Yesterday we received news that our neighbor is terminally ill with cancer. He and his wife are retired and live in the house up the hill that shares the driveway with us.  He is coming home with hospice care.  This will be the first time our children have ever experienced the death of someone fairly close to them.

 Mr. G (our neighbor) is 73 years old, retired, from New Jersey (has the accent too! ;-)  ), and some might know him as a "grumpy old man".  We have not lived here quite 2 years yet, but Mr. G and his wife have shown us lots of kindness.  They have brought us raspberries from their bushes each year, squash and tomato from their garden, told us when our goats escaped, told us about King (our rooster) coming up the hill to their house every day with the wild turkeys to have grain thrown to him, brought nature books over with pictures of the wildlife living in this area, and so much more.  But, what has made the most impact on not only our boys, but also on Mr. G is that every morning our boys would be out feeding their horses, goats, and chickens when Mr. G would walk down the driveway.  He would stop and say hello to the boys, pet the goats, and they would talk about the laws, taxes, animals, wildlife, money, military, and God.  One time he found our little goat caught in the gate and helped her back in.  He gave the boys pictures out of the newspaper of some goat farms in our state.  He would stand out there in freezing cold New England winter weather and talk and talk and talk with our boys.  I could never understand how he didn't freeze out there as I can't handle the cold!

 Yesterday my husband went to see Mr. G in the hospital after we found out about his prognosis.  Mr. G broke down and cried when he told my husband how much he misses talking with the boys each morning. You see, he has grandchildren living in the same town, but they are very busy with sports, extra-curricular activities, etc. and are not over often, but because of the blessing of our children living here and being homeschooled this man has been blessed almost daily!  And our boys have been blessed.  They have learned so much about history and nature from this man.

  So, I am reminded again how short life is and how as we walk down the path of life we are given many opportunities to bless others and to be blessed by them. May the Lord bless you today.

  We continue to walk in FAITH.

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   Before my husband and I had children, we took vacations almost every year.  When I was teaching, we would take off on Spring Break or even Fall Break.  Of course, we also tried to go somewhere during Summer Vacation too.  The summer we found out we were expecting our first child, we had planned a trip to New England(ironically(or is it REALLY ironic?) we live here now!).  It would be our first time there.  We were going to stop at Gettysburg on the way, then on to Mystic Seaport in CT, Cape Ann in MA, etc.  It was going to be great!  But, the Lord had other plans for us.  Our dog had to have emergency surgery, our pet bird became hospitalized (I know, I know...things are different now with children!), and things were falling apart right and left.  We weren't able to afford the trip, so we stayed home and found out we were expecting our first child!!

    Since then we have not taken a vacation.  For our children, moving to New England was a vacation!  Then last summer we spent two weeks in a health center in South Carolina for our two oldest children.  This was sorta a vacation.  We made sure to take a few days and sight see!  We have some wonderful friends here who volunteered to care for all of our chickens, goats, and horses TWICE a day while we were gone for two weeks!  They even had to drive over each time!  That was unbelievable!  We were and still our so thankful for their help and giving spirit.  If it weren't for them, I don't know where we'd be with the health issues of our children right now! ;-) 

   So, we decided for our 20th wedding anniversary that we might try to go back to Indiana to visit with dear friends and family this month.  We began looking into camping, costs of fuel, etc.  and realized we just could not do it financially.  So, we decided to take a family vacation to Maine!  None of us had ever been to Maine!  Our dear friends livestock-sat for 4 days while we went! This trip was an answer to prayer!  We had prayed for beautiful family memories to be made on this trip and they were!

  We first hit the Portland Museum of Art on Friday night for FREE!!  Taking 6 children (yes, we have a little baby girl added to our family now since late October!) into an art museum draws quite a bit of attention!  They seemed to take a liking to us - the staff and security guard.  In fact, the security guard spent a lot of time chatting with us about the paintings.   We spent most of our time in the European room.  We stood 18 inches from paintings by Monet, Renoir, Cassatt, Cezanne, Picasso, and many more!!  It was amazing!  Then we spent time in the Winslow Homer gallery.  Wow!!  We also went through a sculpture garden of life-size Miriam, Moses and his mother, and others.  Our children loved it!  They each got to pick out a card with a painting on it to remember their visit.

