10 years ago tonight!!!

Grace and Jonathan came home ten years ago tonight!!

Rejoice with us! What an amazing part of our family they are! We love you sooooooo much!!

Grace was 9 and Jon was 2! They are now 19 and 12!! God is sooooooo good!

Happy Anniversary you two!! 

Our Precious Blessings!

I've prepared this post in order to feature our children that we've brought home and adopted that have had struggles. We have 2 biological children and 6 adopted children, and 2 more coming from Bulgaria very soon! We home school, and this has allowed us to tailor make our children's education to them as they have come into our family.

Each of our adopted children have had struggles of their own, due to their circumstances from which they came.

Meet our beautiful Grace. Arriving in our family at the age of 9 from Haiti, Grace suffered greatly for a long time with attachment issues, throwing fits that lasted hours. By the Grace of God, she is now doing really well, and is well adjusted and age 17.

Here is our handsome Haitian son Jon. Jon came to us at the age of 2. He had been brought to the orphanage at the age of 1 and weighed only 10 pounds. He was starving to death. Due to his start in life in this way, he has struggled with attachment issues, and also has been categorized as ADD and ADHD, as well as showing some signs of high functioning autism. Jon is 10 now, and has really come into his own. He still has great struggles, but God is good, and Jon hopes to be an evangelist some day!

Meet Elisha and her twin brother Edward. These beautiful children were in our NH state foster care system at the age of 8.5. They suffered greatly before coming to our family in 2010 when they were 10 years old. They both had some attachment issues to deal with, and many educational hurdles to overcome. They were considered too old to adopt, and hard to place, but we knew God wanted them in our family! On the day they moved in, there was an inverted rainbow in the sky! Such a blessing from the Lord!

Meet Nicole. She, too, was from the NH foster care system. Abandoned at the age of 5, Nicole had some major attachment issues. She was prone to fits of rage lasting for hours, and hours. She was truly one of our hardest children to deal with a lot of the time. Nicole is 8 now, and is mine and my husband's little shadow! She is doing wonderfully!

Last but NOT least, is our precious Rosalinda. Born one month early in NH, Rosie was also born addicted to drugs. In the NICU for almost 6 weeks, she was detoxed using morphine drip. Drug addicted babies are so hard to comfort and soothe. Rosie is now 22 months old, and doing really well! She still has struggles, and many behaviors that are part of how she came into the world, but it appears that she is on target with her development in many ways! She's our littlest peanut right now!

It has truly been by God's grace, and the fervent prayers of His faithful that we have been able to come this far. He has equipped us for "such a time as this", and He has equipped us VERY well. He is now preparing us for our 2 newest children, who will also come with much to prayer through.

But we can truly say:  "We could have no greater joy than to hear that my children are following the truth.!" 3rd John 1:4

J & Ed's Fire Wood Business---and Entrepreneurial Skills for Kids!

They say that our children should have started at least 5 businesses by the time they reach the age of 18.  To develop entrepreneurial skills, and character, work ethic, and creativity, as well as budgeting, and other money skills to include tithing!

"So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” (ESV) 1st Corinthians 10:31.

Our children have really enjoyed doing this! The girls have a booming babysitting business, as well as the their "Sister's Cleaning Company" where they will "take the stress out of your mess!", and they've had many clients for that, too! Madelyn's pet and farm sitting business has steadily grown over the last few years as well, and now that she has her license, it's wonderful!

Elisha is going to start a home baking business this Fall, and Madelyn has her newspaper which has been being published for 1.5 years. Grace makes and sells granola, and Madelyn and Grace bake for our local farm stand. Madelyn, Grace, and Elisha had a steady job this summer working at the farm stand, and that was good, too!

Of course the boys love to go to work with Glenn and have learned many work ethic character traits as well as many carpenter skills! 

Jon is studying bikes right now, and hopes to have his own bike repair business started by this time next year, and he's 10!

