An army on the wall

Here's a few photos of our "army" for kid's club. Jena did a great job finding images of armor online, printing them and making it so the kids could tape their pieces up on the wall. They have said lots of memory verses and continue to do so which is fantastic!

At the time these photos were taken (last week) they had on their "Member of God's Army" red banner, the Bible, belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness and arm and leg shields. Looks pretty neat hanging up there! :)

For camp this summer our Bible lessons will be on Ruth and I have to figure out something as an incentive to memorize verses during the two weeks. Last year we built a brick wall putting up a brick for every verse memorized, which the kids all enjoyed!

I've thought about Ruth off and on, trying to come up with a theme, but haven't decided on something yet. But camp is still four months away, but time will fly by, I know! Maybe something to do with wheat, harvest, grain....building a field of wheat or something.

I thought about footprints making a path all over the dining room. Since Ruth traveled back with Naomi to Bethleham and she walked, picking up grain in the fields...traveling.

I'll just keep thinking and come up with something! :)

Middle name...hmmmm

Morgan tagged me a while back with a middle name meme.

Here are the rules: Post the rules on your blog, and then give your answers. List one fact about yourself for each letter in your middle name. Each fact must begin with a letter from your middle name.

I didn't think this would be too difficult considering that my middle name only has three letters, but then I've been staring at this computer screen for the last 10 minutes trying to come up with a word that starts with the letter "K". I finally resorted to a Google search for words that start with "K", "A" and "Y"! I wonder why I thought a three letter word would be easy?!?! ;)

K - kitchen: I love working in the kitchen, whether it's cooking or baking, it's one of my favorite places to be.

A - addicted: Yes, I can become (more accurate to say I am) addicted to my computer. Big surprise, huh?

Y - yahoo!: My email and many of my online groups are hosted on Yahoo! and it certainly is a great site that I use, but Google's search engine is better.

Anyone else who wants to get in on the fun; go right ahead and post on your blog!

What kids will say...

I love teaching my class of 1st, 2nd and 3rd graders every Sunday morning. It's something I look forward to every week! And it never fails that one of my little ones either says something that causes me to chuckle or causes me to stop and think. They aren't afraid to say anything or ask any question! :)

So this morning as we were singing some songs after the lesson, one of my little girls told me,"Whenever you get married and have kids, they are going to have really pretty voices because your singing is so pretty."

Of course, I could probably be the worst singer in the world and she would still probably say that! And I can't sing that well.

A couple weeks ago we were singing the song, I Believe the Bible, and two twin boys who just started coming asked me, "What is sinners? and What does risen mean?"

I'm sure these two little boys are not believers, so their questions were perfect for sharing the Gospel. They ask all kinds of questions on words and things which I take so much for granted. I've known these things for years, ever since I was little, probably younger than they are now. But they haven't had the opportunity or advantage of being raised in a Christian home where the basics of the Bible and the Lord Jesus Christ are being taught everyday.

It makes me appreciate so much what God has taught me, the way my parents have raised me and how I've grown in my relationship with Him!

Camp skit

I mentioned a couple weeks ago that I found a way to rotate videos in Windows Movie Maker and so now I am able to post the skit we did at camp a couple years ago. I haven't posted it online because the video was sideways and you had to turn your head to a 90 degree angle to see it.

Most of you viewing this probably won't be able to understand what is going on, but those of you - Josh, Ruth, Jenna and Jena - who were in it, you will find it funny. It's about 10 minutes long and the the tape ends before the skit is complete, but it's still fun to see again. I watched it to make sure it was playing ok here and just about laughed all the way through it!

And the part where I burst out laughing is not part of the skit. You see, Ruth and Jena had on these ridiculous looking glasses (not to mention their clothing!:)) and Ruth took hers off to see the Bible verse I was pointing to and it was just so funny, I started laughing.

Jena and Ruth got dressed with their clothing and wild makeup in the nurse's room at camp and I can still remember the first glimpse I had of them. It's a good thing I saw their costumes before we started the skit that night, because they looked so ridiculous.

In fact they were so dressed up that most of the campers didn't know who they actually were!

