Family, Faith, and Fridays

Tuesday, November 12, 2013

A Big Christmas Shopping Spree giveaway!

Welcome to Family, Faith and Fridays! We are so glad you have joined us.
Can you even believe that is it almost the middle of November? Where has the year gone? With the holidays just around the corner, I have been starting to think about shopping...how about you? To help a few of you out, THREE to be exact, I am excited to be a part of
A Big Christmas Shopping Spree Giveaway!

I hope you haven't done all your shopping for Christmas already... if you have you may still want to buy a big ticketed item for the whole family!

Here is how the Big Christmas Shopping Spree Giveaway works:

A big giveaway deserves big entry options - Between November 12th through November 18th, you can come back and register for as many options as you desire until you have entered all of them that you desire to enter.
Enter some entries more than once - You can add a new comment on a different blog every day, so visit more of the sponsors and leave a comment to have another entry! You can even tweet once a day for additional entries.
You must be 18 years old and living in the United States - The 3 winners will receive an Amazon Gift Card in the mail.
Winners will be verified - Each winner drawn will be verified that they entered the giveaway correctly.
Winners must provide mailing address within 48 hours of notification - To claim your prize, you only have 48 hours to provide your mailing address or a new winner will be drawn. No exceptions. Be sure to check your email on November 19th or 20th to be sure you don't miss out on a shopping spree you will likely never forget!
Winners shop on Amazon - If you are one of the winners, you can shop online for all of those loved ones on your shopping list. All in time for Black Friday specials!

Now let's get to the entry and one step closer to 3 people winning a $250 Amazon Gift Card for a Big Christmas Shopping Spree Giveaway:

Entry -Form

Monday, November 11, 2013

How Sin Rocked Our Week

This was not the post I had planned for today. Really, it wasn't. Nor did much of this week go as I had planned. Surprise, right? My heart is heavy and I just need to get a few things out there. Be forewarned, it is heavy stuff.

It actually started two weeks ago. I am sure many of you saw the announcement that Doug Phillips, the head of Vision Forum, was stepping down from his position due to inappropriate relations with someone other than his spouse. Rocked. My. Week! This man has spent countless years in the homeschooling and family-promoting-business. We have spent countless hours listening to his teaching on how to raise our children and how to be better spouses. We shop his catalog and we watch his documentaries. We were shocked. We were hurt and disappointed - and friends, we do not even know the man personally.

And then this week things got more personal. We have been notified that one of our children's past youth pastors has been charged with indecent liberties with minors. Rocked. My.Week! This is a man we know and loved. Someone we trusted our girls with. We were again hurt and disappointed, and left questioning a lot of things. Praise The Lord, our girls were not directly affected, but there are at least several moms out there that can not say the same thing today. It breaks my heart. There have been several times this week when quite honestly all I wanted to do was hide in a closet and wait for Jesus to return. Instead, I have prayed and cried and prayed some more and tried hard to dialogue all of this out as a family.

Where does one start to try to explain it all to your children? How do you explain that we all are sinners and just one step away from doing something "just as bad"? How do explain that we live in a fallen world?

"For ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." (Rom 2:23)

Let's face it, those are hard things to talk about. I tend to just want to teach my kid's about God's love and sing Jesus Loves Me. But that is not all there is to the story.

This week we have been doing a lot of talking about sin and its effect on all of us. How we all have to choose minute by minute to do the right thing. How that slippery slope that I have mentioned before affects us all. How Satan can tempt us, but we can ALWAYS choose to do the right thing. How we must cover ourselves and our family in prayer daily. How our actions affect more people than we will ever realize. How we must guard our eyes, ears, and hearts. How our goal should be to stay as far away from the line as possible, not see how close we can get to it.

How we could easily be THAT person.

And then there is grace. Yes, I want my kids to remember grace. That through the tears and confusion and pain, God is still God and He extends grace. To everyone. Even, no, especially, sinners - just like us!

We are all just one step away from the line that divides right from wrong. Lord, may we fight hard to stay on the right side and to help those that have stepped over come back. May we learn to forgive and give grace as it has been given to us.

