Encourage one another.

Yesterday was rough, not gonna lie. Charlie left for a three week work trip and we were on day three. When you have a deployment under your belt, a three week work trip doesn't seem as bad. I can call him when I want and I don't have to worry about not hearing from him for three-four days. He's also not getting shot at which helps a lot. Perspective is key. That's what I tell myself at least. 

Buuuuut, it's still rough. Emily is such a daddy's girl. So when he's gone she tends to act out a bit. The other kids love Charlie very much, but Em is obsessed with Daddio (that's what she calls him). The battle raged on for two days and she seemed a lot better by day three. Still testy, but better. The thing with me is that I believe that there is never, EVER, an excuse to whine about anything. You can feel sad, hurt, mad, and all those emotions with out whining. I don't want my kids to have this idea that just because you are going through something sucky, you have an entitlement to whine, feel sorry for yourself, etc. There is someone out there that ALWAYS has it worse than you do. Always. Trying to teach this concept to a kid is not always easy. 

Tucker decided to take this opportunity to display his Goble temper. So I had one kid who was a testy hot mess and the other who was trying to hit every thing in a fit of rage. Que in a thousand questions, a million "MOMMIES!!", lots of tattling, one potty training kid who decided to pee his self, a gazillion time outs, and a pregnant mama who hadn't slept well in three days. We were sitting down for dinner and I was feeling pretty frazzled, y'all. 

I was having those thoughts that all moms get: "Am I being patient enough?" "Am I doing all the things I should be doing as a mom?" etc.

Miriam, my sister-in-law, looked over at me and said the most glorious thing.  "You have been very patient with every thing that has been going on today" (all the praise hands) That was just what I needed. I did not feel like I was on the inside at all. I was feeling overwhelmed, and tired. It's so amazing how someone saying something like that can boost ones mood so much. I'm reminded of these bible verse: 

 " Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing." 1 Thessalonians 5:11-13

"And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all." 5:14


I was feeling encouraged and not as tired any more. I told the kids we could make baked oatmeal when we got home. We got home and I put Tucker to bed. I want to tell you that this story ends with all of us happily making baked oatmeal, laughing, enjoying ourselves, putting the kids to bed and them peacefully going to sleep. but no. I would be lying and every one knows life with three kids isn't that easy. Emily fell off the chair, Jake started screaming about something, they were both sticking their hands into the oatmeal after being told no. Finally got it in the oven and  put the kids to bed. Emily decided to get out of bed and touch something I specifically told her not to touch, and then preceded to lie about it. 

I say this because I think instead of telling your self how bad today was, it's important to think about the good things. Like your SIL texting you and saying your nephew got put on the heart transplant list (Praise God!), taking a trip to Hobby Lobby with the sisters, getting a new maternity shirt, having my SIL Ruth tell me that she enjoyed hearing mine and Emily's conversation that morning as we brushed our teeth, having a friend that was supposed to leave the next day be able to stay much longer than we all thought, tea parties at 3pm, having people joyfully help you with your kids, having Emily say "I love your baby in your belly!", etc. There were so many good moments that happened yesterday. 

I know that I will probably have another overwhelmed feeling today, but I can trust that God gives me just what I'll need when I need it. 

"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things." Philippians 4:8

The kitchen remodel of 2015

I have been wanting to remodel our kitchen since we bought it. We had so many projects that needed to get done before we tackled this one. This project was my favorite house project to date! I was actually able to help on this one. I'm always pregnant during our projects and I always get the horrible task of taking nails out of boards. I was able to lift things, put flooring in, and stand on ladders without it being frowned upon. I loved it! I ain't gonna lie, being pregnant does has benefits when your working on a project. No one expects you to do much! And you can wonder off and no one really cares since you're not much of a help any way lol.

I absolutely adore the farm house style. I have a pintrest board for my kitchen and I have been saving things on there for months. I had so many ideas for what I wanted. We did this entire kitchen remodel for 5,000. Which isn't too bad when we you consider how it looked before.

This is what it looked like when we first bought the house.

I think it looks a lot better here after we moved in!

And this is what she looks like now......all the heart eyes!!!!

<3

I love this kitchen!

Our little coffee area!

Oven.

I LOVE this sink. We got this sink and our counter tops at Ikea.

                                                         Did I already say how much I love this sink?!?

20 weeks!

I took this picture a few days ago and I was pretty excited about being close to the half-way mark.

                                              

Other than God, my husband, kids, family.......this seems to be the love of my life right now. Seriously, guys. Has anyone else had nerds and ice cream mixed together?!? I try to only have it once every other week because (a) Eating this every night is not healthy and (b) My midwife would freak if she knew I even ate this. For realz. Some one needs a treat when they are told they are only supposed to eat quinoa and all things leafy.  (I hope my midwife doesnt see this blog)

                                       
                                                      

                       AnyHooooooo, I thought it would be fun to do a pregnancy questionnaire:


How far along: 20 weeks!

