Fireproof

Well I finally rented and watched Fireproof tonight. WOW!!! is all I can say. With the struggles I have been going through over the past few months this really hit home. I learned something about myself and what I need to do in my marriage and my life. Those of you who know me should know that I am a firm believer in Christ. I don't always set the best example, but I do try. There are times that I get so tired of trying to be the bigger person and trying to be the one who always has to fight for what I want. I am tired of fighting for things. I have now been reminded that I don't have to fight alone. As long as I follow the motto of firefighters all over "Never leave your partner behind!!!" anything is possible. I have, at times, left my partner behind, but in the most recent times I have not and I can tell you that has been a blessing to me and to see the change that has happened. The credit isn't mine though...it belongs to Christ and Christ alone. I also thank our church "Oak Leaf Church" for being a church that appeals to those who have been wounded either by another church or by family. For showing that there is a place that you won't be judged for anything. A place where you can come as you are. A place where the only "agenda" is to get you from where you are to where God wants you to be. I can tell you, from first hand experience, that this church that started a little over 2 years ago in a movie theater with 25 people and is now having to run 4 services to accommodate the 1200 people coming every Sunday is an absolute God sent miracle to my family's life and to the city of Cartersville. I will learn to Fireproof my marriage and I will fight for what is mine. I have some things that I need to take care of in that matter and with that I leave you and say if you haven't seen the movie...you should. God Bless and I will update soon.

P.S. Please pray for me as Monday I start clinical rotations in Labor and Delivery. I am excited and cannot wait. Giving birth to a baby is another miracle of God. I pray for all healthy mom's and babies and if not then I pray for the strength and compassion to help patient's through it.

Update

Some of you who either know me or read my blog have heard me mention my friend Ashley who adopted a little girl from India. They arrived home today with her from India. They have been there since the 18th. Everything seems to have gone well. It was absolutely awesome to see them ride up the elevator from the tram and have this little girl with them. She was absolutely precious. I am going to include a picture for you at the end of the new Ware family.

Just a little history for those of you who don't know. Ashley and I have been friends since I was in the 7th grade. That is approximately 20 years. She graduated a year ahead of me from High School. She moved to Georgia and I followed suit not too much after she did. I didn't move to Lawrenceville or to Jefferson, but at least I got us in the same state again. Ashley has 2 children (prior to the new addition) that are one year behind Cassie in age. Mason is 7 as of the 29th and Mallory is 6 as of the 16th.

I forgot how much our children like to play together until today at the airport. The girls were amazing and just started talking. They shared pizza and just loved on each other. The boys...well they were boys and preceded to run around and complain about how long they were having to wait on the "Guests of Honor". It was really funny.

Well, I am excited to say that Maddie Ambika Ware is FINALLY home and appears to be in good spirits. She is beautiful. I think she was overwhelmed at the number of people there to see her come home, but she really just sort of fell in to rhythm with all of the little girls that were there. The highlight was while waiting for baggage the girls took my phone and looked up Hannah Montana on Sprint TV and started watching. It was funny to see about 6 little girls crowded around a small little phone trying to see and/or listen.

Ashley...if you are reading this...know I love you and I am so happy for you and your family.

I made a mistake!

If this posts correctly then I am on my way home from the farm. We had a great day! We managed to clean up more of the barn that we tore down last weekend. We had placed most of it on a burn pile and we burned it with a ton of old brush. Well, in the process of burning the kids were playing near the creek and of couse I (as a good mother) had said "DO NOT GET IN THE WATER!!!" And what did my daughter do? She "slipped" into the water, tried to hide it by zipping up her jacket because she was wet from middle of belly to toes. Well we marched to the house, stripped, and got a dry shirt on till her clothed could be washed and dried. Well since there is nothing sweet at the farm I decided to make a Chocolate pound cake. Nice and easy and not to toot my own horn, but I am a pretty darn good cook. Anyway, I started out great and it looked great. Well the recipe called for 1/2 cup of cocoa. There was this container on the table that had a "chocolate" substance in it. I smelled it and it smelled chocolatey, must be the cocoa that was used last weekend to make same recipe!!! Right? Wrong. The substance on the table was homemade Hot chocolate mix. I had made a Hot Chocolate pound cake. Ha ha ha laugh with me!!! Obviously my brain is already fried from 2 nights of school. For those of you asking the cake was actually pretty good. Luke and the kids really liked it. I don't make cooking mistakes often, but this one has to top all of the others.

