Weekend Away...

We had a grand old weekend... On Thursday we hopped in the car and took a short jaunt up to San Francisco to visit Gramma and Grandpa Jim... Reesie is the absolute worst car sleeper who ever lived, which always makes for a nice not-so-quiet car ride... But it was way worth all the chaos... We woke up on Friday, ate delicious apple pancakes & packed up for the day. First stop... Gramma's work. She has a bunch of huge cranes at her office and Siah got to go in one and even operate it (with a little help of course). We had Mimi's for lunch then headed into the city. I LOVE SAN FRANCISCO!!!! It really is one of my favorite places to visit. We took the kids to pier 39...

We checked out the zillions of seals that sun bathe next to the pier...

And took some fun picks of our family...

And went WAAAAYYYY overboard on pictures of this cute treasure....

Siah wanted to jump on this giant trampoline thing, so we totally let him! It was so fun to watch him... Proud Mama & Papa here! :)

More of our Reesie-Piece...

Then... Gramma and Grandpa Jim took the kids home and Papa and I went on the most lovely of dates!!!! On our honeymoon we stayed at a quaint little place in Muir Woods, just outside the city, The Pelican Inn. On thebottom floor of the Inn there is a small pub and the absolutely most lovely restaurant, that only seats about 15 people total. We had reservations for Friday night and I loved every second of it. On the drive we listened to good music and even blessed each other with our smooth dance moves. :) The Inn is located just around the corner from a private beach. We hiked up the cliffs on the beach and at the top we talked about all the things that we like about each other then carved our initials in the sand. (Cheezy yes, but a totally fun!)

At dinner we got the best seat in the restaurant in a little nook by the window... And I must say that we just might have been one of the few couples having genuine fun on our date. There was this couple next to us that were definately on their first date. About every fifteen minutes they would ask each other a question and give each other a one word answer and then sit there in silence for another fifteen minutes all while sipping their wine. Man Oh Man am I glad that I am ALL done with that phase of my life!!! I was so grateful to be there with my Joey!!!

The window in the top right of the photo below is the window into the room that we stayed in when we were on our honeymoon nearly TEN years ago!! My goodness!!

I have a picture of us in this very spot ten years ago, but it was taken with one of them old fashion cameras where you actually had to get the film developed!!

Then.... On Saturday we headed down to San Luis Obispo for my older brother's ordination reception. I was so honored to be a part of such a special day. I have been overwhelmingly blessed to watch my brother grow into an incredible man of God over the past 12 years. He really has a passion for what he does. I can't really express with my words how extremely proud I am of him and the man, Father, husband, friend and brother that he has become. :)

I loved our weekend away... By Sunday night we were TIRED! WE got home in record time,
4 1/2 hours. I have no idea what's going on, but for some reason with each trip we take, it gets more and more difficult for me to unpack and get back to our regular life. But this morning I finally put the last of the clean clothes away. Yeah for me!

Until next time...

Trust

I've been learning how to trust. I mean, what does "trust" really mean anyway? What does it look like in the everyday... in the mundane, in the monotonous? If I experience a brief moment of doubt in the midst of my trusting, does that discredit all the trust that I thought I was experiencing before I had the moment of doubt?

Can you tell that sometimes I tend to make things complicated? Maybe over-analyze a little bit?

I've been asking the Lord, "Show me how to genuinely trust you?" I've be looking for this deep spiritual answer, an epiphany or something of the sort. And then in true Fatherly fashion He opened my eyes to the purest form of trust that I have ever seen...

I don't know how I've missed it all these nights. Each evening before lights out, Joey reads the Bible with the kids and he prays with them. EVERY SINGLE NIGHT the kids pray for the same two things, a house with a long driveway and another baby boy and baby girl in Mommy's tummy. But this is how they pray...

"Thank you God for a house with a long drive way. And thank you for another baby boy and another baby girl in Mommy's tummy. Thank you God. Amen."

Did you catch it? Did you catch how innocently and purely they trust? When they pray, they do not ask IF God can do this or that. They thank the Lord As if what they are asking for has already been done. They unashamedly trust Him to give them the desires of their hearts!

That's the kind of trust that I want to be happening between me and my Savior!
This week, as my treasures prayed their concise, grateful prayers...
I learned a little more about trust...

