My baby is 6 now :o)

Yep, I can't believe how quickly time goes by. Michelle turned 6 on the 7th of this month and as I mentioned in the last post, the last few weeks we were busy planning a fun party. We decided since Angel didn't really get a party for her birthday back in April, we would celebrate her 1/2 birthday at the same time, so we did a Mother/Daughter tea party.

Now, mind you, our living area is not very big, and after inviting friends for both girls, we were looking at almost 30 girls and moms coming. So, since the weather here is awesome this time of year, we had an outdoor party. It would have been really cool if we had some sort of gazebo or tent to set up, but we don't, but we do have a really large garage, and with a little ingenuity and a lot of sheets, we were able to spiff the place up a bit. As usual, I had a lot of fun making invitations and decorations for the party. Angel put her jewelry making talent to work and made little goodies for everyone. I'll post more pictures and details about the craft projects over on my craft website. Here's a couple of pictures of the party.


This first one shows me reading parts of Proverbs 31 to the girls and talking about manners. I didn't want to post this one, but it was the best one to show the garage and how we decorated it.

Here are some of the guests working on their fans and picture frames. (Which reminds me I've got to get the pictures printed and get those back to the girls! YIKES!)

Here's a picture of the food table. Several of Angel's friends stayed over the night before and helped decorate and make the food. They were a TREMENDOUS help! I definitely couldn't have done all this without them. :o)

This, of course, is the cake. Yes, everything is edible--including the teapot, cup, saucer, and spoon. I've really been having fun with fondant lately. I wish the painting on them would have come out better, but I don't have petal dust and had to use food coloring which doesn't blend very well. You can see a close up of these on my craft blog.



And finally, here's some of the Birthday girls. Angel turned 15 in April and can't wait to get her driver's permit soon. She's wearing the dress she made for herself last month. Didn't she do a good job?


And, Birthday Girl #2. We put her hair up in rag rolls the night before. We can't do that in the winter time as the static gets too bad and her hair ends up in a million little knots. Anyway, as you can see, she's lost tooth #2 recently so now she has a big gap on the bottom.

We actually had two parties that day. Our church was having their annual Progressive Dinner and we were the first stop on the route. Since the garage was already cleared out and set up with tables and chairs, it worked out perfectly. After the girl's party, Angel helped me clean up and get the appetizers in the oven for the church party. We even had an hour or so to rest in the afternoon. The Progressive Dinner was a lot of fun. It was neat to see other people's houses and visit with everyone in a relaxed atmosphere.

I guess I should close this here. I have a few other projects we're working on, but I will save those for next week's post. Till then...

God's love and blessings!

Getting ready for School!

I didn't get this updated this Thursday because I couldn't get to my computer! I was knee deep in school books and boxes. I finally got tired of going out to the garage and moving boxes around to find specific books and decided to bring them all into the house, re-organize and catalog them to make it easier to find what I need. It took almost 4 days to get it done, but it finally is, and Angel and I just finished taking the boxes back out to the garage that we are not going to need this year and getting the school room all ready for Monday, our official first day of school. Well, Michelle's first day anyway. Grandma asked if Angel could come help her at the Meals on Wheels site Monday so she's getting a slight reprieve. :o) I think it will be good for Michelle and I to start the first day together anyway since this will be pretty new stuff for her.

We are grateful for the rain this last week. We would need a lot more to fill the ponds and creeks, but at least the plants are getting a good drink. A few weeks ago we noticed a lot of tree's leaves turning orange and yellow already because of lack of moisture. The rain did help the berries a bit, but I think it's a little too late for most of them. It doesn't seem like we'll get much more of a harvest of blackberries this year but that's OK. I think I have enough in the freezer to make one more batch of syrup, and maybe some jam. YUM!

Speaking of syrup, Angel and I took some with us last night to a fun sleepover at church with most of the other girls and their moms. We had a lot of fun playing games, doing hair, getting to know each other, and of course, getting very little sleep. The syrup was yummy on the Swedish pancakes one of the moms made for us for breakfast this morning. That's a recipe I'm going to have to learn.

The guys managed to get Nick's Tracker running last week. I think they've mentioned an oil leak they need to fix, but it should be up and usable for him pretty soon. My van is next on the Dr.'s list once the Tracker is in remission. I pray that it doesn't take long to fix and doesn't cost too much.
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Update: I meant to post this last Saturday but wasn't able to and then simply forgot in the midst of a busy school week. We did start school on Monday, and things are going well. I'm sure we'll be tweaking the schedule a bit here and there until we find what works best for us this year, but so far, so good. Angel's attitude has been wonderful. In fact, she's been up, dressed and ready to start before I am each day. She was even patient with my grumpiness this afternoon during math. I'm not sure that I'm going to be able to help Darlene with the paper route much longer. Five hours of sleep does not make for a very happy teacher, or a very focused one.

Here's a of pictures of Mike and the kids working on my garden fence and the finished project. He needed the kids to hold the log still while he cut a notch in the end. You can't see much of the garden because there weren't any flowers in bloom when we took this picture and the greenery just kind of blends into the overgrown lawn around it. :o) Oh well, all of the plants in the garden, except for the two rose bushes on the end, were transplanted from elsewhere on the property. There are daisies, strawberries and black-eyed Susans. There are even some chives in there that our Pastor gave to me and I didn't have any other place ready for them at the time so they were put in here. I guess you could call this a "holding" garden as I've put most of these in here to hold them until I can find a better place for them and to keep them from being mowed down by the lawn mower.

