ZzzzZzz....

I am tired. I could totally fall asleep right now but Frank has put on a movie that he rented last night. Bridges of Spies or whatever it's called. Once I start a movie, I have to finish it.

Today was a normal Sunday. Sunday school, children's church, choir practice, and then evening service. Frank and I had nursery tonight. 

Last week at church, I learned that Raheem, a boy who's been in our children's church program longer than I have, probably started going to the church before our family have, is going to graduate college. I was quite shocked really. I couldn't believe that he was going to be graduating. He wanted to go to Concord and get a degree to be a pharmacists. I commend him for that. I am quite proud of him. He is such a good boy, never any trouble during church and always looks out for his sisters, just a very sweet boy. It got me thinking though, we don't have many kids in the bus program that stay until they go off to college. Usually when they reach their teen years, maybe not even their teen years, they stop coming. Raheem is my first bus kid that I know of that's going off to college. It felt bittersweet. He's been coming to church for so long yet I don't feel that he's very connected to this church, which he should be because he's been coming for longer than I have! I told Candice that sometimes I feel as if Children's church is such an afterthought and the bus kids are so disconnected to the church, which it shouldn't be like that at all. We have this program for a purpose. To teach these kids the gospel, make sure that they are saved, and to guide them the best we can. I know their circumstance aren't always the best, I want to make sure that we impact their lives so that when they leave us, when they go off into the real world, they'll take a piece of us with them, know that they at least been thought some important life lessons. I want them to leave knowing that they have a church home, know that they have church family that love them and would support them. I want Raheem to know that. I hate that I am only thinking about this now that he's getting ready to leave. Candice has taken the initiative to talk to Pastor and Beth about hopefully doing something for Raheem from the church. It would be nice if we could take up an offering and also ask families to come together and get him some supplies that he would need for his dorm. We asked him today how much more money he would need and he said about $10,000. He is trying to get as much financial help that he can so that he wouldn't have to worry about loans. I can tell he is a smart boy so hopefully he can get the scholarships that he would need. Candice also asked him if he had anything he needed for his dorm an he said he had nothing. Im sure he hasn't started buying things yet but I think it would be nice we could do something nice for him as a church. Let him know that he's loved and he's got a church family that will support him. Hopefully all goes well and we can help him. I'm also wanting to throw him a little going away party at church one day. This situation with him has really got me thinking. I want to be a better children's church leader. I want to be able to make an impact in these kids' lives. I want to make sure that they know that no matter what their lives are like at home, there will always be people that care for them. I also want to teach them the of the Lord. With the Lord, anything is possible and they'll always have a future. 

I should probably go back to the movie. I can't wait for it to end so I can go to bed. I am SLEEEEEPY! Busy week this week. Kids have their testing all week, we need to finish the yearbook in a couple days, and also full schedule of baseball practices and games.

A Normal Day

I can't believe that the last time I wrote in this blog was 6 years ago! Gosh. To be honest, since I started this whole blogging thing so I can remember things, I want to say that I posted that last post yesterday on a different blog. I wanted to start a whole different blog separate from this because I felt like this new journey and the one I started 6 years ago were for totally different reasons and I hate mixing things if they aren't the same. I'd much rather start completely fresh and new. I didn't like the other website or whatever that I was using though. I just didn't feel comfortable using it. I don't feel it was as user friendly, for me anyways. This blog is just so much easier. So I'm meshing.

This was a rather uneventful day. Today was supposed to be the boys' opening day for baseball. It got cancelled because of weather. There was also a women's conference in Charleston that the ladies from the church were going to that I was going to miss because of baseball. Then baseball was cancelled so I thought about going. It's always fun to get out with the ladies. Late last night, I decided not to go because I'd have to get up at 6 to be at the church by 7. I had decided that was way too early and plus, I didn't seem to get the feeling Frank was too excited about my going. I woke up this morning to see a text from my Pastor's wife saying that she felt it was too dangerous to drive 2 hrs so she was calling it off. That meant a morning to chill with the husband and the kids. That was nice. He cooked our usual Saturday breakfast of eggs and bacon. Usually all the kids gobble all the bacon before I can even get to the kitchen. This morning, they grabbed up all the eggs. Frank was nice enough to save me a secret stash of bacon because he knows that usually I'll have to fry myself up more bacon. It's the little things. Love that man. 

The kids REALLY wanted to jump on the trampoline, even though it was snowy outside. We kept telling them no but finally they snuck out there. JoJo back in saying that her hands were freezing. I noticed that her feet were red. Apparently she had gone on the SNOW COVERED trampoline barefoot. Oh goodness that girl. I know they're super excited for the trampoline. They've always wanted one but Frank and I always thought it was too dangerous and it's just a broken bone waiting to happen. I started caving a little when I saw how much JoJo LOVED Carlee's and I just thought it'd be a great way to get them out of the house and off of the electronics. They have a hard time finding things to do outside sometimes. They get bored of what they have and won't go outside. Hopefully now that we have this trampoline, they'll spend much more time outside this spring and summer. I was quite surprised when Frank bought the trampoline. I had mentioned a week or so ago that the kids had told me in the car that they wanted to save all their money to buy a trampoline and that it was only $300. He said what he normally says, that it's too dangerous. Just the other day he asked me if I had Sam's card and I said not anymore and asked him why. He said there was a trampoline for sale. That caught me off guard. He then left to take the boys' to baseball practice and when they got home, I found out he had gone to Walmart and got one. 

