Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Trip to the Mall
I said I would post more about our company that we had last week...well, here's the "more" :)
A friend of ours from back home who I knew from way back in our young adult group days at church and who Nathan has known since going to school in Foley was in Chicago for business. He saw via facebook that we were staying in a hotel close to the airport in Chicago and we decided to hook up! We haven't seen each other in YEARS! So last Thursday evening, Joel came over for some homemade pancakes (which I think he appreciated since he eats out Monday-Friday while he travels!) and some fellowship with lots of laughs. We had to joke that our houses back home are 5 miles from eachother but it takes us both being in Chicago in order to get together. :)
Lots-a-laughs
Due to the weather, Nathan was off work last Friday and we decided to take a trip to the mall. We had no idea what kind of mall it was, it just had The Buckle there and that's where Nathan wanted to find some pants. Once we started to walk around, we realized that it was a tad bigger than the mall close to where we are staying as it remided us a little of the Mall of America, except a bit smaller and minus the amusement park :) But we did look at the directory like 15 times, just to give you an idea. We ran into the Rain Forest Cafe restaurant and our kids were mezmorized by everything they had there. "We wanna eat here!" they all said excitedly. Well, first we needed to finish shopping and then it was time for a potty break. Since we were right next to Sears, we thought to just go in there. We noticed though that there were quite a few people sitting on the benches and standing next to the entrance of Sears with lots of security. We thought there must be a show or appearance or something? But we kept on...needa find those bathrooms! One step into Sears and we saw this sign....
Ahhhh...that makes sense now! Well, pretty sure it might as well be the president making an appearance with as much security and police and rope and walkie-talkies and other badge-wearing people there were!!! It was even 3 hours before they were coming!
The mob of people about an hour and a half before their arrival.
We decided it was time to eat and it was quite the experience for the kids! They loved it!! They were so well behaved too! I think it had something to do with all the things going on around them but the waitress had to comment on how they were are sitting so still and quiet and then they ALL ate everything off their plate and literally licked them clean...she was impressed with that too. "AND good eaters?!?...Where were you when I had kids?!" she said :)
They had a big screen at the mall where you could see yourself and then penguins and polar bears came out of the water on the screen by you. The kids had fun. Can you see us on the screen? :)
The one thing that we are finding out living in a big city is that 5 kids is A LOT!! My friend here said that she thinks she's seen a family with 4 but that's the most. So when we are walking out in public, like the mall, we might as well have aliens sticking out of our heads with the looks that we get :) We've mostly only received nice comments from people, which is always fun to hear. One guy kinda stopped us and asked (of course, as does everyone) "Are these ALL yours?!" "yes" we say with a smile. And after he takes his jaw off the floor, he says "Do you have a couple jobs?" I said "No, just one good one." "Well, that's great!" He says. Then he realized we weren't sure which route he was taking so he went on to make sure we knew that he thought it was great. "Oh, well, beautiful family...really, I love it! Way to go." Another elderly man stuck his hand out and touched Nathan's forearm while saying "You have a beautiful family". Another lady walking with her 3ish yr old girl says to me "Excuse me, are these ALL yours?....These?...All of THESE??...yours???...These are all yours???" YES!! "HOW do you do it???...I can't even handle this one!" Another guy friendly argued with me that I wasn't old enough to have all these kids. Yep, pretty positive that I am :) Those are just a few of the recent comments. I'd love to be with some friend of ours who have 10 or 12 kids! I'm positive people would think it was a private school on a field trip or something. :)
Monday, April 23, 2012
The Bridge
(Blogger changed their website and apparently they won't let the spacing of how I have my paragraphs, etc show up on the blog, so sorry everything is smushed together...blame blogger...)