Anyway, I don't have a lot of time. I realized yesterday that Michelle's Birthday is coming up very quickly and I am hosting part of a church progressive supper the weekend after that. So, this next week I will be busy with a few craft projects and trying to finish up a few projects around the house here along with making sure the girls and I don't get behind in their school work. So, with that in mind, I should head off to bed and get some much needed rest.

Till next week, God's love and blessings!

I'm a Grandma-again

I first became a Grandma when Angel adopted her cat Princess, now my youngest has become the mother to a beautiful monarch butterfly. Length: 2 inches, width: 4 inches, black fuzzy body, orange, black and yellow wings, sex: I have no idea! Isn't it beautiful?

In work related news, Mike really likes his new job. I like that he gets home pretty early and we still have the afternoons to spend together. Nick was just hired at the Subway here in town. It's not much, but it will help towards his college. And, I'm hoping to get a card class going in a couple of weeks--maybe that will help me get my Stampin' Up! business up and running again.

I've been having so much fun outside these last few weeks. The weather here is great and there's so many new things to discover on our property. The girls and I went out picking berries again today and harvested some of the herbs in the garden. Here's a picture of today's harvest.

It's not much for berries. Last week I pretty much filled this basket with raspberries each day. The raspberries are slowing down and the black berries are just starting to ripen. I also think the birds have finally found my brambles and are beating me to them. By next week this basket should be filled with blackberries every other day or so if I can beat the birds. Unfortunately, the blackberries are a lot harder to get to than the raspberries and they are a LOT more thorny. The white flowers in the basket are chamomile that I dry and make tea with. The leaves are oregano, basil, and chocolate mint. I'm drying those right now in my dehydrator along with the chamomile. Yes, my kitchen smells a bit different right now, especially since Angel and I just processed a bunch of the berries to make syrup with later.

We're supposed to get rain for the next few days, so I'm going to find lots of indoor things to do. I need to go through our school books and get next year's curriculum out and get the bookshelves organized. After that, I think I'm going to work on Birthday cards and some scrapbook pages. Mike and Nick are working on Nick's car to see if they can get it working pretty soon. I would appreciate any prayers lifted up in their behalf. I can't seem to keep enough band-aids in the house for them when they're working on cars! :o)

Well, I'm off to get dinner started. Till next week...
God's love and blessings to you!

Fun, fun, fun times!

So much going on the last few weeks. For one thing, we have one very excited 5 year old. Can you tell why?

She has been bouncing off the walls for several days since the tooth loosened. Everyone that has come within 5 feet of her knows that she has a loose tooth, and this morning I had the honors of pulling the wiggly little bugger out. Now she skips around the house with that silly grin on her face. :o)

In other news, my friend, Sonja came out to visit a few weekends ago. We had a lot of fun together. Michelle was so excited to play with Helen again. I think they only had one disagreement the whole weekend--that is a truly amazing thing for best friends. We went to the park, and of course, we had to visit the Mall of America. That was a fun day. The shopping was fun, but just being with my friend and talking was the best part. I so wish they lived closer to us and Sunday morning good-by's were really hard. :o(

I've mentioned before that I believed we had raspberry canes on the property. Well, I was right, not only do we have raspberries, but black caps and blackberries as well. The raspberries and black caps started to ripen just about the time Sonja and the kids arrived, and I've been picking ever since. The first few days of picking I only got about a cup or so, but now I get about 3 cups every other day. The raspberries are tapering off a little bit, and now the blackberries are starting to ripen. Many of the berries are pretty small, but considering how little rain we've had this year, it's pretty amazing that there's any berries there at all. I think I'm going to make a sign to put by the mail box naming our property Berried Treasure. It's so neat each time I go out and find new berry brambles in different areas. They're sometimes hard to distinguish from the rest of the underbrush until the berries start to ripen, but now that they are, I keep finding them all over the place. They're like a surprise gift God has left just for us to enjoy. So fun!

We've been finding other treasures as well. We have day lilies, daisies (my favorite flower :o), black-eyed Susans, peonies, butternut trees, a chestnut tree, grapes, rhubarb, and all kinds of wild flowers. A friend of ours pointed out that we even have a few illegal plants up on the hill that I'll be clearing out this week. (Yikes!-You know we've always wondered what the previous owners of this house were doing with a garage that has double barred windows and doors.)

On one of our berry picking adventures, Michelle pointed out a beautiful monarch caterpillar so we now have a science project going. We've watched him (or her?) eat up milkweed leaves, leave droppings (eew!), make himself a "ladder" of webbing to climb to the top of our jar and then loose his skin and turn into a chrysalis. It's a cool green color with a black and gold stripe and tiny gold dots on it. The gold looks like actual gold. You can even see his wings through the chrysalis. Pretty cool.

Well, I'm going to close this here so I will still have time to get some of the other pictures we've taken this week onto Picasa. Hopefully by next week I'll have some great butterfly pictures to post. :o)

Till then, God's love and blessings.

He's got a job!!

God has been so good. Sometimes it's hard to wait for His timing, but He always knows what's best. We've been here almost a year and Mike's biggest priority was finding a job that would support us. The part time position was fine, but the hours have been steadily declining the last few weeks as business in the shop is slow, and it's really hard to budget when you don't know how much you're going to be making from week to week.