We went to Zootopia today. The kids and I have been wanting to watch that movie for awhile now. I thought it was really cute. I really enjoyed it. It had a pretty good message. Sophie wasn't being the most cooperative baby but there were other kids there talking and I was able to control her for the most part but I kind of had to bribe her with candy. I'm sure she ate way too much Skittles today. Before we went home, Frank stopped at Walmart to rent a couple more movies. We came home, chilled, sent the kids to bed and watched Daddy's Home. Stupid movie but I did laugh at a few scenes.

Now I'm waiting for laundry to wash before I go to bed. Machine's quiet, maybe I missed the sound of the door unlocking. It's 3:15. It's going to be a fun morning. Hopefully I get a nap in before special and choir practice. Oo I hear the machine. Hopefully it'll be done soon and I'll be in bed before 4.

This is going to be a pretty full week I think. I have to finish the yearbook by Tuesday. Cross fingers that actually happens. Almost everything is done. Just have to see if we can redo the back cover picture, redo the title page picture, complete all the ads, and then double check everything but for the most part, it's complete. I hope it turns out and people like it. It's been quite the task, fun but a task, especially with Sophie. Thankfully, Mrs. Beck has been amazing and taking Sophie into the daycare. I definitely get a lot more work done when I don't have to chase after her and hunt her down. Kids have testing all this week but that means they don't have homework which is nice because they have a couple baseball games this week. Their first game is against Lance's team, the Rockies on Wednesday night. I may have to miss the last half of it for church. Hopefully they do well this year.

Laundry's about to finish. Let's end this here since I'm about out of things to write about. Until tomorrow!

A challenge

     It's hard to know exactly what to say when starting a new project. I sometimes have a hard time keeping up with things I start so we shall see how this goes. I'm starting this blog back up again to document my life...my family's life. 

     I got the inspiration from my husband. He has terribly memory. He decided around Christmastime last year to start a daily journal just writing about day to day happenings to help with his memory. He had mentioned a book that a Marine had wrote about his experience in boot camp. He had told me that he couldn't remember very much of his boot camp experience. I know that bothered him so he started journaling.

     I like to pride myself on my memory. I think I have pretty great memory. It's not perfect but I definitely remember more than my husband does. Especially when it comes to the little details. It's hard though, I will try to think back on certain things and realize that I can't remember a thing. That irritates me. I want to be able to remember things. I Facebook quite often. I don't do it as much as I used to because I feel as a 30 year old, maybe Facebook shouldn't my main outlet. I've heard comments from people my age or a bit older saying that they don't want to read what I've (not me in general) what I've eaten that day or my whole day. It made me feel quite ashamed of my posts. I like Facebook because I'm not a huge talker. I have a hard time saying what I feel or what's on my mind, Writing things down is a lot easier so I Facebook. Instead of telling myself all these things, I share with my friends. It's my form of communication. Plus I have a lot of friends from all over the US and Facebook is how I communicate with them. I don't want to be ashamed of what I write on Facebook though. I find myself using my posts as a reference point. Say I want to remember what I did on this day or if I want to remember what day it was that something happened or even if someone wanted to know when something happened, I will use my posts as a reference. I like knowing that I wrote about a certain event and I can go back and find out when that happened. I haven't been able to do that quite as often these days because I feel like most people won't like that I'm writing my entire life online. Maybe they'd understand if they knew my main reasoning for my many detailed posts. I shouldn't care what people thing of me anyways right? I think it's human nature to care though.

     When I was little, my mom used to make me write a daily dairy. She would read my entry and then she will write a little comment. Sometimes I wouldn't want to write in my diary and I would write just a sentence and she would write asking why I didn't want to do it. I think it became a habit and as I got older it kind of carried through. I would write down things I wouldn't want to forget and then read it over and over and it would ingrain in my memory. I stopped doing it because as I got older, I got more rebellious and often times my entries would be about my little escapes and usually my mom would find these and read them and I'd get into a ton of trouble, That's when I stopped writing things down. I did eventually turn to blogs though. I had a few platforms that I used. I had Xanga, MySpace, and LiveJournal I believe is what it was called. I wish I still had access to all those accounts because I wrote a ton of those. I guess thats the downfall of online blogs. Content can be lost overtime.

     I enjoy writing. Just for my own pleasure and for my own personal references. I am terribly at grammar so it won't be anything that I do for a living but I think this will be fun. I am challenging myself to do this daily. I am going to try to challenge myself to do this before bed everything. I think it should be easier now that I have a laptop. It's much easier to get online and just sit and write when I can chill on the couch. I've had this in my mind for a week or so now but there's something about sitting on that hard chair at the desktop that makes me not want to do it. OK! So here we go. This is day 1. Let's see if we can keep this up for a whole year.