Haiti

My friend (& local news reporter) Trish did a touching blog entry on Haiti with links to organizations you can help through:

http://offcamerawithtrish.blogspot.com/2010/01/reporter-and-mom.html

Auntie Katie

There is a blog I would like all my friends and family and readers to please visit. This young woman, Katie, is caring for a family of 13 I believe, besides all the others she is trying to help and feed and encourage. My heart leaps with joy to see this woman as Gods hands in the world this way. Praise the Lord for those who place their lives in HIS hands and answer HIS call.

Amazima Ministries International


I know that you will not only be touched but also encouraged by how the Lord is at work in this woman's life. Please take time to pray for Katie and her children and all those involved. Pray that God might show each of us how He wants to use us. Pray that we might be open to the big steps and the little steps he calls us to.

Adoption has been a ministry very close to my heart since high school. Two of my dearest friends placed their babies into wonderful loving adoptive families while were teenagers. I have seen what selfless love this takes. I have also seen the unexplainable joy in the eyes of some friends who are now adoptive mothers. God can use all of us in this ministry.

Not everyone will be called to adopt children but there are so many many other ways to reach out and help. Perhaps it is as a prayer warrior, pray for birthmoms, here in the US and overseas in suffering countries. Pray for moms who are offered abortions, pray that each mom would hear that there are others who long to hold these babies. Pray that these moms might recieve adaquate health care but also emotional care as this is such a difficult road. Pray for the waiting families whose hearts are aching to hold the children they are waiting for.

Perhaps God can use your time or finances to help orphans or birthmoms. Crisis pregnancy centers here in the US and orphanages abroad are always in need of financial donations and heartfelt prayers. Prayer is needed for the governmental officials and processes involved, please pray that God would send His angels into those places to smooth the road and the processes that need to take place so children can be united with their forever families. Please pray for the children waiting in foster homes or orphanages. Pray that God might send wonderful foster parents or orphanage helpers to physically and emotioanlally care for these children in God's name. Again, these are areas God allowed me to have a glimpse into as a teenager. I had a friend who spent quite a bit of her life in foster care, my eyes were opened to many of the flaws in the foster care system, but I also saw that there are some wonderfully kind and giving people involved in helping children in foster care. And I was blessed to be able to be part of a short term mission trip to an orphanage in Mexico. I love, love, love, how big our God is!!! He is present in every corner of the world and He calls His people to step up and help these orphans.

Think about it ... God is the ultimate example of an adoptive Father. He makes us His children and makes us heirs to His kingdom in eternity.

Praying for Stellan

I'm at a loss for words ... my stomach churns, and I am falling on my knees in prayers ... please join me in prayers for dear little Stellan and his mama


I've been reading many many blog entries asking for prayers for this sweet little guy, so thought I would post links to some of the here for others to visit:


MamaBear

Twinsanity

Boy Crazy

Waiting For Happy

CF Husband

Extraordinary Ordinary

Hilary

Mommy Diaries

Follow The Journey

Minnesota Jo


There are really so many many more blogs posting words and prayers for Stellan. Just try googling him or check out the trends on twitter or head over to Pooh's Corner and see the MckLinky she has set up for all of us praying

Stellan

Please join us today as we visit MckMama's site and pray as her little guy, Stellan, is having heart surgery

Thankful Thursday!

Here is the verse Iris had at the top of her Thankful Thursday post:

“And now my head shall be lifted up above my enemies all around me, and I will offer in his tent sacrifices with shouts of joy; I will sing and make melody to the Lord.” ~ Psalm 27:6 ESV

Hmmm... I want to sing to the Lord! I am thankful, truly thankful for all He has blessed me with. My Thankful Thursday posts could literally take all day if I posted all I had to be thankful for. But one area I feel needs my attention is prayer, so I chose to focus on prayer today ... my time to speak with my Lord, hear from my Lord and yes sing to my Lord. I am so thankful for this privilege of being able to speak with, pray to God, my Father.

I've journaled and blogged for a while now, but have seen quite a bit lately on "prayer journals". Some use plain blank note books, some have special printed pages to record dates and other specifics.

