Why are we gluten free?
Well, we aren't, entirely. But, I did some research and am always listening to people and have come to some conclusions.
People who are gluten intolerant can often develop celiac disease.
On the other hand, once you have cleared a lot of the gluten out of your system, you don't have to be death on wheat bread.
It's easier than a lot of other dietary restrictions, particularly, if you aren't celiac and can't even have a tablespoon of flour to thicken your soup with.
Why are so many people intolerant of gluten? Are we just weaker than our ancestors? Maybe, but there are two basic reasons.
1) For thousands of years the only grains people could bake with were whole grains, making a coarser, denser bread than our modern day white breads. By soaking their flour in an acid (sour milk, buttermilk, yogurt, water with lemon or vinegar) overnight, it automatically made their finished product lighter, not to mention breaking down the outer coating of the grains and making more nutrition available. I'm not an expert, I read this on the internet, just the way you can. The side effect was, the gluten also broke down, so even societies that lived on wheat, rye, or barley bread three meals a day were not getting glutened out.
2) The 20th century Green Revolution made it possible to breed strains of wheat, especially, that had higher gluten levels and resulted in higher, lighter, fluffier products. Think Wonder Bread, hot dog buns, and Betty Crocker cake mixes. People liked them, which fueled the demand for high gluten wheats, so the strains were widely developed commercially. I don't know where you could go to get an heirloom wheat today.
Why did we go gluten free?
I was wondering what was going on with my kids. I did body testing with all of them and figured out that it wasn't the wheat, per se, it was the gluten that was bothering many of them. So, I started changing our family diet. Coincidentally, we got a new pastor and he had to have gluten free meals. I asked him, "How did you know something was wrong?"
He started listing off his symptoms. Pain in the lower shoulder blades, pain in the feet and ankles, deep pain, like, bone deep. And extreme fatigue. Suddenly, so many things came clear.
Personally, whenever I got up from a seated position, it would take me at least 4 steps to walk normally. The pain didn't go away, but things loosened up enough I could take it. I thought it was from being pregnant all the time!
Anna and Becki were complaining of pain in their backs and feet for years. Becki has lain down to do school since she was 12 and still prefers a very sedentary lifestyle. As for Anna, she always complained of being tired. When she was three, we took a family hike at the local state park, and she ended up being carried by Gabrielle because I was a hardnose and thought she ought to buck up and walk. She was fairly active until she learned to read, at which point she went to bed with her books and never came out. She would put herself to bed and read while the family was watching a movie. That was what contributed to her getting up to 100 lbs. by the age of 7. Since we went gluten free, she has taught herself to ride a bike, always wants to go on the trampoline, has learned how to skip and is fighting with her brothers, which she never had the energy to do before. (The downside!) She had never been strong and pain-free her entire little life.
I am more flexible with the gluten now that we have been careful for so long and it has gotten out of our systems. Anna, in particular, who had the worst symptoms, body tests as gluten free, while her older sister, Mimi, still is sensitive. But Anna was amazing in her efforts to stay clean from gluten. Imagine, going to a church breakfast when you are 7 and there is NOTHING you can eat. (She's dairy sensitive, as well!) No one told her she couldn't eat anything; she just didn't. Becki has been more of a challenge. She's always more of a challenge. She is also 16 and has to make her own decisions on things more than before.
Would it be nice if we didn't have to do gluten free? Yes. It would certainly be easier. But, believe it or not, it's cheaper, since we do make a lot from scratch, and it's healthier, since we are forced to use whole grains in a variety, increasing our fiber and making it less likely to develop an allergy because of overexposure. My life is not about gluten free, it's about living healthy. I don't make my kids eat hot dogs with corn tortillas (not a success). I don't turn down the occasional chocolate chip cookie. I don't have to make an issue of it with other people or convert them. They do what they need to for their families, we do it for our family. Celiac is, of course, a different story. But, while most people could benefit from cutting back on their gluten intake, most of us don't have to make our lives all about what we eat. Praise the Lord!
