Forty Days

Will you take the challenge?


Forty Days of Water from Blood:Water Mission on Vimeo.

No diet coke for this momma for forty days! (You might want to watch out if you see me in the next few days! It could be ugly!)

A Moon-lit Walk

One of the benefits to homeschooling is that we are able to be flexible with our schedule and we don't always have to worry about bed-times. On Thursday night when we were eating dinner, Beckett suggested that since it was a full moon, we ought to go to Cades Cove in the Great Smoky Mountains and enjoy a moon-lit walk! We had done this a couple of years ago and it was the perfect night, so we said, "Why not?" and we hit the road. By 9:15 pm we were in Cades Cove, bundled up and ready to go. It had been a beautiful warm day, but I thought it would be cooler in the mountains. We quickly shed a few layers of clothes because the temp was 60 degrees at 10 pm! Crazy weather for February.....but we certainly took advantage of it! So here is a picture of the kiddos in front of a Cades Cove sign. It does say that it closes at dusk, but that is to cars only. Sometimes people will bike the 11 mile loop on a full moon, but there were hardly any people there this night. And yes, Will is in the picture, but I am not very good with a camera and I don't know how to take pics at night, so trust me, he is in the stoller between Beckett and Helen!

Beckett and Helen took turns riding the scooter while we pushed Will in the stroller! The scenes were beautiful! I wish my camera could have captured the beauty of the mountains in the moon light, but I will have to rely on these very amateur pictures to help us remember! Here is a shot of the full moon. It lit up the cove so well and we didn't even need flashlights or head-lamps!

We saw a coyote cross the road in front of us as we were driving to the cove, but this is the only wildlife we saw on our walk that night. He is all lit up from my flash....not the moon. Again, I'm clueless with the camera!

Still trying to get a cool "night picture"....I took this one of Sean and the kids walking in front of me. We had a wonderful night enjoying God's creation and experiencing it at night! We ran into a park ranger who let us look through his night vision scope. That was SO cool! We are blessed to live so close to such an amazing place! We got home around 12:30 am with many fun stories and memories!

Here is Helen's LAST "6th" birthday cake. I promise! :) She had Abigail and Kaelyn spend the night last weekend and she wanted a "dirt cake" to celebrate with her friends. They had a great time! Such sweet girls!

For Valentine's Day, we went to a local Retirement Center with many of our homeschool friends and visited with the residents while they were eating lunch. Here is a shot of several of the kids as they gathered to sing an impromptu song.

A little closer shot. Not all of our kiddos joined in. We had about 35 children aging from a four month old infant up to a 12 year old! It was  great for our kids to have this opportunity and I think the residents really enojoyed visiting with them and most of all hugging them! There were LOTS of hugs!

Each family made a bunch of homemade Valentines to pass out to the residents and they seemed to enjoy receiving them! Here is a picture of Helen with Kaelyn and Abigail as they shared sign language to a song called "God You Reign."

One warm evening this week Helen and Will enjoyed a tea party!

Love those sweet smiles!

Just a fun picture of Will enjoying an apple as he sat on the counter while I made dinner!

Finally, just wanted to share Will's version of Old MacDonald. He calls it "Ah Gah Mommy had a cow." (The second time it sounds a little more like old MacDonald.) And I'm not sure why he turned away from us to sing, but I love how he holds up the paper like he is reading the words to the song. Love this sweet boy!

Picture Catch Up!

Just a few pictures to catch up from the last couple of weeks. Sean took the day off on Monday so that we could enjoy a family day! We decided to hike some trails at a lake near our home. I took this picture right before we took off on our hike. If you look behind the kids you will see a man-made levee that is there to prevent flooding. In order to get to the trails, you must walk beside the levee to the trail head. Well, Sean and the kids decided to be "adventurous" and jump over the wide gaps in the asphalt. They had jumped over quite a few when all of a sudden, Sean knew that he had done something terribly wrong to his calf muscle. It had snapped and been stretched very badly. It immediately began to swell and he could barely walk. Needless to say, the hike was quickly canceled and we headed home to prop up his leg and ice it down. He was off of work for two more days! Fortunately, he is doing better and was able to limp into work today. We were all really looking forward to the hike! Maybe another day......but in the meantime, it has been fun teasing "old dad" a bit! (all while bringing him ice, pillows and the remote control!) 

Here are a few pictures from one of our swimming days. We have a local pool that is enclosed during the winter months with a big bubble covering. One of the local homeschool co-ops has reserved the pool one day a week for a couple of hours. We have gone a couple of times and the kids LOVE it! Here is a picture of Will in his swimsuit. This boy has all kinds of funny faces!

 Helen with Abigail, Kaelyn and Will!

 Will never stops smiling the whole time he is in the water! He LOVES it!

 Oh this boy! Quite confident in his little self. Beckett is striking a pose and having fun!

Now all the little ones. Can you imagine keeping an eye on all these sweeties at the pool? It can be a little un-nerving! They have so much fun and it sure makes for good naps on those swimming afternoons! These kiddos range in ages 1-4 and are all so sweet! This picture was taken right after they had all been dressed and were beginning to bundle up to go home!

Just a few pictures to show that Miss Helen has sufficiently been celebrated for her sixth birthday! She actually is having her birthday sleep-over this weekend (almost a month later) because her first scheduled sleep-over had to be canceled. I'm guessing there will be more cake and singing Happy Birthday, then too!

And I just added this picture because it is too sweet. This is Helen with her buddy River. They had been playing in River's play kitchen and were taking everyone's orders. Precious kiddos!

Created for Care!

I returned yesterday evening from a wonderful weekend in Georgia. I had the amazing opportunity to attend this retreat:

I was so blessed by the speakers, break-out sessions, worship opportunities and by meeting and spending time with other adoptive mommies who share the same heart for orphans and adoption. I am so thankful that Amber invited me and sent a couple of emails on my behalf to get me registered even after registration had closed and also that Sean encouraged me to step out of my comfort zone and GO! I was able to stay with my sister Susi, who lives just about 15 minutes from where the retreat was located and we enjoyed some time together this weekend as well!

This video was played for us on Friday night at the retreat. All of the families in this video had mommies at the retreat! (If you know where to look, and you look really fast, you can see our family in the group picture that was taken at the AGCI picnic this last summer!) Thanks to Andrea who had a vision to CARE for the mommies who have been called to CARE for these sweet children by opening their homes and hearts...to change orphans to sons and daughters. I was equipped with many adoption resources through excellent break out sessions, but most importantly I was encouraged in my walk with my Heavenly Father who led my family on this amazing journey!

Happy Groundhog Day!

Happy 6th Birthday Helen!

First, I must address the song selection on my blog today. I told Helen that in honor of her birthday, I would let her choose a song to put on the blog. She chose this Justin Bieber song. I like to choose songs that might go along with the post, but today, it's about Helen's favorite song. So enjoy Justin and Jaden Smith singing "Never Say Never!" :)

Today our baby girl turned six years old! She is growing up so quickly! We have had a great day celebrating Helen and we still have more partying to do! I took this picture of Helen with the birthday flag earlier this afternoon.

 We started the morning with some presents!

 Beckett and Will watching as Helen opens their gift.

 Helen loved the clay craft kit that the boys gave her and she was all about hugging everyone and thanking them for her gifts!

 Here she is checking out her new secret diary that Sean and I gave her!

Josh, Kathy, Ty and Marley gave her this cool peace sign shirt and bracelet. She put them both on immediately!

 Helen picked her birthday breakfast. She wanted scrambled eggs, bacon and cinnamon rolls. Here she is with six candles on her cinnamon roll!

 Later in the day while Beckett was at his boys book club, we took Helen out for a yummy pizza lunch!

 Hanging with her daddy at the restaurant.

 On a side note, has anyone noticed that I cannot take a picture of my oldest son these days without him crossing his eyes or making some incredibly goofy face? Case in point.........

