New Year's

I don't understand New Years.  I mean, I understand that it is the end of one year, and the beginning of another.   But I don't understand why we celebrate and make a big deal about it.  And this is compounded by New Year's resolutions.

I asked my husband about this once, and he said that people like New Years' because it's a fresh start, a new beginning.  But here's the thing:  Yes, today starts a new year.  February 1st will start a new month.  And January 4th will start a new week.  (Interestingly, February 1st will also start a new week).  And January 2nd, will start a new day.

And this is why I don't do New Year's resolutions.  Lamentations 3:22-23 says that God's mercies are new each morning.  And honestly, the way I read those verses, shows that God's mercies are ever-refreshing.  When I fight with my husband, I don't  say "sorry, I'll try to be nicer next year."  When I started feeling out of shape, I didn't put off getting fit until the next year.  And when I missed a save playing soccer, or a pass playing volleyball, I didn't say, "oops.  I'll be better next season."  Thankfully, I had coaches who pushed me to not even say, "oops.  I'll do better next game."  It was always, "I'll get the next save."  "I'll get the next pass."  I'll do better from now on.  From right this second.

Change doesn't have to start at the next year.  Or the next big marker in your life (after we move, after we have kids, after we get out of debt...).  Change starts whenever you want it to!  It starts whenever you start to make change happen.  I played viola for the first time in close to three years last night.  And it wasn't because it was a New Year.  It was because I was tired of listening to myself say "I should get around to doing that sometime."

So don't ask yourself, "what am I going to do differently this year?"  Ask yourself, "what am I going to do differently TODAY?"  and then keep asking yourself that, every day.  (Bonus:  smaller, shorter goals are easier to achieve. :) )

God's Not A Genie

A few weeks ago, some of our guys went to an anti-drug and tobacco rally.  And as with most youth conferences, there were all sorts of give-aways and prizes and drawings.  We asked him how it was, and he said, "terrible.  I didn't win anything." We asked him a few times what was interesting, what he learned trying to get him to talk about the whole point of the conference, but all he'd talk about was the process he didn't win and the coupons he did get. And I rolled my eyes at how he had missed the whole point of the conference.

More recently, he began talking about how, despite being recently saved, he wants nothing more to do with God, because God doesn't answer his prayers, like how he really wanted to win those door prizes.  Now perhaps he was just in a bad mood that evening (which he very much was when he said that), but at the same time, maybe he really meant it.  But all the same...admit it, you just rolled your eyes (I know I did) at how shallow that is.  

Coming from a well-grounded Christian family, and being firmly rooted in knowledge of God's word, I know that God's not as interested in these details and minor events as we are.  God doesn't care if we win a dirt bike as a door prize, or drive a Ford or a Chevy. 

I almost want to say, "except...what if He does?", but that's not where I mean to go with this.  What hit me about all of this, was how quickly I rolled my eyes at the shallowness of his frustration and prayer requests.  And quite honestly, I didn't make the connection until today, but how often do we do this?  And before you ask, no, I don't pray for door prizes or a nice car either, and I don't know many (or any) adults who do.  But I do know many adults who pray for health, for money (to pay the bills), for stresses in their lives to go away.  And I also know a lot of people who pray for these things, and then get mad at God when their health fails, when money runs tight, when things stay stressful.  ...And isn't that just as shallow?  

Now, I DON'T necessarily mean that we shouldn't pray for those things.  But I DO mean that we should be ready to accept whatever answer God has for those requests.  And even more importantly, we should also be praying, even more earnestly, for the big-picture things.  

And of course, I say that quite easily, but I promise my prayer list looks quite different...lots of little "only affects my life" things.  Seems the big-picture things just don't come to my mind often.  Which begs the question, what ARE the big-picture things?

- our government, and its leaders: that they would stand up for what is right, and  make decisions

      that will most benefit our country as a whole.

- our country/society: that we'd return to good values and moral sense.

- missionaries, all over the world:  that they would have an effective ministry, find rest and peace to    continue, and be able to reach everyone they can for Christ.

stuff

If Jesus is all I want, why do I have so much stuff?  This is something I've been thinking about lately.

I posed this question to my husband the other day.  His response was that we, even as Christians, have bought into the "American Dream".  My retort:  But we're not Americans; we're Christians.

Jesus once said that it was easier for a rich man to go through the eye of the needle than it was for him to go to heaven.  I spent so much of my life thinking that it must be impossible for rich people to go to heaven, then, because how on earth could a camel get through the eye of a needle?  Later, I learned what this really meant:  The needle was a big gate into Jerusalem.  At night, they would close it, but leave a smaller gate open ("the eye of the needle").  If a traveler came through at this time, he would have to take ALL of his luggage off of his camel, and the camel would have to essentially crawl through the gateway.  Ahh.  Now I see - tough, but not altogether impossible.

