Teach me Your way, O LORD;
I will walk in Your truth;
Unite my heart to fear Your Name.
I will give thanks to You,
O LORD my God, with all my heart,
And I will glorify Your Name forever.
For Your lovingkindness
     toward me is great.
And You have delivered my soul
     from the depths of Sheol.
                               - Psalm 86:11-13

Nathaniel says this sums up our year:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIdPPVkkHYs

The Year of 2013 by Nathaniel Barnes

Our family is sorry for people who are looking at our blog, and have seen nothing coming up for a very long time. So, I will have a review of all of 2013, and hope for 2014 to be better.

January: I don't really remember then except that it was the New Year and Daddy went to the electronics fair.

February: We ate lots and lots of icecream, and for some reason, now no one remembers that.

March:  We went on the GAPS diet. I hate the GAPS diet. It is worthless to me. It is ruining our family and is killing our family!!! I thought that our family was going to get better by 2014, and I was wrong.

April: After Grandpa got Alzheimer's, we had him in daycare with Michelle who was a very nice lady. In April we put Grandpa in Silverado facility.

May: I don't remember what happened in May, and probably nothing happened.

June: I got a big swimming pool. Yippee!!!!

July:  Bad fireworks! I was very disappointed about that. And also, I'm very sad about this, but on July 8th my great grandpa, who invented many things, and who was a great man, died. Sad.

August: Timmy's birthday, and Hannah's birthday. We had a few weeks off from school.

September: We started school, again. At the end of September, I was very happy that we were going to Legoland, and I was very surprised that we were going to Legoland. But I wanted to go to the beach.

October: The October Apocalypse!! It was the end of world, every man, woman and child in the Barnes Family was sick and dying! Also I lost my computer. Sad. Sad.

November: My birthday! Yeah! Yippee! Yippi! Yippo! And also there was Joshua's birthday and we watching Turbo. On my birthday we watching Monster's Inc. University Style.

December: Oh Decembrrrrrrr.....There was Uncle John, and Leandra and Christina came down from the cold land. They were nice people and wrecked my life and they gave us penguins!!!

That was the end of year, nothing more, nothing less, and nothing in between. The End.

Joke From our Hannah (as told by Nathaniel)

Q: Why did the policeman put the prisoner in the truck?

A: Because the judge ordered the prisoner to be inCARcerated.

you and me, me and you, both of us together

                                          Hannah and Jax (Nathaniel) prancing through a field

Dad's New Home at Silverado

On Saturday, April 6,Dad was placed in Silverado memory care facility in Escondido. This has been really hard for everyone involved, but seems to be the best solution since both my mother and his caregiver were no longer able to manage him well. Here's some pictures of recent visits.

advice

LEGO

by nathaniel :) lego 2012! copy it lub.lego.com/en-us/videos/?icmp=COUSVideoVLYearInBricks# and

Our New GAPS Diet Adventure

In January, I read an article on Mercola.com about the connection between gut disorders and numerous brain symptoms such as learning disorders, mental health issues, and autism. http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/12/29/probiotics-for-good-digestive-health.aspx I was astonished to learn there was a connection. Our lives have been marked, over the years, by serious digestive disorders such as IBS, Crohn's Disease, diarrhea, Cyclical Vomiting Syndrome, and Acid Reflux. And,... our lives have been marked by four children with dyslexia, one severe, two with speech issues such as stuttering and pronunciation issues, at least one with high-functioning autism and asperger's, dyspraxia, dysgraphia, and mental health issues ranging from obsessive compulsive disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, trichotillomania, disassociative disorder, Tourette syndrome in at least three.

In the article, Dr. Mercola talks about a book called Gut and Psychology Syndrome. The author of this book used Primal Defense and the Specific Carbohydrate Diet to heal her son of autism! Well, I have heard of both of those! The Specific Carbohydrate Diet is the diet that Jordan Rubin used to get well in addition to Primal Defense. I have essentially been on this diet for ten years, but never wanted to impose the diet upon my family because of its prohibition of grains and sugar. It wasn't until reading this article and the book, that I realized that our family is definitely a GAPS family.

People get dysbiosis from receiving too many antibiotics that kill off their good bacteria. When a mother who has intestinal dysbiosis, like myself, gives birth, her children are innoculated with the bacteria that the mother has. So if the balance of bad bacteria outweighs the good, as in dysbiosis, then the child gets that as well. This sets them up for a lifetime of dysbiosis and the whole host of problems seen in the GAPS syndrome.

In dysbiosis, grains and sugars are not properly digested because of the damaged intestinal lining. These undigested foods become food for the pathogenic bacteria. The bad bacteria proliferate, and give off poisonous substances that damage the intestinal lining and the brain. The GAPS diet eliminates these, and provides gut healing foods. Strong probiotics are also used to help move out the bad bacteria causing symptoms. Unfortunately, I have learned, that it is impossible to completely overcome dysbiosis, and when probiotics are stopped, and bad foods are eaten again, the problems will come back with a vengeance.

I believe our problem is complicated by some nasty parasites as well that also spew poison, suck blood and food from us, and incredibly hard for some of us to eradicate.

We are going to begin the new diet on March 11, 2013. For the last couple months I have been trying to use up all the items that are not on the diet. These are all grains and starches and all disaccharide sugars such white sugar. From now on we will have only meats, 24 hour fermented dairy, vegetables, fruits, nuts and honey as a sweetener. I have also spent the last two months stocking up on all the food we will need which are things like nut flours to make breads, fruit juices, bones for making soup, dried fruits and legal snack bars. I have been learning to make a new kind of kefir, saurkraut, dried fruit, and numerous other things.

