Introducing Praying to Children

Praying isn't something that has always come naturally to me. Even now, at times, it can feel awkward.

I never thought of praying as something that is taught, but when Andrew and I realized that we needed to raise Christian children, we were faced with huge problem. We weren't really raised, either of us, in Godly homes. Sure, our parents believe in God, but my parents never set time aside to read the Bible, pray, go to Church, or anything similar. So, when faced with this task, it was huge and overwhelming.

I realized right away that introducing prayer to our children should be a number one priority, but that means that I had to change as well. I couldn't always internally speak to God; I had to do this out loud as well.

It was so hard at first! Boy, the first time I told Caelyn to come pray with me, she looked at me as if I had 3 heads, but she did it.

I remember the first time that I sat at our large front window with her and we talked about everything she could see outside and then I said "Caelyn, God made everything you see. God made the trees, the grass, the sun." She was hooked and asked me if He made the rocks, the bushes, the birds - then we saw a birdie get a worm for its babies.
Then, I told her we have to thank God for what He gives us. She thanked him for the sun.... and her toys! (She thanks daily for her toys haha!)

We continued doing this daily, even a few times a day!

Then, we began to truly pray together.
It started when I realized one of my friend's had to bring her baby to the hospital for seizure. I called Caelyn over and we held hands and I prayed for the baby. After, she asked me all kinds of questions. It felt perfect.
Then, we began to do so all the time - we pray together when I know someone needs it or when I need it or her! The days I am feeling truly impatient or angry, when she is really struggling with her behavior, when Brayden is having a bad day - we pray. We pray before we leave the house.

I thought it would be so hard but I realize its not at all. Its always the perfect way to grow the bond closer with your child. I can't wait to see what our prayer life develops into!

We are now beginning to pray as a family at dinnertime; it is our next step. Then after that, we will begin bedtime prayers. I desire for prayer to be an everyday thing, not just something that takes place during Thanksgiving and Christmas.

A Merry Hayes Christmas

Merry Christmas! (a few days late!) We have had a very busy week and it has been full of joy (and some boo-boos - more on that later!)

 

We had Christmas Eve at our house. After everyone left, it was time to play Santa and set up the presents for the next day. 

 

 Big presents this year were:
Caelyn - a doll house and barn among a few other times and clothes
Brayden - a standing table and a few other toys plus clothes
Andrew - a scanner and crossbow
Me - a new camera and radio for under the kitchen counter plus other items!

After we opened our presents, I reflected for awhile and told Andrew how really blessed we are. We have beautiful children and Andrew has a solid job to allow us to give our children presents such as this. Not every family can afford presents for their babies on Christmas - we are blessed to be able to do so and very thankful that we can.

 Next it was off to Nonna and Pap Joe's house. They got both kids a number of presents and toys - Caelyn got her first big girl bike with training wheels!!

 Probably one of my favorite presents we gave this year was made by my aunt - matching aprons for Donna & Caelyn. Donna's is embroidered with Nonna and Caelyn's says Nonna's Helper with matching oven mitts. They bake all the time - usually weekly if not more - together!! She was so happy and loved it!

 It was off to my parents house after Andrew's parents. Brayden, at this point, wasn't happy and he whined nearly the whole time.

 My parents bought me the new iPhone 5 and I love it! My parents bought Andrew a tree-stand and boy was he happy! Caelyn got a leap pad and Brayden a number of toys and clothes for when he gets slightly bigger

 Naps were in order throughout the day - very much so! Poor kid was so pooped and overstimulated.

We had such a blessed day with family. This year, Caelyn really was excited for Christmas and opening presents. It was so much fun watching her joy and excitement each present.
Brayden was very excited to see new pacifiers in his stocking!

I hope all of my readers had a blessed and happy holiday with their families and friends.

Raising Godly Children

(Image Credit)

 

Raising children is hard work. Raising children in today's society is even harder. Raising children in today's society to become Christian children is like a battlefield.

I don't want to be cliche and say that the devil is attacking daily, but it is the truth. The problem is that everyone makes it seem as if he is coming after your children; to an extent, he is going after our children, but he is really is coming after YOU.

 

Why the parents you ask?

We are the first line of defense for our children. Every single action we take and word we speak rubs off on your children. What a crazy thought, right? Children are like sponges and they take it all in. I know Caelyn can remember things I might have said two weeks ago and she will randomly bring it up. I then try to search my brain as to when I said that!

