Build Your House on a Rock!

THIS MONTH'S THEME IS "HOME!"  

I apologize for being late. October was a hard and stressful month for us -- financially and personally with the death of certain expensive machines that we've come to depend on, needing new medical devices, and the sudden illness and death of a family member. Please be kind and extend grace. Thank you. 

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ACTIVITY:
The online Be the Light Bible Journaling Conference was GREAT!  It was packed with so much information and I learned a lot! Since I got a FREE pass, I took copious notes and put them and the printable hand-outs we received in a pink 3-ring binder notebook! smile! Thank you, God, for the opportunity to attend! Thank you, Dayspring, for contributing the prizes for the conference! Lonnie and Tracie Rollins were the host and hostess of this conference and Tracie has a lesson about a gratitude journal on their ministry website. Check it out! 

Here's Stephanie explaining what five products she uses to Bible Journal with during her interview workshop. She said she gets overwhelmed with too many choices and is basically a simple gal. 

I got really excited too, when I discovered a Sketch-noting Workshop given by Marsha Baker in the schedule of workshops given at the conference. It had to be a God-thing, because I had only made the decision a few days before that, that I needed some kind of organization when I took sermon notes because I couldn't find something in my notebook that I thought I had written down and nothing is more aggravating than not finding what you want. smile! Stephanie had inspired me to take sermon notes in the first place, but I think Sketch-noting will assist me in organizing my notes better! Thank you, Jesus, for good ideas! In addition, Marsha has 365 Days of Gratitude Journaling Prompts on her website -- if you want to find out more, click here! 

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CARDS: 

A Christmas Card sent to us by a Cindy cousin last year!!! I thought it was perfect for this theme as it has apartments on the front. Not everyone's homes are single dwelling cottages. Some prefer to live in apartments or condos. 

Sending a Little Sunshine Your Way (this card was attached to the back of a larger card front that my friend Karen Lange gave me a few months before she passed away and I  made it into a tag. It is inserted into a pocket which was taped into the journal as an insert with clear packing tape.)

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DEFINITIONS: 

Victory -- 1. to conquer, 2. overcome great trial, 3. emerge as champion. 

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POETRY:

Bless our house as we come and go.

Bless our home as the children grow.

Bless our family as they gather in.

Bless our home with love and friends. 

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May you always have. . .

Walls for the winds

A roof for the rain

Tea beside the fire

Laughter to cheer you

Those you love near you.

And all your heart might desire.

May joy and peace surround you,

Contentment latch your door,

And happiness be with you now

And bless you evermore!

(~ An Old Irish Blessing)

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The Little House is not too small

To shelter friends who come to call

Though low the roof and small its space

It holds the Lord's abounding grace,

And every simple room may be

Endowed with happy memory.

(~ Edgar Guest)

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HOLY SCRIPTURES:

Joshua 24:15c = As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord. 

1 Chronicles 16:43 = Then all the people left each for his own home, and David returned home to bless his family. 

Psalm 84:10 = Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God. . . 

Psalm 127:1a = Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain.

Proverbs 24:3-4 = By wisdom a house is built, and through understanding it is established; through knowledge its rooms are filled with rare and beautiful treasures. 

Matthew 7:24-27 = Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on a rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash!

John 14:2 = In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you.

Hebrews 3:4 = For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything.

1 Peter 2:4-5 = As you come to him, the living Stone -- rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him -- you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 

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QUOTES:

"At Livia's indecisive silence, Shaw abandoned the subject and fastened his gaze on the tousled, heavily planted cottage garden ahead of them. Long banners of honeysuckle trailed over the garden fence, its fragrance making the air thick and sweet. Butterflies danced amid bright splotches of poppies and peonies. Beyond a plot of carrots, lettuce, radishes, a rose-covered archway led to a tiny glass-house that was shaded by a parasol-shaped sycamore." (Lisa Kleypas).

"Cottage of Content was better than the Palace of Cold Splendour, and that where love was, all was." (Charles Dickens, David Copperfield). 

"Everyone can identify with a fragrant garden, with beauty of sunset, with the quiet of nature, with a warm and cozy cottage." (Thomas Kinkade).

"Everyone needs a house to live in, but a supportive family is what builds a home." (Anthony Liccione). 

"For a man's house is his castle." (Sir Edward Coke, 1644.)

"It was all a cottage is supposed to be, small and snug, with a front porch, pink climbing roses, and lots of trees for shade." (Jeanne Birdsall).

"Home isn't where you're from. It's where you find light when all grows dark." (Pierce Brown.)

"Home is the nicest word there is." (Laura Ingalls Wilder). 

"Prayer is the most concrete way to make our home in God." (Henri Nouwen).

"The ache for home lives in all of us, the safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned." (Maya Angelou)

"There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort." (Jane Austen). 

"The woman who makes a sweet, beautiful home, filling it with love and prayer and purity, is doing something better than anything else her hands could find to do beneath the skies." (J. R. Miller, Home-Making.)

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SAYINGS: 

Bloom Where You Are Planted. 

Come on Home For the Holidays! (CrackerBarrel Restaurant's Silverware belly band)

Home is where I want to bee! 

Home is where your heart 💟 is!

Home, Sweet Home! 🏡

HOME: the story of who we are and a collection of all the things we love. 

Little by little, the bird makes its nest. 

Our house is just a LITTLE house. . . but GOD knows where we live! 

Shabby Chic Cottage

The first step to living the life that you want is leaving the life you don't want. 

There is no place like home!

. . . Until the Queen arrives! 

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SWEET MEMORIES:

Grandma's home

I was hired on as a pantry girl for Costello's Greenhouse Restaurant and worked there for over a year before being hired to work at a church camp in the center of Kansas the following summer. I remember helping to fix their signature Dirt Cake in glass pots with chocolate cake crumbs with a surprise in the middle and a flower and their yummy spinach and sour cream stuffed baked potatoes. The first thing they always had new kitchen help do was a test of sorts cause I managed to survive my first three days peeling and deveining cold boiled jumbo shrimp. They were first boiled in huge pots, drained, then pour into a barrel on ice, stuck into the walk-in frig to cool and then they were peeled/deveined for their popular cocktail shrimp appetizer. We always had supply of new hirelings to do that job cause it was a tedious one and you worked your whole shift on your feet. smile! 

I married my honey and began our new home together in May of 1982. We lived in an upstairs, downstairs 2 bedroom duplex in former navy housing. 

3 Feb 1993 = We were driving to church and our young son asked us about how he could become a Jesus boy. It was our privilege to pray with him as he asked Jesus to come into his heart so they could be friends. He was later baptized as a teenager. Made his daddy and mom so happy!

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VIDEO!