Christmas Portraits = Fail.

Today I was embarrassed by Asher's behavior in public for the first time.

I had a coupon for a $10 photo package from the portrait studio in Babies"R"Us. Usually, I'm not a huge fan of those types of pictures, but decided that wasn't a bad deal for a 5x7, 4 wallets, and a CD. I figured just try it and see if we could end up with a cute Christmas pic.

Asher was so sweet, as he is most of the time, all morning long. He was in a wonderful mood all the way up to the point we sat him down in front of the background at the picture place. Then he lost it, and the next 30+ minutes were spent trying to either keep him in one spot in front of the camera or scrape him off the floor, sobbing. But that wasn't the embarrassing part.

That came when the two ladies working there were sitting on the floor behind the camera, making faces and noises at him and talking to him in an attempt to make him smile. Asher seemed to be more frustrated than amused by them, so I sat down with him in front of the background, trying to talk him into sitting there like a big boy while we took his picture. Then he just stood up, walked over to one of the ladies who was trying to talk to him (who I'm pretty sure was the manager), and smacked her in the face. He immediately knew he was wrong, so before we could even move towards him to grab him, he ran back to us and threw himself down in front of us in a position exactly like this, butt to the camera, crying.

Of course, I spent the rest of the time apologizing and anxious to be done with the experience. Very surprisingly, we did end up with a pictures that weren't too bad, but I think that may have been our first and last time in a picture studio.

[Click HERE to see the pics we ended up with.]

Blueberry Breakfast Bars

Here's a recipe for some breakfast bars I've taken from Dr. Fuhrman and modified a bit to my own version.  They make a great healthy snack!

1 medium-large ripe banana
1 small apple, peeled and finely chopped
2 madjool dates, pitted and finely chopped
1 cup frozen, thawed blueberries
1/4 cup raisins
1 cup old fashioned rolled oats
2 tbsp ground or milled flax seeds
1 1/2 tbsp raw sunflower seeds
1 1/2 tbsp finely chopped, raw walnuts
1 tbsp chia seeds
1/8 cup 100% pomegranate juice
olive oil or non-stick spray (if you need to grease pan)

Mash banana in a mixing bowl. Add pomegranate juice, nuts, seeds, and oats.  Mix thoroughly.  Add remaining fruit.  Mix thoroughly.  Press into greased or non-stick 8x8 inch baking pan.  Bake at 350°F for 25-30 minutes.  Cool on wire rack.  Cut into 8 large or 16 small bars.  Store in refrigerator.

At last...

I feel like I now have something interesting (to me, anyways) to blog about.......

Food!

In the last couple months, I've become really interested in food - not just how to prepare it, but the effect it has on our bodies and our health as a whole.  If you've ever heard the phrase "You are what you eat," it's truer than most of us probably realize.  I've been experimenting with recipes from all sorts of diets - some raw, some vegetarian, some vegan, and some with meat and dairy too. What I'm trying to do is to feed our family a diet that is overall high in nutrients, low in bad fats/ sugar/ salt/ etc, that contains as many natural and as few processed ingredients as possible, and, of course, tastes good.  And it's actually been pretty fun!

I've never really enjoyed preparing food before now.  It always seemed so intimidating.  I think preparing homemade baby food for Asher is what first got me interested and experimenting, then I moved on to "regular" food.  I realized it was kind of silly for me to breastfeed Asher for nearly 14 months, give him a super healthy diet of natural ingredients for several months, and then just switch him over to the typical American diet of nutrient-deficient, processed foods.  And while me and Matt's diet wasn't absolutely terrible, it still wasn't that good either.  We weren't just eating everything out of a package or anything - I just wasn't cooking things that were as healthy as they could have been.  We were eating too much meat, starches, breakfast cereals, etc, and not as many vegetables, beans, nuts, and seeds as we should have been.  I knew that as Asher got older, he would want to eat what Matt and I were eating, and that we couldn't force him to eat something that we weren't eating ourselves.  Plus Matt and I want to be healthier for our own good too.

