HITZ and Mrs

Measle Outbreak at AWANA

2008-05-09T17:20:00.002-05:00

This is one of the fun ways our AWANA group encourages kids to finish the year and hopefully finish their book. The goal is to have the sickest leader/listener by the end of the night by causing a measles outbreak. The clubbers get to add measles to their leader/listener for each section completed in one night. Pictured are two of the leaders in my room (Sarah and Julianna) who went home pretty sick.

What happened to April?

2008-05-02T14:49:00.004-05:00

Ugh! I missed posting even a single post during the month of April! As Miriam mentioned in her post, I also am looking forward to the end of the school year. Hopefully, I can get caught up in posting some of the many events that have occurred in April, such as:

Measle Outbreak at AWANA

No Job . . . ?

Traveling Mama and Papa

Kids in the House

Turning darkness into Light

Interesting Comment . . .

Easter Again

2008-03-31T21:16:00.007-05:00

I titled this post "Easter Again" mostly because of the beautiful colors and because a few days ago before the tulips were completely open they looked like colored easter eggs in stems.

Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you?
Matthew 6:28

Doesn't that verse just mean so much more when you're actually looking at God's beautiful handy work, rather than just reading black words on white paper.

Gardening

2008-03-17T21:59:00.007-05:00

I logged into my blog site tonight to upload a new post and realized I had started this one but never published it.

A few weekends ago, Chris helped me build two 8x4 raised garden beds. We built the beds out of 2x6 cedar boards and then lined them with layers of newspaper which will act as a weed barrier.

We (rather I) plan to plant tomatoes, strawberries, onions, cucumbers, lettuce and snow peas. I say I plan instead of we mostly because Chris doesn't like any of the above except peas.

Labor Day

2008-03-10T07:47:00.004-05:00

@ 7:47am

Dani and Jon headed to the hospital around 2:30am today. No baby yet, but check out Jon's website for updates at http://www.thatjonjackson.com/.

@11:55am

Baby Noelle was born! Yah. 6 lbs 5 oz and 19 inches long.

A Day in the Field

2008-03-04T21:21:00.007-06:00

Today, I am in Lake Charles for a project trip. Four other project team members and I flow down today for a two day trip to gather information for a tank project. We arrived mid-day (just in time for lunch) then we headed to the terminal for a one hour safety training course. After that, we headed to the field. There had been a lot of discussion about where to locate the tank because we are putting it in the same dike area as another tank and according to NFPA there are certain spacing requires. The surveyors had been out earlier and had marked the final location of the tank and the civil contractor had probed for buried lines. Mark, the mechanical designer, and I went and measured where everything is so we can develop the plot plans. The current plot plans are fairly out of date. Then, Larry, the project manager, gave us a tour of the terminal. I have worked on several projects for this terminal, but this is the first time I had visited the terminal, so it was pretty cool the see some of the things I had worked.

Once we were finished for the day, we headed back to the same restaurant for dinner: Steamboat Bill’s – a Cajun crawfish, seafood restaurant. My project manager loves seafood! I am not a huge fan of seafood, but I don’t hate it either and I always say don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it. So, I had shrimp etoufee for lunch (which I had never heard of before) and boiled shrimp. Etoufee was like Cajun gravy served over rice with shrimp. It was pretty good, as with most seafood; I think it’s gross when it’s cold.

For dinner, Larry ordered a few pounds of crawfish for an appetizer (pictured on the left). The picture to the right is the portion I eat. Crawfish aren't that bad, but it sure is alot of work.

Spring Is Here!

2008-03-01T17:14:00.003-06:00

Last fall, I planted about 100 tulips in our front flower bed. When I plant bulbs I am always afraid that I will plant them upside down or too deep and then they won't come up. In our fast paced world it is so hard to complete a task for which you can't see the results for several months. For several days now, every where I go I have noticed that spring flower bulbs have started pushing through the dirt. Today, I finally check my own flower beds to see if there was any green pushing through. Below is what I saw. Yah!!!

Eva Rose

2008-02-29T18:46:00.012-06:00

Here are some new pictures of Eva Rose, Chris and Lori's baby (Lori's my sister). These were when Eva was 4 month's old which were taken a few weeks ago.

ABC 1 . . .2 . . . that's right 3!

