Spring Garden!

It's that time of year again and I am so excited.  We spent all day yesterday getting the garden ready for planting. This year we plan to add an herb garden to the mix.  I will do my best to keep pictures uploaded and share any tips with you that I can.   Today's tip...don't plant your carrot by your squash.  I did one year and it stunted the growth of my carrots. (A helpful website about companion planting here.) Also, plant some basil by your tomatoes.  It is supposed to enhance the flavor (I don't know about that) and also keep bugs away.  It did help with that.  One more tip and I have shared this before...Use fish tank water for all your plants as a fertilizer; but especially pepper plants.  If you know anyone with a tank, ask them for a few gallons of water from it when they clean it montly.  My pepper plants have grown as high as three feet and that is all I use on them.

Until next time.

Yard Sale!

Last Saturday morning I was on my way to the grocery store when I passed a sign that read "Yard Sale".  This was not unusual for a Saturday morning; but I was unusually busy because we had just returned from a trip and I NEEDED to go and get groceries.  It was also unusual because I had money that belong strictly to me (given as a gift from a church specifically to me!).  I had asked the Lord to help me to spend it wisely; and I almost drove right passed that sale; but it seemed as if the Holy Spirit was tugging me that way (VERY unusual!)...so I stopped, and I am sure glad I did!  I left with two HUGE (50 gallon) tubs of clothes, over twenty pairs of shoes, books and toys for the girls and the church nursery, ect.  Guess how much it all cost? Fifty Dollars!!!  Isn't that great! There were many things at that yard sale that I would never have been able to buy because they were luxeries; but only cost me pennies.  All I can say is Praise God for yard sales adn gifts from others that give us money to spend at them!
Until next time,

Aaliyah in a smart outfit and new shoes from the yard sale.

Another outfit/play clothes

Aaliyah challenging me to play swords. Cassidy is not so sure about my sword.

Two more smart outfits from the sale. Check out Aaliyahs cute shoes.  The lady on far left will be 100 years old this week.

A visit to D.C.

A couple of weeks ago I told you that we went to a Missions Conference in Virginia.  While there we realized that we were only twenty minutes or so away from D.C. so we decided to go site seeing during the day.  We had a blast; but we didn't realize the new challenges we would face by having two small children and a dog with us!  During the conference we had meetings in the evenings. One day we had a ladies luncheon where Mrs. Weniger, the pastor's wife, took all the missionary wives to a wonderful buffet with all types of food  and I do mean all types - from pizza to pad thai. During the other two days we went site seeing.  I hope you enjoy a few of my favorite pics from our adventures.




Raymond in front of the Old Post Office

Street shots

People encamped in front of Wall street

Interesting buildings

American Red Cross building

Until next time,





Therapy

In about ten minutes we will be leaving to go to our second care home ministry today.  I love Tuesdays because it is an opportunity for us to minister to people who cannot come to our church but are often VERY hungry for the Word of God.  My husband and I agree that often we sense the Spirit of the Lord moving in the care homes because there are people there who come expecting to hear from the Lord.  We especially love this ministry now because we have two little girls who are special therapy to the residents.  Every now and then I have to go without them and every time this happens they always say "Where are the girls?". As if to say, "Oh, it's just you today."  Some have cautioned me not to take my girls into places like that; but my response is to think about all the grandmothers who reside in these facilities who never or seldom ever see their grandchildren.  My girls have several adopted grandparents, aunt, and uncles.  Plus people are hearing the word of God.  Besides all this prayer and soap and water still work. 

Until next time,

Busy, Busy, Busy

This year has been an extremely busy one thus far.  That is a good thing.  Recently we heard a preacher challenge the congregation to get worn out for the Lord, I think my husband decided to take that challenge.  This past week we had our first ever conference, The Faith, Love and Family Conference, which went extremely well.  Saturday my husband took a van full of our people to a youth rally in Conway, Arkansas while I took the girls to a birthday party.  Sunday was our church's five year anniversary service.  What a wonderful Sunday it was!  We had over fifty and maybe even sixty people in attendance.  I was so busy I didn't take a count; but every pew was almost full!  This week we get a break; but next week we head to Virginia for another missions conference.  Please pray with us that the Lord will bless us with safety to and from the conference and that we will be a blessing to the people of the church we are going to.  This particular conference is special to us because it is the church of the pastor who was my husband's first independent baptist pastor in Marysville, CA so many years ago, Pastor Brad Weniger. 
Until next time,

HEEELP!

I heard this story last week at a conference we were in and wanted to share it with you.  We know an older couple who just started a church like ours in a neighboring town.  They are former missionaries who had to come back home to take care some medical issues with family.  Well, they have a son and daughter in law (a white couple) who cannot have children; so they have decided to adopt.  Thus far they have adopted one Black young boy (age three) who is just so adorable.  They are in the process of adopting a little Asian boy as well.  Sometimes when you adopt you get children with interesting habits.  This little boy has one that I think is HILARIOUS.  One day as the mom was getting the little boy out of the car seat and getting ready to go into Wal-mart he started helling, "HELP!, HELP!, HELP!" at the top of his lungs.  She finally got him to calm down and the day went on with no other hiccups; but the next time they went shopping he did the same thing, "HELP!, HELP!, HELP!".  (Keep in mind that this is a White parent with a Black son.)  She said she finally had to start spanking him for doing that.  She has also now decided to start carrying around her proof of adoption papers with her just in case. 

Until next time,

Faith, Love, and Family

Last night was the first night of our first annual Faith,  Love and Family conference.  I thoroughly enjoyed it!  Pastor Patterson of Jacksonville Baptist Temple preached for us and he will be speaking tonight as well.  Bro. Patterson preached about how Adam chose Eve over the Lord when he decided to eat the fruit from the forbidden tree, how that if your home doesn't have the Lord there cannot be harmony and peace in it, and how that God introduced grace in the garden (to be continued tonight!).  In attendance we had one of our faithful members, one adult visitor and several of our children.  After the meeting as Raymond was dropping off the children he said they had some interesting conversations.  One I am excited about sharing with you today.  We will call the young boy (age 10) Carl.

Carl:          He is a good preacher!
Raymond:  Yes he is.
Carl:          Where is he from?
Raymond:  Jacksonville.
Carl:          How does he know about this church?
Raymond:  He started this church.
Carl:          Oh, so he is like the boss of this church.
Raymond:  I guess you could say that.
Carl:          What happened to that other guy?
Raymond:  Who?
Carl:          The tall guy who used to preach here?
Raymond:  You mean Bro. Parker?  He went to start another church in Alabama.
Carl:  Oh, he left.
Raymond:  Yes.  He is starting another church just like this one.
Carl:  Are you gonna leave too?
Raymond:  No, I don't plan on it.

That just blessed my heart.  This little boy, by the way, started out as one of our "problem kids", but is becoming Raymond's little helper and every time the doors are open (and he is not grounded for fighting at school) he wants to be at church.

Raymond knows that there is a strong probability that the majority of our services will be attended by mostly children.  He is not disturbed by this.  He has asked our speakers not to be disturbed by this and not to hold back any punches.  These children are taking the messages they hear at church back to their homes.  We know this for a fact.  One parent told us that her daughter said that if she was going to have boyfriends and children then she needed to get married.  What a blessing!  If the parents won't come to church to hear the truth, then maybe God will use these children to take the truth to their parents.  They got an ear full last night and I am looking forward to the rest of the week!
Until next time,