This and That

Abby is still having trouble sleeping. 3am-6am last night. Thankfully my wonderful hubby handled last night for me. She is fine, nothing wrong and she is just as frustrated as we are that she can't go back to sleep. I have scheduled a visit to the doctor next week. I've had 2 nurses call me to discuss the situation and see if I had tried "this and that". You know, over the past year, I have tried "this and that". At this point we are averaging every other night and we are fast approaching a new school year. Lord, I need to have this figured out by then.

The nurse today suggested that even though she was awake for 3 hrs in the night, that I leave her up and do not give her a nap. It was tough, but we made it through the day and we'll see if that will keep her sleeping through the night.

We went to our church tonight to help set up for VBS next week. I am so glad that I am not in charge of this, but glad that the kids can experience a Group VBS. This year is called "Power Lab" - it's a scientist lab, with molecules, beakers, test tubes, atoms and of course concoctions of all sorts! Kevin and I are in charge of the "Squeaky Beakers". This is the Pre-K group (3-5 yrs). We should be good and tired by the end of next week!

I've been cleaning out the basement and closets, trying to get my "Spring cleaning" finished before my new school books arrive as well as working on decorations for our VBS room.
Hopefully we'll get out on the boat this weekend!

Pray for Sweet Dreams around here!

Interviews

I'm going to start with our good friends Dave & Julie and then move on to interviews. D & J came over Mon. night and we grilled out and the kids played. They have Ellie (almost 4) and Noah (2). Years and years ago when Julie was in highschool (ok- maybe not that long ago) she started coming to the youth program that we were doing at the church. She went to an Aquire the Fire weekend and gave her heart to the Lord. At this time, the youth of the church was going strong and she had lots of friends coming to the church. As the next year or so passed, some friends left or stopped coming and J remanined faithful. Dave had been working for Kevin's parents at the lab and Teresa (my sis-in-law) invited him to come to church - where....... you guessed it, he met Julie. Kevin married them on a very hot day in September - anybody remember that HOT day? Now, they live in Gahanna have 2 beautiful children, Dave is a Columbus Fire Fighter and Julie has received her Masters and is looking to be a Guidance Counselor. We are so proud of them! We are so glad that we were able to be a part of this family that God brought together.

On to the interviews - they are over! We interviewed 9 applicants. All of them were of good quality, but we feel we already know who would fit with us. It really didn't take much discussion. We are thankful about that. We were praying that the Holy Spirit would lead us to the right people. I believe that we are going to hire on 2 at this time. A Christian lady who is already a State Licensed Appraiser - she will receive the overflow of orders and requires no training. We will also hire an Apprentice that K will have to train. Our plan is to let them know our decision this weekend and have them start sometime in Aug. I feel a sense of relief as we have taken this step. Now we can move on and hopefully see Kevin working less hours, but maintaining income!

Abby has continued to awaken in the night and finally I have made contact with our Pediatrician to seek advice. They haven't gotten back with me yet. She was awake Sat night from 3am-6am - she slept well Sun night, but struggled to fall alseep Monday night and was awake from 5am - 7:30am Tues. morning. I am now having trouble sleeping even when she is sound asleep. I feel as though I am anticipating her to wake up and I am so tense that I can't relax. So, even the night that she slept all night - I only slept about 5 hrs and I had slept only 3 hours the night before and I believe about 3-4 hours last night. This is not enough for me! Hopefully the doc will have some advice.

Trying to keep it all in perspective, I am thankful that a sleeping problem is my only issue, I know she is healthy and strong and we may just have to get through this season - One good point - I have spent alot more time in prayer in the quiet morning hours! His strength is Perfect!

Pray for a good night's sleep!

The Weekend

We had a wonderful weekend full of movies, swimming, yardwork, basement cleaning, a birthday party and playtime with cousins. Friday we took it easy, watched some TV and started some cleaning in the basement. It seems like things had just been piling up down there since May. We would get stuff out and not put it back where it should go and then it seems like the whole basement is out of control. I need to organize school totes and get ready for a new year. All the girls clothes are mixed up from the change of winter into spring/summer and that needs sorted. Party supplies are in "Meijer bags" everywhere and baseball/soccer uniforms are in piles on the floor. By afternoon the troops were restless and we headed outdoors for some scooter and bike riding. We ran to Meijer and then to pick up "Flyers" pizza (the best pizza in town). We watched the "Bee Movie" and called it a night.

The kids slept in beautifully (8:30am). After some breakfast we made "Amish Friendship Bread" - you know the kind that your neighbor gives you and you have to squeeze the bag for 10 days before you mix all the ingredients and bake the bread. The kids love it! We took some bread to Uncle Jim, Aunt Suzy & the boys - Kane and Gabriel. K & G ended up coming home with us and spending the rest of the day at our house. Our fun started with water - we swam, jumped on the trampoline with the sprinkler underneath, Kevin got into a game of dumping buckets on the kids, and we even put Kylo in the pool - she is a good swimmer! We thought about putting the bunny in, but we could never catch that rascally rabbit! We came inside dried off, had a snack and watched the Bee Movie again and then the kids dispersed into playing Wii and playing with toys. I went back to the basement to clean and sort some more.