2008-02-29T17:51:00.006-06:00

Yesterday evening, we held a triple baby shower for three mom's in my SS class who were all having their second baby. Of the three mom's was my sister, Dani who is expecting Baby Girl #2 in March. The evening was filled with conversation as about 30 women showed up to encourage and "shower" these moms with essentials for their second baby. Here are the three expecting Mom's (from front to back: Dani Jackson (my sis), Darcie Niels and Jen Smoliak. Darcie is having another boy and Jenny is having boy (her first is a girl).

Day One

2008-02-22T20:12:00.008-06:00

Our first day of skiing was really awesome. We had really great weather. The temperatue was about 20 - 30 F with a really light wind and clear sky. Here is a picture of Robert (my cousin) after he successfully snowboarded down the mountain without falling and the other is a picture of him carving his way down the mountain. This only the second time Robert has ever snowboarded and he has really caught on quickly.

Motivation

2008-02-16T21:47:00.004-06:00

Need ideas for motivating your AWANA clubbers? Give this a try! Bec is an LIT (leader in training) at our church. She helps with the 5th & 6th T&T girls club and she is helping me as a T&T Bible Quiz coach. Noticing that some of the girls were no longer motivated to finish their books, Bec gave them a little incentive. The first girl to finish their book would get to pour a bucket of water on Bec. As you can tell from the picture, this definitely got the girls motivated. Now Bec brings a bucket with her each week to club and who ever (in her group) has finished their book gets to pour the water on.

Useful Tool

2008-02-15T17:27:00.010-06:00

Have you ever planned a large party and tried keeping track of all the RSVPs? Evite is the perfect way to eliminate all those hassles. I have used evite for several occassions including baby showers, birthday parties and most recently a Super Bowl party. Evite is really neat in that you can have guests not only indicate whether or not they can attend, but they can also sign up to bring something, like chips and dip or soda.

I started using this for invitations after trying to keep track of over 60 attendees for my sisters baby shower. Sorry this sounds like a commercial for evite, but this is a really great site. I am currently planning a triple shower for my sister and two other mothers in my Sunday school class who are all having their second child.

Science Experiments

2008-02-15T16:48:00.003-06:00

From reading Miriam's blog, I learned of the Science and the Bible experiment books. After reading several of her posts about how she used the experiments in AWANA counsel time; I purchased the books and lent one to our counsel time leader. Last night he tried his first experiment. The illustration involved wrapping our biggest/toughest male AWANA leader with cassesste tape. The first time, he was only wrapped a few times and then he tried to brake free which he was able to do. The second time all the tape was used to wrapped him. This time he was unable to brake free. The leader then explained that we might think that those little sins in our lives are not a big deal that we can "brake free" from them at anytime, but those sins can easily ensnare us. The experiment was a very effective visual, especially for the boys. The experiment is in Book 1 or the yellow book, sorry I don't know the page or title. (I don't have the book right now.)

Oh My! Look who's 35!

2008-01-06T16:14:00.000-06:00

That's right, thirty-five years ago today, Christopher Guy Hitz was born. Here are just a few pictures from that wonderful day. Happy Birthday Chris! Looking forward to at least another thirty-five more.

Answer to Prayer

2008-01-04T20:19:00.000-06:00

For the past few weeks, I have been praying that God would help me witness at work. Every time an opportunity comes along, I never think of the correct response until later. Usually the opportunities aren't specifically related to salvation, but other topics. I always think of all the Bible verses and examples to use after the conversation is over.

Yesterday, while working with IT on a computer problem, the IT guy mentioned that he had been doing some interesting research that he was really excited about. He said that he was researching angels and that his research revealed that there were several levels of angels He also mentioned a few specific angels and told me about one "special angel" that was a man who had walked with God and he was so close to God that God made him an angel. When this angel was a man his name was Enoch. Knowing that I was a Christian, he also mentioned that Enoch was in the Bible as well as 11 other Hebrew manuscripts.

Though I know the true story from the Bible about Enoch, I told him, I thought it was interesting that God would make such a "close man" an angel. If "close to God" meant he was a Christian then making him an angel would be a demotion because the Bible says that Christians are the sons and daughters of God making us co-heirs with Christ. Since Christ is higher than the angels, this would have been a demotion.

