Quote of the Month

Let me first start by saying, October has been a very busy month. I know you can see really well, but just look at my calendar.

When Ron and I looked through the month (early in the month) we noticed there were only 3 day without meetings or appointments or something in the whole month! That's craziness. Part of that is because the UMC's Charge Conference is early in November and there are lots of extra meetings to prepare for that. Honestly though, with 2 churches we typically have a lot of meetings each month. You have to consider there will be 2 board meetings, 2 Jr. Church Meetings, etc. (It's even color coded because I was getting so confused as to which church had a board meeting on which night).

So anyway, this morning, I was writing something (I can't even remember what) on the calendar and Eli says,

"I never want to write on my calendar as much as you do."

It took me just a minute to realize what he said (it was 6am and although he was functioning, I was still struggling). When I did, I looked into those big eyes and wondered, "what am I suppose to learn from this little guy today."

I mean just look...
...he's so full of knowledge and cuteness and just Eli!

I love you Eli and I hope you never have to write on your calendar as much as I do on mine!

A Newborn in the House, Again

Before any of you read that title and assume anything - I am NOT pregnant!

But for the past month and a half we have had a baby around here.

Meet Lelah

Lelah is 5 months old and is a miracle baby. She was born with the cord wrapped around her neck and spent her first few weeks in ICU. You can check out their Caring Bridge website here. She is a little fighter and finally they began to see improvement and today she is fantastic (still visiting doctors, but doing great). The power of Prayer is an amazing thing! And then to top it all off, her parents, whom I had never met, asked me to babysit for them. I was thrilled!

I was pretty excited about the opportunity, especially since we had prayed for this little miracle baby since birth. Now I get to see her grow and develop every day.

It is a little more challenging to have a newborn with 4 other kids around, but we are managing. Lelah is a good baby. She loves to be held, wouldn't you if you hadn't gotten to be at the beginning of life?

Maddie adores her and loves to call her by name, very cute! I honestly had hoped that Maddie would adjust well to her. I don't want Maddie to be the "spoiled" baby of our family - it's nice to have another baby around that needs some extra attention.

So there is another baby around the Adkins home. And it has been an adjustment, but we're doing pretty good!

Not cut out for this

This week has been a little different, well a lot different. Ron has been gone since Monday evening. First of all - I hate to be alone, especially in the evening when the house is quiet except for the creaking noises, but secondly I miss my hubby! He went to Jackson, MS with 3 other former Seminarians. Back to their stomping grounds, Wesley Biblical Seminary. I am happy that they were able to make the trip, but I really am not cut out to be a single parent.

I can handle the occasional day or evening, even a night here or there, but it has been way to long. We need our daddy back! He should arrive this evening! It sounds like they had a great time.

Here are a few of the ways we have passed our time this past week.

The boys all had dentist appointments. For Eli, this was a little scary - he had been once before, but as he says it, "I was still little and it was kinda scary". So since he is much bigger now (a whole 6 months), he just needed me to hold his hand as we walked in and then take his picture while the doctor checked him out. Eli wouldn't stop talking. He asked the dentist if I could take a picture of him "working on my teeth". Then he said, "I won't cry, cause I'm big now". When the dentist agreed that there was nothing to cry about. Eli went on to tell him that he is a big boy now, "I'm even wearing underwares." Which of course the dentist couldn't understand and looked to me for translation. Thankfully he's a daddy too and thought it was so Big Boy of Eli!

so here you have Dr. Parsall and Eli in his big boys 'underwares'

My mom came to help for a couple of days. I had a meeting one night and also the dentist appointment (that I wasn't sure I could handle Maddie and the big boy above). Mom was a great help. She brought new Leap Pad games

and even one for Maddie

She also ready TONS of books

What the pictures don't show are the other 3 kids that I babysit for. Mom read to them too and played with all of them, so that I could keep my sanity. I was running on little sleep (did I mention I don't sleep well with Ron gone) and I was trying to remember all the things he does that I had to keep up on (gathering the trash - before the garbage man comes, getting to the Post Office before it closes and filling the truck with gas - just to name a few). Mom also ran the boys to school and picked them up, a huge blessing!

So mom was a big help. She said when she left, "I think we talk more on the phone than we did these last couple of days" - things are busy around here.

Then would you believe that handsome hubby of mine remembered my birthday too. He not only had flowers and chocolate delivered to me. He had also taken the boys shopping and had their gifts wrapped, and hidden with specific instructions to not forget the day and to sing Happy Birthday too. It was cute!

Thursday morning we sat down for breakfast and Ronnie said, "mom, can I go to the bathroom?" "Yes", I replied rather quickly. It seems someone is always getting up when we sit down to eat.

