Uncle Jamie

My last real grandparent passed away about nine years ago. But Misty and I were blessed with a third set of grandparents in Aunt Marie and Uncle Jamie. They never had any children of their own, but they filled the role of parent and grandparent to many nieces, nephews, friends, and neighbors. Last week we got to say good-bye to Uncle Jamie before he passed away. It was really different from other deaths and funerals that I've been a part of. Uncle Jamie has been ready for a long time. He hasn't been complete since Aunt Marie, his wife of 58 years, died three years ago, so it was all quite peaceful and just felt right. My sweet mama took such good care of grandma and Aunt Marie in their last few years of life, and Uncle Jamie was no different. I have learned so much watching my mom love on and care for elderly people all the while helping them maintain as much dignity as possible. She would take Uncle Jamie to Dairy Queen to get a hamburger and milkshake and sit with him and visit for the hour and a half it took him to eat. Throughout the last couple of years, Uncle Jamie referred to Mama as his best friend. When everyone else was driving him crazy, he knew that she loved him and trusted that she had his best interests in mind. Recently my mom started visiting and befriending people who are in hospice. I love and respect my mom so much and I love her example of loving people like Jesus, without expecting anything in return. This is the kind of love that we are all expected to give as we strive to be Christ's ambassadors. Thank you Mama for your sweet and humble example of love. We're going to miss Uncle Jamie but we're thankful for the full life he lived.

Keith and I with Aunt Marie and Uncle Jamie at our wedding.

Celebrating Uncle Jamie's 90th birthday in June

wordle

summer rewind #1...vacation

As you can see on Keith's arm, the spray on sunscreen is not all it's cracked up to be. We both had blotches of burn after day one at the beach:(

Back in July, Keith and I had a vacation! It. was. so. much. fun. We went to Gulf Shores, Alabama and we LOVED it! Here are a few pictures from our week of fun!

our nice, comfy, relaxing condo!

hanging at the beach!

our camp

big outlet mall!

date nights!

with lots of YUMMY seafood!

deep sea fishing

the serious fisherman...his less-serious fishing buddy got sea sick:(

before

after...we fried Freddy

and grilled Greta.

sporting our souvenir shirts for one last delicious blueberry biscuit at our fave place

If you ever get the opportunity to go on a beach vacation, GO! It was so much fun, so relaxing, so wonderful, we loved it!

Hi Friends!

Hi internet friends!!! I've missed y'all:) I'm excited to be back to blogging! It's taken me a while to catch up on all of your blogs; but I had fun doing it! I just didn't feel right about blogging until I'd read the last couple months on your fabulous blogs! Sorry for the lack of comments!

The end of the summer was busy with a super fun vacation and some home renovations (two reasons I got behind), so I'll have to do some summer rewind posts to catch up, but for now I wanted to show you my new toy! Our desktop was on her last leg (the other reason I got behind), she lived a good life, and I had lots of fun blogging with her, but it was time to say good-bye, so instead of getting another desktop, we decided to get a laptop, and if we were going to get one, I decided it might as well be cute! So, now I'm blogging in style and having lots of fun! It's a pretty purplish-pinkish color with flowers! I can blog in bed, on the couch, at the table, and even in the floor, no more desk for me!

I told you it was cute!

In other news, Keith got a new job! In addition to his job in enrollment marketing at ACU, he is now working part time with spiritual formation and young adults at University Church of Christ. He's been official for a month now. Keith interned there for a couple of years, before preaching at Maryneal, so it's been fun to go back and feel at home. Everyone has been very welcoming, and we're really enjoying getting to know the young adults. We have class with them on Sunday mornings, dinner and fun on Sunday nights, and this week we'll begin visiting home bound members on Wednesday nights. It is a blessing and we are thankful for the opportunities at University.

Finally, I just started my sixth year teaching first grade! It's off to a great start so far! I have a smaller class than usual, only 17 kids, so I'm enjoying that. The kids are really sweet and I'm having fun getting to know them.

how I get from here to there

My little purple car and I have had some good times together over the past 10 years. I remember getting her on Valentine's Day on 1998. I had decided on a cavalier, and I got really excited when II found out they had a purple one with a cd player! In those early years, she took me to high school, to work at Circle D, and we made the drag and enjoyed the night life in good 'ole Roby, Texas. Then she was patient with me as together we figured out our way around the big city of Abilene! In college, she was lots of fun on those late night Bueno and Sonic runs. Spring break of freshman year, she took her longest trip to date and went all the way Waco and made it through a huge rain storm. She even survived a couple of speeding tickets and wrecks. The last few years, her life has been fairly calm, thankfully we've stayed away from those tickets and wrecks on the way to Bonham and back home, and it's been a while since we've made the drag, but we've had fun, and she's been a good car. I hope her new owner will take good care of her!

