A time for change

Today is the first day of the rest of my life...as the wife of a cop!

In one of my first blogs Change of Seasons I alluded to the long road we have been on these, hmm...three-plus years, and my husbands desire to be a deputy sheriff.  After completing night classes and training, my husband became a reserve officer last fall (pics of him getting sworn in).  Jessie has put in over 300 hours since last fall as a reserve officer and he has loved, I mean LOVED every minute of it!  Never has he been more sure of anything, except marrying me of course. :)  His passion is evident when you talk to him about his work.

The opportunity has finally come for Jessie to go on full time with the local sheriffs office.  This means training starts over for him.  He will head off to the academy before long for more intense training and testing than what he went through with the reserve classes.  He is excited and nervous and ready!  I know he will do well.  I am SO proud of him for pursuing his dream wholeheartedly! He inspires me.

As Jessie begins his new venture and our family falls in line with all that entails, we are also preparing for our girls to start school.  We home-schooled last year, which was a blessing in many ways.  My girls are SO smart and learn so quickly! It was nice having them home with me one more year, especially while baby number three was still so new.  However, trying to home school while running my business from home, nursing and caring for an infant, and taking care of a new dog...it was not an easy task.  While the flexibility was very nice, we were completely burnt out!  Our girls are ready for school, a classroom, a teacher, and new friends.  I am excited for them!  I know they will thrive in their new environment.  I'm looking forward to afternoons with them, catching up on their day, helping them with any homework, and letting them play with their dolls/dollhouse together as I am sure they will miss each other after their busy day.

My husband and I have often joked that we always have big changes, at least one, each year of our marriage.  Whether it is a move, a job change, a baby, a dog, a new business venture, or all of the above, there is never a dull moment in our home.  So it is really difficult for me to imagine the next 25 -or so- years with my husband doing the same thing.  However we will still have our side business, my full-time job.  And our kids are getting to an age where they will soon be involved in sports and plenty of things to keep us extremely busy.

I have no doubt that the fun has just begun!

Linking up with Carissa at LowercaseLetters

Been there Pinned that

I received an invite to join something called Pinterest back in October.  I distinctly remember saying to some friends at a pumpkin carving party that I would not join because I didn't need another distraction like facebook.  It was only a couple weeks later that I peaked into Pinterest and was immediately hooked.  

What is Pinterest?  

It is basically a virtual bulletin board customized by you.  

I was always guilty of "bookmarking" things online and never referencing them again.  Even more frustrating was when I would bookmark a recipe or webpage and could not find it in that long list of unorganized bookmarks...or could not remember what I named it.  Pinterest is the perfect solution!  You create your own categories/boards for things you like to search for online: home decor, craft ideas, recipes, a great bag or book.  Okay, you got me, it really is a chic thing.  But in all honesty, it has been a fun and rather handy resource for me the last few months.  

For example, I like to make my kids birthday cakes and have fun with it!  I have a board for birthday ideas with cake ideas I have found online and pinned, and a few fun ideas some other people have pinned and I "re-pinned" onto my own board.  This was Abby's cake I made for her 6th birthday.  It was so fun and turned out super-cute!  

We had a little fun the other week cleaning up all the old broken crayon pieces in the bottom of our little shoebox of crayons.  We baked them in a silicon cupcake pan. 

For a little fun in our homeschooling activities last fall, we traced and cut out the girls hands and feet.  I let them decide what they wanted to make out of their cut-outs.  Katie made a butterfly, and Abby made a tree and a chicken.

At Christmas I took a fun idea from Pinterest and put the kids handprints on ornaments.  I let the girls paint their fingers to look like snowmen.  I messed up on Wesley's handprint...I was so focused on getting a good clean print that I didn't put his print in the right direction, so I had to get a little more creative and make it into something else--I went with a little reindeer.  And it turned out pretty cute I think.  I completed it by writing their name and the year with a marker on the back.

My favorite Pinterest idea come to life was the Christmas wreath I made.  A friend from church hosted a "Pinterest party", where everyone brought the fixin's for their favorite Pin.  This is what I attempted, simply made by stringing ornaments around a wire hanger!

