Vacation is over!

It had to come to an end…and it did this a.m. at 6:00 when we left the girls at the airport. Wow…the security personnel and all the airline employees were on edge. I sure wouldn’t want to be traveling this afternoon.

When we arrived home from the airport everyone but Jamin and I went back to bed. At some point Zander woke up. I went into the kitchen, not knowing anyone was up and saw THIS. It gave me a start! Wouldn’t you be surprised to find a dragon in your kitchen? Evidently, this was a very hungry dragon. Zander and Jamin had a good laugh while I ran for the camera.

We have decided not to begin school today. We have a lot of new things beginning this week. We also have a few jobs we’d like to finish and preparation to begin a new school “year” in good form. We’ll spend the rest of this week finishing a few home projects, planning for the next few months (De’Etta), restocking our library book selection and polishing research papers (Josiah and Jamin).

I won’t say that this leave taking was much easier than the last one…but we keep telling ourselves it’s a “good ache”. At odd times my heart seems to cry out on its own “I want my babies home” and then I quickly remind myself that this is a beneficial leave taking. {sigh}
We spent the afternoon taking Christmas lights down outside. This is a wonderful job in 80* weather. We are shocked at this weather. The girls always organize our decorating so it felt very odd to be taking things down without them. We were excited when we set up because it meant they’d be home soon. Now it meant they were gone. Arielle and I were a bit weepy….the boys were very sweet. We got everything done in 2 ½ hours – outside and inside. Stacia slept through it all and seemed very puzzled to wake up and find all the Christmas finery had disappeared.

Mike was off work today so we HAD to do something fun. For us that meant dinner at Schlotsky’s and then a trip to the Concho River. We fed the ducks and musk rat.

We had a huge laugh when Zander found this piece of bamboo with fishing line attached. He had a blast “fishing”. At one point he called me over to see the baby fish. When we’d all gathered he began flailing the water and saying “See that HUGE fish? It’s doing this”. It’s very apparent that he’s been spending time with fisherman! {this picture just won't upload so I'll try to put it in a different entry}.

The kids had a choice of renting a Hollywood video or trying to find a cache. They voted for a cache. We found two more making our total 8. We are trying to find 20 by the end of this month. Nolan found his first cache. It was hidden well; this is helping us all to be more observant. We found a new fancy neighborhood, a new park and a new cemetery today. We’re bringing the day to a close by watching a few episodes of Hogan’s Heroes….a Christmas gift of Jamin’s.


On our way home Zander said, “Let’s go find Krista and Bre”. He thinks we left them at the airport and lost them. Oh boy. He’s always feared being left behind somewhere and now is sure that we left Bre and Krista behind. I’m not sure how we’ll play this one through. Prayers are appreciated.

Good-Bye

Ever thought much about that word? Growing up as a missionary kid I became very familiar with cyclical goodbyes. Goodbye to friends in OR to go overseas. Goodbye to that country to come stateside. Goodbye to parents to go to school. Goodbye to school friends to spend the summer at home….I quickly learned that many of the things people say about “goodbyes” are plain silly!

“Goodbye doesn’t mean forever” – oh really? I have plenty of dear friends who I said goodbye to 24 years ago, that I’ve never seen again.

“Friends Forever” – hmmm.

“Don’t think of it as goodbye; think of all the hellos you get to say”. OK now…but how does that help the pain of leaving the current friends? The goodbyes are not any less real for thinking of the hellos. If you want to be completely cynical about it, every hello is simply a goodbye waiting to happen.

MK’s learn at a young age to get good at saying goodbye. Don’t think about the parting, smile; don’t cry….life goes on. You’ll make new friends.

Then Mike entered the military. Spouses are told at deployment briefings, “Smile, when your spouse leaves. The worst thing you can do is let your spouse see you crying as he goes into battle, he needs to know that you are strong and can handle things.” I’ve noticed, however, that many, many men/women do not LOOK back when they are leaving…maybe they are told to look straight ahead as the “worst thing they can do is let their spouse see them crying as they go into battle?”

I’ve gotten good at stoically saying goodbye. This was brought home to me by Corinna last summer. She drove the kids and me to the airport when we left AK. She later wrote to me that we were so “strong” she and I. Both Third Culture Kids…we said goodbye, no tears, and quick hugs and quickly walked away…never looking back. I got good at it…until last September when the girls left for WA. Who would have guessed how hard it would hit this expert farewell taker to say goodbye to two girls? I’d been told for months “at least you have a houseful to keep you busy” and had come to think that the children at home would insulate me from the pain that mothers most often experience when children leave home.

It didn’t.

