Thanksgiving Day

Enjoyed a beautiful Thanksgiving service at church; whew was I challenged. Thankful for a visiting minister who raised the bar plenty high. Which we need (at least I do).  Think about this: America is one of the top ten wealthiest countries in the world, and yet the suicide rate has been on the rise since 1999. What is wrong with this picture?  Our society has forgotten Jesus. We were reminded of God’s faithfulness to His people when they are faithful to Him and exhorted to never forget Him! It was pointed out that the first giving of thanks in the Bible was by David, a man after God’s own heart. Is this significant? One would think so, as we are often exhorted in the New Testament to give thanks. Even in suffering – all things have the potential to bring us closer to God. As Zach Bertsch said, we can allow suffering to make us bitter or better. Trusting God, we choose better. It is our choice. Thankfulness is a choice. We do well to remember there is always something to be thankful for: freedom to worship, freedom to gather, freedom to travel, our sight, our hearing, etc. The list is endless. The choice is ours.

Well that kind of turned into a ramble. Anyway. A very very nice Thanksgiving Day service.

Then home to change before heading to a delicious dinner and sweet fellowship with a bunch of Kaisers.

Thanks U. Randy & A. Marj and Grandpa & Grandma.

In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. 

I Thessalonians 5:18

First Skate

It’s been a really fast month. Beautiful days, beautiful skies, beautiful times. School and baking bread and cookies and preparing food and doing laundry and playing with kittens and doing chores and playing Dutch Blitz and Euchre and Hearts and lots of other games and riding bikes and jumping on the trampoline and grocery shopping and mowing leaves and building a rink and making supper. And so on. Can hardly believe that Thanksgiving is tomorrow and it’s almost December.  Kids have their songs for the Christmas program, Christmas plans are being made, and secrets abound. Outside, everything is pretty much winterized, and Kate just commented today that, since the rink is ready for the tarp, there’s nothing more for her to do to get it ready. All tarp supports are pounded in (girl did it solo, all 98 of them), lights are up and working, and the rink shack is in place and ready. All we need now is a still day to lay out the tarp, and then some water, and then some cold weather…..so we wait patiently. Or not.

School is done for the day and thus for the week. All of us are ready for a few days’ break. Haven’t yet figured out how to get kids that are the “Oh mother, I’m so glad we are homeschooled. Please can we do our schoolwork today even though it’s a vacation day?” type. “The books” say those kinds of kids exist, but I’m not sure I believe that. Anyway. School is going well. Much learning for all . . . math, science, history, etc., and the more important things like diligence, focus, and kindness.  *cough* Much to learn yet also.

This week has been gray. No gorgeous blue sky pictures, oh no not this week. Gray means cold – at least it feels cold even if the temperature isn’t actually that cold – so yep, the woodburner’s been running. Love this time of year.

Enough rambling.

Back to last week - - - we thoroughly enjoyed Eli and Mya one day. Precious precious kiddos.

Beautiful sky – last week, of course.

Ditto.

This boy’s evening concerts are a highlight of my day. I love his original songs as well as the traditional hymns and melodies he plays. I hope he doesn’t tire of this because I sure don’t plan to. Don’t remember if I posted about this or not, but a few weeks ago the kids did a program at Restmor, the first in a long time. It was a bit crazy because one of our lead singers, Jacob, was stuck along interstate with a flat tire and didn’t get to Restmor until right before the program started. *Whew* glad he made it.  With that wild caper topping off the scant practices and lack of new songs, which was all due to kids having evening college classes, we decided any future programs would have to focus on the younger kids. And since that means no more evening practices (uhhh, it’s not like there were that many anyway), I relish Ben’s peaceful playing.  Well, I should say usually peaceful playing.  Sometimes he can get a little wild; and I like that too.

Tori had a slow week so decided to take the kids ice skating yesterday. There was a lot of speculation ahead of time about how many others would be skating; the hope was that most kids would be in school so the rink would be pretty empty. I ran some errands while they skated and was more than a little surprised to get Tori’s text awhile later: “It’s packed.”

HAHA Tori! The picture she sent showed exactly five skaters on the entire huge rink! I wished so bad I could skate, but since I’ve been battling a stupid ingrown toenail and my skates tend to be tight on my toes, I figured I better wait until I’m completely healed before I try it. The plan is to go again -  - - soon - - -

This little squirt did GREAT!!! He has good balance and speed and is soon likely to be skating circles around his older siblings, especially if we have a hard winter and the backyard rink is good. Time will tell.

How’s that for a “packed” rink??!!!

And that’s about all I know for this time around.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

 

O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.

Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.

For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods.

Psalm 95:1-3

More Beautiful Skies

We’ve had these gorgeous days lately. I just can’t get enough of the beautiful skies. So thankful for each day of beauty.

 

This is the day which the LORD hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.

Psalm 118:24

Leaf Raking & Hike

Annual leaf raking day at Sarah’s – this time at her new house. Beautiful day for it; kids had fun.

Sweet day of worship at church on Sunday; then afterwards, Dad & I took three kids on a hike along Mud Creek. Another beautiful day.

         Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice.  Philippians 4:4

Last Week

by Kate

Playing on the monkey bars was a huge ‘thing’ for a few days. The three littles would literally spend a couple hours in the afternoon playing with their boards and strings they had rigged up.

Mom’s walking trail takes her through the pasture in front of our house……

and down the back lane……

and back home by way of the pond.

More monkey shenanigans.

And a post isn’t complete without a px of some kittens.

The four Sauder kids joined us for Friday afternoon and evening.  Lexi and Wes stayed the night…the boys camped out but only made it half the night and they ended up back down in the warm basement. Lexi had a campout girl style with Jewel and Sarah: hang out in the girls’ bedroom and play.

Whit taking a run on the bales.

We took a walk out around the field and through the pasture and ended up down at the pond for snack.

Ben and Wes bombed around on the fourwheeler.

THE END

Try Again

So it looks like Live Writer is finally working again. But until I can figure out how to get pictures from my phone to my laptop, there will be no more posts. Any advice is appreciated; I have googled and tried stuff until I’m blue in the face and still can’t figure out what’s going on. Frustrating!