For Thanksgiving, we took on our own crafty little project inspired by Abby.  I think she saw it on nick jr. 

We traced and cut out a template of the girls handprints.  Then rolled out sugar cookie dough and traced our template. I added a smidge of cookie dough to the thumb to give our turkeys a beak-like look.

Then we iced and decorated and had some messy fun.

These were originally going to be place-holders at the Thanksgiving dinner table, 

but we decided not to put everyone's names on them after all. They turned out so cute!

So, if you think Pinterest might be for you then check it out.  Leave a comment and I will be glad to send you an invite.  Click, Join, Follow, and have fun!  Happy Pinning everyone! 

Linking up with Carissa at Lowercase Letters for Miscellany Monday

Our first family vacation

A day at Sea World!

The spectacular entrance to Sea World!

At the end of the summer, we really needed a little getaway. So,on a bit of a whim, we pulled some long hours to get orders caught up and planned a quick trip to Sea World.

The trip there was an adventure in itself.  My in-laws were joining us on the trip so we had a mini caravan and lots of potty stops!  The driver side window in our car broke...I mean literally fell into the door...so in a Walmart parking lot my husband and his dad took the door panel off and rigged the motor components with things we had handy: plastic, cardboard off a legal pad, & scraps of duct tape.  I don't know why I didn't take a picture...it was pretty sad looking!  As we drove, the wind would loosen the tape and it would flap frantically against the window, the window would begin to slide down and in addition to the flapping it sounded like a wind-tunnel...a bit nerve-racking along with normal kid noise, but honestly all we could do was laugh. Thank God for duct tape, right?

Loving on their brother

 The motel was a welcome retreat when we arrived!  The girls had their own beds in their own room!  We spent a lot of time just relaxing with each other and visiting with MeMe and PaPa down the hall from us.  It was such a welcome break for us all.  We brought the movie Soul Surfer and watched it one night.  Our girls LOVE that movie.  They get all teary and sentimental--not about her losing her arm, but at other sweet moments between the dad and daughter--I love seeing their sensitive side.

Such beautiful creatures!

Since Jessie's parents were with us, we got to sneak over and ride a roller coaster--the Manta!  It was quite possible the best roller coaster I've ever been on...then again, maybe it's just been too long since I've been on one.  There was an aquarium under the roller coaster, featuring the manta ray of course.  There were lots of other neat little sea creatures in there too (see my additional pictures below).

12,000 pounds!!

The last time I was at Sea World my baby sister was 5 years old (she's now 19).  Now I have a 5 (nearly 6) year old.  Unbelievable!  So, a lot has changed since I was last there.  The arena for the killer whales was new and HUGE...and I miss the trainers being in the water with the Orcas.  Shamu stadium wasn't the only thing that had gotten bigger in the last 14 years.  Tilikum was a beast!  The picture doesn't do him justice...he was ginormous!

Our all time favorite part of the day was the dolphin show.  I don't have pictures because we sat front & center in the splash zone.  But it was amazing!  The girls also rode their first roller coaster.  Granted it was a kiddie coaster, but they loved it! They kept their hands up in the air. They each rode it several times, taking turns with who they got to sit beside--mom, dad, and their MeMe.  I do have some more fun highlights from the day below.  We stayed one extra day in Orlando, played in the pool and just enjoyed ourselves before we had to return to our normal routine.  It was a trip we would love to do again.  Maybe next time we can venture into dolphin cove.

Ready for their first theme park!

Family Pic

A Cute & Corny little show

Finding Nemo ;)

that weed looking thing is actually a type of seahorse!!

early...

...morning...

...risers.  Love them! 

"It's a busy life, but it's our life"

Life as we know it is just plain busy.  I have documented our lives the last 2 months with pictures and intentions of posting the script to support it, but time has not been on our side.  We've just been--busy!  The daily routine of raising 3 children, one of which is a nursing-napping infant, a new doggie, homeschooling, running our home-based business; not to mention meal-planning & cooking & cleaning & laundry....thank God we're not doing this alone!!  I MUST rely on Him to help me through moments of chaos as they arise.

