a few jaspersims

Here are a few things Jasper asked me this morning on the way to bsf (I'm writing this in my vernacular, to save time):

- why do forklifts have wheels instead of tracks, like bulldozers?
- why doesn't the moon fall out of the sky?
- how does nighttime turn into daytime?
- why does the sun glow all the time?
- when daddy went in his big airplane allllllll the way up in da sky, did he almost hit God? Why doesn't God fall out of heaven and break his arm?
- why does everyone die?
- Why are there different sizes of screws and screwdrivers? Why aren't they all the same size?

he also told me to "keep my eyes peeled for skunks, because they are NOT friendly."

It wasn't even 9 am yet, and I was attempting to explain mechanics, gravity, astronomy, death, and theology to my preschooler on our 12 minute car ride. His little mind is so absorbent and curious and I love it! (I also find myself quite stumped sometimes, too.)

Also, I have been reading the catechisms to J at lunch recently, and in the book, there are 107 questions that deal with God as our Creator and man's fallen state of sin.

The 1st question is:
-What is the chief end of man? The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.

the 2nd question:
- What rule hath God given to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy Him? The Word of God which is contained in the Scriptures in the New and Old Testaments is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy Him.

and so on and so on.

So we read through some of the questions each day at lunch. One day last week, as I was getting the catechisms out, Jasper said, "Momma. I understand nuffin' of da words you say when you's read dat book. Nuffin'."

Oh my. So honest and so cute!

photo bomb

after lunch, we were all sitting on the floor, playing together, when I noticed that the afternoon lighting was beautiful. I just happened to have the slr handy, so I snapped a few pics.

another sweet lunch with the lovebugs

life has slowed down a tiny bit, so I've had a chance to take a few pics of the boys recently. We had another sweet lunch again today..

and the other evening, Jasper had a blast pushing Brody around in his dumptruck. He was very careful and very gentle... Brody wasn't quite sure what to think, but he tolerated it for a while, even had a little fun, then had ENOUGH. As soon as B had ENOUGH, we ended the "ride".  It was pretty cute and filled up one of the many hours andrew was gone this past week/weekend.

sweet lunches

I love my lunches with Jasper and Brody and realized today that it's going to break my heart when they start school and we don't get to spend leisurely hours eating and playing together every day. So in the spirit of making memories, I grabbed my camera and snapped a couple pics of the boys eating lunch today so I can try to capture and remember these sweet moments.

Not the brightest bulbs...

Andrew and I were just chatting, and Andrew said, "hey hon! There a (NFL) game tonight!"

And I said, "there is?! why is there a game on Tuesday?"

He replied, "no hon, it's Thursday. There is always a game on Thursday."

Me- "wow! It's Thursday already?!"

Moment of silence....

Andrew- "oh wait. I think it might be Wednesday."

Yeah. Grad school starts in 3 months. We might be in trouble.

1st day of bsf!

So the 1st day of bsf was actually a while ago, but in the midst of everything, I forgot to post the pic of the boys. Jasper was SO, I mean SOOO, excited for bsf, he was literally shaking with excitement the whole morning and the whole drive there. We told Jasper a few days ago that we were moving to Georgia and that we would be living with Grandma and Bepa for a while; he had many questions, but there were two that he kept asking repeatedly:

1. Will I still get to eat fruit chewies in Georgia?
2. Will I still get to go to bsf in Georgia?

Oh gracious, it so sweetly melted my heart!

here they are, ready to head out the door for their 1st day of bsf, 2014!

our house is sold!!!

Oh my gracious!! I can't believe it!! We accepted a full-asking-price offer on our house today! God is SO good! I can't even believe it! I'm currently exhausted.. Oh so exhausted. I am at a whole new level of exhaustion that I never knew exhausted. But God is so good!!!! I'm desperate to get into bed. But... here are a few pics.

The first pic was taken yesterday at 5:30 pm. We received word yesterday around 3 pm that 2 different people wanted to tour our house last evening. One at 7 and one at 7:30. We said yes, of course, but there were a few "minor" problems with our house, including the fact that it was a disaster zone and that the living room wall was in the process of being spackeled from the 2 huge gaping holes that we made in it a few days before (we were removing all the water damage). It literally had NO paint, NO sanding done to it. There were drop clothes all over the floor and plaster flakes and plaster dust everywhere. Andrew took an hour of vaca time, got home at 4:30, sanded the wall, possibly spackeled some more?? (I'm not entirely sure b/c I was in a cleaning coma and was so busy I couldn't breath), sanded, sucked up the dust with a shop vac, painted, rehung the curtain rod, curtains, mirrors, etc. Then I swept, mopped, and dusted the living room and then and swept, mopped, and dusted the living room again. Anyway, it was the craziest 4 hours of our life, bar none, and we finished with 8 minutes to spare.

This 2nd picture is a mere 24 hours later, and Andrew is signing the contract to sell our house at the full asking price! Praise GOD!!!! This is so literally a God thing!!

This 3rd picture is of Andrew so sweetly looking at the milipede Jasper found earlier this evening and was so desperate to show his daddy.

and this 4th pic is just a random pic of the boys, whom I love so much my heart aches!

