Congregation Picnic

Okay, so I've been in my congregation in Springfield for about 21 years! since I was 10 years old. Friends have come and gone, but we've always had the same base of folks that are more like family than my own blood for the most part. Well, there was a decision made to redraw the dividing line for our city. We have 3 congregations and in one of them there were enough people that if they dissolved it they could be divided into the remaining 2 congregations. Not only would this save on certain costs but it also brings in more wonderful association to the other 2. Ya know, it's bitter sweet... So, when they drew the dividing line some of the ones in our Hall went to the other and we gained some of their folks. It's like, I truly miss my family that went to attend the other Hall (which is like 7 minutes away) but, it's soooo nice to see these other folks coming to our Hall. No matter what we're family. It feels like people moved out of state LOL when they really just relocated only about 6 miles away! The awesome thing about this change is that it truly has brought the city of Springfield's congregations together! Like, we always see each other at assemblies and sometimes out to eat or while in service but we never really GOT to KNOW each other well. Now it's like, I'm closer than ever to the friends that went to the other Hall b/c we keep calling and getting together and then the folks that came over are soooo amazingly loving that I can't wait to make them feel welcomed and get together for dinner. We got some of the most spiritually minded brothers and sisters that are super encouraging. Good people to work hand in hand with. So, we got together on short notice to have a SPRINGFIELD picnic. Usually we have East or West get-togethers. Not everyone was able to make it but we had a lovely turn out! And OOOHHHH the food! Better than a family reunion! Well, maybe not my family's, but surely most's.

Here's just a few of the folks that I'm talking about. And I do mean a few!

Dan and Judy Rosebrock. I just love them!

Brent Mabra. A card shark!

Oh yeah. Be afraid. I kid you not!

My Chae Chae. I've know this child from the womb. Love her crazy lots!


Brothers from another mother. These boys admit that they're almost like twins, minus the black and white thing. They feel they have very much in common. Well.... they do have some crazy stories!




Dan Rosebrock




Aahhh. Debbie Jones. This is my and my husbands extended mother. Well, I'd like to take her for my own, however there's plenty of others that can say the same. She makes it VERY easy for me to love her! To me, she seems so wise b/c she really meditates on what she's gonna say b4 she says it (unlike me). If only I could accept her example.

Fred Richardson and Johnny Kenerly. What can I say? I just love 'em. They are truly amazing men and wonderful pillars of strength in our congregation.

My Cup Runeth Over!

This is my FAMILY!

(Well, a few of them anyways...)

I can honestly say, I truly love every single one! Despite our differences we overlook our imperfections and look forward to a time when we can really appreciate each other without the involvement of Satan's influence.

Oh, and check out the hottie in the pink shirt, front row! Woohoo!

Heidikins! The epitime of Victorian Beauty and a spitting image of her mutha! I love this girl. She's soooo sweet and she's kept my kids many times. The sad thing is that EVERY time she kept Talon I forgot to give her things like DIAPERS or wet wipes. That's all tho. Nothing important! LOL! One time she had to take him with her some place public and he pooped. Apparently there was only like 1 wet wipe in the container and she had this naked baby on a bathroom changing table trying to pull out all of the paper towels out of the machine! LOL! Poor thing. I'm so glad she's still even my friend. She's a wonderful kid. Support her! She's getting ready to go to Guyana. She's helping to preach where there's a greater need for volunteers to help serve all of the people. I'm gonna live vicariously thru her for a little while.

Madam Hopie! The queen diva of the wee ones. Anytime you see her there's usually a long line of wee ones following her like she's the engine of a train.

Thomas Huffman, Sr. He plays the banjo. How cool is that. U know how fast they have to pluck?!

Aaaaaahhh. Miss J'ameya (a - me - a) The lady of rage! That's what I call her b/c of her afro puffs (which I am so jealous of- I wish I could have afro puffs). This child is completely awesome! She's highly intelligent and a million more times sassy! Completely full of spunk. We were at her house a while back watching a music awards show and they were dancing and she's like, "Get it girl!" LOL! No lie, she's amazing and you can't bribe her for nothing! I offer candy and gets NO love. I tell her she's ugly (only b/c she's obviously NOT and it gets a little rise out of her - tehe!) and she looks at me right in the eye and says, "No I'm not!" Ha, never changing her facial expression! Too funny. Talon LOVES her! He's her little buddy.

You see? Even though he couldn't force her to stand any closer to him than this!

Melissa Jordan (J'ameya's mommy) and Jenny Dill. Very classy sisters. Very sharp! And they LOVE Jehovah!

I pretend that this man is my grandpa! I just love him! I think he's the sweetest thing, which makes sense b/c Judy is absolutely the sweetest lady on the PLANET! I kid you not! Her voice just makes you feel as though everything will be alright. I really hope that her father will teach me the jitterbug in paradise! (I'm sure he'll move way better than me! ; )

Partners in crime, K'shante, Kristopher and 'Samson' with baby Olivia. These 3 are virtually inseperable. They're going to have really great stories to tell on each other when they get older.

