Israel has wanted a fire pit since we first moved to the UP, but unfortunately, that never happened up there.  So, since the weather has warmed up, this was one of our first projects that we wanted to work on.  This past Tuesday, we chose a location and dug up the area where we wanted the fire pit to be.  We uprooted the old stones that were surrounding our gazebo, cleaned off the debris, and then transported them to create the border of the fire pit.  I love projects that cost us nothing but some ingenuity and a little elbow grease.

Using the fire pit for the first time…to roast Big Franks with my parents!

Looking forward to many more memories around the fire… 

If you don’t understand the title, read The Great Controversy, people.

Several weeks ago, I was invited to speak at an event in GA.  Since the trip overlapped with my birthday, we spent some time with our friends, the Chung Family.  It was there that my life changed forever.  I read parts of a book called The Self Sufficient Life: How to Live It.  The next week, as Justin Kim and I debriefed at a Barnes and Noble about CAMPUS, he purchased the book for me along with another one. 
Since then, we’ve been even more intentional about reusing, reducing, and recycling and trying to live off the land more than we have in the past.  As a way of educating our boys on these things, we decided to start a worm farm to help our garden out and to make composting easier. 
At first, I was about to purchase 1k worms online.  You can’t just go to Walmart or the gas station to purchase the legit ones.  Thankfully, we had a hard rain that made some worms surface to our patio.  That and the necessary digging required when we made our fire pit in the backyard gave us enough to start our first Ramos Worm Farm. 

Other friends we are hoping to attract and house: toads and frogs when we make a pond [right, Judy ], and loaner bees.  We’ll see if we get around to doing this. 
For the Ramos Family, this is Eye Are (or IR AKA Israel Ramos).

Today was such a beautiful day.  We spent nearly the entire morning and most of the afternoon outside with the boys playing, cleaning out Bonnie, and organizing the garage and pole barn.  And then, as we were scoping out our land, we came across a bonanza.  Underneath a bunch of brush, Israel spotted what looked like a raised garden box.  Upon further inspection, we discovered that he was right!

While Israel worked on other things, the boys and I tackled the garden box.  At the same time, we tried to get a head start on our worm farm.  (This will be another post.)  As we cut and removed more and more brush, we uncovered a bunch of tomato cages that were hidden in there!   

Finally, we got enough dirt out of the box to where the two boys and I were able to lift it out and then drag it closer to the house.  I found some left-over white paint and brushes in the basement and we decided to give it some new life.  They loved this part the most.

Here is the final product!  It took Manu, Micah, and me a total of about 2 hours from start to finish.  Thankfully Ty napped the entire time. 

Later in the evening, Israel helped me transport this closer to our house and we decided it will soon be transformed into a raised herb garden – if we can get our seeds to grow, that is…haha!    

Last week at the Ramos School for Boys, we spent school time doing science experiments from a science kit that we bought for Manu’s birthday.  We suspended our normal school routine to focus on science and more specifically how to conduct experiments to learn more about the amazing handiwork of God. 

We completed a series of 9 experiments throughout this week that dealt mainly with color, light, and dissolving/absorption.  The boys learned how to gather materials, read through procedures, make proper hypotheses, gather data, then come up with conclusions.  They were so excited to be scientists this past week.  I must add, I was very impressed with their work.

Here were some of their hypotheses:

Micah: 
“If we put a color tab in hot and cold water, then they will dissolve the same.”
“If we add 2 ml of red water and 2 ml of blue water, then the water will turn blue.”
“If we put the tabs inside the water, then it will turn into a rainbow.”
“If we add liquid soap to the soymilk, then there will be BIG bubbles.”

Manu: 
“If we add 4 ml of yellow water with 2 ml of blue water, then it will turn yellow again.”
“If we try the 24 color mixing challenge, then we can do it!”
“If put a color tab in hot water and cold water, then the one in the hot water will not dissolve.”
“If we put the 3 color tabs (primary colors) in the soymilk, then they will dissolve and turn it brown.”

So, as you can see, we did a lot of learning and there were plenty of surprises with the experiments. 

Our main materials

Dissolving color tabs in water and watching them fizz!

Mixing 2ml of 2 primary colors and making 4ml of secondary colors!

