Okay, here is my story about staying overnight in Hamilton, TX.

We followed Shannon's hubby, Richard, to the place where we were spending the night. In the middle of nowhere, and it was perfect! I would love to live out in the country like that. The best part was no train, unlike where we live presently.

So here we were following Richard, and as we were driving, I pointed out a light to Jason far away out in the woods, and said "Wow, that house is way out there." He said "Yeah, I see that." As we continued to drive the light seemed to be getting closer, closer, and closer until I realized we were pulling right up to the house we were staying at lol. Here are a couple of pictures I took. Thankfully, Amber took some pictures too because I kept forgetting.

In TX these are called "holding tanks".
Where I come from, they are called Ponds lol.
Do you see the cowboy hats there? Jason put one on, and said he's gonna start wearing one lol. Okay so now for my story.

After Richard got us inside the house he was telling us a story about when it rained once, and the owner of this house could not drive out because the creek bed filled with water so they were stuck until the water dried up. Jason and I thought "wow".


Okay, so we all get to bed, and we are sleeping well. As I am sleeping, I was awakened by this weird noise that sounded like rain, only I was not sure. So sometime in the middle of the night Amber comes in our room to wake me up because she too thinks it's raining. At this point I decide to get out of bed to check, I walked over to the doors in the hallway to look outside thinking I would see the rain....yeah right.....it's too dark, but I knew it was rain. And Sure enough it was not just raining, it was pouring! A least I knew what the noise was. It didn't really sound like rain until I opened the door. After this I walk to the bedroom, it hits me remembering what Richard said about the creek bed filling with water so I thought "Oh no!", and so I try to wake Jason.....like this.

Me: Jason, wake up, it's raining

Jason: Okay, go back to sleep

Me: No, you don't understand. IT'S RAINING, and the Creek Bed is going to fill up! We won't be able to get out.

Jason: Go back to bed, we are not packing up the van at 4 in the morning to drive nowhere. Go back to sleep.

Me: oooookay.......

So I got back in bed, but could not go to sleep right away. I was too busy thinking how we were going to survive. I finally fell asleep, got up at 6am, and went out to make coffee etc......it was nice. It was still dark out too. Jason finally got up, and I told him my little survival strategy ....mean while he is smiling, and chuckling at me. It went like this....

Me: I couldn't sleep last night trying to figure out how we would survive if we can't drive out because the creek bed if filled with water.

Jason: (while he is laughing at me) Okay.......

Me: So I began thinking, and calculating how long we could live on the loaf of bread, 8 eggs, and grits Shannon gave us until help would come for us since there is no other food. Then I began to think if worse came to worse, I could send you out the old fashioned way to hunt a deer, and bring it back to the house since I remembered Richard saying he had seen a deer before when they stayed out there, and then we could put movies on for the kids while we cut the deer up to cook. This way they won't be traumatized. Then we could freeze the remaining meat, and spread it out as long as we can.

Jason: (Laughing) or we could walk to their relatives' house (ten feet away), and ask for help.

Me: oh, yeah.......that would work too (laughing)

It was truly comical! Yep.....good times in Hamilton! ;p
And, no, the Creek Bed was not filled with water. ;0

We spent last weekend with my dear friend of mine Shannon and her husband, Richard. I am so excited for them. They live in Hamilton, TX where Richard is the pastor of Calvary Baptist Church. They have 3 wonderful boys 15, 4, and 2. They have a very loving church family where every one makes you feel right at home like they have known you their whole lives from the moment they meet you! I miss our friends living in Fort Worth but I am so happy they are only a two hour drive away, serving God.

We had a blast! I had a lot of fun talking with Graham who is 4 yrs old. He was too cute, he kept referring to Amer and Alyssa as my sisters. Oh....and little Wesley reminds me of Tiger jumping up and down all the time. I can't remember all my conversations with Graham but here is a really cute one we had while I was watching him play with Alyssa in his bedroom.

Graham: Hey ya know what...there are two Rebecca's.

Me: Yep

Graham: Why are there two Rebecca's? (with a puzzled look)

Me: Because God wanted two Rebecca's.... actually there are three Rebecca's (he doesn't know Rebekah Moore).
Graham: There are three Rebecca's? (eyes get big with a puzzled look)

Me: There sure are

Graham: (with a puzzled look on his face) What's her name?

I laughed sooooo hard! If only you could have heard him.
Her boys are so special to me =)
Well.....I have another funny story but I will post it later.

Well...Michael discovered sometime last week that he has feet. Now he is reaching out for things. Poor little guy can't quite get what he wants because coordination isn't there yet; however, my coffee was his main interest this morning.

I don't mind sharing coffee... but not if I am going to wear it, LOL. Of course I wouldn't give him any. He is such a delight. I love my little man, and it has begun......he pulls my hair, which I am used to, plus anything else within arms reach. Amber, on the other hand, has a cow, and it goes a little something like this.....