So the weeks seem to be flying by...which I guess is a good thing seeing how we are still living in a hotel room. Although I do have to admit that its growing on me and since we were already used to living in small spaces, its actually not that bad. I mean, someone else cleans my bathroom; washes my towels, dish rags, and bedding; vacuums; takes out my garbage; and makes my bed every week! What house can I say that about?? ;)
Nathan is working 5-10s now which we are all still trying to get used to! He is home SO much!! Not that I am complaining by any means but it makes for some creativity in finding stuff to do as a family while he's here! and speaking of that...he convinced me...well, actually just told me, I didn't really have a choice...that we were getting a wii. I thought I had one up on him when I told him that even if we wanted one, we couldnt get one bc the tvs in our room are the old school kind and don't have any cable hook ups on them. Well, we happened to have a friend over from back home (more on that later!) and he told us that we can just get a converter and it would work fine! Well, thank you for nothing, Joel!! :)
So after our outing last Friday (Nathan got the day off bc of the rain..and more on our day out later...), we stopped at Walmart and picked up a wii...and a converter! Well, I'm actually glad we got it as it's given us some fun family time playing super mario brothers and Tiernan can kick our butt in most any world :)
Random Pictures....
Since I don't want to go broke doing laundry here...I typically wash and then hang up on my hangers I bought at Goodwill. After the first load, the hangers paid for themselves :)
Typical scene of the planes...even I love to watch them :)
Jaeger smiling and talking with Daddy
The kids before church last week
So about our awesome church!....
Once we got to Chicago, we knew we wanted to get plugged in to a church immediately in order to start making connections and friendships. I put 'churches' in the search bar of my phone and all the little pins dropped on the map. I scanned thru them quick and came upon one called The Bridge Community Church. I clicked on their website and thought that it'd be a church that we'd like so Easter sunday was our first service! Everyone was soooo friendly and welcoming that we decided to sign up for 'pizza with paster scott' after church the following Sunday. We met even more people during pizza and continue to make friends each week.
The kids love it as they get to go to their class during the service. Last week I decided to take the boys to Awana for the first time, even though there were only 4 weeks left for the year (it goes by the school year). Tiernan WILL NOT stop talking about it!! He had so much fun and CONSTANTLY walks around saying his memory verse from last week (John 3:16). He is in "sparks" andthe 2 other boys are in "cubbies". We will go back tonight for awana again!! And the other nice part about it is that it is from 6:30 til 8:15 and we drop them off so Nathan, Ariella, Jaeger and I get to spend some quality time together!
Aside from the actual church service and Awana, we have met some awesome people there who have already invited us over for a bbq last Wednesday (and even let me do a load of laundry there!) I also meet with some of the stay at home moms at church on tuesday morning for a playgroup where we meet in the GYM (yes! they have a gym too!!...actually TWO of them!) where all the kids run around and burn off some energy. I also met the moms again last Wed for a date at a park in town as well. We will soon be joining a small group at church as well, making our connections circle even larger!
We are very happy to have found The Bridge! Thank you Lord for giving us a church family right away!
And I'm starting to like this part of the city a little better as we start learning our way around. Even though I'm a country girl, I do LOVE having every store that I could want (Sams club, Target, Kmart, Goodwill, Chipotle!, etc) all within a max of 2-3 miles from where we live..with some being just a couple blocks down!
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Rewind,Part 3, Oct
The traffic at the resort slowed down and fall was in the air! We took as many walks were possible, making the trek around "the loop". It was a half hour walk, even going fast, so it was much needed for both the kids and me!
The boys got to watch the owners' sons clean some goose! They loved it! And they even offered Nathan the gizzards of one. He didn't know if he would like them but after frying it up, Nathan wished he would have taken all of them!
After seeing an idea on pinterest, I decided it would be a good idea to make 'blessing bags' for those in need! The kids and I went to the store and bought the required products. The kids (esp the older ones) had a great time trying to figure out what would be good to include in the bags...(bouncy balls didn't make the cut :)
After we made the bags, I heard on Dave Ramsey that they wanted to know of your giving story for the Holiday season. I decided this would be a great fit for his article and I sent in a few words about it. I got an email, followed by a phone interview from Dave's team and they wrote up an article about it and featured it on Dave's website!!!
