Locks of Love Strikes Again

You guessed it - I cut all my hair off again. As soon as I figure out how to fix it, I'll get some pictures up for you.

Our trip to Texas was fast but good. We got to see a lot of Michael's family in the short time we were there and we had a lot of fun.

When we got back Michael left with the youth to go on their mission trip, but he had to come home early. One of our church members lost her mother and Michael was called on to preach his first funeral. Thanks to the help of Pastor Roger and a lot of prayers, the family was really blessed by the service.

The church is now working on constructing our float for the Columbus Freedom Celebration Parade. The theme of the parade is thanking our troops, so we're pretty excited about that. On that same day, our youth will be joining in the community garage sale to raise money for their mission trip and other activities.

Michael has been getting into taking care of the yard. He set up the sprinkler system on it's automatic schedule and today we are weeding the flower beds and trying to plan what to do with the rest of the yard.

Perhaps this is the time to share my thoughts on being "green." I don't necessarily buy into "the whole world is coming to an end and it's all our fault." At the same time, we are called to be good stewards of the natural resources God has blessed us with (as well as the resources of money, time and talents.) That being said, I'm really more in touch with being green now that we live outside the city limits. My water comes from my ground and everything that goes down a sink or toilet ends up in my septic system or out in my drain field. So I guess that getting in touch with actual nature has gotten me in touch with my "green" self. We drive our own garbage to the dump, so I started separating out all my cardboard because they have a bin for it. There is no recycling for plastic here in Columbus but I've started saving all my milk jugs and driving them into Billings along with my plastic bags. (I wouldn't have so many of those if I could remember to bring my reuseable bags with me to the store, but I'm still working on that:)) Also, I'm making the move to chemical free cleaners. I've got to say that they are at least as good as the old standards, and in one case, much better. I hate Windex. I always have. Even their streak free stuff streaks and it makes me crazy! But I always thought that if the name brand stuff didn't work, what hope was there for generic stuff to work? Clorox has a new line of "green" products and their window cleaner doesn't streak!! I love it. Now, so as not to sound to high and mighty, I will share this very large inconsistency. Although I have become concerned about what I put down my drain because it ends up in my ground - we are trying to decide where to kill off the weeds in our yard and gravel driveway with poison that we will pray directly onto the ground. Oh well. I like the "green" stuff anyway and feel good about using it in my house.

That's probably more than you ever wanted to know about my thoughts on going "green." Anyway, I hope you all have a safe and happy Fourth of July. Remember to thank God for our freedoms and to thank our servicemen and women.