Be Still My Heart

 I am so blessed to be able to spend time with these two cuties. I can't believe how much they are growing and what fun they are at this age!

 Mason cooperating and saying 'cheese'. He's so cute.

Kylee being stubborn and saying 'no' when I asked her to say cheese. Typical, and yet still adorable.

We had a great long day making cookies, playing in the snow, taking a bath, watching movies, and building forts. :) They are such good kids! I was very amused watching Kylee in the snow because she couldn't walk in it because she was so bundled up. When she finally learned from her big brother to eat the snow she kept biting it and spitting it out. Mason on the other hand, had a blast eating/gargling the snow and throwing it in the air. I've gotta say, I have a pretty great job.

Just another Tuesday night... not

USUALLY my Tuesday nights consist of...

getting off at 4:15

cook dinner with Drew

have bible study with some amazing young women 

This Tuesday the plans were...

My wonderful brother in law called wanting to do dinner. Sarah, his girlfriend, was headed back to Canada in the morning for Christmas and we were all going to go to Nathan's basketball game and then have dinner together. I was also going to make cookies before the 5:30 game.

What REALLY happened tonight...

• I come home from work, get the mail, walk in the house, and calmly pick up the phone, FREAK out and call Drew. "We have a major problem! Water is raining from our kitchen ceiling!"
• He told me to turn the main water off, but we had a hard time finding it.
• I immediately call my dad when I hang up with Drew because, well, he knows a lot of stuff. Especially about houses. He is very handy like that. So he came over right away. 
• Turns out, we have a pipe running from under our kitchen sink, up through the ceiling, and back down into our refrigerator for our ice maker. Yeah, it was squirting out water like a water fountain, for who knows how long. We both left the house at 8:30 this morning it could have been 8 hours.
• My granddad came over with a carpet cleaner (also extractor) and started helping with that, Drew starting ripping insulation out of the attic. Dad and I headed to Lowes to buy more. 
• Once we got back, we were debating about whether to talk to insurance. We have a certain deductable, is it worth trying to fix on our own and then risking mold or something else to be wrong? Do we pay the people and then realize it was probably unnecessary?
• Once Drew and I saw that our kitchen table is spotted, and the grout on our tiles turned pink (the water from the ceiling was pink, I'm guessing insulation?) we decided to go ahead and pay our deductable so we would have to waste hours, and money, and then possibly still need to get something fixed later on. 
• So that's why I'm still up, because there are men in our house soaking up our carpets and setting furniture on blocks

The Damage - upstairs and down

Soaked carpet

stained ceilings

speckled kitchen table

pink grout on our tiles in the kitchen

wet insulation

The Blessings

My camera, although in the kitchen, remained dry

it did not happen while we were gone to NY for a week 

We will probably still be able to go to NY (anniversary trip), hopefully 

We had unexpected guests drop by for a visit. They make us happy. :)

Pictures to come later. The nice guys left, and I'm freezing and sleepy.

Happenings in This Head of Mine

 1) I think you all have gathered that Drew is obsessed with enjoys playing Frisbee golf.  Well, his friend Steven and he went to Martinsville on Saturday to play in the Chili Bowl Disc Golf Tournament. Yes that's right. They played in the freezing cold, with snow. BUT HE GOT THIRD PLACE!! :) I'm so proud.

2) The first snow of the season was Saturday and it gave me warm fuzzies inside. For real, snow makes me smile despite the freezing temperature! Drew even got me with a snowball and all I could do was laugh.

2)Drew and I went to Scrooge on Saturday with Starr and Wes and had a blast! I have been so bogged down with school that I feel like I never get to relax for a whole evening, let alone go out and relax. There are always time crunches. Not Saturday, I was determined to work all afternoon so the evening could be relaxing. Even though I have seen Scrooge multiple times, it always puts me in the Christmas spirit.

It makes me want to sing and eat and spend time with friends. It makes me think about the little things and how presents really aren't that important. It also makes me think about how I am treating others and what I can do to make them more loved and comfortable.

Anywho, we went to Carrabba's for some yummy food. It could have quite literally killed me, seeing as there were garlic cloves all through it, but it was delicious! :) I enjoyed meeting Starr's friend Wes and again just relaxing in good company. We always watched the rest of the Tech game with Steven and Lauren but I didn't really care too much for the game. They won though so 'Whoo Hoo'. I guess that's what I'm supposed to say.

