Spreading Wings

As parents we are always experiencing "firsts" with our first child. As we have moved recently I have seen pictures of my G as a little boy. I cherish those moments of Babe and I starting as new parents. Really, the little boy hasn't change much except for physically growing taller. He is still the silly, kind, tender, and smart kid. Yesterday he asked if I was stressed and then proceeded to do things that annoy me all at once with a big smile on his face. G's way of saying loosen up Mommy and have a good laugh.

This week we have started a new first. G is soon to begin Jr. High. Not only is he starting Jr. High but starting it at an academically challenging school. This week he is in class to get up to speed some on Latin. The first day he came home and started telling me his homework and inside I was Very nervous. In my head I am thinking . . . Wow, this is HARD. Usually I think of beginnings in school as gradually working into things but not so here. Another parent told Babe that they move very quickly. NO KIDDING. G though was taking it in stride and didn't seem overly worried at all. He showed me the college Latin textbook. I knew I couldn't say anything like "this is CRAZY!" Then it hit me G is intelligent. God has truly gifted him with the ability to grasp this stuff! If it had been me I would have come home crying that I was in over my head.

Last night G had finished his written work and wanted me to help quiz him over the memorization. We worked on the first part and drilled and drilled and drilled on one section . . . "Oh, there is a lot more Mommy." The next part was memorizing 36 tense endings (there was again more after this). I was so surprised and happy to see that G already knew most of them from class and it was only his second day. We laughed last night as my tongue slipped and I wanted him to tell me the 6 "future past" tenses:-0 Oops, slip of the tongue but we had a good laugh.

I know this year will be a challenge. This week he is only working on one subject. What will it be like when he has a full load? What will it be like going to start Jr. High in a new school where everyone has their clicks? . . . I don't know. In my thoughts yesterday I thought of the plaque hanging on the wall in G's room. The plaque was given to him by our church in CO as a parting gift just for him. It has the verse:

Jeremiah 29:11

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end. 

When G saw I had put this up on his wall he was happy.

But really as I think it isn't about the academic tests it's about the character tests. Will he persevere? Will he be kind when maybe others aren't? Will he have "an excellent spirit" when under pressure? This will be a year of some serious growing up. I am excited for him and I will be backing him in prayer.

G is spreading his wings and learning to fly. Is it hard to watch? Yes, somewhat. Is it exciting? Yes.

Thankful for prayer. Thankful for the goodness of God. Thankful for a son with a personal relationship with Christ. Lots to be thankful for.

Today Babe went to go pick G up from class. His teacher said G "was a joy to teach." We're thankful for that and thankful for G's love of learning. He really enjoys Latin and his Latin teacher although he is not always thrilled about the amount of work that comes with it or the conjugating!

Our Final Sunday at Church in Colorado

Above is a song our music director sung for the sending off of our family . . . 

talk about a tear jerker!!!

I wanted to leave our church family with words of gratefulness and love so 

here is what I was able to speak as a farewell:

I have dragged my feet writing this note of thanks to you, our church family, not because of lack of gratefulness but because of being afraid of inadequate words to express our gratefulness. We have so much to thank this unique church family for! Each of you played a role in our encouragement: some of you prayed for us, others of you smiled and gave us warm greetings, some of you embraced and gave us hugs, some of you were always giving us words of encouragement and cheering us on, or maybe brought us food to nourish our bodies as well as our spirit, some worked with our children in Sunday School or music, some drove our children to and from church, some sent us birthday and other cards in the mail or sent us an email, some gave us gifts which will now become to us treasured memories of a wonderful church family. Each of you moved as some extension to the body of Christ and you worked together to pick our family up, embrace us, encourage us, and now today send us on. But we are leaving different than we came. We are now stronger for we have been spiritually nourished. We are not hanging our heads for we have been loved.
 
Psalm 27:13
I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

Thank you for your Christ like love and care. It has made a difference to this family and who knows the eternal differences it will make as our children grow and they remember the faith and love of a small church family who showed them a deep faith in Christ, a united church family, and an amazing Christ like love for others. They saw a Pastor who let the children come to him even a 2 year old wandering the aisle. And a pastor that could get up and solemnly preach God’s Word but also could laugh and joke and say “Oh, cut it out!" And a pastor who he and his wife came to share in the waiting during a surgery for support! They saw a music minister and his wife who were passionate and sensitive to the moving of Christ in their life and who encouraged them as children to use their small talents for the Lord even though they were inexperienced in music. They saw a pianist and a church handyman that were always looking for ways to make a difference not caring who got the credit just quietly serving the Lord and investing time into them as children showing them that they mattered. They saw a united church family who didn’t look for the worst in them as children but the best in them. Time and eternity will show the difference you made in these children’s lives. I TRULY believe the fruit is yet to come. It is also primarily because of YOU that the children don’t want to leave!!