We no sooner got our cereal poured and began when Ronnie came around the corner with a gift bag singing Happy Birthday with a huge grin on his face. It was so cute! The whole breakfast I got the play by play of when they shopped, how long they kept the secret and what they had contemplated getting. These boys of mine, they are pretty special.

So that was the gist of our week. We are waiting for Daddy and ready to get back to a 2 parent home. I'm not cut out for this single parent family thing.

1 truck, 1 piece of floss and 1 less tooth

Around here we like to spice things up a bit. What better time to have a little fun in our life than 10-10-2010. Let me explain. By Sunday, Ronnie had been wiggling his tooth for days and he was complaining that it was really hurting. So Ron said, "well, do you want to get the dump truck?"

See just a few weeks ago we had gone through a process of trying to get one of Nathaniel's teeth out and we wanted to make it a little more fun. The boys are loosing teeth like crazy right now, so Ron was trying to make it a little more exciting. We had gotten everything ready for Nathaniel...then he backed out.

But Ronnie said, "Sure!". So I'll show you in pictures what happened.

Floss tied to the tooth

The other end of floss goes on the truck
OK, he claims he's ready

Everyone else is ready.

(Nathaniel is out of the picture because he's waiting to catch the truck)

Right about the time this picture was taken we hear a 'clink'.

The tooth hit the truck and this is what was next...

So, now Ronnie has a creative story to tell about his missing tooth. Gotta love that!

Oh yeah, and Eli can't wait to try!

The Path Center

For a little over a month now, our Farmer Jr. Church has been collecting food, toiletries and other items for an organization in Defiance, The Path Center. On Saturday, 21 of us got to go take a tour of the building. The Path Center is a place where homeless people can come and find a bed or hungry people can come and get a meal. It was an eye opening experience for many in our group. I especially enjoyed watching the boys as they realized there were people who came everyday to this room to get a hot meal. They didn't have food in their cupboards or their refrigerators. It clicked that all the food they have been collecting each week is going to help people who don't have any. The Path Center is a great thing and we are excited to see how we can volunteer in the future. It was especially neat for me to have our whole family their to see it.

After we left, we went to a nearby park for pizza and some fun. The kids enjoyed the day and Ron and I did too.

We've tried to be a little more thoughtful throughout our day and thankful too. It's been a good reminder that everything we have (and we have so much more than we need) comes from Jesus and we need to remember to thank him for it.

Do you have a homeless shelter in your area? How can you help out? How can you get your whole family involved in helping others? Think about it - you'll end up getting more out of the experience than you give!

Leaves Falling

One day last week the leaves seemed to be coming off the tree in our yard really fast. I gathered up the kids (my 2 and 2 I babysit for) and we went out to enjoy the leaves.

Here Brett and Eli relax after "helping" me rake.

Evan joined the party.
Maddie was pretty sure it wasn't a safe thing to do and settled for watching from the sidelines.

Then the running and jumping began.

Finally I dropped her in.

The bright sunshine made it hard to pose for a good picture.

Yes, that's even a smile on her face. She does enjoy the fall weather just as much as her momma!

How are you spending your fall? The leaves are falling fast here! Winter isn't far off!

No Good Pictures

If you have ever had a toddler, you understand my title. Lately, it is nearly impossible to get a good picture of Maddie. She won't stop moving. I think when she see me with a camera her mind says, "run, move, don't stop"! So in my useless attempt at a picture of my growing and changing daughter, I got these.

Even with her strapped in, I can't get it!

It's not funny!

Oh well, she can't stop me from trying!

A Mighty Warrior

Yesterday, October 4th, would have been my Grandma Wanda's birthday. I honestly don't know how old she would have been. She went to be with Jesus when I was still in High School. Grandma Wanda was not really my "grandma", that was her adopted name. When we lived in Benton Ridge Ohio, my brother, sister and I were very young. Somehow my parents began having Wanda come and stay with us and babysit at times. She got to be so close that she would travel on certain vacations with us just to help watch us kids. I'm not good with age, but I honestly think she was in her late 60 or early 70's during that time. Wanda was a lady who we loved to be around. She was just like a Grandma, only had no children of her own. Her husband had passed years before we met her and so we had each other. We loved to go to her house and I even remember getting to spend the night on occasion. She would always make hamburgers, french fries and chocolate pudding for us. We would play games together and I remember she would let me cheat at UNO by looking into her glasses at what cards she had. She thought that was the funniest! I also remember her coming to our house and we would play the Dukes of Hazard - she was always Boss Hog!

