This is My life

The bags are packed...

Wow...the time has finally come.  We have had exactly two months to get ready to move our whole life and family to Indonesia.  And here I sit, about 15 hours away from getting into the car to drive to the airport,  the bags are packed (and within our weight limit too!), the photos are being backed up, the loose ends are being tied up, and the excitement is high.  This is definitely now what I had planned or expected for this year, but I couldn't be happier at how everything worked out. I'm ready to go.

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Before I say goodbye to the blog for a little bit, just let me answer a few questions that I have gotten over the past week or so:

1) I don't know when I will have internet access again and therefore I don't know when regular blog posts will start up again.  Wireless internet will be a top priority, though :)  I will try to get to a computer sometime in the first day or two just to say that we are safe, etc.

2) My special deal, "50 for 50" will run for a few more days.  Quite a few people have asked that I keep it up until pay day, so, I will.  It will come down when sometime after the 1st when  I can get access.

3)  The August Grab Bags will be available August 1-5 IF I can get internet acccess. They are loaded and on the server, I just have to be able to load them in the cart and turn it on.  If I am late, and you see people asking questions about it around digi land, tell them it's coming :)

4) My email address will stay the same and my other contact info can be found in the header of our friends and family blog.  Information on how to support us is there too (in one of the sidebar links).

5)  YES, I am excited :)

Bye for now!

Always keep your camera batteries charged...

I am usually pretty good about keeping my camera battery charged.  And thankfully, my battery has a REALLY long life and so I only need to do it every couple of weeks.  However, yesterday I noticed that it was getting low.  Alaina and I took my mom out for a "girls day out" and I had to be careful about how many pictures I took.  My camera has a tendency to take pictures and then *bam* no more.

Well, my camera lasted through our day out.  I should have started charging when I got home but I forgot.  And then the craziest night of weather happened.  And I was left cameraless.  Bad Janet.

Enter my lovely iphone camera.  When I bought my iphone back in December, I had no idea it had a pretty decent camera on it.  I mean, it has no controls or zoom or anything else, but it has 2mp and it takes pretty good photos for being a phone.  And so, I was able to capture one of the craziest nights EVER.

It was 90 degrees during the day.  I had been burning up.  Later in the afternoon it looked like a storm was picking up.  I was in the kitchen getting dinner ready when the pounding started.  HAIL.  And lots of it.  It was CRAZY.  Everything was covered.

The kids thought it was snowing.  They were THRILLED, since it has been two years since they have seen snow.  Caleb was HYSTERICAL.  He saw the "snow" and said, "SNOW!  We need to get a tree and a star and PRESENTS!"  LOL!  He thought it was Christmas :)

They wanted to go out and build a snowman.  We worked fast in the quickly melting balls of ice and built us a little Montana snowman.  We grabbed whatever we could find -- and fast.  That meant grabbing the carrots and cucumbers that Alaina had been snacking on.  Cucumber eyes work, right?

And then the "snowball" fights started. Levi wasn't too thrilled :)

It was seriously crazy...

After the fun of the "snow" was over we went back inside.  A bit later, I looked out the front door and saw how beautiful the light was.  Bummed that I *still* hadn't plugged in my battery, I grabbed my iphone again and caught this:

And then Jason went out back and called me to see this:

And this (click to make larger):

(I had to use the Photomerge tool in PSE to get the whole thing)

Have you seen anything so gorgeous.  And just think of how nice it would have been if I had my real camera batteries charged and ready to go :)

50 for 50

Yep, you read that right.  50 products for 50 bucks.  Can't get much better than that, can it?  I am retiring a bunch of products and wanted to give people a chance to get them ALL for a great low price.  Does low even begin to describe it considering the original FAT PACK is included as well as 49 other products?  So hurry, this deal is only available until the 28th.

Montana Life...

Here I am!  Did you miss me?

Life in Montana is wonderful...love the cooler weather, the big skies, and the gorgeous mountains.  Plus, my parents house is huge so the basement where we are staying is larger than our whole house in Florida!  Loving it!

The only downside of it has been the lack of internet -- no wireless and the connection they do have is VERY slow.  They also have a really old computer so I can't even post to the blog (the computer can't support the newer browsers that are necessary for Typepad).  I am trying to stay caught up on checking email, but other than that, I have been off the computer.  Kind of nice, actually ;)

However, right now I am in the middle of a big project for my store so I plugged the connection into my computer and while I am waiting for things to upload, I thought I would check in.

