Kwik Stix

I have written quite a few Blog posts sharing about our family's love for Kwik Stix. 

You can click here to read the 

BIG 

review I wrote on this amazing product. 

These are solid tempera paint sticks that you just uncap, twist, and paint! They dry in 90 seconds but the painting dries looking like paint. You don't add water. You don't need paint brushes. You just uncap and color!

Well they are now available at all 

BJ’s Wholesale Clubs! 

And even better is that they are going to give away a pack of these awesome pens 

to one commenter on my blog.

Leave a comment and cross your fingers for a win!!! 
I will be drawing the name on September 1.

Because we all need to smile

I have decided that my blog will be a happy place. I am not saying I won't ever have anything not happy in the future, but at least for the considerable future, my goal is to remember the things that make me smile each day. Many in our world are very sad. Tensions are running high.

Here is my truth, and if you know me in person, I hope you know this to be true. 

I am a Christian. I have views. I hold fast to my convictions. But I love. I love everyone. Our differences should not impact that. Or at least this is my goal ... always. We encourage people to come visit our farm from all walks of life. And we want them to feel that this is a safe place. I have had friends from all races and religions and lifestyles. And I love them. And I hope they love me back. I truly believe that that is my job on this Earth. To be kind and to show the love that I believe my Savior showed everyone he met. 

Mark 12:30-31 "And you shall the love Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.Love your neighbor as yourself.There is no commandment greater than these.”

So ... on that note, stay tuned for all the happy I can muster in the days/weeks to come. I want you to know that you can come here and just smile and remember that while there are hard things in the world there are also big farms, and little piglets, and kids who say the darndest things.

For example, Hannah was playing outside today. When I went out there, we had the following conversation:

Hannah: "I have three tomatoes in my pocket."

Me: "Why?"

Hannah: "Because I just picked them."

Me: "Are you going to eat them?"

Hannah: "No I don't like tomatoes."

Me: "Okay. Well why is Ritter running around? I had him on the leash."

Hannah: "Yeah. I learned how to take him off of the leash."

(This was news to me and quite overwhelming to think she holds this power.)

Later at dinner:

Isaac: "Here you go Hannah."

Hannah: "I'm not Hannah. I'm tomato girl."

Shortly after that I had to send Hannah to time-out for putting bread between her toes.

These are all true stories.

And I hope you smiled -- even just a smirk will do.

Still blogging (and posting them to Facebook)!

For some reason, JB did a personality quiz this week. He was an INTJ -- they are introverted intuition with extraverted thinking. Not surprising that they are called "The Scientist."

I was an ESFJ  -- we are extraverted feeling with introverted sensing. We are called "The Caregiver."

All of that is neither here nor there, but JB and I realized, as we watched the election results, how different people are in how they manage conflict and disappointment and frustration. We are all people. But we are unique.

I want people to get along so badly. I loathe conflict. I want the world to be a happy place. I would do anything to just have peace.

And I've decided that it is okay to strive for that. I've been really working on spending my time doing things that bring me joy. Seeing people fight on Facebook does not bring me joy so I'm not going to go there and watch people fight. I will still be doing my Blog, and it will post to Facebook. So you'll still see me there. My Blog brings me joy. Writing brings me joy. But looking through my Facebook feed will not bring me joy. And so I'll skip it for awhile.

Since I am not on Facebook, it was my husband who read me a post on our pastor's Facebook page this morning. It said:

Probably a good verse for all of us today: "Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person." — Colossians 4:6

I am so sorry for those who are sad. I am not rejoicing. I don't think conflict can ever be a time to rejoice. But I do know that God is still God and that our world is still here and that we need to show Christ's love at all times.

And that's what I intend to do. I don't care who you voted for. I care about you as a person and you as a soul, and truly, there are a lot of things in the world bigger than this.

So I intend to write about farming and pigs and kids and homeschooling and the insanity of my life .... a few people mentioned they didn't want to stop seeing my posts because they were a happy spot for them.

THAT made me so happy!

Spreading my wings

You can now follow me on Twitter.

You can also follow me on Pinterest.

In addition, you can also be my friend on Facebook (if you aren't already). Just send Wendi Huisman Kitsteiner a friend request.

I've held off on social media (outside of Facebook) for awhile, but am finally diving in ... a bit!

Happy Anniversary Best Friend

Today is 18 years since I married my best friend. We've lived in four states, three countries, and three continents. We now have 4 children, 19 sheep, 8 pigs, 9 ducks, 5 geese, 84 laying hens, 22 guinea fowl, and 150 broiler chickens. :) We also have a ton of wonderful memories and have had, despite some hard times, a fantastic life. I can honestly say that I love my husband more today than ever.

