happy new year!

TOP 10 from 2016:

1. September beach trip (the one in May was, unfortunately, not so memorable)

2. camping in Broken Bow

3. buying "little piece of paradise" - an oh the fun we've had already!

showing the cousins

breakfast tacos to christen the land! 

playing on the bulldozer while daddy works

4. our 11th anniversary adventure

5. state fair with Crowells - here are some highlights

ready to watch the parade

6. Christmas in Austin

7. Allen's Holiday Soiree "afterparty: - where Kenny and I got caught having a little too much fun in the car afterwards. It's definitely something I can look back on and laugh about. But in the moment, I was completely humiliated!!  The party was so much fun and it was pretty cool being "the contractor's wife!" I felt like a movie star.

8. Arrow's Academy began - it's been a dream of mine for so long!! We are still working out the kinks, but I'm so thankful I'm able to homeschool our boys.  They are pretty excited about it too... just look at their faces upon receiving their school for next year!

9. Fossil Rim

10. field trips and fellowship with great friends - We've been blessed to go on so many great field trips with our homeschool group.  I love the weather in Texas is nice 90% of the time.  There is so much to do year round!
And there have been countless late nights at our house playing games with friends, listening to music in the park, grilling/cooking, and enjoying each other's company. Our hearts (and tummies) are very full!

trolley in Downtown Dallas

Highland Park Soda Fountain

Heard Museum in McKinney

Irving Symphony Orchestra

Henrietta Creek Apple Orchard

Dallas Zoo

Arbor Hills Nature Preserve

We are also so blessed and grateful for our health and Kenny's great year of business.  We also took a Growing Kids Gods Way class that taught us so much about parenting - structure, discipline, and creating a family that our kids love to be a part of.  I'm beyond grateful for our teachers, Terry and Michelle Holmes, and eager to see the fruit and God's faithfulness as we carry out what we learned.


the not-so-memorable memories:

*I debated listing the worst memories of the year, because who wants to dwell on calamity?  But I realized it's also a way to see the Lord's faithfulness and to remember it's only a season. He is good... all the time!

1. Anchor's two weeks of throwing up daily - grateful for doctors and a new formula that stopped the throw up and FINALLY allowed our little guy to grow!

2. my horrible GI bug - a week before Christmas I got a nasty GI bug. I started out feeling like I had the flu. That went away within 12 hours, but then I felt nauseous and completely lost my appetite. This lasted a week, had me convinced I was pregnant (even though Kenny had a vasectomy over a year ago!), and had me laying on the couch all.day.long.  48 hours after it began, I started diarrhea that lasted three endless days.  It was such a weird stomach bug, and I wonder if it even messed with my hormones. I felt depressed and remember praying that God would spare me!  Looking back I can laugh about it, but I know in the moment I didn't think I'd make it through the day.  Kenny had to watch the boys, cook, clean, and all in the midst of holiday activities. Words cannot express my gratitude to the Lord for seeing us all through this week.

3. Maverick peeing on himself and me storming out of my mom's house - We celebrate Christmas with my mom on New Year's Eve. It was chaotic (as usual) but we were also having some discipline issues with Joshua based on an event that had happened a week before. I was in the playroom talking to Joshua. Maverick need to go to the bathroom. Kenny says he called for me, but I never heard him. Maverick ended up peeing on himself (and his BRAND NEW SHOES)!  I walk *outside* to find him standing in the front yard, and my brother and his girlfriend laughing at him! It infuriated me! I stripped Maverick down, loaded him in the car naked and told Kenny to load the boys up. I was livid and done!  I stormed through the house to gather my things, which I know ruins the mood for everyone. An hour later, after calming down, I realized I completely overreacted and missed out on finishing up Christmas with my family. (Christmas with my dad was spent on the couch with my GI bug... so both were pretty frustrating this year.)  I admitted to my family that I have an anger problem and need to seek help for it. I know it's okay to be angry but I have to learn to control my anger and not let it dictate my actions.  Hopefully there will be victorious posts about this in the future.


