Colorado

Nate planned an amazing vacation for our family to take to CO.  Here is our itinerary, with some highlights.

Day 1: Drove from Bolivar, MO to Hays, KS.

• We stopped in Topeka to see the Haraders, and my amazingly hospitable sister bought us dinner.
• We drove past the wind farm just west of Salina - SO BEAUTIFUL!
• The kids hit a rough patch on the drive, and this is what Nate posted to FB: Miles is crying. Cooper is moaning with a tummy ache. Madagascar is in surround sound on both screens. Carey has escaped in the passenger seat with her iPhone and headphones. And the good news? Only 266 more miles of Kansas...

Day 2: Drove from Hays, KS, to Colorado Springs, CO.  Visited Seven Falls.

• We stuck the boys into their beds sleeping and we pulled the boys out of their beds sleeping - they never saw the Hays motel.  Praise the Lord they slept after we put them in the car!
• Seven Falls has changed quite a bit from my memory of it.  They changed their staircases to 2 ginormous staircases that we crept up and down, praying to the Lord that our kids wouldn't stumble.
• The kids enjoyed hiking the trail at the top of the stairs!  Jedi do this kind of thing.

Day 3: Visited The Royal Gorge.  Drove from Colorado Springs, CO. to Vail, CO.

• Our family walked across the bridge of the Royal Gorge.  That's trust right there.  Miles only felt safe when Nate was holding him.  I admit I kinda wanted Nate to hold me, too.

• After some convincing (all of us...not just the kids), we rode the gondola back across the Royal Gorge, again, trusting that the engineers knew what they were doing.
   

 Days 4 through 7: Vail, CO

• The Gore Valley Trail was just outside our hotel and ran along the Gore River.  It was beautiful scenery for us to workout by! 
  
   
• The boys played at some really super playgrounds. 
   

• On Wednesday, we rented bikes and tag-along bikes for the boys.  We had four hours with the bikes, so we rode out, had a picnic, and rode more, totaling about 3 hours of riding.  Miles only wanted to ride with his daddy, and Cooper only wanted to ride with his daddy.  I really tried not to let it bother me, but after several minutes riding with Miles crying and saying hurtful things, I admit my feelings were hurt.  The good news is we survived!
   



• We hiked along a stream our last evening there.  We saw several dams, but no beavers.  When we were driving home, we drove by a dam on a stream that created a lake.  I pointed it out to the boys, "Hey - look at the dam." Miles said, "A beaver dam?" and I replied, "No, a dam dam."  Oops.  That one slipped out of the lips before I considered what I was saying.

Day 8: Drove from Colorado Springs, CO, to Colby, KS...our old stomping ground.

• We visited with some very special friends - Bev and Dean Anderson, Tim and Leisa Hansen, and Bill and Terri Adams. 
• We drove by all of the old houses we lived in and pointed them out to our kids...all they really wanted to do was play at Fike Park. :)
• We enjoyed Taco John's for dinner - it is SO much better than Taco Bell!

Day 9: Drove from Colby, KS, to Bolivar, MO.

• We started our day with Daylight Donuts.  Unfortunately, getting there 7:30 meant we missed out on the Peanut Butter Cinnamon Rolls.  And that was a HUGE bummer.  I might have even cried a little. 
• We stopped by Dad and Beth's house to wish Dad a happy Father's Day and give him a Vail Moose.
• We got home!!  Our beds had never felt so good.

Overall, this was a super vacation!

Miles Henry Bethell

This is the true story of Miles Henry Bethell. (And also a little bit of confession...)

In September (right after Cooper turned one), I was running with Sarita and I felt very winded.  I couldn't catch my breath, which does happen from time to time, but this was the third run in a row like this.  I was sweating buckets.  Discouragement was kicking in.  I remember sitting on the end of my driveway stretching after a run, reflecting on how much it hurt, and Sarita said, "Are you pregnant?"  "Oh, no way," I replied.  Sarita answered, "Well, I just remember you feeling like this when you were pregnant with Cooper." 

I couldn't shake our conversation, so I gave myself 4, yes FOUR pregancy tests that day.  They were all positive. Not believing it could possibly be true, I asked Nate to stop by the store and buy the more reliable test on his way home from work that day.  He bought a two pack.  The first was positive, so I did the second, too.  It was positive, too.  It would be an understatement to say I was in disbelief.

After that the crying began.  This was really not my plan.  I watched as several families around us had babies close together, and I thought that was not our style - I needed time to recover from the first.  Surely God didn't have this in mind for me - didn't He remember how hard being a new mom was for me?  Nate travels - remember God?  I think I cried for about 2 weeks straight.

Looking back, I am really embarrased about the way I handled this surprise gift the Lord gave our family.  I wish I would have been mature enough to laugh, to enjoy, to celebrate God's gift to me.  I remember telling a wise friend about another experience that I look back and regret, and his encouraging advice was something like this: Looking back with regret shows we have grown.  Oh, how I long to grow!!  My response to my pregnancy with Miles' really revealed more selfishness in me that the Lord continues to strip away, one piece at a time.  After I married Nate, I remember falling on my face, overwhelmed that I could be so selfish.  Then, after I had Cooper, more and more layers were stripped away.  This life isn't about me, and having a child made it very clear to me that my needs neet to be set aside.

