Fasting.....

The idea of fasting to most people comes with the thought of a lack of food. Although I believe their is a time and place for food fasting I am not talking about fasting from food. I have been feeling this for awhile and I have decided that I am going to be fasting.......from facebook! Thats right ladies and gents. Although I love being able to see my family and friends post the fact of the matter is. I am way to involved in FB and I really need to use my time wisely.
Why am I leaving FB for awhile (or maybe for good I am not sure yet)
1. I am really sick of seeing people re-post, or liked pictures of things I find offensive, or against my beliefs. I personally love the people on my pages but I really dont want to see every things you find funny or angry with. I know I am guilty of re-posting myself and freedom of speech is fine with me. But I feel like that fact that I actually get upset from time to time about personal post when I really dont have time for other peoples drama just shows me its not worth my time.
2. I spend more time on fb then I am even aware of. With the phone app I sure do get my fb addiction filled every few mins.
Lets say I am spending 5 mins every hour on fb just checking up dates, messages or adding my own statues that 5x25=125 mins a day on fb and lets face it, I spend way more then that I am sure. When I am reading articles, messages, replying to comments.....etc.
3. I need to spend more quality time with my kids and have them see that they are more important to me then social networking.
4. This is a big one-I have been lacking in my time with God and I have gotten to the point where I don't even pick up my Bible most days. I currently got convicted of this and feel ashamed that I cant even put down worldy things for some Bible time, That just isn't ok with me.
5. And just to top off this list of destruction with peoples negativity that just seems to bring me down. I dont want to see how you are mad at the world on a daily basis, or that you just farted or even that you are drinking a coke. Good for you but really? I am sure I am guilty of random huh? post but I try to keep a few bodily functions to privacy, come on people.

Hers the Pros and Cons:
Con-
1. I am actually going to have to entertain my self with out using FB -EKKK the thought, lol ok sarcasm included
2. I run a crochet business on a fb page-I cant redirect it that I know of so I have the app for the page itself and will be checking in on it from time to time just to make sure my clients dont leave from lack of communication. But PLEASE do not use my crochet page as my fb page. Its for Orders, returns, and other business related things ONLY!
3. I will miss seeing pictures of my friends and families kids and what not every single day (if you know me in person please email me anything super cute) thanks

Pros-
1. I am going to have a lot more free time on my hands that I didnt even know I had ;)
2. I am going to read more
3. I am planning on spending more quality time with my kids. I think will invest in some board games
4. my house and yard work shouldnt be so hard to squeeze in.
5. I will find out who my true friends are when they actually take the time to email (STONE AGE I KNOW) me and text or call.

I love you guys on FB but the stuff on their not so much. Hoping you can all fast from fb from time to time as well so life can be a little less drama free.

Late nights and long hours

I am currently spending much of my time, NOT SLEEPING! Darn that's not exactly what I had in mind for my life ;).

I am swamped, and this keeping up blog stuff has proven to be more of a challenge then I expected it to be. 

So here's a little of what's going on in my life right now.

#1- Amariah my nine month old is already taking steps, two at a time before falling down and I am just so not sure how I feel about it. I mean come on she's my baby, the last egg to leave the nest. I want to cherish her for as long as I can. But true to form she has her own ideas and plans and isn't going to sit around to please her mother.

#2- I am selling crochet hats like made cakes! I am not complaining but my fingers might literally fall off! In between filling orders I am trying to keep some inventory because I have a craft/gift fair coming up in October and from what I have heard from locals that's just the beginning because everyone shops Christmas gifts from all these little fairs. So I Might just make a nice little profit if I can get myself some good hats made and ready

#3- long story short I got hooked in to selling Mary Kay. Will it take off? I don't know but hey I am getting my make up at a discount and right now that's what matters to me. Along with my hats I will be displaying that stuff at the fairs...so will see if a pink car is in my future :)

#4- I am homeschooling my children, not a big surprise their but now I am trying to start up a keepers of the home, faith group and of course that is going to be time consuming. 

#5- I am currently trying to get involved in my own church so that I can start helping out. That's where God wants me so I am trying to get it done. 

#6- I am Woking on really being organised at my house. Is been working out pretty well and I will post a blog on how I am doing things and how I have been ale with five kids to keep it up. Wow that even amazes myself.

