Inspired by Julia

Ever since since seeing Julie & Julia, I have been wanting to make Julia Child's Boeuf Bourguignon. I watched it last week and then decided that I needed Mastering the Art of French Cooking!

I had the day off so off to the grocery store I went. 

It did take a lot of time and effort but I didn't think it was too hard to make. We both thought it was delicious and it gave us a good excuse to eat outside. The only bad thing was it left a lot of dirty dishes! If you are feeling adventurous you can find the recipe here.

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Living Through Miscarriages

I do not typically blog about anything too personal or I just like to add the positive things of life.

6 months ago, I took a pregnancy test on a whim a week before my period was due. It was a Sunday afternoon and I was thrilled to see two pink lines. Joe was a little skeptical so we went and bought a digital pregnancy test which declared "Pregnant". After a happy call to my parents, and visit home that next weekend to tell the rest of the family, we were pretty excited. The following week I woke up and knew I having a miscarriage. It was a pretty awful two days but slowly we started to recover. 

Last week, I took another pregnancy test and two pink lines again. We were both excited but we both in the back of our heads thought maybe we shouldn't be too excited.

I woke up Tuesday, and now I knew it was another miscarriage. Both were the exact same day.

I always thought I would get married and getting pregnant would be no problem but that is not God's plan for us.These are moments that I know God is near and still a loving God to us.

The truth of the gospel has been pressed on my heart. i know that God has met my every need. He brought my a Savior who in my place took the full wrath of God in order that I can be reconciled with God. When I think of this thought I know that everything else in life is bonus. God is still good.

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"I've never heard anyone say the really deep lessons of life have come in times of ease and comfort. But, I have heard many saints say every significant advance I've ever made in grasping in the depth of God's love and growing deep with Him, have come through suffering."

John Piper

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Couponing

A few weeks ago, I went to Seminary Wives Institute's Seminar Saturday. That day you could choose from 5 one hour seminars on everything to parenting, learning contentment, marriage, women's ministry, and lots of different things. The last seminar of the day I attended was on called Couponing 101. I went because I was intrigued but not sure if I would ever do it.

The two women who did taught the seminar were hardcore couponers! But I could tell that they saved a lot of money couponing.

So I decided to get a free trial subscription to the local paper. That Sunday I was pretty excited to clip the coupons. I found a lot of good coupons that normally I would just leave the sheet out but never use them.

But I even started remembering that I had them and using them. It was pretty exciting last week to use over $10 in coupons on my $40 total at Target.

I even got this super cute coupon organizer on etsy!

After my newspaper trial ended, I just go to Walgreens and buy the paper. But I have fallen in the trap and got some things I didn't necessarily need (like cat treats!) but so far it has been kind of fun.

There are some fun websites out there that will tell you when things are on sale at stores that you can double your savings with coupons.

Do you coupon?

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Daisy

This is our new dog Daisy.

My friend Andrea from work moved to a new house and was unable to take Daisy with her. So we decided what is one more! She is an 8 year old lab. She is really sweet, loves to carry shoes around, and acts like she is one of the gang.

We are now out-numbered 2-1 by animals!

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To Do List

My To Do List for Today

• Finish Laundry
• Return Daisy after our trial weekend (more on that later)
• A Trip to Target (yay!)
• Prepare for my Teenage Girl's Bible Study tonight
• Catching up on 24

What are your plans for today?

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I'm Back!

It has been well over three months since I have posted. With computer problems, forgetfulness, and busyness, blogging hasn't happened!

What has happened in the three months since? We celebrated Christmas, my laptop stopped working, we kept busy with church, jobs, puppies, and life!

So I promise that I will update more faithfully here in the future! Maybe even tomorrow!

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Couch to 5K

Joe's parents were gracious enough to give us their old treadmill. Rewind a couple of months when I found the Couch to 5K running plan. I thought this couldn't not be so bad.

But I what I didn't remember was that I am not a runner. I don't breathe right, I feel like I am dying. Dreaded those days in gym class.

This first week you start with a brisk 5 minute walk and alternate 1 minute of jogging with 90 seconds of walking. Doesn't sound too bad.

Those 60 seconds of running are the longest minutes in history. Between not breathing, dogs barking, almost falling off, it can be pretty dramatic. But I have finished 2 days so far. You are supposed to advance but I think I should probably not want to die during the 20 minutes before I try to run farther.

We'll see how this goes....

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It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

Christmas is here!!

And I have ONE gift purchased so far...I am so good! Well, I did buy myself a steam mop and told Joe that it was my Christmas present and he did a good job so that counts right?

I will soon post pictures of our humble Christmas tree. Joe and I went out early on Black Friday to score a deal at Lowe's! Although later we had a conversation in which Joe informed me that he would be okay if we didn't have a tree! Men!

But he did put up Christmas lights outside so maybe he won't get the Grinch award! Are you ready for Christmas?

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Christmas List

I know it's well over a month from Christmas but my mom is pressuring me for a Christmas List.

You know you have grown up when it think a really long time to come up with a list

Without further ado....

• Martha Stewart's Cooking School


• Canon Powershot (I have a really nice SLR but wouldn't mind a good point and shoot)


• These lazy spoons from Rachael Ray


• A Pizza Stone
  
• The Biggest Loser for Wii
  
  
  

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Family Room Makeover

A few months ago my parents came to our house for a "work weekend." I had many tasks that I needed a handy man for. One of this was thing project. This is what the living room looked before.