Mixing secondary colors together to make brown.

24 Color Mixing Challenge!

Growing colorful soft-watery crystals.

After an hour and a half, they grew nearly 10 times their size!

Observing through their magnifiers.

After a few days, we waited for all of the water to evaporate from the crystals and they shrunk back to original size, but they stayed colorful!

Learning how heat affects the rate of dissolving. 

Dissolving the color tabs in room temp soymilk and then seeing what happens when liquid soap is introduced. 
They loved the reaction that took place!  (Daddy was the most excited about this one.)

My students who now think God is even more amazing than before. 

This would make our Science Experiment Week a smashing success.

Through a series of unfortunate events, our plans for March 4th changed.  In the place of a wedding weekend, our home was filled with visiting friends from across the country, lots of games, exercise, and ended with a last minute birthday party for our birthday boy.  It was definitely what I would call a fun and exciting weekend.  Maybe, at times, too exciting. 

We called a few of Manu’s best buddies to see if they were free to come over on Sunday.  We were so glad that they could make it because it was so much fun!  Manu was also blessed to receive many generous gifts from his family, friends, uncles, and aunties.  Thank you to all those who thought of him on this special day.  He told me it was his best birthday ever! 

The sign for his name was made by Harabuhgee when Manu turned 1 year old!

Harabuhgee treated the boys to fries and Shamrock shakes for lunch – something only a grandpa could pull off.  Micah felt that THIS was the best party ever. 

Playing some air hockey before heading to the Y

Went skating & swimming at the Y

Korean BBQ tacos for dinner at our place

In the basement for piñata time!  Youngest to oldest…

Manu’s turn!  Time to spin 10 times!

Daddy controlling the piñata.  Watch out or the piñata will come after you!

Finally, Auntie Tammy saved the day and was able to bust open that toucan!  There was a mad dash to the goodies!

Manu and the treats he collected. 

Birthday boy!

I feel so blessed and humbled that despite myself, Manu is growing to be such a sweet, caring, and intelligent child.  It is even more wonderful that he loves Jesus with all of his heart.  It is our perpetual prayer that he continues to grow in God’s grace and that God uses him for a special purpose to further the kingdom of Heaven. 

Thank you, Manu, for being the best firstborn son we could have ever asked for!  Your brothers are so blessed to have you to look up to.  We are so proud of you.  May you always shine for Jesus!
     

Since we’ve moved in to our new house, we haven’t had much time to design or decorate our home.  I guess this is the final phase of moving.  So, the last couple of days, the boys and I decided to make-over their bedroom.  When we moved in, we didn’t assemble the boys’ bunk beds because we were just so tired.  We just pushed both beds together and all three boys slept together in the make-shift king bed.  And, there was nothing else in the room except for a space heater.  This has all changed the past couple of days!

We assembled the bunks and put Ty’s toddler bed in the room and then it was time to decorate.  We had a limited budget, so we mainly used what we already had.  The only purchases were the large area rug we found on sale for $20 and some cork that we bought for about $10.  We had a great time doing this and now they absolutely love their room!

They wanted a calendar and they chose what they wanted on the side table. 

Ty’s side of the room with 3 squares of cork we attached to the wall.

The older boys’ side of the room.  They wanted to hang up their own pictures and memorabilia so we measured and cut out strips of cork and attached them to the wall.  Micah has his strip by his bed and Manu has his on the top bunk.

They love their Guam map and also the caricatured map of Houghton/Hancock.  It has all of our favorite hang-out spots from when we lived in the U.P.

Since we set up their room, they now faithfully make their beds and have kept it very clean.  It’s amazing how much pride and care they now have for their own space.  We put two baskets of toys – one for stuffed animals and one for their cars/trains/planes.  We made a rule that they can only play with these toys in their room, and that they must put them away after playing.  Just having 2 baskets has made clean up very simple and easy and it has made their play room much neater as well. 

