I often have random things to share with you but usually only get as far as “writing them in my head” while I wash the dishes.  You have no idea what kinds of amazing random pieces of my life you have missed out on.  Consider yourself blessed that more of these random thoughts never actually make it to the site.

Here’s what I managed to get written for you this week:

**Several weeks ago, one of my readers asked for my shoe size.  She then lovingly hand made me some beautiful slippies for my poor frigid feet.  How cute are these?

Thanks Susan!!  My feet and I LOVE these!  And no, I don’t normally walk around with my pant legs rolled up…I just needed to get a good picture of the feet.

**Going along with the whole “I need to be warm” theme, I broke down and bought myself some new warm jammies a couple of weeks ago.  They are thick and they are fuzzy and they make me feel peaceful and cozy.  I found it hard to decide which pair to get, but let’s just say I didn’t get the ones with Betty Boop all over the pants.
    The reason I needed new jammies is because I only had two pairs and one of them I’ve had for years and they are completely falling apart.  Pitiful. 
     When Malachi saw my new jammies he exclaimed with happiness then asked why I got new ones (cause it’s a big day when anyone gets something new around here).  I told him it was because my old ones were falling apart. 
     He then suggested that perhaps we could have just tried to fix the old ones with duck tape.  It was, after all, the material we had used to fix his sword that had been falling apart two days ago.   According to my children….duck tape is the ultimate tool to fix all things that are falling apart.  Now why didn’t I think of that?

**I normally order my wheat from Azure Standard, but their supply has been low, throwing me into a whole wheat bread and tortilla panic.  I was very happy to discover that a friend of a friend was planning to order a truck load of wheat and other grains, then divvy it up among a bunch of people.  Ooh!  Count me in as one of the people!  I ordered ten-50 pound bags of hard white wheat (for an amazing price)…enough to get me through one year.  It occurred to me later that in just a few weeks, I will have a whopping 500 pounds of wheat in my house at one time.  That, my friends, is a lot of wheat.

**Asa needed some of his clothes from the storage bins we keep in the attic.  I had no idea I had been so traumatized by the bird flying into the face incident…but I really had a hard time opening the attic door and walking up the stairs this time.  Do you think there is a support group for Freaked Out Moms With Attic Issues?

**There have been two stray cats wandering around our yard for the past couple of weeks.  One night I was busy working at the computer only to be interrupted by psycho kitties fighting in the snow pile that is my garden.  You know what fighting cats sound like right?  I jumped straight up from my chair thinking that there were two tiny sick babies dying a horrible death right outside my window.  Horrible I tell you.  It was enough to bring all four of my wide eyed boys out of their beds and down the stairs to see WHAT in the world was going on outside.  “Don’t worry,” I comforted my kids.  “There are not dying babies in our yard, just a couple of silly cats duking it out in the garden.  One of them will win eventually.  Just throw out a couple of light sabers for them and go back to bed.”

Anyone have anything random they just can’t help but share?

This won’t be like my normal random posts (wait, can we call those normal?).  I just had a few things to mention and decided to put them into a quick post for you.  :)

First, I didn’t get very many more pictures of my time feeding the soccer team Sunday night.  Funny thing about cooking a lot of food.  You don’t really have much time to pick up the camera.  At least I actually remembered to try to get some pics and handed the camera to one of the players to snap a few shots.   Thank you Jordan!!

Unfortunately this is the only one I’m able to post.  Isn’t it a GOOD picture though?  Don’t these girls look so sweet?  I LOVE this picture!!

There were more players sitting here and there and yonder all over our yard and in the front.  (Did I just say yonder?)  I’m hesitant to display any pics from the front of my house just in case anyone out there is crazy enough to stalk me.  Which of course I know that you aren’t.  But still.  And it’s a bummer too because there was a really great picture of more of the team sitting around on our front porch.

After Jordan took pictures for me, she went and played dress up with Malachi.  It was a riot!!!  Malachi suddenly got shy then and refused to take a picture with her in their fabulous costumes.  Just imagine an almost six foot tall soccer player dressed in a cowboy hat, orange child-sized work apron, a mask and a super-man girl cape.  It was great.

Moving on…

Jennifer at Saving and Giving has begun hosting A Time to Give Carnival every Thursday.  I love this idea as it inspires us to think creatively about ways we can use what God has given us with to bless others.  Go check it out and consider what you can be doing to GIVE more.

If you want a chance to win some awesome UGG Boots, read this post and GO SIGN UP!!!  All you have to do is grab the Whooga Ugg Boot button and put it on your site, sign your name and you’re entered into the drawing.  There are several chances to win.  I WANT TO WIN.  I think UGG Boots are neato.  Read more details here.  Then go take 30 seconds to enter yourself in the drawing!

Okay, that’s all for now.  

