A Hero Of Another Sort

Its been a blessing for me to celebrate this Memorial Day in the U.S.A. As many of you know, last year I had a, ah, little bit of a hard time adjusting to being in Canada. :) Being out of the country for a year and now being back has made me appreciate my American heritage so much.

My heart goes out to those that are suffering today from the lost of a loved one or the separation of a loved one in the military. My mind travels to those overseas, desperately missing the comforts of home and family. I am filled with gratitude for those sacrificing their lives for our country.

I have not personally experienced this separation of having a loved one in the military. But I would like to tell you the story today of the one in my family who has fought a different battle for his family's freedom.

Norman Gower suffered a great deal in his teenage years with congestive heart failure, spending time in Arizona to try to improve his health. Because of his heart problems, he was not permitted to enter the military.

Instead he married, raised five children, and through much hard work and determination built a business and became a comparatively wealthy man. His family enjoyed many comforts that he was able to provide for them. He was, by the world's standards, living the American dream.

But when he was in his 30's, his life was changed forever when he found Christ, and accepted Him as Saviour. His life took a drastically different direction; now, instead of seeking wealth and prestige, he was seeking a deeper relationship with God. He enjoyed that fellowship for the next 40 years.

His life was also changed in other ways. During the years he walked with Christ, he was misunderstood by others, even other Christians. He was mocked and ridiculed for his deep relationship with Christ. He lost all his wealth and comforts due to the dealings of a deceitful business partner. He was fighting a battle. A battle not only for his own spiritual life, but also for the spiritual life of his family.

He passed away at the age of 72, quietly, comfortably, in his favorite chair. He sat down and his heart simply stopped, weakened by all those years of heart failure. Did he die wealthy? Not monetarily, no. Did he die with all the creature comforts that our world labels "success?" No. As it is said of Enoch, in the Old Testament, "Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him." (Genesis 5:24) Norman Gower walked with God, until God took him home.

But was it worth it? Was the battle he fought called Christianity worth all the pain and sacrifice? Did he get the victory? Or was his battle all in vain?

I'll let you be the judge. Consider this: From Norman Gower's 5 children came 15 grandchildren. From those 15 grandchildren came 22 grandchildren (as of right now), with one in the oven, so to speak. :) All together, there are roughly 52 of Norman Gower's descendants that are right now walking with the Lord, living for him, and being brought up in God-fearing homes. Out of those 52 there are 5 pastors, several deacons, many that have taken short or long-term missions trips, and a couple dozen Christian families all striving to make a difference for Him. So tell me, how well was the battle fought?

Yes, it was a different battle than what most today are thinking of. But I am forever indebted to Norman Gower, my grandfather, for fighting his battle that allowed me the freedom of a Christian home. He displayed for me what the Christian life is all about, and left a legacy for me to pass on to my children.

"I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:

Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing."

II Timothy 4:7-8

Goodbye Ponies

And now, here is my very sentimental purging post. Does anyone else ever get this way? There is the satisfaction of purging, but.... do I have to get rid of THAT?? I mean, I don't use it, don't ever even look at it, but....ITS A VERY IMPORTANT PART OF MY CHILDHOOD!!!

WHHAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!

(tissues please)

Its ok, really, I'll be okay. It is kind of sentimental...but I'm really not that sentimental of a person. Really, I'm not. Really.

And what I have to show you here is, well...probably slightly weird. Okay, its probably really weird. But it is part of my childhood, nonetheless. Actually, its like, all of my childhood.

While I was working on all my fantabulous cleaning/organizing/purging a couple weeks ago, I saved a certain box for last. I knew it was there, but I avoided it, because I knew in my heart that I needed to throw the whole box out. It was taking up space. It was useless. It stunk (literally). So finally, I dug it out, opened it up, and began to say goodbye.

But not without taking pictures first, of course. See, so now I can still look at it and remember it all! Aren't I smart?

Here it all is:

(grab your tissues)

Snif, snif. Lets all cry together, shall we?

Oh wait, you don't know what all that is? Its my collection of every single piece of printed material I ever came across that had a horse on it!!

