The Schamel Family

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The Widow's Might Movie Review   By David Schamel

In November, our whole family went to Texas. We went to visit our friends the Moores. At their house, we watched a movie that John Moore produced called “The Widow’s Might“. The movie is about Cinemablog Productions competing in the American Viewfinder Film Festival. In the movie, John and his friend Cameron, make short films mostly for posting on the internet. One of their short films competes in the film festival and Cinemablog Productions is able to compete at the state level. For the state competition, they need to create a 30 minute film.

John and Cameron find out that their widowed neighbor, Grace Jackson, is unable to pay her property taxes because they had been increased a lot because a new highway had been built next to her house. John and Cameron want to help Mrs. Jackson. They make their movie a western musical that will outline Mrs. Jackson’s case so that people will notice what’s happening.

In the meantime, the election for Wringer City mayor was coming up. They did not like the previous mayor because he made property taxes too high. So, who will they get to be mayor? And what will happen to Mrs. Jackson?

The movie is very funny and is still a Christian film. I liked the movie because it was very entertaining and made me laugh. I would recommend that you see the movie. You can see “The Widow‘s Might“ at the San Antonio Film Festival in January, or buy it from John Moore at his website after the premier in January.

Pheasant Hunting     By Ben Schamel

Hunting has always been one of my favorite hobbies, because of a few things, it is challenging, and it requires skill( being a good shot), knowledge ( knowing the parts of the firearm, and what they do) and patience ( the challenging part.)

On the fifteenth of November 2008, my Dad and I were going to go on a guided pheasant hunt near Kiowa with the Cupit boys, Joe, Luke, and Nathaniel and their Dad Mr. Gary Cupit, who are very good friends of ours.

At 6:00 O’clock my Dad and I left the house to meet up with the Cupits in Elizabeth at the Safeway. After that we drove to the ranch were we were going to hunt. When we got there we checked in and met our guide and drove to the section of property that we were going to hunt. It was almost time to hunt, but first we had to load our shotguns, and the guide had to get out two of his dogs, the Cupits also brought their German shorthaired pointer, Clark.

Hunting with the dogs was a ton of fun, to see those dogs point out a pheasant and just stand there motionless until we drew close enough to get set up, then we would make them fly and shoot them down… sometimes.

So at the end of the day, we got nine pheasants all together, had a lot of fun, and had lunch with some brothers of like precious faith. And that is the tale of going pheasant hunting!

The Schamel's Go to Texas   By John Schamel

Uncle Gene & Aunt Vivi Renew their wedding vows

From the 6th - 9th of November my family and I went to Texas ,when we arrived in Dallas Texas (on the 6th ) it was very late so we ate and went to our hotel. The next day we ate ,did bible study ,went to Wal-Mart ,and then went to the Moore’s house. I played football ,capture the flag ,swung on a rope, and watched a movie called the Widow’s Might. Dad fellowshipped with Mr. Moore throughout the day. Then we had pizza at 7:00 pm afterwards we played pool and at 11:30 pm we ate cheeseburgers. We left at 12:30! My favorite activity was playing football.

      On the 8th I ate, put our bags in the car, and then we started down Abilene. Then we did Bible study in the car. Afterwards I fell asleep until we arrived at our Aunt Vivian and Uncle Gene’s house. We went down to see them because they were renewing their wedding vows. Uncle Gene was at a CPR class, so we let Aunt Vivian watch the Widow’s Might. Then some of her family got there and Uncle Gene arrived too. We ate supper and then I played dominos, finally, it was time for bed.

      On the 9th we got up ate, went to Church. After service we went to lunch at a buffet. Then we said goodbyes and drove up to Dallas to get on a flight back home.

Baby Update   By Melody Schamel

A few weeks ago, my 7 month old brother, Gabriel, started learning how to crawl.

He uses his knees and he moves his hands a little bit, soon he will be able to crawl. He is very funny to watch, because he looks like an inch worm. He gets up on all fours and rocks back and forth, then plops forward. Then he gets up and does it again.

Like Gabriel, we as Christians, fall over and over again, but we have to get up and try again. Because Satan deceives us and tells us it is all in vain, we need God to help us get up again. I am going get up again, you should to.

Philippians: 4:13 says

I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.

 

Schamel

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News

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Oct. issue

Josiah Job

By Melody Schamel

Job is now 17 months old. He has learned a lot in the past few months. Josiah now knows how to say the names of everyone in our family! He says "dada" for Dad, "mimi" for mommy, "Ma-Maw" for Grandma, "Steph", "Amba", "Ben", "On", for John, "Dadid", "Mel", "Gwace", and points to himself and says either "Dob", "baby" or "boy". The dogs are "woof-woof", the ducks are "wawa", "maow" for cat and "eehee" for horse.

