For The Sake of His Great Name

For those of you who read this blog, I'd love to point you to another blog in my side bar. It is called, "For the Sake of His Great Name". Wayne, Hillary and Adelaide Denny made the trek to Paris France and are attending Language school before setting of to Senegal as Missionaries. Wayne will be teaching in the bible school in Senegal.

Please keep them in your prayers and follow their blog for updated information and lots of fun along the way. Hillary is a great blogger and I really enjoy reading about the great adventures of Wayne and Hillary.

Their little girl Adelaide is now 2 and loads of fun to read about.

Praise the Lord for technology used right. Many times when our missionaries leave, we get short snippits of news here and there and sometimes none at all for long periods of time. New technology helps us to keep in contact, and as stateside believer's we can feel a greater part of the ministry we pray for. I think it can also help our friends to not feel so isolated.

So if you read something from them, leave them a friendly message. I'm sure they would love it. :)

A New Guitar

I found this guitar at a great price. Erika has been wanting a guitar for a long time, and we can all learn to play it. I remember a little bit, but not enough to really play, so now we need a good cord book and we will have Music class! :)
Here are a couple of pics of Erika with the guitar. It really has quite a good sound.




As I was cleaning up abit this a.m., I heard Erika in the bedroom strumming away, the same strum the same sound and same note, but singing a most wonderful song she made up from the bottom of her heart.

"I Praise You Lord" "I thank you Lord", "I thank you for my Family"
"I Praise You Lord" I thank you Lord......

It was all just really sweet. :)

Little Girl Mischief?????

I was just notified of a little girl who decided it would be great fun to take her leg off, place it on the sidewalk and hide behind the brick mailbox, so the innocent woman walking her dog could get the shock of her life. :)

This little girl proceeded to let me know the woman's response which went something like "OH MY G--!"AHHHHH!!!!!

This certain little girl won't be doing that again, I hope. :)

The Last Funny of the Year......maybe.......

Erika just asked, "Do we have any chop sticks?"

I said, "Yes, but what do you need them for?"

She has been knitting and I thought she might need them for something different.....

She said, "My lips are really sore and dry."

OHHHHH, that is "chap stick" you want. LOL

My Special Anna Time

Every month I spend one on one time with each of the girlies. It is New Year's Eve, the LAST possible day to spend time with Anna. The other girl's already had their time.
So she and I set out to Walmart to use her gift card. She was so joyful, she grabbed my hand and didn't let go nearly the whole time we were in Walmart and she TALKED, and TALKED.... she had this big smile on her face and was so proud picking out her things.

It is fun spending one on one time with the girls. Their little personalities just come out and the dynamic is so different when they are alone vs. when they are all together.
She didn't need to compete to talk, and that is probably good, because she had so much to say, I don't think her sisters would have been able to squeeze a word in. :)

After getting our Walmart Shopping done, we went to get goat feed and then stopped at Wendy's so she could get some lunch. She got a new favorite purse from Gramma this year and when we left Wendy's, she forgot it.

When we got home, she was looking everywhere for it, so we went back and luckily somebody had turned it in.

What I did notice, was when it came time to ask the clerk if they had found her purse, she was really shy and afraid to ask. She wanted me to ask. I remember working on these skills with the boys long ago. Anna reminds me so much of Chuck when he was her age. It took alot to learn to buy things and speak clearly etc. She did wonderful though and as she gets more experience, she'll do even better.

We had a really sweet enjoyable afternoon together.

Anna purchased a "Paint by the Number" set, and a "Pottery Wheel" to make clay pottery. She has already tried it out and she and Sarah had a good time trying to make a cup. LOL

Anna finally came in and announced, "I made a great CAVE!" LOL

So What Are Your New Year's Traditions?

When the boys were little, we spent time with some friends who were WAY FUN. We were sad when they moved away. One of the things we did together, was to fill up a room with balloons, like over a hundred. We would stick candy and gum in the balloons before blowing them up all the way and money in others. Then, at midnight, we threw a roll of quarters, dimes and nickels into the balloon room and sent all the kids in there for a "balloon fest". What they got was theirs to keep! It was REALLY FUN!