#7- we finally got EGGS for those of you who don't know we have chickens and we are so excited to see our first three eggs. Ready to cook them up 

I am sure theirs more stuff in there but that's all I can currently think of. Mike  and his Dad will be having a birthday this month and I am so happy for my dad who will be turning 70!!!! As well. You are amazing and I love you dad!

Other then that life is all moving forward and close to my favourite season, which is fall! So I am planning (oh yeah here's number 8, a harvest party, anti-scary Halloween) party for us and inviting friends to celebrate. I m sure it will be exhausting but worth it because we will get a chance to make memories and have a great time with traditional harvest foods, and games and just get to enjoy life.

So that's a quick update, I am sticking a reminder on my calendar to post a blog soon about how I am organising my house. Stay tune. Also recipes to follow because fall is all about me baking and cooking up new things tell I get burnt out by Christmas lol

Happy Living and God Bless

London and the big 3 0

Sense the move to England I have had my sights on one goal. To see London! I even told my husband that if it didn't happen with in the first few months that as soon as my birthday rolled around I wanted nothing but to go to London and see all of the tourist sights. Well just as I predicted we did not make it to London tell Aug 22nd, which not only was my birthday but the big 3 0 for me. Yes, yes I said adios to my 20's and I think I sure did it in style. To start the day my kids wanted me to open up all my goodies of course. I was soooo lucky! First I got a poem read to me that Shyanne wrote. It totally melted my heart talking about how much she loved me and her heart would not beat with out me in her life, (tears of joy)....then I got a broken jewlery box from Anika, lol I have to laugh but it was kind of thoughtful. Allyson drew me a picture and mike got me a bunch of mushy cards, he loves to see me get chocked up. Brat ;)
I got a box of fun stuff like yarn, yay, and stationary from Sherrie my birth mom and a wonderful suprises from back home. My really good friends Esther and Amber loaded a box up full of my favorite things including little goodies for the kiddos, so sweet they are.
My in laws sent me the plates that I wanted and my brother in law sent me the matching canisters that I wanted! I am so spoiled!
(Side note: We had a taco night at my friends house and all my Brandon friends (church group) sang to me and had cake, signed a card, and even got me Starbucks gift card! I am totally feeling loved.)

Anyways back to the Trip to London.......
We had to drive to a town called Epping, this is where you park your car then get on the tube (Subway). This takes us about a hour and fifteen minutes. The parking was crazy and we ended up doing a little walking but not to bad.
Hoped on the tube for about another 25 mins, due to stops and such and then we made it to Piccadilly where we got off and started our awes and oooohhhs.
It was a pretty wet start to the day as it was true England weather, raining and getting us all soaked. We were not going to let rain mess up our day though so we pushed on.
We decided the best way to see London for the first time was to take a Big Bus tour, where they have someone who tells you all the things that your passing and stops every so often and you get off and on as you like. Our first stop was the London Eye. Its the largest by far Ferris wheel I sure have ever seen. It was pretty pricey for a ride though so we decided that should wait for another trip. We were all hungry about this time so we headed to a Chinese/Indian type restaurant that looked promising. It was so yummy.
After our wonderful Lunch we hoped on the river tour and floated down to the London tower bridge. Everything was just breath taking. Big Ben, the London Tower, Bucking Ham palace was even amazing, we saw some shops, got starbucks (um of course!) and then hoped back on the Big Bus to head over to the Queens house. She was on holiday but that did not matter the place was still amazing. I felt a little sad for her that she most likely can not even enjoy her own garden because the place is just swamped with people. I would hate to look out my window and have so many people taking pictures of my house. Although I guess thats why she runs away on Holiday?
We figured after that we should probably have dinner and headed over to the Hard Rock cafe, it was in walking distance but still a long walk through the garden!
After Dinner we realized we didn't have much time before the buses would stop running. It was good because are feet hurt but sad because we feel like we did not come close to seeing as much as we wanted to. I did not even get a I love London T-shirt so I told mike we would HAVE to go back again soon!
After we hoped on the Tube and got to our Van it was already 8:30 at night and we still had the drive home.
But all in all it was a wonderful Birthday full of memories and I will surely never forget it.

