Tommorrow....

My mom is coming to town. I'm too excited!! She'll be in late, but we have a full, awesome day planned for Friday. And a whole weekend with the kids. I'm really looking forward to a slow down with her. I've got plans of shopping, scrapbooking, eating at some of our fave. places, and just generally letting our hair down with the fam. I can't wait! I'm sure I'll take lots of crazy pictures. This will be the most time I've had with my mom in YEARS, it's going to be awesome.

New Pages

Did these last week, nothing spectacular, but fun none the less. I'm really looking forward to scrapbooking with my Mom this weekend!!

Dude, I'm tired.

killer long day.

We got a lot done though. My mom will be here a week from today (yay!) - a trip we've been anticipating for almost six months now. And of course, I just now get the bug to really clean/organize my house.

We started in the yard this morning. Well, actually Eli and I started at Walmart and Lowes, purchasing supplies to repair my ceiling hole. Then we got home and spent about 4 hours collectively in the yard; mowing, raking, weeding, edging and blowing. whew! That was exhausting. Meanwhile, I ran laundry intermittently. And I made a pretty rocking dinner of Alice Springs Chicken. The kids hated it, but we loved it. :0 Shortly after supper I saw an offer on a computer desk on Freecycle and Rob went out to get it. We put the kids to bed about 8pm and spent the evening putting the thing together (it's actually 2 identical desks, but we only put together one, without directions - it was interesting) and then rearranging/cleaning/organizing the living room/office space. I feel so inspired by all this decluttering!

Tomorrow we've got a trip to Houston on the horizon with Pastor and Miss Linda. And some more housecleaning. And perhaps a teensy bit of scrapbooking??

nighty night.... before I fall asleep on the keys... maybe I'll post a new-to-us computer desk photo in the am. sleep well all my faithful blogaholics, sleep well....

Love This Commercial

I've seen it a few times on tv and it's so up-my-alley. :) You'll see.

Art Manifesto

Found this today on another blog I read and it really moved me. Stay tuned to the last 45 seconds - that's the best part. wow. I especially liked “if i make it, will someone take it, and think that its genuine?” For someone like me, who has spent my whole life searching for my medium - that was pretty profound.

An Interview about me...

(Sarah's perspective)

1. What is something mom always says to you?
She loves me.

2. What makes mom happy?
by hugging her.

3. What makes mom sad?
by saying I do not like her.

4. How do you make your mom laugh?
ask some silly questions.

5. What was your mom like as a child?
she liked to play with Barbies.

6. How old is your mom?
nine.

7. How tall is your mom?
3 feet inches.

8. What is her favorite thing to do?
play with me.

9. What does your mom do when you're not around?
play on the computer.

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
for being really good at making my birthday party.

11. What is your mom really good at?
being kind.

12. What is your mom not very good at?
opening things.

13. What does your mom do for her job?
cleans.

14.What is your mom's favorite food?
cake.

15. What makes you proud of your mom?
doing the passwords.

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
Barbie.

17. What do you and your mom do together?
wrestle with my daddy and my brother.

18. How are you and your mom the same?
we love each other.

19. How are you and your mom different?
by putting different wigs on.

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
she hugs me.

21. Where is your mom's favorite place to go?
Sonic.

(Eli's

1. What is something mom always says to you?
brush your teeth.

2. What makes mom happy?
presents and my love.

3. What makes mom sad?
like if I kill my sister.

4. How do you make your mom laugh?
jokes, all kinds of jokes.

5. What was your mom like as a child?
I don't know cause I wasn't born yet.

6. How old is your mom?
twenty-nine, that's easy. (for right now)

7. How tall is your mom?
I have no idea.

8. What is her favorite thing to do?
to have fun with us.

9. What does your mom do when you're not around?
do chores.

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
um. I think photographing.

11. What is your mom really good at?
photography.

12. What is your mom not very good at?
letting us break the rules.

13. What does your mom do for her job?
she takes pictures of people.

14.What is your mom's favorite food?
she never told me.

15. What makes you proud of your mom?
she makes dinner for us and she cleans up the house mostly.

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
Timmy Turner's Mom. (from Fairly Odd Parents)

17. What do you and your mom do together?
have fun little dates.

18. How are you and your mom the same?
we're both intelligent.

19. How are you and your mom different?
mommy's a girl and I'm a boy.

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
because she does lots of stuff for us.

21. Where is your mom's favorite place to go?
Cheddars.


(Rob's perspective)

1. What is something your wife always says to you?
I love you.

2. What makes your wife happy?
by hugging her.

3. What makes your wife sad?
when she can't get it all done, when she lets people down, when people are upset with her. (he put a lot of thought in to that one!)

4. How do you make your wife laugh?
Rob.

5. What was your wife like as a child?
she was a good kid.

6. How old is your wife?
29.

7. How tall is your wife?
5 foot 6 inches.

8. What is her favorite thing to do?
make people happy when taking their pictures.

9. What does your wife do when you're not around?
scrapbook. laundry. dishes. talk to Lori.

10. If your wife becomes famous, what will it be for?
photography.

11. What is your wife really good at?
she's a good wife.

12. What is your wife not very good at?
remembering the words to songs. (that is SO TRUE!)

13. What does your wife do for her job?
photography, part-time church secretary, part-time stay at home mom

14.What is your wifes's favorite food?
Italian.

