Tea Party

Yes, its true. I turned 100 on May 17th. My dear friend, Dale, had me a tea party!  I dislike tea sooooo, she made me coffee and served it in a golden pot.  It was amazing!!!!!   We laughed. We giggled. We were giddy! It was extraordinary!!!!  It was so much fun having a tea party that we decided we would certainly do it every month and take turns at each others house. 

We got to have tea party names and dress up!  I was Bubbles.  I'm not sure if thats a tea party name but, Dale always calls me Bubbles from the character on Power Puffs Girls so I figured why not????   

Anyhooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooos, I bought a CD online by Emily Riddle and it is the type of CD that just makes you want to smile and twirl around.   My favorite song is "Puddles"...  Here is the link!   Its a fun CD, Christian and happy!   Its fun to have playing in the house when you have company over !  

"Grace is the most perplexing, powerful force in the universe, and, I believe, the only hope for our twisted, violent planet."   - Philip Yancey

To make you smile :)

A little girl walked daily to and from school. Though the weather that morning was questionable and clouds were forming, she made her daily trek to the elementary school.

As the afternoon progressed, the winds whipped up, along with thunder and lightning. The mother of the little girl felt concerned that her daughter would be frightened as she walked home from school, and she herself feared that the electrical storm might harm her child.

Following the roar of thunder, lightning, like a flaming sword, would cut through the sky. Full of concern, the mother quickly got into her car and drove along the route to her child's school.

As she did so, she saw her little girl walking along, but at each flash of lightning, the child would stop, look and smile. Another and another were to follow quickly, each with the little girl stopping, looking at the streak of light and smiling.

Finally, the mother called her over to the car and asked, "What are you doing?"

The child answered, "God just keeps taking pictures of me."

I love that!  :-)  

Hope your day is beautiful!
Libby :)

Hi Friends!

Have you ever wanted to take a couple of years and do Missionary work or perhaps you know someone interested in being trained to do Missionary work?  There is a DTS, which means Discipleship Training School, coming up in Heredia, Costa Rica in September of this year. Although there are DTS all over the world, this one is one that my son and his wife are leading. I want to go to  it so badly but, fat chance. :)  Its for 5 months I believe and 2 of those months will entail a mission trip to Cuba.  I'm hoping to be on a month long mission into Guatemala for the month of August so I doubt Paul will ever agree to me going off for another 5 months. As a matter of fact, I didn't exactly ask Paul if I could go, I just sorta sweetly told him I was going to be gone the month of August to Guatemala. I made the information casual.  Kinda like an every day thing for me to leave the country for a month.  But, I was gone for 3 weeks last year so, whats another additional week?  He spent that entire time redoing the bathroom so when I came home it was like a little mini palace bathroom... as palace like as you can possibly get for a bathroom not any bigger than a closet and inside a cabin. :)

So anyhoos, here is the information for your consideration:

Youth With A Mission is an international volunteer movement of Christians from many backgrounds, cultures and Christian traditions, dedicated to serving Jesus throughout the world. Also known as YWAM (pronounced "WHY-wham"), our purpose is simply to know God and to make Him known. 

When YWAM began in 1960, our main focus was giving young people opportunities to demonstrate the love of Jesus to the whole world, according to His command in Mark 16:15. Today, we still focus on youth, but we have members (known as “YWAMers”) of almost every age and many of our short-term efforts have grown into long-term endeavors that have impacted lives and nations.

YWAM has a decentralized structure that encourages new vision and the exploration of new ways to change lives through training, convey the message of the gospel and care for those in need. We are currently operating in more than 1000 locations in over 180 countries, with a staff of over 18,000.

A Discipleship Training School (DTS) is a five month course, three months of what is called the Lecture Phase.  It is twelve intensive weeks of classes on a wide variety of topics, like The Father Heart of God, World Missions, Hearing the Voice of God, etc...  The last two months is called the Practical Phase, or the Outreach, where the principles learned in the first twelve weeks are put into practice on an international level.  It is cross cultural and for this particular DTS will be multi-national, the first part being in Cuba, (or somewhere else for those who don´t feel ready for Cuba)  and then other nations to be determined.
  The cost for the Lecture Phase is $1200, which covers food, housing, and transportation, the price of the lecture phase is determined later in the school, but it is recommended that students be prepared for about $1500-$2000 for the outreach phase, which includes airfare, food, other transportation, and housing.  Those who complete the DTS can then take secondary schools if desired.  Here in Heredia we have the School of Frontier Missions (SOFM) which begins in April, and the Environment and Resource Stewardship School (EARS) which takes place every January.  The DTS begins on September 12th and ends mid-February.  For more information, or to apply: (www.ywamheredia.com) 

            I just finished this book, No Greater Love, by Kathi Macias. It was really good.  It is written loosely based on historical events and set in Pretoria, South Africa during the violent upheaval.
Forbidden Romance - Race issues
Unlikely Martyr - tear jerking
Unlikely Hero - didn't see it coming.