  The next day we started the day off at the Rachel Carson Wildlife Refuge in Wells.  We walked the mile hike and saw beautiful views over salt marshes out to the ocean, huge Canadian geese nesting, chipmunks, lots of insects, many pretty wildflowers, and huge pines!  That was our 4 year old daughter's favorite.

  Then on to the Wild Kingdom Zoo in York.  Our four oldest children were able to pet a boa constrictor while he hung on a man's neck.  We enjoyed this visit, but it was not our favorite.  Maybe because my husband and I had been to other zoos?  Even our 4 year old did not care for it much and kept asking when we would be done and she had not ever been to a zoo. 

  We ate some of the great lobster up there too!  Yumm!!

 Then the next day began with us at the beach in Scarborough.  As soon as we got there, our oldest found a live crab!!  He let us take a picture and then threw it back in to the ocean.  We found sponges, seaweed, parts of lobster, a dissected crab, mussels, crab and clam shells, driftwood, and lots more items!  We took tons of pictures and carried a bag full of goodies back to the car!  I'm sure we were quite a sight- family of 8 walking along the water's edge, holding hands, kicking in the sand, and playing, but oh, it was so much fun.  A dinner out for our 20th anniversary could never have compared to this beautiful memory that we will always carry in our hearts!

  Then on we went to Desert of Maine in Freeport.  WOW!!! If you ever get there, GO!!!  It is truly a Desert!  They have been featured on Ripley's Believe it or Not, the History Channel and many others.  We met another homeschool family while there and dug for gems with them.  Our boys loved running up the sand dunes in the middle of a desert.  It was so hot too! Oh, and the tour guide does not talk about billions of years, but talks about thousands!  And the gift shop has Christian books in it!  This was just the most amazing thing to see!  Actually, all the things we saw and did on this trip were from the Lord.  Before we left I had been praying and asking God to show us what were the important places to visit and see while in Maine.  And what kept coming to me was to see God's creation!! And we did!!!

 Then we ran in to the LLBean outlet for a quick second (couldn't afford the real store...just looked at it!).

  Then we headed to Portland to ride the Narrow Gauge Train.  We have ridden many, many trains and I was feeling tired and not really up to a train ride.  But, my husband wanted to go, so, I agreed.  We couldn't even find the place for several minutes and I have to admit that I was somewhat hoping we'd pass on going.  However, the Lord had plans!!!  We did find it and bought our tickets after two busloads of 90 Japanese tourists bought their tickets!  The train could only hold 130 people.  We only saw two other American tourists- a grandfather and his grandson on the train!  We sat down in the middle of all the Japanese tourists and they began ooohing and awwwing over our baby girl.  Some of the younger girls took pictures of our baby girl.  Baby girl is going back to Japan with them! ;-)  On their cell phone cameras!  Then some of the older couples started asking us questions- "These all (pointing at our 6 children) come from her (pointing at me while talking to my husband)?"  "How do you find time to make money (when told we also have livestock)?"  "You have one, two, three...six??"  "Are you Catholic?"  "He (my husband) is busy!  Does he help?"  and we were able to answer back, "We are Christian.  We believe children are a blessing from the Lord.  They are a gift given of the Lord.  We can't take our money or our possessions to Heaven with us, but we can take our children.  We work hard all the time."  They then spoke for awhile to each other in Japanese and then talked some more with us.  I think they spent more time looking at our family than they did the ocean as we rode by it! ;-) I am so thankful that they were able to see the joy in our faces and know that having a large family is beautiful.  After that I knew why the Lord had put us on the train...to share our faith with many, many Japanese tourists!  If only a seed was planted, then it's one seed that wasn't there before!  This was a wonderful experience for us too!

