Family Pics

Friday night our older boys came home in response to their summons to gather for a family picture.  Our last such gathering happened over 6 years ago, so I thought it was a good idea to update the 11x13 hanging over the TV.

 Not only are our then-preschool daughters now pre-teens, but now we have a new member :-)

Before the "real" photographer showed up, I took a few pics just to check out the background I had selected.

 

 

 

I'm anxious to see how they turned out, and will post my favorites. I LOVE THESE FACES and can't wait to get them up on my wall!

  Thank you to my kids for their patience and willingness to do whatever our photographer asked them to do. It was cold and blustery that evening, so if we look chilled, it's because we were!

Orphan Sunday week- day 3

I began working on preparing something for this week's church service, since its Orphan Sunday. 

I finally had to stop watching the videos on YouTube because they had me in tears. 

I hope to be able to give a short presentation to our church without breaking down and crying...we'll see if I'm successful or not!

Now I'm off to see if I can find a huge screen for the front of the church :-)

Back AGAIN.

Thanks to the Geek Squad at Best Buy, I am online again.  After a frustrating 6 weeks of having my computer sent to Dell to have the hard drive replaced (after 3 months of use), and even though I repeatedly told them the keyboard was also messed up, it came back with a new HD and a still-screwed up keyboard.  This time the keyboard was replaced, so we are back in business :-)

Today my Devotional book really made me laugh!  "Linger in My presence awhile.  Rein in your impulses to plunge into the day's activities.  Beginning your day alone with Me is essential preparation for success."

How appropriate!  Being the A-type personality and list maker that I am, I often fly through  my morning trying to get as much done as I can, and I forget to take the time to reflect and commune with God before the craziness that is sometimes my day begins. 

So today I took the time, and thought about all of the blessings in my life. 

It started with waking up next to the man that I love, then surrounded by 3 of my children getting ready for school and being able to love on them as they're going out the door, waking up  my little ones to have breakfast and hugging them as they toddle around.  Getting out our homeschool materials for the day.  Going outside to feed the horses and spend a few minutes leaning against their necks and  just breathing in that horsey smell.   I realized that the life that I have was all what I had prayed for years ago, with a few variations, of course :-)

So again I face my day with the realization that I have everything I need- love, family, plenty of food, a home that is big enough for us with room to spare, and God even provided me with horses that feed my soul and a big white dog that I get unconditional love from.  I know that I am so very blessed. 

So again, I ask myself how can I share my blessings with others?  Because you know, I take this scripture seriously.

  Jesus said, “For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more.” (Luke 12:48)

We've been given SO MUCH, and Loren and I know that we need to reach out to others and share the gifts given to us with others.  The question wracking my brain is "what next?"  What opportunity will present itself.  What task will God place before us?  If only God could email me the details, and I could be prepared, know what I mean??!! 

This year we have taken in 4 new children into our homes- 3 of them are still with us- one permanently  (Quinn-yah! ).  I believe that our next "assignment" will also have something to do with children, and there is this feeling of expectancy.  I'm wondering if it has something to do with our two foster children, who are 3 and 13 and have been with us since July, or if we will jump out of our comfort zone again and tackle another international adoption?  I guess we will need to be patient and see what's in store for our family next.

The waiting is hard, but it's also what makes life interesting :-)

Look who dug out Bri's old ballet gear..
 

You are what you eat~

I just watched this video on TED TV and it has me so excited!!  It's basically about how we can eat and use food to fight cancer. Who Knew??!!

Being the hippy mom who feeds my kids organic, gardens and cans, and freaks out when a bag of Doritoes enters my house, this is very validating news!  Maybe old mom isn't such a weirdo after all?!

I've always known that eating healthy is so much better for us, and even though we often don't see immediate rewards for eating an apple instead of a Snickers, we are doing the right thing. It's why we plant and maintain a huge garden every year, raise most of own meat and eggs, milk our own Jersey, and belong to an Organic Food Coop.

Hearing news like this gives me hope!  Hope that all the weeding, cooking homecooked meals, weeding,  baking cookies instead of buying Oreos, weeding, planting, paying more for organic, more weeding, and just taking so much care into what I feed my family that this extra care will pay out in dividends that will show up for years to come. These efforts could affect our family generations from now, which sounds kinda dramatic, but I don't think it's overstating the importance of this issue. 

We Are What We Eat.

And if that includes pesticide sprayed produce, processed foods and fake foods, mountains of artificial flavors, colors, and preservatives, sugar substitutes, genetically modified foods, and E. Coli ridden meat, then what kind of future can we hope for in respect to our health and the health of our children?

So I guess we gotta do whatever we gotta do to give our families the Nutritional Advantage they need to face the future.

Which brings me back to weeding. Don't think that after hours on my knees in my garden in the hot sun, bugs biting, that by mid July a bottle of Roundup isn't just a little bit tempting.  Cuz it is.

But so far, it's Roundup- 0 and Mom- 1.

Organic hippy moms are tougher than we look. Don't let the environmentally- friendly-humanely-made-Fair Trade-cotton t-shirts fool you.:-)

The Hands and Feet of Jesus- Aug and Sept

The end of summer is a tough time to plan Service Servants projects because of all the events during this time.  County Fair, the start of school, plus the wrap up of many of our summer activities, kept us busy this month , but we still managed to sneak in a few projects that help us focus on others.

August was mostly small projects, but I'm proud that even with the excitement of the County Fair, we still remembered to do SOMETHING!  Here is our list:

• Recycled 2 huge bags of Walmart plastic bags.
• Worked a Food Pantry shift on Friday.
• Served as Committee of the Month at our church, which includes setting up for service, ushering, washing communion glasses and cleaning up after service.
• Sponsored Laura Stevens for the Relay for Life Cancer walk in Beresford.

September was also busy, but at least we were able to find some time to serve others.:-)

First- my good friend was having some serious surgery, so I called several neighbors and friends to line up meals for the family the first week following the surgery.  Given the opportunity, people are thrilled to be able to help out a friend, and I was very pleased at the responses :-)

Chicken and rice, crescent rolls, home made pickles, and peach pie

Our local Food Pantry has been very low on supplies, so our church's Hi-League kids, 4th grade and up, put an article in the paper, and set up a collection table to replenish the Food Pantry supplies. 

I love doing community service projects with kids-  they bring so much enthuisiasm and fun to each event!  And my hope is that they will remember these projects and understand how important it is for them to serve others.