God is Cool!

That's all there is to it - He's just cool! In my last post I included the lyrics of a song that Camden had written during church on Sunday. My good friend, Lisa, saw it and sent the link to the music minister at our church, Larry Newberry; she knew that he has been praying for God to raise up songwriters in our church. He looked at the words, picked up his guitar, and God gave him a tune to go with the words that He had given Camden. We had the chance to hear it on Tuesday and then last night Larry taught it to Camden's choir, who will sing it at their end-of-the-year program on Sunday evening. Only God could have brought this together!

Larry had chosen a title for the song from the lyrics, "He Is So Great to Me"; he asked Camden if he like that title, or if he had something else in mind. Camden said the title is "God's Song Is So Great to Me." At first I thought that didn't sound as good, but then Larry pointed out that it really is God's song, so I guess the title really does fit. Isn't God cool?!?

I tried unsuccessfully to put the video here in my blog, so I uploaded it to YouTube instead. Here's a link to it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIjD1SJUnlo

Now the challenge is going to be keeping Camden (and me, the proud mommy) humble!

From the mind of Camden...

Yesterday we found a cool lizard in the yard. Camden asked me what lizards eat. I said I wasn't sure and he said, "I'll go ask Daddy - he's the smart one around here." Maybe that makes me the pretty one?!?

Today in church, Camden wasn't really listening to the sermon, but I couldn't be too upset about that - he was writing a praise song. Here are his lyrics:

Oh sing of the glory of God
He is so
He is so great to me
So we should follow Him

Oh give God
Oh give God everything
Oh, oh, oh, God is my savior
Oh He is so great

I edited the spelling, but the words were all his - makes me pretty proud (almost enough to forget the comment about Daddy being the smart one!)

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood...

We've had some beautiful weather over the past couple of days and the kids have enjoyed playing outside with the neighbors.

Camden has recently learned to ride a two-wheeler:

Cullen and his friend Grant love riding scooters:

Kenna and Maddie shaved sidewalk chalk and added water to make "sidewalk paint". They then proceeded to paint the driveway, the air conditioning unit, some cups, and I don't know what all else!

Even Dixie got to spend some time out in the front yard with us:

Today was a sweltering 78 degrees, so the boys begged me to let them play in the sprinkler.

Once they felt how cold the water was, they opted to use their umbrellas:

They eventually did get wet and then switched to using the spray nozzle on the hose:

Yes, Camden is spraying it where it looks like he's spraying it!

At one point I went out to check on them and Cullen informed me that Camden was "washing" the car. Only problem with that was that the car was still in the garage!

Fun times!!

Bible Stories and Action Figures

Camden loves to set up scenes with his toys. Here are a couple of his recent creations:

Daniel in the Lion's Den

Cast of Characters:

Daniel......Earth "Ace"

The Angel......Buzz Lightyear

The Lions.......3 lions and one very flat dog

The Baptism of Jesus

Cast of Characters:

Jesus......Neptune "Tune"

John the Baptist......Moon "Lunar"

Celebrating Easter

We had a wonderful time celebrating Easter this year. The weekend was full of fun activities and also times to reflect on the true meaning of Easter. I have a lot of stories and pictures to post. I considered breaking this into several posts, but decided to just do one - so it's going to be long!



We started our celebration the Sunday before Easter. The choir and drama team at our church presented an Easter Pageant in four acts. The first act was on Palm Sunday and depicted Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem. We returned to church on Thursday for the Maundy Thursday service where we saw the Last Supper and Garden of Gethsemane presented and also partook of the Lord's Supper. Friday night was a difficult, but very meaningful service. Christ's crucifixion was depicted. It was humbling to watch and think about all that Christ suffered on our behalf.


Saturday was filled with fun activities. We attended and helped out at our church's Easter Eggstravaganza. Here are the kids with their winnings from the "cupcake walk":





Next we went to our apartment church to have an Easter Celebration for the residents there. (This is one of the churches in the Mission Denton ministry that we are a part of.) We cooked out, played games, had a bounce house, told the Easter story, and had an egg hunt. Robert came and took family portraits for the residents. It was a great afternoon!

The Bunny Hop Sack Race:



We gave Bibles to the kids as an Easter gift. This little girl was so excited about receiving hers:

Eggs just waiting to be found:

The rush to find the most eggs:

After we came home and rested for awhile, we headed out on the back patio to color eggs:

Before going to bed Saturday night, we made Resurrection Cookies. Each ingredient relates to a part of the Easter story and the recipe includes Bible verses to go along with each step. The cookies are put in the oven and left overnight.

We woke up Sunday morning to find full Easter baskets and hollow cookies. The Resurrection Cookies are hollow to represent the empty tomb.

We headed of to church to celebrate our Risen Savior!

