Easter

What are you doing for Easter?

I'm sad to say we will miss Easter service at Vertical Church. I'm sure it will be incredible. I'm already waiting for the podcast to come out so I can see just what I missed.

But I'm so excited because we will be leaving Thursday to go to Virginia to spend Easter with my family. The kids and I are both counting down the days. It's been a while since we've gone to Virginia (my family has been here to visit us numerous times though!) and despite a 6 hour drive with two kids and a dog that really do not like to ride I'm still looking forward to it.

Since we won't be attending an Easter church service, I'm trying hard to make sure my children really understand what Easter is all about. Yes, Easter baskets and chocolate bunnies, pretty dresses, and Easter dinner are all great...it's really about love. The love of Jesus. He loves us so much that he died for us.

So I'm challenging you during these last few days before Easter, show the love of Jesus to others. Love others the way Jesus has loved you. Even when you're stressed out trying to fix Easter dinner and get your house clean for guests, even when you are tying up those last minute loose ends at work, even when you've driven for 4 hours with screaming kids and a barking dog and you still have 2 more hours to go...let His love shine.

Happy Easter guys!

I'm posting at 31 Rubies today! Come say "Hi!"

A Work in Progress..

I finally have some photos of our new house to put up. I'm only going to put up pics of rooms that we are finished with because I plan to do a before and after post as we remodel each of the remaining rooms (Shaylie's room, Nevaeh's room, our bedroom, and bathroom). The room that I am the most proud of right now is our living room. That's the only room that we are completely finished with. I really wish we would've taken before pics, but we didn't.

So..here you go!

The front- we plan to repaint the shutters, add some hanging baskets to the porch and get some beautiful flower beds started underneath the two front windows.

View of the living room from the front door. We painted the walls (they were solid white before) and hung the border. I absolutely love the colors. The hardwood floors in this room are beautiful and we didn't have to do a thing to them!

Another view of the living room. I really love this entertainment cabinet. We found it at a yard sale a few years ago, but our tv is old (My hubby's from his freshman year in college!) and it's about to die so in the near future we will be upgrading to a flat screen and will no longer have a need for this.

The kitchen. Yes, it's tiny, but it's completely functional. We have plans of remodeling the kitchen. There is a partition between the kitchen and dining area (where you can see the stove in the pic) that we plan to remove to open the room up. The previous owners of the house had indoor/outdoor carpet in the kitchen. Have you ever heard of such a thing?! It was horrible. It was gross and there was no way of cleaning it. Ugh. It only lasted about two weeks. Thanks to my wonderful hubby and my Dad it's been replaced! What made it even more strange was when they pulled up the carpet, there was tile underneath.

The new and improved kitchen floor! :)

Our dining area/homeschool room. We chose to use this room for our homeschool room because it's so bright...and because of the built in bookcase (see next photo)

These are all of the indoor photos for right now. More to come in the coming months. We will be focusing on one room a month from here on out. Just wait until you see the before and after pics especially of our bedroom floor that my husband had to completely redo because water damage. It's definitely been a learning experience!

I will leave you with a few pics of the beautiful flowers blooming in our yard.

Don't judge a book by it's cover...unless it's cute!

A couple weeks ago I finished my devotional book I had been reading for over a year. I loved it and was determined that I needed to find another one ASAP. A trip to our local Christian book store and I was faced with so many choices. What exactly was I looking for? Many of them looked interesting. There were devotionals geared toward moms and wives and women in general. The one I had just finished reading was a Mom's Daily Devotional so this time I wanted something for me! I just didn't know how to choose. There were so many and they all looked great. But finances were only allowing me to purchase one at this time. I really needed God to send a big flashing neon sign that said "This is for Heather!" And then I saw it. Let me be honest and tell you that I picked it up because it was cute. Yes, cute. It was black patent leather with silver writing and baby pink inside. That alone told me this was the one for me. It had no description. The only thing I knew about it was the title, "Inspiration for Girlfriends" and the author, Ellen Miller. I didn't open it up and read any of the passages. I just walked to the register and paid for it, certain I had found a gem!

