Windows and Doors!!!

 I never knew that windows and doors could be so exciting, but they sure are...once they are all installed and everyone is still alive (I found out what a miracle the "still alive part" can be when our single door dropped while David, and friend and I were trying to install it.) Praise the Lord, He moved David out of the way! Five guys from church graciously came and helped install that door and the our giant window and it took them around 10 minutes! What an amazing blessing!

 Here is David entering our front door! It's very exciting to be able to lock our basement now.

 This is the side view of the house showing my favourite window that will be our dining room. Notice how big it is compared to the sliding glass doors and us standing in front of it (first picture).

David is finishing up the plumbing and hopes to have it pass inspection before the new year. He was lying in the trench where the septic line runs and was connecting the pipe to the septic tank. The picture doesn't capture how funny it looked to see him completed surround by snow in the trench.

Snowstorms and a Roof

Wouldn't it just be the way that the very day David planned to begin putting the roof on, we got our first snow dump?! His whole family came to celebrate American Thanksgiving and planned to help get the roof started but spent most of the time shoveling off the 2 feet of snow...that was Nov 27. Since then, that faithful, hard working man has continued to work day after day on his own to get the steel roof on. Today, Dec 14, he hopes to finally finish it. We've continued to get snow nearly every day in that time too. The last couple days the cold has been added to what he has to contend with.

 The weather cleared up for one day at least!

This was my work done for the roof (notice not on the roof). I got to pound a nail hole in 5 places on every sheet of steel. My hammer skills have improved quite a bit!

Ultimate Verse Visual

So this is definitely my favourite verse visual that I've made so far! I got the idea from an old Teach Kids! magazine of decorating a Christmas tree as part of teaching a verse. It worked really well, especially since Victoria one of our wonderful volunteers was the one teaching it! All of the "ornaments" were in a box and kids would get to chose one and try to put it in right spot (they're held on by velcro). If they got it right they got a big candy cane and if they got it wrong, a little candy cane.

I will admit it took way longer to make the visual than I expected...but even after being hauled around in a van for 2 weeks and used for 4 clubs, it is still looks pretty good! Yay, for clip art, google images and colour printers!

Isn't God's gift to amazing...it's indescribable! May you celebrate the true reason for the season...Jesus!

The Giant Cupcake and more

Once upon a time, around two and half years ago, in Rogers, Minnesota, a new bride was packing her belongings into a Uhaul trailer to move to Canada. One of the items that most confused and surprised her groom was that the giant ceramic cupcake that was almost forgotten was required to come. This giant cupcake was given to the girl when she was a baby, at a baby shower by the lady that made it.

Every year on the little girl's birthday, she would bring the giant cupcake filled with eatable cupcakes inside to school to share with all of her classmates. This tradition was one sweet memory of childhood.

Fast-forward to present day...this strange cupcake once again has a use! In doing Christmas Party Clubs in Orillia, we are doing a "Birthday Party for Jesus". The kids have really been grasping the idea of how Christmas is really Jesus' birthday but we often forget and ignore Him on His birthday. The giant cupcake has come along to remind us that the biggest and best should go to Jesus.

Please pray for the kids that have come to the two clubs held and those coming to the two next week. Two children came to know Christ this week!

Something extra special this year is that we were given a scooter and two bikes by a family moving to Italy that we have been giving away at the Christmas Parties. All of the kids names are put into a jar and one is drawn as the winner. It has been an incredible object lesson of how nobody deserves the bike, but it is a gift to them. God gives us an incredible gift of forgiveness that we don't do anything to deserve.
Our verse is 2 Corinthians 9:15 "Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!"

Melissa and Brian Rose

David's sister, Melissa was married on November 13, 2010 at Crossroads Chapel in Burlington. Congratulations Melissa and Brian!!!!
They are living in a condo they bought in Ajax. He drives truck and she hopes to pursue music ministry more in the new year and possibly waitressing.

We were privileged to be a part of the wedding, we did music, David was the Master of Ceremonies for the reception and I was a bridesmaid.

Brian kindly let us borrow his truck while they were on their honeymoon and so in full Guyatt style, it was left for them...filled with balloons, candy, a balloon Melissa and Brian along with the whole trucking being wrapped up. Thankfully they're still talking to us. =]

TCE

 We saw God answer prayer in the diligence and dedication of the 8 students that were in the Teaching Children Effectively course these past 4 weekends. What a blessing it was to see that they "got it" and are excited to apply what they have learned!

 David is so excited about building he even brings his tools with him to teacher training!

 Here's 3 of the 5 teachers. Vance was the coordinator of the course and also David's evaluator.

Here are the wonderful students, sighing with relief as the course just finished this past Saturday.

House Update

Isn't it cool that it actually looks like a house now?! I really like the gable (the pointy part)! (I actually know what "Anne of Green Gables" actually means now too!

Here's the view from the back. It's the part that's not as scary since it's not as high.

The basement is still waiting to have the plumbing finished and a floor poured.

I helped David put the Typar (the housewrap) and cut out the windows. We hope to order the roof next week!!!

The first of our windows! We were able to get 5 windows that were pulled out of a house. They took several hours of cleaning, but they look much better now!

You don't have to worry about us any more, mom and dad...we have a snow blower! My hope is that the snow will stay away for a while since we have it now. =] David says he is kind of excited for snow now so that he can use his new machine. I'm glad he's excited. I'll glad watch him blow the snow!

A beautiful sunset I captured in the clouds (we can't actually see the sunset behind the trees). Isn't God so creative? What an amazing God we have!