This seemed to cause him to question some of the things he had researched and I asked him were he had gotten his information. He said the internet.

Praise the Lord for giving a quick response! Hopefully, this will lead to more discussions and an opportunity to explain that we shouldn't worship angels; only the Lord Jesus Christ is worthy of our praise.

Shopping Buddies

2008-01-04T20:11:00.000-06:00

After work today, Dani, Lori and I went shopping. Of course, Zoey and I are best buds so we stuck pretty tight as we shopped. While we were in Charlotte Rouse, looking for shoes, Zoey and I also tried on hats and we were able to snap this quick shot of our shopping experience. Though we didn't purchase anything, we had a lot of fun just spending time together.

"Students of the Snow" (I mean COLD!)

2007-12-16T20:41:00.000-06:00

So . . . It's been almost a month since my last post. Ugh! It's not because we have been bored out of our minds with nothing exciting to write about. Oh no, quite the opposite. Since my last post, we have been very busy with Thanksgiving, Christmas parties, Christmas parties and more Christmas parties followed by ice storms and most of Tulsa without power. Thankfully, we didn't lose power and were able to allow family and friends to stay at our house.

During this whole time, Colorado has been getting plenty of snow which gave Chris and my Dad the Ski bug. Thursday, during all the power outages, Mom, Dad, Chris and I packed up our ski gear and headed too Winter Park Ski Resort. Below are some pictures from the very VERY cold trip. As you can see from one of the pictures, the temperature was well below freezing. The Weather Channel recorded the temperature at -18F! I don't think I have ever been this cold before. BRRRRRRRRRRRrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Hope you enjoy the pictures as much as we enjoyed the trip.

Thanksgiving Favorites. . .

2007-11-21T13:19:00.000-06:00

Thanksgiving is my most favorite holiday. I love . . .

The color of the trees
The smells of all the different kinds of foods
Of course eating all the good food
Cramming all four or five of us girls in the kitchen and trying to cook all at the same time
Decorating the house and setting the table to look festive

My most favorite activity is sitting around the table and telling of the many things or one special thing we are Thankful to God for. Its like our own time of setting up stones as memorials to God’s faithfulness, grace and mercy. Just like the Israelites did after crossing over the Jordon River.

Here is a few other Thanksgiving Day thoughts . . .

Tradition
Unlike Chris’s family, we were never allowed to have dessert for breakfast . . . except at Thanksgiving. Each year at Thanksgiving, we make about 10 pumpkin pies and we are allowed to have a piece for breakfast on Thanksgiving Day and every day after for as long as there is pumpkin pie (which only lasts until Friday or Saturday)

Memory
My most unusual memory about Thanksgiving occurred while we lived on the farm. We were about 15 minutes from sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner, when we realized that Red (our cow) was giving birth to her first calf. We had never had a cow give birth before so this was a new experience. Needless to say, dinner was postponed until after the calf was born. In honor of Red having her calf on Thanksgiving, we named the calf Pilgrim.

First
After eating “mold injected” turkey for Thanksgiving dinner at college for three year, my senior year we had a real Thanksgiving dinner. We called PCC’s turkey “mold injected” after taking some engineering class because the turkey looked like it had been chopped up and then pressed into a mold to look like a turkey. I was married my last year of school, so dinner was at my house. The night before, Miriam, Tamra, Amber and Julie all came over each person made a special Thanksgiving dish that their family always made. It was really neat to see the different types of food people call Thanksgiving. One fun memory from that night was that we had to make an emergency run to wal-mart for NEW shortening. As Miriam and I made pies, we could never get the pie crust dough to the right consistency and we finally determined that our shortening must be bad. Once we had new shortening, the pie crust came together beautifully.

Resolutions

2007-11-01T21:29:00.000-05:00

It is really hard to break a habit you didn't even realize you had.

When purchasing laundry detergent, I have always wondered if you really get as many loads out of the bottle as they claim, because it just doesn't seem like it. So, last time I got a new bottle of detergent, I actually read the bottle instructions. The instructions really surprised me. They stated that level 1 on the measuring cup is for NORMAL loads and level 2 is for LARGE or heavily soiled loads. The measuring cup didn't mention anything about level 3 which is clearly marked on the cup. My own determination of what the levels meant was obviously wrong. I had assumed that level 1 was for small loads, level 2 for medium loads and level 3 for full loads. I wonder if the manufacture actually intends for us to use level 3 or if I am blindly using it and wasting 1/3 of a cup of detergent on every load.