A friend at church gave us notice when the IT position became available in his school district, and Mike immediately applied. We were so excited to find out Wednesday that he got the job. It's not quite a full time position, but it's guaranteed 30 hours a week with dental and other benefits. They would also like to use him to substitute there which would be additional hours. We are all so excited. I think the kids and I have felt like this was home for a while, but for Mike, working only a couple days a week seemed more like he was still on vacation than anything.

In other news, Angel just returned today from a week at church camp. She was just beyond the age of being a camper, so she went as kitchen help along with another girl from the church. She said she had a wonderful time, and she got a LOT of pictures. I will try and get the memory card from her tomorrow and post some on our Picasa site. I saw some really funny ones of her with shaving cream in her hair!

Well, I hear movement above my head which tells me that the movie Mike and Michelle were watching must be over and it will soon be time to say prayers and get a little one into bed.

Till next week...

God's love and blessings.

I've got pictures!

I tried to blog last night, but the pictures I took of the house didn't come out very well, so I had to wait until today when the sun was out to get some pictures. I took some after shots of the kitchen and living room. You can see them here. Here's a few shots of the shelves Mike designed and made for me.
He just cut one more for me to go over the doorway between the breakfast nook and living room. He did such a great job on these and all the other "honey-do" items I've had for him since we bought this place. I think we still have a dozen or so projects to work on as we can afford them, and that doesn't even count the projects for outside! Oh well, there's no hurry, we have the rest of our lives to work on them--or until the Lord returns, whichever comes first.

Well, I've got a shelf to go stain so I will close here. Y'all have a great week and I will chat again next week. Till then, God's love and blessings.

We are officially moved in!

Actually, we've been moved in for a few weeks, but this is the first chance I've had to sit down and do some updating.

We are having so much fun here in our new house. It seems like every time we go out in the "yard", we find new treasures. So far we've found, raspberries (LOTS of them!), rhubarb, grapes, strawberries, peonies, wild roses, and my favorite flower--daisies. :o) Poor Nick never gets to finish mowing the yard because I keep finding things I want to transplant to a better location. We have a family of chipmunks living in the yard along with some squirrels and a bazillion birds. We like listening to the wood peckers and the owls. We've seen a few deer wandering through the property and even a few snakes. We're probably going to get a visit from a bear sooner or later, especially once the raspberries start to ripen. We've already seen a few while out driving. Most of the house is surrounded by trees, but there's a large open field in the front, and the last few weeks we've enjoyed watching the fireflies all around it.

We are pretty much settled in. I still have about 2 dozen boxes to sort through, but the furniture is all in and it looks like home again. Mike just finished a few decorative shelves in the kitchen for me to display my teacup collection. I think one more over the doorway should do it--until I add to the collection that is. ;o) The ones he finished came out great. I will take some pictures as soon as the kitchen is all finished. The other rooms are all finished except the stairway. I want to hang Mike's plaques and momentos from the different bases we've been to, but I need a bigger ladder to reach. Someday I'd like to paint the two bathrooms, but I think those projects may wait a little while.

Mike is still working at the computer store, but, Lord willing, he'll have an interview this week or next for an IT position at the nearby school district. It would be REALLY nice to have a full time job--especially since we had to by a more reliable vehicle. I'm hoping to get my Stampin' Up! business going again soon. My office is almost all organized, but I think it's organized enough to work with. Nick is looking for a job right now, and the girls and I are finishing up their school work a little at a time.

I think that just about does it for us. Since this blog is for my friends and family, I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave a comment or email me. We don't have long distance on our phone yet, so we haven't done a lot of calling. We can use our cell phones, but they don't always have great reception.

Well, now that we're settled in, I'm trying to get back into a routine so I will be posting again this Thursday, and will make a great effort to update each Thursday. Till then--God's love & blessings to you.

So much to do and so little time!

I can't believe it's been over a month since I've updated this blog! We've been quite busy. We closed on the house and started working right away. Mondays and Wednesdays I was taking Nick to school so on Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, we would pack our lunches and head over to the house. Mike has been getting more hours at work (Yay!) but when he does get some time off he comes out with us. So far we've ripped up all the carpet and padding, and done quite a bit of plumbing and patching work. The pipes weren't winterized properly, but thankfully, there was only one busted pipe, and it was easy to get to. Mike finished repairing the wall from that, got the downstairs bathroom up and running, and cut down 3 dead trees that were too close to the house. I just finished the last of the painting that needs to be done and all the appliances are now in--including the HUGE refrigerator that had to go upstairs! Now we're just waiting for the carpet to be laid upstairs.

Since the carpet has been laid downstairs, we've started moving some of the kid's things into their rooms. Angel's room is almost finished. She got a remnant piece of carpet, which was installed right away so we picked up her bedroom set. It's an antique that she bought off of Craigslist. She's just waiting for Mike and I to get a new mattress set as she is getting the ones we're using right now. Michelle's bed is in, but we still need to move in her dresser and the things that are here at Grandma's. She was so funny when we opened some of the boxes of toys that have been packed for 10 months now. It's like she's meeting old friends again. :o)

