Giveaway winner!

We have a winner for our Christmas in July giveaway!!

Congratulations to Liz!! (you’ll hear from me soon) = )

Even if you didn’t win I encourage you to get Prepare Him Room for yourself. I’m finally starting to memorize many of the songs and they are such a blessing to my thinking as I go throughout the day.

If you missed the challenge, we made lists of all the people we needed to buy Christmas presents for, trying to be ready long before the holidays hit.

Now that we have out lists let’s start brainstorming about what those people might like! Keep an eye out when you’re out and about and try to buy at least a couple of things in the next month.

We’ll check back on our progress in August!

Thanks so much to all who entered the giveaway and shared how you prepare ahead of time for the holidays. For those of you like me – this is our year!!

Talk to you soon,

Christie

Christmas in July – is your list ready?

Hi everyone! If you didn’t catch the last Christmas in July post, we’re working on having presents bought and ready before the crazy holiday season hits.

Apparently a lot of you are way ahead of me in this – high five! Just kidding I’m jealous. = )

The challenge was first to have a list made of everyone you plan to shop for. Next we’ll work on keeping our eyes open while we’re out, and picking up things little by little. But we’ll talk about that when we announce the winner of the giveaway.

Giveaway? Yes, I’m giving away my new favorite Christmas music Prepare Him Room. Those of you who have already commented that you have your list are entered for sure. I will announce the winner this Wednesday, so anyone else who has their list ready and let’s me know will be entered as well – yay!!

Thanks for all the fun comments and ideas you all have shared – I’m really inspired!

Talk to you soon!

Christie

Dollars like Pine Straw

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It was a few short months before we would move. We were under contract with our house, but still using “if” and “maybe” terms with the girls just in case something fell through. Boxes were piling up and our already crowded living space was growing smaller by the day.

Some days I just couldn’t take it anymore and would announce to the girls, “Put your shoes on! We’re going outside.” It didn’t really matter if it was lunch time, nap time, something-else-important time, we would go out. One of the girls favorite places to go was the tennis courts. They could run around, play kickball (sort of), play baseball ( no apparent relation to the game you and I know), or sing the latest national anthem they had composed.

The little girls would often tire of the organized games the older girls attempted to play and begin to find fun of their own.

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I was sitting there holding Zoe in a sleepy wrap, a little hot and so much on my mind. Gracie ran up to me with a piece of pine straw.

“Here! This is two dollars. You can buy a house with this!” she said with excitement.

I laughed. “I think we’ll need a little more than that.”

“Okay. No problem.” She ran off merrily.

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It became a great game. She and Mckayla would hunt pine straw all over the tennis court and bring it to me for various things. Dollars for a house, dollars for food, dollars to buy the girlies a present, dollars for McDonald’s…

I received it all with great excitement – “thanks!”

I think I also received a gentle little reminder from the Lord.

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Dollars really are like pine straw. He can find them wherever He wants and give or take them at His good pleasure. As silly as it is for my girls to pretend like a few needles of pine straw could pay for a house, it’s equally silly for humans to think that we can or cannot manage whatever God places in our path.

It’s easy to turn our attention once again to dollars at this Christmas season; but this is just a little reminder for me and maybe for you that our God really does own the cattle on a thousand hills, the wealth in every mine. The whole universe is at His disposal.

Our thoughts, plans, or worries regarding money – to Him might as well be pine straw.

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{Israel recap} Day 1: to turn out that last light

Remains from Herod the Great's palace at Caesarea Maritima
Remains from Herod the Great’s palace at Caesarea Maritima
Original floor from Herod the Great's palace at Caesarea Maritima
Original floor from Herod the Great’s palace at Caesarea Maritima

Today was a happy day. Honestly, just the prospect of having the car and being able to go out and buy Christmas decorations temporarily erased the thought that my husband was gone. I had this funny mental image of myself holding a cardboard sign that said in sloppy black marker, “Will trade husband for car.” (I’ll never understand my mind) Apparently I chose flippancy as my way of dealing with Paul’s departure on day one.

I did realize how important it would be to not lose my car key. Going to try very hard to give extra attention to putting it where it belongs.

While the little girls slept, Hope and Sophia and I cut little triangles of scrapbook paper to make Christmas banners. Then we made banana bread, which is always a hoot.

At bedtime the girls went to sleep fine. We’d been able to maintain a happy, upbeat tone all day.

I wanted to go to sleep and probably could have except that I had to prepare a craft for the next night at AWANA. When that was complete, I began trying to go to bed.

It’s hard to turn out that last light. After everything was ready and I couldn’t bring myself to do anymore, I realized…this is going to be hard. Thirteen nights like this. And this is only the first.

Thanks for reading my first series: Taking care of four little girls alone (while my husband is on an amazing study trip to Israel). Here are links to the other related posts. 

Series coming soon

It’s official: the Israel trip is on

Official introduction

Day 1: to turn out that last light

Remains from Herod the Great's palace at Caesarea Maritima
Remains from Herod the Great’s palace at Caesarea Maritima
Original floor from Herod the Great's palace at Caesarea Maritima
Original floor from Herod the Great’s palace at Caesarea Maritima

Today was a happy day. Honestly, just the prospect of having the car and being able to go out and buy Christmas decorations temporarily erased the thought that my husband was gone. I had this funny mental image of myself holding a cardboard sign that said in sloppy black marker, “Will trade husband for car.” (I’ll never understand my mind) Apparently I chose flippancy as my way of dealing with Paul’s departure on day one.

I did realize how important it would be to not lose my car key. Going to try very hard to give extra attention to putting it where it belongs.

While the little girls slept, Hope and Sophia and I cut little triangles of scrapbook paper to make Christmas banners. Then we made banana bread, which is always a hoot.

At bedtime the girls went to sleep fine. We’d been able to maintain a happy, upbeat tone all day.

I wanted to go to sleep and probably could have except that I had to prepare a craft for the next night at AWANA. When that was complete, I began trying to go to bed.

It’s hard to turn out that last light. After everything was ready and I couldn’t bring myself to do anymore, I realized…this is going to be hard. Thirteen nights like this. And this is only the first.

Thanks for reading my first series: Taking care of four little girls alone (while my husband is on an amazing study trip to Israel). Here are links to the other related posts. 

Series coming soon

It’s official: the Israel trip is on

Official introduction