its me ...again

Life is somewhat back on an even keel, at least for now. Life has been a whirlwind since my last post. DH was blessed to not have to have open heart surgery but there have been and will be many more doctor appointments to continue to treat his condition. With some follow up testing they now also believe he may have COPD.  We should know more about those results when he goes back to his PCP next month. Please continue to keep him in your prayers.
Life has taken many other turns that have just kept my heart and mind busy and my thoughts pulled away from this blog. I have continued on in nursing school. I received a wonder evaluation from my instructor on my Clinical performance. I just need to do well on my finals next week and I can then say I finished this first semester well. But the one thing that has consumed me and at times completely drained me is that we left our church that was our home for 13 years. I served as youth director and Drama Team leader there and served with DH Preacher in the JR church ministry. Although we had been praying for a while on whether or not to leave because of spiritual issues there,sadly, our decision to finally leave came about due to comments our Pastor's wife made to our oldest son. Like any teen trying to live the Christian life today, he struggles to do what is right and also to try and find his "place" among his peers. He is an outstanding young man who was saved several years ago but sometimes now he doesn't always make the greatest choices and that simply means he is human and sins like we all do. He was always being berated by the Pastor's wife and daughter with snide comments and derision not only at church but during school hours, often being openly mocked and ridiculed in front of other children. The final straw came when he made a choice not to participate in a choir competition for school because not only had they been practicing for just over a week , 3 days before they were to leave , the song was being changed for the third time.He told me he did not wish to look foolish in front of the other schools because his instructors couldn't get their head in the game months before and prepare them for the competition. His father and I gave him permission to not participate. When he informed his teacher (Pastor's wife) of his decision, she became very angry at him. Not long after, another classmate also chose to not participate for the same reasons as my son. The PW then proceeded to tell this student that he should make his own choices and be a leader not a follower because the one he was following (i.e. my son) would lead him straight to hell. Later at church that night she announced during prayer requests to pray for those students especially the one one who was leading them down that path to destruction. Now , my son may not be perfect but his judge is God not her. She has always been a gossip and back biter and sadly our Pastor has never set his foot down to put his wife's attitude in order. Over 12 families have left our church over the years due to things she has said and done to or about them and one couple even took her before the deacon board. I pulled my son from the school the next day when I found out what happened and we have not returned to that church. My son was very hurt over what she said to him and about him.And to make matters worse we found out that the PW is spreading lies about us to the congregation and her and her daughter are also bad mouthing my daughter and I to the youth and drama team. These are people we counted as friends. I know God has our back, and he has truly blessed us with good Christian fellowship and some spirit filled services where we have visited, which is something that had been missing for a while at our church, but still the pain of what is being done behind our backs is terrible. The choice to leave was hard to make but in the end it was best for our family. We have yet to find a church "home" but we know God is faithful and will lead us to the right place.
Again I apologize to anyone who does still read here for the long absence. As you can read, life has been a roller coaster ride for us. Keep us in your prayers. My daughter is in the process of making me a new template for this blog and I will be updating again. I just had to spend some time in my "shell" mulling over life. But I do have some good news, out of all the trials and burdens over the past little while, I have again been inspired to write. God has given me so many new things to put to paper. It has been like a dam burst and words and ideas have begun to flow again. I missed not being "able" to write devotions and things and I am glad He restored that joy to me. As I said before , keep us in your prayers and come back again. I'm getting that garden in next week :) I did have to wait after all for Winter to decide to leave and take the frost with him lol. Have a blessed day everyone!

Please Pray!

Well I promised an update on Monday but I have yet to get it done because something else happened that supersedes all other things. My DH Preacher was admitted to the hospital Monday with Peristaltic Atrial Fibrillation. It is a condition he has battled for 10 years. Monday his heart was racing at over 170 bpm. Finally about 4 this morning his heart converted back to normal sinus rhythm. During his stress test this morning his blood pressure bottomed out at 50/40. They finally got it back up and his doctor said his stress test was positive for blockage so he is being sent from the hospital here in Hixon (we were in Chattanooga visiting his family) to Vanderbilt hospital in Nashville. He will go by ambulance and I will drive up. For now we know that they will be doing a heart cath and possibly putting in stints. If stints will not fix the problem then open heart surgery will be the next step. Please pray for us. We ended up missing out on our youngest daughter's 12th birthday today. It broke our hearts not to be with our family today. The doctor is afraid Preacher will have a massive stroke or heart attack due to his condition so we are concentrating on getting him healthy again. We know that is the best birthday present we could give any of our kids. I will update more tomorrow and hopefully have a post with all the “catch up “details of the last few months since I have to do more than sit there and worry and stress and tie my hair in knots.. Thanks for reading and for your prayers. Blessings! ~ Nikki