We decided that was time to say bye to my little purple car and trade her in for something a little roomier. I had fun going down memory lane as I cleaner her out. The glove box had some things I hadn't seen in a while, including my first cell phone (the one my dad got me for emergencies only--it's one of those thick black flip phones and could probably be used in a cell phone museum somewhere:)), an old Roby phonebook from 1998 with my sweet grandma's handwriting on the front, and handy map of Abilene that my sweet mama drew for me with all the places I needed to go (it was the result of several teary phone calls when I was totally lost and her discovering that when needing to get from super Walmart to the mall, I went all the way back to Treadaway...if you know anything about Abilene, you probably know that this is definitely not the most efficient route!).

We researched various car options, looking for a cute, roomy, safe, reliable, fuel efficient car to replace the little purple one, and decided on a Honda CR-V. It is glacier blue and has one of those lock/unlock things on the key....something I've been looking forward to for a while now. It also has GPS navigation, and if you read the previous paragraph, I'm sure you can understand why this will be quite helpful for me and my non-existent sense of direction. So, without further ado, here is our new car!

I'm looking forward to making fun new memories with my cute new car!

Summertime....and the livin' is easy....

We've been enjoying summertime here in Clarksville.

Another school year ended with its usual craziness. This year was especially wild at my school, because our campus is being renovated and we had to pack EVERYTHING (54 boxes to be exact). Only elementary teachers save so many awkward to pack, fragile, heavy, bulky things, that we hope to remember to pull out once or twice a year to enhance the education of our future leaders!

Since then, Keith and I have both been working at ACU. Keith got a job as the campaign manager for the new enrollment marketing department. He gets brainstorm how to "sell" the ACU experience to highschoolers with a great group of people and "play" with spreadsheets. He's enjoying it. It is not the type of job we expected, but it has been a blessing. I'm working part time in the education department as the assistant director of the reading clinic, a class where senior education majors tutor children one on one. My job is a lot of fun too; I get to help the college students look at test results and decide how best to meet their client's reading needs, grade their lesson plans, and fill in when a tutor is absent. It's a fun, low-key summer job. I'm finished by lunch, so in the afternoons, I rotate napping, shopping, TV, laying out by the pool, and such....I know, I know it's a tough life:)

During the evenings and weekends we've spent time with each other and with friends. We started watching LOST and we LOVE it!! We're hooked. It's a great show--abc.com has them all for free online right now, so if you've ever thought about watching it, now's the time. You. will. love. it. It is not a show you can watch sporadically, because if you do, you'll be really confused. We've enjoyed a couple marathons already and have just finished season 2.

We're happy that our friends, Nick, Lauren, and sweet Emmy moved to Abilene! We've shared several meals and played lots of games with them! We've also had some fun visits from out of town friends like Whitney and Suzanne, two bffs from ACU that are lots of fun! Both of these girls are the kind of friends that I don't keep in touch with quite like I should, but every time I see either of them we're able to pick right up where we left off. I'm thankful special friends like that!

Last weekend we went to see Jacquie, Spruce, and Lynlee. We enjoyed getting to play games with them and some of their new friends on Friday night. You can't beat a good game night! Saturday we hung out and played with Lynlee; she is growing and learning so much! That night we celebrated Jacquie's b.day! We went and ate at one of those fun Japanese steak houses and then enjoyed a Rascal Flatts concert. You can read more about our history with Rascal Flatts here. It was so much fun! Such a better experience. Let me sum up the contrast for you....concert number #1--drunk teenagers falling on us and getting muddier than a pig pen full rooters, concert #2--Clay Walker wearing tight jeans, shaking his stuff, and thinking he's 15 years younger, concert #3--soft grass, shade, lots of fun songs to sing along to, sweet kids sitting behind Keith making shadow puppets on his back, funny families to observe, and last but not least, "Spike" (our term of endearment for the lead singer) got a haircut:) Although this was by far the best experience of the three, they all had good friends and lots of laughs in common! Sunday morning we joined them for chuch, met lots of friendly people, and heard a great sermon by Jarrod. Oh yeah, I can't forget to mention meeting precious Rylee, Jarrod and Lauren's sweet daughter!

Hope all of you fellow bloggers are enjoying your summer!

Happy Graduation Keith!!!!

My sweet husband graduated on Saturday and was awarded outstanding academic achievement in the Graduate School of Theology! It was a fun weekend celebrating with family and friends. He has worked so hard in grad school and has really loved it, but is very excited to be finished! Over the past three and half years he has:

completed 84 hours of class

written numerous 20+ page research papers

read lots and lots of very thick books

taken many extensive tests

engaged in lots of great conversation

spent countless hours in the library

even spent a night in the library

studied under and developed relationships with wonderful professors

been challenged spiritually, mentally, and physically

maintained a top notch GPA

made friends with fellow students

mentored freshmen and sophomores as a teaching assistant

ordered, sold, and organized music for the campus store

ministered to the sweet people at Maryneal Church of Christ

and all the while continued to be a loving husband

My heart is full! I could not be more thankful for and proud of him. This has been an amazing chapter of our lives. He's looking forward to having some time to rest over the next few weeks until we see what the future holds.

Celebrating with the fam!

Thanks to our friend and fellow blogger Lauren for taking this fun picture for us!