Reflections of a Friend

Elijah receiving his first hatchet

The Lord has been good to me.  Often, I feel undeserving of the love that the Lord has shown me over the years.  For I do not deserve it.  I did nothing to receive this love and yet he chose me.  I struggle with acceptance.  He has shown me that I am loved, accepted, and more than welcome at His throne as though I were an old friend.  Always welcome to stop in for a chat, a cup of coffee and a good laugh or cry or hug.  

Tami & Matthias last fall.

Honestly, on this earth I have had few friends that even come close to the openness that I feel with my Lord.  Why would a person want to be my friend if they knew everything about me?  I even find myself sometimes going so far as to try to convince people that I am not someone they want to befriend.  Maybe it is something from my past, but I just don't trust people.  People are fickle, unreliable, dishonest, full of betrayal, hate and sin, why would I put myself at their mercy?  

Tyler, Elijah and Josiah.  3 of my men.

An earthly confidant is a spouse, sister, brother, or friend that despite all odds, loves us and we love them.  I have precious few of these confidants.  Each of them is priceless and the loss of one through death, distance or depression is a tragedy.   I muse that the Lord is revealing to me the importance of an earthly confidant by showing me that the loss of one or two is not as bad as it seems.  Oftentimes, I am so fearful of losing something that I never set out to acquire it to begin with.  Yet, amidst great loss the Lord brings joy and I need to rest in Him.  He is my strength and I am His beloved.  

Sandi. The one and only.

The only friend that I truly need is Jesus.  He is my rock.  He is whom I turn to when I am struggling.  When my children all have whooping cough, chicken pox, or broken bones, I turn to Him.  When my goats are going into labor, my husband is traveling and there is no bread for the table, I turn to Him.  When my only truly close friends depart from my sight, I turn to Him.  This is one lesson that 2014 is teaching me and I fearfully anticipate will continue to teach me in the coming months.  

Andrew & Caleb at SMASH.

What else is 2014 teaching me?

I need to...

• Trust God to direct my earthly relationships
• Purge my heart of complaints and pessimistic thoughts.
• Tear down any strongholds that I have that create a barrier between me and my Father in heaven and the people that He has put into my life.
• Enjoy the privilege and voice the joy of spending every hour of every day with five boys.  

What is 2014 teaching you?  

Through the Door

John Piper reminded me today that dying is like entering a new year.  He also stated that we, as Christians, should embrace the new year as a time to reflect on the year past.  If my life was only what I did, thought, said, or enjoyed in 2013 would I end it tonight knowing that the Lord would say, "well done good and faithful servant."?

What a profound idea!  To give ourselves a yearly checkup on our Spiritual walk.  Every New Year's Eve becomes a gift to us to reflect on our life, see where we need to improve and make the proper adjustments.  It is like a personal ghost of Christmas past, only it is ours and not Scrooge's.  

When you walk through the door to 2014 will you be smiling and praying for another 2013 or will you be smiling because, like scrooge, you have a chance to change before the real test of death?

On a side note, I am smiling today, because three of my best Richards ladies and my husband bought me my white dishes for the farmhouse kitchen.  Doesn't the white look fantastic contrasted with the red?  It is like our sins being covered with Christ's red blood and then made white.  What a wonderful reminder of forgiveness in our everyday utensils.  

Where are You?

I am not lost.
Sometimes I feel like it
If you still read my blog then you feel it to,
but I am not lost.

Tonight, Tyler kicked me out of the kitchen so that I could stop.
Stop cleaning, putting the kids to bed, prepping for school, writing, prepping Classical Conversations.
Stop fretting, cleaning, and trying to do everything.
So I stopped.

Above me I hear
Tyler reading to my littles.
He says, "This looks like a girls book"
"It is," They say, "but it is fun"

The boys are excited
They grunt, laugh, and make baby ooup sounds
They like Norma Jean Jumping Bean
I like them

I have not forgotten you all
I will come back when I have
another night
to stop.

If You Died Today

What would you regret not getting to do?

That is the question that I am thinking about today.  What is it that I want to do while here on this earth?  What am I supposed to do while here?

Christians may ask what we are called to do while here on earth, but what I am finding is that my calling in life is often shown through my deepest sense of loss if I go to heaven now.  Let's face it,  if you died today and went to heaven you aren't sad.  You are having the best time in your life, and you aren't regretting what you didn't do on earth.  However,  this line of questioning is a good way to be proactive while we are here on earth and may have the chance to reduce our list of regrets.  So here is my list.  It is short and sweet, because honestly,  I don't have a huge to do list from God while I am here.  It may be never ending, but it isn't overwhelming.

1. I wouldn't be here to raise my kids
2. I wouldn't be here to grow old with my husband
3. I wouldn't be able to help share the gospel with my neighbors in Maine, Africa, and beyond.
4. I wouldn't be able to help parents redefine how they educate their children


Now,  I shall take this list, compare it to our list of goals for our family (yes, we have those, and you should too!),  and redirect my steps.

What would your list look like?