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
One more little girl, Anna, who is 8, and not really expressing her own style yet. But she has her own issues. When you have a daughter who is a regular 8 when she is 8, it is a simple matter to find clothes that fit and are age appropriate. But what do you do when you have an 8 year old who is as tall as a 10 year old and weighs 100 lbs.?
A year or so ago, I saw some growing up pictures of Steve's aunts and realized that my "big" girls came by it honestly. The women on Steve's side of the family tend to be big girls and grow up to be matronly; not fat, matronly. Becki complains that she always gets the part of "the mother" in any play she is in. Matronly doesn't work at 8, however. Once again, we get the bubbles and rolls.
So, to avoid bubbles and rolls, a friend with 8 daughters and a variety of figures advised me to get tunic or baby doll style shirts, which are designed to be a)loose and b) long. They disguise a lot, while not relegating your daughter to looking like garbage bag. The pants are tougher. Anna is still child size in height, but adult size in circumference and Wal-Mart does not carry plus sizes! But we have discovered a wonderful thing: adult capris. Her bottom can be hidden by the long tunic style shirt if she wears adult sized leggings, but we found that capri length pants actually worked very well. "What Not To Wear" did a family makeover and also dealt with an extremely slim little girl using capris as well. The length, being an issue when buying trousers, is not an issue with capris.
After going to all this trouble to find pants that fit her, ironically, she prefers dresses. They are far more comfortable and the height issue doesn't exist. At least, at this point. She can still wear a size 16 girl and it will be child-like in style and appropriate in length. We shall see what we shall see when she gets to be 11 and has to wear adult sized 12 dresses!
One of greatest tricks for turning dresses with not enough fabric on top into modest dresswear, is a variety of tank tops and camisoles. A camisole with lace at the top can "modi-fy" a dress with too much cleavage, while remaining dressy. A tank top with wide straps can "modi-fy" a spaghetti string sundress. As always, finding them long enough is the trick, but a pair of capri leggings under a dress that Mutti gave Gabrielle for her birthday that turned out to have a hem above the knee fixed that.
We're not done.
Shoes. I love shoes, though I am frugal enough to know that I don't need 14 pairs of flats just because they're cute. of all the clothing choices out there, women's shoes are the most diverse and finding a pair of dress shoes that are not too faddish (why buy something that you will not WANT to wear next year?) but are attractive isn't difficult, even if you rule out all the high heels. Shoes are the most expensive part of clothes shopping for us because they do not come in the hand-me-down bags very often. I have also heard that shoes conform to the shape of your foot and you may do damage by wearing pre-worn shoes. So, we buy shoes. Generally speaking however, we have seasonal rules. Sports sandals in the summer, tennis shoes and boots in the winter. Dress shoes are optional and, since they buy their own clothes once they get to 10 years old, they may buy dress shoes if they like. However, not just any dress shoes.
Mimi, 10, likes high heels. Boots for horseback riding need a heel, of course, so I don't argue with those but, since all our girls, including 8 yr. old Anna, wear adult sized shoes, we sometimes have a challenge. Even shoes can be age appropriate. Becki is 16: she pretty much gets free rein. Sarah, 14, and Gabrielle, 13, prefer flats, except for concert wear, which is the most dressed up they ever get. (Ah, the advantages of living in a cornfield!) For Anna, she likes her tennis/dress shoes that are popular these days. But, Mimi! I allow her a 1 inch heel since it is possible to get modest dress shoes with a small heel. It is a constant struggle to remind her that she is not a big girl yet and that shoes count. But, she is learning!
A year or so ago, I saw some growing up pictures of Steve's aunts and realized that my "big" girls came by it honestly. The women on Steve's side of the family tend to be big girls and grow up to be matronly; not fat, matronly. Becki complains that she always gets the part of "the mother" in any play she is in. Matronly doesn't work at 8, however. Once again, we get the bubbles and rolls.