My dad says this church has ruined us forever and he meant that in the nicest way. For he knows as, our family knows, that what is here at Calvary Church is something special and rare and we are blessed to have been touched by it. Thank you for last week and the special Sunday and the extremely generous gifts! And Pete and Pastor thank you very much for the kind and encouraging words. I wasn’t able to hear all that last Sunday as I was taking care of little ones but I got to hear more of some of last week from a video. Thank you. That video will be a beautiful reminder of what is here. Thank you Carol for video taping it!

Ecclesiastes 7:8 says:
Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof:
It seems strange that the end of a good thing is better than the beginning but it is my belief that the reason the end of a good thing is better is it is then that we can look back and see the Goodness, Faithfulness, and Love of our Lord.
God is good all the time.
 
Thank you for everything. We love you ALL and will miss you much.

God Bless You All.

Kids and I sing song:
Thank you for giving to the Lord. I have life that was changed.
Thank you for giving to the Lord. I am so glad you gave.

The Blessings I Cherish

We have had stressful days here as 3 kids came down with nasty sickness. One kiddo (Baby C) got pnuemonia and Baby B and J got a very nasty virus and our house looks like a train hit it since we are trying to move in. I have a lot of blogging to catch up on but I wanted to get this down. Two different days recently "G" has shared with me how God is working or showing him something in his life and honestly with all the stress in a day this comes as such a blessing to see that despite the caos of moving my child is walking with the Lord.

A few nights ago "G" called me into his room and wanted me to see the verse he had just come across. He said he had just finished his nightly routine of confessing his sins from the day and opened his Bible to read and his eyes fell on the following verse and he was obviously blessed by it.

Psalm 86:5
For thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive;
and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon thee.

Also, all on his own doing he has been reading a book on how to get along with your siblings. It is an excellent book and I had read it to the kids about 4 years ago but G found it and decided to read it again. He said reading it he felt like a survellience camera had been watching him:-) It talked about pits falls first borns usually fall into when dealing with their siblings. Any way he called me aside today and said that there was an area of his life that through reading the book he had been convicted about and that when he read the Scripture about that problem he indicated it really did a number on him and he wanted me to know that he was going to try to do better. What more could a parent want? A child whose heart is sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit in their life. Praise the Lord!! What a tremendous blessing.

This Mom cherishes moments like this. God is so good. 

Saying Goodbye To Family

Me with Niece T.

I am going to miss my nieces!

My brother Q with Babe and Baby C.

Me with my sweet Sister-in-law.

Are we styling or what?!!

Auntie T with J!

J and Little C having a great time at the park.

"A" with Cousin A!

Look at Baby B sitting up by herself!!

What a big girl!!!

Cousin A loves to hold Baby B.

We had a great day with my brother Q, sister-in-law T, and Cousins/Nieces A and T! They came to say goodbye to us us. During this day our house was being packed up so Babe and Q stayed at the house with the kiddos while my Sister-in-Law T,  J, and I went on a shopping trip! May seem strange to go shopping but on their way to our house they got a phone call and found out that they were going to be getting twin 3 year old boys AND a 5 week old girl on Wednesday of next week!! She had lots to prepare and I love shopping so it was nice to get be with her as she prepared! It will be a fun memory!

After we were done shopping it was time for dinner and they treated us to a wonderful mexican meal which is really one of my favorites. It was fun and very helpful to us to sit and have a hot meal when our house was boxed up!

We're going to miss them very much!

Goodbye To Our Orthopedic Friends

Nurse S is our Favorite and was really more like a friend.

Dr. S along with our other favorite nurse!

So thankful for their SUPER DUPER care for Baby B!!

Baby B went in for her final orthopedic appt. in Colorado Springs. She got a great report about her hip and she is doing GREAT but she will have to have this followed every year or two until she is fully grown but we are on the right track now!! Going to miss the orthopedic people! They were so wonderful and so caring.

Baby B has been getting up on her hands and knees rocking like she is thinking about crawling!

Can't wait till she is off exploring like Little C.