Religion & Politics: part 2

The conclusion of my thoughts regarding an important social issue of our time:

If you don’t believe in the God of the Holy Bible, then I will beg you to consider what He has to say.  If you continue to reject Him then that is your decision and I will still love you.  But don’t tell me that I am being hateful towards others when I have their best interest at heart.   

It brings the alcoholic happiness when he drinks, but he is worse off because of it.  No one would dispute that, and many work to help him find happiness in something that will not harm him.  It brings the homosexual happiness to be with his partner, but it also brings insecurity, disease, an early death, and as a non-christian: torment in hell.  How is that something that we can condone even on a secular level?

From a completely secular standpoint the constitution of the United States calls for the separation of church and state.  For years, the government has struggled with how to keep a line between the two.  On one hand the majority of our citizens have shared common beliefs, such as the right to life, but on the other they are not all of the same religion.  Government has walked on this line off and on in regards to certain issues.  Like when it started acknowledging marriage for the sake of collecting more taxes.  Now the government is trying to step completely into the marriage issue and change its definition.  The government does not have the authority to do this because marriage has  always been a religious matter.  There is no example in history where marriage was considered a matter of the state.  Therefore, I vote against the government getting involved in religion and in marriage. In order to maintain the separation of church and state the government needs to step back and completely abandon any connection that it has with marriage.  

To honor the constitution and respect the many religions practiced in the United States please vote No on question 1.  The government has no right to get involved in religion.  

Religion & Politics: part 1

It has been a long time since I have posted anything offensive.  Which, by the way,  leads me to remember that I was told this week that as Americans we have the right to offend others, but not the right to not be offended.  So here is me exercising my right.  Unless of course you read this with an open heart and see that I am writing from my heart.  Truly, I struggle with this topic.  I desire so much for others to see this simple fact:  That God loved us while we were sinners and sent His son (Jesus) to die for our sins so that we may have life and have it abundantly!   This reality brings tears of thankfulness to my eyes for myself and my children,  and tears of sadness for all of the people that refuse to acknowledge their need.   So without further ado, I give you my thoughts:

I am sick and tired of being labeled as hateful because of being a Christian.  I read over and over how those who oppose sin are hateful towards the sinners.  Yet, I have not found one example where a Christian was arrested for a hate crime.  Mind you, plenty of non-Christians have been arrested for hate crimes.  Christians make great scapegoats as we believe in showing love to others.  We are told by Jesus to overcome evil with good, and that God alone is good.  So we try, not always successfully, to love our neighbors.  Don’t label me as hateful because I think that a murderer should not kill, and that a liar should be told not to lie, and a man should be told that homosexual acts are wrong.  God judges ALL sin.  If I hate my neighbor then I am guilty, but I know to repent and turn to Jesus and ask for forgiveness.  

If God judges all sin.  Then it is in our best interest to repent of our sin and ask for His forgiveness.  If our neighbor is engaging in sin whether it be murder, lying, stealing, or homosexual acts then the best thing that we can do for them, as a human, is tell them what they must do to receive forgiveness and escape the wrath of God and the torment of hell.  You might say that me pointing out someone’s need for forgiveness is hate speech, but how can me trying to help my neighbor escape the wrath of God be hateful to them?  The worst thing I can do is let them think that they will not be judged for their sins by the all powerful God.  That is truly hateful.  

How are they to know that they need forgiveness if we don’t tell them, and how are they to know to repent and ask for forgiveness if they don’t know that their actions are sinful?  

God gives to all freely who come to Him to ask and ask with a pure heart.  Is your heart pure?  How are you to know if your heart is pure if you don’t know what isn’t?  

Thoughts and Change... part II

"Be the change you want to see in the world." Gandhi

This is an original piece of artwork by the one and only Elijah Benjamin Smith. He is a composing photographer.

Where did we leave off? Oh yeah, Gandhi. Now I will not pretend to know a lot or even a little about Gandhi.  In fact, I looked him up on wikipedia and found out that I was spelling his name wrong. Now that I have that little mishap fixed I want to share with you the problem that I have with this very popular quote.  First, Let's recap...

In the midst of pondering the Way, and how the loving God would help us all change into being more like his Son.  I realized that Gandhi's quote is not the solution to the problem or even the means to go about solving it.  If we were merely the change that we wanted to see in our churches, then yes, some people would notice and some things might change. So, you may ask, what is wrong with that? Nothing, except if you tried to take this concept and put it into a group of people who were not so like-minded as the family in the pew next to you.  

What happens when an advocate for abortion is standing up and "being the change they want to see in the world", and the lady who has been haunted by hers stands up against this practice to protect other children and potential mothers? Or what may I ask is the result of two people who cannot seem to agree? Arguing? Most certainly. War? Sometimes. Famine? It happens.  So lets take this a bit further... What significant difference would I alone make by being so selfish as to only stand up for the changes that I want to see happen?  Do you now see the problem with Gandhi's quote? You may call it too centered on self, small, incapable of making true change, but no other description fits it better than: Not being grounded in the Truth.  This quote and way of thinking did not come from God, and that, my friend, is the problem.

