Homemade happiness in 5 minutes

Cast of characters: a pitcher, some lemons, sugar, and Lipton Cold Brew iced tea.


Simply steep 2 or 3 of the tea bags in some cold water for a few minutes.


Pick a couple of lemons from the tree in your back yard and juice straight into the pitcher. Oh, sorry, I forgot everyone doesn't live in the perfect climate that we enjoy here in Arizona. ;) Store-bought lemons or bottled lemon juice will work just as well.


Add some sugar to taste, and serve over ice. You may notice there is no picture of the finished product. That's because the kids started chugging the stuff the second it was done - and who wants to see a picture of an empty pitcher?

The Octuplet Controversy

So much has been discussed about this subject already, I really did not want to add to the whole hoopla. I think it was 100% wrong and selfish of a single mother on welfare to get pregnant, and to do so though IVF (which kills dozens of babies for every living one).

But I would like to set the record straight on some things the media has been portraying negatively:

It was not wrong for someone with 6 kids to want to have more. Of course, there is a big difference between a married mom of 6 becoming pregnant by her husband and a single woman on welfare using IVF for the 6th time. Still, the news media acts as if anyone with 6 children must be crazy for wanting another baby.

I do not think that it is impossible to give enough love and attention to 14 children. That is, if they are conceived and born under normal circumstances, i.e. children that are spaced naturally. Most parents who have 14 children will have some who are about to leave the home or have already left. They are much less needy than a newborn (let alone eight newborns). Furthermore, many large families homeschool, and practically all of them have a stay-at-home mom. A homeschooled child in a large family gets much more individual, one-on-one attention than a child who only has one sibling but goes to school gets. True, the kid in the large family has to share his parents with his siblings 24/7, but kids in small families who are in school have to share their teacher (not even a parent) for the majority of their awake time with about 25 other kids (who are not even their siblings).

"Octo-Mom" has 10 children under the age of 2, something that is not normally possible, hence she will not be able to care for them as God and nature had intended. Hopefully, there will be people to volunteer and help her out, since the mistakes have already been made and the effort now should be to make the best out of the situation.

I believe that with God's blessing and hard work, anyone can support any size family that God gives them. Again, the emphasis here is children that are given by God, rather than artificially conceived. Stealing from God sounds like a sure way for parents to forfeit the blessings of God.

I do not think that this mom should have "reduced" the pregnancy, i.e. selectively aborted some of her babies in the womb. The mistake was using IVF in the first place, let alone with 6 babies (she said 2 of the eggs split, hence 8 babies).

Population control

“Throughout history, different cultures have celebrated birth as a unique moment signifying the joy of life. The reinterpretation of birth as a form of greenhouse-unfriendly behaviour speaks to today’s degraded imagination, where carbon-reduction becomes the supreme moral imperative. Once every newborn baby is dehumanised in this way, represented as a professional polluter who is a potent source of greenhouse gas emissions, it becomes increasingly difficult to feel anything other than apprehension about the growth of the human race.” (Frank Furedi in the "Australian")

Click here to read a great article on this subject.

Thank you to one of my readers for sending me the link to the following interesting article:

And Baby Makes How Many?

By KATE ZERNIKE

Published: February 6, 2009

THE comment from the photographer at Sears was typical. “Are these all yours?” she asked, surveying Kim Gunnip’s 12 children.

“No,” Mrs. Gunnip replied, “I picked some up at the food court.”

But it was harder to find a retort for the man in line at the supermarket, who said within earshot of her youngest children, “You must have a great sex life.”

Now her family, like other larger families, as they call themselves, is facing endless news coverage of the octuplets born in California and a new round of scorn, slack jaws and stupid jokes.

Back when the average woman had more than three children, big families were the Kennedys of Hickory Hill and Hyannis Port, “Cheaper by the Dozen,” the Cosbys or “Eight is Enough” — lovable tumbles of offspring as all-American in their scrapes as in their smiles.

But as families have shrunk, and parents helicopter over broods tinier yet more precious, a vanload of children has taken on more of a freak show factor. The families know the stereotypes: they’re polygamists, religious zealots, reality-show hopefuls or Québécois in it for the per-child government bonus. And isn’t there something a little obsessive about Angelina Jolie’s quest for her own World Cup soccer team?

“Look at the three shows on TLC that have bigger families,” said Meagan Francis, the 31-year-old author of “Table for Eight,” which stems from her experience raising four children (she is expecting her fifth next month). “One is about religious fundamentalists, one has sextuplets, the other is a family of little people,” she said, referring to, respectively, the Duggars of “17 Kids and Counting,” “Jon and Kate Plus Eight” and “Little People, Big World,” about two dwarfs raising four children, three of average stature, on a pumpkin farm in Oregon.

“You get the feeling,” Ms. Francis added, “that anybody who has more than three kids is either doing it for bizarre reasons or there’s a medical anomaly.”

In the last several days, the British government’s environmental adviser declared it “irresponsible” to have more than two children. And Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House, asserted that including contraception in the stimulus package could reduce government spending. Ms. Pelosi, herself the mother of five, was arguing against unwanted pregnancies, not families who choose to have big broods. But no matter — larger families see the attacks piling up.

On Internet forums and blogs, like lotsofkids.com and largerfamilies.com, the mothers defend themselves against the accusations that they can’t possibly give each child enough love or that they are hogging the earth’s scarce resources. They resist, and resent, efforts to lump them with the Duggars, the Jon and Kates and the octuplets.

Many mothers, in fact, shared the revulsion and the ethical questions about the in vitro fertilization that led to the birth of the eight babies by the unwed and unemployed California mother. Yet they also say that the reaction to her turned harsh only when it was revealed that she had six additional children. Octuplets were amazing; 14 is gross.

Referring to a news show correspondent who seemed “disgusted” by the story, one mother on lotsofkids.com wrote, “I wanted to bounce her judgmental little head off a wall.”

Ms. Francis, the founder of largerfamilies.com, said, “I can’t imagine having 14 children, but I do think it’s possible to raise 14 and do a great job.”

She continued: “People feel like they have some say or some ownership over your kids or the way kids are being raised. It’s this symbol of who you are and your values.”

If large families are the stuff of spectacle, it is partly because they have become rarer.

In 1976, census data show, 59 percent of women ages 40 to 44 had three or more children, 20 percent had five or more and 6 percent had seven or more.

By 2006, four decades after the Supreme Court declared a constitutional right to use birth control (and the last year available from census studies), 28 percent of women ages 40 to 44 had three or more children, 4 percent had five or more and just 0.5 percent had seven or more.

