beautiful weather... but under the weather

Today I was sick... I think some of it was allergy related but it was no fun. I felt all weak and had a soar throat a head ache and a tummy ache... so I laid around most of the day and was thankful I had pictures to edit so I could still accomplish a lot.  So I completely finished editing and printing for both Elena and Garrett's Wedding as well as for Gary and Penny's shoots.

 I also got to go to my woman's bible study this morning were we talked about Saul and Samuel.  It's been really great to meet with other ladies from the church and get to know there lives.  I feel very comfortable there it is a great safe environment where we all share what we have learned. I am really enjoying being around a bunch of knowledgeable ladies that are hungry for Gods word.  One Lady said that it's great how Gods word speaks to all of us even though we are all in different places in our lives and all different ages.  I am blessed to be a part of such a group that accepts me for who and where I am : )

Stuff I learned this week is that I have a hard time waiting... who me?  YES!  Discontentment is a breeding ground for all things evil.  That quote really stuck hard because looking back on my life when i made bad dissections it was often if not always because I was impatient and discontent and wanted to take matters into my own hands especially my own time table. Not a good thing.  Because I also learned this week that sometimes God gives us what we want and sometimes that is the worst thing possible and the farthest thing from what would be best for us.  Heres another one that hits hard... Horrible situations happen in our lives that sometimes we don't deserve.  This is hard for me because in my humanness, I become so wrapped up in rejection from others that sometimes I feel like i'm being punished by God through their actions toward me. Sometimes that can be just the opisit we learned that from Psalm 139:23-24  I could go on and on but one more thing it was good to be reminded of is that God always gives us warnings before we sin. That's hard because most of the time I give ecuses like well I just can't controle myself... but that's very far from the truth and this is clear though many places in scripture including Jeremiah 11:7.

After Garrett got home from working really hard all day he took care of me and made me dinner and we curled up on the couch and watched a Netflix.  Then we strolled down town and ran into the High School bond fire downtown by the Landing.  Garrett loved seeing people he knew. I love my hubby!

Adventures / Milestones

Everyone has a life story worth telling and no one life story is exactly the same. You see we are all created in the image of God but out of that image there so many stories. There are adventures to laugh about, tragedy to cry about, gifts to be thankful about, and a destination we each have to choose. Our stories are so different but our final destination is in one of two places.

The thing that blows my mind out of all the stories that I have heard is that they all lead to those final two destinations. Once you are gone then you only become a story of the past and you have concluded that story with one of two destinations. There are very few things that live on after one passes and one of those things are the unique stories that are told specific to that person.

As I was thinking about that tonight I wanted to record a couple of stories through my own life that will maybe one day out live me. Shelly and I have been interested in learning more about our families and their adventures, tragedies, and gifts that they have had.

My first story starts at my own birth on December 28^th, 1987. I was born at Cox South in Springfield where I immediately had CMV and contracted Pneumonia. My mother contracted Preeclampsia and immediately was transferred to ICU that first night. We left the hospital together a week and a half later after I was born.

When I was six months old we moved into a single wide trailer down the street from my grandpa and Grandma Garrett after my parents had sold our house in Kimberling City. When I was three years old my dad went to talk to a man about renting a house from him after our trailer sold. The man told my dad that he would hold the house for him and we could move in when we moved out of our single wide.

The trailer sold and we had to be moved out of it by midnight and my dad went to talk to the guy about moving in only to find out that he had already rented to someone else that were “in greater need”. So having nowhere to go mom and dad were lost in direction for their family.

Close family friends of ours came over to help my parents move their stuff to the storage unit. Loretta and Dennis loaded all three of our beds in the back of their trailer and took off. Well mom and dad had been to the storage unit twice and never did see Loretta and Denis and began to think where in the world are they.

Finally they show back up at the house and my parents asked if they had made it into the storage unit? The beds were missing from the back of the truck and Denis and Loretta told my parents that we were coming to live with them for a while. We were on the edge of seriously be homeless but the Lord took care of us!

The next story is pretty dear to me because it has to do with my final destination at the end of this life. As a child I witnessed my younger brother come to know Jesus Christ by kneeling down at the coffee table as a family and listening to the sweet words Matt was praying. It was something like; “Lord I know I am a sinner and I can’t live this life on my own. I am sorry for having sinned against you and no longer want to live this life alone. Will you please forgive me of my sins and come into my life?”

It wasn’t long after that I did the same and pray that similar prayer kneeled down at that very same coffee table. I was excited that I prayed those “magical” words and could now call myself a Christian.

One Sunday morning in the Fall of 1998 I was sitting on the center fourth pew back where I felt a conviction that I had never felt about. It was the Lord calling out my name and the sin in my life. All this time I thought the magical words that I had prayed years before saved me from eternal separation from Christ. The Lord was knocking at my door and it was on that Sunday morning that I quietly prayed the prayer of a sinner asking the Lord to come into my life and it radically changed my life. I actually felt something that I did not feel before; yet I was so afraid to share with anyone because others around me thought I was already saved.

