Fun Stuff my kids Say Day 1

I know I have all of this backlogged blogging I need to get to. To say that we have slacked on extras in life is a understatement. We realized that we haven't really taken any pictures of the kids since Christmas. Not acceptable. Moving into a new house and getting some projects done and just breathing again in our own space has been the priority. :)

But I'm inspired to keep track of some of the fun things going on in our lives too. My kids say/do hysterical things on a daily basis. I need to remember them and keep track of them better. So, here we go.

Owen:

After fighting me over dinner for about 20 minutes I finally had to pull out the "you have five minutes to start eating your dinner or..".(something will happen...privilege taken away...I can't remember what exactly. This provoked him to start eating. A few minutes into eating, he looks up and says "Mom, you know, I'm really starting to like this stuff!" (go figure!)

Owen was running around playing guns with Josh tonight and all of the sudden he slid over to me and grabbed my leg and said "Mom, I just needed a hug break" :)

Told me he was praying for me to feel better while I was getting him ready this morning :)

Wesley:

Loves to pat my mouth while I'm talking to make me sound like an Indian

Started saying the word "car" today (sounds more like "ca")

Randomly snuggled me without it being nap time or bedtime today...a rare occurrence I assure you!

Will stomp his foot when he is angry about something OR when Josh turns on the Kinect to play a game :)

Hi

So, Christmas happened. We closed on our new home. My two boys both got ridiculously sick (possibly mono, ear infections and a horrid drug reaction that made Wes look like a lepper). Josh, my brothers in law, and my in-laws went to work on the house ( I did get to help prime the cabinets and paint about a room and a half....that was it. The house was a war zone not fit for Wesley's presence and Owen was too sick for me to be away from him or doing something else). New Years happened (I went to bed at 9:30...par-tay!), We moved into our new house and....I tried not to have a nervous break-down about unpacking our house. Its been busy. I have pictures. We are all really happy in our new place. We love the playroom/tv room. We love having a fireplace. I dislike being even further away from Owen's school and our Church. But all in all, its so great. We feel pretty blessed.

I'll pop back in soon-ish for some picture updates and new things to talk about. Possible topics: 1. Deciding where to send Owen to school next year

2. My baby is a maniac who screams a lot and throws many tantrums (but is also sweet and rubs my face when I rock him to sleep)

3. How much I love my bible study and women in the study

4. How much I hate Jillian Michaels and her "don't take more than a five second rest!" craziness!

Be back soon-ish!

Christmas Letter 2011

I'm short on Christmas cards this year by pure stupidity :) I'm hoping some of my friends and family will hop over to read this. Sorry. I'll do better next year! Merry Christmas/Happy New Year! Imagine a pretty card with our pictures on it! You know...like the gigantic picture at the top of the blog! :)

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December 15, 11

Dear Friends and Family,

Hoping this letter finds you well! 2011 was somewhat of an eventful year for us, so we thought we would catch you up with a nice ”little” letter J

I celebrated my 30^th birthday in February…kind of distressing and hard to accept…ha! But, my husband threw me a lovely party in the midst of our massive ice storm and I was loved on and celebrated by dear friends and family. I’m more than thankful when I look at my life and recognize that I’ve been able to be blessed with so much in 30 years…an education, a good job, a home, a loving husband and two beautiful, healthy boys. God really has been so kind to me!

Among other things that took place this year, Josh treated me to a long weekend out east! I have always wanted to take a trip to the east coast in the fall to enjoy the scenery and get away. We went over Josh’s fall break to Portland, ME and had a wonderful time visiting lighthouses, eating lobster and even taking a day trip to Boston, MA. It was a great trip and we hope to go again with the boys!

Josh applied for and accepted a new position at the end of September. He took a test to become licensed in teaching secondary English (high school) this summer. He officially left his position teaching special education at the Alternative Learning School in Perry Township and moved over to Southport High School to teach lower level English courses. This was a great move for him since he already coaches and manages the soccer program at the high school. Its fun for him to finally be part of a “normal” school and although somewhat surprising to me, he is doing really well teaching English! J (I joke with him because I am the one who always proof read HIS papers in college!) I love the fact that I finally have papers to help grade (something I’ve always wanted to do as a teacher’s wife!) and he is looking forward to helping the English program develop and move forward at Southport. Along with teaching, Josh continues to coach varsity soccer at Southport and as well as head coaching for two club teams with Westside United.