Anyways, the more recipes I've tried that have turned out well (especially when I stray off the path a bit and get creative), the more confidence I've gained in wanting to try more things.  I want to start making posts with some of the successful recipes I've tried, as well as any good natural health/ nutrition related information I come across.  Feel free to comment if you agree, disagree, have something to add, etc!  I'm still pretty new to this, and it's all about researching, learning, and experimenting as I go.  =)

I'll try to get my first recipe on here by the end of the week!

knowledge > feelings

02:00 AM...

This is not how I wanted to start blogging again. But I need to think "out loud" and vent.

It doesn't feel like God is good tonight. I know He is, but I'm having a real hard time with this one. One of my very best friends is going through something no one should have to go through, and I've watched too many similar situations with more than one close friend over the last two years. How many times will I have to tell sit with them in silence or try to tell them God will see them through? Especially when it's a situation where God has majorly blessed me in the same area that they are dealing with so much pain? 

I hate this. 

I know God is good, but it's hard not to think, How could you let this happen? Why them? But then, why anyone? Why do innocent children and "good people" anywhere suffer? Can I doubt God's goodness more when terrible things happen to either me or people close to me than if those same things only fell on those outside my circles? No - God doesn't change. He is good whether our circumstances are or not, whether we feel like He is or not. He shares in our grief and sorrows. 

Right now I feel angry, hurt, questioning, and helpless for my friend.

But I know that God is good, loving, compassionate, merciful, kind, giving, helping, healing, faithful, perfect, comfort, strength, in control.

But I still hate this.

From Psalms 77.

I cry out to God; yes, I shout.
      Oh, that God would listen to me!
All night long I prayed, with hands lifted toward heaven,
      but my soul was not comforted.
I think of God, and I moan,
      overwhelmed with longing for his help.

You don’t let me sleep.
      I am too distressed even to pray!

Has God forgotten to be gracious?
      Has he slammed the door on his compassion?

But then I recall all you have done, O Lord;
      I remember your wonderful deeds of long ago.
They are constantly in my thoughts.
      I cannot stop thinking about your mighty works.

O God, your ways are holy.
      Is there any god as mighty as you?
You are the God of great wonders!
      You demonstrate your awesome power among the nations.

From Lamentations 3.

I will never forget this awful time,
      as I grieve over my loss.
Yet I still dare to hope
      when I remember this:
The faithful love of the Lord never ends.
      His mercies never cease.
Great is his faithfulness;
      his mercies begin afresh each morning.
I say to myself, “The Lord is my inheritance;
      therefore, I will hope in him.”
The Lord is good to those who depend on him,
      to those who search for him.
No one is abandoned
      by the Lord forever.
Though he brings grief, he also shows compassion
      because of the greatness of his unfailing love.
For he does not enjoy hurting people
      or causing them sorrow.

We're back in Maybe-Land... Again.

I'm doing something brave right now... Brave to me, anyways.


I'm going to say that I think God may have just provided a house for us to live in. A wonderful house...

This is how the afternoon went: I picked Matt up and we went to look at the house. The owner, Bethany, greeted us at the door. It turns out that she and her husband, Eli, are missionaries in Africa with their 3 boys. That's why they're moving - to go back to Africa for another three years. That right there was awesome to me. Here I was worried about what kind of people would own the house, and they turn out to be Christians AND missionaries! (If you know my love for missions then you get why this is so extremely cool to me!) We chatted as we looked through the house, but it was getting harder and harder for me to focus on the house itself. All I kept thinking was "how cool would it be to support this missionary family by taking good care of their home for them while they're away..." I was starting to feel like I'd be doing a long-term house sitting more than renting a place! To them it's not just an investment property or something - this is the home they will come back to when they return from Africa.

The only thing we were a little concerned about was that they said "no pets please" and we have Béla. (And Boogie, but in most cases that doesn't seem to apply to things that live in a tank.) I believe that if they say no because of Béla, then it wasn't meant to be, and if it is meant to be, they will allow her.

So now, back to my "brave" declaration. 