A few weekends ago I also had cakes to do for church. One was for our Ladies Salad Supper. I made 100 cupcakes with flowers on them and a small cake that had a watering can pouring water on the flowers. Our theme was from Proverbs 31 and referred to an excellent wife being more precious than rubies. One of the ladies from church designed these cute invitations where she put tiny rubies in the center of each of the flowers, so we kind of ran with that idea for the decorations. Each of my cupcake flowers had a red m&m in the center to represent the ruby. That one was a lot of fun to do, but not as much fun as the one I did the next weekend. I've been wanting to try my hand at making fondant flowers for a while, so I decided that May's birthday/anniversary cake for church would be a good time to play. It took a few days to make the flowers, but it was so much fun. The exciting part for me was the fact that the image in my head actually came out on the cake! That doesn't usually happen. :o) Here's pictures of both cakes. You can see close ups of the flowers on our picasa website


My children blessed me on Mother's day each with handmade cards and $33. I thought it was an odd amount until I remembered joking with Nick that I would love to have $100 to pick out some flowers and herbs. I haven't been able to garden in 6 years, and now that it is warming up, I am itching to be out digging in the dirt. Anyway, the kids cards were wonderfully sweet, and Mike's card had the extra $1 to make it an even $100. I told them this is one idea I would love to become a tradition. It was so much fun to go out shopping for herbs and pots and not feel guilty about it. I even had enough to buy a small burgundy cherry tree that reminded Angel of the cherry trees in Japan, and two rose bushes. I already planted the herbs and am hoping to get a small plot dug out tomorrow so I can get the tree and bushes in the ground.

Speaking of the ground and our property, as things are starting to green up here, and we've done a little exploring around the place, it seems like we've inherited several acres worth of raspberry canes. I am so excited because I LOVE raspberries! I'm not 100% positive, but I'm pretty sure that's what they are, so it looks like I'm going to have to do some experimenting with raspberry recipes and learn to do some canning. I told Mike a few months back that I thought it would be neat if we could think of a name for our place and now I think we might have to call it Raspberry Acres, or something like that. :o)

I've saved the best news for last. On May 3rd, I got an early Mother's Day gift, and the best one ever. Michelle came to me and said she wanted to say that "special prayer". I got the awesome privilege of leading her to the Throne of Grace where she asked Christ to be her Lord and Savior. For me to know that all of my babies are now His children is the best gift of all!

On that note, I must go get ready for bed and another day of house prepping. Till next week (I hope), God's love and blessings.

Exciting happenings this week!

Well, this is the long awaited week. We close on the house on Thursday and will start the process of fixing the place up so we can move in. This seems to be the perfect time of year for it too, as it's just warming up enough that we'll be able to open the windows a bit while we're painting. We haven't done much of the prep work yet because most of it requires us to purchase things, and that will depend on how much we can get from the bank. We're still waiting for the appraisal on the land to find out how much that will be. Anyway, I'm sure Thursday will be a very busy day for us!

We have had some eventful days the last few weeks (sorry for not posting). April 1st we celebrated Angel's 15th Birthday. Unfortunately, most of us weren't home for the day, and we had church that evening, but we did take her out to dinner, and once we get settled in the new place, we'll have a sleepover with her girlfriends. April 6th was Grandma's Birthday, but again, we were all out and about so we didn't get to do much to celebrate. Darlene did make her a yummy dinner, and Mike surprised her and brought home a DQ shake for her.

Last Thursday we were invited to a friend's house to see what it's like to collect maple sap and how syrup is made. It was sooo much fun! The buckets didn't seem that heavy that day, but Nick, Angel and I were all feeling it in the shoulders the next day. :o) Mike got there a little late, but he did get to help out a bit. We had a yummy dinner and fellowshipped for a while. I've posted some pictures on our Picasa site so you can check them out, but here's a few I really liked.


Well, I don't guarantee I will post anything on Thursday this week, but I'll do my best. Till then,

God's love and blessings.

Ooops, missed a week!

Yep, I missed last week's post. I do have a good excuse though. I was busy packing for the Women's Retreat. What fun! Nine of us ladies from our church drove to the ends of the earth to meet with lots of other ladies to spend the weekend in fellowship, worship, and study. It wasn't really the end of the earth, but it sure seemed like it after 5 hours of driving through the woods. I can honestly tell you that I have no idea where we were, but we had a fun time getting there. :o) The retreat itself was great, but being a newbie at church, I think I mostly enjoyed getting to know the other ladies. All-in-all, it was a wonderful weekend.

We are still waiting to hear about the house. We went to the Realtor's last week to resign the papers that they sent back. Right now, we're just waiting for them to sign and set a closing date. I am trying sooooooo hard to be patient, but it can be difficult at times. I would appreciate any prayers lifted on my behalf.

We took Angel back to the doctors today to look at her knee once more. There's still fluid there, and the pain is still the same. Thankfully, it only hurts when she kneels down, and that's something she can easily avoid doing. She will start physical therapy, and the doc drew 4 vials of blood to run tests on. Angel seems more concerned about her cat, Princess than her knee. Princess's eyes were swollen shut for several days with some kind of cold. They seem to be better now. Once we get settled in our own place, and away from all of the cats here, we'll take her in for a complete check up. Thankfully, we had her vaccinated for everything before we left Japan.

Mike has been able to get some extra hours in at work. He had his first substitute job last week, and he's teaching twice this week. His boss at the computer store asked him to work full time hours next week as they have a big job to do for a company. He's also had an interview and a few replies to applications he's turned in. I know God has something in mind for him somewhere, we just don't know where yet. Again, prayers for patience, and just trusting in Him would be greatly appreciated. It's easy to say, but oh, so hard to do!

