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I LOVE Ducks!

I LOVE Ducks!

by | Oct 4, 2020 | Mollie, One Blessed Momma

Hello! My name is Mollie Cundiff. Welcome to my picture perfect, always behaving kids, car and house are always clean, farm. Not! Let’s be real. Kids are messy. Life is messy. Farm life is REALLY messy!

I have piles of laundry (mostly clean at the moment-SCORE!) and dishes. My car looks like a cheese cracker factory right now and my yard needs some serious attention.

I am not a perfect Christian, mom, wife, or blogger and I never want to give that impression. I am here to support you in your mom journey by sharing real stories about mine.

My husband and I, along with our 5 kids, live on a 100-acre farm in beautiful South West Colorado (technically it’s 103 1/2 acres, but who’s counting?). We mostly raise cattle for beef (need beef?), but I also have a few pet cows. I am allowed to name the calves out of two cows, everyone else gets a number. It is a lot harder to get attached to “64” or “23” than to “Ellie” or “Mocha”. Harder, but I still accomplish it.

We also have chickens, A goat (that’s another story!), cats, dogs, horses, and ducks.

I LOVE ducks!

My ducks taught me a lesson this summer. One I want to share.

Here is the back story. We are part of an amazing, christian, hybrid school. I work there as an instructional aid, am Vice Chair of the school board and last year had 2 children attending the school. There are two on campus days and three homeschool days. I feel like it is the perfect blend of traditional school and homeschool. Anyway, it keeps me busy. Like many people, Covid-19 shut our school down in mid-March. That time with my kids was such a sweet time, Not having to, or being able to, run around all the time. Being “forced” to stay home-honestly, it felt like being allowed to stay home. Anyone else feel that way? Just me? Okay, I might have a problem saying no….

Back to the ducks! With all that “extra time’ I decided we should get baby ducks. I love ducks! (Did I already say that?)

We did not have a brooder house or any kind of set up for baby ducks. I decided they could live in a diaper box in my kitchen until they were big enough to put out at the pond. Ha. Haha. I did NOT know how FAST baby ducks grow!

They started out about 3 inches tall. The diaper box was working perfectly!

Three. Days. Later.

I was awakened by a thud and intense peep, peep, peeping. Naturally, I woke up Trevor to make sure our house had not been invaded by burglars trying to lure me out of my bed by playing off of my love for baby ducks. I have a great imagination you see. Anyway, he gives me the “all clear, no burglars here” sign so I go out to check the ducks.

One of them was running around, frantically trying to find his friends. We got him caught and put back, but I knew the Pampers duck nursery was no longer gonna work. We figured it out and in the end they made it out to the pond and are now HUGE and happy ducks.

Summer is VERY busy here on our farm. With irrigating, gardening, hay, cows and kids, it’s a lot! Sometimes I feel like my husband and I never see each other. One day he came home from work and I met him outside with a piece of strawberry, cream cheese scone cake. (Yum!)

We made our way over to the pond and ended up standing there for about 45 minutes just talking and watching ducks. It was mesmerizing watching them swim and dive and seeing how much they had changed from the little brown and yellow ducklings.

We both had many other things that needed to be done, but somehow it seemed ok to just watch the ducks.

That has become our escape. Whether it is Trevor and I or one of the kids and I. When we need a break or need to talk, we can head out and watch the ducks.

You may not live on a farm and have the same busy life I do, but we ALL have distractions in our life. Whether it’s work, play, church, housekeeping or whatever. We all have things in our life that keep us busy.

My mom used to say BUSY stood for Being Under Satan’s Yoke. He likes to keep us busy, keep us from growing in our relationship with the Lord and keep us from training our children in the ways of the Lord.

My encouragement to you is, take a pause. Leave the dishes. Leave the laundry. Redeem the time now to build solid relationships with your kids. Listen to them. Teach them. Go watch the ducks. You will be surprised how much those times will mean to them.

“Where no oxen are, the crib is clean; but much increase is by the strength of the ox.” Proverbs 14:4

This scripture jumped out at me and, yes, I am going to compare my kids to oxen. Don’t judge.