Bye for now!                

I did it !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I ran a Full Marathon on Sunday. It was the Oklahoma  Memorial Marathon. 26.2 miles.
I've never ran one before, not even a half one. 
I don't even know how to describe it because the weather was so bad I don't know which part was more in turmoil, my body running for 5 hours in freezing bitter pelting rain that would not let up, feet so frozen I could only feel them by their tingling and parts of my body going numb from the cold...I was running through puddles so my feet were just freezing rain soaked...it was bitter cold... I felt the depletion of every cell and marrow and organ in my body.  Unfortunately I had focused more on preparing for heat. I packed only shorts and a tank top with ankle socks.  That was it.  Gratefully, Paul brought a jacket and so I wore it but, the rain just soaked me. I was so frozen I couldn't even speak.  But then there is the physical part of forcing your body to run.... after 20 miles it was all will power and inner self pushing because my body was done. I was literally dragging it.  It was like my spirit was pulling it and dragging it. I passed healthy muscular men moaning and groaning and no shame, just blantant crying...this didn't happen till around the 23rd mile but there were ambulances, paramedics, wheelchairs... you think...gosh why do people do that to themselves right? 
After it was all said and done, the first thing I said was never again will I run a marathon and by the next day I was wanting to run another one. Why?  I think its because when we physically push ourselves beyond our limits it is exhilarating. There is a new confidence. I did it. I did it.  I endured and lived and am fully recovered by day 3... well except for a few muscles that keep tightening up... Anyways... It does something inside the mind as well as the physical aspect.  I feel I can endure more than I ever thought I could before because I lived through something that ended up feeling like it would kill me and I could of sat down and quit but I didn't. 
There were these college guys and I kept getting stuck in their pod... they were like spitting and stuff and laughing... I wasn't laughing anymore but I couldn't get away from them because I just couldn't go any faster and this was at mile 16 so I was just kinda trapped with them.  They were still laughing and having fun and when they spit I wanted to ...well...I wanted to not play so nice  and say HEY HELLO i'm behind you and I don't feel like getting spit on...I know the difference between spit and rain.   Yeah I wasn't feeling like my sweet self. So I endured the freezing rain, the run and them but after 22 miles the guys were mercifully mostly silent and in their own private torment but when the clouds just opened up again and poured on us, one of the guys said, "I wish the lightening would just strike me"... and for some reason I busted out laughing... that was just so funny. Because seriously thats how it felt...like lightening striking would be mercy. 

After 5 hours of running I crossed the finish line staggering and disoriented. My face was wracked in pain but I don't know if it was from the cold or physical. I just don't know. I do not like the cold at all. I don't like rain either.  I like it outside and me inside but thats it. I am not a dancing in the rain sort. 

Give me 100 degree weather any day. Any day any day any day.  103. Just give it to me and keep the cold and rain away.
After it was all over I had to sit down to wait for Tiffany because I finished first  and thats only because I ran faster to get out of the rain and I was also having fun at first. I was playing a game in my head. I would tag people up ahead and pass them... just to get passed the boredom and so I ended up playing this little passing game until mile 10 and that was it. After mile 10 I began to have a concentrated pace.  I wasn't giggling anymore. :)  By 10 I was a Popsicle. 
But after the run, the minute I sat down my body went into cramping up. I freaked out.  I couldn't even move without a cramp and I was just mush, I couldn't move right, I couldn't focus... body betrayal. I thought, Oh my gosh this is how people die, the body betrays you and your spirit can't do a thing about it.  The spirit is so strong. Its rock solid strong... thats why we can imagine ourselves climbing mountains and swimming across seas because our spirit thinks we can... but most of us can't.  I tried that one time...swimming across the lake... 

But, its over now and I am done but looking forward to maybe another one next year. 

There is only place in which success comes before work.
And that is in the dictionary.


 I've got The Father on my side, Jesus Christ, The Holy Spirit and 2/3 of the angels... What do you think I'm going to do? Sit down and cry? ~ Leonard Ravenhill