Wednesday, April 30, 2008

We Are Forming a Book Club

It is so exciting!

There are eight of us at the core
of this book club adventure but
we will be advertising and I am
very hopeful that another few ladies
will join us.

The Club is to be held at our local
library whose new Director is one of
the people who wishes to join.

You could have knocked me over with
the enthusiasm Fran showed the day I
stopped by to see if they might have a
room we could use.

She let me know that, while there had been
a book club that met there monthly, they had
recently disbanded and our timing was perfect.
The library will do free advertising in the local
paper and is providing an excellent room for us
to meet in.

Our first book will be Safely Home by Randy Alcorn.
I have started the book and see only one potential
problem. It is so packed with interesting discussion
material it would be tempting to keep talking about it
for months. We are limiting ourselves to two months,
which would be four meetings, at the most.

We are interested in suggestions you may have for
other books. In general we would be spending two
one hour sessions on each book.

Have a great day!

Mine is going to be a bit "rough" with medical procedures
and test prep. I'd love your prayers today and tomorrow.

Thanks!


Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Meet Flat Breanna


My friend, Shelley, sent this to me.

Flat Breanna came from a 5th grade class in
California. I am going to gather some interesting
information from Lancaster County, PA to send to
the class.

The purpose of Flat Breanna is to gather
interesting facts about various places
so the class can find them on the map
and do an interesting geography study.

I am posting this is because
Flat Breanna did not have the opportunity
to visit many people and so I was wondering...
Would You say Hello to Flat Breanna and tell
her what State or Country you are in?

I will print out the comments and send them back to
the class.

Thanks!

Monday, April 28, 2008

Meet One of My Heroes

Hero...I do not use this term lightly.

There are not a lot of people in our
governmental system that earn this title
from me. However, this man had my attention
from the beginning one hot day last year when
a group of us were invited to a Q&A session with
him at the Supreme Court.

I had not studied Antonin Scalia and went in
with no preconcieved notions but I found him to be
charming,
intelligent,
sure of himself,
focused on the Constitution,
gruff~in an endearing kind of way
and
right...in my opinion, on the subject of the Constitution.

I have so wished to share the experience that so
impacted my political life...
This is as close as I can come.

This may be the one of the few times I thank
60 Minutes for the way they handle an interview.

I do not like some of the decisions written
by Justice Scalia, but you will see that
he doesn't either. It is not his job to insert
his personal preferences into the decisions he
writes, he is to interpret the constitution.
Not use his position as Supreme Court Justice to
re-write the law.

Now, if we could get Judges all over this Country
to understand this!!!

We need more like this...

About the job:


About the Man:



It is Raining

A gentle spring rain is falling.

You can almost hear the roots of the trees
and flowers sucking up the moisture. The
stretching of new growth can almost be seen with
the naked eye.

Every day as I step outside I am amazed at the
progress of the little plants all around me.

They are like little soldiers standing straighter
and taller every day. Preparing for the day
when they will produce their lovely flowers
then fade away to rest through another winter.

I have discovered the joy of perrenials.

Until last year, I was an "annual girl",
always preferring the instant color over the
renewed plant growth. However, Seeing the perrenials
come up this year has brought such joy.

My flower beds will be spreading to the other side
of the house this year as we will remove two more shrubs
in favor of a continuation of the perrenial bed.

My "brown" thumb may turn "green" yet!

I'll keep you posted.

Sunday, April 27, 2008

Worship


Dear Heavenly Father,

Thank you for the beauty
in Your creation.

Thank you for the every detail
you included in the making of our
world.

I praise You for Who You are. You are the
One Who holds all things in your hands.
You know me well.
You care about the details in my life.

Thank you, Father, for being there this
week with a song which spoke peace to my
heart.

Thank You that You are not distant
God, but You are active and close
to me.

I love You, Jesus.

Thank You!

Your Daughter

Saturday, April 26, 2008

A Friday Adventure...

It was all to be so simple.
Our first trip, this season,
to the huge plant nursery
of our choice, Groff's!

This place is phenomenal!

Row after row of greenhouses, at least 12 massive
structures plus all of the outdoor perennials
divided into landscaped levels of sunny or shade loving.
Any plant your heart desires.
Truly!

The kids had their notebooks in hand
to continue their botany assignments.

We were ready.

We were traveling down the road and having
a good time. Both Moms were along for the
adventure. Suddenly the van became "possessed".
Not as in taken away, as in
gauges flickering, needles jumping, the radio
turned on spontaneously.
Strange!

I wondered out loud if it was the alternator or the
computer. I decided to pull over at a farm up ahead to
restart the engine and see if it cleared the problem.
My thinking was that if it was a computer problem
this could fix it...Warren always asks me if I have
"rebooted" the computer when I have an issue.

It did cross my mind that if it was the alternator it
would be very likely to not start again.

It didn't...start, that is.

There we were.

