Less like scars...

• And I feel you here • And you're picking up the pieces • Forever faithful • It seemed out of my hands a bad situation • But you are able • And in your hands the pain and hurt • look less like scars and more like character •

Hide and seek...

So I was trying to think of an interesting blog post to write and Jakob 

(I can always count on him :) helped me out a little. Lately when I lay Jakob down for a nap I can hear him in his bedroom playing. I guess he plays until he has no more energy then he crashes. The first time I went in to wake him from his nap and I couldn’t open the door. I tried to peek through the cracked door and see what was holding the door shut. It was a little boys body. I called him 2 or 3 times and he didn’t stir. Eventually he woke up and looked at me like what am I doing here??? 

The second time I went in the room to wake Jakey up and I didn’t see him anywhere. I called his name and heard him stir in the closet. He was sleeping on top of all his blankets in the closet. Yesterday when I entered his room to wake him up I found his bed in a mess. I knew he was in the closet...

naked. Yep, he pulled off his diaper and snuggled into all the blankets in his closet. Thankfully he didn't pee on anything. Life is always an adventure with a two year old :)

 

She's had enough...

I guess things were just a little too stressful for Ella in the nursery this morning. I noticed she was chewing her cookie slower and slower. She laid her chubby little cheek on the table and went right to sleep :D Isn’t that the sweetest picture???

If...

So I saw this on Dana’s blog and thought it was cute. What a fun way to see what your friends are thinking! Feel free to copy and post on your page if you want to :)

1. If I were to get pg again....I would be super, super super , overwhelmingly, seriously overjoyed.  I will be perfectly happy and content with just Jakob, but I’d really like him to have a sibling

2. If I could have any job in the world...I would still be home with my baby boy. Ever since I was a little girl I have wanted to be a mommy. Sometimes it feels like I’m not that great at it, but I’m so thankful to be able to raise my child

3. If I had a day to myself I would....spend the whole day shopping. It’s really hard to shop with a husband and a two year old boy. It would be even better if I had one of my girlfriends to come along :D

4. If I could get married all over again…I would still marry Jeremy. He’s definitely the one for me

5. If I could live anywhere in the US…hmmm, this one is hard. I loved north Georgia, as long as my family lived there too

6. If my boy would have been a girl we would have named her...I like the name Ryleigh (my mom does not!) but I have a hard time picking a girl name, maybe that’s why I had a boy

7. If I could have any talent in the world...it would be to be a super outgoing friendly person

 8. If you met me in real life…you would know that I  am a nice person, but I’m not outgoing. I am shy if I don’t know you very well which makes it hard for me to be as friendly as I should, but I’m working on that!  

9. If I could go back to school and get a different degree…I think I would be an ultra-sound technician. When my child/children are raised I’d love to work for a fertility doctor. My clinic had such sweet, friendly people and I’d like to make other people feel the way I felt going through IVF

10. If money was NO object...I could do whatever I want!!!  Enough said!

11. If I could meet one celebrity it would be....There’s really no celebrity I’d want to meet. They’re just people with problems just like us .

12. If we had a different pet it would be…I am not a pet person. One day I’m sure we’ll get Jakob a dog, but a husband and child make enough messes  for me to clean every day!

13. If I could only shop at one store for the rest of my life...I would definitely love to shop at Ann Taylor Loft…but I guess that goes back to money being no object! I really want to learn to bargain shop for clothes, though I do love ATL!

14. If I could go on a trip right now....I think I’d like to go to Maine, or Pennsylvania to Amish country

15. If I had to choose between a house cleaner or a personal chef...House cleaner. I hate doing dishes!

16. If I had the option of any plastic surgery... I wouldn’t do any! I see these women in Hollywood and their faces look so weird. I do joke about getting botox between my eyebrows because I have frown lines. It is just a joke

17. If I could wake up and look like anyone I would choose...myself, just maybe a little more in shape than I am right now

18. If I could have a magical super power....It would be to fly. Wouldn’t that be cool?

 19. If I could change one thing in my past...I would have been kinder to other people and less selfish

20. If I could wish anything for y'all...it would be knowing God in a personal way (which I think a lot of you do!), that’s the only way we find true happiness :) 

 

Refinishing...

So this is kind of an idea of how I wanted to refinish the entertainment center I just got. Jeremy doesn’t really like the color though, he thinks it’s too dark, so I will have to keep looking. I like the idea of this one I think I will just have to find a stain/paint color we can both agree on

Blessings...