I was playing around with the format of my blog page and noticed that I used to actually write a lot more.  I love writing.  I think when I have moments to process my thoughts I am not too bad at it.  As one who is guilty of saying things off the tip of my tongue, writing actually gives me an opportunity to formulate my thoughts and say things just a bit more gracefully.  I can remember when I was young--highschool & college--when I couldn't seem to find the words to pray, I would write a prayer out to God.  Somehow it helped to put it on paper.  I still have a few of those scrap paper prayers stuffed in my old Bible.

So as time permits, I will post of the events that have occurred even in just the last 6 weeks.  And if you are interested in following along, please do so.  I'd love to know who is reading along.

~Rebekah

I Swear

Last week my daughter was playing with a toy that was not working properly and she exclaimed "dammit!"  My head shot up so fast and I asked "what did you just say?", to which she repeated "dammit".  I immediately brought her to me and began questioning where she heard this word.  We don't use that kind of language.  The only television she watches is Nick Jr. or an old Disney movie.  And our social circle is pretty limited to mostly church friends and family, none of whom speak that way, at least not around us.  She insisted that she made it up and didn't hear anyone or any thing use that word.  So I made sure she knew that it was not a good word, and expressed that now that she knows it is not a good word if I ever hear it again she will be in big trouble!!  


I talked to Jessie later that day about what happened.  We were trying to figure out where she might have heard that word, or how she might have made it up.  I was personally convicted of words that I often use.  I like to call them Christian curse words.  You know, "dang-it", "crap", "freakin", and a few others.  In our home even "stupid" is a bad word as my children occasionally remind me.  My thought is that if by chance she did make up this word, maybe it came from her hearing my occasional use of "dang-it".  By most standards, there isn't anything wrong with these slang words.  But I know that for me it is more of a heart issue.  When I am using these words they are generally an expression of frustration, anger, annoyance, or some other negative emotion.  The way in which I use these words makes them really no different than the true curse word they are replacing--since the "real" words are used under the same circumstances of anger and frustration.  


The Word of God says, "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


I am making a personal effort to watch these words and hold myself to the same standard that I have established for my children which is based on the Word of God.

Big girls don't cry

Katie got her ears pierced!  She was so brave!  -braver than I was as a little girl.  Although, I would like to think that the technology has improved. ;) 

She sure can shed some tears when necessary, so I was certain after the first ear it would take some coaxing to get her through the second.  But I was wrong.  She can be stubborn, or determined rather.  She can be strongly determined either for or against whatever she puts her mind to (I don't know where she get's that from).  In this case, she was determined to be brave because she was too excited to wait any longer.

My baby girl is growing up.  So I will hold in my tears and be brave like my Katie.

My sweet boy

Wesley is now 4 months old.  I know at this point there is not a whole lot a baby can do..leaving very little to write about. But this blog isn't so much for you my reader as it is for my boy. 

Wesley, you fill my heart up.  I love spending time with you: tickling you making you laugh & "talk".  I have prayed over you since your daddy and I found out you were coming.  I have prayed for God's protection, health, for a gentle spirit, and many other things.  You are such a sweet baby.  You make everyone feel so special with your big smile.  I love that you smile with your whole body..you wiggle with excitement and your eyes are so full of joy. 

Your sisters absolutely adore you.  And other than the "accidental" hair pull, you love all the attention they give you.  When I look at you sometimes, I remember holding Abby and Katie when they were your size: singing to them, tickling them, bath time, tummy time and even the fussy moments and a few long nights...and I cherish it all.  I LOVE who they have become and the fun and challenging days that have brought them to where they are now.  And I look forward to growing with you and seeing you through those fun stages of childhood.

You look so much like your daddy, and I hope you're just like him when you get older.  He is a great man of God, a quiet & gentle leader, an excellent father & husband.  He knows how to look at himself and situations and make changes for the better.  You have an excellent example in your daddy!  And I am so thankful for that. 