Kyle Rucker. Lookin' like his daddy! This 'little' guy is like 14! or close. He's faster than a speeding bullet and has a smile to die for!

Chassity Plott and Mailynn. Mailynn lives in eye shot of my house so I like to scream to her when I'm on the front porch that I'm watching her. If she has a few cars over I call her and ask her why I wasn't invited to her party! LOL I just love to kick it with these 2 ladies. Chassity may lead a busy life but if I even sound like there's something wrong, she's like, "Okay. Let's go get a drink." or talk or appetizer or whatever! Both are amazing mothers and dear friends!

Miss Sonya Bustos! The mutha of all muthas! She has 3 amazing kids. By that I don't mean like 'all kids are amazing'. Hers truly are! They are each completely different, yet all histerical! She's an amazing mother to EVERYONE! Not just hers, but I completely know that the whole village/kid thing is absolutely in her thought process. I truly hope we can become even closer sooner than later.

HeHeHe... My little stinker! I'm soo in complete in utter infatuation with this boy. Madly in love with him. Well, he makes it Very easy to be overcome with emotions when he flashes his little dimples. But, honestly... boys are extremely bizarrely entertaining! Esp. this one!

My little heathen is hiding behind Alyssa's noggin. And then there's Toyota/ I mean Mercedez and William Vincent. This combination means... anything can happen. Heads flushing in toilets, farting contests, worm kissing/licking... You think I'm kidding? All of that is true and has already occured.

Rice and Alec Plott. Would you believe these boys are the same age?!

This little beauty is Alyssa Libertus. I don't know her as well as I'd like but from the brief encounters I've had... I like her a lot! She gets my stupid joking around... and we both think that the D.C. bathrooms smell like bootay! HaHa. Well, at least I do!

This is a sillouette of the most sexy card shark on this side of TV! I love this guy! Truly my best friend. Friggin' histerical! He's proven to be an amazing helper for this family to get through these last days!

The youngest Rice boy and my Billie Jo. She wouldn't be the same without those glasses. She reminds me of Margaret off of Dennis the Mennis with Walter Mathou. Do you know what I'm talking about? Too cute and full of personality!

Well, anyways, that's the end of this. I truly love Jehovah for giving me such a wonderful fellowship of folks and perfect companions to get through this system!

Don't you just love tots!

No, not Napoleon Dynomite's tots. Toddlers! Well, we have this 2 (almost 3) year old friend named Aarolynn Jane (A.J. for short) and she is the silliest thing! She does little things all of the time when she comes over, like pull the cat's tail and smile, bang her head into something and smile, overflow the sink... and smile! She's so stinkin' cute/funny and she's a little stinker. No matter what she does, afterwards she looks at you and just simply smiles. What a doll! Stinkpot, but a doll!

Anyways, she (of course) likes to play dress-up or with make-up with my RéAnna. Well, I was in the kitchen and she came downstairs with a tube of Ré's lip gloss in her hand. Sounds innocent enough... she wanted me to put a stroke of gloss on her lips. The only problem is that her apparent attempts to gloss herself ended up everywhere BUT HER LIPS! See enclosed photos!

Hope you all have a good day!

Where the heart is...

Ohhhh. How I've longed through all of the winter and ice to recieve a bit of vitamin D through the most natural source available. And it's finally time to be able to enjoy it! The sun. I know it's only March 19th, but I'm already calling my grandmother for reminders on when to plant things. Last weekend we spent time trimming down rose-of-sharon and planting grass seed in the bare spots that the dogs dug up.


When we were gathering all of our yard debris, we spotted some debris that some kind neighbor relocated behind our privacy fence (which we have to keep clean in order for the city not to fine us!). Well, apparently there was some poison ivy in this heaping pile of someone else's laziness. Now, when it's blooming, I know just what to look for in the leaves and berries. When it's naked, it just all looks like crap to me. So, guess what we did... We took everything over to our friends' house and had a bonfire! Her dad came out when the fire was almost entirely gone and says, "Who brought all of the poison ivy?" AAAAAHHHHH!!!! My heart sank. We had all these people and ALL of us had kids. OMG! If any of them gets poison ivy internally, I will just die! He seemed to feel it looked "old". D@m& those people who left me their mess. OOOHHHH, you just wait. I do a lot of yard work Spring - Fall. I've got an incling as to whom it may be, b/c last year I was hanging laundry on the line and noticed my rose-of-sharon that's behind my privacy fence moving around. Then, I saw the old man that lives behind us walking to his house.... his yard all neat and crap. Well, I have TWO DOGS buddy! ...and "crap" is right! Anyway, guess what I have all over my arms and the creases of my elbows and my fingers! Yep, poison ivy! I don't think it came from when we burned it. It was when we were loading it all up in the truck to take over, I bet! André didn't get anything... Black people!


