The Four Hellwig Ladies at the Mother-Daughter Tea

Posted by Gabrielle

We recently had the pleasure of attending a Mother-Daughter tea at our church, complete with talks on becoming a Proverbs 31 woman, a delicious afternoon tea, and lots of fellowship! It was a great time! And, it was not complete without pictures:

Arianne, Christianna, Mommy and yours truly! ;)

Benaiah is 2!

Posted by Gabrielle

Yes, that's right! On July 20th Benaiah turned two! Where have the years gone?

Poor 'Buddy boy'!

We were hoping that we had gotten him acquainted with birthdays. Oh well...maybe next year.

But, he soon began to enjoy it...and in fact,

smiled for his pictures and enjoyed blowing out his candles!

Though his favorite part was definitely the peach tart!

We thank God for you, Benaiah, and pray that you'll grow up to be a great mighty man in His army!

A Promise for All Times

Posted by Gabrielle

"For every beast of the forest is Mine, The cattle on a thousand hills. I know every bird of the mountains, And everything that moves in the field is Mine." Psalm 50: 10-11
"Are not two sparrows sold for a cent? And yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows." Matthew 10: 29-31

"Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they? And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life? And why are you worried about clothing? Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these." Matthew 6: 26-29

Our 4th of July

Posted by Gabrielle

My apologies for not posting sooner. A busy schedule has made life rather hectic. But here is a picture post of our fourth.

We recently watched the Moody Science video "City of the Bees" and remembered the part talking about giving a bee honey or sugar water to help it fly again when it becomes exhausted. So, that morning, we were delighted (well, not for the sake of the bee ;)) to actually find a bee in such a state on my zinnia flowers. So we gave it a spoon of honey. It drank the whole thing and flew away a half hour later.

Introducing: Moby Melon! Mommy made a much anticipated watermelon carving for us; a certain act which she has not done for many years. So this was new for all the younger children.

Here she is, with Jedidiah watching, drawing the face.

Very cute!

He likes it!

Here are some pictures of the Rolesville fireworks. They don't last for long, only about ten minutes, but worth seeing nonetheless.
The next four are in black and white due to a slight oversight on the part of a Hellwig videographer(who shall remain unnamed ;)) who last took a video in black and white and forgot to put it back, but they are a sampling of some of our favorite ones, still!

Part of the grand finale!

Blackberries!

Posted by Gabrielle

We recently discovered a large blackberry patch on our street! Yum!

Everyone fed Benaiah...

and this was the result.

Elliot's fancy maneuvers to reach the berries.

Elliot, Jedidiah and Arianne

The Great Corn-Husking

Posted by Gabrielle

Recently, one of our sweet neighbors gave us two buckets of fresh-picked, un-husked corn, and we had a great time shucking it on the front porch. Thank you so much, Wards!

Timothy, Benaiah, Arianne, Tobias and Elliot starting in on the first bucket.

Tobias examining the corn. I was appointed the official worm remover. Whenever Jedidiah or Tobias found a worm on an ear, I would hear "Gabrielle, here." and find myself staring at a fat green or brown worm. Hmm...maybe it's time to teach them to be men.

Benaiah enjoyed his first corn-husking!

'Buddy' was happily ensconced on the bench with an ear of corn when I came back after a while to take more pictures. Doesn't look too worked up about it, though.

All five boys, and the beginning of the great corn-husk fight.

Jedidiah being chased by Elliot with a handful of corn husks.

Jedidiah and Timothy

Some wonderful young men I know had to clean up not only the porch, but...

the yard and driveway too!

And our finished product: two bowls of corn!

The Blessing and the Curse

Posted by Gabriellle

Deuteronomy 11:26-29

"See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse: the blessing, if you listen to the commandments of the Lord your God, which I am commanding you today: and the curse, if you do not listen to the commandments of the Lord your God, but turn aside from the way which I am commanding you today, by following other gods which you have not known.

Mount Gerizim

It shall come about, when the Lord your God brings you into the land where you are entering to possess it, that you shall place the blessing on Mount Gerizim and

Mount Ebal
the curse on Mount Ebal."

We've been studying in Deuteronomy lately about the blessings and cursings that God promised Israel before leading them into the Promised land; the blessings if they did obey, and the curses if they did not. He commanded half the tribe to stand on mount Ebal and half on mount Gerizim as a visual reminder for the people of His promise.

So now that we are thinking about visual reminders, I had a visual reminder this spring of the blessing and curses: my zinnias and my sweet peas. ;) As a gardening note, something got my sweet peas and they slowly turned brown and withered up. So next year, I will do more research on them before planting them again!

So, barring the fact that it was no fault of my sweet peas, I found this a good reminder of the results of our obedience and disobedience to God's laws.