Hope you enjoyed my mistake. I can assure you it won't happen again unless requested!!!
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How cold does it have to be....

I will have to say that the past 2 days have been the coldest I have experienced in a long time. Friday was bad, but let me tell you Saturday was...well...miserable. We, and when I say that I mean Luke and I, have started a LARGE project at the farm. It was decided about 2 weekends ago that a barn on the property that was literally falling down should be torn down and removed. Great idea....unless you are the one doing the work. We have moved junk out of the rubble, taken off old siding and saved what we could for another project, made a trailer load of metal to be recycled, and burned old hay. That was just the first two weekends we worked on this "project". This past weekend we had a bobcat and a mini-excavator to help with this. It was SO COLD and honestly I wasn't in the best frame of attitude to work on this this weekend. I found other things to do inside the house as I watched my kids and husband tear down the barn. In all honesty...what was I going to do with heavy equipment. I don't know how to operate those things and I would be willing to learn if it didn't require hypothermia to do it. The wind was bitter and it started snowing mid-afternoon. Didn't last long because, of course, this is Georgia and we never see snow...not on the ground anyway. Then it changed to windy, cold, and rainy. Typical for this time of year. Cold, but not cold enough to make snow. YUCK!!! Well, after I had run out of things to do at the house I had to finally go out to see if I could do something. Well, I got to go get diesel fuel for the equipment. YEA!!FUN!! Then I got to sit in the truck and watch. I was trying to be supportive in this endeavor. Finally, I was told that we were going to take the wood that was left from the barn and place it on a pile to be burned. So I HAD to start helping. Man was it cold. In case you can't tell at this point, I hate cold weather. I don't mind some cold, but the past few days have been literal misery for me. Anyway, it took 3 full 16 foot flatbed trailer loads to remove all of the wood that was left from destruction. Talk about a lot of wood. And none of it was good to use for anything else. The property looks WAY better and our "project" is about 1/3 done. This project actually still involves siding one side a now small storage room that was left from the barn. It was the only part that was worth saving. Then siding/closing in Glory's stand alone stall and building and closing in a stand alone stall for Pilgrim and Thunder. Eventually, we will either have a barn for the mares or they will have a stand alone too. Which ever we can get first. I am so tired today. This weekend has not been restful at all and all 4 of us are walking around like zombies. The one good thing that happened was that I did learn how to operate the pieces of equipment that we had at the farm. I have a general knowledge of how to dig holes with a mini-x and how to work a bobcat. Not sure when that information will come in handy again, but at least I have it. Knowledge is power so I have been told.

For those of you who are reading this please say a prayer for my friend Ashley and her husband Keith. They are leaving tonight for Bangladore, India to pick up the newest member of their family. They have adopted a little girl named Ambika and have finally gotten clearance to bring her home. They will return on January 27. I can't wait to meet her and see them home. I have been talking with Ashley for over 5 years now about adoption, since I am adopted, and we have gone over lots of aspects from an adoptee's point of view. I have always said that they should just include that information from the beginning. It was never something that I remember was a shock to me. It was just something that was and nobody made a big deal about. I was never upset about it and it wasn't a secret. Ambika is a very special little girl and I can't wait to meet her. Prayers for safe travel and a smooth transition for Ambika. I know coming to America is a great thing for her, but it will be hard since she has been in an orphanage for almost a year now. Her story can be found here at Our Indian Angel. It is an amazing story of love and God's timing. I hope you all have a great week.

Wow! I made another post!!

I am so proud of myself. I made another post. Not in a row with the other, but it is an update of sorts. HA HA HA.

