Need a gift idea for the Mom in your life?

For all of you mommies out there, or anyone who knows a mommy, Hearts at Home is a great resource for Christmas gifts. I attended their conference earlier this year, and loved it! I'm currently reading their book, Becoming a Chief Home Officer by Allie Pleiter, and even after 4+ years of being at home, I'm learning some new stuff! Here's a blog I'm posting on my site to help them out, and to let you know about such a great resource.

Everyone loves a good sale, Right? We'll let me tell you about a great one:

It’s a Hearts at Home
Black Friday after Black Friday Sale Dec. 7-11

Did you sleep in on Black Friday? Did you drag yourself out of bed, but still miss out on some awesome deals because you were standing in line too long at one store? Do you still have shopping to do, but dread the crowds, traffic, and cost? Let Hearts at Home help!

Their Black Friday sale has been extended to the week of December 7-11. Shop in the convenience of your own home and receive an unprecedented 25% off all of Hearts books and merchandise. They have great gifts for everyone in your family.

Find gifts for friends, teachers, bible study leaders, bus drivers, and everyone else on your list. You may even find something for yourself. This is a great time to stock up on all those Hearts at Home books you’ve been wanting to read.

Let your family know how much you would love a Hearts at Home gift certificate so you can use it for your Hearts at Home conference registration and/or Mom’s Night Out tickets.

Go to Heartshoppe.com, choose your gifts, and enter code “HEARTGIFT” upon checkout. You will receive 25% off your total purchase (before tax and shipping).

I also want to fill you in on a couple of other great opportunities!

Be sure to check out Jill Savage's blog this month (she is the founder and CEO of Hearts at Home). She is doing one giveaway A DAY through Christmas.

And, if you stop by the Hearts at Home blog December 8 - 11, you will have an opportunity to win a Heart's at Home prayer journal. The prayer journal is a brand new resource from Hearts at Home.

Merry Christmas from Hearts at Home!

Part 4: Life today

Scott is thrilled with his new position. He is pastor to youth and college. Mainly, he oversees the middle school service and is working on starting a college age ministry. The schedule he must keep is very friendly to our family, and we are able to have dinner together at the table most every night. We are also able to now attend a church service together, and get involved in a small group with others our own age. This is something we have not been able to do previously due to his ministry responsibilities.

We have gotten into a routine since we've been here. The alarm goes off at 7 am. Everybody gets up and gets ready for the day, including breakfast. Either Bianca and I or Scott, (if he hasn't left for the office yet) or all of us, walk Bella to preschool at 9 am (MWF, or Bible Study Tuesdays), and then its home to do chores. We pick Bella up at 11:30, and Scott comes home with us to eat lunch. After lunch, Bianca takes a nap. We have supper around 6, then clean up and get the girls' baths before putting them to bed around 8. Bedtime can be an hour long process sometimes by the time we do a combination of pajamas, stories, rock, sing, cuddle, and finally they are asleep! That's a typical day for us so far. Of course, this will change a bit after we move this weekend, as Bella will have to ride with Scott to work and he will take her to preschool when it's time.

ETA: I'll post some pictures later this week. And of course, give you an update of what life looks like now that we've been in our house for two weeks. Still boxes to unpack, but its getting better.
We're trying out a new internet connection: through Scott's Blackberry. You purchase a program called Tetherberry for $50 (I think), and it uses his data plan to connect to the internet. The down side is I have to wait for him to be home for me to be online. The up side is that we don't have a monthly internet bill, and its easier on our budget. I'll let you know how its going. I'm definitely having to reorganize how/when I blog!

Part 3: The LORD is Faithful

ETA: Sorry I didn't include pictures this time. We are trying something new with our internet (I'll share that later!), and with moving into our home this past week, I haven't been able to post. I've been eating, sleeping, unpacking, and shopping for things we need to get settled in our new home! Its slowly starting to feel like home.


Through this time, I thought a lot about what Abraham must have experienced when God called him to leave his country and travel to the Promised Land. He was leaving everything he knew, to go to a place the Lord had called him. The excitement, apprehension, sadness, happiness, and fear he must have experienced. At least we knew where we were going, and what would be there.

Everything fell perfectly into place for our move. We put our house on the market, hoping to break close to even on it, since we had owned it just 3 years in a shaky market. We also hoped to close before we had to move, in little more than 30 days. Some would say this was impossible, and we knew it wasn't probable, but we prayed in this way. In 5 days, we had 3 showings, and received two full price offers! What an answer to prayer! We were also able to close on the house the day that we loaded the truck to leave for Pennsylvania. Improbable, but not impossible with God!

When we arrived in Eagleville, we moved in with the Executive Pastor Bryan Heil and his wife Linda in the parsonage next to the church. They have two children away at college, so they had some extra rooms to spare for us. We had looked at apartments and rentals online, but it was so hard to know what neighborhood they were in or what they even really looked like. The opportunity to have some temporary living quarters until we found something was another answer to prayer!

