Good morning! I stumbled across this on another blog this morning and was very moved by it! How can I do anything but be humbled and then worship, honor, and praise our God?! Enjoy!!
Yum! We made this tonight for dinner and it was so yummy, the five of us ate it all up! It is SO easy and healthy (well, I think it is!). ENJOY!!
Italian Bread Salad
1 pre-baked Italian bread shell crust (14 oz.), cubed
1 1/2 cups diced fresh tomatoes (I used roma tomatoes)
1/2 cup thinly sliced fresh basil
1/2 cup Italian salad dressing, divided
7 cups ready-to-serve salad greens
1 small green pepper, julienned
1 cup sliced pepperoni
1 cup (4 oz.) shredded mozzarella cheese (or cubes are nice, too)
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup sliced ripe olives
In a large salad bowl, combine bread cubes, tomatoes, basil, and 1/4 cup salad dressing; let stand 5 minutes. Add the salad greens, green pepper, pepperoni, mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses, and olives. Add remaining salad dressing and toss to coat. 8 - 10 servings.
I have many things on my heart today - I don't even know how to articulate them all. I feel a bit weary, a bit uncertain about our future, and a bit lonely. Some things are coming to an end here -- school, my daughter Anna's senior year (and then graduation), our Perspectives class -- and I feel a bit of loss and letdown. Could you pray for me/us? For direction, joy in the journey, patience (!), and peace? Thank you friends.....
It seems life has suddenly shifted gears to a new speed that I feel a little unprepared for! We are making plans for a few things coming up and it appears the next three months will be a whirlwind. We are making preparations for:
finishing up school for my three at home next week! Wow! Hard to believe we are nearing the end of my 15th year of homeschooling. Even harder to believe I'll have graduated 2 girls already! Oh, my.
our oldest daughter to come home from college and move back in May 9! Yeah! This is always exciting, but does take us all quite a bit of adjusting (for her and all of us!).
our second daughter's homeschool high school graduation! We are doing fairly low-key things (an open house on May 17 and a prayer night for her on the 18th, in lieu of a graduation ceremony!)
my daughter and I to take her "senior trip" together. I have really dropped the ball on planning this, but it does still seem like we will try a trip to Mackinac Island sometime the end of May. Can't wait!!
my husband and I to travel to Cincinnati for a three-day Vineyard church conference mid-May. We are very excited to have been invited and to attend! Long drive, though.
our 24th wedding anniversary on June 9. Actually, there are no plans for celebrating this.....yet. But I think we should!! Praise God for His blessings and an amazing man!
our daughter's departure for her one-year mission trip (leaving mid-July)....ooooo...this one is getting painful. I am thrilled for this opportunity in her life and wouldn't dream of changing anything, but, oh, am I going to miss her.
We had the opportunity to travel to Kentucky this past week to explore the state while my husband happily spent three days at the Together for the Gospel conference in Louisville:
We had to learn the proper way to say it and even then got it wrong most of the time. I have to admit, we had a hard time understanding the southern accent we heard. I had to ask people twice to repeat what they said. Ugh....such a northerner I am.
By the way, my husband had an amazing time at the T4G conference. There were 5000 men (and a few women) there, soaking in good teachings by such godly men as John Piper, R.C. Sproul and CJ Mahaney. He was overwhelmed and very moved by the powerful teachings. Can't wait to see what God will do next!! Check out the web site -- you and your hubby can listen to the great teachings via MP3! These are all the books the T4G folks gave to each attendee (15 books in all!!!):
The girls and I traveled even farther south than Louisville to Mammoth Caves:
and enjoyed our fairly strenuous tour through the belly of the earth! (stalactites, by the way)
We saw the colonel, lots of bridges (over the Ohio river, of course), and the Kentucky Derby Museum. It was FUN!
I am thankful for fun, happy, lively, creative, silly, unpredictable, joyful, lovely and dear girls to share my life with. It would have been a perfect trip if our oldest daughter, Becca, could have come along, but college is filling her days with busyness! ( We love and miss you, Becca!!!) It truly was a special time with our girls!
I just had to share this funny comment made recently by my youngest daughter, Emma. Our oldest daughter, Becca (a junior in college) has had a boyfriend for almost a year now and his family comes from a small, country town. He comes over for dinner quite a bit when Becca is home and is always surprised by what we have for dinner. He raved about his mom's home cooking (good boy!) and her meatloaf. My dear Emma, very innocently, asked the whole table: "What's meatloaf, Mom?"