Those who know me will guess this is coming…I did a word study on this one. Good means beneficial. Bye means leave taking. I stated last week that it seemed that many of my goodbyes haven’t fit the definition…but this goodbye does. It IS beneficial. It has been a JOY to see how the girls have embraced God’s call for their lives. It has been a blast to see how they have grown and matured and flown strong these past few months. It has been beneficial. It has proven that our lifestyle of parenting…releasing them when they were strong was valid for our family. They were ready to soar. They were not social misfits who wouldn’t fit out in “the real world”. They have had no trouble learning to interact with new authority figures.

And so we prepare to say goodbye once more at 0 dark thirty. This time for eight months. We entrust them to God’s care as they return to Master’s Commission. We eagerly look forward to seeing the growth and work that will occur in their lives in the next eight months.

There is a quote that has spoken volumes to me for years. Elizabeth Stone says, “Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body”. It has never spoken as loudly to me as it has since September of 2005. Even with a houseful of children, parts of my heart are walking around WA. Think of it though: parts of my heart are touching the hearts of others for His glory! This is beneficial…good even.

And so the time has come. Back to feeling that things are not quite “right”; though they are perfectly right. Back to counting heads 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8, 9 in WA. Yes, Donna, you were right. I survived the goodbyes this fall and then they came home, and now they’ll leave again and as you warned me it will hurt all over again…but the hurt is good. The season is good. The day the girls left in September I seemed to be surrounded with 50 year old ladies and their 80 year old moms. I was feeling bad about all the duos and felt God speak to me that it is about seasons. We’ll be together again in the same house…and this time THEY’LL get to be the care provider. {Grin} This goodbye really isn’t forever. This time we really are forever friends. It is a beneficial leave taking.

And now the time has come to say – Goodbye!

Day Twelve of Vacation – 1 January 2006

Today was another nearly perfect day.

After the a.m. activities we headed out to find some more “treasure”. We are really enjoying this new past time. We discovered 2 new areas of town today and 4 more caches. Mom, you’ll be interested to know that Nolan has volunteered the use of his “lizard box” as the family “cache box” or “treasure chest”. We thought that the items we keep which the kids don’t want to play with, will go in there. Today we found a military Operation Northern Watch coin, a Euro coin and a cool wooden TX cut out that a fellow geocacher uses as their signature. I was excited that kids and I were able to find one on our OWN. Then I kept the younger 4 down below near a river while Mike took the older 5 to charge up a hill in search of a difficult find. They found it. Zander had been sleeping when we did this a couple of days ago. He was DAZZLED by the treasure in the little boxes that kept popping up on our hikes! I think he will expect to find boxes on all hikes from here on out. {Grin}

After we had found the four cache’s we’d hoped to find we headed for Dairy Queen….the real treasure of the day was getting out in the sunshine and spending time together. Can you believe it is 80* here on 1 Januaray????

The girls are packing, we will play Night Sky Monopoly, and that will neatly bring the day to an end.

Geocaching Photos:

Can you see the cache? Bre & Arielle did

Jared discovers his 1st Cache

Feeding Frenzy...

Sunset at the last cache site

Racing, Crawling and Power-Walking: My Adventure with the Word

When saying that I’m led to “study” through the Bible this year instead of “read” through the Bible this year, am I inferring that there is something wrong with the goal to read through the Bible in a year? No.

This issue of an annual race through the Bible is one I’ve wrestled with for years. I am allergic to legalistic religion and the way this concept has been presented to me through the years, does, I must admit, smack of legalistic religion. A checklist, if you please, to make me “feel good” about my walk. I’ve resisted. Since Bible College days I’ve had a passion to inductively study the Word. Crawling through the Bible some would say. {Grin} Wasn’t that far better than simply racing through the Bible year after year? Wasn’t the 15 – 20 hours a week that I spent in the Word to prepare to teach Precept courses ENOUGH time in the Word? I reached the conclusion that it was and that I would not fall into the legalistic trap of checking boxes as I read. This was my “former position”. My “current position” has evolved over time.

Quite a few years ago a godly woman made a comment that resonated in my spirit. Nelda Thomas is a Precept Area trainer now in her upper 60’s. I consider her to be one of my mentors. I first met her at a workshop I attended in Ekalaka, MT. We met again at a ladies retreat at Diamond Bar X and it was my joy to host her at a ladies retreat in Alaska and a workshop at Elmendorf AFB in AK. She is quite a lady. Nelda loves the Lord, loves the Word and loves the body of Christ. She KNOWS her Bible. She explained to me that she has a daily STUDY time. She explained that she also (in addition to her study and class prep time) has a DEVOTIONAL time. SHE reads through the Bible at least once a year. Hmmm…of course I had to explore her reasoning? God has given her the gift of teaching His Word to the body and therefore she must be immersed in it, intimately acquainted with it. She must handle this gift well because of her love for the Lord and for His family. (These are my words to explain her challenge to me).

