New Blog

All thanks goes to Olivia for giving our blog a face lift.  Why is it that our kids pick up on this computer stuff so much quicker than us adults?  She just took this upon herself to recreate the whole thing and is now a blogger.  I'm sure she will be posting her own stuff pretty soon!  It's so hard for me to find time to update this blog sometimes but now I have Olivia to help me.  She feels we have a responsibility to put up something new at least every 2 weeks or we'll loose all our readers, which isn't many to begin with!  

Well, thank you, Olivia.  Now I'm motivated to continue this thing with the new look you've given it.  Just maybe I'll find the time to post again next week!  You are the best and becoming more and more talented in crucial areas of life. . .  like blogging. :)

Summer projects coming to fruition

I'm not sure what is happening with this post! I changed my settings and don't know how to do anything anymore.  My captions are all messed up.  I'll do my best. This quilt I've been working on for awhile now.  It's my first one and is called a "rag quilt" because you sew it with the seams showing and then when you wash it the seams fray and make it look old.  It feels so nice to have finished it!  I'm not one to start a bunch of projects all at the same time.  I have to finish the one I've begun before starting another.  It is too stressful for me to have too many things in the pot at the same time.  On the other hand, Olivia is just the opposite.  She starts things all the time and hops around from one project to the next.  I kept urging her to finish up this baby quilt she had started for my friend who had recently had a baby boy.  I'm proud to say that he is 6 weeks old now and she finished it and delivered her gift last weekend!  She has a lot of creativity stored up in that brain of hers.

Whats a post without pictures of Micah?  He is all about hats these days and has always loved shoes.  He finds things to dress up in all the time.  His favorite words are "Hi!" said with much exuberance! "Thank you" is another popular phrase.  He says it more like "Dank you!"

Summer is such a relaxing season.  Maybe I feel that way because I'm a Mom and I home school too.  So when the kids finish their school, not only do they take a break but I get time off myself from my teaching role. Even though my full-time job is still "mommying."   

These tomatoes are from my garden.  This is by far the best year I've had  in the last 7 years for tomatoes, anyway.  I can't seem to grow cucumbers or onions and those are much easier than tomatoes.  But I'm still working at it. Go figure?  I am enjoying these tomatoes, I must admit.  These two were some of the first ones I picked.  We had a whole window sill full at a time.  No grocery store tomatoes for me this month.  It's nice to know your efforts are saving in the pocket book area as well!

Well, I'll stop now since this post has taken me much longer than I expected.  I hope you can navigate around with the captions being a bit out of order.

See you next month with more summer fun.

Visit to the Arboretum

When I look at the flowers, made from above;

It makes me feel this presence of love.

An array of colors surround me,

delicate petals encompass me.

It makes me want to run,

and jump and laugh in the sun.

But it also brings me this feeling of peace;

And freedom that only comes with the breeze.

My family, grandparents, and I, went to the Dallas arboretum for Mothers Day. It was a beautiful day and the trip down there was, I believe, enjoyed to its fullest! I had a hard time not taking too many pictures of every single flower : ) I am amazed at how God came up with this incredible assortment of beauty for all of us to enjoy! It's awesome.

This is mist that came from a small pond in the area where we ate a packed lunch. My dad loved it, and therefore decided that he wanted to take at least 10 pictures of it! Hmmm. . . quite the personality, I'd say. But don't worry, I'll only show you two : )

two hansom, brothers who love each other

This is Corie Anna, a good friend of mine who also came with us. . . I love you, Corie!

I thought this was the strangest flower I've ever seen!! Ever seen anything like this? It is not fake. . .

group picture!

My grandparents with their lovely daughter, my mother.

Julia decided to get her hair cut. Did you notice? I think it is adorable!! This is my wonderful sister. . . I love you too Julia!

This is my mom's favorite picture, so this is for her.

If you ever get a chance to come visit Texas. . . and especially if you want to see us; I would suggest going to the arboretum, where you will be filled with the beauty of it all. It is a great place for refreshment!

And, if you like flowers, I think you will truly enjoy it! Well actually, you kind of have to like flowers, to go there : )

Thank you for reading! I hope you all enjoyed it!

~Olivia

Bluebonnet season!

This is the Texas state flower, called a bluebonnet. Aren't they pretty! I just did a little research and learned that it is legal to pick our state flower but is not encouraged. It ruins their ability to reseed and keep growing wild if you pick them and they only last about an hour once picked if you do.

This is a field next to our church. The bluebonnets grow wild along freeways and in deserted fields. If you click on this picture to see Micah closer you'll see a big grin on his face. There is something about a field of bluebonnets that makes you want to run!

