Equipping Families to be Strong in the Lord
Stephen spoke this morning at church on the book of Jude. He had lots of insights and I thought he did a great job. (Instead of having a pastor at our church, we have multiple elders. Different men take turns preaching the sermons.)
Jude warns us that there are men who seek to lead the church astray with false teaching, and his main emphasis is that we should “earnestly contend for the faith.” That means that we need to be diligent about defending Biblical truth.
Sometimes life seems to be a series of unfinished projects. One unfinished project that we’ve had on our list for a while is a coloring book to go along with our book, Making Brothers and Sisters Best Friends. A few weeks ago, Sarah and I decided to tackle this project so we could have it done for Homeschool Conferences this spring. It’s been going well.
After picking out the pictures we wanted to include, we needed to modify some of them to make them easier to color.
Editing pictures on my dad’s Tablet PC–the wondeful tool my dad has used for the pictures in both of our books and in Bright Lights materials.
Sarah working in her “office” (which is actually her old bedroom).
Yea! Another Iowa blizzard! I’m happy about the foot of snow we just got.
Wow! What would I do without a dad and brother to shovel our path?!
I’ll explain the purpose of our path for those of you who don’t know. Our family has 2 houses back to back, with a path connecting them. We kind of live in both houses. We usually sleep and eat at the “new house” but spend most of the day working at our “old house.” (I know, creative names.) When people come over to volunteer for Bright Lights, they join us at the old house where we have all of our computers and office equipment set up. We bought our new house about 3 years ago out of a desperate need for space and it has been perfect. It was a neat story how the Lord provided it, and we are so grateful to Him. Maybe I’ll post more of that story later.
The back of our old house. (My dad made this trellis in between the 2 yards.)
Sarah recently printed more copies of her book, Before You Meet Prince Charming (now slightly revised) and a semi truck came and delivered some of the shipment – about 100 boxes – this afternoon. Usually Stephen and my Dad round up a group of guys to unload the boxes when book shipments come. Today, since no one else was available, Sarah and I got the privilege. It wasn’t too bad, though…it was actually kind of fun. Kind of. At least the temperature wasn’t 20 below like it was yesterday!
If anyone wants to know how old she is, the answer is found in Joshua 15:32. (I decided to make you work for it. 🙂 )
We have a little family tradition of going to coffee shops occasionally on snowy mornings. This morning we had two reasons to go to a coffee shop: it was snowing, and it was Sarah’s birthday! What a great way to start the day out right!
At breakfast this morning I was telling the family something I really like about Sarah. It’s this: If she is excited about something, she gets the whole family excited about it. If she is discouraged, she takes it to the Lord but doesn’t spread the discouragement to others. My family agreed with me. People like that are nice to be around. 🙂
One thing I really appreciate about Sarah is the great advice she gives me when I go to her seeking counsel. She almost always has the exact answer I need to hear! Sarah is also the most patient person I think I’ve ever met! (And, remember, a little sister would know how patient a person really is… 🙂 ) She definitely practices what she teaches.
Sarah, thank you for being such a wonderful big sister, and for all the ways you’ve led me closer to Jesus. Thank you for your example of one who walks closely with God. I love you!!
“The Lord is my strength and song, and He has become my salvation. The sound of joyful shouting and salvation is in the tents of the righteous; the right hand of the Lord does valiantly. The right hand of the Lord is exalted; the right hand of the Lord does valiantly.” (Psalm 118:14-16)
This morning Sarah and I had a planning meeting together to discuss which projects we needed to complete before Homeschool Conferences start mid-March. I told Sarah I’d bring a snack to the meeting to make it more fun…so we had a little tea party. Or, rather, coffee in tea cups. 🙂
(Notice that I can’t pour coffee and take a picture at the same time without spilling…)
Stephen has been traveling with Gov. Mike Huckabee this past week shooting pictures for Icon, an online wire service that he works for. It’s exciting to hear the “inside scoop” from Stephen about what’s going on. He has been traveling on the media bus and today he flew a couple times on the media plane. I was just talking to him on the phone and he was telling me about how they let him and the other media into Huckabee’s bus (called the Huck-a-bus) this morning where Huckabee was watching the bowl game with his wife and 3 dogs who travel with them.
The black dog in the front is Jet. The one in his lap is Toby. The one you can kind of see on Mrs Huckabees’s lap is Sonic (named after her favorite restaurant). They always travel with their 3 dogs. 🙂
Above: Three pictures I borrowed from Stephen
Below: A few pictures from today when we went to hear Huckabee
We went to hear Huckabee speak this afternoon partly to hear Huckabee and partly to see Stephen. I thought they both did a pretty good job. 🙂
We were suprised to see a picture of Stephen standing with his camera behind Huckabee on the New York Times blog the other day. Check this out…click here.
It felt so good to “all be together again” when I came home for Christmas!
Spending Christmas Eve with my mom’s brother and his family
The reason I haven’t updated this blog in a while is because I’ve been away this December volunteering at the Answers in Genesis Creation Museum. It felt like I was living in a different world but I loved it. Some of the highlights were getting to know many of the staff who work there (they were very warm, friendly, fun, and enthusiastic about the ministry), visiting with guests, and learning more about how the museum operates. I was so excited about this oportunity. It’s awesome how the Lord gives us surprises and variety along our path as we serve Him.
Here I am feeding the Chameleon. Can you see him?
About a half hour ago, Stephen and I were working on our computers when we heard a loud crack and discovered this broken branch…just one of the many fallen branches in our yard this morning. We had a pretty severe ice storm last night!
Ice covering every twig like this gets pretty heavy!
