I have way too much to type about tonight, but a person can only type for so long before fingers begin cramping and eyes begin blurring....and my eyes STINK this week anyway so I MUST be short winded if at all possible!
First of all: visit to eye doctor on Friday. A good & bad thing. Good that I finally went....bad that I can still not see far away. SOMEONE HELP ME. Sheesh. Why are there no eye doctors in this family when I need them. Anywho. Hopefully we'll get that worked out and when I go back for my re-check this Friday, I'll leave able to see road signs!
Next: We are having a SUPER wonderful holiday season in our cozy new home this year! Absolutely not taking it for granted that God has blessed us with this perfect home and that while so many people around the world have nothing tonight while it's 20 degrees outside, I have a home, a warm cozy, spirit-filled, Godly home! Thank you God!
Third: Our advent activities are sooo much fun. We are by no means doing organized daily advent ritual time. But I "borrowed" some advent activities from some other moms (see previous posts) and have been using some of those, as well as creating our own! Examples include: polar express & hot chocolate night, root beer float night, making candy cane ornaments, painting our hands red & green & making handprints (the whole family did this, which I decided was a good way to watch how the girls hands grow from year to year), I bought a stamp nativity set and we did that and made a banner in which I should totally post a picture of b/c it's sooo cute, baking, going to the zoo lights in Memphis...the list continues. I also have checked out some awesome books from the library about Christmas & baby Jesus etc. Kennedy absolutely loves to read and sometimes I forget to nurture that. What a blessing to have a 2 1/2 year old who can't read enough books! *Note to self...read more books to Kennedy!!! So yea, we've been having a blast and I really love how involved Chuck is in all of this! He is eating it all up. He is a huge part of this, and without him being on board with all of the activities, it wouldn't be the same.
The best part of what we've been doing is the advent candle lighting stuff. Once again, no hardcore routine service or anything like that going on, but we're doing our best to actually do it with the girls and have all 4 of us involved which is quite the feat. Last Sunday we prayed for Chuck's cousin Robert in Dubai. He's Uncle Robert to Kennedy...and she adores him! We're going to be sending him a package in the mail and praying for him to be safe and not be lonely during Christmas time. Simple enough & very understandable for a 2 year old. We also adopted our nursing home pal for the season ( and probably we will visit her forever if it works out b/c I'm sure we'll fall in love with her :) ) Her name is Rose Ivory and we have not got to visit or meet her yet but we will this week and I cannot wait! We are gonna make her some goodies and go be a little light in her lonely life! Next week we'll be focusing on our Compassion child. His name is Marteny and he is from Haiti. Chuck and I "adopted" him before we were even engaged and have been supporting him I guess for more than 5 years now! Sooo cool!
I wanted to share an AMMMMAZING idea from one of the same gals I mentioned in my last blog. If you like to doing more giving than receiving and are trying to teach your kids to do the same, then check our Amanda's most recent post. Maybe you've read the book The King's Christmas List, if not, I haven't either, and I'm going to do my darndest to get the book and do what she did next year with my little bebes. I just think it is the greatest idea to buy gifts for children in other countries and I know for Chuck & I, that's what we want our kids to think about at Christmas time. What are more ways to give to others?! So check it out at impressyourkids.org.
Besides all of that!! We are still doing our ABC's and for a while, I had posted what we were doing with that. I know it benefits me to see what others are doing (as I always say) so I want to continue to share what we are doing as long as people want to read about it or borrow or store for future use! We are now on letter I. I have a lot of catching up to do, but I promise that my next blog will be catching up with those. However, fun sidenote, I have chosen the word "Inn" to be our special word this week. No room in the inn. Our scripture is Luke 2:7. Lots of more fun things in store as well! Can't wait! Gonna be fun.
Busy week ahead. Lots of parties and programs at our Mother's Day Out this week. I'll tell ya this much, this mama cannot WAIT to hear her little Angel singing Jingle Bells at MDO on Thursday! I may even make myself a t-shirt to wear to rep my girl!
Hope everyone's holidays are going great! Keep Him in mind. Always.
Rach
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
New "Advent"ures of Team Van Hook
Ok...go me. I'm back again. Twice in one day... WOOP! I figured if I didn't go ahead and do this now, then I might not ever get my hands on Chuck's computer again to do it. So love it & read up!
Alright. So. I am so totally going out on a limb with this whole advent thing. I follow a couple of blogs that have been driving me crazy talking about advent this and advent that lately. Confessionsofahomeschooler.blogspot.com and impressyourkids.org are the two main ones that I follow. I'm by no means a stalker, however, when I started working with Kennedy on doing a letter a week, these 2 mamas had some really great ideas that I sometimes use. So the past few days, and especially today, HOORAY FOR DECEMBER day, I've seen a lot of advent talk. So I decided to look into it and see what these chicks were talking about. This is the cool informative website that I found. I thought it was super cool!! I tried to remember ever having seen or done an advent wreath and then I remembered my elementary Sunday School teacher at FCC here in Jackson. Mrs. Bettye Cole! *sigh* I LOVE her! She tried her darndest to teach us young bucks about the Israelites and all their drama, but Lord knows we were much to young for all that! lol. I would get so confused! But I also remember at Christmas time, she always brought in this wreath with purple and pink candles. We had no clue! I knew that candles were cool. (Don't yall remember when candles of all sorts were so uh-mazing! lol. feel free to hate me for that link!!) But anyway. Yea. That was it in the advent world for me.
Well Chuck and I laid in bed last night talking about how we could start a family tradition that would last for years to come. I'm a crafty girl, but I'm not one to go getting fresh new traditions every year if I can have one great one that we all love. So we came up with a game plan. Here's a summary.
We will do the advent wreath. I think it's a super cool visual leading up to the single greatest birthday celebration ever! (sidenote: let your kiddo throw a huge birthday party for Jesus and invite all their friends! How fun is that :) we did it with the youth last year at the Gathering and made it a Birthday Party/Ugly Sweater Party!) We'll light one candle each Sunday leading up to Christmas and then light one on Christmas. Each will have a corresponding theme and scripture, which I got from the above informative website. So that is something that we'll do every year.
Also, on the homeschool lady's blog, she provided a link to upload the ornaments that her family used for their advent calendar. SOOOO cool! Everyone should totally check them out, use some of what she has, or maybe tweak them for your own family. I don't even feel one bit bad about copying her idea and using her stuff....if it ain't broke, don't fix it & don't reinvent the wheel...I love those phrases. So we're going to make those ornaments and hang them up! Kennedy will be so in to that stuff and it's stuff that we all will have fun doing for years to come. So we won't have to change it, unless we want to.
Lastly, my favorite idea and this one I am proud to say is 1/2 way original. Chuck & I think it's SUPER important for the girls to know that it is more important to give than receive. That is a ridiculously hard concept to teach when the world tells you that YOU NEED EVERYTHING! We decided that we would yes do Santa, but Santa will bring 3 main gifts because Jesus got 3 gifts. Those will be things that she will really love. Then we got her a few things for under the tree. Nothing huge by any means. BUT, we're making sure to go all out when it comes to giving. For every candle that we light, (which will end up being 5 including the one we light on Christmas day) we will have a person that we are giving to this year. Ex. our compassion child, the girls' angel tree friends, our nursing home buddy we adopt etc. Is this going to be easy? I DUNNO! Probably not. It's gonna take a special effort and sacrifice. But that's what it's all about. We are going to be praying for each of those special people and talking about how God allows us to give back to others, and how much it means to them. I am excited! I can't wait! As I said in my last blog, I am no perfect holy Mother Theresa type mom. Just a mom who recognizes that it is important to start early instilling Godly traits into my children (and ourselves for that matter!)
Fun story about Kennedy! I went through her room and cleared out a ton of toys that we can give away. She found the bag and said, "Hey these are my toys. I wanna play with them." I said, "No baby. We're gonna give those toys to other kids who don't have as many toys as you and sissy might." "Why?" "Because some people don't have money to have any toys and you have plenty to share. So we are going to give some away." "OH! Like my Veggie Tales movie. He gived things away." ... Little did I know, the previous night she had watched her new Saint Nicholas Veggie Tale movie in which the little boy gives all of his fish away. HELLO! She soo gets it! She's only 2! What a simple, pure, beautiful faith! So I know it's not too early, and I pray that as she gets older and all her friends talk about the ridiculously insane presents they got for Christmas, Kennedy can maybe share how her family got to give the gift of love. Christ's love. And maybe the light of Jesus in her life will shine brightly into the lives of all those around her!
I know I love to hear what other people are doing during the season. I love to talk about Christmas traditions with other families! I think it's soo cool to see how everyone celebrates Jesus' birthday :) So I thought maybe someone might like to see how we are going to start celebrating. PLLLEASE feel free to leave comments on here or facebook of favorite traditions.
A Beginner~
Rach
Alright. So. I am so totally going out on a limb with this whole advent thing. I follow a couple of blogs that have been driving me crazy talking about advent this and advent that lately. Confessionsofahomeschooler.blogspot.com and impressyourkids.org are the two main ones that I follow. I'm by no means a stalker, however, when I started working with Kennedy on doing a letter a week, these 2 mamas had some really great ideas that I sometimes use. So the past few days, and especially today, HOORAY FOR DECEMBER day, I've seen a lot of advent talk. So I decided to look into it and see what these chicks were talking about. This is the cool informative website that I found. I thought it was super cool!! I tried to remember ever having seen or done an advent wreath and then I remembered my elementary Sunday School teacher at FCC here in Jackson. Mrs. Bettye Cole! *sigh* I LOVE her! She tried her darndest to teach us young bucks about the Israelites and all their drama, but Lord knows we were much to young for all that! lol. I would get so confused! But I also remember at Christmas time, she always brought in this wreath with purple and pink candles. We had no clue! I knew that candles were cool. (Don't yall remember when candles of all sorts were so uh-mazing! lol. feel free to hate me for that link!!) But anyway. Yea. That was it in the advent world for me.
