Autumn tunic and wreath

Our front door had this lovely wreath to celebrate Autumn..and with fall comes my favorite pallet of colors. I had to make a few tunics for the girl's school wardrobe. This one was for Eden, even though they are 1.5 years apart I love that they can already share most of their clothing with each other because even though I made it for Eden, Novie ended up wearing it first ;)

Owl Love You

Once again, I found a product I love on Pinterest and HAD to make it. Since making these I've had about 10 friends ask how to make it and have made 3 since starting! They make the cutest gifts and very simple, easy to make. I enjoy making these and see many more Owls in my future.

http://www.makeit-loveit.com/2010/12/snuggly-owl-for-sewing-republic.html

So, Pinteresting!

Not sure how many of you are on Pinterest these days. If you have any ounce of creativity in your body, need for organization or like to decorate for Christmas (everyone I think) this is the site for you! Everything from DIY, recipes, clothing, tutorials, tips on organizing, cleaning, decorating, holidays ideas, crafts etc (you get the idea) it's the ultimate of "idea" networking in a nutshell, and men, it's for you too. Props to the guy friends who have started to follow my pins.

I used to spend hours and I mean hours! on the Internet trying to find tutorials and adorable ideas for my girls, home and holidays now I'm just a measly click away to my Pinterest account where I have have categories such as; Fall/Thanksgiving ideas, Fashion Inspiration, Repurpose, Living Wiser, Motivation, and Pretty Food (plus about 5 more). Feel free to check out my page:

http://pinterest.com/tabicati/

Now the 1 and ONLY problem I have found with Pinterest is the downfall of just "pinning" ideas all day instead of actually following through on the ideas. Do you do this? or am I somehow the ONLY person who struggles with this. Pinterest needs "rewards" for those individuals who actually fulfill their pins! Like a sticker, balloon or cookie :) Anyone with me on this one? So after pinning for a year and fulfilling a pin once every 3months I completed/made 4 pins in 1 week! aaahhh, I feel fabulous! It's like I lost 5lbs! Anyways, I am going to try better on how crazy I get with pinning. I want to actually MAKE what I pin, complete that organizing tip, bake that recipe and put that outfit together!

Here's to a year of doing and not just pinning. What Pinteresting item did you fulfill this week?

Here's one of mine:

A Day with Mickey

Here are just a few of my favorite Disney memories:

This proves Disney was a HUGE hit

"It's a small world after all"

Nothing like squishing together in the People Mover

Just as we were walking away Eden turns around and shoots Goofy Pirate! It turned into quite the fight! Goofy with his sword and Eden with her gun. I could not stop laughing and cheering her on!

Auntie Sarah gets in on the dress-up fun, literally, this dress size; 3Years and up.

Waiting 2 years for a vacation

Have you ever waited over 2 years for a vacation we'll we did it and it was worth the wait! We went to Disney! Our WHOLE family was there! That was half the fun, the other half was watching Eden and Novie experience Disney for the first time. Man, I LOVED watching them as they "oohed" and "awed" over Disney. They were such troopers as the temperature hit 100 and we waited in long lines, the excited never died down. We stayed in Orlando for a week all 9 of us together in a Villa. We hit FunSpot, Magic Kingdom, Waterslides, the Pool, cooked dinner together, played games, went out for HUGE ice cream cones, met up with distant relatives from OK and made many fun memories. I love vacation ;) hope our next one is sooner than 2 years away.

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Just want everyone to know this is my favorite vacation statement ;)

Camp

There is just something about camp that I LOVE!!! and I LOVE camp at Word of Life Florida! It's exciting, heart-pumping, you run around while you sing songs, you jump, scream, cheer, worship, are challenged, encouraged and blessed. I have missed camp!!! and it feels like we have never left. Also, my kids LOVE camp!! They love to run around with the counselors, cheer, scream, clap their hands and sing as loud as they can. The guitarist in the band gave us the set list of songs we have been singing so we can "youtube" them, why? because my girls have been asking none stop to keep singing camp songs and we cannot remember them all! They are all wonderful, convicting, encouraging and such a blessing to sing together as a family. I love how the Praise Band here has written many of the songs, what a blessing to have such talent being used for camp!

I love the feeling of family here, and many of them are my family! Everyone is Uncle or Aunt, and even many of the Conference Guests have become family over the last 5+ years of working with them. It's amazing how we immediately catch up with one another, encourage one another, and leave refreshed after visiting with them.

Another key element I love is the contagious desire to serve here. When we need help with something we never hear, "no" or "we can't do that" it's always, "let me see what I can do and if I can't help you I'll find someone who can" and it always happens. That is encouraging! What a blessing to be surrounded by individuals who desire to be Servant Leaders. A rare quality even in believers today, and right now I'm surrounded by 100's of them! Greatly blessed to be here these past two weeks! We are having a wonderful time!

