What I'm Not Good At...

Do you ever get caught up just thinking about all the things that you're not good at? Man, I feel like this happens to me all the time! Sometimes I even wonder why Mike keeps me around, he seems to be good at everything (well, except fixing things, but I still love him!) and I, at times, feel like I fail at everything.

I have been feeling a bit like this lately and as I am running to God in these moments, he is convicting me of the ways that I need to change but also pouring His infinite and unconditional love over me! God is also working lots on helping me to just be me and to stop comparing myself with others and trying to live up to who they are, instead of who God made ME to be (that one might be a lifelong journey!).  I'm not sure what I would do without God! I know that though my failures seem so big at times that He is an overcomer and in my weaknesses His power is made perfect.

I arrived at these thoughts tonight as I sat down to FINALLY catch up on my blog. Keeping up with this blog is NOT something I am good at! I want to be good at, I love posting and reliving fun moments that we experience with friends and family but I'm just not good at it! As I made chore charts for my kids the other day I decided that I probably need to make one for myself! Haha! I'm not kidding! I would definitely putting "keeping up with my blog" on it. :)

Well, I better start putting some pics up or I am going to finish night and once again feel discouraged but all that I did NOT get done!

SWEET KARA'S BIRTHDAY!

For Kara's 3rd Birthday I took her to get her first real haircut and get her ears pierced! It was SO fun, for both of us! :)

 

 

 

 

 

The finished product! She did so well and her hair looked so cute by the end! Our sweet lady from our church, Kerry, cut her hair and did a wonderful job!

 

Then off to get her ears pierced...

 

 

 

Boy was she excited as she held the earring options!  I had to fight hard my urge to make her pick the earrings I wanted her to pick. In the end she picked the pink flowers because of course pink in her favorite color.

 

 

 

She cried a little bit but as soon I told her she could pick out a Hello Kitty headband the crying stopped! Funny how that works. :)

 

 

 

What a joy and a blessing this sweet girl is to my life! She makes me laugh every day, when I'm crying she asks why and he joy quickly brings a smile to my face and she loves to dance and every night before bed we have to sing songs about Jesus. :)

 

And, of course, she had a Hello Kitty birthday cake.

 

THE TWINS' 7th BIRTHDAY:

 

 

Trenton looks thrilled in this pic! Trenton and Jason are the hardest kids in the world to get good pics of where they are both smiling in the same pic. Seriously, this causes many motherly moments of frustration!

 

 

 

These two are so fun to be around! They truly live life to the fullest and rarely run out of energy. I cannot believe how fast they are growing up! Sometimes I just want to freeze them right where they are cause they are growing up too quickly! This is one of the reasons I hate behind on this blog...I want to capture every moment but life moves way to quickly to do that. I want to be able to look back and remember every detail. I love these two so much and find it such a joy to be able to raise twins. God is truly growing these boys into mighty men of God and I'm so proud of both of them!

Lots more posts to come in an attempt to catch up before Christmas!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Davis's Birthday and First Day of School!

I can't believe that baby Davis started Kindergarten this year! I was so worried about how he would do but God heard and answered my prayers and he is doing AMAZING!!! Davis LOVES school and has made some good little buddies in his class.

 

But right before starting school, Davis turned 5 years old!

 



 

His first day of school!

 

Davis and Jason

 

 

Jason (blue), Trenton (middle) and Davis

 

 

Trenton was a little pouty about all these pics, so I made everyone do their best pouty face. This pic cracks me up!

 

 

I absolutely LOVE this pic of the twins! This picture really captures their relationship: loving, filled with laughter, and a close knit relationship where they rarely fight. I love it!

 

Praise God that all of the boys have transitioned so well to a new school and a new place! It is a joy to watch them all play together and grow up way too quickly!

 

 

 



 

Summer Fun with the Sanders' Clan!

My sister's fam came to visit this summer and I didn't want to miss getting some cousin pics in the blog!

 

Kara and her cousin Lucy in matching pj's!

 

 

 

 

All of us girls had a special tea party at Starbucks. Flagstaff doesn't have any place to have a tea party so my mom had the great idea to bring tea cups to Starbucks and have our own tea party. It was SO much fun!

 

 

Kara holding her cousin Luke. Kara loves babies!

 

 

Fun on the waterslide

 

 

My nephew, Josh, and I having fun at Chuck-E-Cheese. I love this lil guy!

 

 

Of course it wouldn't be vacation without some krispy kreme donuts!

