Getting Nervous....

There's just something about reunions that make people nervous, right? We leave in the morning to head to Liberty for homecoming weekend (although we can only stay for the day). We've been saying for 10 years that we were going to be back, and when we found out they were doing a YouthQuest reunion this year, we knew we had to try and make it work. YouthQuest was the ministry team that David and I were on - we actually met on a YQ ministry trip to Ohio. So lots of special people and fun memories. We're really looking forward to reconnecting with some of those people tomorrow.

But that's not why I'm nervous. I'm nervous about the fact that, for the first time, I'm splitting up all 3 of my kids to 3 different homes. Wonderful homes. And I'm so thankful for our special friends that have agreed to take a Schrodt for a day. But I'm a bit nervous. They all lean on each other and I'm used to knowing that they have each other for "help". I know they'll be fine. I'm sure they'll hardly even know we're gone - it's only for one day/night. But it's weird. I remember when my sister and her husband would have to go away for some church staff retreat and they'd leave their 3 kids with 3 different families. Now I'm that mom! I feel like it's a whole different level of parenting! But when all your friends have kids, who wants 3 extras!!! Anyways, I've finished the "insurance permission" letters for everyone and am off to pack bags. We should be all set!!!

CFA News

I've learned so much about Chick-fil-A this week! Here's what I discovered:

1. You apparently can swap out your toy from a kids meal for ice cream! I had no idea! My kids are going to be so excited! They don't get kids meals very often, but I can assure you that next time they do, they'll be opting for ice cream!!!

2. For you locals here, the Battlefield location had a sign up today saying that you can bring in your "I Voted" sticker on election day for free chicken!!!

3. Coming in November, they'll be making Peppermint Chocolate Chip milkshakes. Holy cow!!!

FREE TACOS!

For those of you that aren't aware, the World Series has begun (Go Rays!). Taco Bell is running a promotion that for every base that is stolen during the series, America gets a free taco. Well guess what? Tampa Bay got a stolen base in Game 1!!! Yippee!! Here's what it means for us!!

We can go to any Taco Bell on October 28 (that's next Tuesday) from 2-6 pm and get a free beef crunchy taco. Hip hip hooray!

Maybe now more people will watch the World Series right? We gotta pay attention to our free food!

http://www.tacobell.com/stealabasestealataco/

God's Timing

More biblestudy tidbits. This week's homework was all about patience - hello! I could go on and on, but I won't. But here's my favorite quote from the homework.

"Time isn't nearly as important to God as timing."

SO true! We so often get all worked up about our own schedules, our own time clocks, when things should happen. But God doesn't operate like that. He doesn't function on what our day planners say should happen today. It's all about His timing!!!

Peace Like a River

Remember that song from childhood? "I've got peace like a river..."? Well, LAST week's homework in my Beth Moore study was all about peace. It was amazing. One of the biggest things that stuck out to me from last weeks' group session was when Beth made the comment that God promises us peace like a river. Not peace like a pond! He knows how rushed and crazy our life is. He knows our pace and our struggles to keep up. That's why he promised us peace like a river - it keeps up with the pace of our life too! :) Love it!

Jacob's Birthday!

What a great weekend we had celebrating my sweet Jacob!! His REAL birthday was Sunday, and my Mom was able to make a quick trip to be here with us. She came down Saturday afternoon and the party began!! Having his birthday on a Sunday made for a very busy and full day. We had to be sure to be up extra early so the donut cake was ready to go when he woke up. Then we were all 6 out the door at 7:45 am to be at church. It was also our first week of our new small group at 11 am (which went GREAT by the way - 5 new couples were there! AMAZING), so we were all there for the whole morning - all 3 services. Everyone did great though, and even did very well at lunch. Mom took us to Olive Garden to celebrate Jacob and we all enjoyed it. After getting home (at 2:15 PM!!!), Jacob opened his presents and then began building!!! Mom left a little bit later in order to be home before it was too dark. We gave the kids baths at 5 pm and then headed to Coldstone for birthday ice cream. We came home and Jacob went straight to bed - he was exhausted! (By the way, I got the pumpkin pie in the sky ice cream at coldstone - it was unbelievably good! Pumpkin ice cream with whipped cream, caramel, and graham cracker crumbs mixed in. Holy cow!) It was quite a day! (One more thing - my computer froze as I was downloading these picture to the blog, so forgive me that the order is all messed up!)

