Wednesday, May 27, 2009

MHR

I have kind of gotten away from doing My Husband Rocks posts on Fridays so I want to tell you all about how wonderful he is! Between yesterday and today, he painted our little girls fingernails and toenails. He got out the newspaper and the nail polish remover, the cotton balls and the polishes and set to work. He did a base coat, a color of their choice and a top coat of glitter. :) Now, if that isn't special, I don't know what is?!?! Also, he shared with me that he wants to continue to have this alone time with them about once a week because if he can get into the habit, that will mean that as they get older, they will have dedicated time with Daddy where they can talk about their lives for at least a half an hour or so. I love that he's already setting goals and making plans on how to stay involved in their lives as they grow! :) I just love how good of a father he is. I know that when we are with other families, we often hear comments about how strict we are with our kids, but I our kids also know that they are adored. I hope that we are finding the proper balance between discipline and freedom. We want them to know that within certain boundaries, they are free to have all the fun they want. And that when they step out of those boundaries, we will still love them. We're also trying to show them, on the times when they do step over the lines, that the rules we've set in place are often there because we are trying to protect them. Its a work in progress, for sure, but Lowell is pretty darn good at it... And for this, and many other reasons, my husband rocks!!

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Brunch and A Bicycle

Today is another beautiful day in Arizona. Its supposed to be around 100 degrees again and, honestly, it really isn't that bad! :) One of Nathan's new friends, the one who is moving on Wednesday, Matthew, just knocked on the door and had a surprise for Nathan. It was an old bike that needs some work. But he really wanted Nathan to be able to ride with the other boys on the street. It was really thoughtful. And Nathan was really excited. And the next thing he knew, Lowell had a garage full of boys wondering if he was going to fix it up today. :) Now Nathan is over at his friends house watching Ghostbusters. The girls, on the other hand, are feeling quite left out. I'm not sure what we're going to do about getting them some friends... I think we may try the rec center in town but Lowell is a little concerned about getting involved in anything until we get an income. Also, Sunday we're going to try a church. I don't know which one, but we need to start the yucky process of church hopping so that we can meet some new friends for these little girls. Its getting pretty sad around here.
Yesterday we went to brunch with two of my favorite people. We got together with Abby, Matt, Jason and Diggie! :) It has been about 8 years since I've seen Diggie and, my how I've missed her! The wonderful thing was that she hasn't changed a bit. She's definitely a little wiser now, but she is still the same fabulous Digila that we all know and love! She is the mother of a beautiful 14 month old who Lowell immediately fell in love with! And she's the proud wife of a 'techie' named Jason who is obviously in love with her! :) We had a great time and visited for most of the morning. We're hopefully going to get together Thursday night before my class so that I can show her around the new and improved GCU. And then we're all going to have fun Friday night at Abby's 29th birthday! :) Oh, and Diggie, I completely agree. I have a panic attack every time I think about turning 30 too!!

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Picasa

A Ha! Finally... Well, not completely. I've only taken pictures of home.. Not of Buckeye but I'm really getting anxious about posting this so, here is the beginning of my picasa album and I'll post a new link when its done. :)
http://picasaweb.google.com/jesuslovesgiraffes/Buckeye# Let me know what you think! :)

