Matters of prayer...

Hi...I know it has been way too long. :-) I wanted to post something that you all could be in prayer for our family for. Almost one month ago we received a call about a tiny baby girl. She is Silas' (our 2 year old adopted son) new sister. We don't even know her name but she was born on October 7th. She will also be placed up for adoption as her (and Silas') birthmother is unable to keep her. The state of Michigan is wondering if we have any interest in adopting her since we already have her brother. She will not be available for adoption though for anywhere from 5-11 months from now since she is already a ward of the state. We are interested in adopting her and sometimes our hearts just yearn to hold, rock, and sing to her. She is currently in a foster home in MI. This whole thing is completely out of our hands and we are just praying for God's best for this precious child and for our family. If He wants her to be a part of our family then He will make it so. We just bought a used Suburban yesterday so as to be ready vehicle wise. Our previous vehicle was all filled up as it only seated five. As soon as we are settled in Texas, we would have to start our home study all over again. We appreciate your prayers as we settle in a new state and possibly add another arrow to our home. :-) God bless you all during this Christmas season. Love, Andrea

"...no greater joy than to know...

...that my children walk in truth." We are humbled and so very thankful that in the last few months both Haley and Logan have given themselves to the Lord. It is an incredible experience to see your children grow, change, and live. Nothing has been more important to Tim and I (I am sure it is the same for you all) than for our children to love and follow the Lord. Haley is going to be baptized next weekend. We are praying that it will be a special and sacred time for her. May we all walk in a worthy manner. ~Blessings~

Glacier National Park

Beauty beyond beauty! Glacier is magnificent! We arrived home late Thursday evening having been gone for 8 days. God was so good to give our family that time of refreshment. I am going to do a few blog posts about our trip, so here is part one. We set up camp about 1 hour inside of Glacier at a place called Bowman Lake. You could probably find a picture of it online. It is a remote lake that is surrounded by mountains. It was like a dream. I kept saying to Tim, " I can't believe we are actually here in this amazing beauty!" I have dreamed of going to Western Montana for at least a decade. We spent Friday enjoying our site and getting all set up for the coming week. We cooked dinner over the fire in cast iron and then went to bed. We were pretty tired as we were all still recovering from a week of a nasty flu cold. Saturday we got up and decided to go on a hike...a 14 mile hike! ;-0 By the time we got dressed and washed hair, cooked breakfast, heated up water for dishes, did the dishes, tidied up camp, and packed all of our backpacks with a picnic and lots of water, it was just after one o'clock. Tim put Silas on his back in the Ergo (I really don't know what we would do without our dear Ergo) while Haley, Logan, and I each strapped on a backpack. The hike was along one side of Bowman Lake. We started walking...and we walked and walked and walked. By the time we were near the end of the trail it was starting to get late. We were wondering if we would get home before it got dark. So we headed back double time. At this point we had already walked about 7 miles. Tim took the lead and had us alternating between walking and running. Haley and I were in the back and we started getting giddy with tiredness. Both of us started laughing at any and every little thing. A few times Haley fell down on the ground she was laughing so hard. We weren't really helping each other as we both kept thinking of funny things. :-) After another 90 minutes of running/walking Haley and I began to make plans of spending the next day sitting in chairs around the campfire with our feet up and wrapped in ice. Of course this was funnier than either of us could handle and we were laughing and gasping for breath. We still had one hour of brisk walking left. About a half mile from our tent my leg muscles started to cramp up and I could barely walk. You see, we had been pushing so hard because the grizzles move at dusk and we were the only ones out there on that trail. Thankfully we made it to our tent just as it became totally dark and the Lord kept us safe from the cougars and grizzles. I do think though that the 14 mile hike is one of our best memories from our week. Thank you Lord for such a fun, crazy experience.

Thank you Jesus!!

Yesterday we took Silas to the surgeon for his umbilical hernia. We had been told by a pediatrition that Silas would have to have surgery soon after age one. Well, the surgeon said to wait until he is four as it could still close up on it's own. Yeah!!! We are so thankful and relieved. We will continue to pray that the Lord will close up the hole. We are in town today for cello and violin lessons. It is very hot here and little Silas is a bit grumpy. I am planning on starting Tim's and my quilt tonight...so exciting!! Also, we will be moving soon. God is so good and life is full of peace and rest when our eyes are on Him. Have a blessed day!

