All charged up!

We just got back from a long weekend in Bellingham. It was so nice to take some time to see old friends and hang out with family. We went to Tadd's little brother's wedding and we were actually able to sneak in a couple of great coffee dates with some people we love. We got to go to Calvary Lynden on Sunday and be so blessed to catch up on the great things going on there as well as get smothered with hugs and how are ya's.

Noth'in like a weekend like that to lift your spirits and get you all charged up to get back to the everyday. All that said, even though we were only away from home for a couple of days it is always so nice to come back. We tried to snap lots of photos so we could make up for lost time, as we haven't been very good about taking them lately. So here goes the commentaries.

We hit the weekend just right and made it to Tadd's oldest brother and his nephew's birthday party. You can see Kenya and Elijah are not shy about getting front and center even if it is not their birthday.

Next is the lovely bride and groom, the last scheffer male, finally giving into the inevitable. Congrats Andy!

This is Kenya, Elijah and Lakota (their cousin) dancing thier heart out, were not sure who the boy in the tux is but when you are danc'in like crazy, does it really matter?

This is the one, Kenya asked Daddy to dance, and apparently it got framed with a commentary by Tadd's two sisters.

We did meet with our lawyer on Saturday and all I can say is, please continue the prayer. She felt like we did not have a lot of options, as CPS is not the criminal justice system, so the only question the judge would really ask is, "was the law that CPS said you broke, really broken" obviously the answer is yes, the kids were left in a running vehicle which is against the law in Washington. Furthermore, there are not a lot of cases like ours to try to look back on and find loop holes, so it makes it a little harder to work around.

Needless to say. The lord isn't really interested in how doubtful the situation looks or what the facts say. He is above hopeless situations and he doesn't need the facts to line up. It just gives him more room to make a miracle. He has chosen to use man to make the miracles possible though, that is where all of your prayers come in. Please continue to pray and we know that even if the finding of neglect stands. It 's because God wants to use it some how to make His name even greater and we are all for that. Isn't it cool to know that no matter what happens it's all good, cause God is so good? Lord, please help us to always remember that.

Thanks for walking down the road of life with our family and thanks for being the encouragement that lifts us up. Love you all.

Gett'in out a dodge

We are headed to Bellingham this week for Tadd's brother's wedding. We are excited to get some R&R and some good family time. We have an appointment with the Lawyer who is handling our CPS case, we are meeting with her about the Trial in February, it will be nice to get an update on all of the goings on over the last couple of months as we have kind of turned it over to her, it's been so nice not to have another thing on our plate.

Kenya and Elijah are so excited to see their cousins and Grandma and Grandpa They made out a 8 page book of things they want to do with illistrations just in case they forgot. They have already packed both of their back packs and are counting down the days.

Tadd is a little bummed as he will miss the Men's Retreat going on this weekend, he was really trying to make friday, then come to Bellingham Saturday, then come back for Sunday, but when it all boiled down to it, it was a lot to do and Charity is not as confident in her old age, about driving over the pass with snow and 2 kids, by herself. He will have to miss out on the retreat this year and catch up next year.

It will be our first Sunday away since we started down here, we were starting to get nervous about whether we had all of out bases covered, especially being short all of the Men who will be at the Men's retreat. Then the Lord reminded us that it is actually His church not ours and he would take care of it. He is much better at taking care of it than we are anyway.

We will update you on the trip when we get back, in the mean time bless ya and we love ya.

Harvest Party

We had our Harvest Party on Saturday night and we managed to get all the kids sugared up, sleep deprived and spoiled, then sent them home to bed. You would think it would all even out, since we got an extra hour of sleep on Saturday with day light savings. Someone forgot to tell the kids internal clock that. These are the days that teaching sunday school really needs some prayer time. Here is a picture of some of the kids that could stand still long enough to get their picture taken.


This is random activities we had and some pretty cute kids along with it.


We had lots of fun!

We finally got out furnace fixed and now we are really missing sitting by the fire. There is just something about putting the kids to bed and sitting by the fire to wind down. I guess we are never quite content. We are very happy to be warm though and having it happen one of two ways works great. Especially since last friday the power was out for 9 hours and we were supposed to have some of the women over for a biblestudy in the morning. That is when a fireplace comes in really handy. We were toasty warm with coffee made from a french press with hot water from on top of the fireplace. As long as you have heat and coffee what else do you really need.

Kenya and Elijah started Gymnastics again today and had the first day of their "Book worm club" at the library. They really enjoyed both and then we got to top it all off with a date night with mom. Since Tadd has men's biblestudy is at our house every other tuesday night, mom and the kids get to be creative and think of cheap fun things to do for 2 hours. Last time we took the down comforter to the park with lots of pillows and watched a movie on the computer while we ate fiddle faddle. This week we took board games to the ice cream shop and had ice cream and played 4 different games for 2 hours. It is really fun and we all really enjoy getting out and spending time together.

We are headed up to Bellingham next week for Tadd's brothers wedding and are looking forward to spending some family time. Charity has an appointment with the lawyer that is dealing with the CPS case and should know more about what we can expect for the actual trial in January, when she gets back. Well keep you posted whether you want us to or not. God bless ya!

Mail Call!

