Praying for Megan, Brent and Cohen

I'm participating in a blogging day of silence in honor of baby Cohen, who went to be with Jesus at just 12 days old due to complications caused by multiple congenital heart defects. 

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.

~2 Corinthians 1:3-4

May the Lord Jesus Christ comfort you in your sorrow Megan and Brent.

MY COMPUTERS ARE FOR THE BIRDS!!!!

~~~~ small update posted 06-24-10, scroll down to the * (asterisk)~~~~

I thought I'd be back to regular blogging after reformatting my hard drive twice, but alas, it wasn't meant to be.  I'm still here; praise the Lord, but my desktop computer is, I'm afraid, about to die and my laptop won't even turn on.  But, thankfully, I found the receipt for it and just faxed it in to HP tonight.  I don't know what to expect, but hopefully, they will help me make it live again! 

This past winter I put sunflower seeds out for the little birdies.  They must have loved me because I made sure they had seed every morning. They would be sitting and singing in the trees outside my door at dawn, waiting for daylight to come so they could start their feast! 

I have more bird photos to share, but unfortunately, my computer is acting up and/or is in its final death throes..... a lost cause.

*I added a few more pics  on 6-24-10, I'm still having major computer issues, but, I should at the minimum have a laptop back home and working within a week! Yay!  Can't wait to share what I've been up to since my last post!  I have some amazing photos to show of a little sight-seeing tour I guided in early June!  p.s.-Don't you love the looks those 2 birds above are giving each other?  Serious attitudes in such little bodies! Isn't God amazing in his design right down to the smallest details? 

(Preview)

Please pray for Adrienne and the sweet baby boy she has been blessed with.  Pray that the baby will live to full term and that he will be born whole and healthy.  Thank you!  If you aren't familiar with Adrienne's story, get some kleenex and click the link above.  Don't worry; there are tears of happiness in her story too!

I have been thinking about switching to an Apple computer, or Mac or whatever, I never know what the difference is between the two.  But, I'm scared to because of a: the cost and b: I don't know how hard it is to transition over to one after only having PC experience.  Any thoughts?  or personal experience?  I will be back (as soon as I get a computer to work)! 

OUR WEDDING STORY PART 3 OF 3 - OUR 1ST DATE WAS OUR WEDDING!!!

I know what you're thinking....but, no!!! This was not an arranged marriage!!!!

To recap, in a nutshell, I started this blog because I was inspired by Kelly's "Show Us Your Ministry" tour and because I received a physical healing from God and I am going to eventually share that story as well. My husband, John, felt called to give away free Bibles (through our auto shop) to everyone in our town so that the whole town could be saved! Our ministry is distributing free bibles to anyone who wants one.

We have given away over 100,000 Bibles (that have gone all over the world) through our dirty, little, grungy shop. Oh yeah, I received the very first Bible that my husband gave away (before I ever even knew he would be my husband)!

(Click here for Part 1)...
(Click here for Part 2)...

   if you want to go all the way back to the beginning and read the whole story.

I have been meaning to finish the rest of this story since my original post back in February, but have had a whole host of problems, from electronic to physical, including a short stay in the ER a couple of nights ago for a very painful UTI that hit me by surprise and rapidly progressed into a "rip-roaring" infection according to the ER doc. But, by the Grace of God, I am recovering now.

So, to pick up where I left off....my husband was stirred by a passage he read in the Bible, Matthew 7:16 - 20. Matthew was formerly known as Levi, the tax collector who left everything to follow Christ (Lk 5:27, 28). He wrote as an eyewitness of many of the events he described, giving firsthand testimony about the words and works of Jesus of Nazareth. My husband was especially moved by Matthew 7:19-20: Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits.

He decided that he wanted to bear good fruit for the Lord and committed to order 10 Bibles to try to give away. He thought it was going to be really hard. Ha! Little did he know! I worked for him at the time and asked for one (the first one) when he opened the box. He gave it to me and he was amazed at how anxiously I received it. The rest of the Bibles went quickly so he placed another order. And another. And another. And, you get the point, right?

God has astonished us by the people who receive the Bibles we give and likewise how he always leads people to us who want to help give the Bibles away. If you need a Bible, please email me at biblesforanchorage(at)yahoo.com.

Anyway, back to the story......John and I became friends during my employment with him because we were both single parents to boys who were about a year apart in age. We would hang out and let the kids play together or baby-sit for one another often over the next 10 years. We each dated (other people), and had quasi-serious, but definitely not Christian relationships with other people. But we never dated each other, or even came close to anything remotely romantic during all our years as friends. We camped together and went on snowmachining trips with the kids. But we were always just friends. John is 17 years older than me and I was in my early 20's when I met him. To say that I wasn't interested in him in anyway is an understatement! I mean, he was soooo old, you know being 40 and all! (I'll be 40 in three years!) Ha!

It wasn't until we both committed, separately, each in our own time and for our own reasons, that we would not enter into in anymore relationships that involved pre-marital sex that God's plan for our future marriage, yet unknown to us, really started to take shape.

It began in the summer and fall of 2005 and it was an experience like no other! I started to have thoughts of marriage towards John, of all people. John, my best friend. John, my part-time employer.  John, the guy I never even entertained the idea of dating. All the while, he was having visions of me in a white wedding dress, marrying him.

