Ahh Motherhood...

Oregon Campout Quilt

2010-06-03T08:05:00.000-07:00

This post is a long time coming like all my others, but I figured its not too late since the camp out hasn't happened yet! ;D

This year the sisters here in Portland made the quilt! The Brownsville sisters were running out of ideas, so we made it for them. We did send it down for them to quilt. I think I'm the only sister here who knows how to quilt, and I just don't have time to do it.

Anyway, I really enjoyed getting together and working on the quilt. We really enjoyed each other's company. We had some nice visits and lots of laughs as we dealt with the unavoidable problems that are bound to happen when you take on a project this large. Most of the time we got together at my house, and I really enjoyed having everyone over.

Here are just a few pictures I took. Sadly, I didn't think to take more throughout the quilt making!

My Mom has a Blog!

2010-05-27T20:46:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to let everyone know that my mom has a blog. She is on my list of blogs. I think that she will have to invite you to view her blog. I'm not sure. If you can't connect to her page and want to be invited you can comment me your email address so she can invite you. I either accept or reject your comments; so I can just reject the one showing your email after I get it so no-one else sees it. I'm sure she would love to have some "friends" to read her blogs and leave comments.

Christian

2010-05-25T10:08:00.000-07:00

Blah! Again, it has been WAY too long since I have blogged! Christian's Birthday was quite a few months ago and I never did a special blog just for him. I decided not to blog about his Birthday, but here's a blog just for him!

I look at my first baby and I'm amazed at how much he's grown! I've always suspected he'll be built like his Daddy, but it's becoming more and more evident. It seems like we just bought him new pants, but they are already getting too short for him!

Christian is 8 now, and he really is a good kid. He's very helpful around the house, and good at his schoolwork. He seems to get along well with other kids. He will still accepts hugs from his
Mommy! (Even though he does act a little embarrassed about it). What more could a Mom ask for?

Since Christian is getting older, I've started worrying about the stages in life that are coming up for him. I worry about having the right type of relationship with him so that he feels he can come to his Dad or me with questions and concerns he may have. I'm worried that because he requires so much less attention than the other kids, that we give him less attention. I want to try to give him more attention, and let him know how much we appreciate his helpfulness.

In school, Christian's favorite subjects are Math and Science. I think that being good at these subjects could be really good for him when choosing a profession someday.

Christian is such a good help to us; sometimes I worry that we expect too much out of him. At the same time, I am proud of how responsible he already is.

My Baby's 1st Birthday/haircut

2010-03-04T08:14:00.001-08:00

Matt didn't want to cut Zaccheus' hair, but I finally just did it! As you can tell from the before picture it was just way to long for a boy! Here is a before and after picture (I guess it's after and before). It doesn't seem like we waited this long with any of our other boys to cut their hair, but I don't remember for sure. He sure is cute though, isn't he!!!!!

Once again this posting is very late. It has been hard to find time to post. I know that is always my excuse, but it is always true. The past few weeks Matt has been working out of town a lot. We are VERY thankful for the work, but it is harder taking care of all the kids without him!

Anyway, Zaccheus turned one. Honesty it has been so long ago since his Birthday I don't remember who all was there, but there were quite a few that came over to celebrate with us and eat some cake and ice-cream. Zaccheus had his own little lady bug cake that he made a mess with. By the time he was done he was actually crying because he was getting frosting in his eyes! I put him straight into the bathtub after that. After getting all the frosting off I felt so sorry for the little guy. His skin was all splotchy and red. He has very sensitive skin and he was having a reaction to the frosting, poor little guy! If anyone has advice on what kind products are best to use for sensitive skin please let me know. (things such as shampoo, laundry detergent, lotion, etc.)

Zaccheus started walking at about 13 months, which is pretty close to the time my other kids started walking. Maybe because we have stairs and he learned how to climb them at a pretty early age; he is now an expert climber! He climbs down the stairs very well (Which is a relief, since I don't have to worry so much about him falling), but he also climbs onto the table, and pretty much anywhere he can get to! Yesterday morning he made quite a mess with some unfinished cereal bowls that is dear siblings left on the table!

Zaccheus is still very even tempered. There are times I get frustrated with his climbing, and getting into things, but he is very good. Even when he's not feeling good he's not too fussy. He gives sweet little baby kisses sometimes, and it's so wonderful when he puts his little arms around me and pats my back! I've even noticed when the other kids are crying that he goes over and tries to comfort them. He has been having some separation anxiety. When our other children were his age we left them with Grandma's to babysit fairly often, but not so much with Zaccheus; so he gets pretty upset when we leave him. It's nice to know he loves me, but I feel sorry for the babysitter!

Well, I've got lots to do; so that's it for now! I sure do love my baby!

Holiday Pictures

2010-01-08T12:02:00.001-08:00

Garrison opening one of his gifts at home.
Anthony excited about opening his present from Gramma.

Daddy helping Zaccheus with his present from Gramma.

The cozy crowd in Gramma's living room.

A picture from the Brownsville Sister's party.

My crazy hair for Sis. Marisela's party (I won the prize by the way!)

Christian & his cousin Dale got the same thing from Gramma.

Ruby trying on her gift from Uncle Joel & Aunt Mary.

My Crazy Happy Holidays

2010-01-08T11:30:00.000-08:00

Christmas time is always kind of crazy. We had quite a few different celebrations. One weekend we had a Christmas party with the Brethren here on Saturday at Bro. Sean & Sis. Marisela's. It was really fun. We were supposed to dress up crazy; so I went all out and fixed my hair crazy and everything. I don't have a picture of it when I had the ornaments and everything in it because I forgot my camera, but I had Matt take a picture of it after we got home. Sis. Marisela has the better pictures of everyone in the get-ups!

Anyway, on the same weekend we went to Brownsville on Sunday so that I could go to the Sisters Christmas party. It was nice to have an evening with the sisters to visit and exchange gifts. We had drew names ahead of time. I had Ashley, and it turned out she had me! We also did the white elephant gift exchange. We had the party at a Chinese restaurant. I had a really good time.

The weekend before Christmas we went to Bro. Lee & Sis. Sabriena's wedding. It was a nice little personal ceremony. We were so glad we could be there to share in their joy and see the different brethren who came.

My Uncle and Aunt came to visit for a few days after the wedding. I really enjoyed the time we got to spend with them. They even babysat for us one evening so we could finish up our Christmas shopping, and then we did the same for them (even though their children are older, and didn't really need babysat) They had gotten gifts for us; so we had a little "Christmas" one evening with them.

We didn't really know until the last minute where we were going for Christmas, but we ended up going to Brownsville. We opened all of our gifts ahead of time so weren't hauling them with us. On Christmas Eve the McManus clan gathered at Gramma Linda's house and all the kids opened gifts from her. It was a very full house!!! We spent the night at Gramma's house, along with Bro. Brian & Sis. Michelle & their kids. The kids opened their stockings in the morning, and then we had Christmas dinner at Bro. Marshal & Sis. Connie's house. We spent the day there eating, visiting and playing games.

Saturday morning we took the kids up to my Grandpa's house to visit for a couple of hours, and then we had a Christmas party with my family for lunch. We gave out our gifts, ate and played games.

There were quite a few at church in Brownsville on Sunday. About half went to Bro. Marshal & Sis. Connie's to eat and the other half joined us at Gramma Linda's for haystacks. We had a very busy, but enjoyable Christmas weekend.

New Year's Eve was on a Thursday this year (which is our church night). After church Bro. Rusty & Sis. Mary invited everyone over for snacks & games to wait out the new year with our Brethren. I had a good time. We had Bro. Lee & Sis. Sabriena spend the night with us so they wouldn't have to travel home that late. It was nice to have them over and get to fix breakfast for them and visit with them in the morning.

Sunday we had a Birthday celebration for Zaccheus, but I will make another more detailed blog about that.

All in all we really enjoyed the Holidays, but it was kind of crazy busy! My house and I are still not fully recuperated from it!

I think what I will do, is I will make another post with some pictures from our Holidays.

I hope all of you enjoyed the Holidays and have a wonderful New Year!

My little 3 year old

2010-01-05T08:42:00.000-08:00

As always I am late getting my postings up. For those of you who know, Garrison's Birthday is old news! I thought about just skipping blogging about it, but I wanted to do this post about him. We didn't really do anything really special for his Birthday. His cousins from Brownsville were able to be there so that made it a little more special. Here is a picture of some sunglasses that his cousins gave him for his Birthday! He looks very cool...

Here he is showing us how old he is.

Garrison is definitely 3! He has really hit a difficult stage in life. There's times when he wants to do things for himself and he throws a fit if you try to help him; then there are other times when he wants you to help him and throws a fit if you don't! We've really been struggling trying to find the balance with him and his fits. We don't want to go too easy on him so that he won't throw fits, but we don't want to be too hard on him either. As each of our children grow older we've really seen where we need to be so careful and seek the Lord in how to deal with each of them in the right way.

Garrison can be so loving sometimes. There's pretty often that he'll come up to me for no reason and give me a hug and say "I like you Mommy." It just melts my heart when he does this. There's times when I ask him to do little jobs for me and he's so proud of himself when he does it! He's also been showing his McManus side! He likes to do funny things and make people laugh. The kids have been on a joke kick lately! Here is one of Garrison's favorites:

"Knock Knock"

"Who's there?"

"Why did the bear cross the road?"

"I don't know, why?"

"Because it was the chicken's day off!"

And this is where I make a point to laugh hysterically!

Garrison, Mommy loves you and she hopes that she can be a good Mommy and help you to grow up to be a wonderful man!

Another Miracle!

2009-11-24T22:56:00.000-08:00

I wanted to share a wonderful little miracle that God saw fit to bless us with:

The check engine light has been on in our van for a few months now. We haven't been able to afford getting it checked out, and we hadn't really had problems with it; so we just got used to seeing it on. Last week, I think it might have been on our way home from church on Thursday, the van was acting funny and it actually died at a stop light. Matt was able to start it right back up, but it was acting very sluggish. We were very close to home, but I was worried that we wouldn't make it. I told the kids to pray that we would make it home.

Our van was waaaaay overdue for an oil change. I wondered if somehow this had contributed to the engine trouble. I told Matt that we were going to have to spend the money to get the oil changed. I had a coupon for a place and I made an appointment to get the oil changed on Saturday. When I went in, they ended up being behind too much; so they had to bump my appointment to Tuesday (today) I found out that they could diagnose the check engine light for no charge so I planned to have it checked out today when I went in.

We drove the van to church on Sunday, and Matt and I both drove it around yesterday with no real troubles. On my way to get the oil changed I was thinking about how I was going to have them check out why the check engine light has been on. I looked down on the dashboard AND THE LIGHT WAS NOT ON ANYMORE! I almost cried with relief! I had been praying so hard since our problems Thursday night. I had no idea how we would pay for van repairs. That light had been on constantly for months! And now, since we have actually been praying about it, it has just turned off. I do not think that this is a coincidence! There hasn't been problems with the van acting sluggish anymore either. When I told Matt about it, he said that the light had been on yesterday. I'm just so glad that God has done this for us. I just didn't want to fail to give credit where credit is due!

Diligence

2009-11-24T17:38:00.000-08:00

diligence: persistent and hard-working effort in doing something.

Sunday morning we seemed to have a little bit of time left, and I thought it would be good if I read the children a chapter in the Bible. I just read the chapter where my bookmark was. I always neglect my Bible reading, but it always amazes me how when I do decide to pick up my Bible and read I always read just what I need to.

I know we've all heard and read this scripture many times, but I was glad to be reminded.

II Peter 1:4-11

"Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge;

And to knowledge temperance, and to temperance patience, and to patience godliness;

And to Godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness charity.

For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.

Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall:

For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ."

The word diligence is what really caught my attention. It is mentioned twice in this scripture. Lately I have known that I have not been where I should be spiritually. I believe it is this diligence that is missing. I feel like I have been barren and unfruitful. Because of this lack I can see where I haven't been able to see afar off. I haven't been able to see the big picture. I don't want to forget how empty and lost I felt before coming into the faith, and then the great thankfulness I felt when God drew me in. I want to make my calling and election sure that I could have a place in that everlasting kingdom. I want to be a partaker of this Divine nature so that I can escape the corruption that is in the world. I don't want my short sightedness because of my lack of diligence to keep me from making Heaven my home. I have not been working hard at living the faith, and I really need prayers that I could have this diligence that I know is required of me.

Anthony's First Day of School

2009-11-18T09:37:00.001-08:00

My little Anthony started Head Start preschool this year. Out of all my children Anthony is my challenge. He seems to have a different thought process or something. It's been hard figuring out how to deal with him sometimes. I was hoping that going to school might help him. After almost 2 months of school I really think I can see a positive change in him. Here are some pictures of him on his first day of school.

This is a cute picture of him and Garrison we took while we were waiting for the bus.

There he is getting ready to get on!

Here's one of himself by the tree. Daddy did the hair spiked hair-do!

He was pretty excited!

It was kind of nice that Daddy could be there for his first day of school. This is usually something he misses out on.

So far I haven't really noticed any academic improvement in him. I think right now they are mostly working on things like manners and socialization. Anyway, I'm really glad that Anthony made it in. I really think that it's good for him. I went to a head start meeting last night. It showed that in the Portland area there were 566 kids that were in Head Start Pre-school. There are 300-400 kids still on the waiting list! I'm very thankful that he got in!

Life's Potholes

2009-11-15T20:21:00.000-08:00

I'm not exactly sure what caused me to think of him; but as I was sitting in meeting Thursday night I remembered a boy I went to school with. His name was Johnny, he was older than me, but he was simple minded. I remembered how it always seemed like he was happy, and nice to everyone, even those who made fun of him. It seemed like he saw the world differently than most people.

Johnny rode on my bus. I was remembering how there was one really bad pot hole that the bus would go over every day. It was so bad that it really bounced us all around, even though the bus driver tried to go over it carefully. Johnny got to where he remembered that pothole. He knew where it was and he would get ready, and then when the bus would go over the pothole he would jump up and exaggerate the bounce. It got to where a lot of the kids on the bus would copy him, and the majority of us would jump up when the bus hit the pothole. It still brings a smile to my face to remember it. He would say "get ready every body"! And then we would all jump together! I'm sure there were a lot of people that got frustrated at that pothole, but because of Johnny we all looked forward to it! It was the best part of our bus ride! (Of course there were quite a few times that we all got overzealous and the bus driver had to get on to us!)

I thought about the potholes of life. The different obstacles that come our way. I look at our life so far, and it doesn't really seem like we've had to endure any really huge trials yet. Mostly just annoying potholes. I would like to have Johnny's outlook and see the joys instead of the frustrations. When I really look at the different problems I have, and all the blessings, I know that the blessings far outweigh the problems. For some reason I've noticed that I dwell on the negative more than I dwell on the positive. I want to have that happy, joyful outlook on life. I want to be able to see the silver lining, especially when I know that my clouds are really more silver lining than storm clouds. I would like to be able to jump with my potholes, and enjoy the blessings rather than get irritated and frustrated at every little thing that doesn't quite go my way.

Thank the Lord for Remembrances

2009-11-09T09:09:00.000-08:00

Last night I was laying in bed. For whatever reason I couldn't go to sleep. I was laying there with all kinds of things going through my mind. I told myself that if I couldn't go to sleep I should at least think of good things. I lay there remembering how in meeting Bro. Jerry (who was visiting our assembly) started the song "Jesus Reigns". That song always reminds me of Bro. Benny. He also started "When the Saints go Marching in" which reminds me of my Dad. Then I got to thinking about how certain things remind me of certain people. I remember last week I made cinnamon rolls. I got the recipe from a certain sister who is not doing good spiritually now. I thought and prayed for her the whole time I was making the cinnamon rolls. Then I remembered how every time I make homemade noodles it reminds me of Sis. Cindy. Shortly after I was married she gave me the recipe and showed me how to make homemade noodles. She said "Every sister ought to know how to make homemade noodles"!

Somehow my thoughts strayed to the scrap quilt I made for my brother. I know that the many hours I spent on it I thought of him, and prayed for the different struggles I knew he was going through at the time. He wasn't baptized yet, and he wasn't living at home; so I was kind of hoping that somehow the quilt could be there when he was baptized since I knew I probably wouldn't get to be there. That reminded me of my "baptism blanket"...

The night I was baptized my mother wrapped a certain blanket around me. It was just a plain blanket; nothing special really, but from that time on it was my own personal blanket, and I used it all the time and took it with me everywhere. One year at the Colorado camp-out I was at a baptism of a young man that I had known for a long time. I had brought my blanket to the waters edge with me, and ended up putting it over him after he came out of the water. I told him how it was my blanket from when I was baptized and how maybe someday he could pass it on to someone else. Sometime after that I talked to him again, and he told me that he had passed it on to someone else. I laid in my bed last night wondering where all that blanket has been. I thought it would be neat if I saw it again somewhere unexpectedly. I thought about how maybe I will make special quilts for each of my children to drape over them when they are baptized. (If it works out that way.) My brother's quilt didn't make it to his baptism, but that's ok.

Anyway, I was thankful for my wondering thoughts as I lay on my pillow last night and thought I would share them with you all. Do any of you have certain things that remind you of certain people? As I lay there remembering all this I hoped that if people remembered me from time to time that it was good things they thought of.

Zaccheus Pictures

2009-11-05T10:51:00.000-08:00

I decided that it's been a long time since I posted more recent pictures of Zaccheus; so here they are...

In the wagon with his big brothers!Everyone comments on his bright blue eyes!
Yes, he climbs the stairs on a regular basis now. This was taken when he first started.

You can see all his teeth! He has 5 teeth, and for some reason hasn't gotten any more for a few months now. Five seems like kind of an odd number. Usually they come in pairs. Oh, well, I'm sure they will all be here soon enough!

This is a picture of his first couple of teeth. He did like his big brother Garrison, and they came in opposite of each other.

I just love his beautiful smile!

I love pictures like this of him with his Papa!

All About Ruby

2009-11-04T09:06:00.000-08:00

Well, I've noticed how some of you give a whole post dedicated to your child when their Birthday comes along. I'm such a follower that I've decided that would be a good idea! I'm going to try to do this to. Considering that Ruby's Birthday was over a month ago, I'm not doing to well! Let me tell you a little about my one and only girl and then you can look at all the many pictures of her that have been piling up for the last couple of months just waiting for me to post them on my blog!
Ruby is now 6! She's already started losing her teeth. When her first tooth was loose Matt had us rush to Wal-Mart to get her picture taken before she started loosing them. He was worried she would look funny. I think a child with missing teeth looks cute! Anyway, here is her most recent professional picture (pre-tooth gaps). Sometimes Wal-Mart pictures are kind of mediocre, but I think they did a pretty good job.

These pictures aren't in order; so I guess I will tell you about her Birthday first and then her first day of school, even though it really happened the other way around. We didn't do anything really big, we just had some people over for some cake and ice-cream. I made the cake. We only got her one gift because it was really BIG! (and expensive). Sadly I don't have a picture of her with her new dog biscuit, but here she is opening the gift. You can imagine by the size of the box how big the dog is.

She wanted Biscuit for Christmas last year. When we saw that he cost $180 we sadly had to tell her there was no way we were going to be able to buy her Biscuit! Biscuit is a life sized, I believe Golden retriever, He is mechanical and has certain commands that he hears or feels and he will do them. He is very neat, but definitely not worth that much money for me, even to please my daughter! A month or so after Christmas last year Matt found one lonely little biscuit on clearance at Target. I believe he was 75% off. He was still pretty expensive, but we decided to buy him! He has been stored up in our attic ever since then waiting for Ruby's Birthday! She loves him!

Here she is posing by her gifts!

Getting ready to light the candles.

Since Ruby started school I've been consulting that web-site for new hair ideas. I've tried out quite a few of them, sadly I haven't taken very many pictures, but here is a few pictures of one particular hairstyle that I tried. It's similar to a french braid, but you only take hair from the bottom. This makes the braid kind of stand out, and it makes the hair on top flatter.

For this time they had me take the braid all the way around. Since then I have done 2 braids from each side, and then continued to braid them for a ways, then connected them together with a rubber band. I liked this way better, but I don't have pictures of it.

Ruby never went to pre-school. This year she is in Kindergarten, and she really likes it! She is in afternoon Kindergarten. She catches the bus in the mid-morning and then rides home on the bus with Christian in the afternoon. Anthony is actually in pre-school this year. He goes in the afternoon too. So for a couple of hours in the afternoon I only have 2 children. It is very nice!

Here is Ruby getting on the bus for the first time!

Look at that adorable gap in her teeth!

Here she is all dressed up in her new school clothes, and back-pack waiting for the bus:

Ruby is only 6, but she is a pretty good helper. I think she does a pretty good job of being Mommy's only little girl! There are times that she whines about the chores I ask her to do, but when she does them she is a big help to me. She is showing signs of wanting to help me cook. I've been trying to find ways to introduce her to cooking, and helping me in the kitchen that are appropriate for her age, and not too hard or dangerous. It is easier to just shoo her away and do it myself, but I want her to learn the things she should learn. I know I should take advantage of her eagerness now because in a few years she might not be so eager. I just pray that I can be the Mother I should be to her; so that she can grow up to be the woman that God would want her to be.