Well, I guess I should close here. I think I might go work on some pages for Michelle's scrapbook. Till next week...

God's love and blessings

No New News Yet :o(

On the house anyways. We haven't heard back from the Realtor yet that the bank has signed the papers. We're waiting on that before we do any of the inspections. Maybe tomorrow....

In other news, Nick's permit showed up on Tuesday, and he drove us to school on Wednesday. He did pretty good considering he's never driven on the right side of the road. :o) For the most part, driving here is the same as Japan, except for the size of the roads (a one lane road here is a two way one there!) and there are a few laws that are different (i.e. right turn on red). We have to call and make an appointment for him to take the driving test some time next week or the week after to get his license.

We took Angel to the doctors today. She hurt her knee back in late October/early November. We saw the doctors about it in December because it was still bothering her. It was finally beginning to feel better when she fell at church last night. There seems to be a bit of fluid on it, and the doctor is a bit concerned about how long its taken to heal. They took x-rays in December that showed the bones were fine. For now, Angel has a knee brace, and when we go back in 2 weeks she'll decide whether or not to do an MRI and some lab work. The brace doesn't let her bend her knee, so she's feeling a bit like Frankenstein as she hobbles around the house. :o) Thankfully, she's not in any pain unless she kneels down on that knee, which, with the knee brace, I don't think she'll be doing.

Mike is still applying for jobs. He does have his first substitute teaching position on the 20th. He'll be teaching High School Science, so he would probably appreciate any prayers lifted up for him. :o)

As for me, I'm just schooling the girls. Michelle's work is pretty simple, so I'm really only teaching Angel, and we get done with our school days pretty early (when Angel gets up early, that is). I'm really looking forward to getting into a house of our own so I can start teaching craft classes again. Hmmm, maybe I'll start getting some projects planned now, so that once we're settled in I'll be ready to start. Let's see, should I do a card swap first, a scrapbook class, or maybe a stamp camp? (rubbing chin, thoughtfully)

Oh, sorry about that ramble there, I did mention before that I finished a gift for Michelle's friend and as soon as I get done here I'm going to upload the pictures of that and the ones I took of the house to our Picasa website. I apologize if you tried to use the link on the side and couldn't. I didn't realize the link was to my side (where I can edit things), and not the public side. Anyway, I changed the link, and I hope that it works. Please let me know whether it does or not.

Here's a sneak peak of the project. Actually, this is the one I made for Michelle. Helen's was purple, and obviously, said "Helen" on top. It's a set of drawers made to hold her hair bows and hairbands. The drawers are color coded to make it easier to find the accessory that best matches her outfit. It's made entirely of cardstock and chipboard (with some shrink plastic, brads, and of course, glitter for embellishments :o)

And, here's a view from the family room (school/craft room) of the house we're hoping to get. You can see the little bridge there that goes over the creek which, of course, is frozen solid right now. I'm so excited! Isn't that the most awesome view to look at everyday?


Well, I'm off to upload photos to Picasa. Till next week...

God's love and blessings!

I'm a day late.

I am late, but I have a good excuse. I was waiting to hear from our Realtor so I could update you on the house. He called this afternoon (yeah!) and told us everything looks good. They haven't signed the papers yet, but they asked for a copy of the earnest money check and the pre-approval from the bank. So, if they want us to put the earnest money down, they must be willing to agree to our terms and pay the closing costs. Woo hoo!!!! We're going to go see the Realtor tomorrow with the check and letter and then possibly stop by the house and take some measurements for the new carpeting we'll need to get.

Another blessing this week, Nick passed the written portion of the driving test, and they waived the 6 month waiting period for the driving portion. He'll get the permit in the mail, and they said he could come in a week or so later to take the driving test. It's good news for me, but Nick says he's not looking forward to driving to school and eating lunch by himself twice a week. I have to say I will miss the chats we have on the drive.

I took pictures last week at the church snow soccer game, but Nick still has my memory card so I haven't downloaded them to my computer yet. God was really nice and dropped a few inches of snow for us the night before, so we had plenty for the game. It was a lot of fun. Mike was supposed to take pictures of the Lippizan stallions for me that day, but they wouldn't allow him to take the camera into the building. Oh well. Angel said it was a neat show and that they had a good time. Grandma was a bit disappointed that they weren't the stallions from Austria, but some place here in America.

Well, it looks like the next few weeks will be our chance to help stimulate the economy as we shop for things for the house. We will need a washer, dryer, stove, and, as I mentioned before, carpeting. I'm sure there's a few other things we're going to need, but those will have to wait a bit.

I guess I should be going. I was working on a cake I'm making for church Sunday, which required kneading blue food coloring into some fondant. This is not a neat process, and my blue stained fingers and nails are driving me crazy. I think I'm going to go soak them and see if I can find a way to exfoliate it away. Till next week...

God's love and blessings!

God is so good!

Someone mentioned last week at church that it is a good idea to be specific when you pray, so that's what I did this week, and God was so good to answer. First off, we made the bid on the house, and my prayer was that we would hear back quickly from the bank as to whether or not they accepted. We heard back the next day! They didn't drop the price as far as we wanted, so we counter bid. Again, I prayed for a quick answer and that it would be within our budget if it was His will that we have this house. Mike did the paperwork for the bid yesterday afternoon, and we heard from them this morning--and it seems to be within our budget. We dropped by the bank this afternoon to make sure and got our pre-approval letter so Mike is going to the Realtor again tomorrow to give our final offer and see what happens.

