Reading

Lately I've been reading a lot more since I've decided that I need to spend my time more on the things of God.  I have read in the last two weeks:
Called Out by Janet Boynes - A woman who God called out of homosexuality and her story of how He saved her.
D.C. Talk & Voice of the Martyrs - Jesus Freaks; Martyrs - Heart wrenching stories of men and women who were willing to give up their lives rather than denounce their Lord Jesus.  This book was soooooooo encouraging.  If God calls us to the missions field I'm ready to go now.  I don't know that I was before this book but now I will be ready if and when He calls.

I've started:
D.C. Talk & Voice of the Martyrs - Jesus Freaks II; Revolutionaries - Great book that also kinda follows along with the first one although these stories aren't necessarily about those who died for their faith but they do live for Christ and know that their lives may be at stake.
Left Behind - Lehaye & Jenkins - A fictional account of what will happen when Christ comes back to rapture His church and what will happen to those that are "left behind."   Great stuff there.  I wouldn't be surprised if Christ comes back in the next five years.  And boy will I be excited to go home with Him.  We're just strangers in this land anyway.

I'm hoping to finish the two books that I started this week and get started reading some other books too.  We have so many great books, I just need to find the time to read them.  That means spending more time reading books and less time reading online.

Although, I have been having quiet times in the mornings as well where I listen to the Scriptures on Biblegateway.com.  Max McLean has an awesome dramatic reading of the Scriptures and I'm happy it's him that's saying all the hard to pronounce names and not me.  It's been awesome though because I normally read the New International Version of the Bible (more readable in my opinion), but I've been listening to the King James Version.  I've found that listening to the KJV is easier for me than reading it.  I'm getting so much more out of it by listening.  It's proving true what Romans 10:17 says
"So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." (KJV) (emphasis added)

I hope you all are having a fantastic Sunday, as for me I'm off to read some more :) 

Miscellaneous ramblings

So, I realized, I don't normally blog if I don't have a picture to share.  I might have to stop doing that.  I have a lot of fun things I could talk about if I didn't feel like I needed to share a picture.  Although hopefully this summer I'll get out and get more pictures again.

Recently one of the things I did was quit facebook and become more active on Twitter.  I love Twitter because I can follow a lot of the Christian musicians I love to listen to and see what God is doing in their lives.  It's awesome.  There also are no photo albums for me to get immersed in with Twitter, another plus.  I don't feel like I have to go through alllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll the status posts either like I did with FB.  I do miss keeping up with some friends but that's why I started a weekly email list.  Also on Twitter, I started looking up people that make handmade products.  Oh man, this has been fun.  I love it because someday if I'm a stay at home mom, I might try to run a business from home so these ladies offer good insight on how to do so.  One in particular I love to follow is Gussy Sews.  I love the stuff on her blog and in her shop.  Through following her on FB I recently found  out about a contest/giveaway from Cupcake Mag : http://cupcakemag.blogspot.com/2011/02/cupcakemag-loves-gussy-plus-giveaway.html < oh my goodness. . . I'm so excited about this.  Yes I'm doing as much as I can to enter.  I don't normally splurge on buying things (tight budget right now) but I love Gussy's products, sooooooooooo I'm entering.  Too freaking cool :).  I love it.

I think that's it for now, as we have a progressive dinner tonight and I think I might go take a nap before since I got out of work early today which was AWESOME!!!

Back in December

Aaron and I, along with our good friends Carol and Carolyn Schuler, took these three youth group kids to the Toby Mac/Skillet Concert in Pittsburgh.

We made pasta salad that they could eat in the car for dinner. We also had snacks for on the way back.

Robin, James and Aaron

 KT

Skillet's Drummer

Yup, He was that close to us

Love TobyMac. . . I totally got a high five from him.  (Thanks Carol and Carolyn :))

Skillet wasn't really my style of music, too loud, screaming, almost hard rock. . . the kids really liked them though.  Toby Mac was much more my style because I could actually worship the Lord.  I LOVED IT!!! They even performed some DC Talk songs :) :) :).  (DC Talk was a group Toby was in that broke up a few years ago).  On the way back most of the kids fell asleep.  We had an overnighter at the church, we ate a few snacks started a movie and the kids fell asleep.  Sky and Andrew helped us out and we played a game with them and then also went to bed.  The next morning we had eggs, sausage and toast for breakfast.  :) 

That's it for Toby concert, stay tuned for more back posting in the future.

Did I ever mention

how much I love these kids???

The three in the picture above are always at youth group.  It's such an encouragement to have such faithful attendance!

The two girls in this photo come everyone once in a while, but they brought two friends this time.  :) 

Youth group didn't go as planned as a result, but God always makes good of our situations.  We ended up with 5 more people than we normally have (the four above and Brandon showed up).  We ordered some pizzas, played a fun game of Telephone Pictionary, and had a different Bible study than we had originally anticipated.  Although things turned out differently they turned out well. 

The three that were normally there, didn't participate as much but they were still engaged in the study, which was good.  Katie even answered a few questions. 

It was a good night.  Next Friday we're taking the kids sled riding, which should be fun :) 

Hmmmmmm, better than store bought

While I waited for the bread to finish baking, I had some hot cocoa that I got from Sarah and Trent for Christmas.  Delicious!  And I have a cool mug! :) 

Aaron has been asking me to make some homemade bread this week and tonight was really the first night I've had the time to do so.  OH MY GOODNESS . . . deliciousness.  It's 100% whole wheat bread with a bit of honey and molasses for flavoring.  The recipe was so simple.  Here are a few not very high quality photos.  I took them a bit quickly because I was too excited to eat the bread. O:)

Before baking

After baking . . .the one on the right didn't actually come out of the pan correctly, but it still tastes yummy :) 

Aaron and I each had a slice. . . sorry for the terrible quality.

Good night everyone :) 

Waiting. . .

for my first ever loaf of homemade 100% whole wheat bread to come out of the oven.   I'm so excited.  If it turns out well  I'll post a link for the recipe.  The dough rose really well which is fantastic to me because I've never made bread before (well other than quick breads, which don't count).  I've taken a picture before.  I've also worked on doing a lot of dishes tonight and cleaned out the oven (as much as my back allowed).  My back has been very sore lately and it's not my favorite but praise God I'm able to do all of these wonderful things.

Aaron says if the bread turns out well, we won't be buying store bought bread anymore.  I'm down with that, it gives me practice for being a housewife/stay at home mom someday! :D

We're also listening to Slacker and singing along, there is NOTHING like singing God's praise to boost my heart.

Psalm 118:24
This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.


To quote Lincoln Brewster, "I won't worry about tomorrow, giving you my fears and sorrows, where you lead me I will follow, I'm trusting in what you say, Today is the day."








****Stay tuned for pictures of the bread. 

I did it, I quit FB

After spending tonight downloading old photos I quit FB. Now the goal is to not log in for 2 weeks so that it actually gets deleted. :) Recently the song "Blink of an Eye" by MercyMe has been playing through my head, especially the line that says, "Sometimes I feel disappointed
By the way I spend my time
How can I further Your kingdom
When I'm so wrapped up in mine."

That's how I'd been feeling recently with FB taking up far too much of my time. I know I will miss seeing things going on in my family/friends lives, but that's what blogs, emails and phone calls are for. I need to make a better effort to stay in contact with people. I've created a group for my old roommates to share photos on Snapfish so that we don't have to miss out on each other's lives. YAY!


Hopefully more blog posts coming soon now.