i am a total visual learner. when i can see something, or hear an illustration where i can picture it, i learn a lot better. this passage in romans 6 has always been so interesting to me because it is something i can picture.
v16"Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness?"
the kjv says servants instead of slaves, but either way it is the same idea.

this is the deal. i have issues. (hopefully i am not alone?) i take something that has happened to me, against me, or against someone i love. then what i do is i think about it...a lot. i analyze it, like...what was the person thinking when she said that? what did we ever do that would make them say or do that? then i start feeling a little bit upset. not too much. like, it doesn't affect everything...yet. but then i think about it a little more. i start to have imaginary conversations in my head. like, i picture myself talking to this person and saying exactly how i feel. you know, exhorting...to make it sound spiritual :) then i realize that it IS affecting me. i am starting to get a little snappy with my kids, or my husband. i start to feel a little more annoyed, and i have to say...PRIDEFUL. as if I would never do anything like what this person has done! sometimes it goes one step further, although i have to be pretty blatantly in the flesh to let it get here, but i open my mouth and talk about it to someone else. usually only my sisters. i mean, that's not as sinful right?? wrong!!
this is where the verse comes in. i am literally becoming a slave to this sin. this sin of not thinking of others as better than myself. it's crazy because when i picture this, it changes things. this feeling that is making me so upset, i am taking a pair of handcuffs and putting one end on my wrist, and the other on the "wrist" of the sin. why? why would i ever want to do that? if i was in my right mind, and knowing how NOT GOOD it feels to be upset i would want to run as far away from it as i could!! satan has a way of tricking us, huh? this is where the next verse comes into play.
"We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." this is wild. this is how i described it to my 6-year-old. this is a bad guy (show him his little pirate dude)


he is NOT allowed inside your head (show him a hat) but SOMEHOW he got past the traps and got inside the hat!! what are we going to do?!?!? capture that bad guy! (argument and pretension) we put him in the dungeon and say that he HAS to obey. he has no choice!! we bring him to the King of the castle. and then we put a good guy in the hat instead of him.
is this making sense? we need to set up a trench full of hungry crocs and guards. but if somehow, someway a bad thought gets past. we then just capture him, and give him to the KING.


amazingly, we FEEL better! crazy how that works.
let's do that today. every time a bad guy comes in and wants to handcuff himself to you, don't let him! capture that dude, and make him obey Christ.

new life

my very good friend natalya had a baby boy!! i got to have her little girl kahlen with us for the day, which was so fun! here's the beautiful family.

christmas

i was in target the other day, and i literally felt sick to my stomach. i looked down each aisle...one stacked to the top with pink dolls. another jam packed with every lego imaginable. then i rememberd one day, when we brought a few balls and bats with us to the bateyes in the dominican and kids came running at us from everywhere so that they could play with a ball. ONE ball!


i remembered the feeling i had when i got home to my little tiny living room after a week of seeing this


and suddenly the fact that my living room was small meant nothing. it has a carpet. and electricity. and a couch.

i remember coming back from haiti and thinking...wow. i have way too much.




what has christmas become in america? what has america become? forget christmas, that's just become one more excuse to buy your kids way more than they need. parents hardly need an excuse anymore! isn't it all about comfort? OUR comfort??? that is the world we are living in!! is that how we're supposed to live? paul didn't think so. "though i am free and belong to no man, i make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible" (1 cor. 9:19) i make myself a SLAVE in case you didn't read it the first time! my goal in life is to please God. that's it!! i have to make the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. doesn't that put a different perspective on things? it's not all about me and my comfortable life. it's about obedience to the voice of God. and don't forget, if you truly love the God who saved you, his commands are NOT BURDENSOME!! (1 John5:3)
it's the least i can do. Christ is my life. i need to make sure that i am not letting myself get so caught up in a comfortable life that i miss out on what God has planned for me.
i am so excited to see what God is going to be doing in my life. in my husband's life. in the life of my boys. i am praying that i will hear God's voice louder than the voice of the world. i always pray that for my boys. the world's voice is so loud! stop for a second. put down your christmas list. LISTEN to God's voice. make it your GOAL to please him. it is so beyond worth it.

quote of the day...

