Fursday

My favorite day is "Fursday"
It's the best day of the week,
At least it is the one about
Which I would like to speak~

The reason I like "Fursday"
Is because it is the day
That the little animals
All come out to play~

Mistress Rabbit hops out on the meadow
In her brown spring coat,
Froggy in his green wet suit
Swims and stops and floats,
Kitty licks her mittens
-Her fur is like a cloud,
My doggy sports his trendy spots
And wears them out so proud!~

I don't really have some fur,
Still "Fursday" is the best,
I'll invite my animals friends over
To see my pretty dress!

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

Morning ~A Poem

Ting twing,
Twing twang

Cling sing,
Cling clang

The pots and pans
Sound funny

When you bang them
With a spoon,

And hopefully
Our Daddy

Wil be getting up
Quite soon~

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

No thanks! ~A Poem

I don't want to,
I don't like to,
I don't think
It would be right to,

Don't feel like it
And I know so
I'll go hide
Beneath my bed,

I don't need to,
I don't think so,
YOU clean up
My mess instead!

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

Our Toys -Two Poems

Tuffy

Tuffy is a tabby cat,
She's quite a lovely cat at that!

She wears a bow tie
And a hat,
And sleeps upon
The Baby's mat~

Her tail is long and thick,
Her whiskers long and thin,
Sometimes I take her out to play,
Sometimes I take her in~

A cat is a good friend to have
When playing on the garden paths,
Or tramping down the sidewalk or
When building castles at the shore~

Tuffy is useful
To have around
At night when you
Hear creaky sounds,
For she purrs so sweetly
On your lap
Yet can scare the bad guys
With a mighty scratch!

She's stripey with a little patch,
I'm glad we have our tabby cat~

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012


Teddy

We have a teddy bear,
His name is Henry Sue,

He came with little cloths,
But now
He only has one shoe~

He has a tear upon his ear
Where the doggy bit him,
He's got a brown spot on his bum,
From when the heater burnt him~

Still, he is my favorite toy,
I love him very dearly,
Though his button eyes are lost
And he can't see very clearly~

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

Cuddle In

Cuddle in my babies,
Cuddle in, you are safe.
Snuggle and dream
Free of care.

Cuddle in my babies,
I'll hold you tight,
Close to my heart
All through the night.

Cuddle in wee sleepers,
let your lashes lie still,
let me kiss your cheeks
Round and fair.

Cuddle in, snuggle down
Pull your blankies up high,
grasp my hand, or your teddy,
Draw him nigh.

Here I am,
Here we are,
Together we sleep,
I thank God that these moments
Aren't rare.

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

The Sisters Write a Poem

Wise One and Punkin' Bread wrote this poem together for the baby in my tummy, it is called

Mommy's New Baby

I love the baby,
I love her,
I do.

She is as sweet as cake
As could be!

I'm excited to meet
The new baby.
I love the new baby,
I love her too.

I don't know if she
Would like us or not,
But I like her
A lot!

She is as sweet as candy!

Love from 'gurls'

Forgettery Frog

This is a story we made up together, the five year old, the three year old, and me. This is a super fun activity, great for getting the creative juices flowing. We went around in a circle and each came up with a sentence in turns. Here is our story:

The Forgettery Frog

One day there was a frog playing outside, he washed his hands in the sink. But when he went outside he forgot to turn the sink off and it was running all day. He tried to turn the water off, but he couldn't now, the faucet was stuck! He tried to open the door, but it was locked -he had forgotten the key! He thought he was turning off the sink, but it was really the door and he hadn't known it. Then he went vacationing to the beach one day and he splashed in the water. He was going to leave for home in the evening, but he forgot! And he was playing and splashing all night. When he finally got home he opened the door and found an ocean in his house! But he didn't care, because he liked to splash and swim every day. And Forgettery Frog was very happy.
The End

Floury Toes

I may end up starting a blog by this name just for the cooking exploits of my fun little family.

We'll see.

We cook a lot. And when I say cook, I mostly mean bake. There's a subtle difference and the difference is, usually, sugar.