  So, maybe our children had not taken a vacation before and maybe my husband and I did not get that cruise we dreamed of years ago for our 20th wedding anniversary, but you know what??  We all got something even better!  Not our will, but HIS.  He is in control and oh, how sweet it is! This was such a blessing from the Lord.  How unworthy we are, but oh, how thankful we are for His love.

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Would you believe that it has been over a year since I have been on here? I actually couldn't remember my password and could not get on here!  ;-)  But, today, the Lord gave me the info.!!! So, here I am!

I now can write about our wonderful trip to Maine this past weekend!  And our past year!  The birth of our beautiful daughter in October!  Our trip to the health center last summer in South Carolina.  And oh, so much more! 

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Last week was rather interesting on our mini-farm. It started with our inside cat escaping into the garage and hiding behind our freezer.  He must have been out there for several hours before we found him.

Then the next day one of our bucks, Charcoal, decided to go under our fence and eat the grass on the other side.  Don't they always say the grass looks greener on the other side?  ;-)  After we put him back in (with several good shoves and coaxes with food), he decided to wait until we went inside before he crawled under the fence again!  We finally put him in his stall for the rest of the day until we could fix the fence better. He was not a happy guy!

The next morning my husband was home working on the fence and I said to him, "I wonder who is going to escape today?"  My first thought was our horses!  Well, a few hours later, my husband was calling for me.  Our horse Hershey had escaped from his round pen!  We finally got him back in between the two of us.  He definitely was not interested in our hay or grain, but wanted to eat the grass on the other side of the fence. Have you ever tried to convince a young (teenager actually in horse years) horse that he should go back in his pen? After we got him into the pen we realized that he had finally succeeded in pulling a pin totally out of the top of the fence and ALL the bottom pins had been pulled out...by guess who?  The goats!!!! So, Hershey just needed to give the fence one good shove and he was free! It was definitely a conspiracy!

Anyone have some suggestions on where we could sell some of our LaMancha goats?  We have two bucklings (solid black, one has a white ring around it's hoof) and a 3 year old registered doe.  We haven't registered the bucklings yet as they are only two weeks old, but do have the papers.  We'd love to find them a good home.  They'd be great 4H goats.

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We are currently having a sale at Glory Acres Books.  Check us out at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/gloryacresbooks.   Buy $10 in books/videos and get one priced $1 or under for free (your choice), buy $20 worth and get 2 free and so on. Sale ends February 10th!  If you are looking for a special book, please let us know.

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

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We are going to have more LaMancha goat kids in March and in May.  Possibly later also. The kids' father is from the National Champion Line.  Anyone possibly interested in buying a kid or two, please let us know!  Great milkers!

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It appears that Hershey, our Appaloosa Paint "teenager" (age 3 really) has learned a new trick.  The other night while my husband was cleaning out his stall with my son, he(Hershey) decided that he wanted out of the roundpen that he was in.  My husband kept hearing this "clink" and then a few minutes later another "clink".  Finally, my husband caught Hershey pulling the pins out of the roundpen!!!  He gave my husband that sly, "who me?" look.  We never leave him unattended in the pen, but can you imagine the fun he'd have if we did? ;-)

Aren't we like that in life too?  The Lord puts us in a "pen" or "area" or "season" of our life and we spend most of our time trying to get out of it.  "Just let us get through the diaper stage, get through the learning to read stage, the starting into the young adult years, and on and on".  We, like Hershey, don't tend to want to stay "put" in our spot often thinking that there has to be something better "over there".  Contentment....it's something to think about.

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

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I have reviewed the project pack for World War I by In the Hands of  a Child and would like to share my review with you.

First off the packet starts with an immense amount of history, timelines, and important people for anyone to get started without even picking up a book if one so chose. This includes info. on the economic status at that time in history along with peace treaties.  There is also a vocabulary list with the definitions included.

There are forms included for you to make your own fact books and vocabulary cards, timelines, etc. This includes a matchbook- size booklet to make. The areas for descriptions of the gas masks, guns, etc. are wonderful!  There are forms for one to fill in with words/and/or pictures to include in your lapbook or notebook.