My journey into becoming a Christian mother is a HARD journey. It is like Indiana Jones on steroids. With Andrew and I recently changing our lives around and getting re-baptized (I was Catholic before), I find as it every day is filled with dangerous land mines I could fall into and I would take my entire family down for the day with me.
My biggest battle is every morning. You see, I HATE mornings. Mornings are terrible to me. So, every morning bright and early, Caelyn comes climbing into bed with me. Some days Andrew is home and I might get to sleep in with Brayden, other days, its just me. Those days its an internal war. I just want sleep. Brayden cosleeps and he is usually asleep as well. So, in comes Caelyn with her knees and arms hitting me and Brayden in the face. He starts to cry because, honestly, who likes to get woken up by getting kicked in the face? Then I start to yell and anger takes over. Plus, Maggie is in the crate crying. My mornings are not this peaceful waking I dream of. Maybe one day.


So, everyday I start the day on the wrong foot, or nearly every day. That makes the rest of the day difficult. Usually after I drink my first cup of caffeinated hot tea, I start to feel human and apologize to Caelyn for sucking.
Apologizing to our children is EXTREMELY important. That is a whole other post.

Today's society is godless - for the most part. They are trying to remove God from any and everything. So, raising children to love and honor God is extremely difficult when everything they see tells them to do the exact opposite.
We have to protect our children and teach them the right ways. We have to shelter them. Some people say that children need to see the real world - poop on them.
Seriously.
My children have their whole adulthood, which by the way is longer than childhood, to experience the real world. Sheltering is good.


This is why I changed the name of my blog. Some readers might be like, that is not the name of the blog I read a few days ago. You are right. I changed it because my heart has changed. Thrifty is still part of my daily life; it has to be since we are a one income family and many posts will still be about thrifty recipes, meal planning, and everything else. But, growing closer to God and raising my children to love God is my first and foremost goal in my life. I want to share that journey with you all and hopefully, you will learn a thing or two as I do!

Changes Always Happening

Its crazy how fast things can change in a household with babies. Babies are amazing - they do more changing and growing in one week than adults do in months, maybe a year. No wonder their sleep is often so messed up; its hard work growing!

 

 

We have been a busy household lately, from Church, to basketball practice (Andrew is coaching), to cleaning, date night and everything in between. This week upcoming is even more busy! Our calendar is quite full for the next few weeks, especially with Christmas approaching fast.



 

 I officially deam little man a 'supported sitter' and he sure loves sitting up and playing with sissy. This boy is growing too fast and I want him to slow down. Looking back, Caelyn was supported sitting before him and sitting all by herself right at the end of 5 months. I was pushing her though because I wanted her to grow I was so excited. Now, I have learned to appreciate the current stage that my babies are in versus wanting them to get to the next phase.

 He loves to hang out in his high chair and play with the toys that came with it. (PS - its THIS highchair and we love it!)

 He made the recent discovery that he can reach up and grab his feet. Boy, who knew feet could be soo exciting ;-)

 Our little girl has been just as busy. After Andrew and I's date night on Wednesday, we went to Walmart, looking at toys and trying to decide if Santa had enough.
When we got there, I found the Fisher Price Nativity Set. I was soooo excited! I had been wanting to get this for Caelyn forever! She broke parts of my really nice nativity set.
Ever since then, she has played with it everyday. She likes to call baby Jesus baby Moses, but thats ok I suppose ;-)
Its a great tool/toy to use to teach children about the real meaning of Christmas.

 Speaking of the real meaning of Christmas, we decided that one of our Christmas activities this year was going to be making cookies for our neighbors - showing love and kindness during the advent season I think is so important.
We made sugar cookies. Brayden and Caelyn were my little helpers :)
Well.... Brayden ate some pears and Caelyn kept trying to get her hands into the batter to eat!

 What really excites me lately is the ever-growing bond between brother and sister. He is starting to interact with her more and its amazing (and tearful for me) to watch. I LOVE watching her with him and how much he looks at her with amazement and everything he does makes her laugh and then in turn he laughs.

And yes, he pulls her hair ;-) A LOT!

 We are introducing some foods over here. We have tried a few fruits (every veggie causes him to gag, so whatever.. there will come a day when he likes them). He is doing awesome. When he started grabbing food from us and crying and whining when we were eating, I decided to try and he is so happy!

But, boobs are still the best ;-) always to Brayden!

Nighttimes are changing as well. We are beginning new routines to get the kids to sleep better. With Brayden, we cosleep at night, so its a matter of getting him to sleep a few hours at first in his crib while we spend adult time watching TV, crocheting, playing video games, whatever we want to do. We are really trying to focus on his nap times the most. For Caelyn, its about creating a quiet, calm evening after dinner to lead her to an easy bedtime.
Before, we were going from hardcore playing to lets go to bed and thats a hard transition with lots of tears.

Whoa, thats quite an update!
Tomorrow will be grocery shopping day - we desperately need it. I will be posting our meal plan and grocery list ASAP!

Decorating The Christmas Tree

Woohoo, its Christmas Time in the Hayes household. On Monday, Andrew and Caelyn went out and bought a fake tree.

I'll be honest - I HATE fake trees. I grew up with the real deal. I grew up getting up and going out to chop the sucker down at a tree farm, drinking hot chocolate, and having a good old day all about the Christmas tree.