AAA cards were ripped from purses and Georgia was
the first to her cell phone. I walked the short
distance to the farm house to find out what road
we were on...oops. The tow truck said they would be there
in about an hour. So we sat and "enjoyed" the view.

After about 45 minutes I jumped up and said,
"What kind of Blogger am I?!?!?"

Then whipping out my camera I captured these for you...

aren't you glad I am dedicated to documenting every
story - LOL!




Soon after I snapped these pictures the farmer came over and asked if there was
anything he could do to help us...hmmm.
He was very nice, though.

Finally the tow truck arrived and thankfully
it was owned by my neighbor's parents.
He assessed the situation very quickly and put
a "magic" box under the hood, attached to the battery and the van started right up.
We drove home where the tow truck met us and reclaimed their "magic" box.

The van will be staying right where it is until my husband
returns home from his long, long trip.
I can't wait!

Not being the types to be easily put off,
we now headed back to the nursery in Georgia's car.
This time without kids.
Mikey had to go to work and the other two
had spent enough time with us...


It was crowded.

We parked. We began shopping.





My wagon full of plants.



It became apparent that the car
was going to be a "bit small" to
haul home the loot.

Georgia left and came back with the
TRUCK! Yep, this was what we needed!


We returned home and were unloading plants when the backhoe showed up to repair
the water problem at Georgia's. It is now fixed and other than some landscape repair we are thankful to have that mess fixed.

The kids and I were then off to a time of play with our church at a local school baseball diamond. They played, I watched and "encouraged" all the while chatting with my fellow "encouragers".

Finally, when it was too dark to see, we headed home. Several friends
came back to our place, where I served pizza and other snacks.

The kids made up a twist on the game of Pit by
playing keep away with the bell so that poor Mindy
couldn't officially win...since she couldn't ring the
bell. They wore themselves out!

Fun!

Chloe, the Diva


Chelsea's friend, Kara, found this sweet doggy purse.
Chloe is just the little diva in it, don't you think?
Thank you , Kara!

Friday, April 25, 2008

Nearly Missed Blessing

The dear Moms of our Homeschool Co-op have decided that they don't want to stop getting together over the summer even though Co-op has officially wrapped up. They instituted Park Day. I went last week and really do not intend to go every week. The park is a good half hour from our home and I just don't think I should use the gas every week.

However, yesterday morning there was a specific request from one of the families for us to attend and Mikey was willing to give up a day at work in order for us to go. His Thursday was optional. The boss knows that Mikey likes to work and has on occasion offered that he can come in if we don't have something planned for school. Mikey's boss rocks! It is true!

Anyhow, when Mikey was wiling to give up this work opportunity for the Park Day, I thought we should go.

Am I glad we did.

After the time at the Park, I brought home three extra girls and sent my boys off to another friend's house. Check out the fun we had.


We received permission to take our friend Kara along for some Ice Cream.
I asked the girls if I could take their picture and then they volunteered to do a silly pose.




We had a lovely dinner of leftovers, remade in to a fabulously named casserole and seasoned potatoes. I heated some ham in case there could be one who might be offended by the fancy re-do. There was lively conversation and much giggling.
Love these young ones!!!

I am so glad we went to Park Day yesterday!


Thursday, April 24, 2008

Outdoor Classroom

We needed to be outside yesterday, truly!

I could not stand doing school in the living room when the weather was so perfect.
I hate summer's heat and humidity and I am not crazy about the cold weather so there are very few days that fall under the classification of perfect but yesterday was one of those. Today is shaping up to be another. With notebooks in the kid's hands and a camera in mine we headed outdoors to document each flower, perrenial, bug, moving thing, blade of grass...ok you get the point. When we had sketched everything possible we,(I), were,(was), not ready to come in yet so I sent them for their reading books. Mikey climbed up on the deck fencing to read. I took a picture but cannot figure out what file I placed it in...arrgghh. At first he thought he would get up on the roof....but I put a stop to that very quickly.

Remember my post about planting spring bulbs together in a container? This is the beginnings of the result of that experiment. I wish I had put mulch on the top. Looking at this picture I think I might just do that. I should have things blooming in here for at least another month.





Some other flowers or plants around the yard and deck.






It seems so early for some of the perrenials that are greening up. I am very thankful and enjoying them so much!
Have a Great Day!

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

A Date with a Surgeon

He is a fine looking man...
but that is not why I will be
having a date with him.

My family would "frown" on that.

Nope, I am going back under the knife
in an attempt to carefully remove an
ovary and cyst, while removing the
scar tissue that seems to be holding
all of that to the bowel.

I hope I make it to my mid-May date.
It is hurting very badly this morning.
Differently than before.

My friend, Marie, works in that Doctor's
office. This Doctor knows that I know her
and that I do not mind if he talks to her
about me. He told her that it looks like
it will be "involved". This does not contradict
what he told me but it was a bit revealing about what
he expects to find.

So...I told you I would likely ask for
more prayers about this...I'm asking!


