Announcing: ACTION project!

Baby dolls. Such a simple item that can be found in almost every home in the United States. When I was in Mexico, I held a little girl as she received her very own baby doll. She was the only one of the girls to get one and all the others gathered around to gently touch her new "baby." The wheels in my head started to turn as I saw the desire in the other girls eyes.

About a month later, cleaning out the "toy bin" at home, I found five baby dolls that no one wanted any more. We have lots of girls and dolls in abundance, not to mention most of us are past the age of actively playing with them. What if we reached out to our sisters all over the world with something as simple as a doll? What if we could take our unused baby dolls and send them down to the little Mexican girls as a ministry? What if we could use that which we never use to change someone's life? What if God could take out "trash" and use it to bring treasure?

I talked to the missionaries down in Mexico and they thought that the dolls would be a great blessing to the girls down there!

The project: Collecting baby dolls cleaning them up and shipping them to Tucson AZ where they will be brought to Mexico and given to the girls.

Girls: Go through your closets and boxes! Get your friends involved! Make a day to clean and dress all the dolls for delivery. Just imagine what a blessing we could be to these little girls and what fun we could have while doing it!

Guys: Okay, so hopefully you don't have any dolls in your closet, but that does not mean you cannot be involved! Spread the word among your sisters and female friends! We will need some funding to ship all the dolls; perhaps your little sister is getting a box together; perhaps you can help her with the postage! If you don't have that option, I am sure there will be sisters with out brothers, you can sponsor a box for a sister in Christ that you may not even know!

Please feel free to email me at miakalista[at]hotmail[dot]com, if you have any questions or would like to contribute. =) On the right hand side bar is our Facebook group if you would like to join!

Love,

Hillary

Note: This is a call just for baby dolls, not for barbie dolls or stuffed animals ♥

Read more...

Colorado!!!

This is a long overdue post but a few weeks ago I got to fly to Denver and stay the weekend with the amazing Burney family! Mr and Mrs. Burney reside in a lovely area outside Denver with their 10 (soon to be 11) children. All of the Burney children are just adorable (you saw Tiffany's photos below) which is not a surprise at all once you have met their parents!


There is art everywhere....you just have to find it!




Promptly after arriving I made a choice that changed me forever....or at least for the rest of the visit. I had a pillow in my hand. And I thought to myself : "If I hit this small child with this pillow, it will cry. However, if I hit that small child with a pillow they will hit me back and a brawl will ensue with all of them against me... I barricaded myself behind the bed and let it fly!"









I have never seen such a marvelous selection of hotwheels in my life before! What boggles my mind is how they kept track of them all! I mean I have my own room now and I still manage to loose my bobby pins, where do they go?! I digress...




And he masters the wink.... ;-)



Can we say "Camera HAM!"



So many cute little men!!



Board games are a favorite of the family and they are pretty good if I do say so myself!



For some reason the small children thought this was just hilarious!
It did not work btw, but ...the frog was cute!








We spent one afternoon watching Donald Duck, (Thank you Hutchins boys for sending them to us!)



Gideon was SUCH a dear!



Sweet friends!




Jedidiah and I share the same birthday! I knew we got along for a reason!



The weekend was up much too soon and I headed back out west. * sigh *



Goodbye Colorado! You treated me well!

Read more...

Felicity and Tiffany Photoshoot

While in Colorado last weekend I got the joy (and fun) of doing hair and a photoshoot with two lovely young ladies.
I flew out to meet Felicity who is from Australia and I met through the Rebelution forum. I had met Tiffany and her parents on my way to Mexico via Denver in January. We had a blast and I will post some of the pictures of us just "hangin out" later. ♥


Felicity on the left and Tiffany on the right.


Felicity (Don't you just LOVE her eyes!)



Tiffany (I love the stem of grass in this shot!)




All three of us (photo credits to Brittany Burney-- Tiffany's VERY talented sister)


See no evil; say no evil; hear no evil" (photo credits -- BB)



Tiffany (have so many favorites from this shoot...)