I found this project pack to be very useful for my younger children.  However, this pack is suggested for grades 3-8.  As a former teacher, I would like to see some more higher level questions included for the upper grades such as "Why did....happen?"  "What do you think would have happened if....?"  "Create a graph showing...." .  Again, these are just my thoughts for the upper grades.

I would definitely recommend this pack for the younger grades. It has lots of information and would make a great lapbook for a child beginning to study  World War I.

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This week has been one roller coaster ride after another.  It began on New Year's Day with our five month old doeling starting to go into shock.  We had to make an emergency visit to the vet.  The vet didn't think she'd make it through the night.  Our oldest son was a mess.  The goats are "his" and he loves them all dearly.  Well, the next morning she seemed somewhat better and my husband left for his dental appointment which proceeded to turn into a 3 hour visit!  They still did not have his tooth fixed when he left, but gave him a "plastic insert" for a temporary inlay.  He came home and began having severe pain which was not the norm.  Meanwhile, our doeling was lying on her side barely breathing and we were sure she was dying.  Our oldest son kept praying that God would let her live.  I called the dentist about my husband's pain during all this happening with the doeling (she was living in a cage in our bathroom) and was told that he may need an emergency root canal or his tooth extracted if the pain did not go away within the next hour!  So, here we sat- a dying goat, an upset son, a husband in severe pain, and the rest of the family to take care of!  Which way to go?

The doeling actually miraculously recoverd enough to be sitting up by the next morning and was "maaing" at us!  I about fell over, but reminded my son that her life was in the Lord's hands.  We continued to give her shots, syringe feed her, wrap her in blankets, etc.  And my husband?  His pain had left, so, he would be able to finish the treatment later. Prayers answered.

By that night (Wednesday) the doeling was back to dying.  It was so hard to watch this baby that we had had just come into the world five months ago leave us.  Our oldest son sat with her the whole time, crying and loving her.  She finally passed peacefully on.  She is greatly missed by all of us.  I never imagined myself liking goats this much!

Then last night, my husband's "plastic filling" came out right before dinner!  He couldn't eat due to the hole in his head!  He called the dentist and made plans for  a meeting this morning.  Our dentist actually came in on his day off to fix my husband's tooth permanently!  Wow!  How many dentists do you know like that? And no extra charge!  And he's a  Christian too!  The Lord continues to take care of us here.

As we all know there is a time for everything.  In all this I see how the Lord did not let any of these things overlap.  He handed us one "problem" at a time.

We continue to ...

Walk in Faith,

Michelle

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Three years ago my husband's job had ended and the Lord had just sent us to a new church.  We had just moved into our new house that we had begun building before my husband was told his job would end.  There we sat a few days before Christmas. It was Sunday and we went back to the little country church we had found(the Lord had led us to) for a second time.  That day they gave out bags of fruit to everyone as they left church.  I remember taking the bags home and crying as I made fruit salad out of all the fruit.  Thanking the Lord for every fruit I cut open to feed our family. Not knowing if, when my husband would have a job. Nor knowing how we were going to pay for two house payments as the other house had not sold yet. Then the night before Christmas Eve, our neighbor and soon to become dear friends came by with bags for all of us.  These included papertowels, toilet tissue, etc. a doll for our daughter, and these John Deere metal tractors that we had seen in stores.  We had wanted to buy them for our sons, but knew we could never afford to buy all of them new.  And here they were...a whole bag full of them!  We were stunned and filled with thankfulness. Lots of tears were shed (I cry even today as I write this). The next day, my husband was given a call to go to work at a steel mill.  He knew ABSOLUTELY nothing about steel mills!  But, the Lord knew he could learn!

Two years ago we were expecting our fifth baby. Not knowing what was going to happen within the next few months-the loss of my husband's sister, the Lord speaking to one of our sons and giving him our baby's name.