Since then, we have found a home that is exactly what I asked for to rent at the price we wanted. I have always wanted a farmhouse, but being married to a youth pastor, that was not practical, so I started praying for a farmer who had a house on land that he would rent out. The house we found is exactly that. It is surrounded by Worcester Stables and pastureland, at the end of a quarter mile tree lined lane. It has the character and charm of the farmhouse I've always wanted, with land for the girls to play and room for a big garden. We even have our own little family of critters... a groundhog, horses, and deer. God is so good!

Part 2: Prepare for Change

We were at General Assembly in Orlando, Florida, when Scott mentioned in passing that he got a phone call from someone at a church in Pennsylvania, and he was going to meet with them. I remember saying, "Okay, whatever," and not thinking about it much. After this meeting, I asked how it went, and Scott said it was good, but wasn't sure what or if he would hear from them again. By the time we got back home, Scott had an email requesting his resume. So at this point, I did ask what the name of the church was and where it was. We were checking out the website, and it looked very interesting. We were beginning to wonder how they got our contact info, but realized that they were on the same district as the New Jersey church with whom we had interviewed. While I was still trying to remember the name of the church, and just starting to mention it to my mom, Scott was discussing the possibility of us going out to Philadelphia for an interview.Though just two months before I would have been distressed at the thought of moving halfway across country, the Lord had been working in my heart and mind to prepare me for this possibility. We were able to visit Fairview Village Church of the Nazarene in August, and felt very positive about everything we experienced. Within two days of returning, Scott accepted the position with my full support. Scott announced his resignation at Indianapolis First Church of the Nazarene on the following Wednesday, and we moved full swing into figuring out how to make a move across country to a place you hardly know.

Post 100! Moving Part 1: The search begins!

How appropriate that this post would be #100?! I have so many things to tell you, I feel like I could make a list of 100 different new pieces to our lives right now. I don't think you'd make it through 100 news stories from us, so I'll keep it to the most important things!
Also, we have a computer now! So hopefully I will be able to keep in touch with all of you again. I am SO excited to finally have a computer that works! And I'm learning all the neat things that Windows 7 can do. No complaints yet! Love it!

ETA: Even though I tried to keep it short, it got long, WAY LONG! So I'm breaking this into a four part series that will post over the next three days. Stay tuned to learn what great change has occurred in our lives!
We are now living in Eagleville, Pennsylvania! Wondering how, why, what, when? Here's the scoop!

Scott and I had felt for some time that the church we were at and we ourselves had grown in different ways so much that we were being led to serve elsewhere. Where was the big question. There was much searching for the heart of the Lord to be in this move. Scott was wondering if youth ministry was still his call in ministry, and started to feel out other areas of ministry. In the end, he realized that youth ministry really was still his call, but not traditional youth pastor positions. Youth ministry positions can be a dime a dozen, but finding something a little non-traditional in the Nazarene church is not! We were frustrated in our search, but knew that God had a special place for us and was preparing us and the church for the change.

At first we were looking mostly close to home because it was comfortable and our family was nearby, but I remember a breaking point where I said to Scott, "I don't care where it is, I just want to get there!" God must have been laughing when He heard me state this, and decided to test it. Well, about a week later, a pastor at a church in NEW JERSEY called. When Scott mentioned this, I just laughed and as I walked away, Scott reminded me, "You said anywhere!" So I started praying about it, and about a week later, we decided to pursue this opportunity. In talking with the pastor, everything sounded like what we and they were looking for, so we decided to go out there for an interview. We spent 3 days getting the know the church, the staff, and the area. We met a great staff and wonderful people, and got to know a church which was making an impact in their community. We knew going out for the interview that we were just looking for confirmation that this was the right place for us. Although there was nothing that jumped at us as red flags or things we didn't like, we didn't receive that confirmation from the Lord, even after a week of prayer at home. So our search began again.

I'm Alive!

Just a quick note to let you all know I have not fallen off the face of the earth, and I am NOT pregnant! (As one reader questioned my silence) We have moved to Eagleville, Pennsylvania, and Scott has started his new job at Fairview Village Church of the Nazarene. We do not have a computer right now, so I have to beg, steal or borrow to get online, which is why you have not heard from me recently. I prefer not to steal, but I will resort to begging to borrow. I snuck into Scott's office this morning because he is helping to put a new roof on a part of the church right now!

Pray for our family in this time. Its a huge move for us. I have met a couple moms, but haven't gotten much interaction with them. I joined a Women of the Word Bible Study this week, and am looking for a MOPS group. We are also searching for housing right now. It is SO much more expensive than in Indianapolis, just finding a two bedroom apartment will cost more than our house payment in Indy, and then we have to cover utilities also. Currently we are living with a pastor on staff here and his wife. They live in the parsonage, and since their kids are away at college, there is some extra space. There have been a lot of changes in our lives this month. Bella started preschool this week. We are trying to figure out how to increase our income a bit, which may include me working part-time or more until we pay off our debt and free up that money.

We know that this move was fully in God's plan for us, and we are completely at peace, even with all these uncertainties. I will provide a more extensive update soon (including how we ended up in Pennsylvania), but I wanted you to know how to pray for us during this time. God has opened every door in His timing, and I just know He will keep it up!

Something to make you smile:)