Instead I would like to present to you a modified version. Instead of being the change that we want to see, let's have a more lasting impression and vote for real change by being the change that God wants to see.  You see if I studied my bible, loved my Jesus, and did everything in my life that I think God would have me do. Great things would happen, and they would last longer than my mere term of office. After all, if you advocate for something that God doesn't want to happen;  you have to answer to God for why you chose to be so self centered and only try to change the things in this world that you wanted to see change. 

Next time we are confronted with a problem whether inside or outside the church lets think about what God would want us to do.  If we love Him; then we will find ourselves praying "Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." 

Thoughts & Change... part I

I am happy to announce that my brain is working! I know some of you doubt, but really I do think everyday; some days more than others.  I will not deceive you; when Caleb is teething or sick I am not happy; my days are long, my nights are short and my brain is on emergency standby.  If you tried to have intelligent conversation with me about anything besides children, sleeping, and cooking then you would basically receive the blue screen of death!! (is it blue or green?)  Anyway, I can tell when I have a child under the age of one in my home because these moments come and go for that first year. Thankfully, I noticed tonight that I am back to my annoyingly thoughtful self. Let me show you what I mean: 

Tonight my wonderful husband Tyler granted me ten minutes to take a shower without having to concern myself with the boys. We worked outside today and along with using the chainsaw: I got pelted with a huge chunk of ground and had a red ant bite me because he suddenly found himself in my house instead of his.  Needless to say, I needed a shower for my body and my piece of mind ( If my little friend had a brother I didn't want him on me).  

While in the shower I started thinking about all that I had read about people's complaints about churches. Not specific churches mind you, but the church as a whole. I have heard so many individuals tell me one of two things: 1. The church body doesn't focus on worship enough and 2. The doctrine in the church is skewed to being too legalistic or too liberal. Now, I don't want to get into these two debates as they are both viable. What I want to show you is my thought progression from this to something a bit more... thoughtful.  Disclosures aside I suddenly realized that we are not here to change the church, but to rather be changed by God, and as the apostle John said, if we loved God, then everything else would come out of that relationship. Our doctrine would be based on the word out of our desire to read God's word and please Him, and our worship would be sincere regardless of the style because we truly love God. 

Insight into my mind:

"We should be the change... What? Oh yeah, Gandhi: 'be the change you want to see in the world'.  No, there is something wrong with that statement, on the cover it may seem sincere and practical, but it isn't grounded in the Truth." 

What do I mean by this?  Stay Tuned...

The Sin of Hypocrisy

It has become increasingly clear to me that I am now receiving more than 6 hours of sleep at night, and almost 5 of them are consecutive.  I know this to be true because my brain has started to once again branch beyond the basics.  No longer am I confined to eating, drinking, nursing and other necessities in life.  Now I can expand my mind by learning about politics, religion, philosophy, teaching methods, phonics. Not only am I able to do more now physically and mentally, but I find myself reflecting on more while doing some mindless activity like vacuuming.  I am also in the depths of reading large, thought provoking books. Narrative books like Amanda's recent find about China, and History books like my current affair: The biography of John Adams by David McCullough.  I know that I have mentioned this book in a prior post, but today I wanted to share something that I am learning about from the life of John and surprisingly also from the life of Thomas Jefferson.  

Hypocrisy.  I don't know about you, but I hate this word. I don't know if it is because we as humans hate to address this topic, or if it is just the spelling and pronunciation of this highly phonetic word.  Why I would even attempt at a blog post on this topic is beyond me.  Right from the start I would like to say that I, like most people, admit to having some hypocrisy in my life and acknowledge my need for Christ in purging it out.  I try vehemently to make myself transparent to everyone who knows me. What you see is what you get. Alas, I am human and cannot succeed 100% on anything that I do.  So with that disclosure I would like to continue my post on hypocrisy and what I have been learning regarding Adams and Jefferson. 

In your high school History class you probably learned about the American Revolution. You no doubt heard and discussed the two heroes Jefferson and Adams; and may have even seen that humorous and awesome musical 1776.  You may have even been taught that they were not alike in many of their beliefs. This is obvious on the surface as Adams was from New England, sacrificed himself constantly for his country, was poor, had no slaves, and abhorred debt: Jefferson, however, was from Virginia, was constantly in a state of trying to escape to his large home, rich, had over 200 slaves, and had tremendous debt.  They were both lovers of books, education and law. Adams studied law as a profession and one that he loved, while Jefferson studied law purely for recreation as he did not need a profession. Adams would go down in history as a man who spoke his mind, verbally and literally.  He would be recognized as a politician who lived like a farmer, yet could hold the attention of Kings.  Jefferson on the other hand lived like the rich estate owner that he was, and would go down in history as a hypocrite. 

