This book is written by my Mother-in-law, Callie Williams.  She is a strong believer in divine healing as well as the power of prayer.  Over the years she has used her faith and the power of prayer as she faced various illnesses in her life.  She writes about these experiences in her book.  The book also contains healing scriptures that are organized by topic and easy to find.

For many years my Mother-in-law would visit people who were sick.  There was another book she would buy that had scriptures in it, and then give it to the person she was visiting.  After awhile, she could no longer find this particular book.  So the Lord laid it on her heart to write a book herself.  That is exactly what she did.  It took a little while to complete, but at 70+ years old she is an inspiration.  She set out to do what the Lord had for her to do, and she did it.

Her desire for this book is to get it in the hands of people who are sick.  One of the things she would like to see is people/churches buying the book and giving them to people who are sick, just like she has done.  If you are interested in purchasing this book for yourself or a friend or family member, you can buy it here:  healingintheword.com.

If your church is interested in getting some for their bookstore, or purchase them to give away, there is wholesale pricing available, you can send an email to:  anniehow@ymail.com

The second part of this story is about the role I played in getting this book complete.  With the gifts and talents the Lord has blessed me with, I was able to set-up and design the book, so all we had to do is get it printed.  We used createspace.com, where you can do it all yourself like we did, or you can pay to get your book layed-out and designed by one of their graphic designers. It was exciting for me to work on this project to watch it progress into a completed book.  This is something I look forward to doing with other people.  I know there are many people who have a book written but don’t know where to go with it, or what to do with it.  Most people think you have to send it to a publishing company or get an agent.  That’s one way of doing it, or you can self-publish it, and that’s where createspace comes in.

So if you are someone who has a book completed, or have an idea for a book burning down on the inside, grab a stack of paper and your typewriter and start writing!!  I know…that’s how they used to do it in the movies…yeah…a little too far back.  So grab your laptop, iPad or whatever, just write that book!!  I would love to set it up for you and design a cover.  Contact me at anniehow@ymail.com for more information and pricing.

It started Tuesday afternoon at about 1 p.m.  The snow did not stop falling and blowing (30 – 40 mph) until Noon on Wednesday (today), leaving 19 inches of snow with 3 – 5 foot drifts.  This is the 3rd largest blizzard in our area.

My mom always talks about the blizzard of ’67.  It was my sister’s 4th birthday, I wasn’t born yet.  But she spent the day cooking and cleaning and preparing for a birthday party, she was unaware of the snow falling until my dad walked in from work late that evening, covered in snow.  The whole issue with that blizzard is that no one knew it was coming, so it paralyzed many areas.  With this storm we knew it was coming, the weatherman had been talking about it since last week and gave everyone plenty of time to prepare.  Those who weren’t prepared probably just chose not to believe it was coming.  With history repeating itself, Elijah’s birthday is today, with the blizzard coming to an end in the afternoon, I made sure I was fully prepared to have a birthday celebration at home.  Monday we went to the store to stock up on food and stuff.  Tuesday, I baked the cakes and cooked his favorite dinner (Italian Beef sandwiches), just in case we lost power.  With the way the storm was coming in, the worst of it hit us while we slept.  Not taking any chances I also made a pot of coffee before I went to bed.  If we lost power I could still heat things up on the stove.  I also cranked up our heat so it would be nice and warm in the event the power went out in the middle of the night.  Thankfully we did not experience any major difficulties.

This morning we all went out to shovel and got some welcomed help from a neighbor with a snow blower.  Cook, Joshua and Olivia went to her friend’s house the next block over to help her shovel out, and helped another lady whose husband was out-of-town.  They had fun helping.  After that Elijah had his cake and opened his presents and we’ve just been hangin’ out inside enjoying this quiet lazy day.  As Elijah is known for saying, he summed up the day as, “the best day EVER!!”

This is what our backyard looked like before we went to bed, and then what it looked like when we woke up in the morning.

Being so close to Chicago, I have been watching the news and seeing what they are dealing with in the city.  Last night they closed down the major street that runs right along the lake called Lake Shore Drive (LSD).  This was after 3 accidents occurred, but not in time to prevent 900 drivers from being stranded.  Emergency crews were able to get the people to safety leaving their cars stranded.  I have never seen anything like it!!  Lake Shore Drive looked like a parking lot with cars buried and stuck between snow drifts.  Today they have crews out there to dig the cars out and tow them away, there’s about 200 cars left to remove.  I am so thankful that I didn’t have to be anywhere or try to get home like so many people experienced.

Even though the snow has stopped and some people are slowly getting dug out, I don’t know that the worst is over.  Tonight and tomorrow we will be experiencing dangerous wind chills of 25 to 35 degrees below zero.  One thing we can say for sure is, the snow isn’t going anywhere, anytime soon.  But hey…I like snow…right?!?!  Anniehow!

