Word-filled Wednesday!

Last Thursday I found out that there was a blog hop full of other wonderful ladies posting Word-filled Wednesday posts! How amazing!!!! God is soo good! To check out other Word-filled Wednesday posts, please click the button above :) And now, my Scripture for this week, followed by a song that I found that goes with it :)

Psalm 36:5 -- Your love, O LORD, reaches to the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies.

Thoughts on Halloween

It's October, that means that there is tons of talk of Halloween everywhere we turn. Last year was the first year that I realized that origins of Halloween and even dreamed that there was something wrong with celebrating it. I was so thankful that my husband had to work and I was allowed to stay home with my children. We passed out bags of candy with Scriptures taped to them, and in each bag was a thank-you card for the children to color and give to the adult that took them trick-or-treating. This year, my husband does not have to work. He would like to take the boys out, and sees trick-or-treating as harmless. I don't know what to think. I will not be going, I believe it is wrong, I would rather that we all stayed home and blessed others together. But he is the head of our home and I do not believe it is worth an argument...

Last year around this time was also when I first began to have the desire to homeschool our children. The public school that they were attending couldn't celebrate Halloween because it violated some peoples religion, and I was thankful for that, until they said that instead they would be celebrating the Day of the Dead... I was not okay with that! I spoke with the teacher and she assured me that they were just watching a presentation, but in the end they did a bone dance accompanied by a chant...

If any of you don't know that history behind Halloween, I encourage you to look it up. However, there is a TON of history there. The supposed Christian roots of Halloween would be All Saints Day, but even that isn't biblical. It is a day that the Catholics pray for the dead Saints as they believe they are in purgatory. They also pray to them, asking them to intercede on their behalf. However, the Bible clearly states that there is only ONE mediator between God and man and that is Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:5). The Bible talks repeatedly about Christ interceding for us, but never asks us to pray to the dead asking them to intercede for us...

So I would like to ask you how your family handles Halloween. Do you trick-or-treat? Decorate? Discuss the history and talk about what is going on? I don't know what my children will be doing this year. Please pray that my husband and I get the opportunity to discuss it and I will be at peace no matter what the outcome.

The above picture was taken from this blog. It is accompanied by a great post about Halloween that I really recommend!

Nita B!

Nita is one of my best friends. I met her in college when we both worked at Pizza Hut. At the time she was one of my shift managers. Shortly after we became roommates, as we were both in collegiate housing through the college and I did not get along well with my roommates. Well, shortly after we became roommates she got transfered to another Pizza Hut. I was not very happy about this, however, in hindsight I am very glad. I took her to work and picked her up most days, and thus met her boss, who by the way is now my husband.

A year ago in July Nita moved back home to help her Grandma. We were all sad to see her go, but she was only suppose to be gone for 6 months. However, things change and she still hasn't moved back yet, though she does still plan on it.

Friday afternoon our doorbell rang, I wasn't expecting anyone, but when I answered it, it was Nita!!! I was so excited! She wasn't able to stay long because she brought another friend with her who had to be home at a certain time. But she told us that she was planning on coming by this afternoon and spending the day with us. Well, my husband had to work today and couldn't get it off, so she came by yesterday afternoon for an hour to see him.



It has just been wonderful to see her again. We have missed her terribly! Ella has especially missed her. While she was here yesterday Ella slipped and fell and when I went to see if she was okay she totally bypassed me. We all thought she was heading for Daddy, but she shoved him to the side to so that she could get to her Nita.

We are looking forward to spending more time with her this afternoon, but we are already sad that she has to go back home tomorrow morning. :( WE LOVE NITA!!!

Writer's Workshop Warning

On Thursday I posted about a neat blog for writers that I had found, and in my excitement I failed to thoroughly check out the blog before jumping on board. There were one or two things that bothered me about the blog, but I though overall after reading the one post, it looked okay. Well, I have since changed my mind. After reading a second post it is painfully clear that it is not as 'clean' as I first thought. After much thought and deliberation, I have decided not to quit participating. But I wanted to let you all know that I am not sure what the other bloggers will write about or what kind of language they might use in their posts. I did consider leaving it all together, but Jesus calls us to be in the world and not of it. As a stay-at-home/homeschooling mom I don't get many opportunities to speak or influence non-Christians with my words or actions. I thought this might provide that opportunity for me. As I said, I just wanted to put out a warning that this is not a Christian writers workshop, and the language is not always going to be clean, nor can I say what the other bloggers will be writing about... But I will be praying that God can use me in some way through my participation in the writers workshop.

