For Better For Worse

Timbo reminded me the other day as  I was sobbing over something minor  we were having a heart to heart that September is always an emotional month for us.  I don't know why it seems to surprise me when it happens but it does every.single.year.  I am shocked when my emotions begin to ramp up at the beginning of the month and they continue through the month until October and fall rolls around.

This year I am making the effort to realize that I am going to be emotional over little things, my husband is more stressed than normal this month, my boys really don't understand why but they also experience the effects of our higher stress level.  So I am committing to taking deep breaths and praying more.

I am trying to structure our days this month with some margin.  This is going to be a little bit difficult.  We are busy right now but I know that we need to find some time to pull in and have some family time.  I have to make time for both the boys and Tim and most of all for me to meditate on God's goodness.  The thing I can miss the most during our busyness and stress is the goodness of God and how he has carried us through this month for the last 14 years.  Every single year since September 1998 we have relived and remembered our loss.

September for us will always remind us of the vows "for better, for worse".  In 1998 we experienced on of the worst things any parent can experience.  In 2006 we experience the joy and a "for better" moment.  It would be nice if the better cancelled out the worse.  The reality is that isn't the way it works.  It is in the worse that we can know the fullness of God's power.  It is also in the worse that we can experience the comfort that comes from knowing the one who holds us and the one who offers the ultimate comfort of experiencing his peace and grace.

To Have and To Hold Part 2

 

My parents 50th wedding anniversary brought me out of a blogging hiatus. Then thanks to Pinterest I found this marriage challenge and the first weeks emphasis is prayer.

All marriages go through an ebb and flow. I think it is the nature of living with and loving another person. I shared how I have seen the marriage vows lived out in my parents lives.  One thing, I know about my parents is that they daily spend time praying for us individually and as a couple.  This act of prayer is glue that helps hold their marriage together.

My friends and family know that I don't enjoy calling people on the phone. I don't mind chatting on the phone but making the call, not so much. When a crisis happens in my life...my mom and dad are on speed dial.  I worry that because I mostly call when I need them to pray for something that they dread seeing my number on caller id. (Mama I am trying to get better about this!)  But I know that when I call they will pray.  I know that because I have seen the evidence in their lives and in our lives of their intercession.

So I am committing to taking my prayer life to the next level in my marriage.  I want my children to look at our marriage and my life and know that it is bathed in prayer.  I know that the best thing I can do for our kids is to pray for their dad and our marriage.  I am adding some little "reminders" to our home for me to prayer.  I plan to post some "notes" with prayer reminders where I will see them often during the day.

Want to join along?  Darlene suggests using your wedding ring as a reminder to pray for your husband and your marriage.  What ideas do you have for praying for your husband and marriage?

Be sure and check out the link above and also check out this kindle book on prayer that is free Sept. 3rd and 4th. The Sensational Scent of Prayer.

To Have and to Hold

Fifty years is a long time. When something lasts 50 years we are impressed whether it is a car, a piece of furniture, or a marriage. 

Fifty years ago my parents stood in a church with their family and friends and they said vows that sounded a lot like this...

for better or worse  They experienced both in family, with churches and with friends. 

for richer, for poorer  I think they would agree that their lives have been much richer than poor. They are rich in family, friends and churches even if not always in money.

in sickness and in health  They have experienced both and seen God carry them through.

to love and to cherish  One of my favorite memories happened last year when we were home at Thanksgiving. My mom was sitting in a chair in the living room and my dad was on his knee beside her just talking in the early morning. That picture is one I will carry of their love.

from this day forward until death do us part  From my perspective I hope that they celebrate many, many more years together. Their lives have been a model of how to make marriage work. Even when times were hard they never wavered in their commitment to each other. They never spoke the “d” word. They never stormed out and left. They are faithful to each other in every way. They have been a picture of what Paul talks about in Ephesians 5:31,33 “A man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.” and “Each man must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.”

Mom and Dad I hope you celebrate many, many more anniversaries together.