Today we made what we affectionately named "Chocolate is Flying Everywhere Cookies." Between the three little hands "helping" me with the beaters and the rather large amount of flour this recipe calls for, there was, well, chocolate dough flying everywhere. Hence the name.

We based our recipe off of a recipe found in a great little cook book that a friend gave me called International Flavours. It is a book filled with recipes from around the world and was put together by the students, teachers, and staff of the GDQ School, an international Christian school. A great book for missionary families, I'd like to note. The original recipe is called "The best Chocolate Chip Cookies Ever." (From the Hartmann Family, thank you Hartmanns!") An impressive title! But even though we took many liberties, cutting down some ingredients and adding others, I am happy to report that they did live up to their original name of "The best ever."

I bet on cooking blogs you have to be really specific. Yeah, um, sorry. We're kinda' loosey-goosey over here so, bear with me.

First the recipe said to mix one cup of butter with 1 1/2 cups of white sugar and two cups of brown. Holy cow that's a lot of sugar! And butter! I cut it down to one cup of white sugar and about one and a half cups of brown, but put in a little more than a cup of butter, because I walk on the wild side. As I mentioned before, I had three sets of little hands helping me hold the beater as we beat the butter and sugar together. You would think that this would almost ensure that you would never drop the mixer, but oddly, the exact *opposite* is true.

Then my 5 yr old cracked up when I said, "Hang on, I need to mash some of that butter better!" And then my 1 1/2 yr old laughed hysterically every time I turned the beaters on after that. They can't help it, I'm just SO funny like that.

So then we added three eggs and two tsps of vanilla. Mmmm, vanilla...

Oh, where was I? Sorry, the smell of vanilla takes me to far away places.

Ok, so then in a separate big bowl we mixed about four cups of flour (the original recipe called for six. Six! I thought that was a little much.) with 1 1/2 tsps of salt, two tsps of baking powder and enough coco powder to make it reasonably dark. I don't know, maybe 1/4 cup? Go with your gut. The original recipe did not call for coco powder, but we left out the chocolate chips and put that in instead because all of this originally started when one cute kid wanted to make cookies and another cute kid wanted brownies. Brownie cookies! Voila! Problem solved, tears abated, life is good.

Finally we slowly poured the bowl of dry ingredients into the bowl of wet ingredients whilst beating and this is where flying chocolate happened. It was a fairly shallow bowl, maybe that was the problem. I don't know, but three kids running wildly around the room eating chocolate cookie dough off the walls left me time to mix in peace.

Time to roll spoon-sized bits of the gooey brown dough into balls and set them on the pan!

This is about the time that my 3 yr old noticed how much flour had gotten onto her black dress. Appaling. I mean, you just can't go around with flour on your cloths and "Why don't you wipe it off?", while a sensible query to you and I, is nothing but an insult to a young child's dignity. So she stripped naked and we continued on with our work. If you've never baked with a naked three yr old before, you've never really baked.

(Taken just before the cloths came off.)



We cooked the cookies at 180 C for 8-10 minutes. I'm happy to report that we only had two meltdowns in that entire time about "when the cookies would *ever* be done!" And only one of those melt downs came from me! Woo-hoo! Really though. Imagine having to wait eight *whole* minutes for something. In todays world that's practically an infraction on human rights.

Finally we ate them while they were still so hot that we could barely hold them. They're best that way, you know. They were quite moist (all the butter?) and so delicious. I highly recommend this recipe :D

Walk in the Light

"But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin." 1 John 1:7

In The Works

There are several up coming posts about gentle/grace-based parenting planned. I am a very busy mother of three (soon to be four!) wonderful, rambunctious, hilarious, sweet and slightly crazy children, so it may take a few weeks (*cough*months*cough*) to get all of my thoughts written down and sorted out so that they are actually coherent, but they are coming! Just a heads up!

Surprise!

As I stood up my knees began to quake a little and my belly flip-flop with what I realized was nervous excitement, the kind I suppose many Mom's feel when taking that kind of test. "I'm really about to find out... No more dismissing it as 'my period is probably just late.'" I took the cup and the dropper and the test into my room and closed out the sound of the kids roughhousing in the living room with my husband. I dripped a few drops on the correct spot and waited. When the test line appeared, bright, but all alone, I felt an odd mix of relief and sadness.

