Since I Last Blogged

Well I took my final exam last night! All I have left is two 12-minute consultations with my professor on the next two Monday nights, and then my final 10- minute oral presentation on May 23. This presentation accompanies a ten-page paper I have to do. Thankfully, it will be on the "business problem" of generating/sustaining growth in a church plant. Imagine that...

Eric is out early this morning on a drive to Buffalo to visit a man named Steve in the hospital. He had a heart attack on Saturday. Chrissie rode with Eric to visit him on Sunday also. Pray for Steve. They're transferring him to Anoka for a procedure, and he's pretty nervous.

Braden starts soccer tonight. It's really his "thing", so we're glad for him that the season is finally here. The other day I gave him the final math test in his book (just to see how he would do), and he made an A on it. So we're done with math for the year. :-) He's reading a lot lately. He's in the middle of a "chapter" book that Eric read when he was a kid & found in the garage when he cleaned it out last week.

One of the perks of being a pastor's family: we have the use of the church projector. So yesterday Eric installed a roller shade high on the "really" high wall of the back porch. He also installed a little shelf on the side wall to hold the projector. Now we don't have a big white sheet on the wall anymore, and we don't risk bumping the projector during family movie nights!

Josh and Kristin are taking the children to Iowa Thursday night-Sunday, so they can stay with their grandparents. Eric and I have a leadership/prayer retreat Friday night-Saturday, so this is working out well for us! (J & K had to go down there for Jason's [Josh's brother's] graduation from Faith). Sometimes God just works things out so nicely... Here are a couple of recent examples...

--I go to school with a woman named Mary. She and her husband Brian moved to Otsego last fall & started coming to our church. (They're longtime Christians). Brian works right across the river from our house at Great River Printing. He now prints & folds our bulletin for us every week so we don't have to do it at the house at a big expense (it's color). He also does posters and whatever else we need, at minimal cost...he volunteers his labor & uses spare paper they have there. WOW!

--My back was "out" for the past week and a half. Eric mentioned it somehow in his sermon Sunday, and a woman named Sharon introduced herself to me after church. She's a MFT and Shiatsu therapist, and she worked on me for 2 hours late Sunday night, as a gift to me. (BTW, I've been to the chiropractor 4 times...it's getting better--but school last night was not too comfortable. I stood in the back part of the time.)

--Kristin came over last Wednesday and did my laundry & kept the kids while Eric and I went to Sam's to buy a new boxspring & mattress & QUEEN bed frame. Oh, yeah...we got rid of our dog... No comments, please. We GET IT. We're not dog people. Reason for new bed: That dang dog peed on Eric's side of the bed three times in 24 hours. It was the last straw for Eric, and it got us a much-needed new bed! (I was hoping to get one for my graduation anyway!)

--A sweet lady named Penny came over a week ago Sunday after church & swept my floor & helped me get ready for a bunch of company...then she and her husband sneaked away!

Well, this is growing long & Penny will be here in 45 minutes to do a mailing that I have to design & print pretty quickly.

PTL...Last week on our 6 month anniversary, God brought 201 people to "our" church. Funny...this week there were 140! That's what happens when you target non-church people...they consider themselves regular attenders if they come once/month! :-) We're amazed and just a little freaked out about what God is doing and going to do with The Crossing @ Woodland! That He uses people as flawed as us is just nuts!

Wishing you a great week!