Secondly, we were concerned about $5000 we had put down on the modular home we originally wanted to build. Our paperwork said that this was non-refundable. We fretted about it for a while, but we finally prayed and gave it to the Lord. If it was His will that we get the money back, He is more than able to take care of it, and He did! We're getting the entire deposit back! God is so good!

In other family news, Mike, Angel and Grandma are going to St. Paul on Saturday to see the Lippizan stallions. Grandma is so excited she can hardly wait! The rest of us will be going to the church that morning for some snow soccer. Yes, you read that right. Apparently this is a yearly thing at our church to play a game of soccer before the snow melts. It seems that the snow kind of equalizes the playing field for everyone. It sounds like fun. :o)

I spent several days this week working on a Birthday present for Michelle's best friend Helen. I designed a set of drawers for her to organize all her hair bows and barrettes. I made one for Michelle as well. I'm hoping tomorrow to get my camera out and get some pictures of it to post on my craft blog.

Well, I just heard Darlene call us all for supper, so I better close. Till next week...

God's love and blessings.

This is Going to be a Long Post.

Wow, what a week! Yes, I missed posting on Thursday, but I'm making up for it now with lots of news and even a few pictures. :o)

I'll start with the pictures. The library that the girls and I hang out at while Nick is at school was hosting a Fancy Nancy party this Wednesday. For those of you who are unaware, Fancy Nancy is a story book character who does everything "fancy". Michelle was so ecstatic to go. They fancied up the children's section of the library with lights, tulle and ribbon. They had pink lemonade in fancy cups, and of course, lots of accessories. The girls even got to have a little make-up put on. I will post most of the pictures I took on our Picasa page tomorrow, but I wanted to post a few here. I love this one. Notice the pinky...
And doesn't she just look marvelous? That's her Fancy Nancy doll she got for Christmas.

Nick took this shot on the way home. Our Marvelous Michelle pooped out. :o)

As for other news. After going through tons of floor plans, and getting bids on the well and septic, and talking to I don't know how many people about different types of houses, we decided to put in a bid on the house next door. It's the property adjacent to ours, and it's been foreclosed. We had taken a look at it back in November, and I wasn't real thrilled with it then, but the longer we are here, the better it is looking. The listing says it has a walk-out basement, but apparently they forgot to dig a hole for it, so it's actually the first floor. Which means the kitchen and living areas are upstairs. Not sure why they did this, but on the bright side, maybe I'll lose a few of these extra pounds lugging groceries up stairs all the time. :o) It's definitely not my dream home, but the price is pretty good, and it will work for us. Maybe once Mike gets his teacher's license and gets a full time job we'll be able to pay this one off sooner and build the big house on the hill. We'll see. So for now, we're waiting to hear back from the bank on our bid and we'll go from there. Please pray that we'll hear back soon. There is a bit of work that will need to be done before we could move in. The carpet will need to be replaced, and some of the rooms need painting. The listing also stated that it has a fireplace, but apparently the previous owners decided they should take that with them, so we'll need to get the hole in the wall fixed as well.

I spent all of today working on a cake for our church banquet tomorrow night. I would love to have a double oven so I could bake more layers at once, but I think by the time we can afford that, my back and hands won't be allowing me to make cakes anymore! Oh well. Here's a picture of the top of today's cake. I'm going to try and get a picture of the whole thing tomorrow, but it was so big that I couldn't get high enough to get a better shot. I don't like writing on cakes and, par for the course, I ran out of room and had to scrunch the last of the reference on there. Oh well.


One last thing, if you are reading this before Valentine's Day, please pray for Mike and I. We were asked to do a skit at the banquet tomorrow night and we're still trying to memorize our lines! Thanks!!

I better get going. I'm tired and need to get Michelle into bed. I believe I'm going to be crawling into mine shortly after that. Till next week...

God's love and blessings!

Blame it on the Floorplans!

Well, Mike and I stopped by the bank yesterday and got an idea of what we can afford, and the banker really frowned on the idea of a manufactured (formerly known as mobile) home. I guess there's a bunch of additional fees the banks put on those, and they don't have a very good resale value. So, she sent us off to a custom home place where we were given even more floor plans to look through. I've seen so many floor plans the last few weeks my head is beginning to spin, and that's my excuse for not posting yesterday--because I had my head buried in house books all evening. :o)

The girls and I have been busy with school work. Grandma didn't have to work at Meals-on-Wheels, so Angel went with Michelle and I to take Nick to school and we got a lot of her stuff caught up. Sometimes home schooling can be so frustrating and we get behind, but then there are days like today where everything just clicks, and we zoom right through the day. I also enjoy the opportunity to talk with Angel. We have conversations about all kinds of things during the course of a school day.

As you can tell by the fact that I'm still taking Nick to college, he still doesn't have the bank statement, so he still doesn't have a license. :o(

Well, Mike will be home from work soon, so I should close for now. Till next week, don't tell God how big your "storms" are, instead, tell your "storms" how big your God is!

And He got up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, "Hush, be still." And the wind died down and it became perfectly calm. Mark 4:39

God's love and blessings.

Where did Thursday go?

I didn't forget to post yesterday, I simply forgot yesterday was Thursday!