Except that I want to tell you about a major change in the works at our house but I can’t yet even though I really want to.  I will ask you to pray for me because often change is very hard for me.  Even when it’s a good change, which this is.  I think I’ll be able to tell you soon.  And no we’re not moving…no I’m not pregnant…and nothing is going to change about this website.  But thank you for your prayers.  :)

I don’t know why I don’t do these random posts more often.  Random is often how I think and have conversations.  Sometimes I wonder how people (on and offline) can keep up with me.  Brace yourselves.  Here we go:

• One night last week when I was tucking the boys into bed I looked around at the mess that is their bedroom and had to ask myself, “Why in the world is there a sucked-on lemon wedge sitting on that library book?” 
• I really need to re-paint my toenails but I have no idea when I’ll ever get around to it.  I think that by the time I have a free minute, it will be winter and I’ll be wearing socks anyway.
• Today, my friend gave birth to TWINS!!  A boy and a girl.  The doctor had estimated that the twins were going to be eight pounds each…but they were each just under seven pounds.  STILL.  I’m so proud of her.  Good job Melissa!!!!
• We’re really enjoying the okra we’re getting from our garden.  Anyone else out there like okra? 
• Speaking of garden…my tomato plants are looking pitiful.  I’m getting some tomatoes, but you’d think with 23 plants I’d be overloaded.  Not so.  I’m mooching tomatoes from anyone who has extra so that I’ll have enough to make and can sauce this year.  I’m bummed about my plants, but thankful that God is providing through others.
• Remember how I talked about my friend who is staying with me this week?  May I just reiterate how lovely it is to have another female in my home with me if only for a few days?  Last night while I was putting the kids to bed (Matt was at a meeting) she noticed the stuff all over the living room and picked it all up.  I live with a bunch of people who don’t SEE things that need to be picked up.  They will step over it and trip over it and get a bloody nose by it without ever seeing it or thinking that it should be picked up and put away.  But she saw things.  And picked it all up.  I love her. 
• A few days ago, Malachi took a battery operated action figure toy into the bathtub with him.  After getting wet, that toy is now acting possessed.  It has pretty much been talking non-stop since it’s unfortunate dunking.  It found it’s way into a pile of clothes in the bathroom and last night while switching laundry, I accidentally stepped on it.  In response to being stepped on it said (I kid you not), “You want a piece of me?”  Of course I answered it with a confident, “Bring it on”.  Matt watched the whole woman-to-toy interchange and just shook his head.  It must be fun living with possessed toys and a crazy wife.  I think it’s time for that toy to go.  At least the wife gets to stay.

Feel free to add a random thought of your own…

Yes indeed, it’s time for another random post.  As always, there’s no rhyme or reason or order to any of these thoughts.  I’m sure your brain loves trying to keep up with me…

A few days ago, I was putting a bottle of vanilla away in the cabinet above my stove.  And I dropped it.  My lovely ceramic top stove cracked.  :(  Thankfully I can still use three out of four burners (and thankfully my bottle of vanilla didn’t break).  But the whole experience made me wonder…if I had to replace my stove, would I want to have gas?  Or would I stick with electric?  Hmm.

I hosted “bunco” at my house this week.  All last week as I was preparing, I was having a crazy amount of bunco stress.  Like…I couldn’t stand for my house not to look perfect when my friends came over.  Silly.  I mentioned my bunco stress to a couple of friends a few days before the “big” event.  They (very nicely) told me to get over it.  And so I did.  In fact, I decided not to dust my fireplace before everyone came (just to make a point).  Then with my finger, I wrote “BUNCO!” in the dust so that everyone would feel welcome.  It was a hit.  Why, I think we’ll all avoid dusting before bunco from now on.  It’s really about the fellowship anyway, right?  Right.

We got to go pick pie cherries at my friend Michelle’s house a few days ago!  It was oh so fun!  I couldn’t believe the boys.  These things are SOUR, and there they were, eating them one right after another.  :)

I’m so used to doing Swagbuck searches when I’m researching things like “recipe for strawberry bread” and “what is a good non-toxic hand soap” that one day recently I caught myself sitting down to the computer to do a Swagbuck search on “where did I put my shoes, I can’t find them”.  Of course I realized that while doing online searches are usually helpful in so many areas…even the computer has it’s limits.  (I found my shoes all by myself, by the way.  They were exactly where I’d left them.)

I got my Sonlight curriculum catalog AND my Rainbow Resource catalog in the mail on the SAME day last week.  Talk about fun!  Except that I won’t let myself look at them until July.  It’s a rule I made for myself.  Because…I get so excited about school with the boys whenever I look through a catalog that I’ll be wanting to start school next week already if I look now.  So…the catalogs are waiting expectantly on my dresser until July first (at midnight).

