So we just got back from an almost week long camping trip with friends from church. We had an amazing time. I was extremely impressed with the fact that everyone that we knew from only seeing them through church activities was true to character the entire time we were camping with them. I fully expected to see a side of some that I didn't want to know existed. New friendships were made that I am pretty excited about as well. God truly blessed us all on this trip.
Just a few short memories from each day so I don't forget.
Wednesday: Road trip was comfortable and relaxing.
Bruce passed us up, we ran into them at a convenience store.
Got to camp, used detective work to figure out it was our group because no one was there. Jeff's flip flops, Mike's Trader Joe stuff, Nancy's Bible.
Soon as we put the tent up the wind started picking up and the storm rolled in. Rain started falling pretty hard just as dinner was about to be made. It POURED for the longest 45 minutes in history (wink wink)
Mike grilled hamburgers under an umbrella with a metal spatula under a thundering storm!
Kids took shelter in the shower because "It's warm and there are seats. Ready? Go!" (says Nate to Carissa who stood motionless and watched him run away. LOL
Our tent and the Ivey tent had a late night laugh fest. Asked to quiet down by the Breed tent. LOL.
Thursday: Crawfishing, "Levi was a trooper" Caught approximately 300 crawfish that night.
Ivey's made Indian tacos, yummm
Most went to Leman caves. Andrea and I went to the town to do laundry. Enjoyed wonderful conversation. Jeff took the girls to the lake. (Jessi, Trinity, Carissa)
Friday: Fishing/swimming/Levi in raft. Went back to camp to make dinner. Chili and 4 hour baked potatoes. Jeff, "Where's my dinner?"
Mike cut finger, "all the time" but rarely ever cut's himself. Broke his toe later that night. John and Levi went crawfishing alone at night.
Saturday: "Fishing date" with Karl. John caught "brown trout" I caught 4 rainbows. Kids went with rest to 4th of July parade. Leftover night, bacon wrapped hot dogs, fajitas, chili dogs, fried potatoes. Giovanni scares all the kids. Pinterest rockets were a dud. :(
Sunday: First cold morning. No more firewood. clear blue skies for the first time since we got there. Got to see a deer as I was praying by myself in the early morning.
Jeff, Andrea and Giovanni offered to pay for us to go to brunch with everyone else at Hotel Nevada. Jeff at time to pay, "I told them first." Linus in a purse under the table. Such a good boy!
Friday, July 10
Monday, June 15
My Bible Study Today: James Chapter 1
Funny I have "had to," through different bible studies going on with different people, read and or study James chapter 1 and 2 3-4 times in the past 4 weeks. Think God is trying to tell me something?
So skipping over meditation on my favorite verses this time I decided to focus on the other verses to see what I have been missing.
I have a question about verse 10. "But the one who is rich should take pride in his low position..." This verse always makes me go "huh?" I honestly don't get it. Any opinions on what this might mean? I would love a discussion in the comments. :)
vs 20 spoke to me loud and clear! I am now holding a holy ice pack on my head from getting hit with this one. I am USUALLY ALWAYS (lol) very calm and collected and shake my head at people who outburst and don't take the time to understand others before jumping to conclusions. But last week when a lady backed into my car and ripped of the bumper on my brand new (to me) car I panicked and yelled "This is a brand new car, don't you look where you are going when you back up!?!?" I didn't even think to ask her if she was okay.
Afterward I had to tell my husband to handle things for me and I sat in my car and hid.
I have felt so much guilt over this since then.
This is totally out of my character and I honestly have no idea where this came from. An old friend and pastor of mine said to us once "When you are squeezed what comes out? This is what your heart is made of." In this very situation I have to say I don't believe that to be true because that was definitely not me that came out. I am embarrassed and guilt-ridden because of it.
But that's just me being stubborn.
So today I am healing and learning from all of that and diving into God's word a little more purposeful than ever before. Seeking to find Scripture that I can memorize for those times when I may be squeezed in the future.
Verses 22-25, are more favorites. When I read these I want to glue a mirror to the front of my Bible. LOL. I feel it is SO SO SO important to read God's word. I happen to know a few Christians who only pick up their Bible's on Sunday on the way out the door to church. I used to be one of them. I wonder what your opinion is of these kinds of Christians? Can a person saved truly be a Christian if they never read God's word on their own?
