If We Don't Lose Heart

My mom passed along this tape of Bible verses put to music that we listened to when my little sister was about Ellie's age. It's still in pretty good condition, and although the songs are not all exactly to my taste, I find that it's much more difficult to lose my patience or become irritable with my kids when I've been singing Bible verses all morning long.

One of my favorite verses for this stage of my life is Galatians 6:9: "And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart." So much of life with little ones is about repetition. The cleaning, the diapers, the bedtime routine, the discipline. Consistency is the key when it comes to discipine, which for my daughter is all about obeying right away and having a joyful heart. It's easy to become discouraged as we talk about the same issues again and again and again, but this verse reminds me that I'm not parenting for short-term success or even short-term obedience. I'm cultivating these little people for God's kingdom, and by His grace and the work of the Holy Spirit, in due season I will see the fruits of this labor. My prayer is that I will take joy in the work God is giving me right now, that I will not grow weary of this work, and that in due season I will see my children confess Jesus as Lord.

The First Leg

Luke made it to his training in Germany without any travel problems. He's taking his class, meeting some of the folks he'll be working with, and enjoying good food and extra sleep while he can.

We are really thankful to all the people who advised us to try Skype. We've been able to talk several times and it really helps Ellie to be able to see Luke when she talks to him. I think it probably helps him, too.

Thursday

It looks like Thursday's the day. We'll be at the airport pretty early in the morning to say our goodbyes. My parents will be visiting here through Saturday, but I imagine that by next week we'll be ready to schedule some zoo trips, botanical garden picnics, and LOST viewings to help fill the time. Please pray for our family and especially for Luke's safety!

Sheet Baskets

I tore up some old sheets into fabric strips for crochet a loooong time ago, (think: Before Ellie) and finally made something from them. Appropriately, I made some baskets for my linen closet to organize the baby washcloths and cleaning rags and kitchen towels that all seem to keep falling into one big pile. Before they organize my closet, they will hold some goodies for Easter.

Here's the pattern:
Materials: 3/4 inch fabric strips, a bunch in one color and a bit in a contrasting color.
Q hook

Basket is worked in spiral until color change at the end.
Chain 4, sl st into first ch to make ring.
Row 1: sc 8 into ring (8 sc)
Row 2: 2 sc in each sc around (16 sc)
Row 3: *sc in next 4 sc, ch 2, sc in same sc (corner made). Repeat from * 3 times. (5 sc on a side)
Row 4: *sc in next 4 sc, sc in ch 2 sp, ch 2, sc in ch 2 sp (corner made). Repeat from * 3 times. (7 sc on a side)
Row 5: * sc in next 6 sc, sc in ch 2 sp, ch 2, sc in ch 2 sp. Repeat from * 3 times. (9 sc on a side)
Row 6: *sc in next 8 sc, sc in ch 2 sp, ch 2, sc in ch 2 sp. Repeat from * 3 times. (11 sc on a side)
Row 7: *sc in next 9 sc, sc in ch 2 sp, ch 2, sc in ch 2 sp. Repeat from * 3 times. (13 sc on a side)
Row 8: In front loops only, sc in each sc around (39 sc).
Row 9-16: sc around. End row 16 with sl st, change to contrast color.
Row 17: ch 1, sc in each sc around, sl st into 1st sc.

Family Pictures

Here are some pictures we had taken of Luke and the kids a couple of weeks ago:

Another Great Adventure

Luke left this morning for some training in Texas to prepare for his upcoming deployment to Afghanistan. We're very thankful that he'll be home with us again for a few weeks between this training and his deployment. We trust God's Providence as Luke travels and serves and as we spend the next several months traveling and growing through another Great Adventure.

Defeating the Purpose?

Luke has some time off this weekend and we plan to go through the house and garage and weed out a lot of the things we don't need anymore. (Where did all this stuff come from?!) We've always been book buyers and very rarely purged books from our shelf. Our house rule is that we can only have as many books as fit on the shelves... so we've put in a lot of extra shelves.

Last night, we went through the bookshelves and removed at least 4 boxes of books. We're trying out half.com to sell the many textbooks we no longer need, but it didn't seem worth it to list the paperbacks. So we checked out paperbackswap.com. It's awesome! Basically, each member posts books he or she is willing to part with. Listing the first 10 books earns 2 credits. Books cost 1 credit. After listing books last night, I can go shopping from everyone else's list of books and they can shop for mine. For every book I send out to another shopper, I get an additional credit. I pay shipping to send books out and the other members pay for the shipping to send books to me. I can also get credits for referring people, so if you're interested and you click through the link at the top of this post and post 10 books, I'll get a credit.

So you can see where this is going... for every paperback book that actually leaves our house, we can get another one. Maybe this wasn't such a great idea after all...