Here is a look back at some of the blogs I have done on our anniversary since I started the Blog back in 2006:

17th anniversary
16th anniversary
15th anniversary
14th anniversary
13th anniversary
12th anniversary
11th anniversary
10th anniversary
9th anniversary
8th anniversary

39 and new WWOOFer

Today I turn 39. Actually, the first birthday I celebrated on this Blog was my 29th. Here is a flashback to that on May 22, 2006. 

I was so excited that my MOM gets to be here for my birthday!!!! Pictured from left above are: me, Hannah, Abigail, Emily, Isaac, Sidge, Grama K., Grama Di (my mom!), Grampa K., and JB.

The picture above is from last night at Dairy Queen. We went and all got ice cream from my birthday. Our new WWOOFer, Emily, is pictured in the back left. She is from New Zealand.

During our DQ celebration, we learned that New Zealanders have an animal called the possum but we have the opossum. She also had never tried an Oreo which we hope to rectify.

We also learned that she is taught in school that there are seven continents just as we are. Our French Canadian WWOOFer is taught that there are five!

So many things we are learning with all these wonderful people here.

Hard to believe that I've celebrated ten birthdays on this Blog!!

Can You Drink the Cup?

A great piece on grief by an online friend of mine and fellow writer at www.theglorioustable.com. Can we do what God is asking us to do?

By Kelly Nickerson

My husband and I sat quietly in the corner, listening to the humming of the machines. It all seemed so surreal. How did we get here? Our son had been admitted to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) and was unresponsive. He was on a ventilator, and they were purposely paralyzing him while working on his tiny five-month-old body.

We weren’t supposed to talk, because he would try to fight the ventilator, and they wanted him to rest.  His body was overtaken by tubes and wiring, and they weren’t giving us much hope.

My husband and I were blessed with a great support system. The Lord provided many people to help us through those tumultuous days.

At this point we couldn’t make it to church. We were living on prayers, and we wanted to be in the presence of God, as we knew he was the only one who could fix our baby boy.

One of the pastors from our church came to the hospital with a little wooden box and a rolled-up paper that looked like a scroll. The box contained communion bread and grape juice. She encouraged us to take a moment and share it.

To read the rest of this piece, please visit my fellow writers at The Glorious Table. 

Book Giveaway!

I have written previously about how much I have loved author Julie Lessman's books. My favorite still remains the "Daughters of Boston" series. I have decided to give away the first book in the series: A Passion Most Pure so I can get someone else hooked on this awesome series! I am only going to leave this contest open for the next 12 hours! This evening I will choose a commenter and send them a copy of this book. So leave a comment right away with your email address or mailing address (or both.)

P.S. My only "catch" is that I am asking when you are done reading this book you find someone else to give it to!

Year 2: My own very unofficial Halloween awards

Last year I started my own very unofficial Halloween awards for family dress up. I know I am about a month behind, but I wanted to share my results from my second unofficial Halloween awards. These are simply done by people's pictures they post on Facebook.

Here they are!

GRAND PRIZE:

The Pleasant family! I mean they have something for the stroller! And I think that is a carved pumpkin on the porch. Just so that you don't get the wrong idea, I KNOW this family doesn't have it altogether, but I'm impressed nonetheless!

FIRST PLACE:

Great job Deanna! The only reason you didn't win the grand prize is because the dog wasn't included somehow. (Just kidding!) Very creative!

SECOND PLACE:

The Beaudoin family got EVERYONE in on this one. So impressed. Our family would never do a family dress up. It's just not in our DNA. Although Dan cheats a bit since you can't see his face. That makes it much easier to participate.

THIRD PLACE:

I have to wonder if any of my friends even recognize this family? Leave a comment if you do! This gal always comes up with original ideas and is NOT afraid to follow through on it. Well done chica!

Schoolhouse Review Crew

I am so excited! My Blog was chosen to be a part of the SchoolhouseReviewCrew.com. 

A HUGE thank you to my friend Jake Olson for telling me about this awesome opportunity. I had to fill out a lengthy application and meet a lot of requirements. A big part of that was having a daily blog with a certain number of visitors, and a history of completing reviews. So THANK YOU for reading and visiting and being a follower!

What does this mean? Well I don't know everything this includes yet, but I do know I'll be receiving and reviewing a variety of homeschool curriculums that I will then, in turn, share on my Blog. 

I was also recently awarded GOLD status at Booklookbloggers.com which allows me to review two books at a time. I got this because I had 300 followers on my Blog. THANK YOU for being a follower!