If we get it, of course I will continue saying "God is good! Look what He's done!" and if we don't get it I will say "It's not what God has for us right now." I don't think either of these assessments are wrong, but why is it so scary to talk about what God is doing in present tense? 

I guess because hindsight is 20/20. It's easy to look back once something has already happened and say that God did it. It's not so easy to sit there and be like "I believe this is what God is going to do" before it's even happened. If I say that and it doesn't come to pass, do I look like a fool? Should I just keep my mouth shut until I see where things go? Or should I be open to say I believe God is about to do something great? 


I don't know. 


I guess I've never faced this before on such a big scale. Or maybe I have, but I'm just now really thinking about it. What do you think?

Don't worry.

"Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank Him for all He has done." Phil 4:6 (NLT)


I needed to read this verse this morning.


As I said in my last post, we've had two houses we've looked at buying fall through. The second cost us around $600 for inspections and everything. We are still sure that God is telling us now is not the time to purchase a house. But over the last week, we've had a strong feeling like we need to be looking for another home, even if it's not one that we own ourselves. I've been looking at other apartments/condos for rent, and the problem I keep running into is this: It seems that the ones we can afford won't fit our stuff, and the ones that will fit our stuff are more than we can afford. It's been frustrating.


To top it off, yesterday I discovered black mold growing out of the air vent in Asher's room. We removed the vent cover, which was absolutely covered in mold, especially on the back side of the vent. When we looked inside the ducts with a flashlight we could see the mold all on the inside of the air ducts... Definitely not healthy, and yes, I did freak out a little. We called the landlord and we're working to get it taken care of asap, but for the meantime the heat/air is shut off, and Asher is sleeping in his play pen in our room. It may be in all of the vents, but it's definitely worse in his, so hopefully he'll be "safer" in our bedroom.


As you can imagine, this also added to the frustration of not finding a new place to live. I've actually really enjoyed living here for the last (almost) three years, and we don't live in a dump by any means, but it is an older building and has it's issues here and there. Mold, however, is not one that I'm willing to just live with. 


Needless to say, my search for a new home was in full swing yesterday, and I will admit I was getting pretty ratcheted up over things. I couldn't find a suitable apartment or condo, and I didn't want to deal with renting a house because of not knowing what kind of landlords we may get, what condition house we could find within our budget, etc. But after not finding an apartment that would work, I started looking. 


Apparently Matt was looking too, because he texted me and told me to look at a house for rent that had caught my eye earlier in the day. I took it as a good sign that we were both interested in the same house on our own, so I called the management company and said we wanted to take a look. The lady called me back around 5:30 yesterday, and we're supposed to go look at it tomorrow afternoon. At this point, it's worth at least looking into.


I'm trying not to worry about this apartment. God knows that we don't have any closets or storage space here, that there's mold in our air vents, etc etc etc. And I'm trying not to worry about whether we'll "get" that house we're going to look at tomorrow. I'm hopeful that this may be the place God has for us to move to, but I'll be honest, I'm also trying not to get my hopes up too much after being let down in that area so many times lately. 


Don't worry about anything. Pray about everything.


I shouldn't worry -  I can sit and list one amazing thing after another that God's done for us, especially over the last year, but yesterday I still gave in to anxiety, and I was a nervous wreck. I don't want to continue that way. He knows what we need before we even knew we needed it, and I can't sit here and ignore everything He's given us already. 


Tell God what you need, and thank Him for all He has done.


So, (raising my glass of orange juice) here's to a productive Thursday - full of thanks and worry-free.  :)

Staying Put

After looking around at different houses over the last several weeks, and even putting offers on two of them, our house hunt is over... For now. Both of our offers ended up falling through. (The first time we were outbid, the second time we backed out after inspections because we couldn't afford the new roof and foundation work the inspector found.)

I want a house at some point, and Matt does too, more than me I think. We want somewhere that Asher can have room to run around and play indoors, as well as a safe place to play outside. I'm not going to lie - I'm bummed it didn't work out. Aside from having a place for Asher, it'd be nice to have a house and be more settled by the time we want to try for another kid. This apartment would be preeeetty cramped if we had to fit both of us, two kids, a dog, and a turtle (in his 55 gal tank).