Nathan and Cody

Our next door neighbors are quite the social-ites. One of the neighborhood boys is moving at the end of the month and so Beth threw a going-away swim party for him on Saturday. The kids had a great time in the morning swimming and playing at her house and then she treated us all to hot dogs and cupcakes. Then she took six of the boys (I went along to help chaperone) to the laser tag arena in Mesa. They played video games until it was time for their group to begin their laser tag game. The arena is huge - two stories! The boys had a ton of fun and after we got back, 4 of them came to our house to play in the sand with their trucks. It was a busy, fun day! And a great way to get initiated into the local group of parents! :)
Also, we promised Nathan a pair of heelies for his birthday. On Wednesday last week, when I was doing homework, Lowell took the kids to the mall to kill time... There he found a pair of heelies for $20!!! Actual, legitimate, name brand heelies!! They were on Super-sale! And so he got them. Nathan is still a little hesitant on them and Lowell is petrified that he's going to break something! Come to find out, Cody has a pair as well and he needs practice too... So I think Cody and Dennis are going to go out with Lowell and Nathan to have heelie lessons soon! I'll keep you posted on the progress!
In addition, Lowell got himself a bicycle. He's been going riding just about every morning. Its great exercise and he's also learning the lay of the land. And its cool at 5 in the morning! :) Its been over 100 degrees for over a week now, but it really isn't that bad. Lowell and I aren't sweltering and the kids like it too! I've unpacked my scrapbooking stuff and set up my 'office' area. Lowell was really thoughtful in coming up with a place where I could have my own space. My plan was just to leave all the scrap stuff in the garage because I just couldn't see where we could possibly fit it in the house! I guess he really didn't want all that stuff in his garage! :) So now, we've moved our bed over against the wall and I have the other half of our bedroom... Its quite an efficient little space I must say, although I haven't done anything scrapbooking-ish in it yet. Only homework. Scary as it is to say out loud.. I've also made some progress on my book... I've come up with a game plan - a plan of attack for it. I couldn't ever seem to get started on it because I didn't have a direction. But now, I think I'm more ready to get started because I feel like I have a point to make... That doesn't mean I feel any more qualified to write a book, or any more gung ho about the idea.. But it is something that I really want to do... And something that Lowell keeps encouraging me to do. A lot of my hesitation comes from wondering what I could possibly have to say that anyone would want to read. (IRONY: I say this as I'm writing other inconsequential parts of my life on the web in hopes that other people will read it...) Maybe the solution is thinking that I should write a book for myself, without the intent of making it public. That's a possibility. Now t0 find the time and the self-disipline!

Sunday, May 17, 2009

The First Week

Well, today is Sunday and I've yet to create my Picasso album. That isn't to say that we've been completely unproductive this week. We've almost got the garage emptied and the only boxes I have left to unpack are those associated with my scrapbooking and my office. I'm in need of quite a few office things, so I will be digging into those boxes shortly. We've also made some friends. Our next door neighbors have a pool and a seven year old boy. Nathan is in heaven. To make things even better, I get along great with Beth, the mom, and Lowell is having fun spending time with Dennis, the dad! Also, to show what a small world we live in, Dennis has family who live in Arnold and spent quite a few summers in Bishop!!! We take it as more confirmation that we are where God wants us to be! School is good... I'm still nervous and trying hard not to get overwhelmed. It isn't so much that the work is super difficult - I just feel that because this is a whole other level of learning, the quality of the work needs to be superior to what I'm used to doing. I just got my first grade back - my first paper got a 92%. Honestly, it could've been better but I made a few silly mistakes with spelling and grammer and I didn't take the time to proof read my paper before I submitted it. This week I have to do the weekly journal entry, create a table on the paradigms of five different cultures and interview a person of a different culture. Next week, I have to write a cultural autobiography and do an indepth study of the cultural competence of a local business in addition to the weekly journal.
I applied for a couple of jobs today; one at Grand Canyon. Lowell needs to make a few more trips up to California to help his dad get the house ready to sell. I think he's still going to be job hunting because he won't be able to go without a job for long.. He just can't ride it for that long. :) We've also managed to turn the cat blue... Our back patio is a little slab of concrete and the girls have been tagging it with chalk. Indy's new favorite place to lay in on that concrete slab in the shade... And so, now he comes into the house all different shades of pretty... And the girls love it! :) Can you see how the side of his face is blue? And this is after a bath! (Yes, I'm crazy, I bathe my cats - but you should see how much they shed!!!) I'll update again soon!

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Our New Life

This post will most likely be a short one. I am currently in the library at school (Bottom Easters - you have GOT to come back to Canyon and see how this place has changed!!!) working on my homework for the first week in my MASTERS program... I have to say that I've spent a lot of this week being afraid of this class. I am not sure of how the grading will be different from my bachelors classes. I did notice, however, that anything lower than a 76% is a failing grade! Not that I've even gotten a 76 anyway, but just how hard am I going to have to work in order to get my normal 90 and 95s??
We are moving in and getting settled. I've almost unpacked everything except the scrapbooking stuff. We're having Abby and Matt over for dinner on Saturday and I'm really looking forward to that! The kids are adjusting almost seamlessly. They haven't once cried or even really complained about being so far away from the only home they've really known. They are thrilled that we live about a block away from two parks and just yesterday we discovered the town swimming pool with a huge water slide! We have visited the library and today we're going to the elementary school that the kids will be attending. It is a K-8 and has about 800 students.
Much of our time is spent trying to organize things and get things put away but we have made time each night this week to go to the park and we've been trying for three nights in a row to catch the ice cream truck man! :) We've made frequent trips to Wal-Mart because there are two within a 10 mile radius of the house and we're been enjoying the fun of exploring our new home. Nathan still hasn't met the boy next door, mainly because he's still in school and we're just exhausted come night time.
Our internet is going to be hooked up at the house on Friday and I will finally be back in the land of the living! I knew I was addicted to the internet and communicating with people, but I had no idea just how addicted! :) I am desperately awaiting Friday!!!! We are going to drive around and take pictures of our neighborhood and house and I'm going to make a Picasso album so that you'll be able to see our little corner of the world. I'll post a link here ASAP. :)
Thank you to everyone who prayed for our trip down here. There were a couple of incidents, but both times, God made His presence known and He took care of us! I was blessed with an unnatural amount of faith and was able to experience my own peace while sharing some with Lowell too! I attribute it to all the sermons and worship music I was listening to to help keep me awake while driving all night long... :) That is a long story, however, and will have to wait until later. So, until Friday...

