Praise GOD!

I’m so excited! You may or may not have heard on Vincent’s blog we were going out tonight to hand out tracts and Vincent was going to do an open air. Well, I was having fears and almost hoping the night wouldn’t come. Pretty sad, eh? After what happened last time would they be all ready for us with police and a big fat lie about us ’disturbing the peace’? Would I start stumbling over my words and not clearly communicate the law and grace? As I’m typing this it looks funny on paper….why should I be fearful? Greater is He that is in me than He that is in the world! I’m so happy the Lord had some people out there receptive and ready to encourage us. God’s so good! I took my camera with me but didn’t have time to taken many pics, most were taken at the place Bonnie works, which was hosting one of the entertainers of the night. I took another black bag with tracts so we weren’t running back to the house every hour, that was a time saver.

One of my biggest encouragements came while Bonnie ran back to get her video camera and I was ‘alone‘. *shivering my boots!!* Wait, not alone, the Lord was with me! I asked a trio of girls if they had gotten smart cards and I asked if they thought they were a good person. I went through some of the Ten Commandments and they admitted they were sinners. They seemed receptive so I went on we got to God’s grace and Him sending His Son. I told them to read the cards and think about eternity. They left reflecting and one girl ran back and said she didn‘t need it because she was a Christian and she was wanting to witness to her friends and was so happy about what had just happened. I gave her some million dollar bills to give to friends and gave her a hug.

The second one was to another trio, two girls and a guy. We went through the Ten Commandments, etc., and by the end one of the girls looked like she had tears in her eyes. The Word of God will not return void! Amen!

Wow. I’m still excited. The opposition was there too….we got some people taking tracts out of their kids hands and handed them back to us when they figured out what it was, and some people who didn’t care….but we spread the seed and God gives the increase!

God bless and Happy New Year!

I said I had more pictures….





Nothing too fabulous about the pics but, just to prove we saw bluebirds in person yesterday, here they are!! I had to zoom for these so the quality is yuck but it still gives you an idea of what they look like. I hope they show up again tomorrow….8-) I’ll be ready to shoot them. Mawhahah! Don’t worry, it won’t hurt. ;-)

Today we spent most of our daylight hours over at the studio. We’re recording at a breakneck speed, well, at least for us. : P Can you believe we’ve been there one whole day already this week and we’re planning to go back Saturday as well? If we accomplish all we hope to we will finish the raw recording of 7 songs. Yesss!

While we were there Mr. W. let me play with his SLR camera. *faints* I was thinking of upgrading and this was the push I needed. J If anyone knows of any good deals on a SLR camera give me an email or comment. I need to get a flash too…..this bouncing light off the ceiling is the best thing since sliced bread. : D

Some pics of the day….

Tree climbing talents Daniel has!



He can also sing. J



Joel W. in a red sweater. I think it’s his color.


One of the cutest and smiley babies I know, R. Garret. Awww!!!


Of course, I have more pictures but, I’m tired and it’s late….

An acquaintance of mine was nice enough to point out I had a gross amount of typos and grammatical errors in the last posting I linked you all to. I apologize to everyone!! Please know, Dr. MacDonald can write and write well. His poor granddaughter did not inherit her paternal grandmother’s typing skills and it shows. : P That said, I believe these errors seriously detracted from his writing and for that I‘m sorry. I have corrected the problems that I found but, I will not boast they are all found and fixed so please alert me to any typographical errors at carolj@gmail.com. Thank you.

Proverbs 23:12 Apply your heart to instruction and your ears to words of knowledge.

I did a little rearranging on the blog template. You may not even notice the changes. Hopefully I didn't do anything damaging. : P I sure wish I knew more about HTML. I've been thinking of designing a whole new page but, other things are higher on the priority list. I'm thinking, something like a dark chocolate border with an off white page with an elegant black font. Oh, and a photo montage with scripture at the top. I know....if it ever gets done it might be a minor miracle!

Last year I posted a paper my grandfather wrote about Christmas. It's a longer read and worth it if you seriously want to learn about the roots.

My family doesn't celebrate Christmas. At least, not in the 'normal' way. We don't do trees, the gift exchange, or Santa. We focus on what we do throughout the year, giving to people who can't give back. Our concert on Monday morning at the nursing home we count a privilege, as we do every concert. Because we were there maybe someone will stop and think about the real reason Christ came when we point not only to the manger but also to the cross and Jesus‘ ultimate sacrifice. Perhaps something will be stirred in their soul as they hear strains of the familiar songs speaking of the Lord's birth sung by a family, in the world of broken families, of one that is together. The witness of a family together serving the Lord is, sadly, not often seen. When they reflect back, in quietness of their own hearts, I pray the words of the scripture songs come back to them and the Holy Spirit will convict them of sin and their need for the Savior. We plant the seeds and the Lord gives the increase. Praise and thanks be to the King immortal, invisible, the only true God forever and ever.

