New Years Resolutions

I'm plowing full steam ahead into 2012 - resolutions & all! Happy New Year!

Here they are - the serious, the silly and the simple. Cheers to a new year of God's grace, mercy, peace, love, forgiveness, provision, healing, and faithfulness.

Great is Thy faithfulness, oh God my Father;
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not;
As Thou hast been, Thou forever wilt be.

Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Summer and winter and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon, and stars in their courses above
Join with all nature in manifold witness
to Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!

Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

New Years Resolutions 2012

1. Read 3650 chapters of the Bible in 365 days. That's 10 chapters a day. I'm joining a group of over 1,000 who are taking this challenge. There is a 'system' in place to follow - see this link for info on the plan.  I'm excited to, as others have put it, "drink from the fire hose" of the Word. I'm looking forward to seeing connections in Scripture that maybe I haven't seen before. I'm anxious to wear out the pages of my Bible this year. 
2. Pay off debt. Marc and I have yet to figure out the specifics of this one, cause I'm all about measurable and realistic goals. :) All I know is that after building the emergency fund a bit, all the rest of our tax return money is going to paying off debt. 
3. Build a better routine. I always struggle with being disciplined. I need the Spirits help to do this, cause I've tried in my own strength and I fail each time. I'm longing for more routine for my kids and me - especially the days that I'm working from home. 
4. Try a new recipe each week. Some weeks I'm awesome at meal planning and thinks go according to it. Other weeks, I wander through the aisles of the store & pick random things to make (and I always leave out a key ingredient when I don't have a list!). I want to be more adventurous in what I make. I already bought Teff flour so I can try to make Injera (sourdough pancake-like bread that is a staple of Ethiopian food). 
5. Use all my lotion. Hokey Pete. I cleaned out the closet in our bathroom last night. I have an entire shelf of lotions. And most of them are completely full. I get lotion a lot as gifts, which is awesome, but I'm not much of a lotion-user. That's going to change this year. In my effort to purge some of the clutter in my life and house, I'm going to be an avid lotion user this year! My skin will thank me, I'm sure. 
6. Be more crafty with the kids. Okay, so Hope can't really participate a whole lot in crafts, but Isaac can! Tonight we already started this one by making Thank You cards for his teachers, rather than using some that I have. He got to color, use stickers & dictate what to write in each one. He loved it & way more fun than a store bought card! (Sidenote: When I asked Isaac what to write in his card for the teachers assistant, this is what he told me: "Dear Mrs. F. I love you SOO much. I love you forever. Love, Isaac." We toned it down slightly from that. Ha!)
7. Pray more diligently for those who don't know the Lord. I taught Children & Worship for 4 weeks in December. One of the kids consistently prayed for people who don't know God. Here is this 6 year old doing something that I should be doing as well! This needs to happen more. In fact, prayer in general needs to happen more. 
8. Focus on healthy habits. I've strayed from the WW wagon & need to focus a bit more on having a healthy lifestyle - exercise, water, healthy foods, being outdoors, etc. 
9. Play WITH my kids more. This goes back to the routine with working at home. Sometimes while I'm home, I'm working and cannot play. Other times, I should be playing with my kids and not working. I need to play more. 
10.  I need to work on being the wife God has called me to be. Marc and I have been so independent throughout our marriage - somewhat because that's our personalities - somewhat because of differing schedules - but now we have the chance to become more unified. I need to learn how to do that more intentionally. 

My little Peanut

Hope had her 15 month well child visit today. I was anxious to see if her body had started catching up with her head yet, and also wanted to hear what the doc thought about her lack of standing/walking and speech.

She weighed in a whoppin' 19.75lbs, keeping her in the 10% for weight. Don't know where this is coming from! She started out at 8lbs 12oz and the doc says her 'DNA is kicking in' and that she'll probably be a bit smaller. Seriously? Um, she's healthy so I don't care, but her DNA comes from me & Marc, right? Yeah, cause we're definitely not in the 10% for our weights/heights/age!

She was 30 inches long, keeping her in the 50% for height. We're going to end up with a 6'4 Isaac and a 5'4 Hope. :)

And her head - still WAY off the charts. There was a slight increase in the curve she's been following, but nothing too alarming. I was hoping for a bit more of a decrease to bring her back into the 'normal' range, but I guess it's all just numbers. I think my daughter is a beauty - big head and all.

Developmentally, she's not considered 'behind' quite yet, but is on the tail, tail end of where she should be. She's still only saying 'Ma-Ma' and 'Da-Da'. Nothing more, although something I think she tries to say book or dog, but they all kind of sound the same. She doesn't babble. She doesn't try to imitate sounds. She's doing well with pointing at things, and it's clear she can understand when I ask her questions. She can go around the dining room table & point to all 7 of us correctly. She doesn't have a problem hearing or understanding, just potentially getting the sounds out.