I notice that just about every time I've heard this passage preached on lately, they always make the same comment:  "this doesn't mean you have to get rid of all your stuff."  But what if it does?

I've been thinking about how much stuff we (my husband and I) have lately.  And honestly, if you looked at our apartment, you probably wouldn't think we have a lot of stuff.  You might be right.  We spent 3 years sharing a (separate from each other) dorm room with someone else - minimizing stuff and maximizing space was essential.  (We could each fit all of our stuff into our own car at this point.)  When we got married, we moved into a one bedroom, less than 500 sq. ft apartment.  We had sold some of our college stuff (dorm room fridges, for example), and gotten some new stuff (like a couch and a table), but let me tell you - space was CRAMPED in that place.  Nathan's mom sent us home from one visit with a box of stuff once and I about had a meltdown about where we were going to fit it.

Now - we live in a two bedroom apartment.  I haven't actually measured out the area, but I'd bet it's at least twice as big as our last apartment.  It's WONDERFUL!  And I've been in some other houseparent's apartments - same area, way less space.  We probably have no more than half of what they've crammed into their living room.  And yet ...we still have so much junk.  We've got some pillows and blankets in a box that we never even unpacked - proof that we don't need or use them.  We have so much stuff in our house, even unpacked, that we don't use, and quite frankly, don't need.

If Jesus is all I want, then why do I have so much junk? Well, here's my point:  Maybe I don't have as much of Jesus as I want, because I've got so much stuff I don't want. ...Maybe I don't have as much of Jesus as I need, because I've got so much stuff I don't need.

To those pastors (or speakers; to be fair, I know one of the ones who said this was a our SGA chaplain - and not even a Bible major) who say that you don't have to get rid of all your stuff:  I get where you're coming from.   You don't HAVE to get rid of all your stuff to be able to go to heaven; it's about making sure your priorities are right.  Understood.

But maybe we need, if nothing else, that challenge to get rid of all our stuff.  Maybe we need that heart-check to see if our priorities are right.

I don't know about you, but if Jesus is all I want, then I don't need so much stuff.

April 4, 2014

A lesson in God's grace and mercy, from Hollywood.  (Note:  this post might have spoilers about Captain America:  The Winter Soldier)

So, last Friday (the date of this post, even though I'm writing it a week later), we went to the drive in movie theater.  (the double feature this time:  Captain America:  The Winter Soldier, and Frozen).  It was a good time - Nathan and I had a lot of fun getting down there, and the movies were good (we had fun singing along to Frozen), AND we had gotten our house cleaned up earlier in the day, so I was feeling pretty good about that too. :)  

Nathan and I noted that there are a lot of movies lately that have some really good plots and plot twists.  I mean, I know everyone's already been raving about the definition of love given in Frozen, but that's because it's true.  (Along with the exemplary demonstration of love in the movie - all over the place!).  Also, the surprise ending in Frozen...man, that got me even knowing what was going to happen.  But it was in Captain America, that I was really struck with a reminder of how we should treat others.

(spoilers from this movie may follow, depending on how picky you are about knowing what happens ahead of time.)

In Captain America, they're fighting to shut down a project that "will eliminate terrorists before they become a threat."  Now, when they said that, I was on board with it.  Particularly with all the stuff with Al Qaeda in our country (fairly) recently, I thought, "so if we know they're up to something, but we don't know what, we can go ahead and just end it, because if their plan gets all together and going, it's not going to be good."  Sounds good.  BUT, then come to find out what they meant was, they looked up everyone, checked out their jobs, history, past interactions with SHIELD, so on and so forth, and would eliminate anyone who might become a threat (including people who were currently working for SHIELD).  

Man, that really got me.  And after thinking about it, I realized why I was against it.  It's because they were essentially taking away people's free will.  They were punishing people for choices they hadn't made, and choices that they may never make.  And that's what's wrong with it - is that they were being punished for choices that they might not ever make.  If you take away that opportunity to screw up, yeah, you'll have a perfect society, but you also have no freedom.  (And freedom, even freedom to make poor choices, is an important part to both America and Christianity).  

And, that's what I thought about from watching Captain America.  Hope movies we can learn from like this keep coming! :D  

Let me know what other lessons you've learned from movies (or if you missed the pictures on the blog.  or whatever else you want me to know.  or just say hi!)

March 28, 2014

Wow, it has been a long time.  Well, update on the Ranch front:  things are going well.  We've had a lot of changes in population.  And that's Ranch-wide, not just our cottage.  We've gotten a lot of new boys.  In fact, the population in our cottage has gone from 2 residents, to 5, and then landed at 3 (for now), and in the midst of all that, we've had a boy who's been visiting every other weekend or so.  (so yes, we got all the way up to 6 kids in our cottage one weekend - ack!)  And then, because of a home pass, this weekend we're down to one kid (for today, at least).  And that's probably the best sum-up of Ranch life - always interesting, and never predictable.