So, to avoid bubbles and rolls, a friend with 8 daughters and a variety of figures advised me to get tunic or baby doll style shirts, which are designed to be a)loose and b) long. They disguise a lot, while not relegating your daughter to looking like garbage bag. The pants are tougher. Anna is still child size in height, but adult size in circumference and Wal-Mart does not carry plus sizes! But we have discovered a wonderful thing: adult capris. Her bottom can be hidden by the long tunic style shirt if she wears adult sized leggings, but we found that capri length pants actually worked very well. "What Not To Wear" did a family makeover and also dealt with an extremely slim little girl using capris as well. The length, being an issue when buying trousers, is not an issue with capris.
After going to all this trouble to find pants that fit her, ironically, she prefers dresses. They are far more comfortable and the height issue doesn't exist. At least, at this point. She can still wear a size 16 girl and it will be child-like in style and appropriate in length. We shall see what we shall see when she gets to be 11 and has to wear adult sized 12 dresses!
One of greatest tricks for turning dresses with not enough fabric on top into modest dresswear, is a variety of tank tops and camisoles. A camisole with lace at the top can "modi-fy" a dress with too much cleavage, while remaining dressy. A tank top with wide straps can "modi-fy" a spaghetti string sundress. As always, finding them long enough is the trick, but a pair of capri leggings under a dress that Mutti gave Gabrielle for her birthday that turned out to have a hem above the knee fixed that.
We're not done.
Shoes. I love shoes, though I am frugal enough to know that I don't need 14 pairs of flats just because they're cute. of all the clothing choices out there, women's shoes are the most diverse and finding a pair of dress shoes that are not too faddish (why buy something that you will not WANT to wear next year?) but are attractive isn't difficult, even if you rule out all the high heels. Shoes are the most expensive part of clothes shopping for us because they do not come in the hand-me-down bags very often. I have also heard that shoes conform to the shape of your foot and you may do damage by wearing pre-worn shoes. So, we buy shoes. Generally speaking however, we have seasonal rules. Sports sandals in the summer, tennis shoes and boots in the winter. Dress shoes are optional and, since they buy their own clothes once they get to 10 years old, they may buy dress shoes if they like. However, not just any dress shoes.
Mimi, 10, likes high heels. Boots for horseback riding need a heel, of course, so I don't argue with those but, since all our girls, including 8 yr. old Anna, wear adult sized shoes, we sometimes have a challenge. Even shoes can be age appropriate. Becki is 16: she pretty much gets free rein. Sarah, 14, and Gabrielle, 13, prefer flats, except for concert wear, which is the most dressed up they ever get. (Ah, the advantages of living in a cornfield!) For Anna, she likes her tennis/dress shoes that are popular these days. But, Mimi! I allow her a 1 inch heel since it is possible to get modest dress shoes with a small heel. It is a constant struggle to remind her that she is not a big girl yet and that shoes count. But, she is learning!
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Your daughter's style
How do you enforce standards of dress at your home and yet still let your daughters find their own styles? I have seen a whole family of homeschool girls apparently in uniform and, if they are happy with that, of course, there is no problem. But, if your daughter is not comfortable or feels badly in the clothes you want her to wear, it could affect her negatively for years. So could not having standards in dress, so we will address both of these.
When I was little, I always wanted to go look at the fluffy, fru-fru dresses. My mother wouldn't darken the door of that department. She hated shopping, so I only went shopping once a year for my school clothes and it became a battle of her practicality in opposition to my feminine longings. We have since discovered that her style is sporty/natural and my style is romantic. So, when I wanted ruffled dresses, I ended up with herringbone tweed jumpers with gigungous flat buttons for decoration. Yay. By the time I was eleven, she would get a whole pile of clothes to the dressing room and go through them saying, "Do you like this?" I wouldn't exactly say yes or no, but I knew she would not allow me to get something I would like, so I said, "If it is in my closet, I'll wear it." I had come to the conclusion that my opinion didn't matter, so we both got frustrated with her attempts to elicit one. It wasn't until I was 38 and, ironically enough, moved into a house with my mother that I discovered my style.