I know it will be very hard. The food will be hard to get used to, and the die-off from the probiotic will be difficult as well. But from my background of understanding on this, I really think it might work for us. May God help us!

Jack's Pond, part 2

There was one last plant we learned about before we went home from Jack's Pond....

Jack's Pond

Today, our family had a lovely time visiting Jack's Pond! Here are some native plants that we saw along the way:

Artemisia californica, also known as California sagebrush.

Timothy correctly identified this aromatic plant as a plant that Native Americans used to make tea. It was also used as a spice in foods. We have a small specimen growing in our front yard and I love to smell it!

Heteromeles arbutifolia, also known as Toyon, Christmas berry or California holly.

This plant grew in large bushes all around the park. They were very lovely and would make a wonderful addition to a yard. Native Americans also used to eat the berries of this plant. I suppose many other people thought they were nice plants as well, because there is a special law protecting it! According to Wikipedia, "In the 1920s, collecting toyon branches for Christmas became so popular in Los Angeles, California that the State of California passed a law forbidding collecting on public land or on any land not owned by the person picking the plant without the landowner's written permission (CA Penal Code § 384a)." It's a good thing we didn't try to take any home!

Mimulus aurantiacus, the Sticky monkey-flower.

We can tell you from experience that the Stick Monkey-flower is, indeed, very sticky.

Opuntia occidentalis, also known as a Prickly pear.

The thick flat structure you see pictured is called a "cladode". It looks like a leaf, and indeed it carries out photosynthesis like a leaf, but it is actually part of the stem!

Xylococcus bicolor, also known as a Mission manzanita.

This is a lovely member of the chaparral plant species. Apparently, coyotes will eat it's berries. I didn't even know coyotes ate berries.

Marah macrocarpus, also known as manroot, wild cucumber, or "Old man in the ground".

Timothy identified this one as well, I would not have noticed it if he hadn't! This is a very strange plant; vines grow from a large, bulbous central root which can weigh over 200 pounds. It grows large spiny fruits, but it is poisonous.

My family may want to look at the list of plants that grow at Jack's Pond to see if you can remember any other plants we saw!

Steam Engine Museum

Cyclocosmia

OK, so imagine this: one day you're digging around in the dirt for no reason, and suddenly you see this thing that sort of looks like a crazy ancient artifact hanging out in the dirt.

And you're like "Wow! I found some cool ancient coin or... something!" Well, you're not sure what it is, but you're pretty sure it's man made.

WRONG

IT'S A SPIDER

This spider is named Cyclocosmia Truncata (think "truncated") and it is a trapdoor spider. Apparently, it's strange "truncated" abdomen is used sort of like a shield to protect itself against predators. If a predator enters it's trapdoor-spider-tunnel, the spider rushes into a tight passageway and uses it's hard abdomen to block it off - it's body safe behind the shield.

When I first saw this spider, I could not believe that such an amazing looking thing actually existed!

What an awesome and creative God this spider had!

Nathaniel on GodTube.com -- almost 3,000 views!

hay doh wee from wings-as-eagles on GodTube.

Monkey head dancing. By Nathaniel.

Nathaniel age 8

Pleasant Pheasant

We had a pleasant pheasant in our backyard.

Amazing predatory slugs!!

When the word "slug" comes to mind, many of us think of something slow, something humble, something that could only avoid predation if it were poisonous or just very, very, bad tasting - and never something that could catch prey of any kind, let alone keep pace with it! But not so! Behold, the amazing predatory slug!

Here we see the voracious predator having successfully wrestled it's prey into submission; thoroughly immobilizing and entrapping it's prey in sticky slime. Soon the digestive juices secreted through it's pharynx will begin to act, dissolving and externally digesting it's prey. And here is video from this astonishing natural drama captured by a Japanese amateur wildlife filmmaker: This "slug" is in the strictest sense not a "slug" at all (slugs being mollusks), but rather a member of the Family Geoplanidae, commonly called land planarians. Planarians are a type a flatworm, but don't freak out! These little guys are completely harmless to humans.

There are many interesting facts about these amazing little critters! Some are known to hunt by picking up chemical signals left by their prey. They eat just about any other little bug that might be crawling along the ground, such as earthworms, mites and spiders, snails and slugs, all types of insects, and even each other! They can grow up to 20 cm, that's nearly 8 inches! Some kinds have their eyes on their "tails" instead of their "heads" (how the scientists tell which is which, I have no idea). And although they can lay eggsacks, their primary method of reproductive system involves breaking off bits of themselves, somehow... something I don't entirely understand, but it's still interesting! They also come in many colorful varieties:

But even with all these interesting facts, land planarians are a poorly known and understudied group of animals. I could find very little specific information about them on the internet!

More videos of interest:

• A land planarian eating a moth
• a hammer-head land planarian slithering on moss
• a stripy one (apparently a juvenile?)

More on how it eats: It's pharynx (it's "throat") comes out of it's "belly" as seen here (warning! TOTALLY GROSS!!!! BLEH!! YUK!!)

Nathaniel's Birthday!

We went to Legoland!

Nathaniel was king for the day.

And, of course, we had cake.

Happy Birthday Nathaniel!

Lost Pigeon

San Diego BlackOut