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The time has come...

2011-04-28T10:54:00.000-07:00

Alright, I am finally going to do it. I am such a creature of habit and I really don't like change, but I am moving to the new blog! Yep, I am really going to do it now. No more new posts will be showing up here. When you get to the new blog, make sure you sign up to "follow by email" so that you will receive email notifications of new posts. I am not going to use the "disqus" commenting anymore, so the best way to receive follow up comments is to have a Gmail account.

Our new blog address is http://thefeyfamily.blogspot.com/ . So go check it out. There are already a few posts over there, and once I find the motivation I'll write something new.

Easter Weekend and the week after

2011-04-26T17:59:00.000-07:00

I know, I know. I said I'd be switching blogs soon. I was waiting on a few things, and now I need to just finish up a few other things, and then it will be done!

In the meantime, I'll tell you about how we spent Easter. This year we were able to go with the Huisman family to DeMotte, Indiana. Now DeMotte holds a special place in my heart because I was born in Valparaiso, IN and spent the first 4 years of my life right outside of DeMotte in Roselawn. My dad was a pastor at a church in Roselawn, and my family stayed in touch with a lot of people in the DeMotte area, including my best friend's grandparents, parents, aunts and uncles-the Hubers!! We drove down on Saturday morning, arrived a little after 10, the kids ran around and played, then they headed out to Rachel's in-laws hobby farm to see the new baby goats. I don't have any pictures of that because I stayed back and took a nap! After they came back, we went to Rachel's brothers house to see their one day old kittens and fly a kite. The kids were so excited to see the little kitties. They were SO tiny. It was a windy day, so the kite flying was fun too. Then we headed back to Uncle Steve and Aunt Debbie's and ordered pizza. The kids watched a movie and went to bed and the adults played cards.

The next morning, our family headed to Roselawn for church, where we saw lots of familiar faces. Then it was back to the Hubers for a HUGE Easter dinner. We had lots of time to visit and the kids had lots of time to run around outside. Rachel and I went to her Uncle Mark's house to visit with more family. I just love being with all the Hubers. It's like they are family, and they've become that for Darin, Tyson and Jori too! We drove home later that afternoon and still managed to get the kids to bed at a decent time.

Tuesday night was a busy night for our family. First, we had Tyson's school Art Show. Actually, it was the district Art Show and his art was one of the pieces chosen from all the elementary schools, middle schools and high school. He was so excited! What made the night even more special was that we were able to see more Hubers! Uncle Bud and Aunt Bernice were actually in Michigan for Easter, so we didn't get to see them, but now they are here for the week, so they brought Jenna along to check out the Art Show. Tyson did such a great job and we are so proud of him!

Tyson's "Masai"

After a quick tour through the rest of the Art Show, we headed back to the apartment. Then Darin and Tyson headed out to pick up our new laptop (yay!) and Jori and I headed to her school for Mom's Night Out! First we did some singing and dancing. One of the songs was called "Circle Round the Zero" and as soon as I heard it, I started reliving a moment from college that was so horrifying. I took a class called "Music in Community" and we learned all these little kids songs and this was one of the songs. The horrifying thing was that you stood in a circle, and then one person walked around the middle, and if they stopped in front of you, you had to act out the following "back back zero", which involved bumping butts, "side side zero", which was bumping your sides together and then a couple other things. I HATED that song, and everyone knew it and would purposefully stop in front of ME. Seriously, bumping behinds with people that I don't really know is not on my list of favorite things to do! After the singing time, we had ice cream sundaes. Then we made a cute little flower pot craft and that was it. My sweet girls said "Daddy date night was much more fun". Thanks Jori!

We've had a fantastic few days. Make sure you go here to check out the rest of the pictures and I added some new videos here!

Sausage and Tomato Rigatoni

2011-04-17T09:18:00.000-07:00

When we moved into our apartment, our friends Andy and Whitney brought us this meal. It was amazing. My mom was here at the time and she, Darin and I were all just stuffing our faces full of this deliciousness. I think Tyson ate at least a serving and Jori was not a fan. I think it was a little spicy for them, but the adults LOVED it. So, here is the recipe:

Sausage and Tomato Rigatoni

prep: 10 min.      total time: 30 min.

4    cups of rigatoni pasta (8oz.) uncooked (really any tube pasta will do; I usually use penne)
1    lb. Italian sausage cut into chunks
1    red onion, sliced
1/4 cup tomato paste (I use the whole small can because I like it a bit saucy)
1/4 cup Sun- Dried Tomato Dressing
1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped (optional)
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Cook pasta as directed on package.
Meanwhile, brown sausage in a large nonstick skillet; drain. Stir in onions and tomato paste; cover. Cook 15 min. or until onions are tender and sausage is cooked through, stirring occasionally. Stir in dressing. Toss sausage mixture with pasta. Sprinkle with parsley and cheese.

YUM!!! I think I need to go grocery shopping soon!

Change is a coming

2011-04-14T12:04:00.000-07:00

The time has come. I have been working on a new blog for a while and am ready to make the switch! This blog will still be available, but I am going to remove the link to the Picasa Pictures on the right hand side, and some other things including the links to other blogs. So, if you've been stalking them through my blog, you'd better write the web addresses down. I finally started making use of Google Reader, which pulls all the blogs I read into one place. (Thanks Michelle for teaching me all about it!) I won't make changes for a few more days in case there are things you want to jot down, but change is a coming!

I think I might be going back to the regular comment system. If you have a gmail account, you can check a box to receive follow up comments if you so desire. Just make sure that you are logged in before you publish your comment and the option will be made available to you. You will need to sign up to receive the new blog by email and I also added a feature where you can subscribe to comments, but that means you'll be getting all the comments sent to you. I might add disqus to the new blog, but we'll see. I know, you all care so much about all these details!

So, I will send out a post soon with the new blog address!

Pasta with white sauce

2011-04-14T11:24:00.000-07:00

Rachel just gave me this recipe yesterday afternoon and I made it last night for dinner. Jori refused to even try it, which ended up being good for the rest of us because we finished the whole pan.

Pasta with White Sauce

8 oz pasta
4 cloves garlic or 1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 cup butter melted
1/3 cup dry white wine
1/4 tsp pepper
3/4 cup Parmesan cheese

Cook pasta. Mix everything else up EXCEPT the cheese in a skillet. Drain pasta and add to this mixture, then add cheese immediately, stir together well and serve.

It was really, really good, but Darin was a little grossed out by how much butter was in it. So I think next time I will try to make it with 1/2 the butter and more wine (unless someone has a better idea!). Rachel said they used to put the little tiny shrimp in it. I think peas or artichokes would also have tasted great. I chopped the garlic with a knife, so there were some bigger pieces, but they were all soft and squishy and delish because they had cooked down in the butter and wine. Mmmm. Enjoy!

Corn Tortillas

2011-04-14T11:03:00.000-07:00

Here is a recipe that Darin's dad used to make. We actually had these tortillas when we were in Sioux Center. As I said in that post, I am not a huge fan of corn tortillas, but they were still good. Here is the recipe from LaShawn. She writes recipes like I do, with lots of substitutions and suggestions : )

Dad’s Taco Shells

3 eggs (I use just the whites to make it healthier)

1 ½ cup milk (I maybe add another tablespoon to make up for the egg yolks, but I do not measure that out just add a tiny bit)

1 cup flour (I do ½ white flour ½ whole wheat flour, and I have even done all whole wheat flour)

1 tsp salt ( do NOT forget this, they do not taste the same at all without it!!!!

½ cup cornmeal

1 tbls butter ( I just put a big dab of spray butter in, I never measure it just guess about 1 tbls)

Mix all together (I use a wire wisk, it seams to mix it the best). Put a little butter on a frying pan (I just use pam to cut fat again). Take 1/3 cup measuring cup and pour into hot pan, (I usually put the burner on medium and let it get warm before you start). Right after you put the batter in take the pan and move it around so that it makes a shell. Let it fry for a couple minutes before turning it over. (You probably have a couple of bad ones before you get the hang of it, when I used to make them the first one never turned out, now that I do it all the time it is easier.)

Thanks for showing us how to make these when we came LaShawn!

Spring Break 2011

2011-04-14T10:43:00.000-07:00

We just spent such a fun week with Darin's family. We left Michigan on Friday around 4, stopped at a hotel overnight and arrived in Edgerton around 2:30 on Saturday. The kids were so excited to be there that they both jumped out of the van while we were still pulling into the driveway. Safe? No, but it was fun to see how excited they were. Darin's sister Daci and her family came over from Luverne and stayed for dinner and to watch the final 4 games. Tyson and Jori were so excited to see some of their cousins. We had homemade pizza for dinner.

On Sunday we had church and then enjoyed a fun day filled with lots of family. Daci and her family came back after church and LaShawn, Kyle and the kids came from Sioux Center. Evan and Jordan couldn't make it for lunch, but eventually we were all together. It is crazy how much noise 9 kids can make. Thankfully they played outside for most of the day and everyone seemed to get along. Later that afternoon Darin's aunts and uncles on his dad's side came over to visit, so the house was even more full of family. It was fun to catch up with everyone. I always love having the big family get togethers because I didn't grow up with a lot of family around, so I just think it is so special to have aunts and uncles and cousins near by. We are especially thankful that Darin's Grandpa and Grandma Van are still right in Edgerton.

Now lets see if I can keep the rest of the week straight! On Monday I think Karen and I went to Tally Ho for coffee and met up with Heidi. That afternoon Darin and I went to Sioux Falls to spend some time with Evan and Jordan. It was so nice to be able to sit and talk with them, eat a great dinner and play some really fun games (Ticket to Ride and Blockus). Monday night was the college basketball final, so we stayed and watched the game with them. I did not really watch the game, but I am sure most of you knew that!

On Tuesday Daci and Zach came to hang out while the kids were in school. We walked to the library and the kids had so much fun. The Edgerton Library might just be the best library ever. I would have loved to check out a bunch of books from there. There was a play house for the kids, a magnetic wall, some foam/goo stuff to play with and just so many books. Princess books, Fancy Nancy, dentist books, Star Wars, and movies-all for free! After the library we headed to Katie's Closet, a kids consignment store. I found a pair of shoes for Jori that are exactly like a pair that Jenna has, so she was excited about that. Then Darin and I met with his Uncle Randy, who is also our investment advisor. I ate all the good candy out of the candy dish while Darin and Randy did all the talking. Then it was back home for lunch. Tuesday night is family night at the Pizza Ranch, so of course we headed there for dinner. No trip to Edgerton would be complete without a stop at the Pizza Ranch!

On Wednesday morning I had a massage. It was awesome. I would have gladly laid there for more than an hour, but we had big plans for our day. We were heading out to Luverne to visit Daci, Justin, Brooklynn (once she was out of school), Makenna and Zach. We hadn't seen the new addition they added to their house last summer, so it was fun to get a tour and check things out! After lunch, Darin and the kids went back to the farm with Justin. They had such a good time. They saw calves, went to a pig farm (and smelled like it too!), and helped Justin out doing a few things. The girls and Zach came home after an hour or so, but Darin and Tyson went back to the farm and Tyson's favorite moments were watching Justin "put his hand up two cows butts" and riding the four wheeler. He kept talking about those two things over and over again! We left Luverne around 5, met up with Darin's mom for a kid hand-off, then headed to Sioux Falls to meet up with some of Darin's old classmates for dinner. Darin had a great time catching up with his friends and I enjoyed getting to meet some new people and also see some old friends (Hi VanderPols).

On Thursday we headed to Sioux Center to spend the day with LaShawn and the kids. We met up in Rock Valley, Iowa to do a little shopping first. I was excited to go to Rock Valley because my Grandma Brouwer used to live their and my Uncle Faynor and Aunt Jane still do live there. Darin and I took the kids to the cemetery and after a bit of searching and a phone call to my mom, we found my Grandma and Grandpa's headstone. It was super windy out so we only stopped for a minute. Then we met up with the others at the consignment stores. They were all really big and overwhelming. It was fun to look around and I found a few cute t-shirts for Tyson, including a Chicago Cubs shirt! After shopping, we followed LaShawn back to their new house. It was fun seeing their new place and Tyson and Jori were excited to see so many toys. We had lunch, then LaShawn picked Kaden up from school early so he and Tyson could play together. This went well for about 45 minutes, but then something happened involving a rope and it was all downhill from there : ) Thankfully Jori and Nevaeh were getting along great and we tried to just ignore the boys. We stayed for dinner and LaShawn showed us how to make homemade corn tortillas. Jori thought they were pancakes, but she is our picky eater. I prefer flour tortillas instead of corn, but they were good. I know that tortillas are hard to come by in South Africa, so it will be nice to have a way to make them when we are there. We headed back to Edgerton after dinner and managed to get the kids to bed before 8.

Friday was a busy day. Heidi came over for coffee, Grandpa took Tyson out to breakfast, Daci stopped over for a while,and we packed up all of our stuff. Somewhere in there Tyson and Jori got to open their stocking stuffers from this past Christmas. They got the neatest things. Grandma Karen took a bunch of Jori's too small (but still loved) clothes home with her a couple weeks ago and made a quilt, a purse and a bunch of clothes for Jori's doll Charity out of them. SO cute and special. Tyson got a lot of cool new doctor stuff including a real stethoscope and blood pressure cuff. Needless to say, both kids were really happy! We had plans to get together with Darin's grandpa and grandma, but after waiting for them for an hour, we finally called and found out they were waiting for us to come to their house. Just a slight miscommunication! So Grandpa and Grandma Van came over and we were blessed to be able to spend a little more time with them. We had to cut our visit short because we needed to get to Sioux Falls for family pictures. I was not looking forward to this as pictures always stress me out, but the picture taking went great. It was a bit chilly outside, but I am really excited to see the pictures and will be sure to put some up on our blog. After pictures, we brought the kids to a friend of LaShawn (8 kids in all) and then the adults went out to dinner at Carnaval Brazilian Grill. It was such a fun place to eat. There was a huge salad bar, but the best part was they brought slabs of meat on skewers right to your table, then sliced off however much you wanted. I think we were all on protein overload by the end of the night. We picked up the kids and headed back for our last sleep in Edgerton.

Saturday morning came and we all got up and got ready then headed off to stay at a hotel for the night about 3 hours from Edgerton. We all stopped at a McDonald's for lunch, then the women went shopping for a while and the guys took the kids to the hotel to swim. Then the women went to the hotel to take over kid duty and the guys headed to Minneapolis to watch a Twins game. All the kids had a great time swimming and eating pizza and playing together. I am so thankful our kids have so many cousins to play with. I just think it is so special for them. Once the kids were sleeping, we hung out in Jordan and Evan's room and just talked. Then LaShawn and Karen headed out to get us some ice cream and right after they got back, the guys returned from their game. Then we all split up and went to bed, knowing that Sunday morning was getting closer and closer.

Sunday morning we woke up, had breakfast and then started to say goodbye to Darin's family. His dad had to leave early for a business trip, so we said goodbye to him. The kids all ran outside to say one more goodbye to Grandpa Rick. Then we all squeezed into a hotel room and Grandma Karen prayed for us as we were getting ready to leave and not see each other for a long while. Then the tears started. I don't think any of us wanted to actually say goodbye, but it had to be done. Tyson kept going around saying "why is everyone crying", I actually didn't cry, but I think I had just steeled myself that this was going to be a hard morning and knew we just had to do it. As we were driving away, Jori started crying and was kept turning around saying "I want to see Grandma" and that is when I started crying, but then we started talking about how great it is that we can still call each other and send letters and skype and the tears stopped. There were a few times throughout our 9 hour drive home that one of the kids would say "I miss everyone", but they really handled it well.

And that wraps up our fabulous week. Saying goodbye was not so fun, but we are so thankful for the time we could spend with everyone and the memories that were made. (Don't forget to check out the rest of our pictures over here and you can check out a few videos from our week over here. Once you are over at YouTube, you can subscribe and there is a box you can check to receive email updates when new videos are posted!)

New pIctures

2011-03-30T15:41:00.000-07:00

You can head over to our new Picasa site (the link is in the post below) and see pictures of all we've been up to this month. I will admit that most of the pictures have already been posted on our blog, but there might be a few new ones!

I can't believe that we are wrapping up 2 months in this apartment already! The kids have been missing our house a lot, especially our nice street and the path where they could ride their bikes for hours and hours. There really isn't a great place for them to play out here unless we are with them, and until the thermometer starts inching closer to 60, I really don't have much desire to be out there with them! Thankfully their daddy doesn't mind the cold. Darin and I really haven't talked about our house at all. The other night I did have myself a little cry while I laid in bed, just thinking about different things in our house and how it was our HOME. This is just a temporary resting place until we get on a big plane and head overseas. Then we will be in another temporary home, albeit a much bigger and awesomer resting place than this, but are we ever going to feel at home again? (and yes, I know that this world is not our home, and while I do need to be keeping that at the forefront of my mind more often, there are many other people who have written much more eloquent posts about this very topic. I should know. I read a lot of blogs.)