The house is theirs, but divided distinctly, with two of everything. For the first time, I thought I would be in a house long enough to actually decorate it beyond hand-me-down furniture, so I asked my mother for some of her decorating books. We live in the same county as Frank Lloyd Wright's home and studio, Taliesin, and our house was designed with the Prairie Style in mind. Think Mission furniture and Morris as a decorator. Arts and Crafts. Well, I looked at her books and, as lovely and warm as all these rooms were, they left me cold. They were dark, (though our house has heaps of windows and maple flooring), lots of geometric florals and sharp cornered furniture. Very masculine. Things began to percolate for me, however, and I realized that the Arts and Crafts movement took place in the Victorian Age. So, I looked at Victorian and Romantic Country style magazines and fell in love. And when I discovered how I wantee d a house to look, I discovered how I wanted me to look.
My mother wears tweed pants; I wear flowy cotton skirts. Her dining room table is rectangular; mine is oval. Her chairs (even the sofa) have rectangular backs and corners; I have overstuffed furniture and rounded chair backs. Her floral patterns are geometric; mine are natural. I was finally a grown-up, making my own choices!
So, how do you let your daughter make her own choices while still upholding your standards?
We had planned that our daughters would all wear skirts: Steve likes femininity. However, I have seen some very frumpy ladies who would swear they are dressing femininely. Lets look at Proverbs 31:22: "She makes tapestry for herself; Her clothing is fine linen and purple." The Bible says she dresses well. It doesn't mean it has to be fancy or designer - she made it herself - but she is not a frump. Her style should be modest, but flattering. For us, modest means no cleavage and no knees and clothes that are loose enough to not stretch on the body. Clothing that is figure-unflattering can draw just as much attention and be as bad a witness to the Christian life as clothing that is entirely too flattering, shall we say. Our change of thought on the sksirts business, however, occurred when our oldest daughter, Becki, was 8.
Becki was very active, loved to play with the boys, since she had two older brothers, but wasn't comfortable playing boy games in dresses. I can appreciate that, since, at that age, I wore shorts under my (polyester tweed!) skirts to play tag on the monkey bars with the boys. So, she wore sweatpants for the next three years. Everywhere. Even church. She had dresses for really nice occasions, but we didn't have many of those. Her challenge was that she has always been a big girl. She was always taller going into an age (say, 8) than the people turning out of it (becoming 9). So, by the time she was was 11 or 12 and decided she wanted to look nice, she was already in junior sizes. By the age of 13, she was wearing women's size 12. She wanted to be able to wear the cute girl dresses, which actually were age appropriate for her, but none of the clothes available to her were like that. We made a dress or two, but it was mostly letting her dabble with skirts and dress pants, jackets and different styles of blouses and shoes, that she finally found her style. She is still a big girl and she has to try everything on, but we have found her comfortable, everyday style, which is mid-rise pants, a polo with a tank top (for modesty, as well as style) and often a necklace to divide her chest and make it appear smaller. Remember, she's a BIG girl. She has also discovered that she can wear snazzy shoes that add to her height and give her a more feminine walk, even when she is wearing jeans. She is sixteen, so high heels are acceptable in our opinion.
Sarah is 14. She prefers skirts, but will wear pants and is rather artsy at heart. She draws, paints, dances ballet, and came into her own about the time that women friends of ours started handing down their grown-up clothes to us. Becki will sometimes avail herself of the hand-me-down bags, but Sarah revels in them. She covers her head, either with bandana or an artistic hat, and loves long skirts. She is slighter than Becki and shorter, so she doesn't have a problem being fit. Her favorite outfit is a brown tiered skirt, an Israeli Defense Force camo t-shirt and a green or tan scarf for a belt. She's modest, it's flattering, can't complain.
Gabrielle is 12. She wants to live like Laura Ingalls. She only wears pants when she is cleaning out the barn in the winter or when she hunts with her older brother, or when she plays the trombone in marching band. For her, it is dresses, only dresses, not skirts. She covers her head, but only with bandanas or scarves and has made herself a pair of Duck Tape sandals (thank you, Mythbusters!) to replace the $70 Tevas she left at the water park. (That hurt!) Since she truly wants to homestead (completely conceivable as a future career where we live) and would rather have a horse and wagon than a driver's license, the dresses work very well for her.