Michigan, Furlough Part I

It's amazing how fast our time in MI went, furlough is going by way too fast and its making me sad already! it started out kinda nice and laid back but it sped up quickly and didn't stop until we landed in Tampa last Thurs. It's hard to sum up one blog post for one whole month so I will highlight the major events that happened over our 30 day stay in MI:

Frankenmuth

If you have never been it's a must visit location if you are anywhere near it. It's know as "Michigan's Little Barvaria" I still cannot believe I did not get a pretzel! It has many unique shops, such as Bronner's where it's Christmas ALL year long,

the little Coo-coo Clock shop, Fudge and ice cream shops, leather, scrapbook, candle and candy making and too many more to remember! We had a relaxing evening browsing the little shops after the World Famous Zehnder's Chicken dinner http://www.zehnders.com/dining/zehndersdining.htm. We stayed at the Splash Village hotel where we swam, made Ashley go down the "scary" slide, tried to relax in the lazy river (too many people mushing us to really relax) :) the girls went down slides, shot water pistols, got water sprayed and dumped on them and ate DOTS ice cream. we all had fun swimming and playing. http://www.zehnders.com/waterpark/splashvillagewaterpark.htm

Outside of Bronner's

Eating our 5 course Chicken Dinner

Behind the little unique stores

Great Grandparents

I treasure and enjoy the moments my girls have with their grandparents but nothing it more precious than time spent with GREAT grandparents, sharing stories, reading books, playing chalk, games and in the sprinkler, touring the farm, playing at the park...we made some wonderful memories.

Our home

We were greatly blessed my Ms. Lynette for providing us with a beautiful apartment, rent free, utility free. Words cannot express what a blessing she has been to us. What a dear lady to hear of a need and take it upon herself to make it happen for strangers :) Than you again and again! thank you to all the Members of Deckerville Bible for furnishing the apartment and for Ashley carrying it up all those stairs ;)

Supporters

How encouraged we have been by our monthly supporters, 1 time gifts, churches, friends and family members in MI. We had 14 meetings, every Sunday and Wednesday night was full, we had dinner with friends, family and supporters, a park day to catch up with friends and supporters, toys, clothing and money given to our family and ministry, and many words of enocuragement and prayers. We came to encourage them but always left greatly encouraged. Thank you for your faithfulness!

Butterflies

We released our butterflies today. A friend of ours home schools her 4 children (and as a home school graduate myself I remember all the unique opportunities I had growing up having school at home) she ordered us some caterpillars (larvae) to watch grow and change into butterflies. The day we arrived June 2nd they started to build their cocoons so we missed them as caterpillars but we got our little silk-spunned friends and dove into learning about butterflies. They hatched a week later and we had 4 Painted Lady butterflies fluttering around our little cage in the kitchen we watched them eat and fly for a few days then released them into the Autumnwood butterfly garden. It was such a fun thing to do with the girls and for those of you with small kids the waiting period is just perfect for a 3 and 4 year old :)

Eden Louise

My little Spunky, crazy, cuddly, horse, Pirate and tool loving little girl turned 3 last week. We flew over to America the day of her 3rd birthday making it literally the longest birthday of any one's life. After 20+ hours of flying, driving, traveling we got to America at noon to start June 2nd all over again :) 2 days later we celebrated Eden's 3rd birthday My Little Pony style. Complete with Aunt Ashley, Grandma, Grandpa, both Great Grandmother's and Grandad we ate hot dogs, mac-n-cheese, pickles and a very wobbly (melting) rainbow cake. All requests of our little Eden.

We had ponies hanging from the ceiling, on the plates, napkins, table, crowns, cake and table. We had Pony crowns, snacks and whistles. We blew bubbles, sang, open lots of Pony presents and had a tea party. What a wonderful afternoon celebrating Eden. Happy Birthday little Edy-crazy-Lou, I cannot believe you are another year older and old enough to start Kindergarten now. I am blessed to be a part of your life, and I love being your mommy. You are hilarious and unpredictable!

Walmart

So, as Andy and I got closer to America we started talking about all the people we would see, food we would get to eat, places we would visit, stores we would browse, and items we needed to purchase to prepare for the next 2 years in Hungary (mostly shoes and winter items).

The car ride to our new "home" for the next month was over 2hrs from the airport and in order to keep us all awake we decided to hit Walmart to get out and walk (and truthfully I was excited since it's been 2 years since I've perused Walmart) yeah, I had forgotten about Walmart. Andy and I were so overwhelmed with the CHEAP!!! prices and countless options for one item that we actually started to get dizzy and sick. I just wanted to get out of there! How weird is that! We were also exhausted and beyond the limit any normal body should be pushed to which added to it, but what a surreal moment not what I had anticipated.

Also the gas prices here are so cheap as well, $4.20 per gallon! It's over $8 in Europe. Again, we were shocked and surprised. Didn't think we would be saying, "everything is so cheap!" every 2 seconds :)

http://www.walmart.com/

Put things into perspective... and Walmart you really live up to your slogan.