It wasn’t until several months later that I opened up one day and told my dad that I truly invited Christ into my life. When I exposed the change in my life to my dad that day I felt even freer as a believer in the Lord. We were sitting out front of my grandpa and grandma Vanderpool’s house. Once I told my dad he told my grandma that was talking to us as we were about to leave. They both showed so much joy and excitement for that decision that I had made.

Glory be to the God in Heavens for giving us a chose to choose life over death!

Well, you probably guessed it by now what my next story is. I meet the love of my life and we were married on November 21^st, 2009. We honeymooned in Cancun, Mexico and thought it was really beautiful! It was through that trip that we figured out that we loved living in the United States! We have been through a lot of life in the last 10 months but I can only imagine that there is plenty more to come!

She is more than I could ever ask for! She frequently asks me why I married her and truthfully the roots of my love for her start with our very Creator. Our worldviews are truly one in the same and we have the same goals and ambitions in life. I enjoy Shelly and truly desire to encourage her in whatever she desires to do! I want to present her pure and blameless before the Lord! She is my soul mate and I could never ask for any greater blessing in my life.

We struggled our first couple of marriage figuring out where our place in life together was. Our journey began searching for a new church home where we felt we were growing. We have landed at Woodland Hills Family Church and keep getting more and more involved. It truly is our bodily family here on earth as we wait for our maker to take us home or for him to come back to us. We are involved in a Solutions group on Wednesday nights that has rocked our lives!

April of this year I was asked to come work at Kanakuk Ministries temporarily in their user computer department. While I was there I applied for an open full time and part time position but both those doors were closed to me. I declined my summer position at Kanakuk due to the needs to provide for my family financially. So once again unsure of where God wanted me in this life I started my own computer company. Stepping out on faith I began business with one step in front of the other.

It wasn’t two weeks later that I received a call from Kanakuk asking if my company would be willing to come help get their remote camps setup for the summer. This was just a confirmation from God that I had made the right decision to not work this summer.

The Lord has been faithful and has continued to bring more clients to my business since then. I owe everything that I have too the Creator of this universe! Without him my life would be a failure and I would have no sense of direction for my life.

These have just been some of the biggest life circumstances up until this point of life. I can’t imagine what the Lord has in store for us the many years ahead!

Conway to see my Sis : )

Mom and I got to go half way and meet Lori and Jack Jack in Conway.  We ate at Chick-fil-a and walked around and shopped the rest of the day. Check out the cutie sleeping while us girls shopped : ) Check out his lovey... notice the tag. Mom was so sweet and got lori and I matching dresses!  Mine is purple and Lori's is yellow but they are the same : )  Again how sweet is mom to get those for us!  She got jack some cute christmas presents too.  That's why it's great to have a baby because you can christmas shop while they are with you... then again sometimes I get to do that too : )  It was just fun to be just the girls and jack!  

Mom helped me get caught up on my bible studies on the way home so that was great!  

New Shoes

So I finally got a new pair of shoes. In the past it use to take me a long time to pick out shoes but when I walked into the shoe store it was pretty quick and easy. I looked at the shelves and there was the shoes of my choice. I was looking at them and Shelly was like get them babe! I was excited to be able to retire my old ones and get the new ones! Then my watch broke this past week and I can't tell you how many times I looked at my wrist only to find the time was not present. After we bought some new shoes Shell said "Let's go get you a new watch!" I was like that sounds awesome!

So we went to Walmart where I found my old watch but in a different color and so that was the one! I had been happy with my old one but the band broke and you can't buy a replacement. So now I am set!

Spring Town on a Tuesday

So garrett and I went up to Springfield for the night and got to meet up with Randi to have dinner.  We decided (randi's idea) that we could just walk around down town and find a cool new place to eat.  We did!   It was called the Bristro Market we absolutely found a great spot!

 Who offers unique anymore common!  You got to take advantage of a place that has gelato, coffee, flowers, fresh meets, buffet and an amazing atmosphere!  Places this great are hard to find! There is something for everyone here.  We ate dinner at the buffet and I ate way to much because it was good. Eating at a tall bar looking out of floor to ceiling windows! Overall the atmosphere was just a really fun place to hang out. We all really enjoyed it!  It was an out of the blue un expected wonderful evening with wonderful people!  I'm grateful to have people in my life to do fun stuff like this with that is what makes life great!

oh can I add that we've been married TEN MONTHS today!!! 

Little Girls bring Big Smiles!

It is weekend time again!  I love and treasure that time with my husband!  This saturday we went on a lunch date he even let us get all dressed up!  We of course went to our favorite... The Panda house!  We LOVE the Panda house!!!

