Let There Be Light!

We have power! YAHOO!! We got home from taking showers at our friends house and got a wonderful surprise. Lights.

Ice Ice Baby

Everything is covered. We have probably 2 inches on the ground. We are still getting freezing rain. It's supposed to do this all day. We may get snow on top of the ice. This is the worst ice storm Northern Ark. has saw in 10 years I think. But hey, the positive is that we still have power. We think the main reason is because we had a tornado come though Gassville almost a year ago. It wiped out alot of trees and powerlines so there are no trees to knock them over. Who knows, the power still could go out though. Hasn't yet so we are blessed. The heat is nice! It's nice to be iced in WITH electric.. Gotta love winter. Personally I'm ready for spring.

Getting Ready

Today most of my energy was focused on getting ready for this stink'n freezing rain we are getting tonight. They say we are getting over 1 inch of ice...yuck.. Wal-Mart was insane! I didn't even go to Mtn. Home. I went to Flippin. Still insane! I'm sure M.H. would have been worse. I got propane, milk, and all those iced in things. The blessing in all this is that since we are on city water we will have water pressure at least if the power goes out. I guess it's not the end of the world. No heat though..double yuck.

I got all my laundry done today (good thing). Just wanted to be prepared for the lovely coating of ice we will get soon.

Let Her Eat Cake!

Saturday we had Livy's birthday party. We had the grandma's and grandpa's here. Even her uncle Brian and uncle Jason, aunt Buffy, and cousin Bethany came. Livy LOVED her Cinderella cake. Very simple this year, I just put little figurines on top. She was super excited about the cake.

I bought them thinking that after she had them on her cake she could play with them. I think she loved those better than anything she got that day. Funny kid. It's like when you give a kid a present and they play with the box. Same thing.

Here's a pic of the girls. They had so much fun together.

Livy's Grandpa Moeckel made her table and two chairs. They are beautiful! The girls loved setting on the chairs. They also loved playing with Livy's new kitchen.

Livy got other fun presents too. Thanks family! (present and not present) It was fun having family here over the weekend.

Happy Birthday Olivia Grace

Our sweet little lady is 2 years old today. I can't believe it! People always told me that these years go by fast and they were so right. She was supposed to be due on the 18th, but of course it's was God's timing. I remember this time two years ago I was laying in BRMC having contractions and awaiting an epidural. Then at 2:55 p.m. God brought Olivia Grace screaming into our world (how appropriate, she loves to scream..). Ah, seems like yesterday. (The pics of me in the hospital... eeek! Next time I should do something with myself. I totally had the time. I was only laying there numb for a few hours.)

Last year. 1 year old.

What a joy our Livy Grace has been. Happy birthday, sweet little lady.

I will praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful I know that full well.

Proverbs 139:13-14 NIV

There's Always Room For Jello

We love sugar-free, fat-free chocolate fudge pudding!

Don't ya love the proper pinky?.?

After we got done eating it she said, "MMM, I love that puddin Momma!"

Oh, how I love you my sweet pudding face.

A President And A King

The media has been filled with the news of the upcoming inauguration. Tomorrow is going to be crazy in the world of news. My mind has been on this for the past week or so. One of my devotionals talked about this very thing. We need to pray for our new president, his family, and that God will keep them safe. Here's an excerpt from today's proverbs 31 ministry devotional.

This month, the United States is inaugurating a new President. It's a time to observe and utilize our religious freedoms. Let's start by praying for our newly elected President and all government officials. Let's honor God's command found in our key verse, "I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness." As followers of Christ who is the Prince of Peace, let's honor, respect and pray for our President.

As I look at the baby in my nativity manger, I remember that He is not only the King of kings and Lord of lords. He is the Wonderful Counselor who guides Presidents, leaders, and you and I as well. Let's lift them up in prayer.

Dear Lord, I pray for our national leaders. Allow their hearts to be open to Your wisdom and guidance. Remind me to pray for them fervently and frequently. In Jesus' Name, Amen.

I thought that was good. Remember to stop and pray for the Obamas tomorrow.

I Miss You My Friends

Today we got a wonderful surprise when we came into Sunday school this morning. Our friends Joe and Amanda Hall came back to visit for Kilee Long's birthday. We got to know them really well after we moved here and had lots of fun with them. They have been gone for about a year and a half and we miss them! We went to Joe and Kim's this afternoon to visit for a while with them and ended up staying until about 9:30. Amanda and I were pregnant at the same time almost 3 years ago (has it been that long?). Jack and Livy are 6 months apart. We have always said that they are betrothed. Jackson loved giving Livy kisses and hugs. Oh my!