Can We Have Two Daddies?

2009-10-19T20:31:00.000-07:00

Today I was driving down the road with just Anthony and me in the van. This doesn't happen very much; so we were taking the time to visit with each other. He asked me if I told him he was cute when he was a baby like Zaccheus. I told him that he was a very cute baby and that I did tell him he was cute. Then I told him that someday he could be a Daddy and have baby's of his own. He spoke up and asked me "Can we have two Daddies?" I was slightly alarmed, and told him that we could only have one Daddy at a time. He started crying! It took me a little while (sometimes it's hard to figure out a child's thought process), but I figured out that he was upset because he thought that him and his Daddy could both be the Daddy of the house at the same time. I explained to him that when he was a Daddy he would have his own wife and kids and that he would live in his own house. He started crying harder! He said he didn't ever want to be a Daddy because he didn't want to live somewhere different from us. I swiftly told him that he didn't ever have to be a Daddy and that he could live with us forever! That made him happy!

It's nice to know that he will stick around to take care of us in our old age. ;D I will probably have to remind him of this conversation in about 15 years!

I Found a Great Blog!

2009-08-24T14:59:00.000-07:00

My little Ruby is starting Kindergarten this year. She's very excited! I'm excited for her too, but a little nervous...

I want her school experience to be a good one. One of the things I've been worried about is coming up with some cute hairstyles that will actually STAY cute during school! It seems like most days you can't even tell that I fix her hair!

Anyway, I googled hairstyles for girls, and stumbled upon this great blog! This woman has, I think 4 girls, and she mostly uses this blog to give you step by step instructions for different hairstyles! I put her blog on my list of blogs at the edge of my page. I plan to read her blog often, and also read her archives to get some great hairstyle ideas! I know that a lot of you have girls with long hair, and it's so hard to come up with new things. I just thought I would let you all know about this blog! Her blog is called "Adopt a 'Do- Cute Girls Hairstyles"

Laughter IS the best medicine...

2009-08-21T14:17:00.000-07:00

Lately I have been going through a rough time. When I step back and look at what I've been going through it really isn't that bad; but it has been really hard for me emotionally. Let's just say life has not been going the way I think it should and I've been very frustrated!

Last night after all the kids were in bed, Matt and I were going to bed like any normal night. I can't even remember now how it got started, but one of us said something that we thought was hilarious! After that we kept laughing, and laughing over stupid stuff. We were literally rolling around on our bad cracking up! I had tears rolling down my face I was laughing so hard; and we just couldn't stop! We were trying to be quiet because the baby was asleep in our room, but it felt so nice to just let go and be silly together!

After we finally calmed down and said our nightly prayers I was laying there thinking about how good it felt to laugh together like that. It really did seem to relieve the tension of the past few weeks a little bit. It also felt nice to know that Matt and I could still be like that together. Sometimes with the responsibilities of life we sometimes forget to just enjoy each other and be friends. I honestly believe that Matt is my best friend. Last night really showed me how important laughter is in a marriage. Even though it was really dumb and silly, it was just what I needed. Even though my problems haven't changed I feel better somehow...

Also I read this Bible verse this morning, it was a nice little reminder:

"Use hospitality one to another without grudging.

As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God."

I Peter 4:9-10

My Baby is Amazing!

2009-08-11T12:58:00.000-07:00

I know I have been silent for too long. My life seems like it's been pretty crazy lately. I haven't read anybodies blog in a long time. Someday I will take the time to catch up on every body's lives! Right now I decided to take a little extra time from the crazies of my life to thank the Lord for my amazing baby!

I have said it many times, but I really believe that the Lord looked down on us and saw that we really couldn't handle a difficult baby, and he blessed us with Zaccheus! He is SUCH a good baby, I am often amazed by it! It's not like he never cries, but when he does, there's something I can do about it! He really is a blessing from the Lord! So why am I blogging about this now?...

Last night I didn't get much sleep. I feel like a walking zombie today. Zaccheus had a restless night. I really think he was running a slight fever. He seems fine today, by the way. So what is so amazing about staying up all night with a baby who doesn't feel good you say? Just that, he was only restless and a little whiny. Enough so that Mommy couldn't get much sleep, but not so much that he drove me crazy with his cries when there wasn't really anything I could do for him.

So even though I didn't get much sleep last night. I am not as grumpy and stressed out as I would normally be after a night of staying up with a baby who doesn't feel well. For that I am truly thankful! I am, however, hoping that I can get a little more sleep tonight ;D !!!

My diaper Bag

2009-06-26T08:35:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures of the diaper bag that I made for myself! I like it! I would have liked it to be a little bigger, but since I made it from jeans, it had to be a certain size.

Let it be none that I do not like this picture of me! But it shows my bag pretty good.

This is the inside view!

Here is a close up of the front.

We have 2 sisters here who are expecting babies, and I plan to make them each a bag. I thought I would make one and see how good it does on ebay. Also, my sister sells her Avon stuff at a flea market & said that if I ever wanted to try to sell my bags there I could, or she could try to sell them for me. If I can get some made up I might try that. Miminko Apparel where I have my blankets for sell said they might check out about selling these bags next month. I really enjoy making these bags, it would be nice if I could make a little bit of money from them! With the small jean scraps that I have from making the bags I'm making a crazy quilt bag. I will have to post pictures when I get it done. It will be awhile though because I'm doing fancy embroidery on it. I'm thinking when I get it done I will keep it for myself! I think it will look really neat!

Late Night Smoothie

2009-06-26T08:26:00.000-07:00

The other night I was looking at the strawberries I had picked from my strawberry patch; trying to decide what to do with them. Then I noticed the one lonely banana sitting on my counter that needed to be used. I thought maybe I could make a smoothie, but the fruit wasn't frozen. I de-stemmed the berries, peeled the banana & put them in the freezer for a little while. This is the recipe we came up with: It was REALLY good!

1-2 cups strawberries
1 banana
1 small tub of Tillamook orange cream yogurt (not frozen
2 dreamscicles (for those of you who don't know, this is vanilla ice-cream covered with orange sherbet type stuff) We, of course, pulled the sticks out first!

We blended everything together, along with a small amount of milk to help it blend better. It was yummy!

Weights

2009-06-24T09:42:00.000-07:00

I've recently blogged about my struggle with prophesy. Last night I was laying in bed thinking about how it really shouldn't be as hard as it is for me. I was thinking about some things that I've allowed in my life that may be making serving the Lord harder. They aren't really bad things, but I was thinking about how they may be keeping me from being as close to the Lord as I should be.

Again, I was laying in bed thinking about things and I wasn't able to go to sleep. I decided to get up and read the Bible again. Here is the very first verse that I read:

Hebrews 12:1

Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.

So...., I guess the Lord agrees with me that these things are weights that I need to set aside if I want to serve the Lord to the fullest. Please pray for me.

Did You Know...

2009-06-22T09:27:00.002-07:00

I was racking my brain for some blog worthy material when I thought of this...

Many people who know me do not realize that my left hand looks like this:

When I was 2 (so I don't remember, but people have told me) we were visiting my Uncle Gene & Aunt Nadine. At that time they lived out in the country, and they had a bonfire. I guess the fire wasn't going, but there were hot coals. I was walking on the rocks around the fire and slipped. My cousin Brenda had some fast reflexes and grabbed me by the shirt before I could fall all the way in. These pictures show the scars from that fall. I'm sure the burns were bad, but I'm very thankful that the Lord watched out for me as a little child. If I had fallen all the way in it would have been so much worse.

Even people who know about the scars forget that I have them because they are not that noticeable. The scars have given my fingers a web look. They really don't affect me very much, except that I can't grasp things that are very big around, like large cups.

Anyway, so there's a little bit of information about me. If any of you are running out of blog worthy stuff, maybe you could post about some little known fact about yourself!

Reading the Bible

2009-06-16T08:30:00.000-07:00

More than once, but once just recently, Bro. Rusty got up and talked about how the Lord would wake him up in the night, or early in the morning to read the Bible. Sometimes he does it and sometimes he doesn't.

Well, last night, I went to bed late, but I could NOT go to sleep. I laid there and had different things running through my mind. Eventually I remembered what Bro. Rusty had said, and I thought "maybe I need to go read my Bible," but then I would try to tell myself that what I really needed to do was go to sleep. I eventually did decide to get up and read my Bible. It seems like I always tell myself I should read a chapter or 2 in my Bible every day, but I never do. Here was a perfect opportunity for some uninterrupted Bible reading.

I have slowly been trying to read the New Testament, and last time I left off in Hebrews, so that's what I read. A lot of it didn't really seem to apply to me because it had a lot to do with the changing from the Jewish law to the Christian law, but I decided to read until something caught my attention. It is very interesting how it seems like the times that I take the time to read I find something that really boosts me up, and is just what I need. Here is what I read:

Hebrews 10:22-25:

"Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.

Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful who promised;)

And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and good works:

Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another, and so much the more as ye see the day approaching."

As I was reading this I had to ask myself if I could honesty say that I had a true heart in full assurance of faith; also is my faith unwavering? I really am not sure if my faith was truly tested how I would deal with it. The big thing that caught my attention about this scripture is how we hear the scripture about "forsake not the assembling of ourselves together" a lot. Most of the time I don't think of this scripture as applying to me because I always go to church! But as I read this I thought how I could be (and often am) forsaking assembling myself even when I'm going to church! When I read the scripture around that quote, I could see how most of the time I go to church I'm not fulfilling that scripture because I don't really do anything to help my brethren. I really need to stop just going through the motions and really try to do the works God wants me to do.

Here is some more scripture a little farther down:

Hebrews 10:35-39:

"Cast now away therefore your confidence; which hath great recompense of reward.

For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise.

For yet a little while, and he that shall come shall come, and will not tarry.

Now the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him.

But we are not of them who draw back into perdition; but of them that believe to the saving of the soul."

This scripture brought to mind the scripture: "grow not weary in well doing" I think there is a lot of times that I do grow weary in well doing, so I slack off. Too many time I get caught up in the things of this life and I forget what the true goal is, and how great a thing I would be missing out on if I don't press in. Like this scripture says, God will not tarry. I surely do not want to miss out.

The last part of this scripture brought to mind something that I've been thinking a lot about lately. I think it really hit me after the Brewster camp out. My mom told me that my sister had spoken her first prophesy. I was really pleased for her, but I have to admit I was a little saddened by it too. As I think I've blogged about before, I really struggle with this gift. When I heard my sister had spoken a prophesy I was reminded about the parable of the talents. We've heard it a lot, but I thought about the part where the one talent that was buried was given to the man who had used his talents wisely. Even though I draw back from using my gift, I'm horrified by the thought of the Lord taking it away and giving it to someone else! Because if the Lord can't trust me with this one gift, how will he entrust me with any others? Now when my sister reads this I don't want her to be saddened too, because I believe that the Lord has used her use of this gift to open up my eyes to the ramifications of drawing back from using my gifts. I want the Lord to have pleasure in me, I want to be like the man in the parable who received more gifts after using his original ones wisely.

Anyway, I thought I would share my little time of meditation with all of you. Please pray for me, that I can embrace it all and apply it to my life, and I want to READ MY BIBLE MORE OFTEN!

"No More Baskets!"

2009-06-05T09:02:00.000-07:00

"MOM!", he said frantically!

His mom whipped her head around to see what was wrong.

This is what she saw (minus the smile):

"I don't have any more baskets", he said!

She laughed at him hysterically as she fixed his hat for him!

Craft Project pictures

2009-06-02T09:43:00.000-07:00

Well, I finally got done with the camp out quilt, and sent it on it's way back home. I think it looks great! I plan to buy some tickets at the camp out in hopes of winning it! Here is a picture of the whole quilt...

Here's a close up of the center.

The quilt was sent to a few different assemblies to make a border. Each assembly put somewhere on their border, their assembly name. Ours didn't show up real well on the big picture so here is ours:

For our border we decided on the dark brown, and since there are so many children in our assembly we decided to outline our children's hands in different fabrics and sew them onto our border. I think it turned out really cute; so here are some close ups of the corners where we put our hands...

Here is the other project I made. I made this diaper bag for Sis. Cherrie as sort of a going away gift, but I remembered to take some pictures of it before I gave it to her. I was very happy with how it looked. I think it turned out to be a good size. There are lots of pockets for all the little do-dads that mothers need to haul along with them everywhere! I have plans to make one for myself. I thought about waiting to post until I got that one done too, but I wasn't sure when I would get around to it; so here are these pictures. The first one is a view of the inside. I have some ideas of some different embellishments for mine rather than the bow. We will see if they work out. When I get it done I will try to make another post.

An a slightly different note, I sold 2 of my blankets through Maminko, and got my check! The woman in charge is away on her honeymoon, when she gets back I will find out if she wants me to make more to replace them!

I have other pictures to make some more posts. Hopefully you all will be seeing them soon...

Walking With a Child

2009-05-19T10:17:00.000-07:00

I splurged and bought myself a Women's World magazine at the grocery store the other day. In it was a diet. The diet was mostly just a low calorie balanced diet, with lots of raisins. It also required walking. It said to aim for 12,000 steps a day. Somehow eating the raisins along with the walking burned more calories than without the raisins. Anyway, I followed the diet for a little while, but it is very difficult to follow a diet when I also have to feed my family. I basically had to fix 2 separate meals every meal time! Anyway, I didn't do that very long! I have been trying to downsize my portions (the diet helped me see what was an appropriate portion), and still eat the raisins and do the walking. I bought a pedometer and yesterday I walked over 14,000 steps!

Since the diet I have been trying to take walks after Matt gets home from work. I was taking the dog with me, but I decided that it might help Matt more if I took one of the kids with me. So yesterday after dinner I put Anthony in our umbrella stroller and took off.

As I was briskly walking along I was reminded of Sis. Trina's blog about putting herself out there. I am from a small town where everybody knows everyone else; so if you are walking around you almost always say at least a few words to anyone you meet. Somehow in the big city I don't follow the same pattern. We've lived in this house for a year, and we still don't know our neighbors very well. I've thought about planning a block party for everyone to get to know each other better, but Matt's not sure if he wants to do that. Anyway, I'm rambling a little...

Normally on my walks with the dog I would walk along and just mind my own business and not really talk to anyone; however with Anthony with me it was a different story! Anyone we passed by Anthony would say "Hi, my name is Anthony! What's your name?", then he would go off and ramble about anything that popped into his head! There were a few times I had to stop so that Anthony could carry on his conversations! I do think he was a little excessive with his friendliness, but I saw how I could learn from his childish innocence. I decided to try to be more friendly on my future walks, and at least say Hi to those I meet.

You really can learn a lot from a child if you take the time to watch and learn...

P.S.

I have other things I want to blog about, and as soon as I get the pictures ready I will; so hopefully I will be posting more blogs soon.

Working again! And so Much More!

2009-04-30T14:14:00.000-07:00

I've been racking my brain for something blog-worthy to blog about; and I wasn't thinking of the best thing!

For the past few weeks Matt has been working full time again! We're not sure how long it will last, but we are very thankful for the full paychecks coming in. God really has been taking care of us. I am very thankful for it.

There are some things I would like to get pictures of, but since I don't know when that will be; here is a little update on how our life has been:

A few weeks ago Ruby and Anthony found my sewing scissors (I did leave them out :(, but used this incident as a good excuse to get some new sewing storage containers!). When I found them with my scissors, Anthony had very short hair right in front. So now his haircut that I liked some much is gone; and he now has a buzz. I'm very thankful that Ruby didn't decide to cut her hair. I think they knew that was a bad thing to do. Isn't it odd how they will do one bad thing, but not do another because it's bad? I'm glad they used their children type logic in this instance though.

Bro. Lee & Sis. Cherrie are leaving us. :( We are sorry to see them go. For a good bye party; had a BBQ at our house on Sunday, and a singing later. It was a very nice day. I really enjoyed having the brethren in our home. there were a few visiting brethren at church, and then even more came for the singing. It was wonderful to hear the brethren lifting their voices in praise to the Lord in my home. The time I spent in my kitchen was great because I had the brethren serenading me!

Next week is my 8th wedding Anniversary. Matt & I decided that since we would have to take the baby wherever we went that we would make this year a family celebration. We've made reservations at the coast; and we are all going to spend this weekend at the coast. Matt's Mom is supposed to meet us there. I'm really looking forward to it!

I have had a few sewing projects that I've been working on. I really enjoy sewing, but don't usually take the time to sew. It really is hard to do with so many small children. Lately my house has been neglected a little so I can work on these projects. Sis. Cindy F. has been sewing some purses. She showed me how to do it, and I decided I would like to try. So far I have made a purse for Sis. Alyssa E. and a diaper bag for Sis. Cherrie B. I didn't get pictures of the purse, but I did of the diaper bag. I might post them later. I'm thinking about trying to make more and sell them on the same website as my quilts (of course none of those have sold yet... but maybe they will). Sis. Bridget D. also saw the purses and wanted to learn to make them to. After Sis. Cindy showed me; I have showed Sis. Bridget. It has been nice to spend some time with Sis. Bridget, and she has made a cute purse also.

For the Oregon camp out they always make a quilt to raffle off. This year they decided to send the quilt around to the different assembly's that are usually represented at the camp out and have them each add a border to the quilt. We are the last assembly to receive it, and I have been working on that too. For our border we traced the hand prints of our children; and I am sewing them on by hand.

So, with getting ready for the singing, going to the coast, and all my sewing projects. Plus Matt has been working so I don't have him to help around the house and with the kids so much; my life has been VERY busy. But it is a happy kind of busy! Just remember that if any of you happen to stop by! My house really isn't at it's best! Maybe I will concentrate more on that next week...

Happy 4th Birthday Anthony

2009-03-19T16:59:00.001-07:00

Of all my children, Anthony is the most quirky. He definitely dances to his own drummer, that's for sure! I think it's the aspects of his personality that make him extra special also make him the most aggravating sometimes! He seems to be very creative. I've blogged before about pattern making. He's also very creative in his play. He'll take ordinary things and say that he's making things like a Birthday or a circus. He'll also bust up laughing about the weirdest things! I've applied to get him into head start. I think this might be good for him. Here is a picture of him being his little quirky self!

I would like to draw your attention to his hair cut. I've always thought this kind of hair cut looks really cute on little boys. For some reason this haircut won't work on Christian, but I gave Anthony this haircut and I think it looks very cute on him! I call it the "mushroom" hair cut.

For Anthony's Birthday we went to Shari's. On the weekends kids eat free; which is an awesome deal for us with all of our kids! On the actual day of his birthday we just had cake and presents by ourselves. Anthony got to pick out his own cake. I thought he would want a dinosaur cake, or something else that seemed more exciting for a boy his age, but this is the one he wanted. He definitely knows his own mind. Which is good, except for when what he wants is contrary to what I want.

Wow! My oldest is 7!

2009-03-19T14:24:00.000-07:00

It is hard for me to believe I have a 7 year old! Christian is in first grade. He seems pretty smart for his age, but maybe I'm his mother and a little prejudice! I am amazed at the big words he can read. There are 6 students in his class that have harder spelling words than the other kids; and he is one of them. When we practice his math skills, he comes up with the answers pretty fast. I'm pretty proud of him!

As the oldest of 5 I feel like we expect more out of him. In some ways I feel bad about this, in other ways I feel like it is good for him. He's pretty good about helping around the house when he's not at school. Yesterday he gave the baby his bottle and I think that was one chore he didn't mind doing! I'm just amazed at how grown up he already is. I feel like he's a pretty good boy & I hope that we can do our part in bringing him up to be an excellent young man.

Christian's Birthday was actually last month, but it has just taken me this long to get the pictures on my computer.

Christian was actually pretty sick on his Birthday; so we celebrated it late. We took him to Chevy's for his Birthday. Here is a picture of him eating his ice-cream:

They gave him a cool hat that he got to keep and sang him Happy Birthday. It was a nice family outing together. We all enjoyed it. As the oldest of 5, I think Christian isn't the center of attention very often. I think it was nice for him to have this time in the spotlight. Our camera went dead so I didn't get a picture of him with his hat at the restaurant, but I just took some later:

Christian also had a party with Levi M. All the brethren here came over for cake and ice-cream. The boys opened their presents and then we all went skating. It was fun to spend the time with the brethren. I really enjoyed skating! Last time we all went I didn't get to skate because I was pregnant. My feet and back were sore, but I had a good time, and I think everyone else did too. Christian tried roller blades and did pretty good I thought.

HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY CHRISTIAN!

Finally put more pictures on my computer!

2009-03-19T13:31:00.000-07:00

I finally got around to putting my pictures onto my computer today; so now I have some things to blog about! I have pictures of Christian and Anthony's Birthdays, but they will have their own special post. Now for this first picture...

Most of our tax return went into paying off some bills, but we did take a little bit to buy a few things we've been wanting. We took a trip to Wal-Mart! In the big city we live in there is not a Wal-Mart very close; so we don't hardly ever go there, but we went with some tax return money and bought some things for ourselves. This bed set came with the comforter, bed ruffle, shams, complete sheet set, and the 4 decorative pillows for only $64 on clearance! For a King sized set I felt like I had scored an awesome deal! We also had to buy 2 more pillows so we could make use of the pillow shams. Here is the new look in my bedroom. I'm very pleased with it:

Here are a couple of pictures I just had to take. It's just one of those Awwwwe moments!