Psalm 96:5-6 For all the God's of the nations are idols, but the LORD made the heavens. Splendor and majesty are before Him, strength and glory are in His sanctuary.

We did three concert Sunday. We had to be up before the crack of dawn to get out the door on time and so I was able to catch the sunrise.



We parked on the grass in the morning. :-) It was quite interesting since we had to fill up more time than the normal hour and we were pulling things out we hadn’t played since the fall tour. The folks there were so sweet and helped us pack up in a jiffy. We had a nice lunch and fellowshipped until it was time to head off to concert #2.



On the way over we saw our ‘old church’, actually, just the building. They had sold the building years ago. It brought back memories anyway…

And not more than 3 minutes away was this lovely old tree.




The church made up this cool sign..


And here is Bonnie documenting me taking pictures ….lol. She’s having a fun time with her camera. :-)



We had no time to eat afterward because we had 1 ½ hours to breakdown, load, get the next church and set up. Did I mention the next church was half an hour away? :-) Some of the folks made up some food packages and sent them with us. Very sweet of them! We arrived, got set up on time and did our third concert of the day. We ended up staying for the Yankee swap and didn’t get home until just after 9:30pm. Phew. A nice full day.

I started getting a headache during the last concert but didn’t actually start feeling sick until we got home. :- / All day Monday I was in bed with flu like symptoms. Food smelled repulsive and I lived on 5 crackers and water until noon time today. I feel MUCH better now. I’m so thankful I didn’t come down with this on Sunday morning! That would have been, um, interesting. I was feeling nauseated on Saturday night but I chalked it up to getting ‘car’ sick since I was practicing while we were driving. So anyway…I haven’t been near a computer until this afternoon. I’m making up for it now…ha! Praying no one else will get whatever I got...

I’m overwhelmed by God’s mercy and awed at His greatness. How great a love is this -that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. What wondrous love is this! Jesus went to the cross willingly, laying down His life willing for me, and for you. How many times today did you thank God for His gift of salvation? I don’t think it’s possible to over thank God for the Salvation we have in Christ. Some of the world will be celebrating Christmas in a little while. Never forget that Jesus did not stay a helpless babe in a manger. He grew up, went on to live a sinless life, perform many miracles and eventually died on a cruel cross. 11 of the 12 disciples were killed, martyrs for Christ. Are you willing to follow Jesus whatever the cost?

I’m suppose to be writing a post and I keep getting side tracked! In part to the site I’m going to mention next….

For all the home school grads who don’t know yet, this is a neat site. (Edit: Sorry! I did forget to put in the clickable link. Oops!) HomeschoolAlumni.com is a place to meet and greet the graduated home school population. It’s free to register and pretty painless. Just be warned, it’s addictive!

Last night, in Vermont we got stuck! How’s that for real life adventure? : D

We were on the way to a music shop and since there were no available parking spots by the store we drove down this hill. Dad thought he could make the turn and get into the big parking lot across the way.



Obviously, we didn’t.

A police officer was just a little ways behind us and had his lights almost immediately. A man from the fire dept. came and he had a milk create filled with blocks. Turns out they, along with our jacks weren’t enough to get us out and a wrecker was called. If we had more wood it would have been plausible that we could have dug ourselves out. However, there was no place open to buy wood and we don’t carry THAT much wood with us. : P





The wrecker guy pulled out a BIG chain after the fist chain broke. You can't really see the contrast very well in the picture but, it was pretty big.



After we were unstuck we found the left side of the bus wouldn’t air up. We might have spent a night or so up in Vermont if Vincent hadn’t jacked up the bus which made the air bags reseat. *phew!* Vincent is the coolest bro. :-) I’m very partial but, it‘s true! Thanks Vincent for all your hard work.

Afterward we walked back over to the music store for about 7 minutes and Peter tried out some cool mandolins. They closed and we walked back to the bus, very happy to be on the way back to a working bus.

We walked back through a parking garage and at the bottom, were neatly stacked blankets and a man spreading out a sleeping bag. Ouch. That was a painful reminder that many people don’t have a nice warm house to go back to and that made me reflect even more on the bountiful blessings I’ve been given.

This was running through my head this evening....

