Holy Week

   This week and the resurrection is like the super bowl of Christianity.  Christmas, as special as it is, is only about the birth of a savior. The holy week and Jesus' resurrection are truly what give people their faith.  It's all because of Jesus. He was born of a virgin, lived a sinless life, and took the cross for our sins.  He paid the debt...but not only did he pay the debt he broke all the rules and rose from gave. There is nothing we can do to bridge the gap of our sins....there are not enough good things we can do to earn our way to heaven.  It's that crazy FREE gift of choosing to believe Jesus was not just another cool, good guy.  He was and still is the savior of the world. Check out this cool modern take on the age old truth of Jesus!

What if Jesus Had Twitter



We've had a crazy cool week paying honor and remembering the ultimate price Jesus paid for us...

Sunday- We celebrated the miracle of healing in James Dear.  If you have not heard of him check out his wife's blog on their journey.  Dear family Blog

Monday- I met with my incredible mentor.  I think everyone should have a person speaking wisdom into their life.  She is someone who is a lifestage ahead of me her precious grandchildren....she homeschooled, has a ministry in recovery, and is someone who wants to walk daily with Jesus.  She's not perfect but man she so much further ahead than me in my walk and I just want to spend time with her and let her goodness rub off on me!:)

Tuesday- Our small group read through the account of the holy week in Luke 22

Wednesday-Financial Peace class and our Easter craft started growing grass

.....and we still have a New life celebration today, ceremonial passover meal tomorrow night, and a neighborhood Easter dinner at our house on Sunday.

Ohhhh...and stay tuned we have this fun event on Saturday where we are learning about keeping chickens in the backyard!!!!!!

The night I ran away

There are just some weeks that make me want to run away and this was one of those weeks.  I didn't run too far just far enough to meet up with a "sister from another mother" kinda friend!  The week started out with the house showing and I am not gonna lie...it was harder than I thought to not sell the house.  I mean I already had packing boxes in the garage and some of them even packed!

Tuesday brought a visit to the vet.  Our 15 yr. old puppy, Sassy, is now in her "sunset days."  The Vet informed us she has, at best, a couple months to live.  Hospice for Dogs is currently operational in our home.

Wednesday  brought an unexpected emergency trip to the dentist.

My sweet Faith bumped heads with her brother and almost knocked out her two front bottom teeth.  Glad I went to the pediatric dentist when I did.  They were able to re-secure the teeth and hopefully avoid a double root canal.  We go back next Wednesday to see how the teeth are doing and also get a quote to fix the chip where the teeth hit one another.

Thursday we went over to a very special family friend's house.  We did an Easter craft and our 8 kids had a blast!  This is the best picture to accurately reflect how some homeschooling days go....joyful and chaotic!

 Thursday afternoon was the President's Day Challenge.  All the kids ran either a mile or 1/2 mile and completed 4 other challenges.  It was a great afternoon.....until we came home with another friend.  While the Mom and I were talking one of her kids were hit in the head with a softball.  Friday morning I got the call that our friend had a concussion because of it:(

Friday night was supposed to be our date night, but it was a total bust.  Tensions were high...emotions off the chart so I decided to run away with a friend.

Brenda, my sweet "wise" friend made me laugh and forget all that the week ensued.  What a blessing friends are....they know the good, bad, and the ugly and they still chose you!

Well that about sums up the week...I don't think I even mentioned my parents divorce and how it continues to ravage my family, the recovery of my husband and how that still impacts us or my own sinful flawed nature, but for now I continue to run the race set before me....knowing I am in a marathon not a sprint.

Hebrews 12:1 

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us,

The showing that almost wasn't...

I have been on lock down trying to prepare for the showing.  After all was said and done, they ended up not wanting our house.  They seemed very interested when they left and even asked for the sellers disclosure, but before I could hand deliver it to our wonderful agent, they had emailed saying they were going another direction.  Our house is now almost ready for market but man oh man is it hard to have a house "show ready".....especially when you homeschool 4 children and life just doesn't stop for anything.  We are halfway into financial peace and I'll be honest, today I am a little discouraged because HIS will was not my will.  I had started packing us up and was ready to take the leap into the country.  The thing I know is that HIS WAY is perfect so as I wait for my heart to follow that head knowledge I at least get to enjoy a clean and pretty nice house!  Here are the pictures of the 3 weeks that almost plowed us under!!!