Job also says "turch (Church) sing", and has been known to let out a few loud "Amen!"'s that everyone hears, in the middle of service! He prays with us before meals, and is always very polite. His favorite songs are: "men, Amen, Amen" "all We like Sheep have Gone Astray" (Is. 53:6), and "The Wise man Built his House on a Rock". (He calls that one "Rain a rain- SMASH!)

We have started potty-training Job. He's not well trained yet, but he's working on it. He still loves taking a bath, especially with dad. He is very much a daddy's boy!

Job is very fond of salsa. He actually drinks it! And he asks for it by name. His other favorites are cheese, meat, bread, and fruit. He's like his Dad : ). He doesn't want someone else to feed him; he wants to feed himself!

Job's favorite things to do are: play peek-a-boo, climb up on the top of our bunk bed, ride the "voom-voom's" (ATV's), and color.

Thank you, Lord, for giving us Job!

Fall

By David Schamel

September 23rd was the first day of fall. I like fall because you can rake up leaves and jump into the pile, and because I think all of the yellow and red leaves look very pretty.

Do you know why all of the leaves turn red and yellow? In the fall, God tells the trees to send all their sap to their roots. This causes the leaves to die, and turn yellow and red. If the trees didn't lose their leaves, the leaves would collect the snow and cause the limbs to break. Also, the sap in the trees would freeze, killing the tree.

In the fall I like to make leaf patterns on paper. I pick a leaf from outside and place it under a piece of paper, and then I use a crayon, with the wrapper taken off, to lightly color over the leaf.

At our house, we set up fall decorations. We have scarecrows, that we put down our driveway. We also put out fall candles, and fake leaves on our chandelier.

I thank God for making Fall and all the pretty trees.

Without fall, there would be no new life in the spring. And without dieing to ourselves, there would be no eternal life.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.- John 12:24

Camping out

by John Schamel

On September 7-9 my family and I went camping with the Cupit family. We drove up to Marble, Colorado and met the Cox family and drove up to their cabins. Here was our dilemma, the only way we could get up to the cabins, was by four-wheel drive. We had nineteen people, plus food, sleeping gear and luggage, to fit onto two trucks, and five, 4-wheelers.

We finally managed to get up there, and unloaded all of the stuff from the trucks. Then the men practiced shooting their bows, while the boys gathered wood for the fire, and the girls finished the housework and set up sleeping assignments, then set to helping with dinner. We had hot dogs, brats and chili, with fresh fire-baked corn, followed by s'mores for dessert. Then we all went to bed. My two brothers and I had to share a king size air mattress, with only one sleeping bag because on the way up gas got on our other sleeping bags. I got up at five-thirty, and my dad was getting ready to go bow hunting. No one else was up, so I went back to bed.

When I woke up about an hour later, I went down to the Cupit's cabin and ate breakfast.

Later that afternoon, we went swimming in a waterfall nearby, it was freezing cold! When the men came back from hunting, we swam out to a ledge by the waterfall, and took a picture. We swam back to land, it was so cold, everyone was ready to go back.

Saturday night we went to the Cox's cabin to eat dinner together, afterward, we had homemade ice cream and sang hymns. Sunday morning, we all went on a hike together, to an old mine. We had to cross the river by a big log that had fallen across the river. We went up to the mill where there was lots of pyrite. Mr. Cox let us take some of the fools gold home to keep.

Then we went back to the cabins, packed our things and went home. Even though it was a short trip, we had a very enjoyable time and would love to do it again! Thank you Cox family, for sharing the beautiful place God's given you!!

What Atmosphere Do You Put Out?

By Ben Schamel

"...You've seen people that you love to be around. You don't know why. Just that loving type of person. Have you seen that? Just as kind, there, you like to be around them. They create that atmosphere, by the life that they live, the way they talk, their conversation. Then, you've seen those that, you shun them. All the time, they want to talk about some thing evil, and talk about somebody. Say, 'oh, my!' There they come. they're going to criticize somebody there. He's in there now, he's going to talk about this man. All they're going to do is tell dirty jokes...or something like that. You just hate to be around them...seemingly, pretty nice people, but they create that atmosphere.

And the things that you think on, the things that you do, the actions, the things you talk about, creates an atmosphere."

