Sad day

Today I got my new laptop (yay!!!)...(and pink!!! DOUBLE YAY!!!) So now, I will really have time to start posting more often. And to read other people's blogs again. I miss blogs/blogging.

Today has been a hard day. First of all, it's Veteran's Day. Locally, we have lost a LOT of military men recently. The news station is showing many of their pictures with the dates they were KIA.

Also, I am very actively involved on an internet forum. At the end of last week, one of our members, Shelly, passed away at the age of 54. This is the first we've lost someone on the board. It's hit us all really hard, and today was her funeral. She was an amazing woman of the Lord. Worked with her church's youth group, was a great mentor, volunteered in their food pantry, stood up for what she believed, and so much more. She was a great example and wonderful woman and I'm sad I never met her in person.

We also remembered the 5 year anniversary of one of our board member's sons who was KIA today 5 years ago. Her name is LeeAnn and her dear son was Thomas. Thank you to Thomas and all of the other men and women who have given their service, and even more so, their lives for our freedom. And to their families as well.

While Jon is a Veteran, we've been blessed so far in our marriage, since he works within the US, and has not had to deploy. But I've met so many people who's husbands are gone. Their husbands are in my prayers, along with them and their children. I am so thankful for them and what they do.

Hey! There goes our Tire!

In a lake…at 9:30pm…in the middle of no where…with no hotels available in Cody, WY…

This is the story of our return trip from Yellowstone. I will tell about Yellowstone later on, but this part is crazier. And God totally had His hand on all of us during this time. We decided that instead of leaving Sat morning, to leave Thurs night, because we’d seen everything, we were exhausted, and driving at night, the kids could sleep. We had come in to Yellowstone from the south, but it was awful because of road construction, so we decided to leave through the east (we later learned, a God thing because had this incident happened going south, we would have been in much worse shape…)

About 9:30, I was dozing off in the car and Jon started hitting the bumps on the side of the road. I woke up thinking he was falling asleep driving, to see our wheel rolling across the road and going over the edge (God). We lost a lug nut, and the wheel came off. There was a lake on both sides of us. Jon’s first thought was “We’re in a suburban, we’re flipping, and going in to the lake.” Thankfully, none of that happened (God). The truck ended up just sitting right down on the pavement.

Jon started looking for the wheel right next to us, but I said no, I saw it go to the other side. I didn’t realize yet there was a lake over there. Jon went over with a flashlight and found it, floating in the lake. He looked down, and there happened to be a big stick that he was able to use to pull it out (God).

Just as he was walking back to the truck, a police officer pulled up behind us. Now, let me explain, when I say we were in the middle of nowhere, I mean NOWHERE. We had passed a “town” that had a bar and Post office about 15 min before, and the next city was another 10-15 miles ahead of us. Come to find out, this police officer is never out that way, and works 100 miles away. He happened to be helping out in another town and was driving back and said that he probably would not be out there again for 2 years (God!).

Well, eventually a highway patrolman showed up as well, along with a tow truck. So, Jon and Hannah rode with the tow truck man (let’s not talk about car seat safety on that one!) and Zach and I rode with the highway patrolman. They were going to drop us off at a hotel. The only problem? Literally every hotel in the city of Cody, WY was full, not one single room available. The PO called almost every hotel for us, with no luck. It was going on 12:30 now, Zach was still awake, we were just praying.

Eventually, the sheriff’s office called us… they had called Crisis Prevention, and they had ONE room available in the next city, 22 mi away. (GOD) So the towman and the PO drove us out there. On our way, my insulin pump battery died. I was about to freak out, then I remembered I happened to grab Jon’s toiletry bag from the truck while grabbing things for the night, and my spare batteries were in there! (God) Anyway, the motel was not my first choice of where to stay, but it was totally fine by me! Talk about God making you humble!