How cute are these treasures?

Don't forget to pause the music at the bottom of the page. :)

Missing & Missed

To Tara, Adam, AJ & Vivy...

The truth is that we miss you around here. Not a day goes by that one, or all of us, don't ask outloud, "When's AJ (or Tara, or some "Peek") coming home?" So we thought we'd fill you in a little...
Some of the things that you have NOT been missing out on are..
*The zillions of ants that have been invading our kitchen almost everyday since you've been gone... I think I have used an entire bottle of all purpose cleaner on Reesie's highchair alone trying to get the ant situation under control... maybe we should invest in ant spray instead of all purpose cleaner??? You think???
*Speaking of "Reesie-Peace", as she was once known. Her knew name is now "Reesie-Trouble." Let's see... since you've been gone she's... completely unrolled several rolls of toilet paper, swallowed one of her own hair-ties and thrown it up on the way to church, given herself a bath in the toilet, almost drown in a pool, pitched about ten handfuls of fits, pulled every last movie off the bookshelf in the living room like a hundred times even though I've made it very clear that that bookshelf is OFF LIMITS!!... I could go on and on... And believe it or not, I really do watch the girl... She's faster than the road runner. Before I can even get the words, "Reesie-Trouble" to roll off my tongue, the girl has already managed to cause a major ruckus!!!

*Our Mount Everest... yes... those beautiful but pain in the bum floors!!! You lucky, lucky duck! You have not had to clean them for three WHOLE marvelous weeks!!! WOW, how blessed you must feel!!


The trail of ants invading our LIVES!!!!!


FIVE things that are missing you...

You Are MISSED!!!

AS you well know... our treasures have absolutely NO sense of time. So although we are constantly telling them, "ten more days.. nine more days..." They don't really get it! So we made this nifty countdown calender for them. And we've ALL been counting down the days !!!

You are Missed!!!!
See ya soon!


PS Happy Wedding Day to you Rachel!

"Nates Bum Farm"

I'm a mom now, right... so... I must confess that I have trouble saying the word b_u_t_t, because I don't really want to hear that word come out of my little treasure's mouths... But... I am also still extremely immature... So I still find myself referring to "Bates Nut Farm", as "Nates Bum Farm." It's a good compromise, don't you think?

Anyways, we took our annual Fall trip out to Bates last Sunday. It's as close to the feeling of a Fall Country Fair that we can find around San Diego. It was actually cloudy all morning and I got my hopes up that this years trip just might FEEL like Fall. But what do you know, on the drive out the clouds disappeared and it magically became a brisk 80 degrees again. Our poor children were melting in their snow jackets and beanies... okay, they weren't really wearing snow coats, but I can promise you that they were seriously over dressed! Oh well, I had good intentions. :)

Here's Siah caring his pumpkin around...

Our annual attempt at taking the perfect picture of all three treasures... always an adventure...

never a dull moment...

How big is this treasure getting??? OMG!

My little boy...

Our girls... (My personal vote is that that hat is NOT really Reesie's style! It makes her head look like a mushroom... Oh well, it was a nice thought. :)

Siah's getting old... like really old! Now he can climb all over the pumpkins and not even fall over. He has tried to master this "skill" every year for the past four years and this is the first year that he has been successful.

These are my favorites of Hal this year...

We turned our single stroller into a double for the day...

The Fam...

The Girls...

The boys...

On the way up to the Farm Siah enlightened us with his curiosity...
The conversation went like this...
S, "Hey MamaPapa (We become one word when we're together :)?
MP, "Yea buddy?"
S, "How did God get my voice in my mouth?"
MP, "He made it from nothing. Cool Huh?"
S, "Well then, where did he get the parts to make my bum?"

I'll spare y'all the details of how his Papa responded to that question... But this is seriously the kind of stuff that we get from Siah almost everyday.
In fact today in the car he asked, "Hey Mom. Do seven-year-olds have teeth?"
Where does he come up with this stuff? I am pretty sure that he has a bit of his Papa in him! And the total truth is that, even though I am Mom now and I should probably be growing up, I absolutely love all the silly things that go on in our home. And I love that our kids feel free to ask us whatever is going through their head. I love that our home is safe and fun!
It was a great day at Bates! Curiosity and all!