Ode to Micah

Today is your birthday, I hope you had fun!

We played reverse charades, and yes, the boys won!

We made some brownies with walnuts, for you

And we even got you a card or two.

You deserve more than you will ever get

For living with us and not throwing a fit!

Grace, Ben and I love you and think you're the best!

We almost got you a new sweater vest!

But really, you are the greatest husband and dad

You rock, you rule, we think you're totally rad!

So now it's time for this little "ode" to end

Here's a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my very best friend!

Okay, for those of you who are still with me and have not thrown up yet...it is Micah's birthday today.  The kids and I are so blessed to have a man that loves us and makes us laugh every single day.  We love you so much, Micah!  Happy Birthday!

We're home!

We "road tripped" it to Texas and back for Christmas and loved every minute spent with our family and friends while we were there!  I was so worried that Grace would have a hard time leaving when it was time, but she did great!  I, on the other hand, cried like a baby when we left our parents.  It's just hard, you know?!  We love them so much!

On our way back to California, it began to settle in that we LIVE here!  I think that my brain may have actually thought we were on vacation from October until now.  Our trip back "home" made us Californians.  It was kind of weird and really great all at the same time.  It's good to get to the point where you can call a place HOME!  The best part of the trip back was when we started up "our mountain."  That's when I knew, this is my new home for sure!  I got excited about getting back to my house, getting things put away, starting school back up in a week...yep, it's HOME!

We had been home for two days, and the snow came again!  It was just a light dusting, but you know that we were still excited.  THEN...it started snowing again!  It is beautiful up here, even more so than the first time that it snowed.  Take a look!

This is on the road into the state park.  I love this property and it was so pretty today with the snow!

A perfect little family of trees!

The trees were absolutely beautiful, covered with snow.  My picture does not do it justice!

This is my driveway!

We have a group of missionaries here right now, and the children made this awesome snowman.  He was at least as tall as Grace!

Even though it was snowing today, we headed down the mountain to go to church.  We are still searching for the church that will be home to us.  We visited a smaller "church start" today, and were really impressed with how very nice everyone was!  Micah said it could have been because we were the only visitors among the 20-25 people there.  (I mean I guess that would make everyone come and visit with us.)  Really though, the people were so friendly.  

On our way home, there was a rainbow going across the snow covered mountains into the valley.  It was beautiful!  (And no, I did not have my camera to get a picture.  Ugh!)  Then, when we got up to the top of the mountain, where the snow was falling, we looked out over the valley and the ocean was reflecting the sun as it was setting.  I have really not seen anything that beautiful in a long time!  (Maybe ever!)  

So, it's good to be home in this amazingly beautiful place with our wonderful staff family (whom we greatly missed while we were gone)!  Thank you Lord, for filling our hearts with a love for Palomar Mountain and for giving us a passion for Palomar Christian Conference Center that allows us to leave our families to serve here.  We can't wait to see what God has in store for 2013!

Merry Christmas to All!

Thank you, Lord for all that you graciously give us each day. Most of all, thank you for sending us the best gift of all, your son, Jesus! Thank you for loving us even while we were sinners enough to give the ultimate sacrifice!

May the joy of Christ be with you this Christmas!

Next leg of the trip

We are headed out today for our second leg of the Texas tour! We had tons of fun with Micah's parents. We got to see several friends from camp and our great friends The Kovar's! It's always good to see friends and family!

Now we are headed to Huntsville for a SHORT stop so the kids can see their friends then off to my parents' house!

Mama and daddy, here I come!

Christmas Cards

I love getting Christmas cards!  (Hint! Hint!)  The only problem with Christmas cards, is that if you don't send one out for, oh, say, 4 YEARS, your amount of cards your receive begins to dwindle!  It's really sad!

Well friends...I have Christmas cards again and they are going in the mail today!  Yippee!!!!  Woohoo!!!  I feel a great sense of accomplishment!  Anyone else feel that way when they get their cards in the mail?

Here's hoping that you can get your Christmas dreams accomplished too!

(I must be honest, my mother-in-law is headed to the post office with mine right now to mail them for me!  I never said I could be successful on my own!  It takes a village...to get my Christmas cards mailed!)

Safe!

The tragedy in Connecticut has been on my mind a lot today and last night.  I have not watched much television coverage of this tragedy, not to ignore it, but more because I don't need to hear every one's "take" on things.  I know that what happened was horrible, awful, there really is not a word that can be used to describe it.  I did actually attempt to watch a bit of the news on Friday, but was unable to hang in there for very long.  It is just unfathomable really!

