Ringlets

After a thorough hair washing and conditioning, Olivia magically transforms from Don King into a perfect princess with perfect ringlets :)

Not what we were expecting

Well, after a six month long wait, we found out this past Friday that Theo did not get the assignment at work he had been hoping for. And on top of that, we are moving, but only to a different house here. Our landlords are unexpectedly having to move back. They are coming back in December but are giving us until July to move out. However, since we are not moving out of state, we feel there is no point in waiting to get out of this house. Oh, and if all of this wasn't enough, our renters in LA are moving out in a month and we have to find renters for that house! Ughhhh! Stressful weekend to say the least.

So we are most likely going to buy a house close to where we live now. I found a great house in our neighborhood that is a little closer to Carter's school. Theo and I are going to go look at it this weekend and then go from there. I went and looked at it yesterday and I really like it. It's a brand new house and won't be finished for a couple of more weeks but I really like the house. We're not for sure about buying but we are leaning towards that. The interst rates are so good, it's hard to pass up. And if we rent another house here, the same thing could happen to us again. We can't afford to be moving every year!

Although this has been a tough situation for us, we are trying hard to trust God's plan for our lives. It's always difficult to understand why good things don't happen when we want them too. But we have to believe God has something in store for Theo that is above and beyond what he could imagine. Please pray for Theo though because he's having a hard time understanding why he was not given this opportunity despite how hard he worked for it.


Photo courtesy of here

In kid news, Olivia is sleeping better at night finally. She still wakes up some but we usually don't have to feed her. I think she's going through a growth spurt thought because she is constantly wanting food. She gets more and more demanding everyday.




Carter is doing pretty well and is so excited for Halloween. Every picture he draws, he wants to cut it out and keep it for party decorations!

Baby P is crusing along. We're hoping to be moved before baby comes. I've moved beore being 34 weeks pregnant, and although not ideal, we can handle it. This time we'll be moving down the street and not across the country so it'll be ok. I can use my big belly as an excuse to avoid any strenous moving activity! :)

Fox Run Park

Wednesday evening, Amy and I took the kids to a new park north of us. I had heard from another friend that this park was really good. Our neighborhood park is good too but there is no shade and it can get hot or cold for that matter in an instant. So we ventured out of our hood and found Fox Run park. I'm so glad we did. I think this will be our new favorite park. We stayed for almost two hours and Carter slept so good that night! It was nice to have Amy and the boys there too.

The tire swing was all fun and games until Caden turned a few shades of green! Note to self for next time :)




Burn off some of that energy boys!


Carter pretending to get maple syrup out of the tree...he got that from a Little Einsteins book


Olivia just hanging out in the swing

Boo!

In the spirit of Halloween, Carter and I decided to make this ghost craft this week. We used to do a lot of arts and crafts together before we started preschool. But I've really slacked off on that since August....well, since May really! It is so fun to watch the wheels of his mind spin as he creates things. Hopefully we'll make some more Halloween decorations in the next few days for our first annual Halloween party!

Ear infection.....not what you may think

A couple of days ago, Carter stumbled upon these light-up devil horns in the garage.


Theo must have bought them at some point because I'm certain I didn't. So we played around with them and I put them on for a few minutes. I mentioned to Theo that I could wear them for Halloween. Well, Sunday, Carter asked me what I was going to be for Halloween. I told him I didn't know. I guess because we've been talking about Olivia having an ear infection, he came up with this: "Mom, you could be that red ear infection for Halloween!" I said "Are you talking about that headband mommy was wearing?" And he said yes! I thought I was going to wet my pants laughing so hard! That boy, he comes up with some stuff! I guess it's better he think I'm an ear infection and not the devil :)

Our weekend

We didn't do a whole lot this weekend. Friday I ended up taking Olivia to the doctor and she had an ear infection. When I looked with my otoscope, she had so much wax that I don't know how the PA really say her ear drum to saw it was an infection but oh well! I'm hoping this has been the cause of her waking up MULITPLE times a night for several nights! Someone must have told Olivia that vitamin C is good for sickness because she was really chewing on the toy orange this weekend :)



I went to Joann's Saturday morning to get Olivia some more fabric for a Thanksgiving dress I plan to make. I originally bought enough fabric but wasn't paying attention and cut it the wrong way! The turkeys would have been upside down!

