Decorating for Christmas

Our prettiest tree ever:)

The day after Thanksgiving is always our day to decorate the tree and get the ornaments all out. Although cutting down a tree is not something I tackle, wrestling one out of the basement storage room is no small task either. Since Tim has worked this day the last few years the kids and I are on our own. Thankfully, Alli and Erin are old enough to grab an end. It's always fun and it keeps the kids busy for quite awhile. Alli has the most ornaments because she is the oldest and they get one every year. So every year I let Erin and Tyler put on all the extra's balls, as a preventative measure, to help even things out. Alli got to help untangle the lights. I must say they were in the worst wad ever. I think I remember the day I put them away. Pretty sure I hauled them off the tree in attempts to quickly get the tree put away while I was unpacking from FL. Don't think I was in any mood to roll them up neatly......I had totally forgotten about it until I saw the giant wad of green, stringed, lights.... Ooops.

A play date with cousin Ethan

Finally someone to play hockey and monster trucks with that is as passionate about those things as he is.

Yes, Ethan and Tyler have a little fudge bar on their faces. I promise I didn't feed them all sugar:)

Thanks Aunt Betsey for letting us borrow Ethan for the afternoon. It was one of Tyler's best afternoon ever. He would like a do over as soon as possible:)

Pumpkins

I got a little lazy this year. I gave the kids a marker to decorate their pumpkins. I think they had just as much fun and lots less mess.

Halloween 2009

It was a freezing night to trick or treat. Not really what I has hoped it would be. Last year the weather was so nice I would have walked for miles. This year I couldn't wait to get done and warm up. We joined cousins to make it more fun. Really all anyone saw was the kids winter coats and teeth chattering in the cold:(

Beautiful fall colors

Wow we have a lot of leaves

I think he had to empty the tractor with every pass across the lawn.

Sunday morning miracle

I awoke in the night and could not fall back to sleep. Ever have that? I was tired b/c I just worked a 11 hour day. My eyes are bad so I couldn't read the clock. I had no idea what time it was but I knew I needed to pray. I have come to realize sometimes the Lord gives me a quiet chance to pray wither it is conveinient or not. Problem was I had no idea what I needed to pray about. I thought I had been through it all before I went to bed. So I went back to my prayer model. PRAY Praise, repent, ask and yield. (Not Yell). Ok... I may have yelled a little.... I wanted to go back to sleep. I loved the speaker I heard on this. She said, "When you awake in the night and the Lord wants you to pray and the devil wants you to worry and drift. Start preaching at the devil. He hates to be preached at." Anyway, I was tired in the morning I did not feel well rested. I felt as though instead I had wrestled and had no idea why. To be honest my spirit was grumbling about my physical tiredness and my busy day.
So we made it to church. I sat down thankful to be in service. I do children's ministry most weeks so I am delighted to join the adults for service whenever I get the chance. I looked about the auditorium and noticed a new family sitting with one of our friends. I didn't dawn on my until the second song who it was. It was an old friend I had prayed for, for 15 years. It was one of those "hopeless cases." There they were in church a row over...... right then I knew why I needed to spend some night in prayer.....

I encourage you today to read the parable of the persistant widow in Luke 18. " Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up."