Mood:  celebratory

Yep! Tomorrow's the big announcement of my gigantic giveaway! I can't tell you exactly what it is, but it involves a $55 gift certificate that can be spent at over 200 online stores! So, don't forget to come back tomorrow for all of the details. Yippee!!!

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Mood:  happy

I saw this on Facebook the other day and had to share it.

Are you one of the 7%?

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Mood:  not sure

Whenever he comes he always asks thought provoking questions of us and writes down our answers. He wants us to not only be challenged, but to know how to pray for us. Some of his questions pertain to our spiritual growth and some pertain to our ministry.

Ken is a big believer (and so am I because it's Biblical) that in order to minister, you have to keep in God's Word and make sure your spiritual life is in order. I find myself lacking in that so many times. Many times I'll be so busy with ministry (or perhaps so lazy) that I never seem to have the time for my quiet time with the Lord. However, how can I fill someone else up if I'm not filled up myself?

Our time praying, reading the Bible, meditating, and studying is very important. It should be the basis of our Christian walk, often it is the most overlooked aspect of our journey through life.

Recently, through a series of sermons from our pastor, and my experience through the Walk to Emmaus, I've been challenged by King David. Remember, he was said to be a man after God's own heart. I began asking myself some questions. Can that be said of me? Does God consider me a man after His own heart? How can I know for sure?

I decided to begin to study what it means to be a "Man after God's own heart", and what a better place to start than with Kind David himself. The study has been enlightening and challenging. It involves setting priorities - sometimes life changing priorities - in your life. In the next few weeks, I'm going to be talking about what those priorities should be on my blog. I hope you'll drop by from time to time and join me as I share what I have been learning. I know it is going to be a lot of fun.

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Mood:  mischievious

I've been in a mischievious mood today. I do that quite often when I'm tired. But, there is nothing mischievious about the blogs featured in the TOS Crew Blog Hop this week. Again they are TOS First Mate (FM) blogs. FM's are the crew members that have stayed on the homeschool crew for two or even three years so they are experienced homeschool bloggers. Check this weeks list out. I'm sure you'll enjoy yourself!

1. Hearthside Homeschool Reviews... And More
2. Loving Learning at Home
3. Life on the Roller Coaster
4. A Life Better Than I Deserve
5. Joy in the Journey
6. Homeschooling, Autism & Stuff
7. There is Hope
8. Homeschool Reviews for You
9. Mom Loves Books
10. The Legacy of Home

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Mood:  a-ok

Most of you know that my family is a big fan of Compassion International. We support one child and have four other correspondence children. We love writing to all of our children. They are of different ages and are from very diverse places. Two are from South America - Marcelo (Bolivia) and Feyber (Colombia), one is from Central America - Ismael (Nicaragua), one is from Africa - Emmanuel (Tanzania) and then there is Somi from Indonesia.

Recently I was getting ready to write some letters to my kids and I got on the Compassion website. When I got to the page where their pictures are shown I was very surprised by what I saw. There was a new picture of Somi. They update the pictures every two years and it was time for Somi's to be updated. Here's the new picture:

We got a letter from Somi the other day. We had asked what kind of a house that he lives in. He wrote back that he lives in a traditional Papua (the island that he lives on) home called a Honai. Immediately, the homeschool father in me began to search for pictures of a Honai on the internet. Here is the best one that I could fine.

The round house in the background is actually the type of house that he lives in. Can you imagine? They have wood walls, thatched roofs, and dirt floors. They build a fire in the center of the room that they cook on and they sleep with their heads toward the fire with their feet stretched toward the walls. What a different lifestyle.

Somi is from that lifestyle, but, remember, to be considered for a Compassion project, you have to be the poorest of the poor. I wrote a couple of months ago that the village that Somi lives in just got fresh water within the past year. Before, they had to bring drinking and cooking water from a stream some distance away from the village. It was the same stream that they bathed in and washed their clothes in. This is the work that Compassion does and they do it in Jesus' name.

If you have never considered sponsoring a child through Compassion, won't you pray about it today? If you have prayed about it, what's holding you back? God wants us to be His hands and feet and to go out to a dying world and tell them about Him. This is one way that you can do it. Just click here or on one of the hi-lighted links above for more information.

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