Cromer is B.E.A.utiful

We decided on the spire of the moment to go to the beach. It was a hot week here in England. We're talking low 90% and no one has a/c. Yuck! So to beat the heat we decided to go somewhere with  water. I had never been to the beach here before so I was asking friends on fb and ended up going with another home schooling mama and her two boys to Cromer. It was about an hour and 15mins away. Sadly mike couldn't come because he had been working night shift, yay that changes this next week. 

So we left him home to get some rest and headed out.

After what seemed like forever in the car due to traffic, I think everyone else had the same idea we did.

We got to the most beautiful clear watery beach of Cromer.

It was quite a hike down to the beach and was packed full of people.

We didn't care though because it was well worth it.

We spent the day relaxing. Sadly I didn't get to go in the water. My 8yr old child decider that she wasn't going to double check the stack of towels and things I had placed on the couch for her to grab and so my suit got left behind. Boo. But I did get a chance to really have a nice adult conversation with a new friend. We had a picnic lunch and after a very full day of Amariah eating the sand we decided to cal it a day. This ended up being a good thing because

we all got sunburnt, except for Levi that decided to leave his long sleeve shirt on all day. Go him.

The drive home was much quicker and we were all so exhausted we at a very light dinner and drank our weight in water before heading off to bed. I am still peeling from the adventure. Can't wait to go back so that mike can see this beautiful beach.

London color run

So I will make it short because its late, but wanted to share with you guys about the London color run that I got the chance to be in. 5k the longest run I've ever been in on probably one of the hottest days in England. I took my 10yr old daughter and 7mo old daughter along with me. two of my friends also came with and one had her baby as well. We did not get in as much sight seeing as we wanted to but got the chance to go to London for the first time.

The run its self was well a run.....what can you really say. I ran I got tired, I walked haha.

We got covered in color and looked very messy.

We drove to Epping and then hopped on the tube from there to London. We had to switch from one tube to another. This task ended up being a big deal. With a double stroller no handicap access and like four different flights of stairs, ekkk! But we managed to get it done.

On the way back we ended up getting separated from one of the other moms, she didn't make it in the tube before the doors closed. And we had her baby! Luckily we got connected pretty acidly but she was so shaken up. Even knowing we would take care of her baby. But did I meant chin we also had her purse and cell phone? Yup I probably would have almost cried too.

Here's some photos, enjoy.

Busy But Happy

I would like to say sorry to those of you reading my blog on my lack of post. I have been so buys, but in a good way. I am still and currently in rolled in Grace Bible college and working hard on my Old Testament survey. I am trying to prep and get everything ready for my kids to start school on Monday (homeschool so it's all up to me), and of course normal day to day life in England.

We have been so blessed. We found a church almost right away that we just love, including the people in it. We have also been able to find some really great new friends. I have quite a nice group that I feel very supported and well liked in so this is very pleasing to me. 

I have also been trying to sell my hats and headbands, working on new inventions maybe dog sweaters and what not.

I have been baking like crazy too and selling a few of my bread loafs as well, so yay for extra cash.

I am currently tying away on my new iPad 2 so I haven't learned much of the adding photos part. I will have to figure that out so I can post pictures of my beach trip the kids and I took. It was the best day for the beach, we were so lucky....and hot!

Well I will try to work on more blogs very soon......keep on smiling! 

Yarn on the brain....

I started a new fb page where mamas crazy crafts is my front for trying to see how I do at selling my hats, headbands and whatever else I can come up with. Unfortunately my beanie bum name was already taken.  But I guess thats ok. I feel like I am starting to get carpelle tunnel ....is thaf the right name? My wriste are actually feeling strange from it which is a first. I did a pretty good job back home aroubd Christmas and made about $200 from just the word of mouth and people seeing me sitting around crocheting. so I have been thinkibg of all kinds of hats I can make and have been pretty much producing a hat a day. Three headbands yesterday. If I can get enough envitory I am hoping to get a booth at one of the Brandon events.  Heres a few of what I've been working on. 