Well Chuck and I laid in bed last night talking about how we could start a family tradition that would last for years to come. I'm a crafty girl, but I'm not one to go getting fresh new traditions every year if I can have one great one that we all love. So we came up with a game plan. Here's a summary.
We will do the advent wreath. I think it's a super cool visual leading up to the single greatest birthday celebration ever! (sidenote: let your kiddo throw a huge birthday party for Jesus and invite all their friends! How fun is that :) we did it with the youth last year at the Gathering and made it a Birthday Party/Ugly Sweater Party!) We'll light one candle each Sunday leading up to Christmas and then light one on Christmas. Each will have a corresponding theme and scripture, which I got from the above informative website. So that is something that we'll do every year.
Also, on the homeschool lady's blog, she provided a link to upload the ornaments that her family used for their advent calendar. SOOOO cool! Everyone should totally check them out, use some of what she has, or maybe tweak them for your own family. I don't even feel one bit bad about copying her idea and using her stuff....if it ain't broke, don't fix it & don't reinvent the wheel...I love those phrases. So we're going to make those ornaments and hang them up! Kennedy will be so in to that stuff and it's stuff that we all will have fun doing for years to come. So we won't have to change it, unless we want to.
Lastly, my favorite idea and this one I am proud to say is 1/2 way original. Chuck & I think it's SUPER important for the girls to know that it is more important to give than receive. That is a ridiculously hard concept to teach when the world tells you that YOU NEED EVERYTHING! We decided that we would yes do Santa, but Santa will bring 3 main gifts because Jesus got 3 gifts. Those will be things that she will really love. Then we got her a few things for under the tree. Nothing huge by any means. BUT, we're making sure to go all out when it comes to giving. For every candle that we light, (which will end up being 5 including the one we light on Christmas day) we will have a person that we are giving to this year. Ex. our compassion child, the girls' angel tree friends, our nursing home buddy we adopt etc. Is this going to be easy? I DUNNO! Probably not. It's gonna take a special effort and sacrifice. But that's what it's all about. We are going to be praying for each of those special people and talking about how God allows us to give back to others, and how much it means to them. I am excited! I can't wait! As I said in my last blog, I am no perfect holy Mother Theresa type mom. Just a mom who recognizes that it is important to start early instilling Godly traits into my children (and ourselves for that matter!)
Fun story about Kennedy! I went through her room and cleared out a ton of toys that we can give away. She found the bag and said, "Hey these are my toys. I wanna play with them." I said, "No baby. We're gonna give those toys to other kids who don't have as many toys as you and sissy might." "Why?" "Because some people don't have money to have any toys and you have plenty to share. So we are going to give some away." "OH! Like my Veggie Tales movie. He gived things away." ... Little did I know, the previous night she had watched her new Saint Nicholas Veggie Tale movie in which the little boy gives all of his fish away. HELLO! She soo gets it! She's only 2! What a simple, pure, beautiful faith! So I know it's not too early, and I pray that as she gets older and all her friends talk about the ridiculously insane presents they got for Christmas, Kennedy can maybe share how her family got to give the gift of love. Christ's love. And maybe the light of Jesus in her life will shine brightly into the lives of all those around her!
I know I love to hear what other people are doing during the season. I love to talk about Christmas traditions with other families! I think it's soo cool to see how everyone celebrates Jesus' birthday :) So I thought maybe someone might like to see how we are going to start celebrating. PLLLEASE feel free to leave comments on here or facebook of favorite traditions.
A Beginner~
Rach
Lifelong Learner for Life!
YAY! I haven't had the chance to blog in sooo long and I am so excited to get to again. As usual, I have quite a bit to say...surprise! lol. So I will get started.
First of all, Team Van Hook enjoyed a FABULOUS 12 hour long road trip to and from Chuck's hometown of Fayetteville, NC. Muchas gracias to his wonderful family. Everything was perfect, and my butt thanks you tremendously for all of the food spoiling you gave us ;) No really, we had such a good time, and the road tripping with the littles honestly wasn't terrible. (The new car seat that we got JulieAnne saved us...for REAL! She loved it!)
Next order of business...God has been revealing some awesome AWESOME things lately to me...I'd like to share.
1) Paul! Cool dude. As I've been reading through his books of the Bible, I have realized how important it is for us to know Paul. The main reason is this. His credentials. If anyone knows about Paul, which to be quite frank, I never really cared about who Paul was as an individual, I just knew his stuff in the Word was good. However, I believe that Paul made it to the "Bigs" in the Bible for a specific reason. I never realized that Paul was like Jew of all Jews. Like the main Christian persecutor EVER. Like gangsta thug nasty Jew man. Ok... I think you get my drift. So yea, God chose Paul, specifically so that people in the future (like us crazy folks today) could be confident that if God would CHOOSE Paul for such a huge ministry and purpose...then He can, will and DOES choose us as well. NO MATTER WHAT. Murderer, crack addict, prostitute, Christian hater, bible burner....WHATEVER YOU ARE....GOD LOVES YOU JUST THE WAY YOU ARE, AND HE WANTS YOU! Yup. It's kind of one of those aha or duh moments. Anyway. Just cool watching how God used Paul so greatly....which leads to numero dos.
2) The whole Jewish thing. I won't get too much into this. However, I have learned a lot through my Journey in the word about God's people. Jews & Gentiles. Law vs freedom. etc... As Paul was instructing the people to recognize that they don't have to live by the Old Testament laws anymore, because Jesus came as the ultimate sacrifice to free us... my eyes were opened to some things that I guess if I would've paid more attention at Johnson (ug I hate myself seriously for not) then I would have already known. But anyway, reading through Galatians I turned to Chuck and said "Why don't these people get it babe? What did they not understand about Jesus coming to give us freedom from the law? How could they not have known it was the real Messiah?" and the questions continued for oh about 10 minutes...lol. Finally, I shut myself up with another aha moment. I thought back to the beginning...in Exodus when the Moses brought down the 10 Commandments. When he came down to share the laws that God had given him, the people were going buck stinkin wild down there. Worshiping idols and all sorts of junk. That's when it all began. They were hard-headed and stubborn from that moment on. So my realization was that is how it's supposed to be! The answer to my questions was because God said so!! lol. Until Jesus returns for all His believers, will they "get it!" Well...I'm sure there's a TON more to it then that...but for me... it was a bunch of new cool thoughts that I thought I could share on here. I love learning. Period.
3) Be like Jesus. This idea has been confirmed multiple times lately. A very simple and wonderful though. Especially at this time of year. But in all situations lately, instead of responding the way Rachel wants to respond I think the old school phrase WWJD. For Christmas, I really REALLY REAALLLY want one of those bracelets that I used to rock back in Middle School for me, Chuck and Kennedy even. I firmly believe that if in all things we simply attempt to be like Christ then a whole lotta problems would fix themselves! How would Jesus parent? What kind of spouse would Jesus be? Wouldn't Jesus make it more important to give than receive at Christmas time? :/ What kind of friend would He be? Would He care how clean His house was? How much money He made? ... and so on. Just some stuff to chew on this holiday season!! Some stuff I'm really searching my soul about lately!
ok...well! I have a WHOLE nother blog to do SOON about how our family is going to do an advent wreath/calendar with a twist this year. Guess I'll hafta save that one for hopefully tomorrow...or if I'm lucky after this crazy youth hang out night, I can crank that one out tonight. By the way...side-note...PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don't think I write all this stuff on here to be "holier than thou" or "better" or anything like that. I am not. I am sooo imperfect it's not EVEN funny! But, I know that I am encouraged when other people share, and I myself am encouraged when God shares with me, so I just want to give back and share with whoever reads this. AND...if no one reads it, I still feel better just having got it all off my chest :)
Stay tuned for my next post which I will so cleverly entitle "Advent"ures :)
Pray for us....it's crazy youth night (how bout we already have 14 kids on our youth group...Praise the Lord!)
Peace In the Middle East
~Rach
First of all, Team Van Hook enjoyed a FABULOUS 12 hour long road trip to and from Chuck's hometown of Fayetteville, NC. Muchas gracias to his wonderful family. Everything was perfect, and my butt thanks you tremendously for all of the food spoiling you gave us ;) No really, we had such a good time, and the road tripping with the littles honestly wasn't terrible. (The new car seat that we got JulieAnne saved us...for REAL! She loved it!)
Next order of business...God has been revealing some awesome AWESOME things lately to me...I'd like to share.