We laughed and had the best time. We miss you Halls!

Hello Saturday! You're The Greatest!

Again, a lovely Saturday with my family and some comfy pj's.

Today we are going to a birthday celebration for a pair of sweet twin boys in our church that had serious health problems during and after birth. Their Mommy and Daddy are glad to have them here. They will be 1 year old. Speaking of birthdays..Livy got an early b-day present last night. Our pastor and his wife were over at our house and brought Livy a baby doll, a puzzle, and this sweet outfit.


What a cute and sassy little pants outfit! It was kinda hard to get a good pic of the whole thing. I'm going to make a cute black and white print bow to go with this. I may even do it today so she can have it for church tomorrow. Thank you Mike and Kathye!

Bible Study

Tonight we start women's Bible study again after a long Christmas break. We are doing Beth Moore's study of Esther. I'm looking forward to studying this awesome book of the Bible and fellowshipping with my sisters in Christ.

Crafty Momma

Today some girlfriends and I made bows for our girls hair. It was super easy to do! I paid a little over $2 for ribbon, $2 for the clips, and about $3 for wire. I know I mentioned this on yesterdays post but just one bow at War Eagle was $8! It definitely pays to make your own if you can. These are the bows I made today. I had to put them on a kitchen towel to starch them (helps them to stiffen to hold shape). They are still a little wet. Aren't they cute?!?

Pics of Livy this morning.

I'm going to get some more ribbon next week to make a few more bows. They will look sweet in Liv's hair.

Calgon, Take Me Away!

Today I have fixed meals, dressed my child, dressed myself (thank goodness..don't want to scare the world) did dishes, made beds, got groceries, unloaded them and put them away, took Livy potty many times, changed pull ups and big girl panties, wiped noses, tears, and a little butt (yes, I'm talking about Livy's..mine not so little), and I still need to vacuum. I did get to lay down for a couple minutes before I heard Livy stirring in her room. I'm thinking about taking some Tylenol too because I have a headache and cramps (don't care too much for my monthly visitor). Nevertheless, the day has been good (except for the headache and cramps!).

I'm starting to think about supper too. Today before shopping, I planned our menus for the next two weeks. Tonight it's hamburgers and roasted potato wedges. Tomorrow we are having the Pioneer Woman's chicken spaghetti. Make some for your family. It's pretty darn tasty!

Also, tomorrow I'm going to a girlfriends house to make hair bows. It is so much cheaper to make your own bows. Plus they are so cute! At War Eagle women would make bows and sell them for like $8 a piece. Ridiculous! I can make them that they will look the same. Those women maybe have $2 or $3 in each bow. Livy will look lovely!

Now I'm enjoying looking at Livy play with her farmyard set. She looks so peaceful. I love peace. LOL...now she is spanking her bottom and saying booty, booty, booty... She also said, "I like booties!" Okay, I did NOT teacher her that! Oh how I love that little girl! Livy=Joy.

I need that bubble bath now.

Superbowl Food

My mind has already went to the Superbowl and food. I found some great recipes on the pioneer woman. God bless her. She has the greatest recipes. I know that many of us love her. If you haven't heard of her check her out. She is fabulous! What I love most is that she shows you what you need (with pictures, not lists). Then she shows you how to do things step by step (again with pictures not reading). Love it! I'm going to make these two things for Superbowl Sunday.

Now that I have mastered salsa (and I love my salsa!), I need to master pico de gallo and guacamole. I love both of these!!

I also love onion straws! I'm not sure if I'm making these for game day or not. But don't these look just yummy!!!! Of course anything fried is good. We don't fry much (hardly anything expect like bacon, sausage, and hamburger like for tacos) but man is fried stuff good!

I may have to do a test run on the onion straws to make sure they are good. wink, wink :)

No Perfect Families

Good Monday morning to all! While doing my devotional time this morning, I caught a glimpse of what John's was about, so I picked it up and read it. I thought I would share it with you. Good stuff!

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. They are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. (Romans 3:23-24)

SAVED, NOT PERFECT
Romans 3:23-24 applies to far more than the initial salvation experience. When we come to faith in Christ we receive the gift of salvation, not the gift of perfection. On a daily basis, we continue to fall short of the glory of God and we continue to need His grace. This goes for our family life, too. The gospel is not only the means to entering into the spiritual life and relationship with God, it's also the means for continuing to live the Christian life, including family life. Especially family life.