The worship service at church was amazing. The choir presented the final act of the Easter pageant, the resurrection of Christ and His appearances to His followers. The music was wonderful. After the presentation our pastor preached an inspiring sermon. During the commitment time at the end of the service, both of our boys went forward to make a profession of faith in Christ! Cullen had prayed to receive Christ last summer, but just hadn't gotten up the courage to make his decision public; it's a little ironic that he chose to do it on the most crowded Sunday of the year! Camden told the pastor that he had prayed and asked Jesus into his heart at the end of the service (he later told me it was while we were singing).

I had the chance to talk with each of the boys last night. Cullen and I talked about the day last summer that he prayed to receive Christ. It was at our apartment church and he remembers praying with me, the craft we did that day, and even what color shirt one of his friends was wearing. I remember being concerned at the time that he was too young and maybe didn't understand the decision he was making; but, the fact that he remembers the day in so much detail confirms to me that it really did mean something to him.

When I talked to Camden I asked him to tell me why he went forward at the end of the service. He said, "Because I love God and want to follow Him the rest of my life and change my life into a Christian life and accept Him into my heart." We talked some about Jesus and why He had to die on the cross, and I think that even at his young age, Camden gets it.

Kenna was such a good big sister. During the invitation time, she leaned over and asked me if I thought Cullen wanted to go forward. I told her to ask him and she did. I'm not sure if he would have done it if it wasn't for her encouragement.

After church, we went to Nana and Papa's house to spend the afternoon with family. We enjoyed a wonderful meal, took some family pictures, and hunted for eggs.

It was still wet outside from the heavy rains earlier in the day, so we hid and hunted eggs indoors:

I hope you all had a blessed Easter!

Happy Resurrection Day!

"He has risen, just as He said!" Matthew 28:6

Preparing for Easter

At this time of year I always find myself thinking about how little emphasis we put on the real meaning and celebration of Easter, especially when compared with all that we do during the Christmas season. I agree with a lot of people that Christmas is over-commercialized, but I think it's fitting that we make a big deal about the birth of Christ. I also think that what is even more important to the Christian faith than the way Christ entered this world, is the way He left it - as a Risen Savior who had accomplished salvation for those who believe in Him!


Over the last few years I have tried to find ways to make the Easter celebration more meaningful for our family. One thing we use is Resurrection Eggs and we use them to count down to Easter, like the advent calendars we use at Christmas. Last year we opened one egg each day for the twelve day before Easter. This year we're going to open three eggs (one for each kid) for the four days before Easter.

Another thing we do that has become a favorite tradition is making Resurrection Cookies the night before Easter. If you're interested in the recipe, click here. This is a great hands-on way to tell the Easter story. The first year that we made them, they didn't turn out great. I'm sure the recipe is correct because I've found the exact same version on several websites, but I made a few modifications that seem to make them work better for us. First, I preheat the oven to 350 instead of 300. Second, I beat the egg whites, salt, and vinegar to form stiff peaks, before adding the sugar. (The first time I made them I never could get stiff peaks to form when I did it after adding the sugar.)


I'm still looking for ways to enhance our Easter celebration, so please share any ideas or traditions your family has!


Happy Resurrection Day!!

Bluebonnets!

We made our annual trek to Alvarado yesterday to take pictures in the bluebonnets. A good friend of mine is a doctor and some of her patients own five acres in Alvarado that they have seeded with bluebonnets - it is a truly amazing sight. We are so grateful that they invite us each year to take pictures and enjoy the beautiful flowers. It was very windy and a little chilly Saturday morning, so the pictures didn't turn out as great as I had hoped, but we got a few that were pretty good.

The Eden Family:

Kenna wanted to try her hand at photography and she got this really great shot of Caleb:

After all the posed picture taking (which was very tiresome for the kids), we let them run around for a little while, but we told them to try and avoid stepping on the flowers. Cullen was so cute standing in the middle of the sea of bluebonnets trying to figure out where to step:

He finally just started running and jumping through them:

And when he got to the edge of the field he did a little victory dance - too funny!

On the way home from Alvarado, we stopped at the Fort Worth Nature Center.

We saw a couple of snakes on our hike. One was reddish brown and probably about 5 feet long, but that was "the one that got away" (Robert didn't get his camera out before one of the kids scared it off.) We did get a picture of this cute garden snake that Camden almost stepped on:

By far the highlight of the nature center was "Prairie Dog Town". We got to see a couple of litters of pups and they were soooo cute!

Let's Rodeo!

Today was the Kindergarten Rodeo. I may be a bit biased, but I think Camden makes a pretty cute little cowboy!

Camden's favorite part was the wagon ride. Several of the dads got their exercise pulling the kids around the parking lot in wagons:

You may be wondering what that is on his forehead. The kids all got to choose a temporary tattoo "brand". Most of them had it put on their hands, arms, or cheeks, but Camden always has to be different, so he wanted his right in the middle of his forehead. Typical.