How Do YOU Do This?

It is one thing to pass our faith on to our children. It is yet another to pass our faith on to our grandchildren. That is not to say we parent two generations, but rather that we pass on our faith in such a strong, authentic, LIVING GOD way to our own children that they cannot help but pass that same faith onto their own kids.

This is on my mind today. If you were to give an answer to the question, "How does this look (or how do you imagine it could look) in your house?" what would you say? I'd really like to hear your thoughts.

Deuteronomy 6

1"Now this is the commandment, the statutes and the judgments which the LORD your God has commanded me to teach you, that you might do them in the land where you are going over to possess it,
2so that you and your son and your grandson might fear the LORD your God, to keep all His statutes and His commandments which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be prolonged.
3"O Israel, you should listen and be careful to do it, that it may be well with you and that you may multiply greatly, just as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.
4"Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD is one!
5"You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.
6"These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart.
7"You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up.
8"You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead.
9"You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
10"Then it shall come about when the LORD your God brings you into the land which He swore to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to give you, great and splendid cities which you did not build,
11and houses full of all good things which you did not fill, and hewn cisterns which you did not dig, vineyards and olive trees which you did not plant, and you eat and are satisfied,
12then watch yourself, that you do not forget the LORD who brought you from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
13"You shall fear only the LORD your God; and you shall worship Him and swear by His name.
14"You shall not follow other gods, any of the gods of the peoples who surround you,
15for the LORD your God in the midst of you is a jealous God; otherwise the anger of the LORD your God will be kindled against you, and He will wipe you off the face of the earth.
16"You shall not put the LORD your God to the test, as you tested Him at Massah.
17"You should diligently keep the commandments of the LORD your God, and His testimonies and His statutes which He has commanded you.
18"You shall do what is right and good in the sight of the LORD, that it may be well with you and that you may go in and possess the good land which the LORD swore to give your fathers,
19by driving out all your enemies from before you, as the LORD has spoken.
20"When your son asks you in time to come, saying, 'What do the testimonies and the statutes and the judgments mean which the LORD our God commanded you?'
21then you shall say to your son, 'We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt, and the LORD brought us from Egypt with a mighty hand.
22'Moreover, the LORD showed great and distressing signs and wonders before our eyes against Egypt, Pharaoh and all his household;
23He brought us out from there in order to bring us in, to give us the land which He had sworn to our fathers.'
24"So the LORD commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God for our good always and for our survival, as it is today.
25"It will be righteousness for us if we are careful to observe all this commandment before the LORD our God, just as He commanded us.

If You've Noticed...

If you have noticed, my activity and the types of entries to my blog have changed recently. It is not for lack of things to write about. I cannot tell you how many times I have had an "ah-ha moment" about one thing or another and thought, "I need to blog about this." But it is very clear to me that the Lord is asking me to button up. "Shh-shh-shh," He keeps saying.

My persepective or understanding on why, right now, He is asking me to just be quiet is that he is pruning me as a wife in deeper than usual ways. It is not painful (yet), just introspective and has actually given me great joy. I have delighted in what the Lord is teaching me in the conversations He and I have throughout the day. I love what I am learning and how gentlely He teaches me.

I am excited to share details with friends face-to-face (or in personal emails) about all that I am learning. The bloggy world, however, will just have to wait for His green light. In the mean time, I hope you enjoy updates on the family as I have time to post them!

The 4th, a bit delayed, but what's new...

We were over at the Wilson's for the forth (along with 42 other people). We had a really nice time. Jen and Andy set things up to maximize the fun for the kids (and the grown Moffat twins), and the shade for the adults. (It was a HOT day!) A big highlight of the evening were the street fireworks. The stockpile of Oregon gun powder was pretty impressive. I think the dads lit of fireworks for 45 minutes straight. Man, oh, man did those dads have fun! Here is the line up of kids enjoying the fireworks. Twenty in all. A handful of babies were asleep inside, too...

