The Snowy South

We have had more snow here in North Alabama since Christmas Day than we have had combined since I moved here from Toronto in December of 1994. It almost has me feeling Canadian again ;-) The snow we had on Christmas Day was beautiful, big fluffy flakes that started falling about 6:30am while we were opening gifts. It made the day magical. It was Wonderboy's very first white Christmas and although the snow was short lived and not ideal for snow play it was a big treat to us!

We went to bed last night with snow falling and the forecasters predicting anywhere from 6"-10" depending on who you listened to......I don't know about where you live , but here in the Tennessee Valley, I believe it has to be one of the only places in the world that the meteorologists can be continually wrong and remain employed. I was sceptical to say the least! When we got up this morning there was a thick blanket of beautiful white fluffy snow everywhere - no grass, no road, nothing but pretty white stuff all around!! I went out and filled our bird feeder and have been delighted all day today by the steady stream of visitors that we have had. I was thrilled when I sat down in the study at the front of the house with a cup of white peony tea (oh sooo good) to look out the window and see a big fat saucy Blue Jay in the birch tree in our yard and then as I was watching him jump from branch to branch a red headed woodpecker happened by for a spell - they both looked gorgeous against the backdrop of fresh snow.

The street came to life a little while later, schools were closed and most people concluded that getting out on the roads was not a good idea (except for The Principal - but I won't go there....yet), not to mention The Governors of not only Alabama, but also Tennessee, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina and South Carolina declared state wide emergencies (did I mention that The Principal did not think staying home meant him and he went to work? Guess what? The only other guy in his office that was there walked!! Imagine that - I expect the rest of them decided to listen to The Governor and stay off the roads huh??). Most of Huntsville was closed today - no mail, no banking, however according to an anonymous source who had to drive past Wal-Mart to come home greed is alive and well in snowbound Huntsville - there were cars in the parking lot!

Kids and parents and grandparents were out on our street walking and throwing snowballs, in front yards building snowmen, chatting with neighbors where the sidewalks were buried. We have had an all day parade of four-wheelers, one even pulling a young lady about 10 years old on an inner tube who looked to be having the time of her life!

When The Principal came in from work around lunchtime and shovelled the neighbors driveway .....they are in their 70's - he really is a good guy even if he did think the road rules didn't apply to him ;-)Once the work was done it was time for some family fun. WonderBoy has never made a "Real Official Make Your Canadian Mama Proud" snowman. It took a little patient instruction on how to roll the snowball, don't include the dried up grass, try and get it rounded and before you know it - voila! A snowman in the yard!! It was fun - this is the good stuff, the good memories of childhood.....remember?? Turns out the snowman was not enough I had to heat the soup up for lunch 3 times before the 'structure' was completed enough for my budding architect to come in and eat. He was beet red from head to toe and grinning like a mule eating briers - a good day here in the snowy south!!

Prayer Box Sunday

Allow me to share something with you that our family has been doing for about a month now. It is my hope that by sharing this I will be able to encourage and inspire you in your walk with God to help build stronger families and memorable family time together.

A little over a month ago The Principal and I were talking about the spiritual climate of our home and our desire to grow our family a little deeper still in our walk with the Lord. During this conversation the Lord downloaded an idea that we have given legs to and been enjoying ever since. A Prayer Box. Here's how it works.....first the whole family spent about an hour or so talking about all the things we feel we need to and would like to pray about. I recorded these prayers on slips of paper and folded them in half and put them in a lovely wooden box that I bought at Hobby Lobby several years ago - use your imagination here - anything that holds slips of paper will work! The plan is to add to the box as inspiration and need dictate.

Every Sunday now, we gather together with our Prayer Box and each of us will draw a slip of paper which will determine our individual prayer focus for the week ahead. Then one of us (usually Wonder Boy) will draw a second slip of paper which will reveal our family prayer focus for the week.

Let me share with you our prayers for the week ahead....The Principal is praying for his co-workers, Wonder Boy is praying for family members in Virginia, I am praying for Our President and our family prayer focus for the week is ministry opportunities (how awesome is that one?!!). So each night we will come together and pray as a family at bedtime and then remember these prayers as well in our individual prayer time. Next Sunday we will meet again to select new prayers for the coming week at which time we will pray our prayers from the week just past as well as the week ahead. This is also a great time to talk about anything else that may have a special need. We also use this as a lead in or wrap up to a family devotion which typically ends up being a great time to talk and share and plant seed with Wonder Boy.

Today as we were praying I was thinking how special this time was and how wonderful it would be if I could share it with others so in that spirit, I would like to invite you to join us. This has quickly become a favored and anticipated time for our family each week. I would love to know that others are also coming together and sharing this wonderful family and faith building time.

Between now and next Sunday, get your box, jar, bag or any other paper slip holder and your slips of paper ready and I will, in the mean time figure out the whole how to add the linky thingy to a post (feel free to email me with help if you know how) and we can share and encourage each other - sound like a plan?? Great! See you then - it's a date!! Please feel free to invite anyone you think would be interested to participate - let's link arms (posts) and encourage and inspire each other to build our family in faith for Kingdom Purpose!!

Learning as I go,

Leisha

Welcoming New Beginnings

It has been many years since I have welcomed the change of year as I have this year. Not because 2007 was horrible and I couldn't wait for it to be over, but because 2008 whispers of so much promise that the anticipation has had me ready to burst! The number 8 is the number of new beginnings and this is the year I feel like God's timing will deliver promises that I have stood on for many years. We brought the New Year in at home last night over a lovely, elegant, prime rib dinner and I want you to take a look at how beautiful it was.......













.....now unfortunately by the time it was cooked and the smell had us in a trance it was not a priority to get another picture. I did however get a shot of the beautiful punch bowl cake that we had with coffee and a few rounds of Whoonu ( a great family friendly game by Cranium) after our wonderful meal. This was so pretty we almost didn't want to eat it, but we got over that pretty quickly - it actually tasted better than it looks ;-)


So the food was fantastic, the candlelight and the beautiful table made the evening the feel so special, my favorite part of the night however was during dinner when we started something that I hope will become an annual New Year's Eve tradition. I read somewhere recently that a great way to instill a love of learning in your kids is to live it out in front of them so I asked my guys about a week ago to think of 3 things that they would like to learn more about in 2008 and be prepared to share them with each other on New Year's Eve. It was such an enjoyable time as we talked about the things that we thought the others might choose and then got to hear from each other and share our plans for what the year ahead would hold for us all. The outcome was as follows - The Principal wants to learn more about American History,Wilderness /Survivalist Camping and Adventure (I have to be honest - this one scares me just a little!!) and he desires to grow closer to our Heavenly Father as he learns to hear and recognize His voice and how He moves in his life in 2008. Wonder Boy at the ripe old age of 6 wants to learn more about "doing camping stuff by himself ", he wants to learn "handyman" things from The Principal and last but certainly not least says that he wants to "do research up on the true real story of Jesus' Crucifixion". I am forever learning and always adding to my list of things that I want to know more about so coming up with just 3 was a big challenge - my short list was learning more about nutrition - learning to include my new Christmas grain mill into our daily lives as well as replacing unhealthy habits with healthy life changing good ones for both me and my guys. My 2nd choice is to learn more about dreams - understanding how God speaks to us through our dreams as well as learning to interpret dreams. And last but certainly not least is to learn more about blogging !! I have desired to have a blog up and running for probably all of 2007 and beyond and so to actually have one up is a big deal for me - I hope I do not disappoint you Dear Readers in 2008........so let the blogging begin!!

Happy New Year and God Bless !!