Sometimes change is good for everyone......

If you have been a long time reader of my blog you know that I have spoken on sexual assault of children more than once.  I, my daughter, my nieces and a number of my siblings were victims.  I have spoken both about victims and the people who victimize children.  I make no bones about the fact that it is a crime and should always be considered a crime.  That being said I would like to revisit child sexual abuse again. I know as a child when we were victims it was not as yet an automatic thing that you reported.  Sexual assault was quite often something that was dealt with in the family, and was quite often considered a family matter and had been treated as such backwards in time unto obscurity. I am happy that it is no longer dealt with that way, for the most part; but I recently was surprised to find out that the more things change the more things remain the same.  I was probably the most surprised to find that it was a "good Christians" that seemed unable to see the need for change when it came to their family.

I won't say who the situation is about but will try to relay the end result, as a cautionary tale.  Someone I know was sexually assault as a teenager by an older family member.  The older family member drugged the teenager, and at least two other teenagers in that family at different times, to have sex with them.  The teenagers involved either did not remember the events that occurred or had vary shadowy pieces of a memory of the events,  One of the teenagers grew up and because of occurrences with their adult life's work they remembered the events of their childhood. The teenager now an adult had lived without memories of the incident for roughly 10 year, and now nearly 7 year with memories before unbearable change had to come into their life and the spouse was taken into confidence.  The memories became more and more torturous and eventually their job was to much to handle, their life began to spin out of control to a degree that they needed therapy, the love and unconditionally support of their beloved spouse.  The teenager, now an adult, decided to tell immediate family members and parents, of what had happened.  Needless to say the parents of the child, now an adult, were devastated.  This had just happened to their child in their eyes and hearts.  They were angry at the family member and felt totally betrayed.  This was a crime against their child, and unfortunately due to time since it had occurred, a crime that would not be charged or have settlement through the court system.

The mother of the child, now an adult, confronted the criminal, the sexual predator who had attacked her child.  The mother had all the anger of a mother that's cub had just been violated because to her her child had just been violated.  The perpetrator said, oh, that happened a long time ago and I have sense gotten saved and God has forgiven me.  Really??  Does God really forgive you your crimes when you have not asked your victim for forgiveness?  Saving your soul and forgiving you for sins you have not asked forgiveness for is not the same thing.  How could this criminal be so nonchalant and uncaring of the child, children he had hurt so badly?  The prep told the Mother he didn't understand why she was so mad it was all water under the bridge and had happened years and years ago.  He was totally above it all.  The mother spoke with her sisters, both wonderful Christian woman, seeking some comfort and help.  Theese wonderful Christian women basically said it happened a long time ago and she should just get past it.  WHAT???? The mother said, If this was your child you would not feel that way, You would want to help your child too.  I just found out about this, it is like it just happened to my child and you have no compassion for my child or me.  You are actually disregarding that the criminal perpetrated a crime on my child and you are treating it like it was a family matter that should just be swept under the rug! ( I was not there and only heard part of the story between the mother and her sister. I dramatized it as best as I could, as a mother of a child that was assaulted and I found out about it later.)

I was saddened by the prep's thought that his being a Christian now absolved him from any and all responsibility for his past actions. It distressed me almost worse than the two Christian Ladies that I do have respect for acted the way they did about the whole situation and came down basically on the side of the prep and not the victim.  So much like things used to be and not the way they are becoming.  I guess it is maybe their ages and that is why they thinks the way they do.  I personally don't believe in this day and age that we should be protecting criminals in families just because they are family.  I really believe this person is a serial child rapist and I can only imagine how many other children he has hurt and victimized.  I really think that he could still not doing it.  Sadly this is not an isolated incident, it is a story that happens over and over again in our country and this world every day......

I pray for the victims of this tale, and all the other victims of this crime out there all over this world.  I pray that the Lord will come into the lives of the children of rape and console them and that they may know the Lord and find their salvation.  I pray for the prep's out their that they too find salvation and that they find a way to seek forgiveness from their victims.  I think that they owe that to their victims if nothing else..... I pray that you are saved and know that Grace of our Lord Jesus and that he is Lord and Master in your life and you are among the saved in Christ Jesus.... tomorrow.

  

Sauce and soap is a must this week, oh! and pies oh, my......

We had a nice potluck on Sunday.  All had fun and fellowship and that is the whole point isn't it?  I had made a pina colada cheesecake, well I had extra so cooked up a little one on the side and then a nice sweet potato one.  I made coconut, pineapple and walnut sauce on one and the sweet potato had to stand on its own, and on the little extra one I put cherry sauce.  They were all winners and for the most part we didn't not have many left overs to take home.  Monday I spent 6 hours at work, is it really work when it is something you love doing?, making pie filling and huck sauce.  I recall when I worked at my first ever job, that paid me to do it, the hospital in Plains.  I worked there my sophomore year, part of my junior year and all of my senior year, about 30 hours a week when I was going to school, 40 in the summer.  The lovely lady that taught me to cook had just retired and was only working a couple days a week, she taught me a lot and I will forever be grateful to her.  She is still alive and lives here in our town, she only recently had to go into assisted living, she is 103 now.  Still as bright has she ever was and her family is blessed to have her in their lives.  I digress...... Anyway, while I worked at the hospital kitchen, toward the end of my tenure they hired a woman in her 70's to come in and bake cookies, desserts and cheesecakes.  I always thought that was a wondrous job to have cooking and baking, and some one would enjoy eating it as you baked away.  I have found a plethora of baking for your kids and grands has its limitations, eventually all are tired of baked goods.  Alas I never thought I would be able to bake with no thought to it not being eaten but I don't have to worry about that now.  I can now be the old lady that gets to bake and enjoy the process with no thought to it might go to waste and not one will want to eat it.  Again I have digressed......