-Bro. William Marrion Branham

So what atmosphere do you create? Do you release a good atmosphere? The atmosphere you have can easily influence your spouse, children, or your brothers or sisters, in a good way or a bad. Someone is always watching you, or you are watching someone else. And that's something we need to be careful of.

We need to invest our time with family, and our friends with a godly atmosphere, and not spend our time with people with evil ones. Because in 1 Timothy 6:20 it says:O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called:

(Bad atmosphere)

And I Thought

Changing

The Diaper was the

Hard

Part!

By Amber Schamel

Of course we've all heard about every little thing that can go wrong in changing the diaper, but have you ever heard of the struggle of throwing them away?

Growing up in a family of (going on) nine children, I have changed many diapers in my career. But until that fateful night on Sept. 25, 2007, I never thought disposing of the diaper could be so difficult.

My family has one of those nifty little canisters that are supposed to keep the smell down, and has special little bags you buy for them. Little did I know, changing the canister, would be a nightmare!

There I was, about to change my little brother's diaper when I realized Ben hadn't taken care of the last one he had changed. But as we tried to push it down into the can, it wouldn't budge. "Of course," I thought, "it's full. All we do is simply empty it." The problem was, my mother was out of town and I didn't know how to do it. "It can't be that hard. I can figure it out." I was thinking while I tried to remember how mom had done it. I now understand the importance of Titus 2:3-4 which instructs the older women to teach the younger women!

First I tried unsuccessfully to cut the endless bags so I could take out the ones being used. I did finally get them cut, but that was only the beginning of my tussle. After that, I proceeded to pulling the dirty bags up out of the canister. I hadn't realized how many diapers can fit into such a small can!! As I pulled diaper after diaper after diaper out the canister, Ben began to laugh hysterically at me. That's when Josiah began yelling "Amba, boo-poo! Boo-poo!" When I finally got to the last one, someone had put more than one diaper in before twisting the bag to keep them all in a row. The last pair was stuck and wouldn't come out! That's when I noticed the latch on the bottom of the pail. "I think your supposed to take them out through the bottom" Ben managed through his laughter. I opened the bottom and peered in. BIG MISTAKE! I recoiled at the overpowering smell that met my nose.

After recovering from the suffocating gas, I then began stuffing all of the diapers back into the can. That done, I pulled all of the diapers out of the bottom this time, and thought that I was finally almost done. Wrong again. During my struggle getting the diapers out, the canister had somehow disassembled itself. Now I had to figure out how to put the thing back together!

I started by latching the bottom, then tried to put the top part back together. You see there was this little white thing that is supposed to fit into this other little white collar thing and then is covered by the green little bags. (It didn't make sense to me either!) There, all done. I put the diapers that had fallen out of the used bags during the struggle into the canister, and began to twist. But the thing kept unraveling!

"That's easy to fix," I thought. "I'll just smash a little piece of the bag in between the latch and that will hold it still so that I can twist the little white thingy with no problem."

Once again battling the baby-gas-chamber, I began to pull the bag downward so I could fix the problem. AGAIN another problem arose! The bag wouldn't come down!

I opened the top again. "This doesn't look right. I must have done it wrong." I said to Ben, [who be the way was still laughing at me and calling the (almost) endless string of diapers sausages popping out of a machine.]

So I once again took the silly thing apart and tried again.

After fighting with the diaper canister for thirty minutes (Three-Zero, 30 minutes of my precious life!!!!) I finally managed to get it right.

"I am the champion!" I thought to myself. "Wait, of what? The diaper canister?!"

So if all things have a reason, and a lesson... what is the lesson here?

I am reminded of Romans 8:28 " And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose."

Even if life gets messy and very stinky, in the end, we win. Because Jesus already played the game, all ready bore our struggles.

Thank you Lord, for using stinky diapers to strengthen and encourage me!

God Bless,

The Schamel

Family

Schamel Good News
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and joy in our family.

Jan. issue

God's Hand on my Family

By John Schamel

On Sunday January 21st, my family was driving home from church when our back tire went off the road. We started to slide, but God's hand was on us. There were cars in front of us, behind us, and coming toward us on the 2 lane road. The car coming toward us slowed down enough that we were able to get across the road and to the side without them hitting us. We then were able to let the cars pass and get back on the road and home safely. Thank you Lord!

Gratefulness Expressions

By Melody Schamel

We would like to thank these people for their generosity toward us:

*Thanks to everyone who gave us Christmas gifts and cards! The gifts were all cool and it was great to hear from everyone!

