tired

So, the old blog is falling behind. I want to blog. I have it all stored in my head. But I'm just straight up tired. And most of the time there are more "important" things that need to be done. For instance, there are 2 hampers and 1 laundry basket full of clean clothes that need put away. The clothes were folded at one point but we've resorted to digging through them for something to wear each morning. My bathroom needs a good scrub down. The Christmas lights sitting on the table on our back deck need put away. The basement walls are slowly closing in as things get taken out but not fully put away. Our sun room looks like both cars and Ben's office threw up in there. Not to mention the poop covered shoes on the back deck that need washed because Millie (the dog) doesn't have woods to poop in. So our back (and front and side) yards are literally full of landmines. Big dogs equal big piles of poop. (Come spring, this will officially be a daily chore for Ted - he just doesn't know it yet. It's the random warm days in between many cold days of non-poop-picking-up that really get ya!)

So by the time I get the kids in bed, unload the dishwasher, pack some lunches, do some more laundry that won't get put away and do some work for Young Life, I'm D.U.N. as my brother tries to get my kids to spell.

Plus, I don't spend every waking hour with my kids anymore. I don't catch every funny thing they say or have the camera in my back pocket. Our lives are very much in a different season than they've been in about 8 years. It's a very interesting place to be in life.

All that to say, here's what's been happening in our lives the past couple of weeks . . .

- Ted finished up basketball. He loved it. We're moving on to baseball in May.

- We had the most fun little basketball team. Our coach was great. The boys had a great time together. And there was a slew of little sisters that could play at practices and games. 

- Sophie chose to do soccer starting in April. This should be ha-larious!

- Clay Battelle High School (Mon Co) had it's 1st every YL Club last Monday. 27 kids showed up. In a school of 489 for 6th-12th grade, that's pretty impressive!

- Fairmont YL and WyldLife are kickin' it! Seriously, there are some amazing adults on board. Sometimes you just have to wait for the right time and the right people. It is SO encouraging.

- There were 5 YL Clubs on Monday night in the Mountaineer Area. FIVE!

- We traded in our van and our car for one new (to us) van. I LOVE it. (That's another story for another day).

- The kids are doing Awana's and Boys Brigade at CMA on Wednesday nights. They love it. Last week Ben skipped YL College and we snuck in a free date (no childcare and a gift card!)

- I have officially lost my ability to grocery shop. I am usually missing one main ingredient every night. The only good thing about that is that you can wrack up gas points at Giant Eagle really quickly.

- Ted and I went for a bike ride Saturday when it was so nice out. I was over ambitious. Lots of hills. We need to stick with the trial for now.

- I just finished up 4 weeks of Work Crew training. It's one of my favorite things I do each year.

- I have a couple of friends in such deep need and hurt right now. My heart hurts for them. I love to "do" for people. And this I just can't figure out.

- Sophie broke her 4 year, 9 month "non-barfing" streak last night. Technically she threw up one night at my in-laws from coughing so much, but I don't count that. Last night, she had her first ever middle-of-the-night puke-in-her-bed episode. She is a very teachable child. She slept with her little arms wrapped around a bowl and hit the bowl or the toilet every time.

- Why do kids ALWAYS starting throwing up in the middle of the night? Is that some sort of unwritten code for kids.

- I will take Sophie as a sick kid anytime over the other two in our house who shall remain nameless.

- I had just aid earlier this week that, unlike some of our friends, we have really weathered this winter really well. Jinxed myself if you believe in such things.

- This has definitely been our healthiest winter winter since pre-kids.

So, there you have it. Pictures and car stories coming soon.

bowling, backs & bedtime

Just some random things going on around here:

1) Sophie has a little girl in her class who's quite feisty. She has Sophie believing with all her heart that this little girl's siblings are Justin and Nicky. Justin Beiber and Nicky Minaj. We laugh so hard every time Sophie tries to convince us that is, in fact, true.