Well yesterday I make 10 gallons of huck sauce, 5 gallons of pie filling.  Today I got to roll 18 pies.  Tomorrow I get to make pies for the family for Thanksgiving.  I am making a plain cheesecake, as that is Mokie's favorite, she doesn't like, and won't eat, sweet potato or pina colada cheesecake, so she will get cheesecake, and I am making another sweet potato one in leu of pumpkin pies.  Poppie loves apple, the girls like cherry, and I am making harvest pie, aka mock mincemeat, as well.  We will just be Mokie's family and us, maybe one of Poppie's friends if he can't go to his moms.  Goofy has to work and Bug is still in ND.  Friday I have to go make 10 to 15 more gallons of huck sauce but should be home in the afternoon to enjoy my girls.  I made my last batches of soap this afternoon.  All will be good to go by Christmas.  I ran out of coconut oil so I will put all the paraphernalia for soap making away for the year and try to dig out my kitchen.  I will have to package soap in my new packaging.  I finally had to order coconut soap labels so I have to goat milk or the coconut milk ones available.  I can say I am in a good place in my life but then for the most part since I turned 40, I know a lonnnng time ago, I have been.  I am so thankful for that and all the people that God gave me in my life.

I do believe that there is no one in your life that God did not put there, yes, I know God made all people but that isn't what I am saying.  I don't believe that anyone you ever meet, talk to or interact with or maybe even see is an accident or a coincidence, as you know I don't believe that there are coincidences.    God made you life the way he planned it with the peoples he wanted in your life and you are given the people by design to make your life, your life, and not someone else's.  You have free will to do as you would but God gives you all the people special to your life to you to interact with. I pray that the people in your life have made your life the wondrous life God gave you to live and I hope the people in your life have either helped lead you to the saving knowledge of Christ Jesus or that you have had the honor of helping some one find God in their lives, how glorious is God that he can plan your life and let you find the secrets and surprises he meant just for you.  I know that my life has been so specially designed for me that it could not have happened with out a creator to have made it just for me... I pray your's is the glorious life God planned for you and you have found all the wonder God meant for you and have not gotten off track or missed the special gifts he meant for you.  The most special is the grace he sent to us as his son Jesus and the gift of salvation he is...... I hope you find him in your life soon, maybe even today, today could be the day of your salvation... tomorrow. 

Now these remain faith, hope and charity but the greatest of these is charlity (brotherly love)