We've made a tough decision this week. I've been dreaming of my big house on the hill for so long, but it looks like that just isn't going to happen-not anytime soon anyway. :o( So, we've decided to go for a manufactured home next to the garage that is already on the property. It would save us not only on the house itself, but there's already a well, electricity, gas, and of course, the garage. We're also not going to put a basement on this one, so that will save us some money as well. We're trying to do this based off Mike's retirement pay alone so no matter what the economy and his job situation is, we should be OK on the bills. I think we've all got mixed feelings about the idea. We were all looking forward to the house on the hill, but the idea of being in our own place soon is REALLY exciting. We'd also be able to fix up the apartment that's on the back of the garage which would be a great place to teach cake decorating and craft classes and if company comes, they can have their own little apartment to stay in. Mike and I will go and talk with the banker on Thursday and we'll see where we go from there.

Nick is doing pretty good in his classes right now. He's started thinking about getting a job back in Iwakuni and moving there, but I don't think it's likely that he'll be able to find one that will support him-not without a college degree and some experience under his belt. We've also discussed the military. It's not an option he likes, but there just doesn't seem to be anything else available.

Angel worked with Grandma a couple of days this week, but she needed to catch up on some of her school work, so I took her place for a couple of the days. It was fun, but I'm so not used to getting up early and now, I'm exhausted!

Mike seemed to enjoy his first full week at work. He's only working 3 days, but they keep him pretty busy the whole time. He says for such a small company (4 employees) they sure get a lot of business. He said today as soon as he finished up the 3 computers he was working on, someone else showed up with 2 more. He's enjoying it and learning some new tricks as well.

Well, this lady is about to fall asleep at the keyboard, so I better close this for now and get to bed. Till next week,
God's love and blessings!

What a Week!

It's been a roller-coaster, up-and-down kind of week for us. We still haven't heard from one of the schools Mike interviewed for last week, but the Academy College seemed very interested in Mike teaching an Air Traffic Control class for them next semester. However, we still haven't heard back from them as to whether or not he has the job and the hours, pay, etc. He did get a call last Friday from a local computer fix-it shop here that he had visited and asked about a job. We were so excited to find out that they were wanting to hire him part-time, unfortunately, we found out yesterday that the hours are even more "part time" than we were expecting, and the pay's not very good. Oh well, it's a start. Mike's substitute teacher license is on its way so he can also substitute at the schools around here.

Today we decided to go look at some houses that are up for sale. We already have 17 acres, but with this market, it seems that it might be cheaper to buy a house than build one. It's becoming a very difficult decision. I've had my heart so set on our house for so long, that giving up the dream of it is difficult. It's so hard to know whether the desire for this house has been from the Lord, and He's trying to teach us (mainly me) patience to wait for His timing, or whether I'm being selfish and He wants us to settle for something less. So far, none of the houses seem to be "just right". Most of the ones we looked at would take a LOT of work and money to fix, or they were located way too far away. We know we can't make any decisions till about April anyway, so we'll just keep looking and see what happens. In the meantime, I'm also looking at smaller houseplans to see if that's a route we should take.

Angel has been quite busy this week. Carole has been asked to fill in all week at meals on wheels, and Angel has been helping her. Next week though, I think I'm going to have to limit her to only 2 or 3 days so she doesn't get behind in her school work.

Nick is enjoying his college classes so far. They seem pretty easy right now, and he and Mike are working on one of the classes together because it's computer stuff that Mike is interested in learning as well. My only prayer right now is that we get his bank statement soon so we can get him a driver's license. Michelle and I take him to school and then we hang out at the library until he's done. We enjoy the library, but I think it's going to get boring pretty soon, and there isn't anything else there for us to do.

Last Sunday, we woke up to a beautiful winter wonderland so I grabbed my camera as we headed out to church. On the way home, I had Mike drop me off at the corner, about a mile from our house. Nick joined me, and the two of us walked home and took pictures along the way. The sun was out most of the time, and there was no wind blowing, so it was a nice walk home. It even started to snow quite a bit for part of the walk and the sun was out at the same time. Really neat. Here's a couple of the pictures we took.


And here's a picture I had Nick take of Mike and I before we headed off to church that morning. It's not often that I'm in front of the camera so I better hang on to this one!


Well, Angel and I have a busy day tomorrow catching up on some of her school work, so I better close for now. Till next week...

God's love and blessings!

It's Been a Busy Week.

I almost didn't get a chance to sit down here today and post this update, but I am determined to keep this resolution as long as I can. :o)

Last Friday, the Rasmussens invited us to lunch at their house so Mike and Nick could help her with her computer. We had a wonderful visit and a wonderful meal. This is the same lady who invited the girls and I to pick apples and can applesauce. I'm looking forward to learning many gardening and canning tips from this wonderful couple. He makes the most awesome pickles! Mike was able to get her computer up and running, and found her emails for her. :o)

Monday Mike had an interview with the school district here for an IT position, but so far, we haven't heard from them as to whether or not they are going to hire him. :o(

Tuesday night, Angel was invited to a sleepover for one of the girls at church who is leaving for college this week. I think the girls had a pretty good time. Besides the usual sleepover fun stuff, they made some goodies for a couple of the men in our church who are having some health issues.

