"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short and again and again, because there is no effort without failure and shortcoming; but who does actually strive todo the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms; the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat". -T Roosevelt  

We're pilgrims on the journey of the narrow road
And those who've gone before us line the way
Cheering on the faithful, encouraging the weary
Their lives a stirring testament to God's sustaining grace

Surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses
Let us run the race not only for the prize
But as those who've gone before us, let us leave to those behind us
The heritage of faithfulness passed on through godly lives


After all our hopes and dreams have come and gone
And our children sift through all we've left behind
May the clues that they discover and the memories they uncover
Become the light that leads them to the road we each must find

Oh may all who come behind us find us faithful
May the fire of our devotion light their way
May the footprints that we leave, lead them to believe
And the lives we live inspire them to obey

I listen to this song frequently. I need to purposefully take a day at a time, a moment at a time, and be faithful IN the moment, FOR the moment.

Moments become hours,

Hours, days.

Days, years

Years, our lifetime.

FIND ME FAITHFUL LORD.

I'm thinking of the states.....

Today is a day of very mixed feelings. I know this is home now, but my mind is back there, in the states, with my family. Most of them are at a cousins wedding, with lots of family and extended family, and one of my sisters is going home with a brand new baby, born last night.

These are the times that can be hard. I want to be there with everyone.

So I will count some blessings.

1. my sister and her husband just visited, and we had a great time!

2. A single Aunt, a friend, and 3 counsins will arrive in a little over a week. Yay!

3. Another sister and her husband and THREE girls (my children shout with the excitement of cousins coming!!) arrive in several weeks.

4. I am able to get pictures of the wedding, and the new baby via voxer. I LOVE that!

We are SERIOUSLY blessed by the support visitors show. We know it takes time, effort, not to mention, money, to take a trip like this. Thank you for making the days we miss home, easier, by your support. Maybe you aren't able to come physically, but you pray for us, and lots of times when someone comes and brings our mail, we get cards, letters, pictures, and gifts from our friends and family.

THANK YOU SO MUCH.

Why i work out....

This is a random post, but I keep thinking that some of my mommy friends

might be encouraged...

~~~~why I work out~~~~

I have every afternoon free and don't know what todo with all my extra time.

Every day, I have so much energy I can't help but work out

I need to loose weight

I want to build muscle.    (this one may be the most laughable)

I just plain love it so much its a hobby.

Nope, none of those are reasons I have been faithfully walking the 2 mile arobic walk with Leslie Sansone consistently for the last number of weeks

But here are a few reasons that I want to encourage my Mommy friends out there to EXCERSISE.

Its good discipline.

You feel better mentally, emotionally, and physically.

It only takes 30 minutes.  (for the particular workout I am doing)

Its good for your body; for your heart.

Its energizing. I am sure this is different for different people, but I would choose my 2 mile walk over a nap almost any day.

I'm almost 35. Enough  said.

Running the race....

Its a wonderful race, this life of ours. But that doesn't mean that it isn't a hard race sometimes:)

The last few weeks have been different in many ways. Then again, we've only been here not quite 5 months, so do we really know what "normal" is?

School is out and we have had some wonderfully fun hours of summer school. The children think it is great and I enjoy it too.

Then we got ready for my sister and brother in law's visit. We had SO MUCH FUN with them. We savored each day, and made lots of memories. Somehow, times stilled somewhat during that week. I feel like we did a lot of stuff, but I didn't feel busy or bustling.

Off to the beach!

The artist in our family, this Auntie knows how to get the girls' creativity flowing!

I still don't know if it was fortunate or unfortunate that the Agriculture conference that HRM hosted was this same week or not. It was nice in that I didn't have to cook. much. at. all. And Lorens got all the Haitian food they wanted. It also slowed life down here for the ladies in that we didn't do anything much except maintain , basically. This made it easy for me to take off for the beaches several times with Jean. Lovely!

It did mean Jess was very busy and we sometimes just got little glimses of him during a few of those days. He and the team did a wonderful job of coordinating everything, and I think every one of the 75+ people were blessed and encouraged to try new, innovative ways to grow food, crops for animals, prevent erosion, and conserve moisture during dry seasons.

Totally spellbound as Aunt Jean shares, and reads, Shaloms Story. She

gave each family one, written esp for children. The hospital procedures are explained,

and there are lots of beautiful pictures.

We love and miss you precious Girl.

Dance with the angels as you sit at the feet of Jesus.

I wasn't prepared for the sadness I felt after taking Jean & Loren back to the airport. It just made me a bit homesick... her going back to all my family. Maybe realizing just how far away we are.... how distance changes so much, but on the other hand, just how much we have as sisters, to even miss each other this much. We are more than sisters, we are FRIENDS. I'm thankful.

Experiments. ...

I have been wanting to start some herbs and container plants, but the lack of...
No... the price of....
No, I can't even say it's that necessarily. ( although when the majority of things cost almost 3x what you are used to, you think twice or three times before buying)
It's simply a lack of desperation I guess..
Today I got desperate. Wanted soemthing bad enough. And creativity kicked in. ( thank you for your help, Pintrest:))

I started with some peanut butter and mayo container,  a few milk powder tins, black spray paint, and we were on a roll.
( btw... does anyone else love spray paint like I do?! It transforms! )
I had a compost pile started months ago, so I mixed and stirred some dirt over the little stones I collected for drainage.
My mama and my sil had generously showered me with packets of seeds: cilantro, basil, parsley, oregano, chives, & thyme.

And then there were the packets of lettuce just begging to be planted. I've tried several times but to no great avail.
A little peek in the shop junk pile revealed some old drawers that suddenly inspired me. Why not plant a lettuce bed in them so I can move it from sun to shade as well as control the soil abit better? Worth a try!
Ill let you know in a few weeks what happens. In the meantime, my little porch corner has high hopes from me... don't you wanna sit here and have coffee with me while we watch the herbs grow?:)