This led me to a study on verse 22 "...humbly accept the word planted in you."
This is where I will spend the rest of my study time today.
So skipping over meditation on my favorite verses this time I decided to focus on the other verses to see what I have been missing.
I have a question about verse 10. "But the one who is rich should take pride in his low position..." This verse always makes me go "huh?" I honestly don't get it. Any opinions on what this might mean? I would love a discussion in the comments. :)
vs 20 spoke to me loud and clear! I am now holding a holy ice pack on my head from getting hit with this one. I am USUALLY ALWAYS (lol) very calm and collected and shake my head at people who outburst and don't take the time to understand others before jumping to conclusions. But last week when a lady backed into my car and ripped of the bumper on my brand new (to me) car I panicked and yelled "This is a brand new car, don't you look where you are going when you back up!?!?" I didn't even think to ask her if she was okay.
Afterward I had to tell my husband to handle things for me and I sat in my car and hid.
I have felt so much guilt over this since then.
This is totally out of my character and I honestly have no idea where this came from. An old friend and pastor of mine said to us once "When you are squeezed what comes out? This is what your heart is made of." In this very situation I have to say I don't believe that to be true because that was definitely not me that came out. I am embarrassed and guilt-ridden because of it.
But that's just me being stubborn.
So today I am healing and learning from all of that and diving into God's word a little more purposeful than ever before. Seeking to find Scripture that I can memorize for those times when I may be squeezed in the future.
Verses 22-25, are more favorites. When I read these I want to glue a mirror to the front of my Bible. LOL. I feel it is SO SO SO important to read God's word. I happen to know a few Christians who only pick up their Bible's on Sunday on the way out the door to church. I used to be one of them. I wonder what your opinion is of these kinds of Christians? Can a person saved truly be a Christian if they never read God's word on their own?
This led me to a study on verse 22 "...humbly accept the word planted in you."
This is where I will spend the rest of my study time today.
Saturday, January 3
December 2014
Here's a little story I've got to tell about how amazing God is and how HE provided for my family this month! My heart is so full!
The end of the year has been a doozie!
Going all the way back to August: Finally found a doctor who gave me the option of a hysterectomy to finally be rid of my health issue I had been dealing with for almost 4 years. I can live a normal life again! Thank you Lord for allowing me to finally get in to see Dr S!
August was financially tough because we had to work hard to save up the money for my surgery, fast!
September I didn't get much done as I was healing and unable to really go anywhere for a few weeks.
October, almost done healing but only able to go out for very short shopping trips to the grocery store.
November: Here is where the fun begins!
At the end of October (I think) Jessi had a sleep over at a friends house. Well that night Levi was watching a movie in her room and discovered that water was leaking from the ceiling. And it wasn't raining. uh-oh.
We learned it was a condenser or something that has to do with the A/C in the crawl space above her room. We were able to stop the leak but there was still water in the ceiling, this is not good.
So we notify the landlord. No reply.
A couple of days later the spring breaks on the garage door. Notify landlord, no reply.
So a couple of days later he writes a long email basically saying repairs like this have always been our responsibility and if we didn't want to be responsible for taking care of the property then he would let us out of the lease because he doesn't even want the house anymore.
A couple of days later John sees a man in the driveway of the vacant house 3 doors down and he goes to introduce himself to see if he can get some side work for extra Christmas money. The guy turns out to be the homeowner. After talking to him for about 10 minutes John is handed the keys and has a job fixing up the place and also an offer to rent his house for the exact same rent we were paying with his work as a deposit instead of money! Who does this? GOD DOES, that's who!
So November began the moving process: No school this month because we have two houses to prepare for moving out of/into.
Halfway into November while sitting in church both John and I were convicted about the fact that we have never been faithful in tithing. We would tithe probably once or twice a year for one or two weeks and then "oh not this week because we need every dollar from this check" And of course next week we did too...
But this time we vowed to begin tithing and not stop for ANY reason.
During this time Johns work started forcing overtime and 5 ten hour days a week, plus a Saturday here and there. Well with all the work needing to be done at home John ended up calling off of work every Friday in November.