We will be heading for Minnesota on Friday and spending just over a week there. We'll be getting back home on the 10th. The next day will be April 11, exactly 2 months before we leave. Wow! In some way these last 2 months have gone by so slowly and in other ways they have just flown. I am guessing that our last 2 months in the states are going to go by a lot faster as we have already been putting lots of get togethers on the calendar, as well as a few good-bye parties : ( That's the part I'm not really ready to think about, but soon enough I'll have to. I can't stay in denial forever, and if I did, I know I'd miss out on some really beautiful moments.

Videos and Pictures

2011-03-24T16:56:00.000-07:00

Oops, I need to add some links for where you can find out pictures and videos. We started a new Picasa account (to go along with a new blog!), so you can see the pictures of Jori's field trip here and check out some recent videos here. I will have links to both of these on our new blog. I am just not quite ready to make the switch!

Jori's 3rd field trip-Pell's Greenhouse!

2011-03-24T13:52:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, Grandma Karen took Jori on her 3rd class field trip. I went with her to an apple orchard this fall and Darin took her to the fire station. It was a cold day for a field trip, but thankfully it was nice and warm in the greenhouse. I won't be able to give you too much information on the pictures because I wasn't there, and when I ask Jori she says "It's a flower" or some other vague statement : )

I will put up the rest of the pictures in Picasa. Thankfully Grandma Karen took a lot! Jori got to plant a flower all by herself and take it home. She is so proud of it and likes to talk to it and wants to water it all the time. We shall see how long this flower survives...

Jori did say that they saw lots of flowers, and that there were big hoses that almost sprayed the kids! She loves going on field trips and it was extra special that Grandma was here to go on this one with her!

Grandma Karen's visit

2011-03-24T13:43:00.000-07:00

We just had a wonderful visit with Grandma Karen. She and her friend Heidi came up from Edgerton on Saturday and left again on Wednesday evening. Grandma Van drove up with them, but she stayed in Kalamazoo with Darin's aunt and uncle. Thankfully we'll get to see her in less than 2 weeks when we head to Edgerton ourselves.

We packed a lot of fun into a few days, and of course, I did not take very many pictures! I'll have my camera charged and ready to go when we are in Edgerton. Right after they arrived on Saturday we headed out to Tyson's Bible Club carnival. Our family had already been to his school carnival that morning, so it was special that Grandma could come along for carnival #2. The kids got to play a lot of games and we all had some yummy snacks. We headed home around 4, stopped for some groceries, had pizza, then the adults headed to our church to watch a performance of the musical, "The Boyfriend". It was fun seeing so many familiar faces from church up on stage strutting their stuff. Heidi's brother in law was in the play and his hair was hilarious. Wish I had a picture, but just imagine a crazy conductor with hair sticking out all over his head. Good times.

Sunday we headed to church, then the kids both enjoyed a day of playing with Grandma Karen. I think I read most of the day and I don't know what Darin did : ) Jori loved having Grandma color with her and read books and Tyson and Grandma had lots of fun with Legos! I think they went outside for a while too. Sunday night we headed back to church, then it was bed time for the kids and time for the rest of us to watch The Amazing Race and Undercover Boss. On Monday Grandma took the kids to school, which is always so special for them. Then we headed to the mall until it was time to get Jori from school, then it was off to Rachel's for lunch. I know that Rachel is already sad knowing that Karen won't be heading to Michigan to visit with us as they have also become friends. There is just something really special about that! After lunch and getting little Reid down for a nap, Rachel and I left the kids with Grandma and headed out to get me some new glasses! I had tried (unsuccessfully) to pick out new frames on my own, but this time Rachel was along to tell me what looked good. I quickly found out she was no help : ) I am only half kidding, and she knows it. We tried to pick something out at Goodwill Optical, but we were both clueless, so we headed to WalMart. The lady who helped us was great. She was quick to say "No" when she didn't like how something looked on me. Finally we figured out that due to my small head size I needed to be looking in the "youth" section. It was fun to be out without any kids and actually accomplish something that I needed to get done! We headed back to Rachel's and hung out til Tyson walked over there from school, then we headed back home for French Toast. I think Heidi and Karen were both happy to be introduced to our fancy dinner!

Tuesday morning we went to Signatures for coffee. Always a nice treat. Then Karen took lunch over to Tyson at school. He convinced Grandma that he not only needed the McDonald's she brought, but also needed to have hot lunch : ) He took Grandma back to his classroom and she was able to sit in on a discussion about tornadoes and even told the kids about a tornado that hit close to Edgerton several years ago. So fun for Tyson to have those special memories. He was very proud to have a guest at lunch and kept poking kids to get their attention then pointing at his Grandma as if to say "check out who's sitting with me!". Love it. After Karen got back from that, we headed out to the mall again and found some cute outfits for all the girls to wear for some pictures that will be taken when we are in Edgerton. We headed back in time to get Tyson off the bus, then hung out til dinner time. Once the kids were in bed, Rachel came over and hung out while we watched "The Biggest Loser" and ate ice cream. A perfect combination!

On Wednesday morning, I had Bible Study. Grandma walked Tyson to the bus stop, then dropped me off at church and headed off with Jori for a field trip! They went to a greenhouse. I will do a separate post with pictures about that fun adventure. Wednesday afternoon we went out to Jimmy John's for lunch (yum!), then came back home and had Jori try on a bunch of clothes. Once Tyson was home, I finally took a few pictures and some videos. I know, total slacker.

The kids chose the stuff they wanted to have in this picture.

3 elephants in a row-Jori, Grandma and Tyson

Then we headed to Holland to have dinner at Crazy Horse for Grandma's birthday. It was special to be able to celebrate her day with her. After dinner, she and Heidi took off to pick up Grandma Van and we headed home. Right when we got in the van the kids both said "I miss Grandma already". It was wonderful to remind them that we will get to see Grandma again in 10 days, but also bittersweet knowing that we have lots of goodbyes coming up! Can't dwell on the sad part of it.

We had a wonderful time together. Thank you, Grandma, for making the trip out to see us. We love you and are excited to see you in less than 2 weeks!

Cheddar Chicken Bites

2011-03-15T06:40:00.000-07:00

Last night I tried out a new recipe. This was the first time in a long time that Darin said "You could make that again sometime". Based on those words from my husband,Tyson giving it two thumbs up and Jori actually finishing the serving we put on her plate with minimal complaints, I declare this recipe a keeper.

Cheddar Chicken Bites

2 Tbsp olive oil
1 1/2 cups (3 oz) Cheez-It cheddar crackers
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 1/4 pound chicken tenders
1/2 cup Dijon mustard

1. Put rack in lower 1/3 of oven; preheat to 475. Brush a baking pan with olive oil.
2. Pulse crackers in a food processor. Transfer to a bowl and stir in pepper.
3. Toss tenders in mustard then dredge it in crumbs.
4. Arrange on oiled pan. Bake, turning once, until golden brown, 15 minutes.

As always, I made a few changes. I used Meijer brand crackers, and we all know Cheez-Its are better. They just are. These were ok for baking, but plain-yuck! I didn't measure the crackers or the mustard or the chicken for that matter and it all turned out just fine. Just make what you need for your family. We ended up baking these for closer to 20 minutes. Flip them over carefully so the coating doesn't come off the chicken. We had these with salad and Darin and I both added some of the chicken to our salad and it was pretty good. The kids liked dipping them in ranch dressing. The Dijon mustard is a little spicy, but I think plain mustard would taste gross. Maybe you could make them with honey mustard.

Enjoy!

Up and Down, Up and Down

2011-03-09T12:31:00.000-08:00

I feel like I am on a roller coaster these days. Life is good, even great for a while. I feel happy, at peace, ready for what the future holds and then BAM! Just like that I am down again. For the past couple days I've felt things shifting and sensed that the downward spiral was about to begin. Today I am feeling it in full. I have a pretty good hunch that my mood swings are tied to the calendar, and not for the reason you are probably thinking. This has less to do with my cycle and more to do with the dates on the calendar. Today is March 9. In two days it will be the 11th, which means that we will have exactly 3 months left here in the states. My mind has latched on to that fact and can't seem to let go of it.

It probably doesn't help that I decided to sort through our spare room today. Darin's mom is coming in a couple weeks and then the week after that we are heading out to Minnesota to spend time with the whole family, so I really need to make some final decisions about what we want to store and what we'll be getting rid of. This afternoon I was sorting through a box of stuff I've been saving for the kids-pictures, baby books, progress reports from school, papers and projects, special toys... It just made me sad. So I moved on to another box of stuff and that made me sad too.

I feel like I am on this tightrope, trying to balance the excitement of going with the heartache of leaving. It is exciting to be moving to South Africa (just ask anyone!). Yesterday Jori and I looked through pictures from 2008 and I felt myself wanting to be back there, with the people we met and the new things we saw and did. I remembered why Darin and I wanted to go back in the first place. Then Jori says "I miss our old house. I miss how it smells and I miss my room" and my heart aches and I want to have our old life back. I don't want to be that person that is moving in three months. I want to be signing Jori up for kindergarten and figuring out which Vacation Bible Schools the kids can go to, and volunteering to help at Arts Camp with my friends.

I am hoping that once the 11th comes and goes, things will be on the upswing and these sad feelings will go away for a few weeks. I guess I'll soon find out!

2011-03-01T09:24:00.000-08:00

All is well here in Hudsonville. March 1 has rolled around, which means I need to start working in our spare room. That is probably why I am sitting here at the computer instead. Procrastination is the name of the game. I did just have to share a few pictures from last week and then I promise to go in the spare room and at least move a few piles around.

Lately the kids have been getting up earlier than usual, like right around 6 in the morning. Little bodies can only handle so many early mornings before they crash. And when their bodies decide to crash, it can happen anywhere.

Sleeping Beauty

Sweet Jori was playing in her room and I realized I hadn't heard her in a while. I went to check on her and found her sleeping on our full length mirror. We still haven't been able to figure out why she was on the mirror in the first place, but whatever she was doing ended up in a little nap!

On Saturday, Darin headed outside with the kids to play in the snow. I am so thankful that he is enjoys being with the kids and doing fun things with them. I was enjoying some quiet time inside until I was called out to look at what had kept them all so busy.

Hiding out in their snow tunnels

Boo!

Darin was very sore after digging a tunnel for each kid. He even put in a little passageway so they could pass things back and forth. Sadly it snowed more during the night and when we headed to church Sunday morning, we could no longer see the holes as the snow plows had come through and piled more snow on top of them. It was fun while it lasted and I am pretty sure Tyson and Jori could encourage their daddy to go out and build them each a new tunnel this weekend : )

Guess I'd better get to work, although the package of Double Stuf Oreos in the kitchen is calling my name...

YUM!

2011-02-28T15:23:00.000-08:00

Just over a year ago, I posted some breakfast for dinner recipes. Tonight I made the last recipe from that post and it was so good I just had to post it again! I did make a couple changes this time around, not necessarily for the better, but more for to save a little time and money! Usually cutting corners leads to a horrible outcome, but not this time! First, I used regular old white bread and it was very fresh/soft. Second, I did not buy whipping cream, so I used half and half to make the syrup. It still tasted delicious, it just didn't get very thick. I only made 1/2 a batch as I wasn't sure how it was going to turn out, and I did not have enough sugar in the house for a full batch. Third, we had Redi Whip in the house, so we used that instead of making whipped cream. Finally, I only used two eggs and guessed on the half and half because I wasn't planning on making a full batch. The version below is the best, but what we had tonight was so good, I wish I had made more than 8 pieces!

French Toast with Vanilla Cream Syrup
You will need French bread, half and half, eggs, sugar, vanilla, corn syrup (dark or light), whipping cream and berries

For the bread:
Cut French bread 1/2 inch thick
combine 1 1/3 cup half and half, 4 eggs, 1 Tbsp sugar, 1/2 tsp vanilla

Dip the bread in this mixture. Don't let it soak up too much or your bread will be soggy, but make sure it is wet through. Cook in a pan or griddle. (I made 1/2 a batch-about 6 pieces-one night and made more of this mixture for the rest of the bread the next day)

Serve with Vanilla Cream Syrup
Stir together 1/2 cup sugar, 1/2 cup corn syrup (recipe calls for light, I only had dark and it was fine) and 1/2 cup whipping cream over medium heat and simmer until melted. Remove from stove, add 1 tsp vanilla. Cool, then whip until thickened.

If you want, you can make Whipped Cream using some of your remaining whipping cream. I Googled "How to make whipped cream with whipping cream" and it said to use a metal bowl and put the bowl and whipping cream in the freezer for a while, so I did. Then I whipped the cream with my mixer for a minute or so until it started looking thick. Then I added some sugar and vanilla, then whipped it again. It looked right and tasted good, so I must have done something right!

This might seem like a lot of work, but it really isn't, especially if you make it how we did tonight, and it is just so good. Don't forget the strawberries!!

The haps

2011-02-24T09:46:00.000-08:00

We have been living in our new digs for almost a month now. Hard to believe it's already been that long! On the plus side, living in a smaller space has not been near as stressful as I thought it would be. On the downside, having one month down means we only have a little over 3 left here in Hudsonville. I try not to think about it too much, but time is definitely ticking away. (Tami, if you ever get around to reading this, just know that as soon as I wrote that last sentence I immediately thought of DC Talk and Palm Springs.)

February has been a pretty busy month for us. My mom was here at the beginning of the month, the big blizzard meant the kids were around more than usual, we've had small group, cadets, nights out with friends, playdates and more. Here are a few pictures of some of the things we've been up to.

We've been having lots of play dates with Jenna and JJ. We want to soak up as much time with them as we can. Last night we even got to have Reid over at our apartment. Tyson and Jori were thrilled to babysit their favorite little guy. Jori and JJ get to spend the most time together, but Jori and Jenna are a close second. This leaves poor Tyson feeling a bit left out. It's harder to get him together with the others because he is in school an hour later than Jenna, so it doesn't work out quite as nicely, but we'll keep trying. Jenna and JJ both think apartment living is pretty neat. I am guessing they'd be less inclined to think so if they lived here full time!

Jenna did Jori's hair

Lovely, don't you agree?

Last week we met up with Sarah, Josiah and Miles at Playworld. They had a great time and spent 3 hours running around, climbing, jumping, bouncing and more. I didn't have my camera along, but did take a couple pictures when we got home to show how "played out" the kids were.

Rosy cheeks


Our little sweaty Betty. She looked like she had just taken a shower!

A couple nights ago, Jori and Darin went to Daddy Date night at her school. They had a great time together. There were games, crafts and snacks, a perfect night for daddy and his girl.

So excited to go!

Games in the gym

Our sweet girl

Tyson has been keeping busy with school, although he did have winter break on Friday and Monday. We went to Playworld on Friday and on Monday I drove him to Crazy Horse in Holland so he and Darin could go out to lunch all by themselves.

One thing I have NOT been doing is any kind of sorting or packing. I have given myself until March 1 to get started with all of that, so hold me to it!

Cookie Pie

2011-02-24T08:49:00.000-08:00

During one of my recent blog stalking adventures, I came across a link to Our Best Bites, which was showcasing the following recipe. Once I saw it, I knew I had to have it. I did not take any pictures, but you can head over to their site to see some if you'd like.

Here's the recipe:
Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie

1 unbaked 9-inch pie crust, homemade or store-bought.
2 large eggs
1/2 C flour
1/2 C white granulated sugar
1/2 C packed brown sugar
3/4 C real butter, softened (1 1/2 sticks)
1 C chocolate chips (semi-sweet or dark works best, you might find milk too sweet)
1 C chopped pecans (you are welcome to make it without nuts)

Vanilla ice cream, or sweetened whipped cream for serving (a must! I prefer ice cream)

optional: chocolate sauce (honestly, doesn't really need chocolate sauce, but it looks pretty!)

Preheat oven to 325° F.

Beat eggs in large mixer bowl on high speed until foamy. Beat in flour, granulated sugar and brown sugar. Beat in butter. Stir in morsels and nuts. Spoon into pie shell.

Bake for 55 to 60 minutes or until knife inserted halfway between edge and center comes out clean. Cool on wire rack or serve slightly warmed. Serve with ice cream or whipped cream.

Yum! It was so good. You have to make sure you let it cool enough so that it doesn't just fall apart, but warm enough to be like a cookie right from the oven. Mmmm. I actually liked it better the second day after it has cooled completely. It was like a chewy gooey cookie bar. This is the kind of dessert you want to make when you will have company to share it with. Do not attempt to eat a whole cookie pie on your own. One slice is about equal to 5 or 6 cookies : ) I was pleased to discover that even without a mixer, my cookie pie turned out wonderfully. Just made my arm a little sore!

Enjoy!

Leaving behind my flannel sheets

2011-02-19T19:23:00.000-08:00

As each day ticks by and we get closer to our departure, I find myself looking at everything with a discerning eye. Should we pack that? Will I miss that if I sell it? Are the kids really going to play with all these toys and read all these books? How heavy are those shoes? And most recently, do we really need to take our flannel sheets?

Today is the first time I thought about leaving those sheets. I mean, they are nice and warm. They would keep us cozy during those winter nights out on the farm. Darin can mock me all he wants, but below freezing at night with no heat!?! Come on people, that is cold! If you know me, you know I do not like to be cold. Give me sunshine and warmth any day. Flip flops year round? I'm in!

