Day #5

We visited the National Monument of Aborted Babies on Friday. It was a very interesting place with much emotion and mind changers. I often think of abortion happening to women who are raped or down and out. I really found out this is not the case for many who want abortions. Often it is women 18-25. Some women come because they have too many kids or the baby will be an inconvenience or the mother was too young or even too old. One in four women under the age of 40 have had an abortion. Wow! That fact astounded me. The monument was a marble wall with a number of name plates on it along with many stuffed animals and letters lying near by. These plates are from family members who knew of the abortion and wanted to have an acknowledgement of the baby. It was astounding. One lady had 16 abortions in her life before she realized it was wrong.
The organization that works closely with the monument is Choices. This is a ministry that reaches out to women for help before a baby comes or even after they have had an abortion. They offer classes to educate and counsel too.
We helped the organization move from office building to a newly remodeled location. It wasn't much but it helped them so much.
The highlight of the day was dressing up like cows for a free lunch at Chik-Fil-A. Dee got all of the white shirts in her household and bought black duct tape and went to work on spots. It was so fun and very chaotic! The restaurant was crazy!!
On Friday night we headed home. It was a great trip.

Chattanooga Mission Trip Day #4

Today we went rafting on the Ocoee River.

Chattanooga Trip Day #3

Tired. Rainy.
We went to AMG - Advancing the Ministries of the Gospel - Corporate Offices. We attended their chapel service bright and early at 8am and then got a nice tour of the offices. We really loved meeting all of the people in the different offices and hearing what they do. From supporting National Workers to Child Sponsorship to adventure trips to AMG's Publishing Company we loved it. It gave us so excitement to be partnering with a Gospel centered organization. We found the Gospel to permeate through every conversation.
Half way through the morning we started working in the Publishing warehouse sorting books that had been returned to the company. We cleared 4 palets of books in no time. It was so much fun to see our group get into a rhythm of working. Each person found a job and contributed. This was true every day and whatever job we faced. At the warehouse we accomplished in just 45 minutes which would have taken one person a week to accomplish. Praise God!
We were suppose to go hang out with jr high and senior high aged students in the afternoon at the Tennesse Children's Home unfortunately it did not work out. We did some medical supply sorting and throwing out expired medical supplies at AMG for future adventure trips. We did get a tour of the Children's Home and got to see their facility. This was a neat experience for our kids. They have seen so many different ministries and opportunities this week. I know so many of our kids don't have any idea of what they want to do. Launching kids into a life of ministry is my desire and I hope to see many of them there someday.
In the evening we went to a local church's youth group. Our group jumped right in and played volleyball and seemed to have a great time.

Chattanooga Mission Trip Day #2

Today we spent the day working at the Chattanooga Rescue Mission. It was hot and we worked in the heat all day pulling weeds, cutting down a tree, stacking boxes, and organizing donated clothes into sizes. The kids were more sluggish today probably due to the fact the girls wanted to stay up late last night. And late was 12:30am.
It was a hard day for me because I am such a work work work person. If I am given a task I want to complete it and move on to the next thing. I don't want to sit around. Though I often become to task focused, I prefer this over laziness accompanied with complaining. I know it is so hard to get over self-centeredness and it is a lifelong battle, I want to defeat it and have the tools to help those around me do the same. One way I see to help defeat self-centeredness is creating an atmosphere of service. I need to build into my children the importance of serving, not to receive praise or rewards from men but to bring honor and praise to God. It is hard to teach this. Even at our kids age I find try will willingly work for others but not me. How do I change this?
Another thing I noticed today in our students was the lack if initiative. The students have to be told exactly how to do something. This kills me. I would rather just go do it myself than be asked 1500 times the same question. I need to relax and let the questions comes. Many times kids don't pick up or help because they have not been taught how to do the task they are asked. Patience is required to teach them and answer they questions so they can learn their skill. I must let my kids fail to so they can learn how it is done.
A few thoughts. It is time for bed. Sleep tight.

Chattanooga Mission Trip Day #1

Today we worked at the Food Bank of Chattanooga. We got a nice tour of the facility and great facts about how many people are fed through this facility. Our job was to sort the donated food from wal-mart and other organizations into different categories - bottled water, juice, soda, food, bread, sweet breads and cakes. Another part of our group made 50# boxes of food for a family of 4 to pick up. Our kids and adults worked very hard and we really enjoyed the work.
We also did a few fun activities - park for lunch, swimming in the Tennessee river, and then downtown to walk around in the evening. The walk downtown ended up to be a walk in the pouring rain. Fun!
I an really tired tonight. Time to go to bed for me.

A Night of Fun Till the End

We spontanously went to the fireworks in a local town on Sunday evening. We ran into lots of fiends from church and had a great time. Cade just loved the fireworks an Joel had the best sound effects to accompany them. It was fun.
We had a nice long walk back to the van and headed on our way. Less than a mile down the road we got stuck in a long line of cars. We were moving up in the line and then was given a large jolt from the back of our van. We had been re-ended by the car behind us. I immediately felt my neck snap and pain. Curtis handled the situation very well with the young 17 year old driver Unfortunately it made out night last an extra hour or more. We were tired, sore, and sad. There isn't any structural damage to the vehicle but we will need some nice work done at the body shop. I definitely got whiplash and I am still working through that soreness. Thank the Lord our friends and the boys were not hurt.

Dryer

Our clothes dryer has not been working for sometime. It has taken at least 3 dryer cycles to dry one washes load of laundry. Curtis worked at cleaning out lots of lint but it didn't seem to do the trick. A couple of weeks later with no improvement the boys and I started to work on it. Curtis finished the work off when he returned home shortly after we started. It is amazing to be we have clothes left after all of the lint we pulled out. Tuck! So glad to be back on track to one drying cycle per load, and so is our bank account with our electric bill decreasing next month after this fix!

Good Bye Frog

We took Frog back to his home. He came to our home for a 1 week vacation. We were going to be gone for 10 days and didn't want him to starve so we decided that taking him home would be best for him. Plus we couldn't find enough food for him with the dry weather. I am sure we will be going back to find him when we return home.
Case is waving goodbye to Frog.

Birthday Money

Cade received a nice amount of money for his birthday from aunts, uncles, and grandmas. I always struggle with how to parent him when it comes to the money stuff. I want him to understand that things do cost but I don't want to take the joy out of a gift that he was given. He is very possessive of his money and has had a hard time even talking about given some of it to our church. This is a tough one for me. I so often let my joy be stolen with the topic of money. I just find the balance so hard and it looks like I have taught this to my son without even wanting to. Lord, help me to be more generous to causes that really matter and have grace to handle situations with money concerning teaching the boys.
I surprised Cade and let him get a new Lego set when we were at Wal-Mat the other day. He didn't have his wallet with him but when we got home he willingly paid me back.
Thank you to all the family members who gave him money. We enjoyed putting the Battle of Naboo Clone Ship together. He did almost all of himself I was just there to remind him when he forgot a piece.
He is looking forward to spending the rest of his money at the Iowa State Fair!

Art Projects

I have been trying to diversify our summer activities by throwing a few crafts into our daily activities. I can quickly look up an idea on my new phone and then show it to the boys. The hard part is that by the time I gather the supplies the boys have lost their patience. Oh my Cade please be patient at school next year with Miss Read.
The other day Joel and I made a butterfly from construction paper and a toilet paper tube. Then both boys made turtles from a paper plate and construction paper. We blessed our neighbor Ruth with our creations after they dried. Ruth has been in and out of the nursing home the last 7 months so we we're excited to have her back home.
Our next project is to make an ecosystem bottle. We will see if that happens!