Now, everyone has a little hypocrite living inside of them, but Jefferson let his flourish.  He continually spoke and wrote against debt, yet had tremendous debt himself. He wrote letters and documents that included multiple misgivings over slavery going so far as to say that it was wrong, and yet owned more slaves than the average Virginian of the day.  Sadly, Jefferson did not practice what he needed to change his heritage and his reputation.  Adams, on the contrary, spoke adamantly against both slaves and debt and had neither. He continually spoke about truths, and passed his heritage along to his sons.  I am learning that although people may be upset with me over my complete honesty as they were with Adams. It is better to go down in history as an honest person standing for what is right than for a hypocritical person standing for what is popular. 

May we all examine ourselves and ask God to help us purge ourselves of this common practice. Our heritage that we leave our children is too important to not practice what we preach. 

Pro- Death Government

What makes our nation great? God amongst the people. Why should we pray for God to have compassion, and mercy on this nation? Because while the people with power may not repent, the citizens may. The citizens of this country are far greater than the government. 

Everyone is making a huge deal of President Obama's first 100 days in office. So far he has done a great job defining himself as the most anti-life (a right listed in our declaration of independence) President that this nation has ever had. Despite our lack of money he has decided to fund international abortions, and yesterday he decided to fund and allow scientific research on embryos (babies). All of this despite the scientific research that shows that embryonic stem cells have contributed nothing to the cure of diseases and all research related to them has failed to produce any credible reason for further use. 

I read an article this week from Christianity Today in which the author spoke on Obama's technique regarding the issue of abortion:

"The bad news is that Obama declares a false unity. He claims that all Americans share his goal "to prevent unintended pregnancies, reduce the need for abortion, and support women and families in the choices they make."  .....He assumes that we can all unite, as he said in his Roe anniversary comment, "to ensure that our daughters have the same rights and opportunities as our sons,' suggesting that abortion is not just a need, but a right. It's savvy rhetoric precisely because it is so subtle. It quietly isolates pro-life advocates while appealing to those who are tired of the abortion debate.

Obama is not the only politician on the bandwagon. Senators have reintroduced the Prevention First Act which on the surface seems to help reduce abortions, but actually promotes and funds abortions, and even requires hospitals to explicitly lie about emergency contraception. This strategy that he is using is very deceitful to the pro-life citizens because although we can relate with his desire to reduce abortions we must understand that by doing so we would be ostracizing anyone who supports the complete elimination of this murderous practice. 

Government control has been an interesting topic to consider lately as I am reading the biography of John Adams written by David McCullough. Among the many things that I have found interesting is the apparent contrast between Adams and Jefferson. One particular difference that I read about was Jefferson's desire to give the Senate more power and the President less, while in complete contrast Adams' concern over the Senate's ability to give itself power too easily. I have not quite decided with which one I stand, although I continually find myself agreeing with Adams on most other issues. What I have decided is the government in general has too much power and the people too little. 

With this last note, I would like to remind you to pray for the leaders and citizens of this country to be drawn to God through repentence, especially of this genocide called abortion, and to pray for God's merciful hand to be on His remnant that is currently spread throughout this great nation. For God alone can make this country great.

Left Brain, Right Brain

Have you ever filled out a questionaire that reveals to you which side of the brain you are dominant in? I admit that I have not, but I know that I am a very logical and mathematical person which results in me being "left-brained". If you have done any of the readings on brains you find that the right side and the left side are very different from one another.  While one side is objective the other is subjective and so on. 

You can understand, then, how I would be slightly confused over Tyler's insistence that Elijah is very much like me.  Elijah seems to me to be a very right brained young man. He tends to see the whole picture, he is left- handed, and very artistic.  Like myself he loves to work with wood, but where I prefer the natural and simple look of wood, he desires to paint his project numerous bright colors. By the way, in case he hasn't told you, his favorite color is yellow. Yet in this right brained boy I see left brained characteristics emerge.  These traits are mostly his insistence on keeping things well ordered and logical. Which raises the question, is he "whole-brained"; or rather is he, in fact, "right-brained" and the so called "left" characteristics are environmental.  

Whether left or right, what truly matters in that he is learning to see himself as a follower of Jesus in this big and wonderful world.

National Square Root Day

Today is National Square Root Day. I have no idea what that means. I don't know if we are supposed to rally together all math lovers and mourn over the irrationality of the square root of 2, or rejoice over the incredible characteristics of the perfectly square 144.  Whatever we are supposed to do to celebrate today is completely lost on me in light of the reason for today being the first square root day since 2004. As I am sure that you know, square root days come seldom. The next one will not be until 2016, and in fact there will only be 9 of these days in the next century.  Now, I love numbers, and I enjoy math and some good honest 1040 filing. But man, the logic that went behind  3/3/09, is rather disturbing. In fact, I am almost insulted that they have created such a day.  Do you dare to ask why?

Whether you ask or not, I will tell you. In my above example, today is square root day because 3 x 3=9.  Isn't that clever? What the creator of such a holiday has failed to mention is that he* truncated the year. So that instead of the year being represented as 2009, which it is, it is in fact labeled as 09. Does anyone else find this misleading? We have no idea what Century it is, and in fact this exact same day occurred in 1909. Interesting. 