We then met up with barb and matt to pick up miss abbie so we could keep her for the night.  We took her to Carters to get her some cute "aunt and uncle outfits". We got her a cutie fall outfit to wear for the day, shorts and a shirt, and a pretty little skirt for church : )  She is such a doll!  Then we headed out to the city!  We road the tram not once, but twice cause aunt shelly forgot her pass in the car : ) so that was fun... Then we walked all the way across the park to find a ride abbie would like. Well we found it... It was a butterfly ride... she wasn't quite sure what to think of it; garrett and I were unsure ourselves if she was going to get on.  But we watched the other little kids ride it a couple of times and then she decided she wanted to do it too.  So we got in a yellow caterpillar and went around in circles.  She held on with both hands with her eyes real big just watching everything it was so cute.  Every time I asked her if she wanted to fly or go up she would quickly say "no no"  "no fly"  we tried it on the second time riding but she liked it better just going around on the bottom : ) Uncle Garrett waved and cheered for us every time we came around!

  

Garrett is my best friend and we loved being out at the city with abbie ruth.  We ate pizza for dinner (garlic pepperoni digiorno) with fruit.  And all got in bed early.  Garrett and I slept over 11 hours!  We got up early and abb helped me make blueberry muffins for breakfast and garrett and her watched a veggie tales while I got ready for church.  Abbie got to got to church with us which we loved.  And she was all dressed up in her cute new outfit!

We found out from Paul that Garrett is now going to be leading a small group on Wednesday Nights at Solutions.  I'm not to excited about it yet just cause we learn a lot from the people and group we have right now.  That is how I get my hope and encouragement for the week is through those amazing people.   But Garrett is already preparing and he looks at it as a opportunity.  So i'm sure God has a plan and we will see how this all goes. I might just be scared of change but solutions and this great group we have around us is one of the best things God has brought in our lives in the past couple months!  It has blessed our marriage a ton and helped us with other relationships and situations like nothing else.  

God is good and has a plan!  

Then we met mom and dad at North Beach Park!  We ate dinner with them, sandwiches from Walmart, and garrett and dad played horse shoes. Mom and I played phase ten and then we all played sequence together.  It was really cool because the fog from the lake just kept getting closer and closer to us and it was so cooling and beautiful.  We had a great night with them! We are blessed with two great sets of parents who love us and love the Lord!

Happy 50th

It's Garrett's Daddy's Birthday!

September 17th. Today was the official day or anniversary of garrett and I being together.  Our 3rd year of being us!  Crazy to believe that it's only been 3 years.  But we both agree the best 3 years God has blessed us with each other.

We got to go in the evening to Garrett's parents to celebrate with the family Kent's 50th birthday!  It was great to see everyone.  We opened gifts, he got some overalls from grandma and grandpa, jeans from Lori, a pocket nife from barb and matt, and we got him some straps and wipes for his new truck.  Lori made the best cake.  It was an apple raison spice cake.  Very delicious!  I guess Kent begged her to make it she had never tried it before but it was great!

Early Morning Riser

Today I am a Early Morning Riser.  Garrett came and woke me up to invite me to go to breakfast out with him and my daddy.  Breakfast out is my favorite!  I'm not sure if I like the food more but I love the experience more for sure.  Plus we are going to a buffet which I love cause that means and many biscuits and gravy as I can get : )  It should be fun!

Then in the afternoon I drove up to Springfield to see Randi... we ate in the calf in the middle of the afternoon, so there wasn't many choices but there was cheese fries and salad... and Mt Dew! Then we went to AT&T... well really it took forever to figure out where there was one, cause I was trying to use my gps on my phone and i couldn't figure it out. So we ended up driving around just looking for one and found one on battlefield.  Randi very nicely told the guy who did nothing that there service stinks and that she wanted a new phone. : )  Then we went to the park and walked around and took some pictures. I wish we could have got more of the two of us!  Here are a couple: 

We joined!

We officially joined Woodland Hills Family Church Today!  We are so blessed to be a part of this amazing Family! We now commit ourselves to being a part... we look forward to it!

After church and lunch at church garrett and I came home and packed up to head to Dewy Shore, We hung up our hammock in the perfect spot so we could see the lake on three sides and be in the shade. We swam and had chips and dip and soda.  It was so relaxing and so enjoyable a great weekend!

Our Amazing Niece!

We have our neice for the night. She is getting big so fast. She will be a big sister in several months hard to believe!  We went to go pick her up from Day Care a little early so we could spend the evening with her.  She watched Dora on her blanket while I made dinner and garrett finished up work for the day.  We ate dinner tonight one of her favorite meals...spaghetti! And Uncle Garrett liked the meatballs!  We also had a great caesar salad... ending in a very messy little girl!  After dinner we all went to the Dollar Store and got miss Abigail a big girl sippy cup, a new toy and a coloring book to keep at our house.  We had bath time which got Aunt Shelly actually in the tub with abbie and lots of bubbles.  It was fun.  During which Garrett hand pumped up abbies queen sized air mattress.  After our bath I painted abbie's toe nails and she helped me with mine.  Pink!  And we tucked her in bed. Then I  went to Walgreens down the street to get some fudge bars while garrett pulled the couch way up close to the tv so we could watch our Red Box movie without being to loud : )

Sorry this video is upside down that is my fault for shooting that way.... 

