A Little Wordy Wednesday

I just want to share my thoughts today...I enjoy blogging, reading, posting, putting up all the pictures, but lately I've found myself not enjoying it and rushing to get a post up just so I have something up.  I enjoy reading everyone else's blogs (I read about 10 a week-friends, family, other Moms, random ones, etc.).  But I've found myself starting to compare myself to others, their lives, their blogs and I'm not liking it.  So lately I've stuck to reading mainly blogs that are encouraging and uplifting and not so much friends & family-no offense :)  

I'm at a weird place right now, very busy with my own 4 kiddos, family and church-teaching Sunday School, being in the choir, and we're getting ready to start a capital stewardship campaign for a new building.  My main reason for creating this blog was so that our family and friends could see our family on a daily or weekly basis-people that don't get to see us and that would like to know what's going on with us!   So I've decided I'm not going to rush and try to get something up every day, every weekday or every other day, just so everyone has something to read about our family and so they'll keep reading!  I want to be real and transparent, life is full of making mistakes and people need to see that, not a plastered on smile and always happiness!  I am not the perfect Wife, Mom, Youth pastor's wife, I don't always have to be happy and put on a fake front!  Trying to be perfect all the time can be exhausting, not a good example to my own kiddos, students at church and other adults around me!  No one can be happy and always smiling, it's not reality and it's not healthy!  I don't want our blog to fall under the category "look at me and how perfect my life is", we are not perfect, do not claim to be and are not fooled that we are!  So, from now on if I feel like posting, I'll post, if not, I won't.  Please family and friends don't take offense to any of this, this is me, being me!

Weirdness

I've been in a weird mood lately.  I really don't feel like blogging, nothing against anyone out there, but it seems as though a handful of people actually read it!  The time it takes to blog, sitting down, going through pictures and writing, has been outweighed by my other responsibilities!  I love sharing pictures and stories of our daily lives, but lately it's been so time consuming!  So, if I've been a sketchy blogger lately, I'm sorry.  Hopefully I'll get some blogging motivation soon :)

Shot & a band-aid

So last week was a doozie for our family-extended and immediate.  Monday morning Anna woke up with a stomach bug, by Monday evening she was feeling much better and just before bedtime she was able to keep down a banana and some Pedialyte.  Wednesday morning Lizzy woke up with the same stomach bug and the same thing, was feeling much better by dinnertime :(  We kept all the kiddos home from church Wednesday just in case the other 2 would come down with it later on in the week thus exposing all their friends to it!  My Mom was also having surgery in North Carolina at UNC Chapel Hill, this was the second surgery to try to fix heart palpatations.  The surgery for my Mom didn't go exactly as the doctors had planned and she ended up in ICU with a temporary pacemaker, talk about scary for me here in Georgia!  Jody & I seriously talked about me going back once we got the word Wednesday, but since my kiddos had been sick I couldn't risk going back in case I was carrying the stomach bug germs.  Thursday morning Lizzy woke up with a fever and then Friday Jack had a fever.  It was a tough couple of days with me being stuck inside the house with sick kiddos and wanting to be in NC with my Mom, but God is good!!!  Friday my Mom had a permanent pacemaker put in and she was able to go home Saturday!  She has a few weeks at home recovering from the surgery and some adjusting with the pacemaker, but we are so thankful she is doing well!!!  The kiddos had so many questions about Wanka and were so concerned with how she was doing, praying for her at mealtimes, bedtime and any other time they thought of her!  Lizzy wants to see "the shot & band-aid" they gave her-her version of surgery :)  

So for today I'm taking care of my house, picking up after this crazy week and weekend...Saturday we had a Christmas Angel Breakfast at church (where the girls performed some songs from their musicals & choir), then the Kennesaw Christmas Parade, Emma had her first limo ride that evening and the girls had their Christmas musical & choir performance yesterday!  I'll try to catch up later on this week from Thanksgiving, yikes?!  Have a great Monday :)

Winners!!!