Of course, this busy-ness has kept Nathan and I on our toes - usually we pretty much just sleep or watch TV on our weekends off.  Actually, come to think of it, we've kept pretty busy our past few weekends off (maybe that's why we feel so busy while we're on duty!).  We've gone to see shows in Branson, hungs out with friends, and last weekend - we were crazy and saw 5 movies in one weekend (Muppets Most Wanted, Peabody & Sherman, The Lego movie (not for the first time), God's Not Dead, and Divergent ).  Though, in our defense:  two of those were shown as a double feature at a drive-in movie theater - two movies for $5/person!  you can't pass that up, even if you have already seen one of them (...more than once. :) ).

And despite that busy-ness, I've really been convicted of laziness lately.  It seems that I'll get up, create a list of things I should do (and not even a terribly ambitious one!  just like, excercise, shower, clean the house (for at least 5 minutes), and spend time with God.)  And a 3 hour nap, two TV shows, an unexpected errand, and a pity party later - I've done none of it, the kids are coming home, and I won't get a chance to do it.  Isn't that terrible?  Or maybe it's not laziness, maybe it's self-discipline.  Either way, I need to step up my game and spend my time doing more important things.  (I mean, I DO love Late Night with Seth Meyers, but...at the end of the day, does it matter more if I've watched all of his shows, or exercised daily?  And at that, does it matter more that I've exercised daily, or spent time in God's word daily?  And unfortunately, the way I spend my time shows that none of those are very important, but Seth Meyers is up there.)

But the two big things I'm excited about right now are this weekend - we're taking everyone at the Ranch up to a theme park for Christian concert/rally thing.  (I'm SUPER proud of my husband for finally riding a roller coaster, but I know not to try to squeeze much more out of him (at least just yet ;) ).  But thankfully, one of the boys in our cottage (not just at the ranch, but in our cottage!!) is excited to go on all the crazy flip-upside down, go-backwards, roller coasters.  So guess who gets to do it with him (points at self and mouths, "ME." :D)  Also, SOON I will finish a quilt I'm making for a friend.  It's star-wars themed and will bring lots of masculinity to his home (which has two young girls, his wife, and himself, so it's in need of an extra dose of masculinity), and I'm super excited to finally be able to give it to him.

And...I guess that's pretty much my life right now.  Thanks for checking in.

February 3, 2014

So, stuff's been pretty chill as far as Ranch life goes.  Our transportation load got really easy, because some appointments we'd been having off-campus got moved to on-site, so that was VERY very nice.  Also, Nathan and I were going to have to make an out-of-town pick up on Friday, and that got canceled too.  Prayers requested for the issues surrounding WHY it was canceled, but it may actually have been a good thing, because we got hit pretty hard with a snowstorm yesterday, so the related drop-off today might have been tricky, or perhaps even impossible. 

But we've had a good weekend. Friday we went bowling with our boys, and while not flawless, it was a pretty good experience.   Really, the biggest drawback to it was that we were planning on going right after school, so...get to the bowling alley around 5:00.  Instead, we had forgotten about an appointment, so we left around 6, and had to get dinner first.  Also, I'm used to blacklight bowling starting around 10 or 11 (of course, those bowling alleys also stay open til 1 or 2 in the morning).  Instead, blacklight bowling here starts around 8.  And...well, that's pretty much why we only bowled one game.  Well, they were getting a little antsy prior to that, but that pretty much ruled out any hope we may have had at getting them to sit still through other people's turns.  But really, it was an overall good experience.
My amazement yesterday was that it started snowing (barely) when we left for church yesterday, and got a few inches (at least one by the end of Sunday School), and school was canceled for two days before we went to bed.  Lots of snow here (this is snow day...11 or 12 for them?).

But snow days aren't all bad.  While maybe too much TV, we've had a good day.  I got to take this picture in the afternoon (because I thought it looked like a giant crack in the sky).  Also, I started a challenge with one of our boys:  that I can do all of his next discovery thing in his AWANA book (7 pages/sections) in half the time he can.  He's smart enough he could beat me like nothing, but he's not terribly motivated to work on it.  Of course, with the upcoming Bible Quiz, that's pretty much the point of the challenge:  to motivate him.  Anyways, I guess we'll see how that goes. 

Anyways, I guess that's about everything that's going on around here.