Flying with kids

As we anticipated leaving for furlough we always forgot one small thing that has to happen before we actually arrive and see our family and friends. The trapped in a flying, metal, claustrophobic non-kid friendly plane thing. The girls were awakened at 3am and stayed awake for the next 20hours straight. Eden slept 2 whole hours the whole trip and Novie slept a whopping 20min. The first 10 were actually quite a breeze, they had new games, toys, snacks we never allow them to indulge in, and a wonderful perfectly timed layover, giving them the chance to run around. But man those last 4hrs. on the plane felt like a whole day in itself. We were seated right in front of the "grumpy" passenger who was asking the girls every few minutes to be quiet. First off they were not screaming or crying just playing. Lots of laughing, giggling and being different animals yes, there were some toys that were loud, and I understand that. When you don't have kids you have no idea, when you've never flown with a 3 and 4 year you have no idea. I thought they were amazing! Now we did have a meltdown and of course he didn't say anything during that time..kinda inconsistent...didn't make sense..I was waiting to see his head pop around or his head so I could pop it, either way...kinda surprised he didn't chime in during the meltdown (someone had lost a sock) amazing what spurs on a meltdown :)

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150638871690650&set=a.10150579923910650.679820.904125649&type=1&theater

The Lord blessed me with patience any other time I would have given him a piece of my mind for speaking to us that way. :) But again inexperience and naivete was his worse enemy and the fact he kept forgetting it was 9am-5pm, that's typically when kids are wide awake and playing right? :) But anyways I was proud of Novie and Eden kinda impressed how well they did, and kinda disappointed in myself for expecting the worse from them, I keep forgetting I can trust them now. We took several walks, found out a lady sitting in front of Novie was also celebrating her birthday just like Eden, 50+ she said and Novie said, " you're five!" I'm going to be 5 this year like you!" when she held her hands and pumped them by 5, Novie hasn't learned multiplication yet :) also 2 rows back we met a man also celebrating his birthday! it's like they seated them all together to celebrate together, we thought it was pretty funny! Eden sported her felt crown and told the stewardess it was her birthday. (I was kinda sad to hear Delta does not have anything for kids anymore, no wings, tours to meet the captain or have him come back, no one would sing or do anything special for her, no crayons, coloring books or lids for cups) it's been 2 years since we last flown and we did that whole list last time. Amazing how non-kid friendly Delta became in 2 years..seems they would improve in this area not minimize it. But we celebrated her 3rd birthday the best we could, we have special prizes, games, a crown and new outfit! Also I think we sang to her about 10 times :) I was so excited to be able to have such an exciting birthday for her, how often do you fly on your birthday!

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150638871690650&set=a.10150579923910650.679820.904125649&type=1&theater

Here's a funny story, but how would you respond if it happened to you?! especially if you had kid's in tow!!

At the airport for a business trip, Maureen settled down to wait for the boarding announcement at Gate 35. Then she heard the voice on the public address system saying, 'We apologise for the inconvenience, but BOAC Flight 937 will board from Gate 41.'

Maureen picked up her luggage and carried it over to Gate 41. Not ten minutes later the public address voice told her that Flight 937 would in fact be boarding from Gate 35.

So, again, Maureen gathered her carry-on luggage and returned to the original gate. Just as she was settling down, the public address voice spoke again, 'We would like to thank all passengers for participating in BOAC's physical fitness programme.'

and lastly, Brian sums flying up in a nutshell, again, it's always exaggerated with children :) but when flying you have to laugh or it would be torture :) watch this before you leave on your overseas trip, it lightens the mood greatly.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9em-ZCddWk

As we were flying I knew people were praying what a blessing to know people love and care for us on BOTH sides of the Atlantic! The girls did well, the flights were quick, smooth and they served PIZZA and ICE CREAM for dinner (of course it was our opportunity to again celebrate Eden's special day!) we got to load first, had many people help, we got to skip lines to board and get through customs, which is always a huge blessing! Overall it was a successful day of flying and now we are Stateside ready for furlough, family and friends!! See you soon!

Pocahontas

Many of you know about our little kitty she is quite famous around here. She showed up May 2010 on our front porch and has never left :) She showed up during the busiest time for us and claimed us as her family.I was secretly hoping she would move on or go back home but after a couple months I finally gave in and started to feed her. She has now stolen my heart. She is by far the best animal I have ever owned or been in contact with. She has been fought over, dressed up, dragged around, shoved in strollers, boxes, locked in the closet, and squeezed and still has never bitten or scratched the girls, quite amazing since cats are so unpredictable! We are blessed to have such a docile kitty. The girls and all their friends adore Pocahontas. Yes, I know funny name but when we first decided to keep her the options from Novie and Eden were Princess and Dinosaur and I was not going to be yelling either of those names...the movie they were watching daily at this time was..well, that's a no-brainer. So Pocahontas it was.

Well. P just had 4 beautiful babies last week. Again, I was secretly hoping she would wait until we left for furlough but they are here and adorable! I just want to hold them all the time! It's so cute how popular her kitties are she has had 12 visitors so far, more than some newborn babies have, she is such a silly but greatly loved kitty. Here are a several photos the day they were born and 1 week old.