1) Paul! Cool dude. As I've been reading through his books of the Bible, I have realized how important it is for us to know Paul. The main reason is this. His credentials. If anyone knows about Paul, which to be quite frank, I never really cared about who Paul was as an individual, I just knew his stuff in the Word was good. However, I believe that Paul made it to the "Bigs" in the Bible for a specific reason. I never realized that Paul was like Jew of all Jews. Like the main Christian persecutor EVER. Like gangsta thug nasty Jew man. Ok... I think you get my drift. So yea, God chose Paul, specifically so that people in the future (like us crazy folks today) could be confident that if God would CHOOSE Paul for such a huge ministry and purpose...then He can, will and DOES choose us as well. NO MATTER WHAT. Murderer, crack addict, prostitute, Christian hater, bible burner....WHATEVER YOU ARE....GOD LOVES YOU JUST THE WAY YOU ARE, AND HE WANTS YOU! Yup. It's kind of one of those aha or duh moments. Anyway. Just cool watching how God used Paul so greatly....which leads to numero dos.
2) The whole Jewish thing. I won't get too much into this. However, I have learned a lot through my Journey in the word about God's people. Jews & Gentiles. Law vs freedom. etc... As Paul was instructing the people to recognize that they don't have to live by the Old Testament laws anymore, because Jesus came as the ultimate sacrifice to free us... my eyes were opened to some things that I guess if I would've paid more attention at Johnson (ug I hate myself seriously for not) then I would have already known. But anyway, reading through Galatians I turned to Chuck and said "Why don't these people get it babe? What did they not understand about Jesus coming to give us freedom from the law? How could they not have known it was the real Messiah?" and the questions continued for oh about 10 minutes...lol. Finally, I shut myself up with another aha moment. I thought back to the beginning...in Exodus when the Moses brought down the 10 Commandments. When he came down to share the laws that God had given him, the people were going buck stinkin wild down there. Worshiping idols and all sorts of junk. That's when it all began. They were hard-headed and stubborn from that moment on. So my realization was that is how it's supposed to be! The answer to my questions was because God said so!! lol. Until Jesus returns for all His believers, will they "get it!" Well...I'm sure there's a TON more to it then that...but for me... it was a bunch of new cool thoughts that I thought I could share on here. I love learning. Period.
3) Be like Jesus. This idea has been confirmed multiple times lately. A very simple and wonderful though. Especially at this time of year. But in all situations lately, instead of responding the way Rachel wants to respond I think the old school phrase WWJD. For Christmas, I really REALLY REAALLLY want one of those bracelets that I used to rock back in Middle School for me, Chuck and Kennedy even. I firmly believe that if in all things we simply attempt to be like Christ then a whole lotta problems would fix themselves! How would Jesus parent? What kind of spouse would Jesus be? Wouldn't Jesus make it more important to give than receive at Christmas time? :/ What kind of friend would He be? Would He care how clean His house was? How much money He made? ... and so on. Just some stuff to chew on this holiday season!! Some stuff I'm really searching my soul about lately!
ok...well! I have a WHOLE nother blog to do SOON about how our family is going to do an advent wreath/calendar with a twist this year. Guess I'll hafta save that one for hopefully tomorrow...or if I'm lucky after this crazy youth hang out night, I can crank that one out tonight. By the way...side-note...PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don't think I write all this stuff on here to be "holier than thou" or "better" or anything like that. I am not. I am sooo imperfect it's not EVEN funny! But, I know that I am encouraged when other people share, and I myself am encouraged when God shares with me, so I just want to give back and share with whoever reads this. AND...if no one reads it, I still feel better just having got it all off my chest :)
Stay tuned for my next post which I will so cleverly entitle "Advent"ures :)
Pray for us....it's crazy youth night (how bout we already have 14 kids on our youth group...Praise the Lord!)
Peace In the Middle East
~Rach
Monday, November 8, 2010
imperfect perfectionist.
So anyone who keeps up with my blog knows that I've written quite a bit lately about my daily battle between wanting to be the perfect me for me & for others, and then being perfect to be more and more like God. Total, huge, very big difference. One that I am dying to overcome! So yea, I totally understand that I have to put Rachel in the grave every day and pick up my cross and tote it. I know and understand that God does not want me to be like Martha. He would much rather me be a Mary who drops what she's doing to come sit at his feet. So....here comes my openness. I mean this time it's super open and honest. So much so, that I can't even believe I would air my own dirty business like this, but whatever, I'm not perfect, as much as I wish I could be sometimes!
As most of you know, Chuck's sis stayed with us this past week! SOOO super fun. I, in a very unnatural for me way, put most all of my cleaning duties aside for the week. (Cheyenne and Chuck would beg to differ...but there are some things that a mom MUST do every day like cook, do laundry, do dishes, etc. or else no one can function) No dusting, no floor scrubbing (except for once in the kitchen) no toilet cleaning...and actually no laundry. (Hence the reason I did 10 loads today...blah!) That was SUPER hard for me. I know there's more people like that out there, and that I'm not the only psycho one...lol. But anywho, I spent the majority of my week just hanging out and trying to relax and have fun. Sounds great huh? Yay. Good for you Rachel. Way to relax and and enjoy your family. You really are a new person. NOOTTTT!-----> THE REST OF THE STORY...
On Thursday night, I went and cleaned a friends house. Helps her out, and helps me out...so it's a win win! I had made dinner and ran out the door, leaving Chuck, Cheyenne and the girls with a whopping mess of a kitchen (and entire messy home at that...the air mattress lived in the living room the whole week which was totally cool, until this night) I got home from cleaning and Chuck said, "Umm...babe. I hope you don't get mad." hmmm...good convo starter yea? no. He then informed me that one of the guys he's been hanging with lately, who's a young life leader here in town, (and also went to HS with me, a few years ahead) swung by. I haven't seen this guy in years, and have never even talked to him. He is now married with 2 kids. I say all of this to set up my story! This guy...and his whole family...decided to "pop in" while I was gone. AHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Any other clean freaks screaming with me yet?! So Chuck told me that...and what did I do? Wellll....I would love to share with you lovely readers that I was so holy, and said "Oh that's great! How fun was that?! I can't believe I missed them!" But what did I do....*sigh* I can't believe me....I stood in the kitchen alone, cleaning, and CRIED. Yes. I'm serious. I cried. I was sooo dang mad that someone I didn't know "popped in" and their first impression of good ole Team Van Hook was that we were total SLOBS. O.M.G. I had never been so embarrassed or upset. Even almost mad. Seriously Rach? Who are you kidding? You know yourself that you had company, that you have 2 young children, and that this couple also had 2 young kiddos, which means...they understood and didn't CARE!
I mean to tell you! I was TORE UP! You would think we were like homeless or something the way I was acting. And truthfully, I was the only embarrassing thing about the whole night! So here's the God part...obviously, I was tested hardcore. Once I had a chance to chill and look back on the situation, I realized that God had totally spanked my butt!! I could just hear him in my mind saying Rachel, you need to walk it out. You can't just hear me teaching you, you have to put it to use. You need to learn to settle down and remember what is most important. What's important was that God brought a family over to our home. This particular family has a LOT in common with us! AND they felt comfortable enough to "pop in!" That's awesome! I always say that I want people to feel comfortable to just pop in to our home. So why did I freak out so much?! To learn a lesson. For sure. God wanted to see if I meant it. Well now I really get it. Even moreso than I thought I got it before. Gah lee. Isn't that ridiculous! lol. How silly!
Anyway, God totally opened my eyes through everything that happened and I am sooo glad. Another cool thing I realized is just how perfectly Chuck and I balance each other out. He's the chill, laidback who-cares-we'll-clean-it-later guy. And I am the babe, let's-do-everything-now-so-we-don't-hafta-do-it-later girl. lol. Any other couples out there like that?! I'm sure! Well I just thought I'd share. Once again, I hope my vulnerability is not just another crazy Rachel story, but maybe in some wild way can encourage, challenge, uplift, or maybe even be a spanking for you too!! lol. Who knows! Alright signing out. ps I cannot believe it is sooo dark soooo early tonight. Weird, and I can't get used to it. I'm so off. I need hot chocolate. STAT. peace out!
tail tucked between my legs~ Rach!
As most of you know, Chuck's sis stayed with us this past week! SOOO super fun. I, in a very unnatural for me way, put most all of my cleaning duties aside for the week. (Cheyenne and Chuck would beg to differ...but there are some things that a mom MUST do every day like cook, do laundry, do dishes, etc. or else no one can function) No dusting, no floor scrubbing (except for once in the kitchen) no toilet cleaning...and actually no laundry. (Hence the reason I did 10 loads today...blah!) That was SUPER hard for me. I know there's more people like that out there, and that I'm not the only psycho one...lol. But anywho, I spent the majority of my week just hanging out and trying to relax and have fun. Sounds great huh? Yay. Good for you Rachel. Way to relax and and enjoy your family. You really are a new person. NOOTTTT!-----> THE REST OF THE STORY...
On Thursday night, I went and cleaned a friends house. Helps her out, and helps me out...so it's a win win! I had made dinner and ran out the door, leaving Chuck, Cheyenne and the girls with a whopping mess of a kitchen (and entire messy home at that...the air mattress lived in the living room the whole week which was totally cool, until this night) I got home from cleaning and Chuck said, "Umm...babe. I hope you don't get mad." hmmm...good convo starter yea? no. He then informed me that one of the guys he's been hanging with lately, who's a young life leader here in town, (and also went to HS with me, a few years ahead) swung by. I haven't seen this guy in years, and have never even talked to him. He is now married with 2 kids. I say all of this to set up my story! This guy...and his whole family...decided to "pop in" while I was gone. AHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Any other clean freaks screaming with me yet?! So Chuck told me that...and what did I do? Wellll....I would love to share with you lovely readers that I was so holy, and said "Oh that's great! How fun was that?! I can't believe I missed them!" But what did I do....*sigh* I can't believe me....I stood in the kitchen alone, cleaning, and CRIED. Yes. I'm serious. I cried. I was sooo dang mad that someone I didn't know "popped in" and their first impression of good ole Team Van Hook was that we were total SLOBS. O.M.G. I had never been so embarrassed or upset. Even almost mad. Seriously Rach? Who are you kidding? You know yourself that you had company, that you have 2 young children, and that this couple also had 2 young kiddos, which means...they understood and didn't CARE!
