Oh! Jeremy messed up my countdown, but that's o.k. because we're leaving for home a day early!!! Which means we have:

5 more days!!!

Last night I was showing Jeremy Jakob's two teeth that have come in on the bottom of his mouth and I saw two little white dots on his tongue. We had to hold him down to be able to look at them a second time. They looked like little blisters, or ant bites on his tongue. I've heard that hand, foot and mouth disease (it's not really a disease, just a virus) was going around in the church nursery, so we're figuring that's what he has. That would explain his lack of interest in food. He ate cheese and yogurt yesterday. That is all. He was pretty unhappy too. Poor little fella. It's kind of rough being new to this world. So many (bad) things you've never experienced

"Beautiful for me"

Do any of you hear a song you like, it's always playing in your mind, maybe you buy the cd for that song, or download the mp3 and then you listen to it until it's totally memorized and you're about sick of it? Well, that's how I am with music. Lately the song "Beautiful for me" by Nichole Nordeman has been playing in my mind. Yes, it's from a veggie tales movie, but it is a great song with some very good lyrics and I l-o-v-e Nichole Nordeman!  Lyrics that speak to me:

If it’s true that beauty lies in the eye of the beholder    

I want my life and what’s inside to give him something to behold

I want a heart that’s captivating
I wanna hear my Father saying

Has anybody told you you’re beautiful?
You might agree if you could see what I see
‘Cuz everything about you is incredible
You should have seen me smile the day that I made you  

beautiful for me

Close your eyes
Look inside
Let me see the you that you’ve been trying to hide
Long ago, I made you so very beautiful
So I ought to know 

you’re beautiful

It's so easy for me to critique myself. I am getting older. Gaining weight. My skin is not clear, teeth are not perfect, etc. but I have to remember that a great God made me for his glory. I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Even more so than the fact that God sees me as his beautiful creation I want my heart to be beautiful for him. I want him to look inside to the person that no one else can see and know that it's not make-up or diets or acne creams that make me beautiful, but it's the fact that I am his child, loving like him, forgiving like him, faithful like him.

9 more days...

I am so thankful to be a Christian. I am thankful that I can trust God in every situation of life. I've been hearing a show called "revive our hearts" on the radio in the afternoons. There is a couple who wrote a book about children and pregnancy and what a blessing is it to be able to bring children into the world, and how God uses children to work in our own lives and grow us, and that they will basically be the only thing we can take to heaven with us. I know this is all true. I also have to admit that every day I hear part of their segment and I have to turn the radio off. I know that children are a blessing from God. I also know (of) many couples who long for children and cannot conceive. My heart hurts for these people. Yesterday I just felt the need to admit to the Lord what I was feeling. God already knows the deepest secrets of our hearts anyways, but I think sometimes we need to stop and realize that. I gave the burden of infertility to God. I admitted that it didn't make sense to me how good people cannot have children while babies are unloved and neglected every day, but vowed to trust anyways. I was once again reminded that no matter what happens in our lives God is good. He's not good because he does things for us. His very person is goodness. I am so glad that God told me to bring my burdens to him. Once I was honest with God that burden was lifted from my shoulders. I still hurt for those who hurt, but I know I have a friend who is ready to listen anytime I need to talk :) 

 Oh yeah and mom...

10 more days!!! 

I am finally getting a new phone today! I have been completely phone-less since Saturday (we use the cell as a home number too). I had only texting for Thursday and Friday before my phone died completely. Salt water is not good for cell phones. I haven't been suffering without the phone, but it does help you to feel safer knowing if you need to call someone you can. Jeremy always laughs at me when I say I'm safer with a cell phone. He's like..."o.k., what's the cell phone gonna do for you if you're in trouble?" It is true. The phone will not save me from a mugger, or a kidnapper. It just makes me feel safer knowing I can call 911 if I need to. 

Guess what we got in the mail the other day??? A $94.00 water/sewer bill!!! Seriously, that is crazy! Jeremy called them to ask them what was up and if they would reduce the bill for us this first time. The guy said we must have a leaky toilet or something, which we know we do not. They are gonna put a monitor on the meter and see if it is broken. In the meantime they will not reduce our bill. I think it's absolutely outrageous that I have a water bill the size of my electric bill, esp. in Florida, where we're not really hurting for water...lol 

Hopefully they can figure out what's going on. 

I think I am going to start a countdown till we leave for NW Florida ;)

 11 days!!!