Tuesday was also orientation for Nick so he and Mike drove down and spent most of the day there, while Wednesday was Nick's official first day of school. So, we now have a first year elementary student, a first year High School student, and a first year college student! How did we manage to time it that way? Anyway, Michelle and I drove Nick on Wednesday, and we spent his class time at the library and shopping at Wal-Mart. There's not much else to do there. I'm looking forward to Nick getting his license and being able to drive down there himself. :o)

Mike had an interview at a college in Minneapolis today that happened to be a mile from the Mall of America, so the kids, Grandma, and I tagged along and shopped around while he had his interview (mostly window shopping). It sounds like they are going to hire him part time. We'll know all the details later, but it does look quite promising. It is a distance to drive, but right now, we don't know how many classes he would be teaching or how many days he'd have to drive down there. It's also something he can probably do while he substitute teaches and works on his teacher's certificate. I'll update you next week on this one.

Lastly, I'll leave with a little something from my Bible studies this week. In the book of Matthew, Peter sees Christ walking on the water and asks to go out and meet Him. He gets out of the boat and begins walking toward Christ, but upon seeing the wind and waves, he begins to sink. I love this account because it reminds me that as long as my eyes are focused on the Lord, rather than the trouble around me, He will sustain me.

"But seek first His kindgom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Matthew 6:33-34

Till next week,
God's love and blessings to you!

Keeping my Resolutions!

Well, here I am keeping my resolution to post here every Thursday. So far, so good! :o) So, what have the Hendersons been up to this past week? Not a whole lot. With Mike not working, church and school are the main activities around here. Speaking of work, Mike has an interview on Monday, and he received an email last night from another company about scheduling an interview. WOO HOO! He's also been busy making sure the military is getting all his paperwork finalized. Some of the jobs he wants to apply for he could get VA benefits for if he had his "retired" paperwork in hand.

We're also waiting for Nick to get in a bank statement so he can go get a driver's license. I know that sounds silly, but he needs 2 different things to prove that he's a WI resident and so far, none of the things we've tried have worked, to include the notarized copy of the bank statement (he was getting an electronic copy). It's all very frustrating, especially since the DMV is a bit of a drive for us. Anyway, as soon as that comes in, he can go get a permit, and hopefully, since he's been driving for several years, he will only need the permit for a little while before they'll let him take the test. In the meantime, Mike or I will need to drive him to college (about an hour or so from here) and hang out till he's done. That's a LONG time to wait around. Maybe I'll find out what the library is like there and spend some time reading.

Right now, Angel has gone to help her Grandma at Meals on Wheels. Grandma fills in in the kitchen when someone else can't so Angel went in today to give her a hand. I pray that this will be a growing experience for her.

Here's a couple of pictures of the girls (and Mike) ice skating in the corral. There's a low spot that collects water that has now frozen pretty well. These pictures are actually a few weeks old, but I just got them on my computer. :o)


Michelle did pretty good considering she didn't have the bar that she's used to using, and even though he didn't put his ice skates on, Mike still found a way to play on the ice.



As for my other resolution to read a chapter of the Bible each day, I am also keeping that. I've read the first 8 chapters of Matthew, and one thing that keeps coming up is the thought of repenting of your sins and how it really means so much more than simply saying "I'm sorry". It means to radically and deliberately turn from your sin which would result in moral and ethical changes in your life. In other words, if you are truly sorry, and repent of what you've done wrong, there will be change in your behavior as well. What kind of "fruit" am I producing? That has been my question for the week.

Well, Angel and Grandma just pulled in the drive, so I'm going to go see how the day went. Till next week...
God's love and blessings

Happy New Year!

I can't believe how fast 2008 has gone by. It was full of changes for us, many of which we were not expecting, but all-in-all, God was very good to us. As of today, Mike is officially retired. I think, right now, it's bittersweet for him. He served his 25 years well, but with each job denial, I think he feels like maybe it wasn't good enough. We've talked about it, and we know God has a plan, we just have to be patient to see what it is, and , as I've mentioned to Mike many times, patience is not one of my stronger virtues! :o)

I am quite glad that I was able to keep one of my resolutions for 2008. Yesterday morning I finished the last chapter of Revelation and finished my goal of reading through the Bible in a year. It was definitely a growing experience for me. This year, my goal is to read 1 chapter every day. This will not allow me to finish the Bible in the year, but it will give me more time to really explore and study the Word.

I've also resolved to update this blog once a week, and since I'm starting today, Thursday will be my blog day. So, look for a weekly update from me on the happenings on the Henderson Farm. (I use the term "farm" loosely as this is really a few acres with a lot of pets.)

This week was pretty mellow for us. A few days ago we had a pretty good snow storm, and we had fun trying to sled in the yard. Mind you, we really don't have a hill to sled on, but we had fun pushing each other down our mini slope. Then, Michelle decided to bury me in the snow much like you do with sand at the beach. The only problem with that, is that with each handful of snow she threw on my belly or arms, half of it blew into the only unprotected part of me--my face. Then of course, she had to help brush it off with her snow covered gloves. Brrrrr! :o) We did have fun last night at our church Watch Night service. We watched a really neat video on the star of Bethlehem and then played games and snacked until midnight when we prayed in the New Year. We also have Jacob, a family friend visiting for the week while he's out of school. I think he and Nick have only ventured out of the room to eat and when told to go help out in the barn. I think they've killed every bad guy on every video system out there by now!

Well, I don't have any pictures to post this week. Maybe next time Michelle buries me I'll make sure Nick gets out there with the camera. :o)

I'll leave you with something to think about. The Pastor mentioned something on Sunday that has stuck with me..."Whatever we weave now, we will wear in eternity." Hmmm.

Till next week-God's love & blessings