I love you.

One Million Tears

I feel like that is exactly how many tears I have shed in the last 13 years. Today, I will shed a few more. Thankful today that God has kept a record of my sorrow. "You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book." (Psalm 56:8) Thankful that He doesn't leave us in our sorrow. He picks us up and carries us through it.

49 Years and counting

Happy anniversary, Mom and Dad.

Mission Organization in Review

Day 8 and this was probably the biggest day in this project. We have a front room that could be used as an office but we set it up as our school room this past year. It didn't take us long to figure out that this wasn't a great idea for us. I don't like being in the room tucked away and the boys don't want to work in there if I am not in there. They spent a lot of time doing school on the floor in whatever room I was working in. Usually we ended up in Tim's office. That was not a good solution since there are times when we all need a little space. I ended up moving my chair into the living room and setting up a corner area of our living for us to do school. This will allow the boys to have plenty of room to stretch out and I can be in a more central location.

We decided that the school room would make a good room for the boys computer and also a TV with the Wii. At first I thought I would move some of their desks out to the garage and store them. When I actually got in the room and begin arranging things I realized that I could put all the desks on one wall. We were then able to put their computer, one laptop, the TV, and the printer on the desks. By moving all the desks to the same wall it opens up the room and really makes it seem larger. I moved three smaller bookcases along the opposite wall and those will hold our books and the boys bins they use for their daily school work.

In the closet I moved in a cube unit and it holds all our misc homeschool items, magnetic letters, HWT wooden pieces, word cubes, MUS blocks, musical instruments, art supplies, math manipulative's, and all our extra science stuff. I put some things on the top shelf in the closet and these are things that I don't generally want down and accessible to the younger ones with out supervision. This shelf holds our rocket set, snap circuits, Physic Quest materials and also a microscope. The boxes on the top shelf hold the boys school work from the previous year.

I am keeping some supplies we use regularly on top of the bookcases. I found these picnic bins at Target. Last year I got the red one which is a little larger and is divided into 6 compartments. This year I got the blue and white ones. They are divided in half and one half has three sections. I like that they are easy for us to transport to a different area if we need too.

Mission Organization in Review

Day 7 was spent running around in 100+ degree heat! I dropped off the items I had purged for friends who were having a yard sale. I also took Eli to pick up his new guitar. He has wanted to take lessons and we have someone in our church that is going to teach him. I asked on our homeschool group if anyone had an inexpensive guitar to sale. One mom told me her teen son had one and she would find out how much he wanted for it. The young man told me that he would like to give it to Eli! I am amazed at how God blesses us. We went today and picked it up and Eli is so excited to start lessons! AFter that we came home and I managed to clean out our freezer (which was appropriate) and I put off the school room for one more day!

Mission Organization in Review

Day 6 I did some odd areas today. I cleaned the boys room and their boxes under their beds. These boxes are where they keep any special things they collect. I also straightened and organized their bookshelf. I also cleaned out our linens. I have a couple of sets for full size beds and we don't own a full size bed so those are going to a new home.

I rearranged the coat closet. I took all our suitcases and stored them in the largest one. The closet we use for coats is just outside the master bedroom and it is very roomy. I also put a laundry basket in there that holds gloves, hats, and scarfs. In the top of the closet is a basket which holds the boys backpacks. I really wish I understood how a homeschool family ends up with over 12 backpacks for 4 boys. The boys picked the ones they wanted to keep and I kept a couple of extra for backups. The rest are going somewhere else.

I only had a couple of areas in the kitchen that needed work so I tackled those today. I moved some things off the top of the fridge because it really isn't a storage area! I put my supplies for cook outs together with tablecloths that I only use when we have guests over.

I thought I was finished for the day but after dinner I cleaned out my bathroom. I went through all the medicine and vitamins and tossed everything that was expired. Please tell me that I am not the only one with old stuff in my cabinet. I also cleaned out my makeup and lotions. I had a couple of products that didn't work for me and I finally (after a year) decided that I could get rid of them. I rearranged the drawers and cabinet so that things were in a better location. I also cleaned out my jewelry box of items that I don't wear.