Georgia's Water:

Still don't have a solution for that one!
Thankfully we are next door and her house
is temporarily piggybacked to our well.
We are carrying drinking water,
just to be on the safe side,
since the hoses we are using were not super
clean.

We need to talk to our neighbor, who knows
everyone and see if we can get him to refer
us to someone with a backhoe.

Hope you have a great day!

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Check this Out!!!

I can hardly sit still with the
excitement over two posts
my friend Mrs. Rabe has posted.

These two topics are so near and dear to
my heart.

Head on over to see what she has to say
about Family Integrated Worship and the
Movie, Expelled.


Two separate subjects but very worthy of discussion
and consideration!

I have posted comments for all to see.

I have a position on these issues but you'll have to
go there to see them!

This entire post is a link.

Click once anywhere and off you will go!

Thanks!

My Industrious Daughter

Chelsea, 12, wants to earn some money.
There is an item that she desperately
wishes to purchase.
Rather than ask for the money outright
she has asked what jobs she can do to
earn the $20 required to make this purchase.

It makes her crazy that the government says
she is too young to get a job. She already
knows that she wants to work in a Christian
Book Store, volunteer at the Library and at
a Thrift Store. We warned the girl at the Book
Store register the other day that Chelsea is coming
for her job as soon as she can legally work...Ha!

Yesterday, she noticed that the laundry was
piling up. She has been doing more and more
laundry. She decided though to challenge
herself to do ALL of the dirty laundry in the
whole house in one day for a price.

It was a LOT!!!!!

I told her that it was probably worth about
$10 to me if she could get it all done in
one day.

HA!

Jokes on me.

The little stinker buckled down and
when I was returning from a meeting last
evening she was putting the last load into
the washer.

Don't you love it?

Seeing your children set goals for
themselves and then watching them meet
those goals. Rewarding!

I am proud of her. I wonder how she might
earn the other $10? I'm going to let her
figure it out...(-;

She'll think of something!
Chelsea has a will of iron.

She is very quiet in her strength
but is very strong!

Monday, April 21, 2008

Another Trial/Challenge for Georgia

Saturday, Shelley and I returned from
"the hunt".
We had been to many, many
yard sales.
There were quite a few bargains
to be found. Probably the best was a
set of Pfaltzgraff Stoneware...16 dinner plates,
serving bowls, mixing bowls, casserole dish,
salt and pepper, napkin holder, cereal bowls...and more!
All for $20.00.
Shelley was looking for just such a set. This was
better than she could have imagined!
While it wasn't the exact pattern she wanted
how could she pass this up. So, we loaded the
5 boxes of dishes into the car and considered it
the equivalent to a hunter's 6 point buck!
Success!!!

We came home all excited and wanted to ask
Georgia about another item that she would have
information about...we drove directly to her
driveway and went in chattering and happy.

Georgia let us do this and as we finally
paused in our conversation she directed us
to the back yard where there appeared to be
a problem.

Water was bubbling up from the ground.

Not good!

I quickly got Warren on the phone.
As he is still away on business,
there was no way to have him take care
of this one in person.
He talked me through turning the well pump off
and turning off the water.

We tried to figure out what was wrong.

It is definitely related to the well because
when the proper switches were turned the water
ceased it's spontaneous attempt at creating
a water feature in Georgia's back yard.

Our neighbors Ellen and Jim got involved
at one point.

This picture shows some of the process of beginning
to dig. We all took turns.

Ellen would not give up!
She really went to town digging and then
she and I broke the well cap getting it off.

There were many, many
roots to cut through. We have a theory that this
pipe was broken when a tree in the vicinity was cut
down and the stump was ground up in
15 - 20 degree weather.
Most likely the plastic
pipe could not withstand the
vibrations it had to endure.
We believe that this pipe
has been leaking for a while now.
What a shame.
My Mother-in-law did not need this!
She is not a happy camper!

We were not successful in digging to
the pipe and will need
to get a backhoe in here Monday or Tuesday.
However, after
much effort, I went to stand up
and slid into the hole that we had
managed to dig.
My dear friends Shelley and Ellen found it
very funny to see me lying on the ground.
I was laughing hysterically and could not get up.
They took these pictures and made me promise
to post them.

If you look closely you will see that I am on the
phone. I am sooo good! I did not drop the phone when
I fell nor did I even get hurt...which is pretty amazing
given the tools that were all around and the shovel that I
landed on.





So, Ellen and Shelley.
I truly hope you are happy.
This is humiliating!

I had mulch everywhere!
Too funny!

Sorry Georgia!
We will get it fixed!

Sunday, April 20, 2008

Very full and fun Weekend!

Saturday evening the Kids and I
took Shelley to see the overlook
at Susquehannock State Park.
It was just about dusk...
and absolutely beautiful even with the
haze that was hanging in the air.









As you can see, It was pretty. We enjoyed our time there even
though it was brief. This is a favorite place for our church group
to come. We like to play ball, grill burgers and hot dogs, hike the
trails and come out to the overlook. Fresh air and fellowship are
good for the soul!