I contemplated this blog for literally months before I began to write.  I struggles so much that I actually wrote it on paper, and rewrote, and rewrote. I struggles for a way to give God the glory in a way that shows his love for all mankind. I wanted to be one small voice crying out to humanity to look at ourselves and remember it's about God not what we think God wants from we humans. This morning I caught the last 15 minutes of Andy Stanley's weekly program. The Lord spoke to me, yes to me, he does when we listen, and he spoke to me through Andy's words. The words I could not find through all my contemplation's and struggles. I paraphrase his thoughts but here is the jist of what spoke to me and helped me begin or end my struggles that are this blog. If your theology puts bookends or restrictions on God's mercy then you need a new theology because God has no limit to his mercy toward his creation, us, his crowning creation on earth, made in his image.  So look out at your fellow human, man, and remember each and everyone is the image of God.....
I think in our current ebb and flow of society we forget that love, brotherly love or charity is considered the greatest. I Corinthians 13:13 And now abideth faith, hope and charity these three; but the greatest of these is charity.  Imagine charity, love or more precisely brotherly love is the greatest. Greater than faith? not really but faith expressing itself through love.  1 John 2:10 He that loves his brother abides in the light and there is no cause for stumbling in him.I think we get so caught up in our agendas for what we think the Lord wants of us that we forget what he actually asks of us or for that matter what his word really says or tells us. We see so many stickers in the eyes of our brothers when we could build a cabin out of the lumber we have in our own eyes. We don't see the idols we have come to worship in our pursuit of being more Christian or Godly than our fellow man.  Have you said "I never miss a Sunday at Church or a week night service but so and so they are just not as good at attending as I am" Have you ever considered that that could be and probably is idolatry? If being there and being the best at being there and getting one over on a fellow church member is your motive for going and not the genuine glorifying and loving God, you are committing idolatry. Really, yes, you, you are. Have you ever worshiped every word that falls from the preachers or someone you respects mouth? Again idolatry, We forget we are human and our flesh testifies against us. 
Today the hot button issues of our society are homosexuals, homosexual marriage, and abortions, to name just a few. I can say up front I think all are sins against God but then so is lying, having sex with your neighbors wife and remarriage if you are divorce but they are not even mentioned in our daily lives, they are the sins we don't hear about or talk about. Have you ever really read the 76 sins listed in Leviticus, no, not have you ever skimmed them to get through Leviticus because it is a dead book and it no longer applies to us.  Really, Matthew 5:18 For verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled   The law of God is the law today just as God wrote it and sent it down with Moses so many years ago. I read them all again to write this blog (yes, all 76 of them here is a link (I would list them but I am not sure you wouldn't just stop reading and go to the next blog)
 http://leviticusbans.tumblr.com/post/23730370413/76-things-banned-in-leviticus
I am indeed a sinner and I deserve death but for the blood of Jesus I would be on my way to hell.  That being said homosexual sex is listed, abortion is listed (thou shall not kill or burning you children to moleck or for your idol) and marriage is still one man, one woman and one God any other is sin, but then tattoos, lying, speaking slander, cross breeding animals and many many more, you should read the list.
I recently heard someone very well read on their Bible say a homosexual can not be a Christian.  Really maybe they missed a few chapters and need to read some more.  All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.  We are saved by the grace of God and only the sin of unbelief literally not believing in Jesus and the Gospel is unforgivable.
I heard someone else say that they had recently been in the company of Sodomites.  That made me really wonder a what they meant. I know what he meant, and what we as Christians as a whole think it means.  We as a whole think of it as an interchangeable word with homosexual but I am truly not sure whoever coined that ever really read what the Bible refers to as a sodomite. I am currently in the middle of my fifth time through the Bible this year and it has been and eye opening experience as to what I thought it said and what it says.  For instance how many of you think homosexual was the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah? I always did, but not any longer.  I think by the definition giving in the Bible I am a sodomite, and I assure you I have never had any homosexual thoughts or tendencys. Really, maybe you need to read up on it. Ezekiel 16:49 "Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fullness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughter, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and the needy.  I did not read anything about homosexuality. So a Sodomite more precisely would be a person who is full of pride, a glutton, idle, or doesn't help the needy.  Interesting.  I am guilty of all of these as is our society as a whole.
The Hebrew word for sodomite as translated by the King James Bible  is gadesh, it appears 6 times as sodomite and once as unclean, and never once used in connection with Sodom or Gomorrah, but always in conjunction with worship. or as libidinous worship of Venus amongest the Babylonians consecrated to Venus as a harlot or given to Astarte or Venus and prostituting himself in her honor. Det 23:18, 1Kings 14:24, 15:12, 22:47, Job 36:14. Gen 38:21-22. Hos 4:14. gadesh a sacred person IE. technically a male devoted by prostitution to licentious idolatry- sodomite , unclean.   By definition I don't think that homosexuals are sodomites.  They are men who have sex with other men a sin listed in the 76 sins of Leviticus, but not a sodomite.
Well you say Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed because of homosexuality.  The men tried to have sex with the angels and Lot offered up his daughters and they did not want them just the men.  Yes that is true but then when why when the same thing happened in Gibeah in Judges 19:16-30 was not the whole town destroyed as Sodom and Gomorrah? And why were the Angels sent to kill and destroy the town before the men attacked the Angels? Abraham plead for Sodom and Gomorrah before the Angels even went to the town. Weren't the men in both Sodom/Gomorrah and Gibeah guilty of not being hospitable to strangers and not being just?   Gibeah was destroyed by the tribes of Israel for inhospitable and injustice, which was a sin deserving of death, and they received death but God did not destroy the town and destroy the whole area like Sodom and Gomorrah. Ezekiel gives us the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah as pride, gluttony, idleness, not taking care of the needy and poor.  When Abraham and Lot needed to split up because there were to many of them for the land to support, Abraham offered Lot the choice of where he would settle.  What did he choose? Genesis 13:10 And Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld the all the plain of Jordan that it was well watered every where , before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, even as the Garden of the Lord like the land of Egypt, as there comest to Zoir.  Could Lot have been greedy, full of pride and gluttony as all the people who lived there were?  Lot was considered a carnal believer, but for the grace of God Lot would have perished with the rest of his chosen town.  Do any of these fall a little to close to home? They do for me?  I am a sinner that deserves death by my own actions.  As did Lot.  Our country is Sodom, in our pride, fullness of bread (gluttony), abundance of idleness, and lack of strengthening the poor and needy.
I do know that our generation lives in a time and a land likened to Sodom and Gomorrah, or a land likened unto the world Noah lived in full of sin and evil. I think we over think what that sin is. We try to make it some one else's sin not a sin we might be guilty of or one we cling to, surely, it has to be one of those horrible sins others commit. Not me, oh, yes, it's me oh Lord stand in the need of prayer.
We see our brothers sin and condemn him as the reason our country is becoming worse and worse. We see homosexuals, abortionists, drug addicts, and the list goes on and on. Do we ever see that Sodomites (us) are guilty of pride, greed, gluttony, and abandonment of the needy and poor as our own sin, and it just might be the horrible sin?  Do we ever look out and see the same sea of people not as what we condemn to be their sin but as someone the Lord loves, his image? The Lord loves me, we say but surely not the homosexuals, the addicts, the abortionists.  I am not like them, no I am not, I am a liar, a slanderer, I am a person who doesn't always love my neighbor.  I am better than them surely? No! I am a sinner, I like the homosexual have sinned, I like the person who killed a baby to abortion have sinned, I am worthy of death like any other sinner, not better, not worse but like anyone other sinner can asked Jesus for Forgiveness and be saved through Faith. Yes, I can be saved from the punishment of my sins through Jesus, just as any other sinner can be. Yes, the homosexual, yes, the abortionists, yes, the divorcee who remarried,  and yes, even we the Sodomites that call America home, with all our pride, greed, glutton, idleness and total disregard for the poor and the needy. Any and all are welcome in Jesus arms, his grace is sufficient for all.  Jesus already paid the price of your sins and offers forgiveness and salvation to all who will respond to his grace, and accept his forgiveness and salvation.
Can you see my salvation, no, not any more than I can see yours. My new light from God, no one but God can actually see it just because you think you can doesn't make it so, How can you tell if a homosexual is saved, about as much as tell if someone who lies to his wife, you can't only God knows and sees his saved people. You can not see any ones salvation but you can see their joy and suppose, but it is just that supposition that you see the light of their salvation.  Salvation is really something only God can see in us, You have no right to say otherwise, salvation is a precious gift from God, he gives it to his chosen people and we have no say in anyone salvation but our own. I pray God sees your salvation and has given you salvation.  I hope if not you seek your salvation today.  God gives his mercy to all he gives mercy to, and our opinion and pride should not get in the way of your salvation and relationship with God, it is his mercy to give... tomorrow



    

Soap and soup, they just seem to go together so to speak at our house...