Miriam is 10 and only happy when she is moving. Literally. She starts to cry when she has to be still for too long. She is also a ballet dancer, but considers that far too controlled to be really fun. Jeans are her speed. However, she, like Becki, is also a big girl, and the challenge for her is allowing her to wear jeans and t-shirts that are bigger, so they are not too tight (one of standards, remember?) I sometimes have to sneak clothes out of her laundry pile when I know they are getting too small. She's not happy about it, but she doesn't realize they're gone til it's too late. She says she prefers them snug, and I am not really surprised by that. She is extremely tactile, as one might imagine from my description of her, and the tight clothes may actually be more comfortable for her. However, they are not flattering, showing her bumps and rolls. So, we, as parents, have had to work with her style (jeans and shirts and boots) while setting standards (not too tight!)
When I was little, I always wanted to go look at the fluffy, fru-fru dresses. My mother wouldn't darken the door of that department. She hated shopping, so I only went shopping once a year for my school clothes and it became a battle of her practicality in opposition to my feminine longings. We have since discovered that her style is sporty/natural and my style is romantic. So, when I wanted ruffled dresses, I ended up with herringbone tweed jumpers with gigungous flat buttons for decoration. Yay. By the time I was eleven, she would get a whole pile of clothes to the dressing room and go through them saying, "Do you like this?" I wouldn't exactly say yes or no, but I knew she would not allow me to get something I would like, so I said, "If it is in my closet, I'll wear it." I had come to the conclusion that my opinion didn't matter, so we both got frustrated with her attempts to elicit one. It wasn't until I was 38 and, ironically enough, moved into a house with my mother that I discovered my style.
The house is theirs, but divided distinctly, with two of everything. For the first time, I thought I would be in a house long enough to actually decorate it beyond hand-me-down furniture, so I asked my mother for some of her decorating books. We live in the same county as Frank Lloyd Wright's home and studio, Taliesin, and our house was designed with the Prairie Style in mind. Think Mission furniture and Morris as a decorator. Arts and Crafts. Well, I looked at her books and, as lovely and warm as all these rooms were, they left me cold. They were dark, (though our house has heaps of windows and maple flooring), lots of geometric florals and sharp cornered furniture. Very masculine. Things began to percolate for me, however, and I realized that the Arts and Crafts movement took place in the Victorian Age. So, I looked at Victorian and Romantic Country style magazines and fell in love. And when I discovered how I wantee d a house to look, I discovered how I wanted me to look.
My mother wears tweed pants; I wear flowy cotton skirts. Her dining room table is rectangular; mine is oval. Her chairs (even the sofa) have rectangular backs and corners; I have overstuffed furniture and rounded chair backs. Her floral patterns are geometric; mine are natural. I was finally a grown-up, making my own choices!
So, how do you let your daughter make her own choices while still upholding your standards?
We had planned that our daughters would all wear skirts: Steve likes femininity. However, I have seen some very frumpy ladies who would swear they are dressing femininely. Lets look at Proverbs 31:22: "She makes tapestry for herself; Her clothing is fine linen and purple." The Bible says she dresses well. It doesn't mean it has to be fancy or designer - she made it herself - but she is not a frump. Her style should be modest, but flattering. For us, modest means no cleavage and no knees and clothes that are loose enough to not stretch on the body. Clothing that is figure-unflattering can draw just as much attention and be as bad a witness to the Christian life as clothing that is entirely too flattering, shall we say. Our change of thought on the sksirts business, however, occurred when our oldest daughter, Becki, was 8.