2) Ted has been doing a "lunch bunch" at school. It's for social skills for 1st grade boys. Ted was identified as being a "good friend and role model." It's a group of boys that need help with social skills and then some boys who can be example. Everyday when I drop the kids off at school I encourage them to be a good friend and make good choices. Anyone who is a parent understands what a complete blessing it is to hear this from someone else's mouth. I know there will be times when this isn't always the case. So I'll celebrate it now.

3) Our couch cushions have been struggling. In a stroke of genius (again, not bragging - I'm just not really that domestic so in a sense it was genius), I added some stuffing. Actually, it was the foam thing that goes on beds. I feel like I have a whole new couch.

4) In the past month, Ben has been to Puerto Rico for 4 days, Colorado for 6 days (he drove and it was a training, so it really wasn't fun) and to see Mumford and Sons at George Mason University. I'm thankful when he gets to do fun things like that. He works really, really hard.

5) Life is very routine around here for the kids and I. I don't like it a whole lot, but I guess that's what school and work do. Ben, on the other hand, has some serious routine and then throw in a bunch of other stuff. This semester has started off rather chaotic as it always does. We're really trying to average him home 3 evenings a week. Usually we run so hard during the semester and barely take a breath. I would like a little breathing room throughout.

6) We are currently trying to replace the car and the van. We may actually be able to trade in a (barely) functioning van for another. That will be a first! I found 2 vans in Pittsburgh that we are going to go see at the end of the week when I get all our ducks in a row. I'm hoping to drive home in one of them. Both our cars have been in the shop a lot this fall and winter. I'm currently evaluating daily which car I feel safest driving down the interstate. My prayer is that 1 of the 2 vans are still there when we get that and that our current van makes it to Pittsburgh.

7) I have such a heart for single moms. I have for quite some time. If you know one, go give them a hug, take her kids for a couple of hours or take their family dinner. I'm just saying.

8) Bedtime could drive me to drink. If I were Michelle Duggar, I would run away.

And some pictures for you:

Ted and his cousin Wyatt at Wyatt's 7th birthday party the other week. We LOVE bowling!

The non-bowlers. The night Ben got home from Colorado, he was sitting on the couch and his back went out. Just sitting there. That's what sitting in a car for 24 hours will do to you.  I'll fess up to not being sympathetic to Ben when he's sick or injured. I was especially sour because he had been gone for a week, came home and couldn't help for 3 days and then had an absolutely insane week where he pretty much came home to sleep. Hence the non-bowling. Sophie was just done.

We went to the gymnastics/wrestling meet last weekend.  The Mountaineer sat with Sophie and they had a nice chat.

Sophie has started spelling her name like this on everything.

"Sof" at her Valentine's Day party. Amazingly, her party was very controlled and enjoyable. Ted's, on the other hand, was totally chaotic and over stimulating. No pictures from that one. I was on the "Friendship Bracelet Station." Yeah, not my gifting. I dropped 3 kids bracelets as I was trying to tie them.  I'll stick with Bingo.

Ted had on layer after layer of clothes, dress up clothes and winter paraphernalia tonight before bed. I love that he loves this kind of stuff.

So there you have it. I'm sure that's about all the fun you can handle for today.

big boy running

Ben is doing a Biggest Looser Contest with his old mens group from Charleston. Old as in past, not as in aged men. Anyways, so is our friend JB. We've known JB a long time. He was on staff in New Martinsville and was part of Ben's family as he lived in the apartment behind their house. He's attended several of our kids' birthday parties. Then he took the Area Director position in Charleston when we left. He and Ben did program together and he's been on several other assignments. He and his wife Bethany are sweet friends of ours - I would love to someday live in the same town. Around here, JB is most associated with Kirk (his program partner). My kids would most often say JB & Kirk. Not JB & Bethany (sorry, Bethany)!

I digress.

 JB was recently sponsored by a local sporting goods store in Charleston for his weight loss. So he started a blog to track his progress. I'll admit I was a little leery at first. You know, everyone has a blog these days. But I'll be the first to tell you I added him my google reader today. And I think you might too!

JB's Blog

If you don't click on anything else, you need to watch this:

Intro Video

Be prepared to LAUGH OUT LOUD!

PS - JB, we hope you do well in the contest. But only well enough to get 2nd . . . .