I took this picture because I thought it looked like there was a crack in the sky.  (Though, it doesn't quite look like that as I look at it right now...:/ )

Jan 29, 2014

Man, I've had a lot of thoughts running through my head lately. Some of it's been getting our house organized (or namely, our kitchen table cleaned off - that's where EVERYthing seems to accumulate), some of it's been how to spend our money (I was pretty okay with our plan to pay off student debt before I realized exactly how much interest sucks), and so forth and so one, and some of it's been wrestling with deep theological/personal issues.

I mean, this goes right along with how to spend money.  One of my friends recently posed the question "is it okay for Christians to be wealthy?"  (or how much money is it okay for Christians to have, I forget exactly how she worded it.) Now, in a broad sense, when you put it like that, I know my answer.  But when it comes down to how I use my money?  well, then it starts to get a little fuzzier.

A perfect example (and the one that I've been struggling with lately).  Around...I dunno, October maybe? I decided I wanted a tablet, so I set up a way for me to get one.  Then, just after Thanksgiving, I found a good deal on one, so I just went ahead got one a little preemptively (I thought it was on sale, but it wasn't.  But it WAS a really good deal, and I'm really happy I bought one, so it kinda works out.)

But, around the time that happened, my husband decided he needed a new computer (his computer kept shocking him).  So, he got a really nice new computer, which, to be fair, he probably needed more than I know or will admit.  But, when he started complaining about his computer, I started disliking mine.  I found a pretty cheap solution to mine, decided to try it, and it started working really well.  :)  And yet, I still wanted to get a new computer.

And then the shame set in - all of the nice things we have, not wanting for food, for clothes, not shivering in the middle of the night....and yet I'm upset because my computer's running too slow.  Do I really want to spend $300 or $400 on a new computer, when mine still works pretty well?  Am I really that spoiled?  Is a new computer really worth it, especially compared to all of the people world-wide who NEED that $300 for food?  I'm just not sure.

See the tape?

And then, shortly after Christmas - things got a bit more complicated.  While cleaning up our kitchen, I accidentally knocked my laptop off the kitchen table.  When that happened, the battery popped out, and some little pieces broke off (the battery won't stay in on it's own).  To which I thought, "oh, well.  I guess that makes my decision for me - now that my computer's actually broken."  Of course, not long later, I realized that this was actually pretty easily fixed - I can either use my computer on a flat surface, where the battery can't fall out, or leave it plugged in all the time.  OR, true to how I was raised, I could tape it in place, which has worked pretty well.  

And so it's back to square one - should I, or should I not, get a new computer?  Is that really how I should be spending my money?  and I just don't know.

January 23, 2014

Well, that's just a silly picture to go with this post.  We've had an interesting week:  mood swings and tantrums with the boys, shuffling schedules around at the last minute, and some guests to our cottage.  That last bit worked out really well for me; I ended up not having to cook the last two days we were on duty this week!  And, in the extra time I had with not cooking, I got to do some other stuff that's been needing doing, looks putting up curtains in all the boys' rooms.

And now it's our weekend off.  We took an extra day, so we could make the drive up to our college and see a lot of our friends before they graduate and stuff.  Last time we came up here, the weather was horrendous.  The rain was so thick, it was hard to see the road for at least half of our drive.  This time, visibility was MUCH better.  But, it's also VERY cold.  It's currently like 1 degree, and I think the high for about the whole time we're planning on being here is something like 12 degrees.  (I'm also very thankful for the gloves and ice-grippers I got for Christmas! :-)  ).

And another thing that I've been thinking about lately.  How can we show that we're Christians in everything we do.  I mean, the "church answers" would be stuff like pray often, speak kindly, don't let yourself get into compromising situations (or, have integrity).  But like really...in EVERYthing...how do you do that?  How do you bring glory to Him while making dinner?  Or while setting up your budget (or just paying bills, or anything else having to do with family finances?) Or any of the other things we do every day, where we tend to really just check out and do what's expected, or what we need to? 

Anyways, hopefully I'll be back in a few days to tell you how our trip was.  If I don't, maybe I just froze to death ;-) .  God bless, and stay warm!

January 11, 2014

Hello everyone,

 I think it might have been a bit over a week since last time, but, much closer to it than a few months.  So, I'm working on it.

But the past week or so has been a good one.  We had another snow storm, not nearly as bad as the last one we had, just after Thanksgiving, but still enough to get our boys out of school for a whole week.  and more remarkably, they dealt with it really well - they got along pretty well, an didn't seem to be sick of each other by the end of the week, so there's not a whole lot more we could have asked for.

And in the past few days, it was my birthday.   We didn't do anything on my birthday, since we were working and snowed in and everything.  But, last night, we went out to dinner and to go see The Secret Life of Walter Mitty ...which was REALLY REALLY good.  (Nathan said he hadn't thought it looked that good, but he was thoroughly impressed.