DECEMBER:
The first Tuesday in December John was in a very minor, no injury, no damage accident at work and was suspended pending investigation.
The next Monday he was notified that he was fired because it seemed as if he was no longer taking his job seriously. After 10 years of being the safety conscious guy at work he gets tossed aside like trash when he needs this job the most. But oh well... this story isn't over!
So I immediately jump on Facebook pleading for work of any kind to help get us some money coming back in asap. Within a couple of hours John had several jobs lined up. Hanging Christmas lights, fixing things, moving rooms, and helping with a house remodel.
We had money coming in at exactly the pace we needed it!
Not only that but, we received a couple of cash gifts to help us out that were more than we "needed" from both our church family and our neighbors!
We also had a couple of surprise meals that came upon us from neighbors and our church family! They always came at the PERFECT time!
A side note, when John lost his job we had to explain to our kids that due to the surgery/healing/moving and now the job loss there would literally only be 1-2 gifts under the Christmas tree for each of them this year. Their reply, with all their confidence and not the slightest hint of disappointment or wavering in the least... "That's okay" I LOVE these kids!
What's funny is God's amazing timing. The day we sat down to work out our money and bills and said we have enough to get through this month one of the biggest cash gifts appeared in our hands! It was so much that we were able to give some of it to someone else in need at this time. We got to work with her for a half a day cleaning a house together. :)
And then God's timing was amazing when we sat down one evening and I asked John what the plan was as far as looking for work.
He was going back and forth between looking for a job or trying to see if he could make this side job/handyman thing a full time business. And he was so busy with all the little jobs that he didn't have time to look for a job.
This is where the union became our friend. His name had been passed on to another company and they wanted to hire him but we had to wait to hear from them.
So this evening while we were talking John said something to me and my reply was "But what if that is not what God has planned?" And less than a minute later the phone rings, at 5:30 in the evening, asking John to come in for an interview in 2 days!
So as it stands today, with all of God's providence and love and support from family, friends and church family we had an amazing Christmas! I have never felt so loved in all my life! We truly are grateful for all God has done and the relationships he has built for us through this month.
Today John is working with Mike on finishing up that remodeling job, they are putting in flooring together. That job single handedly paid our rent this month. Although it was a tough job working for some difficult personalities the job was such a blessing! We are so thankful.
As of now all of our bills are paid as needed. And John starts his new job in 2 days.
We have food in our house to get us through a few more days and then a surprise check awaiting us at Republic will no doubt be enough for a few more groceries. We also have another grocery gift card waiting to be delivered to us probably on Tuesday from a dear friend.
During this entire time we have not stopped tithing, we have been faithful to God and trusted in Him to take care of our every need and He did! Just like he promised because of our faithfulness.
We were prepared to trust Him no matter what happened. We prepared for the worst but God gave us the best! There are so many things my heart is feeling after all of this and none of it can I seem to express with words.
I have cried more this month than I have in years due to the overwhelming sense of fulfillment, satisfaction, LOVE, JOY, PEACE, and other feelings that I don't even know what to call them!
GOD is GOOD! Seek him and you will find him. And once you find him hold on with every ounce of your being to Him. He won't let you go, for any reason.
The end of the year has been a doozie!
Going all the way back to August: Finally found a doctor who gave me the option of a hysterectomy to finally be rid of my health issue I had been dealing with for almost 4 years. I can live a normal life again! Thank you Lord for allowing me to finally get in to see Dr S!
August was financially tough because we had to work hard to save up the money for my surgery, fast!
September I didn't get much done as I was healing and unable to really go anywhere for a few weeks.
October, almost done healing but only able to go out for very short shopping trips to the grocery store.
November: Here is where the fun begins!
At the end of October (I think) Jessi had a sleep over at a friends house. Well that night Levi was watching a movie in her room and discovered that water was leaking from the ceiling. And it wasn't raining. uh-oh.
We learned it was a condenser or something that has to do with the A/C in the crawl space above her room. We were able to stop the leak but there was still water in the ceiling, this is not good.
So we notify the landlord. No reply.
A couple of days later the spring breaks on the garage door. Notify landlord, no reply.