Amber: Ouch! Mom, he's pulling my hair!

Me: Yeah, they do that.........

Amber: well, come get him

Me: You know he does this......figure it out.

Amber: Laughing.....uh, that was hard (you know she likes it & the attention)

Me: Uh huh....

Well.....I am off to work on my other postings that I will soon share. I usually have grammatical errors when I write so I wait for Jason to scan it for me unless he doesn't have time ;) Hopefully I will get them posted soon.

Here is a cute video. We were playing "Where's the Baby"(instead of peek-a-boo) with Michael before we made our bed in the morning. Our sheet got nice and wet from Michael putting it in his mouth ;p

The pictures were taken by my friend Abby Caldwell. She is amazing!



Create Your Own

If there’s a will, there’s a way, or should I say….if there’s a Rebecca there’s a….. well, enough said ROFL! Jason and I were talking in the kitchen after we put our lights on the tree and kids were in bed he cleaned up the rest of the kitchen for Amber (this is her chore every evening). So I am in the living room and here this loud crash! I knew it was big…it sounded big!

After hearing him react, and then it got really quiet, I knew it was something of mine! So I said “Everything okay in there? What broke?” He said “The coffee pot.” I said “THE WHAT?” What will I do in the morning???? My life flashed before my eyes! He said…”I will buy you a coffe at Quick Trip in the morning if we get moving fast enough.” I had EVERYBODY out the door lightning Fast this morning! LOL….

Got my coffee came home and told Deb ( my long time- known her 20 yrs- friend in Chicago) what happened. She replied with “What on earth are you going to do with out a coffee pot?????????????”….. I was so glad she asked lol!

Here is what I did……..After I told her I accused Jason this morning of this being his way of controlling my coffee consumption LOL ……I tried to use my pampared chef mixing bowl, the small one, to catch the coffee. Well it didn’t quite fit so I then tried to use my coffee cup from Quick Trip to do it, mean while Amber is video tapping me LOL! Nothing was coming out! Well, I finally remembered that it was the pause drip so I got a little knife to hold it so the coffee would come out and… YAY…….I had my coffee anyway!!

It all started last night. My foot wasn’t doing too good but we had to go to Target. We needed to get a couple decorations for our tree and some egg nog in which they didn’t have the kind we like (Southern Comfort Vannila Spice). This is a tradition we started a couple yrs back or so. We listen to Christmas music, eat cookies, drink egg nog and have a merry ole time. Besides, we had to get the tree up last night because she needed to be watered…...don’t worry, I didn’t name her LOL.

Anyway, we get to Target and of course the first place I stop at was Starbuks. Jason just shook his head and said “Fine, I’ll have one too”. I am slowly converting him lol! Well, I got a Peppermint White Chocolate Mocha……HEAVEN……ya gotta go get one! So then we are off to shop, first stop…..looking at decorations, some where nice but not what we are looking for except for the Talking Yoda stalking I tried to talk Jason into getting, he says the same thing ALL time…”Do or do not, there is no try.” So after a few laughs in the “we aren’t doing this to ourselves with new talking stalkings on Christmas morning we are off to brows our way to the egg nog (which I still can’t believe they didn’t have).

So there I am strolling my cart along while Jason is trying to find a remote toy Tarantula when I felt a bump, mind you I had a car seat with Michael in the top of the cart blocking my view. I immediately thought I hit an end-cap so I walked around the cart to see if I knocked anything down. I looked to my left, I saw nothing in front of the cart, so I said hum….and then went to the right and there it was…..a little boy and I mean a little boy walked out and stared at me so I said “Oh sweetie are you okay?”…….Of course he wasn’t! This strange woman towering over him asking if he is ok …..After bumping into him with a giant cart and he doesn’t speak any English.

So what happens next? He starts to cry of course!….so, I’m thinking… oh Lord! I look around and see NO parent, so I ask him if he’s okay, again and he moves away from me crying like I am about to kill him running to an aisle where I see two women pop their heads out from the baby section! He was in the toy section! Alone! Well…….thankfully? he wasn’t old enough to speak or I would have needed someone to translate the obscenities they would be yelling at me wondering what I did to this boy, who was in front of my cart, and who was only a knee high to a grass hopper… LOL. I couldn’t help but laugh when I told Jason. More importantly, I told Jason someone could have very easily taken this boy and they would have never known!! Now that bothered me!

Well…….we leave Target, but not before getting my Chipmuck Christmas CD! Jason thought it was crazy and couldn’t believe I was serious LOL! The girls loved it and I laughed the whole way to Walmart where they carry our egg nog, and I almost hit another little boy playing by his parents truck with his remote control car in the pitch dark while driving around waiting for Jason to come back out! Lucky for him there wasn’t a car seat in my view lol!