Mission Organization in Review

Day 5 was quick work putting our files in binders. I finished our personal files and still have to work on Tim's professional files. Quick day because we invited several friends over to spend the day playing.

Mission Organization in Review

Combining Day 3 and 4

On Day 3 I cleaned up the mess I made from day one and two. Listed the clothes to find a new home and made list of storage containers that we could use.

Day 4 I started in Tim's office. I moved a bookcase in from the school room. This really helped give me more storage space. Also it allowed me to have a place to use this Binder Filing System. I love having our files at my fingertips. I also love being able to get rid of our file cabinet.

In the process of day 4 I finished up Tim's closet. Moved a shelf in their for his shoe storage. I refolded the sheets and blankets so that they sit neatly on the shelf and picked out a few things of his that we can donate.

I also used this time to add some more books to Library Thing.

Interrupting my Mission Organization posts to say...

Happy Anniversary!



Twenty one years ago I had no idea how much I would grow to love you. I had no idea what being a partner in marriage would mean. I had no idea that you would become more than my husband that you would become my best friend. I had no idea that we would dream big dreams and then learn to watch as God moved in ways that were even bigger than our dreams.

Twenty one years ago I had no idea that my heart would still flutter when you called me Beautiful. I love you and am looking forward to the next 21 years.

Mission Organization in Review

Day 2 in this challenge began in the boys closet. First, I went through their clothes and really thinned them out. They had way too many things and since they only wear some of them I pulled out the extras. I kept probably about 10 outfits per child (give or take). I pulled their storage bins out from the garage and also sorted through those. I ended up with 2 laundry baskets full of clothes to give away.

I am listing some on Thred Up and the rest are going to a friend whose daughters are having a garage sale.

I also moved extra blankets out of this closet into the top of Tim's closet. I already had our sheets stored there so this made more sense. I put their bins of next season clothes in the closet. I also used the freed up space to store sports equipment like cleats, soccer shorts, baseball pants, socks and shin guards. At the end of summer I will get one more bin to store swimming gear.

On the side I hung a coat rack we had and bought new laundry bags for each boy. My goal this fall is to teach the oldest two to do their own laundry.

Mission Organization in Review

I used the month of July to organize and clean our house. We are on summer break from school and I wanted to use the time to reorganize things so that we would be set to start back in the fall.

Day one - my closet

I went through my closet and using ideas on my Pinterest style board I begin to clean things out. I only kept things that I loved and that fit. I ended up with an overflowing laundry basket of clothes. I also cleaned out my shoes and purses bags.

I rearranged my shoes and added my smaller purses and wallets into my shoe storage system. A friend gave me these nifty shoe boxes that come in two sizes and fit together in a honeycomb pattern. When you pull out one box the others stay in place. Handy Dandy Shoe Storage. I love these.

I still need to find a storage solution for my larger purses and bags. That is the last thing I need to finish up my closet.

Holiness

God has called us to live holy lives, not impure lives. 1 Thessalonians 4:7

Holy, an adjective, meaning consecrated; dedicated or devoted to the service of GOD.

For the longest time in my life I never really thought out holiness and how it affected my life.  The only time I thought about holiness was in relation to God.  I totally understood the concept that God is holy; therefore, He is "set apart" from us.

A few years ago a good friend spoke at our church and he used this scripture as his reference.  He spoke about how God has called us to live holy lives.  This was something that I had never considered before.  I had bought into the bumper sticker theology that said "I'm not perfect, I'm forgiven."  While this is true, it isn't the whole truth.  I am more than "just" forgiven.  My forgiveness cost Jesus EVERYTHING.  

The idea that well we all mess up and then God dishes out forgiveness from His big bag of goodies leaves a huge question unanswered.  What about personal holiness?  What is my personal response to God's forgiveness?  