Please share with me your ideas: Do you use a special note book for prayer journaling? Where did you get it? Has it helped your prayer life?


Have a blessed week! Go check out the other thankful hearts at Iris's blog!

Answered Prayers

The last few days have been terribly miserable and uncomfortable for me (8+ months pregnant will cause that). Yesterday I asked some online friends to pray for me this weekend. To pray that I would find a way to be more comfortable or that God would simply improve my attitude and mood. And that's what He did! Thanks for praying Ladies! I'm still huge, on bedrest and uncomfortable, but I've had tons of time to study His Word as I lay here today. You would think a mom on bed rest should have tons of time for prayer and reading everyday, but that has not been true as I still have 4 other kids (2 doing homeschool) who need their mama, even if she is confined to the couch. But God has blessed us with beautiful weather today and my husband is off work, so I've had hours to read and pray (as they have all been outside for hours) and WHAT A DIFFERENCE in my attitude! God has lead me to several verses about enduring. After some online searching He also blessed me and lead me to a few sites for Christian women that I would like to encourage you to visit:

Thirsty for Him

Internet Cafe Devotioans

Forever His

These sites are hosted by some amazing women of God! I found encouragment and great scritpure there. God bless you ladies!

An email devotional I recieved today

Today's Prayer
I praise You Lord, for Who You are; the Alpha, Omega, Beginning and the End, Savior and Lord, You're my best friend; Creator of all. Thank You for being my best friend forever. Thank You for being my heavenly Father, always present and always there for me. Thank You for being my sustainer and protector. And thank You for saving me and setting me upon the solid Rock--Jesus. In His name I pray. Amen.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Know Your Armor
TGIF Today God Is First Volume 2, by Os Hillman
05-10-2008

"David fastened on his sword over the tunic and tried walking around, because he was not used to them. 'I cannot go in these,' he said to Saul, 'because I am not used to them.' So he took them off." (1 Samuel 17:39).

David, the young shepherd boy, heard the challenge from the Philistines to send someone to fight Goliath. No one volunteered to fight except David. King Saul reluctantly agreed and offered David his armor. David put on the weighty equipment, but quickly concluded he could not fight in this heavy armor. He gave it back to thing Saul.

God equips each of us in such a way that is unique to our strengths and abilities. David knew who he was and who he wasn't. David was trained as a shepherd to use another weapon. For David, it was a slingshot. David showed great maturity in realizing he could not be effective with Saul's armor.

What are the gifts and talents God has given to you? Have you ever tried to accomplish a task with tools you were not trained to use? God allows each of us to develop skills that are unique to our life. He will not call you to use someone else's tools.

However, this is only half of the equation. These talents must be mixed with faith. Talent alone is not enough. Faith alone is not enough. It is only when the two are combined that God's power is released and manifested in the physical realm.

Sometimes we admire the talents of others and seek to emulate them. The temptation arises to be someone we are not. This is a mistake. Let God live His life through the unique you.

Then, mix your unique gifts with faith today; you will be surprised at the power of God that will be manifested.


To read more daily devotionals from Prime Time with God click here

Thankful Thursday!

Please click on this button to visit more Thankful Thursdays


In some ways this is a tough Thursday for me to be thankful and yet in other ways I'm drasticly aware of all I have to be thankfull for.

* I'm eternally grateful to my wonderful merciful Lord, and Savior. He has carried me, comforted me, and blessed me beyond waht I could imagine. Praise Your Name Jesus!

* I'm so thankful to be 30 weeks pregnant and according to todays ultrasound her heart looks great, amniotic fluid looks great, "she might become a gymnast based on all those moves she can do in there", and she is measuring about 3 1/2 lbs.

* I'm thankful to be where I can receiver great medical care for my difficult pregnancies and that my children have all been born healthy, thanks to our Drs. and their great staff!

* I'm thankful that our two year old son has a team of doctors (6 so far) who are trying to figure out his symptoms, and just what is wrong in his little body and being kind and compassioante all at the same time.

* I'm thankful for my older kids who are being so incredibly understanding that mom is pregnant, sick and exhausted. They pitch in so much and almost never complain. Please Lord bless them ten-fold for their loving kindness.