And now we’re on to the rest of the house…

So, I have been pretty indecisive whether or not I wanted to start home schooling with Imanuel.  He showed interest in learning and he has always loved to read, but I wasn’t sure about structuring the learning in more of a school-style format.  Well, it got to the point in our lives where it seemed like the days were just crawling by.  We would go through our daily routine, but particularly with Imanuel, he seemed to be getting bored and constantly itching for something else to do.  When I brought up the idea of starting school, both Imanuel and Micah were ecstatic.  So, last week, on Monday, January 23rd, 2012, we officially began.  They each chose a backpack for their school books and supplies and we were ready to go.  When Ty goes down for his nap, school begins.

I haven’t purchased anything since deciding to start school.  I decided to utilize all of the pre-K/K books, workbooks, stickerbooks, coloring books, and flashcards that we have accumulated over the years.  I dug out all of my teaching supplies that I previously had, as well as a stash that I had been collecting over the past years specifically for teaching my boys.  I came up with a basic learning curriculum to start off with.  We set an alarm for one hour and within that hour, we have a short worship, learning/assignment time, flashcard time, craft time, and then we close with prayer.

After the hour of school, it is snack and story time.  They are listening through The Bible Stories on CD.  That was one of the best investments we have made for them.  After that, they are ready to play. 

I am so proud of how much they have learned so far.  It really is amazing to see how sharp their minds are.  Just a week and a half ago, Manu didn’t know how to read at all.  But today, he has learned to read over 20 sight words.  A couple nights ago, he read his first few board books by sounding out the words.  Micah came into school not knowing how to color.  Seriously.  But he has really improved in staying within the lines.  His proudest accomplishment has been learning to identify both capital and lowercase letters. 

So far, they really seem to be enjoying this time together.  They help each other by encouraging one another.  When one of them does something amazing, they give a “squeegie-like-a-luigi” (which translates to a big bear hug where both end up on the floor).  Micah made that one up.  It’s lots of fun. 

It has been really fun getting back into teaching.  It is so different from teaching my upper elementary/middle school kids.  But it is still a fun challenge and the satisfaction of seeing your students learn remains the same.  I’m thankful that I spent those years as a teacher by profession.  It provides lots of ideas and resources that I can utilize now.  The limited one hour time frame gives me motivation to prepare a solid, fun, and challenging school session from start to finish.  Hopefully as time goes on, I will be able to maintain the same quality of teaching for a longer period of time.  I pray that God will continue to grant me patience and motivation to be the best teacher I can be for them.     

Here are pictures of our first days of school:
(FYI, we do school in our PJs. 

Happy Groundhog Day!!!

During my sister’s 5 week stay, we had some good times.  Apart from spending the holidays with the whole family, we had lots of fun and exciting adventures.  We worked on a few home improvement projects including assembling and installing a linen closet and bathroom shelf.  We spent an afternoon installing a carpet runner on the stairs going to the second floor since it was hardwood and slippery. 

We did some hardcore clothes shopping at the outlets and the other malls in the area.  And during our free time, we made and delivered DVDs of our holiday festivities to our family, got our hair done, trained my cats to do some tricks, and ate left-overs for nearly every meal.  The only bad part of the whole time was that Aroe was sick and we were worried that he wasn’t going to make it.  He seems to be doing fine now.  Here are some of the highlights from the past months:

The boys in their new amped up play room.  Thank you, Lala & Jacob!!

Visiting our cousin Danny in Champaign, IL for a weekend of reconnecting:

Shopping date and having a sleep-over at Uncle Justin’s (& Uncle Sunny’s)batchelor pad in Ann Arbor:

carbing up at CPK before justin’s sponsored shopping spree

experiencing pinkberry for the first time.  there were no complaints!

Watching Uncle Justin’s IM basketball game:

First-Ever Family Bowling Night with Grams:

Just hanging out with the fam:

daily lotion time

“paw” trick

wearing a part of harabuhgee’s hat collection!

Memories that will last a long time. 

From the time we moved down until now, everything has been such a blur. I guess that’s because the first couple of weeks were spent unpacking and settling in, then came the holidays and my whole family was able to spend time together, and then just until last Sunday, my sister has been here with us during her 5 week vacation. But now that she is gone and I realize that 2 months have gone by without much warning, I’m feeling the pressure to get back into the swing of real life. The challenge is that I’m still trying to figure out what that looks like.