aj: "thanks for letting me read my Bible mom. some parents don't let their kids read the Bible"

world turners

Jesus is coming soon. he has to be, right?? i know that for many years people have been saying this, but in reality...there was no way He could have been coming. there were too many things that needed to happen to fulfill prophecy. like israel becoming a nation to name one!
so here's my thought for the day.
if this is the last generation, WHY did God choose to have ME here? and why did He choose to have YOU here?
maybe He wanted people with a passion and love for himself to be here so we could, i don't know...turn the world upside down? i love in acts where it says "These men who have turned the world upside down..." what a reputation!!

i want people to say that about me, but is it possible?? i mean really! what can i do? what can we do? i want to turn this world upside down, do you?? God has me here for a reason, and you too!! i hope it's because he knew we would be CRAZY for him! just crazy. a nut. that's what i want to be.
i recently had coffee with a girl that i had just met. i started sharing my testimony, and surprisingly i didn't feel nervous at all. i thought i would be, but i felt so much compassion for her, that it's all i could think about. i just wanted her to know the truth. i hope i am like that with every sincle person i come in contact with.
so think about it. are you going to be one of those who turns the world upside down in possibly the last generation? i am. let's do this.

our good friend jeff got the boys this super cool poster...


they love it!

big boy




little boy

being a boys mommy...

today was a beautiful, crisp, sunny day. i sat outside and read my bible and did my Esther study (by beth moore). when i was done, i put my bible and book on the kitchen table. a little later, i came back into the kitchen, and for some reason, this struck me as so funny that i laughed out loud.


i don't know what it was, but it reminded me of how fun it is to be a boys mommy. i'm sure that i have seen things that were a little more humorous than this, and things a little grosser, but it just cracked me up. you know like when you are digging in your purse to find your phone (that is not in the little side pouch built specifically FOR your phone, because apparently you did not have the 2.3 extra seconds to put it there!) and you find peanut butter and cracker packages, goldfish...not in a package anymore, matchbox cars and everything else imaginable?!?! it just reminds you that you that you are a mommy through and through. don't you love it? look around your house, i'm sure you will find some funny combinations...like esther and a gun! :)

highlights of the week...

aj

*we almost won our indoor soccer game
*i played brutal basketball and dodgeball with uncle chad
*i had my first basketball practice
*we are learning to sing the presidents
*i learned about the human body for science
*nanny made us new curtains
*grampops said he'd give us 5 dollars if we find a deer out back

riley

*aiyah and uncle chad came
*i built a house for tank
*ruthie babysat us again. that's the second time.
*we went to applebees again
*we went into the new game stop
*i wrote a whole bible verse in handwriting
*we learned about the boston tea party
*grampops told us to not go outside when he's hunting. we might get shot...


that's it for now.

i love...

that i got to meet my husband in kindergarten


i beat him at a math game in first grade. that has never happened since. he has always been smarter than me. he loves me anyways. i used to trip him in high school to try and get him to stop walking with his head lifted up so high. we got to go to college together. we loved running together at night after classes were over. sometimes we would run 10 miles. i loved doing that. i used to make him pasta in a hot pot and bring it to his window.



he is amazing. he reads his bible a lot. he knows where every verse i ask about is. he is an awesome daddy. he loves the boys so much. he loves bread. he is not a big ice cream fan. he leads worship at church. sometimes i just look at him on the stage and smile. we love watching sports together. he likes fantasy football. i'm not a big fan. i love him anyways. he can read my mind. he makes me feel like i am the most beautiful girl in the world.

i am so blessed to have adam as my husband. we have such similar passions and i love that. we have the same dreams, and i can't wait to watch God fulfill them.

my boys

i love being a boys mommy. i love my boys. so much. i love that they are different. it amazes me sometimes.

AJ
is big for his age. always has been. i can remember wanting to put a sign on him when i was in public, saying what his age was! he fell off the bed a million times when he was little. i rocked him to sleep every night for at least a year straight. he used to sleep with 2 pacifiers, one in his mouth, and one to smell.

he has an incredibly sensitive heart.
he gets emotional easily, and still loves snuggling with me. he is a little more on the serious side. he's a perfectionist and is really hard on himself. he LOVES daddy and wants to please him so much. he's always been incredibly athletic. i remember when he was about 4, he picked up a tennis racket and ball for the first time and just bounced it off the wall to himself forever! he is a natural athlete, and is good at everything. he's very competitive, but he is a good winner (usually :)) he has wicked neat handwriting.