Today has been a busy morning.  I got up and cut the soap I had made yesterday. It is a lovely light lavender color and smell of wondrous lilacs.  I made another batch and this one may be just a pinch darker in color.  I have been making both goat milk soaps and coconut milk soaps.  I had gotten some from Lady so had made a batch of each to have both on hand and have the different soaps.  I had to end up getting a case of the coconut this morning. I am glad that Herbalist ordered it and didn't pick it up so there is a lot of it at our local store, I should pick up another on while they have it. I like the coconut almost as much as the goat milk and think both are super to make and share.  I am also finishing up my chicken stock.  Ever year I trade G-pa soap for 10 old chickens they are the best for making stock and he brings them to me skinned, gutted with a bag of giblets so a win win for me.  They love the soap and we get chickens.  I got half of the chickens pressure cooked into stock yesterday with tomatoes, and the second batch last night with chickens as veggies.  This morning I poured them all together and filled to the brim my 23 quart pressure canner.  I just filled up 23 quarts of stock into jars and 14 are already PC'ing.  The last 9 are waiting their turn. I made up a batch of oatmeal milk and honey soap as I vented the PC.  Can't wait until both are done.  Booboo personally tasted the stock and says it tastes like chicken soup and that is what I was going for....yay.

Poppies hedgehog was out and about in her ball as I worked.  She has only been in it a couple of time but it has made a world of difference in her personality.  She is not as shy now that she is out and about more.  I was just finished with filling my jars and I noticed the ball empty.  I asked Booboo if she took Sunshine out of the ball?  She said no she hadn't I was scared silly at where she might have gotten and that we could not find her and that that would break Poppie's heart.  Mokie and the littles came to help and Poppie walked in as we were looking.  He and Mokie tuned the couch up and there she was sound asleep from all the exercise of her ball.  I was one happy lady, I was so afraid even with pokies and spines one of the cats might have killed her but there she was happy and excited to be found.

I hope all have a great day and remember today is the day of salvation if you have never received the grace of Jesus and accepted your salvation today could be your day. ..... tomorrow.  

Our dear Vegas came and went another year of being blessed by her...

Vegas did not come this summer as she has for the past four or five years.  She didn't slight us she just didn't come home to visit her family this summer she had plans to this fall but they were changed as well from what I understand.  She did however come this week to spend time with her dearly beloved folks who have both had some health issues this last few weeks.  She surprised me at Bountiful Baskets this last Saturday and promised to come see us this week.  She came out yesterday and there was not a person among us here at Nannyland that weren't ecstatic to see her right down to the littlest of us.  We had a great visit with her she always brings sunshine in her wake.  She has one of the kindest honest hearts I know of, she is from good people to be sure.  We shared the year we had had since she had come and gone.  She loved on all the kids, checked out the soaps and I conned her into being one of my guinea pigs for my "noxzema", all to soon she was called back to her real life when her Daddy let her know that the Senior Citizen meal had been delivered.  She did a final roundabout to see, and take pictures of the many animals that abound here.  She tripped over the kids things in the yard and never noticed, or never let us know she noticed the many many things that probably have places but no one has had time or the energy to put them there or see that a child do. So ends another one of our beloved annual events, of late, the time when Vegas gives up her special family time and share some of her lovely spirit with us.  We do so love her and miss her when she goes..

I pray that you have a great day and share your days with the special peoples in your life.  I pray that the number one person in your life is Jesus, no other person is as important as you having a relationship with the Lord and Master Christ Jesus.  If you don't know him you can so many many people would love to share him with you.  If not start by seeking him in your Bible or many be one from a friend or library..... tomorrow.  

Booboo is on the mend ......

We went to Zootown for Booboo's surgery yesterday, we were on time but the little boy that was just before us was late so Booboo's surgery got set back on it's time. We waited about an hour and a half in the waiting room watching the little boy's busy little two year old brother, his one year old cousin that was just practicing his walking skills and watched as his mom feed his little 7 month old sister and grandma tried to helpout.  You could tell the little family was trying to keep their minds off of their little guy in surgery. The little guy was about 5 and had a cast on his leg where one of his club feet had been fixed and they were working on his other one in surgery.  He had others issues but was a sweet little boy with a very supportive and loving family, it was good to see them all together.  We were taken into a pre-op room and Boo was covered with a toasty blanket and then got to have an iv put in. The nurse that did the iv was an expert at her craft and with the help of a medicated spray and a tiny needle with laticane in it Boo barely even felt that iv go in, a true blessing I would say since I have been on the bad side of many a incompetent iv administerer.    We waited another 3 hours before it was her time to have surgery, she got cold and was sure that they forgot about her but they didn't.  She got a heat tent to keep her warm in the cold little room before she finely got a visit from her Dr.  He came in and wrote a smiley face on her left knee, a procedure to make sure no one messed up. He also showed us a picture of his 12 day old beautiful new baby girl.  His first and she had a lovely head of the exact same red hair he sports, one proud daddy let me tell you.