So why isn't everyone as good a mom as I am? I am perfect you know.....says the SRLM (Self Righteous lying Mom) LOL!

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving day. Our was quite funny. It all started with the turkey! We took the turkey out of the freezer on Tuesday, put it in the fridge to thaw, and when we took it out to begin the fixins for it........it was still FROZEN lol! Now what will we do?? hum......so the wheels begin to turn........the turkey is too big for the sink it won't sit under water. So I felt the....."you know if you're a red-neck if you have to soak you're over-sized frozen turkey in the bath tub Thanksgiving morning to thaw" coming on LOL

Jason finally got her thawed and fixed her right up. Sounds kinda scary when I give it a gender hu?...well.......at least I didn't name her, right? LOL
She took a while to cook, but wasn't as temperamental as we thought she'd be. We completed the end end of her life at the table, beautifully golden, and decorated with with the ymmies. It's okay, she never saw it coming.

Other than the turkey episode we had a wonderful day! I could not have asked for a better birthday, and Thanksgiving day. I was thankful for all my family and friends..........of course I am thankful for family & friends everyday LOL The last time my birthday fell on Thanksgiving, I was 10 yrs old. On top of that I did NOT over eat! Everyone else did.......so I was the only one not in pain hehehehe

Ah.......Good Times! ;p

Happy Thanksgiving!

Well.........it turns out that I have strained my Achilles' Heel. This is not good! Apparently I have over worked it with walking, being out of alignment (which my Chiropractor has worked on), going up the stairs (don't have a choice there, we live in a town house).

I did a pretty good number on it too because I can't apply a lot of pressure to my foot when walking. Jason is taking good care of me though, he makes my epson salt water, and I soak my foot. I wonder when I can get back to walking!

I'd really appreciate your prayers! Seriously! =)

Here is a link for basic information on it.
www.achillestendon.com/CausesofInjury.html

I had a great time at the gun range! Jason stood by me and taught me everything I needed to know. I must brag..........I did very well for my first time and he was especially impressed with how well I did! I loved every min of it. I can't wait to do it again.

I shot my 22 cal Sig........NICE........Jason shot his 40 cal Taurus. I JUMPED out of my skin when he shot his gun! It was SO powerful and loud! After he shot a few times I quit flinching. I shot his gun and I could only shoot a few bullets it has a pretty good recoil that I am not used to yet. For now I will practice with mine and I would like to get, eventually, a 40 cal Sig.

Here is my picture of my first time =)

Well.......I decided to play with my page. I am not completely satisfied but it's good for now I suppose. I made the header myself, I took the picture and then got to playing. It's definitely therapeutic for me and it's stress relieving.

I always face being indecisive though, and the perfectionist in me says "it's not good enough" so I keep redoing it over and over till there is nothing left to do with it but to start over from scratch. And the hours go buy fast, before I know it I loose track of time. But a girl has got to have sometime.....right? hehe

I most likely will not keep this for long anyway. It's kinda like buying handbags for me.............need I explain more? LOL

Well........I am tired and not feeing well. It feels like a cold but I think it's my allergies. We rinsed the car down today, I noticed how many cars including ours is covered in pollen. It's not as visible on our car though because our car is in the Gold family so it shows up on darker cars. I went to get the "Equate" brand of Advil Cold & Sinus today and got carded! LOL..............wow

On a different note:
I am really excited about my date with my hubby tomorrow. We are going to the gun range and he's gonna teach me how to shoot. I can't wait! I love the way the Sig feels so I can't wait to feel how it shoots ;p

Well...........I am off to relax.................achoo!

We had so much work to do yesterday for home work. I found myself feeling stressed a few times. I really like Amber's school but sometimes the work load is a bit much, but mostly on Wednesdays. She has 2 History test today, an English quiz, plus she had to do an at-home opened book Science quiz. I wish it would have been assigned to study on Friday last week through Monday. This would have given more time to study instead of cramming everything in on Wed along with all her other home work that is due today.

We worked for hours. Jason stayed home with her last night while I went to church with Alyssa and Michael because the work HAD to be done. I felt bad for her.....she loves LIT (Leaders in Training) at our church. She was upset.... but we had no other choice. If we had waited till we got home she would have gotten to bed too late, and we can't have that! Children who do not get to bed at a decent hour aren't worth much at school the next day. They are tired and cranky........I could never do that to her teacher or myself!

So I am praying and giving real serious thought to homeschooling full time next year. I am willing to be disciplined, create routines, plan, etc........and even expand my own knowledge in order to give our children a better education. The cost is actually significantly cheaper to teach the SAME courses at home than sending her to CLPS.

I have already spoken with the hubby about giving me the right resources to expand my knowledge in order to do this. He is also willing to teach me in areas he feels I need improvement before I undertake such a task where I have always felt teaching is not my gift. I will have some History and Math to learn this summer through him.