We stayed the night there, and woke up to my pump battery dead, again (I think it was a bad battery). I was freaking out, because we had no way of getting anywhere, but Jon remembered that the night before, he’d given Zach a flashlight to play with, so it just happened to come with us, and it had the right kind of batteries (God again!) Eventually we learned that our car would not be fixed that day. So we tried finding a hotel, only to find one that was going to cost $143/night, and we’d have to be there til at least Mon.

Come to find out, Jon’s brother knew someone who just moved away from Cody, WY, so he called him. He had a friend’s cousin (or something like that) that lived there, and this person was willing to let us come stay with them! Well, we then learned it was going to take until at least Wed to fix the truck, and decided that we should just rent a vehicle to drive home one way in, and then get another one to come back or have Jon fly back. However, this family is actually coming south in about a week, and has volunteered to drive it to meet us about half way! Hopefully this will work out for us.

We eventually got a rental car and made it home about 1am this morning. I have never, ever, ever been so happy and thankful to be back home. The interesting thing is I’ve been reading the Shack while out of town (BAD book to start reading while camping!) but, it was great because at first I wanted to ask “Why is God letting this happen to us?” and then I just heard parts of the book echoing in my head. God is so good! And I’m so glad he just really had us in the palm of His hands, looked after us, took care of us, etc.

Peanut Butter and banana

I'm sitting here eating a BPB and figured this was a good time to update my blog, before mopping the floors. (Don't be jealous, you know mopping floors is a blast!)

Our most exciting news is that we're heading to Yellowstone National Park next week! Pray for us, as we are being daring and taking 2 kids, under 2, tent camping, for a week.... Go ahead and put the "insane" sticker on me now. God is really blessing us, because one of our good friends is lending us their bike trailer. We wanted to buy one for the trip, but now we don't have to. Then, some friends from church offered to let us borrow their 8 person tent, so we don't have to buy a new one! We're very thankful and incredibly excited. Now, I just have to remember to pack everything, like towels and sheets, food, etc. The things I Don't normally take on trips.

As for the kiddos... Hannah is sitting up really well, and trying very hard to crawl. Jon said she crawled like 2....legs? Not sure what you'd call it, yesterday. Then today, I set her on the kitchen floor for a moment (I don't usually since it's hard) and she laid down and pulled herself across the floor, to get the oatmeal lid that Zach had left. I was shocked! She has also been slowly cutting her top teeth. One came in last week, and one the past few days is finally poking through. Then I noticed she has a third one trying to poke through up top! Needless to say, between teething, and a possible growth spurt, I'm not getting much sleep, as she's been getting up 3x a night! UGH! She thinks she's a newborn again or something. She's also FINALLY eating more solids. We're up to about 2 to 2 and a half jars a day! That's a big improvement haha. And she's finally decided she wants to start eating puffs... we're still working on that fine motor skills part of picking them up with 2 fingers though. She also loves to pull herself up on things now, and I'm usually finding her standing in her bed talking when she wakes up. So yeah, she's growing up, too fast.

Zach is being Mr. Mischievous like always. For example, today, he had the oatmeal container, with spagetti pasta sticking up out of it, like a flower arrangement or something. Yesterday, he got out of the bath, and while Jon was grabbing a diaper, he ran in to the dining room, stood on Hannah's highchair tray that was on the floor for some reason, and peed on it.... yesterday he also brought me a sweet potato and a plastic fork and said "Pease! and my most recent favorite, I recently found that he had poured his snack in his potty chair and was eating it out of the bowl...yeah.... But at the same time, he's so sweet. He constantly asks me to hold Hannah (but only for 2 seconds, then he pushes her away haha!) He loves to give her kisses, or his stuffed animals... he rocks them like I rock Hannah (and nurses them lol!) He will randomly just crawl on my lap and go "Ahh" and rock back and forth, so I will rock him. He's a very sweet little guy, but a total boy.

As for me, I think I mentioned before that I'm doing a Beth Moore Bible study on Esther and OH.MY.WORD. FABULOUS! Who know that 10 chapters of the Bible contained SOOOO MUCH!!?! Amazing! I'm also about to take over our weekly playgroup at church. I'm really excited about that opportunity, to be back in my "element" some what, doing what I love.