Yogie and I went out to the waiting room and waited, about an hour , a little less then the Dr came out with a small cup of alcohol with a funny little bone, and a bone sliver with red meat still attached to it.  He said it was a pretty big one, and he had had to take off more so that is why there was an extra sliver. He said it had been there about a year.  We thanked him and a short time later we got to go back and pick up our little lady.  She told us she hurt, imagine that, some one had just cut off a part of her bone and she hurt.  She said she was never going to wish for surgery again or be excited about it,  her sister said she would.  Booboo said no you wouldn't if you knew how much I hurt, famous last words.  I told them both to be careful what they asked for they just might get it.  She could stand, though wobbly, before long and we were off.  We stopped a Wallyworld and got a prescription.  Booboo had cried in pain while I was in the store so Yogie had come to get me, and so when I got to the car, no Yogie, so we had to wait for her to return from finding me.  I said why did you leave her, she said she was crying.  I think letting her come was worth the day of school she missed it did her good to love on her sister some.  She was sore the rest of the night but is on the mend for sure.  We lost electricity in the night and the news said no school for us, so the Lord blessed Booboo with several nurse maids, a sister and two cousins.  I went to work this morning and when I came home she was well cared for.

I thank one and all for the prayers for our little Booboo.  I want to return the favor and  pray that you are safe in the loving arms of Jesus and that you are among his children and Know that you have salvation.  If not I pray that you will seek out the Lord and find your salvation.  The Lord wants you to draw nigh unto him and he will draw nigh unto you.  Today is, or could be, the day of your salvation..... tomorrow. 

Booboo's off to surgery.....

Today is Booboo long awaited surgery.  She went on a 20 mile bike ride in August, up the Hiawatha trial, only a short week after riding 8 to 9 miles down the mountain from our huckleberry camping spot.  Yogie and her went together on both outings.  I must say it was fun to follow them down in my car and watch the joy on their faces as they literally sailed down the mountain.  It really was a steady down hill run, and very few even small up hill climbs where they actually had to peddle.  The next week they went on an adventure with their school mates.  Booboo said that they had had a lot of fun. The chaperon later told me that Booboo biked like a mad woman always striving harder and harder, she is a little competitive one might say.  Yogie is on again off again competitive so sometimes gives her a run for her money but not with the constituency our Booboo does.  Well later that night Boo came to me with a sore leg and a lump sticking out of it.  We iced it and I told her we would take her in to the Dr the next day if it wasn't better.  It wasn't and we did.  The DR had x-rays done and sent her to therapy or about 6 weeks.  Nothing was getting any better so I took her to a specialist in Zootown.

The new Dr explained to her it was simply a bone spur on her growth plate and that the ligament was jumping across it. He refereed her to a sports specialist.  We went in and meant with the new new Dr. He was wonderful, he spoke to her, he informed her he had played ball against Superior when he played in high school and then he told her exactly what was wrong with her.  He said that growth plates have sort of little inner tubes around them and sometimes they get leaks and the bones grows in the leaks.  But our bodies are wonderfully mad and the body figures out right away that the leaks shouldn't happen and they don't again unless it is heredity, which it is not with Booboo.  They are technically tumors or spurs, almost never cancerous, but once were considered to be so if we look on the internet it will say lots of scare things so we are not to look or if we do we are to ignore them because he doesn't want Boo scared.  Long story short today is her day of surgery, he told her it was her choice and started to explain her options and she immediately said I want it gone.  I agreed because when the ligament pops across the spur it make her thigh jump about 3 to 4 inches and really does look painful and annoying.   So off on our adventure we go, it is just a few minutes before we leave, will update later.  We really would like your prayers, it is real surgery, the second Dr thought it would be office surgery and she would get her leg number and a local, but the 3rd Dr said no this is a child and she needs to be under so there is no danger that she feels it or the meds wear off during the procedure, it is to hard for kids to do it the adult way.  So please send your prayers, I know she has prayed and is "kinda" scared, I am thinking more than "kinda"..... I pray for your salvation which is much more important than Booboo surgery.... tomorrow. 

Clarification is some times needed.....

It has come to my attention that I may have not been clear about the trial or dilemma that weighed so heavily upon Poppie and me.  I want to clarify that there was no upset, anger or dissension involved in the trial that involved the local Church.  I know that I just got an eye roll from some of you but it is true.  No one was mad, angry or even at odds with one another.  I want to step back a step and update some who may not know.  Poppie was brought up very loosely in a Baptist Church, his childhood gave him no solace or love of any Church or for that matter any belief in God.  It was not the Church but his up bringing and I will not go into that right now.  I was brought up on the knee of generations of God fearing Jesus loving people. I truly can not remember an epiphany that lead me to Christ because Christ was always in my life and I came to Christ more at the "appropriate" age than through any new discovery that I needed to believe that Jesus was the son of God and he died for me.  I have always believed that from such a young age I don't know that I ever wasn't saved or if there is really a moment of belief, but for official measure I and my three other siblings were savedAugust 22, 1977.  I have loved ancestors who were missionaries, preachers and teachers.  I digress, maybe if digression can be associated with the glorious knowledge of testifying about my Master and Lord Jesus Christ.  Anyway Poppie and I made a decision 4 years ago, Poppie thought it was 5 years yesterday but no it is really only 4 years ago, to seek a new Church because the one we had gone to was gone and we needed a new option.  We agreed that local was in our hearts and we truly believe God wants all people to strengthen their local community and go to a local Church.  We knew that with our beliefs that only one or two of the local Churches would even be an options, to make a long story short we landed at Lighthouse Baptist Church.  We knew that since we were changing, not faiths but sects of faith, we would have to conform as much as our beliefs would allow and since the similarities far out way the differences in the two churches it has been for the most part no compromise or real change.  The Preacher was given that info from the start and for the most part has not found fault it our belief but maybe our idiosyncrasies. Full disclosure I was raised in an independent Church of Christ which for the most part is no longer available in most communities as the Church of Christ has gone through a large reformation since the 60's, I was raised in a pre-reformation simple independent Church.  I belief, to the disdain of the Preacher that the independent Baptist Church is basically the same church having gone to both, their really are so few differences and they are not about theology but about really splitting of ways it is done or hairs so to speak.

