Hearts in Service

While growing up, our family did not have many traditions when it came to holidays. Dan didn't come have many either so we were able to start some of our own without a lot of the conflict that many couples have. One of the traditions that we started was decorating for Christmas the day after Thanksgiving. Because we have an artificial tree, this became something that we look forward to each year. Now that the children are older, it's even more enjoyable because they love to do the bulk of the decorating. One of the jobs I've always detested is putting together the tree. That's not an issue any more because the three of them work together to put it up. I put on the lights and then they hang the ornaments. One of the reasons they love doing this is because each year I purchase an ornament for them with their name and date on it. When they leave home, they will get to take their ornaments with them. They love looking at each trinket and talking about when they rece

LOT'S WIFE: The Sunday School teacher was describing how Lot's wife looked back and turned into a pillar of salt, when little Jason interrupted, 'My Mommy looked back once while she was driving,' he announced triumphantly, 'and she turned into a telephone pole!' GOOD SAMARITAN: Sunday school teacher was telling her class the story of the Good Samaritan. She asked the class, 'If you saw a person lying on the roadside, all wounded and bleeding, what would you do?' A thoughtful little girl broke the hushed silence, 'I think I'd throw up.' DID NOAH FISH? A Sunday school teacher asked, 'Johnny, do you think Noah did a lot of fishing when he was on the Ark ?' 'No,' replied Johnny. 'How could he, with just two worms.' MOSES AND THE RED SEA: Nine-year-old Joey was asked by his mother what he had learned in Sunday school. 'Well, Mom, our teacher told us how God sent Moses behind enemy lines on a resc

Psalm 145 1 I will exalt you, my God the King; I will praise your name for ever and ever. 2 Every day I will praise you and extol your name for ever and ever. 3 Great is the LORD and most worthy of praise; his greatness no one can fathom. 4 One generation will commend your works to another; they will tell of your mighty acts. 5 They will speak of the glorious splendor of your majesty, and I will meditate on your wonderful works. 6 They will tell of the power of your awesome works, and I will proclaim your great deeds. 7 They will celebrate your abundant goodness and joyfully sing of your righteousness. 8 The LORD is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love. 9 The LORD is good to all; he has compassion on all he has made. 10 All you have made will praise you, O LORD; your saints will extol you. 11 They will tell of the glory of your kingdom and speak of your might, 12 so that all men may know of your mighty acts and the glorious splendor of your kingdom. 13 Your kingdo

Happy Thanksgiving to you all! Thank you so much for your prayers for Emily. She started Tamiflu last night and by tonight her temperature is back to normal, though she is still coughing a lot. Stephen woke up with a sore throat so obviously, the sickies are going around here. I mustered up the energy to go grocery shopping today and made an apple and pumpkin pie. I hope that you all have a blessed Thanksgiving and remember to thank the Lord for all your many blessings!

We took Emily to the doctor today and she tested positive for swine flu. Please pray for her. She has been running a 104 degree temperature all day and is pretty sick. Dan had to drive 30 miles away to find a pharmacy that carried the medicine. Thanks for your prayers!

We were planning on visiting Dan's parents for Thanksgiving, but I'm going on three weeks of being sick. Emily woke up ill yesterday and Nathan today. So unfortunately, we had to change our plans. I scrambled, but came up with a menu for us on Thursday. Here is the plan: Pumpkin soup Roast turkey with cornbread dressing Dinner rolls Mashed potatoes & gravy Butternut squash Green beans Green salad with all the fixings Cranberry sauce Dessert: choice of pumpkin or blueberry pie with homemade whipped cream Sparkling cider Have a blessed Thanksgiving!

I made these today and they were delicious. I'm pretty sure they will go over well with the children. They like cookies and they like candy. Put the two together and you can't go wrong. I thought I'd share the recipe. Gum Drop Cookies 1 cup butter 1/2 cup white sugar 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar 2 large eggs 1 tsp. vanilla extract 2 and 3/4 cups flour 1 tsp. baking powder 3/4 tsp. salt 1/2 tsp. soda 1 1/2 cups gum drops (use scissors to cut into small pieces) 2 cups quick-cooking oats Cream butter and sugars together. Add eggs one at a time and then add in vanilla. Mix together flour, baking powder, salt and soda. Add to the butter mixture until well blended. Fold in gum drops and quick oats. Roll into 1" balls and bake at 350 degrees for 9-11 minutes. Let the cookies sit on the cookie sheet for two minutes before transferring to a wire rack. Enjoy!

Psalm 147:1 ~ Praise the LORD. How good it is to sing praises to our God,how pleasant and fitting to praise Him! I can't believe another Friday came around so quickly. Since Thanksgiving is next week, I thought it especially fitting to give praises to God and thank Him for the many wonderful things He has done for me. ♫ Nathan told me yesterday that he just loves school and said, "You should have put me in a long time ago!" That made me laugh out loud because the reason I pulled him out was because he was miserable at the time. But praise God, he is happy and doing well! ♫ We are seeing hope for Nathan. He is doing well at his art. He is joining the volunteer fire department as a junior firefighter and is so excited. It may never turn into a career for him, but we don't know and it gives him some purpose! ♫ I have three children who work very hard in school and love it. They aren't star students, but they get an A in attitude and determination. ♫ I have a w

Nathan brought home two paintings this week that he did in school and I was floored at how good he has gotten. I think he really just needed a little direction! Both of these paintings were pictures that he found online and then drew them freehand and painted them. He did a wonderful job. The first was a Mario Brother. The second was Jesus with a lion and lamb. I'm amazed at this one! I think he gets his talent from Dan's mom, because I can't draw anything. Here are a couple of drawings she did for us. See what I mean? Anyway, I'm so proud of him. Hopefully, he can keep it up!

