McKayla's 5th Birthday Party

This year we were finally able to do a birthday party for McKayla where she was able to invite her friends. We are normally at Grandma's house for Christmas and so we just did a family party for her. She always enjoyed those but she really wanted one where her friends could come. So we made her party a little later than her birthday so we could be home to celebrate with her friends. The last couple of years she has asked to do a pool party like her sister gets to do for her party in August. It might not be that cold in Louisiana in December but it is too cold to swim outdoors. So I found an indoor pool in Lafayette with the help of some friends and we got it all set up to have it there. All the girls really had a great time. Getting to swim in the middle of the winter really is a treat.

McKayla also asked for a princess cake and I was going to cheat this year and buy one. I found one at Winn Dixie that was exactly what she had asked for but when they told me it would be $50 I just couldn't buy it when I knew I could make one for half that. Plus I really do like to decorate cakes, I just didn't think I would have enough time this year. It's amazing what you can make time for when you really want to. My mom gave me a Wilton's decorator tool box for Christmas so I decided this would be the perfect time to try out my new tools. I scored a cute castle at Walgreens just perfect for the cake and Wal-Mart bakery sold me the princesses to go on top. I made my cakes from scratch but have decided from now on I'm buying cake mixes. They do so much better! I baked the cakes on Thursday afternoon and then Friday I spent about 7 hours decorating. Definitely not a hobby I can do very often. If someone would make my frosting for me it would go so much faster!! I hate making the frosting. I used malted milk balls for the bushes and one of the grandmothers accidentally called them moth balls at the party and one of the little girls said, "No their malted moth balls." :-).

After the swimming party we took McKayla to Chuckie Cheeses. I like to call it UpChuckie Cheeses because I think their pizza is simply horrible. But the girls have so much fun playing all the games and they always choose that for their birthday meal out so we obligingly go. They were very packed, I guess a Saturday night is not a good night to go if you actually want to sit down and eat. My sister Jeanette and her girls came with us so all 8 of us had to squeeze in a table for three. Needless to say we had to eat in shifts. But it worked out because the girls were more interested in playing than eating. So anyway, I think McKayla enjoyed her first official birthday party. She fell asleep on the way home at 6:30 and woke up long enough to get into her pj's and climb into bed. I guess we wore her out. It probably didn't help that she had just gotten over the flu. I'm just glad she was well enough to go to her party.

Things you can pick up while watching cartoons:)

My daughter McKayla had a day off of school last week and had the good fortune to be able to come to work with me. I clean houses so she gets to watch cartoons while I clean. I happened to be working in the living room when Handy Manny came on and normally I'll be wrapped up in my own thoughts regardless of whether or not the T.V. is on but this one caught my attention. In case you don't know anything about this cartoon, it's about a guy that is a handy man and his tools are special because they can talk. This particular day they were trying to repair an older mans steps when the hammer fell and landed on his head. The poor hammer was confused after that and thought for sure that he was not a hammer but was in fact a screwdriver. Well this caused a dilemma because for this particular job, only a hammer could get the job done. Handy Manny and the other tools tried convincing him that he was a hammer but he just wouldn't believe it. So finally Handy Manny tried to find another tool that would work. They went to the hardware store but alas, they were fresh out of hammers. So they went back and tried a rock and other things but nothing worked. This whole time I'm thinking "Hey Handy Manny, you're his master you pick him up and just use him to hammer that nail in." But he didn't. Finally the older gentleman came along and found out what the problem was and said that when he was in the army they had the same problem with a soldier. This soldier had gotten hurt and forgot who he was. They really needed him so they convinced him to pretend that he was a soldier, and it worked. So Handy Manny and all the other tools asked the hammer if he would pretend to be a hammer. They convinced him that he would make an excellent hammer and so he said he would try. Handy Manny picked him up and held him above the nail but wouldn't use him until the hammer was absolutely ready. I'm thinking, well this is ridiculous. You've got him in your hand, bring him down! Well, finally the hammer was ready and he hit the nails in perfectly. Everyone cheered and when the hammer had come down on those nails his memory was jarred back into place and he realized he was indeed a hammer. So anyway, what did I learn from this? I realized that God does the same thing with us. He made us for a specific purpose. He could use us like puppets and make us do that job for him. But that's not what he wants. He wants us to take the initiative and with his help, do the work he created us for. He's not going to force us into doing anything. It has to be because we want to do it. Another important factor is that we can't do it without him. We need him there guiding us and encouraging us. And that is what Handy Manny taught me for the day.

Still here

Okay so I kind of fell out of the blog world for awhile. I would stop in every now and then and read others' but simply never took the time to do anything with mine. So much has happened since last August when I did my last blog. Christmas and McKayla's birthday to name a couple. My whole family was able to make it back for Christmas in Iowa this year. The house was very full and noisy at certain times but it was so good to all be together again.

We were able to have McKayla's birthday with almost everyone there. The happy occasion was held at Happy Joe's. If you've never had their BLT Pizza's you must try them next time you are in Ottumwa!! I had a lot of fun decorating her cake. Luke, my brother-in-law, drew the bear free-handed for me and I filled in the rest.
I forgot to bring candles with us to the restaurant so Jason ran next door to the drug store and these candles were all they had. She seems rather impressed don't ya think?






We took a slight break from traveling in January and then this month we took a trip to Gatlinburg TN for Winterfest with the youth. It was a very fast weekend but we had a great time there. Two of my sisters were able to come so I enjoyed more time spent with them. The girls had a lot of fun playing in the snow up in the Smoky Mountains.