Anna woke up early yesterday morning sick with some sort of stomach bug, so I wasn't able to get the winners announced until today.  

I wrote down the commenters names for each day on slips of papers & drew one out, and here's the results...

The winner of the food chopper is....Laura H.

The winner of the Minky Ribbon Blanket is....Sarah M.

The winner of the necklace is....Lauren F.

Thanks to everyone who participated and allowed me to say "Thanks" to all of you!!!  If you were a winner, please send your address to SarahChef@yahoo.com so I can get your item to you!

Ok, so I'll give you a small hint...

check the blog on Monday :)

Keep an

 on our blog next week, 

there will be a

or TWO or THREE... 
(and NO it will not be an announcement-LEF ;)

It's a ponytail!

Since Anna was small I decided to keep her hair short, she just looks cute with short hair!  Recently we decided to cut bangs, for a few reasons...but in the last few months Anna has insisted on growing her hair out long like Emma, she wants to do everything Emma does, so no surprise there!  She's always asking me to put her hair up in a ponytail even though it's too short to get it all up!  This particular day I finally gave in and put her hair up, even though half of it fell out right away, but she was happy she had a ponytail!!! 

Note the hair bow, her signature hairpiece, she even wears them to bed!!!

Once Anna had her hair up Lizzy (who never wants a hair bow in) decided she should give it a try...

She looks so cute with a ponytail!  Too bad she wouldn't let me put a barrett in to keep her bangs back too!

Silly girls with ponytails!!!

What in the world?!

So apparently I have used up all my free storage I get for my blog!  I have purchased more space, but it will take a few days to get to my site!  So until then it will be just words :(  I know no funny pictures!!!  

We've been super busy lately with things going on at the church, Emma's school and Jody is almost finished with his first 2 classes at Liberty!!! But busy is good!  

My garage door is fixed, yippee, my Dad and Jody were able to fix it this weekend :)  Our 2-car garage is all cleaned out, the storage room at the back of the garage is cleaned out (it is a large room), the basement is cleaned out as well as the 1-car garage and storage room on the other side of the basement!!!  I've been in this cleaning mood lately and it feels so good to have all these things done and out of the way!  I even have a large neatly stacked and organized "pile" of yard sale items...can't wait to get that out of the storage room in the basement garage!  

Oh and I almost forgot I got all 4 kiddos summer clothes out and sorted through and their winter clothes put away in their drawers and closets...what a large task, but so thankful that it is done.  If only this weather would stay cooler, it was almost 80 here yesterday and it's supposed to be mid 70's for the rest of the week, good thing we can roll up sleeves and roll up pants!!!  I also want to give a shout out to all the families that have given us hand-me-downs over the past few years, what a blessing looking at the girls drawers and seeing them full of clothes!  I'm looking forward to consigning all of Jack's things in the spring, I've never done it and with him being our only boy he gets new things, by the time he's done with them they are still in great shape, ready to be used by someone else!  

Have any of you gotten into "fall cleaning"?

Monday-Monday

Jody's goal this weekend was to fix the brakes on his VW, I don't know much about cars but that you press the pedal and somehow the cars stops!  They needed to be adjusted and he needed some time to work on them, he had planned this weekend since last weekend.  But alas, on Wednesday on our way back from the chiropractor (to drop Jody off at work) I noticed a weird smell, when we stopped smoke was coming out from underneath the hood of the burb, Jody noticed the temp gage rising, awesome.  Luckily everything here is fairly close to our house, only 4 miles from our house to the church, even closer for grocery stores and Emma's school and the chiropractor :)  Jody checked the coolant and it was very low, we had stopped at WalMart to take a look & he was able to run in and grab a bottle of coolant.  I dropped him off at work and off we went home.  We went to church that evening, nothing, got home with no other problems.  Jody was not convinced however that smoke was normal, it was coming from somewhere and adding coolant shouldn't have fixed that problem!  We woke up Thursday to a large puddle of coolant underneath the burb, Jody told me not to drive it until he could investigate it more on Friday (his day off).  Friday came and he noticed (after he drove it around a bit) that there was again smoke & underneath the car (fenders) was wet.  After checking some things he discovered it was the water pump.  Now, the water pump "went out" in my van a few years ago and it looked like a huge water balloon had exploded underneath the car, not a pretty site, so off to Advance Auto to buy a new water pump.  Luckily they aren't expensive, he just had to purchase a few tools (at a few different auto parts stores) to make the job easier.  Long story short he finally was able to get the old water pump in by Friday evening, woo-hoo!  So thankful for a husband who can fix things :)

