Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday, Mom!!!

Have a Wonderful Day.  :)  We had a bunch of fun planning today for you. 

Love,
One of your Quiver

Wait

Wait
by Russell Kelfer 

Desperately, helplessly, longingly, I cried;
Quietly, patiently, lovingly, God replied.
I pled and I wept for a clue to my fate...
And the Master so gently said, "Wait."

"Wait? you say wait?" my indignant reply.
"Lord, I need answers, I need to know why!
Is your hand shortened?  Or have you not heard?
By faith I have asked, and I'm claiming your Word.

"My future and all to which I relate
Hangs in the balance, and you tell me to 'Wait?'
I'm needing a 'yes,' a go-ahead sign.
Or even a 'no,' to which I'll resign.

"You promised, dear Lord, that if we believe,
We need but to ask, and we shall receive.
Lord, I've been asking, and this is my cry:
I'm weary of asking! I need a reply."

Then quietly, softly, I learned of my fate
As my Master replied again, "Wait."
So I slumped in my chair, defeated and taut,
And grumbled to God, "So, I'm waiting...for what?"

He seemed then to kneel, and His eyes met with mine...
And He tenderly said, "I could give you a sign.
I could shake the heavens and darken the sun.
I could raise the dead and cause mountains to run.

I could give all you seek and pleased you would be.
You'd have what you want, but you wouldn't know me.
You'd not know the depth of My love for each saint.
You'd not know the power that I give to the faint.

"You'd not learn to see through clouds of despair.
You'd not learn to trust just by knowing I'm there.
You'd not know the joy of resting in Me
When darkness and silence are all you can see.

"You'd never experience the fullness of love
When the peace of My spirit descends like a dove.
You would know that I give, and I save, for a start,
But you'd not know the depth of the beat of My heart.

"The glow of My comfort late into the night,
The faith that I give when you walk without sight.
The depth that's beyond getting just what you ask
From an infinite God who makes what you have last.

"You'd never know should your pain quickly flee,
What it means that 'My grace is sufficient for thee.'
Yes, your dearest dreams overnight would come true,
But, oh, the loss, if I lost what I'm doing in you.

"So, be silent, my child, and in time you will see
That the greatest of gifts is to truly know Me.
And though oft' My answers seem terribly late,
My most precious answer of all is still, 'Wait'."

May you always be Blessed with the realization that God has given you a great Blessing when He asks you to Wait.   (When you figure it out, do let me know how to do it!!!)

Rebecca

Who has the Keys?

We had a good day with Drama.  We assigned everyone their roles in the play and will be printing and editing the play so that it will be ready for next week. 

This time, Josh had a Chess tournament in the evening so he went home with our friends from town and Dad picked them up and took them to Chess. (Caleb went as well.)  Well, as we were leaving the church we have the drama meetings in we realized that Josh had the key set that had the church key on it!!  Mom had had him go grab something from the car and just let him keep the keys.  Usually no big deal except when he won't be with us the whole time.  Luckily, one of the families has a key to the church so they ran home and then came and locked it. 

Sarah, Mom and I went home and as we were pulling up to the house Mom ask, "Do we have the house key or does the set Josh has have it?!"  (We have to lock our door as our dog can open it and let herself in)
"I will go around and see if one of the windows is open" Sarah said.  So she (such a sweetie!) went around to see if we had left any of the windows open.  Of course, none of them worked. 

She started to take off the screen to one of the windows to try and reach through and unlock the door.  I went out to help her and gave her the set of keys I brought with me from driving the car.  She was using it to try and pry it open the screen. 

I asked her if I could see the key for a second, tried it on the door- and it unlocked!!!!   Here we had been trying to get the door open and we had the "key" all the time!!!!

Have a Blessed Day!
Rebecca

Life

Ahh, I am tired but very happy in spirit, if you know what I mean.  We (Sarah and I) just got back from some sewing time with some friends.  They were wanting to learn to make a quilt so we went over and had a quilting day.  (Really it was just a good excuse for a chat!)  :)  It has made me appreciate all the work that goes into a scrap quilt.  When you do a quilt that you buy the material, you can easily whip it out in a day.  With the scrap quilt it is taking a lot longer because it just does.  You have to match up the different materials, cut out enough material for one to four blocks, then do it again.  Plus you have to sew it together!  :)  That's alright.  Just another excuse to get together!

We have started up a drama club!!!  It is called "A Bunch of Characters".  :D  Mom came up with the name herself.  She is the director, I am assistant director and Sarah, Josh, and Caleb are acting.  We have a nice group coming together with some great talent.  I am really looking forward to everything.  It is going to be a "Bunch" of fun!!!

We are gearing up for the homeschool convention- we do the registration for it.  I am looking forward to that as well.  It is something I really enjoy and one of the highlights of my year.  :)  The only bummer about it is that I don't get to go listen to the speakers.  And there are a bunch of good ones that come!!!!!  I do get to go to a few and we buy the CD's of the convention, but it just isn't the same.  (But I would much rather do registration.)   So if you come to the CAPE convention you will get to see me!!! Haha!