Kelsey's coat was malfunctioning :)
We took a 1.3 mile hike to see this waterfall. We encountered some scary signs along the way.
Well that about catches you up to date. I'll try not to take so long between blogs next time :)
I'll leave you with one more picture. Love the look on Kayla's face :D
Well I can't resist adding this next one too.

Kelsey's birthday

I've been a little behind in my blogging lately but I'm trying to catch up. We just celebrated Kelsey's birthday.....okay, it's been a week or two. I really enjoyed decorating her cake this year. Hopefully she doesn't expect better each year. She wanted a Luau theme and thankfully a family in church just happened to have all the decorations I needed and another member had a relative who had a waterslide Fun Jump. So I decided it would be a good year to invite her friends. I don't think I'll do that again.:) Just kidding. I know she had a great time and it's only one day a year. After all, it was her birthday! I did a horrible job taking pictures. Especially when they were playing on the water slide. I completely forgot to take any until I was starting to clean up after everyone left. Now....what to do for McKayla's!

Acts 2:47

Okay,so maybe that's not what that scripture is talking about but that's what's happening at this church. Since this picture there are 4, maybe 5 more that I know of that are expecting now. These kids are going to have so much fun growing up together! What a great youthgroup in a few years!

In Memory of Opal Guest

I remember the first time I met Opal, she came up the stairs in church with her walker ("sputnik") squeezing her little bicycle horn to get through the crowd with a big goofy grin on her face and I knew I would love her. She truly was a Saint! I remember when we would go to the nursing home on Sunday afternoons and she would come along to visit the "old people". She was what, in her 90's? I really don't remember, I'm horrible with ages. For a special she would whistle one of her favorite hymns. I never used to be able to whistle but when I heard her whistling I wanted to be able to whistle like that when I get to be her age so I started practicing. I'm still not near as good but I can whistle now. Every time I do, I think of her. She always had a big smile on her face and something good to say or some story to tell. I especially loved hearing her stories about when she was a Sunday School teacher. Even though you had to come up several steps in order to get in our church building and then up some more to get to the sanctuary, I never once heard her complain about it. I hope I can be like that when I get to be old. I'm really going to miss dear Opal and I'm really sorry I won't be able to say goodbye to her one last time later on today at her funeral. She truly was a blessing in my life and I'm so glad I got to know her for those few years in Bemidji! It is such a comfort to know that this isn't forever. Some day I will see Opal again and she will be whistling away while walking without her sputnik. Goodbye for now Opal

Is Heaven worth it?

Something has been eating away at me all week and I finally decided I have to talk about it and get it out of my system! I'm not sure it will help but it's worth a try. I tried rounding up some kids from our church to go to camp. I found 9 who wanted to go and I thought, "Great! Now I just need to find another vehicle and driver willing to help bring them." Not a problem, if I couldn't find someone, Jason and I would've driven two vehicles to make sure they could all go. Than all-stars picked their players. That knocked out 6 of the kids who could go. Okay, we still had three, that was all right. Than one had to work, one had summer school and the third one didn't want to come by himself. Especially after calling all the other kids he knew from another state and finding that none of them were going either, due to jobs or sports. I really don't blame that last one, I probably wouldn't have wanted to go by myself either to a different state when no one else I knew was going. We had to wait until Sunday Evening to leave since Jason is the minister and Sundays are his busiest work day. I had packed the car and was all ready to take off after church when we got a call from the camp manager saying that only 8 kids had shown up so there really wasn't a good reason for us to drive 1000 miles to come help out. That was truly a discouraging thing for me to hear. I know there were various reasons why kids didn't show up but I'll bet you anything the biggest reasons were jobs and sports. What I want to know is, why are "things" more important than Bible Camps? I want to saturate my kids with all things to do with Christ and surround them with other christian peers as much as possible so they know they're not alone out there, struggling to do whats right! In the world we live in today, it is tough to survive being a Christian for teenagers!!! They need as much help as they can get. Even for myself, if I had grown up only going to Sunday morning church and maybe one Bible camp a year I highly doubt I would be the Christian I am today. I remember the thoughts I had as a teenager, wanting to do what I knew wasn't right, but those sermons I heard, over and over, would pop into my head, and those memory verses we were forced to learn at camp would be there telling me no, that's not right! And I would be scared of going to hell and it kept me out of a lot of trouble. I don't think hell is real to our kids today. We don't have the hell, fire and brimstone messages we had back then. It's good that kids are taught the love and the grace of God because that is so important to know as well and I wish I had known more of that growing up, but the fear of hell is so important to a teenager. Sunday morning sermons are great but those aren't the ones I remember the most. I remember the ones we heard at camp, maybe because they were geared more for our age, I don't know, but whatever the reason they played an important part in my life. Our God is a jealous God and he says "there shall be no other god's before me." I truly believe that when you put anything; hobbies, sports, jobs, cars, etc. before opportunities to learn more about God, then you are making that your god. You can make all the excuses you want but at the end of the day, what's really going to matter? You go before the judgment seat and you chose...let's say.... sports instead of God do you think God's going to say, "Oh good, you made every practice and every game and are excellent at what you do, enter in, my child, for I need a good player on my team? I do like sports, and I do believe they are good for character development, but there is a time and a place for everything and when it comes down to sports or learning more about God, sports should always take back seat. Sports aren't the only thing to come before God, you can fill in the blank with whatever you like, but it's all the same. Where are our priorities? Aren't you scared about your child's salvation? You should be, because Satan wants them on his team and he's playing every card he's got. A lot of his cards look harmless but when played in the right hand, are deadly. What's Heaven worth to you?