Friends

Thanks to my good friend Brandy who took this picture, as well as taking the kids to the beach last week. Left to right are Joshua, Caleb, & Kiernan. Kiernan is not quite 2 months younger than Joshua - I believe she's making sunglasses for herself, or is it binoculars? The boys had a fun day eating, "fishing", chasing each other & splashing around.

Andrew seems to have fully recovered from Roseola by now and is pretty much walking all the time (at least at home). He still gets down on hands & knees outside or in unfamiliar places.

Joshua and Caleb are enjoying VBS which runs at a nearby church 4 evenings this week. They come home with crafts they've made & lessons learned, and also unfortunately, candy. It seems that everyone in this world needs to reward children (for good behaviour or otherwise) with sugar! I'm so glad our new pediatrician has a tub of small, cheap toys the boys can choose from, instead of candy. And the Dentist gives away stickers & toothbrushes.

It's to the point where the children are expecting SOMETHING everywhere they go. We've started saying "No!" to most of their requests for licorice (after they go potty) and they don't even dwell on it. They're able to forget about it surprisingly fast, and I hope that they're learning that not every good deed will always get an immediate reward! Hopefully they will learn that sometimes doing good is just feeling good inside & feeling better about themselves for it. And maybe they'll some day begin to look for opportunities to do good deeds because they enjoy helping others, which also helps themselves. The lost art in children today is their total preoccupation with themselves & "what's in it for me!". Maybe that's in all of us already, not just the children. I will try to do what I can to develop a greater sense of selflessness in my children and leave the rest up to God!