And when I say every single piece, I mean every single piece.

I don't remember when it started. I do know that at one point of my life (very, very long ago) my dad was worried about me because I had no interests. I didn't do anything. I probably wasn't showing much potential for life. I'm serious, he actually expressed these concerns to my mom. I didn't like dolls or playing house or anything that normal little girls like.

Then it hit, and at some point I'm sure my dad wished he could take his words back. "It" being my extreme love for horses. Clearly, I was obsessed.

See these? They are magazine pictures that I cut out and then covered with packaging tape to "laminate" them so I could hang them up. But of course, I couldn't be like most girls who paper their bedroom walls with these pictures. No, I had to hang mine up on our upright freezer in the garage. (Yes, I was raised a hick, why do you ask?)

I blame that part on my mother, because she insisted my sister and I have a pink bedroom, and who wants to contaminate lovely packaging-taped horse pictures by putting them in a pink room?

Heres a paint by number and some magazine advertisements. I saved everything, I tell ya.

And yes, like any 13-year-old weird teenager does, I had a club. We actually were pretty cool for about 3 months. We got together and did fun things. Like put horse appliques on shirts so we could be matching. We all had secret "horse" names, and membership cards. We sat around and wrote letters to local riding stables asking them to please consider letting us come take lessons. (We never actually mailed them.) My mom even wrote us this song:

I'm a happy horseshoe member

Even though I have no horse

I'm a happy horseshoe rider

In my dreams

On my shirt I wear our motto

Horse stuff I have a lot, Oh

I'm a happy horseshoe member

Yes-siree!

See? We were cute.

Here we have some magazine pages of things like clothing, accessories, address labels, room decor, etc. All with horses on it. My favorite was always this shirt that had all kinds of horse gear on it, and it said, "A very tack-y shirt." Ha ha! (Get it? Tack is what they call the saddle and bridle and all that stuff. You do get it, right?)

And I can't help that Budweiser used stunningly gorgeous horses in their advertisements!

Then there is my wish book:
Full of, oh no, not pictures of horses! Pictures of horse stuff.
For real, can you see me wearing that dress? Yikes!

And last but not least, here is the pile of horse supply magazines. The picture really doesn't do it justice, it was a huge stack. I think my favorite one was "Back In The Saddle." I was like a kid in a candy store looking through pages and pages of different kinds of stirrups, let me tell you.

What I did not get a picture of is the pile of things I kept. I did keep my book from the time my grandparents took me to see the Lippizaner Stallions. (If you look in the picture below, you can see part of that book on the right.)

I had to keep that, they were actually legit. I still remember that incredible show! I also kept my 12 "Horse Illustrated" magazines, because those are actually real magazines with neat articles about horses and horsemanship, and they actually cost money, unlike all those free tack magazines I told you about before.

Well, now you know what a weird, hick teenager I was. And while this stuff was fun to look through and remember how obsessed I was, it was taking up space and it was pretty useless and for pete's sake, it still smelled like our cat-infested barn in Maine. Gross. So really, I'm quite proud with myself for taking the plunge and letting go.

(Where'd I put those tissues...)

Can someone please reassure me that you had a weird obsession growing up as well? Please tell me I'm not the only one!

Photo Editing

I am in no way good with pictures or photo editing or graphics or anything. Ask anybody. In fact, I'm always afraid to post any pictures I've taken for fear that someone like Omar will see them. :) But we all have to start somewhere, right?

Even thought I know I stink at stuff like this, I do like to play around with it and see what happens. About a year ago I installed Gimp on my computer. I had seen how it worked, but never actually used it myself. I have slowly been playing around with some of it to see what I can make of it. So when we took this super cute picture of Sheba......

...I knew something had to be done. See the glaringly obvious collar sticking out? And the gloves in the background? Yuck. I decided to try and see if I could fix that somehow. Here is what I came up with:

Eh, not too bad. Not too great either, but I told you I stink. All I did was use the clone tool and covered up what I didn't want. At least, I think thats what I did. Was that what I did? And I won't even tell you how long that took me...