I handed the baby over to Matt so I could do something and they both fell asleep.

Don't they look comfortable!

Selling Quilts

2009-03-11T00:04:00.001-07:00

Awhile back I answered an ad on Craigslist. They were looking for people in my area who made unique, homemade baby items that they could sell on their website. To be honest I wondered if they were for real because you do have to be a little cautious, but I decided to answer the ad and see what became of it. I sent them pictures of these quilts that I make. (To give credit where credit is due, I want to thank Sis. Cindy for showing me how to make them.) They are incredible soft and easy to make. One side is soft flannel, and the other side is a soft fur material. The more boy type quilts have a triangle edging like this:

And the girl one's have a ruffle edging like this:

After a few contacts back and forth they decided to try selling my quilts on consignment, and I decided that the amount of money I would get from them would be worth it. To tell the truth it's not a whole lot, but I enjoy making the quilts and it's nice to make a little bit of extra money. By the way they do have the above star blanket for sale, but minus the pillow because that was not part of the deal.

From what I can gather a couple of moms got together and decided to start this website that exclusively sells unique, homemade baby items. I even got to meet one of the moms, and they seem like very nice people.

Anyway, I've been checking the site periodically since I signed the selling contract and they received my quilts; and finally today they had my quilts posted! They can be found under the toys and accessories section. I'm also in their featured designers section! This is kind of exciting for me! We'll see how these one's sell. If my quilts do good, then obviously they will want me to make more.

The website is: http://miminkoapparel.com/index.html I will try to figure out how to make a link to them on the sidebar of my blog.

Anyway, wish me luck on my new endeavor!

It's bound to happen...

2009-03-08T11:30:00.000-07:00

This morning Matt and I didn't wake up until 9:30! Matt wasn't feeling real good; so he planned to stay home from church with a couple of the kids. I thought I had time to hurry up and go. I told Christian and ruby to hurry up and get ready, and we would just go through a drive through for breakfast. The baby was needing to eat; so I thought I would take care of that really quick. I sat down at my computer chair (which doubles as a rocking chair) I looked at my computer and it said it was 10:33! Yep! We forgot to set our clocks back. I guess it's bound to happen to someone, but why did it have to happen on the one Sunday morning when we slept in too late?

The ironic thing is that the baby woke up at 7 to eat, and I thought I had some time to sleep a little bit longer. If I'd have gotten up then it was actually 8! So if anybody is wondering why we didn't make it to church today...

Donate to Church by Shopping at Albertson's

2009-03-07T16:32:00.001-08:00

Every year the assembly in Jackson, Wyoming have a ski weekend for the young people on St. Patrick's day weekend. If you link your Albertson's card to their organization a percentage of what you spend gets donated to them & they use the money for their ski weekend. We shop at Albertson's all the time and I just linked my card today. Even if somehow your card is already linked to them, for some reason you have to relink.

Anyway, I thought I would make a post about this so that anyone that had an Albertson's card could link it to them, and help them out.

You can go online to albertsonscp.com to link your card number to their organization number. I tried to do it online and couldn't figure it out so you can also call this number: 877-932-7948. Their organization number is: 49000113535.

If enough people do this they can get up to 4% of what we all spend at Albertson's!

Time to Think

2009-03-04T22:43:00.000-08:00

Matt & I are total Craigslist fanatics. Especially since Matt has been laid off he's always on there looking at the job listings. Every once in awhile we find ads for research studies. Him and I both have participated in these in the past. They usually are looking for a particular type of people to come and give their opinions on whatever it is they want an opinion on. It's an interesting way to make a little bit of extra money.

Anyway, today I went to participate in one for mothers of little babies. What I ended up doing was sitting in a room with six other mothers and looking at potential ads for Similac and giving my opinion on how appealing they were. I got paid $125 for the 2 hours I was there. Today was time well spent in more ways than one...

Matt & I decided that it would just be easier for me to take the max (public transit) to my appointment. We live within walking distance of one of the stops and the place where I was going was a straight shot. I knew I would be riding the max for about an hour there and an hour back; so I decided to take my Bible with me to read. As I was sitting on the max reading my Bible, I realized that I actually had time to just sit and think. My life is so busy that I don't really seem to have time to just commune with the Lord. Even though there were other people there I felt like I had some time for just me and my God. It was so wonderful and peaceful! I had time to actually think about what I was reading, and just have a little talk with the Lord. Thank him for my blessings and pray for guidance to stay on the right path in life. I really felt renewed.

As I watched the different people, it really made me grateful that out of all the many different people in the world God has chosen me. I do not want to waste the opportunity he has given me. There was one part of the city that I could tell homeless people "lived". There was one sidewalk just lined with sleeping bags, backpacks, etc. It made me wonder just what happened to these people to get them where they are today. Even though Matt & I may have some hard times, God has always provided us with the things that we need. It made me especially grateful for the things that we have when I saw evidence of those who truly go without.

Today was a profitable day, and it really helped me put perspective on my small trials, and gave me that little bit of encouragement I needed to keep on keeping on.

by the way.... the research study place was located in the mall and I actually managed to go there without spending any money! Hooray for me!

Just to let you know...

2009-02-28T23:55:00.000-08:00

Tonight I actually took the time to read every one's blogs. (unless you're not on my blogging buddies list, then let me know so I can add you) It's almost midnight and my baby has finally settled down for the night. He seems to be a night owl, but once he goes to sleep he sleeps pretty good. Anyway, I read every one's blogs while I was holding him, putting him to sleep (my computer chair doubles as a rocking chair); so I wasn't able to comment on any one's blogs. I just wanted to let you all know that I read your blog entries, and really enjoyed them. It felt nice to catch up on what every one is up to; to reconnect to the outside world a little bit. Some of the blogs I read really lifted me up; motivated me to better myself, or gave me that extra bit of joy that I needed; so thank you for sharing your life with me on your blogs.

We've had sickness in our home like so many, ours really didn't linger as long as some, but I'm glad it is over. God has really taken care of us, my little baby has not caught any of the bugs that have been flying around; for that I'm truly grateful.

I really want to be better about blogging more often, and I promise to try to do better. I do have the excuse of a new baby, and the sickness, but things should be settling down now, and I shouldn't have those excuses anymore.

I'm really needing to go to bed, but I did want to add how thankful I am that God has taken such good care of us. When I look at our life and examine all the facts and how things have worked out for us I am amazed all over again how God works to take care of us.

Matt is still laid off. He has been able to work a few days in the past few months, but the economy is just so bad that there's not that much construction going on (he's in the laborer's union) He's applied for other jobs, but hasn't gotten any responses on any of them. The unemployment rate here in Oregon is very high and just keeps going up; so any jobs that are available everybody is applying for them.

Anyway, I am not writing this to have a pity party, but to thank the Lord that through it all he has taken care of us. When I look at how much he gets from unemployment, and then how much our monthly bills are, it is literally impossible that we would be able to take care of all our financial obligations, yet somehow we have been able to pay all of our bills. For this I'm truly grateful.

I've really been glad for Matt's help at home with the new baby and all, but I will be thankful when he can go back to work. Until then, I know that God will continue to take care of us. It is truly amazing how good of a job he does.

IT'S A BOY!

2009-01-05T12:39:00.000-08:00

Well, God has blessed me once again with a beautiful healthy baby! Things went real well (as well as labor could be), and me and baby are doing good.

My mom and husband are bugging me about needing to lay back down; so I won't go into too much detail, but here are the important facts:

Zaccheus Cash McManus was born on January 2nd, 2009 at 5:55 P.M. He was 6 1/2 lbs and 20 in. long.

I will try to get some better pictures on later, and if anyone wants some more information, just ask away and I will get back on here some other time.

Thank You every one for your prayers that helped to get baby Zaccheus safely here to us!

36 weeks

2008-12-22T14:10:00.000-08:00

I'm finally getting around to posting a pregnancy picture. I'm now a little over 36 weeks, but this picture was taken at 36 weeks. I really only have a 3-4 weeks to go. It is amazing! I'm looking forward to finally getting to hold this little one in my arms and meet it face to face. I'm really dreading the labor of course. Just pray that I will get through it the right way. I always worry that I will not deal with labor well. And of course there is always the worry that something will go wrong. With all my others things were very normal; so I really don't have any reason to worry.

I still have quite a bit to do to get ready. Since Matt has been home I have organized the things that I have. There are a couple of things I still need to do, like burn the flour; but mostly I have a list of things I need to buy, but we have been stranded at home, so I have not been able to buy them. Hopefully this baby is not born 3 weeks early!

We went through all our little baby clothes and Matt & I picked out the first outfit for if it's a boy, and if it's a girl. The bassinet is set up by me bed now, and I have stuff set out for the birthing. Doing all this has made it all seem more realistic somehow. The baby moves constantly it seems, and I, of course am getting more an more uncomfortable, but nothing to really complain about. I'm so thankful for how well this pregnancy has gone. God is really good to me, I don't want to fail to thank him.

Just keep me in your prayers, and of course I will try to find a way to inform the blogging world of our new addition when it arrives!

Potty Training

2008-12-21T09:50:00.000-08:00

Garrison really started kind of potty training himself a few months ago. I think it was because he lives in a houseful of older people that use the pot; so he wanted to be like us. He's to the point where he only messes himself when he's having problems and can't make it in time. He's still very inconsistent with the wetting, but we are happy for the progress he has made.

This past week we tried underwear (before we were just doing Pull-Ups) He had a lot of wet underwear, but I think it was helpful for him to have that immediate knowledge that his underwear were wet. For now we've went back to the Pull-Ups because he has been having problems getting to the pot on time for his messes. We're cutting back on juice and such to get him back on track.

Anyway, I really doubt he'll be completely potty trained when this baby comes, but I think things will be a little easier and he'll be well on his way. All my other kids weren't done potty training until they were 2 1/2 or older; so he still has a few months.

I took some really cute pictures of him on the pot! (good blackmail material when he's older!) Notice the cute afro ( I guess afro is not a word, oh well)? Daddy actually cut it off recently, but I just love his hair!

Snow Days & Family Time

2008-12-20T22:53:00.000-08:00

Well, I finally decided to acknowledge the existence of my blog! I have a lot to catch up on, I'm sure. I just put new pictures on my computer and have plans to turn some of them into blogs.

The most immediate news is that we have had snow ALL WEEK. Now for some of you that is the norm, but for here it is very irregular. The amazing thing is there's no end in sight it seems. We really don't know when it will let up. I will post pictures of my family playing in the snow. For the most part I've enjoyed this weather. My biggest concern really has been what our energy bills are going to look like after this. Which leads to some other news...

I was going to save this for it's very own blog entry, but it really is a part of this blog, sooo.. Matt got laid off last Friday. The construction business is really slow right now, and they just didn't need him on the job anymore. We are trying to be as up beat about it as possible, and trust in the Lord. It seems like that we are doing ok so far. Matt especially seems to be taking it really well. His last layoff he didn't deal with it so well. God has always taken care of us, and we are really trying to trust that he will continue to do so.

One thing that we have thought of is with the weather this week, and then Christmas and New Years the next couple of weeks he really might not have made that much more money working than getting unemployment (he doesn't get paid Holidays). He's been looking for odd jobs or something, but so far hasn't found anything, but this week people have pretty much been hibernating at home as much as possible; which takes me back to my original subject...

Christmas break was not supposed to start until next week, but because of the road conditions Christian has been out of school all week, and Matt has been home all week too. It has actually been really nice to have the family time that we've had this past week. It seems like it's been a long time since our lives had slowed down enough for us all to just enjoy each other. We've spent more time doing fun things with the kids. Matt has got an amazing amount of things done around here too. It has been really nice to have him here each day to help me.

I think it helps him to see what my day to day life is like too. There's always so much to do. Today he was really getting restless and tired of being at home, but for the most part it's been really nice. Matt has actually been the one to run the few errands that have needed done in the last few days. I have actually never drove in these kind of conditions; so he's been doing the running around. So he hasn't been holed up at home as much as me, but then I'm used to it.

Today it snowed quite a bit. We haven't been letting the kids play out in it too much because they've had colds. Plus at the beginning of this weather it was in the 20's or below, which was way too cold! If the snow is still there tomorrow we might let them play in it some. I've also been considering making snow ice-cream. Yum! My aunt told me how to do it today, and it sounds simple enough, and I'm sure the kids will like it.

Anyway, there's a little update on our life. I better get to bed so I can enjoy more snow and family time tomorrow! There isn't going to be church in the morning because of the weather, but I might see what Matt thinks about us at least having a little family Bible reading or something.

I will try to blog again soon, and take the time to visit everyone else's blogs. Enjoy these pictures:

Good Ministry

2008-12-04T23:40:00.000-08:00

Now before I get started I would like to state that we've had a lot of good ministry here, and I've really been enjoying it; but every so often I hear a sermon where something is presented in a little bit different way and it helps me to look at things differently. Tonight was one of those times.

Bro. Dennis started his talk about how when he was 14 or 15 he liked a girl and really thought he loved her. He thought he knew what love was. Looking back now he can see how it was more of an obsession than anything. He said when he married his wife he thought he loved her too; and I'm sure he did, but he explained how after 20 years of marriage he knows her so much better that the love he felt back when they were first married seems insignificant compared to what he feels for her now. He explained how the reason he loves her so much deeply is because he's gotten to know her. He knows how and why she feels and thinks the way she does. He knows her well enough that he can know how she feels or thinks about something without her even telling him. He understands her so much better and it has caused him to love her so much more.

He then compared this to how we should search out to know and understand the Lord; so that we can love him and be so much closer to him. He explained how instead of just following the commandments of God, we should try to understand why he wants us to follow those commandments. In finding the reason behind the commandments we can get to know God better and understand him better. If we understand him better and grow to love him more we will then have a better relationship with him. We will have more of a desire to serve him rather than just going through the motions because that's what we're supposed to do.

Now there were a couple of reasons this talk had such an effect on me. First of all I had never quite thought of things that way; about how we should try to understand God and then learn to love him more, and then have more of a desire to please him. I, of course, knew that we should understand the will of God, that we should love him and desire to please him, but I had never had it all connected like that for me before.

The other reason this talk really got me to thinking is because it allowed me to see how to work on my relationship with my husband. Now this is a little hard for me to admit, but I've realized for awhile that our relationship just isn't quite what it ought to be. It's not real bad, but I know that we aren't as close as we should be. The one problem I've had is respecting him sometimes. To be perfectly honest there are times that the way he feels, thinks or does things I just think is really stupid! I've had a hard time respecting him with these things. Bro. Dennis' talk helped me realize that if I strove to understand why he feels, thinks and does the things he does my relationship with him will be better. When I look back on some of the things he's done, or said, or whatever, that I just really didn't agree with, I can see where his reason behind it was good; but because he's imperfect he sometimes comes up with imperfect feelings, thoughts or actions. I really, really want to strive to get to know my husband and my God both better; so that I can have a stronger relationship with both.

I would also like to explain that I really do love Matt, and he is a good husband and father. He cares about his family, and he takes good care of us. He loves the brethren and has always been steadfast in the faith. There is so much good in him that I know it out-weighs the bad. Those of you who are married I'm sure can relate to how we can love our husbands so much, but still get so irritated at them sometimes! I really want to try to be more understanding of why he's does what he does during those times that he irritates me.

As some of you know, I have my cousin, Kara, staying with us. She's been helping me quite a bit around the house and with the kids. This pregnancy it seems like I've had a harder time being able to do everything and she's been a good help to me. She just turned 2o and she's not in the faith. Every once in awhile we'll get into some pretty in depth conversations about problems or concerns that she may have, or about the faith. Just the other day we had a really long conversation and I was able to talk to her pretty frankly about some things. What was really neat is that Bro. Dennis brought up a lot of the things we had talked about in his ministry tonight. I noticed some of the things he said, and how it was so close to the conversation I had had with her. After church Kara mentioned the same thing. It was so great that God was able to confirm our conversation in that way. I think it really helped her to hear someone else say the same things I had said and not even know about her life like I do.

Bro. Lee also got up and talked about how if he saw a rich man with a lot of land and he had servants to work that land he would think a lot of that man. But he also said that if he saw the workers just sitting around doing nothing he would wonder how in the world that man got rich. He said his advice to that man would be to get different workers that wouldn't waste his time and money. I know that I have been to idle in the faith, and I sure don't want God to give up on me and grant someone else my place in his kingdom.

He also explained about striving for perfection. He compared it to when he has workers working for him in his tile business. When he tells them to do a job that he knows they are capable of doing, he expects them to do it. If he comes back and it's not done, or done right, and he explains to them their mistakes; he expects them to correct their mistakes. He said it doesn't really matter to him the process they use to get the job done as long as the finished product is done according to his specifications. To him that his perfection. I know we always think of perfection as everything done exactly right, but God knows and understands us. If we make mistakes he just expects us to correct them. Basically as long as we are truly striving to please him and doing all we know to do, and doing what we can to fix or learn from our mistakes, that is perfection.

There really wasn't a whole lot done in meeting, but I really got a lot out of it and came home with a lot to chew on. Hopefully I swallow it and digest it and allow it to really improve my life.

I wasa going to wait until tomorrow to post this, but I couldn't go to sleep anyway because it was all going over and over in my mind; so I thought I would relate it all to my blogging buddies while it was still fresh in my mind. Just pray that I will follow the exortation I recieved tonight.

A Theological Question

2008-11-19T23:53:00.000-08:00

It is almost midnight and I can't seem to keep my mind quiet. There are a lot of things my mind wants to think about, with the Holidays coming up and everything. Also I have a baby that always decides to move when I'm trying to sleep. Most of the time I don't get exasperated though, it gives me a wonderful opportunity to thank God for how healthy my baby seems to be and think about wonderful baby things.

Anyway, as I lay there with my mind going this way and that, and my belly going this way and that I got to thinking about an article I read recently. I get emails about my pregnancy; telling me about the growth of the baby and various topics that might be relevant. The topic I am referring to is about drinking alcohol while being pregnant. They, of course, recommend that you steer clear of it entirely; farther down in the article it says that even a woman who only has one drink a week is more likely to have a child that shows aggressive and delinquent behavior later in life. It said that drinking alcohol can cause low birth weight and/or learning disabilities.

Now as I hope most of you know, I am not an alcohol drinker; however since I've been pregnant I've had an ongoing internal problem that I have drank wine for. As I'm sure all who will read this know, but for any who may not, the Bible says to "Drink a little wine for your stomach's sake, and your oft infirmities." I think I quoted that correctly. (I'm too lazy to go look it up right now though, sorry) Anyway, from time to time since I've been pregnant Matt and/or I have blessed a drink of wine that I have consumed in hopes that God would have mercy and relieve my problem.

As I was laying there in bed feeling my baby move inside me I was thinking about how I wouldn't want to hurt my baby in any way. I was thinking about that article and hoping that the drinks of wine I have taken haven't affected my baby in a bad way.

Here was my question for myself. Is it a lack of faith to worry about the wine I have taken for a spiritual reason? Wouldn't God allow that it wouldn't have an ill affect on my baby since I wasn't taking it to enjoy the alcohol, but because I was trying to do all I could do to have faith in God to take care of my problem? On the other hand, is it selfish of me to take wine for my problem if there's a possibility that it could harm my baby? Now when I was taking the wine it didn't even dawn on me that it was alcohol and I was pregnant. I don't even think of it hardly as an alcoholic beverage, but something we only use when we are sick. Now that the topic has been brought to my attention I'm really questioning what to do. Would it be lack of faith to not take the wine when I feel the need, or would it be selfish to continue to take it?

I have anointed myself, and of course prayed a lot about this problem; so there are other ways to seek God's mercy. I took the wine because I was doing everything I could think of to seek deliverance from this problem. Would it be bad to stop doing this one thing for the sake of my baby, would it reflect a lack of faith on my part that God wouldn't take care of my baby when I take the wine? Or would it be better to just hold off on the wine for now because of the possibility that it might have a bad effect on my baby?

I know this is kind of a deep subject; maybe even a little controversial (I hope not too much though), but I really would like some opinions on the matter; because I really want to do the right thing.

Thanks

Sigh*** I decided I better look that verse up; so here it is:

"Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake and thine often infirmities."

I Timothy 5:23

A Little Fender Bender

2008-11-14T11:45:00.000-08:00

A couple of weeks ago Matt got into a little fender bender on his way to work. It was rainy and wet. Traffic stopped all of a sudden and he didn't stop in enough time and hit the guy in front of him. Luckily neither one of them were hurt. There cars were smashed up, but they were able to get out of the way of traffic and settle the matter peacefully. Matt said the guy he hit was very nice about it.

Matt called me about 6 o'clock in the morning to let me know what happened. He had planned to just continue onto work, but when he tried to drive away he found out that the steering wouldn't work. He called the insurance people and they called a tow truck. I had to take my Aunt Nadine to the airport that morning, so I just told Matt I would leave home a little earlier than I had planned and pick him up and take him to work. The airport is not that far from where he works; so it wouldn't be that far out of the way for me.