“Three is still O.K.,” said Michelle Lehmann, the founder of lotsofkids.com and a mother of eight children who lives outside Chicago. “When you have four, people start raising eyebrows. When you go to five, people are like, ‘No way.’ ”

Beyond 10? “They think you are lying,” said Mrs. Gunnip, who also writes two blogs for so-called mega-families, those with eight or more children.

Leslie Leyland Fields, a mother of six in Kodiak, Alaska, recalled her boss’s response when she announced she was pregnant with her fifth child and resigning as a professor at a state college: “This is what, your 9th or 10th?”

Ms. Fields, who had four children and then two unexpected but welcome pregnancies in her 40s, said, “Inevitably, people would come up to me in a patronizing way, sidle me away and whisper, ‘Let me tell you how this happens.’ ”

In a 2006 article, “The Case for Kids,” in Christianity Today, Ms. Fields lamented new social norms that assume that multiple children burden the goals of educated, professional women: “The smart, ambitious, fully realized 21st-century woman chooses career. The ambitionless woman has children.”

In an interview, Ms. Fields added: “Choosing to have a large domestic life is often seen as negating the professional and the public. I think it’s very healthy and wonderful to have a foot in both worlds.”

With more children, she had to change jobs, but her career, she said, has become more fulfilling: she teaches graduate students instead of undergraduates now, requiring less time in the classroom, which has allowed her to write three more books.

“The criticism feels elitist,” she said. “It’s coming from educated people, which makes me think, You have no excuse for thinking in such stereotypes.”

The article in Christianity Today unleashed a flood of hate mail. One reader wrote in all capital letters: “Did it ever occur to you that if you really want to serve God you should have less children so you’d have more time to serve God?” (“You can’t enter into debate with people who have that kind of rage,” Ms. Fields said.)

With anecdotes of a boomlet in larger families in places like the Upper East Side of Manhattan and select pockets of suburbia, large families are presumed to be either really rich, having children as status symbols, or really poor, living off the dole and completely devoid of culture.

The hayseed assumption prompts a howl from Barbara Curtis, mother of 12, ages 8 to 39, in Loudoun County, Va. “They expect me to come crawling in from Appalachia or something,” she said. In fact, she is a Montessori teacher, and her husband is a commercial accounts manager for an auto company. One son is entering a graduate program in opera, and another was in New York last week auditioning for a theater touring company. Her sixth son was the only National Merit Scholar finalist in his high school class, she said.

Mrs. Curtis illustrates one of the many ways that families grow so large: she had two children from her first marriage, then, with her second husband, seven in 10 years. One of those children had Down syndrome, so they adopted another Down syndrome child, believing two would grow up happier together. Since then, they have twice accepted requests to adopt another child with Down syndrome.

“Children are a kind of wealth,” Mrs. Curtis said. “Just not the kind of wealth our society tends to focus on.”

Still, for many mega-families, existence is hard. Their homes are usually cramped; college often means community college. Parents work long hours on top of the demands of raising so many children. And while the census does not break out income statistics for larger families, women without a high school diploma have about one more child on average than women with graduate or professional degrees.

Mrs. Gunnip is a homemaker in upstate New York, and her husband works as a supervisor in a county sewer department. She says they could qualify for public assistance but choose not to apply, believing others need it more. “I can’t say how we do it, and on paper it looks like we don’t do it, but there’s always a way,” she said. “My kids never go hungry. They do activities they want to do, we go on vacation. We don’t go to Disney, but we go camping.”

Many large families are religious, and some follow the QuiverFull movement, which takes encouragement for big families in Psalm 127: children are the gift of the Lord, “as arrows are in the hand of a mighty man,” and “happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them.”

Those beliefs can run headlong into environmental concerns. At 6.8 billion people, the world population has more than tripled in the last century, and demographers expect it to exceed 9 billion by midcentury.

“Every single person has multiple impacts on multiple environmental resources,” said Alan Weisman, the author of “The World Without Us,” which advocates a one-child policy to return the world to early 20th century population levels. “It’s a no-brainer that the more people there are, the more stress there is on an ecosystem that doesn’t get any bigger.”

Parents of large families counter that they have an economy of scale: a light bulb lights a room whether there are 4 people or 14. Their children learn not to take long showers, to share space, to appreciate hand-me-down toys, clothes and books.

“Large families are some of the greenest families,” Mrs. Gunnip said. “They don’t tend to have a lot of money, so they make sure things go as far as they can.”

And besides, they say, the birth rate in the United States is barely at the level needed to replace the population. Total fertility rate, which predicts the number of children an average woman will have in her lifetime, reached 2.1, considered replacement level, in 2006, but it was the first time it had been that high since 1971. A small percentage of large families, they say, is not enough to tip the balance.

As for whether their children suffer a poverty of time and attention, parents of large families say they make better parents. For while spending time with each child individually is possible, hovering is not.

“You have to let go of a lot of the ideas of the kind of parent you wanted to be,” Ms. Francis said. “That’s not a bad thing. If you hold on to the idea that you can control everything, well, you can’t. They become their own people. With big families, it gets beaten out of you.”

As for the other pointed questions about large families, defenders have developed standard comebacks, lists of which circulate on the Internet.

How can you afford so many? “Lifestyles are expensive, not kids.”

Don’t you know what causes that? “Oh, yes, I now wash my husband’s underwear separately.”

Do you get any time for yourselves? “Obviously, or we wouldn’t have six kids.”

Unschooling

or: The Lazy Mother's Approach to Educating Her Children

"Unschooling" is a term used by parents, most notably mothers, who supposedly homeschool their children without ever actually teaching them much. A favorite catchphrase of unschoolers is "Learning happens at all times."

In essence, unschoolers think that using any sort of curriculum (purchased or designed yourself) and having the child do book work or worksheets is at best useless and at worst stifles the child's natural love for learning. Instead, they believe children learn best by simply tagging along with a parent throughout the day, and then making their own observations. They will use the example of baking, and how it teaches the child about fractions while whipping up a treat, rather than having to sit down with a math book and practice adding/subtracting/multiplying/reducing fractions.

Among homeschoolers, it is very easy to spot an "unschooler" a mile away. In the general population, they may be mistaken for the product of public schooling, which tends to leave weak students behind. Some telltale signs that someone is an "unschooler" are:

- When asked about what grade level their child's studies are, they cannot give a simple answer.
- The parent neither buys any worksheets, nor makes up their own or prints them off the internet for free.
- Both parent and child are painfully compromised in the areas of spelling, grammar, punctuation, composition, etc.
- The child only has basic reading skills.
- The child has very limited knowledge of basic historical and scientific facts, and what they do know is self-taught.
- They are out and about most of the day, rather than staying home.
- When they are home, the child is mostly left to him/herself to play, watch TV, surf the web, etc.
- Unschooling parents often also fail in other areas of their responsibilites, such as keeping up with the housework.