Whenever I am pulling my hair out because someone spilled milk on the table and left it, or decided to cut up an entire package of construction paper into confetti, or chop my 3-year-old’s hair off, or swim in used motor oil, I try to remind myself that all these messes are signs of how incredibly blessed I am to have my five, beautiful, healthy, messy kids.

Smile Mom! Clean up the mess later. Give your kids a hug and go watch the ducks.

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Strawberry, Cream Cheese Scone Cake Recipe

Proverbs 14:4 image

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Meet Mollie

 

Mollie is a lover of Jesus above all. She loves her husband and family and enjoys gardening, teaching, piano, riding, and farming. She lives in SW Colorado with her husband and five kids.

Learn more about Mollie and her family

Quality Time

Quality Time

by | Oct 3, 2020 | Melinda, One Blessed Momma

There is a bad stigma around middle children – always ignored, never get any one:one time, everyone else is spoiled because they were the first or the baby etc. Being a middle child myself, I try to make sure mine doesn’t have any of those complaints. I may go too far at times.

We are a blended family with what some call two sets of kids.

I have my older kids – 19, 16, and 15.  My younger kids are 7, 5, and 3. The 3-yr-old is the only girl I carried in my belly and who lives at our home full time. Which probably means she is spoiled rotten. The 7-yr-old is the first child my husband and I had together, the only one I spent months begging God to give me a baby. He can act like the baby of the family or he quickly steps up to play the “oldest” role when his 3 older siblings aren’t around.

The 5-yr-old is a middle child through and through. He is perfectly happy playing by himself and that is where you will find him most of the time. Building something, working out the design all on his own and don’t you dare try to help him build or try to stop him before he’s ready.

He’s the quietest of them all, but when you get him all by himself and there’s no building happening he talks and talks and talks. He will tell you all about the latest Wild Kratt’s episode he watched, or his dream, or tell you a grand story.

One of my favorite times with him was just recently when he was up sick in the middle of the night. He had to tell me all about whales. This was while he was sitting on the bathroom floor feeling sick.

It was 2:30 in the morning. The middle of the night. All I wanted to do was sleep, but he wanted to talk, about whales. Mom did you know…. and he would spout off another fact.

It was tempting to tell him to hush it was time for sleep, especially as we moved to the couch. I thank God I had the patience to listen and just let him talk. It’s when I have that patience to sit and listen that I get a glimpse of who my children really are.

One of my favorite quotes is “Children are not a distraction from the more important work. They are the most important work.” Dr. John Trainer

In Mark 10:14, a much wiser man, Jesus, takes time to spend with the children. He even chastises his disciples for trying to keep them away. Spending time with our children is beneficial to them, but I think sometimes we forget how beneficial it is to us as well. In verse 14 Jesus tells them that we must receive the Kingdom of God like a child. Spending time with our children reminds us just what that means.
Spending one on one time with our children is so important! It makes them feel valued and loved. I haven’t been the best at finding this time with each of my kids and it is something I’m working on doing more often. I am one blessed momma!

How do you make sure you spend one on one time with your child(ren)?

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Let the little children come to me
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Meet Melinda!

Melinda is a Christian, a wife, and a mom of 6. She has a blended family. She's a recovering perfectionist who is far from perfect, but it makes her that much more grateful for God's grace and mercy in her life.

Learn more about Melinda and her family

Fruit of the Spirit

Fruit of the Spirit

by | Oct 1, 2020 | Julia, One Blessed Momma

Fruit of the Spirit: Galatians 5:22-23: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.  Against such things, there is no law.” 

My girls and I love talking about The Fruits. We wrote it on our chalkboard in our hallway.  We also love singing the song too. Whether we are eating a snack, taking a bath, on a walk, or getting ready for the day we can sing and talk about it.  If you are not familiar with the song you can click here: Fruit of the Spirit Song.

As a busy mom, it can be hard to be in the word daily.  When we can incorporate our children into our daily study we both can learn and grow together.

Each day as we sit down to eat breakfast we talk about one of the fruits for the day.   Sometimes we repeat the same one over the next few days to get more practice and a deeper understanding.  Some questions I would ask:  

Love

  • What is love?
  • How can we show love?
  • Who can we show love to today?
  • Who displayed the greatest love for us?
  • Did you know daddy and mommy love you very much (grandparents, etc)?
  • This is what we do to show you we love you…,
  • How will you show your sister you love her?
  • What does God say about love?