Photos by Olivia Jakira

My kids and I enjoy watching game shows.  We are big Wheel of Fortune fans.  We’ve had that game for our Play Station and also computer.  Years ago Cook and I had a computer version for DOS (which was before windows) with horrible graphics, but the game was fun.  Joshua and Olivia are pretty good at solving the puzzles, we like to yell out the answer once we figure it out.  Sometimes when one of the really long puzzles have been solved, and they read the answer, Benji will say, “Aw…that’s what I was going to say.”   We all wonder why people spend money buying vowels, maybe that’s one of the rules.  It  just doesn’t make sense to us to buy all the vowels…Anniehow!!

We’ve also enjoyed watching Minute to Win It.  Benji and Elijah like this one the most.  After the show, Benji is always making up his own games.  This is a newer show and if you haven’t seen it, this is how it works.  You have 10 games to play, advancing up monetary levels.  You have 3 lives, so if you lose a game, you lose a life.  You have one minute to complete each game.  All games use household items, and have some crazy names like: Face the Cookie, Bucket Head, or Junk in the Trunk.  You can see all the games and how to play them at www.nbc.com/minute-to-win-it .  You can win 1 million dollars.  Once you make it to the $50,000 level, you bank it.  So once you get to that level, you know you are going home with at least that.  As you progress through each level, you can “take the cash and dash, or stay and play.”  I think the most I’ve seen anyone win was $250,000.  It’s a lot of fun to watch, though there is usually a little dramatic moment in each episode.  Guy Fieri, the host, will ask the contestants what would winning 1 million dollars mean to them and there’s usually some tears, or someone calls on the phone to encourage the contestant, (sniff, sniff) it’s a brief moment and you hear the contestants story but they don’t stay there long, so that’s good. Then it’s back to the fun of the games.  We find ourselves rooting for the contestants, and discussing the strategies of each game, it’s a lot of fun.

All the kids like to watch Wipeout.  I’ll watch it with them sometimes, but I just don’t know how the contestants don’t hurt themselves.  The kids of course find it hilarious, and I enjoy listening to them laugh through the whole show.  It seems a lot of work, and endurance to win $50,000.

The latest show we watched was The Million Dollar Money Drop.  This is how the show works.  Two contestants receive 1 million dollars in cash at the start of the show.  The time I watched it, it was a husband and wife.  You answer a total of seven questions.  With each question you have two categories to choose from.  You get your question, and you have four answers to choose from.  Then you have to quickly stack the money on the answer or answers you want.  You have to use all the money and you have to leave one answer open.  You have 60 seconds to distribute the cash.  Then they reveal the answer by dropping all the wrong answers, so if you had any amount of money on the wrong answer, you lose that money.  So on the first question, if you split the money 50/50 on two answers, you will automatically lose $500,000.  Cook actually sat down with us to watch it.  But as the game went on, we were trying to figure out how it worked.  By the third question we were like, this is so dramatic.  We were trying to see the fun in it, and really couldn’t.  With the way the economy is and a lot of people are struggling, I don’t consider this to be a fun game to watch.  This poor couple left with nothing!!  Answered all seven questions but had nothing to show for it.  You could feel their pain each time they lost money!!  At least on Wheel of Fortune you get $1000 just for playing.  I don’t see this show staying around too long, it’s a little too depressing.

Our family likes to play board games too.  My husband is ”a little” competitive, which also makes my children “a little” competitive.  Benji and Elijah need help with their “trash talkin’” while they are winning, but we do it all in good fun.  For Christmas we added a few games to our collection.  Our favorites are: Chess (I don’t play at all), Scrabble, and Othello.  We added Connect Four, Trouble and a table-top Fooseball game.  Benji is the reigning champ at Connect Four.  Elijah is our Fooseball champ.  I don’t know how he does it, but I think Benji actually uses some strategy to his playing.  Because at times, before he gets the connect four, he’ll put a piece in and say, “Boo-yow” like he knows he’s going to win and he does!!  Cook’s sister was in town for the holidays and they had a big tournament, with this one playing that one, and that one playing the winner and in the end it was Benji against her and he won.  She is already demanding a re-match.  This is Cook’s sister…she is also “a little” competitive, but loves to play games with us.  She is a fierce Scrabble player!!  But it’s all in good fun!!  Sometimes we even break out the Monopoly game…when we can spend a couple of hours playing.

So if you’re looking for something different and fun to do, break out a board game and have the whole family play.  The kids will be amazed at the game you used to play when you were a kid…they might even enjoy it.