So, that story is actually a little off subject from what I wanted to right about (A.D.D. much?). My heart truly lies in the open road. OHHH how I long to visit my family out of state! I think I'm going to plan a two week road trip for this year, perhaps when André gets laid off. I don't know. I want to stop by Kentucky, first and visit André's Aunt Cleo (her middle name's Patra. Isn't that cool?) She lives in Louisville. She's much older that André's father (in her 80's) and we'd like to spend some time with her. Then, we have some of the DEAREST friends ever, that I miss so much, in Virginia. Kim and James and the girls. They are really our family more than friends! I forced Kim to be my friend and have been bugging her ever since! They have the most delicious girls around, Jada and Olivia. They left Ohio and went back to VA and we've seen them...twice. They only live 6 hours away (but the roads are so windy, I'm car sick every time we show up!).







Then, we have friends that live in North Carolina, Guy and Veda, who are always up for the company. I believe they just had their 3rd baby! Congrats!

But, our final and last stop will be where my heart has lied since I was 2... Where the humidity takes your breathe away and every beach you go to has a different color of sand. A place that, no matter where you go, has a man on the corner selling boiled peanuts! Aaaahhhh. Boiled Peanuts! The home of the Gators. Florida! My family lives in Jacksonville. Well, actually, McKlinney, but it's just a little town near Jacksonville. My favorite spot, though is St. Augustine! I'm not exactly sure what we're going to do this year b/c I'd really like to see the golf side. It's amazing how the difference is from one side to the other. We'll see. I'll have to do some research. Ugh! But, it'll be worth it!

RéAnna's first talk: "God has a name"

RéAnna had her first public talk in the Ministry School. It was entitled "God has a name". She did such an awesome job! I'm so glad that there's just some things she gets!

For those that couldn't see it -b/c you live over 500 miles away:-( - here's her outline. (BTW, I was her householder. Her setting was witnessing to her music teacher at school. She was working on the first point of counsil: Accurate Reading.)


R-Hey Mrs. Hurt.

M-Hello RéAnna. We missed you at the winter play last night. What happened to ya?

R-Oh. Well, on Tuesday nights my family tries to do our family worship together.

M-What does that mean, ‘family worship’?

R-It’s where we all sit down and study subjects that are in the bible and learn about Jehovah.

M-Oh, okay. You know, if you don’t mind my asking, why is it that you always Him that? I mean no offense, but why don’t you just call Him "God" or "Lord".

R-Actually, I’m not offended at all. I’m glad you asked me that question because we just talked about his name a little bit last night and I wrote a few things down that I wanted to remember… One of the points made was that there are scriptures in the bible that tell us that God named the angels, he named the stars, Adam and Eve, and he even gave Adam the job of naming the animals. You can read that for yourself at Genesis 2:19.

M-reads Genesis 2:19 - 19 Now Jehovah God was forming from the ground every wild beast of the field and every flying creature of the heavens, and he began bringing them to the man to see what he would call each one; and whatever the man would call it, each living soul, that was its name.

R-So, do you think that it would make sense that God would probably have a name too?

M-I don’t know… It’s God. Does He need a name? He knows who He is.

R-Do you think that God has feelings like we do?

M-Sure. I think He gets mad and feels love and joy. I do know that we were made in His likeness.

R-You know, the other day I saw my first grade teacher at Walmart and she didn’t remember my name, and I was kinda bummed out. How do you feel when someone that you haven’t seen for awhile remembers your name?

M-I do feel kinda special. Okay, I see your point.

R-We also talked about a scripture at Isaiah 42:8. Would you like to read that?

M-reads Isaiah 42:8- "I am Jehovah. That is my name; and to no one else shall I give my own glory, neither my praise to graven images. Hmmm. I don’t ever remember reading that.

R-I’m also sure you’re familiar with the Lord’s Model Prayer. Let’s look at it again… Matthew 6:9.

M-reads Matt 6:9-"YOU must pray, then, this way: "‘Our Father in the heavens, let your name be sanctified.

R-I learned that here Jesus is telling us that God wants us to know He has a name and that we should tell others His name…

M-Well thank you for sharing what you’ve learned with me.

R-That‘s no problem. I probably should be getting to class, but I did want you to know that I have a magazine at home that talks all about God’s name, Jehovah. It will help you look in your own bible and see what His name is and why a lot of bibles don‘t use His name in them. I could bring it to you tomorrow if you’d like.

M-I most definitely would. That’d be great! Thank you, RéAnna.


This was actually based on a discussion that RéAnna had with our neighbor. We catered it to fit her assignment. She was awesome! Did I already say that?