Kenya, Elijah and Charity went to the Post Office for a feildtrip today. It was lots of fun and they learned lots. They went with 6 other homeschool families, so it was a lot of kids, but it seems they all enjoyed it. They got to take a letter and go up and buy their stamp, then put the letter in the Big Blue mail box. They got to go back and see where all of the mail goes after you send it out and how they post office has ways to make sure they are doing their job right, it was pretty high tech.!

We were supposed to have a group of people from the Bible College in Seattle come down and do a week long Campus evangelism for us, but it looks like they will have to postpone until April. Which is OK because we would have had the Harvest Party right after they left and it would be a lot, for the next couple of weeks. We are excited for them to come in April, when we can spend a little more time focusing on having fun with them.

It was Charity's Birthday on the 14th, so we took a little date night to Yakima. It's amazing when you are short on time and money, how fun just doing the simple things can be. We went shopping for church stuff and used her Birthday coupons to get coffee and just drive around talking. I know it may sound lame to you, but we really love just hanging out together, especially now that our time together is few and far between.

Kenya and Elijah and Dad have been getting some good wrestle time in and some how Kenya managed to get eaten, as she often does.

She plays the Damsel in Distress roll very well. Mom usually has to come in and rescue her multiple times. It is getting to the point where we think she may actually get into distress on purpose. Oh well, I guess there's nothing like burning calories as a family.

We hope you are all having a great fall season and praying you feel the Lord loving and blessing you to the max.

First winter rain

We had our first winter rain today, the kids were hoping it would be cold enough to do snow, but no such luck. It sure does feel cold enough though. We are really burning through the wood in our fireplace as we just found out our furnace is shot and will require a whole different set of building codes to put a new one in. Should be interesting. It's a good thing the Lord provides us with wonderful people who just drop wood off at our house.

Chruch is going great. We had ten people at our first prayer hour on sunday night. The prayer time was wonderful and we are being blessed by the weekly bible studies. We are also gearing up for our Harvest party on Oct 31th and some of the guys from the Bible College in Seattle are coming for a week to pass out flyers around town, help with a concert for the college age kids and spread some general excitement around.

We are also really enjoy spending some relaxing time together as the bad weather sets in. Elijah is really enjoying it. I sent him to his room for a time out and he thought he would through me for a loop when I came in to see him. I guess he didn't plan on falling asleep.

I guess we could have rented out his room and just moved his closet into Kenya's room for him to stay in.

We'll keep you posted on the upcoming events, I am sure the Lord will be faithful as he always is.

Home Again Home Again Jigidy Jig!

Charity got home yesterday from the Pastors Wives conference in Califonia, it was a wonderful get away and she was very blessed. But a wonderful blessing to be home again also. Grandpa completed Tadd's whole honey do list, plus chopped wood for the fireplace and stacked it nicely.

He's definatly is a keeper. I'm not sure what was more refreshing, taking 3 days at a retreat or coming home to find the whole honey do list completed. Thanks Grandpa. Then Grandma suprised Charity at dinner with a B-day cake and cards. Kenya and Elijah were so excited to be in on a secret that mommy was not in on.

While Grandma and Grandpa were here they let Kenya and Elijah use their camera to take pictures around the house and outdoors, so they could show the cousins when they got back to Lynden. Then we gave then our camera just to even the sharing time out a bit and as you can see they went to town.

As you can see they had lots of fun.

Calvary Ellensburg started the first midweek bible study this week and it went great. The men's bible study started up this week also and woman's starts next week. Exciting stuff and so happy to have a little more fellowship time. We are having our Harvest Party on Oct. 31 and inviting the community so you can pray for people to come and hear the gospel shared and also for the sugar high the parent s will have to endure afterwards. Thanks for all of your prayers we sure do feel them and are looking forward to what the Lord will do because of them. God Bless!

A whole new way to do fall

Fall has definantly hit here in Ellensburg, apparently it is not a gradual thing. One day it was 70 something and the next day we were scrounging for firewood. It has been fun to sit by the fire and pretend we have nothing to do for the rest of the day. Next week we start all of our fall Programs at Chruch, Woman's and Men's Bible studies, Midweek Study and getting ready for our Harvest Party on October 31st.

Tadd and Charity got very blessed to get away for a day and attend the Northwest Pastor's Conference in Warm Beach (which is not really warm and technically not a beach) but it was so great to be blessed by the 4 speakers we listened to and have some great worship time. Not to mention some time together without the kids even though we love them immensly.

Charity has been blessed by some friends, to go to the Pastor's wifes conference in California next week. She leaves on Sunday and comes back Wednesday night. Tadd's Parents are coming down to stay while she is gone and Kenya and Elijah are so excited to get up early and play "WAR"(a card game) with Grandma.

We are so excited to start getting into Bible Studies again and have some time to fellowship and spend with the people we love. Kenya and Elijah are loving all the play dates,

Also, getting back into school with the kids, where some days we just hang out in out pj's and read books by the fire. This is one of the major reasons we homeschool. Call us lazy, but I call it tons of fun.

It looks like Annecy & Isaiah may not be home until after the Holidays, as the signature we have been waiting on has not come yet and it has been delayed long enough that all the other ones may not come in time to have them home for Christmas. It's a good thing the Lord knows all and does whatever is best for us and our kids or it might be a liitle more discouraging.

God is so good to us and is so faithful we are so excited to see his provision, grace, purposes and plan for the next couple of months.