he knows more football and basketball stats than most adults. he has been in 3 other countries. he loves God, and loves reading his bible and learning. he definately has a goofy, funny side.

he has a great laugh. he likes to stay up late. he loves his brother, and they almost always get along great. he loves his cousins, and misses them so much. he could watch football network all day and half the night. he loves ice cream. he likes just about every fruit and vegetable. he doesn't care for rice. and he doesn't like cake. he is very sarcastic. (don't have a clue where he gets that) he likes to dance. he loves music...hip hop is his favorite (all christian only) he likes video games. he loves history. he is very slow-paced. sometimes we call him "aje". his favorite color is green. he likes cooking. everyone loves him. he is a really great pray-er. sometimes he laughs so hard he cries.
he is an incredible boy and i can't wait to see what God is going to do in and through his life.

Riley Joel
is a firecracker. he is fast paced, and moves constantly.

he is hysterical. makes me laugh constantly. we call him ry, and he likes to put that at the top of his papers in school. sometimes i call him leroy, roy or lloyd. i don't know why. he is wicked fast. he finished the 1 mile run in 7:17. he is an incredibly good athlete. he loves soccer. he doesn't like almost every fruit and vegetable. he doesn't like ice cream. he loves cake. he loves bread. he could eat tortilla chips with salsa for every meal. he loves to sing. he likes playing with playmobil and other..."guys" (that's just what we refer to them as!) he could play by himself for a long time. he likes watching westerns with nanny and grampops. he likes playing football. he loves mommy. he loves snuggling. he needs his "puppy blanket" and the puppies have to be facing up when he's covered up. he doesn't like being hot. he is very matter of fact. he misses his cousins so much.
he wanted to grow his hair out so he wouldn't have to put gel in it anymore.

he loves popcorn. he's very imaginative. he makes everyone laugh. he has been in 3 other countries. he uses big words. his favorite color is red. he has a very sensitive heart to the Lord. he is very naturally good at math. he has gotten 2nd degree burns and broken his collar bone. everyone loves him. he likes to stay up late, and has a really hard time falling asleep. his entire face lights up when he smiles.


he is an incredible boy and i can't wait to see what God is going to do in and through his life.

hold on to today

today, a couple different times, i caught myself getting impatient with one of the boys. ugh. i hate that about myself!! i don't want to! why are my eyes so quick to roll?? not necessary.
i wrote a song when the boys were little and today i am thinking of it again. maybe some of the examples in the song are different, but it's the same idea. we don't know how long we have here. enjoy today.

You have to go to the bottom of the screen and hit pause on the playlist first!!



Hold on to Today
i'll let you have a pop at 8 in the morning
give you all the candy you want before bed
i'll let you watch the same movie over and over
if i can snuggle with you and rub your head

i will not yell when you dump your drink on the floor
i won't complain when you want to play ball
i'll give you anything you want, just name it it's yours
as long as you lift your arms to me when you fall

i will hold on to today
don't want to let a minute pass me by
i will tell you i love you and how special you are
never be to busy to hold you when you cry
i will hold on to today
don't want to let a minute pass me by
i'll be the best i can be, God gave you to me
and i will always be by your side

i will not yell when i'm the only one you want
won't roll my eyes when the whining just won't stop
i'll cherish every moment, hold on to what i have
and i will hold those precious tears, every last drop

you never know when your last day will be

if this was the last time i'd ever see you
i'd enjoy watching your face light up when you smile
i'd laugh instead of scream, seeing what a gift you really are
and i would keep you up at night for just a while.

and so tonight i will go in and kiss my boys a few more times while they sleep. pray over them a little harder, rub their heads, cover them up and tomorrow is a new day. God's mercies will be new and i will hold on to every moment i have.

variety

here's a few things from this week

aj just had his baskteball draft. there were about 45 kids in the 3rd and 4th grade who were a part of it. they had an hour long try out then the coaches got together. the guy who had the first pick asked if he was able to pick a 3rd grader. he wanted to pick aj!! they said he had to pick a 4th grader first. but it ended up that the guy who wanted aj actually had the first pick when it came to the 3rd graders, so he was picked then. would you want this dude on your team?!?!


oh, and by the way, he sneaker is a size 5 1/2!! he is EIGHT people!!

let's see. what else.
i don't think this is really blog-worthy, but i made the boys pancakes yesterday that looked like this



they thought it was the coolest thing ever.

