Busy, busy, busy!!!!!!!

Long overdue update!!!!!

We purchased an OLD farm house on 12 acres the beginning of May in southern, MI.  It feels like we haven't stopped since then. We have been working on fixing it up.  We have gutted the oldest section of the plaster and lathe and we're redoing the wiring and insulating it, since it didn't have any.  We hope to have our current house on the housing market by Feb. as soon as we can tie up some loose ends on our remodel of the upstairs bathroom.  The Lord has blessed us mightily with our Church family and friends.  We are currently around 45 minutes from our Church.  When we move we will be closer to most of the families.  Unfortunateley I will have a further drive to work.  The upside to all of this is when we sell our house that we are currently living in.  We will be DEBT FREE!!!!!  Then we can start being more self sufficient with livestock and a much larger garden and an orchard of fruit trees.  It will take some time and money to build the infra-structure for our Hobby Farm.  Our end goal is for me coming home to a home based business.  I hope this finds you all well! 

In Christ<><
Tim

100th Anniversary of the Sinking of the TItanic

The time that this post (written by Kaleb) is posted marks the time 100 years ago that the Titanic struck the Iceberg.

Titanic

By Kaleb M. Cadle

On April 14, 1912 A large ship gracefully glided over the rough water of the Atlantic Ocean. It was near a dark and moonless night. The passengers slumbered in their cabins, while the captain and crew navigated the large ice flow before them. The air was silent and the sea was calm.

Then suddenly, the alarm was sounded. The Titanic was heading straight for a large iceberg! Quickly the officer on the bridge ordered that the wheel would be turned as far as it would go. He also sent an order to the engine room to reverse the engines. The iceberg moved closer, the ship started to turn, but it was to late!

The iceberg struck the Titanic’s starboard bow. Several chunks of ice fell onto the ship’s deck while the iceberg slid by. A couple minutes later, the ”unsinkable“ ship came to a halt. Many of the passengers awoke to see what had happened. On deck nothing looked amiss, but in the bottom things were very different.

When the iceberg struck, it left behind a large gash. When this had happened, a large noise like the firing of a canon had erupted through the lower decks. Water gushed in like a whirlwind and in twenty minutes had filled the mailroom, and was pouring into some of the forward holds and two of the boiler rooms.

The ships captain (Captain E. J. Smith) and the ships builder (Thomas Andrews) quickly moved down to the bottom of the ship. They rapidly inspected the damage the iceberg had done, and it was not good.

The Titanic’s hull was divided into many watertight compartments. The ship had been designed so that it could still float while only four of these compartments were full. But water was spewing into five compartments, and would eventually start filling the other compartments.

Andrews judged that the Titanic might last one hour, one and a half of an hour at most.

Then a light was seen in the distance, it could have been the Californian’s. Captain Smith immediately ordered the crew to fire up distress rockets, which would get the attention of the ship in the distance. The order was obeyed but the distant ship did not answer.

The Titanic desperately radioed for help. They reached many other ships, but they were to far away to reach them in time. They franticly radioed one ship (the Carpathia) that was not very distant. The Carpathia radioed back immediately that they were heading to the desperate Titanic’s location full steam. But would they be there in time.

After an hour most of the passengers still did not know the seriousness of the situation. Captain Smith however, knew everything about the situation, and he was worried. There were only barely enough lifeboats for half of the estimated 2,200 passengers. He tried to think up a solution, but he couldn’t find one that would leave enough boats for all the passengers.

He gave the order to start loading the lifeboats with the women and children first. The women and children were escorted to the Lifeboats, and after saying their emotional final farewells, reluctantly piled onto the boats. The boats were lowered down and then disappeared into the moonless night.

By 2:05 a.m. there were still more than 1,500 passengers on-board the sinking ship. All the lifeboats were gone and a stillness overtook the remaining passengers. The Titanic was now listing very badly, and water started to creep up the deck.

While the Titanic slowly sank below the waves John Harper, a pastor and a strong Christian preached to the passengers. The Titanic slowly sunk lower and lower beneath the water. John Harper spoke his last words as the quote ”unsinkable“ ship slipped beneath the waves.