Owen started his first year of pre-k this year at Traders Point Christian Academy. He has really loved it! I knew that school would be something he enjoyed, and I was right! J He goes M-W-F, from 9-1 and it is just the right amount of time. A few things that he has really mastered this first semester are: recognizing and writing each letter of the alphabet, recognizing and writing numbers 1-10, drawing shapes, cutting along a line, and the pledge of allegiance! We are looking forward to next semester and are prayerful about where we will send him to kindergarten next fall. Such big decisions! Some other fun things that Owen did this past year includes : learning how to swim (and he can REALLY, TRULY swim!) playing soccer for Little Kickers in Zionsville, attend preschool camp at Traders Point, and continue on for his second year of Cubbies (AWANA) at our church, College Park. He is a busy kid and loves people. We are so blessed by him!

Wesley turned ONE in October, which is completely hard to believe. He is a lot of fun and has much passion and spirit J He is finally happy (well, happier) to be part of the nursery on Sunday mornings, and does even better at my Tuesday morning bible study childcare. He started walking between 13-14 months and he is going to keep all of us on our toes! We love this little guy a lot and are excited to see who he will become.

Our biggest news is that we sold our home in September and we are waiting to close on a new house in Brownsburg on Dec. 22! It is a lovely, older home located near the middle school…and we are so excited to have our own space again and put some updates in to make this house great. It will be a wonderful spot for our boys to grow up in and we are feeling so blessed that we were able to sell and buy in this economy…it was harder than we anticipated! We look forward to having you to our new place and hope that you will come visit us soon! Our new address is:

3 Fairwood Dr.

Brownsburg, IN 46112

We hope that you have had a wonderful 2011! Praying that 2012 is a year of blessing and growing in God’s grace for you and yours. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Love,

The Brown Family

Josh, Kim, Owen and Wesley

Owen's Christmas Program

Owen had a Christmas program at his school (Traders Point Christian Academy) today :) I feel like a semi-terrible mom, because he is definitely under the weather. In fact, I raced him the Pediatrician on Tuesday late afternoon because I thought he had strep. We found out he didn't...just a nasty virus that is being passed around, and that he wasn't really even contagious. So, we've been drugging him with ibuprofen (Owen's wonder drug) and gatorade. He feels great about an hour into the ibuprofen high, so I tried to work it so that that high would take place during his program. I kind of made it...he did ok. He definitely looked a little zonked, but I'm glad he got to participate. :) He came home, ate lunch, watched a movie with dad (who took the day off of work to see Owen's program...SCORE!) and then he slept from 1 pm-6 pm! My poor little bubby! Feel free to intercede on our behalf by asking Jesus to show us kindness and mercy and SPARE the rest of us (especially Wes!) this nasty virus! Yuk!

Here are pictures from the program this morning :)

Wes can walk

This post is so anticlimactic. My littlest booger can walk. We've known this for awhile. He has just chosen not to. He prefers crawling. He prefers this weird scooting around on one knee, dragging the other leg behind him. Supposedly, this is faster. He will tease us every so often with a few steps here and there, but mostly refuses. We spent the past weekend with the Gross family. Will, their youngest...(he's twelve months old...a good month and a half younger than Wes) walks. I think Wes felt the peer pressure. He came back from our visit walking a whole lot more. He still doesn't walk all the time, but he walks more. His first consistent steps were right before his birthday. I guess he likes to do things progressively.

That's all. Wes can walk. When he wants to, I mean.

(Wes also is a screamer. Any thoughts on that?! :))

Thankful

I realize this is a post-Thanksgiving post, but that's ok.