So we're back from St. Augustine. We had a really good time. On Monday Jeremy was pretty much over the cold he had, but I felt horrible (mostly sinus pressure/headache) and Jakob still had a bit of a cough. I didn't know if me and Jakey were going to be able to go with Jeremy, but I was pretty much determined that we would try. On Tuesday I woke up feeling much better, and Jakob woke up in a good mood, so we packed up the car and left the house about 9:30 in the morning. We hit Orlando about 12-12:30. I don't know how many of you have ever been to Orlando but it just screams excitement and fun. We're driving on I-4 and there's billboard after billboard of Disney, Universal, Sea World...I am soooo ready to go to Disney! We have a lot of Disney movies for Jakob to watch on video. At the beginning of almost every Disney video there is a commercial about parents taking their kids to Disney. Every time it comes on one of us either Jeremy or I will look at the other one longingly seriously wishing we could take Jakob there tomorrow. Whichever parent is still sane will remind the other that Jakob is too young for Disney right now and wouldn't even really enjoy it. We are waiting till he can actually have a clue what's going on and then we are definitely taking him! I don't know when the day will be, but I'm so excited for it already. Anyways, back to the story...we made it to St. Augustine around 2:30 or 3:00. We checked in to the hotel parked around back because we had a beachside room!!! Whew-hoo! Our room was only on the first floor, so we couldn't actually see the beach because of the sand dunes outside but I'll take looking at sand dunes over a paved parking lot any day. There was also a little porch connected to our room, so that was nice too. Before we unpacked or anything we took Jakob over to the little playground and he climbed stairs and played and slid down the slides for a while. The surf was really rough, it was starting to sprinkle when we arrived so we looked at the beach, but didn't go down to it. We unloaded all our stuff and hung out a while. For dinner we went right across the street to a seafood restaurant...the name escapes me right now, but it was soooo good! The whole time we lived in Georgia we would talk about seafood, but we knew there wasn't any fresh seafood there, so we would just say "when we visit home we need to go eat seafood." I had grilled shrimp and Jeremy had fried fish (grouper, I think) that was huge and shrimp. I ordered Jakob cheese ravioli thinking he might like it, but he ended up eating some of my sweet potatoes and a lot of daddys fried fish. Even with both of them eating that fish we took some back to the hotel with us. Wednesday Jeremy was in meetings all day with his bosses. Fortunately the hotel they were having the meetings in was across the street from ours, so he just walked over there and I kept the car. Me and Jakob went driving in downtown St. Augustine. It is so pretty there. We have decided we want to go again, because we just didn't have enough time to sightsee. Everything is within walking distance-or riding distance (lots of people rent bikes and ride). I found a little street market on the beach next to the pier (for those of you who know what I'm talking about it's like the seafood festival, but a little smaller) There was food there and people were selling crafts they made and jewelry and all kinds of stuff. Next we went to the beach. It was not really warm, so I didn't wear my bathing suit, and I didn't put Jakob in his swim trunks. I figured we'd just get our feet wet and that was it. Well, I guess I forgot how much Jakob liked Sanibel Island. He just ran straight to the water and sat down in it. He loved sitting in the water as the waves washed up to him. The waves even knocked him flat on his back and washed over his whole face (I had to grab him up and salt water got on my phone in my pocket and now my phone doesn't work!!!) and once I picked him up he got back down and ran straight back to the water. I definitely need to get the child some swim lessons! Once Jeremy got done with work (around 4) we headed to Fort Marion which is downtown. We met up with all the other employees that were in town for dinner. I got to meet Nichole, the girl who works with Jeremy doing invasive species work. She's a nice girl. I also got to meet all of Jeremy's bosses , they were all really cool. Dinner was another story. It took this place an hour and a half to get our food. It was well after 7:30 by the time we ate and Jakob was not a happy camper. I couldn't blame him. Thursday Jeremy was only in meetings till 12, then we went to Ripley's believe it or not. The one in St. Augustine is the original one. It's in this castle like house. I was a little nervous, because I don't like scary things, but it was cool. They have this tunnel that is spinning, and you walk through it and you feel like you're turning in circles. When we were standing in it Jakob was not reacting at all, so we took him out of his stroller and let him walk through it. It was so funny. He kept bending over and putting his hands on the ground because he thought he was falling over. He ran out of the tunnel (to me) but he was smiling so big. After that he kept running right up to the entrance of the tunnel, but he would not go back in :) I was so proud of how brave he was. After Ripleys we went to the fountain of youth. Where Ponce De Leon first discovered Florida. They give you water from the spring and you can drink it. It smelled like rotten eggs (sulfur) but I drank some anyways, just so I can say I've drank from it, and Jeremy drank some. They have peacocks just walking around there. They see so many people that they are not afraid of you. Jeremy was watching a video about the discovery of Florida and I had to get up and leave because Jakob was getting restless. While we were waiting for Jeremy this peacock walked right up to Jakob. Jakob didn't know what to think of this big huge bird, he was a little timid and scared of it. Eventually it wandered away from him. After the fountain of youth we got on the road and headed home. We had a great little mini vacation

More pics...

Our only picture from Ripleys...Tim tebows picture made from air soft gun pellets (lol)

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Jakob's shirt from Ripleys

Pretty self explanatory...I hope

Daddy and Jakey with Mr. De Leon ;)

Whew! Exhausted baby

Historic St. Augustine

Jakob's new friend at the fountain of youth...jakey is getting ready to flee

St. Augustine pics...

Cheese!

Daddy and Jakey on the playground

Makes me miss home :(

First time eating fish

I think he likes it!

A water baby

Gorgeous day!!!

View from the top of the Fort

Mommy and Jake

Two of a kind :)