 

 

There were lots more pics but I haven't downloaded them. :( But I have so much to blog that I'll have to move on...but we had a great time with my sis and her fam. I wish we got to see them more!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 



Summer moments, and the 4th of July

Well, once again I am SO behind on this blog. Life has been crazy and consuming. But it's time to placy catch up...

 

I have been so blessed by Mike and my dad's relationship!

 

 

I love my dad so much! Many tears were shed over this bittersweet departure but my dad despite it being hard has always, always rejoiced in us doing God's will, and loves chatting with Mike now about all that's going on.

 

We did A LOT of swimming this summer! Thanks to Mrs. Cathy and Mr. Warren we got to swim at Pine Canyon quite a few times this summer! The kids loved it and would literally do the water slide for hours.

 

 

 

FOURTH OF JULY!

 

We had only been in Rio Rancho for a few days when the fourth came up, so we decided to make it a fun day!

 

 

 

 

It was really hot in the sun!

 

 

My patriotic girl :)

 

 

 

 

Making pouty faces

 

 

The kids made out like bandits when it came to the candy! We had a great time at the parade and then we headed to see Despicable Me 2! Our family loves Despicable Me and Mike often talks like Gru and the kids think it's hilarious. We had a blast going to the movies. Kara slept through the second half and wakes up at the very end and says, "That was so good, can we go see it again!" Funny girl.

 We tried Dion's, Albuquerque's local pizza place for dinner and went over to a friend's house to watch the fireworks. However, God's lightning fireworks show was more amazing then the real one but they were both fun to watch. It was just one of those really fun family days!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stones of Remembrance

For the last couple months life has been really crazy! Come to think of it, life is still pretty crazy! But over the last few months God keeps bringing me back to the story in Joshua where the Israelites are getting ready to cross the Jordan River into the Promise Land. God tells the Israelites to pick up twelve stones to place on the other side of the river to continually remind them of all that ways that He provided to bring them to this point.

As we prepared to move to Rio Rancho, NM God kept telling me I needed to remember all that He's done and all the ways that He's provided for me in the past. I've been meaning to write this post for a few weeks now but I didn't have internet and then I kept putting it off.

I've been feeling pretty discouraged the last few days. We're trying to buy this house that is a short sale and it seems like it's never going to go through, my purse got stolen, I miss my close relationships and even my familiar neighborhood and grocery stores. This morning I felt God nudging me to finally take the time to sit down and write out some of my stones of remembrances. God has never failed me! He has never failed to provide the perfect house, great friends and each desire of my heart that I bring before Him and even those desires I didn't realize I had but he knew. But sometimes amidst discouragement it's hard to remember all of those things.

So it's time to start remembering them...

- First of all God sold our house in a month! Not only did our house sell quickly but God's hand was all over the purchase and sale of that house. It was such a gift and we loved so much about it!

- God provided people to help clean and pack up our entire house and people to watch our kids.

- When we moved home from Vienna and I was pregnant with the twins, we literally had nothing...God provided a townhouse we couldn't afford (the couple gave us an amazing deal!), people just kept giving us furniture and stuff for the twins, and in some of the moments that all the change seemed too much to handle, someone was offering to bring a meal, a family member was coming over to help and people poured love and prayer over us.

- We were outgrowing our Toyota Camry and Mike's grandpa sold us his van for an AMAZING deal!

- God has provided people to call, stop by, text, give a gift or watch the kids at so many of the most perfect moments when it was just what I needed.

- God provided a temporary rental house here in NM that someone at the church owns. This is such a blessing that allows us to not be tied down but buys us time to buy a house.

- Through lots of prayer and spending time in God's Word, God continually gave Mike and I a sense that this is where He was calling us to.

- One of my biggest fears in moving was how Davis would do, he's my shy guy, and he hasn't even skipped a beat here. He loves it and even seems excited about Kindergarten! This is truly a God thing, if you know Davis!

The list could go on! Mike's at a meeting right now but before bed I plan on together talking about more ways that God has provided so perfectly in the past. My hearts feels encouraged already just writing this, though I'm anxious to write the ending where I'm looking back at all He has done. I know that some ways we will recognize months from now and I know that in some areas it will be years before we begin to see where He is at work or how He has been at work in our lives. Though if I could quickly look back and recognize God giving me an extra dose of patience I think my kids would greatly appreciate it! :)

I am begging God for more faith and in my weaknesses, which I feel like abound right now, that He would be strong. I wanted to make sure to blog about this because I don't want to give the misconception to my kids, or anyone else for that matter, as we look back on this that following Jesus is always easy. Sometimes when God calls us to something all the pieces perfectly fall into place but sometimes they don't. Sometimes it's really hard and everything doesn't make sense but that's why looking back is important because in the moment I can't always see how God is going to provide, but when I take the time to look back I can see how He has ALWAYS provided in His perfect way and in His perfect timing.