The Glorious Table

I am so excited to be writing for a new blog called: The Glorious Table. They have quite a few writers so I will probably only have a piece go up every few months, but it is still great to be included. 

The piece I wrote this time is called: You Don't Know the Whole Story! Please take a moment to jump over there, read the article, and then share it with others.

Since today is Pregnancy & Infant Loss Remembrance Day, I find this especially appropriate!

Also, take some time to scroll down to read some other really great pieces on pregnancy loss and infertility including: 

Lucky Isn't Always What it Sounds Like

For This Child We Prayed

When Love and Loss Collide Can You Still See Beauty

The Glorious Table

I am very excited to be joining the writing team on a new blog: The Glorious Table.  You can see the complete list of authors who are contributing to this Blog by clicking here.  This blog was established by my friend Carla's sister, Harmony, and a few of her girlfriends, and I am so honored they asked me to contribute. I hope you'll take the time to view the Blog, and I will especially be linking to them when it is my turn to write!

Blog's 10th anniversary: I want to hear from YOU!

This month, I celebrate TEN YEARS OF BLOGGING!

Here are some fun facts from the first ten years.

• My blog was originally entitled: Life in the Polar North. When we moved from Minnesota to Florida, I changed it to Life in the Polar North Defrosts. Then we moved to Turkey and I think I called it Life in the Polar North Defrosts and moves to Turkey. After that, I gave up on a name. We are working on moving my blog to a new site. Once that is done, it will be called We Bought a Farm. 
• I have written this blog from many states and many countries but most specifically I have lived in: Minnesota, Florida, Turkey (and a little Germany), Portugal, and then Tennessee since this all began.
• I started this Blog with a husband and two love birds. We have since lost the love birds (due to domestic abuse and a big Dalmatian) and have added four amazing children who have rocked my world.
• My first blog entry: First Blog Entry (July 13, 2005)
• My post with the most comments (449!): Introducing Isaac John (May 8, 2008)
• The post that caused the most tears: The Secret is Out (June 23, 2008)
• Hardest post to write: IVF #4 failure (June 12, 2007)
• I had the most blog posts in the year 2010! I had 767 posts. This was a big year as we moved to Turkey and found out we were expecting Abigail.
• As of today I have had 1,295,472 visitors to my blog.
• My blog is most often read by people in: (1) USA (2) Canada (3) Turkey (4) UK
• I had the most blog posts in one month in: November 2013 (95 posts!)
• I have 221 official followers of my blog. 
• I have 294 people signed up to follow me to my new blog. (Click here if you haven't signed up.)

So now it is your turn. I'm asking EVERYONE who is a regular reader and who enjoys my blog to please leave a comment telling me what your FAVORITE post of all time was. (Or some other fun memory.)

C'mon. Don't sell me out. Ever since Facebook, I get a lot less comments on my Blog as people often just leave the comment on Facebook. This time I want to see the comments here. If I write every day, surely you can leave ONE TEENY TINY MEASLY COMMENT in celebration of TEN YEARS?!?!

Big Blog Changes

Did I mention we are going to buy a farm?

After pleasant but intense husband-wife discussions, JB and I have come up with a plan for my Blog. We've both been feeling that the privacy of our lives is an issue -- especially now that we are moving to a small town and he will be a physician in that small town.

The details are still in the works, but basically there are going to be different "levels" to my Blog -- basically it will have settings like Facebook where I can control who sees what.

In order to accomplish this, it will require a lot of work on my part (and JB's) but we have decided that this is valuable enough to me to do it. I really want to continue my writing and hopefully reach a larger audience.

So here goes nothing. In order to accomplish this, I need blog readers to either:

1. leave a comment on THIS post with their first name and email address and how they know me.
2. send me an email at flakymn@hotmail.com with your name, email, and how you know me.

Please understand NO ONE (not even my own mother!) is exempt from this requirement. I cannot begin to track down who reads and their email addresses. The only people who will be given "exclusive" access to my blog are people that email me who they are.

Thanks in advance!

P.S. I will post this blog repeatedly to make SURE I get everyone "in" that wants to be "in" so there is no big hurry. But the sooner the better!

We (are still waiting to) buy a farm

All systems are go to actually buy this farm ... but due to some bank glitches the closing has been delayed a few more days. We are now set to have a final purchase right before Thanksgiving. 

We are headed down in about a week to do a walk through and show Grampa and Grama the property. Slowly getting more and more excited, and while we know eventually we should own this place, it has seemed to take FOREVER to dot all i's and cross all t's.