Saturday some friends from church dropped their girls off (ages 12 & 8) to play for the day before our fall festival at church that evening.  As we were leaving the garage to run errands, the manual garage door opener (string hanging from garage door) got shut in one of the burbs doors and unfortunately I didn't notice until I was backing up, you guessed it, WHAM, right on the burb.  To make matters worse I was parked at an angle, as I started backing up I pulled the garage door off the track and the door started free-falling, add the backward motion of me in the burb, I caught the bottom of the door.  Basically I bent the entire bottom 15ft metal piece so the door won't go on the track, and I made a hole in the garage door!  We found out a new door is very expensive, just under $3000!!!  Wowza, so hopefully Jody can unbend the bent metal and glue/clamp/metal brace the rest!  Jody spent the rest of the morning/afternoon trying to figure out how to fix the garage door while I went running errands with the kiddos.  The burb did fine (new water pump), but as we were pulling into the church for the fall festival (with 6 kids in tow) and both Jody and I were volunteering (different times) we noticed smoke again, Jody was not a happy person!  Once again the fenders were wet, yikes!  Jody is still not sure where the "leak" (he believes it really is a leak) is coming from-he had borrowed a pressure kit that was supposed to find any leaks or broken hoses and everything came back fine so he thought it was the water pump!

All in all it was an eventful weekend, Jody was NOT able to fix his VW, the burb is still not "right" and I broke the garage door!  But we DID have a great time at the Fall Festival and the girls had a great time Saturday with friends PLUS everyone had a great story to tell Sunday at church of how I "smashed" into the garage door :)  

Now that is Living Life Livingston Style!!!  

What did you do this weekend?

Vitamins

Yes or No?  After talking with the kiddos pediatrician last year, he said vitamins are not needed as long my kiddos eat a healthy well-balance diet.  Although I do believe they eat healthy (my kiddos love vegetables & fruit)-with some sweets thrown in :) does it hurt for them to take them anyway?  We usually don't get sick very often in our house, I also chuck that up to me breastfeeding all of my kiddos for some period of time!  Earlier this year when I broke my toe and it there wasn't much healing after 8 weeks (proven by x-rays & orthopedic doctor), I started taking Bone Builder with Boron and Calcium supplements-suggested from a nutritionist friend...these are all organic vitamins by the way.  I also ordered children's multi-vtamins as well as woman's daily vitamins, good quality pricey vitamins.  They of course got put in the cabinet to avoid clutter on my kitchen counter and forgotten about, but I was reminded of my vitamin purchases this morning when I woke up with a sore & scratchy throat!  They suggest prenatal vitamins when you are pregnant...So what's your take on vitamins?  Do you personally take them?  What about your kiddos and spouses?  

Thankful for Thursdays!

Here are a few reasons why: 

• Thursdays mark the end of Jody's work week.  Being in the ministry his work week begins on Sunday with Friday and Saturday off!  I'm thankful he has a day off during a "regular" work week :)  For so many years Saturday was his only day off, leaving not as much time as we'd like to spend with him!
• COFFEE!  This is everyday thankfulness!
• My husband who gets Emma up and ready for school every morning so I can sleep that extra 30 minutes until the rest of the crew wakes up :)
• The short walk we get each day to pick up Emma from the bus stop!
• A husband who can fix car troubles!  While we were in NC (about an hour away from my family) we noticed a grinding noise coming from the front brakes!  It turns out part of the brake pad had broken off and it was pure metal on metal-terrible sound and super scary!  Jody changes our brakes, so it was a breeze & he knew just what to do!  I'm thankful we were at my brothers house who had the tools Jody needed to fix the brakes...who knew he'd need to bring his toolbox?!
• MY silly goofy kiddos who make me laugh, even when they are in trouble :)
• Thursdays mean Fridays are right around the corner and we get to spend Saturdays together as a family!!!

