Spiritual Scrapbooking

I get the magazine Today's Christian Woman which i love! (thanks Kay Lyn!) Anyway, i received my newest issue the other day and there was this little blurb about spiritual scrapbooking on the bottom of a page. It gave a few suggestions about how to incorporate your personal faith journey into your albums. one suggestion i particularly liked was to do a gratitude album. The instructions simply say to use one letter of the alphabet per page to highligh what you're thankful for. Let me back up a little bit.

Andrew has been having a pretty hard time adjusting to life in S. Texas. he doesn't feel like he fits in with the kids here because he doesn't speak the spanish language, and he's having a hard time making friends , etc. etc. The other day he had a pretty emotional melt-down and went on and on about how horrible his life was. Anyway, Richard and I talked with him for a long time and my plan is to let him do one of these album. So as i was pondering over this idea for andrew, i started thinking for myself of things that i'm thankful for. here's what my list looks like so far. Maybe you could helo me fill in the blanks...

A...Andrew and Aaron
B...Beach (It's where i can feel really close to God and His creation)
C...Creative memories of course, Christmas Music (it's my favorite)
D...Daddy ( a little girl loves her daddy)
E...Eva (My Mom, and my closest Girl-friend)
F...Family and Friends, faith and Freedom
G...GOD, Girl-friends, Grandparents
H... Happiness
I... Inspiration
J... Jesus
K...Karleene (i have the greatest mom-in-law)
L... LOVE!
M...Music
N...North Carolina (I miss it.)
O...
P...Pumpkin Pie (hey it's Thanksgiving and i couldn't think of anything else that started w/ P)(oh yeah, Pete-my cat)
Q...Quiet time especially w/ God
R...RICHARD!!!
S...Scrapbooking, Sister's
T... Time with my kids and husband.
U...
V... Voice of God
W...
X...
Y...all of YOU
Z...Zoey (my dog)


i encourage each of you to give this some thought and i'd love to hear what you're thankful for.

love you all...

miss me?

sorry i haven't been here lately. Karleene (my mom-in-law) just left today from visiting over the thanksgiving holiday. i was really great to have family here for the holiday. hopefully mom and dad will be here for christmas. any way, just wanted to write a quick note to say...stay tuned. i have lots to blog about....

Beach bums and Sunsets

(how do i rotate this?)

Yep, we went to the beach again. i love being this close to it. it's a little over an hour, but it's totally worth it. it was cooler this weekend and very windy. Richard and andrew said the waves weren't as good, but Aaron and i didn't care. we were having fun in the sun and sand! Aaron is really overcoming his fear of the water. he actually took a few tumbles in the waves and went under afew times. he didn't like the way it tasted, but he kept going back for more.

We also have great sunsets right out the window of our apartment. we have to go up to the second floor to see the whole thing over the fence, but wow, they are beautiful. i don;t think i'll ever get tired of seeing them.

anyway, that's about all for now. I did get some really cute picts of the boys playing out front, so i'll try to get those on also. Love you all and miss you more!

4 wheelin'

I know, I know, this is posted way after i took these picts, but what can i say, i'm so incredibly busy now that i'm not working. just kiddin'. anyway, i'm trying to get all the picts off my camera in preperation for Christmas and all the thiings we might do when Mom and Jonathan are here and found these. One evening while we were waiting on Daddy to get home from work, the boys wanted to play outside. We brought both the 4 wheeler Aaron received for Christmas two yrs ago and the jeep that was Jonathan's when he was little that finally ended up with Aaron after all 4 grandchildren have enjoyed it. Well, you can see who rode which one. And yes, Andrew is a little big, but what the heck, they had a great time.


We Mostly stayed right out front of our apartment, but we did venture out a little.


they got a little bored staying on the sidewalk and decided to go off-roading. Of course, Aaron has to follow his big brother and do everything Andrew does even if it doesn't work out the same for him.

See...Aaron had a little crash. But he was laughing the whole time. And he got right back up and kept going. they pretended to go to the grocery store and had to stop for gas a few times.

I was able to take a little movie clip on my camera to share with you. That's not our building you see inthe backgroud, but it is one of the buildings in our community. it's not too bad i guess. it is home.

Hope u enjoy the show.

