We were not meant for time

These pictures were taken the weekend of Memory's birth, 14 almost 15 months ago. The kids are growing up so quickly I feel like sometimes I'm missing it even when its right under my nose. (maybe that's why I'm missing it:) I love looking at pictures of the past, but it usually fills me with a sense of sadness and longing. Its hard to put my finger on why except to realize we were not meant for time. I look forward to the day when we will get to dwell with God without the cage of time. Wow, how crazy wonderful will that be?

This pretty much sums it up:
"And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.'" Revelation 21:3-4

They are growing up and there is a lot of them!

My Girls


And..My Boy


okay...so let's be real here

The reality of having a rash on my face is it made me realize how insecure I am. And how I have put my security in 'looking' a certain way for people instead of the amazing security I know I already have in Jesus. This world has a particular form of what 'beauty' is and it has nothing to do with what God says is beautiful. The only thing that matters to God and ultimately in the end is a heart and life given FULLY to God to transform into His likeness. That's it. Every day I'm faced with the lie that my worth is in what lies around me. This includes how I look. If only I could fast-forward oh let's say 40 years and see that what's in the mirror is not gonna last just like everything else around me. If I could see that every day that might wake me up enough to see through all the bull-shitt this world offers. But instead I'll have to try to remember this as I daily struggle through what it means to have my sole worth in Jesus. Nothing more, nothing less. How's that for some honesty, eh?

Oh, and the dermatologist said I have Rosacea. The best way he described it is adult-onset acne but kinda different than what you would think of when you think of acne if that makes sense. Anyways, he told me to go get some antibiotics (oh joy!) and hopefully that will clear it up. Apparently it can get a lot worse than what I have so it's probably good I'm dealing with it now.

here it is...

Please read previous post to understand what I'm talking about
And when I get hot then it really flares up all red and stuff. Not fun!

nothing like a rash on a face

I've been quite blessed my whole life in not having to worry too much about my complexion. However in the last 3 months that kinda changed for me. I developed a rash on my face that progressively got worse. I have NO idea how it got there either. So I finally buckled down and decided I needed to see a dermatologist. I hardly go to the doctor ever so this is definitely a new thing for me. We don't have insurance right now either so I had to figure out how much this whole thing would cost which is impossible to figure out exactly. Anyways, I'm really glad to go in tomorrow cause its the first and hopefully last step I need to take to get this itchy flaming rash off my face.

ps and I would post a pic but that has been hard to do as of late

I'm posting anyways

Is it just me being retarded or is this blogger thing hard to get the hang of? I really wanted to post pictures but every time I try something seems to go wrong. I figured I don't need to have a picture with every post. People mostly just want to hear what's going on in my life, right? Alright then.

My days have been preoccupied right now with figuring out how to homeschool Dove. That's right you heard it HOMESCHOOL. Now I know what a lot of you might be thinking because I thought the same thing at one time. But over the course of the last couple of months God has really been moving us in that direction and we're really excited to take hold of it. It all started while we were over in Kentucky for the last several months spending time with friends and family. A lot of families that we were in community with over there homeschool their kids (my brother included). Ben got to talk to one guy about the reason his family homeschools and it really impacted Ben. He said the main reason they homeschool his kids is because he wants his kids identity (aside from God) to be their family and not a group of kids at school. What naturally happens is that by the shear amount of time you spend at school with your peers they naturally become your identity. Now don't get me wrong we have nothing against public schools, in fact we were all ready to send Dove back when we really felt the Lord calling us in another direction. I also understand that homeschool is definitely not for everyone and rightly so. However, we feel that it fits perfectly with our family vision and the direction we are heading. The other aspect of how it fits better into our lives is the incredible flexibility of it all. We are basically able to make our own schedule of how our life looks from week to week. Instead of having to work around the 6-7 hr. 5 days a week regular school schedule. This allows us to do so much with the kids. From being able to take them climbing to taking them on dates with their Dad/Mom or just having more family time at home. So this past week I was trying to figure out how in the world was I going to homeschool. Honestly I was very daunted about the whole idea of having to teach her everything myself. And then I found The Family Learning Center in Redmond (next year it will be in Kirkland) This was exactly what I needed. They partner with you in helping you develop a learning plan for you and your child. They offer every kind of class you need there. So you are able to pick and choose which classes you want your child in and which subjects you will work with them at home. So it enabled me to still do homeschooling but not all alone. Plus this center is funded through the school district which is also a huge plus. So I really saw God's hand in all of this. He really fitted the pieces together just right.