My boys really enjoyed themselves. Look here at Davis. He was thrilled when one of the dads gave him this firework. Just look at his intensity. (Of course, if you know Davis at all, you know that there is more acting in that pose than true I'm-gonna-blow-something-up desire. He's got enough "Safety-Doug" in him to keep the whole family safe.

Anyway, he posed for this picture and then Ryan (or someone, I can't recall) lit it for him while it was still in his hand. He brought his arm back in a strong launching position and hollared, "FIRE IN THE HOLE!" and just about threw it with all his might. (Remember, there were 19 other kids here and there... throwing fireworks in this - or any - scenario is not real wise.) Just about every grown up there suddenly yelled, "NO! Don't throw it, Davis!!" He stopped, and his face said something like, "huh? What ELSE would I do with a grenade?"

And in true Davis fashion, he went from this pose, to the one you see below in a matter of 20 seconds. Can you say thespian?

Jackson was quite impressed by all the whirring, wizzing and popping of the fireworks. He sat pretty still, cheering from a safe distance like all the rest of the kids. Isn't the sky behind him beautiful (or as Weston would say, "bee-you-foo-foo")?

Thanks, Wilsons, for a fun party. I hope the clean up in the morning was not too bad for you. Church sure came early for our family after an 11:00PM bedtime... Glad it is just once a year!

A Totally Blogable Moment

Picture this: I am sitting on the top step of our staircase, elbows resting on my knees, hair in a ponytail. Little Wet-den, as he calls himself, comes up from behind me, leans his body against my back and says, "here-ya-go, Mommy. Here-ya-go."

Next, I hear this familiar sound but I cannot immediately place it. I turn to stand and face his sweet little two-year-old self and realize that the "familiar sound" was kitchen scissors to my ponytail!!

I was so dumbfounded I just stood there, with my mouth gaping open trying to process what may have just happened. Stories from Ang's blog flashed in my head. Did I just enter a Window into their world??

My expression got him wondering, I guess, and so he asked: "Wut-da maddow, Mommy? Wut-da maddow?"

He was so innocently baffled as to my dumbfounded reaction that I could not be angry. He clearly thought he was being helpful. Thankfully, the damage amounts to about 50 hairs all about 2 inches long. Hardly noticable (so i think, anyway).

Safe to say that I will be somewhat more diligent about putting my scissors back where they belong...

Deception at the Paint Store

We are painting the outside of our house this week (ok, someone is painting it for us...). This is not our first "paint the house" experience. The house we lived in previous to this one we managed to paint the color a clown would wear (bright, bright blue - see below). Originally it was even brighter than this picture shows but we brought the $300 worth of too-bright-blue paint back to the paint store and they were able to tone it down. I tell you the honest truth: that blue paint looked SO GREY in the paint store. I feared it would not have the "pop" I was looking for. That was only after we painted the entire back of the house. We then proceeded to repaint over the clowny blue but as you can see, our tone-down was STILL on the circus tent side. There is nothing GREY about this house color!! But we weren't going to paint the whole back side of our house for A THIRD TIME. So we just stuck with it. And so then, when it was all done, we and our neighbors "got used to it." When we needed to give people directions to our house we would say, "right turn on Orchard, and then look for the bright blue one. YA CAN'T MISS IT."

So, here we are, painting our "new" house (it is new to us, but going on 40 years old. Our blue house is newer and prettier, hands down, regardless of the color). And we wanted a very specific look. We studied color after color. We brought the swatches outside, in the sun, in the shade. We agonized over what the trim color should be. We played with swatch after swatch until it was just right. Though we were pretty sure it was what we wanted, we went ahead and bought sample cans. Deceived at the paint store again. So, 7 different samples later (at $5 a shot), we finally settled on "that perfect color" (plus a trim color to coordinate). But still none looked anything like what they seemed in the store. We finally ended up using our 7 different samples to mix our own color. Today, the front of the house is half painted and...

wait for it...

WE LOVE IT! (WHEW!)

I have been searching the archives looking for a "before" picture so you can appreciate the new look. You will just have to imagine the yucky blucky storm windows and blah yellow-tan paint job that is no more!