Kids at Church

I am revisiting my views on children in the worship service.  I was challenged on this by Rob Reinow, the speaker at last year's Awana conference in our area.

In Scripture, the children are present in their times of worship.  He pointed out that in the last century, we have come up with a "better" way of reaching children at church.  But looking at the numbers of teens and young adults walking away from their faith..... Something's not working.

So Paul and I made the decision to be in charge of our children's spiritual growth.  We're not leaving it up to just what they learn in church.  And one of those decisions was keeping our kids with us in the corporate worship service, so we share in that time and can discuss it during the week.

Which is easy when your kids do this during church:

But not so easy when you have a dramatic daughter who always ends up causing a scene when you walk away to do offertory.  

I'm not sure I think that kids should be this involved in the service. :)

I took her to that side of the church to sit with her grandparents (who sit next to the piano), but she followed me up to the bench.  It was easier just to leave her there than cause a scene.  And she did very well!  She only touched the keys once, and when she noticed everyone watching her, she sat very soberly and quietly.

Maybe she can start playing offertory next year. :)

Anyhow.  The top thoughts were just so there was something of substance to post with these pictures.  (Thanks to my sis Carlsie for taking the candid photos!)

Overheard:

(Zadie picks up the box to Emperor's New Groove.)

A llama??
[mumble, mumble, jabber]
Yeah, weird.



I am so proud!

"School's Out for the Summer...."

(Okay, so that's a rock song.  It only is a clever title if you know the song.....)

So, today..... We finally finished school.  

IN MY DEFENSE, we've kind of had a big year.  New baby, huge house project......  But seriously.  Considering we started 1st grade for Nathan in April of his Kindergarten year..... It's kind of embarrassing that it took until August to get done.  

We had about 10 "Spring Breaks" - as in "my kids are completely stir crazy and the weather is nice, so it's easier to just let them play outside literally ALL DAY LONG than it is to fight with them about coming in to do school" breaks.  That was the biggest thing that set us behind.  We were doing pretty good, even considering new baby last winter, until the weather got nice.

Several people told me that you don't have to finish the book.  Public school standards are 80% of the textbook (I was told), and the first part of the year is all review anyways.  But it's the principle of the matter!  You're not done until it's finished!  Otherwise it just feels like you're giving up and letting your kids win.

I have been starting school on the oh-so-appropriate Labor Day, but our kids are going to get lucky this year.  Paul and I agreed we can't even attempt to start school until the house is completely finished, so it will be mid-September before we start.  Maybe the later starting date will make me even more diligent to stick to it and not get behind.  

We'll see.......

(And Jacob is not finished with his preschool.  But considering he doesn't even turn 5 until the end of October, I'm not worried about that at all.  We will start Kindergarten whenever we get around to it..... Which will probably be right around his birthday.)

Discrimination

I believe I've ranted about boot shopping before.
But may I just say that I think it's discrimination, the fact that women's shoes come in half sizes, until you get to size 11, and then it's whole sizes.  Because apparently when you have a larger foot, you quit caring about whether your shoes fit just right.  Grr.
I am borrowing a pair of boots from my sister for the Horses, Boots, & Bibles kids' day camp.  The soles on mine have completely disintegrated.  I really like hers, but they're a tad snug.  But if the next option is a whole size larger, I'll be slopping around in them.
As it turns out, there's a bootsmith in a nearby city.  Getting my old (men's, I might add) boots re-soled will be less than half of buying a new pair, so that's what I'll go with. :)

Station Break

So in the span of three weeks, we have had/will have....

• music at a wedding (and don't forget rehearsal!)
• VBS, at 8:30 AM each morning
• surgery
• recovery from said surgery (still in progress)
• Horses, Boots, and Bibles kids day camp
• music for said camp, at 8 AM each morning
• music for another wedding (and don't forget rehearsal!)
• helping with launch and return of women for Encounter (There's still time to register, ladies!)

And don't forget, our house is still in shambles through all of this.

And surprisingly, I'm not stressed!  I guess that's the comfort of knowing God's in control. 

I will update progress on the house.... Some day.  After next weekend.  Or maybe before..... 

:)

2014 Home Improvements: It Has Begun

Remember the big project?

It has begun.

As I got ready to type this post, I realized I hardly ever post pictures of the exterior of our house.

So here is our lovely home.  I do love it.  Quirks, foibles, and all.  (Except that stupid propane tank.  Bane of my existence.)

Our house was built in 1940.  Somewhere along the line, the front room (brown door on left end of house) was added (my guess is in the '80s).  It had previously been the front porch, and the front entrance to the house.  (The front room is on the side that faces the road.)

Adding on the front room had switched the house from a south-facing, to an east-facing house.  And now there's a propane tank directly, smack-dab in front of the house.  Isn't it beautiful?  Aesthetically pleasing?  NOT.

A later add-on ('90s?) was the huge deck on two sides of our house.  We love this deck.  Even though we can't afford luxury furniture for out there, we moved a couple homemade picnic tables up there and use it constantly.  It's like a giant playpen for the kids.

Also along the muddled timeline of the house was the addition of the back porch (beneath the dormer).
The framing of the back porch was epic.  Like, how was that thing even standing?  I will post pictures another time.

This was our cellar basement.  It was hard to get a good "before" picture  of it, because you there was a giant stone column and an HVAC unit right smack in the middle of it.  But you get the idea.  Dark, dank, a little bit creepy.  You had to go outside of our house to get into the cellar.  (The doorway is hidden in the above picture by the iris, but it's right under the small window.)  Which is not cool when thinking about severe weather so common in Kansas.

So that was our house 10 days ago.




As of Friday, this is what our house looks like:

No deck.  No back porch.

No flowerbeds.  No grass.

And no basement.

Most of the foundation has been knocked out.  In the case of the wall directly in the center of the above picture, I'm pretty sure the weight of the house was all that was holding it up - which is kind of backwards.  The foundation is supposed to hold the house up, not the other way around.  But it looks like when they lifted the house with the jacks and the I-beams, the wall collapsed inward.

The white post at right was the previous depth of the basement.  The new depth will be two feet deeper.  (You can see the other white post in the "before" picture above.)

I am so excited to see work started, and even more excited for the end result.  It will be messy and stressful, but in the end will be totally worth it.  

More pictures to follow of what we've found as we've torn stuff apart.

Overheard:

My question to Sunday School class:
"Why was God angry with the Israelites?  What had they been doing?"

"They had been washing up idols!"
(Levi, age 4)


He said this in the Kansas way, "worsh-ing" up, and I think in his mind, he was saying "worshiping" but it still cracked me up.  Every week for the last month.  I love kids.