The verse God gave me this morning, that I've known for years but was just what I needed this morn was Proverbs 3:5-6:

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight."

In this season of lots of new things and unknowns I am asking God to help me trust Him, His ways and His perfect plan. He has never failed me! Mike kept saying as we prepared to leave "no looking back, just looking up." I am striving to do that, though I have been failing. Thankfully God has been faithful. He keeps bringing my eyes upward and for that I'm thankful. I know when my eyes are fixed on Him, peace abounds in every area of my life. I am praising God now for what He has in store! I can't wait to look back and see all that He's done!

Baseball Season/Swim Team

Well, for the first time ever Trenton and Jason did different sports! Trenton wanted to play baseball and Jason joined a swim team. I think it was really good for the boys to have something where it was just them and no one was confusing them for their brother.

On a side note I came to realize, while we were gone, that people at school must have started to tell the twins apart by their shoes. I guess one day Trenton couldn't find his shoes and my mom was asking him to wear a pair of Jason's shoes and he refused. When she asked why he said, "cause everyone will call me Jason because those are Jason's shoes and that's how everyone tells us apart!" This is all good info for me...I will now make sure that I never let them choose the same pair of shoes! Or if they choose the same pair at least put different colored shoe laces!

So I have yet to take a pic of Jason at swim team because he doesn't compete yet. He's still working on learning the different strokes and becoming a good swimmer.

Trenton improved a lot in baseball this year! Last year he did T-ball and this year it was coach pitch for the first part of the season and then they did a pitching machine. He loved to bat and improved a ton! Playing in the outfield is a different story...you know when you're watching games and there's that one kid in the outfield that just doesn't care? He's kicking up dirt, chasing away bugs and really just not paying attention...yeah that was Trenton this year! I kept thinking his competitve gene would kick it, yeah not so much! But it was still really fun to watch!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Summer is HERE!!!

I cannot believe that the kids are out of school for the summer! Where did this year go? Where did my cute kindergarteners go that are now quickly approaching 2nd grade! AHHH!! Time is flying by SO fast! I have to say I am quite sad about my kids not getting to go to DeMiguel Elementary School anymore. I have loved this school! It has been fun having my boys go to the same elementary school that I did and even have the same PE coach! Kind of crazy!!

 

Here's our morning bus stop crew (minus Luke another great neighbor boy). Ok, so only 3 of these 6 kids actually get on the bus, Carly, Kara and Davis just come along for fun! Usually the kids are throwing a football or having races or whatever else they can come up with!

 

 

This is our neighbor's son Colin. We have LOVED getting to know their family this year!

 

 

Last time getting on the bus to DeMiguel :(

 

 

Trenton and Jason's teachers. Mrs. Lamer and Mrs. Othon are sisters who team teach. Mrs. Lamer taught on Monday and Tuesday. Mrs. Othon taught on Wed. and Thursday and then they rotated on Friday. The boys loved their class! They were very creative teachers and I really enjoyed getting to help out in their class.

 

 

Of course we had to stop by and say goodbye to Ms. Lynn. She was the twins kindergarten teacher and was going to be Davis's teacher. :( I am asking God to give us someone just as good as Ms. Lynn for Davis!

 

 

 

 

Let the summer fun begin! I talked with my neighbor Misti about having something fun for the kids, they just got a new water slide, so the kids all came home to it being set up! We have the most amazing neighbors and after just a few minutes all the neighbors and kids were outside having lots of fun!

 

 

I meant to buy otter pops but forgot so I made caramel corn instead. It didn't take long for the whole bowl to disappear!

 

 

The boys found and caught a lizard so the girls actually got the slide to themselves for a little bit. There are way more boys on our street then girls but here's Elise, Kara and Piper three of the four girls on our street. We're only missing Carly.

 

 

The girls catching some rays...or warming up!

 

 

 

 

 

Here's our neighbor Misti Welker and her two little girls. All the kids typically congregate at the Welker's house because they have a great big grass lawn out front. We're so thankful that we've had the chance to live on this amazing street! The neighbors are wonderful and have become friends. We're looking forward to lots of time outside over the next month before we move!