Whiter than snow

This week we had somewhere between 5 & 8 inches of snow. I think the official might have been 5 but we heard of others who had 8. What does our official weather guy say, Marc??

This morning in my devotions, I was reading from 2 Corinthians 5:14-20 in The Message:

...One man died for everyone. That puts everyone in the same boat. He included everyone in his death so that everyone could also be included in his life, a resurrection life, a far better life than people ever lived on their own.

Because of this decision we don't evaluate people by what they have or how they look. We looked at the Messiah that way once and got it all wrong, as you know. We certainly don't look at him that way anymore. Now we look inside, and what we see is that anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start, is created new. The old life is gone; a new life burgeons! Look at it! All this comes from the God who settled the relationship between us and him, and then called us to settle our relationships with each other. God put the world square with himself through the Messiah, giving the world a fresh start by offering forgiveness of sins....

Become friends with God; he's already a friend with you. How? you say. In Christ. God put the wrong on him who never did anything wrong, so we could be put right with God.

It made me think of the verse from Isaiah 1:18 "Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow". Wow! Amazing forgiveness!

Pantry

The kids have sometimes come across out-dated things in our pantry. Cereal or some snacks that just have been forgotten. Yesterday I had some time....

...so I decided to tackle the pantry.

This is my pantry.

It is a "secret" walk-in pantry.

Three shelves are non-food items; paper goods, baskets, dishes, and

several Country Woman magazines that are filled with wonderful recipes!

I went shelf by shelf.

Really, not too much was out-dated.

There was a can of coffee creamer that had got stuck clear in the back that was dated 2006. (Yes, I did throw it out!) The oldest out-dated item I found was this - alum. I think I purchased it years ago to make home-made playdough, but I am not sure. Do you think it would still work?

If an item isn't dated - does that mean it lasts indefinitely?

Like Liquid Smoke or garlic wine vinegar.

I wonder how old this is???!!!

Is it still ok to use in soups?! Ha!!

Here is my spice shelf.

Yes - I am one of THOSE people who alphabetizes her spices.

Hey, when you are looking for a spice, it comes right handy!

My cereal shelf... Japanese foods shelf....
and the grandchildren's favorite - the snack shelf!
I felt so accomplished when it was all done!

Now maybe I should tackle the refrigerator.

Creation

The girls came over today. They wanted a snack. First I gave them some apple juice. Hannah said "My favorite juice is apple-mango-silly chocolate milk-cool juice. It is very yummy and most delicious. It sort of tastes sour lemonish." Next, I got out some left over sugar cookies from Christmas and I let them each pick one to decorate. (I don't know why it came out sideways. I couldn't change it)

oops. Sophie got a little too much sprinkles!

I teach a story each week. Today the lesson was the story of creation.

When I finished, Hannah wanted a turn at being the teacher.

Hannah:

"'Let there be light' God said in a firm and loud voice."

"This land is kind of creepy so He made some more."

"He made some animals to be occupied."

"Some fish like to swim near the elephant."

"Let there be some more recreation!"

And that is just what Sophia decided to do.

Embracing children

"He (Jesus) put a child in the middle of the room. Then, cradling the little one in His arms, He said, 'Whoever embraces one of these children as I do embraces Me, and far more than Me - God who sent Me.'" Mark 9:36-37 The Message


I LOVE that!

I am so happy for all the nursery workers who come each week to show Christ's love to the little ones!

All the kiddos wanted to climb the ladder with Mr. Bobby (who was hanging up some valentines on the ceiling). It was safe - he kept close by!

After the story of the blind man, the children could either wear a blind fold or just close their eyes (Natalie was the brave one) and see if they could guess what kind of fruit they were touching.

Then they got to eat the fruit! Yum!

Loving our babies and toddlers!!

Crack me up!

Yesterday was my day to watch the girls while Jill taught piano. Hannah began to talk about wishing it was spring. She said to me "I have had 2 tornadoes in my lifetime". Mind you, she is 4 years old. She told me about how last year they went into the storage room while the tornado sirens were going off. Daddy and Mommy had taken their sleeping bags and the computer, some toys and food into the room so they could wait out the storm. I said that this year if they have to go to the basement, they could use the bathroom to hide in since that room is finished now. She thought that would be a good idea "in case I have to go potty. That would be major!"