So a couple of days later he writes a long email basically saying repairs like this have always been our responsibility and if we didn't want to be responsible for taking care of the property then he would let us out of the lease because he doesn't even want the house anymore.
A couple of days later John sees a man in the driveway of the vacant house 3 doors down and he goes to introduce himself to see if he can get some side work for extra Christmas money. The guy turns out to be the homeowner. After talking to him for about 10 minutes John is handed the keys and has a job fixing up the place and also an offer to rent his house for the exact same rent we were paying with his work as a deposit instead of money! Who does this? GOD DOES, that's who!
So November began the moving process: No school this month because we have two houses to prepare for moving out of/into.
Halfway into November while sitting in church both John and I were convicted about the fact that we have never been faithful in tithing. We would tithe probably once or twice a year for one or two weeks and then "oh not this week because we need every dollar from this check" And of course next week we did too...
But this time we vowed to begin tithing and not stop for ANY reason.
During this time Johns work started forcing overtime and 5 ten hour days a week, plus a Saturday here and there. Well with all the work needing to be done at home John ended up calling off of work every Friday in November.
DECEMBER:
The first Tuesday in December John was in a very minor, no injury, no damage accident at work and was suspended pending investigation.
The next Monday he was notified that he was fired because it seemed as if he was no longer taking his job seriously. After 10 years of being the safety conscious guy at work he gets tossed aside like trash when he needs this job the most. But oh well... this story isn't over!
So I immediately jump on Facebook pleading for work of any kind to help get us some money coming back in asap. Within a couple of hours John had several jobs lined up. Hanging Christmas lights, fixing things, moving rooms, and helping with a house remodel.
We had money coming in at exactly the pace we needed it!
Not only that but, we received a couple of cash gifts to help us out that were more than we "needed" from both our church family and our neighbors!
We also had a couple of surprise meals that came upon us from neighbors and our church family! They always came at the PERFECT time!
A side note, when John lost his job we had to explain to our kids that due to the surgery/healing/moving and now the job loss there would literally only be 1-2 gifts under the Christmas tree for each of them this year. Their reply, with all their confidence and not the slightest hint of disappointment or wavering in the least... "That's okay" I LOVE these kids!
What's funny is God's amazing timing. The day we sat down to work out our money and bills and said we have enough to get through this month one of the biggest cash gifts appeared in our hands! It was so much that we were able to give some of it to someone else in need at this time. We got to work with her for a half a day cleaning a house together. :)
And then God's timing was amazing when we sat down one evening and I asked John what the plan was as far as looking for work.
He was going back and forth between looking for a job or trying to see if he could make this side job/handyman thing a full time business. And he was so busy with all the little jobs that he didn't have time to look for a job.
This is where the union became our friend. His name had been passed on to another company and they wanted to hire him but we had to wait to hear from them.
So this evening while we were talking John said something to me and my reply was "But what if that is not what God has planned?" And less than a minute later the phone rings, at 5:30 in the evening, asking John to come in for an interview in 2 days!
So as it stands today, with all of God's providence and love and support from family, friends and church family we had an amazing Christmas! I have never felt so loved in all my life! We truly are grateful for all God has done and the relationships he has built for us through this month.
Today John is working with Mike on finishing up that remodeling job, they are putting in flooring together. That job single handedly paid our rent this month. Although it was a tough job working for some difficult personalities the job was such a blessing! We are so thankful.
As of now all of our bills are paid as needed. And John starts his new job in 2 days.
We have food in our house to get us through a few more days and then a surprise check awaiting us at Republic will no doubt be enough for a few more groceries. We also have another grocery gift card waiting to be delivered to us probably on Tuesday from a dear friend.
During this entire time we have not stopped tithing, we have been faithful to God and trusted in Him to take care of our every need and He did! Just like he promised because of our faithfulness.
We were prepared to trust Him no matter what happened. We prepared for the worst but God gave us the best! There are so many things my heart is feeling after all of this and none of it can I seem to express with words.
I have cried more this month than I have in years due to the overwhelming sense of fulfillment, satisfaction, LOVE, JOY, PEACE, and other feelings that I don't even know what to call them!