Every family is made up of imperfect people. Realistic Christian parents understand this and know that one of our roles as parents is to train our children to obey the Scriptures rather than their sinful desires and to walk by the Spirit, not by the flesh. That being said, we need to constantly remind ourselves that God's response when we confess our sin is grace, not condemnation. So we should look for ways to demonstrate the grace of God as mush as His discipline.

YOU NEED IT TOO!
One way you can minister grace to your children is to tell them that you're not perfect either, and you need grace every day too. Without going into all the gory details of your sin, it's appropriate to let your kids know that you're a fellow traveler on the path of following Jesus. Then tell them how Jesus powers out His grace on us and rescues us for our sin.

BOTTOM LINE
Parenting is the task of one beggar teaching other (younger) beggars where to find food.

I thought this was so good. Everyone, including our kids needs His grace everyday! This momma does too! I'm NOT perfect!

The Chick's Not So Newsy Weekend News

Kinda catchy huh? We had a good weekend....at home! It was good to be home for a change since we came back from all the holiday stuff last weekend. Saturday morning we hung out at home and ate some yummy pancakes made by my sweet husband. He made me breakfast. That was so sweet of him. Then we went into town to and went to Lowe's for a bit. After that, we went and ate some Chinese at Chen's Garden. We love that place because kids under 4 eat free. We love free! Then it was back home and naps for all. I love naps!

We had a great Sunday with our church family. We are enjoying our new Sunday school class. We miss having Sunday school with everyone since we had to split to make smaller classes, but it has been good. We will have our first party in a few weeks. We also had nursery today in Livy's nursery, and our friends Mitch and Amy joined the church today. Yea! We were so happy about that.

We are going back to church soon. John is meeting with the deacons tonight after church. Maybe we will know when his ordination service will be. Family, we will let ya know if it is going to be the same weekend as Livy birthday. We'll have a double wammy. Don't want everyone to make two trips.

Scripture China

We had mommy group today at my friend Brittney's house and she had dinnerware that is called scripture china. It was so cute! I would love to have a few place settings to use in our home. Aren't these cute? Too bad my birthday isn't until September. Anniversary and Christmas in December. Darn! Oh my sweet John, keep this in mind! I would use my scriptures dishes everyday. I love them. Below are the accent plates. Love it!

Update: Extractions complete

And all is well. After lots of rest today. I'm good. Of course, wasn't bad at all. I was in and out in 30 min. Seriously!

Oh the Horror!!!

Good morning! It's blog time for me. Okay, what's all the horror about. The denist. YUCK!! I'm getting my two upper wisdom teeth out today. They aren't putting me to sleep because my teeth are basically in all the way. I don't have my bottom ones anyway so they don't hit against anything. Twice a year I get a really bad canker sore and a swollen cheek because they rub. Not fun. So Dr. Alexander decided they need to come out. Even though I was a dental assistant for three years and saw tons to extrations and I know how it's done it still makes me nervous. Geeze....not looking forward to the soreness either. After having a baby you would think I could take this. Truly, I don't know which is worse. Not really looking forward to this (I mentioned that part already didn't I..). Oh well, I'll make it and all will be well.

A Mom's Mutterings

Today is full of lots of playing, cleaning, and laundry. Tons of laundry. I didn't do laundry last week because we were in between families houses and holiday stuff. Now that things are back to normal we are getting back to our regular routine. Does it feel like Christmas was a long time ago to anyone else? It does me. It's like, when it's over, it's over..ya know.. Anyway getting back to normal. John had men's Bible study last night. It was our turn to provide the meal so I made a crockpot of chili and some cookies (Carol, I love my crockpot! thanks!).
The next thing on the agenda is to get out in that nasty garage and clean it up. YUCK! A job I don't look forward to. Over Christmas it got in a mess. I enjoy being out in the garage when the weather is warmer (well i really don't enjoy it, but ya know). Livy gets out there with her broom and helps. I may wait until another nice 60+ degree day. I'm crossing my fingers that we get another day like that. Speaking of garage, we have Livy's b-day present out there. We bought a kitchen for at Toys R Us on Saturday.