I figured the tow truck would beat me to him, but when I got there it still hadn't arrived. Matt had to be there when the car got picked up; so I waited with him for a little while. After awhile when the tow truck still hadn't arrived I had to leave for the airport anyway so my Aunt wouldn't miss her flight. By this time Matt's accident had happened over 2 hours ago.

I had planned to wait until her flight left to leave the airport, but I just ended up getting all her business taken care of and leaving her there so I could go pick up Matt.

I guess not long after I left the tow truck came, but the guy really took his time loading the car up. They had a hard time figuring out where to take the car. The towing guy wanted to park it at his lot; the insurance people wouldn't give him a suggestion as to where to take it. Finally Matt decided to take it to a dealership he knew about. When they got there they found out that the dealership didn't have a body shop. They were told about a different place they could take it to. I guess after driving back and forth for awhile they never could find the place they were told about, but eventually in all there turning around they ended up in the parking lot of a different body shop. At this point Matt was getting pretty frustrated. I guess the tow truck drivers' driving skills were pretty scary. The insurance people said Matt could take the car anywhere he wanted so he decided to just stay where they were instead of trying to find the other place.

Anyway, by the time I got to where he was it was almost lunch time and he had given up on the idea of going to work that day. When we got home he made calls and took care of all the kinks with the insurance company. They weren't going to get him a rental car that same day, but he talked them into arranging one for him that evening so he would have a vehicle to drive to work the next day. He has been really enjoying driving the Pontiac G6 that he get to drive around until his car is fixed!

That first morning was pretty chaotic and frustrating, but things haven't been too bad since then. It was so nice that Kara has been staying with us; so I didn't have to drag all the kids around with me that morning. It seems like the repairs are coming along on the car. I'm not sure when it will be ready. We're not worried about the time limit of it all as long as it gets done. Like I said Matt is really enjoying his brand new car for awhile! We do have to come up with the deductible, but we are very thankful that Matt wasn't hurt and that he didn't hurt anybody else.

I took a few pictures of the car. As you can see the damage was pretty minimal. We are very thankful that God was watching out for him, and that there weren't more people involved.

As I look at these pictures again I'm amazed that he couldn't drive the car to work that morning. Its kind of weird that the steering wouldn't work. He said the air bags didn't even deploy; so the impact couldn't have been too hard. If the air bags would've deployed it may have totalled the car and we don't have gap insurance; so I'm thankful for that too.

The "Twin Cousins'" 2nd Birthday

2008-11-10T22:47:00.000-08:00

As some of you know, my sister-in-law Kim and I had our last babies only 17 hours apart. Her's was born on the 28th of October and Garrison was born on the 29th. We had their first Birthday party together and I thought it would be neat to have their Birthday's together again. When they get older they might not like doing this, but I think it's kind of neat to celebrate together when their this young. Anyway, since their Birthday's were in the middle of the week, Matt and I went down the following weekend and we had a little party for them after church on Sunday.

I really enjoyed the party. I, of course, took pictures. I think it will be neat to look back on them in years to come and see them sharing their special days together. Here are some of the pictures I took:

Here are the Birthday kids with their cakes. I had a REALLY hard time finding a Blues Clues cake, by the way. Garrison really likes Blues Clues, but you can't hardly find it in the stores anymore. So if anyone finds some nice Blues Clues items, let me know and I might see if I can get them for him for Christmas.
Here's Kylee blowing out her candles.

Garrison actually blew his out in one blow! I was surprised, of course Kylee had just shown him how it was done...

Kylee opening her presents with her big sister Shay.

Daddy's helping Garrison open his presents. Whatever this one was, he was excited about it!

He got $2 in one of his cards. We still need to take him to the store and let him spend them...

He really liked his presents, but it was nap time too; so he looks pretty tired, poor little guy!

You can't really see, but Kylee LOVED the hangers that came with these cute clothes. We were all laughing about that!

I did manage to find a few small Blues Clues things, but not much.

Here's the Birthday boy hamming it up while he makes a mess with his Birthday cake.

This is just a really cute picture of the 2 of them at Gramma's house later on. What cuties! Garrison is wearing his new shirt and vest from Uncle Mark and Aunt Kim.

Well, I thought I would post these pictures before Garrison's Birthday was too far gone! I just today put the pictures onto the computer. I have some other pictures I want to put on a post too, but that will have to wait until another day. It also dawned on me that I should take some pictures of my pregnant self so you all can see how fat and sassy I'm getting. Who knows when that will happen though. I have approximately 2 months left. Time is flying by. I really need to get busy making sure I have everything ready for this precious little bundle...

Spending Time With Dad

2008-11-04T12:13:00.001-08:00

I'm sorry everyone that it has taken me so long to make a new post. Life has been busy, but I still think I could have taken the time to post. After I get this posted I will try to take time to slowly catch up on everyone else's blog.

In my last post I had mentioned that I was going to go spend a few days in B-ville. He was actually doing a lot better than he had been, but he was still so weak and so much frailer looking than when I had last saw him. I left on a Tuesday and had planned to come back on Saturday morning. Matt had to work; so I left him behind at home by himself. Dad had a lot of visiting family while I was there, so he was in pretty good spirits. I spent a lot of time at Dad and Mom's house through the week, and I was doing pretty good dealing with Dad's illness, I thought. On Friday my pregnancy emotions got the better of me, and I had a pretty weepy day. Early that morning I was laying in bed feeling my baby move all over the place and I got to thinking about how I always like to have Dad there when I have my babies (not in the room, but in the house). It occurred to me that if he didn't get better that he may not be there this time. Anyway, throughout the day thoughts like that would creep up on me and I felt very emotional. I was trying to decide whether to come home Friday or wait until Saturday morning. After the day I had I really felt like I needed my husband; so I went home on Friday evening.

We spent this past weekend in B-ville too. It seems like Dad has stayed pretty much the same, except that maybe he's lost even more weight. It seems like they've been able to keep his bowels moving pretty regular. He's still really weak, but he's able to walk by himself (but not very far at a time) and get up and down by himself for the most part. What we're worried about now is that his stomach is so sensitive and he really can't eat very solid foods or he throws it up, or it really causes him a lot of pain and makes him get worse for awhile. He just hasn't been able to consume all the calories he needs. Matt and I found him a liquid diet that was 350 calories per 8 oz can, but the first time he drank some of it (about half a can) he threw quite a bit of it back up. He thought maybe it was a little too rich for him. Anyway, Mom has been trying to think of things that will be easy on his stomach and have lots of calories. I think they will try mixing the liquid diet with other things, or only give him a couple drinks at a time. Anyway, him and those that help him need prayers that they will know what to do for him. If anyone has any suggestions as to what to feed him I would love to hear it and will pass it on to my Mom.

I actually stayed up with Dad Saturday night. Matt slept in the spare room so I could get him if I needed his muscles. I didn't get much sleep until after 6 when I traded places with Matt so I could get some sleep, but I enjoyed the opportunity to help my Dad somehow. Sometimes when someone is sick like that you really don't know how to help them. Matt actually didn't wake me up until after church was over; so I missed church, but I'm glad I got to stay up with Dad.

You might pray for my Dad's spirit. It's so hard to keep a good attitude when your sick for so long. Just pray that he will have the grace to endure whatever God wants him too.

Thanks again for all your prayers.

Pumpkin Patch

2008-11-04T10:54:00.000-08:00

After the days of being apart while I was visiting my Dad, Matt and I decided to do something fun as a family on Saturday. Around here there are quite a few farms that are open to the public this time of year. We went to one last year that we really enjoyed; so we decided to take the kids to a farm again.

At first it seemed like the day might not not turn out that well. The first farm we went to was not as interesting for the kids as we had hoped; so they were kind of grumpy and irritable. We finally left and decided to go to the same farm as we had went to last year since we knew we enjoyed it last year (and it happened to be close to where we were already)

This farm was much more fun. There was a neat gift shop that Matt and I enjoyed browsing through. We bought some fresh apples and squash and a few other little items. There was a huge blown up apple bouncy toy that the kids enjoyed jumping in. They also had face painting and a hayride. We all rode the hayride together and really enjoyed it. They also had a pumpkin patch that the kids enjoyed climbing around in. They had hay bale mazes too, but for some reason our kids didn't go in them. I guess they were too busy with the other things. We took pictures of course! I decided to post last years pictures from the pumpkin patch to compare how the kids have grown in the past year.

All in all we had a pretty good day. It was nice to enjoy a fun day as a family!

Here we are on the hayride (I'm taking the picture) What an adorable family I have!

Here are all the kids in the pumpkin patch.

Here are Ruby and Garrison last year. Notice Ruby's faithful elephant? I still feel sad when I see pictures of him. I wish we hadn't lost him...

Here is Christian and Anthony last year.

Here are all the kids together last year.

This is Ruby posing in the pumpkins this year.

Here she is with elephant last year.

Garrison this year.

Garrison last year.

Christian this year.

You can't see him real well, but this is Christian last year.

Anthony this year. The sun is in his eyes, but it's still a cute picture!

Anthony last year.

Dad Update

2008-10-13T15:55:00.000-07:00

Life has been busy for me, but I thought I would take the time to post a quick update on how my Dad is doing.

There were a couple of days last week where he seemed to be doing quite a bit better and we thought he was on the mend. My Mom called Friday night and said that he was in severe pain, worse than ever, and had called for the elders. He had a really bad night that night. Matt went down Saturday morning and spent the day, that night and part of Sunday with him. While Matt was there he wasn't in such horrible pain, but he wasn't doing good still. The biggest worry is that his stomach is really swelled up because his bowels are backed up. I guess he was able to go a little bit today, but not much. My sister and her husband will be flying in tomorrow from OK, and some of Dad's family from OK left this morning to come out.

I plan to go back down tomorrow afternoon and stay for a few days. My Mom is really worried that if he doesn't get better soon that he won't get better at all. I appreciate the comments, and I've told my Mom about all the prayers coming from the blogging world. Just keep praying for all of us.

Thank You All!!

A Faithful Prayer

2008-10-07T23:17:00.001-07:00

For a few months now I've had a very personal affliction, I guess you'd call it. It's actually the same one I had the elders for at our camp-out. The problem did not go completely away like I had hoped. Last week it got so bad that I was at my wits end and I was really having a hard time dealing with it. It is not a serious thing, just very bothersome and annoying; so I feel bad that I was having such a hard time with it, but I was. It's something that is supposed to be very easy to take care of with medicine, but I really want to trust in the Lord with it. The really hard part was that it seemed like there was nothing I could do, but just endure. Like I said, I was getting very frustrated with it.

On Sunday Sis. Marisela came and prayed for me. I was so thankful for that prayer and I told her so after church! I had been hoping someone would come pray for me, but didn't want to ask even God to send someone, because it really isn't that serious of a problem. Just the fact that she prayed for me made me feel better. Even if God doesn't take it away I know that he sees me and is aware of my small trial. It was a great comfort to me. Well, since Sunday my problem has been better. It would be wonderful if it went away completely, but I am so thankful for the relief that I have. Thank the Lord for his blessings and the faithful prayer of my dear sister!

Meet Toby

2008-10-07T22:09:00.001-07:00

We got a dog!! We actually got him a couple of weeks ago, but I just now got some pictures to share with all of you.

We've been wanting a dog for quite awhile, but couldn't find one we liked that we could afford. We've especially wanted a Shih Tzu, but they are really expensive. We aren't allowed to have puppies in our rental (plus I'm not sure I would want to have to train one). We wanted a dog that wasn't too big and intimidating for our kids. The reason we wanted a Shih tzu is because they are usually really mild mannered, we've heard that they train easily and they aren't real nervous like a lot of small dogs.

Anyway, we've been looking for awhile, but not coming up with anything. One day I decided to Google animal shelters in our area and I found Toby! He's a 10 years old Shih tzu, fully trained and good with kids. We did have to pay an adoption fee, but it was way cheaper than Shih tzus usually cost! 10 is kind of old for a dog, but he doesn't act as old as he is. The only thing that might show his age is that he naps a lot. It is nice to have a laid back dog. He's very patient with the kids. When we first got him he had a few potty accidents, but they say that is normal for a dog in a new environment. He did have a problem scratching at doors when he wanted in (or out), but he seems to be doing better at that too. The only thing we haven't been able to break him of yet is he barks when someone walks by, especially other dogs, but we are working on that.

He is a house dog, but I have him go outside fairly often, but he does spend most of his time in the house. We are making sure to bath him regularly because I DO NOT want a house that smells like dog! At first we had him sleeping in our bathroom at night, but now we have him sleeping in the garage and that seems to be working out pretty good. He has his own little bed out there, and the garage is attached to the house; so it's not too cold for him. If we hit really cold weather we might do something different for awhile, but the winters are usually pretty mild here.

Anyway, we are very pleased with the new addition to our family, and he's awfully cute; so here are some pictures of him...

This is his favorite place in the house; probably so he can see whenever someone walks by. I thought about teaching him to stay off the furniture, but he looks so cute and comfortable up there that I haven't been able to make myself do it! like I said, he is very clean though; and supposedly Shih tzus don't shed like other dogs. We'll see...

Here he is chewing on his bone. He loves it! We've also been very careful not to feed him people food, but I think he does eat what the kids drop on the floor. Sometimes he does stand there looking like he wants some, but we don't give in. Sometimes we send him to the garage to eat his meal while we are eating ours.

Isn't he cute!

He wouldn't look at me! He was too busy with that bone, but this is a good shot of his cute little body!

Well, that's all about Toby for now. Oh, one more thing, Toby was already his name so we just kept it. If we had named him we probably would have come up with a little more creative name, but Toby is a good name. At 10 I thought it would just confuse him to change his name. He does respond to it too. Sometimes when I'm calling Ruby he comes because it sounds so similar!

I thought I would post a little update about my Dad while I was here. There are days when he seems to be better; but all in all I don't think he is getting better. His nights are especially bad and restless. He's really weak and I'm sure he's getting tired of it all. I really appreciate everyone's prayers, and I know he does too. Just continue to pray for him because he needs it.

Thanks everyone for your prayers an concern.

My Dad Needs Prayers

2008-09-30T11:24:00.000-07:00

I have other things to post about, but this seemed more important; so as soon as I get some pictures onto my computer I will post more.

Some of you may know already, but my Dad hasn't been doing well for about a week and a half now. We believe that it might be a strangulated hernia, but it's hard to tell for sure. He has flu symptoms along with a lot of pain. He's really getting weak now since it's been so long. It seems like he goes through periods like this, but this time it seems to be worse and hanging on longer.

Matt and I went down there last weekend to see him. He's just really not doing good and really needs the prayers of his brethren that God will have mercy and let this pass.

I'm also a little worried about my mom because she has health issues of her own and has been having to take care of Dad. She says that he's getting to where he needs care from a man. I guess the last couple of nights someone else has stayed up with him; which is really nice because his nights are especially restless and she hadn't really been getting enough sleep either.

Please just keep them in your prayers. I will try to post again when there is a change to post about.

Thanks so much for your prayers because I know that the brethren are good to pray when they know of the need. I know my Dad will appreciate knowing the prayers of the brethren are with him.

Smells

2008-09-03T10:31:00.001-07:00

By the way, we had a really good weekend at the cam pout. I always enjoy seeing all the brethren. There were good meetings and lots of good visiting. It was wonderful to spend a weekend surrounded by so many loved ones. There was a baptism and a beautiful ordinance supper. I looked down the row of all my beautiful sisters and my heart just burst with love and joy to see all of them and feel the wonderful fellowship.

There were 6 bishops from different assemblies there. I had them all pray for me for a private problem I've been having. I didn't feel like it was important enough to call the elders to come to my house; but I decided to take advantage of the opportunity of them all being there. It was a wonderful feeling to have them all gathered round me as they lay their hands on me. I could feel so much love to and from them. I thought about each one and how I've known all of them for quite a few years; some for as long as I can remember. They each hold a special place in my heart and are good examples before me and my children. So far it seems that the problem they prayed for is gone! Yahhh! It was very bothersome.

All in all it was a good weekend.

I believe it was Sunday morning I woke up early to help with breakfast. When I stepped out of my cabin a horrible smell met my nose! It smelt like maybe somebody had some fertilizer or something. I teased one of the teenage boys about using too much cologne; and I told Bro. Jim that it smelt like Tulare! (a major dairy town, for those of you who don't know). Even as I joked about it I got to thinking about a prophesy I may have mentioned before. It told me that my sacrifice was pure and that I was a sweet smell unto the Lord.

I thought about how I know that all too often my sacrifice is not so pure and I wondered if there were times that I smelt like dung unto the Lord, or worse. In one of the meetings a brother got up (I forget which one) and was talking about the scribes and how the Bible says they were like sepulchres. They looked beautiful on the outside, but inside there was corruption and rotting flesh. I thought about how horrible that sacrifice must smell unto the Lord.

Throughout the weekend I kept smelling different smells. While breakfast was being cooked there was the wonderful smell of bacon in the air, that fertilizer smell never did quite go away, though sometimes it wasn't as bad as others. Sometimes I would get a whiff of someone's B.O.; or I would walk by someone who had some good smelling perfume or lotion. Even though I didn't smell it this weekend I thought about how someone could use too much cologne or perfume and it could end up being a bad smell. As I smelled each smell I kept thinking about how each sacrifice has a different smell unto the Lord.

Some people's sacrifice has a wonderful smell; others not so much. There's even those who do too much on their own without God's lead and direction and their smell is too overpowering. It really got me to wondering how my sacrifice smells unto the Lord. It really made me want to give the Lord a better sacrifice. I sure don't want the smell of dung, corruption, B.O. or any other such thing to reach the Lord's nostrils because of me.

Here is a couple of verses that I read yesterday that I thought were uplifting:

"Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,
I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."

Philippians 3:13-14

Girls Night Out

2008-08-22T09:29:00.000-07:00

Getting a pedicure is something I really like to do to indulge myself. Most of the time I feel guilty spending extra money on something frivolous like that; so I don't do it very often. With Matt working all this overtime I felt like it would be ok to go get a pedicure.

I found a Beauty School not far from me that only charged $15! Since I decided to do this I thought I would see if any of my fellow sisters wanted to come too. It ended up that they ALL wanted to go! It worked out that the school was open in the evenings when our husbands could babysit. So we all agreed on Tuesday. There ended up being 7 of us in all. It was fun to get pampered like that and get to visit together.

Before our appointment we all met at a Starbucks that was nearby and got ourselves a drink. Because there were so many of us we ended up having to have 2 appointments times; but that was ok. I was one of the later appointments and I just got to visit with those that were getting theirs done first. The only thing that wasn't good there was they only had folding chairs for you to sit in. I was ok, but poor Sis. Cherrie is 8 months pregnant, so she was pretty uncomfortable; but all in all we had a pretty good time. It was nice to have a girls night out.

Like I said, I don't get a pedicure very often; so when I do I like to make it worth while. I like to pick colors that are different. I especially like to get little decals on my toes. One of the girls had some decals and she let me have some! Here are some pictures of my pretty toes! I chose a pretty blue; with raspberry colored sparkles!

I really surprised some of the other sisters with my choice, but I'm very pleased with my pretty toes!

Sometimes bad news is good news

2008-08-21T10:35:00.001-07:00

There was another major catastrophe on the job Matt is on. I do feel really bad for the company Matt works for, but the job was almost over and Matt was beginning to worry they were going to lay him off soon and he wouldn't be able to get on another job very soon. Construction has really gone down around here. Anyway this latest problem is giving Matt more time on the job. He's been busy cleaning up the mess and working overtime. It's been nice having the extra money, but he sure is wore out.

Anyway, here is the story...

They are guessing that Monday about the time when everybody left the building for the day, or shortly after, a water main broke in one of the units. (This is a 16 or so story condo building). Matt says there are security guards at the building around the clock, but the one there that night for some reason didn't call in the fact that he heard rushing water all night long! It wasn't until 5 the next morning that somebody came and the problem was stopped. They estimated that 72,000 gallons of water spewed out during the night! Needless to say that security guard company is getting fired, and I'm sure the security guard was fired too.

I guess the break was on the 9th floor; and so a good majority of that floor and the one beneath it has to be ripped apart and redone. Every floor beneath that has water damage too. The building was almost done; so these floors especially were pretty much ready. Matt has been busy hauling out all the ruined flooring etc.

Like I said Matt has been working a lot of overtime. Even before this accident he had been working Saturdays; because they were wanting to get the building done. It has been really nice to have the fat paychecks, but Matt really is getting wore out; so you might pray for him if you think about it. Also, I hope we use this time of plenty to set aside some money for when he does eventually get laid off.

Anyway, just wanted to update you all on the latest drama...

Oregon Airshow

2008-08-21T10:20:00.001-07:00

I'm kind of late with this post. My excuse is that I'm having a yard sale this weekend and I've been busy going through stuff.

A few weekends ago, Matt and I took the kids on Friday night to the airshow here. We had a really good time! Sometimes when we take our kids out it's not so fun because they get cranky or bored, but they actually did really good. All of the kids enjoyed watching the airplanes doing tricks; even Garrison. They had a lot of different planes doing different tricks. I had never been to an airshow and I really enjoyed it.