Poppie, the girls and I have grown in the Church in the last 4 years basically the same way we would have in either church with the loving spirit of Christ in it.  Poppie has been saved, a saving which started 8 years ago when a tree literally hit him on the head and he KNEW Jesus was real and that he died for Poppie.  My Ladies have been saved and baptized, my son and son-in-law have both been saved as well.  We all have grown in the Church.  There were basically only two or three things that we could not assimilate and change our whole belief system and wrap our hearts around, they may seem trivial but are not to us.   We believe and no one can show us chapter and verse in the Bible where we are wrong and they are right, that God and only God/Jesus adds to the Church.  I don't believe the man has the right to add you to the Church.  The others aren't important in this conversation so I won't go into them.  Preacher has tried to "offend" us into "joining" the Church for literally 4 years.  That is the great dilemma that weighed on our hearts, not a big issue, argument or dissension,  it was simple a splitting of hairs that mattered to Poppie and me.  We did go forward and asked to be members last night, a compromise maybe, an action to help someone not stumble or maybe just to make the trial go away.  The Preacher either by design or maybe, just maybe, to meet us half way did not asked the Church to yay or nay our membership......

I hope I have not been a stumbling block to any of you because of my secrecy in describing something that was very hard and personal to Poppie and I in a more dramatic way than maybe it was but it didn't seem like it to us for the last 4 years.... I hope you look for Christ, read your Bible, or seek a church to learn about him.  He is the only person in your life that will ever really matter, to quote an old high school friend.... "If you meet me and forget me you loose nothing, if you meet Jesus and forget him you loose everything"  no truer words have ever been spoken.  I pray for your salvation today..... tomorrow.   

Church was full to the seams today.......

Today was a great day at Church. The girls and I have been putting up 40 chairs since we started setting up the Church on Saturdays.  They had only set up 32 but from the first we have always set 40 because if you set them up the people will come.  Well today we had 39 people at Church, and if Mokie had not gotten called into work 15 minutes before time to leave to Church we would have had 4 more so we would have had 43, how wondrous that would have been but 39 was glorious as it was.  I do love when the Lord brings his work to fruition and he has only just begun to work in our Church so it will be a wonder to watch where it goes over the years to come .  I think more important than the number in and of itself is the fact that all of us are truly like an extended family and that is what God intends a Church to be.  I think the only down side to the happiness of our growing Church is the ones that have gone away from the Church, I do so miss their embraces and input into the soul of our Church.  They are gone from us, but not forgotten, and maybe someday they will again come or maybe just visit us to see if the things that made them leave are just trials to over come on they way to eternity. I think that the trials in my life are some of my most favorite memories when I look back across my life.  They are where God made the most progress on me.

Poppie and I still struggle with our dilemma, Preacher told the girls we were going to do something today and told them what he thought we were going to do. First of all we hadn't decided to do what he wants and had nearly decided to not do what he wants, as I have said, secondly since we hadn't decided we hadn't included the Ladies as yet in the conversation.  It does now put more pressure on us.  We now have to include the Ladies in the conversation and tell them what we believe and why, and what the Preacher believes and why. We again have thought maybe that we should do it because we don't want to be a stumbling block to others, and maybe even to the Preacher.  We also hover on why compromise is not the answer, and today the Preacher preaches on holding on to your beliefs, so maybe that is the Lord saying we should just not do what the Preacher wants and hold our ground.  We had gone to Church this morning thinking today we will do it this evening, so their is not a huge audience at Church, and this morning would have been an unduly large audience for our Church.  I know I don't make sense but then trials never, or rarely, do when we are in the middle of them.  I often wonder if persecution for Christ sake can be something that to no one else makes five minutes of difference but to Poppie and I it is tantamount to betraying a strong held belief.  Is anything you believe to the bottom of your soul of insignificance even if to other its seem trivial?  I think in the end I don't know the answer and know that giving in is not a sin to most people, or for that matter to God, but why is my soul at such odds?  Why is something so little such a trial, and will I look back at this as overcoming a trial, given in and not standing up for the Lord or just something that happened along the way.  I don't really know, but I do know it isn't as nothing to my soul as the Preacher believes, and he really does believe he is doing right by "offending" us into doing this.  He thinks offending us is his job, I think offending people is something God doesn't want us to do and considers it a sin. There again we disagree in our beliefs but then I think God made us individuals with free will and wants us to have differences in some of our beliefs. He wants an individually relationship with each of us.    I do so miss Belle, she would be so good at helping me with this trial. Poppie does the best he can, but he is really of the same mind as me so sounding off of him is like sound off of to myself......  

