Monday, December 28, 2009

The Box

So here is the link to my sermon yesterday....
The Box - Deuteronomy 1:26-33
Once there you'll have to choose mine.

Sunday, December 27, 2009

A memorable Anniversary

Okay one more post for the day and then I'm done! Today is Rob and I's 12th wedding anniversary! It has been an amazing day! Derek and Jackie had coffee with us this morning and then headed out. I headed out the door at the same time to go over to church. Today was my first preaching experience in my home church! I don't know an exact count but probably in front of nearly 250 people.

Rob brought the kids to service. Grandpa and Gramma Nuzum came over. It really meant a lot to me that they came and even more that Grandpa said when I was done. "They better let you do this more, or they can come talk to me!" I love my grandpa. He's the best!

Uncle Jeff and Julie came as well! Afterwards, Julie came over to the house for a bit. Charlene and her family also came for this first-time experience. It was such a great feeling to know that my friends and family were out there supporting me.

I was a little nervous, okay...really I was terrified, but God worked it out! I'll have to watch it back to see how I really did. But I think it went well and everyone keeps telling me that it did. When the video is posted to the church website I'll let you know, so you can watch it.

After church, Jourdyn went to spend the night at Katie's and Rob and I have hung out all day with the two little ones. He took me to dinner at Luckie's tonight for our anniversary and we are getting ready to watch some movies together!

I can't believe it's already been 12 years since we got married! That's amazing! I love him more and more everyday!

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Visiting with The Greenwald's

Derek and Jackie came up to Michigan to have Christmas with his family. Saturday morning they headed down to us to spend the day. We haven't spent Christmas time with the Greenwald's since before they moved to Virginia. So this was a special weekend for us!

We exchanged gifts for the kids! They got Jourdyn some bath and body works and an Old Navy gift card. Rowan and Nadine some coloring stuff and candy! She brought me a beautiful pic of Carl, Stirling and Ainsley and a Yankee candle! We gave the girls some Brighton Jewelry. Stirling a bracelet that says "Believe in yourself." Ainsley a necklace that says "love & respect."

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Since they were in town, we made a trip to the Toledo Zoo. Rob and I renewed our membership finally and off we went to explore the lights. The lights themselves seemed to be a bit of a cut back, but with the economy who can blame them. But the kids had fun. The older girls are getting so big. They've always had their little squabbles because there's three of them. But this is the first year that we got to experience those raging hormones of teenage girls. It was FUN!!!! :) Especially at 2 am when I was splitting up a cat fight!

Overall they love each other and had fun! And this morning when they headed out they all hugged and made up!

Rowan loved the train display. We had a hard time pulling him away from it. Check out the pictures you can see the excitement in his face! He was in love! In the Smilebox you can scroll over the pics and click on them to zoom them bigger to see them better.

After the Lights we headed downtown to try to get into Pizza Papalis. Everytime we have ever tried to get in there it has been packed. So this was our first time! And there was no waiting. We had an excellent waiter. He was fantastic. And when you put us with Derek & Jackie, you know your eating experience will never be boring!! We had so much fun!

The food is FANTASTICAL!!! The kids made their own pizzas, and we ordered their famous Chicago style deep dish! Better than UNO's anyday!!!!! We will definitely be going back! Kudos to Pizza Papalis!

Well, Derek & Jackie's stay wasn't long enough. It never is! They stayed the night and left first thing this morning to head home so Derek could get to work. We are hoping to head down for a four day weekend in February sometime! And if all goes well, we'll be vacationing with them next summer at Cape Hatteras!
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Christmas Day

We watched the Disney Parade! I just couldn't get into this year. I have always thought it was live and have had this dream to take my kids there for Christmas morning one year. My friend Ronda, my Disney expert, told me around Thanksgiving that this wasn't the case. It is filmed in late November/early December. It just wasn't the same this year! But we did watch and enjoyed the time together!

Julie, Bro and Kelsey came over for the night! We ate dinner. Keilbasa, ham and pierogies, of course. We then decided to head over to Food For Thought and give the gift of time and sandwich making to that ministry. We spent about an hour there making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with about 25 other people. It was great! Nadine and Rowan colored lunch bags. Brodie and Julie put jelly on the sandwiches, Jourdyn and Kelsey did peanut butter. Rob brought bread and kept that stocked. And I filled in where I could! It was an awesome evening! It was really neat to be there on Christmas Day giving of ourselves for others, very symbolic of the giving that Jesus did the day of His birth and 33 years later on the cross!!! It was cool!

