14 inches

This is what 14 inches of snow looks like:Somewhere down in there are about 20 little strawberry plants!I came home to shovel the driveway and this is what I find! The boys and girl (and their mom too!) were working away. They were actually quite productive. I think next year Sandy and I are going into supervisory mode.We all love the snow!

Fond memories...

of warmer days. We're in the middle of another GREAT snow storm. The snow is gently falling outside. We may be up to 10+ inches by now with more to come. It is quite cold out there with a low of below zero expected tonight. As I was cleaning up some videos on the computer, I found these gems. It really made me long for warmer days and green grass.

Sandy was working in the front yard with Matt and Emery last fall. But eventually they snuck out to the back yard to do this unbeknownst to her! Don't you love Matt's hat / goggles look?
This was their ultimate plan. If you can't understand her, Emery says at the end, "That is hilarious now Mr. Matt! General!"

On a separate note, I read Matthew 16 tonight to the boys and girl. In one section of the chapter, Jesus preaches for all to deny themselves, take up their cross and follow Him. Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but he who loses his life for Christ's sake will find it.

I explained the Gospel through that verse and gave an impassioned plea to put faith in Christ for their sins. Matt and Emery both have been talking a lot about becoming Christians and asking for clarification in a lot of Gospel matters. They were both looking at me in seemingly deep thought when Matt asked:
Matt: Dad?
Me: Yes? (can you hear the hope in my voice?)
Matt: How old do you have to be to grow a beard? Can you grow one even though you are a kid or do you have to be old like Cancun (his uncle)?

Deep, theological questions tend to plague our family Bible times. :)

Proverbs 3:5-6

I've heard many people say that kids can memorize things very easily. And I've believed that for years. But as I've worked on training my kids to memorize, I'm starting to disagree with that sentiment. While it is true that many kids memorize things fairly quickly, they also forget things very quickly too. Or at least my kids do. Maybe they are the exception. :)

We spend so much time reviewing our verses for the simple fact that if we don't, Matt and Emery forget them (Andrew does it on his own now). Hopefully, not only will they continue to remember God's Word for the rest of their lives, they will have formed the discipline to memorize and review God's Word for the rest of their lives.

I typically post the kids on the blog once they've memorized the verses. But I thought it would be cute to show the process over a few days of trying to get it down. Sometimes they think they're ready just a tad before they really are.

Here's take 1.

Take 2.

And here he got it! To be fair, he has been memorizing A LOT of Awana verses. So he has had a lot of new verses running through his head. I've tried to slow down on our family verses for his sake.

Emery has not had as many Awana verses to memorize since she is in Cubbies (the youngest club) so she jumped ahead to Prov 14:16 - A wise man is cautious and turns away from evil. But a fool is arrogant and careless.

Basketball

Andrew is half way through the season. It hasn't been a smooth one. So far, he's had 2 of 5 practices canceled due to weather, missed most of another practice after jamming his thumb and missed another because he was sick.

Despite the lack of practice, he still managed to score.

Caterpillar crawl

This song is called the Caterpillar Crawl.

The piano lessons continue...so far so good for the first month.

Brrrrrr

As I'm writing this, the temperature is 4 degrees with a wind chill of -11 degrees. There is something called a Wind Chill Advisory going on - who knew there was such a thing? The low is supposed to be -14 degrees (record low) with a wind chill of up to -23. That is 55 degrees BELOW the temperature water turns to ice for all of my CA friends!But that doesn't intimidate us anymore! Even knee deep snow (granted it was knee deep to Matt which is only about 8 inches) can't stop the boys and girl from going out to play.This is what happens when you give an 8 year-old the camera...you get a picture of Andrew's shadow. That and all of the snow balls he is stockpiling for the ultimate snow fight...snowmaggedon.