Here is after. We made a "faux" fireplace. We installed a mantel and hung our TV on the wall. It made for more walking room. And now I get to decorate a mantel!

I still need to get some candles and a fireplace screen to make my "fire place" look more real (hence half of the mantel!)

These are some of my fall decorations. Thank you Hobby Lobby! As soon as these went up I realdy started planning for Christmas and a row of 5 stockings!

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Happy Halloween!

This year again we had our Halloween outreach for the church where we passed out candy with our church info and did popcorn and cotton candy.

And of course I dressed the dogs up!

Cooper was a banana because our friend Aaron was going to be a monkey.

I knew I needed the right costume for Annie and she is definitely no princess. So she was dressed as a prisoner!

They were a hit again and Joe said that one father said his kids talked for an hour about the Banana dog so he had to come check it out for himself! I think the dogs enjoyed all the attention and the dropped popcorn.

Here are some the students hard at work serving.

Did you have a fun Halloween?

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Canoeing

Joe and I went canoeing in Edinburgh with some of my coworkers and their spouses. Joe and I have never been canoeing together and have only a couple of trips separately. There were some strong warnings that he is not to capsize the boat!



There were only a few times where we were going circles, or running into stuff but all in all it was a great adventure! It was nice and relaxing to



Afterwards, I decided that this would be a great pre-marital counseling session. It is definitely Communication 101! You can learn a lot about communication styles with canoeing. For example, when I get scared I start shrieking or repeating "Big branch coming up! Big branch coming up!"

We even started planning our next canoe trip! Did you do anything fun this weekend?







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Nesting

I was nesting a little bit in the house today. Right after we moved in, Joe and I hung a lot of stuff on the walls around our house. And our house definitely felt like a home but I had just not done many things since in ways of decorating.

Today as I was procrastinating on cleaning, I was in the garage and found mirrors, and picture frames that had been in our rental house. So I got on my kick and starting hanging things everyone. I couldn't find a hammer so I used a hand weight I had...I just starting making do when no hubby is around.

I get on these nesting kicks all of a sudden. I think I have everything the way I want them but then the I start rearranging things, loving pictures in magazines. With Fall quickly approaching, I keep thinking about all the decorations we need to make our home cuuute!

I always will question if this is truly what I should be focused on or is it really just futile. But I thinking my main calling in life is to be a wife, besides being a Child of God. This comes before church ministry or work. And one of my main responsibilities is making a home for us, a peaceful one. Although I know in reality Joe probably doesn't care if this picture looks better over here, I know that I am using my skills to provide.

Now I definitely have this no where figured out in my head or in practice. Our house is no where near peaceful and we don't even have kids yet, but I am always striving.

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Our Life in the Ministry

Today marks the one year anniversary of the day the church voted Joe into being the Senior Pastor. It was quite a journey to even get to that point. After the former pastor left right before we got married, many people approached Joe to full the role. Even as we were decorating the church for our wedding someone called Joe about this. I said "Absolutely not!" I was excited about being a Student Minister's wife, investing in youth, and starting a ministry together.

Fast forward a couple of months. Joe at this time had been the interim pastor, filling the pulpit, and I could see that he really enjoyed it. One day as we stood in our kitchen, I told him if you wanted to put your resume in, that I would support you. I think I thought even then, we are so young, there is no way this could happen!

But one year ago today the church voted Joe in and we started this new ride together in ministry. We've had our high peaks and our low valleys. We've had days where we have barely seen each other or barely even seen home.

But there are somethings I have learned in the last year.

• Ministry is way less about me and more about following God
• The congregation is definitely observing you but will pick you up when you fall
• I am a lot more sensitive to criticism than I realized.
• There many more blessings than trials, but you need to look for them with a heart of gratitude.
• That even in the valleys God is near.
  

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Locks of Love

I chopped 12 inches off my hair today.

That's the most I have ever cut off. I have been talking for awhile about cuttin my hair and with our church directories coming up, I knew now was the time. I have been growing my hair since before the wedding. I thought I would be more emotional about it, but I was happy to be off with it!

So without further ado here is me probably about a pound lighter holding my proud pony tail!

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Sewing

Last weekend, I finally took my sewing machine out of the box. Sadly, it had not been used since I received at Christmas.

One of my friends is an avid sewer so I went to her house for lessons. I learned how to thread my machine, sewing in straight lines, and I made an oven mitt!

So now I am practicing with my sewing machine on the kitchen table, making straight lines, and slowly becoming a sewer or is it seamstress?

I even offered Joe to hem one his suit pants but he politely declined!

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Annie

I haven't written on here about Annie in a long time. Annie came into our lives by surprise and definitely was been a handful! She is all puppy, full of energy, and loves everyone that she meets! It's hard for her to understand if someone doesn't want to stop and love her!

Cooper and Annie have become fast friends and she loves to wrestle with Levi.

Just like life with a kitten, I am not sure I was ready for a puppy. She is into everything, very hyper, and full of puppyness. But then all of sudden she will lay down next to you on the couch, give a puppy sigh and you automatically fall in love!

She's a keeper! And today she is leaving for 2 days to have her 'special' surgery! Hopefully absence does make the heart grower fonder.





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If You Thought It was Someone's Birthday...

....you were right! It's mine!

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Between minor floods, church activities, work, family, and weekend adventures....I haven't posted in awhile.

I promise to make up for that very soon!

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