Sunday, May 3, 2009

Off We Go....

Its been awhile since I've posted.. And in my defense, I've been extremely busy. Nevertheless, I like keeping current on my postings and I just haven't been lately! I've even missed some opportunities to tell the world how wonderful my husband is!! Today is Sunday... Sunday the 3rd.. And today is my graduation day! I finally have a bachelors degree. It seems strange and a little anti-climatic because I feel like everyone has a bachelors so its about time I got one! Lowell is convinced that its a big deal and so he's trying to make a big deal out it. And I really do appreciate him for it! I'd hate to think that I worked this hard for almost two years and it wasn't a big deal! :) We are still in the thick of moving... Our date has gotten pushed back a couple of times... I went ahead and took the kids out of school on the appointed day even though we didn't leave when planned so they've been home for the past week. We've been doing "homeschool" and they've done pretty well. Jillie, of course, doesn't have homework and so the first day I just worked with Nathan and Chloe. She was very disappointed and so, the second day I found some work for her to do too. At the end of the lesson, when it was time for "recess", she came up to me, very serious, and said "Thank you for giving me homework, Mommy". It was soo adorable! :) Nathan and Chloe are each flying through their homework. Its easy to see why they get bored in school. They have three weeks worth of work and we've done at least 2/3 of it in three days. Chloe is almost completely done and Nathan only has one math chapter left. We're going to continue working throughout the summer - especially on writing. I'm hoping to get into the habit of having the kids write their grandmas. I know the grandmas would appreciate it, and it would be great practice for the kids. Nathan's teacher gave me a 2nd/3rd grade math book so that I can keep Nathan interested and I'm going to use Nathan's 1st grade book with Chloe.
I start my Masters class on Thursday... Its a night class, once a week for 8 weeks. My first class is about ethics and ethnics while the 2nd 8 week class is about pharmacology. :) I'm sure that sounds fascinating to all of you, but I'm excited! :) I'm just hoping that I am not too overwhelmed! I'm relying on the fact that Jesus assures me that He'll be there with me.. In my weakness, He makes me strong! :)
So, right now we're looking at leaving tomorrow. Lowell is outside right now working on the car that I'm going to be driving and I'm praying that it will be an easy fix. My daddy came over three days in a row and helped me load the trailer. Steve, Lowell's friend came yesterday and helped us clean up the yard... And then Jordan, my brother came with Daddy today and helped too. We've been very blessed! We still aren't going to be able to bring every little thing with us, Lowell will have to make another trip in a couple of weeks but that is good in a way. He needs to get some stuff for his dad.
Speaking of dads... I had to say goodbye to mine today... I didn't feel the surge of emotions that I thought I would... But then again, none of this seems real yet... I'm really going to miss him... And Jordan. And Justin. I'm just starting to know them and now we're leaving. Jordan wants to be a firefighter. I'm trying to convince them that they need to move to Arizona too. We'll see if that's what God has planned. Ultimately, I just want them to follow God's will. But I really do want them in Arizona with us! :)
I'm sure there are many people that we'll miss. The kids will miss their friends. Thankfully, they will have school, and will meet a lot of new people. I'm praying that Lowell and I can get plugged into a new church soon and can start putting down roots. I can't wait to be there and be settled. Its always the unknown that is so much scarier than the known... But God knows, doesn't He? And we're just following Him. Shouldn't be scared if you're following the only One who has the directions, right!? :)
Off we go...