And in the next few days (or hopefully today)...we'll be pulling down our Christmas tree and getting all the clutter around our house picked up.  That won't be too much fun, but it will be nice to have it done.  :)

Anyways, that's about as much as I've got to say for now.  Hope to be back up here in a week or so!

December 31, 2013

Uh, so no pictures today.  I have quite a few since I last posted (...geez!  was it really mid-October since then? ), but...there are so many, and I decided I'd rather just write some stuff than have photos with it.  So, in keeping with the New Year's theme, here come some highlights of the past few months.

At the end of October, we were able to travel up to our alma mater to visit some friends and stuff.  (We'll probably do that again this semester too).  It was a really nice get-away, good to catch up with some friends, and just kinda pretend we were college students again.  It's not many people who can say they literally took a step back in time like that, but we did, and it was really nice. :)

In November...two of our boys left, (and we got to experience having boys kicked off the bus for the first time.)  But, that's about as exciting as work got.  And, we got to take some time off around Thanksgiving, which was pretty nice, since Nathan's family was able to come down for a visit.  We just hung around the surrounding area here, but it was still a really good time.

In December, again, nothing super exciting as far as work goes.  But, we did get to take some vacation time.  Right after Christmas, we got to meet up with my family in Memphis and tour around there some.  It's a really neat place, and we had a  really good time.  Plus, we switched cars with my parents, so we have a car(SUV) that's a bit more suited to living on a dirt road than our previous car was.  So that worked out really well. :)

We've had a really good year.  Lots of interesting things have happened, lots of things have changed, and we've learned a lot.  So, here's hoping to another year of good experiences and lessons!

(P.S.  Let's make a deal - I'll try and post once a week, and if you read/like my blog, comment, share it on Facebook/Google+, or just tell me.  okay? God bless :) )

October 13, 2013

So, what we do on our weekends off:  go for walks.  And it's starting to get a little cooler here, so the leaves are *just* starting to change.  (It's still mostly green...really green.)  But, what has changed looks really pretty, and makes us even more excited for it to change. One of the things we said when we first moved here, was "man, I bet it's really pretty when the leaves all change and everything in the fall," so it's exciting to see how that goes. :)

And then we came back on duty, and had one of the busiest weeks of house-parenting I've experienced yet.  The day after we came back duty, we had a boy who had a left for a short stint, come back.  Of course, his behavior showed that the reason he had left in the first place was still an issue, so, he left two days later, which was the double-edged sword:  it was stressful to have him back here, but it was stressful to have him gone too.  (But on a more serious note, pray for him).  But then on top of that, the next two days after he got back, all us houseparents went to a marriage seminar, from 8am to 3 pm (and with travel time, that goes from about 7:20 am to about 3:40 pm).  Which more importantly, means no time to go talk to office people about issues, no time to plan meals or get the food for them, any of the paper work we need to do during the day, or (probably most importantly) no time to process what we talked about at the seminar.  So in short, that was a very long two days in itself.  But, they treated us to a very nice dinner after the second day, so that was nice (and I still have leftovers. :D ).

But, we've had a good weekend.  We took advantage of the nice weather, and went down to the creek last Friday night.  We roasted hot dogs, and made s'mores, and it was even nice enough that the boys could go swimming a little bit.  It seems like the boys had a good time (and I know they had a better time than the other cottage that went camping, and then got rained out and had to come back in the middle of the night).  We also got to take all our boys to Wal-mart so they could spend their allowances, so they're all jazzed about their new Nerf guns and everything.  So, as usual, ups and downs, but overall good. :)

October 4, 2013

oops, guess it was another long one.  And to be fair, we have been on for pretty much the entire time between our last post and this one. This picture is the only exception to that; it was from our last weekend off (actually, on the same day as my last post).  We went for a walk, and these were just some pretty flowers along the road as we walked.  And so...there's a picture. :)

And that was pretty much the end of our time off; we didn't do anything particularly exciting.  Just slept a lot and got our house cleaned up.  (This time around, I got it cleaned up right before we went off. :) ).  Our time on was pretty exciting too; family visits for some of the kids, parent-teacher conferences (which took forever).  One of our kids also had to leave rather unexpectedly.  As hard as that was, it was really kinda see God teach us through that.  I was rather moved, because the morning that happened, I went to a Bible study about how God is outside of time and controls everything, and so I thought it was really cool to see not only that we can trust him through everything that happened that day, but also that God knew that I needed that reminder that morning.  Nathan got a good glimpse of that too; he said that his Bible reading that morning was about God telling people that "I'm going to take you away for a while, and it's gonna be really hard and not fun at all, but it's for the best," and that was just a really good reminder for us too.  So as we've said, God is good, even when life is hard.

