Changes...

Here is what can happen in a short period of time....
The drain protecting our house yesterday....

and today...

our house 1 week ago exactly....
and our house today...

It's raining...

When it's raining outside and a flood is coming, what's a girl to do....get her boots and Dora umbrella and play in the rain!We've had a lot of people ask how we're doing as far as the flood is concerned...that's a million dollar question! We're praying the predictions are wrong...if they aren't...it will be a HORRIBLE mess for everyone. They are building dikes and sandbagging as fast as they can, but will it be fast enough? Dan is going to sandbag tonight, they are asking for 24 hour a day volunteers to help...we even have Sandbag Central. If this truly is a 500 year flood...I'm glad I won't be around 500 years from now to experience it again!

The Perfect Club

Last night was Wednesday which equals Family Time in this house. Our verse for this week was

"Now is the time to come to Jesus" 2 Corinthians 6:2

After dancing and verse memorization, we shared the gospel with J and A and talked to them about it. They have both already made a decision to receive Christ, but last night we wanted to focus on the importance of telling others because "NOW is the time to come to Jesus". We talked about how they could share the gospel with their friends and other people that they know. We used the analogy of The Perfect Club. We talked about whether or not we would be allowed into God's Perfect Club - Heaven (only those who are perfect may enter). The answer..."No". We are not perfect. Then we talked about how God made a way for us to be invited into the Perfect Club and that was by asking Jesus to be perfect for us. J shared about friends at school that he could share the gospel with and we talked about how he can pray that God would give him the right moment and the right words to share with those friends. The kids asked lots of questions and they always enjoy talking about people that are already in Heaven to greet them someday. We didn't have an activity this week because family time was condensed down to a 1/2 hour due to homework and the fact that we needed to practice for the play that J is in next weekend. It was a shorter Family Time, but the gospel is always powerful and we want to make sure the kids understand it well enough to share it with others. Will you be allowed into the Perfect Club?

After bath time, A and S listened to mommy and J practice the songs for the play. Precious!

What do you do with lots of snow???

Make a snowman of course! He's kind of like a snowman skyscraper though. The weather has been above freezing making the snow finally sticky enough to make a snowman. I wanted you to be able to understand just how tall he is...that's why it's not a closer picture of the snowman. The snowman had a great, yet short life. Later that afternoon he melted just enough to fall over a litte...when you're that high up and you fall over, you break into many pieces. Kind of like Humpty Dumpty, we weren't able to put him back together again.

Check It Out!!

A friend of mine has her own business making cute clips, head scarfs and nursing shawls. She started the business in order to help fund their adoption of two children. All proceeds go towards those expenses. I recently purchased clips for Alayna and a head scarf for myself. I LOVE the hair clips! We are growing out Alayna's bangs...pony tails are cute, but break her hair...I asked Angel to put foam in the clips and they stay in GREAT! Take a minute, check out her site and if you could use anything consider placing an order, or if you know someone who could use any of the great products she sells, pass along the website.

http://www.adoptionwings.blogspot.com/

Alayna was so excited a couple weeks ago when we got the package in the mail that she put nearly ALL the clips in her hair (plus we already had pony tails in that day!).

The Letter "M"

This week's family time verse started with the letter M.

"My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they know me." John 10:27

We enjoyed our dancing and verse memorization. We recited the verse fast, sssslllllooooowww, like robots, all 'm' sounds, and then like robots again. Then J and A each said the verse all by themselves. A has really improved her memorization skills.

Next, we played a version of hide-n-seek. Mom went upstairs into a hiding spot. Instead of sitting quietly, she softly said words that describe God. J and A searched for awhile before remembering that if they would just listen to hear her voice it would be easy to find her. Dad provided some distraction with annoying singing to drive home the point that we need to listen and avoid distractions if we want to hear the still small voice. J and A each had a turn to hide and speak softly also. Dad went last and by then J and A had the system down. They got to the top of the stairs and stopped to listen right away. When mom was talking, they knew right away that she needed to be quiet in order to hear Dad's voice. It was easy after that.

The whole family went back to the basement to debrief and review the activity. J has a school play coming up that makes him quite nervous. Dad asked him, "Can you run faster than a car?, jump up to an airplane?, shovel all the snow off the whole yard?" Of course each was answered with a strong NO. The final question was, "Can you stand in front of a group of people and sing?" Of course he answered, "NO," again. Then we read the story of Jesus and Peter walking on the water. In that story, Peter does the impossible because he listened to Jesus. Dad then asked J if he might be able to sing in the play with God's help. He smiled and nodded.

Hopefully Josiah will not become over confident in his own abilities but a spirit of fear is also not honoring to the Lord. We pray he develops humble confidence in the ounce of ability God has given him and the power of God to take care of the result. Peter had the ability to walk but Jesus took Peter's unimpressive ability and made it a miraculous reality. Could He do the same with all of us? today?

** Dan has lovingly been writing about our Family Time's each week while the kids and I color about what we talked about that night.

Blizzard 2009

My husband has been a teacher at West Fargo High School for over 7 years now...we have had more snow days this year alone than all the other years combined. It's been a crazy, memorable winter! Here are some pictures of what the blizzard looked like at our house...enjoy!

Our front door yesterday during the blizzard

Where's Josiah? Nearly blocked because the snow drift is getting higher, and higher and higher...

Our mailboxes were buried...it was worse, but Dan had just started clearing them out...what craziness!

The front of our house...yep, there's a lot of snow! Thankfully we have great neighbors that once again brought their big snow blower over to our house and told us to we could use it.