Becki was very active, loved to play with the boys, since she had two older brothers, but wasn't comfortable playing boy games in dresses. I can appreciate that, since, at that age, I wore shorts under my (polyester tweed!) skirts to play tag on the monkey bars with the boys. So, she wore sweatpants for the next three years. Everywhere. Even church. She had dresses for really nice occasions, but we didn't have many of those. Her challenge was that she has always been a big girl. She was always taller going into an age (say, 8) than the people turning out of it (becoming 9). So, by the time she was was 11 or 12 and decided she wanted to look nice, she was already in junior sizes. By the age of 13, she was wearing women's size 12. She wanted to be able to wear the cute girl dresses, which actually were age appropriate for her, but none of the clothes available to her were like that. We made a dress or two, but it was mostly letting her dabble with skirts and dress pants, jackets and different styles of blouses and shoes, that she finally found her style. She is still a big girl and she has to try everything on, but we have found her comfortable, everyday style, which is mid-rise pants, a polo with a tank top (for modesty, as well as style) and often a necklace to divide her chest and make it appear smaller. Remember, she's a BIG girl. She has also discovered that she can wear snazzy shoes that add to her height and give her a more feminine walk, even when she is wearing jeans. She is sixteen, so high heels are acceptable in our opinion.
Sarah is 14. She prefers skirts, but will wear pants and is rather artsy at heart. She draws, paints, dances ballet, and came into her own about the time that women friends of ours started handing down their grown-up clothes to us. Becki will sometimes avail herself of the hand-me-down bags, but Sarah revels in them. She covers her head, either with bandana or an artistic hat, and loves long skirts. She is slighter than Becki and shorter, so she doesn't have a problem being fit. Her favorite outfit is a brown tiered skirt, an Israeli Defense Force camo t-shirt and a green or tan scarf for a belt. She's modest, it's flattering, can't complain.
Gabrielle is 12. She wants to live like Laura Ingalls. She only wears pants when she is cleaning out the barn in the winter or when she hunts with her older brother, or when she plays the trombone in marching band. For her, it is dresses, only dresses, not skirts. She covers her head, but only with bandanas or scarves and has made herself a pair of Duck Tape sandals (thank you, Mythbusters!) to replace the $70 Tevas she left at the water park. (That hurt!) Since she truly wants to homestead (completely conceivable as a future career where we live) and would rather have a horse and wagon than a driver's license, the dresses work very well for her.
Miriam is 10 and only happy when she is moving. Literally. She starts to cry when she has to be still for too long. She is also a ballet dancer, but considers that far too controlled to be really fun. Jeans are her speed. However, she, like Becki, is also a big girl, and the challenge for her is allowing her to wear jeans and t-shirts that are bigger, so they are not too tight (one of standards, remember?) I sometimes have to sneak clothes out of her laundry pile when I know they are getting too small. She's not happy about it, but she doesn't realize they're gone til it's too late. She says she prefers them snug, and I am not really surprised by that. She is extremely tactile, as one might imagine from my description of her, and the tight clothes may actually be more comfortable for her. However, they are not flattering, showing her bumps and rolls. So, we, as parents, have had to work with her style (jeans and shirts and boots) while setting standards (not too tight!)
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Daily Prayers
We're supposed to pray for our family every day, right? And there are times when there are specific things that need prayer (like the temper tantrum happening next to me), but there are other times when we know that we need to pray but don't know how to pray in a way that isn't selfishly motivated. Well, every since doing Kay Arthur's Lord, Teach Me to Pray, I have tried to base my prayers on scripture because I can know I'm praying in God's will if I am praying His words, right? And I have found that even what can seem repetitive prayers can be effective when I pray God's word. So, here are my prayers:
Lord, help me to submit to Steve in all things, as the Church submits to Christ in all things. (Eph. 5:22-24)
Please help the teachings of wisdom to be on my tongue when I speak to my children. (Prov. 31:26)
Lord, I pray that Steve will live with his wife in an understanding manner, as with a weaker vessel, so that his prayers may not be hindered. (I Pet. 3:7)
I pray that you would turn the heart of the father to the children and the heart of the children to the father, so that we may not be smitten with a curse. (Mal. 4:6)
I pray that the children would honor their parents in the Lord so that it may go well with them. (Ex. 20:12)
Help us to love one another, so that people will see that we are Your disciples. (John 13:35)
These aren't my only prayers, and I am always willing to pray more, but this covers the basics of every day with the family.