Size of baby: At the ultrasound they told us around 12oz.

Maternity clothes: I'm still wearing one pair of my pre-pregnancy pants and I'm starting to feel like a busted can of biscuits and those are going to have to go soon. I seriously hate maternity pants. Hate them.

Stretch marks: Hurrrrlo,  I have four kids in four years. Is this even a question?!?

Best moment this week: Seeing our little man!

Movement: YES!! Charlie felt him kick on the outside a few nights ago!

Food cravings/aversions: I had a hard time getting my salad down tonight. I was trying not to gag while charlie was telling the kids (while they were eating their salad) "The salad is soooo good, see how much mommy loves it!!" haha thanks. I was trying so hard to keep a straight face.

Gender: Its a boy!

What I am looking forward to: Having this baby in June!

It's a...

BOY!!

To be honest I was a bit surprised when she said boy. Only because I was so sure it was a girl. I had exactly the same symptoms as I did with Emily and all the old wives tales were there. High heartbeat, certain cravings, etc. But once I saw this sweet little face I knew he was exactly what God wanted me to have and I couldn't be more excited about it. 

I think as parents we can think two boys, two girls, one girl and one boy, or whatever number or plan you come up with in your head will be the perfect plan. I think God laughs at us when we do that. His plan is always the best plan, even though it may not seem like that at times. I'm so glad we have all the kids in the exact order that God wanted it to be. I'm sure this little guy will do great things one day! Here are some pictures!

Profile picture!

                                                             I love his little feet!!

The gift card

The craziest, sweetest thing happened to me yesterday. Let me start with the story first...

Yesterday was grocery shopping day. Which means that it was a very, very busy day. We usually go to three different stores (gotta get the best deals) and it can be pretty hectic with three kids under three. 

We were at Winco which is the last store that we go to.We left the house around 10 and it was now 2:30. We finally made it to the check-out line. The end was in sight!  The kids missed naps and you could tell they were just done and tired. I forgot my reusable bags (they have a bag tax where I live and it annoys the heck out of me lol) so I had to buy 6 of them. I also went over my budget because ground beef was on sale and I grabbed a 10lb log. If anyone goes to Winco you know you gotta get that ground beef when you can. So I was feeling guilty about that. I was trying to load all the groceries bags with Emily's help when some older man came up to me. He looked like he was 65-70. 

He said "Here, I got this card for you." as he reached a card to me.

 "Whats, that?" I replied. I didn't really understand what he was saying.

 "I got this gift card for you to help with your groceries." he said.

and before I could say anything more he handed it to me. "Oh, wow, thank you so much" I said

enthusiastically.  He walked away. I tried to see where he went so I could

give him a proper thank you, but  Emily was trying to load eggs into the cart by herself and I

turned around for a second to help her and didnt see him anymore.


Why would a stranger hand me a gift card?  And why did he choose to give it to me?

I don't know the answer to those questions, but God does. Maybe he felt sympathy for me. Here I was loading groceries, wrangling three kids and pregnant. Maybe he saw that I was tired and needed some cheering up. The thing is, I may never know why he did that. But boy was I ever so grateful. It wasn't the money. I was so grateful because he did something so selfless. I know it must have not been comfortable for him to come up to me and he did. We live in a world where every thing is ME centered. You start to lose hope in humanity when you see how much people care about themselves. You see people not being gracious, only caring about their selves. never helping any one out. Then there's this man who handed me a gift card. I think about it and it makes me cry. He restored my hope. There still are selfless people out there. I was reminded of this verse in the bible.

"He replied, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.”

15The Lord said to him, “Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael king over Aram. 16Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet. 17Jehu will put to death any who escape the sword of Hazael, and Elisha will put to death any who escape the sword of Jehu. 18Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and whose mouths have not kissed him.”

Thank you, whoever you are that gave me the gift card. I am forever grateful. 

Bedroom tour!

A little back story about this bedroom. When we first moved in I was pregnant with Emily and I LOVED the bead board in this room. I thought it would be perfect for a girls room. So we moved our bedroom into the smaller one and gave em this one. Charlie always wanted us to have this room. So one day I decided to switch rooms with Em. It was a bit of a nightmare. About half-way through I hit the "What was I THINKING" phase. I was in denial. I think I may have even hit the 5 stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. Ok, it wasn't that bad, but you get what I'm saying. 

I'm very happy with how it turned out. Charlie was pretty excited. I think he was more excited about the fact that I did it and he didn't have to go through the 5 stages of grief with me haha. 

                       I had some help from this cutie!

Ruth gave me this end table and I painted it and put on new knobs.