With the purchase of this farm, my Blog will be changing directions significantly. Click here to make sure you stay no the "inside" of higher security measures for our family.

5,000th Post!

THIS IS POST NUMBER 5,000!!!

I started this blog in 2005 -- mainly to help family stay up-to-date on our infertility journey. It was called "Life in the Polar North" then because we were in Minnesota and I was freezing my tooshie off like a crazy woman so my husband could go to medical school at the Mayo Clinic.

Life has taken us far since then. We moved to the panhandle of Florida, then Turkey, and now the Azores.

We went from a childless couple -- to a couple with a dog and then a couple with one, two, three, and now FOUR children!

So in celebration of my 5,000th post, I wanted to ask YOU the people who READ my blog to do me a favor.

You've been reading the details of my life for a long time. I have over 200 followers and get about 400 hits a day which is about 12-15,000 a month. But I don't often know many of the people who read my blog. So, even if you are only an occasional reader: Would you leave me a comment? 

Yes, this means even YOU Mom. It means my best bud Kristi and to you, the person who only comes over once a month and scans and has never left a comment. If you EVER read, I am asking you to leave a comment!

Here's what I would like YOU to tell ME in your comment:

1. Your name (if you are okay with that)
2. Where you live
3. When you started reading
4. Why you have kept reading
5. Something interesting about yourself
6. And if you remember, tell me one of your favorite posts that I have written or maybe a subject matter or something else that you like about the blog

All righty folks ... ready ... set ... go!

P.S. I am attempting to respond to each commenter individually, so check back to see my response.

Poll results

I recently closed the poll on the side of my blog. I had asked what types of things you enjoyed reading on my Blog. Here were the findings:

• 92% enjoy our family stories
• 44% enjoy my family stories
• 12% enjoy my adoption stories
• 9% enjoy my infertility stories

ONE MILLION VISITS

My blog just rolled over 1 million hits!!!

Way cool!

Resuable Sandwich Bags

I was recently contacted by a follower of my blog. She wanted to send me some superhero style reusable sandwich bags that she makes. I quickly agreed to share my address and a few days later (man, getting mail in the USA is soooooooo much faster!) I had the bags.

I had never heard of reusable sandwich bags! But I am really impressed with the product and can't wait to try them out. If you are interested in this product, I encourage you to visit her Etsy page by clicking here.

Thanks friend!

Take III

"Because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.” -- D. Seuss or Bernard Baruch

So, now that a little time has passed and I have taken more deep breaths, I want to discuss, briefly, what happened on my blog this past week. If you missed it, you can read Post 1 here. You can read Post 2 here.

My lovely friend English ... Veronia's older sister whom I have known since she was just a tiny little girl (as opposed to the big hunk a' woman she is today -- said sarcastically I assure you), wrote her own post about this on her blog. You can read English's post here.

English's post wasn't so much about what happened but what we should do as bloggers when something like this happens again in the future.

Here is what I have decided.

1. I am not going to stop blogging -- albeit this is the closest I have come to thinking, "I'm not sure I can do this."
2. I am not going to stop talking about personal topics -- that is who I am. My blog would not be my blog.
3. My blog is my ministry. I must remember that that I truly believe that this is the way I beileve the Lord wants to use me. At least right now.
4. The deeper I decide to go on my blog the more vulnerable I am making myself.
5. I am not going to start moderating comments (checking them before they go live.) Honestly, the main reason is that I am too busy. I can't add another step right now. The secondary reason is that I think comments going live immediately allows conversation to develop without my help.
6. I am, in the future, simply going to delete comments that hurt my feelings. I do not need a reason. I do not need to justify it. If a comment is not kind, I am going to choose to just "let it go."
7. I must remember that the minority doesn't speak for the majority. As a teacher, I constantly worked to remind myself that the one student who was so "bad" should not stop me from teaching the dozens who made me love my job.
8. I must try not to take things so personally.
9. And above all, I will attempt, at all times, to think like my Savior, despite the fact that I am a human, saved by Grace, and far from perfect.

English wrote about me and my writing. She said that my  "...blog faces the difficulties of infertility, the joys of adoption, and the surprises that await us around every turn." That is what my blog is about. English gets it! And if English gets it, then so do other people.

The last two days, my real world persona has been effected by what happened to my online persona. In the future, I hope that people will keep in mind that things you say online are real. And that the person receiving it is real. I exist! However, I also vow to strive, as best I can to forgive (even though forgetting takes longer), and to truly do as Jesus would do. Even though my flesh says, "But that isn't fair!"

I will never let the minority become the majority of my blog. And I will always strive to represent my savior as best as I can.