I mean to tell you! I was TORE UP! You would think we were like homeless or something the way I was acting. And truthfully, I was the only embarrassing thing about the whole night! So here's the God part...obviously, I was tested hardcore. Once I had a chance to chill and look back on the situation, I realized that God had totally spanked my butt!! I could just hear him in my mind saying Rachel, you need to walk it out. You can't just hear me teaching you, you have to put it to use. You need to learn to settle down and remember what is most important. What's important was that God brought a family over to our home. This particular family has a LOT in common with us! AND they felt comfortable enough to "pop in!" That's awesome! I always say that I want people to feel comfortable to just pop in to our home. So why did I freak out so much?! To learn a lesson. For sure. God wanted to see if I meant it. Well now I really get it. Even moreso than I thought I got it before. Gah lee. Isn't that ridiculous! lol. How silly!
Anyway, God totally opened my eyes through everything that happened and I am sooo glad. Another cool thing I realized is just how perfectly Chuck and I balance each other out. He's the chill, laidback who-cares-we'll-clean-it-later guy. And I am the babe, let's-do-everything-now-so-we-don't-hafta-do-it-later girl. lol. Any other couples out there like that?! I'm sure! Well I just thought I'd share. Once again, I hope my vulnerability is not just another crazy Rachel story, but maybe in some wild way can encourage, challenge, uplift, or maybe even be a spanking for you too!! lol. Who knows! Alright signing out. ps I cannot believe it is sooo dark soooo early tonight. Weird, and I can't get used to it. I'm so off. I need hot chocolate. STAT. peace out!
tail tucked between my legs~ Rach!
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
Teach me how to Duggar.
LOL. First of all, everyone should know that we have special company this week. Her name is Cheyenne Bonnie Lanae Van Hook. Yep...the whole entire week...someone save me!! (totally kidding...assuming she will read this soon.) So yea. We're pretty much a ridiculous trio we are. Ole Chuck, his sis Cheyenne, and me. There have so far been talks of boogars, pics of poo, farting, burping, laughing, crying, yelling etc. It's only Tuesday. Shooo....we got a whole nother few days of ludacrosity in our home! I love it. It'd only be better if my sister was here too :( That would definitely throw a kink into things seeings how she is about 13 weeks preggo now!!! Gosh I miss her. (Yay for me being an aunt!) Anywho. We are having a very fun time! I love Chey so much, and I'm glad that she gets to be here for a whole week. She hardly gets to spend quality time with us or the girls so it's awesome! (PS Hope no one is offended by my list of "fun things" but I'm honest, and so there ya go...that is honestly what's been going on in my home. Take it or leave it, like it or not!)
Today has been a fun day! I went off to work this morning...Yes I finally have a job for the first time in forever. I'm working at a Mother's Day Out. I love it. I get to take my girlies so it's good :) So today, me and JulieAnne headed to "school." K stayed home with Aunt "Bonnie" because she has a nasty chest cough. Little did I know that my poor sickly baby would be at home with Bonnie in their swimsuits, swimming in the bath tub....life's tough huh?! When Chuck got home from work tonight, for some reason, we somehow ended up all Duggarish. Cheyenne made dinner. I've been on dinner strike. Bored cooking and feeling like I cook the same thing all the time, so she made dins tonight and it was excellent! Chuck rotisseried (I made that up!) a roast and then used our meat slicer to cut it into roast beef slices, bagged it and put it in the fridge for sandwiches later....no seriously. He really did! It was delicious and even picky Kennedy agreed! I decided to cut up some fresh pears from outside and throw them in the crockpot for the night with some butter, cinnamon & sugar. Then we really did go sit in the living room and watch 19 Kids and Counting. lol. Random night huh?! I loved it! Oh and I almost forgot, Chuck made homemade hot chocolate which was like the most delicious thing I've ever had! (My husband ROX!!!) It was a super good time.
All this being said, I want to add just a smidge of what God's been working on with me lately. It kind of ties in with my last post titled Abba. It also comes a little bit from Jeremy's message Sunday as well as what I've been reading as I finished up Romans. The truth is a simple one...but a wonderful one. Here goes. Selfish perfection=bad. Selfless perfection=good! A brief explanation. So many times, I strive so hard to be perfect for myself. To make myself look better. To make sure my house is super clean (HELLO YEA RIGHT I HAVE 2 YOUNG CHILDREN!) for when company comes over, to cook well so that people think I'm a great wife, to do this or that to make myself look better to me and to others! Anyone feel that say AMEN?! Yea I thought so. That's what I like to call selfish perfection. Aiming to be perfect for my own selfish reasons.
Now...there is a perfectionism that God is totally ok with! And that is the perfection that God is changing my heart to follow and aim toward. That would be setting a goal for yourself to be perfect in God's eyes. For God's purpose and will. To please God. To allow your life to be transformed like Christ. To lay down your own life daily and put aside all selfish desires and thoughts and simply want and need to be like Jesus. That's it. Obviously as we all know, we will never be perfect. Impossible. But, we can sure as heck try. That's even what God wants. He knows we're gonna mess up...so what! That's what makes Him all the more amazing! But I know that He wants us to be like Jesus. Every day to try more and more to be like Christ. Now that is possible! So that's where I'm at. Being renewed and transformed daily. So that my mindset is slowly but very surely changing from selfish perfection to selfless perfection. I want to be perfect for God!! I want to be as much like Jesus as I possibly can for reasons that bring glory to His name and no other. If I'm more like Jesus, then my prayer is that God could use me and my testimony as a way to show His glory to others. I want people to see Jesus, not Rachel. (Please don't get me wrong, I am not bashing house cleaning, and good cooking. I love to cook, clean, crochet, make bows etc... and that is who I am. I am not going to change those things, but I can keep in check the reason behind my doing those things.)
Just wanted to share! As always. My split personality life is so ridiculous. Crazy but serious. Loud but quiet. But mostly just honest and truthful. I like to be an open book. My prayer is that God uses me! Be encouraged! Closing thought....go pray over your babies tonight while they sleep! Kiss them one more time! Tell your husband how much you love and respect him and that he's the best dad and husband ever :) Sleep tight!
Selfless Perfection For Me~Rach
Today has been a fun day! I went off to work this morning...Yes I finally have a job for the first time in forever. I'm working at a Mother's Day Out. I love it. I get to take my girlies so it's good :) So today, me and JulieAnne headed to "school." K stayed home with Aunt "Bonnie" because she has a nasty chest cough. Little did I know that my poor sickly baby would be at home with Bonnie in their swimsuits, swimming in the bath tub....life's tough huh?! When Chuck got home from work tonight, for some reason, we somehow ended up all Duggarish. Cheyenne made dinner. I've been on dinner strike. Bored cooking and feeling like I cook the same thing all the time, so she made dins tonight and it was excellent! Chuck rotisseried (I made that up!) a roast and then used our meat slicer to cut it into roast beef slices, bagged it and put it in the fridge for sandwiches later....no seriously. He really did! It was delicious and even picky Kennedy agreed! I decided to cut up some fresh pears from outside and throw them in the crockpot for the night with some butter, cinnamon & sugar. Then we really did go sit in the living room and watch 19 Kids and Counting. lol. Random night huh?! I loved it! Oh and I almost forgot, Chuck made homemade hot chocolate which was like the most delicious thing I've ever had! (My husband ROX!!!) It was a super good time.
All this being said, I want to add just a smidge of what God's been working on with me lately. It kind of ties in with my last post titled Abba. It also comes a little bit from Jeremy's message Sunday as well as what I've been reading as I finished up Romans. The truth is a simple one...but a wonderful one. Here goes. Selfish perfection=bad. Selfless perfection=good! A brief explanation. So many times, I strive so hard to be perfect for myself. To make myself look better. To make sure my house is super clean (HELLO YEA RIGHT I HAVE 2 YOUNG CHILDREN!) for when company comes over, to cook well so that people think I'm a great wife, to do this or that to make myself look better to me and to others! Anyone feel that say AMEN?! Yea I thought so. That's what I like to call selfish perfection. Aiming to be perfect for my own selfish reasons.
Now...there is a perfectionism that God is totally ok with! And that is the perfection that God is changing my heart to follow and aim toward. That would be setting a goal for yourself to be perfect in God's eyes. For God's purpose and will. To please God. To allow your life to be transformed like Christ. To lay down your own life daily and put aside all selfish desires and thoughts and simply want and need to be like Jesus. That's it. Obviously as we all know, we will never be perfect. Impossible. But, we can sure as heck try. That's even what God wants. He knows we're gonna mess up...so what! That's what makes Him all the more amazing! But I know that He wants us to be like Jesus. Every day to try more and more to be like Christ. Now that is possible! So that's where I'm at. Being renewed and transformed daily. So that my mindset is slowly but very surely changing from selfish perfection to selfless perfection. I want to be perfect for God!! I want to be as much like Jesus as I possibly can for reasons that bring glory to His name and no other. If I'm more like Jesus, then my prayer is that God could use me and my testimony as a way to show His glory to others. I want people to see Jesus, not Rachel. (Please don't get me wrong, I am not bashing house cleaning, and good cooking. I love to cook, clean, crochet, make bows etc... and that is who I am. I am not going to change those things, but I can keep in check the reason behind my doing those things.)