I took the kids back to the park Saturday afternoon but cut the trip short on account of some of the rudest boys I've encountered here! They were so terrible to Carter, who by nature is mostly pretty sweet and minds his own business.


But I digress..... Saturday night was not fun. Olivia was super cranky and Theo had gone out for a while so I was happy to put them both to bed. Theo and I watched a really scary, freaky movie called The Collector. It was a good pre-Halloween movie but not for the faint of heart!

Sunday Theo unexpectedly had to work but I took both kids to church. Olivia did well. I was a little worried but she did great. We went to the mall to check out a new gymboree owned store called Crazy 8. I think that may be my new favorite kid's clothing store. Gymboree type clothes at more affordable prices. I got Carter some cute stuff. Nothing for baby girl because her cup closet overfloweth!

Tomorrow, it's back to school for Carter and we have his parent-teacher conference. Other than that and our baby ultrasound, the only other exciting thing this week is waiting for baby Ava, my new neice, to be born!!! I can't wait to see her and wish I was in Louisiana to hold my precious niece :( Hope you all have a good week!

Cabin Fever

We had a pretty good weekend....until Sunday night! We went out to a new restaurant Friday night. Wasn't anything to write home about but we had a good time hanging out. Saturday, we went to a birthday party for Carter's friend Guy. And they were kind enough to have the LSU game on just for me. Okay, maybe not just for me but I got to see most of it anyway. It was such an exciting game that I called my dad at 10p.m. to talk about it! Don't these LSU players know I have a bad heart and they shouldn't be doing this to me? :)

Sunday morning was my first volunteer Sunday with the 1st and 2nd grade ministry. It was a lot of fun but makes me realize I don't want to be an elementary school teacher!

And then Sunday night, BAM! We ALL got sick. Theo, Olivia, and I all had a stomach virus. Carter has croup. It has been a week filled with frequent sheet washing, barely getting off of the couch, watching a lot t.v., eating a LOT of pizza that Theo thankfully went and picked up right before the bottom fell out (no pun intended!). Carter didn't go to school this week. I cancelled his parent-teacher conference. Theo went to the doctor Tuesday and they told him he couldn't go back to work this week. I think we are finally on the mend, although Carter still sounds like Donald Duck and Olivia has been running fever off and on this whole week.

I just can't say enough about my amazing husband. Even in the worst of all of our illness, he still got up with Olivia multiple times Sunday night and other nights this week. I truly don't know what I would have done without him. He is such a good husband and father!

Ok, so enough about all of that yuckiness. Just wanted to let you know what our week has been like. This morning, we finally did venture out early and take the kids to the park. Besides a car ride to Sonic for a vanilla coke with mommy, Carter and Olivia hadn't been out of the house since Saturday. Cabin fever was really taking over! They had a good time at the park and it was so nice to be outside and get some fresh air.




Theo is going to stay home with them today so I don't have to miss my Thursday Bible study. This month's topic is on marriage so I really don't want to miss it. Speaking of that, I better go get ready! Hope you all had a better week than we did here!

Don't be fooled

*Because we have ALL been sick for the past few days, here is a post I had written a couple of weeks ago but didn't post. Sorry, no pictures this week. We all look AWFUL!*

I do NOT have it all together. This post was the result of a conversation Meredith and I had recently. She was at the grocery store trying to decide if she needed shrimp or not or if she already had some at home. I told her just to get it since that's what I always do. Then I said that that philosophy has caused a lot of little fights between me and Theo. He is always frustrated when I bring home something from the store that we already have. And I always tell him that I don't have time to inventory the pantry and fridge before I go shopping and I'm doing good just to get us all out the door! And Meredith said she was so happy to hear that because I always look like I have it together.