We were driving around and I was giving Darin some reasons why I think we'll be leaving the sheets behind. First, I really want to buy one of those heated mattress pads with separate heating zones, so I can keep my tootsies nice and toasty and the rest of my body cool. Second, the washing machine we'll be using is small and there is no dryer. Flannel sheets are kind of bulky and totally heavy when wet. Out at the farm, we'll most likely be falling into bed with dirty feet and less than perfectly clean bodies and our sheets will need to be washed often. Washing and air drying flannel doesn't sound very fun to me.

Tonight I watched something that made the whole issue of taking or leaving flannel sheets so much more to me. If I haven't mentioned it before, I am a blog stalker. That means I read lots of blogs of people that I do not even know. Strange? Maybe, but it's what I do. Tonight as I was ~~stalking~~ reading blogs I took the time to watch the following videos of a family that went to Uganda to bring home their son and daughter. Here is part one and here is part two. While I was watching these videos, I was reminded of why we wanted to move to South Africa back in 2008. We had made connections to people that were doing good in their communities and we wanted to get involved with these local organizations because we felt we had gifts and talents that God could use to help them and help others as well. Not that we are so great or so capable, but tonight I was reminded that we both felt like God was calling us to do more than live out our days in Hudsonville, Michigan wrapped up in our flannel sheets! I want to feel that way again.

I confess that over these last few months of waiting and anticipating and a whole lot of other -ings, I have been focused on the wrong things. I have lost sight of where God has called us to go and why. In fact, it isn't so much losing sight of it, but I haven't even been searching for His vision. I have been caught up in where we'll live, worrying myself about what school will best fit out kids, what church we'll go to, how often Darin will need to be at work and how we can somehow figure out these things and then triangulate the perfect location for us to live based on these places we need to get to. I've left no room for what God might have in store for us. None at all.

I've been tied down by more than flannel sheets. I've been trying to drag my whole life out to South Africa. How can I replicate the school experience that my kids would have here, out there? How can I find a church to meet our needs, be it kids programs, a Bible study for me (Beth Moore to be specific), or a worship service that is similar to what we experience at our church? Is it going to be more fun/relaxing/easy to live outside the city or out in the country? Where can I go and what can I do to find people like me to be friends with?

Our church recently wrapped up a year long series on how this life we are living is not about us. I am not the main character in the story, God is. He is the author and He is also the one the whole story is about. And here, for the last 10 months, I've been making it all about me. No wonder it's been such a struggle. Almost as bad as wrestling wet flannel sheets onto a laundry line.

A look ahead

2011-02-17T15:59:00.000-08:00

When we went to South Africa in 2008, we had the privilege to stay in an amazing house right across from Tshepo Ya Bana, the children's home run by Mark and Chris Harding. The house we stayed in belonged to their son and daughter, who both had homes in the city and used this property as a vacation home. I believe I already mentioned this in an earlier post, but when we head overseas in June, we will be going back to this same house. I thought I would share some pictures that we took in 2008 so you can see (or remember) where we'll be living for the first few months of our upcoming adventure.

Standing in the "front" door

Kitchen and laundry room (that's a wash machine under the counter)

Living room

Sitting room, looking into Tyson's room

Sliders in the sitting room

Tyson's room

Straight ahead, our room; to the right, Jori's room

I can't believe Jori was small enough that we had her in a crib!

Our bedroom

Master bath with gigantic tub

These pictures show the parts of the house that we used most often. There was also a huge loft area off of Jori's room and another loft area over the living room. There were also two other bedrooms and a bathroom off of the kitchen. Let's not forget about the great outdoors! We spent a LOT of time outside and ate a lot of meals out there too.

Can't believe how little these two were!

Our favorite place to sit

Walking to shut the gate

Swing Amos made for the kids

We really did love the time we spent at this house. I think we might try to get Internet hooked up this time around as it was tough not being able to communicate with people unless we went to town or across the road, which were not the most convenient options.

Hope you enjoyed the look back. I know that seeing these pictures does make me more excited to go back. If you want to see more pictures of our time in South Africa, you can click where it says "view my gallery" on the right side of my blog.

A look back to October 2010

2011-02-15T09:55:00.000-08:00

So this weekend I had the privilege of getting together with some of my college friends in Lansing. First we stopped over at Amy's house to spend some time loving on sweet baby Nora, then we headed to Grand Traverse Pie Co. for dinner and dessert. A good time was had by all!

We do a lot of talking while we are together about all sorts of topics and I just had to share about my new tech savvy-ness. When the subject of my blog came up, these dear friends reminded me that I had somehow never posted anything about our 10 year college reunion, which took place in October! Fail.

So, without further ado, I present reunion weekend 2010!

On Friday night we had our 10 year reunion. I am just going to say it was pathetic. Seriously sad. If our group from First Rooks (plus husbands) hadn't been there, I think the number of attendees would have shrunk by a third. If all former residents of RVD had not attended, the total number would have probably shrunk by half. I guess our old dorm just had a lot of spirit! We've all agreed that we would be better off skipping the next reunion and using the money to go out for a fabulous meal instead. That being said, it was fun to catch up with people that I hadn't seen since we graduated and being with my girls is always fun.

Amy, Pauline, Michelle, Kara, Sarah and me

Best college roomie EVER!!

The happy parents to be

On Saturday, we had a baby shower for Amy. We didn't know at that time that sweet Nora would be showing up a little over a month later, instead of 3 months later when she was due! (She's a red head. Need I say more?) It was so fun to be able to sit and talk and eat (cheesecake bars!!!) and share together.


Me, Amy, Kara, Tracey, Pauline, Jenny, Julie, Sarah and Michelle (we missed you Lisa!)

See the cute little onesies behind us? Sarah had the great idea to get a little crafty instead of playing the typical baby shower games. It was so fun! She had all the fabric laid out, a few patterns we could follow, and all the stuff to stick the appliques on the onesies. Fun! That night, those of us who were available went out to dinner. I think we just wanted to soak up as much time together as possible!

On Sunday we gathered together with our families and went to Frog Hollow Park. It was so much fun seeing the kids play together. They were running around, playing soccer, eating cookies and just having a good time.

Tyson hanging around

Grace (Pauline's) and Jori

Kate and Maria (Jenny's)

Kids playing soccer with Greg. Check out his mini-mi, Christopher, right in front of him.

Simon and Jack (Michelle's)

Fenced in parks are the best!


The whole gang!

Keegan (Kara's), Miles (Sarah's),Christopher, Gracie and James (up front with stripes-Pauline's), Tyson, Tate (Kara's), Jori, Jack and Liam (in black, Michelle's), Kate and Maria (Jenny's), and Josiah (Sarah's)


And they're done

It was a wonderful weekend. Who knew when we first arrived on campus in 1996 that over 14 years later most of us would still be living in the Grand Rapids area. Who knew we'd still be staying in contact enough to be truly invested in each others lives? I am so thankful that God saw fit to put a group of girls from all over the continent, three from Michigan (none from GR), one from California, another from Washington, one from Indiana, two from Ohio, one from Pennsylvania and of course a lovable Canadian and that all these years later our friendships continue to grow!

Somebody stop me!

2011-02-14T13:36:00.000-08:00

So I've added another feature to my blog. In the top right corner, it now says "subscribe via email". Under this, there is a box where you can enter your email address, then click on the word "subscribe" below the box. Then, another box should pop up where you enter a word verification. Then you will be prompted to go to your email to check for an email with a subscription verification. You may need to check your junk/spam mail if you don't receive this email in a reasonable amount of time. I tried it out, and I hopped right over to my email account and the verification email was there. Then I just clicked on the link in the email and Voila! I had successfully signed up to receive an email notification when a new post was added to my blog! So try it out, and let me know what you think!

**I am waiting to receive an email that shows my blog has been updated since I wrote this post, but it hasn't come through yet. I am not giving up! I'll see if it comes later today or tomorrow (I don't know if updates are sent out once a day or each time I add a new post) and if I still haven't seen anything by tomorrow, I'll try, try again!

*** Hooray! It worked. This morning I had an email from "Fee Fey Foe Fum" and the whole blog post was right in the email. You can also click on the title of the post, which was in blue and it will take you right to the actual blog, which is great because I don't want people to stop commenting!!

Feeling tech savvy!

2011-02-11T15:45:00.000-08:00

I had been contemplating switching my blog from blogspot to Wordpress recently. One of the main reasons I wanted to do this was because in Wordpress, if you leave a comment you can subscribe to receive follow up comments by email. I often leave comments on other blogspot blogs and have to go back to check if anyone has responded to my comments. Sometimes I would forget to go back and check.

Anyways, with us getting ready to head to South Africa in a few months I wanted to make our blog a place where I could more easily communicate with family and friends. Tonight I think I actually figured out how to do that and still keep using our current blogspot blog! Go me!! I am usually computer illiterate, so I am pretty pumped.

Now you can click where it says "Subscribe by email" and any comments made after your comment will be emailed to you. If you leave a comment, I can reply directly to your comment, which you'll then receive if you've subscribed by email, and then (if I read everything correctly) you can reply to my reply by email and keep the conversation going!

So if you read this post or any others, please leave a comment so I can see if it works : ) Otherwise I might still be switching my blog!

**I thought I should add that you will need to register with disqus to leave a comment, but I am pretty sure that the first time you try to comment, you'll be able to get an account all set up. If you can't figure it out (mom) let me know!

Fighting Fear...again.

2011-02-09T12:32:00.000-08:00

So last night I am laying in bed and my jaw starts hurting. Then my head starts hurting. Why all this pain? I just want to sleep! Then I realize I am starting to clench my jaw and grind my teeth and upon stopping the swirling in my mind, I realize that I am slowly starting to drown in thoughts about the kids school situation when we get to South Africa. Now folks, I have 4 months until we move, and I've already decided to give the kids a summer break til September AND we've decided to "home school" (aka-keep them from falling behind) until the new school year starts in January 2012, so WHY AM I ALREADY LOSING SLEEP OVER THIS???

It's fear. Plain and simple. Fear that I will not be able to teach my kids anything. Fear that they will not respect me as a "teacher", fear that we will all simply hate homeschooling and cry every day about it (ok, that might just be something I will end up doing). Then I have all these fears about the differences in the South African school system compared to the schools my kids are currently at. I know there will be differences, but I've already totally built them up in my head to be insurmountable and horrible and that I'll be damaging Tyson and Jori's childhoods beyond repair by taking them to an unknown country them dumping them into a school system that I have never experienced.

There are so many unknowns and so many different things that could happen between now and January 2012. We could all love homeschooling and decide to do it permanently. Darin could decide to home school and totally remove the burden from me : ) There are quite a few different schools in the area we'll be moving to and we could stop to visit one and fall in love with it. At this point, we don't know if our kids will go to the public school or one of the many private schools in the area.

This morning as I was driving the kids to school I realized that all these fears I started having last night were stealing my joy! I went to bed worrying about the kids schooling and woke up with fears that I am ruining their childhood by taking them from all that is familiar. One fear leads to another, and another and another and instead of feeling myself move in the direction of peace, my heart grows anxious. I have just recently started feeling more positive about our upcoming move, and Satan, the joy stealer, seems to be finding ways to take these happy feelings and crush them to the ground.

Well NO MORE. He's not stealing my joy. I threw my mouth guard away when we moved to this apartment, and I am NOT going to shell out the money for another one, so the teeth grinding has got to stop! No more fear induced jaw clenching for me. "The JOY of the LORD is my strength!" (Neh 8:10)

Pictures of our new home

2011-02-07T12:12:00.000-08:00

As promised, I cleaned up (a bit) and took some pictures so you can all see where we are currently living. It did not take me very long : )

Here is the view when you open our door:

The room at the end of the hall is our bedroom, the kids bathroom is to the left of ours, the bathroom is right before the hall carpet stops, just past the open door, and the rest of the apartment is across from the bathroom.
Speaking of the bathroom, here it is:

Nice and big!

Storage closet tucked behind the door

Missing the 6 drawers plus cupboard space in my old bathroom

Next stop, our room:

This is all of it!

We can't have our foot board on our bed or our drawers wouldn't open!

Tyson and Jori lucked out with the master bedroom:

Looking through the doorway

Tyson's "room". The

Play room, and a peek into Jori's "room"

Master bedroom closet or perfect bedroom for a 4 year old?

Jori's special things

Now the living area.

This is the view from the hallway

The kitchen

The dining room


The living room

Finally, the spare room, which is right off of the living room. This is where we are storing all of the things we are planning to leave in Edgerton, take with us to South Africa or sell.

It's a mess in there and I really don't feel like tackling it today, or any day for that matter, but I'll have to get started at some point. I am currently missing 2 out of 3 pairs of Tyson's school pants and 2 harmonicas. I am not really that eager to find the harmonicas, but not knowing where they are is driving me nuts.

So that is it, our temporary home until we move into our temporary South African home. Sorry about the blurry pictures and the wonky spacing.

Apartment Living

2011-02-06T12:26:00.000-08:00

Ok, so my goal for tomorrow is to clean up our new home a bit so I can take some pictures to show you all. For now I will just give a little insight into apartment living. First of all, it has been over 10 years since I last lived in an apartment, and that was technically college housing so it was a little different than an actual apartment. Darin lived in an apartment for a little over a year after college, so it has been just under 10 years for him. Our first home was a 100+ year old two-family home in Zeeland, not an apartment like many newlyweds live in. Our second home was the one we just moved from-a brand new single family home in Hudsonville. All that to say apartment living is something new to our whole family : )

Overall, I really like it here. It is cozy and our whole family can usually see one another. The computer is in the same room as the TV instead of being upstairs like it was in our old house, and I kind of like that too. The kitchen is small, but I am not a huge cook or baker, so it is ok. The bathroom is huge, which makes its single status a lot easier to handle. Our bedroom is dark and pretty quiet. No more bowling alley pins being knocked down or headlights shining through the window like we had at our old house.

There are some things that are a little annoying. It is HOT in here, and for me to say that really means something because I am usually freezing my hind end off during the winter! At our last house, I would wear two pairs of socks (one wool), long sleeves and a large sweatshirt and I would still be cold. Sometimes I'd have all that on and be huddled under a blanket and I'd find myself wishing I could turn the heat up past the 68 degrees it was set at. Now I am usually sock less and wearing short sleeves. Darin and Jori are both sweating hot. Right now, our heat is set at 60, but it is 72 in our apartment. That is WITH the slider and a window open, so believe me when I say it is hot!

We also have very hot water. We have no control over setting the water temperature, and I am sure if it was set any lower there wouldn't be enough hot water for the 8 apartments that share this building, but I am just praying the kids don't accidentally turn on the hot water faucet! They would get burned. I am also not sure that either of them will be taking showers while we live here. I have already experienced the burning hot water raining down on me and it was not fun. Our complex must also use water softener, which means our water is kind of cloudy and if you are in the shower or bath for too long (which is not long enough for me!) your fingers get all pruny. Yesterday Jori was like "look at my fingers" and sure enough, prune city.

We have a washer and dryer in our building for the 8 units to share. I have done 2 loads of laundry. The washer is super fast. I think it took 15 minutes to do a load. The dryer has three settings to choose from. I have tried 2 of the 3 and my clothes were still a little damp after the dryer shut off. Sadly the 3rd setting is for delicates, so I doubt it will solve my problem! Thankfully everything dried up after laying it on the back of the sofa for a couple hours. I may as well get used to hanging my clothes out to dry before we go to SA!

I miss having a yard. Right now our kids are out, and they actually found some other kids to play with, but I don't actually know where they are right now. Our windows only look out 2 sides of the building, so if they are up front or on the South side of the building, I can't see them at all. We are also surrounded by strangers now, but I try not to think about that too much! Hudsonville is full of good people, right?

I am not a fan of "communal" living, but maybe God will use this to make me more hospitable and aware of others. I like to have the freedom to sing as loud as I want and for the kids to have dance parties and run and jump in the house, but now we have people on 2 sides of us and below us, so we need to be considerate of our new neighbors. My one consolation is that I haven't heard any noise from our neighbors unless both of our kids are in bed and the TV is off. The only really loud thing is the buzzer/doorbell. You can hear it ring even if it isn't in your apartment.

If we had our own yard, control of the water heater and water softener and control over our indoor heating, I think I could easily live in a space this size. I thought it would be horrible, but our little family is doing just fine.

Last Week on Elm Avenue, First Week on Balsam Drive

2011-02-05T18:58:00.000-08:00

Our last week in our house was full! The kids took time to play out in the big snow piles left by the plow...

...and they spent a lot of time in their new fort under the stairs. Guess I should have emptied out that space a long time ago!

It was a good thing they had this little corner of the house to themselves as I was busy packing up the rest of the house! Here's what things looked like on Wednesday:

Lining up things to take, things to sell and things to save

The cupboards were bare...

This is how things looked on Friday night:

The contents of our closets-we have too many clothes!