We pray for blessings
We pray for peace
Comfort for family, protection while we sleep
We pray for healing, for prosperity
We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering
All the while, You hear each spoken need
Yet love us way too much to give us lesser things

'Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near
What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

We pray for wisdom
Your voice to hear
And we cry in anger when we cannot feel You near
We doubt Your goodness, we doubt Your love
As if every promise from Your Word is not enough
All the while, You hear each desperate plea
And long that we'd have faith to believe
 

'Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near
And what if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

When friends betray us
When darkness seems to win
We know that pain reminds this heart
That this is not, this is not our home

'Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
And what if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near
What if my greatest disappointments
Or the aching(s) of this life
Is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can’t satisfy
And what if trials of this life
The rain, the storms, the hardest nights
Are Your mercies in disguise

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So I know Jennifer already has this song playing on her blog, and I must confess half the time when I'm reading blogs my speakers are on mute and when they're not I don't normally hear a song all the way through. They started playing this song on the radio and I was so blessed by it. This is a great song. It's amazing how I hear this song and it speaks of my journey with infertility. I know this song must speak to Jennifer with all she's been through with Benjamin. Everyone has that issue in their life. That issue that you can't just get over. That issue where you have to beg God for help because you feel like you can't take any more hurt, any more pain. Yet when God shows himself to you and makes himself real and known in that situation you can honestly thank him for that hard time you've been through and even be thankful for the experience. Isn't it so amazing to look back and see His blessings in disguise?

Hair on my mind...and head :)

When I got my haircut in August it was not exactly what I was thinking. I didn’t really have any idea what I wanted, so I ended up with that haircut. It was a good haircut and it was cute. The problem with the last haircut was that 3 weeks after I got it I already needed it trimmed again, thanks in part to my curly hair. I had a giant wad of hair on one side of my head. Not.Cool.!!!  The other day I stood in front of the mirror and layered the front of my hair to get rid of the giant pouf, and I like the way it looks now. I think I can survive until October when I have my next hair appointment. In the meantime I was debating what to do with my hair next. When me and Amber talk on skype we often instant message each other (through skype) and send each other photos of things we talk about (shoes, dresses, hair, etc.) Amber sent me these pictures and said I should go all out and get a pixie. I actually kinda wanted a pixie cut last time but totally chickened out and left it a little longer in the front. Well, I think this time I’m going to take the plunge. I will not show fear (though I may be feeling it!) and I’m just going to tell her cut my hair like this picture. I have decided that I will either love it and be the happiest person ever, or I will hate it and have forever reminders of the worst haircut decision ever with all of Kara’s wedding pics :)

Happiness is a choice...

My experience with this part of Florida began in August of last year. Jeremy flew down here for an interview. While he was very excited about the job and the work he would be doing he basically told me I was going to hate the town we would live in. A few weeks after that Jeremy had accepted the job and we flew down as a family to try to find a place to live and just check the area out. The job Jeremy has changes hands quite often. Not because of the job, everyone who's ever worked it loves the job. Mostly because the wives and families of the men working the job dislike the area so much. If you like small town living this place is for you. If you enjoy taking a trip to "town" every now and then or making a long list of things that you cannot buy at the local Family Dollar and then heading to Wal-mart when the list gets too overwhelming then this place is for you. If you like having things accessible to you 
(parks, recreation, shopping, etc) then you're kinda outta luck because it's just not in the near vicinity of this place. The first time we drove down the road to our small town I just wanted to cry. We left North Georgia with the beautiful mountains and the "southern" way of life 
(I never met a stranger in Georgia, everyone you met was your instant good friend) and came down here where the land is flat and the attitude is more small town and people know you're not from here because they didn't go to high school with you. From the moment we moved here we felt out of place. People were not friendly and I missed the south so much! I know we're from Florida, but we're from "southern" Florida. Otherwise known as L.A.... -(Lower Alabama :)- Thankfully we found our church, and the people there are super nice, but we still felt alone. I have tried not to vocalize too much how unhappy I've been here, at least to Jeremy, because I know he can't do anything about the people who live in our town, or where we live to be honest. -You know how when you go to a realtors office and they give you one of those little books that has all these pictures of houses for sale? Well in our town the realtor just hands you one page and the houses are printed on it. Sometimes it will be a large sheet of paper folded in half and will have houses on front and back. There's not a lot of choice in houses, much less rentals.- Anyways, I've complained a lot in my heart and in my mind. I really was hating the way I was feeling. I am not a super outgoing, totally happy person all the time, but I feel like I've learned the last few years 
(esp. after all we went through with IF) how to be content. I was having a really hard time with contentment. People would come and visit and say that the town wasn't so bad. I made excuses as to why they couldn't see how miserable it was to live here. Recently I've been really convicted about my attitude. This is going to sound really cheesy and weird, but one day we were driving around down near the river in our town. It was so beautiful. I was looking at the trees and the water and I realized that I am choosing to be miserable. I don't know if it's because I want to move home, if it's because this is definitely not my ideal place to live, I don't know what it was but it was a choice. I have a healthy family. I have a happy little boy who doesn't care at all what town we live in as long as he lives with his Mommy and Daddy. God has given me everything I need to be happy and I'm choosing to be miserable. I am basically telling God that even though he put me here for a reason I think he messed up and should hurry and move us somewhere else. Of course I realized how foolish I had been and decided that when things come up (and they will) that bother me I will think of good things, honest things, lovely things (phil. 4:4-8) because I am right where God wants me to be. Happiness has been given to me by God no matter my circumstances, it is my job to realize that and accept it.  After that day things have been different. Not because of me, I'm sure. I don't have it in myself to change my heart, that takes divine intervention :) My heart is no longer critical of this town or the people in it. I have found a sliver of beauty here and I'm holding on to it! I believe that if I stay here forever I will be happy and fulfilled. Yes, I still want to move back home, but I want to be in God's will, no matter where that happens to be. I choose happiness.

