Meet Gracie Marie!

Sometime last year I was overburden with a desire to help this young family in our church with their childcare situation. Gracie was already here and she was pregnant with Faith. Faith, as much as it broke our hearts, never made it to this world, but landed right in the arms of Jesus. Many months later, Chuck and Reena tried again and they are expecting once again. And once again this burden became so heavy that I finally shared it with Mike. We both started praying and asking the Lord what is it He wanted me to do. So as I was praying, I finally shared with Reena my burden to help them out, but told her I was still waiting on confirmation from the Lord and wanted her and Chuck to pray as well and to see if they were even interested in their children in my home. Lo and behold the Lord had already been working on them (I shouldn't be surprised, I know, but I was) and they kept having the same conversation saying they really wanted someone to take care of their babies at home and my name kept coming up. However in all of this, I said and they said, "Your too busy!" so they and I always dropped it. As the Lord always does He continued to work in my life and finally showed them and I beyond a shadow of a doubt that He thought I could do this. Sooooooo, Meet Gracie Marie! She has been in our home as of 2 weeks now and I'm so head over heals in love with this little 2 year old. She is so cute and so two! I'm in between a parent and a grandparent. Having lots of fun and yet disciplining as well. She turned 2 Friday and we were able to make a cake with her (Isabella made it!) and give her a present! She is very shy around new people, so it took her a good week to warm up to us, but she did and we are having a great time! Thanks, Lord! for allowing me to open up my heart and arms to this little girl and another one on the way!

Summer is here!

Well since school has stopped and summer has started, this is all that we have been up to! I'll get the bad news out of the way first trying not to spoil your fun. School is still happening to some degree at our house! Sarah is finishing up 11 more lessons of Algebra and 5 more units of Science. Sarah, Zech, and Isabella are all finishing up reading a few more books of US History and we are watching movies such as "Gone With the Wind, Sergeant York, & Glory" to enhance our US History knowledge. Zech and Isabella have to do "some" math this summer because they both seem to loose that knowledge over the summer. And we are working on Math Word Problems and Consumer Math this summer. Just trying to cover all the bases that I don't get in during the regular school year. I know, "Yuck! and Double Yuck!" comes to your mind, but it cannot be helped.

Now onto the fun and busy work of Summer! Sleeping in everyday (well the kids are anyway), staying up late, going to sleepovers, and checking emails, computer time, and lots more fun. The Youth Group included a Summer missions event the first week of June and Sarah busily scraped a whole 2 story house along with 20 some odd other youth from our church. The couple living in the house are not wealthy by the world's means, but rich in love. The wife is blind and the gentlemen is elderly and just trying to keep up. Their house needs painting desperately. We saw a need and God provided as usual. Plenty of youth to work and the house was completely scraped in 2 days. Now they are setting up a time to paint (I think a sprayer is in the works). We've also had VBS happening around our church. We have had record number of kids this year and wow they are excited about Jesus! I'm helping in the 4 year olds, Sarah in the 2nd grade, and Zech and Isabella are participating in their grades (6th & 4th). We've had 5 children accept Christ as their Savior already! Another evening we spent playing Capture the Flag with the Homeschoolers and I believe there were over 50 kids attend the event. Isabella captured the other teams flag and was able to win for her team! Go Isabella (You'll have to ask her how she did it, she loves retelling the story!).

For the rest of the summer will be much of the same, games, vacations, fireworks, watermelon, kicking back and watching movies with popcorn to go along! We have camps ahead and water parks to play and swim and much much more!

Last Children's Choir Performance

After the rousing Thursday and Friday and Saturday, there was still yet two more "end of the year" projects to finish. Sunday morning the Children's Choir sang their rendition of Joshua and the Wall. Enjoy the video!

Piano Recital

So Thursday I went West, Friday I went East, and Saturday after the bible drill I went West again to go home. Home we might be, but busy we were. We were home for about 2 hours just in time for us to unpack, clean up, iron some clothes, and eat a bit and out the door we went for the piano recital for Sarah and Isabella. Enjoy the videos.

The Other Way

After our long field trip to the east, the very next day we packed and headed west to State Bible Drill. Sarah had earned the opportunity to attend the State bible drill, however none of us had any idea what we were in for. Sarah and another girl in our church worked so very hard over the last year drilling and memorizing. They went to regional and were awarded Superiors and a chance to attend state. None of us, including their teachers, knew what to expect or anything. So, we booked a hotel, and off we went. We made it to our destination in time and signed the girls up to drill at 9:00 am! After that drove back to the hotel, got in with a courier from the hotel to take us to eat (downtown area and parking is always hard). After eating Mexican food at a very overrated, overpriced downtown area restaurant, we went walking and tried to enjoy the ambiance. We walked all the way back to the hotel where the kids promptly got changed in their bathing suits and went for a swim on an upper deck hotel pool. Looking out over all the tall buildings and just relaxing it was very nice. The other couple whose girl we brought with us arrived later and then Grandma and Papa Roberson joined us very late that night too. After what seemed a very long night and not too much sleep we enjoyed a good breakfast and then off we went. The girls teachers met us there and they practiced. Both girls were very nervous but did very well. The youth bible drill is intense and at the State level even more so. They all have to find verses they had memorized, books of the bible, and random verses in 8 seconds and under. Not only that but those who stepped across the line first, didn't fidget, concentrated on the judge only, and more were awarded those extra bonus points. Sarah was able to step across the line each time however one of those she realized as the scripture was being said that she had the wrong one. They are instructed to be honest and raise their hands for the judges to see and step back across the line. Honesty is rated very high! Other than that she was perfect on all the calls. Her partner had 2 missed calls. Basically we figured out at the point that out of 35 contestants and only 8 get moved up you have to be perfect and no mistakes and try and receive as many bonus points as possible to move up. We learned a lot that day about the next time going to state. Sarah and Zech will be in Youth Bible Drill next year, so we will see. All in all we were very, very proud of our Sarah for advancing. My prayer is for her to apply all that wonderful knowledge she gained in this experience.

Been a little Busy!

I'll try and catalog a few days in a row or a few weeks I should say in a few days posting. Today I would like to post a great field trip to Frontier Texas. Wow, what a great museum to attend and learn all about the beginnings of Texas and how hard it was to make a start of it. They were all surrounded by Indians, wildlife (wolves, mountain lions, buffalo, bears, etc), the harsh weather, and a vast domain of places to travel and abide. The museum is very interactive for this computer age group of kids. All of the stops had either live 360 degree theatre to sit in and listen to the many tales and watch the firefly's or hologram images of Indians, cowboys, women, and children and their lives that took us to many different scenes among Texas' birth. One lady actually buried 4 husbands, all 12 children, and grandchildren. How horrible that must have been. The pics contain mainly my girls because Zech was in a different group than us (wanted to go with his buddies!). We had a great time and then a wonderful visit with an old friend. Reunited on Facebook we learned we weren't that far apart and we were able to visit and have dinner before I headed back. Long day but totally worth the trip.

I DID IT!

Today was day 30 and I finished! and I'm not dead! Gain and losses? I gained discipline and a well exercised body. I lost several inches, down by at least 1 size, maybe more. Enough said! I'm stinky and sweaty and ready to relax in a bath! Woohoo! Thanks to all who encouraged me, and yes, I have new videos waiting for me starting Monday!