We've Made It!

Hi friends!
We are here at Crooked Creek and I am not going to lie, it is absolutely amazing.

The morning of our arrival, it snowed 4-5 inches. So I was hesitant to be excited, but once you see those Rocky Mountains, you can't help yourself. Your spirit soars!

But the weather has turned itself around, I am actually sporting a sunburn right now!

We have all arrived and campers get here tomorrow. We couldn't be more excited to see their faces when they get off those buses.

It is our tremendous pleasure to let you know that our friend from Asheville did raise enough money to get his plane ticket to join our Work Crew and he is HERE! It is crazy to see his face around camp working like a dog. It is truly a miracle. There were so many barriers to his coming and all of them have fallen away. It has been amazing to watch.

We are so grateful to all of you who contributed financially and prayerfully. It is so exciting to think about how his life will be forever changed by this experience. 

If you want to follow along with what is going on day to day here at Crooked Creek, I have started a tumblr blog for our assigned team and am adding posts all day as I prayerfully observe the workings of the Lord. Please join us as we go before the Father during this Holy Month!

www.crookedcreekranch.tumblr.com

Thanks for loving us and caring for our friends so well! 

I am an unbeliever

I have to recognize that I am not a person that naturally believes in God's provision.
It does not come easily to me.
It is a true discipline.

This year, I have been reading Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" and two days ago he said this about "The Habit of Recognizing God's Provision"

2 Peter 1:4 "...You may be partakers of the divine nature..."

"We are made 'partakers of God's nature,' receiving and sharing God's own nature through His promises. Then we have to work that divine nature into our human nature by developing godly habits. The first habit to develop is the recognition of God's provision for us. We say, however, "Oh, I can't afford it." One of the worst lies is wrapped up in that statement. We talk as if our heavenly Father has cut us off without a penny! We think it is true humility to say at the end of the day, "Well I just barely got by today, but it was a severe struggle." And yet all of Almighty God is ours in the Lord Jesus! And He will reach to the last grain of sand and the remotest star to bless us if we will only obey Him. Does it really matter that our circumstances are difficult? Why shouldn't they be? If we give way to self-pity and indulge in the luxury of misery,we remove God's riches from our lives and hinder others from entering into His provision. No sin is worse than the sin of self-pity, because it removes God from the throne of our lives, replacing Him with our own self-interests. It causes us to open our mouths only to complain, and we simply become spiritual sponges-always absorbing, never giving, and never being satisfied. And there is nothing lovely or generous about our lives.

Before God becomes satisfied with us, He will take everything of our so-called wealth, until we learn that He is our Source; as the psalmist said "All my springs are in you"(Psalm 87:7). If the majesty, grace,  and power of God are not being exhibited in us, God holds us responsible. "God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you...may have an abundance..." (2 Corinthians 9:8)-then learn to lavish the grace of God on others, generously giving of yourself. Be marked and identified with God's nature, and His blessing will flow through you all the time."

May 16//Oswald Chambers.

I love that. "Be marked and identified with God's nature, and His blessing will flow through you all the time."

But I am not typically a believer in God's provision.
I am a sponge.
A complainer.
Not satisfied. Not lovely or generous.

But in recent weeks my heart has been on the move. And this passage really set it in stone.
Then Matt was talking to a high school kid who we love.
He is a tough spot. Loves Jesus. But need a fresh start.
A work crew spot opened up on our assignment, that we leave for in less than 5 days.
This boy would miss his high school graduation.
The first in his family to walk across the stage to get his diploma.
AND he simply can't afford it.

He has been working like a dog just to raise money from donors to go to camp this summer for a week. Add on top of that Work Crew? No way.

This passage has come to mind. And we just want to see. Can we make it happen? Can we see God's provision at work in the lives of our friends and family?

Maybe. Maybe it will be just our blessing to get to see him at camp.
But maybe it will be yours too.