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Who I am

I am so thankful that God created me to be a wife. I look around the world and i see what God created others to be. I see what others have chosen to be despite what God wanted. Im thankful for where God has placed me. There is so much competition in this world. Everyone wants to be better and more successful and acomplish then the person next to them in the same amount of time. The truth is i don't want to be competing with someone especially for something outside of what the Lord wants for me. God gave us each tallents and He wants us to use them in different ways. I don't want to boast in my tallents i want to use them to help others and to bless others. It's not about being bigger better or more successful it's all about loving people and loving God.

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New phone...yes! I got a Droid!

My husband bought me a droid ally. it's the smart phone... my very first data plan!  And It cost the same as my old phone... seriously why didn't i do this earlier?  So i can do Facebook and messaging and it has tons of apps! I can even keep track of what i eat and exercise. I make my own ringtones, play solitaire, check my e-mail, know the weather (75 and party cloudy!)  use a gps to get anywhere... and call anywhere I want without using a phone book!  Oh did I mention I can even Blog!  im spoiled!

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Hammock-ing in the Fall

So fun!  Garrett is amazing!  He put this hammock up between two trees in our front yard!  It is perfect weather to just go sit out in it and read or the other night mom and I watch the Labor Day fireworks!  It's beautiful little get away I have enjoyed it so much... that's why Fall is my favorite season!

Sunday Morning at Woodland Hills Family Church

Sunday!  Something we look forward to every week!  We love our new church family home Woodland Hills!  This past month we have been studying first Timothy on Sunday Mornings.  We have learned SO MUCH!  This was our last week in the series so we studied chapter 6:11 and through the end of the book.  We talked about some cool things here are just a few points from this morning.

First we are to FLEE and PURSUE that's a command and we should take it seriously! Sometimes we think it is a choice to follow Christ and dabble in sin but it's not really.  Second thing we learned was that we need to FIGHT for our faith family and church.  We know that there are winners and losers opposed to what we hear people say "everyones a winner" not true we have to fight and strive for things that are important and worth fighting for so we can win!  Ephesians 6 reminds us that there is a battle. So when life gets tough when relationships get tough when work gets tough we have to fight for it!  (v14) Reminds us that we have to keep fighting until Jesus returns.  So we can never give up on what is important to us and God.  However, as we all know and have experienced we will all feel like quitting.  Number Next is that we have to ENLIST others in the fight with us.  If we are having a hard time fighting it might be because we are alone.  We can't be a part of a glutinous faith but we also don't want to go to the opposite extreme and believe that God want's us poor...  We receive from the Lord with thanksgiving and at the end of this verse we see with Enjoyment. We need to be careful not to horde things and be generous in sharing even within our own family.  (v18) We have been taught how to be selfish.  But we can't save it all for ourselves.  Last point is to QUIT TALKING and DO SOMETHING.  (v 20)   Don't talk about your motives but talk about your actions. We can critic how others are doing something but it's worse to not do anything.

The picture above is garretts coffee cup... he has previously had a hard time when getting coffee at church because he fills it up to much so when he adds the cream and sugar he can't walk without spilling it however this week for the very first time they had lids and he was very excited about it : ) I love my man!

We also attend a small group on Wednesday nights at woodland Hills that has really changed and challenged us in so many ways it's called solutions.

A Dandi Randi Vacation

This week I went up and spent the night with Randi.  My first time in several years.  I am so thankful to have her friendship be a part of my life again. God has blessed us with each other and I could not be more thankful for that!  I went up on Tuesday to MSU to spend the night at Randi's new college dorm room which was so amazing she had green balloons all over and "happy birthday shelly" on her window!

She also had Margarita glasses for my 21st with Mt. Dew of course : )  And my favorite candy Reese Pieces!  She sure does know how to make me feel special!  It was so sweet!

 We had a fantastic time together. Stayed up way to late of course and talked painted our nails and watched a Miley cyrus movie "The Last Song"  The next day Randi went to classes early and I slept in which I have to say I quite enjoyed : )  We ate lunch together Chinese which was SO yummy!  and in the midst of all of this got drenched in the rain several times.

After she got out of classes we went to the mall were we got some flowers for our hair and Randi was amazing and talked a lady down on some amazing make- up.  I love Randi and again am so thankful for her in my life this midweek little vacation was just what I needed!  I loved every bit of it!