One year ago, our baby was deaf and unresponsive to sounds, even tuning forks.  It was at this same time that we gave thanks for our baby and told the Lord we would love him and learn to speak to him through sign language.  If it was God's will.  A few weeks later we let go of our concern about finding a different job in Indiana.  We thought we had to stay there...family, friends, memories, so much.  We told the Lord we would go whereever He wanted us to go.  Within that same week our baby started responding to sound!!! It was also during that time that both my husband and I had strong feelings separately that we would be gone from our house within 6 months.  We let go of the control.

Here we are in NEW ENGLAND!!!  There was no question how we came to be here.  We still don't know all the reasons why we are here.  But, we continue to be blessed.  And yes, within almost exactly six months we were gone from Indiana!  Yes, our baby now does sign language for the plane that he hears far, far off in the distance before his Mama or Dada even hear it!  Praising Him.  In all things we continue to give thanks.

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

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This has been an interesting past two days.  My husband was gone and guess what happened??  Our outside faucet froze that we connect our water hose to!!  You know, the one we use to water our horses, goats, and chickens??  I could not and still have not gotten it to unthaw.  As I write my husband and oldest son are working on it in the dark!  So, we carried buckets and buckets and buckets of water.  Did you know how much water horses drink a day?  When they are living in a stall without a trough?  Buckets and buckets and buckets.  Why, you can fill their "bowl" up and they will stand there and slurp the whole thing clean before you turn around!  Time to go get another bucket!  We carried 20-25 buckets of water twice a day for the past two days from our kitchen sink.  My back is not feeling too great and boy, am I exhausted!  But, you know what came to me today as I was carrying buckets and buckets of water?  I thought about Jesus and how He will continue to carry buckets and buckets of living water to us no matter how much we "kick up our heels in our stall" or "holler and complain" about the situations we experience.  He is always there.  Always.  We are ever so grateful for His daily dose of living water. 

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

P.S. Hoping to get a water line in the barn real soon!

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Taxes, need I say more? This has been an interesting experience here with taxes.  It is absolutely beautiful here and the people here (not at Plimouth Plantation, ha,ha) are really nice!  However, the taxes are unbelievable.  When the tax man came a few weeks back, I spoke with him.  He informed me that our barn had not been taxed yet as the people before us just built in last winter.  Then he informs me that our horses are taxed too! I thought the man was joking and actually laughed at him!  He was not joking!  Each horse that lives, breathes, eats hay, drops manure piles, etc. in our barn we must pay taxes on.  So, we swallowed that with a gulp.

Then today at the only pharmacy in town (that I could find!) they informed me that people who live where there is  a view (i. e. mountains, treelines, etc.) are taxed for the view!! I cannot believe this!!!  They are taxing people to see "God's beauty" as my oldest son said.  No thank you, I will just take my tax-free views of the mountains as I drive by them each time!  Are there other states like this? 

Walking in Faith,

Michelle (who is seeing a whole new world in New England!)

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Well, first let me tell you the answer to my last post was Las Vegas!  My husband HAD to go there on work.  It was unbelievable what he experienced in only a few days in Caesars Palace!! Definitely Sodom and Gomorrah.

Anyway,  I wanted to share with you our trip to Plimouth Plantation this past weekend.  We've never been and feeling that we want to see as much history in New England as possible, we planned a trip there.  We have never had such a RUDE experience in all our visits to museums, farms, historical areas, even shopping centers!

We stood in line for probably 20 minutes and finally got in.  We immediately were greeted with the signs that say not to call the Native people Indians.  Just a side note here, if you ever get the chance, order the CD from Vision Forum about the changing of the signs in the middle of the night!  It's the Pilgrim one.  So, we go on into the Native area and try to go into some of their houses.  We also tried to step up and watch them cook.  But, each time we thought we might get to see something, someone or several someones would push us out of the way.  They would literally step in front of us!!! Adults and children!  We finally decided to go to the English colony as they called it.  As we walked in there was an interpreter dressed in attire standing by his doorway getting ready to leave.  He was talking to some people.  I tried to have our 3 oldest stand somewhat close to him to take a picture with him in the background next to the house.  And wouldn't you know it, some guy jumps in right next to the interpreter, totally blocking him from our picture to have his picture taken!! So, I went ahead and took the mediocre picture!  Then guess what?  He was done with his picture AFTER I walked off. 