Nearly all our possessions stacked up in the living room

It was a very emotional and tiring week. Darin and I were so blessed by the friends that reached out to us and helped us in so many different ways. On Friday, our friends Curt and Juli took our kids overnight. We owe them BIG as Tyson and Jori have never been on a sleepover before and did not really handle their new found freedom very well! On Saturday, 6 guys showed up and in just over an hour they had loaded up the contents of our house AND moved them to our new apartment! It was just crazy fast. Having a big truck (thanks Curt!) really helped speed the process up. We know that there were also many other people praying for the whole process to go smoothly and for strength and peace for our whole family. Our neighbors were also so kind and dropped off food and treats! That just really touched me, so Cindy and Beth, if you ever read this, I just want you to know how thankful I am for the 5+ years we've had to get to know you and your families!

On Saturday afternoon, Darin headed back to the house to load up a few odds and ends (which he would continue to do over the next few days!) and I started unpacking boxes. Juli dropped our kids off by Darin and then he brought them over to check out our home for the next 4 1/2 months. As we were moving things in earlier in the day, Darin and I quickly realized that there was no way the kids could share the room we had picked for them, so they ended up getting the master bedroom. Sweet Jori is actually sleeping in the walk-in closet and is quite pleased to have her own door and her own light switch! We spent a couple hours getting beds put together and rooms arranged, then we headed to Grand Rapids to pick up my mom who was in town for a conference. We had already had dinner with her in GR on Wednesday night, but were looking forward to having her stay with us for a few days. That night we were blessed again by our friends Andy and Whitney and the delicious dinner they dropped off. Seriously, it was amazing and when Whitney gets me the recipe, I WILL be sharing it!

The next few days were kind of crazy. It is much harder getting ready in one bathroom when you are used to having 4. Not that we ever used them all at once, but one bathroom is not always the most convenient! On Monday, Jori stayed home from school. She threw up a few times the night before and although she woke up feeling just fine, I couldn't very well send her. It was not very fun having a sick child in a new environment. We no longer have our own washer and dryer, so I just wadded all her sheets up and ended up taking them back to our house and washed them on Monday. One last load of free laundry! She did help my mom and me pack up all of my breakable things and glassware that we'll be storing in Edgerton. It was nice getting that done. On Tuesday morning, I drove Tyson to school so that we could make one last stop at our house for the kids to say goodbye.

Tyson showing us how he feels in front of his empty closet

Sweet Jori sitting where her bed used to be : (

This video makes me laugh. They went through the whole house and kissed it all good-bye.

Then it was time to take Tyson to school. That afternoon, us three ladies went out to lunch and then had coffee over at Rachel's. It was nice to get out of the house, especially since all we were hearing about on the news was that a huge storm was coming through. Not that the weather people are ever right or anything...
Later in the afternoon, Darin and I met in Holland at the title company to sign all the closing papers on our house. To say I was not in the best of moods would be an understatement. I think that there are some parts of this whole move to Africa that I am still struggling with, so at times I feel like I have had to give up my house against my will (not my will, but HIS be done!) and so it hurts and makes me kind of angry. So I angrily signed the papers and then we drove back to our old house to fill up the van and truck with another load of stuff. It was cold and had started snowing and I was not happy that my dear husband still wasn't finished emptying out our house when the new owner was going to be taking possession of it the next morning! She actually started moving stuff in that night (with our permission) and Darin met her. I kind of wish I had been there, but with my personality, it is probably better that I wasn't. : )

I had picked up 5 movies at the library on Tuesday, so the kids enjoyed a little Sleeping Beauty while the pumpkin goodness baked. Does anyone else think the Disney movies are a little freaky?? Then it was time to play in the snow. It was very cold, so we made sure to bundle them up! The first time they went out, Jori ended up losing a boot in the snow. I think we got over 16 inches, so her poor little self had a hard time getting through the snow. I went out and dug it up. Thankfully I had an extra pair of boots for her because the other one was soaked! After that, I told them to play in the parking lot which had already been plowed once.

Checking out the icicles

Sure wish we had our sledding hill today!

Snow piles from the plow

Jori didn't last very long in the snow, but Tyson ended up meeting a couple kids, so he stayed out for a while. Wednesday night we didn't do a whole lot. Gram helped the kids with baths and gave them lots of cuddles. Then she and Darin worked on getting all of her stuff and a bunch of our stuff into her suitcase. I am not sure how they did it, but they got it all in.

Thursday morning school was canceled again, which worked out rather nicely because Tyson was able to go along to the airport! The roads were still a little slick and there was a lot of snow, but we made it and helped Gram get all her luggage inside. After she checked in, we sat in the play area for a while, then noticed that the line at the security gate was getting really long, so it was time to start saying goodbye. There were lots of hugs and kisses for and from the kids. They were saying stuff like "We'll come see you in Lynden" and "You and Pop will come see us in Hudsonville, right?" and that just made me sad. Those things are most likely not going to be happening between now and June 11. Gram told them she'd be coming to see us all in South Africa and would be bringing all sorts of treasures for them, like mini marshmallows! The line was slowly moving closer to the spot that the kids and I couldn't go past. The kids were running around a bit, and it was time for me to say goodbye to my mom. It sucked. I thought I could make myself just not think about how long this goodbye might be for, but when it came down to it, I couldn't. The heart knows. So we are both crying and now we are at the point where Gram has to keep walking. I just stood there and we kept waving and smiling at each other. Then she was almost around the corner, so I called the kids over and we all waved and hollered our goodbyes one last time. Then when we couldn't see her anymore, we started to make our way out of the airport, me crying, the kids chattering away. Jori finally sees my tears and offers me her friend, Beary. She said "Gram gave him lots of hugs and kisses before she left, so you can have one". Sweet girl. When I talked to my mom later, she said she couldn't get her tears to stop either. It is just so hard to really think about what our leaving means, as far as our personal relationships go. We are used to seeing one or both of my parents a few times each year, so this is going to be a huge change for us all!

We left the airport, came back to our apartment and had lunch. The kids spent the rest of the afternoon either watching Pete's Dragon (mostly Jori) or playing outside (mostly Tyson). They also spent a lot of time on the computer. It has been a hard adjustment getting used to being in such a confined space, and two snow days in a row did not help things. Tyson and Jori are used to their own rooms, and while Jori does have a door to her closet hideaway, it just isn't the same. There is also no basement to run around in and our living area is filled with furniture.

Now it is Saturday night. We have been in our new home for a week. We have enjoyed a quiet weekend-pizza last night, running errands and spending time at the McDonald's play area this afternoon, potato soup and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang tonight, followed by almost 45 minutes of the kids playing together! I am still tired from moving and sleeping in a new place and feeling stressed that our new neighbors must think that we have elephants living with us, but I am also starting to feel more hopeful about the future.

Catching up!

2011-02-05T17:40:00.000-08:00

I know, it has been a while since I wrote. Packing up a house, moving to a much smaller place, spending time-then saying goodbye to my mom, dealing with lots of mixed emotions-those are just some of the things I've been keeping busy with. I also have just not really wanted to write. However, I know that the best thing to do is to JUST DO IT and then it will become much easier to get in the habit again. True of a lot of things in life!

So first, I need to go back to early January, soon after we got back from Lynden. We finally had some snow in Michigan and the kids were excited to get out and play!

Tyson building a ramp for the sleds

Can you tell our girl is not happy?!

Here are a couple videos of the kids sledding. Darin is pointing out that the "ramp" is next to the shovel.

We had (and are still having) a lot of fun with our new Wii Fit. Darin and I are amazed at how much quickly the kids pick up on the different games. Tyson is such a good reader that he can figure out the instructions on his own, which is quite handy! He is also one of the itchiest/twitchiest kids we know as you'll see in the video of him below. He's always scratching at something. Jori loves giving Tyson helpful hints on how to play all the games. I am sure you will hear some of them below.

Let's see how many more videos I can upload on this post! On the 25th, we had Jenna and JJ over to play and sled. We wanted the kids to have one last chance to all play together in our house. It was a little crazy, as I had already started packing and Darin was having a horrid week at work and didn't get home as early as I hoped he would, but the kids had fun and I am thankful they'll have those memories together. I just wish I would have taken more pictures and videos-especially after Jon, Rachel and Reid came and Jon tried out the Wii Hula Hoop. Oh my. I know people who'd pay to see that!

Jori and Jenna sledding


JJ hanging out on the swings

This video makes me laugh. Jori and Jenna usually get along perfectly, but today they were a little out of sorts with each other. Jori made sure to keep bringing up the snowball that Jenna threw in her face the rest of the night : )

And here poor Jori takes a tumble while JJ just keeps swinging away.

We had such a fun night together with the Huisman's. I wish I had some pictures of our pizza party and Wii playing, but I don't. I guess that just means we'll have to do it again!

Falling into place

2011-01-19T12:11:00.000-08:00

Well, after my last post, I was just having a hard time getting back on here to write. I guess I have been stuck in a rut, having an extra long pity party, freaking out, or some combo of these things, but I am back, for now!

A lot of stuff has happened for us over the past week. Yep, it was only a week ago that EVERYTHING was up in the air and I was pretty much going out of my mind. Now, just 7 days later, things have all fallen into place. Praise God. I know it had to be Him, because I was certainly not doing anything productive or helpful during that time.

First, we will be closing on our house next Friday, the 28th and moving to our new apartment on the 29th. (If anyone wants our new address, leave your email address in the comments section and I will get it to you. ) So that is huge. I am feeling ok about moving. Honestly, I am not thrilled about moving to an apartment because we have been so spoiled having our own house, with our own yard, where we don't need to worry if the kids are stomping too loudly on the floors, a garage and shed for bikes and cars and so much more. Now we will have a three bedroom apartment, second floor, no garage, no yard. After storing our bikes for the winter (thanks Jon and Rachel!) we will be keeping them in our spare bedroom, assuming it is still a spare room and one of the kids isn't sleeping in it. Oh yes, we are going to try having them sleep together so that we can have one room to store all of our "moving to Africa" stuff. It is all going to be fine. Different, but good. The apartment complex is really nice and we will still be living right by all the stuff we are familiar with, so it is all going to be ok.

The other big news is that we picked a time to head overseas AND made flight reservations, which means this is really happening! On Saturday June 11 we will be leaving Grand Rapids around 4:30, heading to Chicago where we'll sit til around 8. Then we'll fly through the night to London, land around 9, have a TEN HOUR layover (hello Big Ben!) get back on another plane that night and arrive in South Africa a little after 6 on Monday morning. Crazy, I know, but I am also trying to tell myself it is going to be really fun and that we will all sleep for at least 3/4 of each flight. Maybe you can all start praying for that right now!

So, all is well. Right now I am just trying to sort out stuff to get rid of, stuff we need for the next 4 1/2 months and stuff we need to take along with us when we move. It is overwhelming and stressful, but compared to a lot of other things that people are dealing with, it's not bad at all. I can do ALL things through HIM who gives me strength!

2011-01-12T19:48:00.000-08:00

Tonight I am sad. I feel overwhelmed by all the choices we need to make in the next few weeks. For those who may not know, last week we sold our house. Yay! I know, it's only a tiny yay, but that's more than I was feeling this weekend. I feel like I should be so happy right now that our house has sold and our plans to head overseas can start moving forward. Instead I just feel sad and confused and like we were totally crazy when we decided this was a good idea, this of course referring to our plan to move our family to South Africa, start up a business that we have no experience in, and then support ourselves so we can get involved in some type of missions or community development. Who does that? Oh, yeah...we do that.

Right now everything is up in the air. We don't have a definite date that we are moving out of our house. We should know for sure next week. Once we know that, we can make a plan for some temporary housing, we just don't know how temporary our housing will be. We've talked about moving in April and we've talked about moving in June. We don't know where we'll be living once we sell this house and we don't know where we'll be living once we move to South Africa. It seems like so many things are dependent on other things and there are some decisions we can't make until we get information from other people, so everything just kind of stands still. In the mean time, we may have 3 weeks here or we may have a little more. In that time, we have a house that needs to be packed up, items that need to be sorted through, kids to explain things to, and normal life to live.

Tyson and Jori seem to be doing ok, but I honestly don't know what is going on in their little heads. Jori is fixated on taking one of her baby dolls along. It is an ugly baby, one that I took away several months ago and she never missed. However, I didn't actually throw it away, so it was discovered a couple days ago and now she is totally stuck on having this doll. I don't think she actually wants the doll, but I think it is just something for her to hold on to. So for now I'll give her the doll and then we'll figure it out in 2 months, or 4 months or however many months from now it happens to be when we finally move to South Africa.Because we ARE moving to South Africa. I think I need to say that more for myself than for anyone who might be reading this.

The reality is that at some point in the next 6 months (why not give myself some extra time!) we will be moving to a new country. A place where we (thankfully) have some connections and are somewhat familiar with, but a place that will be very different as a long term home than it was as a short term holiday. We will be far away from family and friends. There will be no 12 hour drives to Edgerton, no 4 hour flights to Washington. We will be thousands of miles away from the people that we hang out with on a weekly basis. We won't be able to stop in at Auntie Rachel's house for a few minutes, which often turns into a half hour or more. We won't have our church, our small group, my women's Bible study-all the things that have helped us with our spiritual footing will be gone. We will be in a totally different time zone. Making phone calls is not going to be quite so quick and easy anymore. We won't have our trusted babysitter Elisabeth right down the road, which means we probably won't be having many date nights.

Right now I am just kind of at a place where all I am seeing is the things we are giving up. The things that we will be losing. I know, deep down I really do know, that once we are on the other side, things will look brighter. I know that our family had such a great experience over the 10 weeks we lived in South Africa. I know that Darin and I grew closer to one another and closer to God as well. It is just really hard for me to push through all the chaos and confusion that I feel surrounded by right now. It is hard to think of the good stuff that's coming when I have so many goodbyes to say and tears to cry on this side of the ocean.

Our Despicable Night

2011-01-11T11:47:00.000-08:00

On Saturday, we had a fun family night planned. It started with some "despicable" bacon pizza from Marcos. Yum! Check out our crazy girl wearing shorts and a tank top in the picture below! Seriously, it is snowing and so cold here, I just don't get it.

Then it was time to watch the movie "Despicable Me". I had wanted to see this movie since I first saw the previews. It just looked so funny. The kids loved it and Darin and I were also laughing throughout. Thanks Jenna and JJ for letting us borrow your Christmas present!

After the movie, we had a delicious dessert of "despicable" brownies and ice cream. When I went to dish out dessert for the kids, I saw that someone had already sneaked a few bites. It wasn't me, so that only leaves one dieting dad to blame : )

We had such a fun Saturday night. I love having movie nights with the kids, and pizza and brownies just made the night extra special.

Christmas in Lynden-Part 4

2011-01-02T17:58:00.000-08:00

Now it is Tuesday and Kristi and her boys are going to be leaving later in the day and Uncle Josh will be heading out that night. Josh and Darin are still making their way back up from Seattle with a load of Josh's stuff, so the rest of us head to the beach/ocean. My mom, Kristi and I drop off my dad and the kids so they can take Pebbles for a little walk. After making sure they were all bundled up, I left my camera with my dad and the three ladies took a little drive and waited for the kids and Papa to catch up.

Papa, Gage (10), Tyson, Jori Gram and Sawyer (9)

The kiddos

Pointing at the bald eagle

Showing off a rock

Buddies

Another shot of Tyson peeking around Pebbles

The Eagle has landed

After we met up, Darin and Josh called to tell us they were back in Lynden, so we drove off to meet them at Bob's Burgers. We were all HUNGRY so the food tasted extra good.

Kristi and her boys left for home, so we had to say more good byes. Ugh! So not my favorite thing to do. Then we headed back to my parents house and hung out with Uncle Josh and Pebbles.

Loving on Uncle Josh

Snuggling with Papa

Josh left Tuesday night to finish cleaning up his house and moving his stuff to his temporary residence. It was a good thing he left when he did because we woke up to a light dusting of snow on Wednesday. On Wednesday afternoon, Jori and I headed over to my friend Kelly's house so she and Addie could play together. It was nice to visit with a friend and I know Jori loved having a little girl to hang out with! We hung out that night and spent more time together on Thursday. It is pretty pathetic that it is only Sunday and I already can't remember what we did! I know we had an awesome steak dinner on Thursday. Sorry sissies, but there were only 4 steaks, so mom and dad saved them for me : )

Then it was Friday. We had to be up and ready to head to the airport by 8. Darin had left his backpack at Josh's house and our van keys were in the backpack, so we had to make a little side trip first. I made sure to take some pictures that morning, but I could tell that I was already starting to dread saying good bye again.

Gram and her grands

We love you Papa and Gram!!!

I wish I could say that the ride to the airport was uneventful, but it was not. Tyson was complaining about not feeling well and a little over half way through our trip he threw up oatmeal and blueberries. Poor kid. Then we stopped in at Uncle Josh's, changed Tyson's clothes, got the van keys and back pack, then headed to the airport. Then it was time to say good bye to my parents. I finally let myself really think about how long this goodbye could be for and when I was hugging my dad I lost it. Bleh. It's not that I don't like crying. I actually am a big fan of letting it all out, but saying good bye to loved ones is almost physically painful, and I am realizing that we have a lot more goodbyes to go. I am so thankful that my mom is coming out here at the end of January, so I didn't have to say the hard goodbye to her yet!

We had a wonderful time in Washington and I was reminded again and again of how blessed I am to be a part of my family and how much I love each person in it!

