the start of week 5

well, we are 5 weeks in to school now - and moving right along. My new dateless lesson plan system has freed me up to skip a few things here and there - thankfully not many - and although we have added subjects this year we seem to be keeping on track. I think the biggest change we have made this year is adding several activities. Bella and Izaiah are both taking piano once a week, Bella has weekly voice lessons, and all three are taking twice weekly PE classes at the YMCA. Izaiah's starting cub scouts this year, and everyone is participating in 4-H. Mommy is teaching weekly horse lessons, and daddy is coaching everyone in soccer.

If you know me, you'll know that I abhorr shuttling kids to and fro - and I generally think America's children are overscheduled. But for the past several months, the house has been very full, and scheduling 'fun' and healthy activities seems to be one of the better ways I can create some normalcy for the kids. Most of the time, I feel like I am walking a tightrope with them - on one side is total immersion in HFH, and on the other, emotional detachment. We are working towards healthly involvement and sustainability for all of us - and asking God for the grace to do it.
Blessings to you,
Mylissa

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Where in the world...

So what have I NOT been doing?? Sewing, crafting, riding my horses, blogging. What have I been up to? Working for HFH, keeping up with my excercise (although not as intensely as I'd like) and trying to finish out the last tidbits of school with my kiddos.

Historically, summer has always been our busiest season at HFH. When I realized we were once again entering the hectic cycle, I figured I had two choices - buck up and deal with it (and help) or say 'no' and grab that time for myself, my hobbies, etc. Thankfully with God's grace I have found some additional time to devote to HFH this summer. The reward has been meeting some precious new moms and helping my husband in the work that he is so devoted to - he amazes me with his dedication! Even when he's having to do things that I know aren't his favorite, he presses on and honors God with his discipline.

Tomorrow, we leave to go spend some time in NY with my mother-in-law and the rest of Mark's family. We will take your prayers - we will arrive thursday at the cottage, and this is the first overnight this year that anyone will have spent there since Gary passed away. We are looking forward to helping Margaret get settled in to what we know is the new "normal" - one that none of us want to deal with but with God's grace we will see it through.

At the end of our time in New England we will make a quick trip to Boston to see our precious and long-time friends Annie and Adam, to visit Eli VanZanten and his family, and to spend a bit of time at L'abri Fellowship in Southborough, MA. L'abri. AHHHH. Enough said. Some of you may know that we have modeled some of what we do here at HFH after the L'abri model. Mark will need to drag me home (I love Memphis, really I do!!). We would appreciate your prayers for our summer trip and I will try to post some pictures while we are away.

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We're still here!!!

It's been a VERY busy few weeks around here! Amanda at Sew Originals loved the items I brought in to show her, and I've been working on putting together several items for her to sell. I think we've collectively decided on Sweet Mylissa's - at this point if I can just get a few dresses made quickly I'll be happy. This month, we've had Nonny and our sweet friends the Logsdon's here to stay, and this weekend is the HFH Ladies Retreat/Pancake Breakfast/Property Workday/Inaugural BBQ Smoking Day/Cole Kaspar's Birthday Party. I will be downtown with 13 or so ladies for our retreat, while Mark is here at at the house managing that other stuff, along with Mo and Andy. Yes, we are crazy :) So I'll leave you with a few pictures from the past few weeks and promise a more detailed update later.

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Happy New Year

Some of you have received our New Year's card by now, and so I thought I would put a little update on the beginning of 2009 if you are checking in. Since we have been home from New York, we have welcomed a new team member to Habitat for Hope, reconnected after the holidays with some of our families and with Andy and Ginny, and had a short visit from my parents. Mark has been in the process of getting ready to lead us on our very first staff retreat in a few weekends. We will travel to Mt Ida, Arkansas with our two other staff couples and the Waggoners, who will come with to enjoy the trip and help the the kiddos. It should be a good time! We are looking forward to it. The kids have started back to school and are honoring me by pressing forward. The promise of lots of new Christmas toys to play with certainly helps. We are doing some renovation and deep cleaning to the house - we have a family from Ecuador moving in next week - and are restocking and prettying up our downtown apartments as well. We have a new family whose two oldest children stay here in the evenings with us; they are from Bolivia. Their youngest sister relapsed recently with ALL. They are precious people and we have really enjoyed getting to know them!
In February, Mark and I will head down to Greenwood, MS to cash in his Christmas present - the kids and I gave him a cooking session at the Viking Cooking School. He's decided to take me along and have a little overnight toghether. I am looking forward to it! The kids are all playing basketball, which has been...a sight to see. They are enjoying it, which is the important thing. Hope January is treating you well!

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Rejoice!

Happy Birthday Poppy Joe!!! We love you.

Hi all!

I intended to write a post today to ask for your prayers. Although I would still love it if you would pray, primarily I would love to share how God is meeting Mark and I right in the midst of trouble this day.

First of all, I won't go into great detail, but Mark and I are experiencing stress and pressure in really all areas of our ministry life right now. We have children that we have loved dearly that are in the process of dying, we are at that point in the year when churches renew their funding (and with the economy we know our funding will likely decrease), we are experiencing some struggles within our team...and yet some great advances as well. Of course, as we close in on the holidays, we are missing Gary (Mark's dad) more every day. I can't begin to imagine how Margaret must feel - and it hurts us to be away from her.

Yesterday, Gretchen posted a few new items she had created that were for sale. I quickly contacted her and told her I wanted to purchase this:























I just love it, and it gave me joy right away. And just to know that my sweet friend made it makes it all the better. Last night, when Mark came home from his men's group, he grabbed my OLD Streams in the Desert devotional off the shelf. He had bought it for me when I was pregnant for bella. We read through some of the prayers that I had written in there several years ago, and it gave us peace. This morning, I grabbed it off the bedside table and found this for November 20:

Blessed is he that waiteth. Daniel 12:12

Wait in faith. Express your unstaggering confidence in Him. Believe that if He keeps you tarrying even till midnight, yet He will come at the right time; the vision shall come, and shall not tarry.

Obviously the waiting part is so timely, but this: "the vision shall come and shall not tarry" is taken from Habbakuk 2:3, which happens to be one of the verses the Lord spoke to Mark through a Garifuna woman in Honduras in 2005 (call mark if you want to hear that story!).

And then I sat down and read over Mark's shoulder; he has been faithful to move forward in reading the bible cover to cover this year. The Psalm today was Psalm 118:19-27

Open for me the gates of righteousness;
I will enter and give thanks to the LORD.
This is the gate of the LORD, through which the righteous may enter.
I will give you thanks, for you answered me;
you have become my salvation.
The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone;
the LORD has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes.

This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.

O LORD, save us; O LORD, grant us success.
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD.
From the house of the LORD we bless you.
The LORD is God, and he has made his light shine upon us.
With boughs in hand, join in the festal procession up to the horns of the altar.

So I wake this morning knowing that the Lord is with us, that He reigns, and His peace and rest is with me.

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New HFH Site

The new Habitat for Hope site is finally up!!

HUGE thanks to Chris from 1Perspective, and to Robin Cornett for so many of the pictures.

There will be tweaks here and there, but we are so glad it (pretty much) done!

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