We tried to go into 3-4 houses and each time were met with pushy adults with their children and sometimes just pushy children alone.  One of my sons had his shoe trampled on and knocked off!!!  Noone wanted to let us take a turn to see the house or the interpreter.  Children came up and literally were saying, "I want to see!!! Me first!!!"  while their parents stood there and smiled!!! UGH!!! These children would throw fits to see if we happened to be in ahead of them!!! These were different children each time.  No joke!!  One boy pushed his way down stairs almost trampling an older woman that was coming up the stairs as my husband and sons were going down the stairs.  My husband had had it at this point and grabbed the kids jacket gently and said, "You can wait." 

At one point we sat down in a corner by a communal baking oven as a family.  We were enjoying a peaceful moment when all of the sudden a group of 20 people rushed us!!  We literally were swept out of our corner!

 We did finally see "William Bradford" and while he was speaking it seemed that he could only say their purpose for coming was for anything, BUT religous reasons!!! God has disappeared suddenly in our HIStory!!! 

We did run into one nice man and his children.  He actually had his children step down from a fence so our children could have a chance to see some animals.  We thanked him and told him he was the nicest person we had met all day.  He said, "Believe me, they are few and far between here!".  Sounds like he was having the same experience as us!

Before we moved here, we were told how rude New England people are.  We had no idea!!! Where we live every one has been so kind and helpful, but go to Plimouth Plantation and they fit the stereotype!!!!  Maybe not the interpreters (which by the way we only saw maybe 6), but the visitors- SHEW!!!

We were so relieved to leave!  How disappointing this would have been to the Pilgrims if they had known what their New World would turn into!  They would have been appalled!  What has our world turned into??? How are you raising your children???? Your children and grandchildren have to live in this world until Jesus comes!  What kind of a world are you making it?  What are you teaching your children?  Are you teaching them the REAL HIStory even if it's not politically correct??? After all it DID happen, even if it was wrong or right!  What are we doing at home, on our farms, in our home businesses, and even in the corporate world to make this New World a better place?  To show Jesus' love? You cannot hide from the TRUTH!!! Teach your children well.  Give them all the truth you possibly can.  Find and use all the original documents and stories of HIStory that you can before it disappears!!  Keep HIStory alive!!!! And in that HIStory you will not find rude children and adults!! They had some manners back then.

Let me also tell you that we ran into a car that was spray painted in devil worship "attire" and I also held the door open for a few of them at another place!  It seems they could not trouble themselves to take the door from me nor hold it open for their grandmother who was with them.  Do NOT give into this!! Do NOT be conformed to this world!!!! 

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

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Can you figure out where this place is?

You arrive in a plane in the middle of a desert with a huge city full of people.  You take a taxi to your palace.  On your way to the palace you see billboards of inappropriately dressed people and many other unmentionables.  At your palace you ride the elevator up to your room on the 82nd floor.  You cannot even look at your window as there is a billboard there with another inappropriate picture.  There is an escalator that is literally four stories high in your palace.  In order to get to your meetings it takes 1/2 mile walk inside the palace!  A bottle of water costs $4.00!  There is absolutely no place to sit except in your hotel room (I'm sorry your palace room) unless you want to sit in front of a slot machine or gambling table.  And the story goes on. . .

I'll share the answer later if you don't know.

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

who is ever so thankful to be living the simple life!

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Time is such an interesting topic.  It goes by so quick at times and yet at other times it goes so slow.  Why, it was just the other day .....