Christmas in Lynden-Part 3

2011-01-02T17:29:00.000-08:00

On Sunday, we all got up and headed to church. Then we spent the rest of the day challenging each other on the Wii, playing cards and just hanging out. Jori loved spending time with Kelsey, the only other girl cousin on my side of the family. On Sunday, Gram and the Aunties let the girls use their makeup to get dolled up. I would have let them use mine if I had more than powder and chapstick to offer.

All dolled up

When they came down after almost an hour of getting ready, you could tell that Jori had been busy. I think Kelsey might have been hoping Jori would be her model so she could pretty her up, but Jori wanted to do a lot of her own make-up. If you click on the picture above, you can a larger image. I think she actually did a pretty good job, but her face and neck were two totally different tones and the purple (and pink!) eye shadow and dark lipstick were a bit much for a Sunday afternoon.

Did I mention how much we all love Pebbles the dog? Well we do. Even I love her, and I usually push people's pets off the couch if they try to sit by me, or kick at them if they get to close to wear I am sitting! I just love this dog.

Hoping to find Pebbles twin in South Africa

Me and my baby

Then Monday rolled around. Laurie was going to be leaving later that day, and Darin and Josh were going to be heading to Seattle to pack up some of Josh's apartment, so they were going to be heading South as well. We (the ladies) decided to go to the mall and have Darin and Josh bring Laurie's loaded up van with her 4 kids to the mall so she could leave from there. That meant the kids had to say good-bye to their Auntie before we left for the mall.

Laurie DiAnn and Jori DiAnn

Three lovely ladies

Papa and Darin were going to take the kids to the park while we were gone, and the kids were so eager to go that they loaded themselves up and sat in the van for about 30 minutes while we finished packing Laurie's van.


Even Pebbles is buckled in

Since Laurie wouldn't be coming back with us, it was time to take a few more pictures. I knew it was going to be time to say good-bye soon and that really stunk.

Me and my "big" sisters

The 4 of us

We had a great time at the mall, and I managed to keep it together saying good bye to the Molan clan in the Kohl's parking lot. I know if I had let myself really think about how long it might be til I see them again I would have been crying, so it was just easier to stay in denial.

One more part of our Christmas vacation to go!

Christmas in Lynden -part 2

2011-01-02T17:06:00.000-08:00

Ok, we left off with the cousins and Aunties and everyone else arriving. It was wonderful to have so much of the family together in one place. It would have been great if Danny and SooHee could have been there as well, but I am just glad we saw them this summer!

Being in a house with so many people, things are bound to get a little silly. The kids found Papa John's wig and decided to try it on:

Tyson in the wig

Pebbles looking like one of the Beatles

Maybe it's better that he doesn't have much hair...

Jori with her thick, dark locks

On Christmas Eve, Darin and Josh arrived with Pebbles and all the girls went to church with my parents that night. On Christmas day, we all kind of laid low (at least that is how I remember things) and then we had a really nice ham dinner that afternoon and then it was time to open presents.

New gloves from Papa and Gram

Barbie clothes from Kelsey


Money and a free hamburger coupon from the Molan's and Auntie Kristi : )


Thanks Uncle Josh!

Molan kids unwrapping their present from Papa and Gram

Papa and Gram getting hugs for the new Wii

Mario Cart and a new Wii fit for the Fey's

We all made out like bandits. I think my favorite things to watch people open were the gifts from Josh. He is in the process of moving (eventually to California) and had recently cleaned out his house. Darin and I received a meat thermometer, which will be handy when we braai (grill out) in South Africa. My parents received a down comforter that Josh was allergic too (I'd have snapped it up if we were staying in the states!), a duvet cover and a mattress pad. My sisters received the best things. Laurie got some swiffer wet pads, with no swiffer (although my mom later dug it out of Josh's trash) and a really nice insulated cooler bag and Kristi got a wine aerator and some spices. I loved laughing with my whole family as each of us opened our gifts! My parents made all the kids (and parents) happy and gave Wii's and Wii fits to everyone. Gage and Sawyer got theirs on Sunday, so they weren't left out. My sisters gave me a necklace, which I absolutely love.

It has parts of two Bible verses on it-Deuteronomy 31:8, which says "The Lord Himself goes before me and He will be with me" and Deuteronomy 30:19 "Listen to His voice; Hold fast to Him". I love it and if I had been forced to read the verses when it was given to me, I would have broken down in tears. So if you didn't know before, I love it and am so touched by the words on it!

The rest of the night was spent hanging out, playing the new Wii games and just relaxing.

Mario Cart

Our favorite pooch

My husband

Christmas 2010 in Lynden, WA

2011-01-01T16:45:00.000-08:00

After 3 years of spending Christmas with Darin's family, we finally spent Christmas 2010 in Lynden with the Van Schepen's. Don't get me wrong, I wish we could be two places at once, because we missed being in Edgerton, but we sure had a lot of fun with my family!

On Friday, December 17, we headed for Chicago to stay at a hotel. Early the next morning, Darin took the kids and I to the airport and our adventure began. My Uncle Herm and his wife Libby picked us up at the Sea/Tac airport a little before 11 Saturday morning and we were in Lynden before 2 that afternoon, happy to be back with Papa and Gram. Tyson and Jori were eager to run around and I was glad to have some extra hands to help me with the kids!

The kids and I were the only ones at my folks until Thursday. We hung out that weekend with my parents and the Korean students that are staying at their house this year. My mom and I did some shopping and my dad entertained the kids at home and took them to his church so he could try and get some work done on his sermons. That was not going to happen! The kids just wanted to keep seeing what Papa was doing. Papa and the kids also went to a farm that a family from their church owns. They saw cows, donkeys and more. I think my dad took his camera along, so I might be able to add some pictures of their time there later.

On Wednesday (or was it Tuesday??) we drove to Canada to go to the indoor pool. We took James, one of the Koreans, along as he did not get to go home for Christmas this year. It was wonderful having so many adults to look after the kids as they didn't want to wear floaties. We were all happy that Tyson AND Jori were both able to go on the water slide. When we were in Canada this summer, only Tyson could go on the slide and he had to have a floatie on. They must have changed their rules, because as long as an adult went down first, both kids could slide down on their own. They also took turns jumping off the diving board. Jori even jumped off the 3 meter board (10 feet) but got hurt after landing in a belly flop. That ruined any chance of getting Tyson to go off the high board. We all liked being in the hot tub and the kiddie pool.

You'd think I'd remember more of what we did, but the older I get, the harder time I have adjusting to the three hour time change! I tried to sleep in a lot and went to bed early for the first few days. I am sure my parents were thrilled to have me around : )

On Thursday, Laurie and her kids got in around dinner time. Tyson and Jori were so excited to have some kids to play with and I finally took out my camera and started taking pictures. Auntie Kristi got in about an hour later, but her boys didn't come up til Sunday. Friday afternoon, which was Christmas Eve Day, Darin and Uncle Josh came up along with Pebble/Pebbles, our favorite dog!

Here are some pictures from the first couple days that everyone was around.

Tyson (6) and Carson (8) snuggle with Pebbles

Hanging out in the den.

Auntie Laurie and her 14 year old, Caden.

Early Christmas presents from the cousins (what happened to the NO gift exchange rule??)

Jori and her new Barbs from Kelsey (10)

Jori and Cameron (12)

Uncle Josh chilling

Jori and Pebs

More to come later...

Christmas Programs 2010

2010-12-17T12:48:00.000-08:00

This week both kids had their school Christmas programs. Tyson's was Tuesday night and Jori's was Wednesday morning. It was fun to see them both up on stage performing. They are still young enough that they are excited about what they are doing and actually want to be there!

Here are a couple videos from Tyson's program. He is in the second to top row, far right side, second kid in wearing a blue shirt.

I love this version of "How Great our Joy". It was a little peppy and upbeat and I love to see kids dance!

Darin couldn't make it to Jori's program, so I made sure to take plenty of video for him to see. I tried taking pictures, but because of the Christmas lights on stage, they all ended up looking pretty blurry.

This one is a little fuzzy, but I love watching her do the motions:

I love this one too, especially during the second verse when her "no" is a little ahead of everyone else.

And one more, just because she's so cute:

I wish we could have been this close for Tyson's program, but it was CRAZINESS in the church and we are just glad we didn't end up in the balcony.

Giving Gifts-2010

2010-12-11T18:24:00.000-08:00

Tonight we exchanged gifts with the kids. This next week is going to be a busy one and the kids and I are already flying out on Saturday morning for Washington, so we figured today was the least busy day to do this, and it gives our kids plenty of time to play with their new stuff.

Our leaning tower of tree-za

A couple weeks ago, when I was wrapping some presents, the kids asked for some wrapping paper to wrap things up for Darin and me. They worked very hard at their wrapping and had been waiting patiently for us to see what they chose for us.

One of the presents they wrapped

We let the kids take turns photographing us opening our gifts. Here is the most flattering shot of me and a headless shot of Darin.

Jori gave up 2 of her bears, Tyson sacrificed a reptile book and a compass, we each got a stem from a broken pair of glasses, some cardboard "computers", a bookmark and the most useful gift of all, a pack of gum.

Our little pile of goodies

A pack of gum the kids swiped from our drawer : )

Next, it was time for the kids to open their gifts. They each started out with something small, but as you can tell, it doesn't take much to make these kids smile!

Tyson and his new pill box

Love these kids!

Next is Tyson with most of his "big" gift. He is now the proud owner of a harmonica and instruction book, a motocross shirt, and a NASCAR racing outfit. The pill box and harmonica set are a couple of the things that Darin and I picked up at our small group white elephant gift exchange earlier this week. Thanks Louzons!

Our harmonica playing race car driver. What a combo!

Now it was time for Jori to open her gifts. First she opened her own package, and while she seemed to like it, she was also kind of ambivalent. Then she and Charity (her doll) opened Charity's gift and she got a little more excited. See for yourself!

Matchy match fun!

We all had a wonderful night, complete with an excellent dinner that I will post about later! Enjoy the videos, but please ignore my impatient sounding voice!

Boo. For some reason I can only upload one video! I've tried several times, but it is not working. Just imagine Jori opening up her little outfit and kind of tossing it to the side, then opening Charity's little outfit (after first having Charity try to open it herself) and still not really getting it, then Darin saying "Doesn't that look like something else" and then she realizes they are matching little outfits and she is happy. Hopefully we'll get the video up another time!

Update 2010 (also known as the annual Christmas letter)

2010-12-10T10:46:00.000-08:00

It's that time of year again. Time to update you all on what the Fey's have been up to over the past 12 months and what's coming up for us in the new year.

As most of you know by now, our family is going to be experiencing some big changes in the coming year, we are just not sure when these changes will be occurring! In April 2010, Darin started corresponding with an acquaintance in South Africa and over the next couple months, a plan was hammered out that has brought us into a business partnership that will eventually see our family moving overseas. Yes, we are going to be business owners, once the business is built! We thought we'd be heading over to South Africa already in January, ready to figure out how to run a petrol station/convenience store, but as with most plans, things come up and the "plan" goes right out the window. Now we are hoping to head over sometime before June, but you'll just have to keep checking the blog to see what happens!

So that is our BIG news, and even though moving overseas to start up a new business is a life changing event, there really isn't much more to say about it at this point because we are kind of facing a world of unknowns. As of right now, we don't know where we are going to live, we don't know what it will actually look like to own part of a petrol station, we don't know where the kids will go to school, we don't know what else we might get involved in. What we DO know is that God has all of these details and many more worked out already, and we are trying to daily rest in that thought! We are excited to see what He has in store for us in South Africa and we look forward to renewing many friendships that we made over there in 2008.

Now, how about a glimpse into what our daily lives are looking like now. We'll start with the littlest Fey, who is not so little any more! Jori will be 4 1/2 on December 18. She is so excited to add that "half" to her age! In September, Jori started preschool at Georgetown Christian. She absolutely loves it and it has been such a joy to see her learn and grow in this new environment. Jori loves to sing and dance. She also loves to play with her "guys", especially her special doll, Charity. So far Jori is excited about moving to South Africa. She has informed us on several occasions that she gets two suitcases to pack all her stuff, and the rest of us may have one. Jori still has the big belly laugh that we have come to love so much, and she is generally full of smiles.

Tyson will be 6 1/2 on December 16. He is in first grade at Park Elementary this year and is loving everything about school, especially recess and snack time. Tyson started reading over the summer and hasn't stopped! He loves learning and you can almost see the wheels turning in his head when he is trying to figure out how something works. This fall, Tyson started Cadets at one of the local churches. He absolutely loves being part of this group and enjoys telling us about the fun things that happen on Wednesday nights. Last week Tyson came home with his first badge and he was glowing! Tyson is excited to move to South Africa to see his friend Fetsi again and he also has big plans to help Darin build the petrol station.

After being at Innotec since graduating in 2000, Darin took a position with a new company in January 2010. After 9 1/2 years of dirty hands and greasy clothes, Darin is now a purchasing agent at Nuvar Inc. This new position has been a perfect fit for Darin and his love for this new job has made our upcoming plans to move a little bittersweet. Another big change for Darin is that he sold the vending machine business that he started way back when we were first married. After years and years of trips to Sam's Club to stock up on candy and treats and many Saturday afternoons spent filling the machines, this has been a big change for our whole family.

In many ways, I have probably changed the least of anyone in our family of four. I have enjoyed helping out at Tyson's school this year and doing "girl" stuff with Jori on her days off. I am still part of a wonderful Bible study at our church and have loved getting to know all the women this year. The past few months have turned me into a much better house keeper, but that is only because our house is on the market and it needs to be ready for possible showings. I'd say the biggest change I've experienced is that I finally feel content with my life. Funny how getting ready to move to a different country away from friends, family and all things familiar has caused me to have such a great appreciation and love for the life I am living right now.

God has been so good to us this year and we know that He will be going with us as we head into whatever He has in store for us next. This year, we anticipate the birth of Christ as snow falls around us and temperatures dip below freezing. What a joy to know that, next year, even though we will now be celebrating Christmas during the summer (opposite hemisphere=opposite seasons) we will still be celebrating the same Emmanuel, God with us, that we do right now.

Thanksgiving Weekend 2010

2010-11-28T19:34:00.000-08:00

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend this year. As you may recall, our last 2 Thanksgivings have been humble affairs, although Thanksgiving 2008 at least found us eating turkey products! This year we were so blessed to have part of Darin's family join us in Michigan. His parents, brother Israel and little Rosa arrived late Wednesday night and were able to attend the Thanksgiving service with us at EGM. We were especially thankful to have them make it to Michigan because Darin's mom had hit some ice on the drive up (they drove two separate vehicles for part of the trip) and had slid across the median and over the oncoming lanes of traffic before ending up in the ditch! As Israel said, the angels were certainly watching over them! We managed to put together a wonderful meal, although technically what we had qualifies more as Easter dinner, complete with ham, party potatoes, corn and strawberry fluff-minus the strawberries that were in scarce supply at our area Family Fares.

Enjoying our meal

Cheesy Rosa enjoyed her cheesy potatoes

Grandma Karen brought her sewing machine along and was able to help me patch up jeans for Darin and Tyson and also make some fun new things for Jori. Both kids loved watching Grandma sew, but Tyson was especially entranced by what Grandma was doing and how the sewing machine worked. He even helped her sew a little.

Learning from Grandma Karen

Turning a broken "gown" into a fun new skirt!

I had found a pattern to make Jori a dress a few months ago, and in one day, mom made it a reality! I followed the instructions on line, cut out the 2 sides of the dress and even sewed a little. Mom made the straps how I wanted them, without a pattern, and sewed the majority of the dress, which I could not have done with such wonderful results! She did this while also helping me finish up Jori's Christmas present, which included making a shirt for Jori's doll, Charity, turning a long sleeve shirt of Jori's into a super cute short sleeve shirt and appliqueing butterflies on both of these. I can't WAIT til Christmas!

Jori's dress

It used to be a men's shirt, so the dress back was the shirt front

On Friday, we went with Darin's aunt, uncle and cousin to the Bodies Revealed exhibit at the public museum. Rox and Al were supposed to go to Edgerton for Thanksgiving, but decided to stay put because of the weather. Amy is at Calvin and was going to ride home with them to see her family. We are glad they could come with us! It was pretty interesting to see. Even the kids enjoyed it. They also liked looking around the rest of the museum. Tyson was especially impressed with the Amway exhibit because he got to dress up in a lab coat. Jori liked touching the animal pelts. I also liked the Amway exhibit because I was able to prove to Darin that I really do have abnormally cold hands and he should not make fun of my when I keep my gloves on inside! They had one of those machines that you can stand in front of and the "hot" parts of your body show up red or orange and the cold parts are blue or green. My hands were the only blue/green ones of the bunch! Grandma Karen's nose was also green. Darin and Tyson were all red.

On the carousel (click the picture to view it full size)

The whole gang, including Rox and Al, and Amy.

