I've been tagged!

I've been tagged by my imaginary friend* Lori Downs with instructions to post the 6th photo in my 6th folder. When she tagged me, she said, "I bet it will be a kiddo!" Well...how 'bout two kiddos? :)

January 2007...This is a photo of Robert and Josiah with Robert's new bow and arrow (junior set) that he had gotten for Christmas in 2006. This was immediately before we got a bale of hay for him to use with target practice. We have a really long back yard so he was hitting nothing but yard here.

If you look really closely, you may see a little bit of red poking out of Josiah's collar. He has a Spiderman costume (bodysuit) underneath his clothes. He wore it to the point that the zipper in the back broke and holes are in both knees. And he still wears it, even though it's so short the "knees" are at his thighs. His big brother (the original owner of the Spiderman suit) refuses to give up possession of the Spiderman mask that went with this well-loved costume. Never mind that it doesn't fit him comfortably or that he even wears it...ever...Sigh...

I am supposed to tag 6 people now. I choose:

1. Dannielle at 50 Fingers & 50 Toes.

2. Mama Ant at Ants-on-a-Farm.

3. Julie at From Inmates to Playdates. (And please read this post and keep her family in your prayers!)

4. Dawn at My Home Sweet Home.

5. ...And I ran out of steam here. You can consider yourself tagged if you want to participate! I love the randomness of this (although that's probably because I had recently gone through old photo files and kept only the ones I loved...you know, the ones I might one day actually get printed...maybe...). I just failed miserably with the passing it on part.

* "Imaginary friend" is the term my husband uses for people I have met online but have never met in person or talked to on the phone...and they may or may not even know that I exist. :)

Wordless Wednesday: Without excuse

For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

Romans 1:20 (NIV)

Visit 5 Minutes for Mom or Wordless Wednesday for more Wordless Wednesday participants.