  I was outside playing hide and seek

  playing paper dolls

  dreaming of traveling the country

  dreaming of living on a farm

  playing school

  enjoying my pets

  dreaming of teaching

  going to college

  praying for a wonderful husband

  finding that wonderful husband

  driving to the church to marry my husband

  teaching children

  praying for a baby

  having a baby that brought tears to our eyes

  thinking we were doing all the "right" things

  realizing over time that we had a lot to learn

  letting the Lord lead us daily

  enjoying five blessings from the Lord

  letting go of control

  following the Lord where ever He sends us

  waiting....still waiting

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

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Okay, how does one deal with a grumpy goat???  We have one female goat that is bossy, strange, grumpy, you name it-abnormal!!!! All of our other does are beautiful and docile, but Ebony....she's another story!! f we put her with our milking does, she refuses to let them eat.  She blocks the hay with her whole body and butts them if they come near! After we bought her she jumped out of a 5 foot fence!!! She stands around and looks at you with crazy eyes and then turns her head around and around.  She refused to mate with our prize buck.  So, we kept her away from him until the other week she seemed to be normal suddenly!! She was looking at him, wagging her tail, almost begging to go visit him.  She was NORMAL!  We hurriedly put her with our buck as we are going to be dry this winter and will need some milk (read that desperate).  Immediately she submitted!! We about fell over.  The irony of it all is that I had just put an ad in the paper the week before to sell her as a lawnmower or horse's friend.  No phone calls came in, so when we saw this happen we decided to not put the ad back in.  Guess what my son saw this morning??  Ebony back in heat!!!  UGH!! And Laser, our buck, is going nuts again.  He doesn't understand why this bearded female goat is so GRUMPY!!!!  Let me find the phone number for the newspaper, so I can place an ad!!!!

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

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It is amazing how fast you can have a handful of memories!  Yesterday I decided to check out the Old Christmas shop.  Every year we buy our children ornaments for Christmas, so that they can someday have a tree full of memories when they start their families.  The only year we did not give them ornaments was one year when my husband lost his job.  We couldn't afford to buy them that year and it will always be a year to remember God's Faithfulness to us. No ornaments, but oh, so much more!

Well, there I stood trying to decide on the ornaments for each child and my husband.  Before I knew it I had a handful of memories and could have easily had an armful of memories!!!  I did not realize that in just a little over 3 months we had made so many memories here!  There was the chicken for the son who carries them around and talks to them all day long.  There was the tractor and the bottle of milk (to symbolize our first time of goat -milking) for my husband, the ring-necked pheasant for another son who keeps seeing this "guy" on our land, there was the bear for my son who is impatiently waiting to see his first wild bear here, there was the beautiful sparkly "princess" type horse for my daughter who is ALL GIRL and loves our horses, and there was the ride-em rough horse for our youngest son who cries when you take him off our horses.  And I had so many more ornaments that I could have bought because of the memories that we had already made here!  I didn't realize that we had made that many!

Every day we are making memories with our children.  It may just be the memory of seeing a bug or the memory of floating down the river with Dad in a canoe for your first time.  It may be the memory of how you spoke to one another, a look, a smile, a hug, so much more!  And we think that we have to take our children to the city to make a memory??? Or to a museum?? A different state? There are no second chances!  Enjoy the day.  Love your children!  You have more than a handful of memories! 

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

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Today I am at peace with being "alone".  But, I can't say I have been at peace every day.  I've never moved from our state back in the Midwest.  Born and raised there, married there, lived there with my husband for 18 years.  Then to be called to New England in a whirlwind fashion...not my thoughts, but HIS. 

So, here I am.  I have met some very nice people!  The one thing I have been told over and over is that in New England you make a friend for life and it is sometimes hard for a "new" person to break in to the tight ring of friendships.  I have never been a pushy person(at least I don't think so), so I don't feel like I should push my friendship on anyone, but I continue to pray that the Lord will bring us like-minded friends, a church, and just a feeling of comfort.  I do feel like this is my home after only 3 months!  That says a lot, doesn't it? 

