The Treasures… A Scavenger Hunt

1. Charity

2. Ohio, U.S.A.

3. Lead Pastor, Sr. Pastor, whatever you call it.  I can’t remember what he has on the website.  You can look if you want:  www.fbcnl.com

4. We move to FBCnl the last weekend of last September so around 13 1/2 months.

5. Three Children.  Madeline:  8 years old, 3rd grade.  Charles:  6 years old, Kindergarten.  Sophia:  19 months old.

6. Unique?  Not sure what qualifies as unique but here’s the list.  First Apt:  Brand new, smelled like Glade Apples & Cinnamon.  Fireplace.  Loved it.  Second Townhouse:  Maddie’s first home.  Infested by ladybugs.  If you’ve not experienced a ladybug infestation you probably still like them, I don’t.  Third House:  Our time of testing by fire.  We put our heart and soul into this house and ended up walking away brokenhearted.   Fourth Duplex:  Season of rebuilding.  Charlie’s first house.  This house was about taking the crumbles from our life and building an altar with them.  Not necessarily fun but it was refuge.  Fifth House:  ”Horse House” as the kids call it.  Lived on a 8 acre stable facility and boarded horses.  A lot of work.  This house was a season of reaping and sowing.  It was a relief and an ahhhh, flop on the couch house.  It’s where we thought we knew what life held for us and we had our plans laid out.  Then…  poof.  In an instant, God redirected us.  Sometimes painfully but always sovereignly.   Sixth House:  the Yellow House.  This house, unknowingly was a transitional house.  It prepared us for the next step.   For the first 6 months we lived here all we had was subflooring on it that was painted seafoam green.  No joke.  Seventh House:  the Parsonage.  Love it.  (and for the record… we may have moved houses a lot but not jobs or areas…  our previous church we served in for eight years.)

7. Neither.  My mother-in-law cooks for us most Sundays.  We head over and have dinner as a family.

8. Nope.  I tend to run late although I must say since moving here I’ve gotten better in general but I do tend to run JUST on time which means I end up sitting down 5 minutes late.

9. Right now?  Flash Forward.  Come January?  24.  Is there any other answer.  (In my secret life I would love to be a CIA/CTU agent.  A PW would be a great cover wouldn’t it?  I drive a minivan, no one would EVER suspect me.)

10. I don’t always have it together, especially around the house…  I folded 256 PAIRS of socks the night before we left for Disney World in September.  No joke.  No lie.  No kidding.  256.

11. Big or little?  Little:  turning non-deals into deals.  Does it matter what color a wall is?  I think not.  Big:  Hearing “It’s not personal”  If it’s about family… it’s personal.

12. The extra candy that’s in my cupboards.  I eat it.  It needs to be pitched.  (Oh, and our Friends DVDs.  We’ve not watched them in four years

13. Chocolate… is there really any other answer?  Although I must say McD’s coke is a close second.

14. We are parsonage people.  The church has a great space for us and we’ve loved making it home.

15. I must admit:  Freak.  Well, that may be too strong of a word but I do check myself, the floor closest to the door and the direct views from the door.  (If I’ve ever handled your business at teh door, I’m sorry… it’s because the house wasn’t okay.  The most embarrassed I’ve ever been was when a family ’stopped by’ (LITERALLY, no warning) to talk about a funeral for their mom.  our house was NOT okay, by any means.  From that point I really do try to make sure the house is acceptable… not perfect, but at least acceptable.  (A side story…  at our duplex we had a small group that came over each week.  Each week our house had to be perfect.  One of my close friends said one day, “my house never looks like yours.  Yours is always perfect.”  So, the next week I showed her…  i had done laundry but not folded, nor put away.  It was all shoved, literally SHOVED between our bed and the wall so that no one could see it and it went the length and height of our bed… but she needed to see that we were people and no, our house is probably never perfect.)

Fever…

This is a confessional…  my two sister-in-laws are pregnant.  One due soon.  One due later.  A good friend just posted pictures of their BRAND new babe and…  okay, here it is… I might have a slight, like 99.0 degree fever, baby fever that is.  Maybe.

(Sarah, Heidi, Ash… HUSH.)

OH and FYI… this does SO NOT mean that I am pregnant.  I am NOT.

The Joys of Democracy…

First.  As I have confessed before… I LOVE politics.  If I was a boy I’d be president.  (PS… I really don’t feel like debating why I said “If I was a boy…”  just know I’m not trying to make a huge statement it’s simply a fact… if I was a boy I’d try to be president.  Anywho…)  I get my political kicks by working at the polls on a Tuesday each May & November.  I love it.  It’s addicting, you should try it.  Plus, it’s Christmas money.  But seriously, I feel patriotic, responsible, like I’m adding value to the entire democratic process.  So, I worked yesterday.  Let me just say this.  I cannot post a full story here because well, I just won’t.  Just know that my patience, my Christian testimony, and my integrity were ruffled greatly yesterday and I didn’t appreciate it or take pleasure in it.  I worked in a new precinct and I enjoyed my day throughly except for one hiccup and that hiccup made me MAD!!!  It’s quite a story so if you see me in person you are more than welcome to ask but it will not be posted.  Anyways, that my friend, was my day yesterday.