Because of the large video file, the skit is in three parts. Enjoy! :)

part 1



part 2



part 3

What did I do this morning? (Saturday)

I actually had this written and saved in my drafts last Saturday, but didn't finish it until now, so just pretend that you read it a few days ago! :)

Usually I am downstairs throughout the week and even on Saturdays, but today I spent the morning working upstairs in the kitchen. Here's just a few bits and pieces from my day:

The first thing I did was turn on the radio; I almost always have music playing when I'm cooking, baking or cleaning!

Then I carried my computer upstairs and was able to catch-up on the majority of the blogs I read and subscribe to in between everything else.

I had put a roast in the crockpot last night, so it was ready to take out this morning. And it smelled really good! I could smell it when I got up this morning and my room is downstairs on the opposite side of the house from the kitchen.

I kept some of the meat for lunch for Dad and myself (Jena's working today) and then froze the rest. That will work great for BBQ beef sandwiches for another day. Lunch was finished and ready once I peeled and mashed potatoes and made gravy.

I used the last of the cooked hamburger I had in the freezer this week, so I needed to cook some more. I cooked....let's see....I think around 10-12 pounds of hamburger meat, so I should have plenty to put in casseroles and such for the next several months. Spaghetti is on the menu for next week, so I'll have some for that day's meal.

After I took the hamburger out of the oven, I spread it out on paper towels spread over newspapers to drain the extra fat and let it cool before bagging it. That's a lot of hamburger!

Hamburger's double bagged and ready to go in the freezer! And I was able to get all that accomplished along with finishing the roast, cooking potatoes, making gravy, cleaning up the kitchen, blog reading and a few other things here and there! Definitely a fantastic morning!

Btw, instead of cooking hamburger every time I need it for a meal, I cook a bunch at once and then freeze it. Then I can just defrost what I need for whatever I'm fixing. Saves tons of time! :)

Plus, and when I say this you are NOT allowed to laugh :), that's what Mom always did with hamburger! So, guess what? That's what I do too! :)

An encouraging thought!

I have a quick thought to share with you as it is such an encouragement to me. Tonight our memory verse for the kids at kids club at church was II Timothy 4:7..."I have fought the fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith".

That always refreshes me and challenges me to think and do those things that are eternal instead of focusing on the temporary things that really don't matter. Can I say like Paul at the end of my life, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith?

A year ago at this time, we were debating what Scripture verse to put on Mom's headstone and decided on this one. So while it also is encouraging to me, it also brings back memories of Mom. But it couldn't have been a better description of Mom and the life she lived.

One thing I recall Dad saying so clearly after Mom died was, "God put her on earth to do what He wanted her to do and she has accomplished it. She finished the race. She ministered, encouraged, helped those to whom He desired her to and now she has her reward. She, like Paul, finished the course. She kept the faith."

What a wonderful future we have to look forward to! :)

No watch, a lost cell phone and not much accomplished...

Yep, that title just about sums up my day. It all began in the morning......

I woke up a little later than I had planned. I had a bunch of things planned to do today, so I had decided to get started on the day a little earlier than planned, which didn't happen.

I started a load of laundry first thing in the morning and then headed downstairs to answer a few business emails and then get started mailing out packages. I had more than normal to send out today, since yesterday was President's day and there was no mail delivery.

So I'm headed downstairs without a watch. Let me just mention that I can hardly function without a watch. I schedule and time myself during the day, using my watch to keep track of what time it is and that I only have so many minutes left to finish this certain task. But the battery in my watch gave out a few days ago and so I was without one today.

Time just flew by as I was printing shipping labels, filling orders and getting them in the mail. My goal is to have everything ready to ship by 10 or 11 am, but that didn't happen. About 11:30 I had to quit and return Snickers (the male cat we've had at our house for a couple of weeks, hoping Skittles will have a litter of kittens in a couple months!) to his owner who lives about 20 minutes away.

Thankfully Jena sometime in the morning threw the load of laundry in the dryer and fixed lunch for Dad while I was out on the road with a screaming cat in the backseat (but, that's a whole other story:)).