then tonight, we ended a four day super-charged conference at church. it was a great night, and the message was from my dad


and it was so encouraging and challenging. based on deuteronomy 6. i need to make my relationship with God my personal decision. i need my kids to see that my relationship with God is for real. it's not burdesome and it's not sigh, going to church argh, because we have to! it's because i want to grow and i love going to church! (i really do too!) if i make good choices now, i will receive blessing for that, that will be passed on for generations. (it was a lot better than how i just wrote it, sorry dad.)
this is what ry was doing during the service

(it's a little blurry, but i had to turn the flash off since i was in church!)
he's so sweet and is very obedient and knows how to sit still in church.

aj was doing this

he has such a sweet and sensitive heart and i love it. he loves taking notes in church!

then we came home and aj and adam spent the next half hour looking at their fantasy basketball! me and ry played cards.



i was snuggling with ry and i said "this is delicious". he said "i don't think it really tastes good. (pause) but it is awesome!"

i guess that'll do it for now. enough is enough, right? read deuteronomy 6. like right now. seriously, do it. it's so good. :)
God'd Word is AMAZING!

does the devil laugh at evolution?

i honestly have been thinking about this lately. ok. satan is not all-knowing, right? i mean, i am sure he knows his end, because it is written in the Bible and he does know the bible. but as far as knowing how his plans are going to go, i don't think he can know that. so do you think that in the late 1800's, that when satan first heard darwin going off about all this incredibly ordered, and amazing creation being the result of...um, let's see...NOTHING. that he thought to himself, "hmm...as nice as this would be to get going, people are not going to buy this one!" and here we are. i mean, do you think he just literally laughs and thinks i can NOT believe these "educated" adults are actually falling for such an absurd theory, and then teaching it as FACT!!! he must be just absolutely thrilled! so-really do you think he is laughing? just a thought.
i listened to my 8-year-old read genesis 1 and 2 yesterday and write down what was created on each day (for awana) and i literally got the chills. just hearing my baby's voice reading "God said...and it was so". awesome. he actually paused at one point, and said "wow". now that is truth. and that, my friend, does not have satan laughing!
also, i loved this email i got from a friend of mine. it said "may you be the kind of girl, that as soon as your feet hit the floor, satan says, oh crap. she's up" haha..i loved that!! i want to be that kind of girl! i want to be doing so much for my Jesus, that satan is doing anything but laughing!! you?

highlights for the boys

because the boys have 6 aunties, and 4 uncles that live far away from us, and grandparents and great-grand parents and cousins that live far away too, i thought i would let the boys give an update of some of their highlights from last week.

aj:
*i scored a goal in my indoor soccer game
*i had my basketball draft
*i started an exercise program every day
*we went out to eat at applebees
*i started doing dare to be a daniel
*i got basketball shoes this week
*i got a new baksetball at the thrift store
*our family started a baksetball fantasy team


riley:
*i played indoor soccer and scored three goals (we won 11-3 and 14-2 in both of our games)
*ruthie babysat us
*school is going awesome
*i learned how to play row row row your boat on the piano
*i got indoor soccer shoes and basketball shoes
*one of my stuffed animals lost its head but we sewed it back on


i guess that's it for now. i will try to keep everyone updated if more "exciting" things happen!

praying scripture

i love to pray scripture over people. there is something incredibly powerful about using God's Word to speak to Him! there are some people that i have specific verses that i pray every day. there are others that i choose different verses for different days. (if you want to know if you have a personal one, you can email me :)) lamentations 2:19 says "pour out thine heart like water before the face of the Lord; lift up thy hands toward him for the life of thy young children..." sometimes i just lift up my hands and pour out my heart over my boys as they are sleeping! i believe with everything in me that prayer works!! a passage that i love that i am praying over them currently is in colossians. my prayer would go something like this...Dear Heavenly Father, I pray that Aj and Riley would walk worthy of you, Lord and that they would be fruitful in every good work. God, please help them to increase in the knowledge of You every single day! help them to be strengthened with all might according to your glorious power. give them patience, longsuffering, and most of all JOY!! Thank you Jesus!!

