Thank you for stopping by my website. Most people know me as the wife of Pastor Steven L. Anderson of Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe, Arizona. Others know me as the homeschool mom of my large and growing family that includes 10 kids ages 18 and under, with a new baby joining every couple of years or so. 

 

I first began blogging in 2007 as a way to chronicle our everyday lives. Over the years, this grew from being just a hobby to a tool for reaching out to other moms. I am thankful for the opportunity to share with them what works (and what doesn't!) in caring for a family of any size. 

 

My other interests include creating things in the form of cooking, baking, crafts, writing, etc. as well as reading and learning, particularly anything relating to natural health in general, and pregnancy and childbirth in particular. 

 

I was not raised in a Christian home myself, though being raised Catholic, I did hear many Bible verses growing up that planted the seeds for salvation. In particular, the verses "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me" and "I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved" kept coming back to me time and again. I remember many times as a child praying and asking God to reveal Himself to me, to show me how to walk through that door. As a side prayer, being an avid reader of children's stories set in the American Wild West, I always added a prayer that God would transplant me there while He was already busy hearing my prayers. 

 

By the time my husband and I met in 1999, when he was 18 and I was 20 years old, I had given up those seemingly fruitless prayers and become an agnostic. I was in my second year of college in Munich, Germany. I was by all intents and purposes a liberal, humanistic feminist interested only in a career, with little room for God, family, or others. 

Thankfully, my husband not only showed me how to be saved by simply believing on Jesus, but since we got married a year later in August of 2000, has provided me with a life far better than I could ever have imagined. It didn't even dawn on me until a few years ago, that God had answered my prayers even all the way down to living in the American Southwest I had dreamed of as a child. God is good, and He works in mysterious ways. 

 

We did not set out to have a large family when we got married, though we did want to have kids right away. When our oldest son, Solomon, was born 13 months later, our eyes were opened to the fact that children truly are God's greatest gift this side of eternity. We have learned as much from being their parents as we have taught them. 

 

The resources you find recommended on these pages are things I came up with myself in my spare time, to use for our own family, or they are the things we purchase time and again. Not finding modest swimwear that was both practical and cute, I designed my own pattern. Trying to cut down on prep time and cost in cooking for our large family, I compiled all my favorite go-to menus and recipes into one cookbook. Currently, I am working on a literature-based homeschool curriculum that will span a total of five volumes. I have used this approach to teach our kids for years. The benefits of this method of learning are overwhelming, but the work that goes into pulling it off shouldn't have to be.   

Our home and our family are far from perfect, but they are perfect for us. By the grace of God, and through faith in His Word as our ultimate guide for life, we have been fortunate to be able to live a life full of His blessings, which I am thrilled to share with others. 

 

God's richest blessings on you and yours as you seek and serve our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!