As for walking, the doc says they like to see kids walking on their own by 16 months and to continue to practice with her. I look at her skinny little legs & wonder how her muscles can even hold her up sometimes - talk about chicken legs!!

Typically kids don't have an 18 month check up, but our doc thought it would be wise to see where she's at physically & developmentally. If she's still on the tail, tail end of things, our doc would like to call in early childhood people to help with some physical and speech therapy.

Overall, she's healthy and boy is she a happy thing! Although after 4 shots and about 4 teeth about to break through, today is quite possibly the crabbiest I've ever seen her. Poor little peanut!

The Christmas Conundrum

The Christmas Conundrum

This is a MUST read for all Christians who are struggling with how to 'do' Christmas in our culture of materialism and entitlement. 

Energized

Yesterday I had a middle school/high school event from 6:45am - 6:45pm. A kind man from our church wanted to bring us to a Christmas pageant in Shipshewana, Indiana for FREE! So, we had almost 20 students load up the coach (which had individual cup holders & foot rests - talk about riding in luxury!) and drive the few hours South. The other 2/3rds of the bus was made of up a handful of Plymouth folks + people who come to our church's mobile food pantry, who also got a FREE invitation.

I focused my energy mostly on some great bus ride conversations with my kids and relationship building during the day. I would go again just for the bus trip! We got to Shipshe & walked around a bit to the different shops and then went to the restaurant for lunch. There was a HUGE banquet room for our bus + about 3 other bus loads of people. I sat with 4 of my students in the middle of a group of strangers. I introduced myself to my neighbor and she said, "I rode the bus with you!". Duh. Kinda felt like an idiot. Anyhow, we converse all throughout lunch and I learn of her children and grandchildren. She learns about my role at PHCRC. She's got 2 grand kids in middle school. We've got our Breakaway Christmas party Sunday night. You can see where this is going, right?

So tonight at Breakaway, in walks my new friend and her two grandkids, S & B. B is a 6th grade girl (as are ALL of my girls in Breakaway) and S is an 8th grade boy (as are a majority of my boys in Breakaway). I meet them, give them the nickle tour of the youth room & start to introduce them around. They seem apprehensive at first. B started to come out of her shell pretty quickly. S got invited into a game of pool with a college leader (awesome work DS). Dinner comes. B sits with all the kids. S sits in the game room against the wall by himself. I invite him to join us, he refused. A few minutes passes & I send guy leader DS in to interact. They talk. I still can't tell if he's forced to be there or has any desire whatsoever.

We played a guessing game - guess how many hershey's kisses are in the cheap dollar store container? 97.
S guesses the closest & WINS! We see how awesome of a smile he's got. He began to engage.

More games, more games, more games. Then, it's time to get serious and focus on why we are even at church in the first place. We watched THIS video to quiet us and focus us. Then I led a lectio devina on Luke 2:1-20. I explained it as best as I could, hoping the newbies wouldn't think we're a weird cult-like place. :) We meditated on the Christmas story. Then I had them journal. B & S journaled right along with the rest of them. They wrote down their prayer requests like the rest of them. They gave me their address so I can send more information about the group. They left with Grandma & I hope to see them again.

They seemed like any other kids who come to a new place for the first time. But here is the coolest part. I don't know if these kids have EVER heard the Christmas story. There mom doesn't believe in church. They're grandma is Catholic and I'm not sure how engaged she is anywhere. They've been evicted from their apartment with their mom and are living with their grandma during the week and with grandpa, mom and others in a 1 bedroom apartment on the weekend. When they see their dad, it's at his fiances parents house where they live. They don't have a church home. They don't have many friends due to too many moves in the last 4 years. Grandma wants to get them plugged in somewhere, and God brought them to the PHCRC family through a series of his Sovereign events.

So, long story for a simple but exciting point that I am energized and thrilled that the Lord has brought them to Breakaway. Please pray for them and Grandma. Please pray for me and the other leaders. Wow. Sharing God's love with people who may or may not already know it is such a privilege. I pray for more opportunities, and for obedience when I'm given them.

Small Vent

So, a quick vent because I feel the need. I cook for 7 people on a regular basis. I don't always have much time. I repeat meals at times. Sorry. Deal with it. Cook for 7 people every night & see how often you repeat meals. So when someone opens the crock pot & says "again?" when I've only made this 2 times before, it's a little annoying. I'm annoyed. Be thankful I cook at all, and that I cook MEAT for pete's sake. Be thankful because we are blessed. Ugh. Vent over.

Made you laugh!

Hope the old picture made you laugh! It made me bust a gut when I came across it earlier today!

I have so many things I could write about, but my thoughts are so all over the place these days, I can't sit down and focus on one thought for longer than a few minutes. Maybe I'm ADD. :)