GOD is GOOD! Seek him and you will find him. And once you find him hold on with every ounce of your being to Him. He won't let you go, for any reason.
Wednesday, July 16
Thought for the day
Here is one of my entertaining thoughts of the day....
I would like to know who in the world decided that a girl should take a sharp razor blade and scrape it across her legs and under her arms on a regular basis to remove hair that God intended to be there. And then who in the world decided it would be a major faux pas if a girl chooses NOT to do this???
I would like to know who in the world decided that a girl should take a sharp razor blade and scrape it across her legs and under her arms on a regular basis to remove hair that God intended to be there. And then who in the world decided it would be a major faux pas if a girl chooses NOT to do this???
Thursday, July 3
Meet Michaela
Meet Michaela.
She is a young (27 years old) mom of 4 beautiful children. Matthew, 8
Faith, 7, Emily, 6 and Elijah, 2
I never got to REALLY get to know her.
I liked her, quite a bit. But circumstances got in the way of me getting able to form a real loving relationship with her.
2 years ago Michaela was diagnosed with Stage 4 Melanoma. It started as a dark strange growth on the back of her calf.
When she had it checked out we were all stunned to hear the results.
She fought hard. HARD! She had thee best attitude about "kicking cancer's butt!"
She received a test result after fighting for over a year and a half. "They found NED. (No Evidence of Disease"
It was over!
Then 2 months later she became extremely sick.
a month later after visiting doctors repeatedly with no answers, an MRI was finally done.
The result: a cluster of cancerous tumors behind her eyes.
2 weeks later she had become even more sick, she became incoherent. She was placed on in home hospice care.
2 weeks later Michaela lost her fight to cancer.
I hate cancer.
As I write this I remember a "nana" to my children who lost her battle to cancer after just a few short months.
And even more saddening is as I write this our church family is praying for another young mom of 4 who has been told nothing can be done about her cancer that has reached her brain. My heart aches.
I hate cancer.
The above picture is of one of the last times I saw her. I gave her those Monkey gifts for Christmas. For the past week I have replayed that moment in my mind about a thousand times. Her smile was contagious. Her laugh was too. She had an awesome sense of humor. She made fun of herself. She loved her babies. She was a good mom to her kids. She loved people.
Now her kids are separated and living in separate homes. Situations are not ideal. My heart is broken for all of them.
I do not know if she made the decision to follow Jesus or not. So I don't know where she is today. But I hope that when I get to Heaven I hope to see her there! I hope to find her drinking from a monkey cup and seeing her smile.
Anyhow, I just wanted to write this as a way of remembering her. So I can look back at her pictures often and be reminded of how fragile life really is. How every second counts.
This world seems to be falling apart. It seems at times there are no more seams holding it all together. Soon it will be a pile of string on the floor.
I am so thankful I have my Savior, Jesus Christ, to catch me before I hit the floor.
Good bye, Michaela :)
Tuesday, May 6
"Lucky Bread"
My friend Ted said it is a "Lucky Loaf"
Saturday, September 28
Home School: Love it or Leave it?
First and foremost, we will not be leaving it. :) I have seen so many positive changes in both of my kids already so that tells me the was one of the best decisions we have ever made for our kids.
When we first decided to take on home schooling I was scared. I wasn't sure I would have the discipline to do it every day as much as needed to be done. So we decided to use an online public school program, the fact that it was a free program made it even ore possible to start sooner. So we thought it was going to be perfect.
The first day was scary, up until the morning before we logged in we had no idea what to expect. Partly because the school did a poor job of explaining to us how things were going to work.
We spent most of the day listening to teacher after teacher telling us the same things over ad over. And I learned that listening to a faceless person talk all day long was completely boring.
But once things started rolling school work wise we all started feeling overwhelmed very quickly. The kids were working their very best, as far as I could tell, but they were not able to finish everything in a day. We were working from morning until far after dinner and still not getting everything done that was on their agenda for the day. We were all feeling very defeated. There were many times I had to walk outside to hide my frustration and to keep from crying.
I started researching online and talking to people in our home school group about other options.
Finally after just 3 weeks of this I talked to my husband about it and we decided to quit, cold turkey. We gave notice and began winging it. Last week was our first week and it was amazing. We had fun, we learned more about each other already, we got so much done!
