being Jesus

we are trying to teach our children not just to tell people about Jesus but sometimes you must be Jesus. well today we got our chance to show them how to be Jesus. my husband coaches a hardball hockey team, they had a 1 day tournament in lubbock, one of the families broke down about halfway home last night. luckily they were in a caravan coming back and were able to just load them up and bring them in. so this morning my husband got up in the rain, hitched up the trailer and took the guy back to get his car. while he was doing this i was going to pick up 2 more hockey kids from their house. their mom had to be taken by ambulance to the hospital this morning. their dad is in honduras on tdy. they had no one else to turn to and i couldn't just leave the kids home alone so off i went to pick them up. we went to the hospital and checked on mom. she will be there a couple of days so me and her best friend worked out how we were gonna take care of the kids. guess what? i now have 2 more kids for the next couple of days. OK God when i thanked you yesterday for giving me a houseful of teenagers i didn't mean You could give me 2 more. just joking, but seriously pray for us.

swimming...prom dresses....blah blah blah

feeling very blah today. colleen has a friend over so i can't do what i want to do. just lay around and watch movies and eat. maybe that's a good thing.

just realized that i forgot to blog about cliff (aka moe) making the middle school swim team. he came home one day from school asking if he could try out for the swim team. i felt sure he had heard the announcement wrong, who know they had a middle school swim team. so we show up at the tryouts a little late because we couldn't find the right gym at central, cliff jumps in the water swims one lap while they time him and he makes the team. the whole thing took about 5 seconds but he was walking on cloud nine. all he could talk about was swimming. i was in tears while he was swimming because i wanted him to make it so bad and to be honest he looked so huge compared to the other kids. a little back ground. cliff has always wanted to do sports but his mom has always moved them so much or missed the deadlines to sign him up. so this was the first time he wanted to do something, got the chance to tryout, and actually made it. we are so proud of him. now we get to add swim meets to our schedule. woo hoo!!!

the girls and i went prom dress shopping about 2 weeks ago. i had planned to spend the whole day with the girls shopping and laughing and trying on dresses and just having fun. well so much for my plans. mexa (aka freddie) was totally in the moment. trying on every dress i pulled off the rack. just totally enjoying the fact that shes a girl and wanting to feel and look like a princess. now colleen on the other hand was sullen and pouty and not in any mood for dress shopping. talk about a mood killer. i'm afraid she has entered the stage where i'm gonna have to work really hard to enjoy her. don't get me wrong i love her like crazy, but there are days i really don't like her very much. my friend monique has warned me this day was coming but i just didn't expect it so soon. luckily i decided we needed to go to koronas. the sales lady took one look at pouty colleen and determined in her heart she was gonna find her the perfect dress. she grabbed a dress off the rack and pushed her into a dressing room to change. colleen didn't stand a chance. when she came out the sales lady started pinning her and made her walk around the store in this dress that she hated. it didn't take colleen long to find more dresses to try on and within the hour found the perfect pink princess prom dress. she walked in pouty and walked out happy. thank you God for pushy sales ladies.

1 year ago today....

....we were in dallas picking up the kids. i can't believe its been 1 year already. it seems like just yesterday our whole world was turned upside-down, in a good way of course. the last year has had its challenges and its joys. i was not always sure we where doing the right thing but when i look back we were doing what we had to do. My sister as much as she loves her kids will never be able to handle the day-to-day stress of raising children. even the simple things get her all tied up. She is now in a little 2 bedroom rent house and is getting the kids on the weekends. for now this works. we have learned to take things one day at a time and not get too set in our ways. every time i plan something it falls apart or gets rearranged. so i'm learning to go with the flow. God has been stretching me and growing me in ways i never imagined. i don't have enough page to write all the wonders of His ways. thank you God for not always giving me what i what but for giving me what i need. even if that means filling my house with teenagers.

colleen made a comment the other day that really got me to thinking. She was telling her cousin that she was my 4th pregnancy. it made me think that even though i have 3 children in heaven God has given me 3 extra children here on earth to love and raise. how cool is that?

the list

here is my list. i was feeling very overwhelmed by trying to come up with 101 things and have them be significant. my time is valuable and i only wanted to put things i really wanted to do or needed to do on my list so i have opted for a shorter list. hey its my list and i can do what i want. my start date is today and my finish day is Sept 2, 2009.