First off, the Bible commands parents to diligently teach their children:

Deuteronomy 6:7 And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.

Deuteronomy 11:19 And ye shall teach them your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.

Since "unschooling" fails to fulfill these commands, it is an unscriptural concept.

There are several reasons why parents "unschool", such as:

- The parent has poor education themselves.
- The parent was duped into believing "unschooling" works.
- The parent believes it is their obligation to teach their child rather than put them in a traditional school, but they are too lazy/unorganized/unmotivated to do it.
- A lack of discipline on the part of the parent.
- In the case of daughters, parents often mistakenly believe that they do not need an education because their daughter will grow up to "just" get married and have children, and never pursue an outside career.
- A fear that educating the child will take up too much time and interfere with the child's spiritual growth, or make the child hate learning.

I do think that the main root of all these is laziness. Even an uneducated person could learn with their child as they teach him/her. Educating a child can be tedious work. It takes motivation, patience, self-discipline, time, and more patience. In the short run, it is not as much fun as bargain hunting at the thrift store, baking cookies, or going on a trip. But in the long run, you owe it to your children to give them a solid foundation for a love for lifelong learning.

It is not true that unschooled children love learning more than a child who is forced to finish their work even on days that they don't feel like it. Just the opposite is true. An unschooled child will be acutely aware of the fact that they have huge gaps in their education, which will make them feel inferior, and thereby even less motivated to learn. People tend to love what they are good at.

Children naturally are somewhat lazy, and will try to get by with doing as little work as possible. This is normal, and the child simply has to be taught to love to work much like they are taught everything else by their parents. Unschooling may lead to children who lack self-discipline like their parents.

Even girls need a solid education that extends past an elementary level. For one, just because they will "only" be homemakers doesn't mean their mind should be wasted. Mathematics is a wonderful subject that trains the mind unlike anything else, regardless of what your life's calling is. The same is true for science, history, and other subjects. Anyone sounds stupid when they have horrible spelling and don't know the first thing about punctuation. Nobody ever learned calculus by studying measuring spoons and cups while baking. Besides, said daughters will grow up one day, get married, and have children that she in turn will have to educate herself. What if she has a son, who will need to have the abilities to earn a living to support his family in today's world, but his unschooled mom never taught him anything because she herself had not been educated?

Nor does a good education stand in the way of one's spiritual growth. When Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon took Judah captive, he wanted the finest and brightest of the children at his court:

Daniel 1:4 Children in whom was no blemish, but well favoured, and skilful in all wisdom, and cunning in knowledge, and understanding science, and such as had ability in them to stand in the king's palace, and whom they might teach the learning and the tongue of the Chaldeans.

Later, the only people who stood for God and refused to bow down to the king's image were these same children. Hence, getting a solid education did not hinder their spiritual walk.

As far as the "learning happens at all times" goes, I would like to submit that yes, it does, which is exactly why making a child sit down to do his worksheets will not be detrimental to his schooling. I would think that if kids can learn without being actively taught, how much more would they learn if someone took the time and effort to educate them?

Summary: Parents are obligated by the Bible to teach their children themselves. Unschooling does not fulfill this command, and is therefore a wrong concept. Unschooled children more often than not will grow up to be uneducated.

Simple remedy for pinkeye

This works for pinkeye, or eyes that are just sore and itchy from allergies, dust, or whatever.

Put 1 tbsp chamomile flowers, 1 tbsp chickweed, and 1/4 tsp goldenseal powder in a mug. If you can find eyebright, add some of that as well. Add boiling water and steep for a few minutes. Strain carefully. Add enough cold water to make the tea a comfortable temperature. Dab a fresh cotton ball in the tea, then lay it on one eye. Repeat with another cotton ball on the other eye. Do this as often as you like.

Important: Use a fresh cotton ball every time on each eye. Do not contaminate the tea.

This remedy is an adaptation of what I found in here, my first go-to reference for 80% of illnesses in our family or ones I get asked about. If you don't have a copy, you should seriously think about buying one. There is a section on how to have an herbal medicine cabinet. I bought what was on the list, and it has served me well in the middle of the night on several occasions. The last thing I'd want to do with a sick child is drag them to the herb store, which is also never open when I need the stuff.

I keep all other "meds" in another kitchen cupboard: the bottom shelf holds our vitamins and supplements, the second shelf from the bottom holds herbal remedies, extracts, and other all-natural "meds", the third shelf holds conventional stuff such as band-aids, hydrogen peroxide, cough drops, boric acid, etc. The top shelf holds some of my health and homeopathy books.

I think that Moms would do well to research natural remedies for common illnesses, and be prepared to treat them rather than running their child to the ER in the middle of the night for indigestion or the sniffles.

Besides not wasting the money that my husband had to work hard to earn, our children also enjoy great health without the side effects of conventional drugs or the mistakes of doctors.

Why I hate church nurseries

The subject of whether or not church nurseries are scriptural and whether or not I think they should exist is one of my favorite hobby horses. Please bear with me as I go off on it for a while in this post.

For those readers who think nurseries are a must, and without them church would be a circus, this post will do little to convince them otherwise because they are willingly ignorant, and inconsiderate of the fact that children are the most important audience.

Rather, my post is intended to embolden parents who are currently struggling with this issue to take a stand against nurseries, and prove that yes, you can and should have your children in church right alongside with you.

My husband devoted a large part of his most recent Sunday night sermon, "How to win children to Christ", to preach on this very subject, and I have embedded the video of it below. While the entire sermon is great, the part pertaining to nurseries starts at 36:14. For some reason the camera was not focused properly, but the sound quality is obviously unaffected by that.



I am not going to repeat the points from the sermon here, but would like to add the following:

Keeping children out of the service and leaving them in a nursery is not only detrimental to their spiritual growth, but also their physical health. Nurseries are like leper colonies, and any and all sickness will be passed around as toys (and the accompanying body fluids) are freely shared. In a small church, there may only be one nursery, in which case older kids could hurt younger children by throwing toys, biting/hitting them, or accidentally stepping on the little ones - I have seen all of these. A baby might accidentally be given the bottle of another child, something that even with labeled bottles happens all the time.

There is a prevailing notion that young children get sick a lot and that that's just the way it is. According to statistics, preschool age children get about 9 colds per year. This number is absolutely ridiculous, but sadly true. When our kids used to go to the nursery during church services, they would get sick at least once per month, but more often it was twice per month. Today I know that almost all of this sickness was completely self-inflicted. Now, the kids get sick maybe once or twice per year at the most. The children in the nursery share germs with each other. They are also exposed to the germs of their respective older siblings, of which they may be a carrier without showing any symptoms of illness yet. They can get sick from a nursery worker who either does not know that she is spreading a virus that she is carrying, or who knew she was sick but didn't want to miss out on holding the babies in the nursery.