15. What makes you proud of your wife?
when she is by my side in ministry.

16. If your wife were a cartoon character, who would she be?
Thelma from Scooby Doo.

17. What do you and your wife do together?
have fun.

18. How are you and your wife the same?
we both love music.

19. How are you and your wife different?
we love different kinds of music.

20. How do you know your wife loves you?
she says it and shows it.

21. Where is your wife's favorite place to go?
Iowa.

What I Never Knew I Needed

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So I was crusing through Office Depot while on the phone with Kimmie today and stumbled across this great 'project planner'. I didn't even know such a thing existed! What a brilliant concept! Imagine, all my notes for all my projects in one convienient organized location! I love it! I slapped down my $10 and immediately started filling it in. I guess I hesitated for a brief moment, considering I could make my own project planner, but then decided that I really didn't need another project. :) I love irony!

Do I have to tell you that I have ten pages filled out already? I normally keep everything on my red clipboard along with my current to-do lists, but this is so much more organized and then I can keep my projects from one year to the next, so referring back will be easy. I love this idea, it totally made my day!

Super excited for youth group tonight - totally expecting God to show up in a big way. He's so good! Rob and I have spent a lot of time planning for this evening's service, so I hope He blesses it!!

Feeling Domestic

You wouldn't probably know it to look at my house right now, it's a bit over-run still at the moment. But the gentle hum of the dryer and folded clothes in the laundry basket are a welcome sight and a promise of a calm in the chaos. :) Dinner is made and waiting to be slid into the oven at the appropriate time and even dessert is a lovely surprise browning while I type. It's amazing to me how these simple pleasures of domestic nature warm my heart when I have slowed down to attend to them. There's such a deep feeling of satisfaction in serving your family.

It's incredible to think about how much my life has changed in the past 2 or 3 years - going from absolutely full-time mom to Jack-of-all-trades. Enough to make my head spin. I love my life now, and I loved it before, isn't that interesting? A peace that only comes from right relationship with the Maker, I suppose.

I'm not saying there aren't days when I'm frazzled and feeling torn between two (or three or four) worlds and wondering what I need to lay down to be able to focus on my priorities... But overall, I love my life so much, I love the choices that I get to make each day. There is so much freedom in each of my 'jobs' - an incredible amount of responsibility too, but I love the challenge of making it all work. So much so that I'm not ready to put down any one of them, instead I constantly re-balance, weighing the immediate needs of each area against the others.

I guess it's a crazy way to live, but it's the only way I know how to survive right now. No, I should edit that, it's the only way I know how to thrive right now. Being a mom is so important to me, and stretching our paycheck as far as it can go and being frugal is part of that responsibility; feeding my family and keeping up our home, those are privileges of motherhood and wifery. :) (yep, I just made that word up).

Being Rob's right hand as youth and music pastor is also important, his ministry is extended greatly by having an extra set of hands at his disposal. We do so much together that he couldn't do on his own. In addition to that, being pastor's wife is every bit as much my calling as being pastor is his! If I were to back off or slow down, it would be so detrimental and I would be stepping out of God's will for my life. He called me to be a pastor's wife when I was sixteen and I've never questioned the validity of that call for moment. And yes, I knew that in my heart BEFORE I met Rob. He's just one of the perks of the job. :)

Starting at the church as a part-time secretary a year ago seemed like an extra item when we made that decision, but it's wound up being such a good one. I love having an office to work out of two days a week and a lot of the things I do as secretary I'd be finding time to do on my own anyway. It's so great to have a place to land on that side of town when I need to, and not to be underfoot in Rob's office but still available to him at the push of a button. Plus it's brought such a connection with our secretarial staff and I feel like I really know what's going on in the church.

And that brings me to photography, which I love so much. I feel so stretched by this business, and it's that good yoga kind of stretching, where it hurts a little bit but it feels so good and you know that you are growing and getting stronger! Photography is the thing that's mine, that has nothing to do with being pastor's wife and everything to do with being Anna. It's the art that's been squelched up inside me since I was a little girl and its' so cool to see it spill into prints and images. Can I say that I feel like it's my future? Being a stay at home mom it's so easy to wrap your life up in your children, which is such a good and worthy thing to wrap up in. Reality says that one day they will kiss me goodbye and head off into their own lives, hopefully staying in close relationship with us still, but living their own lives just the same. I needed something that would still be there when that happened. Photography has been such an amazing outlet for me this past year. And such a witnessing opportunity. The truth is, living a life like mine, I don't get a lot of opportunity to talk with anyone who isn't saved. :) I've met so many fantastic people this past year with the vehicle of photography, and it's been so cool to just be me and let the Lord use it.

So I'm domestic today. And it's good. And I'm glad this isn't every day. I love the life that God is allowing me to live right now. And I'm incredibly excited about all that He is doing in my heart, all the growing we've been experiencing. It reminds me again of His great love for me (and you too!), that He's never content to let us just stay the same. We are to be growing in Him, and in our own abilities, and always, always growing into His will for our lives, which is continually bigger than we are. Wow. What a mighty God we serve!!!