Here is the article:
Dawn and her husband Nathan have four children, ages six, five, four and two—and one on the way. When she saw the idea of making bags of practical items for the homeless on the internet, she knew it would be a great fit for their family.
So, they headed to the store to pick up things like washcloths, toothbrushes, Chapstick, Kleenex, Band-Aids and soap to go in the Blessing Bags that they now keep on hand in the car— simple items that make a big difference, especially in the subzero Minnesota winters.
The Man With No Home
When Dawn told the kids what they were going to do, she made sure to put it in their terms: “We're going to go to the store and get stuff to put in bags for people who don't have homes.”
On one of the shopping trips, Dawn continued with family shopping after picking up stuff for the Blessing Bags. As she added an item to the cart, her five-year-old asked: “Is that for the man?”
She'd already switched gears and asked, “What man?”
“Is that for the man with no home?”
“They totally get it,” Dawn said. She's loved watching their selflessness come out as they help to pick out items , even though she had to explain that a bouncy ball may not be a necessity. She asks them, “What would you want if you were cold and didn't have a place to go to?”
The kids get to add items to the bags in a family assembly line, including pictures they've colored and notes of encouragement. Their oldest child is quick to remind the family to look for someone they could give a Blessing Bag to while they're on the road.
The Freedom of Baby Step 6
The Legatts are freer to experience the joy of giving than ever!
They took Financial Peace University in 2004, but it wasn't until 2007 that they got intense about applying the principles to their lives. But then, they sold nearly everything they owned and lived in a camper for seven (insert: it was really 9 :)months. It paid off in 2008 when they became completely debt-free! Now they are working to pay off their home early.
“Before, we made giving a priority, but it was a little harder,” Dawn said. Sometimes they had to decide whether to use money toward groceries or to give it away. “Now, we don't even really have to think about it because giving money is already saved up. There's no way we ever want to go back to being in debt!”
The family buys items like washcloths, toothbrushes, Chapstick, Kleenex, Band-Aids and soap to go in the Blessing Bags that they now keep on hand in the car.
A Family Affair: Molding Future Givers
The Legatts have a family goal of keeping giving in the forefront. “I want to raise my kids to be givers and servers,” she said.
Dawn knows that they will be more impacted by making and giving out the bags than seeing her write a donation check. She knows they'll remember seeing the look on people's faces of, Is this really for me? Why would you give me this stuff? “It's different than their reaction to getting a dollar,” she said. Plus, it gives the kids a way to use some of their giving money and see the results first-hand.
“In our culture, it's easy to have the mentality of 'throw some money at it and it will be fine,'” Dawn said. “But that doesn't always engage your heart. For us, it's really important to let our kids know that there are people who have less than we do, and there is something we can do about it—to get into their spirits that to give really is better than to receive!”
The boys got to watch the owners' sons clean some goose! They loved it! And they even offered Nathan the gizzards of one. He didn't know if he would like them but after frying it up, Nathan wished he would have taken all of them!
After seeing an idea on pinterest, I decided it would be a good idea to make 'blessing bags' for those in need! The kids and I went to the store and bought the required products. The kids (esp the older ones) had a great time trying to figure out what would be good to include in the bags...(bouncy balls didn't make the cut :)
After we made the bags, I heard on Dave Ramsey that they wanted to know of your giving story for the Holiday season. I decided this would be a great fit for his article and I sent in a few words about it. I got an email, followed by a phone interview from Dave's team and they wrote up an article about it and featured it on Dave's website!!!
Here is the article:
Dawn and her husband Nathan have four children, ages six, five, four and two—and one on the way. When she saw the idea of making bags of practical items for the homeless on the internet, she knew it would be a great fit for their family.
So, they headed to the store to pick up things like washcloths, toothbrushes, Chapstick, Kleenex, Band-Aids and soap to go in the Blessing Bags that they now keep on hand in the car— simple items that make a big difference, especially in the subzero Minnesota winters.
The Man With No Home
When Dawn told the kids what they were going to do, she made sure to put it in their terms: “We're going to go to the store and get stuff to put in bags for people who don't have homes.”