What? Me? No way! So I have felt God putting it on my heart to write about this. No, this is not a post in which I am going to air all my dirty laundry. Yes, I mostly blog about my precious kids because I am by nature a glass half full person (most of the time). Yes, I will continue to mostly blog about the good things because who wants to read Debbie Downer's blog? Not me :)

With that said, I do feel called to write from my heart. I know most of the people who read my blog are young wives and moms. We are all doing the best we can. But no one is perfect. No one has it all together. If so, they are heavily medicated in my opinion! :)

I never want this blog to come across as though we have this seeming impossible perfect life. Because we don't. Don't get me wrong, we have a good life. And I am grateful for all of the heartache and struggles along the way because God had a purpose through it all. But I don't want anyone to every think everything is always roses and daffodils.

My marriage has had it's share of ups and downs, none of which you will find me discussing here. What I will talk about is the everyday things we struggle with as a couple. It's hard living with someone on a daily basis! And no one ever tells you before you get married how difficult it truly is. We had premarital counseling...from a Catholic priest! No offense to Father P but really, what can he say about being married? :)

Our marriage has grown quite a bit over the past year and I'm grateful for that. But again, it hasn't all been roses. I like to think of myself as Theo's conscience, which is never a good thing and leads to a lot of nagging on my part. I have a HARD time submitting to my husband even though the Bible clearly states that is what a wife is to do. I feel like he often puts work ahead of us and that he doesn't appreciate how hard it is to be a stay at home mom. We have had fights over our families, our money, how we spend our free time, etc etc. Probably the same things you all fight with your spouses about.

But we always work through them and those disagreements bring us closer together in the long run. We are really working on trying to respect and appreciate each other. Probably the best book I've ever read about marriage is called Love and Respect. I have said it over and over that if we could daily live out the principles in that book, our marriage would be almost perfect!

I don't have it all together and probably never will. So I'm relying on God to help fill in the gaps, both in my own life and my marriage. I know we could never have a solid marriage if God is not at the heart of it. After all, every good and perfect gift is from above. And my marriage is a gift. My husband is a gift (no gift receipt needed, he's a keeper!) But sustaining our marriage is work, and work we have to keep up with on a daily basis. Fortunately, we have Christ to help us through it!

As seen out of our front door window

Every morning as I walk down the stairs, this is the beautiful scene that greets me. When the sun shines just right, these two trees in our front yard are gorgeous. I love the turning of the leaves. It's definitely one of my favorite parts of fall. You know, besides the pumpkin spice lattes!


And because I haven't posted many pictures of the kids this week.....

One night this week, Olivia and Carter were both in the kitchen. He was having a bedtime snack of applesauce. Apparently, Olivia was begging for some because when I turned around, this is what I saw:



Man, my life just got a whole lot easier if Carter can start feeding Olivia instead of me! Ha!

Theo has been working late every night this week so hopefully he'll be home at a decent hour so we can go out to eat. We rarely go out to dinner. Seriously, maybe once a month. So just in case we happen to move next summer (still waiting on that news which should come by the end of the month), we made a goal to eat out at least twice a month and try a new place each time. A couple of weeks ago, it was my turn to pick. I love mexican food. Really, what type of food do I not love? Not sure. There was a restaurant really close to the library we go to all the time called Salsa Brava. One of Theo's former co-workers said it was really good. So we decided to check it out. The food was terrible! Well, my entree was decent. It was a grilled veggie burrito, hard to mess up right? But the "salsa" was called blackened something or another. And it tasted like burned tomatoes. I thought maybe we just got a bad batch, but the second bowl tasted just as disgusting as that one. How disappointing because you all know I love me some chips and hot sauce. Give me Superior salsa any day! Tonight is Theo's turn to pick. Not sure where we'll go but he said somewhere downtown. My mouth is watering just thinking about dinner. I live for my next meal :)

Tomorrow evening we have a birthday party for one of Carter's friends. We're trying to decide if we want to go to the Air Force Academy game. The traffic was so bad last week for the game (as we were trying to get to the pumpkin patch) that I'm not sure how great of an idea it will be. But I would like to see a game before we a) have to move and b) before it gets freezing outside. Now that Olivia is all over the place, I think it'll be more difficult. But it's one of those things on our "Colorado to-do list". We're checking off things left and right!