Charlene had dropped off a couple of her girls to help, so we got to visit with them for a few minutes. And then we went home. We opened presents and played "Last Word" for a while! We put the kids to bed and watched the movie "The Hangover!" It was pretty funny!

Also before Rob got home from work, Julie had come early and brought Bro's copies of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. We watched the first one. Rowan absolutely loved it. He's not completely able to sit still for a whole movie yet, but he did his best. And all weekend he has been quoting the Turtles, saying things like "Radical" and "Cowabunga!"

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Christmas Morning

Well, since Christmas Eve it has been non-stop around here! So I will be posting several posts tonight to catch you all up!

We spent Christmas Eve at our church service and then the McQueary's. With every passing year since Jack's death the holiday's continue to change around there. It's been 4 years this year, in fact today (the 27th is the 4th anniversary of our burying him.) Things are just different. But we hung out for a while talking with Crystie and Joe and some of the other nieces and then came home.

These pictures are our Christmas morning pictures. Rob worked this holiday on day shift. So we all woke up Christmas morning at 4:45 am to open presents as a family! I was hoping the kids would just go back to sleep, but not my luck! They were up for the day at that point!


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The kids received clothing and a couple of toys. Grandma & Grandpa MacFarlane sent a gift card and I went shopping for them. Since they live in Idaho it's really expensive to buy gifts and send them. The two little ones received outfits from them. Jourdyn got a giftcard, which she will most likely buy a new Wii game with??? Rob received a pair of Nike running pants and I received some jewelry!

Nadine and Rowan got some new games: Operation and Cooties! They love them both. Jourdyn got a new MP3 player and some really cool piano gloves.

It was a good Christmas. Rob went off to work and the kids and I spent the day watching movies and cleaning for our evening festivities with Julie, Bro and Kelsey!

Monday, December 21, 2009

Jourdyn's Christmas Performance

Jourdyn and her friend Brookelynn had the opportunity to sing "When Christmas Comes to Town" at church yesterday in front of 300 people! It's the same song they sang at school, but minus one girl, so Jourdyn got solos!! She was wonderful!! I was so proud of her!!! I am proud of her! God has given her a great gift of music!!!

Christmas Recital 2009

I always love this time of year because Jourdyn has her Christmas Recital. She traditionally has a spring and a winter recital, this one being smaller than the spring. But we love it anyways. Here's a video of the her playing. She played Fur Elise and What Child is This? And did a great job. Both songs are a little complicated and she did a fantastic job! Enjoy!

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Concert videos


Christmas Concerts

Last night was Jourdyn's Christmas Band and Choir Concert for school. I was so excited! At the beginning, some 8th graders sang pre-concert solos, like O Holy Night, Do you hear what I hear?. It was so neat to be sitting in a public school and have the kids singing about Jesus' birth. Way back when Jourdyn was in kindergarten in a different district, they wouldn't even call it a Christmas program, it was a holiday program, in which no "holiday" songs were sang.

Jourdyn sang in a trio with her friends, Brookelynn and Mackenzie. This was a surprise for me. She hadn't told me anything about it. They sang, "When Christmas Comes to Town" from the movie The Polar Express.

Our arts department does such a fantastic job! I'm really hoping that Jourdyn clings to this gift that she has been given!

The Bands performed last and sadly Jourdyn was sitting in the back with the other sax's so you can't see her. I got a couple shots of her like "Mr. Wilson" from Home Improvement, peeking over her music stand. Again, they played songs like Hark the Herald Angels sing, God rest ye Merry Gentlemen and the sorts! It was a great night!

I will have video shortly! :)

Monday, December 14, 2009

Christmas Fun

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This was the weekend of Christmas parties! We started out on Saturday at church for Breakfast with Santa. We had donuts and cereal with about 150 kids and parents, then watch Santa and his elves tell the story of Jesus! It was fun. We had to leave that one early, so we missed the craft and picture with Santa, so we could make it to the Brush Kid's Christmas party out in Fremont.