So when I returned home after 12:30, I finished packing up my packages, loaded everything in the car and drove to the post office (5 miles away) to get everything mailed. On the way home I looked at the clock in the car which said 1:30 and started thinking about what else I needed to get done before the day was over.

I drive into the garage, unload my now empty baskets and walk into the kitchen, reading my mail I picked up from the post office. And then I realized that my phone is no longer in my pocket.

Not too concerned at the moment, I look in the empty baskets, glance about the kitchen, check the car and take a peek downstairs to see if I left it down there. After about 15 minutes of light searching, I still could not figure out where it was. And yes, I did check my purse and it wasn't hiding in there either.

I still was not too concerned, thinking that I laid it down on the counter at the post office and didn't pick it up. Thankfully we have a little post office and there's only maybe 40 or 50 square feet in the lobby where it could be. I was sure that was where it was until I called my wonderful postmaster and she said it wasn't there. Um...it wasn't there?!?!

Then my concern level turned into a panic. I grabbed the home phone, dialed my number and start walking through the house, outside to the mailbox, in the car, everywhere I had been in the last few hours, hoping to hear my phone ringing. Nothing.

I called the post office again, asking if she heard any extra music that just might be a cell phone. No. I called Dad, thinking maybe he grabbed my phone instead of his, since we have the same model. Nope.

I was desperate. I was getting more and more concerned that I was really losing my mind, because, you know, my phone and computer and about the two things I just can't live without! :)

I finally stopped and just prayed, "Lord, I don't know where my phone is. I've looked everywhere I can think of and have no idea where else to look. Help me to think of where I could have put it or dropped it. You know I have lots to do today and looking for my cell phone is not one of them. So help me to find it quickly."

I folded the laundry I had started earlier that morning, all the while thinking about where my phone could be. After the laundry was finished, I sat down and began to go back over my day, thinking where I had been, the last time I looked at my phone, etc. Finally I decided to go back to the post office and look inside and outside. Maybe I dropped it in the street when I got out of the car. The postmaster, Karla, had already looked around inside, but perhaps it was outdoors.

I drive up to the post office, parking away from the area where I was earlier in the day. I'm sure it looked pretty ridiculous, this person standing in the street, looking at the ground, cell phone in one hand ringing another cell phone. Thank goodness it's a itty, bitty town with hardly any traffic!

After a couple rings, I finally heard it and followed the sound to the grassy area to one side of the post office. Hip, hip, hooray!! What a relief! It felt like a huge load had been lifted off my shoulders! Found it - thank you, Lord! Thank you that it wasn't in the street where I had just seen two semi trucks drive by. Thank you that it wasn't freezing cold as I was outside looking around! Thank you that you helped me find it!

With that, I am driving home, looking at the clock, seeing that it is almost 4 pm. And knowing that I'm not going to get everything done today that I had planned. I spent over two hours looking for a little thing that's so very valuable - a cell phone.

And so why am I now typing here instead of writing some posts for this blog which is what I should be doing? Good question....with that I better quit wrap up here and see if I can get another thing or two done tonight! :)

FREE $5 gift card from Sears

Sign up for email ad alerts from Sears and receive a $5.00 gift card in the mail. Offer is valid 1/30/08 – 4/06/08. Limit one free gift card per household. Gift card will arrive via USPS 4-6 weeks after registration has been completed.

Fitted feet in God's armor

Since we are teaching the armor of God on Wednesday evenings for kids' club, this week's lesson is on fitted feet. And what better way to illustrate this important piece of God's armor than with shoes and lots of different ones at that!

To start with, Jena reviews the memory verse from last week and the kids who have it memorized can put a piece of armor up on the wall on their "person". I'll show pictures of our "army" next week.

And then Jena goes over this weeks memory verse - Romans 1:16. She had then do different things like jump up and down, jumping jacks, turn in circle and such while repeating the verse.

Then it's snack time and then the lesson...

This is my basic lesson outline (complete with photos & even video!). My talking parts are in pink and they are kinda improvised according to what the kids said and did. And of course you have to imagine the typed words put into actual speech...it makes the emphasis on certain words much more interesting! :)

Q. Did you have something exciting happen this week? Michael: won in a sports tournament

And you did not tell anyone about it, right?? (You should have seen the facial expression I got when I said this! :)) And of course, Michael's response was,"I told everyone I knew."

