Christie's Top 11 Reasons why I haven't blogged in a very, very long time........

Here we go with the countdown...(please keep in mind most of these have all "come about" in the last few weeks).

1. (No picture available) 28 new baby chicks.

2. (No picture available) 3 turkeys.

3. Our female rabbit (Ugly) had babies that she decided to try and kill shortly after their birth. I tried to save as many as I could and was able to "nurse" 4 of them with kitten formula for about 4 days until they all died. :( Very sad

4. We were dog sitting Greg's parents' dog (Sam) and she is a handful!

5. We went to the fair and started talking to a young girl that is going away to college. She had entered a couple of rabbits into the fair and needed homes for them when she moved. I fell in love with this mini lop eared rabbit and so we adopted him. His name is Oliver and he is the sweetest, tamest, cutest rabbit in the whole world. Not to mention that he ended up winning "Best in Show" at the fair!

6. Yes, two kittens that we have acquired to "guard" our land / house against rodents. They live on the front porch for now until they are bigger and can take care of themselves. They are "Mo" and "Charlie" (girls) that Grant named.

7. In the same night that we picked up Oliver and the kittens, this dog showed up on our porch and stayed for a few days until I was ready to strangle him for howling all day long. I finally tracked down his owner. He has since left our animal sanctuary.

8. Grant Grant started school last Wednesday. I literally had to drag him into class, but when I picked him up he was extatic and LOVED school! His teacher is so sweet and loving and he has two of his buddies from church in his class. There are 10 kindergarteners in his class (5 boys and 5 girls).

9. Why not? We couldn't resist this pup. His name is "Ben" and we adopted him from the Mt. Shasta Humane Society. He is a Retriever / Lab / Chinese Shar-pei mix. The stinkin cutest dog!

10. Lucy decided that she wanted to start going poop in the toilet. Now she has decided that she doesn't want to do that anymore. Whatever! I'm in no hurry.

11. The best one! Lucy finally has just enough hair in back to put into two little piggy tails. Can you see them? She is so beside herself with joy. So is Mommy! So, you know that it takes just a bit longer each day to "do Lucy's hair".

Our Orange County trip

The kids and I went down to Orange County to visit family and friends last month. Here are a few pics from that time...

We had a great time! It was exhausting, but we got to do a lot of fun things. We all agree that we loved the beach the most. I got to see a lot of my good friends this time and it was a blessed time!

What we've done in the last month or so....

The Jr. Rodeo. It was so fun and cool! These were kids and teenagers doing this rodeo and I was just stunned most of the time!

Look how big the ducks are! They just waddle around the backyard now and swim in their blow up pool. They are so funny to watch!

Lucy LOVES to sing, but usually she makes up the words as she sings along. Finally she sang a song that were actually the real lyrics! Incase you can't understand her (clearly there is something wrong with YOU...) she is singing "Jesus loves me".

Grant has been taking swimming lessons this week and he is doing so good! I think his fear of the water / pool is finally over. We had a rough first day, but now he is doing a great job!!! We did a lot of praying and remembering that "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." (Phil 4.13) He is so excited to proclaim that "Jesus helped me to not be afraid!"

A long update.....sorry!

So, I thought that I would give everyone (whoever actually reads this blog) a better glimpse at what is going on with the Horne's.
We have pretty much "settled" into this tiny and temporary home (aside from the temporalness of the earthly aspect) and have been enjoying it. I'm sure that everyone that knows me and including myself didn't think that this was going to be a very smooth transition. I grew up and am a city / beach loving girl, but the quiet, undistracting, "apart" from the world feeling has crept into my heart. We are living in this home that is quite a bit smaller than our home in R.V., but we haven't seemed to notice as much anymore. We are surrounded by God's creation and it is such an awesome reminder of how great and good God is. We can see Mt. Shasta from our front window. The many animals that we now have, that I don't particularly like the smell of, truly bless my children and have become a part of our family. Grant has learned a lot of responsibility since he is the one getting up each morning and feeding them all. It has been a blessing to me to see him become more mature in doing his daily "chores". We have also been so priveleged and blessed by a wonderful church and church family. It is quite a bit larger than UBC, but the people make it feel like a close knit family. Our pastor, Pastor Jon, is so encouraging, loving, caring, humble, and godly and we are so blessed by him and his teaching through the Word. His wife has truly blessed me in so many ways! She is such an example of a Proverbs 31 woman. Each Sunday I have new members come and greet me and the kids (Greg has to work on Sundays) and I am blessed by it each and every time. Greg has been going to a men's prayer and bible study group on Thursday mornings and has been enjoying that a lot. It's mostly "older" men of the church, but Greg enjoys learning from their wisdom. I have been going to a women's bible study on Wednesday mornings and have really enjoyed it and been encouraged by the ladies that attend. Grant just finished with Awana and will be a Sparkie next year. Last week he went to Sunday School without a fight! Praise God! Lucy goes to nursery and has made many friends there (children and adults alike). Grant will start Kindergarten in August and we go to meet his teacher and visit the classroom on Friday. We have also begun a "family garden" with Greg's parents and Lord willing will produce a lot of good food! We prayed over it last week and have slowly started doing things in it. It's about 100' x 50', so we are hoping that we'll have enough stuff to share to those in need also. So, despite my hate for dust and dirt, bugs, and smelly animals, we are happy and blessed to be here. I also make my (about) weekly trips to Medford, OR to soak up some of that "city" life that I sometimes miss. Most of all, the only things that we really miss are the family and good friends that we have moved away from. Oh, and Trader Joes!!!! It's funny to think that just a few months ago, I outwardly said "There is NO WAY I would live up there" until I decided to seek God's will and not my own. He gave me a peace about it, though I was sad to leave our "home", and has been so completely faithful to me. What I thought would be "over my dead body" has been good and blessed. God is faithful and always keeps His promises!