We will be moving Sat, Nov 1, Lord willing. I'm so so so thankful to the Lord for the millions of ways He's provided for us and the billions of ways that He's shown His faithfulness to us. It's truly remarkable! My joy is combined with a little bit of sadness, as our lives here are so incredibly rich and precious. But God has just made is so clear that this is the plan He has for us, and my hope is in Him!

our house is on the market!!

oh my gracious!! I can't believe it. Our house is really for sale!!

This is the first pic that will pop up on "zillow' if someone clicks on our house. I can't believe we're really doing this. It just seems so huge to me and I was definitely fighting back tears as Andrew was pounding the "For Sale by Keller Williams Realty" sign into the yard. Such a bitter sweet moment for me.

We also told Jasper today that we're trying to sell our house and move to a new house. Up till now, he's known nothing about this huge life transition. His first question, immediately upon learning that we might move, was, "Daddy! Can I pwease take my fwoggies wif me?!?!" I was fighting back tears as I was listening to Andrew's conversation with him. This is something that we both want and I definitely have moments of huge excitement and joy and anticipation, and definitely have moments where I'm sad and have a hard time breathing when I think about the reality of moving. So when I have those sad moments, I take comfort in the knowledge that the Lord is with me and He is the one writing my story.

In other news, Brody loves water!! He loves to drink water, to be precise. He still hates tubbies and swimming with all his heart.

The ladies in my Westgate Moms Group call Brody "Mr. Fuzzy Head" which I find utterly adorable and accurate. Jasper and I have started calling him that on occasion.

Jasper loves maps! I mean, really LOVES maps. He studies them all the time and loves to show me new things he discovers on the maps.

Nana so sweetly took the boys to the zoo the other day and Jasper got several maps from his zoo outing. He's never put them down since and I often find him just pouring over them, wearing his zebra hat, of course, since zebras are at the zoo.

And by God's grace alone, these boys still love each other to pieces!! The first thing Jasper wants to do every morning is cuddle with Brody and kiss him.... sometimes, Jasper almost kisses him to death. It's so cute. The other day, while I was intensely cleaning the house, I caught jasper feeding brody pieces of chocolate cookies drenched in syrup. Yeah... Brody loved it. He was literally shaking with excitement (especially considering I've more or less fed him pureed carrots every meal for every day for about 2 months).

One of the moms from the Westgate Moms Group invited all of us, along with our families, over for a cookout tonight. i'm really looking forward to that! It's so fun to move from "these women are my neighbors" to "these women are my dear friends". Since we started meeting 2 years ago, we've gone from mtg once a week at the park to mtg several times a week, texting, emailing, asking for support, asking to borrow things, sharing struggles, inviting over for parties, etc, etc. They are a dear group of friends that I'm so thankful for! Anyway, I need to whip up a salad for the cookout tonight, so I'll sign off for now.

God's perfect provision

While deep, deep cleaning my home today, God used a simple flip flop to sweetly remind my heart that He will always provide. In His perfect timing. Not too soon, and not too late.

I was cleaning out under our bed, which I haven't done in the 6.5 years that we've lived in our house, and I found a pair of black Old Navy flip flops. They were mine, obviously, but I had no recollection of ever having them or ever having lost them. I wear black Old Navy flip flops all the time. I mean, allllllll the time. In fact, I was wearing a pair of black Old Navy flip flops while I was cleaning, at the exact moment that I find these "lost" pair.

But finding these "lost" pair under the bed completely surprised me. They were in perfect condition and I have no idea where they came from. I shrugged, dusted them off, and put them in my closet with my other shoes. And then completely forgot about them.

Less than an hour later, I was walking down the steps in my original pair of flip flops, when one of them broke. Like, completely, irrevocably, not-able-to-fix broke. I stopped in my tracks and realized:

God knew what I needed, before I even knew it.

God always provides, in huge ways and small ways, and sometimes, in the most unexpected ways.

If God cares enough about me to provide a perfect "back-up" pair of flip flops during one of the busiest weeks of my life when I have no time to breath, no time to eat, no time to shower, AND CERTAINLY no time to go to Old Navy to buy a new pair... how much more does He care about the bigger details of my life??? Such as our future move to GA, the sale of our house, the uncertainty about Andrew's TA position, where will Andrew get a job if he doesn't get a TA position, etc, etc, etc.

And if He cares enough to provide me with new flip flops, He cares enough to provide for everything.

And how much He must love me, to give me identical, new, perfect flip flops at the exact moment when I needed them.

"Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. His steadfast love endures forever." Psalm 136:1

(and because all blog posts are better with a picture, here is a pic of the boys playing together while I was getting breakfast ready this morning)

Eat your peppers

i have so many things... I mean SOOO many things that I want to write on this blog. Vacation at Allen's house, anniversary trip to Niagra Falls, Dad's annual Field Day, our actual 9 year anniversary date, etc, etc. I am constantly thinking about this blog and how I wish I had the time to post on it, but ever since we officially found out that we were accepted to Georgia State University, we have been so overwhelmed with our to-do list. We are officially moving to Georgia sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas and we have tons to do between now and then. We're working night and day and night and day to get the house on the market, so that's taking up all of my waking hours and most of my "sleeping" hours as well. I told andrew the other day that I have at least 25 "#1 priorities" that all are pressing and need done right now and I'm getting so overwhelmed that i'm almost paralyzed, not knowing what to do, when to do it, what is really the "#1 priority" and what is not, etc, etc. We both are just swamped. The verse, "the joy of the Lord is my strength" is constantly running through my mind right now.