1. Alas! and did my Savior bleed, 
and did my Sovereign die! 
Would he devote that sacred head 
for sinners such as I? 

2. Was it for crimes that I have done, 
he groaned upon the tree? 
Amazing pity! Grace unknown! 
And love beyond degree! 

3. Well might the sun in darkness hide, 
and shut its glories in, 
when God, the mighty maker, died 
for his own creature's sin. 

4. Thus might I hide my blushing face 
while his dear cross appears; 
dissolve my heart in thankfulness, 
and melt mine eyes to tears. 

5. But drops of tears can ne'er repay 
the debt of love I owe. 
Here, Lord, I give myself away; 
'tis all that I can do.                                                        What a wondrous Savior we have... tomorrow

Today is a BBFC day, always get the blood pumping....

Today was our Bountiful Basket Food Coop day, the only one we will have in November this year which is sad. We had a great turn out of volunteers, beautiful produce and my dear Vegas stopped in and surprised me.  I was so glad to see her and she is going to spend part of her day on Wednesday with us here at Nannyland.  I loved seeing her but her being here is an emergency with her dear parents, both are having health issues and need our prayers, so all who would like will you please pray for these wondrous lovely people.  We got all the baskets picked up and off to their homes, Vegas and I were talking as Booboo locked the door.  She said, "mom I need the key for the dead bolt"  I said, "did you get my purse out of the building?" NO, so my talking has given me a long project of finding someone who is in town to help me get my purse out of the building, but say la vi ......

I am hoping to finally get the chicken done that G-Pa brought that I haven't gotten to do stock from yet.  I also have some beef bones but Kindred, my friend that has never appeared in my blog and has become one of my close friends in the last couple years; she really does remind me of me in her canning, cooking and other things,   said she would give me some hooves.  She killed a cow elk and I had just been talking about hooves in stock when I remembered she had just gotten one so will be excited to try the hooves in the beef stock.  Doing chicken today though, lots of veggies for the pot too so that is great.

Today we are having a birthday party for our dear Cubbie.  She is seven this year.  She is such a mixture of wild child and sensitive lovely soul.  I do think sometimes both of her sister get more of her moms time but she is a little endurer, and the oldest girl so she will be a strong little soul when she gets done growing.  She will be the smallest of her sibling in the end I am thinking, and she really does remind me of Yogie which in not a bad thing at all.  She is doing well in school and more than anything wants to ride a real horse.  She has a real horse that needs training, and they have a pony that she rides bare back on.  She learned her craft on the back of Star the queen of goats.  Star learned be "rein" by her tail.  Cubbie would pull it to the left and she would go left, she pulls it right and she goes right.  I am not sure I have ever heard of a "tail reined" goat, or even a neck reined goat.  She never bucked Cubbie off but she did drop her shoulder a time or two and slide Cubbie off on to the ground by the seat of her pants.

Well off to make stock, and grout a Sam I am checker board.  I hope you have a great day and I pray that the Lord is in you life.  Life with out the Lord in it is so less than it could be.  We all are offered salvation in our lives and those who accept it have a wondrous future in eternity with God.   I can't wait to use all the skills I thought were useless or a waste that I have learned but now I know they are skills God has planned for me to use in eternity, and he has so much, much, much more for me to learn, see and seek in my eons in Heaven.... tomorrow. 

The little that is so fulfilling....

I think as I get older I find the little things are so much more important than the big things or the things young people see as so important.  I think one of my very favorite things is a simple conversation with Poppie, it doesn't have to be about anything or anyone really it is just the simple time spent with the person I love the most on this earth.  We don't have to do anything special we can just be in the same room and share the silence.  I love when on of my grands brings their favorite book and just wants a few minutes of my time so they can peak into a new world of words that has yet been opened to their hungry little mind.  I love the back and forth as my tweens argue with one another in one or the others room, they don't know I can hear them but they are learning how to disagree with someone in a safe place so that some day they can have a disagreement with a friend or spouse and have it stay an disagreement and not something much bigger, they are learning valuable things as they share their childhood with one another.  I love the quiet of the morning when my Bible speaks to me, and no matter how many times I read it it always has a new idea, concept or thought I have never read before.  The Lord, he is so good to me.

Today I got to go to work and work on one of my favorite things, I got to create a new recipe.  I so love making new recipes, the mixing, the tweaking and the math (I thought was never going to be of use to me as an adult, not to mention the chemistry).  The look on someones face when what you wrote, tweaked and contemplated is something they really like, a joy that never gets old.

Do you ever have highs when no one is looking, no one else would even deem it of any consequence and you know in your heart it is a special day that God gave you, something special just for you. I have those days in silence and no one else seems to see the wonders of the littlest things....

Little is much when God is in it, truer words were never spoken.  I love that God has given me so many little joys, that to others are so insignificant.  I think little joys are like dandelions, only a child or simple person ever know their there....  But does God grants us so many little simple things if we but look.

I hope that today you enjoyed something little.  I hope you know that a little step toward Jesus is a giant step towards your salvation.  Draw nigh unto God and he will draw nigh unto you.  God can work such miracles in your life if you but ask him into your life.  He will transform you from the inside out into a new person you won't even recognize. He is the way of, and to, salvation.  I hope today you start your path toward Christ Jesus he awaits you with open arms...... tomorrow. 

I think I have been away to long....