This morning I read these verses in Ecclesiastes:

"One handful of peaceful repose is better than two fistfuls of worried work - More spitting into the wind." and "There's an opportune time to do things, a right time for everything on earth."

I felt like God was telling me two things through these verses: 1) Now is not the right time, but God knows when that is and someday it will come. 2) At this point in time, it is better for us to continue on in our apartment without worry than to take on the worry and work that would probably come with either of the houses we were looking at. They both needed some repair work and updating.

So for now we're just sitting tight, working hard to save what we can and pay off as much school debt as possible, and waiting for God to show us the right time to move. Eventually the time will come.  :)

Keeping Busy

The last two weeks have been nuts!

MLK weekend (which, by the way, marked one year from when we got Bela and found out about our little bun in the oven) we went down to Hilton Head to stay with Grandma for a few days. It went quick, as trips down there usually do. We got to go to church Sunday and see a lot of friends. We also got to meet up with my friend Melissa and her little guy, Caleb, who is about 5 weeks older than Asher. They smiled at each other a lot and seemed to hit it off well. So cute!  :]

The next day after getting home we went to see a foreclosed house we found online, and after a lot of prayer and research, put an offer on it this past Monday evening. It needs a LOT of work/updating, so if they accept our offer we've been looking trying to find good renovation loans. Apparently someone else bid on the house right around when we did, so now we're just waiting to hear back from the bank which of us they're selling it to.

Aside from all that excitement, I've been training to work from home as a typist for a local court reporting company. It's a LOT to learn - more than I actually expected - but I'm having fun. I've got a thick book of grammar rules, a style guide which includes exceptions to those grammar rules, glossary of legal terms, etc., and new software to get used to, but it's going well. (I think! haha) This Saturday I have to attend "Typist Boot Camp" all day at their office, and after that I should be ready to start accepting some easy jobs. It's not the highest paying profession, and it's only part-time, but it will be good to be bringing in a little extra money without having to leave Asher at all. I will do whatever it takes to be able to stay home with my little man!

So please pray for the house - that if it's where God wants us it will work out, and that if it's not, it won't. And please pray that I won't get overwhelmed with all this typing stuff and that I'll catch on and at least be able to make a little money with this job!

:)

Some Thoughts on Parenting

Sometimes I get scared when I start to think too much. I know that parents have always had their challenges, but it seems like our culture goes so against what God says in a lot of ways, and it's going to be extra difficult to teach him and any other children we may have to go against the flow and live for Jesus. I know that one of the best ways for us to teach him to do that is to lead by example, and that fact is hitting me hard lately. It's really challenged me to examine not only what I do, but also my motives for doing it. For example, will Asher see his mom and dad going to church because it's "the right thing" or "what good people do", or will he see us excited to go worship the God he can see we're wildly in love with, alongside others who are there for the same reason?

Every day with Asher is different than the one before. Every day he gets a little more aware of his surroundings and what's going on, a little better at grabbing/ holding things in his hands, babbles using a few more sounds, etc. I know that's completely normal, but it's still amazing to watch. I'm always in awe when I stop to think that something so complex as a little human could come from what seems like almost nothing, and that it can continue to grow and thrive so well only eating milk that comes out of me. Crazy! It just reminds me that the way God has designed things is absolutely amazing and man will never be able to replicate it.

I know that as he grows he is also learning so much more than motor skills and how to talk. He is picking up on how Matt and I treat each other, how to try and get his way with what he wants, and his overall place in the family, even now at 3 months old. Very soon he will also be learning how to treat others outside our family, and how to interact with many different people in different situations. Matt and I hope that the example we set will teach him to treat us and others with love and respect, and that he will never doubt how much we love him and how much God loves him. That's key - it's one thing to know your family loves you to the moon and back, but what a comfort it is to go through life knowing that the God of the entire universe loves you so much that he created you, pursues you, died for you, and will never, ever leave you.

I hear Asher waking up from his nap now... So thus concludes my random thoughts on being a parent for today.

