Update and photo drop :-)

Another school year is off to a good start :-) Josiah started kindergarten today and Rachel started 2nd grade! They were both very excited and up early so that they could play before the bell rang. I'm hoping that will be a trend this school year! Prayer and devotion was sweet this morning and I can't wait to see what happens in chapel services this year. Josiah keeps saying that he's going to get the Holy Ghost...I think he's feeling left out since big sister has it now, which is okay as long as it motivates him to keep seeking it ;-)
God is so good ALL of the time and I'm thankful that His mercy and love is constant!

Is it fall yet?

God is so good! I have a lot of pictures to post, just need to get around to updating. Rachel started first grade and is excited about all she's learning. Josiah started K-4 and absolutely loves it! The private school we enrolled him in uses Abeka curriculum and has combo classes so he'll definitely be acclimated for K-5 at GCA next year. His teacher is constantly telling me that he is such a well spoken and well mannered child... I think he's remembered to be on his best behavior! Even more humorous is the fact that Robert is getting used to me rambling on and on as soon as he gets home from work! He's so patient with me :-)

Also, I wanted to say thank you a million times to those who have kept us in your prayers. The words of encouragement and "love" notes have meant so much, I cannot even begin to describe what a blessing it is to know that the Lord uses His people in a way that gives Him glory. It never ceases to amaze me the way that God cares about everything, big or small!

Next time I post I will be sure to upload pics of the kiddos!

Yes sir!

Robert and I have not taken time away without the kids in a long time (4 years to be exact) and so when we were invited to a friends Air Force graduation in San Antonio, TX, we decided it would be fun to go and be with friends that we've known for many years and catch up on old times. Our friend David is 30 years old, married (to Brianna), and has two little boys, but decided to join the military as a career starter in law enforcement. Our wedding anniversary falls right during Easter outreach and so we don't usually do anything for our anniversary and so we though this could also be a long overdue anniversary trip. Little did we know it would be a adventure :-)

We had decided to drive, since we've never driven that direction, but assumed that mapquest couldn't be right, there was no way it would really take us 14 hours and 47 minutes to get there! YEAH RIGHT! About 5 hours into the drive I came down sick...let's just say we had to keep stopping like every 5-10 minutes. It ended up taking us 13 hours. We arrived in San Antonio at 5:30 am on Thursday...do the math, yes, we drove Wednesday-Thursday. We needed to be at the base by 6am to go through security for the airman's run at 8. I was soooo sick though and so I called my friend, Brianna, and told her to go on without us. We took about a 1.5 hour nap and then got up and got ready for the graduation. Brianna came and picked us up so that we could all be in the same vehicle on base. Needless to say, the military is a lot of "hurry up and wait" so that's what we did. Here are some pics of the graduation:

Thursday, our friend David only had base liberty, so we spent the rest of the day on base shopping, eating, and just hanging out...all the while I did not feel well but was determined to have a good time! The weather was chilly and windy, but sunny at least.

FRIDAY-
Okay, here is where I should have pictures, but I couldn't take any because my hands were numb from the cold! We arrived at base for the parade around 6 am and were greeted with icy blasts of wind. The sunshine had disappeared! The previous evening, Robert had went and bought a coat (yes, he didn't have one!) but we didn't even think to purchase gloves, scarves, hats, etc. So there we sat, with a blanket wrapped around Brianna and I (you become very close friends when freezing to death), when the sky started spitting ice at us! Robert put up the umbrella to try and block the wind, which worked, but it didn't warm up, the temperature just kept dropping. I cannot describe the feeling, all I know is that I couldn't feel my face, hands, or feet. So, finally Robert and I ran to the car to warm it up while Brianna went to tap-out David so that he could leave base.

Robert and I had fun anyhow, after going and purchasing items that would keep us warm! We had lunch at a yummy italian restaurant, took a very long nap, then got up and headed to the RiverWalk. By evening it was just drizzling. Although the boats weren't running on the river, it was still very pretty and we enjoyed a tex-mex dinner at Rio Rio along the river. Then we shopped at the little touristy stores

We ended up buying a cowboy hat for Josiah and a cowgirl hat for Rachel, before heading back to the hotel. 

Saturday was pretty uneventful, yet so fun! We met up with our friends and went to a army surplus store, then headed to Fogo de Chao's for lunch. Fogo's ended up being closed for lunch on Saturdays, so we opted for Tony Roma's nearby. It was raining, so we sat in Tony Roma's for so many hours just talking, laughing, and catching up. When it was evening, we realized that David needed to get back to base in time for his curfew. It was so nice to have uninterrupted conversation! I am so thankful that God has blessed us with friends at home, and away, who love Him! No matter where we are, we always find that the Lord has been so good! 

We can't imagine life any other way than living for Him, and it's wonderful to have friends who feel the same!

I've failed :(

Okay, I know, I know, I've failed my readers! I haven't blogged in soooo long! Life has just been a bit chaotic and blogging was honestly the last thing on my mind. Any"who", for Valentine's day I wanted to have family portraits taken so my wish was granted and and off we went to portrait innovations for photos:

Josiah was not cooperating with the photographer, so we finally said "don't smile"...and of course he then smiled! At least his noncooperation worked well for a "tough guy" image on the motorcycle!

After prayer that evening we were discussing what to do for dinner. Every place we thought of would more than likely require a long wait, and we weren't in a long wait mood. Then somehow the conversation turned to how good Sis. Garrett is on the organ at church and with organizing music....suddenly, we thought of Organ Stop Pizza!!!! (go figure!)

So, we ended up at Organ Stop Pizza and were so happy about it! The kids hadn't been there in a long time, Josiah didn't even remember it, and it wasn't very busy so it was just so enjoyable! There was a older couple (at least in their 80's) who got up at one point and started dancing together over in the corner, which was just the cutest thing ever! They were so in love and it was refreshing to see!

