Hillsong Music - For Who You Are

One more for tonight. I hope these praise songs touch you the way they have me. God is awesome, holy, righteous and ALWAYS faithful to the end! Amen and AMEN! Let's worship Him for who He is, sweet sweet Siestas!

hear our praises

Feeling the spirit pour out... turn up the volume, raise your hands, and praise Got the Almighty. He is awesome girls, just awesome!

LPL BLOG

Oh girls!!! We've GOT to go!

the boy went to school

David started Kindergarten today! He was so cute ya'll. His biggest excitement of the day was that he got to CHOOSE what he wanted for lunch! So sweet! So today he choose to have chicken nuggets, gravy, salad, and watermelon. A boy after my own heart. He also got to wear a "Berna Bears" crown home, which is now in the coveted headboard spot where he puts only his most treasured of things. His teachers name is Mrs. Berna and so she calls her class the Berna Bears. David is ecstatic about it. So here are a few pics from the day. Oh, and ya'll would be proud of me, I only cried a little. :)


This is David sitting at his seat ready to color his Gingerbread Man.

after getting his "Berna Bears" crown...

with his crown and his new kitty, what more could a boy ask for??

i've been tagged!

And I love it! I feel so honored, and so humbled! Shonda, one of my new blogging friends tagged me with this award. It was so so sweet of her to think of me. We found each other through the LPM blog and I have been blessed by her ever since. :) If I hadn't gotten this from her, she would have been the top person on my list to send it to! :) If you have not visited her blog, click on her name and take a look. We share a passion in ministry in which she is truly blessed and called for. Thank you Siesta for this fun award. You are too sweet for words!

So in the tradition of this award, I'm now supposed to tag 4 special gals to pass this on to. So here goes. I am tagging Debra, one of the most special ladies God has placed in my life. I can not define our relationship as merely friends because she is a true sister. A sister in Christ and I love her dearly. My second tag goes to Dar, a really sweet woman and good friend of mine from church. She is as good as they come and I love her bunches! My third tag is Shelly, we have not met and I've only just begun to read her blog, but I'm hooked. My final tag goes to Chrissy, another of my close friends from church. She actually just moved to Amarillo and accepted a teaching job there. (Maybe this will get her to update her blog! :) ) Love you Chrissy!

So good luck ladies, and Congrats!

And thank you again Shonda, you are such a sweet sweet gal!

all my bags are packed...

"I'm ready to go.

I'm standin' there outside your door.

I hate to wake you up to say goodbye...

So kiss me and smile for me,

let me know you'll wait for me.

Hold me like you'll never let me go....

Cause I'm leaving, in my mini-van,

going on a trip with my friends....

Leavin' in my mini-van,

Don't know when I'll be back again!"


LOL! Don't pretend like you weren't singing with me! I'm headed out tomorrow for our Women of Faith trip! I'm so excited! The conference doesn't start till Friday, but I'm going to spend tomorrow at Moms house helping get maps and papers and all that good stuff ready. She's the leader of our group that's going and has really out done herself making up packets for each car going. She's put together maps to and from every place we'll be stopping, and made nice neat packets with phone #'s addresses, all that good stuff. She's done an AWESOME job! So after we spend the night at their house, we'll be on our way Friday morning after picking up my Sistahs, and stopping for our Javalanches! (frozen coffee drink, I like to call it manna from Heaven) :) I'm so stinkin excited! Last year my Sistahs and I did not sleep. No I mean REALLY we didn't sleep. We stayed up all night talking and bonding and it was one of the best experiences of my life! This year the new youth ministers wife is going to stay in our room. We've allready warned her! :) I just can NOT wait. I'm driving this year and have named our van the "silly socks, Jesus praisin', jave drinking, Sistah van!" Dallas better watch out! We're bringing along a caravan of partying, praisin, angels and we won't stop till we've praised God's silly socks off! :) Whoo hoooo!!!

moving

Please keep my friend Debra in your prayers today. They are moving to Houston and are seeking God's plan for the next step in their lives. If you haven't ever been to her blog, please click here , you will be blessed.