News Headlines

On the day when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is making news with her statement "Contraception will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government" (Really? Tell that to European nations...), I thought I would share a beautiful story I found in my inbox today. Those of you who email me with various stories that are forwarded from inbox to inbox probably know that I will look on snopes.com or wherever before forwarding anything. Well, I investigated this story and found the text of this email nearly word-for-word here, and also found the story here and here.

~~~~~

Pam's Story

Pam knows about the pain of considering abortion.

More than 21 years ago, she and her husband, Bob, were serving as missionaries to the Philippines and praying for a fifth child. Pam contracted amoebic dysentery, an infection of the intestine caused by a parasite found in a contaminated food or drink. She entered into a coma and was treated with strong antibiotics before they discovered she was pregnant. Doctors urged her to abort the baby for her own safety and told her that the medicines had caused irreversible damage to her baby. She refused the abortion and cited her Christian faith as the reason for her hope that her son would be born without the devastating disabilities physicians predicted.

The doctors "didn't think of it as a life, they thought of it as a mass of fetal tissue," Pam said.

While pregnant, Pam nearly lost their baby four times but refused to consider abortion. She recalled making a pledge to God with her husband, "If you will give us a son, we'll name him 'Timothy,' and we'll make him a preacher."

Pam ultimately spent the last two months of her pregnancy in bed and, eventually, gave birth to a health baby boy August 14, 1987.

Pam's youngest son is indeed a preacher. He preaches in prisons, makes hospital visits, and serves with his father's ministry in the Philippines .

He also plays football. Pam's son is Tim Tebow.

Last year, the University of Florida 's star quarterback, became the first sophomore in history to win college football's highest award, the Heisman Trophy. Tim's notoriety and the family's inspiring story have given Pam numerous opportunities to speak on behalf of women's centers across the country.

She was the keynote speaker at the Oct. 23, 2008, benefit banquet for two Louisville ministries. A Woman's Choice Resource Center offers such services as free pregnancy tests, post-abortion counseling, adoption information, and material support. Necole's Place is a companion ministry that provides support services for women in need.

Several Louisville-area Kentucky Baptist churches and Long Run Baptist Association help support both ministries.

A Woman's Choice board chairman, John Schmitt, reported at the banquet that in the 20 years since the resource center opened, 4,500 children have been saved from abortion -- 400 in this year alone.

Speaking of the thousands of lives saved, Pam Tebow said, "That just blows my mind. Every little baby you save matters."

What NOT to do on a Sunday night

Update: I am going green and recycling this post to participate in a brand spankin' new blog carnival hosted by Jo-Lynne at Musings of a Housewife.




If it's Sunday night and your husband is asking if you'd like to watch a movie with him, question him fully on what exactly "action" might mean. And if the movie is Eagle Eye, check the time because you really need at least a few hours in between watching this INTENSE "action" movie and going to bed.

At least.

And PG-13? Who are we kidding? It was a good movie, definitely kept the plot line going at a rapid pace, lots of twists and turns...lots of explosions, lots of edge-of-your-seat scenes, and not a whole lot that I would want a 13 year old watching. There were parts I didn't even want to see.

After the movie was over, I washed up for bed, climbed under the covers, hopped back up to give Grace some medicine for an earache when she cried a few minutes later, and then laid there for a while wide awake before giving up and heading back out to the living room. I figured I would get some of my homework done with the Beth Moore Bible study I'm in, Psalms of Ascent. And, no, it was not that I thought it would put me to sleep, but I thought it would help calm me down enough to where sleep could be a possibilty...Jason has already questioned me on that point! ;)

And do you know what? I can get three days' worth of homework done in under 50 minutes when it's 1:00 a.m.-ish and the house is totally quiet and no one is calling me "Mom-can-I." (Hey--It's a step up from "But-Mommy.")

And do you know what else? I can lay there in bed mulling over some of the personal questions in the homework that I didn't immediately have answers for when I was sitting in my chair. I thought, "OK, I'll think about that later" and moved on...only I really didn't think "later" would be so soon.

I was thinking more like daytime.

Instead, I was still awake and making a mental list of things other people might ridicule me for. Seriously. Now, doesn't that sound like fun?

To check out what other people have learned this week, visit Musings of a Housewife.

More of the Little Gym Dawg

This picture was taken soon after this one, when Grace got tickled at herself and started clapping. I love the expression on her face! What a doll!

Worship in Spirit and in Truth

If you are a part of the same Bible study I'm currently doing, you will remember this specific topic in the video session last night. But even if you're not in the Psalms of Ascent Bible study, it applies to all of us who are believers. I ran across this post by Alicia @ Confessions of a Snowflake tonight, and I would love for you to read it, too!

Wordless Wednesday: Little Gym Dawg

This is Grace when she was 8 months old, before all of the curls came in. When she was on her belly, she would push up into a split until she was in a sitting position! Seriously...This is not posed--there was only the conscious effort I made to catch her in a full split while she was wearing this particular outfit. ;)  Just look at all of that sweet chubbiness! What do you think...future gymnast?

Visit 5 Minutes for Mom or Wordless Wednesday for more Wordless Wednesday participants.

WFMW: Crafty gift ideas

For this edition of Works for Me Wednesday, I thought I would share what we have been painting over the last month or so.

I wouldn't normally put red and purple together...well, except for here...but it's for a gift for another Red Hat Society member. :) I got the idea to use this verse after seeing it on a painted tile at Robin's website during BooMama's Christmas tour of homes. When I did the rough draft, "1 Thessalonians 5:16" fit perfectly along the bottom; finished product? Ummm...no.

I had a little better layout with the frame horizontally.

I let Josiah pick out a shorter the next verse. He painted the frame and also decided on the design, too. (I taped for straight lines, did the writing with the dimensional paint, and handled the sequins, but even the sequins are by his design.)

Josiah painted this one, too. I painted a base coat, then let him pick the colors and design he wanted to use. He originally wanted to do a camouflage design, but then thought better of it.

Robert designed, painted, and decorated this frame. This may be the only picture frame ever created with wiggly eyes...the same wiggly eyes that showed up here not too long ago.

The total cost was about $3 for each completed frame, and it is so easy to customize each frame to be personal. I had the sequins on hand (left over from another project), as well as the pack of a variety of colors of dimensional (fabric) paint, and only had to buy the frames ($1 each at Michaels) and embellishments ($2 for the dog theme pack, and $2 for a butterfly theme pack that has more pieces remaining). And that Works for Me! Check out Shannon at Rocks in My Dryer for more WFMW participants.

Inauguration Day

Pray for rulers and for all who have authority so that we can have quiet and peaceful lives full of worship and respect for God.
1 Timothy 2:2 (NCV)

Please remember to pray for our new president and his family. Here are some sites you may want to check out, too:

Pastor John Pearrell has written an open letter to our new leaders.

Beth Moore has opened the LPM blog to prayers for our new president today.

Max Lucado has a prayer guide on his website. There is also a downloadable PDF version on this page.

If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
2 Chronicles 7:14 (NIV)

Who do you say He is?

I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: “I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God.” That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic -- on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg -- or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

--C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

"I don't know what all of the fuss is about the temperature. I don't think it's that cold, and neither does my wife Nanuk."

That, my friends, was some silly blurb that showed up in a Montana newspaper while Jason and I lived there (1995-1996). School was cancelled one day because the high--the high--was forecasted to be around -40 degrees. The wind chill was forecasted to be somewhere around -60 degrees. So what did we do that day? We went to a nearby town (by Montana standards, at least--it was 55 miles away), where we ran into about a dozen people we knew from the school where Jason was teaching. ;) My husband says I need to add that the high that day turned out to be closer to -25 degrees...and when you factor in the lower humidity there, it was really not as cold as it sounds to those of you living in Georgia.