Lee Family Retreat

I'm back. Sandy has been holding down the blog fort for long enough. I never intended to take a blog sabbatical. It just happened for a variety of reasons. Hopefully, I will be back to my regular every other day posting routine.Today was quite the snowy day which landed us about 10 inches of snow and sub zero wind chills. I decided to get a cozy fire going, and Sandy baked some cookies. It was a very relaxing winter day indoors. A perfect day, in fact, to reflect on our Lee Family Retreat which was about 3 weeks ago.

As usual, Sandy and I went to a B&B in the country to reflect on God's faithful grace and love in our lives in the past year. We spent time on our own reading Scripture, praying and thinking. We spent time trying to figure out how God has changed us and continues to change us. We talked about our marriage, our parenting and our kids. We evaluated our past goals and set new ones for 2011.

It was a rich time in so many ways. I love pausing and reflecting on how God is working all around me and even in me. He is so good.

This blog has been a great way for me to keep track of my goals. So here are just a few for 2011:

1. Read through the Bible twice

• Last year, I read through the Bible in 1 year. I thought it was good, but I had trouble reading through 2 places at the same time - 2 chapters in the OT and 1 in the NT daily. George Muller who read the Bible 3-4 times a year inspired me to strive for more. So far, it's been going very well. Reading 6-7 chapters a day from Genesis forward has been surprisingly enjoyable. I'm getting a good grasp of the overall story of the OT books. I've also started reading from the ESV Study Bible - I highly recommend it!
  

2. Memorize the book of Titus

• I must admit that I have memorized the book of Titus years ago so I imagine (hope?) that it will come back fairly easily. It's also only 3 chapters and only 46 verses.
  

3. Run the KC Marathon in under 4 hours

• The half-marathon went so well that I'm excited to go for the full marathon! We'll see how excited I am when I am running 20 miles in the hot and humid summer...
  

4. Read 24 books

• Last year I read 26 books. I think I'm maxing out, but I like this pace. I read some fun books, some difficult books, some marriage and parenting books and some ministry books. God has used them to help me think great thoughts of Him more often. Just for posterity, I list them below.
  

Also for posterity, Andrew memorized 30 verses; Matt and Emz memorized 15. They also memorized a bunch of verses for Awana, but I don't think they retained most of those. It's good to know how much they have been memorizing for future comparison.

I can't believe it's already February. 2011 has started faster than I had anticipated. These are not all of my goals, but nobody needs to know all of them! I think I have too many. But they are very helpful for me to grow in grace and the knowledge of Christ.

2010 Books:

• #26 - What Is a Healthy Church? by Mark Dever
• #25 - When the Game Was Ours by Magic & Bird
• #24 - Why Small Groups? Ed. by C.J. Mahaney
• #23 - Simple Church by Rainer &Geiger
• #21 - The Reformed Pastor by Richard Baxter
• #20 - Worldliness ed. by C.J. Mahaney
• #19 - The Trellis and the Vine by Marshall and Payne
• #18 - Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis
• #17 - Spurgeon by Arnold Dallimore
• #16 - Half-Marathon: You Can Do It by Jeff Galloway
• #15 - This Momentary Marriage by John Piper
• #14 - A Game Plan for Life by John Wooden
• #13 - George Muller of Bristol by A.T. Pierson
• #12 - The Complete Husband by Lou Priolo
• #11 - Gospel-Powered Parenting by William Farley
• #10 - The Godly Man's Picture by Thomas Watson
• #9 - Basic Economics by Thomas Sowell
• #8 - Worship Matters by Bob Kauflin
• #7 - The First World War by John Keegan
• #6 - Already Gone by Ken Ham & Britt Beemer
• #5 - The Treasure Principle (re-read) by Randy Alcorn
• #4 - Don't Make Me Count to 3! by Ginger Plowman
• #3 - Heralds of God by James Stewart
• #2 - The Life and Diary of David Brainerd by David Brainerd, ed. by Jonathan Edwards
• #1 - The Pursuit of Holiness (re-read) by Jerry Bridges