On Saturday, all the guys went out for breakfast. Darin went out and got us donuts first for the women-what a guy. Jori ate one donut too many and ended up feeling sick the rest of the day. When the guys got back home, Mom and I took the boys to run some errands. First stop was Meijer to get the long promised Lego Star Wars set! Tyson was so happy to finally have it in his hot little hands. Then we ran to Target to get Jori some new polka dot pants as Grandma managed to get her to give up her old polka dot pants that were two sizes too small, as well as 3 other pairs of too small pants that she loved. I must admit, I will miss seeing her little buns squeezed into those pants! After stopping to pick up some more sewing supplies, we headed home. Then we started sewing. While we sewed, we also made cookies for the kids to frost. It was a bit of a mess, but they had a great time.

Topless Jori-she got wet "washing" dishes for us

Jori's final product. Got frosting?

He really was having fun

YUM!

Dad and Rosa stuck to eating peanuts

Then the men took all the kids except for Rosa to the bowling alley. Mom and I kept sewing until the needle on the machine broke! That night Mom and Dad treated Darin and I to dinner. It was so nice going out with the two of them. The kids did great for the babysitter and were all still smiling when we got home. Even Jori, who was laying on the sofa with a "throw up" bowl next to her when we left had perked up. After getting all the kids to bed, mom and I got right back to sewing with the new needle we had picked up before dinner. It was nice to sit and chat together.

On Sunday morning it was time to say good-bye. That is always the hard part. First the kids got their Christmas presents, or should I say the rest of their presents as they had been weaseling gifts out of Grandma all weekend : ) Tyson opened his gift first. He actually pulled it out of the bag and assumed it was for Israel. When Grandma said it was for him, his face just lit up! It was a whole box of Lego pieces. He was so happy.

Tyson and his Lego's

Then Jori opened her gift. First she pulled out a coloring book and a CD, and then she hauled out a book that literally weighs about 5 pounds. She thought it was so cool to have such a big book!

Checking out the big sticker book

Then it was time for our guests to leave. While we watched them drive away, Tyson started crying. Later on in the day, Jori said her tummy hurt and after ruling out all the reasons why she couldn't eat she said "I think it's because Grandma went home". So sad! We are so thankful for the time we could spend together as we know we won't be able to do this much longer! Thanks again for making the drive to see us. We love you.

Denial...

2010-11-23T19:50:00.000-08:00

...it's where I am at and where I plan on staying for as long as possible. Maybe it isn't healthy, but I don't think I am ready for reality yet. Reality means having to say good-bye to my friends and family. Reality means no more play dates for Jori and JJ, no more Cadets for Tyson, no more house on Elm Avenue with our path, pond and backyard ice cream shop. Reality means having to actually try and grasp what it means that we are moving overseas LONG TERM. We don't know how long this will be, but we assume it will be at least 5 years. Reality means I can't call my mother-in-law in the middle of preparing my first whole chicken to get her advice. It means I can't just call my mom to tell her Jori thinks describing my hair as a sand hill is a major compliment. Reality means I can't stop in to see Rachel before I get Jori from school and I've already touched on how much I am going to miss Rachel. Reality means no more phone calls between 9 and 9:30 from my sister Laurie as she drives to work in a time zone 3 hours earlier than where I am. Reality means no more Wednesday morning Bible Study with a group of women that I have come to love and respect over the past 3+ years that we've been meeting together.

This afternoon, reality tried to slip in, but I quickly shut it out. Rachel called to see if we would be available to do something on March 23, 2011, and the reality is that I can't commit that far out. I don't know where we'll be at that time. Reality creeps in when I think about wanting to go see my friend Tami in California and realize that I can't keep "thinking about it" and need to get a ticket or time might run out! That's the kind of stinky part of our reality right now-we don't really know when any of this is going to happen. In my mind, we are now going to be here til May or June (even though we still say March or April), so if things happen to go a lot faster than that, I am in big trouble! I am not ready to switch gears from denial to reality. It makes me sad. Really sad. Even when little bits of reality sneak in, it impacts me for a few days. I cry during TV shows and commercials. I try to share sweet things that the kids said and my voice gets all choked up.

I find it easy to get down on myself, especially when I hear about the realities that a lot of other people are facing-death, disease, all kind of loss. When I hear about these kinds of realities, I feel guilty for being sad about something that we have chosen to do. I am trying to work on that, as I do believe that I am allowed to grieve and hurt and feel sad, I just have a lot of mental conversations with myself about needing to suck it up and deal-then I go lay on my bed and have a good cry.

So, at least for the next couple months, I am planning to stay in denial as much as I can. I know I'll have to face reality this Christmas when I see my family for what could be the last time in a couple years. I don't look forward to the sadness, but I also don't want to miss out on letting them know how much I love them and saying whatever needs to be said. Ugh. Now this is making me cry, so I am going to step back and embrace denial again for a while, while still being thankful that I have such a great reality to miss!

Willing to change

2010-11-21T16:35:00.000-08:00

I feel like my head and my heart are just so full of things that I want to write, but sometimes I have a hard time getting things onto paper, or in this case, onto the computer screen. I am not an eloquent writer. I know this. I am wordy, I use lots of exclamation points, too many capital letters, I have poor punctuation and grammar (thankfully Darin catches most of those mistakes) and am usually not able to write my thoughts out in a clear and concise way. Oh well. I have long said that I keep this blog for me and my family as a place to get my thoughts down and keep track of all the stuff that is going on in our lives. I don't scrapbook and don't even print pictures out unless they are needed for a school project, so this IS the record of my kids lives! It is also my space and while I don't plan on being offensive, I do plan on being as true to myself as I can. I want to look back and not only see physical changes in my kids, but I also want to read the words I put down and see how I have changed and how I process things differently over time.

I think change is good. It's hard at times, but good. I believe that too often we hold on to certain ways of doing things because that's how we've always done it. The "we" might be our family, our group of friends, our church or any other group that you are a part of. I read this post today and found myself nodding my head in agreement and wanting to go out and find the book she was writing about. When we were last in South Africa, we were able to see what a big impact a relatively small amount of money could have in that country. My parents church had collected a few thousand dollars, which they sent over with my parents. With this money, we were able to purchase a wash machine, a refrigerator, school uniforms, and more, which you can read about here and you can check out pictures through the Picasa link on the right side of the blog. For the same amount of money, about 1 and 1/2 people could have flown to South Africa, not including any lodging, dining or transportation costs. If this paragraph seems totally random and incoherent, you'll have to just go click on the link above and read the post so you can understand what I am talking about!

I have been doing a lot of reading lately. Usually I stick to Christian fiction-I have a serious addiction, but lately I've been branching out and have been reading a lot of non-fiction. I read quite a few books about the history of apartheid in South Africa, which I once started to post about, but haven't quite been able to get all my thoughts into words on that one. More recently, I've been reading a lot of what I'd call Christian non-fiction, which includes books about what the church could look like, should look like and does look like. Some of my most recent reads have been "Radical" by David Platt, "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years" by Donald Miller, "Forgotten God" by Francis Chan and "unChristian" by David Kinnaman. I just started reading "The Irresistible Revolution" by Shane Claiborne. I would give each of the books I've read so far a high recommendation. They have all given me much to think about, which is good, but thinking alone isn't that great. I find that I have been wrestling with a lot of preconceived notions that I have held about the church and the world, about those who are in the church and those who are outside of it. I feel like these books have changed the way I think about things, but on the other hand, some of the stuff I've read has also strengthened beliefs that I already had. I don't want to become one of those people who hops on every bandwagon that happens to come trundling by. I think that's why I waited so long to do a Beth Moore Bible study. I tend to be more wary of things I perceive to be fads both in and out of the church, which is why you will never see my in a pair of jeggings or skinny jeans! Sometimes I am hesitant to read books like the ones listed above because they often come across as hateful towards the church and think that everything the church holds dear should be tossed out. I think that some people might read the same books I did and think "Jonna, that is just what THESE books are saying!" but I really didn't find that. I think they were all crying out for American Christians to take an honest look at ourselves through the lens of scripture, not through the lens of our traditions, culture or denomination. I would highly, highly recommend the book "unChristian". It's subtitle is "What a new generation really thinks about Christianity...and why it matters". This book really made me reexamine how I have responded to those outside of the church and how I have expressed my views about different issues, such as homosexuality.

I guess the whole point of this post is that taking another look at how we've always done things, or said things, or dealt with things can be beneficial, not only for ourselves, but for those around us. I don't think we are supposed to just blindly follow along and stay on the same path because that's the way it's always been. I also don't think we can just assume that we are still on the same path that Christ first set his followers on. I think that there are a lot of places where we have strayed, but sadly, these things have now become the norm and are often just assumed to be the "right way". As I said at the beginning, I am not a writer. My thoughts are random and rarely cohesive. I guess I write how I talk, which drives my husband crazy! I guess the less I worry about how stuff comes out, the better I'll be at just getting it out there and unloading some of the weight that I've been carrying around.

2010-11-20T18:44:00.000-08:00

Tonight I am feeling sad for my kids. I feel so ill equipped to help them with all the change that is going to be happening soon. At bed time, Jori started crying about having to leave behind her pillow and polka dot quilt. I hadn't said anything about these items, but something made her think about them and cling to them. I tried to turn it into a positive and talk about how much fun it would be to pick out new things in South Africa, but that just made her cry more. All I wanted to do was cry along with her. : (

A way to help out

2010-11-17T10:39:00.000-08:00

Recently, our church, and more specifically the small groups at our church, have become aware of some needs at our local high school. I don't know who initiated this relationship, but have already seen God at work in it. When we first heard about some of the issues that people in our local school community were facing, it was kind of a shock. I mean, we live in Hudsonville for crying out loud. Hudsonville, which by all appearances has it all together. There are churches on just about every corner, and lots of nice cars and nice homes in the area. We may be close to Grand Rapids, but certainly we do not have the kinds of problems that they have.

Yet over the course of a few weeks, we found out that there are teens in our community that are considered homeless. Homeless. In Hudsonville. How is that possible? There is a food bank set up specifically for families of the high school to use because there has been such an increase in the need. One of the school counselors is keeping granola bars, easy mac and other "fast" foods on hand because there are so many kids coming through her doors that haven't had breakfast and may not have dinner available when they get home.

Now, I don't know the reasons for all of these difficulties. I know that I often struggle with becoming cynical and judgemental when I hear about situations like these. It's easy to start wondering why these things might be happening and get so caught up in finger pointing and blame casting that we forget what we have been commanded to do. Darin recently shared something he had read in the Today devotional. It was based Luke 16:19-31, the story of the rich man and Lazarus. Here is the devotion that went with the passage:

“BUT I DIDN’T DO ANYTHING!”

Before we look at this story Jesus told, let’s notice a few things it doesn’t say. The story says nothing about how the rich man got his wealth. We don’t know whether it was an inheritance, a good business, or dishonest tax collecting that brought in his money. All we know is that he was rich.

Nor does Jesus tell us why Lazarus was poor. Was he a drunk, a disabled person, or maybe a victim of extortion? All we know is that he was poor. (italics mine)

We also see that the rich man did no direct harm to Lazarus. Jesus said Lazarus lay at the man’s gate, but he does not say the rich man kicked him as he went by, or mocked him.

Why then was the rich man’s punishment so severe? He earned an eternity of suffering.

The rich man’s sin was neglect. Lazarus lay at his door day after day, and the rich man failed to do anything for him. His sin was a sin of omission. The rich man knew of Lazarus’s hardships but did nothing about them, although he was in a position to help.

In our world, the poor are constantly at our door as well. The media make us aware of their presence daily. According to Jesus’ story, it seems not to matter how we got our money, or how the poor became poor. But if we fail to use our resources to help the poor and needy, we condemn ourselves.

After getting permission from the high school counselor, I passed on some of the stories that we had heard to my friend Sarah, who writes a blog called "Give Me Neither". A couple days ago Sarah wrote a post about the needs of the high school and also provided links to coupons and deals in the area to help meet some of those needs. Even if you don't live in Michigan, please check out her post to look at some of the things that your own local high school might appreciate receiving.

Mountain Moving

2010-11-15T14:21:00.000-08:00

Jesus tells us that if we have faith as small as a mustard seed, then we can move mountains. Why, then, do people still die of cancer, even when there are hundreds, sometimes thousands of "faithful" people praying for their healing? There was faith, true belief that the cancer would be removed, the marriage would be restored, the job would be offered, the child would live, yet none of these things came to be. Instead we are often left with relapses, broken homes, foreclosures and heartbreaking funerals. Surely, the mountains were not moved.

But what if they were? Could it be that mountains are being moved all around us, but we fail to see them because they aren't the mountains that we were praying about?

On Sunday night we took our family to church and heard a sermon preached by a Calvin Seminary student. I will admit, when I saw that a student was going to be preaching, I was less than thrilled, because these sermons are often a little awkward to listen to. On this night, though, I heard something totally new. Maybe it had been preached before in a sermon that I sat through, but I never heard it. The student preached on Matthew 17:14-23, which occurs right after the transfiguration. There is a crowd and in the middle, a father who has brought his son to Jesus' disciples to be healed. However, the disciples were unable to heal him. When Jesus enters the picture, he calls them out for their lack of faith. He goes on to tell them that the power that is available to them is the same power that will be displayed at the resurrection.

The message went on from there a bit, and then the student started sharing the story of a young child with cancer and the community that rallied around her. Not only did they work to meet the physical needs of the family, but they prayed with great faith that this child would be healed. However that was not to be. Now, this is where I heard something new. The student said that in this story, a mountain was moved. The mountain was not the health of the child, but the community and their response to the situation.

I think that this really resonated with me because of our current situation. Right now we are kind of in a holding pattern. We are waiting for paperwork to wind its way through a lengthy governmental process, we are waiting for funds to come available to us, we are waiting for our house to sell. I see all of these things as mountains that need to be moved.

However, what if in the end, this whole thing falls through. What if our paperwork isn't approved? What if we can't come up with any more money and lose the opportunity to go? What if our house doesn't sell, or on the other hand, what if it does sell, but we end up not moving and are now home-less? What if I am praying about these things, and, by faith, I truly believe they are going to happen, but they don't? Does that mean that God is out of the business of mountain moving, or does it just mean that he was busy moving mountains that I didn't realize needed to be moved?

I think about this a lot, as I cry out to God "I believe. Help my unbelief". If things fall through, I don't believe that it will be because of a lack of faith on our part, although I know the devil has been busy trying to get me to go down this path! I have found myself thinking about areas in my own life where God might want to do some rearranging. I think of my marriage, my mothering, the way I use our resources, the kind of friend I am, the way I spend my time. These are all areas where change is needed and would be beneficial to me and to those around me. Is it possible that, instead of moving us to Africa to bring about some of these changes, God might see fit to bring about these changes by having our plans fall through? Yes, I believe it is. Would this totally stink? Yup. I'm not gonna lie, but I have thought it through and it would be a tough pill to swallow. BUT if God knew that there was something in my life that needed to change and this was the only way He'd be able to move me, it would be worth it. Painful, but still worth it.

Even now, in this time of waiting, I know He is busy moving mountains. I want to have eyes to see all He is doing. I want to be more grateful for the things that I often see as setbacks and have a greater awareness of how He is working all around us every day.

I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief.

2010-11-08T12:30:00.000-08:00

I am about 4 weeks into Beth Moore's revised "Breaking Free" Bible study and, while I do like it, I have already fallen behind on my "homework" and had a few occasions where I have not wanted to get up on Wednesday morning and head off to my Bible study group. It has nothing to do with the people, I truly enjoy all the women who are currently taking this study. There is good food, good fellowship and lots of laughter and tears-we re women after all! The thing that makes me want to stay home and put off doing my homework is that this study is much harder than I thought it would be.

In week 2 we talked about 5 benefits that God intends for His children:
1. To know God and Believe Him
2.To glorify God
3. To find satisfaction in God
4. To experience God's peace
5. To enjoy God's presence

These are 5 God given rights that we often miss out on because we are being held bondage by some area of sin in our lives. Now, going into this study, I wasn't so naive as to think that I didn't have any areas of bondage in my life or that I wasn't being held captive by some area of sin, but when we got to week 3, I was about ready to be DONE with this study. In week 3 we uncovered 5 obstacles that keep us from enjoying the benefits God has given us, the benefits that lead to abundant life!

1. The obstacle of unbelief
2. The obstacle of pride
3. The obstacle of idolatry
4. The obstacle of prayerlessness
5. The obstacle of legalism

Well, by day 2 I was over this study. I was already 2 for 2 and having looked ahead to the next few days, I realized that I would soon be checking off all 5 of these obstacles as belonging to ME. Me, the pastor's kid, was being held captive by unbelief. Me, a Calvin grad, was being held captive by pride. Me, the weekly church attender, was being bound by idolatry, prayerlessness and legalism! ME!!! It was too much. I mean, have you ever really taken the time to examine your life, to dig down a little and get past all the stuff you "know" and have been told and really just looked at your faith as something belonging only to you-not to your parents, your school, your church, but just to you? At 32 years old, I don't know that I had ever done this.

I think I was really hit on day 1 to realize that I was being held captive by unbelief. I mean, I believe in God. I have known so much about Him and His Son and the whole Christian shebang for as long as I can remember! As I did the study, I realized that while I know that I believe IN Him, I often have trouble when it comes to just believing what He says, especially as it pertains to me. When I am looking at someone elses situation, I can fully take God at His Word for that person, but when I try to apply God's truths to my own life I often struggle with doubt. This whole South Africa thing has really made that evident to me.

