day is also special in the Fowler household because it was the day God chose to providentially bless my life by creating the man that would one day win my heart...my dear husband Jonathan. So, for today I want to write a pre-birthday dedication to him.

Some reasons why I love my husband Jonathan:

My blog could not hold all the reasons why I love Jon, so I thought I would just give you a glimpse of a few of them:

I love him because he seeks to honor the Lord in his life.

I love him because he is my best friend...he always knows what to say when I need it most.

I love him because he is a wonderful father...his job provides us a living, but his family is his real ministry.

I love him because, after Christ, we are first in his life...he is constantly thinking of ways to make more time to be with us, even if it means late nights working just so he doesn't take time away from the children.

I love him because he makes me laugh...he helps me to see the humor in a situation. He is my stress releaser!

I love him because he is right there to change a diaper, brush little children's teeth, helping to clean up after meals, etc...not because he is asked, but just as a way to let me know he cares.

I love him because he guards himself in relationships with other women...not being alone with them...just because he wants to honor his relationship with me.

I love him because he still looks at me and tells me how beautiful I am...even though I know the years have taken their toll on me.

I cannot think of anyone I would rather be around than my husband. He is truly a blessing from the Lord and I thank God for him.

Don't forget to tell those you love what a blessing they are in your life! And don't forget to thank Christ for all He has given to you!

Beautiful Days

Don't you just love these early days where spring is just around the corner? Even with the pollen coating our vehicle and outdoor items, it is a beautiful thing to behold. These days always make me feel more energetic! Although public schools around here are having spring break, we are still schooling, though on an abbreviated schedule. Due to our move coming up here in June, and all the things that lead up to that, we are pressing on with school, knowing that we will have to take a break to get things ready for moving here in a couple of months. It is hard to believe that in another three months, we will be settling in to a new home...and the same place I called home for years. There are so many things to get done before we leave. I always look forward to getting to a new place, but the process of getting there is one of my least favorite things! The moving process always seems to stress me out! So, pray up for me on that one! Jonathan and I have begun the enormous task of dejunking! That is one of the benefits of being in the military...it sort of makes you reevaluate all your items to access whether you really need it or not. Extra weight becomes a burden in a move, as well as a possible expense. And then one never knows what size house you may be heading to. Here, we have had the privilege of having two units made into one, but we will not have that luxury at Fort Bragg. So, we will be giving up about 700 square feet. So, needless to say, we need to REALLY take inventory of the things we have. But, it has already been a freeing process and we are only just beginning. We have begun to ask ourselves, how much is too much? As a Christian, when is enough enough? Things can be nice, but when one has too much, they begin to drain you either financially, or just by maintaining them. It is so nice to open drawers and closets and see necessities nice and neat, rather than chaos and one more thing staring me in the face saying, "Come and organize!" So, we will continue probably up until the last minute...and of course, we will still have some left to do when we arrive. It always seems to happen that way. But, we look forward to the new opportunities the Lord has in store for us there. Here's wishing you all a God blessed day!

Healthier Days

Since my last post, we have almost gotten back to health here. Julia is on antibiotic because her virus lasted so long that she was beginning to develop an ear infection. The boys have not needed any antibiotic, and have done well with just a few breathing treatments. That is such a blessing for us, especially considering that Joel was on two puffs of Advair morning and evening for months. We just praise the Lord for that. Joy. Joanna and Jonathan managed to miss the viruses altogether, which is also wonderful! We are anticipating being able to make it back to church tomorrow once again as a family. How fitting that it should be on Easter. We hope that all of you have a wonderful Easter day, with a great sense of the presence of Christ, and the sacrifice He made for us. Happy Easter!