Since realizing this, I have determined or resolved to use level 1 on the measuring cup only. I would never of thought this would be such a hard resolution; but every time I do laundry, I fill the cup and empty it without even thinking about what I am doing. It is certainly interesting the things that become habits. Do you have any unusual habits?

Costume Contest

2007-10-31T12:46:00.000-05:00

Though it can be scary, our office Halloween costume contest is always fun. Several years ago, Shannon (a co-worker) and I challenged the office to dress up for Halloween and we would have a costume contest in which a cash prize would be given. Though participation varies each year, it is neat to see the different levels of effort and the different ideas that people come up with for a costume. Here are some pictures of Chris and me dressed up for Halloween.

Little Red Riding hood and the Woodsman who saved her and her grandmother

Popeye and Olive
The year Chris and I did Popeye and Olive, we won 1st prize.

Cow Girl

! PUMPKINS !

2007-10-27T22:23:00.000-05:00

Here is the finished product of today's pumpkins carvin'. More to come later.

Gettin' Ready

2007-10-27T11:33:00.000-05:00

Today, we are baking all the desserts for our Annual Pumpkin Carvin'. Chris's Mom is here visiting us this week and she wanted to make apples dumplings. So, Chris and I peeled and cored the apples and she filled them with cinnamon and sugar, covered them with dough and made a carmel praline sauce to cook them in. I made two pumpkin rolls. Pumpkin roll is a family favorite and it is really quick and easy to make. Leter today, we will go pick out pumpkins and then go to Mom's house where we will carve them. By the end of the day we will have about 10 - 15 pumpkins carved. Below is the recipe for the pumpkin roll and some pictures of us getting it all done.

PUMPKIN ROLL

3 eggs
2/3 C pumpkin
1 C sugar
1 t salt
1 t baking soda
½ t ground cinnamon
¾ C flour

Preheat oven to 375. Cut waxed paper to fit a 10X15-inch jellyroll pan. Spray pan and paper with Pam.

Mix eggs, pumpkin and sugar. Add salt, soda, cinnamon and flour. Mix well and spread in prepared pan. Bake 10 to 12 minutes. Be sure center of cake is done. Let cool in pan 10 minutes. Sprinkle clean towel heavily with confectioner’s sugar. Turn cake out onto towel and roll; cool about 20 minutes.

Filling
1 pkg. (8 oz.) cream cheese
2 T margarine
1 t vanilla
1 C confectioners sugar
½ C toasted chopped pecans.
Whip cream cheese, margarine and vanilla until smooth. Add sugar, mixing well after each addition. Stir in pecans.
Unroll pumpkin roll and spread with filling; re-roll and refrigerate. Slice and serve.

Apples and Apples

2007-10-23T20:18:00.001-05:00

Yesterday I received an e-mail from Elaine (Chris's cousin Nathan's wife) in which she metioned that the family had been to several orchards this year but were never able to pick the apples because it was too expensive. However, they were able to find an orchard that would let them pick apples for free. Here are some pictures of them picking apples. The children are Isaiah, Alethia and Hadden.

After I saw the pictures of all the apples they had picked, I asked Elaine what she did with all of them. She said, "Last year, we picked a bit more; and I made 20 lbs. of apple butter, 20 lbs. of applesauce, and about a dozen cups of sliced apples (which I froze to use for apple crisp--in fact, I still have some in the freezer). We used the rest as snacks or for Nathan's lunches. It's quite a task to peel, core, chop, and/or puree all of it. I had to carve out almost 4 or 5 mornings to do it all. My favorite thing was apple butter. I cooked it in a slower cooker over night and woke up to the sweetest aroma! So, I'll probably do mostly apple butter this year (since I hardly used the apple slices for apple crisp, and I can get applesauce cheap in the stores). "

I remember when our family went and picked peaches at an orchard here in OK. It wasn't free and between me and my four siblings, we picked our money limit in about 5 mins. But, it was alot of fun.

It's Monday

2007-10-15T21:38:00.000-05:00

Our schedule was really busy today.