Here is a HUGE picture recap of the last week...

Last Tuesday we went to BINDER PARK ZOO in Battle Creek, Michigan, with Jason's parents.  The kids loved feeding the giraffe's and even though I screwed up these pictures pretty bad, you can at least get the idea :)

Levi's interpretation of the above scene:

Notice that Katelynn's hand is TOTALLY in the giraffe's mouth!  LOL!

Jason practicing for life back in Asia :)

Taken with my rented 70-200 4.0L.  Such a great lens!

My beautiful little butterfly...

After the zoo we drove to Grand Rapids to visit some friends of ours.  We usually go for 4-5 days, but there just wasn't time this summer.  One night was all we got.  Eight kids under eight...crazy, but fun! Can you tell whose kids are whose?? LOL!

On Wednesday we flew to Montana.  I just love the views here.  My parents are on 25 acres with another 25 acres bordering their property.  Some other people rent out some of the land for their horses we not only do we get the beautiful mountains, but we also get all the horses!

On Friday we went to the County Fair for a few hours.  Good to get out and just be a family.

The next day we went with my dad to THREE FORKS, the headwaters of the Missouri River.  Alaina and Caleb stayed home, so just the little ones went with us.

Here is a panoramic photo of the area we went to.  I took five photos and merged them in Photoshop Elements Photomerge.  Worked great!

And the rest of the time in Montana has been spent just hanging out and playing!

Wanna visit?

Heading Out...

Just wanted to post quickly and say that we are headed out today -- to the zoo, to a friends, and then onto Montana tomorrow morning.  Our friends don't have internet (so I probably won't post tomorrow) and my parents don't have wireless.  Sooo...I may not post every day and maybe, just maybe, I might actually scrap a page or two.  It HAS been over a MONTH since I scrapped :)

Happy day!

Doing the Bloggin' thing...

So, lots of people have asked if I will be continuing with my blog once we get to Indonesia.  The answer is YES!  I love this little blog of mine and love all of the people I have met over the past few years through it. I can't imagine letting it go.

However, there will be some changes, and I am not entirely sure what they will look like yet.  I have spent a lot of time trying to figure out a blog that will work for everyone...my family and friends who want pictures of the kids and updates on our life, scrapping friends that want LO's and product information, other moms who want the encouragement and inspiration, etc. etc.  What to do, what to do...  It is all so ME.

What I have decided is that there will be two blogs.  I will keep this one pretty much the same as it has always been...a little of this and a little of that.  Our family blog will be mostly photos of the kids and our life and updates for our supporters, family, and friends.  Thankfully, typepad lets me clone entries so that when there is crossover I can post to both blogs at once.  The family blog will be sans anything scrapping related (much to the relief, I am sure, of those who just don't get the whole scrapping thing :)  It will also be lacking in my oh so interesting personal commentaries on life.  Just the facts, madam.

I worked a lot over the weekend on purging the old family blog (last entry was *cough cough* um *cough cough* April of 2006 *cough*)  I exported and then deleted the old stuff and added in all the new.  It is a work in progress, but at least there is something!  And for those of you have asked about being part of our support team (in prayer or financially), there is information about that too. So without further delay,

the FAMILY and FRIENDS BLOG (no scrapping allowed :)

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Today is packing day.  We leave tomorrow for Montana (after a trip to the zoo and to see some friends).  When we get back from Montana we will only have two days until we leave for Indonesia (eek!) so we are trying to get the majority of the packing done today.  I just finished the last big Wal-Mart run and now it is laundry, laundry, laundry and then figure out how to get all the stuff into eleven bags. 

Hope your day is more fun than mine!

That's for another day...

My kids are losing sleep.  Three weeks (so far!) of being out of our own home, of having crazy-not-our-normal routines, eating food we wouldn't normally eat at times we wouldn't normally eat, and running around like crazy people is really taking a toll on them.  They are TIRED.  But the tiredness and the novelty of everything is also winding them up like little rubber bands. They are getting to bed late, waking up early, and bouncing off the walls in between.