We've enjoyed encouraging our children to be a shining light for the Lord, and watching them learn and grow as they are doing things under our umbrella for His honor and glory! We've been so encouraged by their testimony as their press ahead to further God's kingdom!

1st Peter 3:15 says:

"But in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect,"

Our boys latest business venture is fire wood. They have helped Glenn cut and split a lot of pine lately, and they have come up with the plan to try and sell some for camping, or camp fires at home. 

This is the firewood stand they made with Glenn yesterday afternoon.  Glenn and the boys had such a great time working together on this, and then filling it up and getting it all ready to go!
Thank you to Elisha for painting their sign! It was soooo cute. Edward went out this morning to see if they'd had any customers overnight! They just finished it as it was starting to get dark!

It's been such a blessing to us as parents to see our boys thinking and planning and preparing. Such a great skill to have as they enter manhood, and "prepare their fields" for the future looking to the Lord in ALL things! 

We've put it on Craig's list, too. You can view that listing HERE

REJOICE WITH US!

REJOICE WITH US!
8 years ago today, (July 7th, 2005) God brought Grace Mickaelle Inolan Winslow (then 9) and Jonathan David Winslow (then 2) into our family! We are truly blessed! Thank you Lord!

2 photos

Our Jonny Boy is Double Digits Now!! Wow!!

Yesterday was a double celebration. We were excited to celebrate Jon's 10th birthday, and also the last snow storm of winter, too! Jon didn't mind at ALL to share his special day with lots of snow!! Below are the preparations the night before!

 Here is Jonny Boy taking off his final ring from his birthday chain that seemed to last a loooonnngggg time!

 Remember how long it was 2 months ago???? It was 59 days until Jon's birthday! That seemed such a long time away...especially to Jonny!

But there he is...no more rings left! The day has actually come!!

 On the menu for Jon?? He was so excited to choose foods from our new THM eating plan!!
Breakfast was...Trim Healthy Pancakes (and yes..I made Jon a giant one, and yes..I snuck in a few chocolate chips, too, for the birthday boy and other kiddos!) and yes...we used our own maple syrup, too! Yum! He also chose grape juice and bacon, too! Yummy!

 Jon talks with Grampa who called from Florida to wish Jon a Happy Birthday!!!

 Oh yes...and I forgot to mention...the muchly anticipated coffee for the birthday boy! Because..what would using the fancy china be like if we couldn't use the coffee cup, too?? Right?

 The whole gang at breakfast!!  Oh yes...and another bonus of the snowy day...Glenn stayed home! Yeah!! Such a blessing!

 After breakfast...it was present opening time!

 Edward helps to read some cards!

 Here he is in some of his camo gear he got for his birthday! Wow! Can you see him now???

 He got a really cool water bottle filled with lots of great survival gear!

 Here he gets a call from his Big Sister Brittany wishing him a Happy Birthday, too! What a popular guy he is!

 For lunch he picked tuna salad, and then some cream pops for dessert! Yum!

 Here are the chunky cream pops...a highly recommended THM recipe!

 shots of the snow! Soooooo beautiful!

 For supper Jon picked cheeseburger pie, a garden salad, oopsie rolls, and peanut squares for dessert! Great choices Jon!

 After supper Jon asked if we could play Uno Roboto. A really fun version of Uno! And...the team of "the busy bees" (Jon and Edward) won! Yeah!!!

 What a blessed day! Jon...you are an amazing young man, and it is so neat to see God's plans for you in action! I can't believe you are 10! You truly are an amazing part of our family, and we love you sooooo much! (even though by this time next year you'll be MUCH taller than any of us, we predict!)

A fun thing Jon got yesterday are: 2 M.R.Es... which are meals ready to eat! Military issue. He got marinara sauce with meatballs and chicken and dumplings. His plan is to take them to church with us on Sunday and share them with his kindred spirit in military things...Michael Collomy!!! 

Happy 10th Birthday Jon!