Every morning in our new school, our children are required to hold their right hand over their heart and say these three pledges:

PLEDGE TO THE BIBLE
I pledge allegiance to the Bible, God’s Holy Word. I will make it a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. I will hide its word in my heart that I might not sin against God.

PLEDGE TO THE CHRISTIAN FLAG
I pledge allegiance to the Christian flag and to the Savior for whose Kingdom it stands. One Savior, crucified, risen, and coming again, with life and liberty for all who believe.

PLEDGE TO THE AMERICAN FLAG
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

If you live in a different country, do your children say a pledge every morning in your school? Can you translate it into English for me, or send me a link to it? I’m very curious. I didn’t grow up saying the first two pledges, and even our national pledge has taken some heat because of the word “God” in it.

Does anyone know the name of that video series that talks about the faith of our founding fathers? I saw part of it a long time ago, and I’d like to watch it again and show it to our kids.

Another great issue of Christian Women Online is hot off the press. Pour yourself a mug of coffee or tea, and get ready to be inspired.

CWO is really starting to gain attention in the blogosphere. It was recently mentioned on the mega-site, msnbc.com, and Jan White featured CWO in her MarketLines column for Cross & Quill Magazine as a hip new publication for Christian writers to submit articles. I’m working on my September Book Buzz column and would love your thoughts on any great new books you’ve read recently. I’m in the middle of a hilarious novel by Diann Hunt called RV There Yet? I can’t wait to review it for CWO because it’s a hoot. Diann Hunt is one of those funny people I’d love to meet someday.

Fortunately, she also blogs for Girls Write Out, along with Kristin Billerbeck, Colleen Coble, and Denise Hunter. Those ladies know how to have a good time — and it definitely shows up in their writing. I interviewed Colleen here a few months ago, and I saw her from a distance at the Women of Faith conference. My brush with fame!

It’s hard to believe our schools begin in a little over a week! We’ve been going through some major family decisions and have decided to follow our hearts and enroll our three older children in a private Christian school this year.

I’ve blogged a little about our educational journey, which has included homeschooling and public school. Yet we’ve always said we’d take things year by year. Back in June, we attended a marriage retreat, and our speaker was a pastor from Wisconsin. He showed us slides of his family and said, “We’re very blessed that all three of our children can attend a Christian school.” When he said that, I felt this tugging on my heart — wishing our children could also be educated in a Christian setting.

Well, this dream became a prayer, and that prayer stirred my heart to start making phone calls and knocking on doors. I talked to so many people, gathering various opinions, checking out websites. And we’ve taken this first step. By faith.

We went shopping for school uniforms last week, something I’ve never done before. I was in complete awe as a polite sales girl brought me all the items we needed in the proper sizes. When my son told her, “I don’t need to try anything on; I can just tell if it fits,” it was wonderful to hear her say, “Oh no. You have to try these clothes on because some run big and some run small.” He went through several sizes and brands before she said, “Those are perfect.”

I had to stop myself from doing toe touches in the fitting area when I saw the transformation of my children from sloppy summer T-shirts and shorts to crisp, pleated MODEST school uniforms. The girls will wear cotton polos and skorts or jumpers. My son will also wear collared shirts tucked into neat shorts or pants. There are special colors for mid-week chapel, as well as field trips.

I watched other kids come out of the dressing rooms as they tried on uniforms, and I was amazed. A young teen girl wearing a halter top and typical shorts disappeared into the dressing room, emerging as a beautiful, modest young woman. If I were a teacher, I would take her much more seriously. She looked intellectual instead of … trampy.

Modesty is beautiful. The simplicity of school uniforms is beautiful.

When I brought everything to the cash register, I asked the clerk, “How long will it take to get the school logos sewn on?” I was embarrassed we were so last minute, wondering how much express postage would cost to have them mailed to us. But she looked over her shoulder at a teen girl busy pressing some things and said, “I think we’ll have all these done for you in about five minutes. Ten max.”

So we got all of our school shopping finished in less than an hour! I read in a magazine that the average parent will spend $483 per child on back-to-school clothes. We spent well below that — for clothes my kids would NEVER have picked out. But they’re so proud of their new uniforms!

We’re heading into a new adventure this year. My older daughter’s teacher already called us and said, “Our theme this year is F-R-O-G. It stands for Fully Relying on God.”

Fully Relying on God.

I wonder if she’d mind if I sat in the back of the room, taking a few notes.

The new July issue of Christian Women Online magazine is out. Click here to read it.

You can enter to win a free copy of Allison Bottke’s A Stitch in Time, which I’m in the middle of reading now — it’s absolutely adorable. And there are regular columns by Darlene Schacht, Shannon Woodward, Bonnie Hooley, Valerie Wolff, Victoria Gaines, Bonnie Bruno, Kim Brenneman, Ann Voskamp, and moi. You can also read a new chapter from Catherine West’s novel, Just a Little Walk, and be further inspired by guest columnist, Polly Boyette, author of Life is a Buffet, So Save Room for Dessert .