So, there is my attempt at a little photo editing. When I am rich and famous you can tell people you knew me when I first was getting started. No autographs, please.

Organizing/Cleaning Post (Finally!!) With A Printable!

Ok peeps, I've really been trying hard to get this post out there. Promise. Blogger hasn't exactly been cooperating with me, ok? For some reason my pictures have been taking FOREVER to download, and this post has a TON of pictures. But here we finally are.

As I mentioned before, ever since Christmas I have been planning on going through all my junk/stuff in the attic and purging and sorting it all. And yeah, so I didn't get started on it until about 4 days before I left. Brilliant, right? Thankfully I still managed to get a lot done.

It started with the purchase of these:

And this:

Containers! Happy dance! Something about them just brings a smile to my face!

I started with this file box. I had a bunch of random papers that needed a home. This one was pretty inexpensive and came with all these hanging files.

I went with this cardboard one as opposed to a plastic one because they are so much more expensive. I was very impressed with this one, it is very sturdy for being cardboard.

I used some bright markers on my folders and popped them in!

I also re-organized some other files that I had. They all just NEEDED to have bright marker labels on them!

And because I am really weird like this and don't mind showing you something thats mildly embarrasing, here's a picture of the sign I put on one of my file boxes when I was like 12 years old:

Getting real spiritual on you, aren't I??

Next I had to go through my clothes. In Canada, I was still wearing my winter clothes, but I would not be needing them in Florida, so I switched them out with the summer wear. I also ended up packing away more than normal, because the airline weight limits would not let me take all my clothes with me. :) So here is most of them.

I use the ziplock backs for my warm socks. It is easy to push all the air out of the bag, and makes them store a lot better. Then they are all in one place when I am ready to pull them out.

Here is a random tote of junk. I really did get rid of a lot of stuff in the process. Promise! I probably could have done even more purging...if I had started about 3 months sooner. :)

See my cute card box?

And because I'm becoming slightly obsessed with this organizing thing, I just *had* to make some labels for my stuff. Oh yes I did. In my spare time. Ha!

And because I did them in my spare time (i.e. midnight) they seriously have that, "Oh, you spent 3 minutes whipping these up in Pages" look. But they work.

They will be a big help if I need my mom to send me something that I have stored. Everything is nicely labeled so she will be able to find it. So it was not a waste of my precious time, right?

Here is all of it in the attic! This is where you pause and say, "Wow, Nicole, nice labels." Why thank you!

And for those of you who aren't too picky and don't mind the "created with love in Pages" look, I've made this be-youtiful label available for you!

I made them slightly larger than your average label, because I was labeling large totes. Someday I may change it so it fits a standard Avery label size. Let me know if thats something you would be interested in.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, I printed these on white card stock, covered them with contact paper, then wrote on them with a marker, and used the make-a-circle-of-tape method to stick them on the totes. I probably did that backwards and should have wrote on them and then laminated them, but once I let the marker sit for a minute it did not wipe off. At all. So I think they will work. And they are not in a high-traffic or very-likely-to-be-touched place, so I think they'll be ok.

Well, there you have it. Hope it was worth the wait. I have one more post related to my organizing in the works. It involves something very near and dear to my heart that I decided to get rid of. *Sniff. Bring your own tissues.

Why You Should Fly Jet Blue

I know I told you that I would post about my cleaning/organizing/last minute stuff I did before I left Canada. And I will. Promise. I just told you it would be in the next decade, so I have plenty of time to work on it. (Insert laugh here)

But in the meantime, and since I just got done a day of flying, I wanted to tell you all about the day. And why you should fly Jet Blue Airlines.

Let it first be said that I’m not doing this because Jet Blue promised me lots of money or asked me to do this. I’m just telling you this because next time you fly you’ll appreciate my advice. I really, thoroughly enjoyed my experience with Jet Blue, and if they read this and decide to give me a free flight, ya know, like halfway around the world or something, I won’t complain.