I really do miss all of you and you all are calling to me even though you might not think so. I have had a rather busy year and have found that I long to be with you ever more increasingly.  I have, as you might remember, been trying to read my Bible through on a steady daily schedule and for the most part that has taken up all of my reading time and most of the time I would normally have spendt with you.  I have read the King James, the New King James, the Amplified, the New King James chronological, the Tyndale new testament,  and am currently in the middle of the Hebrew bible for the old testament to go this the Tyndale.  I can say beyond a doubt I have learned ever so much more about what the Lord wants in my life.  I have loved each and ever one of these versions and know that some of you think that only the King James will do.  I can say I respect that but I don't believe that God's incorruptible word can be anything but incorruptible because he makes it that way and if he wants to send his word out to people in their language or version it is his word and he can do that. I found that the chronological made the Bible so much clear for me in a way that no one can know. I have bought more Bibles and can't wait to dive into them, I find the more I read the more God puts me in the right verse or right translation for the events of my life and he leads me in ways I did not know before.  I will probably never not read the way I have this year and know that the Lord speaks to me daily in love and in a powerful way I can not live with out....  I have purchased an interlinear Bible and just peaking at it has been exciting and I know it will be an adventure to come.  The Geneva awaits, as does the Wycliffe, the Matthews and they are both in old English so I will have to work hard to get comfortable with the words.  I have tried to buy most of the Bibles that became the input to the King James,  I have read that the Tyndale is a majority portion of the King James and I can see where that is so.  I do like his discussion on mansions that the King James left out and I think in ways it cleared up mansions for me in a profound way.  There are some many many things that are clearer and I can't wait to find where I will go as I read forward the rest of my life.  I am thinking I might just find  a clearer and clear view of my Master and Lord Jesus.

I have also been busy this year I took a class on food preservation but am still awaiting the certification from the class.  I really do want to teach some classes on food preparation and am trying to work toward that by getting the books I will need to teach, the videos and the paperwork together.  I was asked to be a fair judge for food preparation and that was wonderful and a step toward my goal of teaching the younger generations to preserve food properly.

I took a job in July that works with my never have a scheduled unscheduled scheduled life.  I am a baker for Huck's grill but I have never actually baked anything. I just make and freeze pies.  I have used my food preservationist knowledge to adapt some of the recipes in a new direction and that is a good use of my skills. I look forward to adventures in baking there.

I work ever forward toward improving my soaps, balms and many many crafts.  I have had wonderful feedback on Nannie's Kiss it Better Balm, and I do so love that it helps people. I am currently working on a "noxema" like soap or face cream.  I think that I have three that are just maybes so am giving out samples to guinea pigs, and I love every one of them.  My two ladies are the first up and many of  my friends have stepped in line for some.  Got to love the friends I have. I am ever excited about the new cottage laws and the possibilities that will bring.

We have a cow now and her name is Zelda.  Shortly after we got her my granddaughter Bubbles went running to her daddy and said, "Daddy, I saw a bear in Poppie's garden.  It has a funny tail."  her daddy said, "Does the bear in Poppie's garden have a rope?"  She said, "yes and a collar"  He said "its a cow, not a bear!!"  Too funny I couldn't stop laughing at her innocent antics..... We are down to only four goats.  Gladys and Glenda are the two oldest queens, we have a yearly names Ducky, and Peanut has been given to us from Mokie.  We had to reduce our herd and gave several to a lady out of town who needy weed eaters.  I think it is for the best.  I do have a lot of goats milk in the freezer so soap is not a problem.  We raised two pigs this year and recently took them to the butcher. My yard is full of chickens....  Last week I got a call from an extended family member that a lady she knew had some pigs she couldn't feed and needed to give them away.  Originally there were 8 but in the end we took home only 4 and they are living with Son and Mokie we are just helping pay for the feed.  I got Poppie a hedge hog and he is ecstatic with her. He has wanted one since Mokie was a little girl and she had had one  She is only a couple months old and is still not sure she likes people but Poppie is up to the challenge of having her for a pet.

I am currently trying to read Heaven by Randy Alcorn, It is only the 4th or 5th book I have read all year it is hard to work extra reading in.  I am loving it and I think anyone that is planning on going to heaven needs to read it.  I find that so many of my worries have been answered by a scripture based author.  On that note I have struggled, well I should say Poppie and I have struggled this year with something that the Preacher has pushed us and pushed us to do but we neither one think that the Lord asked us to do what he is trying to get us to do.  We had had a meeting with him in April and had agreed we could do it so we wouldn't be a stumbling block to the Preachers, or maybe others in the churches beliefs.  We had decided to compromise.  The Preacher never called on us to come forward to do what we were to do as he had said he would do.  This last week we asked him about it again as we had wanted to get it done and over with and do to misunderstanding I suppose he has decided we would need to do it on our own.  I have, as I have said before, read a lot of scripture this year and am still of the opinion that what the Preacher wants from us is not something he can show us in black and white or chapter and verse.  It has come to Poppie and I through praying and praying this week and for years really that it is still not what we believe.  It also says not to compromise your beliefs, the Lord never compromises.  He is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.  We have come to the decision that had the Lord wanted us to do what the Preacher asks it wouldn't  have been so hard to come to fruition and maybe the Lord does not want the same thing from us that the Preacher does.  So we are not going to compromise or go against our beliefs but live by what the Lords asks us to do.

I hope that you know that you have salvation, I hope that you know that God sent his son to earth to die on a cross, for your sins and mine, Jesus became sin and died so that we may be cleansed of all our sins.  He offers one and all salvation, all you have to do is repent of your sins and ask him for his forgiveness and you can live with him in Heaven.  He would rather die and go to hell for us (and over come death) than live in Heaven without us. That is a love that know one can understand that is how much he loves you.  Accept his love, his forgiveness and his salvation, today is the day of your salvation.... tomorrow