If you haven’t joined the CWO blogring yet, what are you waiting for? There’s also a new CWO Blog, which includes daily posts from six of our favorite bloggers: Darlene, Iris, Paula, Joy, Antique Mommy, and Tracey.

Here’s how editor Darlene Schacht introduced my new Book Buzz column:

Heather Ivester has picked some of the best books this month we’re sure you’ll want to get your hands on for summer.

Whether you want to get whisked away to the Isle of Arran, enter the hilarious and hectic world of Beckie Miller, or brush up on your home-keeping skills, there’s a wonderful book waiting for you.

So sit back in your favorite chair, put up your feet and get lost in a book.

Read more…

Take a good look at this picture — do you see something funny? Yes, it’s supposed to look like this guy has wings. Well, I have to tell you about this story.

You know when you turn on the news or pick up the paper, what you see and hear is mostly bad, scary news. At least that’s what I usually feel bombarded with. Here’s some GOOD news. There really are modern day heroes in this world, like angels on earth. Maybe you’ve met one.

A few weeks ago, I interviewed several pilots for an article I was working on about the Angel Flight organization. I’d never heard of this before, so I had to do a lot of background reading to prepare even before I made any phone calls.

I couldn’t believe what I heard when I talked to these people. They’re pilots — busy, well-trained, well-educated pilots. And yet they VOLUNTEER their time, aircraft, and fuel to fly people in need of special medical help.

I talked to a pilot who flew a family with a newborn baby that needed specialized surgery in order to survive. They couldn’t afford to fly to a different state for this critical care, but the pilot flew them, and the baby survived. Another pilot said he takes a little girl from Florida to Tennessee every month so she can get her specialized chemo treatments for cancer. The distance and cost would have been impossible otherwise. His efforts are helping to preserve her life.

One pilot said he helped bring supplies to thousands of desperate people after hurricane Katrina wiped out their town. He happened to show up on his way home from somewhere else, and discovered this town had no communication and had been accidentally ignored by supply planes. The people had no food or water. There were pregnant women about to deliver, and they had no medical supplies!

The pilot said he flew back home and notified the Angel Flight offices. The next day, hundreds of people, volunteers, went out shopping at Wal-Mart and various places, loading up supplies. They flew five planes that very next day — saving this whole town of people! And within a few days, they’d sent out over 25 planes.

I was just in awe. You know, you think you can’t do much in the world, but you really can. Those people who shopped for diapers and formula at Wal-Mart were just as important as the volunteer pilots who flew the planes. Oh, and this man also helped set up a makeshift cellular communication system for the people as they waited for more help to arrive. Amazing.

These are our modern-day heroes, role models for my children. And yours.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Miss Teresa!

I took the kids to the library yesterday, desperate for a new load of books. I’d just found out the unhappy news that our house is not a candidate for cable TV. I was finally exhausted from three years of the same half-dozen fuzzy local channels, and this week we’d decided maybe it was time to branch out and allow a little more variety into our home.

But the cable company came out and informed us our country home sits too far back from the road for cable. Our only option is satellite, which I don’t want. We had satellite several years ago when we lived even further out in the country, and the satellite company was always giving us free “sneak peeks” at upgrades. Our kids were toddlers then, but now that they’re old enough to handle the remote, I don’t even want to take the risk that they might flip to something that would become permanently etched in their minds.

No can do. So we’re back to the books. Which is fine. Better even.

So I walked into the children’s department and asked our librarian, Miss Teresa, what she recommended for our kids’ ages. “I’m especially looking for chapter books for my rising third grade daughter,” I told her. And I added with a whisper, “She still likes checking out picture books, but I want her to move on, you know?”

Miss Teresa smiled at me. “I’ve got the perfect books for you.”

We followed her back to the “L” section, and she showed me Christian author Bevery Lewis writes a children’s series called The Cul-de-Sac Kids. We checked out Pickle Pizza and a few others.

“Look,” she whispered. “These are published by Bethany House. All of their books are Christian!” Her eyes lit up with excitement. “I try to buy as many as I can. These are wonderful.”

I wanted to reach over and give her a gigantic hug — but with a wiggling baby on my hip, tote bag overflowing, it was not possible.

She started pulling more books off the shelf. “Here are some good mysteries your son might like,” she said to me. “The Bloodhound series by Bill Myers are also published by Bethany House.”

Am I the last person in the world to discover Bill Myers? Wow! I looked him up, and his books and videos have sold over six million copies. He’s published with Zondervan, Tommy Nelson, and Bethany House, among others. So we brought home The Ghost of KRZY. I was a little concerned it looked too easy for my almost ten-year-old, who plowed through The Lord of the Rings trilogy this past year, but my son loves this book. In fact, he’s finished it, ready for another.

