Minivan Moments

Generally, the emails to review books for Handlebar Publishing announce books I would like to read, but I usually don't respond quickly enough to get my hands on them. Then I got the email for Invisible , by Ginny L. Yttrup. I wanted this book so badly after I read the description that I was sure I would not get a copy. But I did! After I found out they were mailing me the book, I decided that since I was actually receiving the book and so looking forward to it, it must be a book I would struggle to read. My, was I struggling with trusting God, eh? ;^) Okay, so the book comes in the mail. I'm thrilled, I tell ya! I'm also 3/4 of the way through a mystery novel and no way am I stopping before I find out Whodunnit.... So. I wait. I scramble through the mystery, discover the killer (What?!?! That crazy lady did it!?!?), and sigh with satisfaction as I exchange that book for Invisible , which was patiently awaiting me upon my nightstand. From the very first page, I'm ho...

I'm not generally an idiot. Okay, that's not entirely accurate, but follow me here... This year, as we were dying Easter eggs, i had a couple of first-time thoughts, and i feel a bit, well, dull-witted for not thinking about these things before now. First, our outside can be full of stains and mistakes, but when Jesus peels away our sins through His ultimate sacrifice for us, He leaves us pure and white inside, almost as if the old, cracked, mottled outside was never there in the first place. Perhaps this is why the dyed eggs have become a recognizable icon and family tradition at Easter? If so, i am obviously one of the last to figure it out, but i have made the connection. Finally. Second, we spend a ridiculous amount of time working hard to get the external appearance of our eggs to be unique, colorful, and sometimes sparkly, yet it is so temporary! We crack, peel, and toss the external shell to get to the good stuff, and the beautiful decorations are discarded in cr...

Finally taking time to update my blog about my mission trip to Kentucky's Appalachian Mountains. We had a marvelous time, if you can classify working your tail off, sleeping just enough to stay alive, and enduring frigid temperatures "marvelous." I know i do. We drove into the mountains at just below 50 degrees. When we left it was about 40 degrees. From our first morning to our last night there, it snowed. The high temperature was 32 degrees. For 3 days. The above photo is the morning the snow started, and the picture below was the view on the highway coming out of Kentucky, after much of the snow had melted. Once we arrived, we threw a giant Block Party for the townspeople. That was really fun! I met some great people, and they were so welcoming of all us strangers!  We got to attend church in a neighboring town, where our worship team actually took over the worship for the day to give the locals a taste of the more contemporary worship styles. That wa...

Okay, i've posted before about longing for mission work while in the midst of the mission field God has given me. Now, though, i get to travel with my church on a real mission trip! So many kids being raised in the Christian church in America have this experience before their 18th birthday. But this is a big deal to me!! My eldest child and i will be traveling to eastern Kentucky to help renovate a dilapidated building in need of some TLC... and elbow grease. ;) We're visiting a small mining town, and we'll both be enjoying our time together and our first actual mission trip. We are both so excited! Yet, as i begin this post, i realize this is not our first mission trip.... When we delivered food, toys, and household items to the East Nashville residents after the horrible Nashville Flood, we were on a mission. When we washed disgusting laundry for the volunteers that same week, we were on a mission. When we worked in the Graceworks food pantry, we were on a mission. W...

I love to write. Obviously. ;) My children love to create in their own ways, too, but they have never enjoyed writing. It saddens me, not just because it is a joy to me that they do not share, but because i know writing can pave the way to so many things later in life from college to career (not to mention a positive outlet for the soul!). Anyway, we wrote a story for Dr Seuss's birthday last Friday, and today my oldest and i read an Emily Dickinson poem "Hope Is A Thing With Feathers" and wrote a poem in the same style and rhythm. Here is the poem (we are still wanting to finish pictures for the book): [copyright Angela Varela - do not steal anything on this blog to publish as your own] Happy is a Wagging Tail "Happy is a wagging tail That greets you at the door It drools and licks and wags its tail And rolls over on the floor It whines and whimpers when you leave It home alone all day And when you come back home again It greets you the same way It loves...