I have so many blog posts to catch up on and plan to do so soon.  I'm really hoping 2017 will a turning point for me as a wife and mom.  There's so much I've always wanted to be and do and yet have continually made excuses not to do them. My goals for this year are the EXACT same as last year! And these goals aren't like "climb mount everest," or "start a company and be on Forbes Fortune 500 list within a year."  It's simply to have a daily quiet time, get our school done, maintain a clean/welcoming home, and workout 4-5x per week.  Why are these easy tasks so monumental for me?!?  I feel so lazy and unproductive. I'm seeking the Lord for answers - where is my time being wasted?  How do I manage it better?  What do I prioritize?  My mom had a schedule and stuck to it as much as possible. For a long time, I thought that wouldn't work for our family.  But I'm starting to think otherwise... 

Oh how my prayer is to have a completely different post at the end of this year. I want to write about my success and victory in this area. I read in Joshua 18 today about the Israelites who had not yet claimed the land the Lord had already given to them. Joshua asked "How long will you put off going in to take possession of the land?"  I wonder if God is just as frustrated with me... wondering when I will step up and claim the life of victory His one and only Son died to give me!  Ouch.  

At this point, all I know to do is take it one day at a time.  Lord, help me!  I'm still praying about and seeking confirmation for our family verse. More to come...

family discipleship

There are a lot of changes happening around our house. But none that anyone would notice.

We've been learning about Family Discipleship (through sermons and a handbook from the Village Church) and this week we were encouraged to change our spiritual lives... for us as individuals, as spouses, and as parents.

In a nutshell, here are some of the things we will be implementing:

1. reading the Word daily using the Tabs system - Basically, you read one chapter from 10 different books in the Bible daily.  Read more about it here.

2. Kenny and I meeting once a week to discuss hopes, dreams, failures, what the Lord is teaching us, etc. - consider this a spiritual check-in with spouse

3. family devotions every night - In order to make this possible, we are moving dinner time to 5:30 so that afterwards we can clean up, get ready for bed, spend time discipling our kids, and have a bedtime routine... all before 7:00!

4. family night once a month - think Candy Land, Chutes and Ladders, bike rides, walks to the park, swimming, movies and popcorn, etc.  The only thing not allowed is computers and cell phones!

5. one-on-one time with each boy once a month - Anchor is too small right now, but we both want to spend quality time with the boys on their own.  This means lots of mother/son date nights!

* * * * * * * * * *

This article (from Proverbs31 Ministries) also really spoke to me today as I begin my spiritual journey transformation. Oh how often we need to be meditating on His word... it is life - the very air we breathe!

The Motherhood Press - by Brooke McGlothlin

“I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.” Psalm 119:11 (ESV)

I sat in the late evening sun on the front porch of our home, head in hands, tears streaming down my face, rendered speechless by the realization that I didn’t have what it took to be the kind of mom I wanted to be.

Before having kids, I’d never really failed at anything. Oh sure, I had been through failed relationships. I’d come close to failing a test here and there. I even failed to live up to my own expectations from time to time, but never the big things. Every goal I set for myself I achieved. But as a mom — the one thing I really wanted to get right in life — I was failing.

I wanted everyone to believe I was capable of handling the two beautiful boys God gave me, but I wasn’t.

I wanted everyone to believe I could juggle work, kids, husband, home and church with ease, but I couldn’t.

I wanted everyone to believe crying babies, nursing problems, shift work and the Terrible Twos weren’t too much for me all at once, but they were.

And what I really wanted everyone to believe — that I was a confident, capable, smart, fully independent woman — was keeping me from admitting the truth. I didn’t have what it took.

Motherhood showed me just how much I needed Jesus. 

It scraped me, rubbed me raw and pressed ugly emotions and words out of my heart I didn’t even know were there.

If you asked people I grew up with to describe my personality, I’m happy to report words like “angry, insensitive, overbearing, short-tempered and unkind” would not have topped the list. But there, sitting on my front porch in front of all my neighbors, not really caring who saw, I realized the woman I so proudly presented to others wasn’t the real me.

The truth taunted me and beat me down. The person I thought I was didn’t exist, and for the first time, I couldn’t fix my situation by working a little bit harder. My need was greater than my ability. I simply couldn’t do it by myself.

Why does it take motherhood to bring out the worst in us? Maybe it’s because most of us have never really been pressed so hard, pushed so hard or loved so hard. We’re like children eating a jelly-filled donut. When little hands squeeze, the jelly hiding inside dumps into their lap … and when life presses a mama too hard, sin lurking in her heart comes out and dumps on the people she loves most.