And not worry about your pants falling down! Not a care in the world!

Let's race! It was a contagious feeling of freedom to be among wildflowers!

Then, once you are out of breath, you just have to sit down in them!

Or lay down and dream!

I was so bummed that AJ wasn't with us this afternoon. He had been invited to a friends house to play after church. He reassured us that he had more fun than we did running around in bluebonnets.

Michael Frye stood in for AJ. He is our new adopted son. He just moved here from Florida to work at GFA with Rich. He hangs out with us quite often now and is fitting in with our family really well. As you can see, he is taking AJ's place in this photo!

This is a nice place to take a nap!

Goodnight.

Bad Habits

The weather in Texas has been absolutely fantastic the past few weeks. 70's and 80's is perfect weather for yard work. I had noticed some really ugly weeds in our front yard and finally got out my "weeder digger" and tackled them. I thought it would only take me a few minutes since I remembered only seeing a couple of them. Well, I must have been out there an hour or so finding dozens of weeds in our front lawn. This lent me lots of time for contemplation of weeds and their significance from a spiritual perspective.

The small weeds were not so hard to get up and really didn't take any effort to pull out by the roots but as they got bigger it took much more effort! This one in the picture above was the largest one I dug up and it was no easy task. This reminded me of a conversation that my brother and I had the night before. We were discussing bad habits that are so engrained in who we are that we sometimes don't even notice them until years and years have passed and God sends that trial or struggle to show us our sin. We all of sudden see this ugly habit or character flaw that has been a struggle our whole lives! It seems like such a daunting task to weed it out especially when the roots are big and deep. This is when we realize that God is so much bigger then we are and wants to change us to have His character. He says we are a new creation, created in His image.

I really want flowers in my life, not weeds. but in order to get flowers to emerge in my life I have to get those ugly weeds out. How? I believe it takes a willingness to see the weeds first of all and then a change of heart. . . a surrendered heart, one that doesn't fight the change. It's really not my job to dig up roots of ungodliness myself but God promises to do that part. It's only hard if we fight it.

God has been showing me that He wants to use our home to welcome others. It's His home anyway, isn't it? Everything we have is His. God's heart is loving people. Shouldn't it be mine too? Since I'm a homemaker, my home is my sanctuary, my resting place, my nest. Sharing it has been a struggle over the years. I don't like chaos and messes make me uneasy. It's just a natural thing that when you have more people in a home, the more chaos and mess is present.

So I can choose to close my doors and keep it quiet and tidy (restful for me) or let God open my doors and be a blessing to others. Once I understood the concept of giving my home to God and surrendering this area to him, my desires began to shift. I'm finding great joy in preparing a pleasant place for friends (or strangers) to hang out. I'm amazed at how God has opened our doors unexpectedly without me even trying to "have company". It is so obvious that He is doing all the work and bringing friends and neighbors who need fellowship and love.

I pray that whoever knocks on my door will know that they are always welcome and won't ever fear being turned away. It is never a bad time for Jesus when we want to come sit with him and talk or just rest in His presence with a cup of tea.

Above is a picture of Easter weekend. Michael, in the orange shirt, just moved down here from Florida to join GFA as staff. He is now rooming with Alex, on the left. They spent Easter weekend with us along with Michael's Dad who drove down with him. If you look closely you'll see chocolate on some faces from the dessert we were eating. AJ got a little carried away with the fun of smearing chocolate on his face.

Carly (ACU sweatshirt) and her friend (middle, back row) came over for dinner recently. These two were a joy to have over and our children love them. It looks cold in this picture because of the fire in the background but it really wasn't that long ago. Just a flukey snow day during March! Rich is laying down in the front because he was trying to get in the picture and there wasn't much room. You know, when you prop the camera up and you only have a little time to find a spot before it takes.

Recent picture of Julia. She is growing up right before our eyes these days!

I love this picture of Olivia in our tree out back!

Micah in the sun, eating dirt. What are little boys made of?

Micah's Drinking Problem

Micah is so cute these days and we are fully enjoying him. He gets a lot of attention. I hope that's a good thing. Some people think that when you have a large family, then the more kids you have, the less attention they will get. You can't possibly spread yourself out equally among them all, right? I say, the more you have, the more attention is paid to each one because there are more people in the family to spend time with. They are never alone but always with someone. We don't have TV so we spend our evenings playing together and mostly laughing at Micah.