I have been really random with my posts and I hate that because life is flying by… in case you didn’t know this Christmas is CLOSE and Thanksgiving is CLOSER which means Black Friday is CLOSER plus ONE DAY!!!  WHOOOOO HOOO!!!  I am pumped for that one.  (I already have my list run and I’ve been checking it through and through.  If you think I’m kidding… I’m not.)

Well, I have a couple posts for today so that will be enough for now.

My Soul…

My soul is tired tonight. It was a day. That is all…

My soul finds rest in God alone; my salvation comes from him. Psalm 62:1

Journeying…

I’ve not been very good at chronicling our journey lately. But when the journey gets crazy sometimes all you can do is hang. Actually, last week was really nice. God kinda cleared my schedule for me and it was wonderful. This week again is not so bad… I have one show and class but I’m not on the schedule for piano so I had last night free.

We carved pumpkins. Simple sentence. Not so simple process. It’s not bad, I just seriously don’t think it should take HOURS to do pumpkins but when we decided to get the most mammoth pumpkins we could find… well, let’s just say the guts FILLED our table to overflowing. Then, the dear sweet child that she is, Sophia, we got her pumpkin clean out and ready to carve and the child played with the mush, putting it in and back out of her pumpkin for probably at least a half hour if not an hour. She loved it. My other two dig sparingly with a spoon… I know we’re in trouble with her.

Sunday was another great day of worship for us. Our two services are going well and it’s exciting to be poised for growth. We have noticed that the flu has been knocking people out like flies so our numbers have been down slightly… that just means we’ll be full in the winter, right? You can only get the flu once… right?!?

Anyways, the month of October is Pastor Appreciation and the deacons and kitchen ladies planned out a carry-in dinner for us. I will say it again… people can cook. Our wonderful kitchen ladies got to the church at five so they could fry their chicken. Home made, home battered, home fried chicken: Is there anything more Baptist?

We have been here a year now, well, a year and a month and this church and these people continue to bless our lives. We have been able to see so much going on and are ever so grateful to play a small part in what God is doing here in New Lebanon. Next week we have another two baptisms and then in another week we have two more. God is good.

I think I have a midterm today, I don’t think I’m ready. Oh well… proceed and take the grade that I get I suppose. I’m highly annoyed right now because the classes I wanted to take for Illustrator and Photoshop are not being offered Winter Quarter. The only thing I can hope is that all the classes are not posted yet. If they are, I’m annoyed beyond belief.

Oh well… have a great day.

Sing to the LORD a new song,
for he has done marvelous things;
his right hand and his holy arm
have worked salvation for him.
The LORD has made his salvation known
and revealed his righteousness to the nations.

Houston… We Have a Problem…

We are fighting the flu here, I think… Nothing horrible or big, I think it’s just the headcold flu type stuff… honestly, I kinda wonder if it’s the swine… I know Maddie’s class had one student had it… they’ve both run a fever today, had a minor *cough*, and have head aches. They’re up and acting fine… sick but fine. Oh well… Stephen’s not feeling himself but again, it’s going around.

In other news… it’s fall. Beautiful fall. Other things I love right now… the german chocolate cake I made for Linda’s birthday (and this was NOT out of the box… we’re talking 8 eggs, evaporated milk, buttermilk and all other forms of goodness in this cake), foxnews (sorry Whitehouse, but there are people that love them), old friends & new friends (the old ones make my heart ache so badly when I see them… the new ones bless my day more and more… if only we could merge the two on a regular basis… New Lebanon could have a population growth, I wouldn’t be opposed!), Christmas…I’m so getting the itch… bring. It. ON!

Things I wish I was doing right now… getting wallflowers in fall smells and putting out cornstalks on my light posts. Maybe tomorrow.

Practice…

We have practice for worship on Wednesday nights… that sounds kinda silly doesn’t it? “Practice for worship…” Well, the thing is, it kinda is how it sounds. The less you practice the less you can worship as you lead or play on Sunday…

We intro’d a song last week that Stephen has been in love with since hearing it at Catalyst two years ago and it FINALLY came out on a CD this year. It’s by Fee… Steve Fee that is. (sorry, really bad attempt at humor…) But it’s “Glory to God, Forever.”

If you’ve not heard it, you seriously need to youtube it. Or simply buy the CD. But, anyways, I love it. It’s a pretty simple song as far as chords and stuff go but it’s really powerful. Anyways, we’re manipulating it this week and I think it’s going to be really good. One thing that we’ve been trying to do really hard is this…

Stephen and I came from a church that has two different styles of worship… a blended and then a more modern feel (I hate the word contemporary so I refuse to use it…) and when we moved here to FBCnl in the transitional plan it called for two services that would follow that same model, if you will. However, it wasn’t until this past week that we were ready to do the two services growth wise. So, in the past year and really especially in the past six months we’ve worked really hard (a whole gang of people on our worship team) to line out services that are smack in the middle of those two type services.