41 things in 501 days

1. read the bible (0/66)

2. memorize 66 bible verses (0/66)

3. shave my legs every week (1/72)

4. read 15 books (0/15)

5. grow a garden

6. complete 12 college classes

7. call my mom every week (1/72)

8. write letters

9. sit quietly w/God for 30 mins everyday (1/501)

10. reach my goal weight

11. maintain my goal weight

12. take 1 class every week at the Y (0/72)

13. take a road trip w/no plan and no map

14. get a passport

15. learn some german

16. visit germany

17. learn how to juggle

18. visit the planatarium

19. take walking tour of the city

20. weekend at hummer house

21. pedicure (0/5)

22. all day shopping w/girls (0/10)

23. 1 day of total silence

24. finish battlefield of the mind bible study

25. date night (0/10)

26. make a quilt

27. learn to knit....again

28. learn to type w/out looking

29. visit a nursing home

30. buy bookcases

31. wash face and floss every night (1/501)

32. finish flowerbed

33. paint house trim

34. do assumption paperwork

35. put $20 in savings every week (0/72)

36. finish 1 cross-stitch project

37. scan in all family pics and save them to a disk

38. buy a fire safe

39. girls night (0/10)

40. revisit honeymoon spot

41. blog about each completed task (0/41)

lover of lists

my friend jinny (hi! jinny) is doing this thing. she is making a list of 101 things she wants to accomplish in 1001 days. it has kinda got my attention. i love lists. i love checking things off of a list. sometimes the lists are just in my mind and sometimes i write them down. so this whole list thing sounds very interesting. if you're interested go here. i am contemplating, pondering, trying to wrap my mind around it. can i even think of 101 things to do in 1001 days? and if i can how will i fit one more thing into my already busy schedule? but on the other hand are there things i have always wanted to do and have just not taken the time to do them. would this list provide me the incentive i need to set some goals and then accomplish them. i think i will start my list and see where it goes from there.

thanks mrs h

i am truly blessed knowing that my daughter has such an awesome teacher. not only are you a teacher who cares but you're a teacher who prays and those are the best kind.

woo hoo

on sunday i submitted my first test for my business class. i was really sweating this test because i had to write (big gasp) essays. The test consisted of 10 multiple choice and 4 essays. i have not written an essay in about 22 years so i was really worried. and the essays counted as 60% of the grade so i was really worried. did i mention i was really worried. i have never considered myself a writer. i have always written, but i have always been shy about anyone reading what i have written. so i was really worried about those essays. well i checked today and are you ready for this.....i made a 98. woo hoo. i really don't know what i was so worried about.

5 creepy things

i was driving to work the other day and saw a really cute house. the only thing uncute about it was the storm cellar in the side yard. the first word that popped into my mind was creepy. so this got me to thinking about other creepy things and i came up with a few things i find creepy.

1. storm cellars - lived in a house w/one and my brothers would scare us by threatening to throw us in. plus they always seem to be dark and cobwebby.

2. clowns - 'nuff said

3. spiders/snakes and other crawly bugs - i can squash them but it still creeps me out.

4. old women in hair rollers at the grocery store - i always see these women in rollers. do they ever take them out? or just keep them rolled. you don't see this very often anymore...thank you Jesus.

5. a storm cellar filled with spiders, snakes, crawly bugs, clowns and old women in hair rollers. now that would be creepy.

say my name

1. YOUR ROCK STAR NAME (first pet, current car):
Jennifer Ford

2.YOUR GANGSTA NAME (fav ice cream flavor, fav type of shoe):
Chocolate Peanut Butter Barefoot

3. YOUR NATIVE AMERICAN NAME (favorite color, favorite animal):
Green Cat

4. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME (middle name, city where you were born):
Marie Mansfield

5. YOUR STAR WARS NAME (the 1st 3 letters of your last name, 1st 2 of your first name): Watrh

6. SUPERHERO NAME (2nd favorite color, favorite drink):
Blue Crush

7. NASCAR NAME (the first names of your grandfathers):
Harry Sherman

8. STRIPPER NAME ( the name of your fav perfume/cologne/scent,fav candy):
Tuscany Kitkat

9. TV WEATHER ANCHOR NAME (your 5th grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter):
Childress Chicago

10. SPY NAME: (your favorite season/holiday, flower):
Spring Magnolia

11. CARTOON NAME: (favorite fruit, article of clothing you’re wearing rightnow):
Pink Lady Nightgown

12. HIPPIE NAME: (What you ate for breakfast, your favorite tree):
Cinnamon Harvest Pecan