A VERY Thought-Provoking Post

If you are not familiar with the blog, Generation Cedar, you're missing out! This post, especially, has my wheels spinning. Very, VERY thought- provoking.....

Divine Appointment: Babies are a Part of the Gospel Picture

No Time for Bon-Bons Today!

Helping Momma wash jars...

Apple seconds from Hood River: $0.25/lb! Makes me smile...

The simple beauty of sparkling clean canning jars...

Thelma is doing what Thelma loves most: cookin' up a storm...

I know my grandma would be tickled pink to know that I'm STILL using her Foley Food Mill...

And 17 quarts later...

But no Bon-bons yet! Craig's birthday dinner: Manicotti...

Yummy, says the whole crew...

No birthday for Craig is complete without an apple pie! I'll never make them as perfect as his mom's, but then again, a wife should NEVER make apple pie better than her husband's mother...

And after such a day, Jacob wonders if he can come out now...

Jacob's First Autumn

Convicted or Condemned

I've been thinking about the difference between condemnation and conviction lately. A house is condemned; a criminal is convicted. These are the situations where we hear these words used most frequently. I am neither a house (though ask me in about 4 more months and I may tell you that I feel like one) nor am I a criminal. But condemnation and conviction effect me on a daily basis. So what's the difference between the two?

It seems to me, for starters, that conviction occurs with the purpose of repenting and restoring while condemnation occurs with the purpose of destroying and obliterating. We convict a criminal of a crime with the hope of punishing him in such a way that he will regret his actions and choose not to repeat them ever again, thus restoring him to the status of law-abiding citizen. We condemn a structure because it is no longer deemed safe and thus must be destroyed. There is hope for the criminal but all hope is lost for the house. I think I'd rather be the criminal:).

So then, who does the condemning and who does the convicting in my life? Well, the obvious answer is that Satan condemns and Jesus convicts. There's more to it than that, though, as I am discovering while digging into the treasure chest that God's Word is. But alas, the baby is wanting some attention. Perhaps a Part 2 will be necessary!

Sarah Grace: A Snapshot

Sarah Gracie, with salsa on your mug, look at your momma!

Gracie, I wanted to take a NICE picture of you!!!

You're ornery through and through, Girlie!!!!

This girl of ours is something else! She was a perfect angel for the first three months of her life; every mother's dream come true baby! Easy going, hardly ever cried, put herself to sleep when she was tired and cute as a button. And then..... We're still looking for the individual who flipped her switch! From about 4 months to about 15 months the girl drove us batty!!!!! She cried, whined, complained, fussed, wailed and sobbed and she did it all very, very loudly. She wanted to be held, BY ME, all the time and so I did, simply to provide our home with a little peace and quiet. Praise the Lord, and I really, really do mean that, we all lived through her first year. Now, here she is, three years old and what we've got is that perfect angel mixed with that little stinkpot all in one incredibly delightful package. She's sweet as can be and ornerier than all get out.

Our very latest talker, we still can't understand about 1/4 of what she says (which is a vast improvement, believe me). We constantly wonder what we've agreed to as she rattles on and on about who knows what and we politely nod our heads in consent. She'll attempt any word under the sun (today she tried her linguistics out on the word 'competition') but oh, how we wish she would have been born with an interpreter. In fact, for quite some time my mother described her as the foreign exchange student:). And it was the perfect description.

Around here she's known as the Chicken Whisperer. She can cuddle and pet nearly any bird in the flock of 22 with seemingly little effort while they run for their lives from the rest of us. She is fascinated with horses and is certain that every single one is "Spir-dit", the horse from her very favorite movie by a similar name ("Spirit"). She grosses us out on a regular basis by holding pet slugs and other various outdoor creatures. We all laid down the law, however, when she marched in the house with a daddy long leg in her hand!

Sounding a bit on the tom-boyish side, isn't she? Don't be fooled. The girl LOVES anything that smells pretty, can be found on a daily basis nursing her wee little babies, and is the first of my children to inherit my ability to cry at the same movie over and over again! She and Hannah love to play "House" and Sarah always gets the role of "Christy", the young daughter.

Miss Sarah Grace is busy from the moment she rises until the moment she crashes and yet still, her very favorite place to be in the whole wide world is snuggled up on my lap with a lock of my hair in her little hand. She keeps me on my toes (and I have a hunch its only just begun!) and I simply cannot imagine my life without her.