I would like to propose that we do not continue to do the lazy thing, but instead openly embrace the entire year and if you would like to celebrate square root day then do it on an appropriate date. For example, February 14th of the year 2025 is the 45th day of that year. the square root of 2025 is in fact 45.  Thus, that lovely day should be a square root celebration. (note: our original creator will also celebrate square root day in 2025, but alas it will be on May 5th). Following this wonderful example we can see that the last true square root day was in fact in the year 1936 and was on February 13th. As you can see this is in fact a very rare occasion as only one square root day occurs in every century. Of course, at the beginning of the AD period they were much more common, but now they are practically extinct. 

In light of this new information, I hope that you have a wonderful math filled day and I look forward to our truly root filled day in the upcoming year of 2025. What kind of party would you like? Be forewarned we will only have one such party in our lifetime.

*he in this sense is a generalization I in no way am suggesting that the creator of this holiday was male. Alas I do not know the gender of our wonderful clever little mathematician.

A Good Book

A good book is hard to find. I love reading. Fact, fiction, magazines, children's books, and even a dictionary can be interesting.  What great lengths people go through to produce great reading material, and yet how many children today love to read? So far my boys love reading. We are making the world of words part of everyday. Not only do we read about Tigger and Tom Sawyer, but we read about what is happening in the world, and about what has happened.  I am currently reading the book 1776, which is wonderful, and the boys love to hear the things that I share regarding the revolutionary war.  Reading is a wonderful gift, and although the boys cannot read independently yet, they are learning to read by asking questions. From publicly reading the bible in the morning to discussing what we are learning from our individual reading endeavors; the boys are taking in the information just as though they were reading the materials. 

Lately my mind has been focused on books. What kind of books do I want to read? What kind of books do I want the boys to read? Which books are worth spending money on? How do I start building the boys library into a wonderful collection of useful renditions?  I think that between us making reading an everyday occurrence and sharing the treasures that we find in words and The Word, our boys will love reading. They already do, but I want their passion for books to be with them for their entire life. So what am I doing to bring reading to the next level? Well besides teaching them to read for themselves. 

This year Elijah turns 5, and 5 is a big number. It is a whole hand.  We have decided to make the fifth birthday for each of our boys a special birthday.  Elijah will receive his very first and exclusively his own bookshelf to hold his very own collection of books and toys that are off limits to the others. This idea really is a merge of feeding Elijah's desire to read with teaching the boys to respect each other's property.  We will also be starting Elijah's book collection this year with three books by Jules Verne. I am praying that with this special gift will come a special memory for Elijah so that he will always think fondly of words, and reading, and how he started reading before, well, he could read. 

I hope that this update has come to you well, but mostly I hope that it has sparked an interest in you to read a good book and learn something new from the experience.

Keeping a Stay at Home Mom Sane

The majority of the time when I converse with someone on the phone I talk to the boys at the same time.  This type of behavior can be confusing, and drives some people crazy; just ask Ali.  

Talking with someone that I am not familiar with is surprisingly not much different. While it is true that we are in fact strangers it doesn't take long for them to learn that I have 4 rather loud boys, and that I will continue to address the boys during our conversation if the need arises.  Naturally, I receive comments about the ages of the children, and how we manage, and how I stay trim and beautiful (ha), and how tired I must be.   While these are all well and true (I am very tired), these comments seem to all be screaming one thing... "How do you not go insane staying home all day with four boys under 5, and no car!?" 

Today's conversation with a nice lady contained one exception.  While waiting for her slow computer to bring up information (it couldn't be slower than mine), we chatted about all of the normal things: How many children do you have? Genders? etc... But today was different. Near the end of our conversation, Janice (her name, not mine) said that I was incredibly blessed to have such a wonderful family with four boys.  That is not your typical customer service comment! In fact, that isn't even related to going insane.  I know that God sent that comment for me to relish in my family that he has given to me. And even though the nights are long, and the days are longer, there is incredible blessings in what I do. 

Of course, my thoughts did not stop there. Why is it that I don't ask myself how I stay sane?

Raising a family can be mundane tiresome work, but I know that if I can just persevere it will be worth it someday. Most days I fall short of the mark, but I am slowly learning how to balance my list of things that I need to do with things that I want to do, and things that I should do. Why is it that what we should do doesn't always land on the need to do list? Is it because we lack time and energy so something has to go? That doesn't even get us into the list of things that I want to do.  For example, I want my day to be ordered, I want to get my chores done right after breakfast, teach the boys in the morning, and still have time to play outside before lunch. I want to clean up after lunch without the boys destroying what I cleaned in the morning hours. I want to finish reading Tom Sawyer with Eli, and be able to build him a bookshelf for his birthday. I need to do the laundry, dishes, laundry, vacuum, mopping, laundry, and cook dinner, but I really want to order pizza so that I have time to play with Josiah whom is so independent I have to literally drag him away just the two of us to have some time together. I want to go snowshoeing, and teach the boys about Jesus everyday, and not just a few times a week. I want to be diligent in teaching the boys about life, and this world that God has made. I need to teach Eli to read. I need to balance the checkbook, and call customer service reps once in a while. I want to learn how to make a yoyo and other wooden toys.  I need to stack wood; I want to shape wood into something useful.  I want to build another house, but I don't want to build a huge thing that takes me eight hours to clean and no time to do any of my wants on my list. 