We haven't done the balloon thing with the girlies, but it did cross my mind this year.
Instead, we are going to do "The Minister's Cat". At about 10:00, you sit in a circle and a person starts "The Minister's Cat was a...." and then you start with an A adjective to describe the minister's cat. When everybody has exhausted the A, you go on to B, then C.... until you get through the alphabet or midnight comes. :) It really is a fun game and the adjectives the kids come up with are pretty funny.

"The Minister's Cat was an Angelic Cat" "The Minister's Cat was an Angry Cat" etc.

The girls have been practicing, so I'm curious about tonight to see what they come up with.

Gettin' Ready For The New Year!

The Countdown has begun..... 3,2,1, NEW YEAR 2009!!!!!

I can't believe it is almost 2009! Where did 2008 go? For that matter where did 2000-2008 go? I'm still remembering Y2K!
ALOT has happened since then.....

In Y2K, I had one graduate living on his own. 2 seniors in high school and 1 junior in high school. I had no hopes of ever having a girl in our home besides me, even the dog was a boy! We purchased a bunny, named her CLEO and she turned out to be a boy and had to be renamed CLEVON..... I was alone! I loved raising boys and never even thought about girls.

8 years later...... We are a house of girls and now MIKE is the one who is on his own...he is the lone male of the house; but we all adore him. That means he gets LOADS of hugs and attention. :)

I have so many loose ends to finish before the new year begins and so many "New Year's Resolutions" that were never met. However, It is NOT too late! I can add them to this year's New Year's Resolutions!

So what are your resolutions this year?
I like resolutions because they help us to set goals, even if we don't meet the goals. If there is no goal to meet, we definitely won't strive to meet it...... :)

This year, my ULTIMATE earthly goal will be to keep up with my personal filing....
My personal spiritual goal will be to spend more time studying my bible and praying.
My mothering goal will be to begin to teach the girlies to cook and sew.
My schooling goals will be to get them to SPELL with accuracy.....
I also plan to kiss my husband more and see my grandkids more.

I have loads of resolutions but..... I'd like to know yours. :)

WARNING

I was looking for a particular BBC program about Bulgarian Orphanages on Google.
I found a site that mentioned it, and had "documentary" highlighted, so I clicked on it. It took me straight to a porn sight and I got an eyefull right off the bat! I couldn't believe it.... I'm SOOOOO glad the children were not standing by the computer.

Sheesh, that is just awful to trick somebody like that.

May my mind be cleared of such garbage.

BLOKUS: The Thrill of Victory and the Agony of Defeat

Ahhh victory!




And Now In Reverse:



All because of this little game:

More Pics:

Erika was a busy bee knitting scarves, here are two of the happy recipients of her hard work.


Here was an interesting Backgammon Game: Uncle Bob was very amused at his demise:



Here are a few pics of the girlies:

After the Day Is Done

THERE IS MEGA CLEANUP! :)

We had a really fun time with our family. We missed Joe, Becca and Sam, who spent the Holiday in Maryland, but it was nice to talk to them on the phone. We also talked to Uncle Dave in Arizona, who is planning to play backgammon with Erika online at Amazon Games. He is a very creative uncle.

Our biggest joy this year was that Uncle Bob made it safely after a pretty nasty accident. He is feeling better today. Advil is a great product!


Three of our Son's and daughter's in law and 4 of our grandchildren were here. We didn't even put a dent into this:


Here are a few more pics of the day:

Merry Christmas!

The Good News Is.....

Uncle Bob is OK!

The bad news is, he was just in a car accident. He called from the scene of the Accident and Mike is on his way to Oklahoma to get him. His car is totaled.

Apparently, somebody tried to cross the highway and pulled in front of him while he was going 65 mph! He said he now knows what air bags feel like. :) Poor Bob, still can't locate his glasses. I'm sure he and Mike will look for them before they come back. If not, we can get him an emergency pair here.

In the mean time, please pray for him as he will need a car for his job. This one is definitely totaled. And pray for him as he processes what just happened to him.
It is a miracle that nobody was seriously injured.

I think we have the best Christmas Present of All. Another visit with our very precious Uncle Bob. :)

I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus......

Sarah was peeking!


