Vacation is so WONDERFUL!

Sorry that it has been so long since the last post, but we have been rather busy. We went on a family vacation with Grandpa and Grandma Meier from Saturday, April 28, through Saturday, May 5. We rented a house just outside of Orlando, and it was absolutely wonderful. We had a five bedroom house with an enclosed swimming pool and spa, with a private dock to the lake in the back. With the exception of Friday, every day was mid-90's with not a cloud in the sky! A far cry from Minnesota.

The flight was Jefferson's first, and he did tremendous! The only time he fussed was the last 20 minutes, and on a 3 hour flight, that is fair. JT is the seasoned traveller, and he enjoyed it, as usual.

Once we got to the house, the rest of Saturday was pretty uneventful.

Early Sunday morning grandpa and JT went out for JT's first attempt at fishing. We were lounging around when all of a sudden grandpa and JT started to get extremely animated. Brian went out there to see that grandpa had caught a baby alligator (the one in the picture). Brian got out there and was looking at it while grandpa started to tease the baby with the fish he caught. Brian looked up and saw the 8 foot mama (also in pictures) swimming in hard and fast. At that point all lines came out of the water and the cameras came out! The alligators never tried to come up the bank, but when you are on a dock five feet above the water looking straight down at the alligators, it is rather impressive.

On Monday we met up with the Schaffers, friends of ours from Northland who were also in our wedding, up in St. Augustine. It was a beautiful day. We toured an old fort, the historic part of town, and then had a great seafood supper.

On Tuesday evening we took the boys to their first baseball game ever. It figures that we have to go to Florida to take the boys to a Twins' game (it was great timing though). Brian tried to get JT down to get an autograph, but we just missed it. It would have been neat too, because the last player there was Torii Hunter. Now, for all you that have attended baseball games in the past, here is your chance to get jealous. In the first baseball game he ever attended, JT got an actual foul ball game ball! Actually, a guy a couple rows in front of us caught it, but he gave it to Jackson. All in all a fun time.

On Wednesday we went back to the beach. The boys absolutely loved the Gulf of Mexico! We had no sooner got there and Jefferson tried to eat as much of the beach as he could. JT loved digging in the sand and looking for shells.

Thursday was a different day as grandpa and grandma went out for the whole day with friends of theirs, so we had a day to just the four of us. It really was a great, relaxing time.

On Friday we all just relaxed and enjoyed the pool again. It really is nice to be able to swim every day and not worry about having a bunch of people jumping all around you. The boys were relaxed, so they really had fun in the pool.

As with anything else, all good things must come to an end. On Saturday we flew back home, but we did not want to. When we took off, it was 95 degrees in Orlando. When we landed in Minneapolis it was 57 degrees! Enough said there.

Enjoy the pictures of the trip.

It has been a while...

I apologize that I haven't posted for a while, but those of you out there with young children can relate. Of course, who isn't busy anymore, right? Life has been pretty hectic here since the end of basketball season. My husband thought that once his season was over that life would be a little more regulated, but boy was he wrong! We have been running pretty crazy right now. In March, Brian was very busy with his job and the SEC filing that he does for his company. The first full weekend of April was Easter, the second weekend of April Woodcrest (my church) hosted a Deaf Retreat, in which I was in charge of the kids program and also helped in the music. Then the next weekend we went to Brian's parents for the weekend.

The boys are growing like weeds and are more and more fun each day. Of course, two "very busy" boys can create all kinds of not fun situations too, but I just love the two little guys to pieces.

Anyway, I really did not have much to say at this point. I just wanted to get a new post out to let people know we are still alive, and that things are going well for us.

Just the boys

Sorry it has been a while since I have put up any pictures of the boys, so here are some pictures to enjoy.

This IS Minnesota!

It only took about 5 years, but we finally got a snowstorm kind of worth talking about. We had about a total of 12 inches (I know, for Minnesota that seems small), but it makes us glad we don't live in those areas of New York. We have gotten about 22 inches on the year, with another 6-12 inches supposed on the way the rest of this week, and that is about how much some of those areas out east got in a 24 hour span! At least the boys get to play with their new sled more now.

A seven year career comes to an end

Well, the basketball season is finally officially over. The MACS tournament was this past weekend, and the boys placed third. They were seeded first, but the team experienced a couple of issues and problems on Friday night and came up just a little short in their first game, but responded wonderfully on Saturday afternoon. The girls were also seeded first, and took second place, so all in all, it was a great year for Woodcrest basketball. The girls ended up their season 17 - 3 and the boys ended up 16 - 4. We were very proud of both teams this year.

What is even harder to believe is that after seven seasons, Brian is not planning ahead for next year. It was a hard decision for him to come to, but he has decided that now is the right time for him to hang up his whistle and focus on some other things that he feels he needs and wants to accomplish before the boys get into high school. Actually, he was really debating whether or not he was even going to coach this year, but after we talked it out, he knew that he needed to see this last group through. He said that even though he went out on a winning note, that when that final horn went off on Saturday, a whole flood of emotions came over him. He really enjoyed coaching, and I am sure that down the road he will manage to get back into it, but I am glad that he was able to have that opportunity, and that he said he feels like he can step down with absolutely no regrets.