Because we were such good friends and each of us valued our friendship so much, we were both really weirded out by our thoughts towards one another and it took a few months before either one of us brought it up.  (I can't remember for sure, but I think he brought it up first!)

God was stirring in both of our minds and hearts and I know that it was He that turned our hearts toward one another. Coincidentally, our pastors had been praying for John to find a wife! John kept telling them that he wasn't looking for a wife, but they prayed faithfully anyway! Eventually we did broach the subject and after we talked it all the way through, he proposed to me on August 19th, 2005!

We had never even gone out on a date. Sure, we hung out together, but always as friends.  And then, suddenly, we were engaged.  We spent the next four months crazily planning and preparing for our Wedding Day.  It was our very first official date!  We were married on November 25, 2005, and left for our honeymoon in Hawaii that night! Praise the Lord! 

This is a picture of the very first Bible. It's a hardback NIV version. I own many Bibles, but this is the one that is the most special to me.  (And I added a wedding pic too!)

WHY I HEART HEWLETT PACKARD

I purchased a Hewlett Packard Pavillion Notebook almost three years ago (just like the one in the pic above).  I recently started having weird problems with it and I had hoped that repairs were still covered under the extended warranty that I purchased for it.  The other night after I finally got my new (non HP) printer working, I logged on to HP's website to see what I could find out. 

Was I ever surprised.  I mean blown away.  I mean I heart HP forever now.  I iniated a chat session with product support and was blessed to work with Ms. Robin Small.  She was incredibly kind and helpful.  After providing her with my details (serial number and name, etc) she informed me that my warranty expired just over a year ago. 

Here's the really neat part:  Ms. Small informed me that if I fax my orginial store receipt along with some other info like my name and address, HP will still help me get my notebook working because "We want to ensure your satisfaction with our products and our service."  Wow.  A company that acknowledges their product even when it is out of warranty.  I tried to get help from the manufacturer of my wireless router when I was going through all that printer setup nonsense and because it was more than 1 year old, that company did not want to have anything to do with me, which I think is typical of most manufacturers these days, unfortunately.   

But that's not all.  After we discussed my warranty issue, Ms. Small asked me if there were any other technical issues she could assist me with.  I asked her if I still have chat support available for my notebook even though I'm out of warranty and she said, "Certainly, do not worry Rachel.  We are always here for you....round the clock!  It does not matter if your notebook is in warranty or out of warranty, we are there for you."  WOW.  I can't believe it.  This company really does care about my satisfaction.  I'm very impressed.  This is quite a contrast from the experience I just had with my new Samsung printer. 

Now I'd just like to say to HP and Ms. Robin Small:  Thank you from the bottom of my heart!  I have always liked your products, and now I have a reason to love your company.  I wish all companies would stand behind their products like HP.   Thanks HP!

P.S.  - HP did not ask me to write, or compensate me, in any way for this review.  As a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure I mean nothing more to HP than just being another customer who needs a repair!  This review is soley based on my own  experience with HP and how extremely happy I am with their product and support! 

04-14-10 SNOW AND SAMSUNG REPAIRED MY HEART...I MEAN PRINTER!

I wanted to do a post about Spring Break-up in Alaska.  Spring Break-up (we Alaskans just call it break-up) is when the temp starts to stay above freezing and all the snow and ice starts to melt.  It's quite a mess!  Take note of the vehicle in the 2nd picture below.  It is very hard to keep a car clean here is all I'm sayin'! 

Break up is one of my very favorite seasons (yes, in Alaska break-up is a season, at least to me!) but, it looks like Old Man Winter isn't quite done this year.  It snowed at least 4 inches here in Anchorage a couple of days ago!  And the forecast on my iphone app is calling for snow off and on thru next Tuesday.  As in the 20th of April!  And it is still freezing outside!

Here's a couple of pic's from my iphone that I took at work when it was snowing on Thursday:

(sorry about the quality - iphone pics)

See those big dark spots?  Those are snowflakes!

Global Warming, Smlobel Warming.  The weather is always unpredictable in Alaska, and it can snow on any day of the year, but I am so over winter!  I need some good ol' sunshine to warm my bones.  I count it all joy though.   We're blessed to be here, praise the Lord!

On another note....Samsung's Product Specialist never called me back, so I called tech support again.  I spoke to a really nice guy by the name of Douglas who guided me through all the correct steps to finally get my brand new printer working!  Hooray!  I nearly cried tears of joy!  From the time I purchased that printer it was an unbelievably frustrating experience, but in the end, Samsung came through, and I am thankful.  Thanks Samsung for unbreaking my heart and my new printer. :-)

Tomorrow I will tell you why I now heart HP (as in Hewlett Packard).  I have to keep working on getting my computer restored back to it's pre-reformatting state and I'm 3 weeks behind on home office stuff and on work that I need to do for one of our businesses, plus all things blog (reading, writing, researching, learning) because I've been dealing with the printer issue, but I plan to get back to regular posting just as soon as possible!  So, thank you to my readers who have been patiently waiting during this down time.  Now I have to go get the dishes done before Hubby gets home!  Have a blessed weekend!