love to paint

Children have so many fears when they're little.  I remember two years ago when my girls were SO afraid of bugs.  I'm afraid that I wasn't much help since I actually don't like bugs.   Still, I continually tried to encourage them not to be afraid.  I hid my fear of bugs.  When they were upset, I spoke in a calm voice and tried not to make a big deal out of it.  They did seem to grow out of their fear though they still didn't them them. This summer they changed.  My daughter, Sami, has actually gotten crickets out of the underbrush for a friend's frogs.  She's come a long way.  I believe that part of what has helped her is my friend, Jenny, who loves bugs.  Her example and joy in God's creation--bugs--has opened my daughter's eyes and helped them to feel comfortable holding, touching, and being around bugs. Sometimes it's hard to know just what to do to help our kids get over their fears.  Bugs are a common fear among kids. ...

I love used book sales!  At this time in my life, it is less stressful to fill our house with books from used booksales then to stress about finding a lost library book somewhere in our house.  I am blessed that several of the libraries sell used children's books at their book sales for a quarter each.  Whenever I find children's books about God, I always pick them up.  I take them home and read them.  Most of the time I redonate them to the library.  But, every once in a while, I find a buried treasure.   Four or five years ago, I found one of these.  It was titled Everyday Adventures .  I only paid a dime for it.  I read through these stories with my daughters and I loved them.  They enjoyed them too, though my younger daughter wasn't able to follow them as well because it was a lot of reading and not as many pictures.  She was only 2 1/2 at the time.   I tried to find the author, Pat Holt, online.  At first, ...