It is hardest on Alaina.  For the most part, if she deviates more than about half and hour from her normal sleeping routine she is an emotional mess.  In her defense, she has been doing remarkably well for how crazy things have been.  However, everyone has their limit and last night she broke down.  She was a crying, screaming, irrational mess.  I had tried to go to bed early and I woke up to loud shrills from my five year old girl who apparently had a rough evening. I came downstairs and she quickly held out her arms and clung tightly to me.  I carried her upstairs, got her changed and to the bathroom, then laid her in bed next to me.  She was still crying (she couldn't stop) and she could barely speak.  She was an emotional WRECK.

I just laid there next to her, thinking about this whole parenting thing.  I thought about how she was being ridiculous (I mean come on! Breaking down over not getting your way??)  I thought about how she had been disobedient, inconsiderate, and totally selfish. I thought about how she had been spoiled by dad and grandma by being allowed to be up so late and that had the audacity to complain that things didn't go her way.  And then I thought, "But that's for another day."

You see, in that moment, my little girl needed ME.  She needed to be held tight in the arms of her mama, to be told that she was loved, to be sung to, and to be prayed for.  I could have tried to deal with her sin issues -- selfishness and disobedience being at the top of the list -- but she wasn't up for that.  That's for another day.

And so it is with God.  I am amazed at how utterly patient He is with us.  He knows all my sin and issues that I need to deal with, and yet there are days (weeks, months) when He knows that all of that is for another day.  Those are the times that He knows that we just need to be wrapped up in His love, to be cared for, to be loved, and to encouraged by His Spirit.  He does this through His Word, the Body of Christ, and through the inner peace that only He can provide. 

And just like in my instance with Alaina, when we are READY for it, He will deal with our sin.  He won't ignore it (like I won't ignore Alaina's.) But He will wait and with His love and tenderness reveal to our hearts areas of our lives that we need to work on.  And thankfully, He usually lets us deal with only a few things at at time. All the while, He is there right beside us, holding us tight, and telling us that our burden is His burden. I'll be right there next to Alaina and God will be there right next to me.

So much more to say, that that's for another day...

Ten years and four kids later...

No, not me.  My sister.  She and her husband and doing a first in their ten years of marriage -- they are getting away BY THEMSELVES for four whole days.  Anyone who knows me knows that I feel strongly about couples remaining a couple even when the kids are around.  The marriage needs to take top priority.  This means date nights and trips AWAY from the kids.  It will make everyone stronger -- mom and dad will still feel strong in their own connection and kids will be secure in the fact that mom and dad LOVE and HONOR each other and man and wife, not just as mom and dad. So, I am SO HAPPY for my sister, that they are getting away for a long weekend in Chicago.  Go them!

We wanted to see them before we left for Indonesia so we came yesterday and got to spend the afternoon and evening with them before they left.  One of the things they really wanted to do for their ten years and before I left for a few years was to get some family photos.  The little one wasn't much in a cooperative mood so there will be no gorgeous canvas hanging over their fireplace anytime soon, but we did get some cute shots.  Not sure which ones to show, so I'll show a lot :)

The whole crew

This is their favorite picture of the bunch.  This is my cute 7 year old nephew.  He is definitely growing up and developing his own little personality.  Not a baby anymore...

This is their second oldest -- she is ten months older than Alaina.  I asked her how old she was (6) and I got eight fingers :)

Here is number three...one month younger than Caleb and just as quirky :)

And here is the little one.  This is about the only picture we got of him without a binky in his mouth or him screaming.  He is a real cutie in real life :)

And here is the whole gang...eight under the age of eight.  Wesley (7), Audrey (6), Alaina (5), Caleb and Ashton (4), Levi (2), Cole (20 months), and Katelynn (4 months)

And with that, I'm off.  We're heading to IKEA for breakfast and a *little* bit of shopping (I HAVE to keep telling myself that we DO have airline luggage limits!) Then we are meeting up with Jason's parents to have lunch with the grandparents.  It is quite possible that this will be the last time we see them (as in ever) and so it will be bittersweet.  A lot can happen in two years...

Have a wonderful Thursday!

A little of this and a little of that...

First things first...

I was tagged by the lovely MandaKay.  So here it goes:

The Rules: Answer the questions using only one word. Then tag four others.