We're back!

From the midwest that is. It's weird being back after all that time. Definitely was and still is a crazy transition. I'm gonna try to update this more often now that we're back. Here are some pictures from our trip. Sorry they are all out of order. Some are from our roadtrip out to the midwest and some are from our actual stay in the midwest and a couple are from our 10 day trip to Europe.


Big sister Dove at a park in St. Lois
Also in Italy
Seven at the Renaissance Fair
Memory is a year old now!
Ben and I on a bike ride in Italy, Florence
Beautiful Austria from on top of Hitler's Eagles Nest
Eden at The Children's Museum
The inside portion of the fleemarket
outside at the fleemarket
At the St. Lois "free" zoo

Family Camp Part 2

I had to do it in 2 parts cause I'm retarded and don't have the patience to figure out how to do this whole blogger thing correctly. Maybe the next post I'll have it figured out.

Family Camp Part 1

I'm finally posting pictures of family camp. Eventually I'll get to our road trip as well. We had a good time at Family Camp. It was pretty awesome not having to cook or clean house for a week.
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Goin' on a Road Trip!

Well, we have quite the adventure planned. It's the craziest thing I've done in a long time. My brother and his family are driving out here in their RV to come to family camp with us next week up at Lakeside Bible Camp on Whidbey Island. Then, their flying back and leaving their RV for us to take all the way to Northern Kentucky (Cincinnati) area. We're planning on stopping at Yellowstone, Denver (where some friends of ours live), a water park and whatever else suits our fancy. I've never ridden in an RV before so this should be fun. The kids are pretty excited about it. Once we get to Kentucky we will stay their for about 2 months. Yeah, I know, that's a long time. My brother has a body church that he's apart of and their doing a 9 week Discipleship training class that Ben and I are pretty stoked about. Plus, my whole family is there now and we have a lot of friends out there now because of my brother helping recruit a lot of people from out there onto our blackjack team. I'm really excited to be apart of this community that I've witnessed (a little) and heard so much about. These people are living and growing in Christ together on a daily basis and its very compelling to want to be around. And all of our other trips out there have only been a couple weeks long so its nice to have such a long chunk of time there. We also have 2 weddings to go to in October. The first one is in Kentucky and the second one is in Northern Italy. Yes, that's right, Eruope. So Ben and I are leaving our 4 kids with my parents and going to Italy/Scotland for 10 days with our good friends Colin & Grace. Soooo looking forward to that. Needless to say we have a busy/fun time coming our way. I'll definitely be missing home after a couple months. I will try to take pictures and post some up periodically of our trip.

the beauty of birth

I just recently had the privilege of attending/helping out with the birth of Colin & Grace's son. What an amazing experience! Now I know I have had 4 births of my own, but there is something remarkably different and just as rewarding about being an observer/helper instead of the one actually giving birth. I was able to enjoy things that I wasn't able to with my own births because I was so involved in the experience. (go figure!) It's so neat to have been able to be on both sides. I have only made it to one other birth before this and it was only after Dove (my first) was born so since then I have had 3 more babies and I feel like I was able to enjoy this experience all the more. It's crazy how emotionally connected I felt to Grace and what she was going through but at the same time not being physically connected. It was kinda nice for once. :) Just to be able to see the miracle and the joy that giving birth brings brought it all back to me. Thank you Colin & Grace for letting me be apart of something so precious to you.

This is a first

So I thought I wold join the world of blogging. I'm a little nervous, but I thought it would be worth it to keep in contact with family and friends and a way to get my thoughts out. I've just really enjoyed reading a lot of other people's blogs and thought it was only fair for me to start my own. Hopefully I'll update at least once a week, but we'll see how it goes. I need to figure out how to get pictures on here as that would definitely make it more interesting.

Back to climbing

I'm just starting to get back into climbing again after getting pregnant with Memory who is now 9 months old. Our friends Mark and Heather came to stay with us from Cincinnati for a couple weeks and we did quite a bit of climbing. So much that my ankle hurt for a week afterwards. But it was worth it, I think. PS the last picture is yours truly.