A Restless Few Nights

We have had a restless few nights in the Fowler family this week. I came down with a strange virus on Monday night. I felt sick on my stomach and very achy...as if I had the flu. About 24 hours later, although I was extremely weak, I was feeling much better. I broke out in a rash and kept that for a good day, and then it was all over. Julia got sick on Tuesday night. She developed a stuffy nose and by the middle of the night, had a pretty bad case of crupe. I ended up taking her to the emergency room about 3 am because we tried all the interventions we could at home, but she still was not breathing well enough. They ended up giving her an oral steroid to open her passageway for breathing and then we got home around 5 am. She has maintained a pretty bad head cold and a dry cough now, but praise God, she is breathing well. Joel got the virus next, on Wednesday night. We have had such a wonderful bout of health since we have changed our eating habits and putting the children on some really good vitamins. Both Jonathan and I have been dreading this moment when Julia and Joel would get sick again. They both have had such difficulty healthwise and we have had such scares with them. Joel had a bad bout with breathing Thursday morning, around 5am. I got him up and gave him a breathing treatment. It didn't work as quickly as I would have liked and he was still having difficulty breathing. Jonathan was at PT and there was no way I could get in touch with him to bring back the van in case I needed to take him to the hospital. I put a blanket around Joel and we went outside to sit in the cool morning air. I sat there praying for him, that God would cause him to breathe well again. And within a minute, my son who was laboring so hard to breathe, just calmed down and began breathing normally again. Since then, he has done so very well. He is still sick and coughing some, and the crupe is always worst on the third night, so we are praying that he gets through this evening without anymore ER visits. Even though we have been sick this week, there is still great blessing. Joel has physically handled this sickness so much better than he has so many others in the past. I am so very grateful to God for that. It is so hard to see little ones sick and know how utterly helpless you are to correct the situation. Please continue to pray for our family as we try to get over this sickness. So far, the other children and Jonathan have remained well. Pray that they stay well. God bless and we love you all!

Happenings with the Fowler children

The children wanted me to write and let you all know what a typical school day is like in the Fowler home. So, here we go. Joy wakes up at 6:30 am and begins her devotional. By 7 am in the morning, we are working on math usually. Since that subject is the most challenging for her, we try to get that done early when we are both fresh and there is not much noise yet going on in the house. Believe me, that doesn't last long around here. We stop for breakfast, where we share in family devotions around the table. After that, it is morning chore time. Then it is back to school. Throughout the rest of the day, she completes Latin, music, writing, literature, Bible, grammar, science, art, geography, spelling and history. Every week, she also is assigned to extra reading that I give her, usually corresponding to her history unit for that week. I also try to complete a read aloud to the children by reading a book within a week, a little bit each day. Josiah is mainly focusing right now on phonics, reading and math. He is over half way through in his math book for first grade and will start the phonics and reading program for second grade on Tuesday. He is learning some history facts along with Joy and all the children, except Julia that is, are chanting Latin througout the day, even during bathroom breaks. It is odd to hear Joel using the restroom saying "laboro, laborare, laboravi, laboratum, I work, to work, I worked, worked!" But, it is great to know how easily they pick up things and what an asset that will be when their study begins. Joanna, who will be five the end of this month, can almost make all the letters of the alphabet herself. She is doing first grade work in phonics and reading. Joel desperately wants to do school, but Mommy is wondering how she will work that out. But, I have promised him that this next school year, he can work on a preschool program. I hope Julia holds off for a little bit, at least for my sake. Besides the schoolwork, there are chores throughout the day, altercations to squelch and redirect, fresh bread to bake daily, whole foods menus to prepare, and lots of love and funny sayings to enjoy. Some of those are as follows. Joel now has a habit of exaggerating his situation. Sometimes when he is misbehaving we will place him in a chair or on the couch for a quiet time. The other day he remarked, "Mommy, why do I ALWAYS have to sit in a chair or on a couch. I am tired of sitting in a chair or on a couch. Why do I have to go to bed and you all get to stay up? I don't like that." Joanna was outside the other day and she got three small ant bites on her arm. The second day, the swelling started to go down and she said, "Look Mommy it's swelling down!" And then there are the endearing things the little ones say. Jon and the children watched a movie about William Carey today and Josiah said, "Being a missionary in India must have been hard, but I would like to preach the gospel to them." And Joy, who will often out of the blue say to me, "Mom, thanks so much for all you do, how you take care of us and for homeschooling me." Those moments are the kind that take my breath away. How blessed I truly am! I wish for you all God's blessings too!