While children are exposed to germs out in public all day long, it is not as aggressive of an onslaught as in a nursery. A child that is exposed to a few germs at the store or in the church auditorium will most often shake it off before it develops into an illness. Such is not the case when their system is overloaded with the amount of germs that they are exposed to in a closed environment such as a nursery with other sick children.

I could go on for hours on this point alone. In short, our kids used to get sick all the time. Since we took them out of the nursery (which was well-maintained and cleaned regularly) they hardly ever get sick any more. Best of all, they are not passing sickness on to my husband, as they had before, which would mean substantial financial losses because of him being too sick to work.

Then there is the question of safety. Churches draw freaks like moths are drawn to light. People are trusting, courteous, and easy targets. How can anyone know that the sweet nursery worker that they just handed their child off to is not a predator? I get so tired of hearing about background checks. They are 100% worthless. All a background check says it that someone has never been convicted of a crime. Maybe they just have never committed one yet? Maybe they just didn't get caught? Every child molester had a clean record at one time - do you want your child to be the first victim? I am not saying that you should go around suspecting everyone, I am saying you should not go around blindly trusting anyone just because they happen to go to your church. Would you trust that same person at church with all your personal banking information, your wallet, the keys to your house and car, and all your money in cash, to do with it as they saw fit? Hardly. To me, my children are worth so much more than all that together.

Learning to sit still in church will also be a valuable lesson for younger children, rather than picking up every bad behavior from other kids in the nursery. No child is perfect, my own included, which is why they shouldn't just all be cooped up together to learn each others worst habits.

According to the Bible, it is wrong to tell people who come to church where to sit:

James 2:3 And ye have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing, and say unto him, Sit thou here in a good place; and say to the poor, Stand thou there, or sit here under my footstool:

According to the Bible, Jesus was angry when the disciples tried to keep the children away from him:

Matthew 19:14 But Jesus said, Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven.

Mark 10:14 But when Jesus saw it, he was much displeased, and said unto them, Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God.

Luke 18:16 But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God.

According to the Bible, it is wrong for the pastor to rule over and command another man's wife by forcing her to use the nursery.

Romans 14:4 Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? to his own master he standeth or falleth. Yea, he shall be holden up: for God is able to make him stand.

1Peter 5:3 Neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being ensamples to the flock.

Yet, there is not one single verse in the entire Bible that says that children should be pushed aside into a nursery while the adults attend the service.

Do yourself and your children a huge favor and get out from under the footstool that pastors have confined the next generation to because they are so ill-prepared for their sermon that any little peep from the audience will make them lose their train of thought.

To read previous post on this subject, click here, here, and here.

Recipe for Lángos

Tereza, this post is just for you. And for me to vicariously enjoy the thought of getting to eat these. Note for my non-Hungarian readers: this is kind of like Indian fry bread.

The recipe was taken from Culinaria Hungary, which is worth every cent and vital if you ever feel homesick for Hungary. Amazon carries a paperback version that costs less, but I love the hardcover edition and use it often. Every food I have ever eaten in Hungary in my life can be found in this book. It even has a recipe for making túró!

Zsírban sült lángos

150 g soft-cooking potatoes
30 g fresh yeast (or use 1 1/2 tsp. dried yeast)
400 ml milk
3 tbsp powdered sugar
400 g flour
salt
50 ml oil
oil for frying

Cook potatoes with skin. Dissolve yeast in 100 ml lukewarm, sweetened milk and let rest in a warm spot for 10 minutes. Peel potatoes and mash while warm. Sift flour into a large bowl, pour in milk and yeast. Add potatoes, oil, remaining milk and some salt and knead into a smooth dough. Sprinkle with flour, cover with a kitchen towel, and let rest for approx. 1 hour in a warm spot (until doubled in size). Fill a pan with approx. 6 cm of oil and heat. Tear off a piece of dough, make a patty approx. 2 cm thick, and lay it in the hot oil. Fry until golden, turn carefully, and fry other side. Sprinkle with salt and enjoy hot.

Just be careful not to let the oil get too hot.


I apologize, that was in totally poor taste. I feel terrible for whoever suffered this fire, honestly. I just couldn't resist.

Lángos taste great plain, but can also be eaten with any of these toppings: garlic, sour cream, ham, shredded Swiss cheese, feta, dill, káposzta, or pretty much anything else that strikes your fancy.


Please click here if you need to work up an appetite.

Getting up early

Lately, I have been encouraged by post like these and this to get into a habit of consistently getting up early. This is certainly a concept that is found throughout the book of proverbs as well as the entire Bible, but the most famous verse is probably the one in the description of the virtuous woman in Proverbs 31, verse 15:

She riseth also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and a portion to her maidens.

I think getting up early really is a question of self-discipline. It is very tempting to want to stay up late at night to get some quiet time without the kids running around, even if it is just to clean or get caught up on stuff around the house. I am not at all against staying up after the kids are in bed, but let's face it - most moms will be way too tired at this point to really get much housework done.

Personally, we do not have a TV, but families who do may be tempted to just sit in front of it and "veg". Even if they enjoy more wholesome fun such as a craft of board game, they will inevitably be too tired the next day to want to get up early.

Getting up at the same time as your children (or after them) is detrimental for various reasons, some of which are:

- You will be very busy the second you roll out of bed with feeding and dressing the kids. This leaves no time for you to pray and read the Bible by yourself first, get groomed and dressed, have something to eat, and just generally get some alone time to give you the strength needed to make it through a long day of hard work.

- Getting started on dinner preparations will also go out the window, which will have you working that much harder later in the day. It's much easier and faster to throw a meal in the crock pot or get bread dough going when you are working without any little ones around. The time it saves could be used to make a special treat with the kids later in the day.

- Your kids will probably wake each other up, which means that you will have to care for all of them at once rather than one by one as they wake up one after the other. By getting up before them, you could have some one-on-one time with the child who rises first as a reward. In our house, our kids are always very creative at carving out time that they have either me or my husband all to themselves.

- In general, you will get a much later start on your day, and you will be struggling all day long to get even the basics done.

- You are setting a poor example for your son(s), who will one day have to rise early and work hard all day to provide for their own families, and your daughter(s) who will have to work hard at raising a family just like we do every day.

