Crazy times!

Well, we have had a lot going on around here! Family pictures, Cross Country trip, Halloween, Stomach flu....good times! ;) We will be sending out the family photos with our Christmas cards, but here's a sneak peak....



And then Dennis and I left last weekend for an overnight trip to Lexington, KY, for his cross-country team's last meet. They did really well and it was my first real experience with a CC meet.....fun, but very COLD. It was about 40 degrees with 20 mph winds! I think they should have CC in a warmer season, but I guess it won't change any time soon! ;) Here is a photo of his team...

Then of course, Halloween is today and we are still not sure if we will be able to go to the Trunk or Treat at church tonight because Emily has had a nasty stomach flu. She has been sick since Saturday morning. She has been "spitting up" as she calls it and feeling very yucky. We took her to the Zoo Halloween party Sunday afternoon because it was our last chance and she hadn't thrown up that day, but the poor thing was pale and had to stay in the wagon the whole time. But she was a trooper and had fun. Then she started "spitting up" again yesterday, so we are not sure about tonight's plans!! She is better today, though, so we're keeping up hope!! Here's a few photos from Sunday....

So...Emily is maybe over this thing and seems to feel better this morning. So I have Clorox-wiped everything that will stand still and we hope to be moving on to cleaner, healthier pastures! No one else has gotten the bug at this point. Pray that we don't!!

Fall Fun!

Well, we've been enjoying many traditions of Fall. Hayrides, carving pumpkins and get-together's with friends. We also went today to have our family Christmas photos taken....let's just say it was not Anna's favorite activity of the month. God bless that sweet photographer! She met her match with Anna. But...we managed to get some cute family shots and you'll all be seeing them in time for Christmas!
Dennis and I are both off for Fall Break this week, so we are doing some family stuff with the kids. Check out our pumpkin carving photos!

Drawing on the little pumpkins with Braedon and Stephanie...



Carving pumpkins with Mommy and Daddy...


Anna spending time with her friends, Larry and Stephanie!

Superheros and sidekicks!!

My last post had no photos, so I will make up with it this time with some really cute ones! Many of you won't get to see the girls on Halloween, so here is a sneak peak of their costumes....meet Larryboy and Bob the Tomato! We have a Fall Festival at church that the girls will attend and this coming week we are taking them to the zoo for their Halloween party. Emily had so much fun seeing her costume being created! She is a Larryboy NUT!




REMEMBER, GOD MADE YOU SPECIAL....AND HE LOVES YOU VERY MUCH!
BYE!!

Bronze Serpents

So, this week's post probably won't have photos. But it will have an awesome devotional that comes from last night's sermon by Dr. Chad Brand at Little Flock Ministry Center. He preached a wondefully challenging sermon about "knowing God in the present" and not looking back to victories and deliverances of the past, but expecting victories and deliverances in the future! Great challenge to a church who has lost several ministers on staff and are in a tailspin because of change!!

So, this is my devotional thought for you all this week:
2 Kings 18:1-6, focusing on verse 4: "He removed the high places and broke the sacred pillars, cut down the wooden image and broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made; for until those days the children of Israel burned incense to it, and called it Nehushtan."

The serpent this passage refers to was created by Moses and was introduced in Numbers 21:8, when the disobedient Istraelites were being bitten by serpents God sent against them because of their lack of faith. God told Moses to create a sepent, put it onto a pole, and He said whenever the people had been bitten, they could look to it IN FAITH and they would live.
Over the next 700 yrs, the Israelites held onto the bronze serpent and it became an idol to them. This led to the need for it to be destroyed in 2 Kings. It became an idol because they forgot that God healed them and began to attribute the healing to the serpent.

How does this apply to me, you say?? Well, often as Christians, we getted stuck in times of the past when we've been stronger in our faith and when God healed us, or delivered us, or stirred us in exciting ways. We have a tendency to get stuck there....listening to the music that we listened to then, wishing we were still at the church we went to then, wishing we had that dynamic preacher we had then and thinking God is not present with us anymore.
We need to remember to put our faith in the present God who gave us past victories, knowing there will be new victories and new experiences with that same living God!!

Hopefully this will give you the same excitement it gave me, as we remember this week that God is living and active, no matter our circumstances!!