This summer, we were making plans to move in January. We listed the house, sold many of our possessions, started telling people we were moving. Now, here we are over a week into November and we are just waiting. I am not even sure what we are waiting for, but I am pretty sure it is going to be a long wait! I really do not do well with waiting. I like to know something so that I can pretend like I have some sort of control over the situation. Instead we are thousands of miles away from where paperwork is (hopefully) winding its way through some government office or another and we really have no control over any of it! For a few months, I've been reading the Bible and verses like "all things work together for the good of those who love God" and even as I read the words and know that they are true, there has been a little voice in my head saying "but they may not all work out for you" or "you know this is all going to end up as a huge failure" and "you don't spend enough time with God to know what He wants you to do and for all you know, you are WAY out of His plan and He is going to bring you down!". I know now that this was the voice of fear, but I had kind of given fear and anxiety free reign in my mind. Why, I'm not sure, but I was just finding it hard to take God at His word and just go forward in peace, which was most likely being cause by the obstacle of prayerlessness, something else that I realized had a heavy presence in my life!

So, now I am trying to listen to the voice of truth. The voice that said in Mark 9 "Everything is possible for him who believes." God I believe. I believe that you are in control over all the paperwork that has been passing from our hands to a place across the ocean. I believe that you have determined the right time for these papers to be seen and approved, or disapproved. Father help my unbelief. God, I don't know how long we will be in Hudsonville, but You have a plan for Darin, Tyson, Jori and me right here, right now. God, I believe, please help my unbelief.

Happy Halloween!

2010-10-31T11:53:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I am neither for, or against Halloween. On the one hand, it is fun for kids and there is a lot of delicious candy that comes into our house! On the other hand, it is a big waste of money and resources that could better be spent on any number of other things.

That being said, we had a fun day yesterday with our costumed kids. We ran a few errands during the afternoon and let the kids dress up while we were out. I didn't take any pictures, but they had fun going to the grocery store as a ninja turtle and a, well, we don't really know what Jori was.

After running errands, the kids played for a while, then it was time to start getting dressed up. Here they are in costume.

Ninja Turtle and Princess

Princess Jori

Tyson striking a Ninja pose

Ninja kicks

Then, around 4:30 we headed over to the Huismans to take our annual Halloween pictures of the kids. We've done this ever since Tyson and Jenna were little. We usually trick or treat with them as well, but this year we went our separate ways : ( We did have fun though for the 20 minutes we were together!

Woody (JJ), Cowboy Reid, Jessie (Jenna), Princess Jori and Tyson the Ninja

Best friends

Buddies forever

Little Reid-e-lee-boo

Auntie Becka getting in on the leaf fight

It is funny how you can cram so much fun into such a little time. I think that the moment was made more bright and brilliant because we know that we probably won't be doing this with our friends next year as we head off to South Africa and our hearts are also full of the knowledge that Becka is leaving for training in Texas on Monday and then heading to Afghanistan much faster than any of us would like. We threw leaves at each other, took turns doing scary laughs, which Rachel caught on tape. We even got Darin and Jon to take part in that. I was laughing so hard I almost peed my pants. I LOVE moments like this, and I know that having these memories will sustain our family when we are far from friends and familiar things.

I was in kind of a contemplative mood when we packed up the van to head for our next stop. It is so easy to let the looming sadness of saying goodbye overshadow that present fun that we are having, but I need to keep shaking it off and thanking God for each moment He is giving us here!

This year, we were invited into someone elses Halloween tradition, along with the rest of our small group. We had a wonderful time in Zeeland with the Rigterinks, Louzons, Brenners and Elders. Here's a group shot of all the kids:

One of my favorite parts of the night was when the DADs all took the kids trick or treating and the moms stayed in to relax.

The highlight for the dads was when they stopped at a house with a scarecrow on the porch and the scarecrow waited til all kids were on the porch and then jumped and said boo. This was the last house on their trick or treating route, so we were soon inundated by kids saying "Joey just got scared by a scare crow" and sure enough, poor little Joey was so shaken up, that even retelling his sorrowful tale made him cry again! The dads enjoyed seeing all the kids get a little scare.

After lots of good food, candy and cake, we finally headed home a little before 9. A fun day was had by all.

Mr. Chicken

2010-10-31T11:17:00.000-07:00

A few days ago, I made my first ever WHOLE chicken. It was a little scary for someone who is used to cooking with boneless, skinless chicken breasts, but I figure I should get used to working with bone-in chicken before we move to South Africa!

I will admit, I got a little attached to my chicken. I think he just kind of drew me in with his little wings and legs and fat little belly. Call me crazy. I know some of you already do!

Here's my chicken friend after I took out the packet of gizzards, or whatever that nastiness is called.

Just hanging around

Then I just had to stand my little buddy up

Then, after I washed him inside and out (I was a little too aggressive and ended up breaking his skin apart! I used toothpicks to put him back together), I covered him with butter that had salt, pepper and basil in it. And I cut up an apple and stuffed my chicken with it.

All ready to go in the oven

The recipe I was loosely following was from The Pioneer Woman. It said to cook the chicken at 450 degrees for an hour and 15 minutes or so. So this is what I did.

Oh chicken, you look and smell so good

When Darin came home from work, I was sitting in front of the oven, staring at my chicken through the door. It was just getting so brown and delicious looking and I was feeling SO accomplished.

Then Darin took the chicken out to see if it was done. He pulled out a chunk of meat from the right side of the bird. It was good. Then he looked more closely and saw that the chicken was still a bit raw looking underneath the part he had just sampled.

Mr. Chicken went back into the oven. We all ate some very delicious, very cheesy and buttery potatoes while we waited for the chicken. After 20 minutes, we took him out again and Darin tried the other side.

My poor chicken

All was well, so he took off some meat for the kids to eat, then we served ourselves. I would say Mr. Chicken was tasty. However, he was also quite dry. I usually love to nibble on chicken skin, but after seeing little feather remnants when I was washing Mr. Chicken, I just couldn't do it.

I am sure I will cook a chicken again someday, but I'll have to find a different cooking method for sure.

Jori and JJ

2010-10-28T12:41:00.000-07:00

When Tyson and Jenna were little, I thought there would never be a better twosome than the two of them. Now I am not so sure. Jori and JJ have become quite the pair over the past year. When Tyson and Jenna were in kindergarten, Rachel and I started switching kids a couple days a week. On Tuesday she'd take Jori and on Thursday I'd take JJ. It gave us both a kid free day (until baby Reid came along!), which was such a blessing! This year we have continued the kid swapping. This week I had JJ on Tuesday and JJ and Reid for a while on Wednesday. This morning at 9 I brought Jori to Rachel's. Now it is 3:30 and I have had a whole day to myself. I've done 2 loads of laundry, cleaned the bathrooms, sorted through some toys and books, spent some good time in prayer, worked on the blog and prepared my first ever whole chicken, which will be detailed in an upcoming post.

Playing in the neighbors leaves

HUGS!!

Best friends

For those of you who may not know, Jenna and JJ are brother and sister. Their mom, Rachel, is my best and oldest (meaning I've known her for the longest time) friend. Our moms were pregnant with us both in DeMotte, Indiana. I was born on July 20 and Rachel was born on August 19. My dad was the pastor at her church until I was 4 years old. Even after we moved, we managed to stay connected through some deep friendships between my mom and her mom and grandma. Rachel came to Oregon to see me with her grandma, we picked her up in Indiana one year and she came along to visit my dads family in Canada, we went to all 4 conventions together in Indiana, Colorado, Rhode Island and California. We lived in the same dorm our first year of college and currently we live less than a mile away from each other. To say that it will be hard to say good-bye to Rachel when we (eventually) move, is an understatement! I can't even think about it without feeling a little bit sick : (

So, first Rachel and I are best friends, then Jenna is born on May 25, 2004 and Tyson comes along on June 16 of the same year. Jori and JJ have a little bit bigger age gap, but are still just as close as ever! I am so very thankful for ALL the years God has let Rachel and I live by each other and also for the time that our kids have had to become friends. I pray that their friendships will remain as strong as ours did, even when we lived far apart.

Jori's second field trip-to the Fire Station!

2010-10-28T12:24:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, Jori had her second field trip of the year. Darin managed to get some time off from work to accompany her on this little outing. I am so glad he could go and experience all the preschool fun! When I picked Jori up from school, she was very chatty and told me all about seeing the fire fighters, the fire truck, the "gear" and much, much more. Here are some pictures from her special day.

Learning about the fire engine

Time to get down

Listening to the fire chief talk about all his gear

The fire chief asking Jori if he looked scary

So excited to be wearing some gear

Jori's class

Darin said the kids watched a little video, climbed in the fire truck, saw what a fire fighter would look like all decked out in his gear (Jori was not scared, but some kids in her class were), got to look through an infrared camera, tried on some gear, and got some homework. Apparently when the fire fighter said the kids would have homework, Jori's mouth and eyes opened really wide. She LOVES homework, so this was exciting news for her!

At dinner last night, Jori showed us how to stop, drop and roll. It was her solution for every fire related problem we asked her about. Smoke in the house, stop drop and roll. You are on fire, stop drop and roll. Your door is too hot to touch, stop drop and roll. She also said kids are supposed to jump out of windows and find a park or another person's house to run to if their house is on fire. Good to know she was paying attention : )

More of Gram's visit

2010-10-21T15:07:00.000-07:00

Tyson in front of EGM's art camp Art prize entry

We did a lot when my mom was here. On the first Thursday, we headed downtown to check out Art Prize. Last year, my mom was with us the one and only time we went downtown for the first ever Art Prize. This time, we had already been downtown to check out some of the art, so we knew what we wanted to show my mom and had also (mostly) figured out what else we still wanted to see. We went back to Art Prize on Saturday to see a few things we had missed the previous two times.

The big pig ( I think it's actually called the steam pig)

A pride of lions, made out of nails

My mom and the kids took a lot of walks down the path, and also made several trips to Love INC and the library. We really were blessed with wonderful weather the whole time my mom was here. I think it only rained one day! It was different having Tyson in school full time. We didn't want to do too many things during the day because he would have missed out on all the fun. Jori, my mom and I did go shopping a few times, went out to lunch, hung out with Auntie Rachel and Bud and Bernice and spent a lot of time coloring, reading and drinking coffee.

Gram painting Jori's nails

One of the best things for Tyson was having Gram bring him to the bus and pick him back up again. I went along on Monday just so I could take some pictures.

Jori riding through the leaves

Telling Gram about his day

Love

On Monday we headed straight from the bus stop to the bowling alley. We had already gone there once for ice cream, but now Gram got to see the two kids in all their bowling glory.

And then it was Tuesday-time to say good bye to Gram : ( First there was time for a quick game of war before Tyson had to head to the bus.

Jori didn't get to play this round. Can you tell by her face?

We love you Gram!

Jori and I took Gram to the airport around noon. It was very sad saying goodbye. I think it made me start thinking about all the other, more long term goodbyes we'll soon be saying. Jori was getting kind of teary too, so that made it extra hard for me! After we dropped my mom off we ran a few errands. Each time we went into another store Jori would say "Where's Gram?" and I'd remind her that we brought Gram to the airport. So sad.

We love you Grandma Willie. Thank you for coming and spending so much time with us and loving us so well!!

Post Family Farm 2010

2010-10-21T12:39:00.000-07:00

We love going to the Post Family Farm. There are so many fun things for the kids to do and they make the best pumpkin donuts!! This year we bought a dozen to eat right away and another 1/2 dozen to freeze for later. Yum! Click here to read about last years visit to the farm.

Tyson and Jori both had fun riding the pumpkin train. First they rode it alone, and later they CHOSE to ride together, which was just the sweetest thing to see.

This is love

So glad they have each other

Swinging sissy

After the pumpkin train, it was time to try out the rope swing. Jumping into itchy straw is not my idea of a good time, but they were having a blast.

Tyson's turn

Then it was time to take a couple pictures with gram.

Gram and her special guy

Lovely ladies

Then we fed the animals and played on the zip line. The zip line was their absolute favorite, and I am pretty sure I didn't take any pictures of them riding on it!

We have been having such fabulous weather this October and were very thankful for a sunny day to spend at the Post Family Farm!

Park Pride Field Day

2010-10-21T08:53:00.000-07:00

Well, my mom was here and now she is back home in Washington. We had a lot of wonderful times while she was here visiting. I actually remembered to haul my camera out on more than one occasion, so I have lots of pictures to share!

My mom came in late Wednesday night and on Friday, Tyson had his first "Park Pride" day at school. That morning his class also had a visit from the fire department, so needless to say, it was his "favorite day ever". When my mom and I first got to the school, Tyson didn't even notice us! He was that into what he was doing.

Waiting for his turn

Listening to instructions

In fact, it wasn't until he popped his head over the bleachers here that he saw us. He was so happy (I LOVE how happy this kid gets over the littlest things!)

Here is a video of Tyson going after the soccer ball. He always has that little tongue peeking out when he is concentrating. It was so funny watching all the kids run around. They split all the kids up so the grades are mixed together, first through fifth. The first and second graders were a bit lost, but it was neat seeing the older kids encourage them.

After the soccer game, we followed Tyson's group to the bucket brigade. All the kids were getting so wet, so it was nice that they had such a warm, sunny October day to celebrate field day! Here are some pics followed by a video of the water brigade.

See that tongue!

Team work

We are so thankful for Park Elementary School. Tyson has been making so many wonderful friends, learning so many new things and we know God is at work in this place!

2010-10-05T18:53:00.000-07:00

My mom is coming tomorrow night. I am so excited to see her and spend lots of time drinking coffee, eating cookies, reading, and just being together. She really couldn't be coming at a better time. I have been in a real funk the last few days, and I am hoping my mom being here will help get me out of it. I am sure she will tell me to "snap out of it" and "get moving", but she'll also hug me and tell me she loves me and that God has all of this stuff in His control.

Right now I just feel like there is a lot of "stuff" that is kind of starting to weigh me down. We've had a few house showings, but no offers. I am already sick of keeping the house clean and cannot for the life of me figure out how our house seems to be filling up after we just had a huge moving sale. I feel like I am constantly finding new things laying around the house and it is starting to stress me out. I do not like living in our house right now. I feel like we can't just be. I am always watching the kids to make sure they don't scuff the walls. I try to keep them out of the basement because Darin patched up the dings and scratches down there and I don't want them to make new marks. I don't ever really feel relaxed. I am trying to remain positive about our house selling, but am starting to feel a lot of dread, fear and worry pulling me down. What if it doesn't sell? What if we can't get what we really do need to get out of it?

Then there's the whole moving to South Africa thing. We have no set date for when this will be happening. It could be spring, it could be summer. Who knows! It just won't be January, which is kind of nice on the one hand because that is only 3 months away, but now the whole moving thing is starting to seem more like a fantasy than a reality. We have no control over the business side of things in SA. We cannot make any plans. When our kids ask us about when we'll move or if we'll be here for their birthdays, we don't have any answer to give them. Sometimes I am not even sure I want to move. I start to think it is all a game and I can just decide to stay right here. I am just struggling to see moving to South Africa as something that is really going to be happening. I don't even really like talking to people about it because I don't even know what to say! We don't know where we are going to live, when the business will be up and running, what the business will be like, when we're moving-NOTHING.

We are trying to sort some stuff out about our sweet boy. I am sure I'll write about it at some point, but right now I can't really find the right words to say.

I feel like Darin and I are on different planets sometimes. I have all these feelings, emotions, questions, doubts, worries, ideas, plans... and he is just not there with me. I am guessing that I am kind of a mystery to him as well right now.

Our precious preschooler is showing some major 4 year old attitude. She is also big into baby talk right now. So I don't really know which Jori I'll be dealing with from one moment to the next, past Jori (the baby), present Jori (at 4 years old) or future Jori (a catty teenager) and it all makes me feel a whole lot of crazy.

I am also reading a lot of books about apartheid in South Africa and that kind of makes me feel heavy all over.

Please God, bring my mom here safely. I need her.

Crafty Fun!

2010-10-01T11:51:00.000-07:00

So, I have a lot rolling around in my head right now. Like more than I really know what to do with. However, instead of writing about some stuff that I should probably deal with in the not so distant future, I am going to write about something much happier instead.

Guess what time it is?? It's CRAFTY TIME! Tomorrow I get to join a couple friends for food, fellowship and sewing fun! Remember Tyson's quilt? If not, you should click on the link and go check out the pics from my last adventure into creativity. Now it's time for Jori to benefit from her mom's crafty side. I have been checking out a few on line sewing sites and have big ideas for these two beauties:


Jori and Charity

Yes, I am going to tackle sewing clothes, which will be challenging, but I am hoping it will produce some fun results! If you never see a follow up post, then you can just assume it was a horrible, disastrous failure. Hopefully Jori and Charity will soon have a few matching outfits to wear both here and abroad!

Now I will show you the fabrics I've picked out and include some links to sites that show what I HOPE to do with them!

First, I am hoping to make a dress like this one out of a shirt I picked up at Goodwill. Thanks to the helpful lady at Fields Fabric (who are having a sale on Amy Butler fabric until October 11!) I also picked up some fun "trim" to lighten things up.