Needless to say, the kids loved every moment of the music and they were entertained more than at a playland! We will definitely be doing that again!

Mama's day in Texas

Life has been so busy! In a good way though :)

For mother's day weekend I had requested that I go see my mama. I haven't spent a mothers day with her since moving to Arizona (6 years)! So we decided to make it a surprise trip and didn't tell her we were coming. We actually drove into Amarillo, TX where she was spending her day shopping. I communicated with my dad via text to find out what store they were at when we got into town. Then, it was perfect, she was inside the store when we got there, so we stood outside next to the front door of the store. When she came out, I stepped towards the door and said "excuse me ma'am...", I didn't even get to finish my sentence, she was in shock!!!! It was great :) It was a great weekend, lots of fun, but we're glad to be back home. It's funny, I always look forward to traveling but am so happy when I'm back home in my own "castle".

Here are some pics from the weekend-

                               Rachel and I singing a special song at church service Sunday:

                     Rachel, Josiah, and their cousin Jaxon hangin' out at Papa and Nana's house:

                                                                         All smiles :)

 

Living for God is fun!

Whew! I can't believe that April is almost over! We have had so much fun the last few weeks with Easter outreach and now are totally "stoked" (Robert's words) about what God is going to do in the near future!

Ok, for those of you who are not familiar with outreach, it is fun. Work yes, but definitely fun and worth all of the effort. This year, we were part of a very united outreach team and were so thankful for the spirit of God being present at every moment of the way. The team met at church every night for a week and a half to do outreach and prayer before was powerful! This year bus routes were combined to make sure that each route had a shared effort put forth to get the message out.

Now, let's just say that friendly competition is fun, very fun. My husband and I are not super competitive by nature but we do like to be "friendly" in our competitiveness that exists. So, the Saturday night before Easter, we delivered a "epic" (thank you bro. and sis. Lipkin(s), lol) friendly prank. So, originally a few of the "red" people were planning on flooding the "blue" teams (smurfs!) buses with red balloons on Saturday night, well, it was leaked somehow and the blue team "people" were not too happy about it. We thought it was pretty harmless (unless allergic to latex) but decided since the plan was ruined, oh well. We went to dinner and over dinner one of us made the comment that we could instead "prank" ourselves and blame it on the blue team for a little while, just to get them all fired up! LOL, EPIC! So, that's exactly what we did. You'll see some photos of the process. We were all exhausted but it was so much fun. The looks on the blue team captains faces when the buses were pulled around on Sunday was priceless! They immediately began to say "we didn't know! so sorry!" hahaha, by the end of the day it had been hilarious to watch them questioning each other, trying to find out "who" did it. When they were told that we had done it to ourselves, that was even funnier! Even our team captains house was "tulled" (instead of toilet paper, much easier to clean up) with blue tulle. Who said living for God can't be fun?!

Enjoy the pics below of just a few of the wonderful moments we experienced:

 

 

 The significance of this photo is because while at Wal-Mart buying our "prank" items, the cash got jammed in the machine...I've never had that happen before and we were laughing about it because it was just so typical!

I think we have a witness FOR Jehovah on our hands folks....

Okay, so lately Rachel has really been serious about the fact that living for God is necessary. She is constantly asking the question "why?", which we promote in our house. I don't want my children living for God just because we said so, but instead I want to help foster a understanding in their hearts. So, with that being said, Rachel's been at it lately evangelizing her family, friends, and yes...strangers. She has recently pointed out to a few family and friends things that are found in Deuteronomy 22:5, Leviticus 19:28, 1 Timothy 2:9, 1 Corinthians 11:15, and Psalm 101:3...let's just say, that doesn't always go over very well :) To be honest, I've had a hard time with the negative feedback I've received about it, but at the same time I don't understand why we would teach our children such truths and then tell them to keep it to themselves...doesn't make sense. Of course, there is not a ounce of wisdom when it comes to the way they present it usually, which means a lot of "explaining" to do, but at the same time I wish that I had the boldness to proclaim the gospel like a little child!

 

Anyhow, last night just made me laugh and cry so hard that I have to share. So, as you may know, yesterday was Ash Wednesday. I didn't think of this when we I took the kids to McDonalds to play in the playland until there were a few people with the ashen cross marked on their foreheads from attending mass. Well, Rachel noticed nearly right away and began questioning a boy (probably 8 yrs old) about his beliefs. Next thing you know she walked with him over to where his mother was sitting and the conversation began...it went like this:

Rachel: "There is not 2 gods!"

Boys mother: "Oh really?"

Rachel: "No!" "there is only one God and His name is Jesus!"

Boys mother: "Oh, yes of course!" "My son was talking about Mother Mary honey."

Rachel: "Yeah, well, Mary was Jesus's mama, she is not God." "Mary got the Holy Ghost, spoke in tongues and everything, then she died."

Boys mother: astonished look...."Oh, okay."

Rachel: "I just want you to tell him" (pointing at the boy) "that there is one God, because he thinks there's 2 or 3!"

Rachel: turns to the boy..."see? There is only one God".

Boy: "Ok".

 

Of course, when this conversation came to a close, I looked at my husband who was about to explode laughing and he said "what do we do?". Thinking back to my own childhood and the times I did some of the same "witnessing", I said "nothing"..."let's go though because I am about to laugh and cry at the same time".

 

It is amazing to see such a light come on in a child's mind when they begin to grasp a little of what is being taught to them. It sure makes me feel overwhelmed with awe at how God can work through the innocence of a child to spread such a important message. Remember: Psalm 8:2 & Matthew 5:14.