Walk for Life

We were so pleased with the turn out for Walk for Life this year. Last year the center was only able to raise $2,000. This year, they raised $43,000. The Lord blessed this event in a wonderful way. Praise the Lord for the provision to continue the wonderful services they offer. Here are some pictures of the fun we all had! Especially VIVIAN! Notice her first face painting!
Thank all of those who gave so generously.

MINIVAN!!!!

Hello everyone! I wanted to let you see our new addition to our family. It has been long in coming, but we are so thankful that we finally have a MINIVAN! It is so nice to have the room and not have to bend over to put Vivian in and out of her car seat. It's a 2002 Honda Odessey. God provided more than we ever hoped for, including a LOWER car payment with less years to pay than we expected.
YEAH!

Women's Retreat revelations

This past weekend, I did the unthinkable, in my mind. I left Mac and Vivian and went on a weekend with a bunch of girls. I struggled with this to the point of thinking, "how can I get out of this?". I should have known that God had great things in mind for me! This weekend radically changed my life and walk. It was the pinnacle of everything that the Lord worked on for the past year and a half. Actually probably longer than that. In looking back on my life and ministry, I am sad to say that I wasn't as effective as I could have been, had I understood God's grace more. The weekend was about WALKING in grace. I am still trying to wrap my mind around everything that it means. It's so huge! Realizing who you are and what you have to offer with God's grace leading the way. Every minute of everyday, we have NO ability to glorify God. Our confidence lies completely in the Grace of God. We rely on the strength God give us for everyday. God has promised us to provide EVERY need we have. I always looked at that as an option. "Well God, if I need you, I am so glad you are there." When our thinking should be, "God I can't make it 5 minutes without talking to you and being completely dependent on you. We have this misconception that the more we learn, the more independent we will become. We have "grown" in that area. When it truly is completely opposite... the more you learn, the more dependence you have on God. Talk about a spiritual wake up. We don't have to fear because we serve a sovereign God, who will NOT abandon us. Hebrews 13. The lyric of a hymn rings in my head, "I need you every hour, Most Gracious Lord." I am beginning to realize, I DO need you Lord! Help me, please. One of the talks this weekend was about how so many words in our society mean something terrible, but in God's kingdom.. they are essential. One being the word rescued. When we view being rescued we view being taken away from the spot we are currently in. But in God's Grace, he loves us enough to rescue us by leaving us exactly where we are! WOW, how much he loves us! As a parent of a toddler, I am seeing Vivian struggling with different things and many times the best thing for her is to leave her where she is, so she can learn. I can totally see this! The heart wants to go and get her and just "rescue" her from this strain. But because I love her, I want her to learn. So, I just love her where she is to help her learn. God does the same thing with our life! I could go on and on. I want to live out the dreams that only God can dream for me. That may mean heartache and hardship, but in the end the result is secure and sure.. we will be in heaven. Wow! Praise the Lord!
If you would like to hear the messages from this weekend, they will posted sometime this week on www.northwake.com.
The pictures above are of some of the fun times we had.

Catch up with LOTS of pictures

Hello Everyone!
I am going to keep my post brief as I have a TON of pictures to show. We had a WONDERFUL Easter celebrating our life in Christ! We have big news.. we have a buyer for our car. We are set to make the transaction tomorrow morning. Please pray for us as we are looking VERY quickly to secure a minivan while Mac is still on Spring Break in hopes to not be without a car. There are some GREAT prospects in the picture. We have pictures from our recent trip to Charleston.. where we did a 10K. Mac ran it in just over an hour and I walk/ran it in just under 2 hours. It is a 6.2 mile trek and it was a blast. We plan on doing it again next year. It's a very scenic 10K. We just have family pictures as we wanted to be as light as possible. We have some on our cell phone from the race that we will have to post later. For Easter, we were here! YEAH! So nice to stay home for once. There are pictures from a friend Easter Egg hunt. There are also pictures from a church Easter Egg Hunt at Grandma and Granpop's Church. Then we hunted eggs again at Grandma's house. Nana also did a hunt in Charleston for her. So needless to say, she is an expert. At the hunt at the church, she didn't want any of the easily accessible eggs, she had to climb under the swing set for her eggs. Here are the update pictures. ENJOY! ps. If you want to send a pledge for the Walk for Life, please send it ASAP. We still need more donations to be able to walk. $5 total pledges are wonderful! Whatever you can do will help!