We had a nice Thanksgiving. We celebrated with Josh's family on Thursday at Caleb and Heather's home and with my family on Saturday at my mom and dad's. It was very low key. I did a little cooking. (homemade rolls, mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese and pumpkin bars) Which I love :) I got to see my brother, and meet his lovely new girlfriend. We took the boys downtown to see the lighting of the Christmas tree, which was fun...kind of...but mostly chaotic and paranoia inducing because of the large crowds and small children who eventually became overwhelmed by the crowds. Oh well. Its all part of the experience! :)

I'm tempted to be thankful for the same things that I'm always thankful for. And I am. For my children, my husband, for provision, for health, for family and friends that make my life so full. I'm thankful for specific things like...an able and generous father who loaned me an extra car when my ENGINE died in our Saturn Vue. WHAT?! I'm thankful for a generous engineer friend who will be able to fix said engine after the Holiday's at a fraction of the price it was going to cost us to do ourselves (well, not ourselves...but at a shop..you know). I'm thankful that we have generous family who are helping us through this transition time.....and I'm thankful that we have an accepted offer on a lovely older home in Brownsburg that we expect to close on at the end of December! Yay! (more details to come later...we are pending inspection and I don't want to celebrate too early...but we are pretty confident! :) Yep, I'm pretty grateful that when I look at my life...barring a few complications and setbacks along the way, God has pretty much given me everything I have ever hoped for....even if it hasn't come packaged in just the way I had thought it should or would!

But ya know what else? I'm pretty darn thankful that God is doing a huge work in my life and heart right now. I'm humbled and grateful for the continuing work of the Holy Spirit in my life. Realizing that mercy and grace and the conviction of the Holy Spirit is big gift from my Father...I look forward with great expectation to see what God is going to do in my life, in the life of my husband and my boys.

There has been this theme that God has brought me to lately of "everything is GRACE". Yes, Ive read that outrageously popular "1000 Gifts" by Ann Voskamp, but even outside of that...via church, small groups, bible study, personal devotion...I've come to a weird but precious place in my life. I feel a big shift washing over my life from what I used to value....to what I am now seeing is truly valuable. Like, our house. We choose...somewhat weirdly BUT happily to buy a home that is priced 100k less than what we felt comfortable buying. Our home is old and outdated. And ya know, while I look forward to putting new things into that house and making it "better" I care SO MUCH less about it than I ever thought I would. Our cabinets are nasty. The laundry CLOSET is in the KITCHEN! Guess what?! I don't care! ( ok, maybe I care about 5%, but really..what's 5%?! :)) It doesn't matter! You know what IS great? I HAVE cabinets! I HAVE a washer and dryer! Its wonderful! :)

I'm starting to naturally look past the surface and find blessing in everything. This is huge in my life! Even things that don't seem great. Who am I to know the mind of God? If I can see my life through the lens and filter that "everything is grace" then even hard stuff can be joyful. I believe that even the "bad" stuff is God's grace in my life. Without it....how would I know that I needed a Savior? His grace and mercy in NOT giving me everything I think I want/need to make my life great...is for my sanctification...and I'm starting to embrace it. My response to his direction in my life is the only way I have to honor Him. Oh I want to do it well. I need eyes to see and ears to hear...I pray this for you too. Whoever still stumbles upon my blog from time to time, may God be gracious and kind to you...to give you eyes to see and ears to hear...that which is truly important and will count for Jesus and his kingdom. Its so tempting to take the easy road, to live for ourselves, for our comfort...to make ourselves our own God...but its so very dissatisfying.

So that's it. I'm thankful. And I'm hopeful that I can live this life well and do something that will make a difference for Jesus. I'm hopeful that I can teach my boys what it means to love others and to have a generous heart. Thanks Jesus for not giving me everything I think I want and need all the time, every time. I'm afraid it would make me a pretty nasty and ungrateful person!

‎"Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen
Show me how to love like you have loved me

Break my heart from what breaks yours
Everything I am for your kingdoms cause
As I go from nothing to Eternity"

-Hillsong

Trick or Treat

We did a few things for some Halloween fun this year. We went to Zoo-Boo at the Indianapolis Zoo and we went trick or treating with our cousin Bailey! Fun! We all know how much I love Halloween and I think I've somehow managed to create a child who loves it just as much as I do. Owen and I counted down the days together until Halloween and several of his comments just made me laugh..."Mom, Halloween is my FAVORITE time of of year" :), etc, etc. You know the sentiments. We celebrate halloween for the fun that it is....dressing up, handing out candy (which we didn't get to do this year :(), being with friends and family and indulging in the beautiful season of Fall. I think as long as we keep our perspective on loving Jesus and making it kid-friendly, we'll be ok. That's my plan! Here are some pictures (in no particular order of course :))