Sunday is my first day to work with the first and second graders at church! I guess I'm a little nervous because my church is HUGE and there will be a ton of kids. But I need to get plugged in and there is no better place for me to be than working with kids. Unless they have a food tasting commitee or something, which I doubt! Hope you all have a great weekend!

Itsy bitsy spider

Some of the most chilling words I have heard my husband say are "Get up (or walk away) very slowly". Immediately I break out into chills and start contemplating how my children or I am about to be hurt.

This time, we were sitting on a hay bale out in the middle of the pumpkin patch. I just knew it was a snake, after all, we have already had two encounters with snakes while hiking.

But when I turned my head, this is what I saw:


I wasn't near as terrifed by this huge spider as I was the snakes because I knew I could outrun the spider. But Carter was a little frightened and wanted to stay in the stroller. I can't say I blame him. Glad we don't have one of those for a pet!

Happy Birthday Omaw!

We love you! You are the best Omaw ever!

Gossip

I am taking a break from my regular cute and sweet posts to share something on my heart. This past Sunday, Pastor Brady preached a sermon about gossip. You can watch it here. I must confess, this is something I have always struggled with. I don't believe I am alone. Pastor Brady said that gossip somehow satisfies a need of our carnal flesh. I agree. I used to love hearing good and bad news about people I knew well and people I barely knew at all.

But Sunday, I felt a conviction like I never have before to end the gossip, both telling it and listening to it. One of the sweetest girls I have ever met was my college sorority big sister. I never heard her say a negative word about anyone, which seems almost impossible these days. Now, we haven't kept in touch so I'm only basing my assessment of her from when I knew her. But the thing about it was that I never heard anyone say a negative word about her either. Funny how that works.

Truthfully, mostly I gossip to Theo, sometimes my closest friends, and sometimes my parents. I often feel like I need to tell Theo things because it helps me feel better.

Where is the line drawn between gossip and venting? I don't know if I can make that distinction. But on the flip side, if I never got my feelings out and talked to Theo or my close friends, I feel like my insides would probably explode! And Theo often talks to me about things bothering him too.

Mostly I gossip about things that annoy me. When so and so gets on my nerves, when so and so does something I would never do, when so and so is insensitive or hurts my feelings. But when did God appoint me their conscience? When I did become head judge and why is it my place to tell others about this?

Don't get me wrong, I am a trustworth person. If someone, anyone, came to me in confidence, those things I will take to my grave. And even if they tell me not to tell Theo, I don't. I don't want the people I'm close to to feel as if they can't trust me.

But, I have been quick in the past to repeat things I've heard about others from other people. Pastor Brady defined gossip as this: 1) telling the wrong info (half truths, heresay, etc) to anyone (which is obvious to me) and 2) telling the right information to the wrong person. Hmmmm, this was what got me. Who is the wrong person? Anyone that is not part of the solution. Will the person I am gossiping to benefit from what I'm telling them? Could it possibly change how they feel about the person I'm gossiping about? If so, they are the wrong person to share that information with.

I had to have a hard conversation with someone I am close to and ask for forgiveness for some things I've said behind their back in the past. I'm telling you, that was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do! Fortunately, and undeservingly so, that person was very forgiving. But after I hung up the phone, I felt a huge burden lifted off of me. This was something I feel that the enemy had been holding over for a long time and was the cause of a lot of guilt. And now he doesn't have that hold over me. Even though I had already asked for God's forgiveness, I knew I needed to go to this person and ask for their forgiveness as well.