Anyway, that's about it for the past two weeks. Here's a few pictures.

Standing up

Zach wanted her in the stroller so he could push her.

Fourth of July outfits
This is Zach's newest thing, laying on the coffee table
with one of his blankets and saying "awww...Night night"
(Yes, it's Hannah's blanket)

Busy busy

Wow, lots going on for us this summer. We returned from FL about a month ago (Yeah, it's been a while since I updated). We had a great trip, and picked up our new suburban. We LOVE it! The DVD player was great for traveling back across the country and keeping Zach entertained. While in FL, Aimee got to eat at the Loop and we got Firehouse, two important meals when in FL. We spent Sunday in St. Augustine with my parents, part of it with Tim and his girlfriend, Sarah, and the other part with Andrew and Katie. While there, we attended mass at the Cathedral, visited the Fort, the mission, got ice cream, and shopped on St. George Street. We also spent an great evening with Viviane, Mike and Story, and Aimee got to eat lunch with the girls one day.

On our way back, we spent some time in MO with Jon's family. While there, we had some BBQs, went to a park, went to the Bounce house place, ate at the Mongolean BBQ restaurant, and got to replace the alternator. Thank God it went out there instead of on our drive there or in the middle of Kansas.

On Father's Day, Jon also celebrated his 26th birthday. So to surprise him, I got some friends to come babysit, without him knowing, and took him hiking at Red Rock Canyon. We had lots of fun and then went to The Loop for dinner. Sadly, it's not the same Loop as in Jax, and this was Mexican. It was ok food, but Jax's Loop is much better!

Jon also just learned that he passed his test for Tech Sgt that he took in Feb! This is a big promotion, as it's one of the hardest tests to pass, most people take it 3-4 times, this was his 2nd time taking it. It's also a huge pay increase. Sadly, he doesn't actually get it until NEXT July.

Along with work, he will be finished with school a year from now, meaning he can go ahead and apply for OTS (Officer Training School). He has to lose a lot of weight and have his application in by Dec. We should find out by mid-March if he made it the first time or has to reapply. If he made it, he could be going probably as early as Aug or Sept of next year! This is exciting and scary for us. I am also working with him to lose weight on my own.

As for me, I've been doing a Beth Moore Bible study, Esther, at another church over the summer. I've really enjoyed seeing what God has to show me through Esther and Beth Moore really has a great way of making you dig deeper. I also just attended one of their summer MOPS meetings and really enjoyed it, and hope to participate in MOPS in the fall. The kids and I have also been going to the park most Wednesday's with our church's playgroup. This is always a nice break in the middle of the week.

Zach is growing much more independent and learning to listen to mom. I've recently started telling him if he doesn't stop, he's going to bed (as timeout). I've had to put him in bed once today, and ever since, he's done what I've told him to. He's being mischieveous still as well. FOr example, the other day he put creamer in a bowl of corn I was defrosting (Creamed corn haha!) but then he also has his sweet moments, like when we were praying at dinner the other night, he took his dog's hands and folded them in prayer. He's been playing pretend a lot lately. That is so much fun to watch.

Hannah is growing so fast. She's 7 1/2 months already. She has her bottom 2 teeth and is trying to cut the top one. She's sitting up really well and trying to get down on all fours. Crawling is defintely in her near future.

Well, this gives you an idea of what is going on for us this summer. I hope everyone else is having a great summer!

Stess-ness

First of all, my baby girl is 6 months old today! How'd that happen?!?!

And yeah, I'm a lil stressed. I'm taking a short moment to post while I chow down on leftover pizza from teh grocery store... pizza that lied about the carbs, as I ended up eating over 100 carbs throughout the night to correct for too much insulin...but I digress..