Actions may be: with our words, writing a card, drawing a picture, cleaning up after ourselves, or helping someone else clean up, the list goes on.  

Joy

  • What is joy?
  • Who tells us to have joy?
  • How can we show joy?
  • What does God say about joy?  

Peace

  • What is peace?
  • How can we show peace in our home, at school, work?
  • What does God say about peace?

Continue the questions for each one.  As the weeks and months go on, and you see one of these traits demonstrated by your child or anyone in your family, state it aloud!  Let everyone know that 5 years old, Johnny showed love by checking in on his little sister who just fell down and then is helping her up.  Or 1 year old, Mary displayed self-control when she really wanted to dump her crackers on the floor but chose to pick them up out of the box one by one and eat them instead.  Or when the lines are really long at a local drive-through you say, “We ALL had to practice our patience today while waiting for our food, it got hard but we did it!”. It’s good for them to hear actual current events and how they are relevant in their lives.

It’s also good to hear when we, ourselves did not succeed in portraying these characteristics.  We too, as adults are not perfect but we keep trying.  As I have far too many real-life examples, there is one I wanted to share with you.  The other night I was making dinner in the kitchen and my husband had to step outside for a minute.  I thought, “my girls are playing so nicely in the living room- they should be fine”. 

Of course, those are the times, when you let your guard down the children feel the freedom and test their surroundings.  My 2 year old decided to climb and up on my desk to get to the floating shelf.   She got into sharpies, markers, and my lavender essential oil all within a couple of minutes.  She’s tiny and this is a huge feat for her, although not at all surprising.  She’s a very determined little girl.   Can you relate?    

After those few minutes, she tried to get down and fell.  That’s when I ran in and got upset that I wasn’t there to watch her. Side note- I think my frustration of her getting hurt goes deeper than just not being there.  She’s a preemie and we had a rough NICU journey, but that is a story for another day.  I reacted loud and frustrated.  As I picked her up I pushed toys out of my path so I wouldn’t trip, but I definitely lacked finesse.  I needed to calm down.  I needed to apologize to my 4-year-old.  So, after I checked my toddler, I apologized. “Mommy had a hard time displaying peace and self-control when sister got hurt.  Please forgive me. I am going to try to take a deep breath before I respond next time”.

The next day my 4-year-old got frustrated, and you know what she did?  She pushed a toy that lacked finesse.  We talked about her frustrations, we talked about how she reacted and how one can respond differently.  Mainly we talked about my actions and how I shouldn’t have pushed the toys like that the day before.  I apologized again. We decided to be each other’s helpers in calming down when we get frustrated.  

Children are mirrors.  They are a reality check to our own behaviors and what a blessing it is to have that self-check. If we are modeling and striving to have the fruits of the Spirit then they will learn how to also embody the fruits.  Our trees will grow and produce fruit when we are planted by the living water and our roots are in the word. 

Now that we put them into real-life situations for the children, let’s hit the sensory fulfillment.

  • Books 
  • Puppets
  • Storytelling- This could be one you made up yourself or a story from the Bible.
  • Acting out- Create a skit for showing fruit of the Spirit.  Act out a scenario where someone did not show self-control and how they learned to change their behavior.
  • Sensory bins- These can be filled with rice, beans, shredded or tissue paper, beads, water, ice, etc.  That may contain a heart for love, smile for joy, peace sign for peace, picture of someone with their hand up saying “wait”.  Be creative, have fun!
  • Fruit of the Spirit Necklace- free printable below!

Have you had any mirror situations? Do you talk with your children about the fruits of the Spirit? Or do you have a climber story too?  Please leave them in the comment section below. We’d love to hear from you!

Download your free printable

Fruit of the Spirit Necklace

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Meet Julia!

Julia is a wife to her high-school sweetheart, a mother to two beautiful girls and a follower of Christ.   She loves crafting, teaching and is forever grateful for a God who is in control of all unknowns and thankful we can have a peace that surpasses all understanding.