In Christ Alone

I love the truth and power of this song. The theme of the life, death, resurrection of Christ, and the implications of that for us all is so strong. Such a powerful song for reflection as we move through this lenten season and contemplate what our Heavenly Father did for us through the gift of His son. Jesus commands our destiny! Hallelujah!

What a Way to Celebrate!

I can't think of a better place to spend your birthday than in a cabin in the mountains with your family! Beckett got to do just that for his ninth birthday this year since his birthday fell on the weekend that Nana and Papa planned a Harper family get away to the mountains!

There was so much to do at the cabin and the seven cousins had a blast doing it ALL! Here is a picture of Lillie, Beckett, Marley, Helen and Ty in the hot tub one afternoon!

 There was a media room where we watched movies and hooked up the Wii! Here are all the boy cousins watching a movie on the flat screen TV!

 There were many Will Sports Resort challenges all weekend! Love this action shot of Ty playing a game!

 The game room had air hockey, a pool table and a foosball table. Lots of fun had in this room, too!

 We also enjoyed sitting on the deck in the rocking chairs just looking at the mountains!

 On Saturday, we decorated the cabin for Beckett's 9th birthday.

 Here is the birthday boy!

 Everyone had fun with the blowers and made lots of noise to celebrate his birthday!

We surprised Beckett and took him to Mr. Gatti's in Sevierville that night for his birthday. They have a HUGE pizza buffett and a big game room, so he was loving it! I didn't get a group picture, but I really like this one of Lillie, Ty and Helen as we were leaving the restaurant!

Each night we did a "Family Time" devotion. Our family was part of a pilot group that started doing these devotions with our church several months ago and our family really enjoys them. We thought it would be fun to do them at the cabin each night with all of the cousins.  I don't think anyone will forget the first night's devotion that talked about the greatest weapon that we all have. Our greatest weapon is our tongue and the object lesson was an actual cow's tongue! (I'll spare you the picture!) Each kid got to come in to the room blindfolded and feel "the greatest weapon"......not knowing that it was an actual cow's tongue. It was a great lesson and such a good one to come back to when brothers and sisters (and cousins) begin to fuss. We can use our tongues to build up and encourage or to break down and hurt each other. The night this picture was taken, we talked about "traps" and we had a mouse trap as part of the object lesson. So fun and great time together with family!

On Sunday morning we woke up to SNOW! It didn't snow a lot, but it did snow for a few hours and it was so pretty. On Monday morning when we left, the view from our cabin showed that just a bit above our elevation had snow still in the trees! Beautiful!

It was another wonderful Harper family cabin vacation!

Thanks again, Nana and Papa for the fun and memories!

And in case you are wondering.....the song on my playlist is in honor of two of John Denver's newest and biggest fans....Ty and Marley! They had us all singing John Denver all weekend and they know the words to so many of his songs! We love us some John Denver!

Forty Days

Will you take the challenge?


Forty Days of Water from Blood:Water Mission on Vimeo.

No diet coke for this momma for forty days! (You might want to watch out if you see me in the next few days! It could be ugly!)