I think that not getting a chance to quietly read and meditate on the Word of God, your spiritual food, is by far the worst of all these disadvantages. It will put your attitude on the wrong path all day long, and you will not be the wife and mother that you should be. A dirty house is one thing, but a grouchy mom that is stretched to her limits and ready to snap at any moment is far worse. I have been guilty of this myself many times, but it's just not a good way to go through life.

Looking at the above verse, it says that the virtuous woman rises "while it is yet night", which in the Bible is technically anytime before 6 AM. Others may interpret it to mean anytime before the sun comes up. I don't think there is a "set" time that God had in mind when he wrote that verse, and I think it is different for every lady.

In my case, our kids usually go to bed around 8 PM, later on church nights. After they are down, I like to "pick up" the house. Then I run the dishes, laundry, and sweep/mop the floors. These are activities that I would not want to do early in the morning because they are loud, and our kids are light sleepers in the morning and would wake up, which would defeat the whole point of me getting up early. At night, however, nothing wakes them up. Also, I like to wake up to a house that looks neat and tidy, even if it is not totally clean, rather than a complete mess that I know I have to get done before the kids wake up.

There are other activities that I do not like doing at night, because I am usually too tired. Some of these are cleaning the bathrooms or folding and putting away laundry. So in my case, I want some alone time at night as well as in the morning. On average, when I am not pregnant, I function well on 6-7 hours of sleep. I have also noticed that if I go to bed early, I will need less sleep and often wake up of my own after 6 hours or less.

My plan the last couple of weeks has been to be in bed by 11 PM and get up between 5 and 5:30. Many times, I wake up on my own before the alarm goes off. I sit in the school room and listen to the Bible on CD while folding laundry. Since this is very monotonous work that doesn't take much thought, it does not distract me from what I am listening to. When I am done with the laundry, I start cleaning, so I switch to my Bible memory index cards because I would be too distracted to keep listening, or just pray while I clean.

As summer draws closer and the days get longer, I want to start getting up a half hour earlier because by 6 AM, it is bright day here, and the kids get up around that time.

The results have really paid off. I have been able to keep up with our daily laundry load (3-4 loads per day, more on Mondays), and I have a much easier time getting a lot of Bible reading done then when I would get up early hit-and-miss. When we went on a trip to California earlier this week, I got up early the first day (after driving half the night and only sleeping 4 hours) so I could go to the store and buy our food for the day rather than getting unhealthy and expensive food at Legoland. The next day was the first day that I have gotten up late recently - I was woken up by my husband at 9 AM after sleeping 12 hours! Him and the boys were in one hotel room, and me and the girls were in another room next door. It was really nice, and because we were not home, there was no housework that got neglected by my sleeping in.

This has been a good goal to work towards, and I would encourage every lady to give it a try.

I will say, though, that I would not be getting up this early if I were pregnant. When I am pregnant, I need 10-12 hours of sleep in any 24 hour period, especially during the first few months. If I get less, or get up early, I get violently ill, which I hate. There are different seasons in every mom's life, and right now I am bursting with energy because I just had a baby. I am sure that once I get pregnant again in a year or so things will slow down for 9 months, and that's good, too.

Interesting study on SIDS

Fans may reduce the risk of SIDS, or sudden infant death syndrome, a new study shows.

Babies who slept in a room with a fan were 72% less likely to die from SIDS, according to a study released from Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine. The study included interviews with the mothers of 185 infants who died from SIDS and the mothers of 312 other babies.

Click here to view the full news article, or simply do a google search on "SIDS fan study".

I have to say that my theory on why fans have this effect is slightly different from the conclusion that the study authors came to (who don't know exactly why fans seem to help, it's possible that fans improve air circulation, preventing infants from rebreathing exhaled carbon dioxide, which can pool up in the gap between a baby's face and the mattress). While I think that point is definitely valid, I doubt many (if any) of the kids in this study were placed on their tummy to sleep, which would be the only way for carbon dioxide to pool up in front of baby's face.

My theory is that air blowing lightly in the baby's face triggers their natural reflex to inhale. If you have a young baby, you can try this: blow gently in their face and they will take a quick, deep breath. This works great for example when your child hurts themselves and "screams silently" without breathing in. Our oldest would start turning blue and almost pass out until I learned this trick. Now I just give a quick blow in their face, which makes them stop screaming to take a breath.

This is another reason why I LOVE LOVE LOVE having my youngest baby always tucked in by my side to sleep at night. They do not need a fan because while I am sleeping, I am constantly breathing on them lightly, which is like a "breathing pacemaker" to them. I believe that this is a major reason why "co-sleeping" babies have so much lower rates of SIDS. Breathing is an involuntary reflex, but in some babies it is a still a little immature at birth and they simply "forget" to breathe. The natural reflex to breathe does not kick in, and they die. Of course, there are many contributing factors (such as cigarette smoke, not being breastfed, etc.), but I believe that these come into play only because they disadvantage the child and further undermine his/her health.

I am a firm believer that all young babies should sleep with their parents, and that parents need to take precautions to ensure their bed is baby-friendly (i.e. no gaps, guard rails for older babies, etc.). If you or your spouse are intoxicated, have taken prescription medicine, or are extremely obese, having baby in bed with you is NOT safe, as you may inadvertently roll over them in your sleep.

You can find lots of information on safe co-sleeping habits online or at the library.

Edited to add: Please check out this post on important information regarding the safety of (crib) mattresses.

Recipe for Taco Soup

Taco Soup

This has been a staple dinner in our house ever since I first tried it. Tastes great, inexpensive, and the ingredients are always on hand.

Allison, if you are reading this, THANK YOU for sharing this recipe with me. I still have the original, hand-written copy you made for me! It is covered in countless food splatters and grease stains because I have used it so many times. In fact, I know the recipe by heart, but I like to pull it out and read it because it reminds me of you.

Ingredients:

* 2 pounds ground beef
* 2 envelopes taco seasoning (= 1/2 cup) or less, depending on your taste
* 1-1/2 cups water
* 2 cans mild chili beans
* 2 cans whole kernel corn, drained, or frozen corn
* 1 can tomato sauce
* 2 cans diced tomato with green chilies (or plain diced tomatoes for a milder flavor)
* 1-2 beef bullion cubes (optional)

Directions:

In a Dutch oven or large kettle, cook beef over medium heat until no longer pink; drain. Add taco seasoning and mix well. Stir in remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered, for 15 minutes or until heated through, stirring occasionally.

Tastes great with corn chips, sour cream, and avocado on top. Enjoy!

My favorite copycat recipes

I enjoy going out to eat as much as anyone else, but it is a lot healthier and cheaper to cook at home. Which is where the internet comes in. If there is a certain dish you like from a certain restaurant, you can search for a recipe of it on google and are almost guaranteed to find something.