"For it is by grace you have been saved through faith, and not of yourselves; it is a gift from God..." (Eph. 2:8)

Blessings and prayers for you all, friends!

Linking up with Amy today at Raising Arrows!
Welcome Home Wednesdays

The Force- Book Review and Book Basket Giveaway!

Books? Did you mention books? I happen to have a few, read a few and maybe even covet a few! It is a personal thing...I love books! So if someone asks me to read one and review, my answer is usually YES!

Being a homeschooling mom though, most of what I read and review is curriculum so I was very excited to be asked to review a Christian Thriller for a change. Let me just be honest right up front, this is NOT my usual reading genre. I am a wimp and have been know to creep myself out with thrillers and not finish them, but I decided to take a chance with The Force, written by mother daughter team Alexandra and Joyce Swann. Hey, it is good to get out of your comfort zone, right?!

While The Force (358 pages!) is a stand alone book, it is actually the sequel to The Fourth Kingdom. Because I am a "do things in order" kind of gal, I HAD to read that one first. Loved it. A tale of mystery centered around cloning, The Fourth Kingdom introduces young brothers Jarrod and Joshua Sinclair. There are a lot of historical references that made me go back and do a little research of my own. My recommendation- read it! The Fourth Kingdom held me in suspense and I stayed up late the second night of reading to finish it. So glad I did!

The Force finds the Sinclair brothers years later, again in the middle of a cloning mystery, this time on an international level. With the help of a retired Christian detective, the brothers try to capture their childhood nemesis, Josef, and tie him to the recent murders of Hollywood look alikes. Little do they know that the investigation will take them down an even darker path of evil and the seeking of ultimate world power.

Man, did I mention this genre is out of my comfort zone? While I did enjoy the story, I have to admit it creeped me out more than once. Well written and obviously well researched, the themes of cloning and someone seeking to alter the human race to be able to rule it are pretty deep, and often disturbing subjects. The Force has its share of violence which made me uncomfortable at times but is written within the boundaries of good taste. This is not a book for wimps nor is it light reading by any stretch of the imagination. Be ready to pay attention and reread several sections for clarity- I did!

And what about the Christian part of it? The Sinclair brothers as well as detective Fred Kowalski are unashamedly Christian. From the prayers they say to the values they hold dear you never question who their loyalty is to. Amidst a world being taken over by the evil they hold fast to their beliefs.

"...the devil is not powerful; all power belongs to God and to Jesus. The devil uses force, but he has no power." "As long as you have the power of the Holy Spirit in you, the devil can never defeat you, and you never need fear him. One day God will call you to take a stand against the forces of Satan. When that day comes, remember this: Whenever power and force collide, power always wins the fight." (ii, iii, The Force)

This is one of the things that kept me reading- the thought provoking wordage. I loved that the authors made me stop and think, to evaluate what I believe and what I know to be true. To me, to be able to more deeply evaluate a book beyond just the story line and words on a page is a sign of good writing.

If you like books like the Left Behind series or things written by Frank Peretti, this is one you will want to add to your to read list! Just remember that I warned you- be ready to be creeped out! But to be challenged as well!

The Force is available for $12.95 at Amazon, and for the Kindle for $4.99.

About the authors-

Joyce and Alexandra Swann are mother and daughter. Joyce homeschooled her ten children from the first grade through master’s degrees. She is a well-known author and speaker on the subject of homeschooling. For nearly a decade she was a popular columnist for "Practical Homeschooling Magazine". She now blogs regularly on parenting, homeschooling, and Christian lifestyle issues.

Joyce and Alexandra have co-authored two other novels, The Fourth Kingdom and The Twelfth Juror, both of which were published in 2010. Joyce’s personal story of her experiences raising and educating her family is chronicled in Looking Backward: My Twenty-Five Years as a Homeschooling Mother, published in February of 2011. Her novel, The Warrior, which tells the story of one woman’s ten year prayer vigil for a man she has never met, was released in May of 2012. She is also the author of two children’s books, Tales of Pig Isle and The McAloons, which began as stories that she told to entertain her grandchildren.

