My New Toys

I didn't get a Valentine's, Birthday, or Anniversary present this year because Jason wanted to get me these!! I have been wanting to get new pots & pans for awhile as our old ones were chipping and just a really cheap old set that Jason had from college. So I though the new house was a great time to get new!! So today we went to Bed, Bath & Beyond and picked out these. I'm so excited to get into the new house and test drive them!!! Who wants to come for dinner?! =)



Count down is 5 days! We move in starting Friday!!!

Splash Day

Today was Preschool Splash Day at church. We met at Shoaff park and played at the splash pad. They also had a huge playground and Pastor Jim was nice enough to have snacks and juice for us.

Dalton & Spencer had a BLAST! They really loved being drenched. That is Spencer in the blue & red Elmo trunks and Dalton is in the red & white Hawaiian trunks.






But Vivian on the other hand . .


I sat her by one of the fountains and she was NOT happy with me. Oops!

But all in all we had such a fun time. Dalton said he LOVED splash day. I can't wait to take them to another splash park. On a side note SPLASH is my new goal for Spencer to say. It's a hard one but I know he can do it. Just this past week he said Sippy, Speech & Orange. All words that he really had troubles with. So off we go to learn to say SPLASH!

Stop & Think

A friend of mine posted this song to her blog the other day and of course I teared right up. After all my "wanting something more" talk, I'm wondering what I really want.



It's time to stop and think.

Music of my life

This song pretty much sums up how I have been feeling. Granted I don't go to "work" everyday but trust me being a stay-at-home-mom is WORK!


Something More

Monday, hard to wake up
Fill my coffee cup, I'm out the door
Yeah, the freeway's standing still today
It's gonna make me late, and that's for sure
I'm running out of gas and out of time
Never gonna make it there by nine

[Chorus:]
There's gotta be something more
Gotta be more than this
I need a little less hard time
I need a little more bliss
I'm gonna take my chances
Taking a chance I might
Find what I'm looking for
There's gotta be something more

Five years and there's no doubt
That I'm burnt out, I've had enough
So now boss man, here's my two weeks
I'll make it short and sweet, so listen up
I could work my life away, but why?
I got things to do before I die

[Repeat Chorus]

Some believe in destiny, and some believe in fate
I believe that happiness is something we create
You best believe that I'm not gonna wait
'Cause there's gotta be something more

I get home 7:30 the house is dirty, but it can wait
Yeah, 'cause right now I need some downtime
To drink some red wine and celebrate
Armageddon could be knocking at my door
But I ain't gonna answer that's for sure.
There's gotta be something!

Snapping Beans

Tonight was such a fun night! Not only did we talk to the cows, which I will blog about later. But then we came in and helped grandma snap beans. Bushels of green beans were laid on the table and we went to town. My father-in-law, Jason, & myself snapped the ends and then Dalton & Spencer snapped them into pieces so my mother-in-law could can them. It was fun to sit around the table and talk and snap away. Oh what fun a simple task, and a lot of work, can be!





Oh the memories we are making and adventures we are having!

Something More

Do you ever want something more? Something more out of your mate? Something more out of life? Something more out of yourself?

I'm not sure why but all of a sudden I feel like I'm at a crossroad. I'm not sure what the options are or why I all of a sudden feel this giant need for change. But all the same I feel it. I just feel like there is something more. Something more I should do or say or be. So now what? Do I go to Barnes & Noble, grab a Venti white mocha and search the self help section? Maybe. Do I try a new sport or hobby to try to find that "something". Maybe. I just don't know what I'm supposed to do. So I'm going to keep praying and see what God shows me. And if you know what it is or have any ideas, I'm open!

Sunday Thoughts

Today was a Sunday not unlike most. Jason had to be in the sound booth and I had to sing on worship team. Both of those things on the same Sunday means that we usually miss out on at least part of our Flock (Sunday school) lesson. Well lucky for me our teacher was just starting when I walked in. Today we were talking about John 14:1-14. In this section Jesus comforts his disciples and also tells them HE is the way to the Father. I'm sure I've not only read but heard and visually seen these verses in the Living Last Supper numerous times, but I really hadn't given them much thought. Well today a specific verse stuck out to me. Verse 13 says "And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father."