Over the past week, we have determined to live life every day. We are trying not to get caught up in the humdrum, same-old-same-old attitudes, making sure to see each day as a gift and not a repeat of the day before. If you homeschool and stay home full time with your children, you understand the challenge this can be! So, we have had an eventful week! And because of that, i have not been diligent in updating. So, here's our "week in review." Taking Tests! Fun! ;)   Valentine's Day Gluten-Free Cupcakes for a dear friend. Nom nom nom...   Drama Queen makes Valentine's Fondant! "It's like taffy!"   Valentine's Day Gluten-Free chocolate cake with Drama Queen's fondant.     Visited the War Memorials in Nashville. Korean War Memorial     All in all, we have tried to engage outside of our house more. It has been fun, and since the youngest is now capable of handling being busy out of the house, we wil...

Okay, i know i am not the only one who has found myself struggling with some task/responsibility longer than necessary. I know i am not the only person on the planet who has ever failed to accomplish something i set out to accomplish. And i know i am not the only woman alive who has ever hung her head in utter dejection. So i was thinking about something recently in a visit with a friend, and i thought, "i wonder how many people realize this?" Which, naturally, meant i had to blog about it! All 3 of my followers (just kidding) might need this word from the Lord today! ;) It took God several years to teach this particular nugget of wisdom to me. Not because He is not a gifted teacher, but because i was a stubborn student. It took God many varied-yet-similar situations to get through to me. Not because He didn't provide just the right opportunity, but because i was blinded by my own self-reliance. And it took God far too many people to express His truth than can be cons...

I got so caught up in trying to restructure my day and get us back to enjoying our learning that i forgot to post our project pictures from last week! Whoops! It took 2 days of building, gluing, drying, and building, but they got it done with only materials laying around the house and recycling supplies. First we have the Man-Child working on the recyclables at his workbench, preparing them for his sisters inside.... Now we have the inside operation: gluing strips of cardboard to represent planks of wood on the houses and stripping sticks to resemble the logs the original colonists would have been shipping back to England. And the next day, the little one had to play with the toys while she was waiting for her big brother and big sister to get the scene finished....     Then we had to make the SNOW!!! :)     Once they made the snow, they dumped Winter Weather on the poor, unsuspecting colonists....   Hee hee. Here's the f...

Up until recently, i surveyed my life from a very stagnant point of view. It was the same old, same one, new day, same schedule of events. Over the past week, however, i have been taught not to take anything for granted. Everything can change in the blink of an eye, and all you have thought about your future can be questioned. So i am embarking on a new journey: Daily Appreciation of Life as it Happens. To do this, i am going to be blogging about our day and what i appreciated about it. This is going to have the side benefit of being something my children and i can look back on for years to come, a reminder of life as we experienced it... the life that was well-lived and not taken for granted. Today, we began a project with recyclables, little historical action figures, some craft supplies, the woodworking tools, and some fake snow. This project grew in detail over the course of my children's imaginings, so it will likely be days-long. I promise to post pictures. That will he...

I've understood that i live within the gray areas of life for some time now. I've even begun to say that out loud in several circumstances. And today, as i am emotionally dealing with a lot of things in my life, i am aware of yet another way i live within the gray: my sick kids. Okay, so my children don't have cancer. Or leukemia. Or diabetes. Or autism. Or cerebral palsy. And for that, i truly am thankful. However, my children (and i) are still sick. We are just not overtly sick. We live with inflammation, headaches, nausea, bloody stools, hyperactivity, vaccine intolerance, behavioral problems, and learning disabilities. My kids live with food sensitivities, dietary restrictions, and many issues surrounding food. (And in case you haven't noticed, you can't really cut food out of your life.) So, while i am not the least bit sad that we are not facing some terminal illness like cancer or some debilitating condition like cerebral palsy, it is sometimes frustrat...

As a member of BookSneeze, I received a copy of Free Book , written by Brian Tome, to read and review. I liked the idea of the book because I believe we Americans have a lot of freedoms other countries don't, and I also believe that we Christians are free from things other religions are not... yet we too often live as if we are bound by rules and stipulations rather than free in Christ. Overall, I must proclaim that Christ came to set us free, and that is definitely Tome's point. He starts by breaking the ties to "religion" and establishing our "New Identity" in Christ Jesus. With that out of the way, he proceeds through a couple of things that might be hurdles to feeling free: forgiveness and strongholds. These issues are bigger than most people understand fully, even in the Christian world, and he does a good job of breaking them down. Then he proceeds into the spirit realm, and he talks about all the ways we allow the enemy to muddle our thoughts and ...