First Day of School

Today is the big day! I feel like I'm sending my boy off to school for the first time, and in a way I am. David heads down to Toronto for the weekend to teach "TCE"- Teaching Children Effectively Level 1. It's a 30 hour course that is really solid in helping children's ministry workers see the need to evangelize along with the tools and practice to actually do it. It's quite the process to be able to teach it and David is working through the final step of it-- having his lesson plans and classes evaluated. I'm very thankful to be past that stage and now just get to sympathize with him and pray for him.

This course spans 4 weekends: Oct 29-30, Nov 5-6, Nov 12-13, Nov 19-20. There are  8-10 students enrolled. Please pray for the students to have the time necessary to put into the course and the homework and practice that goes along with it. The whole goal is to see children come to know the Saviour but it can be easy to lose sight of the importance of that in the midst of a busy life. I get to join in on teaching for two weekends...but because of other things to be done, I can't go this weekend...so in a few hours David will be heading off on his own. I better go pack his backpack suitcase.

A Little Fishy

Random story of the week...
I had a cold, one with a completely stuffed nose. I had bought some fish on sale and thought I would cook it all nice for David after a he'd worked a long day on the house. Upon entering our apartment my kind husband commented "It smells kind of fishy in here." To which I replied, "Well, I am cooking fish." =]

However, when we sat down to eat, I smelled it just a bit and commented that it smelled a little strange. David then informed me that it actually smelt quite bad--not really fishy bad, but rotten bad. We both tried a tiny bit and knew it was officially bad.

That night while I was at a ladies Bible study, our land lord, Ruth, knocked on our door. She asked David I was cooking something different that day. He explained the situation to which she said with relief, "Oh good! I thought there was something dead on our side." I did think that was pretty funny...it was just that bad. A week later, the nasty smell has pretty much cleared out...finally!

Canadian Thanksgiving in the U.S.

 My parents gave me the amazing opportunity to fly to Minnesota for a week to visit!!!! It was a rather sudden thing, but David and the other workers had things covered at the Norfolk County Fair. It was the first time I've been back by myself since getting married almost 2 1/2 years ago.

 The weather was absolutely amazing and hot! I LOVED it! (sorry Stacy) I got to run around with the kids barefoot!

 We had a blast playing the leaves.

 Carving a pumpkin. (Don't you love that Christopher is going at it with his toy saw. It's a good thing it's plastic or the pumpkin would have been completely destroyed in minutes.)

 That's the "yucky" pumpkin face.

 It's amazing how every little girl wants to be a princess. The sweetest thing was seeing my brother dance with his little girl. She even had plastic high heels on. Her big sister was so good about sharing with her too!

 Now here's the real princess...the reason I ended up going to MN. My mom was in a fashion show for Breast Cancer survivors. It's amazing that God has spared her life for 30 years since her first diagnosis.

 My sister was adopted and I was born after mom's first two surgeries. The last reoccurance was when I was in 1st grade...she's been cancer free since! Praise the Lord!

 What a sweetie! She 4 but knows the sounds all the letters of the alphabet make too- she "taught" my mom and I her song. It was so cute. I guess it helps that her dad and mom are teachers.

I got to meet beautiful Elliana and even be there for her baby dedication!

 The diligent little artist.

 Brielle found a nice leaf for me.

..so I put the leaf in my hair. I sure do miss those kids. It was wonderful to see them but the time went by way too fast. 

My sister even made Canadian Thanksgiving dinner for me! Josie called it "Fake Thanksgiving". We did our tradition of saying something you're thankful for and then getting to eat a candy corn. We just did 3 thankful corn (it's 5 at "real" Thanksgiving). It was neat to hear the kids come up with things. I'm thankful for:

1) Getting to go to Minnesota and see my wonderful family

2) My incredible husband David who is so loving and thoughtful

3) Our house that David is building

Plowing Match

 The new Noah's Ark display allowed the kids and their parents to walk through and hear the story of Noah from Mrs. Noah, Noah, and his sons (and sometimes their wives). Throughout the 10 min they also heard the message of salvation through Noah's story. 1525 kids/teens/parents came through last week.

 Beautiful murals were painted on both sides of Noah's ark.

Meet Mr. Noah (one of them). =]

 After going through the exhibit, the kids or teens could get their faces painted.

Be ware of the giant shark that might be lurking outside!

David's Latest Favourite Comic

This is how we build in Canada.

A Floor, Walls and Other Wonders

If you're wondering why the picture is so dark it's because it WAS dark! Thanks to the cool invention of a generator and a string of light bulbs, work can happen even in the dark. It was freaky putting the plywood floor down in the dark though, I have to say. I was the chicken that made David and Andrew walk on the joists to get everything and lay it down while I stayed on the solid part.

I was excited when we came to this part because as I kid I learned how to screw down plywood floors when I helped with the gym construction at our church. Little did I know that one day I would be doing it for my own house!

A few days later the view has already changed! David and I put up the walls by ourselves. I didn't know such things were possible. Another scary experience was holding up the walls, hoping the wind doesn't pick up and push them over the edge before they were braced down. =]

 This will be the view from the kitchen window!

This shows an eventual window (middle) and double door (right), off the living room. The big window is where the dining room will be.

Now that the walls are all up, the next project is the trusses! Yikes! David was excited that each one only weighs 135 pounds.

Do you like our fancy dining table?

 How about the lovely kitchen?

 I was always terrified of the grill, but I have finally overcome my fear and learned how to BBQ!!! I have now "cooked" hamburgers, hot dogs, pizza and leftover casseroles. We got the neatest plate for a shower gift from Heather and Alex Walburg that you can use on the grill. I was waiting until we finally had a grill to try it out. It's amazing! We can expand our meals beyond hamburger and hot dogs now!

Here's a note we found on a board one day. What a cool guest book, eh?