China. Does. Not. Like. Me. *big, big, big grin* Blocked on BOTH my blogs… Suh-weet.

The first name is quite common, the last, less so… but the combination…

HowManyOfMe.com

There is: 1 person with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

I spent several hours today showing a good friend around a neighboring town.  Her husband is interviewing in the area and as it is a small town, any woman would want to scope out the available shopping and she is no different! The short drive gave us some good visiting time and her dh was such a sweetheart to let us gab away. Every time I’m with her, conversation seems to flow so well and yet when I get home I never fail to think ‘doggonit, wish I had talked less and gotten her to talk more’… Interesting friends about whom you wish to know more and listen to are such a blessing. 

Their family is such a treasure and I’m so looking forward to having them in the area.  They are going to be a fabulous addition to our homeschool group and parish, not to mention the medical community.  Certainly, their coming is an answer to prayer.

The commentary is in black, my response in blue…

I was concerned to read that you could for even one nano second think that our Loving and Merciful Father would ever hold your dear children accountable for your failures, whether perceived correctly or not. He just doesn’t do that Anne – never has, never will. 

I appreciate your concern, but I lovingly and respectfully disagree.  He has done so in the past, and He does not change.  

Exodus 34:67 Thus the LORD passed before him and cried out, “The LORD, the LORD, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity, continuing his kindness for a thousand generations, and forgiving wickedness and crime and sin; yet not declaring the guilty guiltless, but punishing children and grandchildren to the third and fourth generation for their fathers’ wickedness!”  

Leviticus 26:39-40 Those of you who survive in the lands of their enemies will waste away for their own and their fathers’ guilt. “Thus they will have to confess that they and their fathers were guilty of having rebelled against me and of having defied me,  

Numbers 14:18  ‘The LORD is slow to anger and rich in kindness, forgiving wickedness and crime; yet not declaring the guilty guiltless, but punishing children to the third and fourth generation for their fathers’ wickedness.’  

Deuteronomy 28: 45-46   “All these curses will come upon you, pursuing you and overwhelming you, until you are destroyed, because you would not hearken to the voice of the LORD, your God, nor keep the commandments and statutes he gave you. They will light on you and your descendants as a sign and a wonder for all time.  

Even death itself was passed down from Adam as a consequence of his sin. 

Romans 5:12    Therefore, just as through one person sin entered the world, and through sin, death, and thus death came to all, inasmuch as all sinned 

 

However, just as He has and may hold our children accountable for our sins… so is He capable of and willing to show mercy… 

Deuteronomy 5:9b-10   For I, the LORD, your God, am a jealous God, inflicting punishments for their fathers’ wickedness on the children of those who hate me, down to the third and fourth generation but bestowing mercy, down to the thousandth generation, on the children of those who love me and keep my commandments.  

 

 We are all responsible for our own actions and choices, yes even the little darlings entrusted to our caring and teaching. Them too – no one is exempt. 

  Certainly, we are all responsible for our own actions and choices, and yet, our choices DO impact our children, and our sins may become their curse, yes, and even impact others outside the family.  I have experienced this personally in my life, in my family, and seen it in others… Not only that, but even the most godly of parents may be guilty of this… and I am not immune.  As much as I try to be a good parent and not pass on the sins of my fathers, I am painfully aware of my own character failings and sins with which I battle.  It is my constant prayer that God would protect my children from my failings, that not only would the generational sins and burdens stop with me, but that He would NOT allow them to bear the burden of my failures either, instead asking for mercy because of my great love for and devotion to Him. 

  My heart ached that you even considered that. So after reflection on my long friendship with you and my knowledge of ‘how’ you think – I conclude that I must be mistaken and have misread what you meant. I hope that is true? 

   As you can see, despite our long friendship and your uncanny knack for knowing my thoughts, you were not mistaken and did not misread me.  I hope this does not cause you undue distress, it is not upsetting to me in any way, and I fully trust that God will deal justly with me, and the precious children with whom I’ve been entrusted and who He loves more than I could ever hope to. 

I’m way overdue for blogging but the vacation was so good for me that I really haven’t re-engaged heavily in any of my usual online haunts. Despite the extra time that has given me offline, the house still doesn’t look like I’d like it to, which just goes to show that we work hard enough, run hard enough, etc, that even if I am online or NOT, given the homeschooling lifestyle of a family of six – the house is just a challenge. Period.

Other than that, we’re back in the school groove, pretty much all trips done for the fall, and what slaps me upside the head? THANKSGIVING! **hyperventilating** I can’t believe it!  Gotta get the Christmas schopping done too… boy, time sure flies when you’re having fun.

I plan to blog on the trip as well, but it’s not a short entry so gimme a little time.

Well, we’ve finally got school back on track after the whole painting fiasco.  It is a good feeling to get to the end of the day knowing we are caught up, with all lessons completed and graded, ready for the next day.  Now, if we can get the closets finished and that mess cleaned up, the house might end up looking good too!

What’s with the closets? They had cheap shelving in there and what with winter coats in the one, and the youngest child’s abundance of hand me downs in the other, we had us a leetle avalanche of sorts? Anywho, dh has been working hard to replace the rods and shelves with a more durable sort (read that ones that don’t use DRYWALL ANCHORS) and we will be glad to have the contents of those closets put away properly again soon.

Our fall is jam packed with stuff going on, some of it fun, some not so fun… but a great deal to do and we simply MUST maximize every school day we have.  I’m still feeling run down from some emotional stress over the last few weeks and a viral thing from last weekend… but pushing through anyway and while that may take ‘feeling better’ a little longer to get here, the satisfcation of work done well is worth it.

I realize that ‘caught up’ is never gonna happen… but I’m looking forward to being ‘less snowed under’ at least…

I’m so pathetic.

The transcripts and scores will take at least 3 weeks to arrive.  They won’t accept me before they’ve seen them.  The application probably just go there in the last day or two since it had to be mailed even though the University is in town. Yet I have found myself riffling through the mail looking for an envelope with the University address on it.

Sigh… the weeks ahead are going to be long… but they will be busy and I won’t notice… much… I hope…  

I spent a couple of hours today requesting transcripts, SAT scores, and filling out an application for admittance to the local University.  I attended for a year and a half before my marriage, took three classes between my first and second children, and now they are old enough that I can try again. One last thing to send… perhaps the third time will end in parchment.

We’ve had a hankering to make homemade ice cream all summer but Walmart just doesn’t carry a 6qt ice cream maker… but Rural King does! We stumbled across one last weekend so this Friday night saw dh staying up very late doing prep work.  By the time I crawled out of bed this morning the brine was chilling a homemade version of Rocky Road ice cream.  Dh didn’t read the directions (isn’t that just like a man) and put the marshmallows, nuts, etc in at the beginning.  The marshmallows didn’t survive intact, but only made the finished product that much richer.  It was a lot of work, but boy was it worth it.  I hope it doesn’t last long because I have already eaten more ice cream today than in the past three weeks combined. (Not as bad as it sounds, only one -rather full- bowl… I don’t eat much usually anyway.)  Nice treat to the end of the first week of school…

So I’m a hardened criminal… or so says my local police department.

All of which I found amusing until I realized that this COULD’VE happened on a trip planned in the not too distant future, worse still, a trip to Chicago itself for a mother/daughter weekend… I can just imagine the Sonlighter friends reaction… Yeah we used to meet homeschooler’s from the forums until this one car thief came to visit and the cops showed up at our house…