I made a vow on Sunday that I would not gossip about anyone again. Now that is a hard promise to live up to but I know with the help of the Holy Spirit, I can do it! I have been mediating on this verse: "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen" (Ephesians 4: 29)and it is helping me keep a guard over my mouth! Now don't get me wrong, I will talk to my husband about things that are bothering me. As a wise woman once told me, in the confines of a marriage, I am one with Theo. There is a higher level of trust and it's a safe place where I should, and do, feel free to speak whatever is on my mind. But I will keep those things between Theo and myself. Anyone else, I just can't do it anymore.

What I need from all of you is to first of all pray for me. Secondly, if I even start to share something that resembles gossip, please stop me! And on the flip side, please don't share things with me that would be considered gossip. If it's not beneficial for me to know it or if I can't help with the problem, I probably shouldn't be hearing it. That my make our conversations very short :) but at least then I will know I am doing the right thing!

Berry pickin' and tractor ridin'

Carter loves tractors! Ever since he got his first taste of one a papaw's house, he has loved them ever since. This year, we had the giant stroller so I wasn't sure if we would get to ride on the tractor at the pumpkin patch. So Theo just took Carter and I stayed with Olivia and it worked out great! It was the same guy driving as it was last year when we went.




At the pumpkin patch, they also have raspberry bushes. This was Carter's favorite part. We spent quite a while and ended up with 2 pints of fresh raspberries. I got tired of squatting down (most of the berries left were on the underside of the bushes) and my legs are paying for it now!


We gave Olivia a raspberry and I'm not sure if she like it. She spit it out along with a mouth full of vanilla wafer!

Now we have to come up with something to make. Any raspberry recipes?

Post berry pickin' picture...can you tell Carter man was tired? He took a nap in the car on the way home!

Pumpkin Patch

Today we ventured an hour south of us to go back to Happy Apple Farm. The apples were all picked out, but we mainly go for the pumpkin patch anyway. Fortunately we had BOB (our heavy duty jogging stroller) so we were able to maneuver over the rough land.





Carter really enjoyed it. Olivia was pretty happy as long as her tummy was full. We found a spot where I could actually sat her on the ground and I was able to get some cute pictures.


The weather could not have been more perfect but I did manage to bring home some pumpkins and a sunburn! When will I learn?


If we are here next year, I know we'll enjoy taking little baby P along too!

Cute Carterisms and story time

These are just some of the things my sweet, and often hillarious son has been saying lately:

Olivia had a shirt with a strawberry on it the other day and he said "Mom, she looks like Strawberry shortcut!"

We were just looking at pictures from Olivia's baptism and he said "How did Olivia get bath ties?" and it took me a minute to realize he was trying to say baptized!

He used to get a small treat for staying in his bed all night (like two skittles) and a couple of weeks ago, he ended up in our bed several nights. In the mornings, he would say "Mom, I wasn't coming in your bed. I was just coming to check on you!"

I have been going to Bible Study Thursdays at church. Carter gets to go in a different room than he does on Sundays and he calls it the "wood chip center" aka, the worship center! Hahahaha!!!

He's also been saying he wants to get big and strong like daddy. When I ask him why he wants to grow up, he says "So I can go to work!" If only he knew what he was in for.....

On a different note, my kids love books. There are very few days we go without reading a book or two or thirty! Now Olivia has also gotten into books and loves to pull out the big kids books and pretend to read them. She even flips through the pages and sometimes shakes her head no as if to say that is not how the story goes. It's so precious.



But what is most precious is seeing them sit together on the floor and Carter reads to her.

I'm so thankful my kids have a love for reading just as I do!

Sorry, no fabulous recipes this week. I didn't make anything out of the ordinary. But next week's menu is sheperd's pie, chicken noodle soup, and steaks with twice baked potatoes (not all in the same meal of course!). If any of those turn out better than ordinary, I'll share the recipes :)