On the day we had Baby B's last orthopedic appt. "A" was acting a bit off and told us her tooth was really hurting. She ended up at the dentist getting a cavity filled. She felt much better! Then the very next day she was being silly and fell and hit her knee on a decorative item that had been taken down in preparation for our move and it slashed her knee open. She ended up in the ER and getting stitches:-) She handled it in true "A" fashion. Brother "R" didn't even know she had gone to the hospital it had happened so calmly. She is not our drama queen but we do have one of those!:-)

That night after "A" got back from the ER Babe and I had to stay up into the morning hours to get the house ready for the packers and that worked out VERY well. The little ones went to bed and "G"and "A" wanted to stay up late with us. They thought it was fun and they helped us out. "A" was so excited when it was finally time to go to bed to run and check and look at the clock to see how late she was aloud to stay up:-) . . .  the excitement of moving

We Had Fainted . . .

Psalm 27:13

I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

This Sunday our church did a going away service for us! So Sweet! I wasn't able to hear much of it because J had a melt down.;-) Our pastors wife has heard our story of G when he was a little kid having a hard time when a lot was going on and saying "Too many decorations!" That meant too much going on for him. So after church Mrs. K said there were too many decorations for J!! Soo true. J didn't want all the attention on him and he didn't handle it well.

Our church, I tell people, has been a balm for us .  .  . a healing balm. We rejoice that the Lord brought us to their fellowship and we wonder at how they embraced us with open arms even though a lot of them have been together for so many years and their church was so peaceful before us! But despite the noise and craziness and bonds between them they welcomed us with open arms as we were!! This church and the people inside, may I say our church family (I've never in my adult life been able to say that) have come beside us and encouraged us, cheered us on!  I was the young mother in the group and yet these moms encouraged me on . . . so positive. . . so kind even though they probably knew a better way!

I put the video above of P giving us a wonderful word of send off. Maybe it seems weird for me to post this for others to see but here people can see EXACTLY what I am talking about!! Babe joked today that the video is proof that nice things are said of us:-) This church and its people exist. . .  with Christ-like love not self-serving dictates and actions. Babe and I felt like fainting before we came to this church. We needed a dose of Christ's love with cheerleaders beside us saying "you can do  . . . God is in control . . . we're here too!" They helped us through one of the most difficult times in our lives when we were living in exhaustion and craziness. But you hear P say "we were going through it with you". THAT IS NOT A JOKE, THAT IS OUR CHURCH.

Babe got some clips from the morning. A friend at church got the whole service so I'll be able to watch it later! For weeks the kids have been preparing to sing and play the piano for this special day. Our wonderful and dear friend Mrs. W has worked A LOT with the kids through the years with music. We are so grateful for all the work and time she has spent teaching them. The kids have very much enjoyed her teaching and the songs and we will all miss her a lot. She is a dear friend and she helped us ENORMOUSLY this year . . . much prayer, listening, visiting, making me yummy homemade soup, buying us groceries, and on and on. She was forever helping us and I would say "but you're so busy" and she would say "You know what they say if you want something done you ask the busiest person." Well, finally I got a chance to try and give back a fraction of what she had done, not even coming close, and she says "but you're so busy" . . . :-0 I took joy in reminding her that a wise woman once said "You know what they say if you want something done you asked the busiest person.":-)

We are going to miss our church A LOT! This church has given us Christ-like love beyond belief. They are GEMS. They lifted us up and now are sending us on our way. Our church family always had an encouraging word for us, smiles, hugs, and prayers for our family.

They sent us off showered in gifts: first Bibles for the twins, Bible games, verse plaque, encouraging plaques, sidewalk chalk, Oh and $400 to buy something special for our new house!!! Seriously. Oh and then they took us out for a VERY NICE lunch at a VERY NICE restaurant!! We had a wonderful time of fellowship. It was so fun. Mrs. W had helped the kids put together a very special card for Daddy for Father's Day with pictures and memories of the kids. MR. W gave the kids an AMAZING gift. About 50 years ago when he was plowing a field he found a very large indian spearhead in SUPER shape. He knew "A" loved all things Indian and so he gave it to all the kids. It is quite the piece and Babe said it is really museum quality.

My Little Princess

Little C has learned to wave and I know I am biased but it is just cuter than cute! She has the perfect princess wave! She seems to be so girly . . . her wave is so cutesy and she seems to LOVE beautiful outfits and pretty things! Tonight Babe was feeding Baby B and I was feeding Baby C and Baby C kept looking at Daddy and waving. SOOO Sweet!! The girls are growing up!!! Baby B has been getting up on her hands and knees rocking and looking like she might take off crawling but hasn't done it yet. It will come in time.

Our house is really looking like we are moving! In the video above the kids mattress' are on the floor. Things are looking a bit dismantled.