Something urgent has come up with regards to NYS funding to assist youth who are homeless (and thus at huge risk of trafficking). New York Governor Cuomo threatens to cut 100% of NYS funding to organizations helping homeless children and youth, as well as organizations working with Domestic Child Trafficking victims.

Please check out this link: http://forsakengeneration.com/actnow/ and or post here: http://sparkaction.org/alert/governor-cuomo-nys-runaway-homeless-youth-yo

SPRING TIME!

You make anew the earth.

You renew the life of me and
You make a new life within me!

If you can't read the small print, it just says the week #. Ex: "March 26: 12 weeks"

Snow on the daffodils.

Chris and I explored Princeton University together on Sunday to discover that spring has come to New Jersey. Some trees are already blossoming in white and red and daffodils spring up on the roadsides. BUT it snowed last night. Even today clumped snow, tiny hail stones, and fat rain drops fell fast and hard all at once. That in itself is some of the strangest weather I have yet seen, but seeing snow on the branches of my green-budding tree and snow atop the daffodils is almost surreal. I hope none freeze to death.

Family Vacation

The Denver Post published this picture the week we were in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. As we rode up and up the lift, the balloon appeared to go down and down on the horizon. The mountain is huge, the ski routes many, and the powder ideally powdery. Snowboarding with my siblings, cousin, and boyfriend-in-law was great fun and hanging out with Mom and Dad the rest of the time was a breath of fresh air (not that the air in the CO Rockies isn't fresh enough already).
I only snowboarded two half-days for safety and rest (beyond wk 16, I would do no such thing). Despite the temperature being warm enough for us to peel off coat and hat layers on the slopes, we left the town on the day of a winter storm warning! I feared I would not make my flight back to NY. With snow falling hard and thick onto the already white roads and, according the the weatherman, 12 more inches to come, we COULD NOT make it up the first mountain pass out of town. We drove halfway up, turned around, got a running start, tried again, turned around and tried AGAIN, then gave up and drove back to an auto shop to buy tire chains. If we did not get out of NW CO by that morning, we expected to be stuck there until the following afternoon! Fortunately, my brother proved to be a tire chaining champion and we made it to Denver airport just in time for me to walk straight to my gate and onto my plane. Wahoo!

The Power of God > not = the power of Heather

I have learned that trusting God does not always involve my discernment. I have many a time prayed, "God, I trust you with this situation. Now, please help me to discern Your will." Then I proceed to worry for months about whether or not I'd discerned correctly. Don't get me wrong, I think that is a good prayer and we absolutely should actively seek God's will, but my anxious attitude behind it was draining, pointless, and less than trusting. I was trusting myself as much as or more than I was trusting God. Did I forget that He is the mighty one?

When Chris and I were moving to NYC, we prayed that God would lead us to the area where He wanted us to live and mostly to the church that he wanted us to join. I worried for months that we would not choose the right home then I worried afterward that we had mischosen/ that we would spend 3 years friendless in a big city. As it turns out, if Chris and I had not moved to the southern point of Staten Island (rather than the north or Brooklyn nearer to his work), we would not have visited The Point Church in nearby New Jersey and experienced the blessing that has made living here the most worthwhile. I cannot imagine our life without our brothers and sisters there and I do not think I would be as able to face the journey of motherhood without the love and wisdom of our friends. I didn't carefully discern that God wanted us to move here- I was clueless. I do not feel any sense of accomplishment in having chosen correctly. I simply prayed. And he answered. All that worry and stress was not necessary; it glorified myself rather than Him and revealed to me that I needn't waste my energy trying to trust my discernment. Rather I should just believe that God is powerful and trustworthy.
Depend on Him, not on Him plus yourself. And toss your anxiety out the window.

On Child-rearing

"We rob our children if we merely seek to have them meet our expectations. We need to be on God's agenda for our kids lives so they can experience the abundant life God intends for them." -Henry Blackaby in Bible study, Experiencing God

God, I want to be on your agenda for our child's life. I don't want to make up an agenda myself. We want all of our children to know you and to "be conformed to the image of Christ." Like Paige said (prev post), kids are on loan to us for a while. They are not ours.

Even if I think my agenda is a godly one, I'm not wise enough to pull it off lovingly and fruitfully, He is the gardener and the vine. John 15: 1-5. God leads and guides it, I don't. I may play a role in how He guides it and I feel blessed for the opportunity to do so.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%2015:1-5&version=NIV

An Announcement.

Heather's Text to Paige Marcella Rieck Hill:
Hey Paige, guess what I am.
It's a sort of state of being or a condition if you will. an unplanned and unanticipated but never the less (after a bit of adjusting) welcomed one.
The condition itself is temporary, but the effects are pretty darn permanent.

Paige's Response:
You have a parasite.
That you will name.
And grow to love

Heather's Response:
Yes.

I remember once in college (I don't know why Paige and I were talking about child rearing), Paige said that God gives children to parents on loan for a while to love and to train. Correct me, Paige, if you can say it better than that.


Chris said it looks like a peanut, but I can kinda tell that it is going to be human. See the big head on the left and the little body with arm and leg nubs on the right?

My sister, Katie, commented "I showed my friends at work and Laura said it looked like a gummy bear. Everyone loves gummy bears and they are cute, so tell Chris that it looks like a gummy bear or I thought it looked like a black eyed pea..."

But since he/she looks so much like a Peanut, he/she has been dubbed Little Linus.  Let it be known that the birth name will not be Linus.  

As you can see, I really enjoyed Middleton Place Plantation.

double click the image to make it big and pixilated.

And scroll down to the next two posts for pictures.

I promised some pictures of Charleston and Savannah, so here are a few of the few that we took.

Ice cream in Savannah because it was Blue Bell. Even though it was cold, we were so excited about seeing Blue Bell ice cream (which you can't find up north) that we ate it anyway.

The trolley goes back and forth down River Street in Savannah. The driver has a seat on both ends of the car.

This building was built out of ballast stones from the belly's of trade ships.
The mansion at Middleton Place plantation. most of it was destroyed in the Civil War.

A building on the College of Charleston campus that allured me.
Middleton Place is an active farm.


I guess the peacock thought I was pretty.

The Aiken-Rett house, a beautiful mansion in downtown Charleston.

St. Michael's Anglican Church where Chris and I attended during our stay. It's steeple bells are the oldest cast bells in America.

The Circular Church on Meeting Street in Charleston was a very interesting building surrounded by a fascinating graveyard. The picture on the right was take 5 hours before we found out I was pregnant.

We woke up many January mornings to a multi-inch coats of fluffiness. The winter has been fun (and for NYC, expensive), but I am ready for the spring!