So back to my flights. Because I am going to be here for 6 months, I had, um, slightly more luggage than a normal person. But really I did pretty good! I just had one really large suitcase and one smaller one and my backpack as my carry on. My first checked bag was free, but the second one I had to pay for. The guy at the check-in was super helpful...he tried to get me to take the smaller bag as a carry-on instead, but it was just waaaaay too heavy and full of liquids and gels anyway, so I just decided it was worth it to pay for it. Nice of him to try to save me some green, though. Then I went to pay for that bag, and all I had was cash. I didn’t have exact change, and he didn’t have any change, so he knocked $5 off the price. Seriously, this guy was intent on saving me money. Mucho thanks, buddy.

I flew out of Portland, which is a pretty small airport. I actually sat outside security talking to my Grammie, who took me to the airport, until 20 minutes before I had to board. Then I breezed through security (I’ve got that down to a science!) and only had about an 18 minute wait to board my flight. We boarded right on time, and as soon as everyone was seated we were airborne!

It was by far the quickest I’d ever taken off. Usually its like, sit and wait for who knows what or who knows who that has to be paged all over the airport or the pilot wants another cup of coffee or SOMETHING! But not this time, just sit, buckle, and we’re off. LOVE IT!

Because of this efficiency, we landed 35 minutes earlier than we were supposed to. Yeah, when does that happen? Oh, and even though it was only a 45 minute flight, we still got a personal TV, soda, and a snack...with a choice of potato chips or chocolate chip cookies. (Just so you know, I picked chips. And they were blue. They say that they are made from naturally blue potatoes, but I have my suspicions. They were just so….so...blue!)

I was supposed to have about a 2 hour layover, but it ended up being more like a 3 hour layover because we got in so early. Which is fine, I actually really like just browsing around the airport, watching people, and not feeling at all rushed. Not too far from my gate I found a Dunkin and a Boarders….the perfect combination! And they had free wireless with these cute little places for you to sit with your laptop, and an outlet right next to you. It was a great layover.

My second flight was slightly more delayed, but not bad. We boarded a little late, and then there was some minor glitch with starting the engine. They still got us moving very quickly (maybe a 10 minute wait?) and we landed only a little late. This flight was longer which just meant that we had more snack choices. :)

Oh, and can we just talk about legs for a minute? I mean, leg room. Supposedly they have these seats that if you pay a little extra you get an “Even More Legroom” seat, which gives you even more legroom, in case you were wondering. But myself and the girl beside me both came to the decision that there is no need to pay the extra moolah because there is plenty of legroom in the regular seats. I was able to put my backpack under the seat in front of me because there was so much room under the seats, and so I didn’t have to worry about getting up to get something out of the overhead bins. It made it much easier. (I hate standing in the aisle making the whole rest of the passengers wait while I heft my backpack into that space. Blah.)

And a couple other blessings from this flight (that have nothing to do with Jet Blue, really):

I had window seats for both flights. I LOVE window seats! If you think God’s creation is beautiful down here, you should see the “big picture” of it when you are up in the air! Stunning!

I had an empty seat beside me on the first flight, and had two nice ladies sitting in the seats next to me on the second flight. No fat men beside me or anything.

My cousin Crysten and my siblings made me a couple plane letters to open while in the air. Very fun! Got some chocolate out of it, which is always a good thing.

My sister Rachel (with a little help from my parents) wrote me this poem and put it in my plane letter. I must share it with you. I laughed so hard, the other passengers probably thought I was wacky. Which isn’t true, btw. (I’m going to spell everything just like she did, because that is half of what makes it so funny.)

While Your Away

While your away

We will have fun,

Playing outside

Cause school will be done.

While your away

We’ll have Jaimie instead,

She will stay in your room

And take up the whole bed.

(Can I just insert: someone has warped that poor child’s mind. You know who you are!!! :)

While your away

We won’t cry boohoo,

Miss Jaimie won’t make us practice

As much as you do.

While your away

The weather will be cool,

But you’ll be in Florida

Just like a fool.

While your away

Aunt Kathy will be here,

And you’ll be so lonely

You might shed a tear.

While your away

You’ll get a nice tan

And maybe if your lucky

You’ll even get a man.