But yeah, that were pretty much the highlights of this week.  Oh, nope one more.  I had felt a little rough over the weekend, but the high (or low...) point of that was Saturday night when I actually got sick, which then meant I couldn't really do anything the next day.  I felt bad leaving Nathan by himself for the next day, but it was nice to have some extra time to relax, and I had to erase this:

All month, I've been systematically using colors to make a pattern as I crossed out dates on our calendar.  Of course, what I didn't really think about when I started this, was that it wouldn't really show up until it was time to erase it.  so...I took a picture of it right before I erased it.  And as Nathan points out, the blue, purple, and black, are almost indistinguishable from each other, so that whole pattern idea might have been a flop.  (Which is why it's a checkerboard this month. :) )



And the last big deal (or at least the last thing I remembered to take a picture of), is the fly.  When we first moved up here, there were a TON of flies, EVERYwhere.  Literally, we put people on "fly patrol", where they just walked around with a fly-swatter and tried to kill as many flies as they could.  Anyways, we noticed...maybe a month ago, so that the flies got a lot better (more scarce).  as in, we didn't really have any.  And then about two days ago, we found another one.  and not even just a normal fly....a HUGE one.  and it just flew around the house, and buzzed around my ear while I was trying to nap, and basically I vowed to kill it.

Well, tonight we made it happen.  I got serious about getting it, and ran around our living room for about 15 minutes, and then finally Nathan got it.  Of course, we didn't think he got it, so we just stood guard in the room for about another 5 minutes, before we finally found where it had just landed after he had smacked it.  And I'm telling you it was a big one.  Here's the fly near my thumb:



And...I guess that's all I really have to say.  Except...maybe I'll be back sooner this time?  We'll see. :)

September 21, 2013

Whoops, I haven't done this in a while.  Just get busy during the day, and at the end of the day, it's just a race to finish some paperwork so we can go to bed.

Anyways, this is the picture of the week, I guess.  I mean, it was from over a week ago, but it's the only picture I have since the last time I posted.  Anyways, here's the deal:  every night, we have to set an alarm that goes off if any of the kids leave their room or anything.  But one day, it turned off.  Like, the batteries died, and there was not getting it set that night.  So, we had to sleep out in the living room.  It worked out okay though, because you remember that couch/bean-bag thing we got a while ago?  It turns into a mattress, so we didn't have to sleep on the couch, we got to sleep on an actual mattress.  Our assessment:  better than an air mattress, not as good as a real one.

September 8, 2013

Well, it's been a crazy week for us.  Sunday through Tuesday of last week, we were really just pushing to make it through to the end of our on-duty stretch.  We made it, and actually, as hard a time as I had making it to the end, I spent a surprising amount of Tuesday night thinking and talking (and some planning) about our boys.  And even then, we weren't really free from work, because we had to make a 3-hour trip to go to some training for work on Wednesday.  but then, we really were done. :)

Thursday, we really had some time off, but even then, we couldn't really just sit down and you know...rest.  Instead, we got our house pretty much cleaned up (or at least, we got the junk off our table. :) ), and got packed up for our trip.  And then, Friday, we got up super super early and left to catch a plane back to my home, for my sister's wedding!  Friday we got the place all set up and decorated (...which was mostly done by the time I got there...), and did the rehearsal and everything, and then Saturday we ran around doing last minute things and getting ready and taking pictures, and getting my sister and her now-husband married. :)  It went so well, and we all had a great time :)

And then today, we packed up (or you know, put the boxes we packed up yesterday in our cars), and drove home, unpacked, took my brother to the airport, and just kinda hung out (and watched Duck Dynasty, which I just found out my parents are big fans of. :) )  Anycase, we're gonna rest and sleep up tonight, and tomorrow we'll get up at a much more reasonable time than we did to come here, and catch our flight back to where we live.  And then we'll get to just sleep up tomorrow night, and then go back on duty the day after that, so we got some nice vacation time in this week. :)

Anyways, considering my sister got married, you'd think I'd have a ton (or at least one) pictures of her wedding.  However, my husband borrowed my camera...for the entire weekend.  so, I don't really have any pictures from it.  I did manage to catch a few pictures though, so because it's been a whole week since I posted something, and in honor of her wedding, you get all three of them!

This is a picture of my husband, the night before we left.  He decided to shave while in the shower (and thus, no mirror).  He did ask for me to tell him once or twice where stuff would be evened up, but...obviously not enough.  After a while, he just gave up, and shaved facing a mirror (over the sink) after he got out of the shower.  And he looked very nice after that. :)

This is a picture I took while running some errands after getting picked up on Friday. We had to go pick up a keyboard from the music store in town, and when we pulled up, I noticed that the strip of buildings in which the store was located had a funky swirly chimney.  I thought it was cool, and so here's a picture.  