Alexandra is author of No Regrets: How Homeschooling Earned me a Master’s Degree at Age Sixteen and Writing for Today. She has been self-employed for over fourteen years and was the 2011 Chairwoman of the Board of the El Paso Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. She writes a regular blog, Paying for Protection, about the consequences of over-regulation and over-reaching government. Her novel The Planner, which is the prequel to The Chosen, was published in June of 2012.

And to get you started on your path to reading- a super fun giveaway!

We are excited to help Frontier 2000 Media celebrate the release of The Force by Alexandra and Joyce Swann with a super cool giveaway for book lovers! Two prizes will be awarded, one containing 11 awesome books and the other with five books. Total value of this giveaway is $185! Woohoo!

We would like to thank the following authors for their generous donations to these giveaways! Be sure to stop by their websites to say thank you!

William Struse
Tricia Goyer
Sarah Sundin
Eisley Jacobs
Gwen Toliver
Carey Jane Clark

To enter the giveaway, use the Rafflecopter at the bottom of this post. Two winners will be selected and announced by noon ET on November 25, 2013. U.S. residents age 18 and older only please. Other Terms and Conditions can be found in the Rafflecopter.

Book Lover's Giveaway #1 ($120 value)

The Force by Alexandra and Joyce Swann

The Fourth Kingdom by Alexandra and Joyce Swann

The 13th Enumeration by William Struse

The 13th Prime by William Struse

Love Finds You in Glacier Bay Alaska by Tricia Goyer

On Distant Shores by Sarah Sundin

Dragons of the Deep by Eisley Jacobs

Blink of a Dragon by Eisley Jacobs

Born to be a Dragon by Eisley Jacobs

Seed Sowers by Gwen Toliver

After the Snow Falls by Carey Jane Clark

Book Lover's Giveaway #2 ($65 value)

The Force by Alexandra and Joyce Swann

The Fourth Kingdom by Alexandra and Joyce Swann

The 13th Enumeration by William Struse

The 13th Prime by William Struse

Love Finds You in Glacier Bay Alaska by Tricia Goyer

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Friday, November 8, 2013

An Apple a Day

Welcome to week 11 of our Fun Friday giveaways! (I think it is week 11....) Can you believe that we only have one week left? It has been a whirlwind of fun and allowed us to meet many new friends! If you are a new follower, welcome. We hope you will have fun here and be blessed as well.

Today we have a fun family product I want to tell you about! I was thrilled to be contacted by Lisa Johnson about sharing her Children's Nutritional Tracker, which is called An Apple a Day. In the past few years our family has made a conscious effort to improve our health and eating habits. While we never ate total junk, we did eat a fair amount of processed and boxed "stuff" for ease and simply out of habit. Thankfully, during the past few years we have been able to make some major changes in our lives in regards to eating.

One of the things I saw very early on in our process of changing our eating habits was that we truly had no idea what we were putting in our bodies on any given day. We went from one end of the spectrum to the other. One child practically no fruits while the other ate nothing but. One parent ate tons of veggies while the other ate tons of breads and other carbs. (ummm, that would be me...) If you are a busy family like ours, it is often hard to keep track of what each person is eating.

Here's your answer- An Apple a Day Children's Nutritional Tracker!

Developed by Lisa and her brother, this innovative chart system is a perfect way to track your child's eating for a day. After slipping an age appropriate Nutrition Card into the holder, you use sliding windows to keep track of the food eaten in each individual food category- fruits, veggies, protein, grains, calcium and treats. The last window is labeled activity so you can keep track of that as well. The holder is a sturdy plastic, made to sit bi-fold on your counter or can be mounted on your fridge with its magnetic back. Colorful icons make tracking fun and easy, and the sliding windows help with the visually inclined as well as those that need more tactile experience to learn. Each day you start with all of the windows open and then your child slides and clicks them shut when they eat something from one of the categories. With a quick glance, you or your child's caregiver will be able to see what your child has eaten and where you need to catch up for the day.