(I’m told that my mother helped with that part….very funny.)

While your away

We’ll miss you very much

Do not forget us

And be shure to keep in touch.

Love, Your Family

Making My Organizing Efforts Look Good

I'd like to show you a small part of my organizing efforts from this week. You know that I am leaving soon, and I really wanted to get all of my stuff in order so that it is not in the way while I am gone. I also needed to clean some stuff out of my room, as my parents have an intern coming this summer who will be using my room.

Okay, so the truth is that my stuff was a mess and really needed to be purged and sorted badly. And I've been meaning to do it all winter and decided to save it for my last 3 days here instead. Boom. Now you know.

I had a pile of pictures that needed a home. Some were doubles of pictures already in an album, and some were just random pictures from who knows where that probably should just be pitched, but I can't throw away pictures. I did go through them and made myself part with the ones that were too dark to even see what the picture was supposed to be of...and the ones where my finger got in front of the lens....but even those were somewhat hard to part with. I mean, how cute was I trying to take pictures as a little girl with my finger in the way???

Well anyway, because I was doing this at the last minute, I just grabbed some old card boxes and decided to cover then with wrapping paper. I put a small piece of tape on the cover to help hold the paper in place while I fit it to the box.

Yes, this used to be my old pencil box, whatever gave you that idea?

Then I trimmed the corners a little bit:

...and cut straight to the corner to help all the paper lay right.

Then I just folded it into the cover and taped it all real good. I tried to make it all lay really flat so that the cover would still fit down over the box.

Ta-da!

The first one didn't come out so hot...see the ugly box peeking out?? Oh well, live and learn.

Then I just grabbed some scrapbooking scraps and stuck a label on it.

And popped my pictures inside!

I ended up with three boxes of pictures:

Kinda cute, in the end. Not bad for a quick fix. Cardboard boxes probably aren't among the top best things to store pictures in, but its a way to work with what I had.

How do you store your pictures? Do you have trouble parting with pictures, even if they are just old doubles? Anyone else ever get their finger in the way?

Flowers in the Spring

Because I leave for Florida on Wednesday of next week (Yikes!) I am in the middle of packing, cleaning, and organizing the insane amountof junk very important things I have. I am going to post on the organizing and packing process sometime in the next decade, but until then, I thought I'd show you some of the beauties blooming around our house.

What is it about dandelions that makes every kid think they have to pick them for their mom? I'm not sure, but I know that I did the same thing as a kid. I personally think they are kinda pretty, especially when they are the first thing to bloom and especially when they are in a blue vase.

Ah....purple. Does life get any better?

This rose came from our local nursing home to thank me for being a volunteer. It has to be the most perfectly-formed rose I've ever seen. It was beautiful. So while this isn't one of the blooming beauties I was talking about, it sure was a nice way to brighten up my room a little bit. Here is a shot of the top of my entire dresser:

Those other two flowers in the other vase are wooden. Seriously, each one is carved out of wood. The petals are about as delicate as pencil shavings! I got those when I was in South America a few years ago.

So, there is a little spring love for ya. Maybe no one else is as obsessed with flowers as I am, but I just love them, especially in the spring after staring at months and months of snow. Yuck.

Are things blooming at your house?

Missionary Monday

I never thought I would be writing a Missionary Monday post about myself, but here I am. I have the opportunity for the next 6 months to help at a mission board in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. Below is the letter I wrote explaining this ministry! Thank you for taking the time to read it and for praying for me.

Dear Family and Friends,

“The LORD has done great things for us; whereof we are glad.” Psalm 126:3

The Lord has been doing great things in my own life over the past few weeks, and I am excited to share with you the opportunities He has given me. Over the past few months I have been ministering in Canada along with my family at Calvary Baptist Church. During that time I was trying to gain permission to teach piano, a ministry that I felt the Lord was calling me to do. Despite hours of research and phone calls, I was unable to gain the necessary permission because of my current status as a temporary resident.