What are you thankful for on this Thursday?

What in the world?!

Yikes, so it's been about a week since I posted!  We've been really busy-NOT an excuse, because we are all busy I know!  We've had birthday parties (yes more than one), two 4 year olds, a visit to NC, Build A Bear, volleyball games, new bangs, grillin' out...I'm working on posts as I type this, so don't fret (like I'm sure you are :).  I'll be back to letting you know what's up with The Livingston Family ASAP!!!

Sorry for no posts the past few days!  We headed back to North Carolina Thursday after Emma got out of school and got back late Monday evening (just in time for bed)!  I'll hopefully be able to post this afternoon, that is if I finish all the laundry, get to the grocery store and unpack EVERYTHING!!!  Hope everyone had a great labor day weekend :)

Heh-Low

While reading a friends blog, I saw her post about this excerpt in "A Mother's Heart" by Jean Fleming:

 "As I've thought about the role of love in my mothering, I've been stimulated by 1 Corinthians 13, which I have paraphrased:

If I keep my house immaculately clean, and am envied by all for my interior decorating, but do not show love in my family--I'm just another housewife.

If I'm always producing lovely things--sewing, art; if I always look attractive, and speak intelligently, but am not loving to my family--I am nothing.

If I'm busy in community affairs, teach Sunday school, and drive in the carpool, but fail to give adequate love to my family--I gain nothing.

Love changes diapers, cleans up messes, and ties shoes--over and over again.

Love is kind, though tired and frazzled.

Love does not envy another wife--one whose children are "spaced" better, or in school so she has time to pursue her own interests.

Love doesn't try to impress others with my abilities or knowledge as a mother.

Love doesn't scream at the kids.

Love doesn't feel cheated because I didn't get to do what I wanted to do today--sew, read, soak in a hot tub.

Love doesn't lose my temper easily.

Love doesn't assume that my children being naughty just because their noise level is irritating.

Love doesn't rejoice when other people's children misbehave and make mine look good. Love is genuinely happy when others are honored by their children."

WOW!  What a wake up call to ME, a wife and Stay At Home Mom to 4 little ones!  How many times a day do I fall into any or all of those first statements?!  And how many times do I actually fulfill the last statements?!  I have been blessed and given the opportunity to be a wife, to be a mom and to stay at home with my kiddos!  It got me reading the actual 1Corinthians 13, here it is (New International Version ) starting in verse 4: 

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known."  Which brings me to my favorite verse in the bible 1Corinthians 13, verse 13 : "And now these three remain: faith, hope and love.  But the greatest of these is love."  

It is so amazing to me how a book written so long ago in a completely different time period to completely different people can still speak to us today and in a way we understand!  What an instruction manual for ALL of us!!!

Last week...

was a crazy week for me!  Jody loaded up the charter bus and headed out Monday morning to Panama City Beach Florida to take our students to summer camp (BigStuf)...I wasn't able to go this year :( My brother & Paige left Tuesday a little before lunch and I was on my own until Friday evening!  Now many of your husbands travel a lot, but I'm not used to being by myself with our 4 little ones, so it was a bit stressful for me!

Emma had music camp at our church everyday from 9:00am-2:30pm and LOVED it!!!  It really was an uneventful week, we didn't go out much (besides church), but we sure were glad to pick up Daddy Friday!  They pulled into the church about 15 minutes before Emma had to be at the church for her performance Friday evening!  We got a few pictures of Emma, but there were around 70 kiddos in the performance moving around, singing and dancing, so it was harder to get a good shot!

