Williamsburg

Yay!  We had the most amazing weekend.  My parents were able to come with us on a mini vacation to Williamsburg, VA.  It was a very good trip to take on our limited budget.  It is free to park and walk around the city, and military gets in free to Busch Gardens so we just had to pay for hotel, gas and food all weekend.  Moriah also had some very big firsts.  She cut her first two teeth, crawled, said bye-bye, played peek-a-boo and rode her first amusement park ride.  It was also a sweet time of reunion with some family friends who live in Hampton.  They were there when I was born and I haven't seen them since I got married.  It was a blessing to catch up, and we also went by the house my parents lived in when I was born.  It was neat to see where my first home was.  You can click here for some pictures.  Hope you had an amazing weekend too!

A Grateful Heart but a Leaky Roof!

It's no secret, I am a family girl.  I love my family.  I love being around them, I love when they visit, I love just talking to them (my mom can attest to this, we talk several times a day!).  It is because of this love that I must be careful of my attitude.  I long to live near my family and so it makes it hard to be grateful for where I am now, especially when I find fault with my current place in life.

God has called me to be a military wife.  I grew up being a military kid, so this wouldn't be that much different, right?  Haha!  God has used me being a military wife to teach me so much.  Right now He is molding me into having a grateful heart.  So, let me tell you what I am grateful for.  A hunky hubby and sweet baby girl.  No matter where I am, how near or far from extended family, my two loves are with me and I love them so much!  A traveling family.  Since we can't live near them they come to us for visits.  How fortunate I am that God has provided my family with the means to travel.  Provision.  We can buy food, good food and we do not go hungry.  Friends.  Even though our family isn't near us, we have been blessed with friends who treat us like family.  If in need, they are there.  Praise the Lord, He knows just the people we need for fellowship.  A home.  The area I struggle being grateful the most.  Let me explain.

For anyone reading who has been in the military or lived in a military home you can surely relate.  The rent is taken straight out of your housing allowance and you pay no utilities.  Yep, that's right, we have no water bill, no electric bill, no garbage fee.  For that I am grateful.  We have a yard where our dog can run and we live in walking distance of where Zack works.  We were assigned a 3 bedroom and use the extra space as a much need office/ guitar room.  So, you may be wondering what is there to be ungrateful about?  Location.  It is not in FL, where my heart longs to be.  And age.  We live in what has been labeled on base as the "projects."  It is not really that bad but the homes are just really old and in need of some remodeling.  Our home will be up for remodeling next year.  Till then we have to just live with carpet coming up, gaps between the floor, a screen door that lets bugs in and a leaky roof, just to name a few, I don't want to sound ungrateful=).  I am praying that a roofer can fix our reoccurring leak problem.  If not, we have a bowl in position to catch the water.  I am grateful we have a warm home in the winter and a cool home in the summer, even if the roof is leaky.

So that about sums up what God has been working on in me.  Here are the lyrics of a song that has been on my lips today.

Many men will drink the rain and turn to thank the clouds

Many men will hear You speak but they will never turn around

I will not forget you, You are my God, my King

And with a thankful heart I bring my offering

And my sacrifice is not what you can give, but what I alone can give to You

A grateful heart I give, a thankful prayer I pray, a wild dance I dance before You

A loud song I sing, a huge bell I ring, a life of praise I live before You

Many men will pour their gold and serve a thing that shines

Many men will read Your words but they will never change their minds.

Waterdeep I Will Not Forget You lyrics

I hope you can find things to be grateful for today, even if it turns out to be a horrible day. 

  

Mother's Day!

I think this holiday (next to the ones that celebrate Jesus, of course) is one of my favorites.  At this point in our life, Moriah is obviously too small to really plan anything for Mother's Day, so it was left up to my wonderful hubby to make it a special day.  Oh, how he succeeded!  He asked me what I wanted to do and I had already decided that I didn't want to go out to eat.  Moriah has been pretty unpredictable lately about how she will behave out to eat.  She inevitably ends up in one of our laps and we take turns eating.  Normally, this is fine with me, I don't mind holding my little girl, but I didn't want to be in a crowded place and feel rushed and stressed.  I just wanted family time to enjoy my new role as a mom.  I wanted to relish "my day" spend time with the sweet girl who made me a mom.  