Life is a little crazy from here on out. Tonight, I'm going out with the moms from our playgroup for mom's night out. We're going to my favorite Italian restaurant, yummy! Then tomorrow, Jon's best friend is flying in and styaing with us, along with his two girls. Then Sat we're throwing a HUGE party-like 25 people or so- welcoming our friend back from being deployed for a year. Then Sun is church... hoping to make it to the early service since we have lots to do, but might end up at the late one if we're up too late Sat night. THen packing all day, maybe going out to eat for dinner, then leave the house at 6:30 am on Mon.

Thankfully a little stress was relieved. I was stupid and only planned a 55 min layover. But, thank goodness, we found out we're going to the smaller airport in the city instead of the big one, so we'll be fine instead of freaking out.

The final thing is, I'll share my scary mom moment from yesterday! Last evening, I was in Zach's room, cleaning his bed. Zach was down stairs with Jon last I knew. Jon was playing video games with his headset on (Grrrr).... Anyway, the doorbell rings. Of course, Jon didn't hear it, so I went to answer it. It was the people across the street- WITH ZACH! He had gotten out the back door, walked through the backyard barefoot, opened the gate (it doesnt lock), and was walking up the sidewalk! Thank God for our neighbors who saw him, thank God he didn't go in the street and get hit or kidnapped, thank God for so many other things! He is so sneaking and mischeivious for a 20mo! Anyway, I insisted that as soon as we get back, we get a lock for the gate, and spend money on a new screen door that locks properly. I'm still so upset about it and the posibilities of things that could have happened!

Playing pretend

Getting ready

Well, a week from Monday, we are flying to FL! I am so excited. I haven't been home in 15 months and Jon hasn't been to FL in 2 years! We are long overdue. We will be in FL for a little over a week, then driving back across the country in a little less than a week. A trip of this magnitude takes lots of planning. And if you know me at all, you know I'm a BIG planner.

So today, we tried putting 3 suitcases, 2 duffle bags, the pack n play, and the stroller in the trunk to see if it all fits. AND IT DOES! Wahoo, we can fit it all! (I LOVE my trunk in my Impala!!!) So, we'll be good there. I can easily fit between the two car seats (I LOVE the width of my Impala!), so we have room to have someone come with us and drive our car back from the airport. So, I feel like a major part has been checked off.

Yesterday, we FINALLY went and got Hannah's birth certificate, so that's checked off as well. My parents are giving us their Suburban, which is how we're driving back, so we went to the DMV to get what we needed to, so that's done as well. I have also packed a duffle bag full of toys for the plane ride...I wanted to do that now, so it'll be a little while since Zach has played with those toys and he'll be excited for them on the plane. I'm trying to decide if I should take crayons and a coloring book or not. I've also deflated the pool tube to take and bought bathing suits for Hannah and I. Zach needs sandles still, but that can likely wait til FL. I'm not impressed with what I've found for $10 around here.

So yeah, that's what's been going on here, just trying to get ready. I will leave you with two fun videos. The first is of Hannah rolling, with Zach helping her, and all of Zach's words. The second, which I had to put under a different post, is Zach playing pretend with Hannah.

Well, the second one ended up above... it didn't work out the way I wanted, but that's ok :)

Peas

Zach has started saying "Please". Well, "peas", but just the same. And it's soooo cute. He gives you this big smile and says "peas" and gets so excited.

Tonight, he went down stairs and came back up with his detde (aka his blankie... Jon called it a detde growing up, and ever since, for all kids and grandkids after him, that's what it's been called), came up to me waving and saying "Nigh-nigh". ::Ahhh:: Seriously, how is this boy talking already?!!? I said "Are you ready for bed?" and he kept waving and saying it, walking off. So we went to bed. He wasn't happy to change his diaper first, but settled in for prayers. Before I was half done, he was waving to me. I guess he wanted me out of there. (Yet he laid in there talking for 30 minutes still haha)

We've also been trying lately to teach him sign language. I didn't when he was younger, and sort of wish I had, so we're teaching him a few things, so he'll be able to use signs, and also be able to teach them to Hannah. So tonight, he got down from the dinner table, and I said "are you done?" and he made the sign for eat! It wasn't the right answer really, but it let me know he knew what he was doing.