Mama and Santa in his BLUE UNIFORM! :)

WHOO HOO! We burnt the lights out on that one. :)

The Girlies Blog Privatized

I made a step to privatize the girlies blog as daddy requested to protect them.
If you would like to follow their blog, email me your email address and I'll add you to the list of private viewers.

mikeandchristie@minichfamily.us

God's Will Is NEVER Second Best

I was talking with a most very favorite person the other night about children and adoption and babies and all sorts of fun things. I was telling her about my children; all 7 of them. We talked about how fun babies are, and how funny Mr. Will is and how much like Joseph Sam is.

And then we were talking about when our lives take a different direction. A direction that is way more different from what we ever expected.

I remember being idealistic and young and how I knew absoloutly everything about life when I was 18. :) (NOT) I had no idea what would unfold in my life. If I had known, I most likely would have never stepped into the water of life, but hid out somewhere safe, and thus, would have never really lived.

Life is full of choices, it is full of pain, joy, and everything in between. The great thing about serving our Heavenly Father is that we are always living our life BEST.
It isn't second best, even when bad things happen, and circumstances are brought into our lives that we do not comprehend as being possibly good for us, our life isn't second best.

How in the WORLD can it be good to suffer? How can it be good to have pain? How can it be good to watch your premature baby day after day struggle to breathe and be told he will die?

I honestly don't have all the answers, and unlike when I was 18, I don't know everything.

But there is one thing I do know. When I am centered in God's will, when I am focused on serving Him, I know that He only wants what is best for us. I am most happy and satisfied in my life, when my desire is to bring Glory to HIM. My son has cerebral palsy. My daughter had her feet amputated and has arthrogryposis, my other daughter has restrictive band syndrome and a missing leg and fingers. We have had our share of tragedy and triumph, all 7 of my children have been affected by abandonment, adoption, rejection and acceptance. My children have come to us in various states of gestation and age. But they are all gifts from God. Each and every one of them are perfect just as God sent them to us. They are not second best. They are best. All 7 of them, each in their own way, with their own strengths and weaknesses.

So, back to my conversation with one of my most favorite people..
...

She has some decisions to make and is at a crossroads in her life. Her desires are good, but may not be what is in store for her. As she looks to the Lord for guidance, I pray that she will see that God does not choose second best for us. He chooses to bless each of us differently in order to refine us into pure gold.
That refiners fire may mold, shape and break us in ways we do not expect, but when we come out on the other end, we will shine. We will be greatful and we will see that our life truly was BEST.

Borscht for Oatmeal

Sarah and I came to an agreement. If she ate her oatmeal, we would make Borscht for lunch. She did, and we did.


Grating Beets


Sauteing Cabbage


More Grating Beets

Enjoying the Finished Product

Sarah's Response To Oatmeal

"All right woman, get me some Borscht!"

A Morning To Remember

Well, This is Christmas Sunday, and here I sit at my computer, typing this post, in hopes that it will bring help, understanding, joy to those who read, and Glory to the One who's Birthday we celebrate at this time of year.
(Anna is next door picking up the giant dog poop left in the neighbor's house by their dog. She is caring for their animals while they are on vacation)

We had all intended for this morning to be a special morning. It is Christmas Sunday. I love Christmas Sunday. It is a time for Celebrating our Savior and we were going to Attend the Morning Christmas Program. But..... something else happened, and plans changed.

When Mike and I got up this a.m., he told me about a funny dream he had, but I didn't tell him about mine. Mine wasn't funny. In fact, I'm not sure it was a dream at all. It was more of a "spiritual experience". The kind I don't like, but that have happened before. It was like I woke up to a bad presence, or oppression, and it was dark. I felt pressure and could barely move. I instantly began to pray, and speak out the name of the Lord, and then it came to my mind to pray for Anna. I began to pray for Anna, and then when drowsiness won, I went back to sleep peacefully.

So, while Mike and I were sitting peacefully by the fire, having our coffee, a little voice called from the room. Mommy, Daddy, can I come out and sit with you? It was Erika. She is so excited about her 3rd Christmas with us. While Anna and Sarah slept peacefully in the other room, we rested on the couch with Erika and enjoyed talking with her. She reminisced about Orphanage Christmases, and talked about identifying with the Character in the American Girl Movie "Samantha". Then she said, "May I never wake up from this dream!" :)


Anna and Sarah were sleeping so peacefully that we finally had to wake them. It was time to get ready for church and we were all excited to go and watch the Christmas program.