Buttons is curled up with me on the bed.  She would like to play with my hands as I am typing, but it creates unusual words and scratches up my hands so I don't let her. :)  We have been missing Tinker for a while now.  I miss her a lot, and I feel sorry for Button as she doesn't have her buddy.  I know animals don't have feelings, but I am sure they enjoy the playmate.  She seems pretty happy, and we enjoy grabbing her and hugging on her for a while.  She likes to play so we grab a string to play with her and she is pretty happy. 

How's that for a major catch-up?  Things are starting to fall into a "normal" after the busyness of December.  How is your January going?
Blessings,
Rebecca

The Mom Song

This is a really fun song!  Finally, someone writes a song about the hardest working people I know- MOMS!

You're the Boss

The Driver

The Ultimate Surviver

A Doctor

A Cooker

Your Man thinks Your a Looker

If you work all day and bu you never get paid

You're a Mom!

This song is by a group called Go Fish.  They have some other songs that are neat as well...

Winter on a Ranch

It is New Mexico, so winters here are really not bad.  It has been getting pretty cold- cold enough to freeze the ice so that we   Joshua has to go break ice.  It can get pretty thick too.  Anywhere from an inch to half a foot.  Try lifting that out of the water after breaking it....  Not fun after the fourth tank.  :)   Poor Josh was getting REALLY chapped hands even with all the gloves he was putting on.  He didn't complain until we started noticing.  We found a pair of long gloves (up your arm) that are made of PVC plastic- or something like that- to protect him from the ice and cold water.  Now his hands stay protected through all the abuse. :)

Here are a few pictures from last year;

Of course, when you have snow you have to take the opportunity to play in it!!

Joshua breaking ice while Daisy "helps" warm it up and cool her off.

Loading a big hay bale onto the back of the truck while Daisy supervises.  Them cows eat a lot, ya know.

Our cousin and Josh feeding hay to the Mommas.  Amazing how those cows hear the feed truck. 

Even more fun to watch grown cows run!!!

Although it is nothing to crow about...

It is a lot of fun on the Ranch, and we pray daily that God continues to let us live it.

Love in Christ,

Rebecca

Still to come, The Case of the Mad Momma

Secretariat

 "Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said..."

"Do you give the horse his might?

Do you clothe his neck with a mane?

Do you make him leap like the locust?

His majestic snorting is terrible.

He paws in the valley, and rejoices in his strength;

He goes out to meet the weapons.

He laughs at fear and is not dismayed;

And he does not turn back from the sword.

The quiver rattles agains him,

The flashing spear and javelin.

With shaking and rage he races over the ground;

And he does not stand still at the voice of the trumpet.

As often as the trumpet sounds he says, 'Aha!'

He scents the battle from afar,

And thunder of the captains, and the war cry."

Job 38:1, 39:19-25

The above scripture was the starting line to one of the best movies I have seen in a while.

Josh, Mom and I went to it the other night.  I think it is on my list of favorites.  It is about Secretariat, one of the greatest race horses of all times.  There is yet a horse to beat his record. 

He was a champion of champions.

   

 It was one that just touches the right chord in your heart and makes you want to sob for the sheer joy of watching this animal run.  The director did an excellent job of letting the movie grow, and letting the emotions of the moment rule.  It was beautiful.   

If you haven’t gone and watched it at the theatre, it is worth the $20 to go and buy it.  Yes, it was that good. 

It was very clean.  One place where there is a bit of rude humor, although not bad. 

One of the things I took away from the movie was that God created this wonderful animal that was a one-of-a-kind animal.  But it still needed an owner who was willing to persevere and still continue on through rough spots, and who would believe in Big Red and be beside him to get him to where he needed to be to “show off God”.   The animal in itself was amazing, but it needed a human to get it to the races.  To train him, feed him, take care of him when he was sick.  

It was excellent!  Absolutely beautiful!  I thoroughly enjoyed it.  Anyway, go see it.  :grin:

Love in Christ,

Rebecca

The owner and Secretariat;

The Real owner and the actress who played the owner;

Some quotes from the movie;

"He leans back against the starting gate like he's in a hammock in the Caribbean"

"The owner hates the attention but the horse loves it."

"That woman scares me."

"How much did you pay for your hat?"

"That horse just loves to run."

Other Page

Someone on another blog did this so I thought I would "steal" their idea.  I have added another page up at the top for all the blogs that I recomend.  Go check it out! 
~Rebecca

Photography

We had a nice, quick blizzard this afternoon.  Typical NM weather.  It snowed hard for half an hour then was finished.  We could hardly see the barn.  It was quite charming. 

Anyway, I went out afterwards and brought my camera along. 

The Kittens came along, but just for some fun in the snow.

One of the trees by our house.

The Lilac bush by the barn.

A few shots of the corrals that didn't turn out quite like I wanted them to, so I turned them black and white. 

Well, what do you think?   Which is the best?

~Rebecca