another one of my favorites is in Ephesians 1. this one would be...
God, i pray that you, Jesus Christ, our amazing and powerful Father would give Aj and Riley the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of you! Help the eyes of their understanding to be enlightened, so that Aj will know what is the hope of his calling. So that Ry will know the hope of his calling. Help my boys to know what the riches of the glory of YOUR inheritance are. help them to completely understand the EXCEEDING greatness of YOUR power toward them...because they belive!! according to the working of your incredible power. Thank you. amen.

i have another one i love for adam and the boys too. i'll put that in another post :)
pick a passage and pray it over the ones you love! and be SURE...that your fervant prayer will avail MUCH!!

indoor soccer

both the boys are playing indoor soccer this year and i was so excited to bring my camera and get some good close up shots of them in action...this is what i actually got


awesome.

sisters

i am so lucky...

i homeschool and only have 2 kids...

just a confession today. here we go. (and it's not about my super-awesome book corner that you are seeing in the picture!)
sometimes i feel like i am not taken seriously, and my homeschooling, or child-raising almost "doesn't count" because i only have 2 kids. seriously, going to any place that has homeschoolers, and it's like they are looking behind me wondering where the rest of my kids are! i get comments a lot when i am out in public about how well-behaved my boys are. (course, i have a lot of people who love to say that i was so "lucky" that my kids were so good!! oh ya...total luck. had nothing at all to do with the training!!!) but then i will talk to people with more kids, and it's like...well, if you had more kids it would be different. i am not in any way denying that having more kids is more difficult!! of course it is! but regardless, raising kids is hard work...if you have 1, or if you have 13!!
i was just encouraging a friend of mine (with a 1 1/2-year-old) to remember that harder work now, makes for less work later. disciplining your kids takes work. it is always "easier" to give in at the time. but it is always HARDER 5 years from now when you have taken the easy way out! make the effort to be consistent now so that your job will be easier later.
i STILL have to make schedules for my kids. i still have to write out assignments, i still have to do laundry, make meals and the same things everyone else has to do!

so there's my confession. thanks for listening!
the point is, if you "only" have 1 or 2 kids - be a godly, hard working, and CRAZY FUN mom!! and if you have 13 kids, do the same!! i love deuteronomy - one of the best books in the Bible - it talks about teaching about God's love and faithfulness ALL THE TIME!!! no matter what you are doing. sometimes i just start singing a bible verse that i made up. sometimes when i hear a great praise and worship song i just grab the boys and start dancing. i want to show my boys that Jesus is not just a part of my life, he IS my life!! i admit that i'm a little crazy, and i love laughing. i want that to be a big part of my family's life. in God's presence is FULLNESS of JOY!!! let's act it, no matter how crazy or calm our life may be!!

how do you say you're a homeschooler?

question. what do YOU do when someone asks you what teacher your child has in school? Or if your kids have the day off from school? i feel like i have been in many situations lately where i am faced with this. what should my response be??? i don't ever want to come off as better than anyone, or snobby about it. but at the same time, i am not ashamed of it, and i have no regrets at all! i am trying to be a light. that's what i am called to be. i don't want to say "oh...IIII homeschool!!" could you sense my tone of voice there? :) i also don't want to say "oh i'm a total dork. we homeschool"
i'm not apologizing for homeschooling and i am grateful that i can, i also wouldn't send my kids to public school. again...not judging, just saying what my husband and i have chosen. so how do YOU respond? do tell.

what keeps me going...

the first thing...





the second thing...





the third thing...

my big sister

Happy Birthday to the BEST big sister a girl could ever ask for.

some of the reasons i love my sister -

*she loves the Bible as much as i do

*she is an incredible example of how a godly mom should be

*she never ever acts like she's better than me, or like my problems are less than hers, even though she has 4 more kids than i do!

*she is almost always smiling

*she is a great listener

*she loves coffee

*she sometimes fails, and is not too prideful to admit that

*we could literally talk on the phone for hours and probably not have one milisecond of silence

*we have the same standards for raising our kids...and i honestly don't think there is another human alive that i could say that about!

*she knows how to multi-task

*she loves my kids

*she loves to ask for my fashion advice

*she is always thinking of others

*her love language is not words of affirmation, so she won't even need to read this post :)

i could go on and on all day long, but i will stop for now.

*the one thing i hate...

she is WAY too far away from me right now!!!!!

i love you erika, thank you for being such an amazing and wonderful sister and friend. i feel so proud to have you as my sister, and i honestly feel bad for everyone else in the world who doesn't get to have you as their sister. hope you have a great birthday.