Hello blog friends! I love blogging and it has opened a whole new group of people to me that I enjoy chatting with. I do want to say that I appreciate each and every one of you who leaves me a comment. I hardly ever respond to them because I would be online forever if I did that. However, I read and cherish each one. I did receive a rather unkind comment today from an anonymous reader about a grammatical error I made in my post about Nathan. I fixed it because I do try to use proper grammar. However, I'm human and I type fast and sometimes I make a mistake. I fixed the error, but I would say that if someone ever notices a typo I make, please feel free to let me know but I just ask that you do it in a respectful way. I have feelings and I'm dealing with all kinds of things in my life that are very stressful. I don't need to feel like I can't post on my blog without getting blasted for my English. I notice that usually the very unkind comments (which are very rar

This year I've been feeling like I need a change with my Christmas cookies. Every year I make the same kinds and I'm ready for something different. I've poured through magazines and have decided to keep a couple of our favorites, but try some new ones. Here is my list for this year: ♥ Gingerbread Men ♥ Spritz ♥ Chocolate Biscotti with Cranberries ♥ Pecan-Toffee Tassies ♥ Cranberry Cookies ♥ Lemon Bars ♥ Raspberry-Almond Poppy Twinkles ♥ Kolachky Cookies ♥ Chocolate Snowflakes ♥ Cinnamon Pinwheels Normally, I've started on this much sooner so I need to get baking!

I took this picture of Nathan yesterday and thought it turned out so nice. He has really shot up the past few months and is taller than me. We've had our challenges with him this past year and it's been a hard road. However, God is faithful. He has used bad circumstances to help us learn more of the extent of Nathan's disabilities. We have an official diagnosis from both a psychologist and a neurologist of autistic spectrum disorder. It is interesting because there were so many times over the years that the word, autism, would cross my mind but then I would think, "A doctor would have told me that." However, Nathan is obviously on the higher functioning end of autism. Most people don't notice anything out of the ordinary with him superficially. However, after spending any amount of time with him, you will notice things such as garbled speech, he doesn't make good eye contact, he has no relationships with his peers, he gets very stressed out with c

I hope you all can stand some more cards that I've made this week. I like doing them because they are quick and easy. Here is an apron I made. Unfortunately, the camera is making it look like it's two-tone. The red poinsettias are the same all the way through. I made my own binding. I will NEVER EVER make this pattern again. It was very annoying trying to sew with 1/4" binding everywhere. Also, I made the large size and it is like a 2 or 3X size. I don't know anyone it will fit. Sigh. This is why I don't sew that much.

Deuteronomy 32 ~ 3 I will proclaim the name of the LORD. Oh, praise the greatness of our God! 4 He is the Rock, his works are perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is he. Good morning! I'm glad that I'm doing this each Friday because it really does help to look back and think of ways that I've seen the Lord working over the past week. So, I'm thankful for.... ♫ The fact that I was sick this past week. Even though I felt miserable, I was able to work on some sewing projects and craft projects that I don't always have time for. ♫ For my children who are always willing to do what I ask, even when they aren't thrilled about it. The boys raked and bagged leaves this week. ♫ For my brand new mattress that is allowing me to get a good night's sleep! ♫ The Lord allowing Dan & I to see the Holy Spirit working in people's lives and actually seeing them change before your eyes. I

I have been down the past few days with some sort of virus. After weeks of working with coughing, sneezing, sniffling children, I finally caught whatever bug is going around. I'm hacking up a storm and ache all over and have lost my voice. I think my children like that last one! Anyway, I'm hoping to feel better very soon because I feel downright lazy!

How about some worship this morning! Hillsong: Mighty to Save

We had a very busy weekend and it culminated in the sweetest service last night, as Dan baptized 14 people. Some of them were brand new believers and some had decided to follow the Lord years ago, but were never baptized. It is wonderful to see the Spirit of the Lord moving in our small church. We used another church because we don't have a baptism tank. If it was summer we could of used a local pool, but this was actually very nice. Of course, I cried through the whole thing but they were tears of joy. We had two whole families that were baptized. Four sisters Dan gave a wonderful devotional on what baptism is. Than each one was baptized. It was such a special night and I feel so privileged to have been a part of it.

Psalm 95:6-7 (New International Version) 6 Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the LORD our Maker; 7 for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care. In keeping with my new tradition of giving thanks and praise to God on Fridays, here are the things I'm so thankful for this week. ♫ Please rejoice with me on this one! On Sunday evening we are having a special baptism service and 15 people are making a public profession of their belief in Jesus Christ by being baptized. Whoo Hoo!!!! Isn't God great? ♫ Our wonderful, caring congregation gave us a gift on Sunday so that we can buy new mattresses for our beds. All of our mattresses are about 10-15 years old. ♫ God's provision by allowing me to substitute. I have teachers requesting me now so that has been a wonderful affirmation of my desire to teach. It also pays the bills! ;-) ♫ Nathan is doing so well in school. He is developing self-confidence.

I must be getting better about sending out little notes to people because I used up the last batch of cards I made. I sat down the other day to put together some more with a Fall theme. I do have to say that I especially liked this bunch. Hobby Lobby, which is a huge craft store here had all of their scrapbooking items on sale so I was able to get such pretty papers. This one is my favorite. Well, that's it until the next time a creative bug hits!

Saturday was our Fall Festival for the community. Unfortunately it was drizzling most of the afternoon and I think because we had it on Halloween that many people had other plans. We didn't get as big a turnout as I would of liked but we still got quite a few and everyone had a good time. Here are some pictures of the day. I didn't get that many because I kept forgetting to take them. There were balloon animals & face painting. Games & food. Crafts. Even the adults got into the spirit of things. The children all said they had fun. If I do it again next year, I'll probably pick an earlier date or go back to having it at the local park.