A time to relax!

I've been enjoying vacation with my husbands family this week and I love it. His family is so laid back and easy going; the opposite of my family! There is also something nice about getting away from the house that makes vacation so special.

After a week of sleep deprived work camp it took me four night of sleeping twelve hours to get caught up on my sleep. But finally this morning I woke up to a silent house and checked my email. My father-in-law woke up shortly after. We took a nice relaxing walk on the beach. There is something so calming about waves crashing on the beach. I wonder if the baby gets that calming feeling inside my tummy, being surrounded by 'water' all day. Sometimes I wish I could go inside there too ;-)

Speaking of baby. Wow, I'm huge. I've been begging God for the pregnancy tummy so I wouldn't just look fat to those that don't know me and boy did he deliver. This week I swear my belly has doubled in size, along with little 'soybean'. That has been nice, but the thought that I'm only going to get bigger is kinda scary.

Another note on the baby- last week Friday we were suppose to have our ultrasound to find out soybean's gender. Well that didn't happen. The Tuesday prior the office called and said they had a scheduling conflict. My heart sank. What does that mean?!? I just wanted to burst into tears, but I held it together. She couldn't reschedule me until TWO WEEKS later. I was devastated. I know that worse things are happening in the world, but it had already been 20 weeks of wondering- two more weeks felt like forever! How did women survive before ultrasounds I'll never know. That day I still had a doctors appointment and I told her about it. She suggested that we go down to the office and see if they had anything at another location sooner. They did. Now Aug. 4th is "The Day." I'm not sure God reasoning, but if there is something I've learned about God is we often never understand His reasoning, but it usually works out better His way.

We have entered the second half of vacation and I'm sad to think this wonderful time, like all things in life, must come to an end. But I'm going to remember and cherish this special time with my family and my wonderful husband. For that I'm very grateful! Here are some pictures for you to enjoy as well.















Matt and I enjoying the pool.















This is Matt, me, my sister-in-law Carrie, and her fiancee Chris at the beach.




















Matt and me on date night!

Working for the Lord: Part 1

I really wish I had the chance to write last week when I was at Lebcamp, but the point of Lebcamp was to leave the "world" outside and be one with Jesus. And boy did that happen! Sometimes you wish a missions trip or church camp could go on longer than one week, but reality is, we can't shut the world around us out forever.

I'll back up a bit and let you know what I'm rambling on about. Last week my church put on a youth work camp. The camp lasts for a week and the youth go out in crews to different work sites in our immediate community. The work ranges from painting to building onto houses. The youth spend the rest of their time in fellowship at the church.

Last year was the first year I was able to spend the entire week helping out. For the two years previous, I was only able to help out a day or two. Well did God rock my world!!! Seeing the kids grow in their faith, going in my faith, and everyone getting to share the experience together- it was awesome! I had a wonderful time with my crew and getting to know the youth at our church was great too. In fact, I continued working with them throughout the school year at the middle school and high school youth nights during the week. To say the least this years Lebcamp was highly anticipated for me, and God didn't let me down.

So this past week I got to know six new wonderful youth and one new "adult." I put adult in quotes because Josh and me talked all week about how hard the transition from youth to adult can be once you exit college. Josh was one of the many blessing I had. He was wonderful with the kids and had my kind of sarcastic sense of humor, so we got along just great. Both of us talked about how this week was really the beginning of a wonderful friendship. How awesome is our God?!

Although the week was full of blessing, that doesn't mean it was a week without a little struggle. Monday had been a hard day for me. I'm a crew adult and we're really there for support and encouragement. Each crew has a crew leader, a youth, who is in charge of keeping the kids on task and making sure things are getting done. Well my wonderful fearless leader, wasn't quite fearless yet. She was struggling, and me seeing this I jumped right in. At the end of the day I felt like I hadn't done the right thing. I spoke with Jason, the youth director, and he gave me some pointers. So on day two, after a night of prayer, I set out to be the perfect supporter. Well we almost got there. But I felt so frustrated because yet again I had to step in. I felt like I wasn't doing what God needed me to. I felt like I had let our crew leader down and myself.

Wednesday was a our "mystery" workday. This day was exactly what the crew needed. We went to a nursing home. There we put together a skit and put it on for the residents. Then we got to play a trivia game with them. We just got to relax. It was like God was telling us to chill and enjoy each other, and we did just that. By the time Thursday rolled around the crew leader was getting the hang of leading and I was feeling comfortable hanging back and encouraging her. On Friday I wasn't able to be there on site, but from the reports everyone gave me our crew leader kicked butt. God really worked with her and I all week. She is a wonderful young lady, who I know will go on to be a wonderful leader someday in whatever she does. God really showed us how relying on Him can change us all in just one week.

Lebcamp 2010

Well I've gone on long enough. There is more to come though, look for part 2 and I will let you know how our resident, Mrs. Clark, glows with God's love!!!

What to write...?

I got the idea to start a blog after seeing another person's blog. I'm thinking that is how must blogs start. I thought it was an interesting way to jot down ones thoughts and milestones. I had journals/diaries growing up but by high school that idea went to the wayside. I tried starting a journal again and do write in it on occasion, but I'm hoping that I will be more regular with this. I also prefer typing over writing. First of all typing has spell check, and I should probably pre-warn you now that I can't spell worth a hill of beans (even with spell check). I often leave "s" off the end of plural words or switch up homophones. So with this I'll begin with a short version of what's been going on in my life.

I am a Christian and love that I have a loving God. He has blessed me daily since I accepted Him into my heart. I hope to never forget that. Sometime I'm sure I will let you know how I picked the name for this blog. It's rooted in His word!

I am also a wife to the most wonderful husband, Matt. I sometimes think I don't let him know it enough, but I sure do love him. God has blessed me in so many ways through him. I sometimes look back and wonder if I knew how great he was and would be back then. I must have known, why else would I have married him? Maybe I'm in such awe of how well matched we are now that I think, how could I have know how well we were made for each other. Sometimes when we do things that are similar at the same time or have the same thoughts we say "Oh, we're so perfect for each other." Deep down inside I know that is nothing but the truth!

Matt and I have recently been blessed by God with a baby. We are super excited and have been loving our little "soy bean" (if you watch The Office you'll understand the reference) since before we knew we were pregnant. It was a long road, which I'm sure I write more on another day. We only have to wait one more week to know boy? or girl?- the big question. Some people elect to wait and find out what it is at birth, but if you know me, the first 20 weeks of not knowing was hard enough. Plus, the Lord knows I really want a gender specific nursery. So my prayers lately have been that He will reveal to us what we have inside this tummy of mine. Only time will tell.

Also you should know that I'm a teacher and I love my job. This past year was a little trying, okay a whole LOT of trying. But I know in my heart of hearts that God put me with those specific students for a reason. Not sure I understand it quite yet, but He doesn't always reveal to us His mater plan when we "want" Him too. I have also been "chosen" to move schools for next year. I honestly believe it was an answer to prayer. Maybe that is why God made last year such a growing year for me, so I would be open to this new endeavor. I sure will miss those close to me though. I'm also not looking forward to being six month pregnant and unpacking all those boxes in the new classroom- I'll be needing your prayers those days for sure.

I don't know if anyone will read my posts or keep up with my blog, but that really doesn't matter to me. My goal is to use this as a way to remind me of God's blessing in my everyday life. To have a place to write them down and be able to look back on them and remind myself, when needed, how blessed I really am! And with this I'll end with a quote from scripture "...let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven." Matthew 5:16