It had been agreed upon a few weeks ago that the girls would be wearing the same dresses that a relative had picked for them so sweetly. They are very pretty dresses, very FANCY, and we figured Christmas Sunday would be a good time to wear them before they get too small. :)

Anna isn't particularly fond of fancy dresses, nor is Erika, but Sarah is, so she was very excited to put hers on. Erika joyfully put hers on too.... but then there was our Anna. She wasn't joyful. Then, when mom said, Let's get a picture, she REALLY wasn't joyful. Soooo, I said, "common' Anna, we want to send a picture to your Aunt so she can see your pretty dress in front of the tree." Well, with that, came pouts, tears, and then anger. Real anger. She made some statements about not caring, etc. etc.
and we asked her one more time to just try. She pretty much refused.


So, then I stepped in, and said, "your behavior is inappropriate, and there is no reason to behave this way etc. etc. I shouldn't have followed the trail, but I did.
And it didn't help. It started to spiral in the wrong direction. So, I said, "Daddy, why don't you go ahead and take the girls to church and I will have to stay home with Anna. She is obviously in no condition to go to church, or out afterwards, we cannot reward this kind of behavior."

Dang.... that sealed my fate. I had to miss the Christmas program and miss eating out afterwards, because of my own words.
When we speak, we MUST keep our words, or they have no value. That is why it is also so important to not speak unless you are sure. I wasn't sure, but I spoke. I think I over reacted abit, but at the same time, felt the behavior could not be overlooked.

So sadly, Daddy, Erika and Sarah left for church and Anna and I stayed home, all dressed up with nowhere to go.

She was weeping because she really did want to go and started to say, "I said I was sorry." (she didn't)
I told her, sweety, if you had taken responsibility and said you were sorry, we wouldn't be sitting here right now.

She then became mad and started down the wrong path again. I listened to her and then I asked her to come over to the rocker with me.

So we sat at in the rocker together. Me in my Sunday dress, and her in hers, and we began to talk.

I told her about my "experience" in the middle of the night, and that I instantly knew to pray for her, and that I really felt that she was dealing with some serious anger, and I began to tell her about Anger I had as a little girl, how I didn't think my life was fair, and that I was mad about it for a long time.

For 2 hours, we were glued to the rocking chair, and as I presented the gospel to her once again, through the reason we have Christmas, and why sin exists etc.
As we sat and talked about how our loving Creator, who only wants what is best for us, came down, emptied himself of ALL HIS Glory to become a baby, child, man, and Savior, the words came to life for her. She asked lots of questions and she listened about how evil exists and sin exists in us BECAUSE of the fall. I also told her, I would rather have hardship in order to have found the Lord as my savior, than to have had an easy life, only to lose it in eternity because I never had a need for my Savior. Her final statement was, "I Never Heard the Gospel put that way"......

We talked about being thankful for hardship, and being thankful for good times. The hard times, let us know that the good times are REALLY Good! If we didn't have sin, we wouldn't understand Holiness and how Holy and Righteous God is.

It all seemed to click with her and she had a joy come over her that was so very good to see.

Then, she asked to redo that picture. She said she did care, and that even though the dress isn't her favorite, she will wear it, and she will have her picture taken in it when her sisters get back from going out with daddy.

So all in all, while our morning didn't turn out like planned, maybe it turned out as God had planned.
He is such a loving Heavenly Father. At first I wasn't glad that I had sentenced myself to stay home, but after our talk, I was glad that I did.

Here are some pictures from this a.m.



After they returned from Church:

Erika The Knitting Princess

Erika learned to Knit and to Weave last year. She is one busy girl getting ready for Christmas. She made her prosthetist a great scarf in his favorite color, and is now making gifts for Christmas. Since we didn't have school today, I think she started knitting this a.m. and hasn't stopped. In fact, at about 5:00 I went to find her and give her a hug. I haven't heard a peep from her all day. She has been a busy bee!

Here she is making a gift for some lucky person. :)