So many times I treat God as a magic genie that I pray and He will do what I want. God save me from this situation, God make this circumstance go away, God help us find the right house. I read the first part of the verse "And I will do whatever you ask in my name" and I add a period there when God made it a coma. He intended me to read the first part but then pause and read the rest. The second part is a condition to the first. He will do whatever you ask, IF/WHEN/SO THAT it brings glory to Him! He isn't a magic genie, although He could anything He wanted to. He is the Alpha & Omega. The great I AM! He is Yahweh, the LORD, the God or Abraham, Isaac & Jacob. He can do anything He knows will bring glory to Him. I don't always know the reason why He does things from an earthly stand point but I do know from an eternal stand point that He does things to being people to Him and bring Him the glory.

A good friend of mine made an AMAZING statement today that blew my fuse (as my father-in-law- would say). We should be praying that God USES the circumstances, and not just that the circumstances would go away. He was speaking specifically about a family member with an illness. He was saying how when he prayed for her it was for healing, which we all would. But his attitude in the praying was wrong. He prayed for healing because he knew how much this loved one meant to her family and how she would be missed greatly. But he was saying that he SHOULD have been praying that God would use her illness to bring others to Him, even if that didn't mean healing. That is a such a hard thing to do. I can remember the first time my brother went to Iraq. I can remember praying for him before he left. And praying that God's will would ultimately be done, even if that meant he wouldn't come back home alive. How it hurt to think about my brother not being here but I knew that if God called him home, HE had a greater purpose.

Pastor Joel gave a example today of how God sees things as apposed to how we see them. When we watch a parade, we sit in our lawn chairs on the side of the road and see just a small part. We see the band come and go, we see the Shriners driving their little cars but we can't see the whole thing all at once. But God is like the man up in the helicopter. He is up so high that he CAN see the beginning and the end and the whole parade route. He sees how all the pieces come together to make the perfect parade. Much the same as He sees the beginning and end of all time and how all the parade floats (us) come together to make His parade.

I don't know why God had me write all this out, I just know I needed to hear it and I can only hope that someone else needed to hear it too. Don't forget to pray today, especially to praise Him for His blessings. If you list them out I bet you have more than you know! I'm trying to stay positive and keep listing my blessings.

Few more weeks!

This week we celebrated 3 weeks down and 2 to go! I can't believe we have been here 3 weeks. The time has really gone fast. But we are SO ready to be in our new house. We went couch shopping last weekend. As if couch shopping wasn't fun enough we decided to take all 3 kids! In case you don't know, we have 3 young kids, Dalton - Almost 4, Spencer 2 1/2, and Vivian 1. So 3 under 3 going couch shopping is an experience all in itself. Well no luck on the couch hunt but the kids did their best to test the durability of any and all couches we go near. The poor sales associates LOL Oh well it was just one of the adventures in the lives of the Baker family!

This week I also got the opportunity to go see our old house. We got a call that there was a package at Valley Creek for us. So I decided to run over and get it. How surreal to drive into our addition, pull up to the house, and go ring the doorbell. As I was walking up to the door our old neighbor was outside and I stopped to talk to him and pet his dogs. I miss those puppies! The new homeowners are so sweet! They instantly invited me in and I was able to get my first look at "our" house. It wasn't ours anymore. The walls were the same, the paint was the same and the carpet was the same. But yet it was different. It smelled different, the furniture was different and it wasn't "ours" anymore. It was such a bittersweet moment. I knew that the house was being loved and cared for. It was so obvious by all the flowers around, the pictures hung up and the yummy plug in they had going. It was so good to see the house being loved but it was still a little bit odd to walk in there and it didn't feel like home. We are so happy that the Kruegers are taking such good care of a home that we loved so much. And we pray often for them, that they will have a great life at Valley Creek.

4th of July

Like most Americans I love the 4th of July. We have many members of my family either retired or are active military. So the 4th is extra special to our family and a great time to get together with family. This 4th was even more special as we are living with Jason's parents. We had all his brothers and sisters over and made ribs and shot off fireworks. What a fun time for the kids. Oh who am I kidding?! It was a fun time for us all. As a kid we really didn't do fireworks at home. It just was me and my parents were older so they weren't up for late nights and loud noises. The craziest we ever got were sparklers and an occasional snake, the kind you light and it grows and leaves huge black mark on your drive way. So it was an extra special treat to marry someone who was open and excited to blow things up. This year while everyone was here we got a lot of fireworks, waited until dusk and then had a BLAST, literally!

Here are the boys getting ready for the boom!



And then of course I had to line them all up for the typical "This is my family" picture.


It was all in all a GREAT 4th. Uncle Bob helped the boys shoot off some fireworks and we all enjoyed just being together as a family. I can't wait until next year when the kids are little bigger and they can really get into the sparklers, which they really didn't like this year. I just love these memory making moments that we are here.