Enough reflecting.  I am a sinful, selfish woman, saved by God's grace.  God has used my children to refine me, break me, and mold me.  He gave me Miles Henry Bethell. And I am thankful.

Just think, I would have missed all this:

Catching Up

Well, it's been a little while.  I thought the easiest way to play catch up would be through pictures...so here goes nothing:

In December, Nate took me for a surprise weekend in KC to celebrate our 10 year anniversary.  We attended the BEST Chiefs game of the season - against the undefeated Green Bay Packers.  And as you can see, the Chiefs defeated them!

In January I visited my very sweet friend Sarah in Phoenix, AZ.  The night before I left, Coop was up puking about every 20 minutes.  I went anyway, and left Nate with 3 sick boys, including himself.  Sarah and I visited Fashion Square in Scottsdale because the two of us are so...uh...fashionable.

In February, Nate picked up our new dog in Seattle and brought her home.  We only had her about a week before...

...our house nearly burned to the ground.  That might be a bit overdramatic, but it was pretty serious.  It took about 5+ weeks to recover from the smoke smell.  One of the firemen, our friend Jim, said if our cabinet or laundry room door had been open, our house probably would have been a complete loss.

So we moved in to Tom and Sarah Jones' flat for 4 weeks.  That's right - the four of us lived in one big room for a month and we didn't kill each other!!  So many of our friends blessed us in generous ways.  It was amazing to see the body of Christ at work!

We moved back in on March 15th, Nate's birthday.  Our carpet was not yet installed, but we decided to tough it out on the subflooring.  Here is our van with everything from the flat - all we really needed to live for a month could be reduced to this:

We even had cake to celebrate Nate's birthday.

Aunt Hanna, Claire and Katie came to visit while we were still sans carpet - we made the best of it!

The boys played soccer in March.  Cooper was pretty into this year, while Miles enjoyed hanging on the periphery.

March also included a trip to Kansas City to Dad and Beth's house to celebrate March birthdays, and the boys got in a little Jedi training while they were there.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, we couldn't (and can't) keep Fiona from digging holes for her friend Frank to come over and play.  She lived with Frank while our house was cleaned after the fire, and they are such good friends now! 

We celebrated Easter in Enid with the Bethells.

The boys caught several fish!  We had so much fun with cousins - flying kites, breaking open a pinata, and hunting eggs!

That gets us through April.  We are living in our (God-given) home, we have carpet, we are not puking - we are BLESSED. 

Tattoos

On November 1st, Nate and I went and got inked together. Here's the story... :)

In May of this year, some friends and I wanted to be praying diligently for our friend, Cara, who was facing a hard situation. We ordered small beaded bracelets to wear to remind us to pray throughout our days. Wearing that bracelet really served it's purpose for me. I prayed for Cara, but I was also reminded over and over throughout my day to seek the Lord moment by moment. And after a couple of weeks of wearing my bracelet, it broke. I craved the constant reminder to seek the Lord moment by moment, and decided it might be fun to have a tattoo on my wrist. I wasn't sure what I wanted the tattoo to be - just a reminder thta I belong to the Lord and that I need His help to make moment by moment decisions. When I'm left to make my own decisions, it isn't pretty. I decided at that point that I would wait for one year to decide for sure if I wanted to make such a permanent change to my body.

The Fall brought some real struggles for our family. I experienced a trial that brought me closer to the Lord than I had ever been before. I really was relying on Him for my moment-by-moment provision. I count it joy that the Lord allowed me to face such a difficult time, but just as with all trials, my reliance on the Lord started to fade as the struggle subsided. And that's when I knew I wanted a tattoo. I don't want to forget.

Deuteronomy 6:4-9 says “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one! 5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. 6 “And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates."

God knew that we would need to be constantly reminded of Him. We are forgetful people!! Over Christmas, Tom (Nate's dad) led a devotion from Eph 1. Verse 13b says, "When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit." We talked about how it's kind of like when cows get branded with a Farmer's brand. That cow belongs to that farmer. I have been branded for Christ.

Nate and I decided to go together to get matching tattoos to not only to show that we are sealed with Christ (the tattoo is "Jesus" in Hebrew characters), but also to show our committment to one another.

So far, no regrets.

The Things They Say

These are comments from FB that I want to have documented on our blog, too.

Miles Prayer at Breakfast on 12/30
Thank you God for this great day. Thank you that we could take mom to work and that she can do work there and not be grumpy. And, thank you that mommy can eat breakfast and get good food in her tummy so that she will feel better and be all warm and cozy when she gets home. Amen.

From 9/24
I told Cooper that he needs to be careful about turning on the TV because sometimes there are really bad things on TV. Cooper: Like what? Me: Just some grown up stuff that isn't good for you to see. Cooper: Oh, like people squirting water into other people's eyes?

From 9/23
Miles prayed for his daddy to have a good trip to Dancouga. (Vancouver.)

From 8/26
Cooper was complaining about picking up toys he didn't get out. I reminded him about how Jesus died on the cross for sin he didn't commit. His response to me was, "But Mom, I'm not Jesus." So true.

From 8/20
Nate: Miles, should we turn on the radio while we build Legos?
Miles: No, but how about some Bennie and the Jets

From 8/11
Me: Cooper, why did you just hit your brother? Cooper: I don't know. I just need to rethink my life a little bit.

From 7/5
Cooper wants to dig in the garden so he can dig, "mound after mound of rich, fresh soil.". Where does he get this stuff?