Organization

I've been accused of keeping a neat and organized home. I generally try to respond graciously to such comments, but inside I am thinking of all the places in the house that constantly scream "disorganization" at me. Over the years, I have developed a few habits that help keep our home streamlined. Friends have asked how we manage it. Recently a precious friend asked for suggestions and photos. So although I am not impressed by our level of neatness, I will gladly share, in hopes that we may help another. I must warn you that this could possibly the most boring blog entry you've ever read, unless you just happen to be interested in how other families keep up with their stuff. :)

Because I do think the cleanliness and neatness of our home is one way the God can be glorified in this family, I make it a priority. Not a room in our house would be neat or clean if I did not expect/demand it everyday. Learning how to involve/inspire the children, not get angry, and not lose my joy when I can't keep it up, are my struggles. Sometimes people think that well-behaved children are just born that way and that well kept houses belong to people who don't make messes. Both are false.

Here are some ideas that work for us- 8 children, 2 adults, three bedrooms:

-pyramid bunk beds: double on bottom, twin on top
-each child has two/three dresser drawers for clothing
-each child owns enough clothes for one week only, per season (warm/cold)
-limited amts. of stuff are allowed on top of the dressers
-each older girl has one box of personal stuff under the bed
-younger girls share underbed boxes with themes such as baby dolls/clothes/dress-up
-out of season clothes for upcoming year are in underbed boxes
-closet floors are for shoes, hangers for clothes, shelves for hand me downs or out of season clothing/linens
-baby clothes fit nicely in the plastic rolling stacked drawers, so we have one in our bedroom and one in the girls' room
-each child has his/her own color and monogrammed towel in the bathroom (no confusion about who it belongs to)
-handtowels are changed atleast everyday
-bath rugs are hung up, never walked on with dirty feet or shoes
-under the bathroom sink is for clean linens and organized hair and personal stuff
-everyday the floor is wiped up for hair and lint and the trash dumped out, also the surfaces are atleast wiped off, or disinfected
-all books are returned to the main bookshelf in the living room several times a day
-we give away everything that is not truly being used
-messes that cause stress are re-evaluated regularly: thrown away, relocated, or boxed in a special child-friendly bin

-hand-me-downs and other donations become part of the clothing organization or are given away immediately

We generally do keep the rule: a place for everything and everything in it's place.

A friend of mine takes pictures of things that her children would like to collect/keep, rather than keeping the items themselves. She is the same one who owns no dressers but keeps all clothing in underbed boxes.

Teri Maxwell wrote in her book, "Homeschooling with a Meek and Quiet Spirit" that we should do something constructive with those "joy stealers" in our homes. She was speaking about those things that tempt us to yell at our children. If its the toys strewn all over the floor that stress us, then we need to do something about that. Get bins, label them, insist that the toys stay in the bins unless being played with. Toys that don't really go with anything have to be tossed out.

I finally decided that I was fussing at our boys too much about their messy room. After many warnings, I went in with two big underbed boxes. I told them that Legos go in one, Lincoln Logs go in the other. Everything else they had was to be thrown away. They begged to keep the animals, indians, soldiers, police and a few matchbox cars. So I found a smaller box to fit inside of one of the larger bins, and said, "If you can keep your toys organized in these three boxes then you can keep them. Otherwise, I'm giving them away." You can't imagine how nice it has been for as many as five children to play together in the boys' room with only those three categories of toys. They build cities, forts, boats, and you-name-it. The best part is that the little girls have a doll house in the den with people and furniture. Those little pieces have their own drawer in the den. But the girls bring the people and furniture to the boys' room and play for hours combining everything. The boys have never missed their pile of junk that kept them in so much trouble. And the children are learning how to get along and share.

I did the same with the little girls (that includes our 2,4,and 6 yr olds). They had a kitchen set, dishes, food, dress up clothes and a doll house as mentioned above upstairs. Everyone would come up to the room over the garage and trash the entire room. In fact the boys would bring indians, soldiers, weapons, animals, Lincoln logs, etc. and it would take hours to clean everything up!

I brought the doll house and kitchen stuff down to the den. That way I can keep an eye on what's happening before it gets out of control. I bought a set of stackable drawers for the food, dishes and doll house accessories. Amazing! No more huge messes. And no more late night, Mommy fits from going upstairs to check email at the end of a long day and finding total mayhem in the supposedly cleaned up room!!!

This is where Noah's bed and clothes are kept in our room. His outgrown or next size of clothes are kept in boxes under our bed.

We keep baby or children's clothes for the upcoming season under our bed. This way I know what we need to sew, buy or ask Grandma Butler to look for, in advance.
We really love these towels. (We used a Lands' End giftcard to buy them) They really help to keep the bathroom tidy. I'm usually the one who hangs them up with the names showing nicely. But the children do a good job of keeping them hung up.
These are the dressers that are in the girls' room. They do get cluttered each day mostly with hair elastics, brushes, ribbons and books. But it doesn't stay that way for long b/c I require it to be cleared before breakfast and bed.