Malachi (age 4) has decided that he’s never going to get married.  In fact, he’s been quite concerned lately that we’re going to force this marriage thing on him and make him move out.  We’ve reassured him over and over that he never has to get married and that he can live with us forever and ever (and that if someday he changes his mind, that’s okay with us too).  Ah, my baby…I want to be your favorite girl for a long, long time.

So what’s going on with you? Anything random you’d like to share?  Go ahead.  We can handle it.

Here are a few things I’ve been wanting to share.  Warning:  the first random rambling is a run on sentence but if you can’t have a run on sentence when you’re being random, when can you?

Random Thing #1: 

If you’ve emailed me with a question sometime within the last week to 20 months and I wrote you back and said, “What a great question…I’ll definitely write about that on my blog sometime” and I still haven’t written about it on my blog sometime and you feel neglected and annoyed please know that I really will write about it on my blog sometime but I haven’t gotten to it yet because I have lots of excuses.  My dad asked me recently if I ever ran out of things to blog about (except that I don’t think he used the word blog because I don’t think my dad has ever said the word blog or really knows what a blog is) and I said, “oh Dad, you should see my inbox”.

Random Thing #2:

A few nights ago, Matt and I had a conversation about whether or not Miley Cyrus was Hannah Montana.  What in the world brought that up, you’d like to know?  I have no idea.  It was quite likely the most useless and bizarre conversation we’ve ever had.  We finally did a Swagbuck search to find out that indeed…Miley Cyrus is Hannah Montana.  We know who Darth Vader is (”I am your father”).  Hannah Montana?  Not so much.  Well, except now we know.  And I know you can not believe that we didn’t know in the first place.  Yeah well…we don’t have daughters and we don’t have cable.  I’m pretty sure there’s a bunch of other things we don’t know either.  (Like what is a Polly Pocket?  Can she really fit into a pocket?)

Random Thing #3:

Michelle at Scribbit wrote an ebook about blogging.  And it’s really good.  And it’s free.  I neglected my kids for several hours one morning last week while I read through the entire book.  (Just kidding…they were happily playing legos and not feeling the least bit neglected.)  (Except that Malachi stayed in his jammies until lunchtime.) (And so did I.)  Anyway, if you’re a blogger or want to become a blogger…you’ll want to read Michelle’s ebook.

Random Thing #4:

When my friend Jill guest posted here, I shared her email address so that anyone who wanted to write and ask to receive her awesome daily email devotional could be privileged to do so.  A couple of weeks ago, something got messy and she lost her list.  If you were on her list and haven’t been receiving her devotionals, please email her again!!  Or, if you weren’t on her list but would like to receive her devotionals, email her!!  (jill6758 at cablespeed.com)  Just so you know…you WANT to be on her list.  Her devotionals are a great thing to wake up to in the morning!

Random Thing #5:

You know how we begin our school year the first week of August so that we can finish the last part of April?  The last part of April was last week…and we did it!  We are done!!   We celebrated the end of our school year by beginning to read Island of the Blue Dolphins.  I guess we’re never really done…are we?!  But, oh did it feel good to hang up our math books for the summer!

Have anything random to share?  Or anything along one of these topics to share?    Anyone want to tell me more about Polly Pockets?  ‘Cause all we’ve got in our pockets are rocks, plastic spiders (at least I think they’re plastic) and little lego storm troopers.  Ah-hah!  Lego storm troopers.  Those must be the male equivalent of Polly Pockets.  No?

As I’ve been working to keep up with the two new blog series (how do you say series in plural form?  series-es-es?)…and of course Gratituesday…and menu plans…and new recipes…

I’m finding there’s not much time to blog about anything else.  And I kinda miss it.  So, I’m taking just a tiny break this week from Feeding the Family and Women with a Mission so that I can take the time to fill you in on some little tid-bits of our lives: 

• Matt got home tonight (Wednesday).  Yay and yay again.  I didn’t rearrange any furniture while he was gone, but I did manage to clean out my email box so that there are only 37 unread emails waiting for me.  I try to keep up, really I do!  Oh, and when Matt walked in the door he held in his hand a single rose that he’d taken from Grandpa’s casket…and brought all the way back from CA for me.  In his hand.  Even though the rose was a bit wilted and saggy…it was the most beautiful red rose I’d ever seen. 

• Somehow the boys have created a game in which they are never allowed to step on any part of the floor that is wood or tile.  This is a problem because most of our floors are wood or tile.  The simple task of “run upstairs and grab your math book” now consists of jumping onto the rug, leaning heavily onto the couch, vaulting themselves into the air and hoping to reach the steps that are carpeted.  I’ve about had enough of this game and will soon have to put my foot down and insist that the wood floor is not hot lava.  After all, I should know.  Even after several warnings that “Mom!  You’re in the hot lava!  You’re gonna get burned!” I have yet to feel even a bit of heat.  And besides, how am I supposed to peel potatoes in the kitchen?  Stand on the countertop?