Dear Lord, thank you for bringing this family into our lives. The passion and heart they have to follow Your will, is not easily matched. Please protect them as the move to Houston, and guide them down the road you have for them. And please give them a way to keep in touch with all of us who love them. You are good, Lord, and I love you. Amen

the legacy

Grey hair ya'll. I found grey hairs. I have found a few before and had almost as close a meltdown. I colored my hair and put it behind me like a bad dream. Sigh. If only I were that lucky. My sweet Mother pointed out a few weeks ago that she had seen several white (WHITE!!!) hairs on my head. Again, I blew it off. I mean I hadn't actually SEEN them. No reason to think they're there. Then it happened. I was drying my hair after my shower a few nights ago when the ugly little things decided to pop up and say hello. White ya'll. Not grey, not silver, not anything other than white white WHITE hairs on top of my brunette head. Sticking out like a sore thumb on my otherwise dark brown locks. And yes, sadly, there were more than I could count on both my shaky hands. I wanted to grab the nearest baseball cap, but since we didn't have any a headband had to do. I ran out in my sweats, hollering something about NEEDING to go to the store and almost sprinted my way to Wal-Mart. I ducked in and out of aisles, hoping no one I knew would notice me, grabbed a light brown box of Nice-N-Easy and headed for the check-out. I was back home and in the bathroom faster than hubby could even ask what was going on. One hour later I was a full-on brunette again. I had to e-mail my mom to tell her what had occured. I mean afterall, I'd just barley missed a hair tragedy. She laughed and told me that she and my grandmother had also colored their hair this week and what did that tell me? I "snootily" replied, it tells me that you've left me with a heritage of GREY hair!!

Sigh. Praise God for hair color ya'll. :)

anyone going?

To the Women of Faith conference next weekend in Dallas? We have a group of 26 ladies from our church that will be caravaning up there next Friday morning. I'm so so excited! This is my "big" vacation of the year, and I look forward to it ALL year! This year I'm driving and will have my closest friends riding with me. :) We're going to wear silly socks and praise Jesus all the way to Dallas! And then we'll be spending the next 48 hours lifting Him up and spending time with the gals. I can't wait!!!!

Here are some pics from last years conference:


My "Sistahs" and I - I'm the one on standing, second from the right.

Natalie Grant - oh goodness... what an awesome performance!!!
This is also where she formally annouced she was pregnant with twins!

Robin McGraw spoke and then, Surprise! Out came Dr. Phil to lead her off stage. So cute!

boil your water

That's what they are telling us tonight and now the town is in a frenzy for bottled water. Something about there not being enough chlorine in our water and now there is a possibility of micro-organisms in our water system. On the news tonight they showed people loading up carts FULL of bottled water because they have said they think this could last for days, maybe weeks. Ick! And do you know that neither myself or my husband thought to go get bottled water? What were we thinking? We were thinking we'd just boil what we needed. We did decide however that it would be a much safer precaution to go ahead and get bottled water. The question was, where could we find some? All 3 news stations said the stores were sold out. So we said a short prayer and picked up the phone. The first store we called didn't have any. Second store... they had JUST gotten some in off a truck that probably drove several hours to get it here and we'd need to come right then if we would even have a shot at one case. So into the car went Scott and right now, at 10:38 p.m. he's at Wal-Mart grabbing up the last 2 cases of bottled water. How crazy. Of course I am planning on patting him on the back when he gets home for a job well done! :) But it's got me thinking. We've got to have water to live, why hadn't I thought of a single back-up plan for situations like this? Contaminated water is just something I never thought of.

Contaminated life is something many of us never think of either. How many are out there living with contaminated lives. Full of things we shouldn't see, shouldn't read, shouldn't eat, shouldn't drink.... the list could go on. The world is full of it's own contaminating micro-organisms that can do far more damage to our eternal lives than maybe we ever realized. What do we do to clean it up? How do we escape from all the contaminants that fill our daily lives? For Christians the answer is Jesus. We're simply not contaminated anymore. Washed clean by the shed blood of Jesus. Praise His name. But what about those who don't know Him? What about those who wear the contaminants like garments? When do they realize there is another option? When do they see the fresh spring one hill over from the dirty mud-hole? They see it when we show it, Sisters. I wouldn't have realized there was another water option had I not seen people stockpiling their shopping carts with bottled water and saying to my husband, "now they've got something we need!". Do people say that about my Jesus? Do they see me and say, "now she's got something we need". Oh Father how I hope they do! I hope they see that You are the fresh water, bottled and ready to be set free in their lives. I want them to see the well, springing up in me! Let them seek out the clean water, Lord, and let them reach up and take hold of the only uncontaminated being to ever walk this earth.

Inspiration from a "boil you water" alert... only by His grace.

if you think about it...

***** Update*****

Judy is going to be released from the hospital tomorrow and will be on bedrest for another week . The Dr. thinks they were able to get rid of the clot, but she will still need to be on blood thinning medication for at least another year to avoid it clotting again. Thanks everyone for all the prayers. You are all so special to me. Thank you for reaching out in prayer for my mother in law and our family.