"But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. 'The Lord is my portion,' says my soul, 'therefore I will hope in Him.' " Lam. 3.21-24

What's new with the Horne's.....

We have had the chicks and ducklings for about 2 weeks now. The ducks have tripled in size already!!! They are so cute, when we let them out, they just follow us around. I am looking forward to them going outside permanently since they are stinking up the laundry room.

Grant and I messing around with the camera.

Lucy's impersonation of Ace Ventura Pet Detective...

Lucy girl attended her first "official" Tea Party today. She has been playing "tea party" at church in the nursery and so it was so exciting for her to get to go to a real tea party. Greg's Mom took her and I to Miss Lynn's Tea House for Mother's Day. We had great food and a lot of girly fun!

Farmer Horne

Well, we thought that we would take advantage of the beautiful land that God has surrounded us with and the barn. So, we have now added 3 ducks and 6 chickens to our family. The ducks are "Boaz" the brown boy duck, "Ruth" his wife, and "Tinkerbell" his concubine (named by Lucy girl herself). They are actually really sweet! They chirp for us and when we come to see them, they run to see us. Aparently, they can live up to 30 years and are good "companions". We got them just for fun because they are so stinkin cute. Maybe one day we'll have little families running all over the place.

We didn't name the chicks because they are all girls and we can't tell them apart. They are "laying hens", so they each will lay an egg a day. Cool, huh! Guess we'll be having a lot of eggs in our diet.

We also got 2 new (scary) rabbits that look evil to me. Hence why there is no picture of them.

Blessed promises fulfilled through Christ's birth, life, and resurrection!

We had a very blessed Easter, celebrating the resurrection of our Lord! The morning started @ 6:45 am with Sunrise Service at Greg's parents' house out on their front lawn, it was cold, but beautiful to listen to the resurrection message and watch the sunrise over the mountains. After the message, we had the hugest breakfast with pancakes, biscuits and gravy, sausage, muffins, quiches, potatoes, fruit, etc.... with about 50+ other believers. Later on in the day, we had another feast at Greg's parents' and enjoyed the beautiful, sunny day that the Lord made!!!


This picture was taken on the side of "our" house. Lucy loved her dress. When she looked in the mirror that morning she said "oh....Lucy princiness" as she twirled back and forth.

Throughout the week preceeding Easter Sunday, we read about Jesus' death and resurrection. Grant found this branch and put it on his head saying "Mom, this is like Jesus' crown of thorns". Lucy of course tried to do the same.

Grant got a bunny the day before Easter. Another Warden's son "sold" it to Grant. Believe it or not, it's a baby. Grant loves him and he named him "Jack".

Lucy and Mommy and her giagantic new bunny rabbit from her aunt. It is bigger than her :)

Some very good friends of Greg's parents made this uniform for Grant. When they showed me, I had to hold back the tears. It blessed me so much to know that they went through so much trouble to bless my son. They put a lot of time and effort into doing this and Grant was so, so excited!!! If you know Grant, he is so serious most of the time, but when he saw it, he had the hugest smile on his face. He wore it for the rest of the day and to bed that night and is still wearing today.

Daddy ready to go "enforce the law" and Grant wishing he could go with him.

Blessed with friends!

Friends are truly a blessing from the Lord. It's even a bigger blessing to have friends that, even though they live hundreds of miles away, still feel as though they are not far. Friends that you know will be forever friends!

We had some good friends of ours come and visit for a couple of days. They live in Washington and stopped here to visit on their way down to Rio Vista. It was such a blessing to have them here and we miss them so much already!

This is Grant and his "best buddy", Titus. They have been friends since they were about 3 months old. Grant told me that when he grows up he is going to move by Titus. It breaks my heart that he is apart from such a good friend. Our prayer is that God would bring a new friend into his life like Titus.

Lucy and her "big sisters". She loved having them here to play in her "house" with her and her "babies". They were so sweet to put up with her and her attitudes!