Happy Valentine's Day!

Schaeffer worked so hard to handwrite her name on each valentine

One for each classmate, schoolteacher and BSF teacher

Valentine's Day party

Can you guess which heart craft belongs to Schaeffer Jo? 

Happy Birthday, Sara (Iron Chef Style!)

Griffin prepping food for 'battle'

The women's team with the birthday girl

The men's team 'plating' their food

The men's plate

The girl's soup

All the yummie eats

The birthday girl

Griffin and I were able to celebrate his sister's birthday with an Iron Chef-style battle at the Chopping Block in Lincoln Park in Chicago. It was great fun, and great eating. 

Happy birthday, Sara!

Sledding at school

Schaeffer, Cody & Paige

Schaeffer flying on her saucer

SJ conning her classmates into giving her a 'ride' back into school

Wednesdays during the winter months at Christ Lutheran are student favorites because the sledding hill is open. Schaeffer loved hitting the sledding hill with her friends and playing in the snow with her friends. 

Schaeffer, the snow bunny!

 Schaeffer coming down the bunny hill

  SJ learning to turn and stop

on the magic carpet

A new year, a fresh start, a blank page.

You have been handed a new book.

Its pages are blank.

Its spine is stiff and the paper smells fresh.

You crack open the ledger and thumb through the crisp pages.

All empty.

Not a single line of prose.

Not a single jotting of a memory.

Not a single letter, sign or symbol.

Every space available.

Every room a vacancy.

Every chapter void.

What will you do with this diary? Is your memoir a mystery, comedy, or tragedy? What would the title read? The chapters? Will you do with this diary the same as you did with last year's? Will you write within its pages the same verses, the same resolves, the same worries?

What if, instead of being bound within the binding of yesterday, you could scribble new dreams? What if your journal, instead of failure, recorded fruition? Instead of regret, rejoicing? Instead of fear, faith? But, despite your own determination, your quest for perfection is unattainable. Your hunt for holiness, useless.

However, the hero in our story defends our honor. The villain who would hinder and sabotage our deliverance is bested and crushed! Our worthless virtue becomes exquisite beauty. Since God reconciled us through Jesus,

we all get a fresh start with new mercies and new grace. 

Every single day.

Every single page.

Every single line.

As you pick up your pen to write in your new year's book, within the narrative will you record the truth, when confronted with lies? Will you testify to hope when driven to despair? Will you submit to His authority as the Author and Publisher of your faith? If you belong to Christ, you are a new creation. The old things have gone; everything is made new! 


What a note-worthy novel yours will be!