We created a small fundraising opportunity to help send him to camp. (And maybe a few others if we go over the goal. We believe in a big GOD!) All you have to do is click on this link. And give some money. See what happens!

Give

We can't wait to see OUR friends become partakers in God's nature in the life of a high school student. It will be so cool.

This Mother's Day...

Yes please.

MacKenzie

This is my beautiful friend MacKenzie. I had the pleasure of taking her senior portraits last weekend and all I have to say is WOW. She made the camera pop!

She going to Appalachian State next year to play tennis and she is going to set the world on fire. I can't wait to see what she makes of the world.

Favorite Apps

Now that I am the proud owner of many many Apple "i" products, I have to populate these products with Apps from the App Store.

Not just for Productivity. Clearly.
But also for entertainment.

Not just for me. But for those around me.

Today, I will be talking about Kid Apps that I am enjoying letting my kids use in a few spare moments.

I am not a big fan of "Screen Time" for my kids. We have pretty strict rules about television and video games around here. And the ipad and iphone are not different.

But, like a lot of parents there are times when it is simply convenient to hand over the device and let the kids have some downtime playing a game or two. That I have selected for them.

On the ipad we love:
Albert
http://itunes.com/apps/alberthd



It is a really cool game that literally our whole family LOVES. It is challenging. And it is NOT Angry Birds.

Another one that I like to use is:
My Spelling Test

Asher doesn't "LOVE" this one but I like to let him build his spelling tests of the week in the app. He records his voice saying the word. Then he types in the word. And once the test construction is complete, he takes the test.
I think it really helps him to "get" the concept of spelling on a variety of levels and instead of just rote writing words on a piece of paper in engages him. And he gets to use the iPad. Which he likes. Bribery. Use it wisely my friends.

Spell Free

My final app suggestion today is one called Happly
It is almost a platform for kids and family.
You sign your kids in. And then suggestions are preselected based on their age that are appropriate to link to information all over the internet from YouTube, video games, and informational sites that kids that age would like.
The catch is, your kids can't navigate from looking up something about dinosaurs. To then finding out what adults think dinosaur sized "body parts" are. If you catch my drift. I hate handing over my iPad or iPhone and thinking that my kids are just two clicks away from things that I would NEVER lets them see or know about otherwise.

The app developer came to create the app because his kids learned the f-word after watching some videos on YouTube and kept clicking on the right hand side. Next thing you know...

This site is really fun because you as an adult can navigate it and leave "messages" for your kids on sections that you think they would particularly like. Also, they have fantastic photography from National Geographic throughout.

Here's another review if you don't believe me:
Tech Crunch

To Celebrate the Return to Blogging

My children did what they do best. They danced. 

One Month

Welcome back! I don't know if you ever left or even check this anymore...

But we are one month away from an amazing month in the Colorado Rocky Mountains and I know if I expect anyone to give a whit about what we are doing out there, I ought to catch them up on the last 5 months or so.

Here we go.
This is the truth.

Matt was in a weight loss contest. He lost nearly 50 pounds (47 to be exact). I lost 12. It took a toll on the old "blog energy". In addition, my sweet grandmother died. My work load increased. I decided to become a Young Life leader again and was in charge of Work Crew training in our area. And we have two children. One who is about to go to kindergarten.

It hasn't been a slow Spring.

So, I will catch you up in the best way I know how.
Pictures.

One of my last letters from my Grandmother.

The landscape plan for the property she and my grandfather lived on. 

My whole family wears a "Buckle Ring" that my grandmother wore my entire life. We had copies made when she fell ill. We all wore them at her funeral. I miss her dearly. 

We took the kids to Disney World in January following the All Staff Conference with Matt's sister Buffy and her family. It was a most fantastic trip.

Matt and I got away to Universal Studios.

Our team won the chili cookoff. Again. 

The key to the diet. Breakfast smoothies. 

The other key to the diet.

My sweet wiener dog Slappy had to be put to sleep in late February. 

My last picture with her. 