"Oh, I guess not... Hmm, itreallywouldn'thavebeenthebesttimeforitanywaybutgoshIthoughtIwasandwhytheheckis myperiodsolate?"

Then I remembered how the instructions said it could take a few minutes and I had a flash back of another pregnancy test, not so very long ago, whose second line was so faint that I almost missed it, too.

I peered closely at the test strip on my dresser and veeery slowly another line began to appear, at first only a shade darker than the background, but darkening with each passing moment.

Oooooh myyyyy goooosh....

Oh. My. Gosh!

I walked out towards the living room, passing the one and a half year old, elbow high in a toilet paper clogged sink in the bathroom. I plucked her out of her mess and strode into the living room, grabbing a diaper and the wet ones on the way, and plunked her down for a change. In my other hand I grasped the test.

"What is that?" My three year old says, pointing. "I want some! Can we eat it? Or is it just for smelling?
I laughed and I couldn't conceal my goofy grin.

"What? What is it?" My husband asks, alarmed, as he notices the look on my face.

"I naycake, I naycake! (I'm naked!)" The wriggly one beneath me shouts gleefully as I try to wrastle her into the diaper.

I glance sheepishly up at him as the toddler runs off (still naycake.)

"Pregnant?!"

"Pregnant."

Promises to You, My Unborn One

I promise to give you as gentle a birth experience as possible.
I promise you your genital integrity regardless of your gender.
I promise to nourish you from my body, both now while you are inside of me and later on with the milk I produce -thereby gifting you with sustenance, comfort, and even protection of your health!
I promise to cherish you as the gift you are.
I promise to delight in your giggles, your coos, the new things you do, and in just you being YOU.
I promise to comfort and protect you always.
I promise to be there for you -in the light and through the dark, though I may be drained and through the rains.
I promise that my arms will always be open to you.
I promise to never knowingly allow toxins or harmful substances into your body.
I promise to teach you about God and His Word, to strive to "train you up" in a godly manner, through example and servant leadership, and with kindness, respect, forgiveness and understanding. "There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear." ~from 1 John 4:18 "Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near." ~Phil. 4:5
Honey, Mamma is a sinner, she fails sometimes a lot. But darling, not only are you a precious child in our family, you are a precious member of a bigger family -God's family. As such you are a brother or sister to me in Christ and I will strive to serve you with Christ-like humility, gentleness, and tender loving care. To work at cultivating in you and me the fruits of the spirit, and to build you up so that you may always be "growing in the grace of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ" -as I too, hopefully am growing and learning and I hope to teach you with the same grace that our dear Lord lavishes on me. "Therefore encourage one another and build one another up" ~1 Thess. 5:11 "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law." ~ Gal. 5:22-23 "But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen." ~ 2 Peter 3:18

Promises from your sisters~

Adelina ( age 5 1/2): "I promise to not let Albulena pinch you or be mean to you. I promise not to let you get fat lips like Albulena does sometimes. I promise to bring you to Mommy if you ever get an ouchie. I will teach you how to say a lot of words. I would love you more than my heart."

Teuta (age 3): "I will be gentle to the baby. I will give you an apple. I will be nice."

Today

You are small today
Today you are a little girl
I cherish you

You are sweet today
Today you are full of cuddles
Snuggle up

You are full of wonder today
Today you share your dreams
Dream big

You are funny today
Today you make me laugh with joy
Laughter makes things bright

You are you today
Today I am proud to be your Mommy
Today and always

Today

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

Goodbye to Summer

I hope you have
the sweetest dreams
Of tadpole nurseries
in mountain streams,

Of purple flowers
a-hum with bees
And breezy breezes
in the trees,
Of bears all fat
and full of berries,

Of trees all plump
with ripe red cherries,
Of meadows ringing
with bright bird-song,
Of days so warm
and full and long,

Of Sister's arms
around your neck,
Of Mother's kisses,
smooch and peck,
Of watermelon
sweet and drippy,
Lemonade to taste
and sippy,

Run and jump
and chase and climb,
Dream about
sweet summertime~

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

Sleepover

Open one eye,
Look around-
I'm on a mattress
On the ground.