6:00pm Immediately after work, both Chris and I had eye doctor appointments. Chris was in need of a new pair of glasses and I have been having a lot of trouble with my contacts. The doctor said that my prescription had not changed, so all my problems were probably due to my contacts. We are going to try a different brand and see if things get better.

7:00pm Tutoring with Cassandra. Cassandra comes over every Monday and we work on anything she is struggling with in school. Most of our visits have been about Chemistry, however, tonight we were working on a mini-research paper. She was supposed to write an eight (8) page paper including citing works she had used. Cassandra had 3.5 pages and no cites. So I gave her some ideas on how she could expand the paper, and explained to her how, when and why you cite other works.

8:00pm We ate dinner . . .well, actually since it was so late I just reheated pizza.

8:15pm I threw a load of laundry in the washer and began making some breakfast biscuits for the rest of the week. I sliced and cooked to packages of sausage and bake one can of biscuits so we could have sausage and biscuits a few mornings out of the week. We had three skillets cooking at once and Chris and I had a lot of fun trying not to burn the sausage.

9:15pm Switch laundry around, check blog sites and write this post. Miriam’s blog is the only blog I check regularly because Tamra, Amber and Elaine haven’t started blogging yet (come on you guys).

After this I will probably fold the laundry, iron clothes for tomorrow, double check the menu for tomorrow’s dinner maybe squeeze time in for reading a bit and then go to bed.

So there’s a little bit about Monday, October 15, 2007.

Personality

2007-10-11T20:17:00.000-05:00

Over the weekend, my Mom told us about this personality ID survey which she had taken. We kept asking her all kinds of questions about it and eventually she said "Just get on the computer and do it yourself." So several of us did. So after Chris Hagen and my Chris took the survey they siad I should. I think these surveys are really interesting. It's amazing how you can assign a number to a bunch of characteristics which then summarize your main behaviors. Though I am intrigued by these surveys, I hate taking them. I can never decide if I'm more detailed than commanding or more loyal than detailed. These surveys aren't supposed to take very much time, but I always start out focused and then get bogged down by what they mean by tough-minded and what does that have to do with meticulous, convincing and kind?

Well, I finally made it through the survey and it said that I am a "deep thinker" and all of my numbers came back within the "mid-range". It was definitely interesting and alot of fun to see how the survey turned out for different family members. If you would like to give it a try, the survey is through Career Direct Online which is "a revolutionary assessment system that combines biblical principles of stewardship of talents with cutting-edge career guidance technology." Career Direct is somehow related to Crown Financial, but I couldn't figure out exactlt how. Have Fun!

Cooler Weather

2007-10-11T19:57:00.000-05:00

The past few days have been getting pretty cool around here which has made for the perfect walking weather. Tonight and this past Tuesday, Chris and I went for a walk around the neighborhood. There still are not very many houses built and there are alot of trees so the walk is quite pleasant. Tonight, we had a special treat of listening to an owl hoot as we turned the corner and came back around to the house.
Below is this weeks 7 day forecast as predicted by Channel 8's Chief Meteorologist Frank Mitchel. As you can see, we are expect to get down into the 40s tonight. This is the first time this season for us to get this low. I guess fall is upon us.

Reflections in a Mirror

2007-10-06T18:07:00.000-05:00

Just received this video of Eva from my sister (Lori) and it was sooooooo cute I just had to post for everyone to see. In the video, Eva is not quite three weeks old.

Picnic Social

2007-10-04T21:29:00.000-05:00

About every other month, someone in our Sunday School (SS) class signs up to host or plan a SS Social. Our SS social last month (September) was a picnic. We all brought our chairs and blankets and riding toys for the kids and we met at Renaissance Ten Acre Park. There was a really nice pavilion and charcoalers there which we used to grill hamburgers. The Lord blessed us with really nice weather and even a gentle breeze to keep the mosquitoes away. Everyone sat around and visited with each other as we watched the kids play. Above are some pictures of my niece, Zoey. She is so cute I just had to post these pics of her. She is growing up so fast.

SORRY

2007-10-04T21:02:00.000-05:00

Tonight, after some of the chores were done, Chris and I played SORRY. Chris was Red and I was Yellow. We played and ate the brownie pie that Chris made. Chris is quite good at making brownie pie. For those who are not familiar with this pie it is simply a brownie mix that is poured into a pie crust instead of a baking dish. It is quite good with Cool Whip on top. We played three rounds of SORRY; it was a lot of fun.