Don't you think that if the customer service reps could see my lists they would ask all the more "How do you stay sane?" 

By the grace of God and...

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures!!!

No matter what I am doing, I have my camera ready at all times ready to snap the boys doing something funny, or not doing anything at all. I don't know if I could survive without being able to laugh at those moments and capture them to share with Tyler later and laugh again. Sure, I have no car, but I have my camera.  If you know me at all you know that I use two things in my house everyday multiple times a day, and they are (not the sink, and washing machine) my camera and computer. With these I can share my life with others, learn about what happens outside my own doors, and laugh about it. Sure it adds one other thing to my list, but really, I like it and I am not dropping this hobby anytime soon.  

  

Hindsight is 20/20

I am convinced that this is the motto for the year of 2008.  This year especially has been filled with so many ups and downs and twists and turns that I don't know if I can cope with it all. At times I wish that I had hindsight before the event happened, but now looking back I don't know if I could have held on for the ride.  I am not going to go into detail of our yearly activity. I am, however, going to ask  you a question... looking back throughout the past 12 months how does your year rate overall? Was it too exciting for you?(is there such a thing), Was it fun? Did you learn a lot? Tell me what your year was like and what you got out of it the most. 

I wonder if the company of LL Bean would have answered my question this way: "We wish we had waited one week to do our outdoor sports festival this year; we would have saved so much money by not needing to produce our own snow." You may know what I am talking about if you went to Beans before Christmas. They had a huge pile of man made snow out in front of their store, and looking back I cannot help but wonder why they didn't wait just one week for the snow to come to Maine.  For as you all know, this year was a beautiful white Christmas with inches of wonderful fluffy snow.  White Christmas or not this festival got my family out to Beans to see their man made snow and try out their sleds. Here are some pics of what we did at the famous store: 

The boys loved the bubble inside the fish tank at LL Bean.

Elijah sitting in snow that had to be contained with hay. Does anyone else find it odd that we feel that we have to rush winter while living in Maine? Could you imagine living in Florida and rushing in summer? 

Tyler and Josiah sliding down the snow covered ramp. That ice chunky snow on a slope can really speed you along on a sled. 

I would like to close with simply this: Don't get too worked up over what you didn't know was going to happen this year. Instead learn to lean on the Lord in the good and bad times and know that you will be carried through this next year with Him by your side.

Ego Trips for All

I love that song by the Newsboys called "Fad of the Land". There is a line in that song that says "I'm packing for an ego trip".  Now I came to a realization this week that made me think about this song, well mostly, about that line in the song; and I'm not talking about keeping up with the Jones' (you should listen to this song if you don't know it). Well let me start at the beginning and show you what I am talking about. 

Last Week I watched Tyler and two other men mill some pine and oak from our land. They had a sawmill here that was attached to a trailer. The mill did most of the work, or at least that is what it seemed. The only thing that the guys had to do was run the blade and move the cut lumber off of the mill and onto a pile. Now Tyler and these other gentlemen would take turns pulling the cut 1X's and 2X's off of the mill and carrying it over to the pile. These boards ranged from 10 -14 feet long and were between 4 and 11 inches wide. Not that big in comparison to beams and such. While building the house we would use boards this size in trim work and framing and such. Sometimes these men would take two boards at once and it didn't seem to be that difficult to them. (Are you starting to see where my ego trip came?).  Overall, the men did a great work and I am very thankful for them and the lumber that came out of their day of work. 

They stacked the wood in two places and one of them, unfortunately, is in the way of some stumps that I want Tyler to remove with the excavator, and thus needs to be moved. Thankfully this is the smaller pile and only contains about a third of the wood. Monday during my 30 minutes of all boys napping I decided to go outside and move some of the wood to help Tyler and lighten his load at home.  Let me just say I never realized how much heavier wet lumber is to kiln dried seasoned wood that you buy in the store. I had a hard time to move even the smallest board out there. When all is said and done I only moved about 3 1X6 12 footers. I could not have lifted anything larger. These are some heavy boards! I have no idea how those guys lifted all of these boards for the entire day of milling.  Tyler is not any larger than I am; as you probably know we are about the same height and normally weigh about the same. (although lately I average a higher weight than him, shhh! don't tell anyone).  But man let me tell you he is a lot stronger than I am, and I am no dainty woman. I can lift with the best of them ( at least I used to be able to). I spend the whole day lifting kids and I can paddle a canoe all day, and hey, I can leg press 160 lbs; but I cannot stack that lumber in my backyard.  Thus I have gained a new respect for the physical strength that God seems to have bestowed on men rather than women.  