After prayer, I began to race through the Bible year after year. I have learned there is much to be gained through reading the Word over and over. You develop a sense of context that you miss even when you are careful to place individual books into context. You also find yourself reading obscure passages that are often not chosen for local studies.

Someone once told me that in reading through the Bible in a year I should read it "like a novel" and when I study a book inductively I'm studying more "like a school assignment". Racing or Crawling? I believe both approaches are valid and both are needed in the body of Christ. I race through the Bible and I glean context and familiarity. I crawl through specific books of the Bible and I mine the gems beneath our cultural understanding of what I've read. I learn to accurately handle the Word of truth and I glean accurate and powerful applications for my life.

Regardless of our chosen approach, we all need to be in the Word. Recent surveys have shown the majority of those who claim the title “Christian” are NOT spending time in the Word, in prayer, or in fellowship with the body of Christ. It's sad. It’s been my practice each year to race through the Bible while I crawl through 3 - 4 books.

As I’ve prayed about the plans and goals that God would have me set for the upcoming year, I'm led to begin a survey/study of the entire Bible. I believe there are seasons when the Holy Spirit will lead us to do something different than we've always done or different than we'd planned to do. This is one of those seasons for me. I will not be racing through the Word this year, because I am led to “Power-Walk” (cross between my normal paces of racing or crawling) through the Word this year. I’ve reached this conclusion not because reading the Bible in a year is a worthless endeavor but because I want to be even more familiar with the obscure sections, I want to be more comfortable with context. I’m not attempting (at this time) to do an in-depth, inductive study of each book of the Bible. I want more depth than the typical survey which includes historical background, main theme, date and author. I also want to study it personally and not simply read another's summary and commentary(good as they may be). I'm certainly not sure I can accomplish my Power-Walk in a year (most plans I find are scheduled to take 3 years), but I believe my desire to begin this Power-Walk is God-pleasing, Spirit-birthed and will produce fruit in my life regardless of the date when I reach the finish line. I'm excited that I will shortly be even more familiar with the Word that I've come to love so much.

In my ministry with women through PWOC, I’m often asked where I find the time to read through the Bible in a year, participate in local Bible Studies, and study a book or two in-depth. The sad thing is that many Christians don't find time to even participate in a local study that will require more than 10 or 15 min a day of their time. Many don't find the time to read even 10 minutes a day. I was challenged to rethink my attitude toward the time it takes to be a woman of the Word by Nelda Thomas and Jan Priddy (Precept Trainer/Workshop Teacher and on staff at the National office of Precept Ministries). Both have made the comment that there are 24 hours in the day and we can certainly give God an hour of our day! This convicted me. The next step came when I began to realize that I could at LEAST tithe of my time..... That would be roughly 2.5 hours a day. Previously I've been able to race through my reading plan and participate/teach inductive studies locally within this daily time frame. Because I'm often the teacher it has been easy to combine my crawl through a book with local teaching responsibilities. Sometimes I was doing what I would call "fluff" or "milk", an in-depth course and reading plan and it has always been able to be accomplished in less than 2.5 hours a day. However, computer time and communicating with others often have to take back burner to bigger goals for the day or week.

I’ve been led to the realization that I need to do all I can to make sure MIKE has the opportunity to tithe his time in personal time with the Lord. I’m possessive of the few hours he has at home, but we are discussing and praying over schedule changes that will make a set “study hour” in our home for all those who need it. He may stay at work even later a few nights a week to have this time. I believe it is important, as his helpmeet, that I do all I can to support his goal in this area.

I hope this clearly explains why I’m doing what I’m doing and why I feel that any time in the Word will be beneficial. As you read the Word this year may you come into personal contact with the Lord of the Word, may you develop an accurate view of who He is and what He requires of you, and may you be transformed by the time you’ve spent in relationship with Him through study of His Word.

http://blog.honeypot-hollow.com/ This is the blog of a friend of mine. She reads through the Bible twice a year and has listed links to many reading plans

Personally, I will be using the New Inductive Study Series and the plans in my New Inductive Study Bible for my power-walk. http://www.precept.org/newindex.html here is a link to Precept Ministries.

Another great site to download FREE inductive studies and information is http://collegelife.grace-bible.org/html/download_bible_studies.htm

Day Eleven of Vacation – 31 December 2005

Wow – the year is drawing to a close and so is our vacation time.

We spent today attempting to take this year’s family picture. This took a long, long time. We took 29 picture and then took a Stacia mandated break. We had the kids vote on pictures and we all liked one – except Nolan. Obviously, he was wearing a less than perfect expression in this photo. He asked that we try for a better shot.