How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! 1 John 3:1a NIV

And, Kendra tagged me so, here we go……

A - Available/Single? Single? Available sounds fishy.
B - Best Friend? ~Bonnie~
C - Cake or Pie? Pie. (Apple is good.)
D - Drink Of Choice? Water. Oh you mean besides that? Then it would be mocha with chocolate chips melting at the bottom. That’s good stuff.
E - Essential Item You Use Everyday? Glasses. I’m nearly blind without them (or contacts).
F - Favorite Color? Red!
G - Gummy Bears Or Worms? Gummy Bears.
H - Hair Style? Up in hair sticks, clips or out. I’ve given up braiding for now….
I - Indulgence? Sleeping until 8:00 am.
J - January Or February? January.
K - Kids & Their Names? I don’t have any.
L - Life Is Incomplete Without? God and family.
M - Marriage Date? Since I’m not married it would be pretty hard to know now, would it not?
N- Number Of Siblings? 7, 2 sisters and 5 brothers
O - Oranges Or Apples? I like both.
P - Phobias/Fears? Is there a word for being afraid of computer viruses? :-)
Q - Favorite Quote? Romans 8:28
R - Reason to Smile- My sins are washed away by the blood of Jesus! PTL!
S - Season? Do I have to pick??? Right now a nice snowy winter sounds fun but, very impractical.
T - Tag Three People? Anna, Bonnie and Kim
U - Unknown Fact About Me? I didn’t know how to make chicken soup when I was about 12. Mom said to drain the broth. I did, right down the drain. : D
V - Vegetable you don't like? Okra.
W - Worst Habit? Saying yes to too many things.
X - X-rays You've Had? I’ve never counted. Not something I keep tabs on ya know…..
Y - Your Favorite Food? Pizza.
Z - Zodiac Sign? Don’t know, don’t care.

I went out to photograph the dusting of snow and this little guy was just sitting there posing for me. ;-)



- Note the snow on the leaves! - :D


And if anyone wants to know how the concert went yesterday you can keep reading. (I left the house in such a hurry I forgot to bring the camera. No pics.)

We’ve decided to erase yesterday from the calendar! : P

I was at work from 1pm-5pmish. I got back in enough time to get concert clothes together, grab my violin and jump on the bus. We get there and start setting up. Where is the trumpet and the saw?! (Yeah, we bring a saw with us.) Apparently no one thought to bring them since the person who normally makes double checks wasn’t home. No trumpet means no brass selections and we have to revamp the whole program. The presets were not made for our new songs and dad practically has a heart attack trying to get our voices and millions (hyperbole) of instruments mixed correctly. Peter’s mic ran out of batteries and he had to use another mic. Anyone who runs sound knows how hard it is when mics get all switched around! So, we had many pauses since on one knew which song was coming next! After doing a program for 9 weeks+ it gets hard to into another groove. (I was adlibbing the emcee stuff in-between too. Ahhh!! I don’t like doing that! I’m seriously glad no one recorded anything…) Right before the last song my mic dies. It had that dreadful dead battery syndrome. (Btw, I do like my new wireless, A LOT! But, it doesn’t work very well dead. :-) ) Some of us start off with Silent Night and one of the duet people start singing words from all verses and dreadfully mispronouncing some words apparently oblivious to the fact we had words on the music stand! Finally the concert ended, thankfully before we messed up on anything else. *sigh* I don’t know if you all wanted to hear all that…lol. It was one of ’those’ concerts. :-)

We are thanking the Lord for a safe trip there and back. The snow decided to come today instead of yesterday and it was just a dusting. It was quite pretty to watch falling though. :-)

We get another chance at getting things ’right’ tomorrow. : P Pray dad is able to get the presets set tomorrow. It normally takes weeks to get them just like we want them and we only have 10 more concerts of this program. We would like to have this done and set soon!

I'm so glad tonight is over with!! :D

The band Vincent, Bonnie and I play in had their concert this evening. Our family did 20 minutes at intermission. I was nervous! It's a good thing I don't feel like that before every concert.

The concert was held in a new place and we had hardly any room to set up.

We ended up on the side, way on the right in the picture. (You can see the bass there.)

Some guy asked Daniel after the concert,

“So, where do you go from here?”

Daniel said, “Home, Orange.”

The guy said “OH! I thought you were from Kentucky, with all that bluegrass.” :-P

We were trying out some new mics tonight so there was some added stress over that, but the concert went as well as could be expected. Before we sang I didn’t have a good feeling about the concert. My thoughts were something like... ‘if I mess up in front of all these people who know me this is going to be so embarrassing!’ But even though I made mistakes and everything wasn’t perfect from the comments I got after I knew the Lord had been working. Praise God! He’s awesome and deserves all the glory for anything good!!

Here’s Bonnie and me. Our yearly picture together. :-)



I put someone in charge of pictures and they got very few pictures, particularly of Bonnie and Vincent since they were burried in the band.....





Bonnie's head is right above the music.



And that's Vincent! Can you see him?!



The man with our mic is Mr. Cass. He emceed for the night.


1 concert down, 11 to go! It's suppose to snow Sunday-Monday and we're suppose to sing in Barre on Monday night. Praying for good roads!