One Sunday morning I viewed our backyard through our kitchen window. Something wasn’t right.  It looked like a gigantic bush had grown overnight towards the back.  Actually, a huge twenty-foot branch had snapped off the towering Manitoba Maple – a very old, weathered tree. It is strange as there was no storm or wind that night.  Maybe it had received...

“How would you like to learn a song?”  I asked one Sunday morning at our Hillside church.  Rachel quickly nodded her head “yes” and Robyn responded with a “no.”  I began singing the old Sunday School chorus “This Little Light of Mine, I’m gonna let it shine,” three times, followed by “Let it shine.” three times as well.  Do you remember singing this song as a...

“He really has ‘gone through the wringer!’” commented Scott Lockhart about his friend one evening at our weekly Hillside Home Group meeting. I quickly asked him if he knew what that phrase meant. He responded, “I think it refers to someone boxing, has been knocked down in the ring, the bell count is finished, and the boxer is declared a loser.” Gary and I started...

The highlight of 1987 for our family was the adoption of an almost six-year-old boy from South Korea named Chul Min Lee, now Lee Chul Min Carter. We all totally agreed to this decision of having a more hands-on experience with a needy child. On the other side of the world, Chul Min was wanting to live in a “fambily,” whatever that meant to him.  After our home study...

Our front doorbell kept ringing non-stop. I hurried downstairs as fast as this old body could take me.  I unlocked the door and Gary quickly leaped into our small foyer.  He gasped, “I almost stepped on a skunk in the driveway!”  I am not sure what both of us would have done if this unwanted visitor had sprayed him.  Thankfully, it didn’t happen and so one potential...

Have you ever been stared down by two large dark chocolaty-brown deer eyes?  The other day a couple of deer decided to saunter through our backyard up to our kitchen bay window.  They probably were determined to check out the bright flowers on my plants on the window ledge to see if they could snatch some tasty petals to snack on.  Did they understand...