Thinking Back & Looking Forward

I've been thinking back to last year's holidays, and how our lives were SO incredibly different from what they are now. Even though the last year has flown by, a year ago still seems so far away because we were in such a different place. We believe that God is good whether we have a "good" year or not, but it's hard not to feel that He has been extra gracious to us this year in giving us so many great things:


- amazing new jobs (Matt at Blue Cross and me as a stay-at-home wife and mom)
- good health (I don't think either of us really got sick at all this year!)
- being able to continue living in our apartment surrounded by such kind neighbors
- a new car and the sale of our old one
- a great church that has really taken us in like family
- a new floor in our apartment after the old one was ruined
- some new future family members (Matt's dad and my brother's engagements)
- so many amazing friends we've been able to grow closer to
- our dog, Béla
- and absolute best of all, our little Asher (and all the help, gifts, and meals that came after him!)


We rejoiced and suffered with some of our close friends as they went through some major changes themselves - pregnancies, babies, marriages, engagements, loss of babies, medical problems, divorces, family issues... We are so thankful for all the good things in our lives and our friends' and family's, and also hurt for the struggles and losses we've had to watch a few of our friends go through.


Just like we could probably fill several pages with a list of things we have to be thankful for this year, we could also probably fill pages of things we'd like to accomplish, both individually and as a couple, in the year to come. I'm not going to list all of those either, but here are some of our biggest goals for 2011:


- give God thanks whether this next year brings joy or pain (though there's sure to be some mix of both)
- keep Christ the center of our individual lives and our marriage
- be the best parents we can to Asher
- become more actively involved in our church
- be good stewards of our money
- eat healthier (yes, I realize this means I need to start cooking more)
- actually USE our gym membership and get back in shape
- grow because of, not in spite of, our situations
- be the best friends and family members we can be


All that said, here's wishing everyone a happy, healthy 2011!

A Very Belated Announcement

Congratulations. He's a keeper.

The first few days were a blur. Then all of a sudden, boom, you realize this is life with a baby. And not just any baby... your baby. You're exhausted, you've barely had time for a shower, but you can't stop watching this incredible, new little person. He sleeps. He eats. He poops. And it's amazing. 

Welcome to parenthood.

*****

Thanks, Huggies ad. For once, I found something I could use in our junk mail!

Anyways, because I've seriously neglected this blog for quite a while, I thought I should mention that Asher David Coppel was born at 3:15 PM on Friday, October 1, 2010. He weighed 9 lbs 1 oz, and measured 22 1/4 inches. Matt and I are absolutely head over heels in love.  :)

JEEP FOR SALE!!!

1994 Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited

~  146,000 miles  ~  5.2L V8 engine  ~  dark blue exterior w/ black trim  ~  grey leather interior in great condition  ~  custom subwoofer box w/ amp and 10" speaker included  ~

(Click HERE to see full picture album.)

If you are interested or know someone who is, leave a comment or Facebook message, or call (803)386-1638.

Time for an update.

Matt is in his final week of training at Colonial Life already. He has exams this week plus a lot of homework. Next week he will begin the second half of his training program over at Blue Cross, where he will work permanently once his training is complete. It's much closer to where we live, which is nice. So far he's done really well on all of the work he's submitted. I'm proud of him.  :)

This past weekend my mom and my friend, Courtney, came up to spend Saturday and Sunday with me. Matt's sister, Laura, threw me a baby shower this past Saturday at their dad's house. She did an amazing job putting everything together and it could not have turned out any better. The food she made was delicious and we had a good time visiting, playing some cute games, and opening presents. Good memories.  :)

(For pictures and a more detailed account, check my post on the baby blog.)

Hmm... Last thing I guess I'll mention -- Yesterday Matt and I dropped the Jeep off at the dealership for a diagnostic inspection. We are wanting to sell it sometime in the near future. It's in excellent condition considering how old it is, and as far as we know right now there aren't any problems that are too major. (When we dropped it off, the guy helping us got in to move it and was like "This thing is pretty sweet!" So hopefully that's a good sign for selling it...) We're hoping to get $2000-2500 for it, but of course that all depends on what we hear back from the mechanics. Once we know more and get it back we'll take some pics of it and start officially advertising.  :)

Independence Day '10

First of all, is it really July already? Where is this year going?!