This is the girls' closet. For now only Kendal and Kelsey hang their dresses and skirts in here. (The three little girls' church clothes are in the master closet with mine) All the girls keep their shoes neat in the closet floor. It's Anna's job to straighten the shoes. At six, she's a wonderful organizer. Atleast twice a day the shoes have to be brought from the front hall or back door to each person's closet, since we don't allow shoes on in the house. They are taken off at the door.
This is one of the bunks in the girls' room (this one is Mary and Anna's). If they had a bedskirt, the underbed boxes wouldn't ever be seen. So that's on our list of things to do.
These shells were from our first family vacation in Nagshead. A shadow box seemed to be the only practical way, or reason to, save shells. Recently a local gem store was closing and selling these "gem trees" for less than two dollars apiece. It was a luxury we could afford! And Kendal took this photo so we encouraged her photography skills by enlarging it and letting her frame it and hang it over her dresser.
This is one of the dressers in the boys room. They have one on each side of this window. Bob collects WWII tanks, soldiers and jeeps and displays some here. They also keep a few books. But all their trinkets have to fit in the three tiny drawers in this dresser, or out they go.
These are Isaac and Daniel's toy boxes. The only other things that are supposed to be under their bed are two buckets of magnetic letters and a bedrail. This requires daily maintenance too.
This is just the start of a huge fort or some other creation that will ultimately fill the room and have to be put away before dinner. The children don't like this rule, but it makes late night trips in and out of their room much safer for all.
I look forward to the day when they will all keep their own stuff organized without my "encouragement". But that is probably the same season when I will have a quiet house and spend my days hoping to have some grandchildren!

Raising Adults, Not Children

Bob and I are first generation homeschooling parents, just like many of our friends. To our family and friends, who don't run in the same circles, read the same media, or listen to the same sermons, it seems like we are pioneers in an unknown territory. But realistically, there are hundreds, perhaps thousands of families who started schooling at home in the 70's and 80's, far ahead of us. Their children are now grown and they have families of their own. However the largest boom of homeschooling did start in the early 90's. Many of those students have since graduated highschool and college, and have families of their own. The academic results are in, no contest, homeschooling/tutoring one on one, surpasses, and at the least, equals government education success. But we are more interested in how the homeschoolers fair as grown-ups in God's kingdom and by biblical standards.

Our ears perk-up at the sound of an adult, former homeschooler's story being told. We are so curious to see how this all turns out. We are hoping that our efforts will pay off. We have many dreams. Mostly, we hope that keeping our children out of the world, for the most part, when they are very young, will help them to learn the basics of biblical living. As they mature, and begin in interact with others, outside of our home, we hope they will be able to discern God-honoring behavior from the habits of sinners. Ultimately, we hope they will choose to serve the Lord with their very lives-as salt and light in a dark world.

Thankfully, folks like Mike and Debi Pearl at No Greater Joy Ministries, among many other things, are collecting information from homeschool graduates and their families, and reporting in their newsletter about the good, bad and the ugly. I cannot say enough about how their "Jumping Ship" series (now a book) has helped us at just the right time. And this month, their first installment, in a series of articles about the outcomes of homeschooling, was right on. We don't always agree with everything they write, and they wouldn't want us to. But overall, our family has been strengthened more by their example than any other individual ministry.

We have noticed that there are many bandwagons that a homeschooling family can jump aboard. Bob and I are constantly sifting through the latest idea about things like what we should eat, wear, teach or let our children do. We need the wisdom that only God can give. Otherwise we are doing no better than our counter-parts, who send their children to school, where the latest trends are honored rather than seeking what is best for each child.

Pulling children out of school, church and community activities for various God-inspired reasons can be good and even make life a little easier than before. But figuring out how to let them go into the world and gradually test their own faith without getting perverted or victimized along the way is tougher.

Then there's the issue of the unique needs of a large family; once the oldest children are old enough to start doing things without Mom and Dad, they are so desperately needed at home with the little ones, that Mom feels she can't afford to send them out! This is where Mike Pearl's article above really helped me this week. We have to treat them as individuals without reinforcing the worldly concept of individualism. This is a fine balance. All children want to be treated as if no one else exists in the world. That is the selfish behavior that the Bible says no Christian should exhibit. Sometimes, well-meaning onlookers act as though our children are being neglected somehow, because there are eight of them. Bob and I (coming from smaller families) agree that their lives are richer because our house is full. It isn't easy, but it forces all of us to submit to God's way. Without adherence to a (perfect) "higher standard" and eternal perspective, our family would self-destruct. We believe in the long run our grown children will be more willing to serve the Lord because of their disciplined home life.