A Few Favorites

Yesterday I was thinking about a few of my favorite books. I love books and would love to know about some of your favorite books. The books in my list are the ones that have impacted and challenged my life the most. They are the ones that I find myself reading again and again or thinking about years after I read it. So other than the Bible, these are my current favorite books.

1. Streams In The Desert by Mrs. Charles Cowman
2. Jeanne Guyon Autobiography by Jeanne or Madame Guyon
3. Never Alone by Violet Miller
4. The Family Meal Table and Hospitality by Nancy Campbell
5. Calvary Road by Roy Hession
6. So Much More by Anna and Sophia Botkin
7. The Naturally Clean Home
8. Rees Howell: Intercessor by Norman Grubb
9. The Power of Motherhood by Nancy Campbell
10. Created To Be His Helpmeet by Debi Pearl (one of my most life-changing/inspiring books)

What are your favorites?

Quilts

How I wish I could post a few pictures, but hopefully soon! :-) Now that I have Haley, Logan, and Silas' quilts all finished, I am ready to start ours. We have changed our minds a few times about what colors we want to make our quilt. For the past 8 years or so we have had a comforter on our bed that is tan, burgandy, and navy. We are going to go with something much brighter and cheerful this time. Our new quilt is going to be made out of different patterns and shades of green with white. I made a girl's baby quilt that was green and white and we just loved it. So, last week I bought my first of four fabrics. Fun!! We have the pattern picked out and once I collect the other three fabrics I am ready to start. Can't wait! ;-)

Fake names...

I just wanted you all to know that from here on I will be using our real first names on our blog. Sunshine is Haley, Vision is Logan, and Beloved is Silas. It has just been too confusing for me as I type. :-)

Thoughts...

Yesterday I had something really heavy on my heart. It was the subject of children from godly homes, growing up and turning away. Oh how that breaks my heart and makes me want to despair. Quite honestly, I just about can't think of anything worse than our children rejecting the Lord. But yesterday I think the Lord wanted me to learn something and that is that I can't control any other person, not even our children. Our children have to choose the Lord for themselves. My job (with the Spirit's power) is to show them the Lord on a daily basis, teach them about the Lord, and pray, pray, pray. The Lord loves them and wants them to follow Him even more than we do. So, to a great extent, I must leave it in His hands. After wrestling through this yesterday, with my dear husband encouraging me with truth, I came to a rest and peace in Him. I CAN'T make my children godly so I don't have to be all stressed out trying. Anyhow, I don't know if any of this makes sense to anyone else, but those are my thoughts. :-) God bless you all today as you love the Lord, your husbands, children, and keep your home.

Amazing...

Here is a short movie on YouTube that is really something to watch. One more huge reason why I believe in having big families if possible. Children are such a gift from God. The muslims are taking over the world with their own children. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-3X5hIFXYU

Homemade Tortilla's

Tonight for dinner we had fried zucchini sandwiches with tortilla's as the bread part. They are delicious and mostly healthy. I make a mixture of flour, salt, pepper, and garlic powder and put that in a cake tin. Then I slice zucchinis into fairly thin discs. I put the sliced zucchini in a bowl of water and melt some butter in a frying pan. Then I put some zucchini in the flour mixture and coat. Lay these in the melted butter and fry on both sides until golden brown. Then put mayo and cheese on a piece of bread or in a tortilla, fill with fried zucchini and roll up or put a top piece of bread on. There you have it! We really enjoy these sandwiches. Some people like a slice of raw tomato on these too. Now for the tortilla recipe... 4 cups of whole spelt flour 1 heaping teaspoon of salt 1 to 2 cups of water (add as needed) 1/4 cup oil Sift together flour and salt. Add oil and some water and start to mix. Add enough water to make a nice, soft, supple dough. Not too dry (no extra flour in the bottom of the bowl) and not so wet that it is very sticky. Cover with plasic wrap and let sit on the counter for at least 6 hours. Then heat up a skillet and put a bit of oil in the bottom. The skillet should be on medium to medium high heat. We have just had to learn the right temp. by trial and error. Dust the counter with flour and roll large golf ball size pieces of dough into thin, round circles with a rolling pin. Cook on each side for a couple of minutes and there you have wonderful, healthy, homemade tortilla's. If they are totally stiff and unrollable then they were probably cooked too long. ENJOY!!!!

