Jamie Lindtner

It was 70 degrees today...  in Pennsylvania.  in November.  Ya'll..  70 blooming degrees.  I. Will. Take. It.  It was lovely.  And the kids were off, cause you know..  voting and all.  So we headed north to my mom's house, met up with my sister and her bundle of kids that she nanny's for and spent the afternoon at the park. The weather was perfection.  Blue Skies.  And the leaves..  Oh, the lovely, inviting, glorious, shimmering fall leaves.. candy to my eyes.  I was so glad I had my camera with me.  I love taking portrait pictures.  I love looking at my surroundings..  the colors, the scene...  and shooting real life.  I'm not too much of a pose..er...  for shooting..  I shoot as life happens.  I shoot pics as my kids play..  as we hike...  as they interact..  I see a moment..  call their attention.  and Wah.. Lah..  a moment captured for eternity. ...

So, I think October won.  October definitely had me beat.  Worn out and tired, I can feel the cold weather blah's coming on and October was not productive.  I feel like I trudged through last month in a fog and it's time to get a hold of things and pull back out of it.  So, November here I come and I plan to win.   For Starters, November means getting back  to the Y and exercising.  I had glorious plans of getting into shape, losing some added pounds, pouding the pavement..  I mean, both my kids are in school ALL day now.. I have hours upon hours to exercise and it JUST. HAS. NOT. HAPPENED.  And I could beat myself up over it.  In fact, the jeans getting tighter are doing a fine job of that themselves.. Instead, I'm hitting the Y this month and setting a goal again of 30in30.  I did this a while ago - with running..  30 miles  of running in 30 days..  I'm no where ready to be running 30 miles this month, ...

Oh October you have brought with you birthdays and lovely weather and the subtle changing of colors.  And October, it's been a nice transition in seasons.  Well Done my friend, well done. We celebrated a sweet girl turning 6. Hannah had some friends over and they drank orange soda and ran around outside and painted pumpkins and it was a lovely little afternoon.   We have had grandparents day at school, have tagged lots of items for consignment sales, been to the eye dr....  twice....  to monitor and check on the health of my eyes and some blind spots there that maybe, could have, possibly been a red flag but thankfully seem to not be of any concern.  We have had Wednesday nights rehearsals for Alice in Wonderland and soccer practices and fun soccer games on Saturdays.  We are also into the swing of things for homework and goodness gracious...  I cannot keep up with 1st and 2nd grade homework!  Trying to stay organize...

It is NO longer      I who live,  BUT, CHRIST  who lives in me.  ~Galatians 2:20

It's this sweet girls birthday today.  She turns 6.  I remember like it was yesterday..  finding out I was pregnant with her.  Asher was a mere 5 months old.  5 months ya'll.  And I don't think he had slept yet..  well, maybe for only 20 minutes.  He was not a sleeper.  He was a wide awake, curious, alert, round baby.  Which meant Momma had not slept for 5 months either.  I was tired.  I remember standing in our kitchen behind the counter, prepping for dinner when John walked in.  I'm pregnant, I told him.  Again.  We'll have another newborn due the end of October.  And I cried.  I cried, because sometimes finding out you are having a baby is overwhelming.  And I was tired.  And I thought I would never get to sleep again.  EVER.  And how was I supposed to mother and care for another little person who might keep me up all night too.  How?   Oh, HOW, I thank Go...

This past summer, I began rethinking our youth Sunday school program.  We were in need of something different, something to peak students interests and commitment again.  Something to get our leaders and teachers excited about.  And we came up with a new name, focus and enthusiasm for studying God's word in a variety of ways. Rooted An opportunity for middle school and high school students to become ROOTED in their faith through participation in; Service, Faith Journaling, Technology Fun, Music & Drama and Small Groups for guys and girls.   Last week we began with our Service Sunday and we headed down to The Paris Foundation  in Elkton Maryland to hand out blankets to folks in that community struggling with homelessness and financial burdens among other things.  I'm so excited that we are going to be more intentional about getting our students out of the building to 'BE' the church in some very tangible ways.  Our next Service Sunday falls o...

We are back in school and so far we are surviving.  It was a harder adjustment for some more then others.  My sweet girl did not like being away from her momma ALL day and there were lots of tears. But this week she seems to have turned a corner and is talking about friends and teachers and all the fun she is having.  Phew...  It was so hard to send her to school knowing she would cry when she got there.  All I wanted to do was keep her home.  How many other momma hearts were hurting these first few weeks of school?  The hard things we must do as a parent.   I'll be the first to admit, loudly and bodly.  I DO NOT LIKE HARD THINGS.  At all!  I don't like working hard.  I don't like being in hard places.  I like things EASY!  call me a wimp, lazy, whatever. I like it easy.  But the thing is, I know hard things are good for us.  I know sending my girl to school when she doesn't want to go is sometim...