3) I experienced today how HORRIBLE testing while driving can be. I watched it happen. This girl was moving oober slow in the far left lane of 581. So I got in the middle lane and when I passed her I saw her phone, sitting on the top of the wheel. I watched her occasionally look up at the road. Yeah you heard me. She didn't glance at her phone when she needed to check something, she glanced at the road to make sure she wasn't about to die. I watch in horror as she inches into my lane. I speed up to miss her, and notice her looking up and drifting back into her lane. How can you be that close to an accident, that close to being so careless, and not even realize it?? It made me a tad bit tense. Along with having a grandma cut me off. Sheesh people!

4) I love so many aspects of the holidays. Today, while perusing the mall with Kylee, I noticed that people were genuinely happy. I love that you can count on people being cheery around the holidays. Salespeople chat more, people actually notice when you are trying to hold the door while pushing a stroller and holding lots of bags, and do something about it. That doesn't happen most of the time. :( It also made me sad to think that people are being happy because of the holidays, but what part? Is it because they get time off work? Are they going to see family or getting the latest gadget? I get to be genuinely happy all year round because of what my Jesus did for me after he was born in Bethlehem. I get to look forward to every day of my life because I know He made it for a reason and I get the privilege of being about of that reason. I so wish that people could see that joy to the world, is not just a Christmas thing. He CAME and therefore we can be joyful. ALWAYS. No matter what!!!

5) I'm almost done with my semester!! Boy am I jumping up and down!! I gave my research speech last night which was what I was dreading the most this year. I was a little nervous for the sole reason that I wasn't nervous. It should have been my hardest speech but I was so at peace about it. That my friends, is a result of prayer. Now I feel like anything else will be easy. Although if I keep procrastinating...

6) Speaking of prayer, that is definitely what God is teaching me lately. He hears me, you want to know why? Because he is right beside me. The knowledge that God is here no matter what I face good or bad, great or small, He is here. He promises never to leave or forsake me. Since I have been really grasping that on a whole new level, my prayer life has been better. I feel like I am in a more constant connection with God. I used to relate that to my friend Starr. She is a texter. She loves texting randomly whether they are quotes, or a song she just heard, or something hilarious that just happened to here. It doesn't matter, but it's random and brightens my day. Well, I feel like that is how I am with God more. It doesn't have to be a long conversation. I can simply say "God this sunset proves your awesomeness, thanks" or "God my friend is taking a test right now please be with her" or simply singing a song from the radio and meaning the words. They all are ways we can communicate and show our love to Him. It's a pretty good feeling to be on Christ's heels.

Date #22 - Boring Christmas Trees and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer!

Due to the horrible bug that attacked my family last week, Drew and I had to post-pone decorating for Christmas. Although we got out last Sunday to shop for two quick gifts since there were sales going on, we didn't feel like decorating when we got home.

So I anxiously patiently waited until THURSDAY, when we both had the full evening free, to get out all our Christmas goodies. We stuck in a Christmas Classic DVD that Drew gave me last year, and got to work.

I may be just plain dumb (I am according to the cracker barrel game, but hey, that thing is hard unless you are like Drew and have read the secret), but I was actually kinda sad that we have a fake, prelit tree. It makes decorating a tree go by SO fast. I'm definitely not used to that. Maybe next year will string some popcorn so it will take longer. Ha Ha yea right, Drew would die if popcorn was on our tree. He is all about the white lights with simple ornaments, not too cluttered. Poor deprived child, doesn't know that colored blinking lights, with strings of beads, popcorn, homemade paper and baked ornaments belong on a Christmas tree... along with a colored, VERY tacky star. What ever happened to that star???.... oh wait, and tinsel! Moving on.

I guess I will just have to pray one day I am blessed with several baby girls that have their daddy wrapped around their finger so they can say, "But I made that hideous beautiful ornament at school JUST FOR YOU! We have to have it on the tree" and "But we love seeing colored lights, it makes us SO happpy. We promise we'll be good if we can have them [insert adorable faces here]" Yea, that is the only way I will get my version of a perfect Christmas tree back. I may have to persuade them of my way of thinking, but I can do it. :) Since that will be years from now, it is a pretty tree even though it took 2.7 seconds to put up.