But Wanda was more than just a Grandma to us. She was a Prayer Warrior. Grandma Wanda loved Jesus with her whole heart. She would pray with us and read the Bible to us. She was a wonderful Godly women who I know is in Heaven today.

So throughout the day yesterday I thought of her. I wished that my husband and children could have known her. I wished that I could still go to her house for the chocolate pudding and UNO games. I thought throughout the day about her being in Heaven and how excited I am to see her again one day!

So today, as I remember Grandma Wanda, my prayer is that I will be a Godly Woman who loves Jesus with my whole heart and points all those around me to Jesus - even when I'm in my 70's!

Reflect His Glory

Today I have 5 kids (2 are mine and 3 are kids I babysit for). Monday's are usually a little rough. They have been away from each other all weekend and off the "normal" routine. So they were all fussy and at each other this morning and then I said, "let's listen to some music". I quickly put in the CD I had just gotten from the Come to the Fire Conference and they loved it. They started dancing and praising and it was so cool. They actually even made my CD skip in a couple of places.

The oldest little boy finished up his lunch and asked if he could listen to some more. Praise the Lord. They are hearing Jesus and loving it! I really wanted to find the CD so I could link it here, but I'm still looking for it. It's a great CD!

Come to the Fire

The past couple of days I had the opportunity to attend Come to the Fire, a Women's Conference that was held in Ft. Wayne. On Thursday night 7 other ladies came from Farmer UMC to join me at the conference. We were 8 of 1600 women who joined together for this conference.

It was a fantastic conference.
The 5 of us (my mom, good friend, Connie, me, Sue and Peg - both from Farmer) stayed the whole weekend and had a great time together.

But let me tell you a little more about this "Coming to the Fire". It is just what its' name says, an opportunity to Come to Jesus and into His Fire and be molded and shaped by His fire so that coming out on the other side I can Reflect His Glory. And be more like Jesus.

On Thursday night there were, as I mentioned, 7 other ladies from our Farmer Church who attended. I felt burdened for them and so badly wanted an opportunity to be the "good Pastor's Wife" and pray through things with them.

It was a wonderful time of Praise and an absolutely solid Biblical message given from my extended mother-in-law (OK, she's not really mine at all, but I feel connected because my sister married her son!). So Jesus used Ms. Bethie in a powerful way and many met him there.

Friday morning again was a time of wonderful praise and testimony and Jesus came again, but this hard hearted Pastor's Wife was too worried about those around me to hear Jesus.

Finally, Saturday afternoon the Holy Spirit got through to me. I waited until the end of the Healing Service, long after the invitation to come and then finally after many - "Jesus are you sure it's me you want?" I got up found a Godly lady that I knew Jesus put right behind me for a reason and went to the altar.

**Let me pause for just a minute**

Have you ever negotiated with Jesus? I sat in my seat for so long, tears rolling down my face, pleading with Jesus to show me, "is it me you want at the altar, are you sure it's not someone else?" Then, when He still wouldn't leave me alone (thankfully) I said, "well I don't want just anybody coming to the altar to pray with me." So he put that mother-in-law right behind me and my own mom right beside me. So I said, "well, Jesus, could they just tap me on the shoulder or something then I'll talk to them and go forward?"

I mean, really. Why don't they just go up and pray for me while they are at it!

But you know what Jesus did? He had my momma grab me around the shoulder and say, "are you OK, honey?"

I lied..."yeah (through tears), I'm OK." And Jesus said, what else do you want. How else can I prove to you that I want you to get out of your seat and come to me?

The tears came harder then and I realized the service was closing. The worship leaders were leading us in praise for all God had done, but I couldn't praise. I couldn't even begin to sing.

So I got up - FINALLY!

and walked to a beautiful lady who shines with Jesus, Stephanie, and ask her if she would pray with me at the altar.

Stephanie and I the next morning

and you know what...Jesus was there. He was there they whole time - He was waiting on me.

Through my tears I told Stephanie and Jesus that I simply wanted More of Him. I wanted Jesus to be Enough! I know in my head that He is, but I wanted Him to know that I wanted Him to Fill me from Head to Toe and be Enough and Fill me to Overflowing!

And He is and He Did!

Jesus is all I Need!

He's more than Enough!

Ephesians 3 gives Paul's prayer for the Ephesians. Where he prays that He may strengthen them with power through the Spirit, so that Christ my dwell in their hearts through faith. And that by being rooted and established in love, we may have power to grasp how wide and long and high and deep the love of Christ is. That we may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

He is More than Enough for all that we will Face in this World and not only that He wants to be with us all the way, in order to show us all that His power can do in our lives.

So to Him be the Glory!

AMEN!