It's the Fisher Price "grow with me kitchen". Doesn't it look like tons of fun!!! What is shown here is the pre-school set up. We will start with the toddler one. It makes fun sounds. When she get older the sounds can change to be more life like. FUN! I had a kitchen when I was little. I'm excited for her. She will love it! Of course there is assembly required. Her Daddy will have fun with that. I'll have to do some rearranging in her room to make her a little kitchen area. Her Grandpa Moeckel is making her a table and some chairs. They will be very special and a keepsake. We look forward to her birthday.

Ready or Not!

Here comes the toddler bed! Oh my. Sometimes I think I'm crazy! She wasn't climbing out of her crib or anything, we just thought we would teach her now. She will be 2 in a couple weeks anyway. We felt it was time, so yesterday John coverted her bed. Livy needs to get used to it anyway. She started at nap time yesterday. She did get out of her bed, like 6 times I think. After that I told her if she got out of her bed again Momma would spank. And she got out of her bed...shocking huh? So Momma gave her a spanking. She didn't like that. I eventually rocked her. It took 5 min and she was out. Thank goodness! Bedtime was better. I read her a book and told her to stay in her bed. To our surprise, a big surprise, she stayed in her bed and went to sleep. I'm glad that drama didn't ensue like it did at nap time. Whew.... We'll see what today is like.

Wisdom from Proverbs

I like this. This is from my "One Minute Bible for Women" email that I get each week. Thought I would share. Enjoy!


The Wise Mother - Teaching Her Children
Selections from Proverbs 1, 2, 6
Don't reject your mother's teaching, for it will be a garland of grace on your head and a gold chain around your neck... . Then you will understand righteousness, justice, and integrity - every good path. For wisdom will enter your heart, and knowledge will delight your soul. Discretion will watch over you, and understanding will guard you... . When you walk here and there, they will guide you; when you lie down, they will watch over you; when you wake up, they will talk to you. For a commandment is a lamp, teaching is a light, and corrective instructions are the way to life.
The goal in teaching and disciplining our children is not so they can behave in the checkout line, but so they can become so accustomed to obeying us while they're under our wing, they'll have no problem obeying God when they're out on their own.
We always need to be on the lookout for those teachable moments with our children spontaneous lessons that appear in the side yard, the laundry room, the grocery store. But those are not really enough, because anything that we relegate to haphazard status will often get crowded out of our schedules. If it's important to us, then sitting down with our children on a regular basis to listen, ask questions, share our hearts, search the Scriptures, or talk things over with God is worth the extra commitment.
Look At It This Way ...
It is easier to talk about issues like servanthood, humility, and obedience than it is to make them a reality in the lives of our children. We know that it is not enough for us to memorize the meaning of these words; we must live them out in our actions. It can be difficult to teach these qualities when we know that we are in our own lives still struggling to learn these Christlike qualities.
As parents, we may lack the confidence to teach characteristics that we know we fail to carry out as we should, or we fear that we will be exposed as hypocrites in the eyes of our own children. But we must remember that it is only by the Lord's grace that we are qualified to be his representatives and to bear the responsibility of training our children in his likeness. If we abandon this vision because of our fear, then we are left to wander aimlessly with no direction other than our own self-interest. It is far better that we admit our frequent failings and still keep our eyes focused on the race we are called to run. Susan Card

A Final Though:Truth is, you're teaching your children something every minute you're around them. Make sure the things you're doing are lining up with the things you're saying.

Weary Travelers

Our holiday travels are finally over! We are soooo happy to be home! We a had a good time with family members over New Years. We were chating on the way home and we realized we have only been home 2 days in the past week and a half. That's not counting going to Bethany's first b-day party a couple weeks ago. That's another time completely. All this travel'n has wore us out. Fun, but wearing. Good thing we don't plan on going anywhere for a while. A big plus is that gas is cheaper. Why is December so stink'n crazy??? I think everyone should come to our house next year. Give us a break! Oh well that's not for another 12 months. Thank goodness!!!!

New Years day we went to my aunt and uncles house in Springfield before going to Jason and Buffy's. We played my uncles new wii (his Christmas present) on his 62 inch T.V. It's insanely big! Everyone played. Good times. John really wants a wii now as well as a massively big T.V. Don't know where that would fit in the budget. Is it a real need? A wii is lots of fun though.

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Tonight after our hot wing fun, my brother Jason and I gave the girls a bath. They loved it.
Our girls our are too cute!

The girls had fun in the tub. Me and bro with our girls.