The more I think about teaching not being my gift, I realize that God gave us these beautiful children, and we actually teach them through example, love, discipline, responsibilities, and the list goes on............

I teach them everyday with out realizing it (how could I not realize that?). From the kids helping to cook, clean, do laundry and other chores, we are teaching them. I am teaching/leading by example how to run a home. Wow, what a huge responsibility I have, to lead by example to teach our daughters how to manage, and run a house with creating a safe, peaceful, God centered environment, and my being a submissive loving wife. Also, according to Deuteronomy we are commanded to teach our children.

The more I give thoughts about homeschooling full time, I realize that, as parents we only have one chance in this life at our children's education (in every area of life), and how a solid foundation will determine their success along with a positive attitude, but more importantly a personal relationship with God.

The more I hash through my thoughts in writing this, I realize I need to improve my "Suzie homemaker" skills. I can remember the kind of wife and mother my mother was, so what will my children remember of me? What will they walk away with when they leave "the nest"? Will I have taught them every thing God has commanded? Will I have set an example worthy of the "Proverbs" wife?

Being a stay-at-home mom is so much more than I have ever realized. This is my call, my ministry, and when the job is done........the right way, it's a lot of hard work! Much harder than I ever realized. Since moving to TX from FL to attend seminary, my perspective has changed in this area. I take my responsibility a lot more serious than I have ever before. I wonder if I was just "playing house" before.

I treasure my time having worked at the seminary. It was the HARDEST year of my life! To be away from my children for HOURS, and only being able to spend 2-3 hours each evening with them, if even that. The weekends were not much better because we had laundry, grocery shopping, and church to attend. This left very little time for me to be who I really am.....wife, mom, and homemaker. I NEVER felt content even though I learned a lot, and gained precious friend ships that I would never trade anything for.

But.......My heart and thoughts were always at home: playing with my children, cleaning , cooking, and there was ALWAYS this subtle knock at the door to my heart yearning to be where God was calling me. He was calling me to be home--calling me to be a better wife, mother, and homemaker than I ever was before. So through a lot of prayer, God opened the door/doors or me to come home. I have never seen my children happier, and Jason more relieved about my returning home full time. I would not be were I am right now if we had not follow God's calling on our life to come out here.

In closing, and through juggling my thoughts through out this blog........ I have a lot of hard work ahead of me if I plan to make a "real" difference in my home.

Okay, there are about 50 things I am "supposed" to get DONE right now/today! But since I am feeling over whelmed about all of it........ I decided to take 10 min to play................
Click on the pix for a BIG view =)









Hanging out with daddy =)


Alright, back to work. I will have to answer my emails later though!

Jennifer:
Thanks for all the links girl!! =)

Blondies are a type of Brownie. If you have never had a blondie, here is a simple and quick recipe. You are just a bowl, wire whisk, and an oven away from heaven!

Blondies

6 tablespoons butter
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chocolate OR peanut butter flavored chips

1. Combine melted butter and brown sugar; stirring until dissolved. Beat in eggs and vanilla.
2. In another bowl, combine flour, baking powder, and salt. Add to the butter mixture. Spread the batter evenly in a well-buttered 9-inch square pan. Sprinkle chips over the top.
3. Bake at 350*F. for 25 to 30 minutes, or until the center is set. Cool before cutting.

Makes 16 squares.

*Cheers to GOOD Eats!!

Will my feet stop growing?
I can't remember if my feet grew when I was prego with Amber, however, they did grow when I was prego with Alyssa. I went from a size 7 to a 7 1/2......not too bad. Well.......my feet grew again while I was pregnant with Michael. In July I had to go buy a size 8 shoe. This was to be expected since my feet grew while I was pregnant with Alyssa so I assumed they would again.

Here is the WEIRD part! After giving birth to Michael, I started walking my two miles every morning again around 3 or 4 weeks after giving birth. Well, I told Rebekah (my girlfriend) that my feet were hurting ( this was in September) and I probably needed to cut my toe nails. So I cut my toe nails and this did not help! Turns out my feet were STILL GROWING, and I had to go get new shoes yet again.

The new shoes I have now are a size 8.5 and my feet are starting to hurt, again......this time I am having pain throughout my feet period. My toes are hurting once again, so I asked Jason to feel where my toes are in my shoes. He said "They are right at the end", he sat down, looked at me, and said "Stop growing." So tomorrow I want to get my feet measured at Payless or somewhere. We will see if I am growing in to a size 9, but what happens if I have more children? Will I be BIG FOOT?? Yikes!

There appears to be a lot of controversial issues about this movie. My husband and I always watch any movie first before we allow our children to see it. I am interested in seeing the movie to know if some of the rumors are indeed true. I have been told by a couple friends that the author has an anti-Christian agenda, along with Pullman's "The Golden Compass" being a direct rebuttal of C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia.