My New Addiction

Pinterest. Just that word makes my heart start pounding with crafty excitement. Haha! Just kidding. But seriously, Pinterest is my new addiction. When I first heard of this website, I thought to myself, "What in the world? How boring." But no. It is fantastic. Now, if you know me, you know that I am NOT a crafty person. I despise all home improvement projects and whenever I start a craft it usually ends up sitting in a dusty drawer somewhere waiting to be completed. But then I discovered this wonderful place that has so many cool ideas! Now I am addicted as well as my mom. Our boards are slightly different though. Hers is composed of mostly homeschool ideas, little kid crafts, and ideas on how to photograph and organize a big family. Mine is filled with funny quotes, expensive clothes I will never own, and delicious looking recipes I will probably be too lazy to ever try (except these Rollo stuffed cookies. I made them twice and they are so yummy!). Anyway, my mom wanted me to share with you some of her favorite pins.

So there are some of her favorites. Now, I must admit, I have many (many, many, many, many) more pins than my mom does. It may have something to do with the fact that I have a lot more free time than she does... But here are some of my favorites! 

This just perfectly sums up my first day of pinning.

So there you go! Those are some of our very favorites. Now, if you haven't joined Pinterest yet, I suggest you think long and hard about it. Do it once and you'll just want to keep going back for more. Happy Pinning!  

Right At This Moment

     Today is Monday. At our house, that means that we are all in a bit of a slump trying to get back into the weekly schedule of school. Forcing yourself to get up and get stuff done after a fun weekend is pretty difficult sometimes. I don't know anyone who likes doing that. Consequently, I've been too busy to come up with something really fun and interesting to blog about. So my mom said I should just let you all know what we are doing right at this moment. As I am typing, the boys are supposed to be cleaning their room. Supposed to be. Usually what they do is sit in the middle of the mess, pick up something, pretend to put it away, and then play with it for twenty minutes until my mom or someone walks in and catches them. What else can you expect from a seven and a four year old boy? I've said many times that they have the attention span of a gnat. 

While the boys are attempting to clean their room, Kate is putting away all her clean clothes. She seems happy to finally have something to wear. 

Many people have commented on how much laundry we must have. The lucky person who gets to do it all is Ally, but she wants to remain anonymous. 

In the midst of all the madness, Jonah was getting a little upset about being ignored. So Isaac headed over to Mom and Dad's room to help out. 

A noise you hear a LOT around here, is the banging of a ball bouncing off the walls of the basement. Whether the kids are playing dodgeball, soccer, or catch, the sound of a ball hitting something is usually heard. Landon loves soccer, so he is found shooting a ball into a makeshift goal. 

After my mom went around and took all the pictures, she proceeded to come into my room (followed by a herd of kids.) to tell me exactly how I should caption each photo. I figured it wouldn't be a complete blog without a picture of the person who contributes most to the household, so I had to take one of her. She complained that she can't take a picture with her eyes open. So I took five pictures of her. In five out of five pictures, her eyes were... closed. Haha! So I just chose the best one. Love you Mom! 

     

How It All Started

     Ok. This is my first attempt at writing a blog, so bear with me. Honestly, I haven't even read other people's blogs, but my mom has. I'm sure she'll have plenty of opinions. I suppose my first post should be an introduction of our family and how we became a big, crazy homeschooled family.
     It all started when my parents met at a small college in southern Kansas. My mom was studying to be a teacher while my dad was busy getting the credits he needed for medical school. Actually, he hadn't decided what he wanted to do until he met my mom's mom. She was the one who suggested he go to medical school. Who wouldn't want their daughter to marry a doctor? Anyway, he thought that sounded like something he would enjoy. So, they got married and moved to Kansas City so he could study at KU. My mom taught at a middle school while they were there. In 1995, they were blessed with something pretty amazing. Me. Just kidding... It was really hard for them both. My dad skipped classes to watch me, while my mom taught. He managed to study from other people's notes while watching me. Sound like fun? I didn't think so. He usually met my mom at the door. Not with a hug, but with a, "Here. Take her. I'm done." They managed to make it work until my mom quit teaching to stay home with me.
     Soon, we moved to Wichita to finish up medical school and to do residency. During the five years we lived there, we added two more kids to the family. Allyson (Ally) was born in 1996, and Emma followed soon after in 1998. When residency was done, we decided to move to a smaller town. The same town where they had met in college. We moved into a house that was only a few houses down from my mom's parents in the summer of 2000. A few months afterwards, in November, Landon was born. While living in that house, we added three more kids to our growing family. Kathryn (Kate) was born in 2003, Isaac in 2005, and Jackson in 2007.
     One of my parents biggest dreams was to build a house on their own land. They had planned and saved for this dream for a really long time. A few years after we moved, they bought land, but hadn't been ready to build. I still remember calculating how old I would be when we finally got to build our house. I was so excited that when we moved I would have my ears pierced! During the summer of 2008, we finally saw my parents' dream start to take shape. The house was going up! For months after that, our doorbell would ring everyday. Fans, light fixtures, bathroom mirrors, sinks, faucets, and many other items would be delivered. My mom found this exciting, but I didn't quite understand why. I mean, what's so great about faucets? She told me I'd understand if I built my own house someday. We moved into our house the summer of 2009.
    At that point in time, we all thought our family was complete. Almost all of us were positive Jack was the last one. Except Emma. Emma has always had dreams of having 10 kids. So, of course, she was begging Mom and Dad for more. She wanted another so badly, that she was praying every night for God to give us just one more. During our spring break vacation of 2011, my parents informed us that her prayers had been answered! We were expecting another Davis to arrive in November. I was beyond surprised. I had the feeling you read about in books, where the character feels like everything is a dream and can't wake up. Not in a bad way. A good way. So, on November 22, 2011, we welcomed the latest addition to our family. Jonah Craig Davis. Since then, we've been busy with a new baby and trying to keep our heads above water. So far, so good!