Ephesians 5

"15Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, 16making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil."

Sound off to me. I'd love to know what this scripture means to you.

Princess' Family Project

Princess had to do a project for school. She chose her hair donation. Enjoy!

You might remember this picture from a couple of weeks ago. Bless her heart. This is a classic picture of what her room looks like most of the time. She doesn't intend for it to look this way, but out of all the things we have tried ... we have yet to inspire her heart. She simply does not have the motivation to take care of her belongings. I have her room very organized, so it is not a matter of function, but one of fortitude. Until now, she has not had the inspiration to persevere in keeping her room clean.

Taken this morning: I hereby present, Princess and her clean room! She even made her bed after this picture. "What inspired the transformation?", you ask. Well, two words. CHAMP LADDER. We started the Champ Ladder yesterday and she is very excited to begin. The nice folks at The Champ Ladder suggest starting your child out in the middle of the ladder, at level 5. King and I prayed and talked about this and we wanted to inspire Princess and affirm who she is in our eyes. Thus, we started her out at the top of the ladder ... level 10! The basic premise of the Champ Ladder is to reward behavior with consequences, both positive and negative. Princess is in complete control of her privileges. I believe this system is so close to real life and will inspire her to do her best. We truly need her to care for her body in such a way that she prevents paralysis episodes instead of us trying to cope after she has had an episode. Thus, we have tailored the Ladder to her interests and needs. She will be rewarded for taking care of her body and doing all she can to prevent paralysis episodes as well as being rewarded for doing her homework on time, helping with dinner, caring for the dog, and keeping her room/bathroom clean and tidy.

We are all excited to start this trial week that began last night. We will take a week to try the system to work the bugs out and then it goes into full effect this Sunday.

We were blessed to attend the Casting Crowns concert this past weekend. We had great seats (as you can tell from the pictures) and worshipped freely! It was very fun to take a night off from the harried state of our lives to just be still and know the One who holds our lives in His Hand.

Enjoy the pictures. If you want to see the other 87 pictures, you can follow this link. I hope it works.

Straight Jacket

Ever have those days? A day when you are so close to the edge that if o-n-e more thing goes wrong you are certain your loved ones will summon professionals bearing a straight jacket.

That's my day today. As a reminder, we serve 93 different countries and I am in charge of customer support and sales plus sharing technical support duties. I woke up dreaming about customer service issues because I am so far behind at work. It's been a busy day plus I had an emotional conversation regarding a volunteer organization of which I am on the Board of Directors. I felt misunderstood, had difficulty relating the crux of the issues at hand and left the conversation feeling as bad as when I entered it.

Running to the place with all the answers and comfort, I'd love to say that my time in the Psalms this afternoon solved all my problems. I found the answer, but I still clung to my "I must get everything done today" mentality. In that vein, I decided to go to a happy place where there were no problems. The grocery store. It's a happy place, I tell you!

After purchasing my dinner items, I proceeded to the 10 items or less register. After all of my things I have to do today, I decided I could atleast have someone else check me out at the grocery store instead of doing the self pay register.

I had to wait while the tellers changed shifts and then when I reached for the credit card reader, it broke off in my hands. I stood there for 2 split seconds wondering if what I was seeing was actually happening. Surely this short, happy and trouble-free "field trip" was not also ending with me having to trouble shoot something else in life.

With a deep breath, I grabbed the cable and plugged it into the reader still in my right hand. As a technical options screen flashed on the reader I prayed a quick arrow prayer along the lines of, "Lord, this is yours to solve". Would you believe that the thing rebooted all by itself? All the while the sweet little senior citizen cashier was teasing me about calling the grocery police on me for tearing up their store. "I need a manager to Register Six", he bellowed over the loud speaker. It was at this moment that I assessed the situation.

1. I had just purchased a rotisserie chicken. I did not have to catch this chicken, kill it, pluck it, cut it up, cook it or package it.
2. I had just purchased a potato salad for which I did not have to grow, harvest, peel, cook or mix it.
3. I had just purchased a tiny apple pie for which I did not have to grow, harvest, peel, cook or package it.

I told the fun little cashier guy, "You know, if this is the worst thing that happens to me today, I have had a great day." His response, "You've got a great attitude!!"

Yeeaaah. He doesn't know how narrowly I escaped being wrapped in a white twill jacket with wrist straps in the back.

Lord, Help us. She's genetically linked to me in so many unfortunate ways.

This is how her room looks at this very minute. Normally she cleans up before she goes to bed, but we were working on a school project before bedtime. Then King and I agreed to let her sleep in our room again tonight, so I totally forgot to check her room.

For the love of all that is ... unholy. Look at this. Please note the chinese take out container and drink on her desk! You might think it took her a week to get this room in such a fine state. Nay. It took part of one day. A day filled with church, errands and a school project, too. It took her mere hours to do this. One can only conclude that the chaos of sin nature is alive and well in our home and that the sooner Jesus comes back, the better we will all be!