There is only one recipe I have never been able to find online yet, and that is for the bread that they serve as a starter at Stuart Anderson's Black Angus. My guess is that it is some sort of oat bread with lots of molasses. If you have a recipe for it, I would LOVE to get it!

Here are my other favorites:

Lemon Loaf like Starbucks

This recipe is great, and tastes just like the real thing if you manage to wait long enough for the cake to cool and the frosting to set. In our house, that has only happened once. Warm it doesn't taste exactly the same, though still absolutely delicious. Substituting whole wheat pastry flour for the all-purpose flour works great in this recipe because the oil retains the cake's moistness. Or, you could substitute part of the flour.

Chicken Enchilada Soup like Chili's

There are several different popular versions of this recipe. This is the one I liked best and thought tasted most like the real thing. I found that if you add the amount of masa that the recipe calls for, the soup will be very thick the next day if you have leftovers. I simply added some more broth and spices until it was the right consistency again. Also, I used shredded Jack and Cheddar cheese instead of the velveeta. It was a little stringy when the cheese first stared melting, but after 10 minutes of careful heating and frequent stirring, the cheese was completely dissolved and not stringy at all.

Fajitas like Chili's

A long-time staple in our house. I serve them with the flour tortillas that can be found uncooked in the cold section at the grocery store and have to be fried before serving. Sam's Club and Costco have great deals on those.

Cinnamon Rolls like Cinnabon

This recipe was not advertised to taste like Cinnabon, but I think these are THE BEST cinnamon rolls I have ever eaten. Seriously. You HAVE to try them. The only change I made was in the frosting: I left out the maple flavoring and coffee and instead added more milk. Plus, in addition to the powdered sugar frosting, I also put cream cheese frosting on these puppies. Simply beat a stick of softened butter, an 8 oz pack of room-temperature cream cheese, some vanilla and enough powdered sugar to get the right consistency and sweetness and spread on liberally. This recipe makes enough to fill about 6 or 7 disposable round baking pans, so you can spread some serious joy with this recipe if you are so inclined. Or make a half batch and eat it all yourself, but don't blame me if the scale won't be kind the next day. But then, these are SO worth it. I am getting hungry just writing this.

Now please get off the computer and bake a batch of these. Right now.

Hormone use and breast cancer

This is a very interesting article.

Should a Christian celebrate Christmas?

I love Christmas. It is my favorite holiday of the year, no doubt about that. Naturally, a lot of the posts about our family this month will relate to the Christmas season, so I thought I would share this article which explains, as well as I ever could, why I do not think it is wrong to celebrate Christmas.

It was written by John R. Rice, and you can click here to read the article as it was posted on the website of the Sword of the Lord. While I may not agree with exactly every one of Dr. Rice's beliefs (for example, I do not consider myself a "Protestant"), I do believe he was greatly used by God in his preaching. Another reason I like Dr. Rice is because he wrote an entire book dedicated largely to explaining why birth control is wrong - but that is not the topic today! :)

Should a Christian Observe Christmas?

By Dr. John R. Rice (1895–1980)

“One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.

“He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord; and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks.”—Rom. 14:5,6.

I love the Christmas season. I find great joy in preaching on the Christmas themes of the angels, the shepherds, the manger, the virgin birth, and the wise men. I get a great thrill when I hear Christmas carols. I love the gathering together of loved ones, the giving of gifts. And I rejoice to be remembered by those I love.

Perhaps my own feeling is colored by the fact that for many years I have been away from home most of the year, but at the Christmas season I can be with my family.

How sad that many do not enjoy Christmas! Even some devoted Christians feel sour and are cantankerous and full of objections about the season. To you I would say in the words of Scripture—if you regard the day, regard it unto the Lord. And if you do not regard the day, then be sure you act Christian about it. Let nobody judge or criticize others for an honest, worshipful, spiritual and loving attitude about Christmas.

SOME OBJECTIONS ABOUT CHRISTMAS ANSWERED

1. “December 25 Is Not Really Christ’s Birthday”

The Bible does not tell us exactly when Christ was born, and there are no other trustworthy sources from which we can learn the time. Therefore, some think it wrong to observe Christmas.

I know a little girl who was born on February 29—leap year. Now, is it wrong for her to observe her birthday on February 28 when there is no leap year? In other words, is it wrong for her or others to observe her birthday anytime except leap year? The precise date—February 29—is not the important factor, but that another year has gone by and the little girl has grown a year older; and that fact should be recognized by loved ones.

Would you say it is wrong to observe Thanksgiving on a certain Thursday in November since not all our blessings have come on that day? Or would it be wrong to set a more convenient day if all agreed on a national day of thanksgiving? Whatever the day, it is still right to have a time when we publicly thank God and as a nation officially express our gratitude to the Father of Mercies for all His bounty, for all His goodness and for all His blessings. The important thing is not the day of the calendar on which we do it, but the fact that we give praise to the One who loadeth us with benefits.

Although many scholars do not believe that Jesus was born on December 25, it could still be the date on which the angels announced His birth. We love the dear Lord Jesus. We want everyone to remember His birth. We want to teach our children about the Babe in the manger, about the wise men from the East who came to worship Him, about the angel’s announcement to Mary, about the angel chorus that told the shepherds of His birth. And December 25 is as good a day for that as any other day. It is not wrong to remember the birth of Christ on a day which is as close as we can come to His birthday.

2. “Christmas Means Only ‘Christ’s Mass’—a Catholic Holiday”

We are told that the name of Christmas comes from “Christ’s Mass,” that it was instituted by Catholics and therefore good Protestants ought not to observe it.

That objection seems a little foolish. Nearly all the names we have, we inherited from the heathen. Many cities, towns, counties and rivers in America have Indian names. But when we see the Susquehanna River or read of Shawnee, Oklahoma or Comanche, Texas, we are not thinking about the Indians. And the names have no connotation of heathendom. Names mean what they mean, no matter what the origin.

Sometimes Seventh-day Adventists make much of the fact that the name of our day “Sunday” comes from the worship of the sun. I reply that their “Saturday” is named from the god Saturn. But no one has reference to the sun when he uses the word “Sunday” or when he worships on Sunday; and no one has any reference to the god Saturn when he works or serves on Saturday.

So it seems foolish to make an artificial distinction when none exists in the minds of people who observe Christmas.

January was named for the Roman god Janus. Are Christians, therefore, wrong to call the month by that name? To every sensible person, Christmas means simply Christmas, not some kind of mass. Catholics may observe it with a mass, but Protestants do not.

It will be good to keep these things in mind.