This is a picture at the rehearsal dinner.  The restaurant we went to set this out as an appetizer (I think just for the bride and groom).  It's a rose, but it's edible.  The stem is made out of some fancy bacon (I heard some one say that it had something special done to it, and it sure looks like something was done to it, but I have no idea what was done to it.)  and the flower part is made out of a deviled egg.  

And this is the only picture of the wedding day that I have.  My sister and I went to run errands the day of the wedding (because we had to get our hair done, and pick up the flowers).  Anyways, I ended up needing to parallel park while we were out, which most people make a little bit of a big deal of, since it's kind of uncommon to do anymore (which probably adds to why people always say it's hard).  It was also more of a big deal for me, because (though it was debated later that day), that was the part of driver's ed that everyone (including my dad, which is kinda impressive in and of itself) thought I didn't actually need, and never made me do.  Anyways, first time time having to parallel park, and with no one else in the car (coaching or otherwise), this was my second attempt.  ...The first time, I got between the cars, but I was only like a foot in from the street.   But, by the end of the day, I was a pro at parallel parking (and backing up and down steep, curvy hills.)

Anyways, I might be gone for another bit, since the battery in my camera is dead, but once we get back home, I'll find some more stuff to take pictures of. :)

September 1, 2013

So, our week wasn't been too bad.  and then it was the weekend.  And really, it's not even that the weekend's been that bad; the kids have actually been really good.  ... it's just that we're tired, and they got out of school early on Friday, and they don't have school tomorrow, so we have to come up with stuff to do with the kids while they're not at school.  But it has been good.  we've had a lot of fun playing around the house and at the creek.

Anyways, our picture for today:

We're having a group on campus this week.  They're going to stay in their campers and do some helpful things around the Ranch (though to be honest, I don't exactly remember what they're going to do.  I know the ladies are going to decorate Christmas wreaths and bake us cookies, but I don't know what the guys are going to do.  I kinda went into "I'm going to be off-duty that week; I don't really care what's going on then" mode when they started talking about it."  Anyways, just be praying that they can do all the things that they mean to do, and that they're blessed while they're here (and especially that we don't do anything to make them not blessed).  

Also, I found this picture on my camera today.  It's not really anything special, just a moth we found on our house the other day.  But it sure did look cool, so I thought I would post a picture of it. :)

August 29, 2013

Welp, I was wrong...that chair did get here today. And I even managed to squeeze in some time to get it unpacked and assembled... well, sort of assembled.  All you had to do was open the box, put the cover on the floor, then dump the mattress-cube deal into the cover, zip it up, and squish it some to get it to decompress.  I think it's still got some decompressing to do, but it's plenty comfy anyways. :)  Even better, it's just the right size for my husband and I to both sit on, which is exactly what we wanted. :D

Anways, the only other real exciting bit of news is that we're getting two new boys today.  The other boys are all excited to have them here, so I think it's gonna work out real well.  In any case, be keeping us in your prayers, and just that they'd settle in well and all that.  Also, one of our other boys started asking about salvation and so forth last night, so keep in your prayers too!

August 28, 2013

So, as we expected things are going fairly smoothly.  I mean, we've been on the receiving end of some temper tantrums and such, but...that's what we get for working with 7 year olds, right? But seriously, it's been going really well, overall.  Having them in school is pretty nice, 'cuz then we can catch up on sleep during the day and stuff, and that's been very helpful.

So...pictures.  yeah, last night, I went to bed knowing what I was going to post when I got around to posting it, so here it is.  When we first moved into this apartment, we noticed there were no blinds in the window (but two sets of blinds lying underneath the window).  Turns out, those blinds were too big.  We put in a maintenance request to get those installed...within two weeks of getting here. But other stuff was more important (and we do appreciate all the other stuff they keep running instead of us having blinds), and they had to hand-cut the blinds to the correct size, and this that the other... but finally, we got them installed yesterday.  Or, to be fully accurate...our wonderful handymen finally installed them yesterday.  And they look great, and we're excited to have them up in our apartment. :)  (Plus, I got our kitchen table cleaned off, so it actually looks like responsible people live here and stuff. :) )

BUT THEN, came the truly exciting story of the evening.  Or rather, the next day.  We have to set an alarm system in our house, so we know if kids are getting up in the middle of the night and that sort of thing.  Unfortunately, the kids in our cottage set it off a bit more frequently than we'd really like (especially once we find out WHY they woke us up at 1:30 and 4 in the morning).  In any case, last night the alarm went off  (twice, if you didn't pick up on that), and I ran out, turned off the alarm, and started to go to the kids room, but I accidentally kicked the door I had to go through, and scraped my foot. But I didn't realize I had until after I had gotten him all taken care of, and was starting to go back to bed. (I feel like the tape all the way across my foot makes it look way worse than it really is, but at the same time...it is kinda gross-looking underneath the gauze.)   Anycase, doing that meant that today I got to fill out forms about my injury, and what time it happened, and "the specific process I was involved in when I sustained the injury" and so forth, and it was really kinda a hassle.  ...Especially since I'm pretty sure the most this'll turn into is a week or so of me having to take an extra 15 minutes a day (throughout the day, not even all at once) to make sure it's clean and bandaged nice and that sort of thing.  oh well.