1. Where is your cell phone? hmmmm...
2. Your significant other? asleep
3. Your hair? messy
4. Your mother? cook
5. Your father? baseball
6. Your favorite thing? cuddles
7. Your dream last night? ?
8 Your favorite drink? coffee
9. Your dream/goal? photography
10. The room you’re in? bedroom
11. Your hobby? scrapping
12. Your fear? transition
13. Where do you want to be in 6 years? together
14. What you’re not? disciplined
15. Muffins? chocolate
16. One of your wish list items? 70-200mm (that's one word! LOL!)
17. Where you grew up? Michigan
18. The last thing you did? surfed
19. What are you wearing? comfies
20. Favorite gadget? computer
21. Your pets? none
22. Your computer? LOVE
23. Your mood? content
24. Missing someone? yes
25. Your car? selling
26. Something you’re not wearing? rings
27. Favorite store? Amazon.com
28. Like someone? yes
29. Your favorite color? green
30. When is the last time you laughed? bedtime
31. Last time you cried? hmmm...

Let's see...I'll tag my sisters Sally and Sharron (so they will update their blogs), Erika (because she is on vacation and has time), and Jen (because I am going to miss our every-six-month meet up)

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Shopping was a success!  We rarely go shopping, especially for ourselves.  But, there are some things that we just can't get (or get easily) in Indonesia and so it was time to do some shopping.  Jason went to visit with his grandparents for a few hours while I tackled the lists for me and the kids.  Then Jason met up with me and we did some shopping for him.  Other than a few pairs of shorts for Jason, we are good to go in the clothing department.  Phew, that was one MAJOR thing on the to-do list and I am glad it is done.  I even found myself a wonderful new set of Merrells.  Yummy.  Sorry, can't find of photo of the ones I got.  They are black MJ's.

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Today we are off to visit my sister and do a little IKEA shopping.  Need silverware and a new comforter. My sister wants some family pictures taken so we will do that too.  Should be a nice day.

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A few more pictures from the past week or so...

This first one is from the talent show we had at PFO.  Alaina's class sang a song about Jonah and the whale.  Notice that there is only one mike (well, only one that you can see) and notice whose mouth it is right in front of.  Can you guess who the ONLY person we could hear was? LOL!

On the way back from Memphis we had to drive through Upland, Indiana, where I went to college.  I figured it was a good time to snap a picture of my dorm since I don't think I have one.

We also drove over to the next town (where we lived for the first six months we were married).  There is this little place in the park where they have animals that you can feed.  Jason and I used to go all the time when we were engaged and first married.  We even bought two goats from this place (and had them until we left for India).  The kids loved it!

When we got to my in-laws house, they had a fire going in the back and food ready to be cooked.  Katelynn got her first ride in the swing.  Do you think she liked it :)

Katelynn has also found her toes, so she spends much of her day looking like this:

Have a great Wednesday!

A Photo Re-cap

Needless to say, the last few weeks have been extremely busy.  And when we weren't busy, we were too tired to do much (which includes pulling out the camera).  However, the camera did make an appearence every now and then and so I have something to show for our time.  A quick recap:

At hotel on our way to Memphis.  We had gotten out of the pool and after a chilly walk back to our room, I decided to warm up in the tub with Katelynn.  Shortly thereafter, the rest of the crew had the mistaken impression that they were invited.  Anything for a little family time, right?

The house where we stayed was a kids dreamland -- a puppy, a trampoline, and LOTS and LOTS of toys.  All day long the kids would ask if they could "go back to the big house."

And this is classic -- Levi was sitting on the porch watching Alaina jump on the trampoline.  This was his reaction to a really high jump:

A few times I got the camera out for the sole purpose of working on nailing exposure (working in manual mode).  Sometimes I got it, sometimes I didn't.  Anyone want to give me a great tutorial on when to use matrix metering and when to use spot metering?

One morning I woke up early and decided to take a walk through the neighborhood.  Grabbed my camera on the way out -- so glad I did.  It is really nice to take photos of subjects that don't move or make silly faces.

And then one morning Katelynn decided that she should learn to roll over.  Glad she didn't roll too far!

Alrighty...I have more but I am on the way out the door for most of the day.  Once a year shopping I call it.  More pictures tomorrow!