Just wanted to share! As always. My split personality life is so ridiculous. Crazy but serious. Loud but quiet. But mostly just honest and truthful. I like to be an open book. My prayer is that God uses me! Be encouraged! Closing thought....go pray over your babies tonight while they sleep! Kiss them one more time! Tell your husband how much you love and respect him and that he's the best dad and husband ever :) Sleep tight!
Selfless Perfection For Me~Rach
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Abba.
I want to have my quiet time as a blog today. As a mother, even if they are under the age of 3, I am constantly wanting to be the best Godly mother that I can be. That is some sort of a goal for me. I strive to be the mother that my children need, and more importantly I strive to be the mother that God wants me to be. And so as I was about to journal today for my quiet time, God was leading me to write all of His characteristics as Abba Father. The ultimate parent. And so I decided that I would blog it, instead of just write it in my journal....this way multiple people can be reminded of who the best parent in the whole world is, and who we should daily use as a parenting example.
In a world surrounded by fellow bloggers, and insane technological progressions, I have found myself at times being motivated and encouraged by other moms like me, young and old. To see what other people are doing often gets something going in our brains. Like maybe, "Ooo! That's a great idea. I could totally make that, or do that, or cook that!" Anyone know what I mean! Seeing other women put themselves out there allows us to gain new ideas and new creative insights on what we like or how we may want to do things. So...all that being said, it is hard not to sometimes see what everyone else is doing as a mom and not think, "Dang, I'm a sucky mom!" or "I will never be that crafty or holy or ______!" And I have fallen for it before and today I'm standing up to say...IT'S A LIE FROM THE MASTER OF DECEPTION. Satan is the king of lies. The Bible is clear about that. He knows our weaknesses and picks on us like a big fat bully. My eyes have been opened to that, and God wants me to be the mom that He wants me to be, using Him as an example rather than any other cool or crafty or holy mom out there that I might "follow."
So I am now going to make kind of a random, as the thought comes, list of the type of parent God is...therefore making a list of the kind of characteristics I would love for Kennedy and JulieAnne to one day say that I have!
~God never turns His back on us
~God ALWAYS listens to everything we say...stupid or important (I don't always listen to Kennedy's jibber jabber, but even when I jibber jabber and whine to God, He listens...hmmm.)
~God forgives not 7 times but 77 times if needed (Matt 18:22) do I?
~God keeps every single promise He has ever made...do I? "I promise, if you're a good girl I will____" hmmm.
~God is confident in us
~God never says negative or degrading things to us
~God disciplines us in ways that teach us
~God's love never fails
~God wants the best for us
~God (the Holy Spirit) prays for us (actually Romans 8:26-28 says that the spirit groans in prayer for us even when we don't know what to pray for!)
~God doesn't allow ANYTHING to stand in the way of His love for us
~God sacrificed for us
~God gives us peace and joy
~God protects us
~God is fair
~God teaches us and speaks to us in meaningful ways
~God doesn't care if our clothes match, if we have make-up on, if we smell terrible, if we're ugly, fat, sloppy, or whatever. He doesn't care! Priase the Lord rigiht?!
~God does care if that we seek Him, that we serve Him, that we love Him, that we tell others about Him, that we talk about Him, that we walk out what He teaches us etc....
And on that note, I want to end my list. Because, I think that last one is the clencher. God does all these things for us, and He is so perfect and amazing, but I think that the key is what we do for Him back. Because then and only then does He know that we truly love Him back and desire Him and His will. He can do all those things, and His love will never fail or change, but unless we are doing our part, then the relationship isn't complete. Isn't that what we want with our own children? What if Kennedy told me everything? What if she trusted me completely? What if she knew without a shadow of a doubt that I would always be there for her? What if she told all her friends about how cool and great I was? What if she shared with others all the things that I have taught her? What if she remembered the things that I taught her and they flowed freely out of her? What if she really did listen and obey all the time? I could go on and on! That's what God wants from us. He desires us to be the perfect child! Now obviously we are not perfect, but can we not aim to be? Certainly! It's a beautiful symbolic story this parent/child relationship. All we have to do is look at the type of Abba Father that God is and aim to be like that! Then we have to alternately look at the type of child He desires us to be, and glorify Him by helping our children to become that child. The one that God is proud of and brags on! The one that He carries pictures around in His wallet and shows people and says, "This one, she's my pride and joy!!" Can you imagine! I want to be THAT child of God!! He is such a beautiful example of a parent. I want to be like that! So the more I aim to be like God as a parent, the better child of God I will be, and the better children of God my children will be! Make sense?! lol. In my head it does. Hopefully on here it does too.
God let me be the Godly mother that you desire me to be, so that I can be the child of God that you want me to be, so that I can raise the children of God that you desire me to raise :) I am so thankful for your parenting instruction book. Your word. I hope that you are proud of me. I hope that you can one day pull my picture out of your wallet and brag on me to the nearby group of angels. I want to bring glory to You and You alone. I love you with all my heart. You are my number 1!
Making Papa Proud~ Rachel
In a world surrounded by fellow bloggers, and insane technological progressions, I have found myself at times being motivated and encouraged by other moms like me, young and old. To see what other people are doing often gets something going in our brains. Like maybe, "Ooo! That's a great idea. I could totally make that, or do that, or cook that!" Anyone know what I mean! Seeing other women put themselves out there allows us to gain new ideas and new creative insights on what we like or how we may want to do things. So...all that being said, it is hard not to sometimes see what everyone else is doing as a mom and not think, "Dang, I'm a sucky mom!" or "I will never be that crafty or holy or ______!" And I have fallen for it before and today I'm standing up to say...IT'S A LIE FROM THE MASTER OF DECEPTION. Satan is the king of lies. The Bible is clear about that. He knows our weaknesses and picks on us like a big fat bully. My eyes have been opened to that, and God wants me to be the mom that He wants me to be, using Him as an example rather than any other cool or crafty or holy mom out there that I might "follow."
So I am now going to make kind of a random, as the thought comes, list of the type of parent God is...therefore making a list of the kind of characteristics I would love for Kennedy and JulieAnne to one day say that I have!
~God never turns His back on us
~God ALWAYS listens to everything we say...stupid or important (I don't always listen to Kennedy's jibber jabber, but even when I jibber jabber and whine to God, He listens...hmmm.)
~God forgives not 7 times but 77 times if needed (Matt 18:22) do I?
~God keeps every single promise He has ever made...do I? "I promise, if you're a good girl I will____" hmmm.
~God is confident in us
~God never says negative or degrading things to us
~God disciplines us in ways that teach us
~God's love never fails
~God wants the best for us
~God (the Holy Spirit) prays for us (actually Romans 8:26-28 says that the spirit groans in prayer for us even when we don't know what to pray for!)
~God doesn't allow ANYTHING to stand in the way of His love for us
~God sacrificed for us
~God gives us peace and joy
~God protects us
~God is fair
~God teaches us and speaks to us in meaningful ways
~God doesn't care if our clothes match, if we have make-up on, if we smell terrible, if we're ugly, fat, sloppy, or whatever. He doesn't care! Priase the Lord rigiht?!
~God does care if that we seek Him, that we serve Him, that we love Him, that we tell others about Him, that we talk about Him, that we walk out what He teaches us etc....
And on that note, I want to end my list. Because, I think that last one is the clencher. God does all these things for us, and He is so perfect and amazing, but I think that the key is what we do for Him back. Because then and only then does He know that we truly love Him back and desire Him and His will. He can do all those things, and His love will never fail or change, but unless we are doing our part, then the relationship isn't complete. Isn't that what we want with our own children? What if Kennedy told me everything? What if she trusted me completely? What if she knew without a shadow of a doubt that I would always be there for her? What if she told all her friends about how cool and great I was? What if she shared with others all the things that I have taught her? What if she remembered the things that I taught her and they flowed freely out of her? What if she really did listen and obey all the time? I could go on and on! That's what God wants from us. He desires us to be the perfect child! Now obviously we are not perfect, but can we not aim to be? Certainly! It's a beautiful symbolic story this parent/child relationship. All we have to do is look at the type of Abba Father that God is and aim to be like that! Then we have to alternately look at the type of child He desires us to be, and glorify Him by helping our children to become that child. The one that God is proud of and brags on! The one that He carries pictures around in His wallet and shows people and says, "This one, she's my pride and joy!!" Can you imagine! I want to be THAT child of God!! He is such a beautiful example of a parent. I want to be like that! So the more I aim to be like God as a parent, the better child of God I will be, and the better children of God my children will be! Make sense?! lol. In my head it does. Hopefully on here it does too.
God let me be the Godly mother that you desire me to be, so that I can be the child of God that you want me to be, so that I can raise the children of God that you desire me to raise :) I am so thankful for your parenting instruction book. Your word. I hope that you are proud of me. I hope that you can one day pull my picture out of your wallet and brag on me to the nearby group of angels. I want to bring glory to You and You alone. I love you with all my heart. You are my number 1!
Making Papa Proud~ Rachel
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Mini Lesson Plans
Ever wonder what the learning capacity is of your small child? Ever think ...I wonder just how much water this little "sponge" human can soak in. I always knew that children at Kennedy's age are often called sponges. I learned about it all through my education. So when my own daughter got to the age in which she started soaking everything in, I guess I decided to take it to the next level.