Evalee's daughter Mandi was there to help with crafts! The kids made Santa pins and opened their gifts! We didn't wait to see Santa there either. The line was way to long! So we will be visiting Bass Pro this week to see the Santa man!

Just the other day in the store, Rowan was telling us how much he wanted Nerf guns, and that's what he got at the Brush party! He's so excited! Nadine received a Sorry game, to which she is happy with except the Spongebob theme. But they will play with it anyways. This was Jourdyn's final year for the Brush party's. They stop giving gifts at 12 years old. And she received 20 bucks cash!

On another note, some friends of ours are moving and couldn't keep their furniture. They were going to put it to the curb because it was dirty. So we said, no, don't just throw it away, let's try to clean it and see what happens! Needless to say, I have pretty much brand new furniture sitting in my living room! When they had bought it, they had a protection plan put on it, so it was scotchguarded - everything was surface. It took me about 3 hours of deep cleaning and it's beautiful! :) It's microsuede so in the picture it looks different colors but it's not.

Friday, December 11, 2009

Daisies in Action

Tonight was our first Daisy service project. The Girl Scouts offers projects like collecting socks or hats and scarfs. But I thought the girls should do something hands on. So I decided to take them to Food For Thought.

Three of my daisies came and we had a lot of fun coloring the bags that the Peanut Butter and Jelly lunches will go in. When it was time to go, none of them wanted to! They were ready to dive in and make sandwiches!

I've made a slideshow with some of the artwork and pictures of the Daisies in action!

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Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Christmas Preparation








Today was the day that we finally got our Christmas decorations down and began to decorate the house! We put up only one big tree this year. We've decided we are going to look for a clearanced 9-ft tree at the end of the season. We also put up Nadine pink feather tree and Jourdyn put up her white tree in her room!

We are expecting a big storm tonight so maybe no school tomorrow! We'll see!!!!

Grandma's village is out and under my TV. Stockings are hung! And one of my nativity's is up. Our Women's Ministries Christmas party is Thursday and our theme is nativity so most of my nativities are in a box waiting to be used as centerpieces on Thursday.

School is officially DONE for me!!! I haven't received my final grade for this last class yet! I will be updating my resume soon! I am also preaching for the first time at my church on my anniversary, Dec. 27th! Exciting and terrifying - all rolled into one big ball!!!! :)

Friday, December 4, 2009

My Hero

Jourdyn has a Hero's banquet at school today. She invited me. I was up early and got ready to go experience the 7th Grade Hero Banquet. I was a little nervous. I had never been to one of these before and thought it a little fishy that Jourdyn would invite me! :)

But she loves me, whether she wants to admit it or not! And she made me cry! We were near the end so it took a very long time and we watched almost everyone else. No one hugged their admirer at all. I was going to and then I thought that could very well be social suicide if I clobber her with hugs right here on stage!

Here's what she wrote for me and read in front of the 7th grade class and all their heroes and you better bet it's being hung on my wall:


My Hero
By Jourdyn McQueary

My hero is my mom. Her name is Sharon McQueary. She doesn't work, but she does go to school online at Northwest Nazarene University. She lives with me and my family. She loves to sing and is a really great artist. She enjoys having fun and is always messing around with me and my dad. She also enjoys going on Facebook and her blog.

I invited my mom because she is an example of what a hero is to me. She always tries her best and doesn't give up. She's always there for me-even when I think I don't want her there. She is also loving and smart. She even stays home with my brother and sister all day, and that is really brave. She is very protective of my family too. I can't imagine life without her.

One thing we did together is go to a conference called Revolve. It was a conference for girls in middle school and high school. We had a whole weekend down in Columbus. We went with a big group of people from our church. We had lots of fun. We even got an autograph from Krystal Meyers, a famous singer. Afterwards we all went to the Cheesecake Factory-I think that was my mom's favorite part. This experience was really important to me because I got to spend time with my mom. It was really great.

Thank you for being my hero and my mom. I'm thankful for you always being there and caring about me. I love having you as my mom. We may fight sometimes but we get along more than we fight and that is the important thing. You're really great. Thank you so much.

 
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