Impervise

Today was another situation thay came across my path where I needed to Impervise.  Here are a few I have done before. Open a can with a rock and keys, take a can and use as hammer for a nail to hang up a clock, cover my shoes with plastic bags to wade in the water and today...... used a coffee pot to make rice.
Moving into a house is not an easy adjustment when your lack of items are limited.  I had to make rice for dinner but didn't have a pan and lid to achieve this. Hmmm qhat to do. If you ask my husband he will probably tell you I dontet silly things like this to get in my way. Looking around my kitchen I remembered I had a new coffee pot. All I really needed was hot water. So I heated up the amount of water I needed and when it got hot I dumped in the right amount of rice.
A little stirring and poof perfect rice.
I am always a little proud of myself when my experiments turn out well.

Are my eyes open?

Yup, I think I see the screen through blurry vision. Coffee in hand and my brain is slowly coming to life. On a side note my two older kids have been fighting on who can make me coffee in the morning. I am not complaining! Works for me and its like a little blessing each morning when I sit down and get handed a cup of coffee. Some times to strong, some times to much creamer. But all in all a blessing.
We have been pretty busy around here so much that I actually havent even thought about blogging. Which in turn means that when I do sit down to blog I cant even remember all that went by. What a blur!
So I am going to try to remember what I have done and share it with you.

First off England is just gorgeous! I can not be more happy with the beauty of the place! Feels of bright yellow and greens to the point that I feel like someone had to have just colored them with oil paints! Amazing! I've hear two things one is that they can make mustard with these plants and the second was canola oil. I don't really care what they are for they are just pretty to looks at. Besides the fields look at those clouds! They are beautiful as well, like a painting!

We officially own a British car! Its really cute I think but its funny as well because it looks like a mini van that got washed and shrunk in the dryer. When we park next to a regular size van ours looks like its shadow. I will have to take a picture for you so you can really see the size difference. We actually all fit, but thats it! Nothing else can go in the "people getter", as I have heard it called. Which is funny because our last car Mike called a grocery getter.. lol 

We should probably give it a name? Our Black Kia vans name is Chanel.

So far we have loved everything about this little Van except the lack of cargo but our kia should be here soon.

We have tried to make as many meal in as we can, to avoid the coast of eating out. I mean we do have seven people even on the dollar menu thats about $14 bucks to feel the family so think about an average meal. But we did try one that was right outside of Mildenhall called Mickeys.

It was actually pretty good. They were low on there shipment and keep asking for forgiveness to us over and over again because they were out of like half of what they had on the menu but I thought out of all the food we have had here, theirs was the best. I had a grilled ham and cheese with some of the best onion rings I've ever had! YUM! Bummer they aren't into the ranch dip here like Americans are because that probably was all my meal actually needed! I might have to get a mini bottle and carry it around with us ;)

Its Official! I am totally obsessed with the phone booths around here so much that I went out and got us coasters that I found in one of the shops on Lakenheath. I even got a key chain phone booth for my keys. Next search is on for a cell phone cover! 

Yesterday was BEAUTIFUL! The Weather was nice for maybe two days after we got here and then nothing but wind and rain the next 10 days! That might not be the exact number of rainy days but it was a lot. So when I woke up to the Sun shinning, which was the normal start of the day, my thoughts were that by the time my coffee was done and the kids were ready to be entertained the rain and clouds would be back. By 9am it was still shinning and we decided to hit the park. The weather was perfect. Warm enough to be outside and get some vitamin D and yet cool enough that a little sweater would do just fine. At one point my legs even got hot from being in the sun. I never thought I would be so excited about the sun ha ha.

 Shyanne enjoying the outside air without having to wear her snow jacket! lol sad but true.

Allyson running around like a crazy person. I am still nervous to have her playing at this park (If you remember the teeth story)

House hunting has been one of our top priorities here! I mean we have to be her four years so we might as well have a house ;)

After getting the news that we were not going to be getting the house that my heart desired I had to move on. The sad thing was that the list we had was not that great. I mean one house that Mike was on board with getting pretty much put me into tears! If you know me thats a big deal. I am blaming it on lack of sleep and to much stress.  Anyways the house was ok and had a great yard "garden" in front and in back. But the rooms were all very small and I found very strange things like a toilet in a closet. All our furniture would have not fit in it at all either. I felt really depressed because the houses with the bedrooms we needed were very few and far in between. So when we came upon the one I just told you about I felt like we had to jump on it other wise we wouldnt have a house. But lucky for me we had a showing of two more that were not in the area I desired but at least had potential. So we held off of putting the deposit down on the above house and went to look.