Kendal is nearly fifteen and she is our eldest child. She has never been on a retreat or trip of any sort without her parents. On a couple of occasions she stayed with my mother or Bob's mother overnight, along with her sister. That was years ago. She doesn't have a piano teacher or youth leader. In fact, except for her friends and their parents at church, no one contributes to her daily life except her siblings, father and I. Until today that is...

When I found out my mother was going to be in town this week, I started to wonder if Kendal could or should spend some time with her grandparents alone. Ultimately, Bob, Mom and I agreed that she could go home with Mom today. Mom and Bill live seven and one-half hours from here! We aren't planning to see her until our family takes vacation near their home in three weeks! It's been a very prayerful issue and we are all looking forward to whatever the Lord will do during this special time. Kendal knew nothing of our discussions and only had two days notice. She was thrilled. She packed everything for herself, of course. If she had any concerns, they were about missing little Noah. She has promised to write Kelsey and try to post here on our blog. After she left, I found a note to her daddy and me, thanking us for giving her such an opportunity!

My mother and I are the best of friends. She understands our standards and clearly supports us. If we thought she would work against our purposes, this trip would not be wise. She and Bill will be a blessing to Kendal.

We also have the challenge of explaining to the other children, and possibly Kendal when she returns, that we are not changing to a frenzied life of sending out our children in shifts to stay with anyone. This is the first trip of many, but they will be carefully chosen by Bob and I until our children each reach adulthood. Again, we will have to depend upon God to help us discern what activities will be fruitful in their spiritual lives. And ultimately, when we have more teens than children in our house, we will just have to give in to a new season of life, where everyone will not always be home together...

I realize many parents would read this and think we are very extreme and have sheltered too much. However, we maintain confidence in the fact that God chose us to be their parents and therefore we know, or will discover, what is best for our children. We may have made some mistakes along the way, but we believe our family is better off at this point, since we have the privilege of granting new freedoms that are appreciated, rather than taking away poorly chosen ones. We'll be proceeding with great care and prayer!

Here's the link to the article I mentioned above: www.nogreaterjoy.org/articles/child-training/parent-child-relations/article-display/archive////cloistered-homeschool-syndrome/?tx_ttnews%5BbackPID%5D=7

Noah Meets Grandma Brenda!

My (Marcella's) mother has been visiting with us since last Friday. We are all enjoying her visit. She was making Noah laugh by raising him in the air, in the photos below.

Darlene (a dear friend of Mom's) and her sister, Verna, are with my mother, and admiring Noah also. We have stayed with Darlene and her husband a couple of times in Abingdon and look forward to spending time with them again, and also Mom and Bill at the cabin in Floyd Co. next month. Noah will be four months tomorrow. He is such a precious gift to our family!

Is it really a good deal?

Have you ever thought you were getting a really good deal on something only to discover at a later date that it wasn't as thrifty as you'd hoped? For example:


We often shop at thrift stores and do not try clothes on before we buy them. At a thrift store there are no returns. We usually come home and say things like, "We bought five skirts and five shirts for the price of one new outfit!" Then after we wash and try the items on, we find out there were tears from the tag/staples put in at the store, or that the some clothes are too tight to be worn modestly. Suddenly our average price per item is rising. These mistakes teach us to shop more wisely next time. And ultimately it is still a better deal than shopping at a real store, but disappointing just the same.


Another common experience is in sewing. We'll find a pattern that we already own and even material that was left-over and start to create an outfit, usually for a little member of our family. Four days later the project is just not what we'd dreamt it would become. Too many adjustment have to be made to compensate for too little fabric. Even if we keep the finished product long enough to take a picture, it just isn't useful after that. On the other hand, sometimes the addition of a little skirt to an unused onesie becomes a beautiful dress.


Recently, we found instructions for making a tiered skirt. You know, the kind that are different, yet coordinating fabrics on four levels. The fabrics used on the example made it look like it would be pretty even without yards and yards of gathered fabric. They used striped fabrics on two layers. That added a gathered effect. It sounded like an inexpensive way to make a nice full skirt. Next, we went to the clearance table of our neigborhood fabric store and started "matching" materials for the levels of four skirts. (BTW, that took me hours because I, Marcella, am color challenged for sure) We're posting some photos today of the finished products.

We concluded that all three of us (Kendal, Kelsey and Marcella) prefer the very full, gathered tiered skirts. So we decided that in the future we'll adjust the pattern from online to suit our tastes. We were able to change around some of the fabric and make Kendal's skirt fuller.