Since we had cupcakes at Jacob's party the week before (and just finished up all the leftovers, we opted for the birthday donuts instead. Aren't these pumpkin donuts from Krispy Kreme adorable? He LOVED them!)

My dad got jacob this lego set of a coast guard 4wd and jet ski. (Oh, and jacob made these weird smile poses most of the weekend. who knows!)

he was VERY excited about the star wars wrapping paper!

The 3 kids before leaving for church that morning. All remnants of donuts cleaned off their faces. The boys were holding new star wars guys mom had given them that morning. (And no, Josiah didn't wear flip flops with socks that morning to church. i think he had put them on to bring in the newspaper for me)

Callie has this "CHEESE" pose down!!! She does it anytime she sees a camera! it's hilarious!

Jacob wasn't the ONLY one excited to have Krispy Kreme for breakfast!

We ended the night at Coldstone to have birthday ice cream. We had VERY tired kids, but it was a great, full birthday!

Here's Jacob with the Coast Guard helicopter and life raft that mom got him. It was a LEGO birthday. Both boys love to build, so they had a BALL!

Mom and Josiah - two peas in a pod. So much alike!

Jacob and David...working hard!

David and the boys sat at this table for 2 hours working on their new lego sets. all 3 loved it!

What a sweet, sweet boy Jacob is. My little Jacob Aaron is 4 years old now. That sounds so big to me. So grown up. It has been an amazing year with him. He asked Jesus to be his Savior last year in October. He continues to ask so many questions about Jesus. The other day he asked me if we would still blink in heaven! He absolutely adores his brother and sister. And wants to do just about everything Josiah does, and the two are most often somewhere playing superheroes. He has begun to get a bit more independent, and will finally tell josiah if he doesn't want to play something. For the longest time, it was whatever Josiah wanted. He loves to chase Callie around the house. He calls her his Callie-girl, just like I do, and is always quick to help her. He still loves to rub her head like a cat - just like when she was a baby. Jacob is JUST like David in so many ways. He's always looked just like him - a "circle" head (as he calls it), blue eyes. Same laid back personality. Is a physical touch boy for sure. We've seen his personality develop even more this year, and he and David have so many similarities. Jacob is quite the cuddler - when he wakes up, especially. Loves to sit in a lap, hold a hand.

He has really enjoyed our mornings together. While I know he misses Josiah terribly while he's at school, it has been very special having some more one on one time with him. He enjoys doing school (I think mostly because it's what his brother is doing too), and continues to work on writing his letters. He seems to have a natural inclination towards math and numbers (again, like David) - they have always come so easily for him. He loves to build - whether blocks, legos, kid k'nex, whatever. He will sit and watch transformers with josiah, but really loves curious george still.

He has really grown up this year. I still tell him all the time that he's my baby boy. He wipes my kisses off faster than I can put them there - but all the while giggling and squealing. What a year it's been. Happy Birthday my sweet Jacob. I can't wait to see how God is going to grow you this next year! Don't get too big my sweet baby boy!

They may as well be twins...

...because everything in our life right now must come in sets of two! Josiah and Jacob. Absolute best buddies. Can fight and pick at each other too, but are mostly inseparable. Josiah was 13 months when I found out I was pregnant with Jacob. And when I found out he was going to be a boy, I was THRILLED! We prayed for these brothers. That they would be the best of friends. That they would be close. That they would stick up for each other and defend each other. We tell them ALL the time that they are each other's best friend. And now they say it too.