Our Week

I wanted to give you all a bit of an update on our life. We are all settled into our new home and are enjoying it so much. Yesterday afternoon Sunshine and Vision had the most wonderful time working on building their own little fort. They didn't even want to come in for dinner they were enjoying themselves so much. A few days ago they packed a special little picnic and went a hiking/exploring. When they found a good spot they sat down and ate their special little picnic and then continued on their adventure. We had walkie-talkies to communicate with. Every once in a while we would talk to each other, mostly for Mama's sake to make sure they were okay. They are just having a grand time on this beautiful mountain. We are so thankful to the Lord for putting us here for this time. We don't know exactly how long we will live here but we want to enjoy it while we are here. Dh was gone to another state this whole week for his new job training. He loved it and can't wait to get doing it. It is with a decorative concrete business. We never knew that there was even such a thing as decorative concrete, but it is just amazing what they can do with this type of high-tech concrete. While at training they made a wall that looked just like a brick wall, colors and all. Paints and stains are used to make the colors. They do floors that can look like a marble floor, shower walls, counter-tops, and sinks. One of the really neat things about this to me is that dh will be able to use his artistic abilities. The owner is a Christian and we are so glad! The owner and hubby had a wonderful time together all week and are looking forward to working together. Sunshine and Vision have their first big concert coming up with their young orchestra. They are so excited and hopefully Mama won't blubber too much. ;-) Beloved is running all over and is just soooo smart. He loves for me to hold him...that is his favorite place to be. If we could just get the excema on his face all gone. We just recently celebrated the one year anniversary of the day we got him and how thankful we are for him. Sunshine told me that she doesn't know what she would do without him. Sunshine finished her last math lesson this week and Vision has two more lessons to go. I love the math that we are using. Sunshine is already doing algebra and she just finished 5th grade. We also just started a new science program and I think it is going to be wonderful. This was our first week. It is Apologia science and we are going to go through the Botany book. I must admit that I still have not found a satisfactory grammar program. We are thinking of trying Easy Grammar. Does anyone have any suggestions? Tomorrow we are having a special Easter breakfast at our church and then we are having people over after church for lunch. On Thursday evening our church got together and had communion together along with washing each other's feet. We also spent a long time singing to the Lord together. It was a special time thinking about all that Christ has done for us. May you all be blessed with more of Him as you remember His death and resurrection this weekend.

The Move...New Mercies

Here we are, just a few days before our move to the mountain. It is so beautiful up there. We will be living on 49 acres that are mostly wooded. The children and I are looking forward to going on our daily walks surrounded by God's amazing creation! For now we will be living in the walk-out basement of the log home. It is much larger than our apartment and has two glass sliders looking down the mountain. I know we will very much enjoy living in the basement and on the mountain. Sunshine and Vision are daily enjoying playing their cello and violin together. What a blessing to us! We all played together in church last week, Dh on the piano, me on the guitar, Sunshine on the violin, and Vision on the cello. How sweet it is to be able to all play and sing together!! We LOVE it!! We sang a song that we learned from dear friends in our home state, 'There's A Mighty River'. It is such a special song to us. Whoever wrote the song was given a gift by the Holy Spirit. I am so thankful for new mercies and new days from God. Last Saturday I felt unable to continue on...I was seemingly surrounded by dark clouds with no hope of sunshine in sight. I spent most of my day crying. To put it plainly, I was a mess. I missed our families and friends terribly. No matter how much I tried to look to the Lord, I could only cry and wonder if He really was hearing our prayers. Since dh has barely worked for almost 4 months with no work in sight, I felt like a hopeless, wrung-out dish rag. Anyhow, by the end of the day I was seeing a bit of sunshine thanks to my dear husband, a neighbor from Nepal, and some friends we had over for dinner. By the next morning I was feeling almost entirely renewed and thankful that it was a NEW day. Unbeknownst to me, my loving dh had asked the Lord to please ;-) send some encouragement for me. Well, He did. That day we were given a refridgerator to use in our new living place, some meat, possibly some work at our church, and a brother in Christ stopped by with a gift for us. How undeserving I was, but how loving and merciful He is. O me of little faith. I am sure we all have days where there seems to be no hope for whatever situation we are in. God will never push us beyond what we are able. He is a good Father and only does what is good for His children. Many times it is hard to hold on to that when difficult situations come, but He will never desert us. He is trying us by fire so that we can come forth as gold. The Lord wants us to be able to totally trust no matter what is going on around us. Thank you Father for your tenderness.