Boy was I right?! I'm only 16 days into it, but already I can tell you it is speaking to my heart and changing my life. God has been bringing some of my not so great personality traits to the forefront of my mind lately. I really feel him urging me to make some changes. One of the biggest issues I feel him challenging me on is my judgemental attitude. Often times without even realizing I'm doing it, I judge people. I feel horrible even admitting that, but admitting there is a problem is the first step, right? I've been praying that I will recognize when I start to have those thoughts and change them immediately.

This morning, I wake up and do my usual routine of reading my morning devotion before I get out of bed. Guess what I read??? "...I quickly realize that I often do not live a life of grace. When I am spread too thin, I tend to become harsh and judgemental...Something as simple as acknowledging an unhealthy pattern or reaction can be a powerful tool in stopping the insanity of repeated mistakes.." Yes, I have no doubt that message was for me and I am thankful for it. Each devotion ends with a quote from Scripture. This was today's: "Since you judge others for doing these things, why do you think you can avoid God's judgment when you do the same things? Don't you see how wonderfully kind, tolerant and patient God is with you?"- Romans 2: 3-4. Ahh yes, I will be pondering that for a while!

P.S. Here's a link to the book if you would like to learn more!

Randomness

To my 11 Faithful followers- Thanks for hanging around even when I have been absent for so long. :)

Let me start this post by saying God has been moving moving moving in my life recently. I feel like he has been laying so much on my heart that I have no choice but to follow his lead and make some changes to my life.

First off, we all know about the new house. The one that I still have yet to post pictures of as I promised in my last post. Let me tell you a secret..it's because I'm still unpacking. Yes, the house has been ours for almost a month now and there are still a few boxes sitting around. I finished unpacking/organizing the girls' rooms yesterday and have full intentions of finishing my bedroom by the end of the week. Then we will officially be "moved in"! We still have to paint a few rooms and hang wall decorations after we paint but it will be a few months until that's all finished. But pictures are coming...

Second, we've been attending a new church. Vertical Church to be exact. A friend at work was telling me that she and her husband had started attending Vertical and kept talking about how awesome it was. I was intrigued. It sounded great. I really wanted to try it out, but I felt guilty for "abandoning" the church we had been attending for the last year. So for a few weeks, I tried pushing the idea out of my mind. I really think God was urging me to go see what all the hype was about. So finally, I gave in. We attended one service and I was hooked. I loved it! I had never ever attended a church service like that. The music was incredible (songs that I listen to on K Love!), the sermon spoke directly to my heart. There is no way you could be bored in a church service at Vertical. Even my husband who doesn't consider himself a Christian enjoyed the service and has been back numerous times. God is doing BIG things in our community and he's using Vertical Church to touch the lives of so many people. If there is a Vertical Church in your area I encourage you to check it out! You won't be disappointed!

Homeschooling is still moving right along. I can not believe the year is winding down. After this week, the girls only have 9 more lessons in our Kindergarten math curriculum! When we finish those, we will review math and spend extra time on phonics. We have about 12 weeks of Phonics left. I'm amazed at the progress the girls have made. I love love love to hear them read. It just makes my heart smile. In science we're studying about plants. We started a plants lapbook today and will be planting bean seeds later this week.

I've been trying to make more time for "Mommy Quiet time". During this time I read my Bible, study my devotions, write for 31 Rubies, write for this blog, read, listen to music, etc. I've been trying to do it first thing in the mornings. Most days though I'm not awake before the girls, so I'm trying to squeeze in "me time" while they're running around and asking for breakfast, which isn't really working out very well. I find myself getting frustrated with them. Why? Because they want breakfast!? That's silly. Of course they want breakfast they haven't eaten in 14 hours. But I want my "me time!" That's what I want to say. And then my wonderful friend Nikki posts this on her blog today. It was a message from God just for me! I need to wake up FOR my kids, not TO my kids! So I will be making friends with my alarm clock. Many of you who know me are saying "yeah right! She is not a morning person", but this is just one of those things I need to do.

There are lots of other things going on in "Heather Land" right now, but you'll have to tune in tomorrow to find out more!