On one of the shopping trips, Dawn continued with family shopping after picking up stuff for the Blessing Bags. As she added an item to the cart, her five-year-old asked: “Is that for the man?”
She'd already switched gears and asked, “What man?”
“Is that for the man with no home?”
“They totally get it,” Dawn said. She's loved watching their selflessness come out as they help to pick out items , even though she had to explain that a bouncy ball may not be a necessity. She asks them, “What would you want if you were cold and didn't have a place to go to?”
The kids get to add items to the bags in a family assembly line, including pictures they've colored and notes of encouragement. Their oldest child is quick to remind the family to look for someone they could give a Blessing Bag to while they're on the road.
The Freedom of Baby Step 6
The Legatts are freer to experience the joy of giving than ever!
They took Financial Peace University in 2004, but it wasn't until 2007 that they got intense about applying the principles to their lives. But then, they sold nearly everything they owned and lived in a camper for seven (insert: it was really 9 :)months. It paid off in 2008 when they became completely debt-free! Now they are working to pay off their home early.
“Before, we made giving a priority, but it was a little harder,” Dawn said. Sometimes they had to decide whether to use money toward groceries or to give it away. “Now, we don't even really have to think about it because giving money is already saved up. There's no way we ever want to go back to being in debt!”
The family buys items like washcloths, toothbrushes, Chapstick, Kleenex, Band-Aids and soap to go in the Blessing Bags that they now keep on hand in the car.
A Family Affair: Molding Future Givers
The Legatts have a family goal of keeping giving in the forefront. “I want to raise my kids to be givers and servers,” she said.
Dawn knows that they will be more impacted by making and giving out the bags than seeing her write a donation check. She knows they'll remember seeing the look on people's faces of, Is this really for me? Why would you give me this stuff? “It's different than their reaction to getting a dollar,” she said. Plus, it gives the kids a way to use some of their giving money and see the results first-hand.
“In our culture, it's easy to have the mentality of 'throw some money at it and it will be fine,'” Dawn said. “But that doesn't always engage your heart. For us, it's really important to let our kids know that there are people who have less than we do, and there is something we can do about it—to get into their spirits that to give really is better than to receive!”
Monday, April 9, 2012
Rewind, Part 2, Sept
The tiny turtles that we all over the resort. They were trying to make their way to the water before fall. They were adorable!
My "cowboy princess" :)
Making applesauce. Pretty sweet mechanism if you ask me! Just boil the apples for a tad to get them slightly soft, then put them thru the hopper on top, turn the crank, and out comes applesauce!
The peels, core, and seeds come out the other side dry as a bone. Super slick!
And we made this much applesauce (13 quarts) in a couple hours (I froze it).
By far one of the coolest pictures...yeah, my little girl's not afraid of snakes!!
Homemade silly putty for school. Elmers glue and liquid starch. The boys LOVED it!
My "cowboy princess" :)
Making applesauce. Pretty sweet mechanism if you ask me! Just boil the apples for a tad to get them slightly soft, then put them thru the hopper on top, turn the crank, and out comes applesauce!
The peels, core, and seeds come out the other side dry as a bone. Super slick!
And we made this much applesauce (13 quarts) in a couple hours (I froze it).
By far one of the coolest pictures...yeah, my little girl's not afraid of snakes!!
Homemade silly putty for school. Elmers glue and liquid starch. The boys LOVED it!
Rewind, Part 1
So I thought I'd travel back in time a tad and go over a few things during our time at "the cabin"...just so I don't forget them.
We ended up staying in the 600ish sq ft condo for a total of 7 months. His hours continued to ramp up like they normally do and 7 days a week started mid Jan and lasted the rest of the time we were there (thru March). The hours were anywhere from 10-13 hours a day.
A few weeks before Jaeger was born, we were driving back to the condo from getting milk. We passed a church that for some reason we never saw before but thought that we should look it up. I searched for it online and thought that it might be something that would suit us well. Since Nathan was working 7 days a week, I decided to bring the kids by myself the following Sunday. They loved it, I liked it, and we made friends the first Sunday, even inviting us to eat with them at Arby's after the service.