2 months! are you kidding me...

i cant believe its been that long since i posted. there is an update coming i promise. so much has been going on but i will tell you all about it in a new post. look for it by monday night if you still read my blog.i hope to have it done by then.thanks :)

Brrr

Yesterday was my first official nursing class.It was pharmacology. It went well. It wasn't as bad as I had been dreading it to be but then again it was day one. It was sunny and 66 degrees when I went into class at 12:30 but when I came out at 3:30 it had dropped 14 degrees and was raining.Guess what was on its way? Yep, snow. Temps kept dropping all afternoon and we had the weirdest thunderstorm right before it began to snow in earnest. We have had some very high winds all night too.We don't have a lot of snow on the ground right now but its still coming down If the wind dies off it will pile up quick.
I got my free Seed Savers Exchange catalog in the mail yesterday.I have just skimmed it so far but I'm looking forward to settling in with some pumpkin spice cappacino and looking through it. Like most of you, seed catalogs keep me going til Spring lol. I need to get a garden plan done so thought I know exactly what to order. What's going in your garden this Spring?

First Snow Of 2012

Hope that everyone has had a wonderful start to their new year. Temps plummeted here yesterday and snow started flying. We just got a dusting but some places got several inches. The roads are kinda nasty in spots too. Our first snow and close to 0 wind chills call for the first fire of the year too. It feels so nice and warm in here. I dread going outside in the cold this morning but alas it must be done. I'm going to put it off as long as possible though:)
I have not made any resolutions this year but I do have some goals that I would like to accomplish. I will list mine below. Do you have any goals for 2012? Comment and let me know.
My Goals For 2012:
1. Read my Bible everyday
2.Memorize a new Bible verse every week
3.Be the best wife and mother I can be :)
4.Be running a mile by Spring
5.Do my best at my schoolwork
6.Be healthier
7.Stock my pantry well and be more prepared with needed supplies

Guess What ?

Good morning everyone! I hope that you had a blessed Christmas. We were able to spend Christmas with both Preacher's parents and mine We went to Chattanooga on Friday and came home Sunday afternoon after we had Christmas lunch with them. We got home just in time to have Christmas supper with my family. The food and fellowship was awesome. Preacher's sister and her family blessed us with dinner (China Moon YUMO!) and a movie for Christmas. We had some great family time that we really enjoyed. Our tight budget doesn't make for dinner and a movie very often.We still wanted to have a private Christmas celebration with our kids so they opened a small present at Preacher's parents then after we left we stopped by an old Civil War camp (now a soccer field) and had our regular gift opening. We had a blast. Odd, different but fun.I was blessed with a family sticker set I sooo wanted (yay!) , new shoes and a beautiful birthstone ring.
But guess what? Before we left Friday afternoon I checked the mail. Wanna know what was in it? Hmmmm? It was a letter....that stated....congratulations, you have been accepted to Walters State Community College school of Nursing for the Spring semester.... I cried...tears of joy cause it was months of hard work and the blessings of God that got me here...it was like I had been holding my breath since Summer semester.Wow, now the intense studying begins lol. Be praying for me.I have orientation the first week of January and classes start on the 12th. I'm ready for this journey...I think:) Blessings! ~ Nikki

*Tap* *Tap*... is this thing on?...hello?

Is any one still here? Sorry for the looong silence but I got caught up in school and preparing for finals.That and family just consumed all my time.But I'm back. I have a lot of reading to catch up with everyone. I managed to do well this past semester so now I am just waiting to see if I get accepted into the school of nursing. Our Christmas plans are still kinda iffy at the moment as we are not sure exactly where we will be Christmas day;here with my family or in Chattanooga with Preachers. I will be reading lots while on break so you may see me pop in to comment on your blogs:) Have a great day everyone! Blessings!~ Nikki


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