Q: What do you do for Christmas celebrations? How do we get through without it being a focus on presents and stuff and food? Is it possible to shake off the materialism of this season? Sure, I have a few thoughts, in no particular order: #1- I don’t know how old your kids are, but […]

Every now and then Doug Phillips comes up in an article or reference, and I remember all the things… and am just so incredibly saddened that people were lured in by him. Plenty of men followed his leadership, in his church, in his organization, and in his conference/teaching circuits. But women, in particular, were drawn […]

Q FROM A READER: How do you feed your large family? The older my son gets, the more he’s eating, and I’m realizing I need to get better at cooking more food for less money. Yup, with 9 kiddos (8 of whom are sons!!), you know I understand! This is an ongoing point of analysis […]

Did you miss something this month? Catch up and get the encouragement your heart needs. BABY WATCH & MY WRITING/PODCASTING SCHEDULE Baby News: My sweet new son, Fisher, was born at home this morning: In December, look for blogposts once a week– each Monday. And Season 1 of Mom On Purpose podcasts will be released once a week, every Wednesday, through […]

Sometimes when people long for the good old days, they’re remembering something that didn’t exist, fabricating entirely, or even just wistfully only recalling the good (but forgetting the accompanying bad). But when it comes to the way children behave toward their parents and toward adults nowadays, there really is a significant differencebetween what the average mom puts […]

Q: I am totally struggling with my oldest… One thing that I’m having trouble with is knowing how to discuss things with him. He still struggles with basic obedience, so that is an issue. Also, he tends to argue with me while we are talking. For example, this morning I told him that something he […]

My husband, Doug, and I are privileged to be able to do marital and pre-marital counseling through our church. Here are some of our thoughts for the about-to-be-married virgin couple about having healthy, realistic attitudes about honeymoon sex: 1. GO SLOW. For her: Your body takes time to relax and open up. Let yourself warm up […]

Q: How do you share with your husband what you are learning about teaching and parenting? I spend so much time learning how to be a better teacher and mom but I feel like his mindset about parenting is not growing like mine. I analyze my childhood and why I feel and do things that I don’t […]

Last fall, we took our 12-year-old son away for a weekend of hiking and discussion while we worked through the Passport 2 Purity material together. When we went for our longest hike, it was a blustery day with heavy winds. As we went deeper down into the canyon, the pines at the top of the hill […]

Well, this year we had a long summer. Longer than normal. And it was fabulous. Here are some highlights: Our family of 9 spent 12 days on a backpacking trip around Mt. Rainier. We were completely phone/internet disconnected during those days, and lived off of (1) what we could carry, and (2) what we stashed in 2 food/fuel […]

Hi Jess, I don’t know if you answer emails like this since you aren’t active on your blog, but wanted to tell you I took your advice to heart and am not blogging. It was the best decision. I had my fourth baby, and I would’ve had to lay down priorities in caring for my family to […]

Our oldest son, Ethan (14), with his brothers Luke (21 months), and Fisher (newborn) The misperception is common, and I probably would have thought wrongly about it, too. Back when I was single, or a mom of 1-2 kids, if I’d had to describe what postpartum weeks would look like for a mom with her […]

So. It’s Sunday morning. Well, it’s not Sunday morning when you’re reading this, but it’s Sunday morning as I’m writing it. I’m in the middle of what might be termed an adult tantrum, fussing and angry because things haven’t gone my way this morning. You see, I had everything planned. For the first time since our […]

I’ve always thought of myself as pretty brave. Whether that’s true or not I don’t know but I looked to the externals and deemed it so: moving around the world, multiple times, as a growing family keeping having babies even though it HURTS (!!!) every time, and makes life harder quitting my dream job and moving to […]