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What To Do First to Make a Profit

The PF Women Team at our Annual Team Retreat  ~ 2018 Today on Seth Godin's blog, he said: It's tempting to decide to make a profit first, then invest in training, people, facilities, promotion, customer service and most of all, doing important work. In general, though, it goes the other way. Yes, it does. If you are waiting to make a profit before you do these things, in my experience you're  not going to make a profit. So many organizations, ministries and churches are struggling with financial issues. I know your pain. As anyone who follows our story knows, our ministry was in a ton of debt four years ago when I came on as director.  Since that time, we've gotten out of debt and turned a profit every year.  God has done amazing things through out team, for which we give Him the glory! I find that what Seth is saying here is absolutely true, with one disclaimer. For Christian leaders, spiritual disciplines must always be first. Before we started inve

Long (sleepless night) and long (busy) day...


I got no sleep last night. I was up all night not feeling well. I probably got about 20 minutes sleep. This morning I had Jeanne Barta (our director of prayer at NS) pray for me as well as having my husband pray for me a few times both last night and today. I think I'm just "fried" quite literally. Larry looked up some things on line this morning to get some ideas of what to get me at the store as well and we went and picked up some vitamins and special foods this afternoon and I do feel somewhat better. I am believing for a great night's sleep tonight and have a few people praying that way for me.

We had our Northside "home for Christmas" service today - with special music numbers, Christmas carols, drama, puppets, etc. I think it went well. Let's put it this way - anytime I have a morning where I'm not stressed is good! And this morning I wasn't real stressed, just tired. Things went rolling along pretty well.

After church the staff quickly set up all the candles for Christmas Eve Communion. Then we went out with some families - Currie's, Garland's and Hart's. (Three of my fav "peeps" as Larry would say) Good times.

Larry and I did all the grocery shopping for Christmas dinner after that and then I came home to lay down - FINALLY! Man, I was beat. I took a short power nap, then got up to start doing a few things for Christmas dinner. I got one table completely set and all the linens out and all that. And I got two casseroles done plus a few pitchers of tea. Tomorrow I'll keep working on more. First when we wake up we have my homemade sweet rolls that mean so much to the kids. Second, here's what we are having for Christmas dinner in case you're wondering:

My homemade yeast rolls
7-layer salad
Ham with Larry's special cherry glaze
Hashed brown potato casserole
My special recipe sweet potato casserole
Green bean casserole
Lisa's incredible pineapple casserole
Homemade creamed style corn
Pumpkin pie
Cookies
Mixed berry pie
Sodas, Tea, Coffee

And there you have it ladies and gentlemen - our menu for Christmas. My family loves it - it's been a tradition for all these years and never changes unless we have a friend who brings something new (such as Lisa's pineapple casserole - let me say, I am not even crazy about pineapple but this is OUTSTANDING.)

In case you didn't notice, we're a casserole family. We don't like anything plain, although it is a challenge with weight watchers under normal circumstances and I have to alter everything we do (with lite ingredients) to be more point friendly on every other day but Christmas and Thanksgiving! I love making casseroles. One of my favorite things that ever happened when I was hostessing an evangelist in our home revolves around casseroles. I had made their meal the first night they were with us, and every dish was a casserole. When they walked in the door the husband said, "what are we eating tonight?" (he had no idea what I made) and I said, "what's your favorite food?" and he said, "CASSEROLES! I LOVE CASSEROLES!" He was in absolute heaven that night.

Well, I'm running on about 1 hour sleep now in the past 24, so it's time for some...g'night and I'll be back for a few minutes to blog on Christmas eve in between cooking, cleaning and getting ready for communion tomorrow night. :-)

Love to all...

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