Tonight my family and I went to a local housing project and helped to feed some of the people there.  We joined in with a couple of groups from our church to provide the free meal to the people at CSL.  It's a lot of fun, and kind of sad at the same time.  Many of the p eople there have so very little and they really look forward to the free meal.  tonight prayer was asked for Mary and Pat.  Pat, I believe,, is not saved and his wife is verry concerned about that.  We prayed for the two of them.

Today was also Malerie's surgery on her face and eye socket.  They started at 4:45 and still aren't doone yet.  Her parents were pretty worried about her.  Prayers for her everywhere!!

Tonight Emily reported that she had asked a 20 yr old to the prom.  Needless to say, I had a few thingds to say about that.  She didn't appreciate my comments a whole lot...but I don't care too much!  My job is to be the mom and to make sure that she makes good decisions...I can't very well do that if she doesn't even give me a heads up about what she's doing....can I?

Praying for Malerie and the Shaffer Family and Pat and Mary tonight!!

Today was a blessed day!!!  Church was wonderful.  We have such a good preacher.  He preached today on how we as Christians are "the hunted".  We are prey to the devil and he, the devil, can and will do anything to break us.  He uses everything!!!  After church, however, we discovered that another preacher that we knew had committed suicide...the reason...because the devil won.  the devil was able to break this man because he allowed him to seep into his life and the devil ultimately took control.  It's horribly sad for the man as well as his family.  It really makes you stop and think about your own life and how it only takes a little bit at a time for us to allow the devil in and he slowly takes control and sometimes we don't even realize what's happening.

On a more positive note, a little girl, Malerie who we have been praying for for a couple of months is finally sitting up and talking.  She was in a car accident, is 13 years old and has almost died several times.  Her parents commitment to God and their faithfulness has truly inspired so many people in our area and I'm sure around the world.  Seeing God work is amazing!!! 

The whole situation with Malerie has inspired me to memorize scripture because after every post on CaringBridge they sign off with a verse from the Bible.  I want to be able to do that...just pull scripture out of my head and pass it on to someone.  So that's my goal.  They have actually posted about 60 or 70 different verses throughout this whole ordeal.

The first verse that I am learning is:

Jeremiah 29:11 and 12.  For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.  Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. 

If you read this...I pray for you to have a blessed day as well.

So today I took 2 baby pot-bellied pigs out to the barn.  Up until this morning they were living in my bathtub, being bottle-fed until last week and I have slowly been weaning them off of the bottle.  They are currently eating 3 or 4 times a day...milk and scraps, but mostly oatmeal or bread...they love that!!!  I had to move them to the barn because they are really starting to smell.  They like taking a bath, however, I really needed to get them outside so that they didn't forget that they were pigs. 

Today, I also moved some of my lillies and basil.  I am hoping to build a new chicken coop and then turn my current chicken coop into a potting shed.  I can't wait.  I have so much stuff that I would like to do outside, but really have nowhere to do it. 

I also worked on cleaning out the barn.  There's a lot of poop and hay to get cleaned up after the winter.  I got a small section done.  I have to take breaks from all of that shoveling.  I also cleaned out the shelterhouse and worked on cleaning out my flowerbeds.  Got the yard picked up a little bit and fixed one of my chimes that got broken over the winter.

Spring is a wonderful time of year and I look forward to it so very much, but it is also a great deal of work.  I have 3, maybe 4, field trips scheduled for the Farm already this year.  I'm  looking forward to them, but just have a lot of stuff to do.

Believe it or not....I am currently bottle feeding 3 baby pot-bellied pigs.  They were born yesterday and the wind chill was like 8 below so I brought them in the house to save their lives.  We had already lost 2 of them, so we now have 2 girls and a boy.  They are so cute.  One is black and the other two are white.  Love them so much!!!  We also had 2 baby goats born yesterday...a boy and a girl.  Both are doing very well so far.  The weather is so cold that I totally expect more babies very soon.  We have at least 5 that are bred.  So now just waiting for the kidding season to go into full swing.  Tonight my Tyler had a wrestling match.  He had t dress up for the away match...He looked adorable.  Red shirt and black tie with blue jeans...Adorable!!!  Love him sooo much!! 

Blog Information Update

So, it's been almost a year since I posted anything to this blog.  I have to learn to be more consistent.  I have so much information about adoption, children, farming, grandchildren, etc., etc., that I feel the need to share the things that we have done wrong, but also share the things that we did right.  So, I hope that if you run across this blog, that you take the time to read some of our "Simpson" story.

Goat Milk Soap

I made another batch of goat milk soap today...it's coconut and oatmeal. I can't really smell the coconut yet, but hopefully I will as it cures. I made some the other day that is wild berry and coffee grounds. I'm trying to get better at the soap so that I can possibly sell it. I have made butter, yogurt and soap with my goat milk. So far it's all turning out well. My husband and I spent a rainy day yesterday cleaning our bedroom together. It was time-consuming, exhausting, but fun too. I love him to death, but he sure does drive me crazy. We have a really big bedroom...he calls it the family room cause the kids come and go as they please and never knock. With 9 kids doing that, he gets a little edgy. Anyway, our room is sort of the catch-all of the house. If you don't know where to put something...it comes to our room. So we spent the day getting rid of a lot of stuff, moving furniture, getting rid of furniture, sorting through books, shelves, totes, everything. We got a lot done, but we still have a lot to do.

Chaos and Craziness

Well, I have decided that I'm probably going to have to mud in my garden this week. My father-in-law always told me to make sure that my garden was in by Memorial Day! I have always tried to listen to him, but this year with all of the rain...I don't know if I can get it in or not. I'm gonna try though! In church last week our preacher said that when there is chaos and turmoil in our lives...it's because the devil is trying to take over. He said that to stop that from happening that all we have to do is tell him to leave in the name of Jesus. He said that if you speak the name of Jesus that the devil has to leave. With all of the craziness in our lives....I try to do that but I get so caught up in all of the chaos I forget to tell him to leave until everything is over and I'm feeling guilty, because I didn't handle things very christianly. Wouldn't it be nice if you could see the devil lurking so that you would know that he is there and creating the chaos...so then I might remember what I am supposed to do? I'd probably still forget!!!