She brought me a toy that was broken. She told me that her daddy has a special glue. "You need to see my Daddy's special glue in action!"

Sophia and Hannah love to play with playdough. Here is a little film about that.

Frozen Fog and Little Chefs

I woke up this morning to this beautiful scene. Frozen fog. Isn't it amazing how the fog freezes in those little pieces??!

Lord, Your beauty in nature is spectacular!

* * * * * * *

Tuesday afternoons I get to have the girls over while Jill teaches piano. Today, Hannah arrived with her pink "visiting Nana" suitcase!

She brought her Pooh cookbook and her apron and chef's hat along. Guess what she had in mind for the afternoon?!

My little cooks

Nana? Can I eat some of the chochate (translation: chocolate). We were unwrapping some Hershey's Kisses to use in the recipe. How can I resist this sweet face?

This recipe was just a little wierd - never made something like that before. Oh well. It isn't something I will share with the blog world. But the girls had a blast doing it! We took a lot of it to their daddy at church to share with the office staff. Hope they enjoy it!!

After we finished cooking, it was time for our "lesson". We are doing "Nana's Preschool" on Tuesdays. Today our lesson was about how the Bible came to us. God's Word is true, it is like a letter from God, filled with many treasures! Just like we don't put a letter from someone special on the counter just to ignore, we should long to open and read the love letter from the lover of our souls.

Waffles and Spaghetti

This past fall, we began leading a new young married's community life group at our church. Each month we have one night of study followed the next week by a game night. Then another study night and then one week off. Each week we have supper together and one person shares their life story, along with how they came to know Christ and about their decision to follow Him.

We started studying "That The World May Know" by Ray Vander Laan. Very good video series to help you understand the Bible by learning more about the culture of the time it was written. There is nothing like having a Biblical scholar like Vander Laan talk about history and guide you through the historical sites and explain the importance of those Biblical sites and how the Jewish context affects the Scriptures. Very eye opening!

Starting this evening, we switched gears and are going to learn about marriage. How to make marriage "work". Most of these couples just got married this past year. A couple have been married a little longer, but still, all young couples. We've been married almost 35 years - and these "kids" are mostly in their 20's.
We are using the book:

The basis of the book is that men and women process life very differently. "In this refreshing and humorous look at relationships, Bill and Pam Farrel explain why a man is like a waffle (each element of his life is in a separate box), why a woman is like a plate of spaghetti (everything in her life touches everything else), and how the differences can work".

So it was appropriate that we have waffles for supper tonight! Kathy Beverlin's Belgian waffle recipe*. Waffles with lots of different toppings.....

German sausage (from the Yoder Mennonites), strawberries, bananas, blueberries, whipped cream, scrambled eggs, eggs over easy, peanut butter, syrup, ice-cream and chocolate chips.

This was a new one for me - Kristin put peanut butter on her waffle and topped that with syrup!

But look at Andy's waffle.

Look closely!

It had everything on it! Oh my!

We look forward to growing closer as a group, as couples, and closer to our Lord this year. Just as being a Christian means walking through life with Christ by our side, going through the hard times and the good times with Him, so too we walk with our spouses by our side. The good times, the tough times. Often couples who have been together for years begin to look like each other, can often know what the other one is thinking, can finish eachother's sentences. So, the longer we are in relationship with Christ, hopefully we become more like Him. Hopefully people see the resemblance. And when we don't, how forgiving and loving He is! And we need to be forgiving and loving of our spouses when they don't meet our expectations or when they fail.

When we finish this book in May, we will have to have a spaghetti supper!

*Kathy's Begian Waffles

3 eggs, beaten

1 cup milk

1/2 cup melted butter

1 T. vanilla

Mix all together.

2 cups flour

1/2 t. salt

1 T. baking powder

2 t. sugar

Mix and add to wet ingredients.

Bake in waffle iron.

This makes about 5 BIG waffles. I had to quadruple it to feed all of us.