And one more thing, my kids will double your views. We've just watched it 4 times in the last 10 minutes!

what's up

Sometimes the days just keep on coming, running into one another with some sleep in between. Then there are multiple days when school is delayed so the temperature can rise from 2 degrees to 5 degrees. Then the following week it's 60 degrees. Then the week after that it starts snowing around 8:00 pm several nights and school gets cancelled to make it a FIVE DAY WEEKEND! Throw in an early dismissal and that just monkey wrenches every thing. We haven't had a full week of school since Christmas break yet. Awesome. 

Here's a little catch up on the old photos:

 

Sophie goes through phases of barely having enough room for herself in her bed.

My birthday cupcakes from Cold Stone. The only picture from my birthday I believe I have.

Sophie appeared in my room like this one morning having already put on her pink lipstick and freshened up with vanilla hand sanatizer.

 The attempted sleepover that didn't happen. Sophie really just likes her own bed. This was during Ben's trip to Puerto Rico. Yeah, he went to Puerto Rico for a long weekend for a bachelor party. I'm still waiting for my trip to an exotic location.

More pink lipstick. I can't get enough of it.

Millie turned 10 on Tuesday. She's such a good dog. A very, very good dog!

Again with the lipstick on the way to dinner. She put on about 4 layers of different colors of lipstick. Ted was absolutely mortified and embarassed.

"Double fisting" her silverware for mac and cheese.

I told them I would take them out to dinner tonight and let them choose. Their first choice - Red Lobster. Their next choice with Eat N Park for cookies. Not my top choice but they like it.

Sophie licked that cookie for far too long. And the icing stayed on for way too long.

Ben took a nap one day one Sunday on the couch and I found the kids sneaking in some of their own tv time.

Ben got me a bike for my birthday. We are going to be a bike riding family this summer. I'm so excited. If anyone's getting ride of a bike rack, we'll take it!

 A temperature variation of 65 degrees from one week to the next.

Sophie's lite brite is really fun. Until she crams them all side by side. Took me FOREVER to get these out. 

Thankfully we have stayed really HEALTHY. I am so thankful for that. Ben went to Puerto Rico for 4 days in January. And he has been in Colorado all this week. He had a training with Young Life. He DROVE out there with two other staff guys as a protest to flying and as a man trip. They left on Sunday and it took them 25 hours including a couple of hour stop to watch the Super Bowl. They left Colorado around 8:30 tonight. We had a surprisingly good week here at home. Today my alarm didn't go off, so Ted stepped up to fix Sophie breakfast and they both got ready on their own.

So, that's the catch up on pictures. Soon the catch up on life.

#yloglebay2013

So these people, and some more not pictured, went to Oglebay Park last weekend for our annual River Region Staff, Leader and Committee Weekend. We took:

3 staff

3 staff spouses

5 high school seniors

12 adults

22 WVU Freshmen who will soon start training to be leaders

25 high school/college leaders

4 band/sound people 

1 preschooler 

1 infant

.For a grand total of 76 people. In a 30 person cabin. Hence the grocery list on my previous post from last week! And people EVERYWHERE.

Ben and Cameron led worship. As always, the talent within our area and around the state is pretty incredible. Kirk, JB and Ben Allen made us laugh hard. (Ben Allen is just one of those people that I use first and last names. Kirk and JB are a standard pair in our house - you can't have one without the other.)  Bill Paige spoke to our hearts about living real life along side each other. And taking our junk to go minister beside and to people with all their junk. (That's a pretty crude summary, but it's what I came away with). 

It was a great weekend but it WORE ME OUT!  On the way home, I was telling Ben that I didn't feel that I got to connect with many people. Then I realized that hospitality is not one of my gifts. So doing stuff like this drains the heck out of me. Plus the cabin was just full of people all the time. So when I had about an hour Friday night and Saturday afternoon, I went next door to Charleston's cabin to just have some space. I didn't even interact with them much because I was just straight up drained. 

A great time was had by all. I'm so thankful for all the people that donated food so these guys could be fed physically, and be prepared to be fed spiritually. I'm so proud of the adults that stepped up. It is so very, very encouraging.