And that was good news you wanted to share, right? It was exciting and you couldn't wait to share it with everyone.

I repeated my question with a couple other kids and their responses and faces were just as great as the first! :)

We have the most important good news that we can share with everyone and we need to do it!

The Bible tells us in Ephesians 6, that we are to make sure our feet are fitted with the Gospel of peace. The Gospel of peace is referring to the good news of Jesus Christ. If you have trusted Jesus as your Savior, that He died on the cross to take the punishment for your sins, you are at peace with God and He is on your side, helping you to stand firm in His Word.

Q. Do you know what the word Gospel means? good news

Q. What is the Gospel or good news that we have? Jesus died for us on the cross, taking the punishment for our sins. If we trust Him as our Savior, we can have eternal life and live with Him in heaven.

Believers can stand firm, knowing that Jesus Christ is there to help and guide us. But not only do your feet remind you of your relationship with Jesus, but they also take the same Gospel that you believe and share it with others. Our feet take us everywhere and we should take the Gospel everywhere we go and share it with others.

Someone look up in their Bible and read - I Peter 3:15 - ...always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you...

Q. What is the hope that we have? Jesus Christ died for us and we can look forward to living forever in heaven with Him.

We always need to be ready and prepared to share with others the hope we have in Jesus Christ and the reason we can look forward to living in heaven with Him.

So....we need to be prepared....

When you are packing to go on a trip, you have to pack the things you will need, right? If you are going to Alaska and you don't pack a coat, you're not going to be very prepared for the cold days, are you?

We're going to take a journey. You will be given a pair of shoes to wear and you must follow the path you are given, pick up three items that might be helpful on your trip and reach your destination, which you will find out at the end of your journey.

Note: Jena and I taped six different colors of crepe paper to the floor in a crazy pattern. Then I put three items (some would apply to their destination and some would not) on each path of crepe paper. At the end of the path (crepe paper), I put a paper plate with the destination written.

The kids would follow the path with different pairs of shoes on, gather their items, find out their destination and come back to the group and explain why or why not these items would be useful. The object of this: None of their shoes would be appropriate for where they are going. They wouldn't have all the correct items for their destination. :)

follow the colored line

Blue flip flops - going to Greenland
items: gloves, marshal badge and sunblock

The gloves would certainly be needed in Greenland, but the marshal badge? You're going there for a vacation, not to be a policeman. And the sunblock and flip flops? Your feet were not prepared for this journey!

White tennis shoes - dancing in a ballet recital
items: sheets of music, matches, sunglasses

If you were going to be in a ballet recital, the music would be a definite must, but the matches and sunglasses...hmmm...would they be part of your performance? And tennis shoes for ballet dancing....I don't think that would work, do you?!

Pink hearts house slippers - going to Church
items: pen, paper, earmuffs

It's Sunday morning and you're prepared to go to church in those shoes? The pen and paper are a good idea, but the earmuffs....hmmm? And what important item are you missing if you are ready to go to church? (Bible!)

Black snow boots - going to the beach
items: towel, Bible, coat

Let's see....snow boots and the beach....that doesn't quite make sense. I would say your trip and your shoes don't match, don't you think? The towel would be a good idea and maybe your Bible, but a coat?

Orange flip flops - you are the President giving a speech
items: speech, ballet costume, farmer's cap

You're the President of the US, giving a speech on national tv and you're wearing flip flops (and orange at that!), in a ballet costume (in colors of pink and blue, which don't even match the flip flops) and you have a cap on your head? It's a good thing you do have your speech in your hand, but your clothing and shoes aren't appropriate.

Ballet shoes - hiking up Mt. Everest
items: water bottle, men's suit, scarf

For hiking up a mountain, a water bottle and scarf would be most useful. However, I don't think you would be wearing a suit or have ballet shoes on your feet. Your feet would never make it to the top in those shoes.