For many years I lived a life that bought into this theology.  I would go along and be "OK" for a while and then sin would creep into my life.  Oh and sometimes it didn't creep, I ran out the door down the side walk looking for it and inviting it in.  After that I would feel guilt and shame.  Guilt is a healthy response to sin.  It is what drives us to make things right with God and with others.  Shame on the other hand is what drives us to bury our sin and hide from others.  Guilt calls us to make restitution and to repent.  Shame drives us to shove everything in a closet and lock the door.  As Beth Moore says "Shame is the Devil's calling card."  I would then spend time praying and begging God to forgive me.  Missing an important element...He already has.  Christ's death on the cross covered all my sins.  Forgiveness was readily available, I needed to accept it.  The problem with systematic sin is that forgiveness doesn't seem to stretch to cover it because we haven't really turned away from it.  

It is really hard to pray "Oh God, forgive my sin of gluttony." while rummaging through the cabinets in search of more food.  It is hard to pray "Oh God, forgive my unfaithfulness."  while chatting with someone on the Internet.  It is hard to pray "Oh God, forgive my lying."  while...well I think you get the idea.  Even when we try to live a "double" life our heart will find us out.  It will whisper to us that it isn't true.  

The good news of this story is this that when we truly repent; when we turn our face, heart, mind and body away from that sin...forgiveness washes over our soul.  Personal holiness is possible.  It isn't easy.  Daily it is a struggle to lay down my life.  Daily it is a struggle to fight the temptation to believe the lies Satan whispers.  Daily it is making the choice to turn away from any thing that draws me away from God.  Daily it is making the CHOICE to live a holy life.  

Strawberry Birthday Cake

For most of the birthdays in Tim's family they all get a Banana Cake. The Banana Cake is not what most people expect. The Fowler family recipe is actually a yellow layer cake. In between the layers are butter cream and bananas and the entire cake is covered with cool whip. It is very yummy.

For my birthday it has become a tradition that I have a strawberry birthday cake. I think it started the year we got married and has pretty much happened every year since then. I love strawberry cake. I had a strawberry wedding cake in the days before flavored wedding cakes were in vogue. Back in the day, you had a choice of a white wedding cake and the groom (who made this rule?) had a chocolate grooms cake. Well one thing I didn't want was a white wedding cake. I don't like white cake and since Tim got the chocolate I went with my next favorite strawberry. It was yummy and beautiful.

Back to the birthday cake, this year I had the brilliant idea of taking our Banana Cake recipe and substituting it with strawberries. It turned out very delicious. Here is my recipe.

One strawberry cake mix plus eggs, oil and water
One tub of Brummel & Brown Strawberry Creamy Fruit Spread
One cup of powdered sugar
milk
pint of strawberries
large container of cool whip topping.

Follow the directions to make the cake and bake it in three round layers. While the cake is baking mix the fruit spread (or butter if you want the original) and powdered sugar. Use the milk to get this to a consistency that you can spread between the layers. Slice the strawberries. When the cake is finished let it cool completely. After it has cooled place it one your cake pan or dish you will serve it on. Put a layer of cake and top with 1/3 of the fruit spread/sugar mixture and then add strawberries. Do this will all three layers. Then cover the entire cake with cool whip.

YUMMY goodness. This cake needs to be refrigerated if you aren't going to eat it right away.  I will post the original banana cake recipe when Tim's birthday rolls around and maybe with his I can get a picture of the cake when it is cut and you can see the layers.

Our Calendar Noteook

This past year, I decided to try a new method for teaching calendar ideas. I saw this Calendar Notebook and really liked the way it looked. I also liked that it wouldn't take up space on the wall like many calendar centers do.

I looked around and decided that I would use the following inserts for our notebooks. I used the blank calendars, blank 100 grids and Tally marks chart from Mrs. Meacham. I downloaded Written Date Page, Make the Date with Money, Hundred, Tens and Ones, and Weather Graphs from Mama Jenn.