My kids were Cat in the Hat on my birthday. All Dr. Seuss' birthday. Just a little cute. 

My big gift for my birthday. A Juicer.
I'm one of "those" people now. 

It's true. Lucy is ready for kindergarten. 4 short months away. 

I ran the Cooper River Bridge Run! Super fast I might add. 47 minutes for 6.2 miles.
I was shooting for 45 minutes. But I'll take it.  :)

My sweet girl friends ran it with me.
I love having friends that love being active. It totally keeps you motivated.

Look at these beautiful girls! I love being around high school kids again.

Consider yourself caught up? 

Good. 

Let's get this thing started again!

Truth

I've had the "I tasted the chicken, it's slimy" conversation before. Talk about freak out....

I've Got the Mondays

I'm in the middle of a pretty long week around here.

I tried to get up a little early this morning to spend a little time to "myself." That was interfered with by a dog (I don't know which one) making a throw up sound in our room. No throwing up. But that behavior was supplanted when one of the dogs began licking its butthole. Repeatedly.

So that was a sweet alarm clock.

I got myself up, let the dog out. And took care of my "personal business."
When I came back to the door, Ranger had very kindly covered himself in turkey poop.
At 6:30am.
Awesome.

Time for a bath.
In my nicely cleaned bathroom.
With a dog that has dark, black hair. YAY!
After I bathed my dog, I got to clean the bathroom and wake my children up.

One child got up and decided he didn't really like any of the options for breakfast or anything I was making for lunch.
Too bad.
Then, dragged his feet through all the rest of his morning chores, brushing his teeth, putting on his shoes and then decided a light little jacket in the middle of February when it was 18 degrees outside was good enough. We had to go through 3 jacket changes, do his hair and blow his nose before also taking our neighbor to school.

Got them off, took Lucy to school but not before realizing that my laptop was at Matt's office and were I to do anything related to my job today, I needed to go get it.

I managed to grab it and return home by 9:30 to get my day under way.

But I am worn out and a bit cranky and I want so badly to be joyful in the midst of my day and serving my family. How does one do this when everything seems like an uphill battle?
It felt like an attack this morning telling me "You can't do it all and you shouldn't even try" and to "give up." Truthfully, I totally failed.
I yelled at Asher.
I yelled at Matt.
I grabbed Ranger by the ear and yanked him back in the house.
It was no fun to be at my house today.

But a little space.  A little quiet.
A little renewal and the truth can settle into your bones that nothing has been done that can't be undone.
And I am a work in progress too.
I need grace and mercy every bit as much as my husband and my children do.
It is hard to apply it to yourself.
Especially when I am so intense and want everything to go right.

And all I wanted was a little quiet time this morning. To get my day started right.
I think its more important sometimes for it to end well. Right?

Let's hope so. And let's all hope for Tuesday.

Living House

This Chubbiest Loser contest has brought into question so many areas of our lives that were totally unexpected.

When you start focusing on your diet and how you use food to compensate for your emotions; then you realize other ways that you do this as well. Finances, anger, even coming up with little "plans" to fix these things is a way to cope with and compensate for your emotional downfall. Rather than going to the source of all the questions and answers in our lives.

I am leading our areas work crew training right now and we have been doing a Bible study from Discipleship Journal called "Becoming More Like Jesus" and this week ended with a paragraph from CS Lewis that I wanted to share:

"Imagine yourself a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building a quite different house from the one you thought of-throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but he is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it himself."

My vision is completely quaint for my life. I have become the kind of person that has decided the safe, secure little cute cottage is a good idea instead of the wild ride that God promised me at the beginning.

But for sure over the last few years He has knocked out a few walls and installed rooms and towers where I would rather He didn't. It's good to have a vision of what is happening in my life so that I can take part in the joy that He has for me.

"God has set before us the ultimate prize of Christlikeness, and anything that moves us closer to that prize-including the lessons we learn through failure-bring Him pleasure and glory."
-Traci Mullins