S.W.A.T. on my block!

Homeschooling today was highly challenging.  I allowed us all to sleep in.  We, therefore, didn't start homeschooling until about 11 a.m.  Plus, with the routine being so disturbed, no one seemed to be able to get into the rythm.  Why did we sleep in?  Oh, and I didn't mention that my husband stayed home from work as well.  You see, my husband works from 5:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. daily, and therefore gets up about 3-3:30 a.m.  Well, last evening, he and I were sitting in our Front Room with the shade still up and we noticed an awful lot of cars seeming to gather right in front of our home.  Not long after that, our street was blocked off on both sides by police vehicles and then the S.W.A.T. team began coming one after the other.  Yes, SWAT!  Apparently, a despondent, drunk father of a family 4 doors away from my home shot off 4 rounds out of his mind. . . and then was hiding out in his backyard, threatening to committ suicide.  My nerves were high. . . I knew that this family have children, and I desperately desired to know that they were safe.  My own children were perfectly safe, asleep in their beds.  My heart bled (still does) for what this family must be going through.  HOURS later, they managed to take this man into custody, and just as quickly as the chaos started, the normal calm to our block returned.  However, this drama had us up until around 1:00 a.m. 

I am attending a dinner featuring speaker, Mike Huckabee, for Illinois Family Institute this evening. My brother, David Smith, is the Executive Director of IFI. It is an excellent non-profit organization created to safeguard the rights of the conservative christian family, which is highly under attack today. I'm proud of my brother and the work of IFI. They often stand on unpopular opinion, but they wholly recognize that they answer to a higher authority than today's society. While the work of IFI is largely only relevant to residence of Illinois, feel free to check them out even if you are not from our state. http://www.illinoisfamily.org/  Of course, if you do reside in Illinois, do yourself and your family a huge favor and sign up for their newsletters and calls to action - you will be helping to keep our state family friendly.


On a completely unrelated note, I just signed up to be a book reviewer for Thomas Nelson and requested my first book.  Very exciting.  If you love to read and write a blog, check it out here: http://brb.thomasnelson.com/