A Boy's Passage

Turning 13 for a young man is a big deal in our family.  My husband years ago read the book "Raising a Modern Day Knight" by Robert Lewis. It is a powerful book that we highly recommend to parents, particularly fathers, of boys.  We do a special ceremony at 13 and then again at 18 for them.  My third son turned 13 this past April and like my husband has done with my other older two sons, he took him on a special camping trip.  This trip also included close family and friends with their dads as well.  They had a great "man time" camping and on the second night of the trip had a special ceremony for Christian.  This past time was the largest crowd they have had on one of their trips and my husband said it was truly a powerful time of exhorting Christian to godly manhood.  My sons, and even my daughters because they have heard it so much, all know the definition of a real man, as taught by Robert Lewis in the above book:
Real Men.......Reject Passivity
Real Men.......Accept Responsibility
Real Men.......Lead Courageously
Real Men.......Expect God's Greater Reward
Other men chimed in encouraging their sons as well and Christian's older brothers and friends shared some awesome things too.  I wish I could of been there, but I know this is a sacred time for young men and I'm so glad my husband has been faithful in planning these times for each of them.

My husband on the trip with four of our six sons......Matthew and Patrick were a bit too young to go.

They were in the beautiful Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina and had great weather.

Christian with his 4 special friends.....all fine young godly men!

If you would like to read more about this from my husband's perspective, here is the link to his blog post about it.....it's much better than mine : )

http://jacobsenfam.blogspot.com/2011/06/passage.html

Girls and Camping

My husband loves camping, but I must admit I really don't.  I support him whenever he wants to take the boys camping and I even visit them for a meal or 2 if the campsite is close enough, but I have actually never been camping.  I know, it's almost embarrassing to say : ) I blame it on growing up in the deep south.  People just don't camp much there, unless it's actually in a cabin or camper maybe.  It's almost always hot and humid and there are numerous insects and reptiles and other wild animals.  Plus, there are no beautiful mountainous areas with clear rivers or streams.  I did sleep outside in a sleeping bag one night every year when I would go to summer camp in Mississippi, but my husband says that doesn't count.  I keep telling him that when I'm not pregnant and don't have a child in diapers, then we can do a whole family camping trip and I will go.  But, I've had a baby or been pregnant for basically the last 20 years.  Anyway, we will do that one day but in the mean time my daughters have been begging to go. My poor teenage daughter has wanted to go since she was 10, but she was always the only girl going along (my husband usually goes with another dad or two and their sons).  Well, this year he finally promised to take her even if she was the only girl. He got it OK'd with the other dads and sons and so Anna spent 2 nights and 3 days camping at Jordan Lake with 9 other males.  She did great.  One day Ron even had the little girls out there with him for a good 7 hours.  The baby and I came later and  had dinner with everyone and brought the girls home to sleep in the soft, safe bed in a house with wonderful air conditioning!  But now my girls are hooked and Caroline kept saying all the next day, "Daddy never told me before how much fun camping was!"