You can't see this plane real well, but they were bigger than the other planes doing tricks and there were 4 of them at once; and they had red, white and blue tail smoke. They were pretty impressive to watch.

Here was a duo doing some tricks. It definitely takes talent and lots of practice to get all the moves synchronized like they did.

This is a pretty good picture of one of the planes. I actually took a lot of pictures, but it was hard to get good ones.

When it started getting dark they had some planes go up that had some sort of sparkling tail smoke so you could see them in the dark; and they had some parachuters (my spell check just told me that parachuters isn't a word, but I don't believe it) with sparklers attached. It was pretty cool to see. I tried to take pictures, but it was useless. My camera is just not made to take good night pictures like that. They had a really good fireworks show at the end. We actually left during it because it was pretty late by then and Matt was tired and had to work the next day. We saw the fireworks as we were walking to our van though. It was very impressive. It was nice to get ahead of the traffic and get to go home without fighting the traffic rush after the fireworks were over.

It was a really enjoyable evening. It's so nice when we get to have some nice family time like that.

A Good Day

2008-08-11T10:29:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a very good day for me.

We had a pretty good meeting. There was some of the ministry that seemed like they were holding up a mirror to me and saying "you need to work on this." It was very good for me.

After church we went to Bro. Dennis and Sis. Trina's for a potluck dinner. There was A LOT of good food. I've been scared to get on the scales today! I feel like we had some pretty good conversations and fellowship too. There was one conversation that was especially good for me that I needed to hear:

I had been having some child rearing issues, I knew that what I was doing wasn't really working, but I didn't really know a better way to deal with it. My dear sisters talked with me about it and gave me some really good advice. I want them all to know that I greatly appreciate there input and the loving and caring way they did it. I now have some different options to try and hopefully things will go better.

The big reason yesterday was such a good day for me is because it was a learning day for me. God has a wonderful way of showing me where I need to improve. Usually I listen and decide that I'm going to do better; and most of the time I do better, but then it seems like I get back into my usual groove and the Lord has to show me all over again that I need to improve.

I really prayed yesterday, last night and this morning that I could follow through with my intentions and actually form so lasting good habits. So far today I feel like I've done pretty good; but I really need prayers that I wouldn't slack off, that I would continue to do things how I should. My family and others would be so much better off if I would.

One of the first things I did this morning is took some time to read again. Today I read the 4th chapter of Ephesians. This is how the chapter starts out: It was exactly what I needed to read...

"I therefore the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called.
With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in Love,
Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace."

I so much want to walk worthy of the vocation wherewith I was called. I also feel like that how my sisters strived to help me yesterday was the fulfilling of the next 2 verses. Sometimes I wonder why God has so much patience with me, when I mess up and fail so many times, but I sure am glad he does!

Well, here I go to continue to try and walk worthy...

Paul's Blessing

2008-08-08T15:00:00.000-07:00

Today I took the time to read a chapter in the Bible. Paul was talking to the Ephesians, but I felt like he was talking to me too. It seems like it was a blessing that he was requesting from God for all of God's children. I thought I would pass this blessing on to all my blogging buddies. Paul wrote from his heart to the Ephesians, and I share it with you from the heart. It's from the 3rd chapter of Ephesians; from the 16th verse to the 21st...

"That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man,
That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in Love,
May be able to comprehend with all Saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth and height;
And to know the Love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God.
Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,
Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen."

Reading this just gave me a wonderful loved and cared for feeling. God really is wonderful! I especially liked the part where it says he'll do even more than we ask or think. I'm so glad I'm a part of this and that I have a taste of the wonderfulness of God!

Last night I was reading Matt the weekly report I get emailed to me about our baby's growth. After reading it he said he really doesn't understand how people can see all the miracles (such as babies forming) that there are in nature and still not believe there's a God. They'd rather believe that things just happened all of a sudden on their own, or somehow evolved. When I feel the Love of God, the comfort of the Spirit, and feel the fullness of God, I'm so thankful that I'm not one of those who only believe in what they can see. I'm thankful that I can feel the Love of Christ that passeth knowledge. I'm glad I took the time to read this morning.

It's Alive!

2008-08-07T08:56:00.000-07:00

A couple of nights ago I was laying in bed reading a book; when I felt something! I thought could this be my baby moving already? It seemed a little early to start feeling the movements, but I lay there and sure enough! What was very surprising was how strong the movements felt. Let me tell you, when I'm reading a book, I'm usually very engrossed; so for me to notice the movements meant that they were fairly strong for so young a baby. I put my hand on it and just enjoyed the moment! Of course I told my husband who was at the computer in our room. He even came over to see if he could feel it since the movements were so strong. He wasn't real sure, but he thought he could feel slight movements! Every since then I've noticed my baby letting itself be known to me! I love this point in the pregnancy! I'm not so uncomfortable with pregnancy, but I still get to enjoy feeling this small being moving inside of me! Now I have a little over 5 months until I get to see it eye to eye!

Mourning the Curls

2008-08-05T10:54:00.001-07:00

Garrison's hair was getting pretty wild with all of his little curls; so I finally broke down and cut his hair. I wanted to cut it a little shorter than I did last time, but I was hoping some of his cute curls would stay behind. Here is a picture of him before his haircut. He's awfully cute with those curls, but they were getting a little out of hand; so one day when daddy was gone (Matt kept saying he didn't need a haircut) I did the deed...

What happened to my baby???? Where did he go. I cut off all his curls, and now a toddler has switched places with him! I miss the curls! He's still really cute, but not quite the same. I'm hoping they will grow back, but I'm beginning to wonder...

I couldn't resist posting this picture too. Here he is with his wild hair. Daddy brought some groceries home and he wanted to help; so Daddy gave him the bag of potatoes. He dragged them as far as the front steps, but couldn't figure out how to get the bag up the steps! Mommy came to the rescue and helped him. (After having a good laugh at his expense, and taking this picture, of course!)

Just Getting By

2008-07-28T12:01:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we had a pretty good meeting (and had a nice time afterwards at Bro. Sean & Sis. Marisela's). Bro. Lee preached about not holding back and giving your all to living the Faith. Bro. Bill got up and talked about partaking of the Lord's supper and how we should be partaking of the Lord's body and blood everyday. Bro. Sean got up got real blunt with all of us. I'm glad he did too. I know that at least for me it was something that I needed to hear put that bluntly.

He said he remembered when he lived here before and the young kids spent a lot of time together. They were always looking for reasons to spend time together. He said they didn't get to spend everyday together, but they always wanted to. He said how the brethren here really don't spend a lot of time together. We all go about our own lives. It's really easy to just stay home and relax. He was basically saying that we needed to have such a desire to be together that we would find ways to make it happen.

I know that Matt and I fail in this also. We do have people over for dinner fairly often (though we've only just recently picked back up on that). And most Sunday's we spend with the brethren, but it's been a looooong time since we've just decided to go visit somebody some evening.

Another thing that was mentioned a couple times was fasting. It's been quite awhile since I've fasted. Sometimes I see how I struggle in certain areas and think about how I ought to fast about it, but I don't do it. I really want to try to fast more often.

I've also been examining myself and today I've really looked in the mirror and seen one especially glaring fault. I do what I have to do to get by. I don't put all my effort into living the faith or even taking care of my family. I was visiting with the brethren yesterday and told them how my sister Wenona is a really especially good mother, and Alicia is a really hard worker and I'm just mediocre at both things. I know I could do better at living the faith, keeping my house clean, taking care of my children, being a wife; really at everything, but mostly I just do what I feel like I need to do so that I can just squeak by with the minimal amount of effort, so that people will still think well of me. I know some of you may be thinking that this can't possible be that bad, but it really is and I need prayers that I can put my best effort forth. I can remember in school I wasn't very popular with the kids; so I liked to be on the good side of the teachers. I did well enough at school so that my teachers would think well of me, but I didn't work my hardest. I really think I could have gotten straight A's if I'd tried my best, but I didn't. Today I have really seen how this is how I live my whole life. It's just horrible! I really need prayers that I can overcome my slothful nature and do my best at all I do. I know that my life and that of my family and those around me would be better if I put forth more of an effort.

Before Bro. Lee and Sis. Cherrie moved here he received a prophesy. Even though it was for him I believe it was something the whole assembly here needed to hear. I don't remember all of it, but I do remember that it said that the truth would be preached in this part and we would be a haven for the brethren. I think this is a wonderful promise, but I can see where if we don't all put forth our best efforts God's plan for this assembly could fail. I really, really, really want to do my part, and not Just Get By; because really just getting by is really not getting by at all.

Real or not?

2008-07-28T10:11:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago we took the kids to the Saturday Market in downtown Portland. We road the Max, which the kids think is really cool! Even though we didn't have much money to spend it was nice to browse around at all the different booths, and also see all the interesting people. There was a point when it was getting to be nap time and Garrison started throwing a screaming fit, but other than that it was an enjoyable outing.

At one point we were taking a bathroom break, and way up on the edge of building Christian saw an owl. I zoomed the camera as far as I could and took a picture, and then when I got the picture on our computer I cropped it even more. While we were watching it we did see it move. I guess it never occurred to me to wonder why an owl was out and moving in broad daylight. After I cropped it on my computer I thought it looked like it was fake. Maybe it's some kind of surveillance camera or something.

What do you guys think? Is it fake, or not? The more I look at it, the more I think it's probably fake.

Feeding the Ducks

2008-07-28T10:02:00.000-07:00

Earlier this summer, Matt's mom came and spent a few days with us. The kids really enjoyed having their Grandma around! One of the things we did while she was here is take the kids to feed some ducks. The kids really enjoyed it and it was cheap entertainment! There's a library next door; so we went to the library too. I'm thinking about taking them again soon.

I had them all sit down and throw the bread so the ducks would come closer.

There were a couple of geese there that would actually eat out of your hand, but Christian was the only one of my kids brave enough to do it.

Poor Baby

2008-07-22T11:00:00.001-07:00

This is what happens when your older siblings wake you up too early in the morning:

I went to get Garrison out of his highchair this morning and this is what I found. Anthony got up pretty early this morning and decided to wake everyone else up too.

Here he is in another similar situation awhile back. I came in to clean up from breakfast and found my baby laying on the counter with every one's cereal spoons clutched in his hands fast asleep. I, of course, had to snap a picture while laughing quietly to myself. I quietly cleaned up around him while watching him closely to make sure he didn't roll off the bar. It wasn't very long and he woke up and went about his day.

Here's a cute picture of my baby I just wanted to add for the fun of it. He won't be my baby much longer! He's already showing signs of wanting to be potty trained, but I'm not very excited about it. It would be nice if he were potty trained when this baby came though, but none of my other kids were done that early.

I hope he keeps those beautiful blue eyes and that curly hair. It's time for another hair cut too, but I love his curls so much it's hard! Christian and Ruby's eyes are changing to green like mine did. I like the green eyes too, but I hope at least one of my children keep their daddy's blue eyes.

THE FAITH

2008-07-21T22:35:00.000-07:00

There is something that I've been really thinking about lately and Bro. Lee got up yesterday and talked along the same lines. I've been thinking about how we call our walk as brethren living the Faith. Most of the time when we say that, it's more of a title than anything else; but lately I've been thinking about the definition of Faith. This is what Bro. Lee talked about. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Basically when we are living the Faith we are providing the evidence of things not seen. The love of the brethren, the wonderful works we've seen done that only God could work out; the spirit that we feel bringing forth the wonderful things that we have the opportunity to experience. It's all the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. I've just never quite thought of it along those lines before.

Also when I was finally taking time out today to read my Bible I came across a verse. It's one of those verses that I think get overlooked a lot. I've read it lots of times, but never really thought about what it means before. It's the second to the last verse of Galatians; so I guess I've just thought of it as a closing verse, without any real in dept meaning. Anyway, here it is:

"From henceforth let no man trouble me for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus."

All of us who have the Spirit in us have the marks of the Lord Jesus; so we really have no reason to be troubled by anything that man could throw at us. I just thought this was an interesting verse worth sharing. It's in the 6th chapter of Galatians. That chapter is full of a lot of good things, but this verse really stuck out for me this time. Maybe God was sending me a message to not let myself be troubled or worried about the things of this world. If God be for us who can be against us.

WhooHoo

2008-07-17T15:01:00.000-07:00

No, I am not advertising for Washington Mutual. I just wanted to let everyone know that I found the missing book! Yahhh! Actually Christian found it. I guess he found it under my bed. I had looked under there, but I guess not good enough. I wonder if this is a hint that I ought to clean under there? Hmmm.

The Holcomb Sisters

2008-07-13T21:41:00.000-07:00

Just before we moved to this house I had found my Holcomb Sisters CD. For some reason I couldn't find it for the longest time. I put it aside because I wanted to be able to listen to it. Somehow during the move I lost it again and hadn't been able to find it. I've really been wanting to listen to it too.

Well, I got a notice from the library that I had some overdue books. I quickly renewed them so they wouldn't rack up more of a debt; and then I went searching for them. I found all of them but one. As I was looking for this missing book I found my Holcomb Sister's CD! For some reason it was in a drawer of a table that we've only had since we moved to this house. Someone else must have found it a put it there without me knowing it. Anyway I'm glad I found it and I finally got to listen to it again!

Sadly, I still have not found the missing library book. I'm really running out of places to look. I can only renew it so many times before it just starts racking up dues. I really hope we find it before them. The ironic thing is that I got it for Christian to read and he never got to read it! I sure hope it turns up before then.

Christian's t-ball and Kindergarten Graduation

2008-07-11T21:59:00.000-07:00

Since it seems like I've been doing blogs about my different children I decided to dedicate this blog to Christian. As I was looking through my many pictures that I have yet to post about I came across the ones of of Christian's t-ball and Kindergarten graduation. I decided to put a picture of Christian on his first day of school. You guys can tell me if you think he looks older now. It seems to me he's grown a lot, but I'm not sure if you can really tell from the pictures or not. I do know that we've had to go buy him a whole new set of pants a couple of times this year because he's outgrown the ones he had. He's 6 and wears a size 8. Anyway, here he is on his first day of school (notice Anthony and Ruby with her beloved elephant).

Christian had such a nice teacher. She really did a good job. I tried to help out in the classroom fairly often; though towards the end of the year I didn't because of our move. It amazes me how a teacher can get that many children together that really don't know much and actually manage to teach them something! Christian knew the basics, like his ABC's, some letter sounds and how to write his name; and of course colors and shapes. Now he is really reading and knows all his letters sounds and can even write. At this stage they don't worry about spelling. The kids just write how they think the words sound. Anyway, I know that this is all normal Kindergarten stuff, but it still amazes me that she managed it! I can't imagine keeping a room full of almost 20 5 & 6 year olds under control, not to mention teaching them to read.

I didn't get very good pictures of his graduation, because I was kind of towards the back, and didn't want to leave my 3 other children to get a good picture, but here is one that turned out pretty good.

Here's Christian with his medal and Certificate from t-ball. He really likes his medal. I think they even had it personalized and each child has their own name on it.

Here's Christian playing outfield. This is one of the days when he forgot to bring his Mitt. There weren't very many kids that actually hit the ball this far; so Christian got pretty bored out there. I would try to remind him to pay attention so he could know what was going on. I took quite a few pictures of him messing around in the outfield.

Here he is playing catcher. It was his first time ever and I thought he did a pretty good job.

This was Christian's first year doing any kind of sport; so he really had no idea what he was doing when he started. He really showed improvement I thought. Towards the end of the season most of the time he could hit the ball coach pitch. The coach would give them 3 pitches and if they didn't hit it then they would use the t. He also started out not knowing at all how baseball was played, but he figured out the basics. They didn't score or anything so he didn't learn about outs, but I think it was a good first year. He seemed to enjoy it too, which is the main thing.

To me the whole reason to play sports is to enjoy it, learn team work and the positive interaction with your peers. I don't really like it when people take winning too seriously. I do believe you should try your best, but I know that people can get carried away. I hope that when we put our children in sports it is a positive influence in their lives. If it begins to have more of a bad affect on them, or if we get too carried away with it I hope the Lord will show us it is time to quit. Or maybe some of my fellow sisters will nicely point it out to me (hint, hint)

The Coast on the 4th

2008-07-10T11:02:00.000-07:00

Since Matt had the 4th of July off, and it happened to be on a Friday and we got a check in the mail that made it possible;we decided to spend the weekend at the Coast. It was a last minute decision. I called close to 20 Motels, most of them were full, or they were WAY beyond our price range. I actually managed to find one that was a reasonable price; so I jumped on it. We decided to pack up on Thursday and head to the coast right after church. We got to our Motel around 11; which wasn't too bad. For the price we got it for (especially it being 4th of July weekend) it was actually nicer than I expected. There were 2 queen beds in a separate room and then a hide-a-bed, dining area and kitchenette in another room. It was kind of old, and the bed wasn't real comfortable, but I was pretty pleased with what we got for the price. It was a nice enough place to call home for a couple of days. The kids did amazingly well settling down and we all slept pretty good. After having breakfast at a really nice restaurant (where we couldn't even finish all the food we ordered) we stopped at a toy store to get some sand toys and then headed to the beach.

These pictures are backwards. I always forget that you have to put them on your page in the opposite order of how you want them on your page. Well these pictures are of us making sandcastles after getting good and wet; so we are getting good and dirty! Christian wanted to make his castle with no help from anyone or any castle molds. Ruby had help from me. The reason their eyes are squinty is because the wind was blowing pretty hard and they kept getting sand in their faces. Spellcheck is telling me that squinty is not a word, but I'm going to use it anyway!

We were all so dirty after playing in the water and sand that we didn't want to sit in a restaurant; so we ordered pizza and all took showers and then tried to take a nap. That didn't go over too well. It's hard for kids to sleep in that close of quarters; especially when its still daylight outside. I guess we got to rest anyway.

This is the only picture I have of Matt. Isn't that awful! I guess he was taking most of the other pictures.

Christian and Ruby in their soaking wet clothes. I wasn't going to let them get that wet. Just wade around a little, but the water was amazingly warm for the Oregon Coast and they fell in a few times; so I gave up.

Even though Garrison fell a few times and got a little scared; he always got back up and ran with a huge grin on his face to meet the next wave!

Here's Anthony having fun.

Here's me with all the kids except Garrison.

After our showers and resting time we went to a Chinese restaurant. Our kids actually really like Chinese food, mostly the sweet and sour. There were going to be fireworks on the beach about 3 miles from where we were. We were told we could see them from the beach at the town we were at rather than going to the really crowded beach 3 miles away; so we took the sand toys down to the beach again and let the kids play until fireworks time. This time I didn't let them play in the water; so they wouldn't get quite so dirty. There were a lot of people setting off their own fireworks; so we got to see them. A lot of them looked like illegal fireworks. Their were quite a few people on the beach, but not nearly as crowded as the other beach would have been. there were a lot of bonfires on the beach. Some people even shared theirs with us. That was nice. The bad thing about the fires is it was still windy; so if you were downwind from any of them (which we were) it was very smoky. The big fireworks show was disappointing because we could just barely see it. I don't even know if the kids even really noticed it. But they had fun playing in the sand and watching everyone Else's fireworks; so it wasn't a huge disappointment. We had bought some sparklers, but it was just too windy on the beach. we did those a couple of nights later at home.

The kids were so worn out that they went to sleep pretty easy. The next morning we worked on packing up. There was a watermelon that we had cut into the day before and we ate that for breakfast. We had intended to buy breakfast, but it was so late by the time we got out of the Motel it was so late that we just got lunch. Since you have to eat seafood at least once when you go to the coast that's what we had for lunch. We walked around in the shops for a little while. We bought the kids each a silly hat, but sorry, no pictures! There was a carousel in one of the shopping centers; so we all rode on it. It was fun. The kids threw such fits when we had to get off that we figured they were tuckered out and it was time to go home.

Looking back I see that I have rambled on a lot, but now you have all the details of our fun weekend. It was nice to get away and have fun as a family.

Good bye Elephant

2008-07-03T13:57:00.000-07:00

When Neena brought to my attention that my sidebar needed to be updated I noticed the picture of Ruby with her elephant. I've been meaning to post about this, but never had.

Here is the story of Ruby and her elephant:

Ruby was probably our worst baby ever. This is probably a horrible thing to say; but it's very true. Maybe she was colicky; I don't know, but she cried a lot. I had a hard time calming her down when she got upset. She did not like to be cuddled; so I couldn't rock her to sleep. Sometimes I literally spent hours trying to get her to go to sleep. Then there were nights she would wake up screaming and it didn't seem like there was anything I could do for her.

One evening we were doing our grocery shopping at Winco and Ruby was starting in on one of her screaming fits and we still hadn't finisher our shopping yet. We passed the stuffed animal section and I snatched a soft and comfy looking elephant. It was grey with a ribbon around it's neck and tusks and had that mixture of loose stuffing and beans. At the time it was probably about as big as her. I think she was somewhere around 10 months at the time. When I gave her the elephant she stopped her fit and was good for the rest of our shopping experience. It was love at first sight! From then on she slept with her elephant every night and she took it everywhere with her.