What's been going on???...

What's been going on lately is that I've been a really lazy blogger. I've had some blogs already formed in my mind, but then I just push it off and forget about them. (sigh)  The good thing is I have created my schedule, and for the most part I've been stickin' to it! I feel much better waking up and knowing every morning my goals for the day. I feel even better when those goals are met plus some! That happens every now and then even with a two year old running around my house:)

Jeremy found this little guy last week while working in Miami...Eeeek! Believe it or not he's been going down there for work for about 2 months or so and his last day there he finally saw the first aligator.

 

With all these hurricanes spinning in the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico lately we've been getting a whole bunch of rain. Jakob loves the rain. He also loves to say the word rain, though it sounds more like "wain!!!" After work his daddy will take him outside sometimes and let him run around in the "wain". He loves to splash in the puddles :D

In spite of the rain Jakob can see the sunshine (lol) He finds these glasses no matter where I hide them and walks around with them on. Sometimes he will stand on my bed, look at himself  in the mirror and say "oh yeah"

Isn't this the cutest little hanging bag???

And isn't this the cutest little 5 piece suit ever??? This is Jakob's suit for Kara's wedding. He looks so cute in it! The tie has a zipper on the back of it so you can put it around their neck and zip it closed. I'm glad it's not a clip on, because he'd probably  pull it off and lose it somewhere

I bought this entertainment center last week from a lady on Craigslist. I have been wanting one since I got married, but in a store they cost at least a couple thousand dollars, usually the ones I like cost a lot more. I got this one for 175 bucks(!). Thankfully our friend agreed to help Jeremy pick it up. It does have some dark spots on it where maybe it sat outside on a porch or something for a while so I am thinking about refinishing it. I would really like to just paint a darker stain on it and then scrub it so that you see the lighter color also... Don't really know how to do that, so I will have to start reading up on it. If anybody has suggestions about how I should refinish it let me know. I know it'd be way easier to just paint the whole thing, but I do like the wood/shabby chic look. We also want to buy some new hinges for it because the doors hang kind of crooked from the hinges being messed up. With a little work it will be perfect

Jakob was introduced to the joy of oreos the other day. Of course we had to buy the football shaped oreos. -Yes, in case you missed it, football season is here. Last Saturday my television (as well as the computer) was tuned to a different football game every hour from about noon on. My husband is not just a Florida football fan, he is a football fanatic in general. On labor day he went to Belle Glade to see two high school football teams play . He texted me and said ESPN is here, maybe you'll see me on t.v. :) - Anyways, it's funny how some things need no explanation. Jakob always takes his oreos apart, licks off the white filling and then eats the cookies. I don't know if that's how oreos were designed to be eaten (I'm thinking no) but i know a lot of people eat them that way.

In spite of the super serious oreo face he was really happy and really liked them. He was sitting at his little Toy Story table saying "MMMMM!" "MMMM!" letting me know that this was a good buy, and next time we go to the store we should get some more of these things :D Jakob is such a sweet child. He brings so much joy to our lives every day. At night we will brush his teeth, change his diaper and put him in his pj's. When it's time for sleep Jeremy says "Jakey, are you ready for night-night?" Jakob gets up, walks towards his room and then looks back to make sure daddy is coming. He goes to his room and climbs into his own bed. Daddy (or Mommy sometimes) puts his Pooh Bear under his left arm and his stuffed elephant under his right arm a couple other toys go beside them, then we cover him with his blanket. He gives you the sweetest little smile and then we close the door and he goes to sleep. It is so adorable. I told Jeremy I wish everyone could put him to bed one time just to see it, it will melt your heart. Anways, that's what's going on with us right now. I have another blog I'm working on (in my head) but it's one of those painfully honest ones that you put off 100 times before you write it, so maybe I'll write it soon. We'll see

A walk around the block...