I compare it to the time when I was teaching the Tumbling Turtles class at Precious Lamb Preschool. I had a hodge podge class of part-time students ranging in age from 2 1/2 to 5. I decided that I would treat them all the same, and teach them all the same. So we learned things like Spanish numbers to 10 & Spanish months of the year. Our names & addresses, ABC's, etc. I knew that the 2 1/2 year old was having a blast but I never thought that she would really get all the stuff I was teaching. One day her parents came in and asked me if we had been learning Spanish and I told them we had, a little bit. They proceeded to tell me that they had been out to eat the night before, and her big brother (like 7 or 8) was telling what he had been learning at school. He kept trying to count to 10 but his little sister kept joining in and singing our Spanish numbers song! The parents had no clue! They were shocked and excited as were the people around them in the restaurant. I guess that is when I knew that kids that age could definitely hold their own!
So here I am, mother of 2 little sponges. Kennedy Jane is somewhat of a guinea pig for me I suppose! lol. I guess you could say I'm trying to find out what kind of quality sponge she is. So, I've taken it upon myself to go through our ABC's each week and do a verse, a song, and activities that go with the letter. I have had a couple of people ask about it and so I want to share what I am doing in hopes that maybe someone else will want to use it, or take what I have been doing and make it 100 times better. The key to me is using a phrase that they told us year after year at JBC..."Don't reinvent the wheel!" So I don't. I use a collection of cool things and websites that other people use and then add to it my own ideas and BOOM! I then have Kennedy's mini lesson plans.
Another thing that I would say before starting anything like this with a kiddo that is so little is that they are not old enough to be in school, not old enough to sit down at a table and have lessons or homework or anything serious of the sort. Her attention span is the size of a hmm....well that tiny little quarter sized gourd that she picked out for sissy JulieAnne at the pumpkin patch...yea that's about right! Sometimes I get frustrated if she's not getting something and then I have to set myself straight and remember she's only stinkin 2 years old! So there's definitely some things to think about beforehand. But I'm gonna share what I've done and some GREAT resources! (BTW this is exactly how I make these little lesson plans. I have a notebook and a pen and I do all my researching on Sunday night and write down the ideas that I find & like.)
Letter A~
apple stamping
acorn hunt
"A gentle answer turns away anger." Proverbs 15:1
the Johnny Appleseed song (one of K's faves & if/when you decided to do a song with the week, be prepared to be singing that song a LOT!)
Ants on a log
Ants being hard workers (we fed ants various foods to see what they like best and we watched how hard of workers they are!)
acorn outline on brown paper, glue oats on bottom and cocoa crispies on top part ( we did this at the library and it is SUPER cute!)
Letter B~
cut out magazine B things
painted beans blue
outlined a butterfly shape then hot glued on the blue beans (on blue construction paper of course)
old school songs either "Be ye kind..." which goes with fave scripture Ephesians 4:32 or
The B-I-B-L-E
2 verse choices Be ye kind, one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God for Christsake has forgiven you. or Believe in Jesus so that you and your family will be saved. Acts 16:31
Letter C~
BEST verse "Children obey your parents in the Lord, for it is the right thing to do." Ephesians 6:1
Cute old song O be careful little eyes what you see...
any fun cookie idea that you may have for "c"ookie; we made candy corn cupcakes
colors (paint, crayons, etc. we did colorful leaf collections)
we cut out a green const paper C and glued on the poofy ball things to make a caterpillar (cute!)
obviously a princess crown was painted and given sprinkles and stickers galore :)
Letter D~
drums from formula cans (we didn't do this but cute idea esp for boys!)
Dunkin Donut breakfast was my favorite part of D week!
dancing like D animals
dig in the dirt
cut out letter D of const paper and we glued dirt on it. Messy and fun.
A gift for Dad (we painted a rock with dad on it but get as creative as you want)
play with dominoes
Hickory Dickory Dock, Hey Diddle Diddle, Diddle Diddle Dumpling my son John (cute nursery rhymes that I looked up on youtube and K didn't want to stop watching them!)
couple good scriptures Psalm 37:4 "Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart." or Luke 6:31 "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."(my fave)
So there ya go. Long yes. But very cool to us! I'll tell ya this, Kennedy yesterday could tell me every verse with a tiny bit of prompting when necessary, could sing every song and even say the new nursery rhymes! She absolutely loves it. She's no pro at letter recognition, but when we turned into Hobby Lobby and Best Buy the other day and she saw the big signs where we turned in, she screamed "AHHHH letter B's mommy! Look!" and I pretty much wanted to cry! lol. The most important thing at this age I think is to just incorporate things into their normal everyday life. If you're playing or doing something fun, make it about the letter. Talk about the scriptures at just the perfect opportunity like when sharing doesn't come real easily, or not very nice words aim towards a sibling. Sing the songs during bathtime, suppertime and all the time! I hope this has been helpful and that some people will like it, use it, or share it with someone else. Here's some of my favorite resources:
woodsonchapel.com
heartofthematteronline.com
these 2 & others have some good scriptures for kiddos that we've used
impressyourkids.org
(a GREAT mom's blog that I used often. She's a good one to follow and did the ABC weekly thing also.)
notimeforflashcards.com
enchantedlearning.com
teacherplanet.com
(those had some good activities or crafts for the letters)
That's pretty much it. Enjoy watching your little sponges become little Jesus lovers! Leave comments :)
Standing in the Gap~~ Rachel
I compare it to the time when I was teaching the Tumbling Turtles class at Precious Lamb Preschool. I had a hodge podge class of part-time students ranging in age from 2 1/2 to 5. I decided that I would treat them all the same, and teach them all the same. So we learned things like Spanish numbers to 10 & Spanish months of the year. Our names & addresses, ABC's, etc. I knew that the 2 1/2 year old was having a blast but I never thought that she would really get all the stuff I was teaching. One day her parents came in and asked me if we had been learning Spanish and I told them we had, a little bit. They proceeded to tell me that they had been out to eat the night before, and her big brother (like 7 or 8) was telling what he had been learning at school. He kept trying to count to 10 but his little sister kept joining in and singing our Spanish numbers song! The parents had no clue! They were shocked and excited as were the people around them in the restaurant. I guess that is when I knew that kids that age could definitely hold their own!
So here I am, mother of 2 little sponges. Kennedy Jane is somewhat of a guinea pig for me I suppose! lol. I guess you could say I'm trying to find out what kind of quality sponge she is. So, I've taken it upon myself to go through our ABC's each week and do a verse, a song, and activities that go with the letter. I have had a couple of people ask about it and so I want to share what I am doing in hopes that maybe someone else will want to use it, or take what I have been doing and make it 100 times better. The key to me is using a phrase that they told us year after year at JBC..."Don't reinvent the wheel!" So I don't. I use a collection of cool things and websites that other people use and then add to it my own ideas and BOOM! I then have Kennedy's mini lesson plans.
Another thing that I would say before starting anything like this with a kiddo that is so little is that they are not old enough to be in school, not old enough to sit down at a table and have lessons or homework or anything serious of the sort. Her attention span is the size of a hmm....well that tiny little quarter sized gourd that she picked out for sissy JulieAnne at the pumpkin patch...yea that's about right! Sometimes I get frustrated if she's not getting something and then I have to set myself straight and remember she's only stinkin 2 years old! So there's definitely some things to think about beforehand. But I'm gonna share what I've done and some GREAT resources! (BTW this is exactly how I make these little lesson plans. I have a notebook and a pen and I do all my researching on Sunday night and write down the ideas that I find & like.)
Letter A~
apple stamping
acorn hunt
"A gentle answer turns away anger." Proverbs 15:1
the Johnny Appleseed song (one of K's faves & if/when you decided to do a song with the week, be prepared to be singing that song a LOT!)
Ants on a log
Ants being hard workers (we fed ants various foods to see what they like best and we watched how hard of workers they are!)
acorn outline on brown paper, glue oats on bottom and cocoa crispies on top part ( we did this at the library and it is SUPER cute!)
Letter B~
cut out magazine B things
painted beans blue
outlined a butterfly shape then hot glued on the blue beans (on blue construction paper of course)
old school songs either "Be ye kind..." which goes with fave scripture Ephesians 4:32 or
The B-I-B-L-E
2 verse choices Be ye kind, one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God for Christsake has forgiven you. or Believe in Jesus so that you and your family will be saved. Acts 16:31
Letter C~
BEST verse "Children obey your parents in the Lord, for it is the right thing to do." Ephesians 6:1
Cute old song O be careful little eyes what you see...
any fun cookie idea that you may have for "c"ookie; we made candy corn cupcakes
colors (paint, crayons, etc. we did colorful leaf collections)
we cut out a green const paper C and glued on the poofy ball things to make a caterpillar (cute!)
obviously a princess crown was painted and given sprinkles and stickers galore :)
Letter D~
drums from formula cans (we didn't do this but cute idea esp for boys!)
Dunkin Donut breakfast was my favorite part of D week!
dancing like D animals
dig in the dirt
cut out letter D of const paper and we glued dirt on it. Messy and fun.