Boulder Falls

Last night a friend of ours came into town. We were so excited to see her! My husband got off work early to come home and spend some time with her, only to have her leave before he got here to take another friend that she had with her home. She is coming back on Sunday afternoon to spend more time with us, but she is really here to take part in another friends wedding. So we had my husband for the night with nothing to do! So we went for a drive in the mountains!




We drove through Boulder and down Canyon road into the mountains. We stopped at along side the road and Hiked up to Boulder falls. It was so beautiful, but quite a bit cooler than we expected. It's amazing what a little bit of change in altitude can do. The kids enjoyed climbing on the rocks and sticking their hands in the freezing cold water. There were a few other people on the path and we all exchanged cameras so everyone could have a photo with their whole group in it. It was wonderful.









We had a ton of fun, then on the way back home we stopped at Cold Stone Creamery in Boulder for some ice cream. Yes, I was already freezing, and the boys (including my husband) wanted ice cream. I had never been to Cold Stone's before, so it was a new experience for me. They kids loved it! I am not a natural decision maker, so so many choices made it hard for me...

After we got home I decided that I have been blessed with one of the most wonderful families ever. We might have our ups and downs, but they truly are an amazing bunch!

The Gospel According To Jesus

“The Gospel According To Jesus” by Chris Seay, would be more properly titled: “The Gospel According To Chris Seay,” although after reading it I’m still not certain that what his definition of the gospel was, or how it was involved in this book. I do know a lot about him, his church, and his beliefs though. He opened the book by addressing some problems in the church, mainly the lack of the understanding of the word righteousness (which he also failed to give the definition of), then skipped around to different things from there.

I was very excited about reading this book… that is until I started reading it. While the author has some amazing thoughts, he takes them to extremely unbiblical proportions. I would caution anyone who reads this book to be very discerning. In all honesty I wouldn’t have even finished this book if it wasn’t required of me. The interviews in between the chapters made it hard to follow, and interrupted the flow of reading for me. I think that his target audience is one that is up to speed with pop culture (aka the secular scene). If you are not, then this book really won’t hold much for you. Either way, I will not be recommending this book to anyone, as I do not think it holds much Biblical truth. Again, he had great thoughts, backed with Scripture, but taken to unbiblical proportions.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Closer to home

Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is. -- Ephesians 5:17

God is so amazing to me, and His wonders never seem to cease! A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post called Expecting the unexpected. My husband had just found out that there was a possibility that he would be fired. Well, over the last two weeks, I'm not sure what has really changed there. However, General Managers are quitting the company left and right. They have lost some amazing people, and my husband was growing more and more frustrated. Somewhere in the stress of hating his job, not knowing how long he would have his job, and watching these good men walk away from their jobs, he took a risk. He e-mailed his boss and told him how he felt. That the company wasn't what it use to be and he thought they should re-evaluate somethings.

His boss called him the next day and they talked for quite some time. The conversation ended with his boss asking him to always put a positive spin on everything no matter how negative it was, but he appreciated the feedback. Also during this conversation, my husband was given the possibility to take over the Quiznos next to our home. You see, as of right now, he drives 23 miles to his store. During rush hour it takes him around an hour to get there or home (more if traffic is really bad). One of the managers that recently quit was the manager of the store that is less than 5 minutes from our home (1.5 miles). He had been told this store was unavailable, and apparently that information was wrong. So we are now waiting to hear back to see if he gets it. They first have to find a manager for his store. I had wrote this opportunity off because we had heard it was taken, so when God reopened the possibility, my heart soared. I still want it to be God's will and not my own. I want my husband to take this store. I want him to have it. I want him to be closer to home. It would be good for our family in so many ways! But I want it to be God's will.

I still feel like God is preparing us for something bigger, but this would help us be able to prepare for something more. We would have more time as a family (as he wouldn't spend so much time driving). We wouldn't be spending so much money on gas (he is even looking forward to the possibility of riding his bike to work). Just having him in the community would enable people from our church to stop in and encourage him, which as of right now, no one can do because he is so far away. I could go on, but I don't want to covet the possibility. I think it would be good for us, but I want God's will to be done, not my own. So I'm praying for God's will, and also for patience while I wait for the news...