A core card is included with your Nutrition Tracker that further explains serving sizes and nutritional information and can be inserted in the bottom portion on the tracker. If you have two children you want to track you can simply slide the second child's card in the bottom instead. Another cool thing that is available is a responsibility card that can be used to track chores and such for a child and comes for ages 2-5 years old or 6-10 year olds. Since nutrition needs can vary for ages, the tracker comes with a 2 cards for 2-9 year olds, but additional cards can be bought for children ages 9-13.

Lisa was generous in sending us both levels of cards so we could track our two boys at one time, ages 6 and 11. We found our stainless steel fridge would not support the magnets on the Children's Nutritional Tracker so we set it on our counter for ease. From afar, it looks like a pretty little laptop! ;) Maybe that's why the 6 year old loved using it! Actually, what happened was the 6 year old thought it was pretty cool when he was doing it himself, but found it really cool when he realized the bottom tracker was his brother's. Let's face it, a little friendly competition can sometimes be a good thing! After each meal he took great delight in racing to see who had eaten "the best"!

Here is another thing I discovered...my boys had a lot less knowledge on the food groups than I thought they did. Maybe that is a homeschooled thing, but we have not really talked about food groups that much now that I think about it. The Nutrition cards along with the core card helped us to teach the boys exactly what a protein and grain where and what a serving size looked like. On the back of the core card are some healthy snack ideas.

My bottom line- This is a fun product. While my oldest son lost interest quickly, probably because he could never get in enough fruits and veggies, go figure, my 1st grader loves this and is still enjoying it. It is easy to use and not only a great teacher but also a great motivator for healthy eating habits!

Details-
The product comes packaged for 2-8 year olds and one tracker can track the daily nutrition for 2 children.
Menu cards for children ages 9 to 13 years old are available and sold separately.
Plus it folds easily to travel wherever your child takes you.
Sturdy plastic case will hold up to little hands.

An Apple A Day Children's Nutritional Tracker can be ordered for $29.99. Additional cards can be added for $5.95.

Lisa has generously offered to give An Apple a Day Children's Nutritional Tracker to one of our readers! Enter the Rafflecopter below for your chance to win!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Wednesday, November 6, 2013

King's Faith- Review and Movie Giveaway

I am usually very hesitant to recommend movies, as everyone's tastes are so different, and quite honestly, we are pretty conservative in the movie arena. That being said, I was intrigued by the King's Faith movie trailer and excited to see it. I have to tell you- it has now made it to our family's list of favorite movies!

King's Faith is the story of a young man, Brendan King, who has been trapped in the foster care system for many years and who eventually ended up on the wrong side of the law, due to misdemeanors and drug use. Brendan became a Christian while in prison and when he's released at age 18, he's determined to turn his life around. Placed in one last foster home he starts anew; new friends, new hobbies, and a new family in the form of foster parents who are struggling with their own loss. Things are looking up. But when his past begins to threaten his future, will Brendan trust God or return to the life he knew?

This movie is pretty intense in parts. The beginning scene in particular deals with a police raid and is very harsh. We did allow our almost 12 year old son watch it, but be forewarned there are few scenes that show fighting and blood and there are references to drug use. The violence is not too graphic for the teens, but this is definitely not a movie for younger kiddos. Though the subject of abortion is dealt with, the actual word is never used and I felt the scene was handled very tastefully.

From our past experiences, not all Christian movies are done well. Many times the story is good but the film expertise is lacking or vice versa. That is NOT the case with King's Faith. The acting is first rate as is the cinematography. No amateur work here.

Enjoy the trailer! As soon as she saw this my 15 yr old announced, "We have to get this movie." We think you should too!

ABOUT THE MOVIE-

Run Time: 108 minutes

MPAA Rating: PG-13

Suggested Retail Price: $14.99

Special Features: A 10-minute behind-the-scenes feature, commentary, discussion guide, Bible study clips affiliated with the LIVE IT OUT Bible Study

You can connect with King's Faith-

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KingsFaith

Twitter: https://twitter.com/kingsfaith

I am giving away a copy of King's Faith to one of our readers. Enter the rafflecopter below for your chance to win.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Blessings,