For thirty dollars I had purchased enough fabric to make two nightgowns for little girls, and material for three tiered skirts. That was a great deal! Most of the fabric was $2-3 a yard. My skirt materials were mostly fall colors. So I went back for some last minute summer fabrics. It was so bright and unusual for me that I was concerned I'd never wear it. Thankfully a friend invited us to a Hawaiian theme birthday party that week and I developed a love for the comfort of my new, crazy skirt.

The toughest part is to make a cool, cotton skirt that doesn't require a slip. If you have to wear a nylon slip it just defeats the whole purpose of wearing cool cotton! So I'm going to make a slip of muslin this week!

In the end, I think we'll have two nightgowns and four skirts for about thirty-five dollars! That's not bad at all.


This is Kendal's skirt. Hers has four widths of fabric on the bottom, three on the third tier, two on the second and one on the top.
This is my "summer" skirt. According to the pattern, you can also pull it up to chest level and make it a dress. We didn't include any photos of that! :)
This is Kelsey's skirt. Each of us sewed our own. These were the first projects that the girls had made on their new sewing machine!

Friends are forever

In keeping with tradition, here are some recent photos of our family. Noah is three months! He rarely lets us lay him down when he's awake because he wants to be sitting up!
We were too late in taking the "naked baby" photos, but this one is sweet! He looks huge to me!
Yes, Mary still wants to hold Noah alot! Anna is very good with him too.

This may sound strange but I (Marcella) have collected an assortment of stories about how God has brought someone from my/our past back into our life. The reason that is amazing to me is because when I was growing up we moved every other year, atleast. Often I would attend a school for only one year, then as my grade changed, that would require a move to another school within that city. Once I went from elementary to middle school and in the next city moved from elementary to highschool. The following year I joined other ninth graders who were just attending highschool for the first time. By the time I graduated highschool I had attended nine schools and lived in eight different places that I could remember. After investing in a "letter" jacket at the first of three highschools, I gave up. :)

Because we moved so often I developed a mentality of thinking that "goodbye" was final. There was no email so ultimately I lost contact with nearly every friend from the past. Imagine my shock when one of my fourth grade classmates and I ran into one another in a college dorm hall during our first year. Better yet, my best friend at church in seventh and eight grade, reappeared on my dorm floor that same year. That friend who lived on the same floor in college, has reappeared twice, to my sister through her job at a Virginia lawfirm; the strangest part is that my friend lives in NC. My mother moved back to a town we once lived in and attended a community Bible study, which was attended by another dear friend of mine from church in seventh and eighth grades; she is now a missionary in Brazil with her husband and daughter. We are on their ministry's email list as a result of that one meeting with my mom. Recently, a young man that I attended highschool in Georgia with, showed up here in Tidewater. He is married, has a daughter and is living for the Lord. Bob and I enjoyed a wonderful evening with them last month. We discovered one another on the highschool reunion webpage. About five years ago, we were in a church plant, and on Easter we met a lovely family of seven who was getting ready to move out of our area. The mother and I connected immediately that day, but I thought we'd never see one another again. Imagine my surprise to see her sweet face in a fabric store only one mile from our house a couple years later. They haven't ever moved back to our town, but thankfully, God continues to have our lives intersect. We have seen each other in some very unlikely places including Nagshead!

Why does God do this? It definitely helps me to remember that every interaction I have needs to be God-honoring. I would always want someone to be glad to see me again, or to remember good things from our last meeting.

I also think it's a little taste of heaven. God is truly able to see the beginning from the end. What can feel like a lifetime down here is just a vapor to Him. He is weaving our lives together in a way that we often don't understand. Being reunited with someone who loves the Lord is such a faith-building experience. It's encouraging at the least. And when the Lord brings someone in my path from the past who is not walking with God, I am reminded in a dramatic way, to pray for them. Sometimes I even have the opportunity to speak Truth into their current circumstances.

Now that I've lived in the same area since I was sixteen, with the exception of four years of college, I'm starting to get the message that I must not burn bridges or think that anyone I meet is unimportant. I even had to train myself to be glad that I saw someone I knew when I went out in public. I had become so accustomed to annoniminity that I felt a little crowded if I was recognized. I don't like to admit it, but in social settings I would often purposely direct my attention to those people that I was fairly sure I'd be friends with for a long time. I suppose it was a habit I'd made during my school years since time was always so short. As it turns out, good friends have turned up in some unlikely situations and I was a fool to take anyone for granted.

Our family has been friends with atleast three other families who moved out of the state, even the country, yet we've had the privilege of fellowshipping with them again. We never imagined we'd see them on this side of heaven. What a blessing! I'm always thankful that I took the time to respond to their emails and keep some form of contact going, although it seemed there would be no reason to do so. God has made all of those little efforts worthwhile with every reunion. Every friendship has value. Every person is valuable. Every interaction has significance. I'm starting to get it. Thank you Lord for being patient with me!