Mischevious Years Ahead

If this photo doesn't convince you that the future for us parents (Finkler's & the Rudd's) holds at least a considerable amount of mischevious boy acts, then I'm not sure what would. As these boys live next door to each other, the opportunity abounds for future 'adventures' together...

New Clothes...

The camo set with the underwear are not newer clothes but a current favorite to put together.
And Josiah insisted on being a part of the photo as well with that's right, 1/2 the swiffer - not sure what happened to the other 1/2!


Josiah in 'still' mode...notice the favorite hat as completing the outfit?


Here's the whole lineup - the boys got some new dress pants and workshirts (as they call them because they want to be like Daddy) that actually fit them for upcoming nice events. And Josiah being who he is, took them all out and made them all into outfits for us.

And the outfits again.

Can anyone say detail orientated?! I don't know how much of this I've passed on to him, but the genes are coming through pretty strong here!!

Marriage Course...

For those of you that don't know, Larry and I have been involved in an in-depth marriage course at our church, Living Light, since mid-January. And we are hoping to get finished before the babies come! (both myself is due mid-July as well as another couple in the church so that is a firm deadline to meet - ha!)

At any rate, we have been greatly challenged, provoked and stirred in our hearts towards marriage and each other since the beg of the course - which is great. With 3 young children and everything else to juggle in our lives along with a newborn due to arrive soon, we just needed some time to invest into our marriage as otherwise the time just seems to escape us.

I wanted to share something that I had read recently in a chapter of our book for studying for the course that was greatly encouraging to me -

'God measures our worth by the depth of our service. When you are scrubbing out the tub or heating up dinner for a husband who is late again...(or in my case never home for dinner!)...when your emotions are shouting, "What do I do that has any value?"...remind yourself that you are annointing the head of Jesus with service, and it is a beautiful fragrance to him.'

Yes that's completely and absolutely right. I need so often to have a shift in my perspective to recognize who it is ultimately that I am serving in my life - otherwise the emotions do crowd in and slowly but surely everything turns inward focused - a dangerous place for any of us to be.

May this be encouraging to you as well in focusing again on why we do what we do, it's a beautiful picture to consider annointing Jesus Himself every time we are routinely serving our husbands, our children, our friends - and sometimes with little or no recognition (just like Him!), but beautiful to Him nonetheless and of great worth in His sight!

My Husband & Easter Egg Candy...

So in talking with my husband over the day last night after we got the children to bed, he confessed to me along with his addiction to easter egg candy (jelly beans, chocolate, etc) a very funny incident that happened that morning.
We keep a bowl of jelly beans on a shelf in the dining RM. They are way too convenient at this point to walk by and grab some to put in your mouth and the children know they are up there too. Good and bad in that but jelly beans can be very great incentives for clearing your plate! (for the big boy too but then again that's never really been an issue anyways!!).
After Easter this past Sunday, Larry took the rest of the easter candy that we had rec'd and poured it all into this bowl. Included in that stash were several chocolate foil wrapped candies among the jelly beans too...
So yesterday AM as Larry was headed out to work, he reached in and grabbed a handful of candy on the way out the door (in place of coffee or his morning boost of energy). AND as everything was all mixed together, the funny part is that he ended up chomping down on jelly beans, chocolate and of course the FOIL that covered the chocolate all together in his mouth...I was laughing so hard as he told me. These kinds of things only happen to Larry usually! In the end thankfully he didn't end up eating all of the foil but what a mess to sort out at that point!! :)
We all know that Larry is quite the funny guy and love him for it!

God's Part in the Snow

After having a gorgeous week to be outside, this past Saturday morning we all woke up to fresh snow on the ground and COLD. Josiah was heartbroken, he loves spring and summer so much. He would live in shorts & tshirts all year long if we let him.
So as he's explaining to me that there is snow on the ground, he looks outside and makes this remark (I can tell that he's trying to console himself) - "I think that God tried to make it summer but He just made a mistake". Poor guy, I then had to explain how God does NOT make mistakes but that really He thought it best to have winter continue for a few more weeks.
Soon enough we'll be back outside again in the spring turning summer weather, for which I can't wait! These children need some consistent time outside again in the sun (and so does their Mommy!).

What do you think - look alikes?

Josiah looked so much like me in his early days but now there is no mistaking with that black hair and green eyes exactly who he resembles in the family.

He is a great joy and so much fun! We love him tremendously and can't believe that he is already 5 years old...how the time flies...

Pie :)

Last night Larry and I finally got around to putting in a triple berry pie that we had bought up at Door County. Wasn't even sure if it would still be eating worthy but based on how lovely those pies are were definitely NOT going to throw it out before we tried it.
As the pie was baking, we were still eating dinner and told the boys they could have a special treat if they ate all their dinner (and for Josiah that means not taking forever either).
Well the sad end of that story is that neither one of them ended up with pie because they just didn't do a great job eating (and Josiah WAS the last one at the table, again!).
The funny part about this is that Noah woke up early this morning, came into our room and with no hi, good morning, nothing, his VERY FIRST question is, 'Hey guys, did you eat pie last night?'. We said yes and his next comment was, 'I like pie.'
I felt a little sorry for him that he missed out on it because yes, I know that the kid loves pie. He loves all sorts of fruit desserts. He requests that I make him blueberry muffins even. I just thought it hilariously funny that perhaps even all night he dreamed of pie too - but the first thought in his head was pie, pie, pie! :)