The first one had a great yard space and was on a quiet little private road with four other houses and I could see our kids playing in the drive way area with no fear of getting ran over by crazy drivers. Unfortunately the Realtor and Mike had a mis-communication and we actually never got to see the inside. We figure it was a blessing thought because it looked like it needed a lot of things fixed before we would be able to move into it. We headed off to the other one. The moment I saw it I fell in LOVE with it! I think it is adorable! 

Here it is our soon to be home! My next worry was just what is inside because I was worried that it might have some strange things that wouldnt work for us. A sigh of relief when I realized that the only strange thing as a sink in of of the bedrooms, who knows why? Which will probably be perfect for us anyways because we will be using this room as our office/craft/home school room and the sink will be perfect for cleaning up craft stuff that might be messy. 

Its a 5 bedroom 2.5 bathroom living room, dinning room, utility room, 2 car garage. YIPPEE

So I am not going to lie I still would have loved to have the first house we looked at. But this house is still wonderful. Its a little out dated but for the most part its going to be perfect!

 This is the living room (ha ha Amariahs hat is peaking into the photo) The door there goes into the dinning room. Its bigger then the picture makes it seem and I am probably not all the way backed against the wall either.

 This is the dinning room, double doors there lead to the living room and there's a door right behind me that leads to the kitchen. There is also a hallway that goes around the dinning room which leads to the half bath and Anika and Allysons room and Entry way so you do not have to go through the dinning room to get to the living room if you do not want to.

This is the back yard, Its a picture from the kitchen window so its bigger. They said a gardener was going to come cut the grass. Thats good because we dont have a mower yet. Its got a nice little area like a half moon that has brick down for chairs or a table maybe? Also a side garden where Mike and the kids are already planning for Chickens! YES CHICKENS oh my that will be an adventure all in its self.

I will post more pictures when we actually move in. We are waiting on the base to make sure the house is safe to live in. Once they finish with that inspection will get the keys as long as they dont find any problems. Our belongings from the states haven't even make it here yet :( so we will also have temp furniture from the base for awhile. I dont know how long, hopefully not much. 

We are more then ready to be in our new place and get the garden started, the chickens (I guess) lol and have Levi and Amariah feel settled. They dont understand all the moving like the older kids do.

We are also excited to just start our lives and not feel like visitors.

We are lucky enough to have meet some really nice people and everyone we meet out in town seem so friendly and love that were Americans. My kids have been getting after me because they say a few words I say sound like I have a British Accent, I told them this might happen lol I am tend to pick up on accents right away and I dont even mean to. So will see what our friends and family think when they come to visit. 

I am also happy to report that I am now allowed to drive in the UK thanks to the fact that I passed my drivers test. Well back to my coffee, enjoy my kids. And live a wonderful life here in the UK.

Cheers!

House Hunting Day 2

Yesterday we managed to see a house that we just fell in love with! The house had everything on our list. To tell you the truth if I knew that we were going to live here longer then four years I would have bought it! We didnt want to just jump on it with out seeing any other houses though so we scheduled two other house viewing for today.

When we went house hunting today we felt like the house we saw yesterday just got better and better! Everything we saw today just seemed scary....like steep steps that we could see our small children tripping and falling down. EKK. Then the second house was a church conversion and although it had large space it was so far away from where we really wanted to be. The roads were single lane and we did not feel good about the drive to and from the base as it is, let alone days in the winter with rain and snow in the dark.

So we called to confirm with the realitor that we FOR SURE wanted the house that we saw yesterday. We found out that the landlord has several people interested in the house and basically is allowing people to come see the house all week and then make a decision Monday who gets the house. I wanted to scream, cry, throw a fit, and all else related to a toddler not getting their way. I mean we still have a chance to get the house but I feel so discouraged. I hate when I am competing against other people and yet I cant even do anything about it to make it happen. I have to rely fully on God to do this for us. Which is hard, because trusting that we get what we want over what we need is hard. I do believe God will provide a good place for us but this house is really what we want! So if your a prayer, pray for us to get this place, PLEASE!!!!!!

I did get a chance to enjoy some pretty scenery along the way though.  Apparently I love phone booths so enjoy some of the ones I managed to take from the car as we drove by ;)