*Thank you to Grandma Schamel for helping with the dishes and tidying up.

*Thanks to Great Grandma Hammon who gave the big girls several pairs of shoes, us younger kids a piano, dad cherry chocolate kisses, cookies for us all, and mom a can opener. She gave them to us for the bestest reason of all. No good reason!!

*Dad took us to Chinese dinner last Friday night. Thanks dad!

Up and Going Job

By David Schamel

Good job Job! Josiah Job is now 8 months old. He is learning many new "tricks". He recently has learned to crawl. He likes to crawl to mom and to toys and to little pieces of stuff on the floor.

Job's favorite word is "da da". He also says "mama" and "buba" , and "hi".  We are working on teaching him sign language for the words "please" and "more".

Josiah eats crackers and applesauce and soft foods. He especially likes Honey O's (organic of course!)

Job's favorite hobby is eating. He also enjoys bath time, especially with "da da".

Science

By Ben Schamel

For science class, we are listening to Jonathon Park from Vision Forum while driving in the car. This audio series takes the listener on adventures, dangers and excitement. Although the people and circumstances are fictitious, the places, scientific and historical information are true. Jonathon Park's father is a paleontologist who is fired from his job because of his creationist views. The adventures include discovering dinosaur fossils and how they were likely preserved through Noah's flood.

We have learned that there are many fossil deposits here in Colorado and I look forward to taking field trips to some of these places (when there is not 5 feet of snow on the ground)! The stories make learning fun and the whole family is really enjoying them.

Also, when we are at home, we are watching Moody science videos. On Voices of the Deep, it shows how the fish can communicate and make noises. The dolphins use sonar to tell shapes and sizes of objects. They can even tell the difference between copper and steel!

I am excited about science this year as we have such neat materials to learn from. Thanks Dad and Mom!

A Quiver Full of Arrows

By Amber Schamel

Robin Hood took off his hat and wiped the sweat from his brow. He should've picked a lighter disguise! He had come to this archery competition undercover. The sheriff, his worst enemy, had forced him to do so. Even now he could hear him conversing with his friends. 

" We scarcely would've seen better competition if Robin Hood was here!" said one of his companions.

"Hmm, I thought he would be here, but even with his bravery he didn't dare." The sheriff boasted.

Robin could hardly contain his laughter. " You'll soon see, Sheriff, that Robin Hood is here." He laughed to himself.

The match had come down to William of York and himself. "Give up! Red Jacket!" William's friends shouted! " You can't beat our William!"

Robin glanced down at his red jacket. " It is rather ugly." He thought, " I'll have to buy a new one. No matter, their teasing will soon come to an end."

Fresh targets were set up, much farther away than they had been before. William of York shot first. His first arrow hit dead center of the bulls-eye. William smirked then drew another arrow from his quiver. His shot was not far from heart of the target. He turned to "Red Jacket" expectantly. Robin was not impressed.

Robin Hood stepped up to the marker. He eyed his target. Then he shot so quickly that the second arrow was in the air before the first hit the target. Both arrows hit dead center of the bulls-eye one on top of the other.

For a moment the throng was silent. Then the crowd roared! He had won the prize! Yet no one knew, that this hero was Robin Hood!

Ps. 127:4

As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, so are children of the youth. Let's take a close look at this scripture. There are several aspects to this verse.

1) Children are a blessing. In today's culture, Children are looked on as a curse, or a burden. But, this is not how God meant it to be! When God wanted to bless Abraham, his faithful servant, He promised him: Children! This verse shows us that children are one of the greatest miracles He can give! Where would Robin Hood have been if his quiver were empty?

2) God wants us to study. Arrows can be very deadly, But only if we know how and when to use them. "Mighty Men" must know how to hit their mark. This will take instruction and practice. God wants us to learn the best way to raise our "Arrows".

3) We have a responsibility. God wants us to know that along with the blessing comes a great responsibility. We will be held accountable not only for our own actions, but for the actions of our children. Eli was cursed for failing to properly raise his sons, even though he was in the service of the Lord. Our mistakes will affect our children possibly even more than it does us.

And finally God wants us to use our arrows. As in the parable of the talents, God does not want us to keep our children locked up in the house for safekeeping. Although we do need to protect our children, we should be using them to touch the lives of others. I had the opportunity to stay the night with my Great Grandmother after she had an operation on her eye. THUNK! My Father's arrow hit its mark. That's the way it is supposed to work. God designed it this way so that, the mighty man and the arrows working together, can win the prize for Christ. Who could ask for a higher calling?