Preaching to the Chior?

We have so much to be thankful for this year! Great is the Lord’s faithfulness! To give you an update: Adam is now a permanent employee of the Forest Service. Today is his “first day.” I cannot express enough the following:

1. Kids—go to school. God will be faithful to reward your hard work. He WANTS you to be successful and he has such great plans for you in employment.
2. Love one another. Love is the only way that we have made our marriage work. Granted, all you need is NOT love, but patience and joy and trust and desire for a successful marriage. After God, Adam is my number one. Lucy will always be my BFF, but also my #2.
3. Be patient. Our life together started as man and wife in 2005. We were not rich, we had no money to our name, in fact, our debt was more than we made in a year. Our first year of marriage we made $10,000. That’s it! We kept plugging along though, trusting that God would provide. He gave us the means to get out of debt and gave us the endurance to stick with part time employment while finishing school.
4. Consider it all joy! In May we moved from a beautiful CLEAN 2 bedroom apartment in Eureka to a crappy, dirty, hell hole in Susanville. Ok, so maybe it wasn’t THAT bad, but I hated it and I wanted to move as soon as possible. I did complain more than my share, but I stuck with it and God has blessed us with the fact that we’ve never had to call the cops or make complaints about our neighbors. And now, we’re looking to buy a house! It would be nearly impossible for us to buy right now if we had moved again. Moving is so expensive.
5. Let go and let God. We really stressed this year about everything. Lucy’s health. Money. Adam’s school. Adam’s job. Where we were going to move. Ashley’s job. Money. Our living situation. Money. Did I mention we stressed about Money? Any way… why did we stress?

Matthew 6 says:
25"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? 28"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

I fail these simply rules time and time again (except for the “go to school” part. Been there, done that). But God is faithful when I am not!

Snow Day!!

This week we had our first snow in Susanville. It started about 11am on Friday and continued through the afternoon. We had between 4 and 6 inches. We saw this as the perfect opportunity to let Lucy play in the snow (as much as her snow suit would let her) and take a family photo.Lucy's first snow angelWe ARE a handsome family!

The snow coming down from our living room windowLucy did not like eating the snow.

Here's a video treat for you!

Lucy at 10 Months

So pretty in pink!!

Lucy's First Spaghetti

Uncle Joe visited and he and Daddy spent most of their time lounging on the couch and on their iPhones. The were probably even texting each other.

At one point we all had the swine flu. It was horrible. Lucy was able to sleep anywhere.

She LOVES baths! And has the wrinkliest butt!

Our little Flower

Back from Paradise

We just got back from a vary nice visit to Paradise. Other that just passing through on our way to the Lord's Land in September, we hadn't visited since Catherine's wedding at the end of August. We took Lucy to several friends homes on Halloween to "trick-or-treat." She was so cute dressed as a flower. As soon as I figure out how to post the photos, I will (they're in a wierd format). We visited Grandma Marian at her new house and Aunt Kim at Casa de Paradiso. Great Grandma Lue was visiting and Lucy got to spend a lot of quality time with her. It was so good to get to see everybody and not feel overwhelmed by the traveling. Sunday, even Great-Great Uncle Clyde and Aunt Orpha drove up for a visit. Saturday night we went to a party at Jessica and Dustin Jackson's house. We had a great time! Sunday we went to church and the intern pastor preached a great sermon on Revalation 4. Check it out at http://ridgechurch.podbean.com/ (it's the one titled Unveiling Paradise by Josh Lee).

Pumpkin Patch

Being so close to Paradise has been great--we get lots of visitors! Two weekends ago Auntie Cady and Uncle Joe came to visit and we went to the Pumpkin Patch. Lucy didn't completely know what was ging on, but she was a good sport with the photo taking.

Adam's Job

We are still waiting to hear as to whether Adam is going to be a permanent employee with USFS. Just wanted to let you know we're still WAITING and we'll let you know as soon as we have more answers.