As a baby she would suck on the tusks when she was sleepy. When she got too old for that she would just rub the tusks with her hands; sometimes I would catch her making a sucking movement with her mouth as she did this. Through the years, the many trips it took, the washings it got and from much loving it became very wore out. She still loved it though. It reminded me of the velveteen rabbit. It's ribbon got lost somewhere along the way; and it's fur wasn't its original silky softness, but she loved it all the same.

There were times she would leave it somewhere and we would have to turn around and go get it. There were a few times as she got older that she would leave it and wouldn't miss it for awhile; but most of the time she took it everywhere with her.

Well, we took it with us to go to Brewster camp out this year. We made a lot of stops along the way, of course. The last stop we made was in Omak to get groceries for the weekend. We really couldn't quite remember if that was the last place we saw the elephant or not; but we were pretty sure Ruby took it in with her. Sometimes we remembered to tell her to leave her elephant in the van so she wouldn't lose it; this time we forgot. It was pretty late and we were quite a ways out of Omak when Ruby realized she didn't have her elephant. This time we didn't turn around (I almost wish we had). We weren't even definitely sure she had it in Wal-Mart and we were already going to be getting in so late. We did call Wal-Mart, but they hadn't found it yet. When we got to the camp out we looked in the van really good, but no elephant. We stopped at Wal-Mart on our way home, but it had not been found. We stopped at a few other places that we remembered stopping at, but nobody had seen Ruby's elephant. It was so tattered and worn that someone who found it might have just thrown it out, not knowing that it was such a special thing to a little 4 year old girl.

I realize it was probably getting to be time to ween Ruby of her elephant; but she loved it so much that I wanted to be able to keep it for her to have when she had children of her own. I really feel sad that she lost it. This may seem kind of silly, but I even have a small hope that somehow God will allow us to find it so that Ruby can keep her beloved elephant. It wasn't even a toy to her. She very rarely played with it. Sometimes she would say that elephant was hungry or tired; but most of the time elephant was just a comforting companion for her.

She's doing fine without elephant, but she still sometimes tells me that she wishes she had elephant. We really do miss that poor old elephant. I'm going to post some pictures that I have of Ruby with her elephant. Most of the time we made her put the elephant down, but we have a few. Now I wish I would have taken more of her with it as a baby.

Elephant at Uncle Brian and Aunt Michelle's house

Elephant at Dennis and Trina's house

Elephant at the pumkin patch

Elephant at the airport.

Anthony, my 3 year old organizer

2008-07-02T10:16:00.000-07:00

I finally got all my pictures edited! Yah! And because of my near scare with Anthony yesterday I decided to make my first picture post of him. Anthony has this little quirk. I'm not sure what it means, but I'm sure he's destined for great things because of it! He likes to take things such as crackers, chips, sticks; anything really, and organize them into shapes and patterns. When we give him fruit snacks in church he does eventually eat them, but first he puts them out in a line and makes different shapes and patterns with them as he eats them one by one.

This first picture is just a funny picture he wanted me to take.

The other day Matt gave Anthony a handful of trail mix. Here he is lining his p-nuts out in rows. You can see the raisins off to the side waiting for their turn. It just amazes me how he always does this. I haven't figured out yet what he's destined to be, but I know with a tendency like this there's some wonderful thing he will grow up to be!

I didn't get a picture of it, but just a day or two after these pictures were taken I had given him a back of carrot sticks. He had them fanned out like a flower on the bar stool. He told me that it was fire. I just wanted to share with you about my special boy!

Looking for the One

2008-07-02T09:21:00.000-07:00

I had quite a scare yesterday...

There's a park here in town that has activities for kids and then free lunches. I try to take the kids every once in awhile. It's also right by a library. Yesterday I took the kids to the library and then I let them play on the playground until lunch time. There are, of course tons of kids milling around.

When it was getting time to round up the kids for lunch I could not find Anthony. I looked all over the playground, and then I went to the area where they were doing activities and couldn't find him. Then I thought that maybe he had saw all the people starting to line up for lunch and decided to join them. I looked over there and still no Anthony. At this point I was really starting to worry. At this point I decided to get some help; so I talked to the lady who was in charge of the activities and lunch. I gave her a description of Anthony and she announced it on a bullhorn she has. It just so happened that today there were some Firemen there to help pass out the lunches and I talked to them and they all fanned out looking for him. I was really getting upset. It was a horrible feeling! I was afraid that someone saw him wander off and taken him. It wasn't too long and they found him at the craft shelter making a craft (I had looked there, but either I hadn't seen him in all the other kids, or he had shown up after I looked). I was so relieved to have him found that I lifted him up in my arms and cried. I was so thankful! You can believe that I will be keeping a closer eye on all my kids next time I go to the park with them.

There are two things that I really thought about through this. I thought about all the other people who have went through losing their child. Only there are so many who never find them. I only got a small taste of what they have to go through. It really made me more aware of what they go through.

Another thing that happened was I had told the kids that I was gathering them up to get in line for lunch, but when I couldn't find Anthony I told them we weren't eating lunch until he was found (of course!). In their little minds they just knew that they were hungry. I told them that finding Anthony was the most important thing right then. Ruby told me that when I said that, it made her feel like maybe she wasn't important. I told her that if she was missing then finding her would be the most important thing.

It wasn't until later when the excitement had died down for me that I thought of the parable about the one sheep that was lost and how the Shepherd left the ninety-nine to go and look for it. That was how I felt. It wasn't like I didn't care about my other children, but I knew they were safe; so all my focus was on looking for the one. I didn't leave my other children, of course, but the message is the same. It really made me think about how the Lord feels when we are lost. He must be devastated. I know when we hear or know brethren that have strayed and we are sad about it; but that cannot compare to how the Lord feels. Also, if they never come back we begin to forget about them, or at least only think about them every once in awhile. If I had not found Anthony I can't imagine that I would ever stop thinking about him and hoping and wishing that we could find him again.

I then thought about if one of my siblings got lost and was never found I would still want to find them; and would keep trying to get them back. It wouldn't be the same as what a Mother or Father would feel, but I would still be working to get them back. I think in the Faith too many times I look at those who have strayed as hopeless, or that I really can't do anything. Or sometimes I think that if they really wanted to come back they know where to find us, they could come back on their own. That's not to say I don't feel sad and wished that those I know would come back to the Faith. What I'm trying to say is I really don't do anything to try to help them find their way again. The brethren are my family. They are all my Sisters, Brothers, Mothers, Fathers. If they are lost I should be looking for ways to help them come back; because that's what I would do for my real Sisters, Brothers, Mothers and Fathers.

I'm not glad that I lost Anthony for that small amount of time, but I'm glad for the lessons to be learned through the experience. I know this was a really small thing, and the bad part didn't really last that long; but so many times when we go through bad things it seems like there are important messages that God wants us to learn. I only hope I truly learn them and follow them; so I don't have to go through a similar experience again.

Life Long Friends

2008-06-24T23:44:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we went to Ashley and Bodie's wedding. It was a beautiful wedding and I'm very glad I went. I would write up all the details; but I'm sure others already have or will. Sorry, I haven't read any blogs lately.

One of the reasons I was so glad to have gone was because there was a lot of brethren there that I hadn't seen in awhile and it was so good to see them. I only wish that I could have more time to visit with everyone. After seeing everyone I've really been thinking about how many good friendships I have with so many brethren. There's the one's my age that I grew up with and even the older ones that I can really say are my friends. Even if I don't see them very often I know that when I see them again our friendship will still be the same. I guess maybe not the same because as we grow and mature our friendships do too, but I know that there are so many brethren that will always be my friend. I have so many life-long friends that I can't even begin to count them. I am really blessed.

I thought about in the world it seems like most people are doing good if they can hold onto just a few friends their whole life. Me I'm surrounded by a whole network of friends that I know will always be there for me. It's really been a wonderful thing to think about these last few days.

So, for all my blogging buddies and all my other many wonderful friends; Thanks so much for your friendship! It really is a gift from God to be treasured.

On another note:
The memory card on my camera actually got full! So I was forced to take the time to download all my pics. It really is a huge amount of pictures and I've been slowly working on categorizing them and editing them; so as soon as I'm done I plan to make some posts with pics! I still don't have any pictures of my house because it doesn't seem done enough to take picures of. Sorry! I might try to at least take a picture of the outside. Also, I'm sorry I haven't taken the time to read everyone's blog. Hopefully someday soon I'll take the time to catch up with everyone and you'll be getting some comments from me!

Explosion at Work

2008-06-12T15:13:00.000-07:00

Here I am posting twice in one day! Wow!

I just talked to Matt on the phone, and I guess there was a major accident on the job today. I may not have the story exactly right, but he said one of the workers were drilling and somehow drilled into the major power line. Matt said he was on the 9th floor working on a patio when it happened and he saw the explosion reflected in the building across from him. I guess the man that did it is still alive, but Matt said he saw him, and he looked horrible. It sounds like there were a lot of workers who were treated with smoke inhalation. I don't know if Bro. Dennis was actually treated, but Matt said he had smoke inhalation. Matt said that there were a lot of fire trucks and emergency vehicles, and of course News Camera's.

Matt's not home yet. They stopped work of course, but asked the workers to stay. I know this accident will have a definite affect on the job; but I'm not sure exactly what. I'm sure Bro. Dennis could use prayers because as a Superintendent he will probably have to deal with a lot of the stress from it. I'm Thankful that him and Matt are ok. I feel so bad for the guy that got hurt, but I'm glad that it sounds like there weren't more with serious injuries. I'm going to try to see if I can possibly find a link to a News Broadcasting about the accident and then I'll post it.

After Matt got home today he told me that the guy that got hurt was chipping on the concrete; which is actually a loborer's job (which Matt is). The man that was doing the work was a carpenter. The work also legally required the use of a resperator, and Matt says he is the only one on the job who has a resperator; and has the training required to use it. It sounds like for whatever reason they probably wouldn't have (and obviously didn't) asked Matt to do the work; but basically Matt should have been the one that was down there chipping away above the power line. I do still feel very bad for the guy that did get hurt, but I'm thankful that it wasn't my husband.

I also searched online for a News video of the accident. I only found one. I really thought there would be more, but here is the link to it: http://www.katu.com/news/local/19872799.html?video=YHI&t=a

My Horrible Dream

2008-06-12T14:24:00.000-07:00

I had a really bad dream last night...

In my dream I was driving in the van with Anthony and Garrison. I was going to some sort of fair or farmers market and I was having a hard time finding a parking spot. I finally came to this dead end street that was fairly close to where I wanted to be; there were no marked parking spots, but there were other cars parked there so I figured it was ok. Kind of around the dead end there was water. In some spots there were big rocks blocking the way, but the area that had room for parking was right on the edge of the water. I just figured the water wasn't very deep. I started backing in. I tried to hit the breaks before I got to far, but the van started rolling into the water. Only a few feet in there was a huge drop off. I tried to stop the van, but I couldn't. In my dream I must have blacked out or something because I woke up and there was no water in the van, but the sides of the van were actually bowed in because of the water pressure. I knew that it wouldn't be long before the van would be filled with water; and even though it seemed impossible I was going to try to get my children out of there. I started to unbuckle them. I remember they put their little arms around me with such trust because they felt like Mommy would take care of them. I knew the minute I opened the van door a wall of water would hit us with full force, and because of how much pressure the van had on it we must be down really far. I, of course was praying to God to help us to somehow get out of the situation safely, but realistically I didn't really think it was possible and here my little children had such faith in me. That's when I woke up.

Even though it was just a dream it really shook me up and I couldn't go back to sleep for quite awhile. I thought of how trusting my little children were that Mommy would make everything ok; when it was Mommy who had gotten them into the situation in the first place. I really shouldn't have tried to park in such a place. And there I was praying to God to get me out of the horrible situation that I had gotten us into.

I thought about how in real life our children look to us for guidance. They may not consciously think it, but they expect Mommy to take care of them and be the right example and make the right choices in their lives. If I'm completely honest with myself I know that I'm not living the Faith to the best of my ability. In the dream I knew that parking spot was not the smartest choice, but it was the easiest; and I really didn't think it was THAT bad. There's a Bible verse, I don't know If I'm quoting it exactly, but it says: "Pay a more earnest head to that which you have heard, lest at any time you should let them slip". I am, knowingly, letting things slip because I try to tell myself it's not THAT big of a deal. I'm not doing any horribly bad things, but I know I'm not trying as hard as I can; I'm trying to be lazy about living the Faith and taking the easy way. I believe that God sent me this dream to remind me that in taking the easy way I might go too far before I can stop myself, and endanger my soul and those of my children.

As I lay awake after the dream I thought of all the regrets I would have if my life ended. All the things I knew I could have done better.

I'm glad that God sent me this "wake-up call". I really need your prayers that I could really get in there and live the faith the way I know I should be. I'm afraid that if my children continue to live with a mother who doesn't live the way she really should, that they will never grow up to live the Faith the way they should; or possibly never live the Faith at all

Telling My Secret

2008-06-02T09:34:00.002-07:00

Well, I never can seem to keep this kind of news to myself for very long...

I'm pregnant with baby number 5! I have to admit that at first I wasn't too thrilled, but it didn't take me very long at all to get excited about the news and want to start telling everyone about it! I'm not very far along. According to my calculations I should be due in January sometime. As soon as I find which box my calendar is in I will call Sis. Cindy and have a more exact date to tell everyone.

All of my other children have been about a year and a half apart. When this baby is born Garrison will be close to being 2 1/2; which is a pretty good space. Usually at this point I'm still in panic mode wondering how in the world I'm going to handle yet another baby; but I feel more ready this time. I'm really looking forward to having another tiny little baby to love and hold! I know life will be more stressful and I do need prayers that we can be the kind of home that God wants us to be. That we can raise these children that he has given us the way that he would want us to.

I never did get back to my pre-Garrison weight, which is kind of a bummer; so I'm hoping I can maintain my pregnancy weight better than I usually do. I, of course have been trying not to think of labor too much at this point. I always pray mightily while I'm pregnant that the Lord will get me through the hard part, and he always has; for that I am very thankful. For now I will just concentrate on thoughts of adorable babies and on restocking my supply of maternity clothes and baby stuff; because, stupid me, got rid of it all! I think a lot of it I gave to my sister Alicia and she has saved it and will loan it back to me.

Well, that is my great big news for today! Sorry still no pictures. Life has been crazy, but I'm hoping it will slow down soon.

A Quick Note

2008-05-13T09:10:00.000-07:00

We don't have Internet yet at out new house. It's one of the things on my list to take care of. We still have out computer set up here at out old house until we get Internet in the new one. I'm taking care of some things here today; so I thought I'd type up a quick update for all of you.

Saturday a lot of the menfolk from church, and even one guy Matt works with, came to help move all the big stuff. It was such a big help having all of them get all of that done. Our new house is starting to look like we live in it now. Matt still hasn't put all the kids' beds together and there's still a lot of boxes for me to unpack; but I really like the new house. It's really coming together and I have some neat ideas for it! Last night I made a fire in the fireplace. It felt nice to take some time to sit back and enjoy it all. There's probably only enough firewood to do that a few times, but the cold season is really coming to an end (I hope); but I would like to get some firewood for next year. I love having a fireplace (except if one of the kids gets burned) and it will save on the heating bill if we can burn the wood instead of use the heat. Sorry, still no pictures; but my life is so busy right now, it's crazy! We made plans to have a singing at our house this Saturday. I thought that would motivate me to get everything ready. I'm going to be very busy, but I'm looking forward to having everyone in my new home!

The old house still has a few things in it that I need to take to the new house. We have until the end of the month to get completely moved out and get the place cleaned up. Today I'm emailing our property management people because we can't get out dryer to work and then I'm going to stuff things in the van and take it to the new house. Well, I better go, so I can get started!

I just did spell-check, I didn't know that Internet had to be capitalized?? That's interesting.

Finally Posting Again!

2008-05-05T10:56:00.000-07:00

Here I am finally posting again. It has been so long since I caught up in the blogging world. I've been reading people's blogs and it had been so long that I had to connect to the older blogs to see all the ones I had missed. I'm still not done reading everyone's blog, but I will get to it eventually. It was nice to catch up. I decided I better put a new post of my own. There's been a lot going on.

We took the kids to the zoo a few weeks ago, but I never posted about it because I wanted to post pictures and I haven't downloaded the pictures off my camera yet.

Matt and I took a much needed vacation for our 7th Anniversary (which is actually today) I will post more about it when I stop procrastinating the picture thing.

Here's the news that I feel like I will make a full length blog about (though I'm going to try to make it short because I have a lot to do)...

We are going to be moving again!!! We aren't moving to a different assembly, but our lease runs out on this house this month, so we applied for a different house and got approved! I'm not looking forward to the hassle of moving and having to get situated in a new house. It took me 6 months to feel like I was completely done moving into this house! Anyway, I am excited about this house! For some reason I'm really into houses and different floor plans. This house has some neat little quirks that makes it different and I think I'm going to like them.

I really feel like God blessed us with this house. When I got the application for the home, they said that their policy was to only accept applicants who's monthly bills were 65% or less of their monthly income. Ours is more than that, but we always pay our bills and house payment. I thought about not even applying because if we didn't get approved there was a nonrefundable application fee of $90. We decided to apply though because we liked the house so much and it was such a good deal.

The house we live in now is a great neighborhood, but it's a development neighborhood; so the houses are very close together, and we don't have much of a yard and there's really not parking for company. When we have company either us or them have to park a few blocks away. This new house we will be moving in has a decent sized yard and plenty of parking. It is in a more established neighborhood; so there are nice tall trees and the houses are more spread out. Even though its still in the city it has a more small town feel to it. The house is a little closer to the "main drag", which Matt wanted for commuting to work every day. It's also a 4 bedroom instead of 3 and 700 sq. foot more! All for only $55 more a month than we are paying now.

We are supposed to sign the lease and get the keys on Wednesday, and we're hoping to do most of the moving of the big stuff on Saturday. I'm still trying to decide if I'm going to try to drive Christian to school for the rest of the school year since we'll be moving to a new area, or if I should just pull him out of school for the rest of the year. He's only in Kindergarten and there will only be a few more weeks of school anyway. What do all of you think?

I will try to post pictures when I put new batteries in my camera and get back to the house to take the pictures and stop putting off loading the pictures onto my computer.

Tomorrow the property management people for this house will be showing it; so today I'll be busy getting my house ready for that.

I'm sure this will prove to be a very busy week. My mom was so nice to me and has come to spend the week with me to help me get ready for everything. Thanks Mom!

The Ice Cream Adventure

2008-04-14T20:04:00.000-07:00

The other evening, I think it might have been on our way home from church, Matt had this bright idea to stop at McDonald's and get the kids each a kiddy cone to enjoy on our way home. We wondered why they charged us a dollar for each of these and then we got up to the window they handed us full sized cones for our kids! AAAHHH! We were expecting the little tiny ones that were only a couple of inches long that an adult could eat in 2 bites. Anyway, I was worried about what a disaster this would make of my already messy van; but what could we do? We gave them their cones and they enjoyed them. The mess they made actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. After awhile I noticed Garrison had turned his cone upside down and had taken a couple good sized bites out of the bottom of his cone! I thought it was pretty funny; so I got my camera out and took a couple of pictures.

I couldn't get a good shot of Christian. They sure appreciated their daddy that night!

The Brave Little Squirrel

2008-04-14T19:52:00.000-07:00

The other day I took the kids to the park to play. As they were playing I noticed this little squirrel who was going around the play area scavenging for food. I was really amazed at how close to the kids he would go. Of course I whipped my camera out and found some old pieces of food from our van. (It was horribly messy, but yesterday it got a total detail job done thanks to my wonderful husband!!) Anyway, I threw these treasures out to him and I tried to get the kids to sit quietly to see how close he would come to us. Maybe if I hadn't had the kids with me I could have gotten him to eat out of my hand; but the kids couldn't sit quite still enough for that. They did pretty well and he got within a foot or two of us. Here are some pictures I took. It made our little excursion to the park that much more special.

A Great Day

2008-04-13T19:26:00.000-07:00

Today was a really good day.

We had a very good meeting. Bro. Marshal & Sis. Connie were visiting and after church we all went to a nearby park and had a picnic. We all visited and ate while the kids played. It was a really good time. I kept thinking in my mind "this is what it's all about". The fellowship of the brethren is wonderful.

Here are a few of the points in meeting that really came to me. I even stood up and asked the brethren to pray for me that I could actually take it home and improve my life with what I heard today. So many times I think what a great meeting, but it seems like it's not very often that I go home and really try to put what I heard to good use. Anyway here's what I heard...

We heard about building your house on the solid rock. I remembered a prophesy I got once that told me to build my house on the solid rock. When looking at my life I can see where I've let that rock become sand and I need to get back to the strength of the rock. Close to the beginning of meeting Matt had a song book open to "Honey in the Rock". I was reading the words, but didn't feel to start it; and he never started it either; but as I was reading the words it really got me to thinking about how the Rock of God is not some horrible set of rules that we have to follow to make our lives hard and boring, but there is such sweetness that comes when your house is truly built on the rock. I would like to partake of that sweetness again. It seems like I've let so many things muddy the waters I guess you might say that I don't have the peace, joy, comfort etc. that I should have.

Bro. Rusty got up and read the 12th Chapter of Romans. I was actually out with my baby, but there were some things that he said that really jumped out at me; so I found the scripture later and read it to myself.