There are some days I just cry and remember friends and family back in good ole Indiana.  I remember the farm lands, the flat lands, my whole life!  It's not that I miss the land as I feel New England is absolutely beautiful right now!  I love living in the valley and mountain areas!  I love the wildlife.  I love how kind every one is.  I miss being able to call up a friend and talk.  I miss going to the park to meet with other friends for a few hours.  I miss sharing thoughts and ideas about homeschooling with other moms. I miss what I knew for so long. I even miss running the homeschool group I started, the two food co-ops, and the 4H group!  And that was keeping me very busy.  I know that this is a time that the Lord is calling me to REST.  I can feel that lying heavy on my heart, so, I have not tried to take on any new "activities".  I have also felt a pull to get back to writing again.  I know I am not alone.  I know the Lord is always here by my side.  I know He has plans for our family.  Somedays it is just so lonely.  But, I know that is a good thing, because it causes me to focus on the Lord and what His vision is for our family.  If I am too busy (even if only with a few things) than I will not be able to hear Him when He calls me. 

Soon enough our children will be grown up.  What kind of memories do we want them to have?  What kind of a foundation are we building for them?  SERVING THE LORD!!!FAMILY!!!! There are not any second chances!  So, I have to keep reminding myself that this move is not about me, but about growing our children for Christ.  God has a plan for each one of them and we need to be listening.

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

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Who ever would have thought a year ago that the Lord would have picked us up and moved us into the mountains and valleys of New England from the Midwest? And put us in a small town at that!! Small town of 11,000 or less.  This is how small it is:

Our oldest son started having horseback riding lessons at our place each week. Well, he hadn't even had his first lesson when my husband called a farrier and asked him to come work on one of our horse's feet.  The farrier was discussing when he thought he could come to work on them, and then suggested he come on the afternoon of the lessons.  My husband had not told him that our son had lessons later that evening, but the farrier made the comment that that way the horse would be ready for the lesson that night!!!  Okay......so who knows when our next dental appointment is???   I live in a small town.

We once in a great while stop by the Subway in town to get seafood and crab salads.  We like to get double seafood and crab toppings. Of course, this is only one of two fast food restaurants in town that do not have drive- thrus as that is not allowed in town. Well, several weeks ago my husband stopped and brought home some salads from Subway for us to eat on a Friday night.  Keep in mind that we have only lived here about 3 months now!  And know NOONE basically! We sorta know a few families, but not any close friends yet. It turned out that the salads were not done well that night.  My husband was extrememly disappointed as they hardly had anything in the bowl to eat!  So, he called and talked to the owner.  The owner gave him some coupons to use for free meals the next time we came in.  We decided to use the coupons the other day.  Guess what?  My husband walks in to the restaurant and says he has coupons for free salads and the second guy that was working there says, "Oh, yeah,  I know who they are.  They always get double seafood and crab salads.  I was going to say when you came in you didn't need to give me coupons, because I'd know you!"  You'd think we stopped there all the time!  We've probably been there 5-6 times in over 3 months! So, we are the only family in this small town that does double seafood and crab salads!  I live in a small town.

Then as we were driving out of the parking lot of the shopping area (if you want to call it that!), a car pulled right out in front of us and crossed over to the other side!  We couldn't believe that the man had not stopped before pulling out in front of us!  So, as we pull up to the stop light next to him, he looks over at us and says, "I'm sorry about that back there."  We about fell over!  And they told us back in the Midwest that New Englanders were snobby! Ha!  We have ran into the nicest people around!  I live in a small town!

A few weeks after we moved in word reached down the street  and around the corner and down another street that we were homeschoolers.  And Christians at that!!!  The family that heard about us made us a desert and came over to welcome us to town! They are Christian homeschoolers also!  I live in a small town!

In the Midwest where we used to live we saw tractors drive down the street.  Here we watch horses walk down the roads and trails daily.  This is the horse capital of the state!  They say our state has more horses per acre than any other state in the union.  So, on the road you pass by horses walking daily!  I live in a small town.

And traffic jams?? What are those???  A couple times I have had to wait at the stop light in town for about 8-10 cars at rush hour.  I live in a small town.

What a beautiful small town!!!

Walking in Faith,

Michelle

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