What a relief to know my kids are reading books by Christian authors, whose faith will be woven into the pages of the book. And it’s pure joy to know my children’s librarian is a kindred spirit. Miss Teresa also told me she bought the Landon Snow books, which are published by Barbour. I reviewed Landon Snow and the Auctor’s Riddle last fall.

So I ask, does your children’s librarian know what kind of books you want your children to read?

P.S. Another great series for kids is the Wilderking trilogy, published by Broadman & Holman. There’s a new interview up with author Jonathan Rogers over at Gina Holmes’ wonderful blog, Novel Journey.

I know. I know. I said I was going to take a few weeks off to focus on my family this summer. And I AM. But I’ve got one child at summer camp and four asleep right now — so I think it’s be OK for me to sneak over to the computer and tell you:

THE WOMEN OF FAITH CONFERENCE WAS AWESOME!!!!!

You’ve got to go … just got to. If there is ever a conference in your city, I hope you can get there. Here’s the link that lists all the upcoming conferences left in 2006. Next month, they’ll be in Chicago, Cleveland, Washington D.C., and Calgary, Alberta. In August, they’ll be in St. Louis, Hartford, Ft. Wayne, and Dallas. (To my blogger friend in Phoenix, they’ll be coming to Glendale Arena Nov. 17-18!)

The theme for this year’s conference is “Contagious Joy.” Oh, how God knew I needed to hear the music and great speakers at this time in my life. This whole conference was a gift from my mom. She invited me and my sister several months ago — before I knew we’d go through a sad family time and have two of our extended family members pass away within a few days of each other.

So this! This conference gave us something to look forward to! I really had no idea — there were 15,000 women packed into Philips Arena in downtown Atlanta, right across from the CNN Center. Most people came in groups, and lots of these ladies wore matching colorful T-shirts. They came from all over besides Georgia: North and South Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, and more. The youngest attendee was a newborn swaddled in her new mom’s arms; the oldest was in her 90s.

The hostess of the conference informed us we had a surprise — Sandi Patty was there! She sang for us!! I’ve never heard Sandi Patty in person, but I’ve listened to her CDs for years. Anyway, you ain’t heard nothin’ until you experience Sandi Patty singing “How Great Thou Art.” Her voice echoed all over the arena — I’m sure you could hear her for miles around — it was incredible.

I was so overwhelmed, it was all I could do to keep from crying in front of my mom and sister — I did NOT have on waterproof mascara and I didn’t want to look like too much of a raccoon.

We also heard music from talented Nichole Nordeman, who has the most beautiful voice — she played several songs that I’ve heard on the radio but didn’t know who she was. What’s really interesting to me about Nichole is that a few weeks ago on our trip to the beach I was reading Madeleine L’Engle’s book, Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art, and Nichole wrote the introduction to this book. She described how L’Engle impacted her life and writing, so it was pure joy to hear Nichole sing.

The other group was Avalon. Wow! They sounded amazing as well — and had the whole place rocking. And there was also a Women of Faith Praise Band that played all of my favorite praise songs. I brought their CD home with me and have discovered that my 3-year-old enjoys singing and jumping around the kitchen with me while this music is on.

I’ll tell you about the speakers in a different post — because I hope you’ll have time to follow the links here.

We did find out one piece of amazing news — the speaker for next year’s Women of Faith pre-conference in Atlanta will be:

BETH MOORE!!!

Have any of you ever been to a Women of Faith conference? There’s one in Atlanta this weekend, and I’ll be there. It would be fun to meet some like-minded friends. If any of you will be there, please let me know. The theme is “Contagious Joy.”

We have had a death in our extended family, and I will not be able to post for a few days. I would appreciate your prayers. Thank you.

From time to time, I feel a flicker of doubt, and I wonder if I’m wasting my time writing. Then someone will send me a note of encouragement and remind me that this is a ministry God has called me to do for this season of my life. While my children are young, I’m thankful to be able to write while they play or read beside me.

A couple of weeks ago, I was surprised to receive this very kind note from one of you. I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to send this to me!

Dear Heather,

Thank you for your obedience in sharing this info…..and thank you for the great site!!!

This note meant so much to me — because I felt like I’d really connected with a reader. And not only me — I’d connected her to this conference. So I wrote her back and asked if she went to the conference. Well, she told me that not only did she have a fantastic time at the conference, she fell in love with the church and knew this is where she wanted to be! So, she and her family joined this church, as an answer to many months of prayer.

Thank you, Lord, for this encouraging note. I know that you prompted her to write me to show how you’re working not only in my life, but in the lives of those who you deliberately lead here. How awesome you are, and how humbled I am to be a messenger of your mighty work!