This past Monday, I “officially” started school with the two older boys. During Ty’s nap, we spend one structured hour together. The boys have been begging me to make school longer, but I think one hour is all I can handle. It is also really all they need. I’m really enjoying getting back into the swing of structured teaching. I may write more about that later.

I’m currently at a place where I am highly motivated to restructure everything in my life. I want to get back into triathlon training so modified meal plans are in the works. This ties in with our new goals for budgeting and adjusting to our new daily schedules. While my sister was here, I experienced something similar to when I spent that time with her in Guam. I can’t really place my finger on what it is, but being with her is so refreshing. It was like finding myself again.

This past Christmas when my whole family was together, I realized something I never thought about before. It was like rediscovering roots I had forgotten I had – like remembering who I am. I think time apart, living separate lives is essential to personal growth and development. However, coming back together was like a breath of fresh air. It helped to give me a sense of personal identity once again. After all, deep down, I still am a proud Namm. I don’t think anything can take that away from me and it is something I could never deny.

The Namm in me pushes me upwards to new heights and lofty goals. The Ramos in me causes me to think outside the box and to remember to value what truly matters. Both of those combined teaches me to live a meaningful life filled with faith, hope, and love.  It is a perfect combination that only God could have orchestrated.

I know I need God’s help most of all. I need His undying love to keep me humble and fervent. I need His strength to give me perseverance and discipline. And I need His wisdom to keep me on the right track. I want to do great things for Him.

So, here’s to an amazing new year in a new city and home! Here’s to a new chapter in our lives.

Me and the boys in our new home in DeWitt, MI.  January 2012.

Knowing myself to be incredibly nostalgic, I am tempted to feel discouraged about this move. An analogy that has continued to emerge in my mind is that of a plant that has generously spread out its roots over the course of some incredibly significant and important years. But the time had come for the plant to be pulled from the soil. It’s as though each of our roots have been removed one by one, in rapid succession, from this life. I have been much too aware of the many “lasts” that we have had to face recently. We experienced our last U.P. fall. I distinctly recall mowing the lawn and thinking about how this was the last time. The boys had their last trip to Portage Hospital to see Dr. Rajanee. I stopped by to drop off mail at our Chassell post office and chatted with the post lady for the last time. We had our teeth cleaned for the last time by Dr. Richards. We had our last Sabbath here in Houghton. Our snow plow guys came for the last time. We had our last Thanksgiving. I just now heard a pack of coyotes howling, perhaps for the last time. We attended our last Yooper Task Force meeting. Our trash pick-up man, Greg, came to our house to pick up our trash for the last time. This past Tuesday morning, we loaded up all of our belongings in the conference semi-truck and they left the U.P. at last.  And tonight, we had our last family evening worship in this home.  We spent it sharing special memories that we’ve spent here.  For the boys, it mainly involved swimming and biking and playing with their friends. 

Now the family is asleep on the floor of an empty house and when we wake up, it will be our last day before we leave the U.P.  I never imagined it would be this hard to move. I never thought I’d make such strong attachments to a place and a church family. But I praise the Lord for this thing called faith. Faith has helped me remember that when He calls us to move, it is always to something better to bring us to someplace higher in our experience. As in the words of a rad Christian artist, “God’s gonna do a new thang”. I feel as though I am being uprooted, but by faith, I know it is to new soil that will enable me and my family to grow.  I also realized that it is time for a new pastor to come in and minister to our churches in a way that we never could.  It goes both ways.  As Christians, we get potted and re-potted several times. Otherwise, our growth will get stunted or we may even die. So, beyond the tears and heartache and lost memories, I can look with hope to the future. It is hard to imagine a better place for our boys to grow up, but I trust that God has a master plan. I know He is preparing us to bring us home, to our final destination, where we can grow indefinitely in the earth made new.

Intently watching all of our belongings being loaded into the truck.

Big Mac & our moving crew on Tuesday, November 29th, 2011.  It was done in 3 hours.

What the last couple of days in the Yoop looked like.

Last day with Grandma Karen – one of the main reasons why leaving is so hard.

Tomorrow morning, once we cross Big Mac, we will officially turn from being Yoopers to Trolls.  That’s basically like changing our citizenship.  Please pray that we aren’t too affected by culture shock.