Abby was up again in the night (3am-6am) and the whole time I kept thinking - "how will she make it through church today, she will be miserable - how will I make it through church, I will be miserable." But we made it through just fine and headed off to Savannah's 6th birthday party. We dropped of Jord and Rach and the rest of us headed home. Abby and I napped. Uncle Keith picked up the girls for us and brought them home. The fun weekend was not over yet though- Zach and Jord went home with Uncle Keith and Lexi to play at their house for a couple hours. Kevin and I took Rach and Abby out for some dinner - we ate outside at Chipolte (the girls had KFC) and the girls were great and fun to be with. They seemed very talkative and we really enjoyed the cute conversations that we had. We picked up Z & J, came home and actually did a few chores around the house (clean bunny cage, sweep, empty dishwasher and bring down laundry). 4 tired kids were eager to go to bed and so am I.

Pray that Abby sleeps all night. I believe that God has placed a plan in my heart to help with this "no sleeping" thing - I'll keep you posted!

Dear Friends

Sorry that the pic is a little dark - we were outside the Olive Garden! Yummy!

Today we met a dear missionary friend from India for lunch. When Santosh Babu is in this area he stays with some other dear friends of ours - Don and Joan Hughes. Don and Joan were part of the core of the church that Kevin and I had pastored and they have remained a part of our lives and continue to be a blessing to us everytime we see them. We took Zach and Jord to lunch with us and they enjoyed talking to Santosh about life in India! Kevin spent 3 weeks in India back in 1994. Of course, he would love to go back and visit again someday - sounds like a father and son trip to me!!

Well, I need to start on dinner and work on some more laundry. My friend, Jamie and I are going over to the duplex that we own to clean one side tonight after the kids go to bed.

We have new tenants moving in this weekend.

Cleaning up your own mess is never fun and it's worse when it's someone else's mess! Oh the joy of being a property owner!

Stace

Our Babysitter left Today

Our babysitter, Candice, left today for Louisiana for college. She started babysitting for us when she was 12. We would put Zach and Jord to bed and she would come to the house and stay while we went to catch a movie, a bite to eat or just go shopping. As the family grew and she got older she would feed them, bathe them and put them to bed. I always knew that if she ever needed help it was only a few steps away since her family lives across the street. I know she had to call on her mom to come help a few times over the years. We are not the only family here on Kellerman Ct. or in the subdivision wondering when we will ever go out again. She babysat for many families and was always busy. Everyone loved her because she was so good with the kids, she loved to play with them and she would always come to their birthday parties! She will be greatly missed here! If anyone knows of a great babysitter - I might be interested!

We spent the day running errands - post office, library, oil change and recycling. I have been recycling faithfully ever since my friend Melissa hooked me up with a big trash can and some bags. Thanks M! It saves us a lot of room in our big green dumpster (Jamie always said it would). We used to go up and down the street on trash night looking for a can that had some room in so that we could put a couple of our bags into it. Now everything fits great! I take the recycling bag to Sam's (they have lots of dumpsters there for recycling - and you don't have to sort) about once a week and I'm usually going that way anyway.

We scheduled interviews for Midwest Appraisal Services today. We will be interviewing 9 applicants on Mon/Tues. Please pray that we will be sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit as we meet these people face to face. I'll update on this after the interviews.
Have a blessed day,
Stacy

Finally Nothing To Do

So, we have nothing scheduled for the next 2 weeks - absolutely nothing on the calendar except a hair appt for me. Already the kids have been asking , "What are we doing today?" I say, "nothing" and they are not sure what that means. We laid around this morning, watched some TV, then put away clothes, made beds and everyone straightened up their rooms a bit. After lunch we headed out to the pool. Abby needed a nap so I came inside and Rachel soon followed. She is now playing on another computer here beside me. Zach and Jord have been asking to invite friends over because they claim to be bored. Imagine that!

I have made a list of projects that I would like to tackle during this "time off". Some cleaning, scrapbooking of sorts and painting. We'll see how that goes.

Kevin is looking to hire some help for Midwest Apprasial Services and I need to contact the applicants today and schedule interviews for next week. This makes us very nervous as we would be letting a stranger into our business and lives. We have been prayerful and slow to move trying to follow what the Lord would have us do with this business. Kevin definately needs help - he works day and night and almost all weekend long. Pray that we would be sensitive to the leading of the Lord as we go through the interview process.

We also have to clean out one side of the duplex we own to get ready for new renters. They are set to move in Aug. 1st and the previous tentants moved out last week. We have a few simple tasks to accomplish before we can hand the keys over.

So really. is there nothing to do?

Girls Sleepover

Last night was Jordan's sleepover for her birthday and it was wild and crazy as you can tell from the pics. We set up our basement for a concert. We had a sound system, microphones and stage lighting. The girls were jumping off chairs, singing and dancing. Zach was the DJ for the night and he played guitar and swung from the rafters. The girls ate pizza, went swimming, made some crafts, did the concert thing and watched a movie. Then it was back to crafts, manicures and then more crafts. This was a perfect party for Jord. Finally, the last eye closed around 3am and so did mine. This party was more work for me than Zach's party. The boys only wanted to play Wii and watch movies.

At this moment all girls are in bed, resting and I am going to do the same as soon as I finish this blog. Nothing else is planned for today except maybe some laundry and mowing - but even that could wait until tomorrow!