The kids have started back to school and as of yesterday my life has resumed a normal schedule...well sort of...my school starts tomorrow. I guess that will be the offical start to what we call normal around our house. School for the kids is going well and my house is getting back into order from the 2 1/2 weeks the kids were off. It was nice to have them home, but man it rained EVERY day that they were out of school. OK so maybe not everyday, but enough that they couldn't go out and play any day that they were off for Christmas break. Talk about really cruddy. We had a great time during break seeing family, welcoming a new member who you can see here at our new adventure. He is the cutest. We also spent lots of time at the farm with the horses. Luke and I have made the decision to really try to make the horse thing work for our family. The kids are really involved with it now and they are doing GREAT with their skills. Jacob has started riding on his own...or let me rephrase...he is now riding his horse Joy without any help from an adult. Luke used to have a lead rope connected to Joy's bridle and he would help Jacob with control. That no longer happens. Jacob now is able to control the horse on his own. We stay right with him of course...he doesn't have free reign to go anywhere he pleases. He isn't quite ready for that, but he is doing a great job. Cassie is still learning and getting her "seat" about her. She likes to ride with me on Lady and she rides Glory in the paddock on her own, but we don't have a horse that she can control on her own...yet. That is a work in progress. I think Lady will do really well with her, but I and going to have to ride her more than once a week or once every other week. Then again...it has to stop raining long enough that we aren't sopping through the mud too. Pilgram is progressing nicely. He and I are working on getting on the same page with each other. Riding him is nice, but getting a saddle on him is still an issue. I am trying to learn when to be "his friend" and when to be "his boss". Luke says it is all in my tone of voice. For those of you who know me...this should not be a problem, but apparently what horses hear and what we hear must be different. I thought I had an authoratative tone with him this past weekend, but it took a lot longer and a lot louder tone than I thought I would need. Maybe it was the fact that I didn't take him peppermint treats. HMMMMMM Maybe I can try that.

Bribery works right?

Well, I guess we will see...let you know after this next weekend. We have to finish tearing down the largest section of the old barn on the property and close off the section that is left. It is going to be COLD so I hear this Saturday. Pray that I don't freeze to death. I am hoping that all the work Luke has planned will keep me busy enough to stay remotely warm. I will make sure I have my camera so that I can show you what we have done. I know I have been promising pictures for a while, but I keep forgetting to move my camera from one purse to another. Well...I have to go exercise to keep the weight off and to keep losing so I will update as soon as I have new information for you.

Just another day at the farm

OK so I missed a day blogging. Sorry...I am trying real hard to keep up on this for now. School starts back on the 14th so I might be a little slower with posting at that point. Well, we spent another day at the farm working on things. It was foggy, rainy, and cold...I swear it was like we lived in England. Anyway...the kids and their cousins played for most of the morning and then made Gingerbread Men with their grandmother. This was a makeup date since I was in the hospital the last planned date. They had a blast! Luke and I worked on disassembling (sp?) the old barn that sits on the property. It has been falling down for years now and no one has had the intestinal fortitude to start to take it down. We are hoping to save a lot of the wood off of it to use on our barn to be built after we get tax money back. Over the past few weeks I have really been indoctrinated into what owning a farm with 7 horses on it is all about. I honestly hurt in places that I didn't think I studied in anatomy and physiology. It is a good workout though. I don't need to join a gym for weight training or for cardio when I start riding my horse or breaking the 2-3 we have left to break/train.

We have been working with the stud colt "Thunder" and with my gelding "Pilgram". Actually Thunder has been a work in progess due to his leg injury (but that is another blog story). Pilgram is a BIG learning task for me and for him. I have never trained or broken a horse before. We have gone from him being skiddish of any human contact to me actually being able to ride him (with Luke's help of course). Like I said he is a work in progress. I love him though. He is a really lovey horse. He loves me a lot too and I am not just saying that. We have worked on this relationship for a long time. He actually became mine 2 years ago, but I have tried to love on him since he was born. Origianlly he was my brother in law's (Matthew)but when he got married in 2006 he became mine. I was so excited. It took the rest of that year and then some for him to become the sweetie he is now though.

I used to spend hours studying in a chair next to his pasture so that he would come and stand by me. I gave him horse treats and started buying him grain to have on a daily basis. He is now my "baby"!! Well, to continue with all of this horse talk...we have decided that starting the first of May we are going to start showing our Morgan horses!! Luke wants to try to make some money from them by breeding and selling the foals and the only way to do that is to show your face and to do that you have to go to shows and place. We have beautiful animals and they have great bloodlines. Now all we have to do is work them into well behaved all the time horses. That is a feat in itself. They definitely have a mind of their own and it isn't always on the same wavelength as ours as to what they need to do.

Like I said I will try to keep this up as much as possible and I will put pictures as soon as I remember to get my camera out of my purse. HA HA HA

I hope everyone had a great New Years Eve and that 2009 blesses you all.

Happy New Year

I hope everyone had a great New Year's Day!!! The kids, Luke, and I spent the day at the farm. We had a great day!! We rode horses, cleaned tack, and just spent family time together. It was great!! We are going to repeat it tomorrow and Saturday! I am loving spending so much time at the farm with my horses. Hopefully there will be pictures coming soon. It is hard for me to take pictures when I am on the horse so as soon as I figure out how to make that happen you will have them!

HAPPY NEW YEAR