Every year during the week of the 4th, Matt takes his Boy Scout troop up to the mountains for summer camp. This year his training for his new job didn't allow him to miss any days, so we drove them up on Saturday (07/03) in a 15 passenger van and got a ride back to Columbia with the Waddells that Monday. On the 4th, the Boy Scouts always participate in Rocky Bottom's parade (I use the word "parade" very loosely), then venture down to the great town of Pickens, SC to eat some corn dogs and ice cream as they mingle with the locals and watch the fireworks display. Chances are you'll see more mullets that night than the rest of the year combined, provided you don't live in Pickens or a similar town. Good times.  :)

Rocky Bottom 4th of July Parade

some of the scouts in the pool

Troop 424

The following Friday when Matt got off work, we drove back up in my car so that Matt could bring everyone home again in the van on Saturday. It made for a pretty busy week, but I love going to the mountains. It's so beautiful up there.  :)  It was Béla's first time to the mountains and she seemed to really enjoy it as well. I wish we were able to go up there more often!

Feeling Productive

I'm definitely feeling a sense of accomplishment this week. I like keeping myself busy with little projects aside from just keeping the house neat, going to the store, etc. That stuff gets boring after a while.

I finally got Heather & Alan's wedding video finished and to them. (Still need to burn the raw files to DVD for them, but that's no biggie.) I think it came out pretty well, especially considering that Matt and I are not professional videographers, and it was also my first time ever working with iMovie and iDVD.

I also helped Matt with some of his homework. He volunteered to be project manager and complete a design for a t-shirt that his training program had to create. No one knew how to do vector drawings in Photoshop or even draw a sketch on paper that would be good enough to use. (Matt doesn't really know a lot about that stuff either.) He's in training classes from 8AM to 5PM every day, then comes home and has 3-4 hours of reading to do. His new work load plus everything he tries to do for his Boy Scout troop adds up to a lot. So last night I helped him out by making the t-shirt design his group came up with. I had NO idea how to do this stuff, so I was reading online as I went, trying to figure it out. There are still some things that need to be added, but this is what I did so far. (And yes, they look simple, but I'm still proud of myself. I probably could've done it in 30 minutes in Paint, but in Photoshop this took me like 2-3 hours.)

(FRONT)

(BACK)

I think my next task to accomplish will be making a video of our own wedding. We had someone tape it, and people were walking around with the video camera at the reception... I just need to upload the footage and make it pretty so we can have a DVD of ours, too.

Happy Birthday, Matt!

I should probably start this post continuing from where I left off in the last one. The "situation" I was referring to at the end of my last post was a job offer that Matt had received from a recruiter at Blue Cross Blue Shield of SC. We didn't want to say anything about it "in public" until we knew what was going to come of it. They called him pretty much out of the blue saying they had three positions suddenly open up that needed to be filled ASAP, and wanted to know if he was interested. It was an entry level position for application development, and though that's not an area that was exactly in his comfort zone, we still felt like God was opening this door for us and that he should go ahead and apply/interview. He had to go in for a formal interview, followed by a two hour, timed programming aptitude test. Within a week of getting the initial phone call about the job, we found out that he'd been accepted for the position! Not only that, but he was also the only outside hire! He started there last Monday and seems to love it so far. He got a pretty substantial increase in pay plus awesome benefits, so now I shouldn't need to worry about working outside the home once the baby arrives. What a GIGANTIC blessing for our family!!


This past weekend we had a nice Father's Day celebration with Matt's family. Saturday we had a cookout/pool party at Matt's dad's house. It was me, Matt, Frank, Laura, Malcolm, Malcolm's parents, his sister Brianna, her husband, Clay, their baby, Carter, and Malcolm's brother, Courtney. The four dogs - Rita, Kandi, Izzy, and Béla - were also there. It was a full house but lots of fun and good food! I didn't know what to get Matt for his first Father's Day, nor did I have much money to spend, so I just got him a card and a onesie that says "I ♥ DAD" on the front.  :)  Yesterday we had planned to go to church, but ended up sleeping right through the alarm (the dog included). I think we were all pooped from the excitement the day before, so we took our time getting out of bed then headed over to Matt's dad's again for Father's Day lunch with his grandfather and relaxed around there for the rest of the day.