He also has some stuffed animals and is loving them lately. Today, he was walking going "ahh" while hugging one. He put two of them in the swing a few days ago to push them. Last night, he put his bear in his mini Tonka truck and was pushing him around the kitchen. This little boy has totally captured my heart more than I ever thought kids could! I'm so glad my heart softened before getting married about having kids!

As for Hannah, I stopped giving her cereal for a while, because she just didn't seem like she was ready for it. So, I tried again this afternoon. She ate it with so much gusto! She was doing really well and getting excited and happy with each bite.

I bought her some sandles today. I have a complaint about baby shoes! They are never the same size! She has two pair of black dress shoes, both size 2. One falls off, the other is too small. I bought her a pair of pink shoes for the summer, size 2 (Without her there), and they're too big. So today, I found sandles for her at Baby Depot, and ended up getting her one size 1, and one size 2! And get this... Size 2 is "3-6months". My daughter wears almost NOTHING size 3-6 mo anymore, except shoes.. and a size 1 that's 0-3 hahaha! I guess she just has tiny feet.

In other news, we have 5 tulips and 1 dandelion that have bloomed-all yellow! Wahoo. It looks like 2 red tulips will any day now. Also, I added a few more links to my other blogs. Cake Wrecks is HILARIOUS but be warned, some can be a little inappropriate, but they will have you laughing for hours.

With all of this, I shall end my post... Jon will be home soon. He had to work this morning, then got to come home for a few hours, then go back until 10pm. ::Sigh:: So, I'd like to have the dishes done in the next 1/2 hour, so, goodnight to all! Much love from us.

Learning so much

I am totally seeing where every little thing is a learning experience. Let's take this afternoon. We went to plant grass in the backyard. Zach got to learn how to turn the seed spreader wheel thingy. He also got to figure out the hose a little bit, and how walking underneath gets you wet. He also got a lesson in walking through mud gets you hosed off.

So then, we went to the library. Walking there, and back, he got a lesson in crossing the road-look both ways, hold daddy's hand, etc. At the library, he learned there are many ways to go, ways to get lost in all the racks. Plus he learned how to run away from mom and dad, and how to show mom and dad he wanted to play with the legos. Also, staying with mom and dad as they check out, even if he doesn't want to.

Leaving the library, he learned we CAN pick up the big rocks outside, and if we aren't careful, we can almost make it land on daddy's foot. Walking back, he also found a golf ball. He wandered in to someone's yard, which he isn't suppose to do, but because he spotted the ball. So he picked it up and immediately through it in to the road. Then he was upset we wouldn't let him go get it. When he got home, he learned how to throw it down the driveway and watch it roll. He also picked up a rock and threw it several times, but it didn't roll as well.

Oh, what a life for a little boy! It's so fun watching them learn and teaching them things constantly!

Learning words

So Zach has been learning to talk (say actual words) a lot more lately. His newest one that he likes to say a lot is "clock". Everything is a clock right now. It started because of this... He knows who Jesus is, and points and says "Jesus" when he seems him. Well, Jesus is usually hanging on the wall, so he pointed to the clock and said "Jesus" and we said no, that's a clock. So every time we're at the table, he points to it and says clock.

We are also learning our body parts. We know nose, ears, eyes, toes, feet and kind of mouth... and today, we worked on hair, teeth and tongue.

After dinner, he helped daddy do dishes tonight. Well, "helped". Then, I asked him if he wanted to play legos or read a book. He ran and got a book and got up on the couch, waiting for me (This isn't something we do often, so I was surprised). It was a 500 First words book and he sat there for at least 20 minutes, looking through it. We found shoes, socks, a cat, a dog, and well... a clock... more than *I* thought were in the book (ie a book was a clock, a lamp, etc) I never thought teaching a one and a half year old words would be so fun!