Please pray for my mother in law, Judy. She was taken to the hospital today and they found a blood clot in her leg. They're admitting her and will run more tests on it to see how big and all that tomorrow. She's had several medical issues this year and it's been a hard year on her. Please if you remember, say a prayer for her.

Thanks Sisters, Sistahs, and Siestas. You are all so special to me.

please don't miss this

Something everyone should see. The awesome power of God's healing touch. Please click here and witness an awesome unspeakable miracle of God.

God shines

Well Scott didn't have today off, won't have a day off this week, but you know what? I'm okay with it. God is so awesome. I had to just sit and clap for a while, even cheered. Scott got home at lunch time today and we have spent the better part of the afternoon and evening having family time. What a blessing. I love my man and I love my boys and I can't think of anything better than spending the last 4 hours in the pool playing with my family. That's exactly what we just did. And now we're going to order pizza and veg out while watching Chicken Little.

Sweet Lord can it get any better? I'm blessed beyond anything I've ever deserved.

Blessed. Blessed. Blessed.

Girls I just need to shout out how much I love Him.

WHOOO!! I LOVE HIM!

God is awesome. I'll post pics of our pool time later. I'm off to spend some more time with my men!

work

I'm tired of work. Not mine, but hubbies. He has been working 13.5 hour shifts every day for two weeks now. We only see him about 2 hours each day. And just when we thought he was out of those hours for a little bit, one of his co-workers got into some trouble and won't be there for a few weeks. Sigh. So again, he's having to cover extra shifts. It makes for a good pay-check, but a lonely house. The boys miss him, bawled today when he had to go in 3 hours early. Just makes things really hard when he's gone so much. But I know that he's working hard for us and it's giving me a new look on my job here at home. I'm not so grumbly (if that's a word) about cleaning the house or putting away dishes, or even ironing his work shirts. I know that I am blessed to get to stay home with my boys and spend time watching them grow. And I also know the only reason I'm blessed to do that, is because my husband is willing to work so hard. I appreciate so much the sacrifices he makes. I just wish sometimes the it didn't mean sacrificing so much time with him when things get tough at work. His promotion is with reach, will be happening this month. And he knows that all the hard work and extra hours are going to be worth it when he does get promoted. I'm so proud of him! He had to take a test, 100 questions half multiple choice, half essay. In order to even be considered for a promotion you can only miss 10 out of the 100 questions, and that includes the essay part. He did great! He only missed 5 questions! So now they're pushing him through his final book (and I do mean PUSHING!) so that he can be promoted by the end of the month. It's really awesome to see him working so hard towards this goal. So yes, he puts in long hours and yes we don't see him much these days, but I know in the end God will bless us for this time of sacrifice. And God is good to us while Scott is away. In fact today the boys I will be making some banana bread. One loaf for us, one for Nana, and one for the people Scott works with. They're all having to sacrifice time with family right now due to the 2 managers that are gone (one fired, one dealing with personal stuff), and so we want to minister to them in whatever way we can. And though he won't say it, it also makes Scott feel good to have something from home at work with him. (to be honest he loves the compliments on what a great cook his wife is, and how nice it was of him to bring them something. but who doesn't right?) So I'm going to go mash some "naners" with my boys and pray that Scott will still have tomorrow off. He needs it, and so do we. :)

Thanks girls for listening to me whine. Each and every one of you that read this and pray for our family encourages me more than you know. These past few days (and more to come) while being surrounded by my boys, it's nice to know that I can come here and have a safe place to "talk" and ask for prayer. You are all amazing women, and I'm blessed to call you friends.

couple of weekend pics

So the boys are into, REALLY into, Power Rangers right now. Every Saturday at 11:00 a.m. that's where you'll find them. Watching Power Rangers Overdrive and "accelerating" themselves so that they can fight the Fearcats. They are so cute kicking and jumping all over the place. This weekends episode was about a Ranger who'd been hit with some type of "ray" that caused him to have bad luck. In true form the other Rangers banned together to help the one over come his sudden hit of bad luck. They each gave him something "lucky" to carry with him to ward off the powers of the "bad luck ray". (so funny). Well one of the good luck charms was a sombrero, which Dano thought was the coolest thing he'd ever seen. So he quickly ran to his room to retrieve the straw "cowboy" hat his Nana had given him. Then my sweet boy proceeded to defeat the fearcats, straw hat and all. And once again, good triumphed over evil with the help of good friends, brother, and a sombrero.

getting ready to twart the evil Fearcat...

watching it go down...

victory tastes so sweet...

I Need You To Love Me - Barlow Girl

close your eyes, listen and let God move...

looking back

Debra posted this on her blog today and it looks like fun. :) So here goes...