I was a Kindergarten teacher once.  It was my favorite experience in the world of education yet!  My best teaching memories are from that classroom at Oak Ridge Elementary with those precious children that I was blessed by each day.  I still get very excited when I hear information about their successes and where they are today.  Teaching is just like that!  You pour your heart and soul into those who you come into contact with.  The children (your kids), other teachers, other students, parents...this is why I won't understand this tragedy.  It won't make sense.  It doesn't have to.

I pray for each of those families a lot through the days right now.  I pray that each of them know and have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ so that he can comfort them in a way that we can never truly understand.  I pray that God places people around these families to minister to them in special ways.  I pray God's promise for them.

Psalm 18:2
The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.

I was driving last night while everyone else was sleeping, and the song "Safe" by Phil Wickham came on.  All I could think about were those families of the victims of Friday's tragedy.  Listen to the words, and then say a prayer for each and every person who was affected.  Parents, teachers, friends, policemen and women, first responders, cousins, aunts, uncles...ALL of them! 

Road Trippin'!

We are headed to Texas for the holidays and decided to drive this time to save some money! Do you know how long it takes to get to Texas from California? No? Look it up! No, just kidding! Our trip should take around 19 hours.

Here is where we get crazy! We are going to do it in one trip. No stopping at a hotel!
Nope, we like a challenge! (That's the nice way to say we have lost our minds!!!). We are about 1 hour from El Paso as I type this. The trip has honestly been great so far. (Thank you Lord for the DVD player on our car!). The hardest part of the trip will be when we reach Texas and still have 7 hours to go! Here's hoping I packed enough movies! See everyone soon!

Christmas Blessings!

We had the annual Palomar Christian Conference Center Christmas Party given by the Board in San Diego this week.  It was amazing.  The Board goes all out, and serves the camp staff in a huge way.  It was so much fun to have everyone together, and for everyone to get all dressed up in their fancy "duds!"  Here are a few pics of our new camp family.  I did not get everyone, because I was the awkward person running around taking pictures of people!  You don't want to be THAT person, right?!  Ha!

David and Melanie

Micah (Ben loves this new friend!)

Wayne, Brenda, Melanie, Jodi, Ian, Christina

Lane and Hilda (our neighbors)

Thomas, Joe and Matt

Ashley, Sarah, and Thomas (Ashley and Thomas JUST got married and moved here from the great state of TEXAS!!!  Just sayin'!)

Matt and Jared

Laurel, Lindy, Zach and Katie (That's Bennett in her tummy!  We can't wait to meet him.  He better wait until I get back from Texas.)

Noah and Ben (Ben loves this new friend too!)

And...the cutest little group of camp kids ever!

We love our new PCCC family!  They are our very own Christmas blessings!

Snow babies!

I really hate that I have not been able to keep up with my every night posting schedule! So many exciting things have been happening, so I am taking a few minutes away from packing to let you guys see what has been going on.  (Yes, packing!  We leave for Texas tomorrow!!!!!)

As many of you know, we prepared for snow about three weeks ago, but did not get any.  Well...WE GOT SNOW yesterday and today!  It was so awesome for the kids.  (Okay, let's be honest, it was awesome for Micah and I too!)  Anyway, they woke up yesterday morning so excited, but there really was not much snow.  (That's relative!  It was a TON of snow for Texas but not much for here.) We got our gear on and went out to plat at 8:30 am.  The kids had fun!  Here are some pics.

Making a snowy-leaf angel!

Then we came in and warmed up with oatmeal, toast and hot chocolate!  Yum!

That was all yesterday morning.  Then, about 4:30, it started REALLY snowing!  We were so excited. Micah told me to drive down to dinner in the car.  I tried backing up, and there was so much snow that I started sliding, so I put it in park and we walked down!  (I have no idea how to do the whole 4WD thing!  I guess that is another lesson for me. )  It was much more fun to walk in the snow anyway.  Here are a few of those pictures.

Can you see the snow falling behind them?

It was coming down hard!

Then, this morning there was enough to sled!  Hours of fun.  Micah was awesome because he took both kids down to the rec field and let them sled for a while!  Can I just say that those little disc things are amazing!  They were going fast!!!!!

This has been a really huge blessing for us!  I had prayed that Grace would get to experience the snow here at our new home before we headed back to Texas.  It will be hard for her to see family and friends and leave them again, but little things like snow, can make our new home a fun place to come back too.  I am sure that you can understand that perspective of a 9 year old!  Our new home is really great for so many reasons!!!!!