My family is not big TV watchers.  Recently, I’ve been guilty of watching more, especially when Dancing With The Stars comes on or Celebrity Apprentice.  Last fall I did get my family hooked on FlashForward, only to have it cancelled.  So with the new fall season starting, the kids and I sat down the other night to watch “No Ordinary Family.”  The story seemed interesting and it was.  The cast is good, and it was really funny.  I was impressed with the dialogue that the Dad had about wanting to spend more time as a family.  Something I think a lot of families don’t have the opportunity to do.  So I’m thinkin’ this is a family oriented show.  I was disappointed though when the  Mom is talking to the Dad and says something to the effect, remember what we used to do when the kids were gone and we had the house to ourselves?  Next scene they’re both in the bedroom…in bed…supposedly no clothes.  I couldn’t tell you what actually happened because I switched the channel.  I’m sorry…I’m not comfortable watching bedroom scenes with my kids.  The next disappointment was when the high school daughter is talking to the Mom about breaking up with her boyfriend because he is sleeping with so-and-so.  The mother’s reply is “that b****!”  OK…not my first thought.  How about alarms going off in your head…Red alert! Red alert! My daughter’s boyfriend sleeps with his girlfriends!!  Anniehow…the daughter also talks back, calls her brother an idiot and is acting like “the typical teen” (per media standards) and is just disrespectful.  I know teens can be difficult, and moody and hard to be around at times, but I still feel they should respect their parents and watch how they talk to them.  It made me stop and wonder about the parent who has a difficult teen, who acts like the daughter, and happened to watch this show, did they find it entertaining to watch the parents frustrated and arguing with the daughter?

I’m sure a lot of you are thinking “where have you been, this is normal?”  Like I said we normally don’t watch much TV, and this is probably why.  When are we, as parents, going to figure out that our teens don’t need to watch just anything?!?!?  They are going through hormonal changes and allowing them to sit and watch shows with half-naked people and other teens kissing and talking about sleeping with people doesn’t help anything. The more these images are fed to them the more likely they are to act that way when given the opportunity.

I just thought this could be a show for the family to watch.  Now…not so much.  There are times when my oldest son will watch some of the old re-runs of “Andy Griffith” or “The Dick Van Dyke” show and he is just cracking up.  My husband and I find ourselves stopping and watching them and laughing along with him.  It’s really something how simple and just plain silly those shows are, and yet entertaining.

I will clarify this, my kids didn’t watch every episode of FlashForward with me, nor do they watch Dancing With The Stars.  We are very mindful of what our kids watch and we don’t watch things just because everyone else is.  I guess you can say my family is “no ordinary family.”

My family went to the Staples Bears Training Camp presented by Chase on the campus of Olivet Nazarene University in Bourbonnais, Illinois, and we had a lot of fun.  This is the 9th consecutive year of them being at Olivet Nazarene.  This training camp is open to the public, and there’s free admission and free parking, it’s a great time for the family, especially Bears fans.  The training camp started on July 30, and ends today, August 19, 2010.  

There are three different practice times, Noon, 3 p.m., and 7 p.m.   The gates open one hour prior to start of practice and close one hour after.  It’s a lot of fun to watch them practice, and you get a chance to see your favorite players.  There are several Theme days, where they have extra activities going on throughout the camp ground.  There is the Staples Kids Only Autographs on select days.  Where the first 150 kids ages 4-12, in line will receive a pass for the autograph session for that day.  Kids are allowed one autograph per person, but they are not able to take pictures with the players.

There is also the Staples Bears Pride Poster Contest on select days as well.  Kids ages 4-12 can make a poster, and are entered into a random drawing.  The winners receive a pass to enter Staples ”Front Row Kid Zone” along the players exit from the field.  There were several booths and tables with free things available.  We each received a Bic marker and a folder for  autographs.  There were free roster posters with pictures of different players.  Staples had a booth and were giving away free Bic markers in all kinds of colors.  I was excited about the free markers!!  Staples also had a Back to School day, the day before we went and they were giving away free  Bears/Staples brand backpacks to the first 500 kids.  I didn’t know about it until after we went.  The website didn’t list that as one of the theme days until probably the day before.

Jewel-Osco sponsers the Inflatable Kid Zone where they have this huge obstacle course shown here with Benji sliding down.  They have other inflatable things as well as a basketball toss and football toss.  Benji and Elijah really enjoyed this.  We were there at a good time, since there weren’t a lot of kids waiting in line.  Throughout the camp grounds there are concession stands to purchase food, and they also have hydration stations for fans to access free water and Gatorade. 

There is also a Pro Shop that has everything Bears to purchase, hats, mugs, footballs, jerseys.  We were there the second to the last day, and they were selling the Training Camp T-shirts for $10, which had originally been $25.

There’s just enough things to see and participate in.  The day we went was very pleasant, the sun was warm, but there were some areas of shade to cool off.  Of course Elijah thought it was the “best day EVER.”  It is a lot of fun, especially for the younger kids.  For anyone in the southern suburbs, its a pleasant drive to Bourbonnais.  I look forward to going again next year.