I love today’s key verse, Psalm 119:11. I learned it as a child, and its simplicity is the perfect antidote to my challenging, chaotic mothering days: “I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.”

I learned a life lesson that day I hope will stick with me forever. What’s in our hearts will come out, good or bad. In order to be the kind of godly women we want to be, we have to store God’s Word in our hearts, letting it change who we are in our most-hidden places, so when we’re pressed, His love pours out.

Father, give me a never-ending desire to spend my moments storing up the treasures in Your Word, so that when I’m pressed by life’s challenges I might not sin against You. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

TRUTH FOR TODAY:

Matthew 12:34b, “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” (ESV)

Proverbs 4:23, “Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.” (ESV)

progress - something's got to change

At the beginning of this year, I made some goals with an actual intention of keeping them.  This is how it's going:

1. spend time in the Word daily - Unfortunately, this hasn't happened at all.  I am reading through Dangerous Duty of Delight with Melissa, but that's not the same as spending time in His Word, listening to Him, and seeking what He has for me and our family.  So Kenny and I hope to start getting up around 6 or 6:30 to read our Bibles and pray together.  We've discussed reading through Romans since we are studying it in our homegroup.  I also plan to start the Busy Mamas Bible Study on Psalm 22.  And I just need to start praying more... for Kenny, our boys, our family, our friends, our country.  The list could go on and on.  I plan to keep an ongoing list of prayers in my phone so whenever the opportunity presents itself, I will have a plan and be able to focus my time wisely.

2. be up before kids - This has been difficult as our sleep has been more interrupted lately. Joshua has started waking up screaming again.  We ask him what's wrong and he has no idea.  I think it's either night terrors or spiritual warfare. We play Scripture Lullabies in his room all night and I'm trying to remember to pray over them and their room before bed.  But I'm often so exhausted at the end of the day that my good intentions seem to disappear.  But regardless of how much sleep we get, I need to be up before them.  Hopefully goal #1 will help in this area.

3. keep house clean and welcoming -  I think a schedule will help in this area.  But I need to make one and think about it more... in all my spare time.

4. homeschool Joshua - This has been going very well! I just need my kids to stay healthy and we could get more accomplished.  I'm loving our curriculum and Joshua's enthusiasm for it as well.  It's been great fun so far!

5. spend time with each child individually every day -  Yup, need to work on this too.  Why can't I clone myself!?!?

6. establish bedtime routine - We were doing pretty good with this. I've slacked the last few weeks, but it should be pretty easy to resume. This has been a good reminder!

7. make four homemade meals per week - Lately I've been very convicted about my eating habits.  Food has definitely been an emotional release and I'll even say it's become an idol.  The Lord has shown me He created food to give our bodies (our temple - 1 Corinthians 6:19-20) fuel and energy so we can accomplish His will.  It's not supposed to replace seeking Him when our lives become stressful and difficult.  Yet, that's what I've been doing.  So I started Whole 30 today!!!  I won't be eating sugar, alcohol, grains, legumes, dairy, or processed foods for 30, yes thirty, days!  It's required a lot of meal planning and shopping but I'm pretty excited about it.  Eating Whole 30 also means I will be making ALL of my meals.  Breakfast, lunch, and dinner... no eating out, no cheat meals, no shortcuts.  I also know it's going to be tough... and I figure it will be like drug withdrawals.  The first few days/weeks will be the worst.  But eventually my body will be so much healthier, my habits changed, my mom pooch gone (hopefully), and I'll be free from my sugar addiction! I'm eager to see my results!!!

8. exercise three times a week - I started out exercising every day... that lasted two weeks!  I'm hoping to start walking more (with the boys!!) and to keep working out as well.  I just feel so much better when I do.  It's time consuming and I don't want it becoming a higher priority than spending time with God, so I've got to figure out how to fit it into my day.

I feel like so many areas of my life need a drastic change and ASAP.  I know that all of this can't be fixed tomorrow.  Lord, show me the areas that are most important and need attention now.  Show me how to structure my day so that I can be most glorifying to You.  I want to be a vessel fit for Your use.