You're such a good baby!  You have 2 teeth already, they both came in this week.  And rather than fussing and doing the normal baby stuff during this tough milestone, you practically slept through it!  You seriously slept your usual 12 hr night plus 3 solid naps.  I'm thankful and flabergasted at how great of a baby you are.  I have no doubt that at some point in your life you will jokingly rub that in your sister's faces. :)  But be nice because they will remember how much you spit up!!  Seriously, I don't know how you have those chunky legs when you seem to spit up more than you take in..it's unbelievable!

My girls have taught me so much about myself and parenting, and my boy will bring new learning experiences into the mix.  I look forward to the adventure! But take your time sweet boy...please take your time.

Adventures of Mommyhood

When I was little I was pretty daring for a girl...I played with the boys climbing trees, trekking through the woods, digging forts.  I did some fairly sneaky things just to see what would happen, like pouring bleach in our neighbors washing machine, disguising cooled grease as mashed potatoes and making someone eat it, stealing candy from the "general store" at our Gospel Bill vacation Bible school...oh! and I put sugar water in a skin-so-soft spray bottle and told the boys it was bug repellent.  I don't know why I did any of those things, but fun was had, punishment was given, and lessons were learned.  I was a bit fearless though even as I got older, wanting to take on the biggest roller coaster or free-fall contraption, and I know I would have jumped out of a plane if I had the opportunity.  But after a few decades of reason and common sense I would not be so quick to take on the sky, entrusting my life to a device harnessed around my body.

Nope, instead I have chosen the adventurous life of mommy-hood!

So, yesterday I endeavored to take my 3 under 5 out for the day.  We have done this before, but the difference this day was I was attempting to take them for professional pictures.  If you're a mom, you know what this means...everything that could have spilled or messed up before leaving the house--DID.  Once we left the house we had an errand on the way which directed us through the Chic Fil A drive-thru.  I was clever enough to NOT request sauce of any kind, however the chocolate milk (what was I thinking?!) ended up on Abby's white & tan shirt she was to wear in the pictures.  The chocolate milk blended rather nicely into Abby's shirt--thank God!  Katie's outfit I got the night before didn't fit, so we were also going by Old Navy to exchange for something else.  Mind you this stop involved getting the stroller out & into the vehicle with all 3 children in tow.

Once we got to the studio, I had to feed Wesley while the girls waited patiently. Pictures went very well but took forever!  I had to feed Wesley again before leaving.  (I will post some of my favorites once the grandparents have seen them)

Next stop was Babies R' Us for a quick merchandise return before a birthday party at Chuck E Cheese.  We were too early for the party, so the kids and I browsed through the baby store for a little bit until I heard crackling thunder and a torrential downpour coming from outside!!  We have been in the middle of a drought for like a month, and the sky breaks loose while I'm in a store right across the parking lot from where we need to be like, now!  We waited...and waited...but it wasn't letting up.  This was supposed to be a quick trip into the store, so all I had was my purse and Wesley is perched in his carseat on the shopping cart.  So, we took off our shoes and I kept the girls close to the buggy as we quickly pushed Wesley toward the car...but not before Abby falls and scrapes her little foot.  Ugh!  Keep running I told her...and she's crying the whole way to the car.  I dried off the kids and we drove over to Chuck E Cheese across the lot.

Here we hovered in the back of the van waiting for a break in the rain, but we had to make another run for it.  I changed Wesley and strapped him to me in his carrier.  We searched the car and found a broken kiddie umbrella--sweet!  We're good to go...and we ran/walked quickly indoors...to the calm & serene atmosphere of...Chuck E Cheese!!  (note sarcasm) The party was fun and I'm blessed with great kids: Wesley didn't cry or whimper one time, and the girls had a blast.  We got home to daddy (who if you were wondering was at work and class all day while we were on this adventure) around 9pm and everyone crashed!

All in all it was a crazy busy day, and days like these are thankfully few and far between, but fun was had, punishment was giver, and lessons were learned.  I am glad that I have a bit of an adventurous spirit somewhere deep inside, or we would never have survived our crazy day.   And I am so very thankful that I have children who listen and obey (for the most part), which makes days like that a little easier to manage.