I love so many things about him. I really hope I remember all of this when he is older so that I can tell him what he was like as a toddler. My older children love hearing about themselves when they were younger. Here are 10 new things that I love about Micah:

1. I love the way he smiles and runs in place when the music begins.

2. I love it when he claps after a hymn is sung at church

3. It is absolutely adorable when he raises his hands during worship just like those he sees around him worshiping.

4. I love it when he folds his hands to pray after he has already started eating. We all finally sit down at the table to say grace, so he drops his spoon and folds his hands too. But he usually sneaks food during the prayer time.

5. I love it when he says "Oh!" with great inflection in his voice.

6. He has just started blowing kisses to us which is way cute. He kisses his hand and then throws it out in the air.

7. I love it when he sits on the step of our sunken living room and pats the spot next to him signaling that he wants me to sit next to him.

8. I love it that he sits and reads books, babbling off and on, just as if he is reading. Usually the book is upside down but he doesn't care.

9. I love it when he plays peek-a-boo by covering his eyes with his hands and then peeking through his fingers.

10. I love it when he coughs and sputters when taking a drink of water with no lid and then goes back for more!

Micah, Art, and Sacrificing

I know this is a weird title but I have 3 things to share that have nothing to do with each other. My brother titles his e-mails this way sometimes. A random list of topics, makes others curious what you are talking about. So I decided to try it. Curious?

First I wanted to share these few recent pictures of Micah. They came out good and show how he is changing. He is 18 months now and went through a stage where he liked to wear hats. He was toddling around the kitchen one afternoon barefoot, with his winter hat on, holding this football. I grabbed my camera!

These next few pictures are a few of Olivia's art work. This one on top is the latest one she has been working on in her art class. They are learning how to use charcoal and deal with lighting and shading. She loves to use charcoal and has been experimenting with it outside of class too.

Don't almost all girls love horses?

Olivia likes to draw pictures of animals for friend's as gifts. This is the elephant she drew for a friend's birthday. She framed it and gave it to her. Her drawing has improved so much since she started art lessons. It's fun to watch and see so much progress with practice and training. She is entering an art contest for fun. We'll see if she wins?

I've been learning and process so much these past few weeks. Do you ever feel like God is showing you things. . . here . . . and there. . . but it's hard to figure out how they relate? My life is busy with a large household to run and I don't get large chunks of time to sit and think or even sit and talk to others about what going through my mind. It takes time to merge all these teachings, thoughts, and feelings into one subject. It must be a part of my personality that says I need to organize my thoughts. Otherwise they feel chaotic inside and I can't keep track of them! Whenever God turns the light on a subject and then another, there is usually a theme. I think I figured out the theme well enough to put something on paper! You guessed it. . . it's sacrifice.

Without writing too much and boring you with too many details, I'll try to get right to the point. What is the Christian life without sacrifice? Is there not a narrow road and a broad road that Christ speaks about in the Bible? The broad road leads to destruction but the narrow road to life! The size of the road signifies the difficulty of it. It's not easy to live on the narrow road for it involves sacrifices but this is where we find LIFE! The broad road might be easier but did you notice the end of it? Destruction.

This week a pastor came to Gospel for Asia's headquarters to visit. He flew in from California for a day and was asked to share with the staff. Maybe you know of him? Francis Chan is his name and he pastors a large church in Simi Valley. God really spoke through him. It was the kind of sharing that makes time fly too fast. You are soaking it up and before you know it, his hour is up and you are left wanting to hear more. Anyway, he shared about these two roads and it really got me thinking. He shared that sometimes he gets accused of being too radical. How can you be too radical for Jesus? Some Christians believe that there is another road, a middle road between the narrow and broad. You live a nice life, going to church and taking in all the benefits of being an American but no sacrificing is happening.

This caused me to think about my own life. God is asking me to sacrifice. I cringe when I think of that word and yet when I have the right perspective on it, it's music to my ears! There is LIFE in the very sacrifices made and that, my friend, is beautiful. What are the sacrifices that I'm referring to? Time, money, dreams. Right now I'm thinking through daily sacrifices. How I spend my time. My schedule is mine, right? Not really. If I'm going to walk in the good works that God has prepared beforehand for me (Eph. 2) then I need to be ready to change my plans.

I'm reading a book called Open Heart, Open Home by Karen Mains. It's about Biblical Hospitality. I'll end this with a quote from her book and then a prayer:

"What a sin it is that many Christians know so little about this broken world. They have isolated themselves from the starvation of nations, turned their backs on battered and abandoned babies. Little do they care that children grow without a gentle touch, that old men haunt park benches dying from loneliness rather than age. This world, to many believers, is one large, silent scream."

O God, help us to hear, to hear those cries without fear for ourselves, and with compassion for those who mourn. Help us to listen to those in need, without thought for our own material treasures. Help us to seek to be like Christ, upon whom was the Spirit of the Lord!