Don't get all girl power on me ladies! I respect the strength that men have, but I know that they would practically die if they had to go through the pain of childbirth. Thus, the equal balance that God has created: Men are physically strong to lift heavy objects (their wives when they are in labor) and women are physically strong to handle the stress before, during, and after childbirth.  Hopefully my blog has not set you up for an ego trip; please do not go hurting yourself by trying to prove that you can lift more than some guy. It isn't worth it! After all he cannot prove that he is as strong as you by having a baby, so stop pushing your unfair advantage on the guy!

The Lord is Good to All

So many people quote Romans when they are in despair. You know the verse that I am talking about: "For the Lord causes all things to work together for the good of those who love Him". 

I often wonder, though, if they leave off that last part in their mind.  I have heard non-christians bring that verse up when they are going through tough times. They look at me and ask: what kind of good can come of this? Well, I wonder what makes them think that God will cause everything that hits them to work towards their good if they aren't willing to love Him and serve Him with their lives. I am a blunt person, and I have been reminded that I would make a horrible President because I am too straightforward; to be frank, I don't care what you think. Truth is truth, there is only one.

Of course, that verse applies to the people that love God and it would be painful to confront that fact to a non-christian during a crisis.  Even I would shy from doing that, but there is nothing wrong with talking to them about it when doing so wouldn't result in a severed relationship.  This is a great verse, nonetheless, because it does apply to those that love God. So now whenever I am struggling I am reminded of that which brings a comfort and a thought: Do I truly and honestly love God?  

Do You?

My prayer is that someday not only will I, but my children, family and friends will also be able to answer with a resounding YES!

When the Rain Comes...

When the rain comes we as adults tend to become sad and even depressed, but our children see it as an opportunity to have some different kinds of fun. After almost a week of rainy wet weather I admit that I gave in and learned to have a little fun as well. 

Life's rainstorms are always a little harder to understand than a song.  Tyler and I have been through what seems to be a very large raincloud.  I hesitate to call it a storm because it doesn't seem to be that trivial. There is something to be said about a bit of upset in your life, whether it be your plans not working out, or your car not running or the kids bad attitude. Some of these changes I have learned to embrace because it helps me  to see life from a different angle.  Let me start at the beginning to tell you what I am talking about in regards to Tyler and I and how we are learning to sing and dance in the rain.  

Our lives' are always changed by education. I have even changed the way I write things now that I understand a little bit of grammar (please don't check my doc, I don't edit that well).   From the beginning of our marriage Tyler and I have tried to understand both how to make a budget and how to live on it. This proved to be quite difficult because we didn't know anyone who could mentor us in this pursuit.  I must admit that we have done fairly well on the little bit of education that we had  (no thanks to the public school system).  A couple of years ago we discovered a gentleman by the name of... drum roll please... Dave Ramsey. Now I don't know if you have ever heard of this man, but he is very good at teaching us all what we needed to learn in high school about money and finances.  By this time, Tyler and I had been living on a budget, but we had also acquired a house, a tractor, two cars, and the Sallie Mae pet. We decided that the ridiculousness of life was getting too complicated so we started truncating everything. We dropped one car, paid off the tractor and other various loans, and made a pact to not borrow any more money for anything ever. 

Enough of the background, now let me tell you what has been happening this year...

I am not going into great details here, this is a very long story. I will start in April when we attended our first Financial Peace University class taught by none other than Dave Ramsey. What a great class this was.  We learned how to revamp our budget to work harder for us, but we also learned how to set financial goals for the future.  During the class we struggled with one decision: to sell or not to sell. As it turned out the only debt that we had left (I am anxious to kill this thing), was equivalent in value to this tractor sitting in our driveway.  We prayed about selling this thing, after all, we had already built the house, and although we used it, we didn't use it enough to justify it.  Most christians would say that we put out a fleece to see if selling the tractor was what God wanted us to do. Alas, we didn't have any serious inquiries and the tractor remained in our yard along with the ever detestable Sallie Mae.  Then the dreadful thing happened...

Alas, our Dave Ramsey jalopy beater of a vehicle died. I am talking dead in the water died, engine gone and going to cost more than the car is worth to fix; dead.  Now we had our emergency fund, a dead ugly beater, and a tractor. It didn't take us long to decide to sell everything we could. After almost a month the Lord blessed us with a buyer for the Mazda and the Tractor in one day. Isn't that awesome? It just comes all at once, after a month of waiting.  We sold those and now had cash to buy a dependable reliable vehicle, that holds more than 5 people. Last Saturday we drove down to Portsmouth NH and laid an envelope filled with cash down on this desk and purchased a car at just under the trade in value. A very good buy, especially when you consider that for the first time we didn't finance this dealership purchase. 

This was a bitter sweet moment for me, because as much as I liked our new wheels, I saw the dream of killing our pet this year go away with the tractor money.  But now I know that God didn't want the tractor to sell this Spring because he knew we would need the money for a vehicle.  Anyway, off we set for home Tyler in the new car and I in the old. Actually Tyler had two little boys occupying the rear seat in his car, but they were good and having a grand old time buying cars (even though Josiah was upset that he forgot his money to buy a car; too cute).  