AWANA

2007-10-04T12:53:00.000-05:00

I thought I would take my camera with me to AWANA tonight and take some pictures. I am responsible for the Girls Red color line which consists of 3rd - 6th graders. Last night during game time with played several combinations of relay games. First, we run several sets of 3 (3 clubbers once around) then we ran a few sets of 6 (6 clubbers once around). After that we only ran 2 sets of 3 backwards (3 clubbers run backwards once around). Our game leader is always hesitant to run this set, because he is afraid one of the clubbers will fall backwards and hit their head. Then we ran piggy back relays. Yes, that’s right, clubbers team up with older or bigger clubbers giving younger or smaller clubbers piggy back rides around the game circle. During this game the guy leaders on the Boys circle thought they should get a chance at this. So, the last race of the night the leaders participated and raced around the game circle with a clubber on their back. It is always fun with us leaders get to participate in the games. I think the clubbers really enjoy seeing us out there playing and messing up just as much as them and the other leaders who don’t participate get a good laugh at seeing us run around.

After game time, we had to our rooms for handbook time. I am the leader for the 4th grade girls and last night we were short one leader, so it was pretty crazy trying to listen to 5 girls in 20 minutes. All of my girls are doing really well this year. Our goal is for the clubbers to complete 3 sections per week. So far this year, we have been one girl short of having the whole class complete 3 sections each week.
Last night, I told the girls that if everyone in the room said at least 3 sections next week, I would declare it double buck night. As you can imagine that got a lot of attention. Hopefully next week I will be able to post a picture of our class with all their bucks.

Back to the beginning . . .
As you can tell, I was pretty busy last night, so I only remembered to take a picture once. Oh well! I think this second picture really shows how fast paced the evening is. :)

Number Puzzles

2007-10-01T18:58:00.000-05:00

A co-worker recently showed me a really good site for printing off free Sudoku puzzles. The site is thru The Washington Post newspaper. I have never purchased a Sudoku book of puzzles because I’m afraid it would consume my time. Once I start one, I can’t put it down until I have solved it. The other day, my co-worker printed a Sudoku Mega puzzle which is a 4x4 and uses numbers 1-9 and the letters A, B, C, D, E, F and G. I had never seen a MEGA puzzle. After completing the puzzle (3 days later), I didn’t think it was really any harder; it just took longer. To the left is an example of a Mega (4x4) Sudoku puzzle. I also found that there is a MINI Sudoku puzzle which is a 3x2.

Another neat game on this site is Kakurko. Kakuro is like a mathematical crossword puzzle: the rows and columns must sum the number above and to the left. If you like numbers, you should try Kakuro. Below is a Kakuro puzzle; as you can see, this one is rated pretty difficult. If you have never tryied one, I would recommend going to The Washington Post site and selecting an easier one or play online until you get the hang of it.

above all that we ask

2007-09-27T18:25:00.000-05:00

It was really neat to see God at work this week through Good News Club and AWANA. Today during Good News Club, Mrs Adams asked several questions about the previous weeks lesson and one of the kids basically quoted back to her the entire lesson. Kids are so talented! It’s amazing how they can sit there and seemingly NOT pay any attention to the lesson and then quote the whole thing back to you.

Last week in AWANA, we prayed that one of the clubber’s Dad would get a job. This week the same clubber requested prayer for her Dad as he had to pick between TWO job offers he had received.

Praise the LORD for answered prayer. Eph 3:20 Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us.

Reaching Children

2007-09-20T20:42:00.000-05:00

Before school started this year, our church was notified that several public schools would be willing to have Good News Clubs in their schools. Good News Clubs is a Child Evangelism Fellowship (CEF) out reach program. CEF’s goal is “to reach the largest people group . . . Children”. Good News Clubs are designed to be held in neighborhoods or in schools. According to Child Evangelism Fellowship:

The Supreme Court ruled in 2001 in Good News Clubs v. Milford Central School that Good News Clubs can meet in public schools after school hours on the same terms as other community groups.