School has been a great thing, but an adjustment too. They've both had to adjust to not being around each other 24/7. It's been great for Josiah, because he can tend to use Jacob as his security blanket. If he's nervous about something or a situation, he'll make Jacob do it first and then he'll try it. And it's been great for Jacob to get to be "my biggest boy" at home in the morning, get to be the older one, get to choose what he wants to do instead of just going along with Josiah. But they really do miss each other in the mornings. There are often times when we get home for lunch and they are off in their room playing some superhero something before I even have put my keys away.

In the last month, there have been countless times where they have chosen something for the other one...requiring that we have two of something. Here are some examples:

* Each week in Sunday School, Josiah gets to choose from the treasure box if he brings back his homework completed. After they had so much fun with a horse he had chosen one week, he chose another horse just like it the very next week so that Jacob could have one to play with.

* Remember those nasty teeth? Josiah had picked those from the school treasure box...and same deal. He picked them two weeks in a row so that he and Jacob could both have one.

* Today at BJs, they had some cupcakes out for samples (gotta LOVE the sample carts!). Jacob ate his, and then asked if we could take one home for Josiah to have it.

* Jacob used some of his birthday money to choose some star wars guys. He was emphatic about having to choose the package that had two guys in it - so Josiah could have one too.

How I love these boys.

The Wieds were here!!!

We lucked out today!!! The Wiedmaier's came over to play this afternoon! Samuel's kindergarten is an all-day class, but they had an early dismissal today, so they met us at our house at noon (well, right after I picked up Josiah from school). The kids were so excited to see each other (as always). Jacob's first question to Samuel was "Do you want me to play rough with you Sam? Because if you say "yes", then I can. But if you say "no", I can't play rough and have to wait for my dad." Hilarious! (Can you tell i have two boys? We've been working on the fact that not EVERYONE wants to play rough!) Anyways, they had a GREAT time! We had lunch together, and then the kids went and played castle in the backyard. Sometimes the boys can be a bit "exclusive" and gang up a bit on Meredith, but this was the perfect idea for them (i was impressed they came up with it). Jacob was the king, Sam & Josiah were knights, and Meredith was the princess! Sandi and I had a great time catching up, and Morgan was just happy as can be. She's just started on rice cereal, and although not super excited about it yet, was doing very well licking the high chair! It was a great afternoon spent with sweet friends.

"What? This chair isn't what you want me to eat?"

Girls Night Home

The boys are out and the girls are home! The boys were headed to school to see Charlotte's Web. The elementary campus was doing a movie night tonight, and the boys were SO excited! Initially they thought it was going to be in Josiah's class and they were worried there wouldn't be enough room. I told him not to worry - that it was going to be in the Life Center and have plenty of room. So they were off at 6:00 pm!

Callie, on the other hand, is in bed asleep! She fell asleep on the way to pick up Josiah today, and then woke up when we got home because our friends had come over to play. I tried laying her down later, but she was already off and too excited to play. So she was ready for bed!

It's a quiet night here for the girls! Aaahh.. I have some cooking to do for a client, may watch one of my "girlie" shows while I have the opportunity, enjoy the quiet. Love it!

After the Race? How about the ER!

So after we got home from my race, off to the Emergency Room!! Not me, mind you. But David! He had been struggling since Tuesday of last week with dizziness, weakness, and by Thursday, some pretty severe pains in his chest related to his breathing. He went to his PCP's office on Thursday afternoon and saw the Urgent Care doctor. They did a chest x-ray and an EKG, both of which came back normal. He ended up prescribed him some anti-anxiety medicine. For anybody that knows David, anxiety is NOT his issue. He's quite the opposite. (I told him to keep the prescription though - I may need it one day! :) ) Anyways, the pain continued throughout the weekend and intensified Saturday night. He made it through church on Sunday and to my race that afternoon, but afterwards it was off to the ER. They ran all the tests there and diagnosed it at pleurisy, which is an infection in the muscle lining around the lungs. In healthy, young people like David, it often begins as just a regular viral infection. He continued to take motrin to help with the inflammation, and is FINALLY feeling some relief from the pain in his chest. So it was QUITE the drama!!