The story does not end here.  On the highway around Biddeford I guess it was, Tyler and the boys were stranded. The new car that was going to be reliable and dependable and get us through this hump, died. The alternator just plumb went dead and Tyler was stuck on the highway with two boys at 9:00 PM. Where was I? I was in the OLD car trying not to worry about the boys and telling myself that they were fine, even though I couldn't locate their headlights. I kept convincing myself they were ahead of me. Anyway, I arrived all the way back to my parents to discover that they had been stuck with a dead car. Praise the Lord! My parents were at OOB and were able to pick Tyler and the boys up to bring them home. In times like this I am reminded of the trivial things in life. I was so upset about my husband and children stuck on the highway at night, and me not being there to help them that I couldn't care less about this new vehicle that we purchased. I didn't care if it was broken; I cared that my children were in a difficult situation and I wasn't there to help. God took care of my boys though, and like everything else, they saw it as an adventure. When I saw Eli that night at 11 he said "Mommy, we had a bit of trouble". Well, I should say so boy! You broke my car!  

So now you see we are in a rain cloud, but Tyler and I are learning to dance and sing in the rain just like those boys did last week. I don't know when it will end. I don't know if God is trying to prepare us for something bigger ahead, whether good or bad. I just know that we are learning to trust Him with our finances, cars, time, and give Him control. I share with you the scripture that I keep quoting to myself...

"Wait for the Lord, be strong and let your heart take courage, Yes, wait for the Lord" Ps. 27:14

I am waiting for the Lord, I don't know what He will do, but I am sure that it will be glorious. In the meantime I am learning to trust Him with every aspect of my life and keep my mind focused on what really matters. 

* I am sorry that this story was so very long, I have so much more that I could say too, but maybe I will share more about what I am learning some other time.

Give Her the Product of Her Hands

Josiah helping me with the frame of the new desk. It is almost done now, I just need a top, and I need to sand and poly it.




On Wednesday of this week I was at "the chicks'" house. This is not a house full of little yellow puffy chickens, although they are cuddly and loveable, but rather they are a wonderful family with the name of Chick. Anyway, I was there with my fun and rather odd friend Alison. I don't know if you have met Ali, but she is the kind of woman who played with GI Joes, and Tonka trucks as a girl, but still embroiders, knits, cooks, sews, and etc. She is one of those weird type of anomalies, but when you think of it we all are. I have met women who engage in all of those feminine hobbies, but would never wear a dress or be considered a delicate feminine lady.

Then there are women like me, I hardly like calling myself a woman even, which tells you something about myself. I would rather think of myself as a lady or a little girl. Anyway, I listen to these incredible ladies discuss sewing and I don't know whether I should feel guilty for not being interested or if I should be pleased that I am not stuck sewing clothes for my children. They enjoy it, it is one of their hobbies, but I cannot seem to get myself to enjoy these feminine past-times. I don't understand how they can read a book on how to make a particular knot and then duplicate it in their work, how do they even understand those books?

I like to do what most would call "man's work" I sometimes get sad over the fact that my husband always fixes the car and I don't get a chance to rotate the tires, or replace the spark plugs. Please don't get me wrong, I love the fact that he does these things, but sometimes I want to do them. I have boys, it makes sense, as when they get older I will be outside with them blazing trails. I could never teach a girl how to sew, or knit, I don't even know how to do that. In fact, I am not even that fond of cooking. I like to work with wood to build things, I love yard work, and my job growing up was dump runs. But in spite of all of this, my friend, John, called me a romantic. He is right of course, I may like to do these manly things, but I love a good love story, or a good song. I am a sucker for a chick flick and Jane Austen.

I know so many women who aspire to do great things. It may not seem great at the time, but all of those countless hours spent working on something that blesses the family is worth it. It is still cheaper to make your own clothing, food, or furniture, and that pleases me. On Wednesday, I saw some ladies take an interest in something that I do not understand, embroidery (I think), and I thought, "that is such a noble feminine hobby," and you know what? They are working with their hands!

Now where have I read that before? Oh yes, the very popular chapter in Proverbs... 31. You know this chapter it tells of a worthy woman. I don't know a single woman who reads this chapter and thinks "Oh yeah! I am doing it all, I have got this Proverbs 31 woman thing in the bag!"

Have you seen this woman? She works with her hands, and you know what is great? She doesn't just sew or cook or embroider. She buys land, works out, does yard work, feeds the hungry, makes her own clothes. Okay so the words "she works with wood" or "she works on cars" is not in there. But who cares? "She works with her hands in delight". I work with my hands, it may be "man's work", but it is work and it is with my hands, and it saves my family money. I am not even going to mention (or maybe I am) that when I work with my hands, my boys help, and I would rather be teaching them "man's work" than how to embroider pillows.

I am not yet a well-accomplished woman, but hey if that means I need to spend hours at a machine, or cross-stitching (which I did as a kid), then I would rather not be "well-accomplished". What do you do with your hands? Is it something that will praise you in the gates?


Elijah making a coat rack for the closet