3. “Christmas Was a Former Heathen Holiday”

It is true that before the birth of Christ, December 25 was a pagan holiday. The Encyclopedia Brittanica says this date was a “Mithraic feast day” to celebrate the unconquered Son of Philocalus.

Evidently many new converts were tempted to keep the pagan feast celebrated on December 25. Possibly it was to counteract this pagan influence that Christian leaders decided to observe this day as “Christmas”, which means “Christ-sent,” hoping this would help new converts resist the temptation of partaking in the pagan feast. (Following the same reasoning, many churches have a special banquet and program for high school seniors on the night of the annual senior prom.)

At any rate, the celebration of Christmas is definitely not a continuation of a pagan custom. It is a unique Christian holiday to counteract the influence of a pagan holiday. Pagans did something on every day, and we cannot do away with all the days they used, whether for worship or for ceremonies about sowing or reaping or about the solstices or the new moons. We have the same sun heathens worshiped, and we benefit from its rising and setting, but we do not have the heathen ceremonies about that.

In 1936, I held a blessed revival campaign in the Binghamton Theatre in Binghamton, New York, sponsored by eight churches. The fact that in this theatre people had seen lewd movies or burlesque shows or legitimate theatre productions did not change the fact that now the building was used for the glory of God and souls were saved.

I myself am under new management too. Once the Devil lived within; now Jesus Christ does. So if heathens used December 25 for idolatry, why should Christians not use it now to honor Jesus Christ and His birth? Whatever day we set aside to honor Christ, it will be a day somebody else has used for bad purposes.

But now all the days belong to Christ and none to heathen gods. No Christian should be grieved if we think about the birth of Christ on December 25. Is that a worse sin than working to make money on that day? Why should anybody object if we sing Christmas carols, have a happy celebration with a feast and go over the Bible story of His birth and teach it to our children on Christmas Day? We would not honor God more by having less Scripture, less singing, less of the spirit of giving and less manifestation of love for others. All the days belong to Christ, and December 25 should be used to honor Him too.

4. “Christmas Trees and Decorations Are an Abomination”

Many people believe Jeremiah 10:1–4 is talking about Christmas trees and that therefore it is a sin to put one up. Notice verses 3 and 4:

“For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe.

“They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.”

This is a description of an idol made of wood and covered with silver and gold. Notice that God tells Israel not to be afraid of these idols because “they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. Be not afraid of them; for they cannot do evil, neither also is it in them to do good” (vs. 5).

As a matter of fact, the Christmas tree has a distinctive Christian origin. In the eighth century an English missionary named Boniface went to Germany to preach Christ. The Germans, at that time, were heathen and worshiped idols. One of their objects of worship was the oak tree. But Boniface told them God was more like the evergreen tree which did not lose its leaves and appear to be dead in the winter.

So gradually, as people were converted to Christ, the evergreen tree became a symbol of the eternal God in whom they had learned to trust. Eventually the evergreen tree was used for decoration at the Christmas feast. Because God had shown His love to us through the gift of His Son, it became customary for Christians to give gifts to those whom they loved at Christmastime.

The decorations on a Christmas tree could not possibly be called heathen nor have any idolatrous significance. Who thinks that heathens worshiped their gods with paper chains? that popcorn on a string is a form of idolatry? that electric lights on it for the joy of little children to brighten the home are sinful?

I love Christmas and its decorations, which are but an expression of joy in my heart as I think how God became man, how the Creator became a Babe, how “though he was rich, yet for [our] sakes he became poor, that [we] through his poverty might be rich” (II Cor. 8:9).

It is sad that the world as a whole does leave Christ out of Christmas. But for those of us who love the Lord, it can be a blessed time of fun and feasting and fellowship.

5. “There Is Too Much Revelry During the Christmas Holidays”

It is true that many do not honor Jesus Christ at Christmas. Some drink more liquor during Christmastime than at any other time. That is a sin. Many business people think of Christmas only as a time to make money. In this they are wrong. Sometimes even Christians lie about Santa Claus and deceive little children with a heathen legend when they could tell about the dear Lord Jesus. That is wicked. Deceit is the poorest possible way to honor the birth of our Lord.

I do not believe in having a Santa Claus at Sunday school or in the church service. Certainly to deceive little ones with a lie is a sin. No Christian ought to condone it. The truth is so much better than a lie. We should tell them how the dear Lord came into the world to save sinners.

Yes, people often dishonor God at Christmas. I am sorry they do. I hope you will not grieve God by such a sin.

But we should not turn Christmas over to Satan and wicked people because some misuse the Christmas season.

Should we abandon Sunday because it is often misused?

On the Lord’s Day there is more drinking, more revelry, than on any other day of the week. Should Christians, therefore, count the Lord’s Day the Devil’s day and give it up? Certainly not.
A great many teach that baptism is essential to salvation. They give more honor to the water than to the blood. That is wrong. But should we, therefore, disobey Jesus Christ about baptism because some others have overstressed baptism and made it a false doctrine?

The second coming has been a greatly abused and perverted doctrine with many. False cults have greatly perverted the doctrine of Christ’s coming. People set dates. They speculate on signs. Should the rest of us Bible Christians, then, ignore the clear Bible doctrine of Christ’s imminent return because the doctrine has been abused? Certainly not.

Nor should we ignore the Bible doctrine of the fullness of the Spirit just because many associate it with talking in tongues and with sinless perfection.

Just so—we would be very foolish to turn Christmas over to Satan and worldlings. If the world has a Christmas of revelry, let us make it a day of love and a time of honoring Christ. Let us make much of the Christmas story, of Christmas carols and Christmas love and fellowship.

Do other people make giving gifts a mere form? Well, it does not need to be so for Christians. We can give gifts that really express our love. We can make gifts the response of an honest heart. We can send greetings with Scripture verses and with holy admonitions.

Is it wrong to have a day of rejoicing? Is it wrong to feast and to send portions to others? No indeed.

When, under Nehemiah, the remnant of Israel had gone back to the Land of Promise from the captivity in Babylon and the Law was read and explained, the people wept. It was not a time for weeping, but a time for rejoicing. The wall of Jerusalem had been rebuilt, the gates had been hung, the city had been restored as the city of God, and the worship had begun.

Let us listen to the plain commands of the Lord in such a case, as given in Nehemiah 8:9,10:

“And Nehemiah, which is the Tirshatha, and Ezra the priest the scribe, and the Levites that taught the people, said unto all the people, This day is holy unto the Lord your God; mourn not, nor weep. For all the people wept, when they heard the words of the law.

“Then he said unto them, Go your way, eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto them for whom nothing is prepared: for this day is holy unto our Lord: neither be ye sorry; for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”

And we are glad to learn in verse 12:

“And all the people went their way to eat, and to drink, and to send portions, and to make great mirth, because they had understood the words that were declared unto them.”