As for our family, I will post another day all the fun and different things that have happened, along with some new pictures of the boys.

Another day in the life

Well, today I get to post (this is Brian) and update everyone on what has been happening in our lives lately.

This week I have had to do something that I have only had to do one other time in over 8 years of marriage - be a bachellor for a week. The last time was the summer of 2001 when it was just Jody and I. The story is that my mom had reconstructive surgery on her wrist last week Wednesday (January 31). My dad was home with her for a few days, but had to go back to work on Friday night, so after we beat Rosemount for homecoming, we all drove up to my parents house, and then I left on Saturday afternoon to come back home for some appointments, leaving Jody and the boys to take care of my mother.

Well, they were supposed to be coming home today, but my wife had left me a voice mail at work at 4:00AM and then called me on my cell phone on the way in to work to inform me that they were all pretty sick, none of them had slept the night before, and they are all miserable. We narrowed it down to food poisioning at a restaurant they ate at last night. She is tired, the boys are both so sick and miserable that all they can do is lay down and moan and wimper. So, needless to say, I will be home alone until this weekend, and they all need to get better.

Please pray for Jody and the boys to get better and for my mom to heal. Saturday morning she had to wake me up around 6AM to take her to the emergency room. She was afraid she might have had pneumonia, as her lungs were "bubbling" when she breathed. Fortunately it was just an infection in her lungs, not contagious, and easily curable with meds.

Other than that, I have been busy with work and basketball, so I am fortunate there. Otherwise I would probably be going nuts.

We are still amazed...

We are still amazed every day at how God just leads and guides us, opens and closes doors, protects us (I am firmly convinced that our two boys have more guardian angels per boy than most families have and need combined!) and proves His love to us each and every day.

The first is how He takes care of our family. In watching Brian's career and the path (sometimes many paths) he has had to take and endure, it is amazing to be able to see God's leading through it all - even if it is after the fact. A couple of weeks ago Pastor Poorman (Pastor Mark to many of you) preached on how God takes care of us even when we get upset about it. He talked about how he and his wife and the music pastor and his wife went to the music conference at the first of the month, and because they couldn't get into the restaurant they wanted to they had to go somewhere else, but lost time. He mentioned how he was frustrated because they had lost time, and then as they got back on the road there were delays, but when he started doing the calculations, he realized that he could have potentially been in either of the accidents. Well, Brian has worked some long and crazy hours, moved from that job to his current position where he had to work those hours again, but then to find out that most of the staff from his last job has left. In his current position he is in a department that needs four people, but has really only had three since he started. In the past two weeks the director of his department retired and his manager is going to a new company, so now the department went from being one person short to just one person. Well, we weren't too excited about this, because it will probably mean even longer hours during his filing time (he averages about 80 hours a week during those weeks) but he talked to the individual that they all report to, and there potential for a promotion now. We will just have to pray and see.

The reason this is so interesting to us is because Brian also gets calls from recruiters on a daily basis, and sometimes he will just politely dismiss the individual and sometimes he will listen. Well, last November he got a call from a company that really wanted him, and it looked like a great opportunity. There was one catch to it - the company was not in Minnesota. It would have required a move on our part. At first we were discouraged because we knew the town that the company is in, and we knew that the local church and school there is not very good. Thank God for the internet! We started looking around the area thinking that, well, Brian already seems to end up driving long distances whereever he works, so maybe we can find something and split the difference. Here is where we got excited. You see, the company is in Elkhart, Indiana. We know the churches in South Bend, and they are good churches, but we both have reservations about them. So we managed to find this First Baptist Church in Mishawaka, Indiana, which was a little closer to Elkhart. We went to the website and it looked ok, but what was really interesting is when we clicked on the staff page - who should be staring us in the face but Paul Ice! And the picture next to him was Pete Jones. That was very interesting for both of us. Well, through all of it, God closed that door to open the potential door where we are now, but it is interesting to see how God works and moves. Yes Paul, that is why Brian sent you that semi-weird email a few months back. We almost became neighbors to you.

We are also very amazed at how God protects us. I am starting to believe that both of my boys' roles here on earth right now is to be doorstops. I cannot begin to tell you how many times Brian and I have accidentally had the door stop short on us, only to hear the "build up" before the scream - and any of you parents know exactly what I mean there. When you hear the thump, and then nothing for about 30 seconds or so, but you can tell that the air pressure is dropping int he room? Follow that by the really loud sound! Jefferson has also taken more dives and headers off our furniture right now than we care to count, but he is at that stage where he does not want to be helped. Still really doesn't want to walk by himself, but heaven forbid if you try to help him down when he has his mind set on it.

Anyway, sorry for the rant, but this is just something I wanted to share.