But anyway... there was a little thing with Jasper that I had to record on here..


Because we had literally 75 green peppers sitting on our counter over Labor Day weekend, Andrew asked if I could make some stuffed peppers for dinner one night. I happily obliged, seeing as how I, too, love stuffed peppers and cooking for my family is one of my greatest joys. So sunday night, I made awesome, awesome stuffed green peppers. These huge peppers were stuffed with ground turkey, China Red whole grain rice, sauteed cabbage, sauteed peppers, sauteed onions, bacon, 3 different kinds of cheese, 5 different kinds of spices, etc, etc.

And Jasper refused to eat his. Absolutely, all-out refused to eat his. Our rule is this: We eat dinner for around 35-45 minutes. We set the timer for Jasper (and we set a generous amount of time on the timer). If he hasn't finished his dinner in 45 minutes, that's fine, but dinner is over and he will have what is left of his dinner for his bed time snack.

Well, Jasper refused to eat his dinner. So we moved on with our evening, had our family bike ride, had bible time, and Jasper had his left over stuffed pepper for bed time snack.

Only he refused to eat even a bite. I would have sorta felt bad for him, except we gave him such a small portion of pepper, and it was stuffed with his favorite things in the world. He loved stuff peppers! It was quickly turning into the battle of the wills. So we told him, you need to eat this for bed time snack. If you don't, you'll have it for breakfast. And he replied, "I jus' fink I'll have it for breakfast." ok, buddy. Game on.

So for breakfast the next morning, I said, "hey buddy. As soon as you finish your pepper, I'll get you yummy cereal!!" and he said, "Momma, I fought (thought) about it, an' I's decided I's not gonna eat my pepper. Ever."

oh my. I was laughin so hard on the inside. So I said...

"It's your decision of when you eat your pepper. But you are not going to get any other food to eat until you eat your pepper first. So babe, sit at the table for breakfast with me and Brody and eat your pepper."

Jasper said, "I'll sit, but I's jus' fink I'm not gonna eat da pepper."

so I set the timer. He didn't eat a bite. Breakfast was over. About 5 minutes later, "Hey momma, can I pwease hab some rasisins to eat?" and I said, "Sure buddy! as soon as you eat your pepper for lunch, you may have raisins."

Jasper... "No, I's not donna eat dat pepper. But I's so, so hungry."

me- "that's great that you're hungry! Because you have yummy pepper to eat. At lunch time."

Jasper... "I's so hungry, but I's not gonna eat dat pepper."

and on and on all day it went.

you get the point.

At lunch, during my phone conversation with Andrew, he said, "babe, you have to win this battle with Jasper." and I said, "oh I will."

It was a definite battle of the wills.

But...

It gave me a great opportunity to teach him A LOT that day about how our choices have consequences and our bad choices give us bad consequences.

it was almost a full 24 hours that Jasper didn't eat a bite of pepper until he caved and finally ate his original tiny amount from dinner the night before.

But at the end of the day, I'm pretty sure he got the message:

Eat the pepper. Momma don't play.

(this is the infamous pepper. It was on this hill that I took a stand, and it was on this hill that I won the battle. Momma don't play.)

Celebrating Nine Wonderful Years of Marriage!!!

GUEST AUTHOR: Andrew Meade

Sometime, a long time ago, Natalie asked me if I would ever guest-write a post on her blog.  Well, she is out of the house at the moment (rocking it at the gym) and I thought I'd take this opportunity to write a bit...

Tomorrow (Wednesday, September 3rd) marks Natalie and my 9th wedding anniversary.  It's a little strange to think about because the time has really flown by.  We've held each other's hands through many life changes since that beautiful late summer day.  Through each adventure God has helped us to grow and taken our marriage relationship to a greater level.  By God's amazing grace we are different people than we were back then but our love for and commitment to each other has been unwavering.

Look how young we were back then!!

I can honestly say that marriage to Natalie has been the most wonderful, humbling, awesome, blessing that God has given me.  I am consistently challenged and amazed by Natalie - her tender heart for other people, her love for Christ and the church, her willingness to give of herself, her steady patience with the boys (and me!), her ever-growing repertoire of delectable dishes, the way that she teaches the boys about God and life, her loyalty to her friends, her passion, her earnest desire to make our home into the place we all want to be, her ability to absorb new skills, her forgiveness and her dedication.  I am so very, very blessed to call her my wife and to have enjoyed nine years of marriage with her.  I'm so looking forward to holding her hand through many more adventures together in the years to come.

Natalie, I love you!!!

Here is a preview of our (I'm sure soon to come) 9th anniversary Niagara Falls trip blog post.