With each trip you took, you can see that you have to be prepared with the right shoes that would work for your journey. It's the same with us. We need to be prepared to share with other the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the good news and what He has done for us. It's such good news that we need to be excited to share it with everyone we meet.

Needless to say, the kids all enjoyed wearing different shoes and following the trails. Some more than others as you can see below! And hopefully they also have a better understanding about witnessing and how important it is that we share Jesus Christ with others.

the boys seemed to have fun dressing up...

some...ummmm....more than others...

Let's just say Jena and I have small feet which was
a challenge for some of the kids! Which of course made it
all the more fun for the kids to run and keep on their shoes!



click to play a video snippet

Losing someone...

Losing someone you love so much is very hard, but watching another person you love, hurting and grieving over the lost of that someone is almost harder.

I miss Mom so much and there are days that I think of her more and miss her more than others. But watching my Dad day after day, knowing that he misses Mom so much seems to be much harder than the pain in my heart over losing Mom.

And sometime, there are moments harder than others...

Happy Valentine's Day!

Just about every year around Valentine's Day, we make cheery cheesecake dessert and this year is no different.

It's been a while since Jena or I have made cheery cheesecake and it tastes soooo good! :)

For future information...

You know how you look and look for something one day; you need it desperetly but can't find it? Then a week later you find that thing you were looking for and could have saved you time when you needed it a week ago.

Well...it's two weeks later since I taped my quilt lessons upside down and I found what I needed. I discovered in my blog reading here how I can rotate video files in Windows Movie Maker.

And of course, it's not two weeks before I need that information....it's two weeks after I needed that information. Oh well, next time, I know exactly what to do.

But the great thing also is that not only can I rotate videos that have been taped upside down, but also those that have been taped sideways. I have a video tape of the skit some of the teachers/counselors did at camp 2 years ago that Krissa taped sideways. Now I know how I can change that!

I'm still glad I found that info, even if it is two weeks after I needed it!

Winter time

After the Christmas decorations came down in my Sunday School classroom, up went Winter.

the bulletin board

our classroom door

I don't think I'll ever run out of ideas for classroom decor...I have a whole notebook full of ideas. Plus do you know how many ideas you can find online? More than I would ever have time to do.....:)

Did you watch the game?

Football season is over for this year...til next fall anyway. I always enjoy watching football on Sunday afternoon, especially if the right teams are playing.

But yesterday was the Super Bowl and the end of the season. And I was hoping the Patriots would win, as they were favored and expected to win. They were my favored team to win also.

Why? Well, my reasoning is very important, so listen close: The Patriots are an AFC team and the Giants a NFC team and I like the AFC teams better than NFC teams. Why? Because NCF teams are broadcast on Fox (which is a fuzzy, blurry station in our area) and AFC games are typically shown on CBS (and that station comes in as clear as a tv screen can be).

But that's only part of the reason. The other is that the Chiefs are in the AFC and of course, they are my favorite team.

See how valid my reasoning is......:)

It was only the Giants quarterback who narrowly escaped being sacked and the receiver who just barely caught the long pass and then the touchdown that changed the game to the Giants favor. Too bad for the Patriots and their perfect record season!

It was fun to watch, although I could most certainly do without the commercials! As much as I will miss football on Sunday afternoons, it's not like I can't find something else to do. :)

And after all, it is just a game. Now to move on with more important things in life.....

Well...there's good and bad news....

Regarding Jena's lost or rather deleted blog.....

The good news is that I have an old blog feed stored on my computer and she can copy and paste those posts. It looks like they date back to February 2007, so at least she can recover some of the info she posted in the last year. The only thing is that they are stored in my computer's temporary files, so she can only access them from my computer. And you know how I can hardly live without a computer....:)

The bad news is that I can't find old archives of her blog. After a few hours of digging, I did find the site I was thinking of; it's the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. But there are no past archives of her blog. And I guess I should have expected that; blog pages are stored differently than web files.

The other piece of good news is that Jena started a new blog on Wordpress. She was planning on switching from Blogger to Wordpress in the future anyway, so the move is right now instead of later!

Her new blog addy is: http://alilyamongthethorns.wordpress.com/