Breezy kind of day

Can you tell what major project is happening today? Yes you are correct, it is the front door being refinished!

What makes this really fun and interesting is that last night the kids feed a stray kitty cat a bowl of milk and he keeps trying to claw his way in!:()

Market Ready

We are slowly fixing our current house up for market. As of last week I was not moving at lightning speed pace, but then an email came in on Friday.  We had been asked to do a one time showing to an interested family.  EEK...let's just say things were moved into overdrive as much needed to get accomplished in 1 week.  There were some unexpected delays due to on our part...

Delay 1

The staircase right off our front door needed some touch-up...yep this blessed staircase was one of the things I touched-up with ceiling paint...oops.  I then found matching paint and proceed to paint but soon found out that the staircase and trim does not all match.  Today I can proudly boast that the entire downstairs and stair have all their trim repainted along with the outsides of all of the doors. WHEW...just keep swimming...just keep swimming.  That's what was running through my head at 1AM last night!

Delay 2 and Miracle #1

Our master shower was looking rough so we decided to have it cleaned by the tile guys.  Well, apparently, the last owner decided to caulk over the grout to hide the mildew.  This led to us removing the grout and accidentally breaking two of the tiles. All was fun and games until Lowe's told us that our tiles, 14 years old, had been discontinued.  This was a costly mistake that we tried to work around.  We talked about using a accent row of tiles in a different color, but that was dangerous because we could damage more in the process and ultimately have to redo the entire tile work with also surrounds the tub.  So by the grace of GOD we ended up talking to a hole in the wall place that had our tiles...not only had, but gave them too us for free.  If that's not a miracle then I sure don't know what one is.

Craig "The TROWELER"

Craig thinks the name sounds a little creepy, but I think it is fitting.  He has done a great job working with a shower that was not a great gift to begin with.  The spacers didn't work, the grout color was a gamble, the tiles were discontinued, the mildew was epic...and tomorrow we shall see the final product!

Finished Kitchen

Next up.....frame for the master bathroom mirror.

Facebook Fast

I know most of you are on here since I am fasting from Facebook.  Let me just this fast is wayyyy sacrificial for me.  Lame I know, but sacrificial none the less.

Here's how it all transpired.... So in true form we discuss, at the Hindes School of Learning, cultural norms and religious holidays to see where they hit our biblical worldview.  We talked about the Lenten season and why fasting is typical.  A challenge arose and before the kids could formulate their fasts they challegened me to give up Facebook. Please insert guilt and shame as their mom and teacher. With inserted shame came pride that ....oh yea....I can totally go without facebook.

Day one 1 I find myself on autopilot clicking the facebook app on my phone.  So upon clicking I heard the voice of the evil one, although not willing to hush him, trick me that just looking and not posting is not really cheating.  By day 5 I am a pro at "just creeping" on Facebook.  Now on Day 6 we had a fatal flaw for the fast. By this I mean fatal only because the Facebook world caught me in my web of deception. So my smart phone is super amazing but oh so touchy. As I am scrolling down, just creeping away on Facebook, I somehow Hoover over the like button on someone's status and inadvertently click like. What do I do? Besides freaking out, I quickly unlike the liked status and close down Facebook. Isn't it funny how really my fast was over day 1,but day 6 is what it took for me to realize the flaw in my appearance based fast?

Day 8 was interesting, I realized that I could somewhat cheat the system by tweeting.  It's not nearly as fulfilling as Facebook, but let me continue to think in Facebook status form!:) So I have what maybe 2 weeks left and realized how horribly wrong I failed at it but also realized how much I need a savior to pick up the pieces of flawed me. What a gracious God I have that loves me despite my lack of ability. Surely if HE can be patient with me so can I with my kids when they fail to meet the mark.  That's it that's my rambling non Facebook status status. Praying each of you prepare your heart as you remember what HIS death and resurrection season is all about...a perfect savior coming to bridge our imperfect lives offering nothing but a free gift of eternal perfect "gracebook" living!