And the really exciting part of the day is that we're supposed to get our couch/beanbag deal today (check out CordaRoys.com if you want to know exactly what I'm talking about).  I didn't believe that it'd get here today, especialy when it got to Memphis at 7:20 last night.  But, it was in town at 6 this morning, and on it's delivery route at 6:05, so I started to change my mind.  ...but it still hasn't gotten here, so I'm getting a bit more skeptical each second again.  I guess it doesn't really matter, since we won't really get to use it until next Tuesday or so (when we finally get some time off! :) )

August 24, 2013

Well, things at the Ranch never go quite like we plan on them going, but this past week has turned us for more loops than I really care to count.  Monday was the last day I posted about, so here's a quick update of the week:
Tuesday:  all hell broke loose in our cottage.  and yes, it was really that bad.  and keep in mind, the kids are in school for most of the day.
Wednesday:  our wonderful co-workers helped us recover from the previous night, and stuff is starting to look up a bit.
Thursday:  We went to training out of town for the day, and were supposed to go off for the weekend that night.  Unfortunately, our relief houseparents had a death in the family, so we got Thursday night, and Friday night off, and go back on Saturday morning.
Friday:  ...nothing super exciting happened. just slept up, and ..well, didn't really get a day off; we had to keep running to the office about kids we have to take to the doctor before the office re-opens and other crises with kids and stuff.  ...But we weren't responsible for WATCHING (or feeding. :D ) kids.


Which brings us to today.  We came back on duty fairly early (...I guess 9ams not THAT early...), and had a pretty good day.  The one good thing about being suprise on-duty this weekend, is that the hard day to plan (Saturday), was actually pretty easy, because our kids already had their day planned out from about 9-6, and they're supposed to go to bed at 8:30.  We had a church group come visit and do some activities (and feed!) our kids, so it was pretty chill for us.  We spent the majority of the day building and shooting off bottle rockets.  I helped one of our boys make one (and it went pretty good! :D  mostly straight line, and a pretty good distance),  but somehow my husband and I ended up with this one:

yeah, cute little ladybugs all over it and everything.  Pretty sure it's not one of the boys'. ;)

In any case, we're pretty tired, but today went well, and it seems like things are looking up, and will smooth out soon. :D

August 19, 2013

So maybe you'll get a two-for one today.  This was MEANT for yesterday, but it was late, and the internet was being stupid, and...I just waited to post it 'til now, but you still might get one for actually today!

The big deal for today was that it was the first day of school.  So, Nathan and I got to kinda take it easy and do paperwork-y stuff while all the kiddos were off at school.  That was really nice, and we definitely appreciated being rested up when they came home from school all crazy and amped up and stuff.

The other kinda exciting thing from today, is part of a sort of long story.  We noticed the other day, that the living room smelled kinda funky.   The next day, one of our co-workers came to our house and was like, "man, it stinks in here...I think you have skunks living under your house."  So we got with another of our co-workers, who said to put some old meat outside of the critter hole we found, and he'd try and get it later.  So we've putting some chicken outside of the critter hole for the past few days.  Last night, we were going to bed, and saw this:

Hmm...I thought I caught him, when you could actually see the stripe across his eyes.  He's a little hard to see, but if you look close (just above the blue bucket), you can see a raccoon eating up the chicken.  

And that was pretty much our day.  

August 17, 2013

Today was fun, because I got to practice my wifey-mothery skills (and somewhat newfound crafty skills), and fix this cutie for one of the cuties in our cottage:  

 That particular cutie came up to me earlier, and asked me to fix his monkey (...except he called it a bear...), because one of his arms got pulled off.  I heard a story about he got in a fight with his brother, and his brother pulled it off...but I don't actually know how it got ripped off.   But it's a moot point now, 'cuz I fixed it for him.   

Though to be fair...they weren't complete cuties all day.  Sometimes the kids were being really rude to each other (it was really sad to see the brothers fighting), and after a while you just want to strangle them all.  But then you start tucking them into bed at night and they're just so sweet and give nice hugs, and you just want to take them all home with you...which is kind of an odd way to feel, since we basically do live with them.