Here is how we are doing things for now.
We started out with the basics.
Math, Science and Reading/Language Arts are most important so I knew we should start there.
Week One Independent:
Started off the day with a writing prompt that I found on various internet sites. I just let the kids free write which is one of their favorite things to do. This gave me time to settle into my day and I knew my kids would love this because it is one of heir favorite things to do.
We also read from our favorite books just for fun, with no agenda.
For math we found a free program on KhanAcademy.org It started out with a pretest and takes the info from that test to cater a program just for that individual and begins teaching one lesson at a time. You have to get 5 problems right in a row in order to move on to the next lesson. I actually have an account as well and whenever they do their lessons I do mine to brush up on my own skills. ;)
For English/Language Arts we are using a website with another free program called FreeWorldU.org It's a flashcard system that teaches almost everything in every grade level, they also have math and science and even lessons on manners and internet etiquette! As well as training for medical school! LOL With this program is where we have the most fun learning, so far. We have learned a lot about what each of us knows by trying to guess the answers before looking at the "other side of the cards"
For science we have been doing science experiments from various sites and kits I have been collecting. And on other days I watch a TV show from the science channel the night before and write questions and quiz them on what they learned after watching it the next day. Then we look up more information on each topic afterward if we have any questions.
For their "electives" we are planning to create some sort of art program to follow for my daughter and Levi is continuing to attend his previous Jr High school for his guitar education.
Oh and we have a World history curriculum that was shared with us with is a Christian Curriculum that focuses on God throughout the lesson.
When we first decided to take on home schooling I was scared. I wasn't sure I would have the discipline to do it every day as much as needed to be done. So we decided to use an online public school program, the fact that it was a free program made it even ore possible to start sooner. So we thought it was going to be perfect.
The first day was scary, up until the morning before we logged in we had no idea what to expect. Partly because the school did a poor job of explaining to us how things were going to work.
We spent most of the day listening to teacher after teacher telling us the same things over ad over. And I learned that listening to a faceless person talk all day long was completely boring.
But once things started rolling school work wise we all started feeling overwhelmed very quickly. The kids were working their very best, as far as I could tell, but they were not able to finish everything in a day. We were working from morning until far after dinner and still not getting everything done that was on their agenda for the day. We were all feeling very defeated. There were many times I had to walk outside to hide my frustration and to keep from crying.
I started researching online and talking to people in our home school group about other options.
Finally after just 3 weeks of this I talked to my husband about it and we decided to quit, cold turkey. We gave notice and began winging it. Last week was our first week and it was amazing. We had fun, we learned more about each other already, we got so much done!
Here is how we are doing things for now.
We started out with the basics.
Math, Science and Reading/Language Arts are most important so I knew we should start there.
Week One Independent:
Started off the day with a writing prompt that I found on various internet sites. I just let the kids free write which is one of their favorite things to do. This gave me time to settle into my day and I knew my kids would love this because it is one of heir favorite things to do.
We also read from our favorite books just for fun, with no agenda.
For math we found a free program on KhanAcademy.org It started out with a pretest and takes the info from that test to cater a program just for that individual and begins teaching one lesson at a time. You have to get 5 problems right in a row in order to move on to the next lesson. I actually have an account as well and whenever they do their lessons I do mine to brush up on my own skills. ;)
For English/Language Arts we are using a website with another free program called FreeWorldU.org It's a flashcard system that teaches almost everything in every grade level, they also have math and science and even lessons on manners and internet etiquette! As well as training for medical school! LOL With this program is where we have the most fun learning, so far. We have learned a lot about what each of us knows by trying to guess the answers before looking at the "other side of the cards"
For science we have been doing science experiments from various sites and kits I have been collecting. And on other days I watch a TV show from the science channel the night before and write questions and quiz them on what they learned after watching it the next day. Then we look up more information on each topic afterward if we have any questions.
For their "electives" we are planning to create some sort of art program to follow for my daughter and Levi is continuing to attend his previous Jr High school for his guitar education.
Oh and we have a World history curriculum that was shared with us with is a Christian Curriculum that focuses on God throughout the lesson.
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