Messy bed and Tucker looking out the window.

He was trying to walk to me. I love him!!

"For we all stumble in many ways..."

A couple weeks ago we had a bible study and I was given James 3 to study. I know that you should be careful with your words and taming the tongue is a big deal. I also know that I mess up daily with this. How could I not? Anyone that knows me knows that I'm a talker and I will willingly talk to anyone if they want to listen. To be honest, I'll keep talking even if they don't. Just keeping it real. Anyways.... there are so many times when I say something not so great and that night I lay awake thinking to myself "Why did I say that?!?" Then I feel so guilty and spend the rest of the night worrying about it. I even go as far to worry about it the next day as well. Anyone else do this?

I always come back to this verse. "We all STUMBLE in many ways....." you see that? God knows that we all stumble. He knows we are not perfect and that we mess up. Does that mean that we keep on doing it and saying "Well, God knows I'm not perfect, I shouldn't even try." No, it doesnt mean that. 

"What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means!" Romans 6:15

What it means is that God knows that we can't do it on our own. We need His saving grace to help us. We shouldn't stay up all night worrying about what we said. I feel like that gives the devil a stronghold. What we should do is give it to Jesus and trust Him.  He is the only perfect man who came into this world. God knows we aren't perfect. He loves us anyway. So next time you say something you shouldn't, go to Jesus. Ask Him for forgiveness and trust that He will forgive you. If you feel like you hurt someone with your words, go tell them. Ask them for forgiveness, tell them your shortcomings. You won't always get it right, cause taming the tongue is hard work y'all. But I pray that the next time you have a slip-up you remember these verses:

    "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." 1 John 1:9

" For we all stumble in many ways. And if anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle his whole body." James 3:2

Living room.

I decided to snap a few pictures of our living room while the kids are napping. 

Here are the before photos. We tore a wall down between the kitchen and living room. Gotta have that open concept, right?

Before we laid the flooring.

Yeah, it was a little bit of a hot mess.

Let me be real with y'all for a hot minute. This is what my living room looked like before I cleaned it up. I was trying to fix my blog while the kids were running around causing about as much chaos as an opossum in a trash can. It was bad. So here ya go. Awesome cell phone picture and all.

Now the cleaned up version:

What you see when you first walk in. I probably should have swept the floor...that's all right cause #igotkids.

The living room.

I really need to Windex the glass and tv.....

Another view!

Charlie made these adorable little shelves for me. They are probably Ana Whites plans.

House Tour

We actually bought this house before we even saw it! Crazy, right? To be honest, we had a hard time deciding if we wanted to live in Kentucky or Oregon.Charlie was stationed at Ft. Campbell and he was going to be getting out in a few months. I was around 20 weeks pregnant with our first at the time. The big question was: Do we stay here? Or move to Oregon? 

In Kentucky you could get a 40 acre farm (with a pond) and a fixer upper house for 150k. You would never see something that cheap in Oregon. You would have to pay 500k for something like that here. We tried to tell ourselves Kentucky would work, but God kept telling us both something different. Every time we would look at houses in KY, we would feel that it wasn't right.  After a few weeks of this and knowing what God wanted us to do, and realizing it was more important to raise our kids around a great family, we decided Oregon was the best place to be. So here we are! 

We first bought this hot mess before we even looked at it. It was amazing deal and we couldn't pass it up. 


                                              Why the blue roof? WHHHHYYY? We are planning on siding this bad boy, putting new windows in and hopefully painting over that blue roof (all da praise hands!!)

 

This is when we tore the yard up and the kids had the best time making mud messes.

Looking better, huh?

                                             Looking muddy and adorable.

                                             Why wouldn't you dig for gold in this mud mess?

The first time we moved the lawn after laying the hydroseed!

 And this is what she looks like now!

Proudly flying that Kentucky flag.

 

 

 

A trip to Kentucky.

We moved to Oregon in 2011 and we can only make a trip to Kentucky once a year. Which is sad, but plane tickets are insanely expensive and we can only afford to do it once year. We went last summer and had the time of our lives. I always forget how beautiful it is and the first thing we did was eat at Cracker Barrel. The closest one to us here in Oregon is a NINE HOUR DRIVE. NO, I'M NOT BITTER ABOUT IT. Other than the kids having jet lag, screaming every five seconds, and someone eating most of my chicken and dumplins, it was pretty good.




                                                      Some of the cutest cousins.

                                            Mamaw showing Emily her beautiful Garden.

                                       Nana's Grandbabies and the awesome tire thing she built.

                                                       Auntie Ashley is awesomeness.

                                                               Mamaw and Tuck the Duck

                                                     
                                                 


                                                            Emily playin' in the creeks.

Auntie Ashley and Gunner

Gran and Paw with the kids.