A gift for Dad (we painted a rock with dad on it but get as creative as you want)
play with dominoes
Hickory Dickory Dock, Hey Diddle Diddle, Diddle Diddle Dumpling my son John (cute nursery rhymes that I looked up on youtube and K didn't want to stop watching them!)
couple good scriptures Psalm 37:4 "Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart." or Luke 6:31 "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."(my fave)
So there ya go. Long yes. But very cool to us! I'll tell ya this, Kennedy yesterday could tell me every verse with a tiny bit of prompting when necessary, could sing every song and even say the new nursery rhymes! She absolutely loves it. She's no pro at letter recognition, but when we turned into Hobby Lobby and Best Buy the other day and she saw the big signs where we turned in, she screamed "AHHHH letter B's mommy! Look!" and I pretty much wanted to cry! lol. The most important thing at this age I think is to just incorporate things into their normal everyday life. If you're playing or doing something fun, make it about the letter. Talk about the scriptures at just the perfect opportunity like when sharing doesn't come real easily, or not very nice words aim towards a sibling. Sing the songs during bathtime, suppertime and all the time! I hope this has been helpful and that some people will like it, use it, or share it with someone else. Here's some of my favorite resources:
woodsonchapel.com
heartofthematteronline.com
these 2 & others have some good scriptures for kiddos that we've used
impressyourkids.org
(a GREAT mom's blog that I used often. She's a good one to follow and did the ABC weekly thing also.)
notimeforflashcards.com
enchantedlearning.com
teacherplanet.com
(those had some good activities or crafts for the letters)
That's pretty much it. Enjoy watching your little sponges become little Jesus lovers! Leave comments :)
Standing in the Gap~~ Rachel
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Humbled
So it's Thursday morning, and I have had a few days now to "Round-Up" all of my thoughts from our 10.10.10. launch weekend. And I will definitely go ahead and warn anyone reading this, that I am a long blogger. But, in my opinion at least, it's usually worth it. So here goes....
Let's start with the fact that on Friday evening, our family's besets friends in the whole world arrived! I don't know who loves Ben & "Ekka" more, me & Chuck or Kennedy :) They arrived around bedtime, and came in like a stinkin Santa Clause or something. All that really mattered (in Kennedy's mind) was a brand new Little Mermaid costume from the Disney store that she proudly sported pretty much the entire weekend except for church and only because I nixed that! lol. Gosh was it wonderful to have them there for the weekend to support us. With them being there, I realized just how hard it is to be away from close friends and although God has provided us with people here in Jackson that are fun friends, it takes a long time to build up to something like what we have with those 2. On the flip side of that, I know good and well that there is reasoning behind being far from all of our friends & "family" in Sevierville. God wanted Chuck & I to learn to stand strong on our own two feet. I keep hearing the word crutch in my head, and know that in a way, the Gathering was a type of crutch that we had had since we got married. Something solid to always lean on. Not anymore! God wants to heal our limp. And it is working :) Chuck and I are being stretched & as hard as that is, it is going to be so worth it to develop a relationship with Him that can stand the test. Anyway...
Mom came over around 10:30 so that us adults could go over to FCC when The Gathering youth & leaders arrived so that we could run around town like crazies posting up bright orange signs that said "thejourneyiscoming.com 10.10.10." We put them up at a lot of the main intersections around town. So that is what Chuck called our blitz campaign. Afterwards, grandma & grandpa, I mean Ben & Erica, went back home and went to sleep while Chuck and I pretended like we could still stay up and stay alive until 2 a.m. at Steak & Shake with the youth kids. HA! We were so tired it wasn't even funny. lol. But that was super fun & it was a blast to have them all here to support us and help out in any way possible!
Saturday a.m. Chuck lead those guys in some Jehovah Witness type door hanging activities. They got a ton done so it was great. They also helped to prepare for & lead a men's prayer breakfast at my home church First Christian. So that was cool too! Saturday evening some more friends and family arrived for our Van Hook junk food fest 2010. Chuck's Mamaw & Papaw, Alicia & Brent Altum, and Angela all arrived just in time for some good ole pizza, chips and brownies! Chuck and I got to open our home to all those who were in town for the weekend and it was sooo much fun. I miss our old youth nights that we had at our house. Who cares if the kids stained the carpet, broke glasses, stunk up the bathroom or beat each other up?! It was fun! lol. After the junk food fest we all caravanned over to the Fun Zone where we have church. It was set-up time! We took Alicia, Brent, Angela, Erica, Ben, Mamaw and Papaw all over there so that they could see how we roll at Journey Church. And when I say roll, I mean roll! We (all the guys) take out the roll-y cases from the trailer and deliver them to their designated area so that they can be unloaded. It is a fun and for the most part, organized procedure to set-up and tear down. I was glad that they all got to watch the magic of Journey Church unfold! They all thought it was really cool. Chuck says he's going to make a video called "It's my Church in a Box!" ;) He so should!
So that all lead up to a pretty emotional late night for me. I laid on Erica's air mattress crying late Saturday night. I vented to Alicia about everything that was brewing inside of me. From the youth group having to leave on Sunday morning, to being so ridiculously humbled about the whole Journey experience. I cried and she prayed. It was a VERY huge and meaningful moment for me. I am so grateful for a friend like that. A friend who would put herself aside to lift me up when I was a real live trainwreck! After that, Chuck & Ben got home. The mood quickly changed seeing how they had just had a midnight shopping spree for chocolate con leche fuel injector cleaner. Ug. they're so weird. But I'm even weirder because we ended up talking about poop. Tell my why do I always ALWAYS end up talking about poop of some sort?! Anyway, it was funny and we all were rolling...I won't go into details. You can thank me later :) Now for some serious stuff!
So Sunday morning, I got all jacked up on Dunkin Donuts and coffee before we rolled on over to Fun Zone. Everything was set up because we did it all on Saturday night. I just went on patrol duty supervising all the youth kids and making sure they were helping rather than hindering! For example I busted up a couple middle schoolers with their stanky shoes and socks off in our tiny nursery playing a warm and friendly game of dodge ball...I politely told them (I think I was polite) that if I had brought my little JulieAnne to this nursery I would have turned around and left! lol. They straightened everything up and moved the smelly shoes from the doorway and we were good to go!
We had a great meeting with the launch team and all who had come to support us at around 9:30. Jeremy prayed and then asked us to split up and go around the campus covering it with prayer as well. We presented him and his wife Sheila with a fun goody bag of some things they love and God allowed me to cover them in prayer. Gosh I love doing ministry with them! They are amazing, God-loving, spirit-filled people who could not be doing a better job if they tried! So that was really awesome too. After that, which turned me into a basketcase yet once again, everyone took their posts to prepare for what we soon found out would be craziness that morning! I mean to tell you, the folks started rolling in like whoa baby! There was a grand total of 399 total heads that morning, they turned it into an even 400 because of the pregnant woman who was about to pop :) yes. 400 people came to Journey Church on launch day! Can I get an AMEN!! There were about 70 kids total which is incredible. And about 48 who were in the next room yelling Round-Up!! My own included! Jeremy did an excellent job! The sermons & even worship now I do believe are up on our website. All went smoothly and it was so great to be a part of it all. To wrap things up, anyone in town as support, as well as the launch team, went to lunch across the street. Then most everyone headed back home.
In all my time of reflection this week, I always kept coming back to feeling humbled & unworthy. Just a crazy mom, who tries her best to listen and obey. I know that I am unworthy, the good part of it though, is that I know that God has chosen me and that I am His treasure. (Deut. 7:6) He makes me worthy through the blood of His Son Jesus Christ. And therefore by the power that I am able to claim in His name, I am thereby made whole in Him. I can do ANYTHING through Him. And so I WILL do anything with Him. I will do it to the best of my ability. And so it balances out my feeling of unworthiness, because I realize that any iota of worthiness that I may have comes from Jesus Christ! And I praise Him for that!!
Welp. My times up. Chuck's going to work and snatching the computer. So I reckon I'm done. Probably a good thing because this bad boy is pretty long! lol. So hope it's not hurting your eyes, and hope you enjoyed. (ps I totally didn't edit this, so I hope there's no curse word type-o's or anything like that! lol)
Living the American Dream~xoxo
Thursday, October 7, 2010
o.m.g.
ALERT ALERT!! I'm about to write the shortest blog that I will probably ever write. Just a couple of thoughts on the eve of our 10.10.10 weekend!
1) I get butterflies every single time I think about Sunday morning! ahhhhh!
2) I cannot wait until all of our friends and family get here...I mean canNOT wait!
3) Screw house cleaning. I am so over keeping this house clean when I have a toddler and a baby. And to all the other moms who are anal about cleaning like me, and have 2 young kids or more and keep your house clean...forget y'all too! I am wearing myself out acting like this "home" will stay clean like I want it...it won't. I give! One day, when the kids are grown and gone ( and I don't care anymore probably!) then I will return to my anal cleaning habits...but until then...if you come over here...my house is a home. We live in it. My kids play in it and we like it like that. Yes me included. I officially like it like that. On we go.
4) The Fun Zone is gonna be stinkin packed this weekend. I hope that every person on the launch team has to sit on someone's LAP! Wouldn't that be funny?! lol. I'd settle for standing, or sitting Indian style. But I have a feeling that it's gonna be CRAZY UP IN THERE! Can't wait.
5) Sometimes I forget that I am the Associate Pastor/Family Pastor's wife....and pray to God that he is proud of me and the life that I am living. It's a big responsibility and a huge calling in which I have gladly answered and followed.
6) I hope everyone is praying for us. The whole weekend. Every single detail.
7) I'm thinking about and praying for all the others who are launching publicly this weekend. Stadia is starting about 100 if I'm not mistaken. So lots of prayers covering this entire weekend are mucho appreciated!