But, Andrew is allergic, so unless I want to not have a husband living with me for a month, I have to deal with the tree.

I'm going to use some Scentsy scent circles - Iced Pine and Festival of Trees - and I am going to stick them inside the tree and make it smell.

 

Anywayyyy, I got the pleasure of watching Andrew put the tree together while nursing the baby. I love nursing sometimes ;-) 

 

 Then we got down to the fun stuff. Caelyn, Andrew, and I put the lights, the garland, and the ornaments on. Its located in our kitchen. Weird, I know.. but it would make the living room way too crowded. After we are done with the addition on the house, it'll go in there (which will be a playroom/family area).

 Little man jumped in his jumperoo for the whole time and he was so good! He enjoyed watching us and the lights.

 Then, it was finished :) Its not perfect, but I love it. We listened to Christmas music and had fun. It may not be real, but its ours and its us making memories, which I love sharing :)

This makes me feel soooooo festive and ready for this holiday season! Yay for Christmas time!!

Meet Miss Maggie Mae!

A few days ago, I checked facebook and a friend of mine had posted asking if anyone had been looking for a dog. She said that a friend of hers had found a dog in a local park, in a hole, in the cold and alone. Sad.

So, I said I would talk to Andrew. We had been entertaining the idea of another dog. We agreed we would want a puppy so that they could get used to growing up around children. We knew Buddy, our current dog, might want a friend as all the other dog friends he has just never want to play with him the way he wants to play.

We were like what the heck, lets go look at her!

We came home with her and we named her Maggie - Maggie Mae to be exact.

She is a spitfire and full of the wonderful puppy energy. She is not housebroken (her number 1 problem!) but we are working on it. We go on the 12th of December for her vet appointment but I am sure they will say she is between 2-3 months old. A baby. And this baby is going to be big one day soon. 

 

 Caelyn is getting used to not being able to lay on her because she has growled. Buddy lets Caelyn do any and all things to him so we are teaching her how to properly treat dogs. She loves to play with her though and just be close to her - but then Caelyn forgets she is close and steps on her.
My house has become a little more insane!

What kind of person leaves a cute little face like this out in the cold (winter) with no food? She is a baby. It makes me so angry! But now, she has become a member of our family. Buddy and Maggie are getting along like best buds; she actually listens and is pretty much good with Caelyn 90% of the time. Puppies are work BUT we are glad we got a puppy as we can train her to be what we want, hopefully ;-) Stay tuned for more cute pictures of Buddy and Maggie!

Our Wedding Day!

Things have been crazy in our home lately and for a great reason. On November 6th, we got married! Yes, voting day! Since then, our lives have been hectic with so many little things going on.

 

I wanted to share a few photos from our day. It was a great day. It was simple, small, and stressfree - three really great S words! We had the ceremony at our church with about 30 of our close family. Afterwards, we went to my family's restaurant, then home! My mom kept Caelyn and Andrew and I went out for a few drinks while his mother sat with Brayden. No fancy wedding night for us. He is too young for me to leave comfortably. We might take a little weekend (well it'd be a week day with his work schedule!) trip in the summer/fall of 2013 - I'm thinking NYC!

 

 

The day was great. Here are a few of my favorite photos. My mother's friend took our photos. We didn't want anything fancy - just enough to remember the day and a few to develop. 

 

 Lighting our unity candle - we had a good laugh because he asked what song we wanted to play and since we didn't have a first dance, we picked our song - Far Away by Nickelback. It actually ended up fitting wel for us.

 I just love this photo - I caption it as - a couple that prays together stays together.

 We keep Christ as the center of our household. I love this photo!

 Us with Brayden - he looks so big in this photo! He had just turned 4 months!

 There is always one person that isn't looking!

 Apparently, Brayden thinks the lights are a lot more exciting than photo taking.

 Bretton, my little sister, and I - I really do love her, I swear!

 My new in-laws: I really like how my mother in law grabbed my hand. I find some really deep symbolism behind it.

 My wild child, my princess, the person who changed my life almost 3 years ago. This little girl means more to me than I could ever describe. I love this picture, despite her little fishy face.

Me and my dress.

 

My dress.. well my mother, sister, and I went dress shopping. We had 3 weeks til the wedding,so whatever we bought had to not need any alterations and needed to fit well.

 

I tried on a bunch of dresses. Dress shopping is STRESSFUL!

Finally, I searched the racks myself instead of the attendant helping me. I found a dress that had been marked down to $199 from $650. I was trying to keep it as cheap as I could for my mother. So, I was like what the heck thats a deep discount, I'll try it on.