The beautiful Felicity




Just for fun!



Tiffany



Felicity!



I love the contrast here! Photo credits -- BB



Photo credits -- BB



Tiffany

Read more...

Of dreams, friends and God...

Those of you who know me well know that it has always been a dream of mine to play the harp. I have looked off and on for several years at harps online and read books about them. I never did quite get around to getting one mostly because I keep spending my money on something else. :-P

I had been praying about it and was more than a little bummed when once again the harp was bumped down the priority list by my dear beloved camera breaking. :-( I came home from a very bummy day of repair shops and repair men that I am still SURE were trying to rip me off! ;-) I had just gotten to the point of deciding it was okay and after all God has a way in everything and it was just time and money... nothing to worry about.

I pulled in the driveway and there was the oddest shaped box on the front step..? Taking a closer look I could not believe my eyes! There was the very harp I had intended/wanted to purchase and had just given up to God's timing!

Long story short, the Rebelution Forum Team got together on it and bought it for me! (along with "Basic harp for Beginners" the book)

I cried..... then I dried my tears, made some more inquiries and then cried some more. ♥ Hey, I am a girl... I can DO that!
I am still just blown away by their thoughtfulness and kindness and how darn sweet of them!!!!! ♥

Okay, I love you guys, and I will shut up and produce the pictures I know you all want to see. ;-)







I love love love LOVE it!!!!♥♥♥♥♥

Read more...

Adventures

Greetings to all my faithful blog readers!

I hope this post finds you all warm and enjoying the family togetherness of the season. :)

God has been doing some exciting things in my life in the past few months and drawing together the strings of two dreams of mine.


Over a year ago I sat down with dad and made a list of the things I wanted to do with my life, near the top of that list was going on a short term missions trip. I started praying that God would open the doors and send an opportunity my way if it was His will for me. For about 6 months nothing happened until I read about an opportunity on the Rebelution Forum to go to Sinaloa Mexico and help put the roof on the Coult Family's house. Long story short I leave a week from today for almost two weeks in Mexico! God is so good! I have been continually awed at the precision of His ways and how He has brought every little detail together so perfectly!

Three days after I return home from Mexico (Jan 15th-16th) my church is hosting a Rebelution video conference of which I am the head coordinator. Ever since I got involved with the Rebelution in 2006 I have wanted to bring them to Omaha. When Dad and I went to their conference in Des Moines, IA the summer of 08 I was completely hooked! When Mr.Nelson asked me to coordinate the video conference at Millard Alliance Church I was excited and very nervous. Once again God took my original plan, tripled it, and then sent it far and wide. He provided willing volunteers and people to help me plan. ( I never knew how many details went into these things!)

By the way...there is still room to register for the conference and we would love to have you! It is $10 per person at the door and you can RSVP to: omaha2010rebelution@gmail.com . If you would like to come but cannot afford the fee just let us know and we are happy to offer assistance. :) (*shamless plug..I know I know*)


God has been so good to me this year and as it ends I am excited to see what lies beyond the sunrise!

Read more...

Doing Hard Things

I did a hard thing today...

I retired 2 of my oldest and dearest members of my hooded sweatshirt collection. The blue one was very pretty (I thought) and very chic. It got all stained real quick though (someday I will master the art of eating without dropping food all over myself) The Green (and my by far most beloved sweatshirt of all time) was a hand-me-down that I caught before mom could throw it away. Mom hated the beautiful thing and I LOVED it. I wore it faithfully for 3 years. First the zipper pull broke, so I used a safety pin. Then the thing I pinned the safety pin to broke so I used my finger. Then the zipper stopped zipping, thankfully while it was zipped up! Then the bottom of the zipper split...
I kept it on the porch for good luck for about 6 months... but the dreaded day came today. I threw it out, both of them.
DO HARD THINGS!

*sniff*

Read more...