"And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God."

I would like to renew my mind that I through my life can prove the perfect will of God.

"Be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love; in honour preferring one another;
Not slothful in business; fervent in the Spirit; serving the Lord:
Rejoicing in hope; patient in tribulation; continuing instant in prayer;
Distributing to the necessity of saints; given to hospitality."

There's so much in there that I need to work on. I've really been slothful and not fervent in the spirit. I need to rejoice in the hope that God gives us and patient with my little trials (which aren't much of anything really) I need to pray more. It needs to be something that I do instantly without even thinking about it. I need to look more to the needs of my brethren and invite them over more and visit them more.

"Recompense to no man evil for evil. Provide things honest in the sight of all men.
If it be possible, as much as lieth within you, live peaceably with all men."

There's so many times that I wonder if people that know I'm a Christian look at my life and see the ways where I'm not doing things like I should and think I'm a hypocrite.

Anyway, I was very glad for the day we had today; and I really, really want to act on the instruction that I received today.

Also, there's been a scripture that a read a while back that I've thought about a lot. It's the 9th and 10th verse of the 12th chapter of 2nd Corinthians:

"And he said unto me, "my grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness." Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong."

Sometimes when I reach my weakest points, where I see what a failure I've become; it's easy to be even more discouraged and down on myself; but I feel like this scripture is telling me that when we are weak it makes us realize our need for God's strength more. If I was never weak it would be easy for me to become puffed up and think I'm really something, but the times that I'm weak makes me realize that the only strength I have is from the Lord. Because when I'm left to my own devices I can really mess things up.

It seems like we hear a lot about rejoicing in tribulation so that we can become stronger, but what I noticed in this piece of scripture is the word necessities. I guess when trials come our way we know that we need to be strong to get through them with God's help; but I think what gets me down the most often is the necessities of life. The boring day to day stuff that can really grind on you. I need to take pleasure in the dirty diapers, the whiny kids, dirty dishes, laundry and all that other stuff that I'm sure you all know about. I can remember when I did take pleasure in these things because I was so happy that God blessed me with a husband and a home and then children to take care of. I'm still happy that God has blessed me, but I don't take pleasure in these things like I should.

Anyway, I've kind of went on and on and I have laundry, dishes, vacuuming, etc to do...

So, onward I go, trying to take pleasure in these necessities!

Rascal Flatts Concert!!

2008-04-05T11:37:00.000-07:00

Last night Matt and I went to a Rascal Flatts concert. I had never been to a real concert before so it was a new experience for me! It was really great! It had been awhile since Matt and I had went out by ourselves. It was a very nice evening. Sis. Marisela's girls stayed with out munchkins while we were gone.

Taylor Swift opened the concert. She was really good. I like her songs and admire how good she does at such a young age. The crowd LOVED her! She really interacted with everyone good and got us all pumped. Since I had never been to a concert I didn't realize that the greatness of Taylor Swift's part of the concert was just a small taste of the main act.

I want to rewind for a minute. When we bought our tickets I'm pretty sure the ad on Craigslist said that the seats were on row 214. In this Colosseum there is the floor (where the basketball would be in a ball game) and then there's the 100 row, then 200, then 300. So we thought the 200 row wouldn't be too bad. When we got to the concert and the people were helping us find our seats our tickets said section 114, row D! So our seats were on the bottom row (not counting the floor) only the 4th row back. So we ended up having way better seats than we thought we did! The stage was on one end of the floor, and we were close to the other end, but we could see pretty good. Right in front of us in the middle of the floor though was what looked like a small round stage, but it was not connected to the other stage.

When Rascal Flatts started there was of course some awesome effects, smoke, firework type things and all kinds of lighting effects. Their band was on the stage with a huge screen behind them that showed music videos and other effects throughout the whole show. Anyway, Rascal Flatts rose up out of that round stage that was right in front of us! It was so cool! When they were ready to go to the main stage there was a bridge type thing that came down and connected to the main stage. They spent about half of the concert on that stage right in front of us; so that was really awesome!

The reason I wanted to go to a Rascal Flatts concert is because I love how they sound, but they seem like good people. Their songs are, for the most part, morally good and true. The way society is these days it's nice when a group like this comes along who can hold to good values and not be afraid to sing about God and whats good and right. And they're still very popular! Of course I don't know them personally, so they might be horrible people in real life, but I like their songs! I really liked the way the talked to the audience like they were normal people just like us.

Here were some highlights of the evening:

* Matt and I road the Max to and from the concert so we wouldn't have to deal with parking and traffic. We've lived here for almost a year and hadn't rode it yet. It was a neat experience. It was nice to just be able to relax instead of dealing with traffic. Now we definitely want to take the kids sometime. They would love the train ride!

* When Taylor Swift was on stage she did this drumming battle type thing with a woman band member. The really cool thing is they were playing on metal trash cans!

* During the break in between concerts we watched these guys climb up these cloth ladder things up to the lights hanging from the ceiling. They sat up there throughout the show working the lights. It seemed like there wasn't much between them and falling to the floor. Matt and I discussed how much they must get paid to do that. Matt said he thought maybe $30 an hour. I think it would need to be more than that. I'm thinking I might be too much of a scaredy cat even if they paid me lots of money!

* During one song the lead singer of Rascal Flatts picked up a little girl out of the crowd and brought her on stage with him for awhile. I was imagining what a wonderful moment he made for her!

* One of the last songs they sang was "He Ain't the Leavin' Kind", which is about how God doesn't leave us. During the song he had some men from the Marine Corp standing on stage fully decked out in their uniforms standing to attention. I'm not really into the military, but I thought it was a nice patriotic thing to do.

* Another cool thing is there was a few songs they sang which weren't country songs at all, like "I Feel Good" and "American Woman."

* Also during Taylor Swift's concert she introduced each band members and they each played a solo for us. They were very good. During Rascal Flatts concert their guitar player and fiddle player each played a really awesome solo. It was really cool.

I know I've kind of went on and on, and there's probably even more I can tell you, but the bottom line is I really, really, really enjoyed my evening out!

The next concert I want to go to: Josh Turner, because he has an awesome voice; and he seems like he has good moral values also.

Back to Work!!!

2008-03-30T22:13:00.000-07:00

Well, Matt got a call on Friday from the Union and he's supposed to start work on Monday!

He got called on a one day job a week and a half ago. The general foreman was really impressed with him and told him that if he had a full time laborer's position come up that he would ask for Matt. Anyway, it sounds like this is a full-time thing. The guy that called him from the Union said that Morgan (that's the company that Matt will be working for) has a lot of work lined up. So we are super excited! Matt will know more tomorrow when he goes to work, but I really think it's all going to work out.

Really he was only off for 3 weeks; which isn't bad at all, but since we didn't know how long it would be before he got called out it made it hard. It was kind of nice having him around all day, helping around the house and with the kids, but we are very glad that he's going back to work tomorrow!

God has really taken care of us. I'm so thankful. I'll have to post again and let you know how it's going.

My Young Shaver

2008-03-24T16:24:00.000-07:00

We went to Brian & Michelle's house for Easter. After playing all day with his cousins Anthony was taking a bath with Garrison. When I went to check on them I noticed little bunches of hair floating in the water. Anthony had found some shavers and had done some art on his head. I didn't notice any damage done to Garrison. I was amazed and very thankful that neither one of them got hurt. I will have to remember to check for things like that before putting my kids in the bathtub. Later that night I did notice a spot on Garrison's head that was irritated and there was a little bit of hair missing, but it wasn't very noticeable. Here is a picture of the damage:

Today Matt took Anthony in the garage to fix the damage done. He came back in the house looking like this:

This haircut was inspired by Uncle Brian and Bro. Derick.

Thankfully Matt was not really done, but wanted to see my reaction. I don't have a picture of the real haircut, but it's basically buzzed all the way around; except that Matt left a Little tail in the back. I really don't like the tail, but it is better than the above picture. Maybe that was his whole purpose in showing me this haircut, so that the tail wouldn't seem so bad in comparison. Someday when Matt's not around maybe I'll cut the tail off, but I can put up with it for a little while. I might post pictures of the final job someday. I was thinking that Anthony was needing a haircut, but I wasn't thinking this drastic; just a little touch up.

Anyway, I'm thankful that my boys were OK and didn't get hurt. It's nice that God watches over my children when I'm busy elsewhere.

Traveling Memory

2008-03-22T10:52:00.000-07:00

When we were traveling through the mountains yesterday we came upon an accident. It was a good thing there were flares set out or we probably would have hit the car. This car was on its side in our lane. We had to move into the passing lane to miss it. As I said in my last blog our trip took longer, but I'm glad we were far enough behind that were weren't in that accident, or come up on it before flares were set out. After passing the accident I was reminded of a trip I took when I was 12 with my Uncle Gene and Aunt Nadine.

They took me and my sisters with them and their 2 daughters that were our age on a trip through Washington. We went to quite a few different assemblies, and I know there were a lot of things on that trip that helped strengthen my belief in God and my Love for the Brethren; but there is one memory from that trips that really sticks out the most.

It's been a long time ago, but I think we were on our way to Prosser. We were driving on a kind of curvy mountain road when we decided to stop at a viewpoint and look around and read the sign. As we pulled off a van full of people went past us and around the next curve. After looking around for awhile we got back in our van and got back on the road. When we went around the next curve, there was the van that had passed us upside down on the road. Somehow they had lost control and ended up flipping. We stopped to see if they needed help, but they were all OK. As we continued on the road we all marveled at how God had kept us from being in that accident with them because someone would have been hurt for sure then.

The next meeting we sat in was in Spokane. I wasn't in the faith yet, but I know my sisters were and maybe even my cousins I don't remember. I remember thinking all through church about how someone should testify about our near miss, but they never did. I really wanted to tell people about it myself, but I knew I couldn't because I wasn't in the faith yet. I remember that some of my family got up in church, but never mentioned that incident.

After church Uncle Gene said that he thought there was something I wanted to tell everybody. I hadn't even told him how I wanted to tell the brethren about what had happened to us (or what hadn't happened to us). So God had revealed my desire to tell the story to my Uncle Gene and I was able to share with the brethren how God had protected us.

Now the reason I remember this story is not because God protected us on the roads. I know there's been a lot of times that God has protected me on the road and I don't remember it so vividly. What makes it such a wonderful memory for me is that God looked into the heart of a 12 year old and saw what I desired to do and revealed it to someone else. This is one of my many wonderful memories of God's goodness to me.

Cloud Gazing

2008-03-21T22:54:00.001-07:00

Today we left to go to Brian and Michelle's for Easter. It took us WAY too long to get there. I don't know why, but it seems like it always takes us longer to get somewhere than it should. I'm sure it has something to do with having 4 small children. Anyway, considering how long the trip seemed to take us, I was pleasantly surprised how well the drive went. The kids didn't fight too much and we actually enjoyed the time spent in the van together.

One of the things we did was cloud gazing. The kids and I would tell each other what we "saw" in the clouds. The clouds were just the right kind to find all kinds of neat things. I thought about taking pictures, but by the time I thought of it, it was starting to get dark. We saw fish, pencils, angels, monsters, people, faces, etc. It was a very fun time. My favorite things were when Ruby said she saw a body cut up in pieces and Christian saw an elephant that didn't look like an elephant. Kid's are so funny sometimes! I was very thankful that the too long trip here went well.

Another cute thing that Ruby said on her way here: She asked me if I knew why it was raining before we left. I told her I didn't. She said that God was wanting us to pack up to go to Dale's house. She said the sun started shining after we left because God was happy that we were going to Dale's house.

Anyway, there's a few more tidbits from the life of Tisha

Humerous Tidbits

2008-03-21T10:38:00.000-07:00

Matt and I have started getting the paper and there's a small section called the edge that has some pretty funny stuff in it. Some of it is a little too risque', but there were a few things that I thought I would post to give you all a little chuckle...

In Nanching, China, a young man, wanting to impress a woman he'd been set up on a date with, stole a motorcycle form in front of a supermarket, then drove it to pick up his date the following evening. When he arrived, the woman was furious because, as it turned out, the motorcycle he'd stolen belonged to her.

Percentage of Americans who Google themselves: 33 (Matt and I have done it)

Rank of "God" among the top Google searches beginning with "who is": 1
Rank of "Satan": 10
Rank of "Buckethead": 6

Amount of time it takes blood to circulate in your body: 23 seconds
Amount of money Exxon Mobil makes every time your blood circulates: $28,000

Number of new blogs that were created in the time it took you to read this sentence: 5

Just for a little bit of news about what I'm doing right now. I'm sitting here eating scrambled eggs and toast. I put mushrooms, ham, cheese and cilantro in my eggs and it is soooo good. I love cilantro and as I was trying to decide what I wanted in my eggs I had the brainstorm to use cilantro. It is REALLY good. You all ought to try it sometime!

Re-breaking the Littlest Member

2008-03-14T15:34:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago I broke my baby toe. I don't believe I blogged about it though. I know it broke because I actually heard a snap and it hurt really bad for a few days; then the pain lessened. That was the third time I had broke one of my baby toes. Every time I do it I'm reminded of the scripture about the littlest member. It is amazing what a difference breaking a baby toe makes.

Well recently my toe was feeling like it was almost healed. It still hurt when it got squeezed, or something like that, but I could basically go about like normal. So this morning I was going about like normal with no shoes on~! When somehow my toe collided with my shoe (the one that should have been on my foot). I had actually done something like this already, but it only hurt worse for a little while. Well, it feels like I have re broke my poor toe and the mending process will have to start all over again. AAARRRGGGG!!!!

My dear darling husband doesn't have much sympathy. He says I need to learn to wear shoes instead of going around bare foot all the time. It really is my own stupid fault, but it still hurts!!!!!

The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

2008-03-14T09:07:00.000-07:00

I've had some bad news to share with everyone for a week now, but I just haven't gotten around to posting it yet. Now I have some good news to go with it; so it seems like its time to tell all of you.

Last Friday Matt got laid off. The construction business is really slowing down right now; plus I know that being in the laborers union a lay off should be expected and prepared for towards the end of each job. We are a little bit prepared. We have some money in our saving account left from our tax return. It really won't last us very long if he's laid off for very long. He applied for unemployment, but that's now even enough to pay our bills each month. So he's been looking for people that need little odd jobs done to make a little extra cash until his next job comes up and he can start working again. So here comes the good news...

Yesterday he went to help a guy with a move. I guess this guy helps people move fairly often, and it sounds like he'll have Matt help him when he needs to. Also the people that were moving have some things they want to pay Matt to help them do; so once again God is taking care of our needs. I don't know why I feel so amazed. Last night I asked Matt why God was so good to us. I really don't know why he is, but I'm sure glad we have him watching out for us and taking care of our needs. The downside of Matt finding that job to do yesterday is he didn't end up being done in time for church; that's when things got ugly...

I took the kids to church myself. I was going to go into all the details, but I'll just make a long drawn out story short. The kids were worse than normal without their dad there. At first they weren't too bad, and Sis. LeAnne did what she could to help (I really appreciate her help), but after so many fits and having to take multiple children out. The final straw was towards the end of meeting was when Garrison wouldn't stop throwing fits (he was probably getting tired) and Anthony wasn't minding me and decided our church bench was a jungle gym. I decided that everyone would probably get more out of meeting if I took my kids home. So I left.

It really made me appreciate my husband. It is amazing how much difference he makes. I've decided he has to live a long life because I don't think I would survive as a single mother!

As I was driving home I was reminded of a sister who used to live in Brownsville who had 4 very rowdy boys and for years she took those boys to church by herself. I remember that they were very hard for her to control in church. Well she is now my hero! I plan to write her a little note telling her so.

Matt has told me that he is really going to try not to miss church again. He's already told the guy he can't help him on Sundays. I really feel like God is blessing us with the money we need; so it seems weird to miss church to get the money. Anyway hopefully I don't have to go through that again any time soon. I really admire all the sisters who take their children to church by themselves and actually manage to get something out of meeting and stay through all of it!

God's Protecting Hand

2008-03-05T07:52:00.000-08:00

I'm finally posting again!!! Yahhh! Here are my excuses: I got sick, plus I've been having a hard time coming up with something to blog about. There you have it, I know it's pretty lame. Anyway...

The other day I was taking care of some errands around town. I had pulled into a corner gas station to get gas. The place where I pulled out was a light where I wanted to turn left. It just so happened that the way was clear for me to get right into the turning lane; and the light was green so I just kept on going. As I was going out into the intersection I noticed the little sign that said that I was supposed to yield to oncoming traffic if the light was green. Sure enough there was a line of cars coming. Somehow we all just kept going and missed each other. It all happened so fast that I didn't even have time to react at all. I didn't step on the brakes at all. Now that I think of it, if I'd have slowed down I might have hit someone (or them hit me).

Later on I told Matt about the incident and how I felt like through my mistake and bad observance skills, God had protected me and the kids from getting into an accident. Matt told me of a very similar incident that had happened to him a few days ago. I am so thankful for God's protection to us.

I've still been trying to read the Bible sometimes. I don't have some glorious insight about what I've been reading, but it's all good stuff; so I decided to sometimes post my "verse(s) of the day". Technically this is my verses of yesterday since I read them yesterday, and I haven't yet done any Bible reading today; but here it is:

"But this I say, He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which soweth bountifully shall reap bountifully.
Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity. For God loveth a cheerful giver.
And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work."

From reading these verses in context, I believe it's talking about donating physical items, but this could be applied to other ways of giving too. Basically God wants me to give from the abundance that he has given to me, to help others who are in need. Whether it be giving things, money (even giving to the church), or just using my health and time to help others, or just saying the right words; or sharing the spiritual blessings that God has given to me; so that I can encourage others. I guess kind of like writing about my near accident the other day. I really believe that the Faith is all about giving. If I'm not cheerfully giving what God wants me to give; then I'm not living the Faith as I should. I know that I need to work on this.

Showing Care

2008-02-12T09:00:00.000-08:00

I hope that you all aren't getting tired of me putting these kind of posts on, but I was reading my Bible again this morning and found a very interesting verse:

It's the 12th verse of the 7th Chapter of 2nd Corinthians. I believe that Paul is refering to his first letter to the Corinthians in this verse.

"Wherefore though I wrote unto you, I did it not for his cause that had done the wrong, nor for his cause that suffered the wrong, but that our care for you in the sight of God might appear unto you."

Reading this verse gave me a little different outlook on the kind of attitude to have when I want to help those that are in sin, discouraged etc. If I'm just out to fix a problem, that seems like a good cause, but I should really be out there helping them because I care for them as souls that God wants to save.

I know that sometimes I'm afraid to reach out to those that really need it because I'm afraid to push them farther away; but if I can have this right attitude. That I can truly be out to save their souls, and not just to fix everything that I see that's wrong in their life. If I can figure out how to convey to them that I just want to save their souls and not just point a finger at them I wonder if I could reach them better, and actually help them?

I really don't often extend myselves to help those that are truly in need of this kind of encouragement. It's really out of my comfort zone. There's sometimes that I think of different ones who have strayed from the faith and wonder if there's any way I can help them, but I don't act on that thought; besides praying for them of course. Maybe sometimes that's all God wants me to do, but if there's anything else I can do I sure would like to have the right attitude about it and do what I can to save them, "For God is not willing that any should perish."

A Good Memory

2008-02-06T09:39:00.000-08:00

Sis. Cherrie has a post on her blog titled "Lost and Found". It reminded me of something that happened to my dad. Some of you might have heard this story before; but it's worth telling again.

As most of you know, my dad owned his own roofing business before he became blind. He had a wrist watch that he used to keep track of his workers hours. If I remember right it was actually a pretty beat up watch, but it had an important purpose. Somehow he lost it. I don't know it it had been lost for a few days, or just one, but he couldn't find it.

He was going to bed one night; his watch was still missing. He decided to pray that God would help him find it. He said that he'd had a dream in the night. In that dream, he'd looked under his bed, and his watch was face down in a certain spot. He turned it over and it said a certain time (I think it was 9 something). The next morning he got up like usually and started going about his day. After awhile he remembered his dream; so he thought he'd go look under his bed for his watch. Sure enough, there it was, face down in the exact same spot as in the dream! He turned it over, and it said the same exact time as in his dream!

Now that story in itself is pretty neat, but it doesn't stop there...

Sometime after this happened my dad misplaced his olive oil bottle. (For those of you who don't know, my dad always carries a tiny bottle of olive oil in his pocket so that he'll always have it handy if he needs to annoint someone, or something). He couldn't remember where he'd put it and he couldn't find it anywhere. He went to go to bed, and remembered how God had helped him find his watch. He thought surely, if God can help me find my wristwatch, surely he will help my find my olive oil bottle. So once again he prayed before going to sleep that God would help him find his olive oil bottle. He woke up the next morning, and he hadn't had a dream like the last time. He was kind of dissapointed because he'd really thought that God would help him find it. Then he went to roll out of bed, and there was his olive oil bottle in his hand!

God is soo amazing! Sometimes we forget the great power of God; It's nice to be reminded by things like this.