~~~~~

It is 23 degrees here as I type this. It has dropped 3 degrees in the last 30 minutes, and it's not even 11:00 p.m. Brrrrr...

I have just bits of randomness to talk about. That's about all I can do right now. :) I've been busy playing around with a new header, sticking with the chocolatey theme...do you like it? (If you get this by email, please click over to the blog to see what I'm talking about!)

Speaking of chocolate...I found my favorite at a local discount grocery store for $1.29 a bag! Robert asked me, "Why are you taking a picture of that?" To put it on "thuh-buh-log," of course.


Pure yummy-ness. I splurged and bought three bags. They are currently hiding from the kids in my bathroom closet among the towels.

Hey, I told you this would be random.

Earlier this week, I put the boys to work helping me clean out the garage before the colder weather hit. Grace did her part by sleeping peacefully through the whole thing. I don't normally brag about ugly concrete floors, but...

Now we can fit a whole car in there! Whoo hoo! Haven't been able to do that in a loooong time.

This morning the kids played "BibleLand." Robert decided to teach the younger ones how to play. Grace won the first time; it must be because of her intense concentration.



Yesterday, Grace organized an impromptu picnic for her babies, Emily and Other Emily. She shared her banana by giving each of them a piece, but they just weren't hungry, she said.



With that last bit of randomness, I am going to get ready for bed, curl up under lots of blankets, and get some sleep. Either that, or fight with Blogger over spacing issues with all of these pictures...Whatever...

Y'all stay warm!!

Works For Me Wednesday

I don't have a Works For Me Wednesday post of my own this week, but you simply have to read this one from Julie at From Inmates to Playdates. Seriously. Go read it now. It is the best WFMW post I have ever read.

Well, what are you waiting for?!? Go!

Overheard

Grace [looking at a funny picture of herself around 9 months old]: Momma, I want you ta put dis on thuh-buh-log [the blog]!

~~~~~

Josiah [incredulous]: You mean I behaved all day for nothin'? [muttering under his breath as he leaves the room] What a waste!

~~~~~

Jason [singing part of a song he made up that uses any of our children's names]: There once was a little girl named Grace.

