Glimpses of Resurrection Sunday

Getting things in order

Sometime here I would like to share some of the goals I had in mind for myself and our family this year. I didn't do a full post about "New Year's Resolutions," but that's what I'm talking about.

I have a list of things that I'm working on, and one of those things was getting a will put in place for my husband and I. I guess that with 6 children you would think we had already done that, but we hadn't. One of the things that held us back was the cost involved. Plus, it seemed complicated and that involves more time figuring out how to navigate that road.

Last year, we hunkered down and secured a more reasonable amount of life insurance on both my husband and I. It has taken an adjustment in our budget, but we have much more peace of mind about this. As we were getting this all in place, the subject came up again about getting a will done.

Again, we hit a wall when it came to finances. I had overheard someone sometime telling another someone that they had just gotten a will done and that it had cost them $2,000. There is no way we can even come close to affording that, but we knew it was something that we HAD to figure out a way to do. Let me encourage you....if you have children.....if you have one iota of interest in what happens to your children if you were no longer around to care for them....then you have to have a will in place. If not, your children become wards of the state and there is this whole legal process to go through for a family member to get custody of them. Why not just take a few minutes now to get that information down on paper, toss it into a safe deposit box, and be done with it. Then if something tragic does happen to you, your grieving family won't have to go through all that with your sweet babies!!

ANYWAY, so this was a burden on my heart and one thing I wanted to get done THIS year!!

So I was praying about it, when I got a letter in the mail one day here this past January from this organization: Homeschool Legal Advantage

I am very familiar with them as most of the churches I have been involved with support their ministry. Plus, when I was in high school, David Gibbs Jr. was still participating in some debate competitions that my high school attended, as well as his father, David Gibbs Sr., being one of the featured speakers. They had just been at our church a few weeks earlier and I had had this conversation with the younger Gibbs. ANYWAY, so this letter says that because our church supports them, we were receiving a FREE membership to the "Homeschool Legal Advantage." It is a ministry that is comprised of Christian lawyers who will defend your right to homeschool and other things.

But here is the amazing news: one of the benefits of this membership is that they draft your "Last Will and Testament" for FREE!!!

FREE!!!

I couldn't believe it. They sent us a form to fill out for a basic will that names the caregiver for your children in the event you die before they are legal age. We sent that back, they emailed us a rough draft for corrections, they sent us a hard copy to have signed and executed. We signed it in front of a notary with two witnesses, and it was DONE!!! Easy......oh, and did I mention....FREE!!!!

If you go to their website, you can see all the benefits of the one-year membership and the cost! It's something like a "suggested donation" of $65 per year. But, my friend, that cost alone would be less than the cost of having a will drafted in another place!!! It would be so worth the one-year membership just to have your will drafted!!!! Please go check this out!! We did it and were thrilled with how available they were to answer any questions we had and the professionalism with which they treated us!!!

Go.....GO!!!

P.S. Once you get some of this stuff in order you may want to have a handy little thing like this to keep track of it all!!!

We have a winner!!!

A couple weeks ago, our local little newspaper introduced an Easter coloring contest. My children had entered a couple of their other contests before, so of course they wanted to participate this time too. Well, out of 175 entries in 3 different age groups, our Lexi won FIRST place in her age group. For those of you familiar with ADHD, this is a magnificent accomplishment for her!! She used 3 different mediums (puffy paints, crayons, rubber stamping) and it took her a couple different days to finish the project. It tested her focusing skills, and my patience with the mess she would leave behind every day, but she won a $35 gift card to the art school where her winning picture was displayed!!!

Her picture is the one above her head to the right with the blue ribbon on it!!

Signs of new life are everywhere

Spring's Rebirth

Springtime~and earth awakens,

Nature clothes herself anew;

After winter's bleakness

Spring comes smiling through.

Springtime~and tender grass

Spreads softly, greenly, o'er the lawn,

While chirping robins cheerfully

Proclaim the early dawn.

Springtime brings the sunshine~

Beams that warmly penetrate

To the darkly hidden spots

Where the germs of life await.

Springtime means new beginnings,

Sermons in each tender shoot;

Peach and plum and apple blossoms

Promise give of summer fruit.

Springtime~and Easter's message~

Earth adopts a hopeful mood.

Easter means resurrection,

Life and strength and faith renewed.

Easter~and reassurance

Soothes a weary, ravaged earth;

As again her people witness

The changeless miracle of spring's rebirth.

~Elizabeth Lathrop Powers

Reflecting

How can we forget?

How has this truth gotten so lost down through the generations?

How is it that so many people do not know?

How can so many people not believe it?

It is so profound.

It is so horrific.

It is so amazing.

It is so beautiful.

Do you know?

Have you remembered this week?

Please go here and read today's post. Watch the video clip. Then read yesterday's post.

Never forget.

Believe it was for you.

Accept.

Then live.

Live life anew.

Live life with new purpose, new meaning.

Remember.

April

Song

April, April,

Laugh thy girlish laughter;

Then, the moment after,

Weep they girlish tears!

April, that mine ears

Like a lover greetest,

If I tell thee, sweetest,

All my hopes and fears,

April, April,

Laugh thy golden laughter,

But, the moment after,

Weep thy golden tears!!

~William Watson

How are you remembering Christ's road to the cross this week?

This week our family is remembering the road that Christ took to the cross. You can follow through the Gospels and reflect on the activities of Jesus Christ that final week before His terrible death....His slaughter. This event climaxes everything the Old Testament was about......everything the Old Testament pointed to. God's satisfaction for the sins of mankind was permanently, this one time only, displayed hanging on the cross. His death so completely satisfied the debt that the ten-foot thick veil that hung between all believers and God the Father in the Temple in Jerusalem was divinely torn in half signifying that it was no longer necessary to have a human high priest go before God the Father to intercede for our forgiveness for our sin. Believers in Jesus Christ, Christians, now have full access to our Heavenly Father because Jesus Christ is now our High Priest and we can go before Him ourselves. That intimate relationship with God the Father was restored to us because of the death of Jesus Christ. Our sin that stains us and contaminates our being and prevents us from being in the presence of a Holy God has been covered by the blood of Jesus Christ.

I wanted to make this week of remembrance special for my children this year. I'm really not interested in combining this most sacred, holy, reflective time with bunnies, eggs, and candy. I don't really see how the two even relate? I do like to do baby animals, eggs, and candy for celebrating SPRING....but Easter? No. So for the last couple weeks, I've been looking for some great hands-on activities that my children can do together that really pictures what this week is all about. I found some beautiful ideas here.

Then I went over to one of my favorite blogs, Holy Experience, and found lots of great ideas.

Here are a couple things I found that I want to incorporate into our teaching times:

1. We made candy crosses today. "Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Romans 12:2. Are you learning how to be conformed to the image of Christ? Here are some pictures of our family's version:

2. On Wednesday I would like to do the project with the magazine pages and make some butterflys. We'll talk about new life....new life found in Christ....and the life cycle of butterflys.

3. I LOVE this idea about an Easter Lenten Garden. You must read this tutorial about how to construct one. I'm not sure I'm going to be able to get all the supplies together that are necessary before this week is over, but I'm going to try. My daughter's will love this project and it is just full of meaning!! If not this year, then next!! Read about it here.

4. Oh my!! The "Family Box of Repentance". Another lovely, profound idea that we'll incorporate and see how the Lord speaks to my heart full of pride!! Go see it here.