Fall Colors

I promised my good friends Michele and Leah that I would post more pictures of fall colors. So here is some more fall colors from So. IL! ENJOY!

Something else that seems to go with fall here in IL are these wonderful wolly worms (catepillars). There is a farmer's tale that says, if you see wolly worms crossing the road that we are suppose to have a very cold winter...if this is true then we are in for a long cold winter here this year.

Where is the common sense???

This is so outrageous! It's completely maddening! How is a parent of a special needs child to feel safe enough to send her child to pubic school? Let alone her typically functioning children?? I do not want to paste the whole article and have no idea how to post the video but please check these two stories out... Experts question benefit of school time-out rooms also on that same page you will find the video of a 3 yr. old autistic child left on a school bus alone for 6 hours. The link to that video is on the left of the Time out article. I simple am disgusted with how little people value a human life let alone the life of a precious child! All children have the right to be cared for and treated with respect and decency. Autistic children have feelings! Our Kristofer is very sensitive to how you talk to him. Talk to him with an angry tone and he gets very upset. Usually ends up crying. I can't imagine the fear these two precious kids must have faced during these two situations.

Mister

So a few months ago we had two kittens born on our front porch. A neighbor boy took them away and we haven't seen them since. Until yesterday! The kids were outside playing and Jaron over heard the neighbors talking. One person said I am getting rid of this cat. The other said what did you do with it...I put it on the church front steps was the answer. So what do my kid do...go find the cat. Well low and behold...the kitten turned out to be our Mister that was taken from us. The kids are besides themselves with joy! He is about 4 months old now, smaller than most 4 mo old kittens. SO her are a few pictures I took of him today.

Shame on Denis Leary

OK this is a repost from a guest blogger: Angela from Memoirs of a Chaotic Mommmy.

Let me just warn you in advance there are some choice words that are not Angela's! They have been ** out. This is a quote from Denis Leary's new book. This really makes me upset! If anyone is a moron, it is Denis Leary! Sorry if I offend you but this quote offends me, a parent of an autistic child! You can read the original article at The Huffington Post.

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In his new book:"There is a huge boom in autism right now because inattentive mothers and competitive dads want an explanation for why their dumb-a** kids can't compete academically, so they throw money into the happy laps of shrinks . . . to get back diagnoses that help explain away the deficiencies of their junior morons. I don't give a [bleep] what these crackerjack whack jobs tell you -- yer kid is NOT autistic. He's just stupid. Or lazy. Or both."

Truly he should have learned from Michael Savage's mistakes.

So, in the spirit of protecting our kids I have found the following:

#1 the book will not be released until November 18th.

#2 the publisher is Viking Adult and you can find them through Penguin.

VIKING
vikingpublicity@us.penguingroup.com

"Fan Mail"

Apostle Pictures Inc.
(Production Company)

568 BroadwaySuite
301New York, NY 10012
USA
(212) 541-4323
Fax: (212) 541-4330

Colors

As promised to my dear friend Michele over at An Adoptive Family's Life. I am posting some colors from our back yard and some other pictures of the kids playing with our not so little puppy. Izzy will be 6 mo old on Oct 18th (Sat), she was born on April 18th (Kristofer's birthday). I plan to take more pictures of the colors as more appear. Many have come out but there are still many trees that are just starting to change. Enjoy!

Oh just a little praise note....Sara's CT scan came back negative! NO KIDNEY STONES! Apparently either she passed it or God healed her. We believe God healed her!

Appreciation

October is Pastor Appreciation Month. Today our congregation surprised us with a love offering and some kind words. Then tonight we were surprised with a small party with some yummy cake, banana pineapple punch and these beautiful red roses. Many in our congregation show us through out the year how much they care about us through small things such as watching our kids for us when we needed to go as a couple for the results of the evals for Kristofer or when I had knee surgery, the ladies made us dinner every night for a month.

If you are not in ministry can just encourage you to show your pastors how much you appreciate them. If you can do anything big because of money, a card of encouragement will do! If you can do more but don't know what to do ~ something from the heart means the most! But respecting your pastor's family time is extremely important! As a pastor's wife who works along side her husband in ministry any time we can spend together as a family outside of the ministry is cherished. Anytime we can spend together without a phone call or a scheduled event we must attend is cherished.

Now don't get me wrong! We love being in the ministry! We are servants by heart! e love teaching and leading others to Christ! But we are also human just like you, we need to be able to just be a family. So respect your pastor's time and wait till the morning if your call is not an emergency.

This month take time to tell or show your pastors how much you appreciate all they do for you, your family and your church! They do much more than you may think they do. It's all the small things that we do that make the ministry continue to flow! We do all of these things to reach the lost for Christ and if it wasn't for the strength that He gives us we could not accomplish all things for HIS GLORY!

Learning...

more than I truly care to know! Once again we are on another medical journey with one of our kids. This just happens to be with Sara again. If you recall at the end of August she was hospitalized for severe stomach cramping. The doctor never figured out what the problem was and we gave God the glory for healing our baby. We still are. Well two weeks ago we went to a WIC appointment. WIC is a wonderful program and I highly advise all mothers to be and of small children to check into it. It truly is a blessing.

Anyway, while at the appointment we were made aware that Sara's iron count was low so they recommended we check with the doctor. So yesterday we headed to the doctor and then was sent to have blood work. While at the doctor's office Sara was complaining about her stomach again, something she does all the time. Sometimes because she is hungry, sometimes because she needs to go potty. But other than in August the pain has never stopped her from being an active little 4 yr old. So she also had the job of peeing in a cup. Which she thought was the funniest thing in the world.

Thankfully her blood work came back all normal but her urinalysis did not. She has all the signs of having kidney stones. I about flipped when her doctor told us that. So tomorrow she will be having a CT done to make sure there are no stones in the kidneys and make sure her kidneys are working correctly.

Am I nervous? You betcha! Freaked out that my little girl has to have this done, OH YEA! But I am also for Godly wisdom. Because to be honest the results at the WIC office weren't so low that I should have been concerned. Even our doctor was like those numbers aren't low enough to warrant any worry but being cautious because she has been ill we took her to the doctor and are thankful we did. God allow things to happen and my experience is that many times He does so that other things can be revealed. In this case that she has crystals in her urine indicating kidney stones. My research and Sean's sister has reassured us that this is actually more common than I ever knew. So please keep her in prayer tomorrow at 8:30 AM central time. We probably won't have the results till Monday morning. Either way just pray what may be there is passed without incident.

Feeling a little tested!