5th Chapter of 2nd Corinthians

2008-02-04T10:48:00.000-08:00

I almost didn't read my Bible today because I had so much to do today. Maybe that's why I decided to; so I could prolong the dreaded housework! Whatever my reason was I decided to sit down and read a Chapter in the Bible this morning. Unless I feel otherwise inclined I just pick up where I left off last time. So today I read the 5ht Chapter of 2nd Corinthians. I thought I would share with all of you some of what I found; and the insight that I feel God gave me. I should stope being amazed at how this happens a lot to me. Anyway, here goes...

"For we know if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the Heavens.
For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from Heaven:...
For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life....
Therefor we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord:
(For we walk by Faith, not by sight)
We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.
Wherefore we labour, that, whether present or absent we may be accepted of him.

Now I did skip a few verses in this part of the chapter. I'm sure if you want to read the whole thing you can. Sometimes it's hard to put into words what the Lord shows us. I prayed about how I would explain in words what I felt God was telling me when I read this morning. Basically I'm not supposed to be comfortable here on earth in this earthly body. That's not to say that I shouldn't strive for certain comforts here on earth. I felt like God was telling me that my desire for Heaven should be greater than my desire for earthly things. If my soul stops "groaning" for the Heavenly home which is in Heaven; (or it's just become a muted thing in the back of my mind); then I need to re-examine my life. I feel like God was reminding me that I am here on earth so I can earn that home in Heaven. I should stop giving these earthly comforts so much importance and concentrate on what is important for me to make it to Heaven.

There was another verse farther down in the chapter (the 20th verse) that I guess I've never really examined before:

"Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christs' stead be ye reconciled to God."

I've heard over and over again the ministers saying how we are ambassadors for Christ. It wasn't until this morning that I really thought about what an ambassador was. An ambassador is someone sent to another country to speak on behalf of their home country; to try and persuade the foreign country to conform to their way of thinking. We are supposed to be speaking on behalf of Christ, beseeching others to be reconciled to God. I guess I really already knew this, I just did't quite think of it in this way before.

The last verse of the chapter (21st verse) speaks for itself:

"For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him."

I would like to make a note to everyone:
For some reason spellcheck hasn't been working for me; so if there's any misspellings, you'll have to bear with me. I'm not sure what the problem is, but hopefully it stops pretty soon.

The Twice Weekly Church Battle

2008-02-04T10:26:00.001-08:00

In Brownsville we were very spoilt and had grandparents readily available to help with grandchildren. I think the hardest thing for us has been the difference in church. Our children took turns sitting with Gramma Linda, and every once in awhile one of them sat by my Dad and Mom; so we never had all of our children sitting by us in church.

Of course when we moved we have had to get used to dealing with all of our children in church, plus I think moving to a new place somehow made them act worse in church than they did before. Needless to say this has really been a trial for us. There's been times Matt has said he doesn't see the point in going because we didn't enjoy meeting because it was just one big battle field with our children. We did always go though, but it has really been hard for us to enjoy meeting and contribute to meeting in any way. This has been an ongoing battle ever since we moved. We've tried a lot of different things to try to get them to behave in church. We've even prayed about it, but they were still little terrors for us.

Last Thursday night all of the kids were especially bad. We had literally gotten to the end of our rope. As Matt was talking to them it dawned on me that we had never explained to them why we go to church and why it was important for them to behave so that we could enjoy meeting; so Matt and I took Christian and Ruby (the other two are too young to understand) and tried to explain to them why they needed to behave in church. It really seemed like they understood what we were trying to explain to them.

Yesterday when we were on our way to church, we stopped at the store and Matt went in to get a few things. While he was gone Ruby asked me if we ought to pray that they would be good in church. I thought that was a great idea! So me and all the children (except Garrison) took turns praying about it. I think being part of the solution instead of the problem really helped them because they were sooo much better than normal in church yesterday! I was so thankful! They weren't perfect (you can't expect perfect from a 5, 4, 2, and 1 year old). Garrison was his usual grumpy self in church, but having the other kids behaving better made that so much easier to deal with.

I am really praising God for this little victory; and I pray that this is the beginning of the end of the twice weekly church battle!

The Character Building Chain

2008-02-04T10:05:00.000-08:00

Yesterday in church Bro. Dennis read the first Chapter of 2nd Peter:

"And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue: and to virtue knowledge;
And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness;
And to Godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity.
For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ."

I've heard this scripture a lot; and it's a very good scripture to examine myself with. It's amazing though how you can hear something so much, but every once in awhile you get some insight that you've never had before. As Bro. Dennis was reading this scripture I examined the order more closely. I thought about how it would be hard to be truly virtuous if you didn't have Faith first. He also explained how virtue had the same core word as virgin, meaning pure and undefiled. I thought about how it would be hard to have the true knowledge of God without first having virtue; because if you didn't have virtue it would be easy to have knowledge that wouldn't be the pure and undefiled knowledge of God. Again, it would be hard to have temperance if you didn't have the knowledge of God to help you be temperant; and I think it would be nearly impossible to have patience if you weren't temperant. I also think there is no way you could truly have Godliness if you didn't have all those other things first; and it would be hard to have true brotherly kindness if you weren't Godly first. My dad is always quoting the scripture that Charity is the end of a perfect work. I've never really thought what exactly was the perfect work it was the end of, but I think this scripture kind of explains that.

I have to say that my baby got loud, and I had to leave while Bro. Dennis was still up; so I don't know what all he said, but I was glad that God allowed me to hear what I heard.

Now to start working on my character building list.....

Hundred Thousands Place

2008-02-01T12:28:00.000-08:00

After reading Sis. Trina's blog titled "Faith in Children" I was reminded of something that happened quite a few years ago...

I was at my Aunt Mary's house helping her out. She homeschools her chidren and I used to go over there quite often to help her. That day Alyssa was working on her Math. She was learning about the number places (you know, ones, tens, hundreds, thousands etc.) Well she had gotten to the part where where she was supposed to be learning the hundred-thousands place. Now Alyssa is a smart girl; so it wasn't like she didn't understand her Math book. She just refused to believe that there was a such thing as the hundred-thousands place. No matter what we told her, or what her book said she would not do her work because there was no such thing! Needless to say we had a very frustrating day with her. We argued with her most of the day about it. She said she'd never heard of it before; so it wasn't so.

We were getting very aggrivated with her. It seemed like there was no way for us to get through to her so that she could continue with her schoolwork.

All of a sudden, it was like a light bulb came on in my head! I asked Alyssa if she believed what the Bible said; even if she wouldn't believe her me, her mom, or her schoolbook. She said she did; so I got a Bible and looked up in Numbers where the people were counted and found a place where there was a number that had a hundred-thousand place. I believe it was six-hundred-thousand something. Anyway, once she saw that it was in the Bible she finally was convinced it was real and went on with her schoolwork! It was as easy as that!

Looking back, it's kind of funny now; but it's always stuck with me that she believed the Bible when she wouldn't believe anything else. I hope that I instill that kind of faith in my children.

Witnessing the Miracle of Birth once again.

2008-01-29T08:21:00.001-08:00

My Aunt Sara had asked me to be with her when she had her baby. She's about my age; so she's really more like a cousin or even a sister than an Aunt. On Thursday my mom called me and talked to me about how Sara was coming along in her pregnancy. I had heard so many different due dates that I wasn't sure which was the right one; but Mom told me that Sara was due in about 2 weeks! Time had crept up on me! I hadn't talked to anyone about watching my kids while I went up there or anything. I had plans to get that all figured out on Friday.

Well about 3 in the morning Sara called me and said she was probably in labor. She was early enough that I wondered if it could be false labor, but she sounded like she wanted me to come be with her; so I packed up some things along with my kids and headed to brownsville. I had to make a last minute phone call to Sis. Connie to see if I could take my kids to her house. It is sooo wonderful that you can call the sisters in the middle of the night like this and have them willing to watch 4 small children at a moments notice! Sis. Connie if you are reading this I REALLY appreciated this!

When I got to my mom's house Sara was definitely in labor; and for the rest of the day we all played the waiting game. Sara did really well during labor, but of course she was getting tired of being in this much pain with no immediate results. There were no complications whatsoever, but it was just taking time. Especially with a first baby this was very normal, but hard. We were getting into the evening, and there was still no baby. Sara was getting to that point where she was feeling like she needed to get some extra strength from somewhere. She asked me to call the brethren and tell them that if any of them felt like coming to pray for her that they could and she would really appreciate it. When I left the room the pains just didn't seem quite hard enough, Sis. Cindy could feel the baby when she checked, but we couldn't see it yet; so I was telling everyone that it would probably still be awhile, but Sara was getting tired and needed some extra strength. I hadn't finished my phone calls when I heard a commotion in the bedroom. Me being the person that I am didn't want to miss out on anything; so I abandoned my phone calls and rushed into the bedroom. Within a minute or two we had a little baby boy!

I have to say that I really thought that things would be worse than they were. I didn't expect any fatalities or anything, but I just thought it would be harder than it was. I guess the Lord heard all our prayers and things went REALLY well. I guess that's what I get for shortening God's arm as they say. I'm so glad the Lord proved my ideas and fears wrong!

Here are the important details:

Jack Dean Elliott, born January 25th 2008, 5:20 p.m., he was 5 1/4 lbs., 18 in. long.

He's pretty small, but seems healthy. We have been a little worried about him getting the nourishment he needs since he's so small, but we've all been working hard to get him to eat; and I think he's doing pretty good.

My job was being the picture taker; so I'm posting some pictures.

Here's little baby Jack with his proud new Daddy.

Here he is with the midwife, Sis. Cindy.

Little Jack on his first day after getting cleaned up, dressed and bundled.

Here he is on his second day. I just think he's sooo cute! I of course went wild shopping for him on Saturday!

Here's the proud new Mommy!

Little Jack sleeping in the family cradle. It was originally made for Eric (Sara's brother). There's been a lot of family babies that have used this crib. He's also bundled up in an afghan that was made for Eric.

Here's Jack on his 3rd day. I, of course, requested he wear one of the many outfits I got him before I left! This one was small enough to fit him OK; and it's soooo soft.

On Sunday I finally brought my kids over to see the new arrival. Here I am showing him to them. They thought he was pretty special.

Well now I'm back home, but it was such an honor to get to see and have a small part in the miracle of birth!

United in Prayer

2008-01-19T23:26:00.000-08:00

It seems like especially lately I've been hearing about a lot of people who are in need of prayers. Mostly because of some illness. A lot of times when I receive this news I at least call the brethren here to let them know to be praying. Sometimes I feel bad to be passing on this bad news all the time; but I know that if it were me I'd want as many brethren praying for me as possible.

We all have heard about how prayer can be pretty powerful. Sometimes if feels like that prayer is such a small thing and you don't really think it can make much of a difference. I have seen how prayer has real turned a situation around when it seems like it wasn't possible. We all know that prayer works.

What I'm thinking about tonight is a little bit different. I was thinking about how praying for our brethren; and knowing our brethren are praying for us brings us together somehow, closer. Like prayer connects us together with God. When we pray for our brethren we are thinking of their needs, trials etc. and it brings us away from our own problems and makes us think about others.

Tonight we went to Bro.Dennis & Sis. Trina's house. We visited for awhile and then we decided to play a game. During the game Sis. Chantel called and told us that Sis. Dawn was doing really bad and that she needed prayers. When Sis. Trina hung up we all got down together on the floor and prayed for Sis. Dawn. It was a very special moment for me. It not only helped me to think about Sis. Dawn's Trial, but it somehow made me feel closer to those I was praying with. It especially touched my heart to hear Bro. Dennis and Sis. Trina's boys pray. I really enjoyed hearing their prayers and seeing the evidence that the Faith is being handed down. One of their boys even prayed that they were thankful that we had come over that evening, and that really made me feel good.

Prayer is a very powerful and special thing; and I'm so glad that it's something that I can share freely with my brethren.

After we all prayed Bro. Dennis started putting the game away. He didn't really say anything, but I was glad he put it away. It didn't seem right somehow to go back to our game. Sis. Dawn needed our thoughts and prayers, and so we became united in prayer.

The Faith and the brethren are such a wonderful gift. All too often I take them both for granted; but it sure is nice to hear my brethren pray for me. And to know that even when I'm far away I always have the power of prayer.

The Potty Training Roller Coaster!!!

2008-01-09T11:12:00.001-08:00

I'm sure all of you (or most of you) know what I'm going through with Anthony right now. Potty Training can be a very trying experience for parents.

It took awhile for Anthony to even cooperate with me and potty train. My other two were already completely potty trained (except for bed wetting , which we still need to master) at this point. I can now finally say that Anthony is being potty trained. He's probably doing pretty good really, but I just want it to be over!!!!! Here's the low down on my roller coaster ride...

He started out, of course where I was having to change his underwear a lot of times a day. He would go potty in his pot, but would not keep his underwear dry; so I was down. Finally one day he'd wet his underwear an uncountable amount of times; he hadn't messed his pants yet that day, and I was just dreading having to clean that up. That evening Matt and I kept sending him to the toilet over and over again until finally he pooped in the pot!! Yeah! We were so excited about it! We made a HUGE big deal about it! So I was up:) I had thought that if we could get him to poop on the toilet just one time he would understand how great it was he would want to do it again. The next couple of days he did really good about keeping his underwear dry; so I was up:) But he kept messing in his underwear, so I was down:( Then he did fairly good about keeping his underwear dry, and just when I was putting him to bed he said "Mommy I need my Pull-Up off". I asked him if he needed to go potty, and he said he did; so he went downstairs (for some reason he likes the downstairs bathroom best) When I got down there after him he was sitting on the big pot (usually he goes in the little one) and he was pooping!!! Yeah!! I was very happy because this time he had done it by himself basically! It is amazing how excited you can get about these things! Matt and I made a huge deal about it again; so we were up:) The next day he didn't keep his underwear dry very good and he messed in them again. Argghh! So down we go again:(

well today is a new day; so wish me well on my potty training journey!

Sweet Smelling Savor

2008-01-07T12:29:00.000-08:00

I've been thinking a lot lately about a prophesy I got when I was just young in the faith, about 16 or 17...

We were at the Colorado campmeetings, and I was sitting in meeting one day. There were a lot of people getting up, and I so badly wanted to be a part of it. I really prayed that God would give me something to do, but it didn't seem like he wanted me to do anything. Now looking back I can see how foolish I was, but Satan started whispering to me that God didn't have any use for me and that I should just give up. I started having my doubts about my usefullness to the Lord. I prayed that God would send a big wind through the church tent that I could just know that he still cared for me. No wind came. Of course I was feeling pretty aweful by this time; and I started thinking that there was no reason to try if God didn't have any use for me anymore. Then I started looking around at all the brethren gathered around me. I began to think about what they would do if they saw me give up. Would I influence others to do the same? So I had come to the mind that I needed to continue to live the faith so that I could at least help my brethren get there; even if there wasn't a spot for me anymore. Now I can see how thinking God didn't care for me was really stupid, but I was young. About that time Bro. Lee Bosch came to me and spoke me a prophesy. There was more to it about things that were going on in my life, but what has stuck with me the most is God told me that my sacrifice was surely pure and that it was a sweet smell unto him. This prophesy was so much better than a big wind!

Sometimes in my life when I feel like my sacrifice is no longer quite what it ought to be I remember that prophesy. I believe the pure sacrifice that God loved so much was that I was willing to live the Faith for my brethren and not myself. I had gotten to the point where I felt like I would get nothing, but that I felt like I needed to keep going so that my brethren could get what I wanted so bad. The pure sacrifice was a selfless one. I am so glad that God taught me that lesson that day. I've fallen back on it so many times in my life. If I would have just gotten the wind like I asked I would not have learned the lesson I did. God sure does know what he's doing so much better than we do.

Please pray for me that my sacrifice could be that pure sacrifice and that I could be a sweet smell unto the Lord once again. Thanks.

Garrison's First Haircut

2008-01-04T10:50:00.000-08:00

(sigh) We finally decided that it was about time to give our baby his first haircut. We hated to see his adorable little curls go, but his hair was getting in his eyes; and we figured that was a sign that he needed this haircut. Here are some before and after pictures. I didn't think to take some just before; and my most recent pictures got deleted, but I found a faily recent one that showed how shaggy he was getting...

As you can see, he still has a little bit of curls left. We couldn't bring ourselves to cut them all off. Matt only wanted to cut the top, and leave the back curls in tact; but I DID NOT want that; so I intervened and got the back curls shortened too. He doesn't look so much like a baby anymore (sigh)

Resolutions

2008-01-03T10:32:00.001-08:00

I have debated about whether or not to post these, but I thought that if I put them on here; it might make me more motivated to work on these things. So here goes...

1. Stop being selfish. This is the one thing I can see that I need the most work on. There's a lot of things I can see in my life that need improvement and a lot of it has to do with the fact that I am a selfish person. This is a hard fact for me to admit, but believe me, it's true. There's a lot of aspects in my life that will get better if I stop having a "what's in it for me" attitude and just do things with an unselfish and willing heart. I really need prayers with this one.

2. Get closer to God. I know that I'm not nearly as close to the Lord as I need to; or even as close as I have been before. I want to get back to the relationship I once had with him where I could have conversations with him; and even say a little prayer for guidance and know what the Lord wants of me almost immediately. Sometimes I feel like I'm just floundering, not really sure how the Lord wants me to go about my life.

3. Get closer to my husband. I feel like Matt and I have a pretty good relationship, but lately things have been a little strained. We're not having major marital problems, mind you; but I can see where if we don't start repairing it when it's a little off, we could blink our eyes one day and wonder how our marriage got so horrible. however I think that if I can get the first 2 resolutions figured out this one will follow pretty easy.

4. Lose 15 lbs. This one is not nearly as important as the other 3, but I would really love to lose that extra 15 lbs. Last year I wanted to lose 20 lbs, but only lost 15. If I can lose 15 more I'll be right where I want to be.

There are so many other things I need to work on, but if I can fulfill these ones my life will be so much better; and I believe that so many aspects of my life will be affected by them.

This has been a little hard for me because I want everyone to believe that I am the perfect person with the perfect life (like they really believe that anyway), but the truth is I feel like I am so much worse than I feel like people perceive me. I see so many people that seem to have their life so much more together than I do. I really need help in these things and I would like the support and prayers of my blogging buddies. Thank you all very much!

Visitors

2008-01-02T11:35:00.000-08:00

Matt's mom came and stayed a few days with us. The kids really enjoy having her around. She was going to watch all of our kids while we were in Brownsville so that we could go on a date, but there never seemed to be time with everything else that was going on; so Wednesday night Matt and I went on a date. It was very nice to have some time just for ourselves. We went to an Italian restaurant that I have been wanting to try out, but didn't dare take the kids to! The food was good. It was SO nice to enjoy the meal just the 2 of us. I had gotten a gift certificate for Christmas; so we went to Christopher and Banks at Streets of Tanasbourne. We've never been to that shopping center. We really liked it! If it hadn't been so cold we would have browsed longer. I got a nice new outfit, and Matt got a hoodie that was on sale at Hollister. He's really into these brand names. Since we don't get out by ourselves very often anymore we decided that it was ok to splurge a little! We came home a little early, but it was nice to get out.

Thursday Sis. Trish came over. She stayed a few days with us, and then took Linda home. She had something she had to take back to IKEA. Her and Linda were just going to go by themselves and I was going to stay home and try to get some things done; but I could tell that Trish was nervous about driving in Portland, and I was courious about IKEA. I'd never been there before; so we all ended up loading up and all going together. It was quite an ordeal trying to figure out how to get to IKEA. It was frustrating, we would pass it, but see no way to get to it. Finally we found it! I am now an IKEA fan! It was such a great place! We wish we could have had more time to browse around. I decided that someday I want to take Matt there. He really enjoys that kind of thing.

Friday I invited all the sister's here to come for lunch to visit with my visitors. Sis. Marisela came with all her kiddos. The other sister's couldn't make it. That was kind of a bummer, but we enjoyed Marisela. We had some lunch and then we played a few hands of cards while we visited. Friday evening we decided to go visit Rusty and Mary. I hadn't been to their house yet, and I've been looking forward to getting to know them better. I was glad we went. We had talked about going to see a movie, but decided to go visiting instead. I'm glad we did. We enjoyed our time at their house. We played some games. I think I was always on the losing team, but enjoyed myself anyway!

Saturday Gramma and Sis. Trish had to go. Our kids were sad to see them go, but we were glad they got to come for awhile. That afternoon we took care of some errands and took the kids to a movie/arcade. They really enjoyed it, and were fairly well behaved.

Sunday was literally a day of rest for us! It was nice to just relax.

Monday was spent getting ready for the party that night and more company that was coming to spend the night. Mark and Kim were coming home from Brewster and had dinner with us, and went to the New Year's Eve party with us and spent the night. They had to leave the next morning, but we were glad to get to see them.

Monday night the brethren here got together at the place we have church and ate snacks and played games until it was time to bring in the New Year together. I really enjoyed it. I felt like it helped us to be closer together. I enjoy spending time with everyone. Again I don't think I won any games, but had fun anyway!

Anywhere, there's a little update on how crazy my life has been. Today things are back to normal! I only wish I had pictures to post about all this... Oh well, I guess it doesn't do any good to cry over spilt milk.