I just found out that some friends are facing a terrible trial right now. Dave and Karen Hauseman have been friends of my family from my childhood and have been blessed with 7 or 8 children. The four oldest were on their way home last night from visiting an aunt in Texas and were involved in a horrible car accident.

The oldest, Luke, was killed. Anna sustained serious head injuries and is critical condition, in and out of consciousness. Ethan has a broken jaw, and Julia has unspecified injuries.

The Houseman’s are from Atchison, KS, and the rest of the family is headed down to Texas today. Dave has requested prayer for wisdom.

Please keep this precious family in your prayers in the coming days. I’ll post any updates that I receive.

Here’s a link to the local news story. Thanks for the link, Lynn.

I like working with a menu, but I’ve never been very good at making them! I’ve purchased the Menu Mailers from the Dinner Diva for a couple of 3 month stretches, and really liked them. My family liked them as well, but I missed having our favorites.

We’re off on a new learning journey. Ellie had a long overdue exam at the eye doctor’s today, and she apparently has Bilateral Refractive Amblyopia. In layman’s terms, this means that she has two lazy eyes, caused by her brain being overwhelmed by the degree of her vision loss and astigmatism and, to some extent, “giving up.” Her glasses should arrive in a couple of weeks, though the best they can get right now with the glasses is 20/40 vision. The hope is that by helping the brain’s load with glasses, and with the addition of eye exercises, we can eventually help her brain decide to kick in full force and get her to 20/20 with lenses.

That’s the factual short of it.

An helpful article I found this afternoon gives the following information:

Amblyopia is poor vision in an eye that did not develop normal sight during early childhood. It is sometimes called “lazy eye.”
When one eye develops good vision while the other does not, the eye with poorer vision is called amblyopic. Usually, only one eye is affected by amblyopia, but it is possible for both eyes to be “lazy.”

Under causes, it says,
Refractive errors are eye conditions that are corrected by wearing glasses. Amblyopia occurs when one eye is out of focus because it is more nearsighted, farsighted or astigmatic than the other.
Amblyopia also can occur in both eyes if both eyes have very blurred vision. This can happen when there is a high amount of nearsightedness, farsightedness or astigmatism.

If you’d like to learn more, just google “amblyopia” or bilateral amblyopia” and you’ll find plenty of reading.

On the mental/emotional end of this news is the fighting off of a load of guilt. It’s difficult to avoid focusing on the “what if’s.” I realize that the past is the past, and we can’t go back. So we’re moving forward, going to do our best help correct Ellie’s vision, and going to get the rest of the Blessings in for exams asap.

It’s wonderful to know that God is sovereign and all-wise, isn’t it?

We had a good time of fellowship at our chapel on New Year’s Eve – food, fun and games, a good movie, and a neat time of testimonies. My wonderful Papa and Mama were in town for a visit and it was great to have them with us at the BBC New Year’s party.

Papa shared a bit about their year at the testimony time. It’s been a rough year from man’s perspective… having to put G’pa and G’ma into a nursing home early in the year, then seeing both of them pass away in October. Papa also shared a portion of John 10.10 – “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly,” and brought out the fact that we often misunderstand what Christ meant by abundant life. He didn’t say He wants us to be happy, rich, or trouble-free. The path of our lives might be rough indeed. His desire is for us to have life abundantly through Him in the midst of wherever our path might lead as we follow Him.

As Papa shared, I knew the Lord was trying to teach me something, but I wasn’t really “getting it.”

Yesterday, Humble Amy posted a link to a blog entry by a Jon Bloom (not either of the John Blooms that I know) entitled Trust Promises, Not Providences. He says,

Experiences are very powerful. They often feel more powerful than promises. So it’s tempting to interpret prosperity and ease as God’s blessing and tribulation as God’s displeasure. And sometimes they are. But often they are not.

In his discussion of how God wants us to treasure the unseen more than the seen (and often uses trials to adjust our perspective), he gives a couple of quotes from a booklet entitled Honey Out Of the Rock by Puritan Thomas Wilcox. I’ve printed it out and am eager to read it. The quotes in Bloom’s blog are

“Judge not Christ’s love by providences, but by promises.”

and

“Bless God for shaking off false foundations, for any way whereby He keeps the soul awakened and looking after Christ; better sickness and temptations, than security and superficiality.”

I’m definitely in a period of life where I believe the Lord is working to adjust my perspective, to set my mind on His things, and to give abundant life to me in a much different way than I have imagined. I’m not sure how coherent this post of mine is, as I am not feeling well at all today, but go read Bloom’s blog and be blessed!

Thanks to Keith for finding and posting this great video. Carol of the Bells is one of my favorites, and the light display is gorgeous.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ot-B4V8oqPQ&rel=1&border=1]

We’ve had a hard time finding socks for Stephen because his legs are so chubby. Either socks will not stay up, or they’ll squeeze way too tight, or both. So the other night, I decided to go extreme, and I tried on some socks that are labelled “Fits 4-6 1/2, Shoe Sizes 5 1/2 – 8 1/2.”

Crazy, but true… they work! They’re long in the foot, but they work.

This also demonstrates that I’m not always on the ball enough to keep the boy in cloth diapers. And that’s okay! 🙂

The Blessings and I had fun today sledding. We don’t have any super hills on our property, but we made the best of what we have. 🙂

The older kids were sweet about taking the little girls with them…

Unfortunately, B. was already inside when I got the camera out for pictures, but he had a blast as well.

Thank you, Lord, for the beautiful snow!

On December 10 (last Monday), everything was covered with ice. It was beautiful, though I realize it can also be deadly. It was surreal to have so much ice and not have any snow.

Then on Friday, Dec 15, after all the ice had melted, the snow started to fall.

I LOVE snow!!

Here’s the bottom step of our front steps… I thought it was cool that the snow came right up to the step.

This shot gives a bit more perspective… and a reminder to rake those leaves before the snow falls!