Carissa and Jolanthe both have great print outs and links for calendar boards supplies and ideas. Carissa has some downloads to do color of the week, thermostat temperature tracker, what day is it? Lots of really good ideas.  I like the idea on Carissa's site of using real coins in the make the date and I plan to incorporate that into our notebooks this year as well.

Homemade Dishwasher Detergent

I posted on facebook that I was trying a recipe for homemade dish washing detergent. I had a few people say they would be interested to know if it worked.

I used this recipe. I actually had pretty high hopes. Ultimately, it was a huge failure. I even clicked around to some different tips and tried changing out the lemonade mix for lemon shine. Neither recipe worked well. We create a lot of dishes around here. So I want my dishwasher to work well. I don't want to have to pre wash my dishes before I put them in the dishwasher. A little rinsing is fine but anything more than that is a waste since I could just wash them by hand and be finished.

When I used this I had a few problems. The biggest was it didn't get things clean. Since I usually only lightly rinse my dishes I did the same thing with detergent. If there was any food on the dishes it did  not  come clean. The second issue was it left a white residue on everything. I tried adjusting the amount I used both more and less and still had the white film. I even tried doing an extra rinse cycle which helped somewhat but felt wasteful. The third issue is that the washing soda has a fairly strong soapy scent. The vinegar rinse helped with this but I just didn't like using that on my dishes.

Overall this experiment gets a big thumbs down. I only made a small batch of this but I am not sure what I will do with what is left. If you have any ideas please share.

Meal Plan Monday

We had a few meals "left over" from last week.

Breakfasts

cereal
pancakes
grits
eggs

Lunch

sandwiches
tacos
hot dogs
chicken nuggets
quesidillas
potato bar

Dinner

burgers
spaghetti
ziti
chili
pizza

I am also planning on restocking my pantry with a few easy meals with week.

Pantry meals

mac n cheese
chicken noodle soup

Meal Plan in Review

I thought I would post how our meals actually turned out.

Monday

cereal
Chick fil a
Pizza

Tuesday

pancakes

We had friends over and so lunch was a spread and some of this was snacks also.

pbj sandwiches, pb crackers, carrots, broccoli, apples, cuties, cheese sticks, chex mix, last of the chips, pretzels and choclate cupcakes

Moms had Cuban Chicken Salad.

Leftover pizza for dinner

Wednesday

cereal

Lunch was snack food for the boys, yogurt, popcorn, tortilla chips, cheese sticks, granola bars and pb crackers. I had leftover Cuban Chicken Salad.

Dinner burgers, rotel dip and tortilla chips. Dessert was ice cream with carmel sauce.

Thursday

cereal

sloppy joes

chicken noodle soup and french bread

Friday

chipotle

pizza


Saturday

leftover pizza and McDonalds

chicken, broccoli and rice

Sunday


granola bars

chili dogs

leftovers

We did pretty well the first part of the week.  Friday and Saturday we had some things come up that meant we ate out of the house more than I wanted to.  I plan to make sure that next week we have more sandwich options on hand.

3 John 4

I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.

On the morning of July 6th, I decided to take the boys to a summer movie. J didn't want to go and as I look back on that I am thankful that this time I didn't push the issue. He decided to stay home with Tim. They watched a video and talked about baptism and Jesus. He has been asking questions recently and we have been praying that God would continue to draw his heart. I walked in from the movie and say Tim and Josh sitting on the couch reading and praying. Amazing to see my husband lead his child in a prayer of faith. I went to our bedroom and cried.

As a parent there is nothing that I want more than to see my children follow Jesus. I know that they will still have trouble and trials. I know that life will not always be easy. I know they will face heart break and disappointment. I also know that all of those things are bearable when you walk in faith. I can't explain it but I know what "peace that passes all understanding" feels like. I want that for my children. I want to know that in the tough times and the times in which there doesn't seem to be a way out, that they will know that there is One who will see them through that day.

On Sunday we baptized this child "Church Plant in Texas" style, in a horse trough in a movie theater lobby.