Well, today I give you a partial explanation for these goofy faces. I caught another one on camera today. Looks like Beckett comes by it naturally..........

Happy Birthday sweet Helen! You are a blessing to our family and we love you so much!

Happy New Year! (11 Days Late!)

How did the Harpers ring in 2011? Well, it was pretty crazy.....but fun! On New Year's Eve morning, Sean and Beckett began to talk about jumping in a lake on New Year's day! What? Were they crazy? Yes. But as the day went on, the whole idea took shape and it turned out to be one of our most memorable New Year's events yet! Jumping (running) into the lake for no other reason than to get wet and cold seemed pretty nuts to me, but as Sean and I talked about the spiritual applications that went along with what we were thinking about doing, it became clear that this would be an awesome way to ring in the new year! So on December 31st, we sent out an email to many friends and family with the following message:

God calls us to join Him in what He is doing. Many times He calls us into deep, cold water and at times it is uncomfortable and out of our “warmth” or comfort zone. As we welcome a new year and the adventure that it holds for each of our families, we thought that this experience could be a great way to embrace and acknowledge that God wants us to join Him and be his hands and feet on earth even if it gets a bit uncomfortable. Matthew 14 tells the story of Peter being given the opportunity to get out of the boat and walk to Jesus on the water. Peter, against all logic and reason, jumped out and started walking. The rest of the disciples stayed in the boat and watched. Our role as believers while we are here on earth is not to sit in the boat and watch, but to get out of the boat even if it makes no sense at all. (running into 40 degree water for no reason!)

So on New Year's Day at about 11 AM, we gathered at a local park's recreation area with four other families and took the plunge! (FYI, the local temp was about 45 degrees.) Sean led us in a prayer before we went in, just asking our Heavenly Father to call us out of our comfort zones and to dive in to all that He has planned for our families this year!

And as soon as he closed the prayer, everyone turned and made a break for it! Thanks to Libby (maybe the only "sane" one of us) who took these pictures! She had five week old baby Ian all bundled up and strapped on to her, so there was no water for her.

After the plunge, we took a few minutes to take some family pictures.

 The Baileys were there. Love this family! So excited to see God working in mighty ways in the life of this family! Can't wait to see what all 2011 has in store for them!

 "Some" of the Parsons were with us. This family has seven children and four of them are under the age of four.....so Janice stayed home with the little ones while Matthew brought two of their crew!

 2011 has one sure blessing in store for this sweet family! The Kuhns are hoping to hear news about baby Christopher very soon. They are waiting on a referral for their baby boy from Ethiopia and we are so happy for their family!

The boys had a blast! Most of them took more than one plunge that morning. They kept running back into the water! This event is what every boy dreams about! (Did I mention that this whole thing was Beckett's initial idea?)

The girls. No crazy "muscle" poses here. They are the smart ones....all wrapped up in towels! And there is Abigail. Her momma is Libby who took many of our pictures. I'm sorry that I didn't get a pic of them together. Stephen stayed home with two of their kiddos while Libby brought Abigail so she could jump in with her friends!

 It was pouring down rain all morning, but right about the time we arrived at the lake, the rain stopped. Will was dressed to stay all warm and dry, but at one point, he waded in about knee deep. He had fun throwing rocks in the lake.

 The rain began again as we headed back to our cars. Loved this shot of Will and Sean walking together in the rain!

 So that was our crazy New Year's Day activity. Believe it or not, we are planning to do it again next year. We are hoping that it will just get bigger and bigger each year and that more people will want to participate with us!

Just wanted to end with a couple of pictures that I've taken in the last few days. The first is one of Beckett reading to Will. I found them all piled up in Will's bed reading his favorite books. I was able to sneak a picture before they saw me.

 This picture was taken the same day as Will returned the favor and "read" a book to Helen's baby Jaden. Actually, Will was "reading" his favorite coloring book about cows! Sweet!

Happy 2011! I hope that you will all "dive in" to what God has in store for you this year! What are you waiting for? What have you got to lose? When you take that first step Into the unknown, you know that He won't let you go!