Rebelutionaries Unite

Katherine, Sarah, Hillary, Mark

Abort73

Emily, Sarah, Mark, Hillary, Stephen



The three of us forumites.
Mark initiated the Hutchins/Hipps relationship
and since he is not getting away with all of the credit...
I responded to his initiation, and investigated the people involved
and since she did start *our* friendship...
Sarah, found me and began the lines of communication there.

Basically Sarah and I kinda used Mark and then dropped him :D poor boy!




Sarah and I ( Sarah is one of my very bestest friends. Aside from the fact that she is such a good friend and I hate to have her spread so thin, I would recommend her friendship to each and every one of you)







View the entire album on Facebook with this public link:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2016406&l=ccbd6&id=1231054154

Read more...

This is what I have chewing on ever since the Rebelution Conference.



I’ve been thinking a lot about doing hard things in regards to my attitude. How does the attitude I maintain portray my life as an element of God’s kingdom, and a Rebelutionary in my generation? Am I truly rejoicing in the life I have been granted by God? Or do I gripe and fuss because. ‘Hey, face it, life is not always easy’? Or am I straining ahead to what might be in the future instead of enjoying and making the most of every day in the place God has me now? Having a godly attitude is hard, let me explain….
My current situation has me staying at home watching my younger siblings, trying to keep the house clean and doing all the laundry for a family of 11 people. As of current I have virtually no options to do what I used to call ‘important’ hard things.
If you went to the Conference or read the book you have for sure heard about the ‘important’ hard thing that are getting done by your fellow Rebelutionaries, they are raising millions for orphans, writing books, producing films, and digging wells in Africa. Now if you are anything like me you looked at them and thought, “Man, if only I was somewhere else; that could be me”
I have often asked the question: “ God, why couldn’t you have given me a hard thing that would make a more significant impact in the big picture”. For me, making my bed, doing dishes, folding laundry…all that is normal expected actions I have done all my life, but doing it with a joyful and grateful attitude, now that is HARD! I mean who is going to know or even care for that matter that I held my temper with my sister today. Honestly 99.99999% of this world is not going to give a rip if you kept from losing your cool or not, and even if they notice you can be sure you will not hear about it. I say 99.99999% because your sister is sure to care if you blow up at her; you might even hear something from your parents if you really got heated. But, letting it go and being patient is not going to see the president hanging the Best Teen medal round your neck and giving a speech on how well you controlled your temper.
Which is exactly why it seems so much harder to cheerfully wash the dishes, patiently amuse your baby brother for hours on end, or say no to your temper and turn the other cheek instead. No one is going to pat you on the back and ask you to come speak to their youth group because you did your chores with a good attitude. In fact it will seem at the time that no one cares at all whether you make the effort to have a good attitude.
But, God does! He sees, He cares, and it is for Him and His glory that we do hard things in the first place! It may seem like it is not really important to have a good attitude wherever God has you today but, this is part of God’s training camp for your future; the clearing of your launching pad so to speak.
It is just as hard of a thing in God’s eyes for my to rejoice in folding laundry and changing dirty diapers, as it is for Alex and Brett to travel country wide ministering through the conference, or for ‘Hoops of Hope’ to go world wide in its endeavor. God has me in one place and them in another. All three are equally important.
The hard thing God has given me to do for today is to rejoice, be content, and to mirror my life after His. Right now that mirror reflects mountains of laundry, whiny kids, a messy house, and a joyful spirit. My heart attitude is my hard thing!

How about you?


What is your “Hard Attitude”?

Read more...

The Rebelution

Alex and Brett Harris in action! Well, this is what they looked like most of the time:-P


Alex talking with people during the break


The security guards; awesome!


Alex signing their book. (sorry most of the pictures are of Alex; Brett was to swarmed with girls to even get close:-P you can see him in the background talking to...a girl)



All of us forum people.


The conference was awesome. I would highly recommend it to anyone in a heart beat. I wish I could hear it all again today, it was so good.

Read more...