Women's Convention. Whew!!

What an experience!!


I so enjoyed getting to know 7 of the ladies in the church better, the fellowship was awesome! These gals are just a hoot! We visited Harwin St. in Houston and that was quite an experience in itself. I picked up 3 Pashmines for $3.99 each, so hopefully I won't be cold in church any longer!

And worship, my goodness - it was amazing!! This song in particular really got me, it wasn't the first time I heard it, just incredible!

The worship team was from Spring, TX and they were absolutely gifted. Our speaker was Lori O'Dea from Michigan, but I recalled her from her time at AGTS. She spoke directly to my heart. She actually prayed with me personally and was just so encouraging!!I also had a fantastic time with my friend, my boss, and my mentor, Linda Hayes. Our best talk took place in the wee hours of this morning. I'm so thankful to have her in my life, she brings out the best in me. We took this silly picture, thinking we both really needed to wear these hats on Easter Sunday and bring back the trend of hats in our church.

But the very best part of the weekend was all my time at the altar, just soaking up God's presence.

Sometimes, being who I am makes it tough to just really get intimate with the Lord during our regular worship services. I certainly try, but at the same time I need to be aware of others needs during that time, and available to pray or whatever else might come up. And of course, being the worship pastor's wife, I'm a little distracted for my husband, always praying for him while he's up there, leading us all into worship. I love going to conferences and retreats where I'm not pastor's wife any more, I'm just Anna, humble servant of God, trying to get my time in with my Maker. It's incredible. I love to worship, it really is my heart and always has been. And I did a lot of worshipping this weekend, but I also spent a lot of time just wrenching my heart out before my God, and that was incredible. I feel so spent for Him right now, and I'm really looking forward to a wonderful night's sleep in my own bed with my own husband.

Meanwhile, I am so incredibly excited about what God is doing in my life, and I'm more willing than ever to allow Him to do it. I want to serve Him more than I ever have before... It's such a good place to be.


So on to tomorrow;

We are hosting Roy and Annette Brewer in both services tomorrow and another Monday night. And I'm shooting a birthday party tomorrow afternoon. Should be a wonderful Sunday. God is good!!




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BTW? (I really missed these people)

Radio Silence

It's going to be a little quiet on the blogs for the next couple days. I'm headed to Houston this morning for a much needed women's retreat. I can't help but feel like there's been radio silence in my own heart lately, and a little time on my face before the Lord will be good for my soul.

Pray for my family while I'm gone, I haven't been away from them in over a year and a half, so I'm sure it will be a little trying for Rob, but I've left them well-prepared.

Lost Change, Lost Souls

One day last week Eli and I were making a quick Wal-mart run when he halted dead in his tracks in the parking lot - squealed with delight and picked up a penny off the asphalt. "Lost Change, Lost Souls, Mom". I was confused at first, thinking he was spewing some new age nonsense, and then he slowed down a bit (and explained things to his old mom) that it was a new Buddy Barrel/BGMC drive at church. When you see lost change, think of lost souls. My heart about broke right there in front of the cart return. My eight year old boy was pointing out to me the hurt and lost people in this world. This kid has a heart of gold, I'm serious. Anyway, I've been thinking about it all week and I'm going to share it with our teenagers tomorrow night during our Speed the Light offering. And because I'm a visual learner and I assume everyone else is too, I wanted to include a little bit of visual aides. Eli was more than willing to give me a hand - actually two hands. So the first photo is to remind us about the importance of each soul, and just a little bit of money can make the difference in helping a missionary reach the life of one person. And the second is to remind us how many souls are out there and how giving more can do even more for God.

It's cool to think about how each one of us are important enough to God to stop in the Walmart parking lot and pick up as thought we are a brilliant treasure, rather than a dirty, tarnished, nearly worthless penny.

I'd like to think I'll never look at a penny the same way again.







Then, on a total aside...

We are having a babysitter for the kids this evening and they asked "what are you doing at church tonight?"

How sad is it that our kids only think we would ever get a babysitter for church activities?

'hello beautiful'

I've been excited about this page since I found this great cloud paper from Prima last week. I've been hanging on to this precious picture of Sare for a few months now, and it just seemed perfect. The crochet flowers were an el-cheapo find at Novel Approach for fifty cents a piece. I had too much fun working on this page and it only made me want to scrapbook more!!

Rodeo Sunday

Lots going on at church lately, you probably gathered that from last night's post. One of our big events is Rodeo Sunday and this year we brought in some real live Longhorns. It was a huge success, our people loved it! It was a bit cold, so it would have been even more fun if the weather had been a bit better, but us Yankees were just fine. :)

Hanging In There

Super uber long day. Topping off another long weekend. Looking forward to a day at home catching up tomorrow, trying to keep my house from caving in on itself.

But it's all good, I promise. I love, love, love my life. Can't wait to be able to blog about it all soon. So you, like me, hang in there for a lengthy update tomorrow. toodles till then, sweet dreams!