Torture Tuesday & Halloween

I learned a valuable lesson today...don't do laundry during the day. You see, the community we live in has 12 buildings each with anywhere from 8 to 18 apartments in each one, you do the math. there is only one laundry facility (which i am thankful for since both my washer and dryer died when we got here) that has 5 washers and 5 dryers, one of which is broken. Apparently, not many residents here have their own washer and dryers, because the laundry room was BUSY today. someone actually took my stuff out of the dryer to use it. luckily it was dry, but still, how rude.

any way, enough complaining...

I'm a few days late getting these on here but what can i say, first i had to find the ubc cord for my camera, and i have a very taxing job now...it's very demanding!

Just to clarify a few things, Andrew was a Ninja and Aaron was a scary, mean, red pirate. he wouldn't let me put a mustache on him and he wouldn't wear the earring that came with his cosutme, but all in all he was the cutest little pirate i have ever seen!

Welcome To Mission Texas (part 1)

hello again. i was able to get a few pictures while out today so i thought i'd get them on here for all to see. the top left is the front veiw of Andrew's school, Ruben Hinojosa Elementary. It's pronounced eno-hosa. It's a really nice school. I spent a little time there today with his teacher Mrs. Guzman and his counselor, don't ask me what her name is.

Anyway, he seems to be doing very well at school. He has a new friend named Menor (not sure of the spelling) and his teacher says he's avg to above average in reading which is really good.

I guess that's about all for now. i will try to get halloween picts on here afterwhile. right now it's bath time. but first andrew has to finish his homework.

Come Monday...

Good morning to all. Hope everyone had a good weekend, and for those of you who partied without me, I hope you had fun and missed me!

Our weekend was pretty uneventful. Actually, it was very uneventful...absolutely nothing at all happened. Richard's days are getting progressively longer so when the weekend comes he just vegetates and relaxes. i can't blame him for that.

Andrew is feeling a little home sick and like he's not going to fit in and make friends, so please remember him in your prayers. I think he misses his friends and teachers from PG. I know he had a really great teacher this year and we hated to lose her. i' called this morning about getting him involved in some sports and clubs, so i think we'll go register for basketball this afternoon.

any way, i guess that's all for now. I'm gonna work on getting some pictures posted of different things in our area so you can see what it's like here.

ta-ta for now...

Listen, please.

I've posted a YouTube video link on our blog. i found it by accident, or what i thought was an accident, but the more i listen to it, the more i realize that God meant for me to find it. I love what is says about another raining day...a lot like being depressed, but when i am stuck and don;t know what to do, i got keep singing, keep praising your name...May God bless you and keep you no matter where you are in your walk with Him. remember, He will never leave you or forsake you and with Him all things are possible...please just close your eyes and listen to the words. thanks...

WHEW!

Oh my Gosh! There is so much to do and I have no energy to do it. I've got most of the boxes unpacked. there are still some in the garage mostly because i don't know where to put everything. i haven't really "decorated" yet, one because I'm not that great at it, but two, cause i can't hang pictures and curtains w/out Richard's help so it will have to wait till the weekend. Our washing machine AND Dryer are broken so I'm having to lug all the laundry to the clothes care center at the front of the community to do laundry. that's not too bad, i usually load it in the car and drive and park as close as i can get. I'll try to get some pictures of the community and the surrounding area on here so everyone can see what it's like here. It's really pretty. Lot's of palm trees, and you know how i love palm trees. the mornings are usually a little cool. there have been a few mornings as low as 43 degrees, but by afternoon it's in the 80's, I LOVE THIS WEATHER!!! I'm sure I'll change my tune in the summer, but for now, it's great. I was watching the weather this morning and the humidity was 93%. right now it's not too bad, but next summer will be horrible.

Aaron keeps me busy. He's a genuine "jabber-jaws!" his dad said he gets it from his aunt Mylinda! when he's not talking he's singing, some songs we all know like twinkle, twinkle little star, others are songs he makes up. he's very funny. it's very hard to be mad at him sometimes.

Andrew is adjusting slowly, but i think he'll be okay. School is a little harder here, or at least that what he says. i think he misses the southern hospitality and nice, warm and fuzzy characteristics of his teachers at PG Elementary. Overall, he's okay. we've had a few struggles with getting homework done in the evening, but we always manage to get it done. He's a lot like his father and hates school. i have no doubt he's smart, just lazy at times.

well, i guess that's all for now. I'll email my personal tech support (aka. Mylinda) to figure out how to get more interesting stuff on here. in the mean time, just bare with me until i figure it all out.

love and miss you all....Leslie