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
Introduction
Well, where are we? My name is Shannon and my husband, Steve, and I have been married for 21 years. I was brought up in apartments in Chicago and he was brought up under the runways at O'Hare Airport. We met at a large singles Bible Study at a large, non-denominational church in the western suburbs, where he was Mr. Hospitality and I was a lowly, recent college grad. But he took pity on this introverted girl who got stomach pains whenever she walked into a ballroom and talked to me. We got married 2 1/2 years later and started having babies right away. (Steve was 31 and figured he had waited long enough to have children and there was nothing else I wanted to do!) Ben was born a month after we moved into our first house and two weeks before our first anniversary. I had convinced Steve that I really wanted a home birth and, as hard as it was, we were both glad that I had.
On our honeymoon, Steve and I sat on the balcony of his condo and discussed the direction of our life.
Shannon: What do you really want to do?
Steve: I want to spend time with my kids.
Shannon: Okay. So what do you want to do while you are spending time with your kids?
Steve: It doesn't matter. Whatever will allow me to spend time with my kids.
That turned into a nine-year adventure of praying that God would bring Daddy home while we investigated buying a deer farm, an apartment building, and a camera shop. We talked about raising llamas and starting a Bed and Breakfast. We discussed his going back to school to become a veterinarian, or my pursuing a performing career in music and his taking the kids with me on the road, or having a family ministry. We especially talked about moving to the country in the hope of getting out of debt with a lower cost of living. But we always understood that Dad being home was the goal, not country living.
With his computer work for various companies, Steve finally ended up at a job that was in a small town/country environment, but there was no housing available with all the building going on and he was commuting so far that some of the children were acting out terribly. There were only five of them at the time, and we all missed Steve dreadfully. Well, coincidentally enough, my father (Papa) retired and followed my mother's (Mutti's) inclination to move to Southwestern Wisconsin so she could become a recluse. They knew of Steve's interest in multi-generational living, and his desire to move us to the country, so Papa and Mutti invited us to dinner one night and said, "How would you like to move up to Wisconsin with us and we will find out what we're going to do when we grow up?" Steve was 40!
So, we did! We had two small houses in town while Mutti and Papa located land to build a house for us all. It's a house like you've never seen, since it is essentially two houses connected by common areas. My mother insisted that we have our own kitchens, so she wouldn't take advantage of my cooking and she would not have to face our mob for every meal.
On our honeymoon, Steve and I sat on the balcony of his condo and discussed the direction of our life.
Shannon: What do you really want to do?
Steve: I want to spend time with my kids.
Shannon: Okay. So what do you want to do while you are spending time with your kids?
Steve: It doesn't matter. Whatever will allow me to spend time with my kids.
That turned into a nine-year adventure of praying that God would bring Daddy home while we investigated buying a deer farm, an apartment building, and a camera shop. We talked about raising llamas and starting a Bed and Breakfast. We discussed his going back to school to become a veterinarian, or my pursuing a performing career in music and his taking the kids with me on the road, or having a family ministry. We especially talked about moving to the country in the hope of getting out of debt with a lower cost of living. But we always understood that Dad being home was the goal, not country living.
With his computer work for various companies, Steve finally ended up at a job that was in a small town/country environment, but there was no housing available with all the building going on and he was commuting so far that some of the children were acting out terribly. There were only five of them at the time, and we all missed Steve dreadfully. Well, coincidentally enough, my father (Papa) retired and followed my mother's (Mutti's) inclination to move to Southwestern Wisconsin so she could become a recluse. They knew of Steve's interest in multi-generational living, and his desire to move us to the country, so Papa and Mutti invited us to dinner one night and said, "How would you like to move up to Wisconsin with us and we will find out what we're going to do when we grow up?" Steve was 40!
So, we did! We had two small houses in town while Mutti and Papa located land to build a house for us all. It's a house like you've never seen, since it is essentially two houses connected by common areas. My mother insisted that we have our own kitchens, so she wouldn't take advantage of my cooking and she would not have to face our mob for every meal.
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