All in all our summer here in Georgia is winding down, believe it or not!  They only have traditional schools here (no year-rounds) and school is starting back up August 5th, a little over 2 weeks!  Emma is pretty excited to get back to school, not because she's bored, she's had a pretty busy summer, but because she loves school!

Hopefully this afternoon I'll be able to get through pictures and get caught up on blogging!  

Until then...what have you all been up to this summer?

Can't always...

get them to look or have their eyes or mouths open!!!

FINALLY!!!!

Our internet is finally working again!  

We had VBS last week (super crazy week) and I wasn't able to get over to Comcast (20 min away + 4 kiddos) until Friday!  We swapped out the modem, drove home and the modem didn't even turn on!  So we decided to just go buy a cord an RadioShack...the modem worked, internet still nothing.  But by the time we got home it was time to get to the church for the last night of VBS!  And of course we couldn't talk to anyone at Comcast until this morning!  I'm way behind on posting, hopefully I'll get one up here this afternoon after all my errands this morning and Jack goes down for a nap :)   

Our internet isn't working, so I haven't been able to update our blog since last Friday :( After talking to the cable company a few times, we realized we needed a new modem (which we can simply swap out), but our cable company isn't open on Mondays! Hopefully we can get a new modem soon and have internet again!!!

Easy-Peasy

If you are a blog junkie, as many of us who blog are, did you know you can check them ALL in one place?!  I love reading blogs, especially since we recently moved and have family and friends all over the United States!  Blogging is a fun and easy way to stay caught up on what's going on with people!!!  When I want to catch up on my blog reading I go to http://www.blogger.com and there they are, all the blogs I read, listed  by the most recent post :)  When I find a blog I want to follow, I simply click on the "follow" button on their blog (you only have to do it once) and voila, all in one place, newest first :)  Super easy and you don't have to worry about bookmarking pages or remembering the web address:)  Super handy when you have a laptop and desktop or not at your home computer!  

So...I'm expecting a lot more followers after this post!!!    

Q & A: Random

Here are the last of the questions you asked, so we'll call these Random :)

1. What are some things that you did at SH that you are changing at KFBC or some things you are glad you did at SH and are going to do again at KFBC?

This is a hard question, every group is made up of different people and has different dynamics!  Our goal in student ministry is to first reach them with the Gospel of Christ, partner with parents to give them a solid biblical foundation and Christian worldview, help our students live boldly for Christ, provide opportunities for fellowship, encouragement, and accountability and to be transparent and real in front of them!  Love God, Love People :)

2. What has been one of your most embarrassing moments?

Probably recently when I broke my toe at church.  Not only did I break it in front of a bunch of students and adult leaders, but in the middle of our youth service!  I could not put any pressure on it, so I had to use a wheelchair and the elevator to get me to the car, we were up 3 flights of stairs and across 2 buildings in the youth room!  Having to explain my clumsiness story to the urgent care staff (receptionist, nurse, doctor, x-ray tech), then again to the orthopaedic staff (receptionist, nurse, doctor, x-ray tech, doctors assistant) was awesome too :/  And the fact that I have crutches and a foot boot for a broken toe!

3.What is a dream of yours that you want to pursue? What's holding you back from it if you haven't started yet? If you have started pursuing it, where do you want to go with it next?
Wow, what a question!  I'd have to say I eventually want to go back to school and finish my degree.  Jody and I got married just before our third year in college.  I had decided to take a semester off and never went back :( Although I definitely see the importance of a college education in our society today, I'm not planning on going back to work once I do finish my college education.  My greatest impact at this point in my life is on our kiddos and we feel it is very important for me to stay at home with them now, to teach and grow them :)  Jody and I are planning on me staying home with our kiddos until they are much older, maybe then I'll go back to work with my degree?!  I know it is a privilege for me to be able to stay at home with them and am very thankful that I am able to do so :)