So, here is how the day went.  My thoughtful husband got up with Moriah at 5 AM to feed her and put her back to sleep.  She woke up at 8 AM and he once again got up with her, fed her breakfast and played with her.  I crawled out of bed at 9:30!  No one woke me up, I woke up naturally.  I think this is the first time since I had Moriah this has happened!  It was so nice!  What awaited me downstairs was a smoothie and toast breakfast with my two loves.  Moriah took a nap while I took my time getting ready for the day and Zack packed our picnic lunch.  When Moriah woke up I had the joy of opening cards and presents.  Zack gave me a card with punch out coupons for massages, dinner out, and things like that, a way of pampering the mother of his baby.  It was really sweet.  Moriah's card was so cute!  She did a good job picking it out =)  She also gave me the Willow Tree figure holding a baby, just perfect!  

It looked like rain out so we headed to our picnic hoping for the best.  Zack found a park online but had never been to it.  We ended up getting lost (I read the directions wrong and we went the wrong way) which was a blessing really.  Moriah took a little nap in the car so by the time we got there she was well rested and a peach the whole time we were eating.  Zack took care in packing sandwiches, chips, fruit, cookies, and sparkling grape juice.  It was chilly out so after we ate we decided against our original plan of going for a walk and just took some pictures by the trees before we left.  We are thinking of making this a Mother's Day tradition, something I am all for!

We went to church that night(which was amazing!) and ate pizza with our church family.  It was the perfect day that was coming to a close.  I spent some sweet mother-daughter time with Moriah snuggling before I put her down to sleep.  Just precious.  I have the most wonderful husband for putting all this together and making my day so great.  I am truly blessed beyond measure with my family.  My heart just smiles when I think of how thoughtful Zack was in his planning and how sweet my little girl is.  

Check out pictures here.  I hope your Mother's Day was as blissful as mine was!

I'm Back!

So, it has been a while since I posted.  I must confess I was on strike from blogging.  I have been getting very frustrated with the whole thing.  I think I have written like 5 blogs that just will not download pictures.  When I go to download them the computer freezes and then I end up not posting them.  So, I am sorry it has been such a long time.  Here is a run down of the major events in our life since my last post:

Easter!  It was a wonderful first Easter for Moriah.  He is Risen!  We went to some friends house for Easter dinner and had a great time.  Click here for pictures.

My mom and dad came to visit and we were also surprised by a weekend visit from family friends.  It was so great to see them.  I have know them since I was 3.  We also took a couple days and visited Amish country.  Moriah did a great job with all the driving and sightseeing.  We finished out their trip with lunch with some relatives who were visiting.  It was a busy wonderful week.  Click here and here for pictures.

April was a wonderful month full of great moments with Moriah.  Check out here for some snapshots.

The most exciting part of April was my mom turned 50!  My dad surprised her with a cruise.  It was priceless to see her shocked face when Zack, Moriah and I jumped out at her in the Kohl's parking lot.  She was even more surprised when we told her to pack her bags, we leave tomorrow for the Bahamas!  What a joy it was to spend the entire weekend with family.  My aunt gave my mom a party when we got back so we were able to see extended family too.  I am counting down till we move back for good.  It is so hard to leave after every visit.  Click here and here for some amazing pictures.

Moriah's seventh month of life has been so full of changes it is unbelievable.  Her personality emerges and she gets stronger physically everyday!  Here are some pictures of what she has been up to so far this month.  Biggest accomplishments: pulling up, sitting herself up, giving kisses (my favorite!) and getting up on all fours and rocking (not quite crawling yet).

Ok, so that is the short of it.  Our lives since my last blog.  I will try and overcome my frustrations and just blog anyway.  My mom made the comment that if anyone was trying to see what is going on in our lives by reading my blog they wouldn't get much.  Oops!  It is my desire to use this blog to keep our family and friends updated and to share my struggles and triumphs with you.  God has been teaching me tons and I just want to share it!  Sorry I have failed in sharing recently.  

More blogs to come SOON on having a grateful heart, Mother's Day, and Philippians.