1. Who was your best friend? I think I had a bunch of best friends, but my closest was by far Annette (we also found out that we are cousins, which made us be even better friends!). But I can't leave out Jeff, Eric, Brian, Jeb, Candice, Candace, Adam...

2. Did you play any sports? Nope. Liked to watch them though.

3. What kind of car did you drive? A white Plymouth Reliant - hey, it had a.c. and good radio, don't judge!

4. It’s Friday night. Where were you? Probably working at Reel Action. (video rental store)

5. Were you a party animal? No, but I'm just now finding out that there were actually some crazy parties. Man, talk about naive!

6. Were you considered a flirt? I'm not sure. I know that I flirted, but really only with my "crush for the moment". I quit flirting though when B.F. and I got together.

7. Were you in the band, orchestra or choir? No but ALL of my friends were. And B.F. at the time was 1st chair trumpet. I don't think I'll ever forget the first time he DIDN'T make first chair. :) I love you guys!

8. Were you a nerd? I didn't think so.

9. Were you ever suspended or expelled? No

10. Can you sing the fight song? Parts of it.... I know the music by heart though. Spent most of my time cheering on the band and all my friends. Can still hear Eric on the drums...

11. Who was your favorite teacher? Mrs. Runkle - AP English, Senorita Sutphen - Spanish

12. What was your school mascot? Bulldog

13. Did you go to the Prom? Yes - and I'll never forget it. Eric and the "love rollercoaster". So awesome. Food wasn't that great (never is I guess) but we had a blast! This first pic is of myself and one of my close friends, Jeff. The second pic is of us all doing the "love rollercoaster", following Erics lead. :) Annette is in the black and white dress to my left.

14. If you could go back, would you? Only if I could go back knowing what I know now.

15. What do you remember most about graduation? The deck of cards being thrown in Mr. Merrymans face. Well deserved, but almost cost us our diplomas.

16. Where were you on Senior Skip Day? I can't even remember if we had one. Did we?

17. Did you have a job your senior year? Yes, Reel Action Video. Worked there through my last 2 years of H.S. Even after it burned down. Lemme tell ya, the smell of wet, smokey, movie cases is NOT a great smell. Ew.

18. Where did you go most often for lunch? Football field will all my buddies. :)

19. Have you gained weight since then? Yep.

20. What did you do after graduation? Spent the summer with friends and working and then went off to Tarleton. For the life of me I so wish I had gone with Annette! My life after H.S. would have been so different...

21. What year did you graduate? 1997

22. Who was your Senior Prom Date? Eric. One of my best friends and an amazing guy. He was the funnest date and I still have wonderful memories of Prom because I got to go with him. :)

23. Are you going/did you go to your 10 year reunion? Probably, if Annette will come with! :)

found it!

Oh my goodness I am SO excited! I found THE program for our childrens choir Christmas musical. It's so so soooooo good! And yes, it's allready made me cry. I just think of my kids up there singing and ministering in this special way and it gets to me. This year we're doing something we've never done before. We'll be combining our program with a food drive for our local food bank to help raise food items and money for the needy in our community. I'm really excited about this new endeavor and have allready been on my knees about it. I am hoping that this musical and outreach will touch the hearts of everyone who hears the message the same way it's allready touched mine. We're going to be doing "Bows of Holly" this year. If you work with the Children Choir ministry at your church, look it up. It's a shorter program but the message and community outreach just can't be beat. I am so excited to get to work and teach the songs to the kids. God is going to bless them for their hardwork!

There is a part perfect for a sweet little girl that's moving away, and it breaks my heart! But I know God will provide the right kiddos for the right parts. Please pray for us this semester. Our goal will be 500 pounds of food, but the cry of my heart is that God would bless our community with twice that! I'd like to see God use our church and these kids in a BIG way, and I know He can!

i finally did it!!!

I'm done! DONE! Whooo hoooo! For the past year and a half I've been taking an online course in medical transcription. It's been really hard to stay focused with everything going on and I did lapse for seveal months without picking up my book. Finally I got my tail in gear and got busy finishing up my practice dictations for grading! I'm all done with my assignments and now await final grades and ultimately my diploma. I will be a graduate of the Applied School of Medicine through Ashworth University.

Sounds so official doesn't it! Now pray girls that I do indeed pass all my assignments and that I get a job that will allow me to work from home. That is my ultimate goal in taking this course. Now I'm going to take a break, wait on my diploma and then I will probably sing up to take their Medical Billing course online. Nothing like furthering your education girls!

If you are interested in the course I'm talking about, click here for more details.