Grace [singing to the same tune]: There once was a little girl named Daddy.

~~~~~

Robert [after picking up the library books that were being held for me]" They're all for people like you. [BIG goofy grin]

The titles? One was from the "Complete Idiot's" series, and the other was from the "Dummies Guide" series. Oh, hardy-har-har.

~~~~~

Beth Moore [quoting a friend of hers, during the introductory session of the "Psalms of Ascent" Bible study that began at our church tonight, talking about overcoming nervousness, self-consciousness, etc.]: You're not good enough to mess God up!

Remind yourself of that the next time you are nervous about doing or saying something. And, please, remind me, too.

~~~~~

Grace [eating ice cream with Daddy]: Oh! My nose is cold! It needs a jacket!

~~~~~

Grace [excitedly opening the door for me as I came home from Bible study]: Hi, Mommy! We made cookies! And we saved you some! [She paused as she ran over to pick up the container on the the table, which she excitedly held out to me] HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

No, it's not my birthday. ;) Did I mention she was excited?

"Excuse me, but I need you to sit over there."

We went to Zaxby's tonight (whoo hoo!) and while the rest of us were eating our yummy chicken and seasoned fries, Grace kept turning around to look at another family seated across the aisle from us. I finally told her, "Just turn around and eat your food!"

She turned to look at me and said, quite seriously, "But, Momma, I don't want him to sit there. I want him to sit over there," indicating the other side of the family's table.

She wanted to rearrange their seating arrangement. And she doesn't even know them.

We are in soooo much trouble.

~~~~~

After Grace gave up on ever getting that family across the aisle to cooperate and change seats, she turned her attention to Jason's plate of celery sticks. He had never gotten celery sticks before, and you could tell because every several two minutes Grace asked, "Can I have some of dat?" I repeatedly told her she could after she finished the chicken on her plate. It didn't matter...she asked me over and over again. Finally, she tired of my answer and turned to Daddy. "Daddy, can I have some of dat?" He repeated the same thing I had been telling her. She immediately looked at me in disbelief. Because, really, why would Daddy say that?

Finally, she finished her chicken. And you have never seen anyone so excited about eating celery before. She loved it. She generally loves anything that has a sauce to go with it, and crunchy celery with ranch sauce was no exception.

(The blurred family behind Grace is the one she tried to rearrange. In my opinion, their choice of seats was just fine.)

~~~~~

As Jason started eating the celery, Josiah (eater of all things) asked if he could have some "salary."

Robert corrected him. "You can't have a salary. You don't have a job."

Josiah, eater of all things, didn't like the celery. But he did have fun with the Wikki Sticks that came in his kid's meal.

My, what big eyes you have!

Fun with wiggly eyes from an, um, interesting craft project. (I'll have pictures of the project up soon.)

Overheard

Grace [looking at a book about Daniel in the lions' den]: It's great having lions in yours house!

Josiah [totally serious]: No, it's not.

~~~~~

Grace [hugging me]: MY mommy! Not Josiah's mommy!

Me: But if I'm not Josiah's mommy, he'll have to go live somewhere else.

Grace [nodding, totally onboard with this idea]: OK!!

(It was not quite the response I expected from the little girl who greeted her older brother with a big hug yesterday after he'd been gone for just a few hours. She absolutely squealed, "Oh, Josiah! I miss you so much! I so happy you back!")

~~~~~

Grace [wearing, literally, 10 layers of dress-up clothes around her neck]: Look! I a lion! Rarrrr!!

We were sitting down to eat at the time, so I made her take them off...after I took a picture, of course. She was eating from a Lion King plate. Hmmmm....

Here she is, properly dressed up as a "pincess":

Can you just see her giving out orders from her throne? And do you see the socks she's wearing with her dress up shoes? (It was chilly that day.) Josiah has been helping her coordinate her dress up outfits. At first, he saw no need to remove the socks.

~~~~~

Grace [attempting to calm Josiah down]: It's OK, little boy. Now, smile.