The Carpathia arrived at the scene, but it was to late. Only 705 of the Titanic’s passengers remained in the lifeboats. Most of the men had drowned, or been eaten alive by sharks. The women and children were haunted for the rest of their lives by the memories of their deceased husbands and fathers.

The men who died that night of April 14 were true men. We should never forget these dead men’s stories of Chivalry and Courage. Those men sacrificed their lives, for the women and children instead of saving themselves. Never forget these mens’ legacies. Never forget that Women and Children are first.

   

     

This movie is showing one night only (March 27th) across the country!   You can look up theater locations in your area here .  Our family is looking forward to seeing this.

I Love This Book!

"Thou shalt love thy neighbour." --Matthew 5:43

"Love thy neighbour." Perhaps he rolls in riches, and thou art poor, and living in thy little cot side-by-side with his lordly mansion; thou seest every day his estates, his fine linen, and his sumptuous banquets; God has given him these gifts, covet not his wealth, and think no hard thoughts concerning him. Be content with thine own lot, if thou canst not better it, but do not look upon thy neighbour, and wish that he were as thyself. Love him, and then thou wilt not envy him.

Mayhap, on the other hand, thou art rich, and near thee reside the poor. Do not scorn to call them neighbour. Own that thou art bound to love them. The world calls them thy inferiors. In what are they inferior? They are far more thine equals than thine inferiors, for "God hath made of one blood all people that dwell upon the face of the earth." It is thy coat which is better than theirs, but thou art by no means better than they. They are men, and what art thou more than that? Take heed that thou love thy neighbour even though he be in rags, or sunken in the depths of poverty.

But, perhaps, you say, "I cannot love my neighbours, because for all I do they return ingratitude and contempt." So much the more room for the heroism of love. Wouldst thou be a feather-bed warrior, instead of bearing the rough fight of love? He who dares the most, shall win the most; and if rough be thy path of love, tread it boldly, still loving thy neighbours through thick and thin. Heap coals of fire on their heads, and if they be hard to please, seek not to please them, but to please thy Master; and remember if they spurn thy love, thy Master hath not spurned it, and thy deed is as acceptable to Him as if it had been acceptable to them. Love thy neighbour, for in so doing thou art following the footsteps of Christ" ~ "Morning and Evening Readings" by Charles Spurgeon

This was the morning reading today.  Awesome!  I love this book.  So many times it is just the right message that I need for the day. 

In Christ,
Lisa <><

Tiffany's editorial post

Tiffany has recently rebutted a letter to the editor from the Adrian MI Daily Telegram.
Below are copies of the letter to the editor that she was writing in response to, and hers. It is very nice to be able to get your voice heard out there with very little effort.  We all need to stand for Truth and have our voices heard about ALL the current issues that we are facing.  Letters to the editor are FREE and  usually pretty easy to write. While much of the media is liberal it is always nice to read the LTE page when there are conservative Christian values expressed.


In Christ <><
Tim

What we've been doing

Hello Everyone!


Sorry it has been rather dead around here for the last few months; the Holidays where busy, busy, busy! I’ll try to fill you in on the latest.

1. We have one new indoor cat and three new outdoor cats! The indoor one is a black male that was already neutered and declawed when he showed up around Thanksgiving. The vet says he is only about a year old, yet he seems to have already been through some rough scrapes. One of his ears is torn but nicely healed and his tail has had some damage as well. We named him Jackson (as in Stonewall Jackson!) The three outdoor ones are kittens (one female and two males) who showed up while we were putting up the Christmas lights. They are currently braving the winter out on our patio (not a hard feat with the strangely mild winter we’ve had)and go by the names of Nutmeg, Eggnog and Chestnut! (What can I say? It was Christmas time!) I took pictures of them to post but I can’t find the SD card. :-(

2. Mommy’s birthday was earlier this month, so we took some short day trips to celebrate. The first was up to Frankenmuth MI, the next to Columbus, OH, and the last to Fort Wayne, IN!

Other than that it has pretty much been home life as usual. Getting school work done, cleaning the house, building and keeping up fires in the wood burner and cook stove, and all the other elements of everyday life!

In Christ,

For the family,

Tiffany