* I'm so thankful for the friends and family who continue to cover us with their prayers. You are truly a blessing from God!!!

Posting about Anna - also my 100th post

Today marks my 100th post to this blog, but I can not say I feel much like celebrating. Like many of you who blog I have been working on a list of "100 Things About Me" for this day ... but I'll save that for another day ... today just does not seem the day to post that list as we are recovering from attending the funeral of our little three year old friend, Anna.

You can read more about the beauty of Anna and her amazing family on her CaringBridge Site at www.caringbridge.org (then enter annameg where it asks which site you would like to visit.)

This was Anna just before she was diagnosed with Neuroblastoma:



Her cancer may have changed some things about her ... but
not that precious smile:



Please join me in praying for her family and friends who miss her so very much:

Blogger Friend School #17 -Wall of Prayer

Nancy's assignment for Blogger Friend School this week was for us to visit The Wall of Prayer, for service members and their families


I added to the The Wall of Prayer two friends who my dh served with while he was in the Navy. Both of these families are homeschooling, Christ loving families, please keep them in your prayers, too.

K. Horn, serving in the Navy
Please join me in praying for this Christ Loving
family, who so selflessly serves our country and our God

M. Conner, serving in the Navy
We pray that God would bless this family as they serve their God and their country.

We know the sacrifices of serving our country and we know that these families are so gracious and unselfish. I encourage you to pray for those serving in the military and reach out to those families who may live near you.

Thanks Nancy! Great assignment!

Bed Rest

Well, being on bed rest means I get to read and catch up on a lot of blogs. Yep I said bed rest already ... but hopefully just for this week. Here is the story of our crazy weekend:


I went in for a normal 18 week appointment on Friday morning and was so dehydrated that my OB sent my off to the hospital for IV fluids. Being dehydrated in pregnancy is not unusual for me, but this time it took 4 bags to get my levels back to normal. It seems I've been feeling sick for so long I did not really identify the signs of my own dehydration. Please pray that I won't do that again. I spent 9 1/2 hours at the hospital that day and my dad came and entertained our kids (hours at Underwater World and dinner and ice cream at my sister's house - kids never missed me). Allen was able to be at work since the kids were cared for. I finally arrived home around 10:30pm, to 3 sleeping kids and my dad and O.(our 5 year old) watching Star Wars in the living room. Owen tells me that Papa is his very best friend (I wonder why)

We all slept great till about 3:30 Sat. morning, I woke up and felt very odd, went to the bathroom to discover bright red blood. Very very scary, lots of tears and prayers. I continued to spot over the next few hours and called the on-call OB at my clinic who said I could wait and see what happens or come in for monitoring and ultrasound. We waited around for a bit, and my dad came back to get the kids, Allen called work and let them know he would not be there on time. When the bleeding seemed to get worse we went in. Praise the Lord they found baby's heartbeat right away! What a relief. Then we had an ultrasound that looked great! There were several theories on what caused the bleeding, but no way to know for sure. We were just thrilled that baby was fine and the bleeding seemed to be slowing and turning more brown than red. My dad had our kids for several hours and knowing that baby was ok Allen went to work and our good friend, Marcia, came to sit at the hospital with me. At some point in the afternoon my dad delivered our 4 kids to Marcia's house. So her dh got to enjoy the chaos of 10 kids in his house. Thank you, Mike!!!! I was finally sent home around 7:30 pm and told to stay on bed rest for a few days to be sure the bleeding did not reoccur and to resume my activies slowly.

Sunday went OK, I have 4 kids, so I can't admit to complete bed rest, but we tried. Over the evening my lower abdomen and left side started to ache. I tried to sleep, but by morning I again called my clinic. Since I was not bleeding they were not overly concerned but wanted me to come in for a few tests. Turns out there is blood in my urine and I have a bladder infection. So I am now on antibiotics and supposed to try stay on bed rest for a whole week. Please pray for me and the kids, this could be a LONG week. And please praise God that it does not seem to be anything more serious than my usual pregnancy nausea and a bladder infection.