• Remember how I mentioned that Monday night we were inviting Madge over, the woman who recently lost her husband?  Our red headed friend was here too, and may I just say what a delightful evening we all had together?  We enjoyed our chicken and noodles and Madge laughed at the boys jokes (even the ones that weren’t funny).  Then she stayed and played Apples to Apples Jr. with us.  She’d never played before…and somehow she pulled off the win!  It was the most precious night and I loved it.  This woman is a wonderful mentor to me.

• Sometimes the challenge of raising our boys into godly young men is so daunting to me and I feel incredibly overwhelmed.  I’ve been feeling that lately.   It’s good to feel this way I guess.  It reminds me that I’m relying on God for help in this huge job.

• I need to go put butter on my hands.

• I am learning some new recipes from my friends and after I try them and like them, I’m gonna share them with you.

• I have three dirty towels hanging in the kitchen right now.  No, four.  Where are all the clean ones?

• Recently after I finished drinking all my milk, Malachi got excited and told me that now I was going to “grow up into a great big daddy!”  Would you like to be the first to congratulate me?

• We’ve had temps in the 50’s and 60’s for several days now and we are all loving it!  That never happens in the middle of a Nebraska winter.  If I don’t watch myself, I may go outside and start planting lettuce.

So, what have you been up to?  Do you have any clean towels hanging up in your kitchen?  Were you aware that stepping on uncarpeted floors meant you were stepping in hot lava?  Consider yourself warned.

Here are a few random things I thought you might need to know to help get you through the weekend  :) …

• Last Sunday morning I was making stew to have ready for when we came home from church.  I took the lid (cast iron) off the pot, set it down onto my pot holders, stirred the stew, then put the lid back on.  A few minutes before leaving for church, I gave the stew one last stir.  It was then that I noticed a POT HOLDER inside the stew.  Yeah, it had stuck to the lid and hidden itself when I put the lid back on.  Yum.  Can I just say how HAPPY I was to have found it BEFORE I left the pot on the stove to simmer during church?  Yum.
• Recently, Elias asked me, “Mom, has it almost been a year yet?”  And I said, “A year since what?”  And he said, “Just has it almost been a year?”  Ummm…probably…
• We have six bedrooms in our house…enough for all of our boys to each have their own room if they want one.  Instead, they prefer this:

Not that you can tell…but there are two long lumps in sleeping bags
on the matresses, a medium sized lump on the top bunk,
and a little lump on the bottom bunk. 
Four boys, one room.

• Now that I’ve been blogging for a year, I’m afraid I’m going to start repeating myself.
• Now that I’ve been blogging for a year, I’m afraid I’m going to start repeating myself. 
• ;)
• One morning this week, Malachi told me, “Mommy, you look SOOOO cute!”  Guess I’ll have to not brush my hair and wear my mismatched jammies more often.
• I finished Austin’s quilt!! (Can’t show you pics until after I give it to him.  I would hate to ruin his surprise, you know.  Because I’m pretty sure he reads my blog already.)  Malachi thinks the quilt is perftic.  Yeah, don’t look too close.
• We can’t find Justus’ glasses.  Anywhere.
• Lately Justus has decided that it’s fun to pretend he’s a puppy.  And his little brothers have been following suit.  Which is fine most of the time since thankfully they aren’t naughty puppies.  But there comes a point when I ask someone where the phone is that I’d rather not hear, “rrr..Ruff!!” in response.  Am I really asking too much?
• I have finally given in to peer pressure and am now Twittering.  You can see my profile here.  Now, just because I have finally become a Twitter-er, don’t get your hopes up too much about how often I’ll Twit.  I find it hard enough some days just to find time to wash the dishwater off of my glasses so that I can see.  I’m not sure how good I’m going to be at this new thing I’ve just gotten myself into. 
• Oh, and by the way…when I was setting up my Twitter profile, I couldn’t call myself “HeavenlyHomemaker” because apparently 17 letters is too many.  It kept cutting me off at “HeavenlyHomemak”.  I didn’t want to be the “HeavenlyHomemak”.  So I decided on being the “HeavenHomemaker”, which is only slightly better, but better enough.  Later, I thought, “Why didn’t I just put in Laura Coppinger?”  Duh.  So, I tried to change it and it wouldn’t let me (or I couldn’t figure out how).  Then I tried to just start a new account, but they said that someone was already using the email address, laura @ heavenlyhomemakers.com.  Yes, I told Twitter…that would be the HeavenHomemaker.  We are the same person!  Ah well, HeavenHomemaker it is… (Any of the rest of you talk to your computer when it isn’t doing what you want it to?)

I’m going to go look for Justus’ glasses.  I’ll try to post it on Twitter if/when we ever find them!!