I think I laughed so hard I cried. Her question actually made me very, very happy. I had not made meatloaf in probably 15 or more years. Just last night, we had North African Pigeon Pie (OK, it was really chicken, but it was supposed to be pigeon -- I just couldn't find those at Meijers.), orange, onion and olive salad and a sweet potato dish with onions and tomatoes. One of our family favorites is teriyaki chicken stir fry, or this great N. African dish with chicken, sweet potatoes and raisins all slathered over couscous. Believe me, I am not a gourmet cook -- I get scared if a recipe has more than 15 ingredients -- but we certainly do like variety and flavorful meals.
I try at least 4 new recipes a week (from my 12 years worth of Taste of Home magazines or online at Food Network or cook books from the library) and we absolutely LOVE different cultures' foods. So, after Emma said that, I dutifully went online to the Food Network and found Bobby Flay's recipe for meatloaf and gave it a whirl. Result: a big veto from the family. Too boring! Hahahahaha.
Here's my recipe for N. Africa Turkey Stew:
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 large sweet potato, cut into chunks, about 2 cups
1 cup chopped onion
1 cup peeled and sliced fresh carrots
1 clove fresh garlic, minced
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 (14.5 oz) can diced tomatoes, undrained
1 3/4 cup water
1/2 cup raisins
2 cups cooked turkey (or chicken, both taste good in here -- try to use dark chicken)
1/4 cup shelled pistachios, chopped
box or two of couscous
1.Heat oil in large saucepan over medium heat. Add sweet potatoes, onions, carrots and garlic. Stir. Cook 6 minutes, or until onions are tender, stirring frequently.
2. Stir in cumin, ginger, cinnamon, and salt. Cook 1 minute.
3. Add tomatoes with liquid, water and raisins and stir well. Bring to a boil. Cover.
4. Reduce heat to low: simmer 25 minutes or until vegetables are tender.
5. Cook couscous acc. to package directions. Cover to keep warm.
6. Add turkey (chicken) to vegetable mixture: cook 5 minutes or until heated through.
7. Serve stew spooned over the couscous, sprinkle with pistachios.
Another wonderful and humbling report!! Anna's fundraiser was so special and wonderful last night. She shared her testimony and Doug and I were able to share as well. It was very moving and precious! We are thankful for our God and our daughters!
The evening raised over $5,000!! Beyond what she needs!!
A surprise for me last night: Anna had been praying that I would be able to come visit her sometime during the year she is gone and that specifically any extra raised would be used for a plane ticket for me! Hallelujah!! I'm tickled pink and so excited to be able to go visit her on the field. It was a wonderful surprise and of course there were lots of tears and hugs! I will probably go halfway through her year, perhaps in January!
An amazing evening of giving glory to God and watching Him open the door for Anna!
It has certainly been a busy week here for us. Anna's fundraiser is this Saturday night and we are very busy gearing up for that. We are expecting several hundred people! I just wrote my little "speech" for it and I cried reading it aloud for my husband to hear. It's going to be a very emotional evening of blessing and supporting our daughter and her mission to Africa. (please pray for me as I recover from a cold!)
We finally took Emma (our youngest) to the doctor Monday after weeks of coughing and she is now on antibiotics for bronchitis. Poor little one. She played outside a bit today, since the weather was so lovely (a balmy 46 degrees with sun!) and came in coughing and coughing.
While we were at the doctor Monday, they said they heard a heart murmur and wanted to check it out more thoroughly, so off we went yesterday to a big city hospital for a echocardiogram of that precious heart of hers. It looked awesome to me and all I could think of watching it tick away was how fearfully and wonderfully made we are, by a mighty, awesome and loving Creator! I'll keep you all updated on Emma's heart!
The other thing we did this week was to go ahead and get pre-approved for a mortgage. No problem! I was thrilled to hear of our excellent credit score and thankful for the faithful provision of the Lord. Please continue to pray for us for wisdom on whether to buy a house here or wait and see if the Lord opens a door for us into the ministry somewhere. It's a pretty huge decision to make!
Here are three pictures of our field trip to the Kalamazoo Air Zoo (see "spring break" post below). It was fun day! The 3D rides were super, especially the one simulating the WWII air fight -- very moving!
I don't have any good pictures of the girls to post, since they were all silly that day and so many of them turned out just plain goofy! Hahaha....we are a silly bunch, our family.
Random thoughts on our life in beautiful Michigan (the mitten!), serving the Father, homeschooling with our four amazing daughters, and cuddling Maggie, our adorable pug.
(stalactites, by the way)
Hahaha....we are a silly bunch, our family. 