Minute to Win It Night

We had our camp family (those that could come) over to our house on Sunday evening.  It made things feel normal with people over.  I really don't know what to do with an empty house!  We had treats!

Reindeer Food!  (This is a staple of our home at Christmas time!)

Mini pizza bites! (Thanks to Pinterest!  Biscuits with cheese and pepperoni inside.  Yum!)

Monkey bread!  Enough said!

We also had Texas Trash (a super yummy dip), sausage balls, cheese and crackers and lots of other yummy goodies!

The get-together happened because it was "Minute-to-win-it" night at our house.  (That was our advent calendar activity for the day.) So, we thought we would invite everyone.  The kids were the main players, but we had a few other good sports!  I did not get any pictures because I was in charge of the games.  Sorry!

The next day I spent all day in town, and "just to keep it real" here is what I found downstairs on Tuesday morning.

I am sure that this was because Ben was working on a sorting activity!  Right?!

The week is getting crazier by the moment as I try to get it together so that we can head for Texas.  Tomorrow night is our camp Christmas party down in San Diego.  I am super excited to see the board members and for them to meet our kids!  Here's hoping I get a few pictures to show you guys from the party!

Rest Stop/Break Time

I guess that it is time for a short rest stop/break during this climb up the mountain!  Two nights without a blog post!  What is going on?  OH...it's getting close to Christmas!  I spend the whole day (6:30 am - 9:30 pm) in town yesterday conquering all that I could for Christmas.  There is just much to do.  I don't even spend lots of time walking around looking at all of the wonderful things out there, and it still takes a long time.  It's getting exciting though!  We are heading back to Texas for Christmas, and I get more and more excited by the day!  I am CERTAIN that I am going to miss our new home, but I cannot wait to see our families!

I will try not to take too many breaks along my climb, because historical evidence would tell you that if I sit down, I may NEVER get back up!  So, if I don't blog one or two nights, it may be that I never blog again!  Now, we can't have that can we?!  Thanks to those of you who are climbing this mountain with me!  I could not do it without you!  So, up I go...got to get climbin'!

December Nights in Balboa Park

We got to visit Balboa Park for the first time tonight.  It is AMAZING!  (Granted it will be even more amazing when there are not 300,000 people there!)  Balboa Park is home to the San Diego Zoo, Museum of Man, Automotive Museum, Science Museum, Natural History Museum, Air and Space Museum, and many more that I can't even remember.  It is huge and the buildings are architecturally unique and really awesome.  (I would have said amazing again, but I think I already used that word too many times in one paragraph!)

Anyway, it was December Nights in Balboa Park.  A 2 day international Christmas festival where there is food from all countries, a fair, lights, and the museums are free from 5-9 p.m.  It really was quite fun, and our kiddos hung in there really well for the amount of time we were there walking around.  Here are some pictures:

A huge climbing tree on our way into the park.  

Beautiful buildings.

The Museum of Man.

The Whoville Tree!

Carolers.

Two cute kids!

The bagpipe man! He was a trooper because he was simply warming up, but I was determined to get a picture.  He was the nicest looking of all the bagpipe players!

Chinese dragon.

Air and Space Museum

Automotive museum.  I have no idea what type of car this is, and I know that some of you will be offended by that.  I just knew it was a cool red car, so I took a picture!

Santa was in the automotive museum!  (I'm totally hoping that this counts as our visit to Santa this year. Micah said that is cheating!)

This is the stage area where the performers were.  Really beautiful area.  (It has an official name, but I have no idea what that might be. )

Then we visited the Science museum, where we happened upon the GROSSOLOGY exhibit.  It was, by far, the favorite of the night.  Can you guess why?!

GROSS!

This was DE-sgusting, as Ben would say!

A life-sized operation game.

We will definitely revisit this museum on a school field trip soon!

Cool silhouette pic by the fountain.

And another...

LOTS of people by the time we were heading out.

Really cool buildings, and I am still loving that there are palm trees instead of oaks or something.

And my two "homies" ready to leave the park!  (Sorry that they look possessed!  Still working on those editing and photography skills.)

Another fun family outing in SoCal.  We enjoyed our evening with our favorite tour guides (and awesome friends), The Hammond Family!  Nathanael was calling us tourists when I was snapping the silhouette pictures.  I told him I may be a tourist for the next 10 years here.  There are SO many things to experience.  Such a blessing to get to go on new adventures.