We did have an enjoyable evening, and those classic movies are fun. Especially when you have a husband quoting them and getting excited that one of them looks like Thomas Frankie. I felt sorry for poor rudolph and his mis-fit friends. It's just a mean, mean world out there. I would probably find a loud, bright red nose pretty handy... or not.

Oh, and in case you were dying in anticipation to who exactly Thomas Frankie looked like. It was Yukon Cornelius. Just so you know. 

Wordless Wednesday

Date #21 - Chick Fil A with Kiddos

This might be stretching it a little bit, but it is the closest we got to a date this week. As I mentioned before, Drew, Jeremy, and I took Audrey, Mason, and Kylee to Chuck E Cheese on Friday. Well, Jeremy got sick there and went home, so Drew and I took care of the kids. We did NOT want to eat greasy pizza (which was a smart decision knowing that it would not be staying down later that night) so we headed to Chick Fil A. Let's just say having a 3 year old, 2 year old, and 1 1/2 year old is quite an adventure. Drew definitely made a comment on how "Mary is a saint!" It's true, she is. ;) 

Anyway, everyone had a good time, and Drew and I were able to talk a little about life and kids. We also talked about how easily marriages can break as a result of kids. Children are wonderful, but couples MUST take time for each other alone. Just spending this week with our niece and nephew showed us that we hadn't really talked all week... and they aren't even ours! We both agree it is so good we are establishing "date night" now, before kids. Thanks Lauren for the encouragement to stop thinking about it and do it! 

Except for having to climb in the play place to get a scared Kylee from the corner, it was an uneventful trip. Everyone got home safely, and took really good naps! :) As I write this I realize that 'no kids' were part of the rules for date night... but that was your own, right??

Relaxing Despite the Chaos

When looking up the word chaos in the dictionary, it informed me that the word means, "a condition or place of great disorder or confusion." PERFECT. That is a great summary of the past week. Disorder is not always a bad thing, because I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of the chaos. On Friday, Katie, Jeremy, Audrey, Owen and Mom came to stay with Drew and I. Not Friday as in yesterday, Friday a week ago. I was so excited to spend a huge amount of quality time with them, and am grateful looking back, that I did. :) It was slightly chaotic though. Here is a run down...

• mom rolled her ankle after only being here an hour
• Drew painted the youth room Friday and Saturday... lots of work but looking good!
• I was privileged to take family pictures of the Naffs on Saturday... perfect weather! :) Crazy active 2 year-old
• Sunday lunch at Momar and Dadaddy's (grandparents)... good food and conversations... with church before and after.
• 3 of my toothbrushes were stolen by sneaky Audrey
• I think 3 or 4 toilet paper rolls (whole, unrolled) were stuffed in the toilet.. I lost count, but Audrey thoroughly enjoyed herself
• I worked all week except Thursday, and always hurried home to cuddle my niece or nephew and chat with my sister and mom... one night I actually forgot to go tell Drew hello when I got home. Whoops!
• Audrey got sick Monday, Katie got 'it' Wednesday night, Mom somewhere in between and Jeremy Friday morning.
• Thanksgiving morning/early afternoon Drew and I spent time with his parents and Nathan. We missed Bryan but had a great relaxing time! I thought I would be stuffed, having two thanksgivings, but there was a good amount of time in between.
• Chuck E Cheese with Drew, Jeremy, Audrey, Mason, and Kylee on Friday... there is the definition of chaotic right there
• Drew and I had a lot of plans for this weekend which included sanitizing the house, schoolwork, Christmas decorating, shopping, cleaning the car, Drew preaching on Sunday, etc... We had no obligations but being together and we were SO excited! 
• Friday evening I get sick, sometime around 2 AM Saturday, Drew gets sick. We spend the day in separate rooms with mixing bowls beside us... i know, TMI.
• We are both weak and have fevers, but are optimistic that the worst is behind us... phew!
• Here's to hoping tomorrow is a productive day!

 Can you tell that our chaotic thanksgiving revolved around two cuties... because it definitely did!