If Israelites would honor God by having a day of joy and feasting and of sending portions to others because the wall was rebuilt, the gates were set up, and the worship was established, then we today do well to have a day to rejoice over the birth of the Saviour and to send portions to one another and to make merry with spiritual joy.

I feel nearer to God at Christmas than at any other time. I seem to love the Word of God more at Christmas, when we read and quote it again and again. I like the time as a good excuse to get into people’s hearts and win them to Christ. And many have been saved because I brought a Christmas message or urged sinners to accept God’s great Christmas Gift.

Let us have, then, a happy Christmas and make Christ supreme on this day which we remember in honor of His birth!

6. “Is It Proper to Give Gifts to Others on Christ’s Birthday?”

Certainly Christ should be first. But then He wants and deserves first place on every other day also! Giving should honor Christ, and certainly we should give ourselves and all we have to Him. But giving gifts to others is also a proper way to honor the Lord, according to Bible example and teaching.

At the feast of Purim, a feast to the Lord celebrating the great deliverance God gave the Jews in answer to the prayers of Mordecai and Esther and other devout Jews when wicked Haman planned to exterminate them, Jews were taught “that they should make them days of feasting and joy, and of sending portions one to another, and gifts to the poor” (Esther 9:22).

Again, when the Jewish remnant who returned from the captivity began to mourn on a holy day as they met to hear the reading of the Law, they were instructed, “Go your way, eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto them for whom nothing is prepared: for this day is holy unto our Lord” (Neh. 8:10). So they returned home for feasting and sending gifts.
So giving gifts, if it be done in the right spirit and motive, honors God on special days set apart for Him.

Remember that God does not need our material things except as He wants them for other people. So under some circumstances giving to others may be as pleasing to Him as giving to pastors and missionaries. We should take care to give in Jesus’ name, remembering specially the poor at Christmas. But the right kind of giving to others is certainly fitting on Christmas.

When the rich young ruler wanted to be perfect, he was instructed to give his property to the poor, not to Jesus (Matt. 19:21); when Zacchaeus was converted, he was led to say. “The half of my goods I give to the poor” (Luke 19:8). That pleased Jesus very much.

Jesus said that He would reward everyone who gave a cup of cold water in His name. He also said, “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me” (Matt. 25:40).

So giving to others must please Christ very much, if it is done in loving thought toward Him and in His name. Certainly we should give to missions, to the poor and also to loved ones and relatives at Christmas. But be sure your motives are right.

7. “Should Christians Tell Their Children There Is a Santa Claus?”

Certainly not! Lying and deceit are wicked. Lying on Christmas is as great a sin as lying on any other day. It is shameful that Sunday schools often choose to teach a lying fable at Christmastime instead of teaching the marvelous true Christmas stories about the Baby in the manger, the shepherds in the field, the angel’s announcement of a Saviour born, the heavenly chorus and the wise men from the East. The story of the virgin-born Saviour is sweeter that any lie or fable invented by heathen people and spread by non-Christians.

I remember the sad, sad day when I, five years old, found that my father and mother and kin people had deceived me about Santa Claus—or Saint Nicholas. I was ashamed. I had been victimized. Those I trusted more than anybody else on earth, devout Christians, had lied. I wondered if other things they said were not true either. So Christmas was something of a mockery to me for years until I began to learn the sweetness of a Christmas centered about the birth of Christ.

Lying is wicked, is plainly forbidden in the Bible and is certain to have bad results. And the lie about Santa Claus is especially hurtful in that it crowds out interest in Christ Himself. The Lord Jesus, in many so-called Christian homes, is crowded out by the old, fabled gentleman who is always seen on whiskey ads at this season of the year.

Parents should always tell the truth. My own children were happier about Christmas than those children who have known Christmas as the celebration of a lie.

8. “What About ‘Xmas’?”

Many people distribute leaflets urging us to “keep Christ in Christmas.” In these tracts they sometimes attack the use of “Xmas” as an abbreviation of Christmas. X, they say, is a symbol for an unknown quantity, and this is a devious device of the Devil to remove the name of Christ from Christmas.

While I personally feel it best not to use the abbreviated word “Xmas,” it was not a deliberate attempt—at least at first—to “take Christ out of Christmas.” Actually, in the Greek language a large letter similar to an X stood for the letters CH, and thus for Christ. Originally, then, Xmas was Christmas.

Be that as it may, I am strongly in favor of putting “Christ back in Christmas,” and I never use the abbreviated “Xmas.”

Gingerbread Cookie Recipe

The kids and I made gingerbread cookies this week. We make and decorate sugar cookies quite often, but I had never tried gingerbread cookies. We got the idea from a gingerbread house kit we saw at the store. In the past, we have usually bought a kit every year, but I didn't want to do that this year. For one, I didn't feel like spending even $10 when I had all the ingredients at home for a much tastier and healthier alternative than the rock-hard prepackaged stuff. Also, those kits come with WAY too much candy, more than I wanted the kids to have.

This is the recipe I used:

4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tbsp. ground cinnamon

1 tsp. ground ginger

1/4 tsp. ground cloves

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 cup butter, softened

3/4 cup packed brown sugar

2 large eggs

3/4 cup molasses

1. In a medium-sized bowl, sift the flour, cinnamon, ginger, cloves and baking soda. Set aside dry ingredients.
2. In a large bowl, blend the butter and brown sugar. Add the eggs, one at a time, and then the molasses. Slowly add the flour mixture to the molasses mixture, stirring after each addition with the wooden spoon or mixer (the dough should be stiff).
3. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. On a floured counter, roll out the dough to a 1/4-inch thickness. Use cookie cutters to cut out gingerbread men and a spatula to transfer them to a greased cookie sheet, spacing them 1 inch apart. Bake for 9 minutes, or until light brown.

Note: I did not put the dough in the refrigerator for two hours after making it. I simply rolled it out right away, transferred the cut cookies to the baking sheet, and then let each batch sit in the fridge for 10 minutes before baking.


As far as the toppings go, I used my all natural food colors to make different colors of frosting. Some colors, such as a bright red, can not be achieved with natural food colors. I thought the frosting came out in nice shades nonetheless. I also put out my all-natural sprinkles, and was excited about finally getting to use the snowflake ones. There are many more varieties out there, but because of the fact that they are not artificial, cost is a factor and I don't have the full product range.


I then let the kids talk me into letting them put some "unhealthy" candy on for decoration. Ah well, they will live.





Solomon declared this activity to be the funnest time he has ever had in his life. While I doubt that is really true, I was glad to hear he enjoyed it, as did all the other kids.