I know that we’re not making everyone happy. But honestly, do you ever? Probably not. If you did you’d be doing fifty things and then only one or two of them would be at your best ability… So, we’ve committed to simply trying to put together the best services using the old and the new. One of the things that I love the most, and I have loved this for a few years now, is the Passion Hymns: Ancient and Modern.

I love the ‘meat’ of the hymns and the stories behind them. They tell the Christian legacy that I don’t think we should forget. They can enrich us like none other. However, in order to be relevant and to teach them and to share them with the generations that follow when they were written they may need to sound a little different… It’s kinda like Hannah Montana… The best of both worlds.

Anyways, this post may sound completely random and maybe it is. I really don’t have a major point to make or statement… I simply and saying I really like what we’re doing in worship right now. Rehearsal went well last night and think Sunday’s gonna be good. We’re opening with a choir feature that the band is playing… “A New Hallelujah” and the choir does really well on that song… then we’re doing “All Because of Jesus” which would be better if I could play all the right notes instead of 4 out of every 5… yeah, seriously. Then we’re going into a hymn that’s major guitar driven… “How Great Thou/You Are” Such a classic, I love it. Then into a crowd favorite but we’re switching it up a little this week… “God of the City.”

Anyways, I’m excited. I pray that wherever you worship on Saturday, Sunday, or whenever that you’re excited about this weekend. I’m expecting great things and I know my God never fails…

Glory to God, glory to God
Glory to God, forever…

Take my life and let it be
All for You and for Your glory.
Take my life and let it be Yours…

We sing… Glory to God.

PS… I have my first midterm/test in ten years today… agh! Oh, and my arms still hurt from kickboxing and I have to go back tonight! That’s all…

Wednesday Wanderings…

My title means simply that… this post will be random. I have gotten out of the habit of blogging and my apologies on that. However, since our plane landed coming home from Disney World my feet hit the ground running and they haven’t stopped.

The worst part: you know how I was on Cloud Nine because for the week and a half prior to WDW I was keeping up and being the super mom of laundry… well, not so much anymore. I have not been able to catch up nor keep up since getting back. AND, that’s not cool because while my kids have about 10 pair of shorts and capris, etc. The girls especially have about 4 pair of pants… which for adults wouldn’t be bad but for kids that can’t remember the rules: (Jeans = Two Wears) + backed up laundry = struggling outfit choices on nippy fall mornings. My goal today: laundry. Clean. Folded. PUT AWAY.

Last night was kickboxing at church. I thought I would die. I have come to realize that my body is in general out of shape however there are some elements in kickboxing while not pleasant I can keep up with the best of them… however, however… HOWEVER… plank holds

are not my friend… especially when you have to do six sets of eight pattycakes… not cool at all. Oh well, I need kickboxing and other forms of exercising. My knee has been bothering me lately and I think it’s because I haven’t been as deliberate in doing squats and stuff for the quad muscle but i’ve been doing quite a few stairs at school.

Speaking of school… honestly, I forgot how much I enjoyed school growing up. I enjoy learning and even though the one class isn’t at all what I thought it would be… it’s a glorified art class, I am really enjoying it. I’m not sure what my academic career will look like but I’m going to enjoy what little I’m doing.

Today, we’re going to get Sophia’s pictures taken… don’t write me hate mail but the child has not had an actual portrait picture taken since she was two weeks old… I know **GASP** horror *SHREEK* she’s the third don’t you know. Honestly, we have a ton of pictures of her that we’ve taken and some of them are really good so her life is documented but still… it’s pathetic.

And this one is for Rebekah… last week I sewed my first piece of paper. I loved it. I made baby shower invitations for Ashley and I love how they ended up. I’ll have to take a picture and post it.

This weekend I have an open house at a friend’s house. We’re doing a 31 (purses, bags, etc.) Pampered Chef and fall & winter decorations Open House. If you’re in the area let me know and I’ll give you the info…

Well, my day has to start. So, I’ll talk at you later. Enjoy the fall… it’s my favorite.

School Days…

Why do teachers need inservices? Do they not know they lead to fighting amongst the natives?

To Wrap It Up…

Friday. Dreary rainy day. Kids in school. Cleaned house. Folded laundry. Stephen studied. Made plans. Plans failed due to rain. Went to Target. Went to church for 5th Quarter. Charlie puked. Cleaned up puke at church. Came home. Watched Flash Forward . Very good. Stephen woke up and puked.

Saturday. Stephen kept puking. Got up. I started puking. Kids watched tv. Watched some more. Sickness continued. Kids boredom continued. Did absolutely nothing.

Sunday. Feeling better. Stephen can’t preach though. Launched two services today. (Of all days to be sick… Satan, you’re dumb.) Services went well. Enjoyed naps, except Sophia. Came home. Heading to bed on time and early. Looking forward to tomorrow.