My toys are scattered
'Cross the floor,
Is that my jacket
On the door?

I turn the other
Way to see
My sister staring
Back at me!

We burst into giggles,
The big clock chimes,
And Grandma calls,
"It's breakfast time!"

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

A Billion

If I had a billion bucks
I'd spend them all on books,
Big books, small books,
Arms stacked high,
Despite the funny looks.

If I had a billion hours
I'd while them all away,
Reading in my garden
'Neath the branches
Gentle sway.

If I had a billion nights
I'd spend them in my bed
With a flashlight under
Grandma's quilt,
'Til Mother came and said:

"Little one, it's really time
To please switch out the light
And let me tuck you in once more,
And once more say 'Goodnight.'"

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

Into

Plink plink plink
the little pebbles say.

Plunk plunk plunk,
the bigger rocks say.

Ploonk ploonk kerploosh!
The biggest stones sound.

And Splash! is what I say
when I jump into the pond!

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

At River's Edge

If you ask me where
is my favorite place to be,
"The river's edge!" Is what I'd say,
if you asked that to me.

The sunlight sparkle on the water,
glinting gold and bright,
the chatter of a flock of geese
just settling from flight.

The skipping of the water bugs
that glide like little boats,
the muddy banks and frothing foam
that look like root beer floats.

Whether stirred with tiny white-caps,
or calm and smooth as glass,
don't matter what the weather,
I like to crouch and watch it pass.

A beaver lazily swims by,
then gives his tail a flick,
and dives down underwater
with his newly gnawed off stick.

Deer and coyote,
duck and hare
all come here to drink,
I come here to play around
or just to sit and think.

There's rocks to throw,
there's mud to squish,
-if I had a pole,
I'd fish-
There's frogs to catch,
boats to watch,
and lots of flies to swat.
There's plenty of cool water
For the days that get too hot.

Just listen to the way the leaves,
from trees along the shore,
crackle underneath my feet,
how could a kid need more?
Shh! And hear the cooing
of a dove up in that tree?
Yes I'm sure the river's edge
is the bestest place for me.

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

Rockabye

Rockabye baby,
Rockabye blue,
Rockabye baby
All the night through~

Rockabye lashes
Fluttering oft,
Rockabye little lips
Pouting and soft~

Rockabye cheeks
All rosy and round,
Rockabye wand'ring dreams
floating around~

Rockabye tummy,
That tumbling affair,
Rockabye whisps
Of lightly curled hair~

Rockaby pudgy legs,
Tickley toes,
Rockabye fingers
And pink button nose~

Rockabye bunny,
Snuggle you tight,
Rockabye baby
And kiss you goodnight~

Copyright Jacquelyn Bytyqi 2012

Time

Oh let her stay little
A little bit longer,
Oh let her stay little,
My Love ~
Oh let her stay little
A little bit longer,
The babe of my bosom,
My Dove ~

My Valentinies

I have three Valentinies,
There’s Wise One,
Little Bird,
And Tippy Toes ~

Oh she’s into the cupboards; she’s into the drawers,
She scatters her cheerios over the floors,
Yes, she’s an explorer,
My sweet Tippy toes,
With her pink laughing cheeks
And her button nose ~
Tippy toes giggles
At ev-er-y-thing,
Her toys, a balloon,
When her big sister sings ~
I snuggle sweet Tippy Toes
Close to me each night,
She’s cuddly, tickly,
Sweet grin delight ~

And then there is Little Bird,
Fawn eyes round and dark,
She’s shy, gentle, quiet,
And soft as a lark,
But when we’re at home
She is silly as can be!
A hysterical giggle of cuteness, you see ~
She dances and jumps
And has Princess Dreams
And is just as strawberry sweet as she seems ~

Wise One’s a tumble
Of colors and words,
A bright blur of twirling skirts
And bouncing blonde curls ~
Always jumping or skipping,
She’s most likely to fall,
But when talking,
You’ll soon find
That she knows it all! ~
She’ll pause for a peck
Or a hug round the waist,
She loves her special treats
And must get a taste! ~

So you see each Valentiny
Is sweet in her own way,
And I’m so thankful to have
These three Valentinies
Here with me today! ~