A few weeks ago it became clear to me that the Lord had something else in mind for me at this time. I was presented with the opportunity to spend six months helping at a mission board, Gospel Mission of South America, in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. The Lord has answered many, many specific prayers and has shown the way clearly to this ministry and opportunity. I consider it a short-term missions trip, with the incredible opportunity to be a help to many missionary families.

During my time at the mission office, I will be helping in the office in the absence of the director and his wife. They, in turn, will be going to the field to fill in for a missionary on furlough. I will be involved in normal secretarial work there, and working along side another couple to accomplish the tasks of running a mission office.

GMSA is a mission board focused on reaching South America with the gospel. Their purpose is to glorify God by serving the sending churches as we help their missionaries establish reproducing churches in Latin America through evangelism, discipleship, and leadership development. My every effort in ministry with GMSA is intended to further the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ in South America. I have been to Argentina and Chile on a three week missions trip with this mission before. It has been my privilege to get to know many of the missionaries and their families, which makes this opportunity all the more exciting to me.

I would ask that you might remember me in your prayers during this time. This opportunity is different than anything I have done before, and I believe that the prayers of the Lord’s people are vital to His work being accomplished. Please pray that the Lord gives me the strength to recognize and do what he wants me to accomplish during my time there. I will be leaving in just two short weeks, and will be in Florida until November.

This opportunity is not a paid position. As I will be relying on the Lord for strength, so I must rely on Him for my finances during this time. The mission has been gracious to provide housing and a car for my use while there, both of which are blessings and answers to prayer. I will be trusting the Lord for finances in travel expense, day to day living expenses, health insurance that is required, and for gas money to be involved in a local church there. If the Lord lays it on your heart to be a help in this area, you can consider helping me with a one time gift or on a monthly basis. All donations may be sent to one of the following addresses:

Gospel Mission of South America

1401 SW 21 Avenue

Fort Lauderdale, FL 33312

Canadian donations may be sent to:

Gospel Mission of South America of Ontario

P.O. Box 150

St Charles, ON P0M 2W0

CANADA

GMSA has asked that supporters include a note with your donations stating that it is to help with my short term ministry. 100% of all donations with go directly to meet my expenses. Each supporter will receive a receipt for tax purposes.

Your support during this time, whether through prayer or through finances, is a great encouragement to me as I seek to do the Lord’s work. If you would like to receive periodical updates of my ministry there, send me an email at the address below. My prayer is that at the end of this trip, I will be able to say, “I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.” (John 17:4)

Because He Lives,

Nicole Risinger

The Incomparable Christ Conclusion

Over the period of days that most denominations call Lent, I participated in reading the book "The Incomparable Christ" by J. Oswald Sanders, and listening to the corresponding broadcasts on Revive Our Hearts by Nancy Leigh DeMoss. I told you about my plans to do so, and now I am going to follow up on that series and tell you what I thought about it.

I have just two things to say about it. First of all, WOW, and second, WOW again.

I have never observed Lent. It is not something that my denomination commonly does. We would say that its not practiced in "our circles." (Nor in our squares either, btw.) But after spending those 40 days before Easter reading about my Christ and spending the first part of every day learning more about Him, I can honestly say that it has changed my life.

Was is because I had never heard these truths before? No, I had. In fact, I had even read this book once before. Was is the incredible articulation and speaking ability of Nancy DeMoss? No, although she is a great speaker. It wasn't even a result of all the chocolate bunnies I consumed, if you can believe that. No, what made a difference was simply stopping to think. Pondering the many different aspects of Christ. Contemplating the various facets of His character and His life here on earth - as fully God and fully man. Astounding.

I left this series feeling full to the brim. Humbled at what Christ did for me on Calvary - for me! It is so easy to know all about salvation's plan and about what Christ did, and to then go on with our life with stopping to consider - to just sit in silence and think about it. To remember what He has done.

I can say without question that I will be observing Lent next year in this same way. Maybe I will read The Incomparable Christ again, or maybe I will find another book that speaks of redemption's plan. (I'm already on the lookout for one! Or two, of three...) But no matter what I read, I want to make sure that I remember. That I study the scriptures and ponder what great things He has done. That I don't become complacent and forget His work on Calvary - for me.