What do you know, I LOVED it and my mother and sister LOVED it. It fit like a glove. Perfection. It also had an extra $50 off making it $150. We added a very simple $20 veil and $30 shoes.
My mother was more than pleased with the price tag of my wedding attire :)

 

I am very happy to be married. I am happy that I am legally Bethany Hayes. I am happy that we are an offical family. Many wonderful blessings will come after this. I know our journey is just beginning! 

Happy Easter - 2012!!

Happy Easter all! I hope everyone else had a fabulous day like we did! It started off with just the Caebug and I. Andrew worked :( and because of a large amount of call offs, he was unable to get done early, like he had hoped :(.
But.. We started off the day. She dug into her basket which included two dvds - Team Umizoomi and Max & Ruby, a gardening set, sidewalk chalk, some crayons, and a coloring book. She also got a swing! Plus candy. Duh.
She dug into the candy ASAP which of course resulted in a sugar high!

After awhile, we made our way to Andrew's parents house. They enjoyed watching her dig into their basket at their home - including lots of goodies as well :). Then, Pap Joe hid Easter eggs outside and we went out for an Easter egg hunt!

As a kid, I never did Easter egg hunts every year, but I think its so much fun and she had a BLAST. I think we created a new tradition.

We had such a nice time, despite Andrew missing out on it all. After we spent time with them, we were off to my parents house. They gave her some more goodies and presents, like an awesome bug catching net (my kid is a bug fanatic).

It was my Dad's and Grandma's birthdays today! They decided that they wanted to go to Olive Garden for dinner, so off we went. It was a lovely meal. Caelyn was so good - despite her having to stay seated for soo long (about 2 hours). She ate very well - it was just an overall good dinner out.

Plus, there was birthday cake... and who doesn't love birthday cake?!

Afterwards, we went to Andrew's grandma's house and met up with him and the rest of their family. We all relaxed and talked and enjoyed time together. Then.. we came home and she crashed!
Easter is a very tiring holiday ;-)

I hope your day was fabulous! Ours sure was.

Tomorrow is the last day of my break :( then I have 8 more days of teaching before my student teaching is finished and I am so ready to be done! So excited! Tomorrow is going to be full of things that need to get done!

A Vacation Is All I Needed

Oh boy.. I sometimes pull a disappearing act and I did it again. I sometimes forget that I love to blog and I get distracted with everyday life. But lately, I've been feeling that drawing to going back to blogging and wanting to expand - wanting to expand into things I love such as gardening, home decorating, and my favorite - saving money, oh plus that little thing called parenting :)

But.. I wanted to give you all an update on how we are over here in this world.

Andrew and I are doing great. I don't think I ever updated this but in the beginning of September, we got engaged :) - my ring is perfect and lovely. Our wedding date - well its always up in the air, but I will explain why very soon ;-)

Caelyn is 26 months old - *cry* - my baby is growing into this little person all her own. On a daily basis, I am in awe of the wonderful things she does and says.
She is just as stubborn as I am, not that I expected anything less. She is beyond smart, loves to play, loves the outdoors, and her parents :).

Today, we went to the annual Easter Egg Hunt at the Pottery Addition Volunteer Fire Department - Andrew recently became the new Assistant Chief. She had a blast!

She played on 'Daddy's Truck' for awhile and later this evening, he took her back over because she had such a blast playing on the truck - future firefighter? Maybe!

We bought a home! I will give you a tour soon :) Its a 3 bedroom home sitting on just over an acre of land. Currently, we are in the middle of adding an addition/sunroom area/family area over top of the garge, so it will look a bit different.

We had a lot of reasons to move. Our other home was just too small, it was a box basically. It was beside a bar and who wants that? Weekends were a nightmare... Plus this leads to one of the biggest announcements....

Our family is expanding as well!

That is right :) We are expecting! This is why our wedding is currently up in the air. We found out at the end of October, right when I found the dress of my dreams - God works in funny ways, right?

My due date is July 9th, 2012 and we are expecting a little BOY - Brayden Joseph. We are so excited. A bigger home was definitely needed for our growing family and we are so happy to welcome him into our home and grow as a family. I can't wait to see Caelyn meet him! I get teary eyed thinking of it.

In this picture, I am 26 weeks 3 days.

So, that is why is going on in the Hayes' house.

I am happy to be blogging again. I want to document the rest of this pregnancy.

I have been student teaching since the end of January. My last day in the classroom is April 19th and I am so ready. Student teaching has confirmed that...

- I am meant to be a SAHM - at least for awhile

- We will soooooo homeschool ;-)

- Teaching is definitely one of the hardest, yet most rewarding careers one could pick.

I know, some people cannot believe I have student loan debt but want to be a SAHM and thats right, I darn do. Andrew recently picked up a second job at Lowe's - its seasonal but we hope it'll become a part time job afterwards or I will apply for subbing after i graduate... I just am meant to stay home, as much as possible! Its God's calling for me.

Happy Easter! I will be back tomorrow evening with some lovely photos from our day ;-)