Down Computer

I just wanted you all to know why I haven't been able to put up any new blog posts...our computer is not working right now (hasn't been since the day that I put up the last post). I am typing this from the library right now and I do not have any way of posting any pictures. When I can I will resume putting up posts. God bless you all!

Cheese and Jammies :-)

We love making cheese...and eating it too! Here is the beginning of making mozzerella cheese. There are four gallons of milk in the pot. I am slowly heating the milk up to 98 degrees. Here I am stirring the curds. Exciting!!

Now for the really fun part, stretching and shaping the cheese. I have to dip the cheese in 200 degree salt water so that I can stretch it. This cheese in my hands is very hot. If I did not stretch the cheese it would not have the right texture. It is at this point that we all eat a big, warm chunk of it. It is sooooo good!

Below are the finished shapes. That is how much cheese comes from four gallons of milk. A couple of days later we made homemade individual pizzas with our homemade cheese on top. Yummmm!! :-)

For Christmas, Sunshine (dd) and I made matching flannel jammie pants for our three men. It was really fun to keep it a secret and work on it while Papa and Vision were gone together. Sunshine is becoming quite the sewer. She entirely made Papa's and Vision's after I cut them out for her.

Christmas with friends...

I know that this is a little late, but I wanted to put up a few pictures of our Christmas day with friends. Here are all of the adults, minus me, at the big table. We had turkey, fruit salad, crackers with a cheeseball, rolls, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, stuffing, gravy, and sparkling cider. This is the medium aged children's table.

Here we are getting in line to fill up our plates.

This is the little children's table.

Three dear friends of mine.

Thanks so much for having us all over for a Christmas meal! It meant even more since we live so far from our home state with so many family members and friends.

Celebrate!!

How much we love you our precious Beloved son!

He loves splashing in the water. Hello everyone near and far! :-) How is your new year going so far? Our family is doing well and has a big reason to celebrate today. We received something very special in the mail today...Beloved's finalized adoption papers! He is legally our son now even though he has been our son in our hearts since the day we received him. Wow!! What amazing things God has done in our life this past year. How WONDERFUL to have three blessings...we can't wait to have more! The way has, at times, been the most rugged we have ever had to climb, but He is faithful. I am not just saying that either as a nice little spiritual cliche'...we have watched our God provide for us time and time again during this journey of adoption. No He didn't make it all easy and soft, but He never left us. It is good that God doesn't show us in advance what we will have to walk through. I am afraid I would have quaked in my boots. But, He lovingly gives us strength and provision for each day as we need it. I can look back over this past year and see how God was always gently teaching us more and more to live by faith in Him alone.

When nothing whereon to lean remains,

When strongholds crumble to dust;

When nothing is sure but that God still reigns,

That is just the time to trust.

'Tis better to walk by faith than sight,

In this path of yours and mine;

And the pitch black night, where there's no outer light,

Is the time for faith to shine.

Last week we had another exciting event...Vision's first cello lesson! What a beautiful instrument. How I have loved hearing him run his bow across the low, mellow strings. :-) I am so often proud and in awe of Sunshine and Vision's musical abilities. They both have more talent than I so I just love getting to watch and hear them. They both sing harmony and play to some degree or another 5 different instruments. Anyhow, our whole hearts are to honor our Father with our music and worship. May we never do any of it for the applause of men.

This year I am reading the devotional 'Streams In The Desert' by Mrs. Charles E. Cowman. It is sooooo good! Each day I read one little section along with my Bible reading. I am also reading a book called 'The Children's Storm'. It is a true book that relays the historical happening of the major blizzards in the Dakotas that Laura Ingalls Wilder based her book 'The Long Winter' on. So far it is very interesting though I only get to read a few pages a day. ;-) I am also, very slowly, reading a biography on Adoniram Judson. Christian biographies are my very favorite.

I am soon going to post about making mozzerella cheese, and the most yummy dinner rolls I have come across.

May God bless you all as you live for Him who died, gave His all, for you. We have SO much to be thankful for.