I help with the Briarglen Public School Good News Club and today was our second meeting. We had between 15 and 20 elementary school kids. We start out with the kids signing in (because kids are not allowed to attend without written parental permission) and then we have a snack. After the snack, we file down the hallway to library where the kids sing songs and hear a Bible story. We also teach a Bible verse each week and play review games with the verses they learn. Then we have a short cliff hanging missionary story. At the end, the kids get prizes for being able to say the previous week’s memory verse.

This is a really good program for teaching unchurched kids about the Bible. All the stories are pre-planned and each one is designed to explain who each member of the God Head is, who Man is and what sin is and how it affects our relationship with God.

There are two families and two individuals who help with our Club. Each of us take turns with the different aspects of the club. For the first month, I am responsible for telling the missionary story and then I will switch and do something else. They say that a vast majority of Christians became Christians when they were kids. I hope that the Lord uses this Club to draw more kids to Him.

Brownie Experts

2007-09-20T19:58:00.001-05:00

Wednesday’s are our busiest day of the week. We leave the house at 7:00am for work and we get home between 10:15 and 10:30pm. But even though it is a really long day for us, the last event of the day is worth it. After AWANA, we meet my two sisters (Dani and Lori) and their husbands at my Grandpa’s house for Brownies. We always walk into the house and smell the warm chocolaty sweetness of Brownies. My Grandpa Vandervort makes the brownies and he has tested and perfect the best brownies from a box. It’s so much fun when he finds a new brand of brownie mix and we HAVE TO compare which one is better. Though it’s a tough job everyone steps of to the plate and eats two brownies.

It’s a lot of fun to sit around and hear how each others week is going or bounce different ideas off each or ask each other for advice. Last night, Jon (my brother-in-law) was giving me some crash course information on HTML for my blog site. In the previous post, I had a lot of problems with the pictures. I think I posted and re-posted over 15 times. Hopefully, I will be able to insert pictures without so much trouble in the future.

Dount Shop or Hospital

2007-09-18T08:10:00.001-05:00

Lori (my sister) had been experiencing short contractions every evening for about a week, but yesterday night was different. By early yesterday morning the pains shifted and by 7:00am Chris (Hagen) was headed to the hospital rather than the donut shop for cinnamon rolls.

Shortly before heading to the hospital, they started the phone chain . My mom called to tell me that Chris and Lori Hagen (my sister and brother-in-law) were headed to the hospital to give birth to Eva Rose.

Eva Rose was born at 1:00pm Spetember 17th, 2007,
weighed 5lb 15.7oz, is 18.5in long and has a full head of dark-dark hair. She is so tiny and precious. Praise the Lord for His wonderful little treasures.

Lori is doing great though very tired as she didn't have an epidural and had to do quite a bit of pushing.

It has begun . . .

2007-09-13T18:54:00.000-05:00

I'm sitting here wondering, "what does one write as the first entry in a blog"? I suppose for starters I could explain why I have decided to blog.

July 2007, I was introduced to the blog world (or blogosphere as some call it) by a best friend who began blogging. She sent me the link to her site and I have come to check it quite regularly to see what new or ordinary things occur in her life. Before she started blogging, we would only call each other about once every six months. Now I feel that we stay much more connected and in touch with each other since she started blogging; and it has been alot of fun to read about her life experiences. So my first goal for this blog is that it would help me stay in contact with friends and family especially those who are not local.

Coming up with a name . . .

I struggled with a name for awhile because as the saying goes, "a flower by any other name wouldn't smell as sweet". So I thought if I didn't pick the right name the blog just wouldn't be right. Later, I decided it wasn't that big a deal. There were several blog names up for consideration but when I mentioned HITZ and Mrs to family members, everyone immediately said that was the one. Other nominees included:

barHITZva
ivoryz
HITZablog
HITZblog
icHITZ
blogHITZ - kind of a play on words because people want hitz on theirblog... he he
HITZzz - ya know, like you're sleeping...

The above suggestions are by Jon Jackson (check out his cool websites) and I think they were all great suggestions. My personal favorite and the one I all most chose was blogHITZ . . . I liked the play on words.

Hitz and Misses or Hitz and Mrs suggestions came from Miriam Lofgren and I chose HITZ and Mrs because I like the double play on words.

hit and miss will probably best describe how often I post something here, and
it is a blog about HITZ (either our Hitz family or Chris) and the Mrs . . .me :)