Shirt and trim

I am also hoping to make a circle skirt similar to this one, but I want to cover the elastic. Tonight I need my dear husband to help me make the pattern for this skirt. Sewing involves math skills, something I am seriously (SERIOUSLY) lacking and Darin has in abundance.

Butterfly fabric for Circle skirt

Once I feel a bit more confident about my clothes making abilities, I hope to tackle the next two projects. First is the Double Layer Skirt. I just loved the flower fabric and think I did a good job of picking a coordinating fabric to go with it.

Double Layer Skirt

Next we have something that seems so far beyond where my sewing skills will ever be that I am not even sure why I bought the fabric to someday try and make it! I give you the Apron Knot Dress. I actually found a tutorial to make this dress on the same site as the Double Layer Skirt, but the ones shown in the link are just so much sweeter!

Apron Knot Dress

Seeing as I don't actually own a sewing machine, it is going to take me a long time to get any of these projects started, let alone finished! Thankfully I have very generous, patient, super-crafty friends that are willing to share their talents (and machines!) with me. I will say that going to the fabric store is kind of addicting. If we weren't moving, I might even try to get Darin to see the need for me to have a sewing machine : ) I have actually looked on-line at Makro, a store in South Africa, to see how much a sewing machine would cost, but that would not be a "necessity" for setting up house, so I will just have to pray for a crafty, sewing machine owning friend in South Africa as well!

The History of the Vending Machines

2010-09-27T17:23:00.000-07:00

Many, many years ago, Darin decided it would be fun to start a vending business. He was working at Innotec and figured that he could do a better job than the people who had been providing candy and chips for Innotec's employees. Not only did he do a better job, but over the next several years he grew his little "hobby" into a small business, a family business if you will.

Not only did Tyson join the business at a young age, but he was also used in "promotional materials" to market our vending dynasty. Not really, but we did stick him in front of boxes of candy and chips for a totally sweet Christmas picture!

There were a couple years where Darin thought Tyson needed to stay home and "mature", but ever since he was 4, he has been his daddy's right hand man. "Vending", as our sweet boy calls it, has been a weekly tradition for Darin and Tyson. As with all good things, this too had to come to an end. With our upcoming move to South Africa, we needed to sell the machines for logistical reasons (we cannot fill the machines from where we'll be living) and we were also getting to a place where we needed some money for our upcoming business venture.

Selling the vending machines has been really sad for Tyson, and Darin and I have been sad for him as well. This weekly daddy/son time has been so special for Darin and Tyson. Darin has loved seeing Tyson learn to help him by opening the doors or flipping on the lights or just keeping him company. Tyson knows little things about all of the different buildings that house the vending machines. He knows where gloves are in every building, a very important detail for him! Sometimes Jori and I would go along and I loved listening to his commentary as he told Jori what they could play with or how to help daddy at each location.

Here are some pictures from one of the last vending runs.

Filling up the machine

My hard working men

Finding some gloves

Our favorite vending helper

Waving to cars on Washington

Here is a little video where Tyson tells you, in his own words, how he feels about the vending machines.

More new clothes for me

2010-09-23T19:46:00.000-07:00

Today Jori and I did a little shopping. Since we've decided to move to South Africa, I've been trying to pare down my wardrobe to save on luggage space. However, when I talk to other Americans who live in or have lived in South Africa, they tell me I should be stocking up on a few things as I can buy things for a lot less money in the states. So today I did just that! Jori and I left the house around 10:30 and 6 stores and just under $28 later, we came home with the following items.

First, from the Goodwill store in Jenison I picked up the following shirts for $12.57

Brown flowers to match my new brown pants-$3.29

Navy shirt-not quite 3/4 length sleeve-$3.29

Green and white striped- $3.29

Plain red tee-$1.99

I found these 5 tops at the Salvation Army in Kentwood, on 28th across from Sam's Club, for $14.79.

To wear with my brown pants-$1.99

I have been looking for a brown cardigan to wear with a dress I bought earlier this summer (kind of like all the shirts I had to buy to go with my brown pants). I didn't think this would fit me because it was a large, but the price was right, so I think it is going to work out just fine.

$.3.99

Brown shirt with buttons at the top-$3.99

Brown and beige stripe (also goes with my brown pants)-$1.99

Love "Hoo" you are-$1.99

And here are my new brown pants. I picked these up a few weeks ago at The Hive in Holland. I think they were just under $10. I do not really know why I bought them because I did not have anything to wear with brown pants. Now I do.


Comfy brown pants-$10

So, if I add in the cost of the pants, I spent just under $40 for 10 items! Go me!

Jori's First Field trip!

2010-09-23T19:19:00.000-07:00

Listening to Mrs. Wells

On Wednesday, Jori had her very first field trip to Wells Orchard. She was so excited about her field trip and made sure she reminded Tyson many times that she was going to be doing something special. Tyson did steal a little bit of her thunder, because his school ended up not having power on Wednesday so he got to go along to Bible study with Miss Whitney and Amelia, which made his sis a little jealous!

In the apple store

Once the actual field trip got started, Jori was not so excited. It was wet and there was a lot of walking and looking at different types of apples. There was a lot of whining from a lot of kids, and Jori was no exception! Four year olds have very short attention spans!

Can we go home?

At the end of the field trip things got a bit better. All the kids sang the apple song (video below), which Jori had been practicing at home, so she was back to her smiley self.

Singing the apple song

Then it was time for a little snack-donut holes and apple cider! That was the best part of the day for Jori.


Eating a donut and drinking apple cider!

2010-09-21T15:55:00.000-07:00

I thought we had been doing a pretty good job explaining to the kids why we are moving to South Africa. However, today when their friend Jenna asked them this very question, I found out we might have a little more explaining to do. Jori's answer was "We are going to Bela Bela, because they have a swimming pool there. When we were there last time we lived there for a few days and we are going to live there again." Did we stay at Bela Bela in 2008? Yes we did, and you can read about it here. However, we didn't live there and we are not moving to South Africa to go swimming at Bela Bela.

Tyson didn't really give an answer to why we are moving, but when Jenna said "I hope you can give stuff to the poor people there" his response was "There aren't any poor people there." When I reminded him of Mama Cathrine, he said "We gave her stuff last time." He then went on to say "I am NOT giving anyone any of my toys or any of my clothes".

It is both interesting and heartbreaking to hear what the kids have to say about our upcoming move. There are times when they seem excited about going, but they both have some definite anxiety about the changes ahead. It is good to hear them put some of their thoughts into words so that we know what's going on in their heads.

Please Pray!!

2010-09-17T05:42:00.000-07:00

When we went to South Africa in 2008, Tim and Angie Sliedrecht, who are missionaries in Uganda, stayed in our house. You might remember I had posted about their nephew Luka when he was having major health issues. Now it is Tim who needs our prayers. He has an infection that started from a thorn that stuck him in the elbow. He and Angie are currently in Kenya and the doctors there are having a hard time figuring out what is wrong with Tim. Here is a recent post that Mandy Shaarda (Angie's sister/Luka's mom) wrote:

Hi everyone, I just wanted to update all of you about Tim. (For some of you this is the first email I have included you in so if you want to read the old ones they are on the blog - address below.) I am so thankful so many people are praying because things have not gotten better. I talked to Luka's doctor on Tuesday about Tim's condition and he immedately said he had to come to Kenya and preceeded to call the doctor he needed and told him to prepare for his arrival. Tim, Angie, Zulea, and Jennifer (our team mate who is a nurse) all flew to Nairobi, Kenya on Wednesday after a very frustrating and disappointing experience at a Kampala Hospital. Tim's infection has moved to his knee and he cannot walk well (or at all at times) so we arranged for a wheelchair, got the tickets (thanks to another missionaries help), parked their van at another missionary, got them what they needed...and got them out of here - actually they just caught their plane in time! We are so thankful they are in Kenya and under better care. The doctor met them at the ER door. Since then a team of doctor has been working on Tim and can not figure out what is wrong. The blood work has come back with an infection but not too bad, yet Tim continues to not feel well then does better, then worse, then better... They are now waiting for an MRI which didn't happen yesterday - rrrr! We are praying it shows what is wrong. The doctors told Angie it is a puzzle and they need to put all the pieces together before they will know what they are deal with. 

Wow, it has now been a week and a half of dealing with this infection and I think everyone especially those in Kenya are really tired and stressed and emotionally drained and confussed and worried and... We all simply can't believe this is happening to our team again. We are holding on to God. Is this an attack from the evil one or a refining fire from our Lord? How good it is to look back at God's hand of love and healing with Luka and know that same hand is on Tim and Angie.

A couple other things. Luka's urine is completely normal! He is healed! Thank you Lord! His doctor would like his urine tested again in three months from Kampala and would like to see him again around June. Thanks for all your prayers. Also, Josh's parents arrived! We are so happy to have them here (feel bad it is a bit crazy with everything with Tim and Angie but what can you do). We are also caring for Avalien and Moses for a couple days too. I just pray they feel God's peace with all that is happening. Our team is also expecting the arrival of new team members on Monday. With Tim and Angie gone and with us having Josh's parents we need to make some adjustments and new plans. Please pray for all of us through this difficult time. But above all pray for the doctors to figure out what Tim has and for his healing. 

If you would like to read more about what's been going on, I have a link to Mandy's blog on the right side of my blog (Shaarda News) and a link to Angie's blog as well (Beyond News). Please be praying for healing for Tim, peace and rest for the whole family and wisdom for the doctors.

Papa's visit-September 2010

2010-09-16T17:20:00.000-07:00

Papa John came out to Michigan for a meeting and then extended his stay by a couple nights so he could spend time with his us! Tyson and Jori have been eagerly looking forward to Papa's visit and they were not disappointed!

Jori and Lily Rose

Even though Gram wasn't along, she sent some pretty fun presents with Papa. Jori was so excited to get a new "Barb" (Barbie) and Tyson got a chapter book, which was a very big deal. He also got some money for hot lunches and is eager to use it up!

Tyson and his book

On Tuesday, after meeting Tyson at the bus, Papa and the kids headed down the path. They were going to feed the fish, but were side tracked by the sandy hill. When they came home they were very happy, but very dirty. After some quick baths, we had dinner, then spent some time reading and playing with Papa before bed.

Ice Cream Alley!

Wednesday Papa walked Tyson to the bus, then came along with me to drop Jori off at her first official day of preschool. After that he dropped me off at church for Bible study. I hitched a ride home with a friend because Jori wanted only Papa to pick her up from preschool. (She had a great first day!) Papa and Jori spent a lot of time outside tracking down monarch butterflies. Then after meeting Tyson at the bus, we headed to the bowling alley. Tyson and Jori had fun showing Pop how they bowl, and Papa was on a roll, a turkey (3 strikes in a row) a bunch of spares and almost another turkey at the end. When we got home Darin was there. Pop took the kids back out on the path for a while and then it was time for pancakes, bacon and strawberries. Soon after that, we headed back to the bowling alley for ice cream!

Thanks for the ice cream Papa!

Mmm. Cherry.

This morning Papa and Tyson were up at 6:30. When I came down at 7, Papa had coffee made, and the kids were eating breakfast. Then Papa read more of the firefighter book to Tyson, which made Jori pout for a while. After all, shouldn't she always be the center of attention? Ha.

Reading with pop

Pouting because Pop isn't reading to her

We took Papa to the airport and as we were pulling away from the curb, both kids were already saying "I miss Papa so much". I felt the same way. Thanks, Dad, for spending some extra time with us in Hudsonville. We love it when you have meetings in Michigan and are going to miss having you visit us when we move to South Africa. We know that you will come out there too, but it just won't be quite as often! Gram, thanks for sharing your main man with us. We loved having him and can't wait to see you in October!!

Jori's first day of preschool

2010-09-13T09:20:00.000-07:00

Today was Jori's first day of preschool. I has a harder time sending her off than I did with Tyson. Even when he went to three-school it didn't seem like that big of a deal. I guess it's because Jori's our "baby" and we don't know if/when we will have other kids, so this could be the last time I have a child go to school for the very first time. : (

Our preschooler

Love this girl SO much

The Nemo backpack lives on for another year!

Jori was SO excited to go to school today. She was not too happy that I actually wanted to do her hair this morning, but she does love looking at herself once she's all dolled up.

Jori's school

Adding beads to her name tag

Today was actually an open house/parent info time, so we only went for an hour instead of the whole day, and it wasn't anything like what a regular day of school will be like for her.

The shoes Jori chose to wear

When we were leaving the parking lot, I asked her what she thought of the first day of school and she said "School is absolutely wonderful and absolutely fun". I was happy to hear that! I know Jori will do great once she gets settled in a bit.

Handful of Dollars

2010-09-12T16:55:00.000-07:00

This weekend we had our moving sale. I thought about taking pictures, but didn't. Let's just say that even with the 4+ racks of clothes, 8 tables full of household items and various large pieces of furniture being sold (or donated) we still have MORE THAN ENOUGH to live and live better than most people in the world. With that being said, we were so blessed this weekend by so many friends and total strangers coming out to affirm us as we begin this journey. We advertised our sale as a "Moving to Africa Sale" and there were several people who came to find out where in Africa we were going and why.

One woman who stopped by had her daughter and one of the boys her family adopted from Ethiopia along with her. She was telling me about a family that recently moved to Ghana to start an orphanage in their home. We talked a bit about how our family's journey to South Africa began. She picked out a couple things from the sale and then she came to pay me and pulled out all that she had in her wallet. It was not a huge amount, which she apologized for, but I immediately started crying and if there hadn't been a bunch of people milling about my driveway, I would have been weeping. I don't know if she will ever read this blog, but if she does, I want her to know how much she blessed me. I am starting to cry again just thinking about it. I was just so touched that a stranger would reach out to me, to my family, that way. It had nothing to do with the dollar amount, it was just the act of unselfishly giving what you had to a total stranger.

Last week was just kind of intense for me. Tyson started First Grade, we "came out" with our news of moving to South Africa, Darin's 2 year old nephew fell out of a 2nd story hotel window and MIRACULOUSLY came away with some stitches in his chin and broken bones in his leg (only God!!!), we were preparing for the moving sale and then had the actual sale on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, and we had our first house showing on Saturday afternoon. It was just emotionally draining week. If not for the blessing of friends, who watched the kids, made signs for the moving sale, came over to help set up for the sale, helped out during the sale and shopped at the sale, brought me coffee and hugs and prayed us through, and the blessing of strangers, who emptied their wallets for us, came to see where in Africa we were headed, extended words of blessing on our journey, and spoke encouraging words after other strangers said things that were less than comforting, I would not have made it through.

I am so glad the moving sale is behind us. It just feels like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders. We have our spare room back just in time for Papa John to stay there this week, Jori starts preschool tomorrow, Tyson has his first 5 day week of school, and my women's Bible study starts up again on Wednesday. Fall is in the air. It is time to buy apples for making sauce and head out to Post Family Farm for pumpkin donuts! Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who helped us out this week in so many different ways. We truly are beyond blessed!

Telling the kids

2010-09-09T16:41:00.000-07:00

Last week we told the kids that we were moving. We didn't say where we were going to, just that a sign would be in our yard and that we needed to start keeping the house clean. This afternoon the for sale sign went up in the yard and we decided it might be best to tell Tyson and Jori the whole story instead of taking a chance that they might hear the news from someone else.

Let's just say it went way better than Darin or I expected. Jori ran around saying "South Africa, hooray!" and "Yay, South Africa" over and over and over. Tyson was a little apprehensive, but most of his worries were about the moving van getting our things to Africa and then some confusion about Grandpa Rick driving a moving van. After that, he seemed pretty happy as well, especially after we talked about getting a DOG!

So, I am glad that the kids know and seem excited, although I am sure there will be moments of anger and fear as well. I've been there and I'm supposed to be one of the grown-ups that has it all together! We still have no definite plans, but as we told the kids, God already knows when we'll move and we don't need to worry about it.

If You say wait...

2010-09-09T16:40:00.000-07:00

...we will wait.

Are you familiar with this song? If not, you should give it a quick listen. I have had the lyrics running through my head for the past couple weeks.

If you say go we will go
If you say wait we will wait
If you say step out on the water and they say it can’t be done
We’ll fix our eyes on you and we will come

Your ways are higher than our ways
And the plans that You have laid are good and true
If You call us to the fire You will not withdraw Your hand
We’ll gaze into the flames and look for You

This morning Darin was on Skype with our business partner and we found out that we will probably be waiting a little longer than we had planned before heading over to South Africa. Now, I admit, this did send me into a mini-tizzy, but I actually pulled out of it pretty fast. God is going to move us over in His time. If He still wants us to go in January, I need to trust that He will work that out and make it clear to us that we are still to head over. If He wants us to stay where we are til June, I need to trust that His ways are higher than mine and look for what He wants me to do in the place He has put me.

So, we are still planning to list the house on Wednesday and have our moving sale a week later. Darin and I both feel good about both of those things. What we are now questioning is when to fill the kids in on our plans, especially since these plans are so up in the air. One thing I know for sure is I need to just turn it all back over to God and quit stressing over the details.