Besides the 'young families' group that we were apart of (we went thru the book Crazy Love by Francis Chan), one of the best physical things about this church was that they had a gym!...A full size gym with a closet full of balls, bowling, hockey equipment, scooters, tents, you name it...all for us to use whenever!! This was a life saver on a couple of occasions! All I had to do was make sure that it wasn't reserved by another group and we could go there and play all we wanted! Let me tell you, it SO helps to have a GYM to run around in when you 1)have 4 small children with a lot of energy cooped up in a small space and 2) when you can't play outside.
They also had a large playgound area outside that is all fenced in that we used once the last time we went to play. It was almost 70 out and it was March 19th!
Guess this is why they call it Sunset Cove Resort. So beautiful!
Another blessing during our time there was that another co-workers of Nathan's who moved into another condo at the same resort brought his family with him. They have 2 boys, ages 4 (Leif) and 3 (Lewis) and one girl who is 5 months (Josephine). It was SO nice to have another woman there with her kids that I could talk to. She would watch my kids when I needed to nap at the end of my pregnancy or when I needed to get some groceries after baby was born. The kids would play together nicely and Ariella just loved her baby girl (bc she wore pink!). It's because of Natalie that I found out what a "breve" was, as I am not a coffee drinker, and introduced me to Tillamook cheese (made in her native Washington state). Ryan and Natalie were a blessing to us and we miss being next door to them!
Jaeger and Josephine
We ended up staying in the 600ish sq ft condo for a total of 7 months. His hours continued to ramp up like they normally do and 7 days a week started mid Jan and lasted the rest of the time we were there (thru March). The hours were anywhere from 10-13 hours a day.
A few weeks before Jaeger was born, we were driving back to the condo from getting milk. We passed a church that for some reason we never saw before but thought that we should look it up. I searched for it online and thought that it might be something that would suit us well. Since Nathan was working 7 days a week, I decided to bring the kids by myself the following Sunday. They loved it, I liked it, and we made friends the first Sunday, even inviting us to eat with them at Arby's after the service.
Besides the 'young families' group that we were apart of (we went thru the book Crazy Love by Francis Chan), one of the best physical things about this church was that they had a gym!...A full size gym with a closet full of balls, bowling, hockey equipment, scooters, tents, you name it...all for us to use whenever!! This was a life saver on a couple of occasions! All I had to do was make sure that it wasn't reserved by another group and we could go there and play all we wanted! Let me tell you, it SO helps to have a GYM to run around in when you 1)have 4 small children with a lot of energy cooped up in a small space and 2) when you can't play outside.
They also had a large playgound area outside that is all fenced in that we used once the last time we went to play. It was almost 70 out and it was March 19th!
Guess this is why they call it Sunset Cove Resort. So beautiful!
Another blessing during our time there was that another co-workers of Nathan's who moved into another condo at the same resort brought his family with him. They have 2 boys, ages 4 (Leif) and 3 (Lewis) and one girl who is 5 months (Josephine). It was SO nice to have another woman there with her kids that I could talk to. She would watch my kids when I needed to nap at the end of my pregnancy or when I needed to get some groceries after baby was born. The kids would play together nicely and Ariella just loved her baby girl (bc she wore pink!). It's because of Natalie that I found out what a "breve" was, as I am not a coffee drinker, and introduced me to Tillamook cheese (made in her native Washington state). Ryan and Natalie were a blessing to us and we miss being next door to them!
Jaeger and Josephine
Saturday, April 7, 2012
Kohl Children's Museum
So despite not having very good luck driving around this city, we decided to give it another try and make our way to the children's museum.
"It's Good Friday...no one's going to want to go to the children's museum" we thought...WRONG!!!
We pulled up into the lot and read the big words on the sign 'LOT FULL'. Oh, gee, that's wonderful. Guess a few more people had the same idea we did. Crazy how that works in a big city.