Today is another celebration - Matt's 30th birthday! Tonight we're going out to dinner downtown to celebrate with his family.  :)  


Lots going on in the last few weeks... So far the summer is off to a great start!

Just what we need.

Then Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught by its horns in a thicket. So he took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering in place of his son. Abraham named the place Yahweh-Yireh (which means “the Lord will provide”). To this day, people still use that name as a proverb: “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”
--Genesis 22:13-14


Yahweh-Yireh, or Jehovah Jireh, 'The Lord Provides'.  That's God's promise to every believer who waits on him, to every one of his children who trusts in him.  Many times in our walk with God our faith will be tested.  And when that happens, God wants to show us that he will provide.


I can't believe we're nearly half way through 2010 already. Time seems to fly faster every year, and this morning I started thinking about all of the things that have happened over the last months and how God has been right there providing us with what we need, at exactly the moment we need it. I'm thankful that throughout my life God has shown himself to me in that way over and over again, whether it was providing financial support at the last minute before a mission trip or providing my family with anything from groceries to Christmas presents when we didn't have the means to purchase them on our own. 


This year has been no exception. We were able to get our sweet little puppy Béla back in January, only to find out less than 24 hours later that we were pregnant.  :)  A month later I lost my job, leaving us with only Matt's salary to live off of. It was a little scary having our family income cut nearly in half, but I applied for unemployment and it went through quickly with no problems, providing us with exactly the money we needed to afford to keep our health insurance and pay the rest of our bills. (Very thankfully, we have no debt right now outside of our student loans.)


Then when it came time to file taxes, it looked as if we were going to have to pay anywhere from a few hundred to a couple thousand dollars to the government, due to some things that weren't done properly with Matt's job. It worked out that we did have to pay federal, but got a return from state so that it not only evened out, but we were left with enough money from the state return to pay our car taxes for the year and the COBRA payment for the month of June. Even our accountant said he was somewhat surprised that it worked out so well. 


Then a couple weeks ago the filtration system on Boogie's aquarium broke during the night and had been spilling water out onto our living room floor for several hours by the time I caught it the next morning. It damaged the wood laminate as well as the lady's living room ceiling below us. We didn't know what we were going to do, as getting it fixed will easily cost anywhere from a few hundred to possibly over $1000, depending on whether or not we can match the flooring or if we have to re-do the entire room. Somehow it came up when we were talking to some people at church, and within a week we got a call from another member of our church who is involved in a local ministry that does contracting type work for people who can't afford it. He came out to our apartment and looked at the damage, took a piece of the floor with him, and told us not to worry about anything, that everything would be taken care of. What a HUGE blessing!!! 


Those aren't the only ways that God has provided for us this year, but they are definitely some of the big ones. There have also been so many other things I didn't mention that we've been blessed with through our families, friends, and church. And now there is yet another situation where it seems like God may be providing our family with a truly enormous gift. I don't want to say too much "in public" until we know for sure what the outcome will be, but whichever way things happen I know that God is in control. If this particular thing doesn't work out, I know that He will continue to provide for us in some other way.  :)  

Now we know...

Let's start somewhere.

Alright. I started this new blog because I wanted to have a place to post miscellaneous non-baby related things. I want to keep the baby blog mainly about the pregnancy, and this blog mainly not about the pregnancy.

I used to use Xanga, but I don't really know anyone who uses it anymore, plus I like being able to log in and see both of our blogs together in one place. I'm sure I'll be the one writing most, if not all, of the posts on both blogs. Matt's not into blogging much, but he always reads what I post and sees the comments as well.

So, that being said, welcome to the new blog. Our lives aren't thrilling, but hopefully it'll be at least somewhat interesting.  ;)