8) I am thankful that my family is here and that we will be going to church together.
9) I am devastated that Chuck's family is not close enough to be a part of this amazing experience, and wish with all my heart that they could be here.
10) We should Skype the service for them :) lol.
Ok. that's all. Wasn't as short as I thought it'd be. Guess I had a little more on my mind about this weekend then I thought. Alrighty. Well, that's probably it until after the launch. Tomorrow and on is gonna be uber busy. So more lata!
Living the American Dream~xoxo
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
The Me I think I am.
So as I sit here watching SVU with my lovely husband...he is so totally trippin out about all these "purse" comments that have officially taken over facebook. Hmm...Not sure how I feel about all that but anyway. He's like thinking of what he would type as his status..."I like it in my back pocket." Is actually what he just said. Yea. He ain't right! lol. But seriously...next subject. I wrote this blog so that I could be me! Write about the things I do. The crazy things, the serious things etc. But today, I'm feeling a little bit proud of myself so I'm gonna write about that!
Kennedy and I are on week 2 of our Alphabet homeschooling sessions. Yea, I know, she's only 2 1/2 but hey, she loves to learn, and she's a stinkin sponge so I'm not gonna pass up the opportunity to teach her about God :) All is going super well. She loves it, and so do I. This week is letter B, of course, and our scripture is Believe in Jesus, and you and your family will be saved. (A little watered down but not too much) She uses motions and says it, and also now knows our letter B song, which is a classic, if I do say so myself...The B-I-B-L-E! Hooray for old skool Sunday School songs. (I would sooo love it if everyone left a comment of their favorites. I'll make a playlist, and they might even be used for a letter of the week song!!) Today we also painted blue beans which we glued onto blue construction paper in the shape of a...yep...butterfly. Good fun day.
The highlight of my day however, was that I finally mastered the crochet baby beanie!! WOOP. I have been trying for a few weeks now to make a darn baby beanie, and every time it ends up a sock. Chuck so kindly told me that I needed to "increase my stitches or it will never get bigger. Duh." ug. So it finally worked out, and I have an adorable little brown beanie that I truly hope fits baby J's head, or I will probably cry :'( nah. But I will be sad. So yea! I felt pretty good about doing that. That little laminated tri-fold sheet from hobby lobby did a pretty good job teaching me to crochet. Along with the 1800 crochet you tube videos I watched. Lame. I know.
So that's it. My day in a nut shell! JulieAnne's first 2 teeth are cutting through! Gosh she will look sooo different with teeth. I love baby's teeth coming in....hate the side effects: diarrhea, screaming through the night, fussy, fever, clingy...must I continue?! Anywho. I am now about to fall asleep with windows open, next to the sexiest man alive :) Boy am I lucky?! Blessed is more like it. No matter how many little petty things happen throughout the day to stress me out...in the end, it doesn't get much better than this!
~Living the American Dream xoxo
Kennedy and I are on week 2 of our Alphabet homeschooling sessions. Yea, I know, she's only 2 1/2 but hey, she loves to learn, and she's a stinkin sponge so I'm not gonna pass up the opportunity to teach her about God :) All is going super well. She loves it, and so do I. This week is letter B, of course, and our scripture is Believe in Jesus, and you and your family will be saved. (A little watered down but not too much) She uses motions and says it, and also now knows our letter B song, which is a classic, if I do say so myself...The B-I-B-L-E! Hooray for old skool Sunday School songs. (I would sooo love it if everyone left a comment of their favorites. I'll make a playlist, and they might even be used for a letter of the week song!!) Today we also painted blue beans which we glued onto blue construction paper in the shape of a...yep...butterfly. Good fun day.
The highlight of my day however, was that I finally mastered the crochet baby beanie!! WOOP. I have been trying for a few weeks now to make a darn baby beanie, and every time it ends up a sock. Chuck so kindly told me that I needed to "increase my stitches or it will never get bigger. Duh." ug. So it finally worked out, and I have an adorable little brown beanie that I truly hope fits baby J's head, or I will probably cry :'( nah. But I will be sad. So yea! I felt pretty good about doing that. That little laminated tri-fold sheet from hobby lobby did a pretty good job teaching me to crochet. Along with the 1800 crochet you tube videos I watched. Lame. I know.
So that's it. My day in a nut shell! JulieAnne's first 2 teeth are cutting through! Gosh she will look sooo different with teeth. I love baby's teeth coming in....hate the side effects: diarrhea, screaming through the night, fussy, fever, clingy...must I continue?! Anywho. I am now about to fall asleep with windows open, next to the sexiest man alive :) Boy am I lucky?! Blessed is more like it. No matter how many little petty things happen throughout the day to stress me out...in the end, it doesn't get much better than this!
~Living the American Dream xoxo
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Boo on Satan the Prowling Lion :x
Well ladies & gents. The time has come. This is gonna be one heck-uv-a week. A week that I'm pretty sure God has been orchestrating in mine & Chuck's life for oh about 25 years now. Everything that we have been through up until now, and all the tools, resources & experience (what little that might be) we have under our belt, have led us to this week. Our church plant, Journey Church is officially launching to the public in LESS THAN ONE WEEK! O.M.G.! Like for real for real! Today was our last practice service.
So, all that being said, and being the emotional, crazy & honest person that I am, I have decided to write a blog about all that is going on inside of my head. So, be prepared for whatever might come out. I'm not really even sure myself yet :)
First I want to talk a little about the practice services. All have gone extremely well seeings how we literally started from scratch. From hanging thousands of doorhangers on the doors of families around town, watching the Journey trailer be unloaded for the first time, borrowing the old "On the Trail" series set from the Gathering, using our first few "First Time Guest" cards, having our first family ministry volunteer meeting, watching the first person make a decision to follow Christ full-force...until now....we have all, especially Chuck, Jeremey and Andy, been busting our rears to make this come together. It of course has been a roller coaster ride. Many glitches to work through, and many things to fix, but I do believe we have, with the help of God alone, a feeling of readiness for 10.10.10!
Second, I want to talk about just how STINKING excited I am to know that so many of our Gathering family are driving 5 1/2 hours to support us this weekend....WHAT THE HECK?!?! How cool is that! I am definitely going to be a basketcase. So I hope you all come bearing kleenex. (Speaking of kleenex...remember that joke How do you make a tissue dance??? Put a little boogie in it :) lol I randomly told that Chuck today out of the blue. That's really a gross joke if you think about it. But anyway.) You guys please hurry up. I can't wait to hug each and every one of you!!!
Lastly, this is what is mostly on my mind lately. It's really quite unfortunate, but just the way the world has to be, darn that ole Adam & Eve. And that is Satan. I'm super pissed at him lately. I tell ya what, as I'm sure so many of you know, Satan really hates when God's children are obeying, following, being blessed etc. And I will be the first to be honest and say, that Satan has tried really hard to force his way into our home. With all of the "busy"ness and long nights getting ready for this coming weekend, there have been moments in which we might have forgotten to put on maybe say our belt of truth or to pick up our shield of righteousness when we get started in the am. And satan takes any chance he can to work his nasty skank way into your life when you're not looking. I don't mind to say that Chuck & I & our family are not perfect. As much as I wish we were, and as much as we pray, read our bibles, listen to k-love all the time, and raise our children in a godly way, sometimes we fall. Hard. My point in being so completely honest and letting down the walls of the Van Hook home is to do what God tells us to do & that is to carry each others burdens. Pray for each other. Encourage one another. I ask that this week, anyone who might read this would send up a few prayers for all of those who are involved with the launching of Journey Church. Planting a church is not easy, in case you ever decided to try it as a side hobby or something. It's actually downright hard. Emotionally, relationally, financially, and especially spiritually. I would love love love for whoever is filling up for it to join me and my family as we bind satan from our home and all of those who are helping to launch the church.
I know this is incredibly long. That's how most of my blogs usually end up. But, most people don't mind...especially if you know how much of my heart I'm sharing on here :) I am definitely one of the most honest people you'll ever meet when it comes to what other people need to hear. I am not very often honest about myself or my own personal life. As so many others, I try to make it appear that our family's got it all together, and that we are you know...all that & a bag a chips or whatever you wanna say. lol. But we AIN'T! So there ya go. I don't want to be bickering with Chuck, or impatient with my girls on the week that God is allowing us to be part of the birth of a church. That's kind of a big deal. I want daily to put on the FULL armor of God. With God on my side, I don't have to fear satan and what he thinks he can do to my family. I will stand strong. Like David facing Goliath will Chuck & I go at this week!
We are SOOOOO PUMPED! BRING ON 10.10.10 BABY!!!!! Gosh. What a privilege and honor! Thank You Lord for choosing us. We are so daggum unworthy it's not even funny! I don't know why. But I do know you have a purpose and a plan for me and my family. And it is a plan to prosper and not harm us. So let the prospering begin O Lord. I am so in love with You. I am desperate for You. May Journey Church be a church that truly does help people to reach their next step in Christ whether that be their very first baby step like JulieAnne, or their very last step into Your arms like the mamaw of a very dear friend of mine. God be glorified by Journey Church and may all we do bring honor to Your name. Smile down on the launch team this week. Let us be shining stars. God I love you. I am NOTHING. NOBODY. without You. But with You, I am ALL THINGS. In the name of Your Son Jesus Christ. Amen.
much love homies. thanks ahead for all the prayers. xo :)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)