So we drove around to the other side of the block as instructed and walked. And it was a little chilly walk. We, of course, don't have coats on and it's a brisk 37 degrees with lotsa wind. Have I mentioned that it's windy here? Always windy?? Hense the name 'windy city' I suppose.
So anyway, we found our way inside and realize that not only was it Good Friday but it was Spring Break so I'm sure all these mommas were ready to get their children out of the house after being cooped up all week. We were wondering what was taking the line so long to enter and then we realized that the building had reached it's max capacity so once x amt of people left, they would let x amt of people from the line into the museum.
We paid our dues and were on our way inside. It was crazily busy with children and toddlers EVERYWHERE...playing, pulling, banging, screaming, yelling, feeling, touching, looking...just being kids I guess! There were 17 different stations from music to body to water and more.
After a few hours we decided we had enough and left.
Next up was lunch at a place we'd never been before called Steak 'n Shake. We had no idea what kind of food was served there so a quick search on google I found the menu and sounded like something we'd eat!...burgers and fries mainly but also milkshakes. They were very INexpensive and the milkshakes were super good. And since we were there during happy hour, the shakes were 1/2 price....
...so this baby was only $1.75. It was huge. And this is their 'regular' size. Notice my drink glass next to it. :)
Today has been much more lazy. Lounging around the hotel room, nap in the late morning, then to wandering around Target for a couple hours. The kids were begging and begging to go play at the park across the intersection from us so after dropping me and the baby off at the hotel, Nathan took the other 4 kids to the park. I tried to get ariella to stay with me, even bribing her with candy but to no avail...she wanted to play at the park.
After getting back, Nathan said "well, we were definately the only white people there...well, white people that speak English anyway." It's very interesting to us how many Europeans and Indians are around here. We are the minority by far. Nathan said being at the park was like listening to the forgein channel on TV but without being able to turn the channel." :)
Tomorrow we will try out a church...
"It's Good Friday...no one's going to want to go to the children's museum" we thought...WRONG!!!
We pulled up into the lot and read the big words on the sign 'LOT FULL'. Oh, gee, that's wonderful. Guess a few more people had the same idea we did. Crazy how that works in a big city.
So we drove around to the other side of the block as instructed and walked. And it was a little chilly walk. We, of course, don't have coats on and it's a brisk 37 degrees with lotsa wind. Have I mentioned that it's windy here? Always windy?? Hense the name 'windy city' I suppose.
So anyway, we found our way inside and realize that not only was it Good Friday but it was Spring Break so I'm sure all these mommas were ready to get their children out of the house after being cooped up all week. We were wondering what was taking the line so long to enter and then we realized that the building had reached it's max capacity so once x amt of people left, they would let x amt of people from the line into the museum.
We paid our dues and were on our way inside. It was crazily busy with children and toddlers EVERYWHERE...playing, pulling, banging, screaming, yelling, feeling, touching, looking...just being kids I guess! There were 17 different stations from music to body to water and more.
After a few hours we decided we had enough and left.
Next up was lunch at a place we'd never been before called Steak 'n Shake. We had no idea what kind of food was served there so a quick search on google I found the menu and sounded like something we'd eat!...burgers and fries mainly but also milkshakes. They were very INexpensive and the milkshakes were super good. And since we were there during happy hour, the shakes were 1/2 price....
...so this baby was only $1.75. It was huge. And this is their 'regular' size. Notice my drink glass next to it. :)
Today has been much more lazy. Lounging around the hotel room, nap in the late morning, then to wandering around Target for a couple hours. The kids were begging and begging to go play at the park across the intersection from us so after dropping me and the baby off at the hotel, Nathan took the other 4 kids to the park. I tried to get ariella to stay with me, even bribing her with candy but to no avail...she wanted to play at the park.
After getting back, Nathan said "well, we were definately the only white people there...well, white people that speak English anyway." It's very interesting to us how many Europeans and Indians are around here. We are the minority by far. Nathan said being at the park was like listening to the forgein channel on TV but without being able to turn the channel." :)
Tomorrow we will try out a church...
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