Back to the living room and 19 shots and who knows how many minutes later and we have a few more shots to pick from. We are still not sure which photo will win. We all like the one with Nolan’s silly face best of all…but we want to honor his feelings as well. ONE of these pictures will become the new Family Picture hanging on our wall and mailed out in our “After Christmas Cards”. OK - one photo uploaded before blogger tells me that the page isn't available...so I'll post whichever picture we finally choose, later.

We had hoped to make it to the lake and such this afternoon…..but that photo session took much longer than we expected. By the time the session was over I had the raging start to a migraine. Mike and the kids decided to spend the couple of hours they had playing Ultimate Football at the school down the road. I took drugs and slept.

We had all planned to ring in the New Year at a friend’s with a game night. It became apparent that if I hope to be functional tomorrow I need to avoid light, noise and being overly tired tonight. I took more drugs and stayed home. I am going to bed now….and I’ll bring in the New Year in style in the a.m.

Almost a Family Picture....

After hours of posing, running back and forth from the tri-pod to the pose, breaking for bottles etc., the kids are voting on which picture will be our "family photo". We had one but Nolan wanted it redone...so we had another session.

I'm quite sure it will not be one of these:

Severe case of PPSS (Post Photographic Stress Syndrome)

Eager Expectations - A New Year's Reflection

Excerpted from an article I wrote for our local PWOC newsletter

My family teases me for having "calendar issues". At any given time I will have at LEAST five calendars in use at my home....two on the fridge, one in the bedroom, a desk top one beside the computer and a PDA in my purse. In addition to these calendars, I'm teaching two students how to use calendars (great way to learn so many things) and those daily lesson plans x5 can look suspiciously like a weekly calendar. No doubt about it, I like a well-thought out PLAN, and I probably do have calendar issues.

Are you a "first of the month" type of person? Do you love tearing off the old calendar page? With one mighty rip of the page, 30 days of past accomplishments, frustrations and, yes, failures are crumpled and left behind in the trash can. We get to move on! We get to START A NEW MONTH; a month with somewhat clean spaces and boxes. We get to choose how to fill those spots. We are faced with 30 days full of possibilities! Think of the awesome opportunity and responsibility of "tearing off" a whole year of months! May I challenge you to consider how God would have you fill some of those boxes? Would PWOC play a part in any of your plans?

Starting a new year can cause us a certain amount of uncertainty as well as excitement. We aren't sure what lies ahead in the upcoming year. There may be successes, failures, moves, deployments, joys, births and more that are unexpected as of 31 December 2005. BUT GOD knows the plans He has for you! Isn't that an awesome assurance? One of my all-time favorite verses is Jeremiah 29:11! "For I know the plans that I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope. (Oh, I can never stop with ONE verse )Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to ME, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find ME when you search for Me with all your heart (emphasis added) I will be found by you, declares the LORD, and I will restore your fortunes and will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, declares the LORD, and I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you into exile." Jer. 29:11 - 14. Is your heart full of joy? Do you feel like you've been exiled? Regardless, the principle remains: God has a PLAN for you. It's a well-thought-out PLAN. It's a good PLAN, a PLAN for your welfare. God is not planning for your downfall - you can trust His PLAN - even if you can't see the purpose of all the details. God PLANS to give you a future and a hope!!!! Dear Sister, you are not hopeless! Are you searching for God with all your heart? He will be found. You can trust His mercy to walk with you along each step of the New Year; you can trust His loving-kindness to guide you. You can trust His strength to sustain you through any unexpected twists you may discover on your path in 2006. God wants to give you a future and a hope. A very basic definition for the Hebrew word translated hope is an "eager expectation". Are their areas of your life that you are clutching close to yourself? Why not consider handing them over to God and letting Him give you instead an eager expectation for the upcoming year? Do you sense an eager expectation in your heart? It's God's PLAN for you to have hope. It's God's plan for you to have an eager expectation for the things He will teach you and the ways He will guide you in 2006. If you find that you have no hope, will you make it a priority to spend time with your LORD today and ask Him for that hope which He promises those who seek Him?

Over 25 years ago I began to ask God to display His mighty miracle- power to turn me into a Proverbs 31 woman. May I leave one more exhortation with you? Proverbs 31:25 "Strength and dignity are her clothing and she smiles at the future." In the quietness of your heart will you honestly evaluate if you are smiling at the future? If not, God stands ready to calm your heart and to give you the grace to smile at the future...to even eagerly expect great things from Him for this year. Journals are great tools - you may want to take some time to write out a prayer to the LORD about those "eager expectations" He is impressing on YOUR heart for the year 2006.

As for those calendar issues, could it be that I'm subconsciously trying to find more time in the month?