Buckets of Love

Friday, June 21st my Granny Piatt passed away.  She was ninety one and a half.  I have found it hard to articulate my feelings, for words seem insufficient to express the grandeur of this woman.  She was literally at the center of my childhood.  From her house being in the middle of our family farm to her involvement in my life.  I can trace much of who I am and what I do to her influence.  She taught me many things but mostly she showed me, by her family first example, how to live life.  In the end she left this world just as she lived it; surrounded by her family and she wouldn't have had it any other way. 

As I have been reflecting on the life and legacy of this dear woman who I called Granny one story stuck out in my mind. It best sums up her wisdom and ability to teach without telling you what to do.  One day I came to her concerned with a childhood problem that seemed really hard to me at the time.  She listened and then very easily shared a story with me.  She told me of her beloved goats.  Everyday she had to fill up two water buckets and walk them the long distance to the goat's barn.  It was hard and the buckets were heavy.  She would walk as far as she could.  When she couldn't go any further, she would set the buckets down and cry.  After a while she would pick up her buckets and finish walking them to the barn.   

There is so much to this simple story.  It has become part of my philosophy for life.  No matter what the task, go as far as you can.  When you feel like you can't go any further, stop, have a good cry and then pick yourself up and finish the task.   

Granny Piatt 

December 16, 1921 - June 21st, 2013

Family outing or as I like to call it, therapy

 A co-working and friend of Kevin's has some land not too far from where we live with a few horses and a fishing pond on it.  Saturday we decided it would a be a great place to take the kids and enjoy some family time.  It was therapeutic.

Purposefully Thirty

December 6th I turned twenty nine.  As my birthday approached and the joking commenced on this being my last year in my twenties I began to reflect. I find that for me it is easy to fall into the just-trying-to-survive mood of life and not truly living.  I want to thrive not just survive.  So I started thinking about some people in my life who I admire and trying to decided what it is about them that I like so much.  Then I thought back on a moment in the Spring when I met up with a friend, in a McDonald's of all places.  She just sat and chatted with me and my kids for around an hour and then went on her way.  Driving home from that McDonald's I felt happy.  I later talked to my husband about the experience and how I was left feeling happy.  She didn't do anything specific, or say anything profound yet I left feeling uplifted.  I have finally concluded that when you are living a purpose filled life, living close the the Savior you can't help up lift others.  I wanted that for me.  I want to live a purpose filled life, not just a I-survived-another-day life.  

Time passed and I was still busy surviving.  Then my birthday approached and I found an opportunity to try and switch gears, set some goals and live a more purpose driven life.  This was the perfect birthday for it too.  As I close a decade and start a new one, I want to try and eliminate as many items on my 'to do' list as I can and move them to the 'done' list.  I don't want my thirties to be filled with the same wants, habits (or lack of habits), and I'm-going-to's as my twenties have been.  

I've decided to be purposefully thirty and not just turn thirty.  I heard it said that when you make your goals public you are more likely to achieve them.  So I'm going to post some of the goals I have for this up coming year.  Then post throughout the year on how I'm doing.  Also, if you think of a good goal let me know and I might add it to my list.

Purposefully Thirty Goals

Memorize thirty scriptures. 

Sew thirty things 

Lose thirty pounds

Read thirty books

Do a thirty day fast

Write thirty letters

Meet thirty new people

Do genealogy for thirty people

Visit thirty new places

Record thirty stories from my life

Share the gospel thirty times

*(I got a sewing machine for my birthday)*

Such is life

As a traveling, homeschooling, mother of four life is busy. With all that I have to get done during the day I find myself too exhausted to strain words together and form a post.  I also find myself wanting to spend a few quiet moments with my husband, therefore forfeit the time I would have to blog.  I try not to blog when my children are up.  It's enough to take a minute and jump on facebook or snap a picture with my phone and post it but it's another to sit down and pretty much completely ignore them in order to type a coherent post.  All that being said, I have a lot that I have wanted to post about.  Some of which I will post about and probably some or most of which I'll just move on without posting.  On a positive note if we are friends on facebook then you've been getting the quick versions of life events so no need to worry that you are missing a lot.  If we aren't facebook friends I apologize for what you might miss.  

Let me give you a quick overview of life since I last posted in (ahem) October. 

- Halloween was a blast. The kids were a ninja, a cat, yippee-yi-yeah and a turkey. 

- Kevin worked long hours

- I worked long hours

- Kids did school work

- We went to a Renaissance festival 

- Lathen has been earning Cub Scout awards

- We pulled the 5th wheel to my parents for Thanksgiving

- We had a great Thanksgiving

- We moved to Corpus Christi, TX 

- We got a puppy

- Kieralee lost her top front teeth

- I turned 29 (for the first time)

- We had a wonderful Christmas in Irving, TX

I hope I didn't forget anything.

More detailed posts on some of the above posts coming soon...

Welcome Home Razzle

This past weekend I drove from our house to my parents house, about an hour and 45 minutes, to spend the night and leave my three oldest kids to stay with my dad.  The next morning, my mom, Desiree and I got in my car and headed for Cincinnati, OH.  Seven hours later we arrived at our destination to pick up a very special package, Razzle.  Mom and I had good time road tripping it up.  We even got some geocaches along the way, I picked up three new states!  

I took this picture in Cincinnati.  We were standing in front of the Bengal's stadium and could see the Reds' stadium, but the bridge was the coolest sight to us. It was a really cool bridge. 

The John A. Roebling suspension bridge.

I've been kicking myself for not taking a picture of my mom and myself somewhere during our trip.

When we got home Kevin had made a welcome home banner for Razzle.

Heath kept asking me, "That MY dog?!"  When I told him yes he said, "Thank you Mommy!!"

Didn't take long for everyone to settle in.

Heath pretending to be a dog.

Kieralee loving on Razzle.

 Playing some fetch

 And this...this is what made the drive up and back, with a fussy, teething baby worth it, when this boy cried because he was so overcome with emotion. 

Thank you to our Michigan family for taking care of Razzle for the last two years!

Getting Lost

I have so much to blog about.  I feel like if blogging becomes a burden, like I feel overwhelmed because I have so much to catch up on that I feel I may never get it done, then I shouldn't do it at all.  Sometimes I think it would just be easier to upload an album to facebook and call it a day.  Seriously, it's hard to find time to blog and then wait for blogger to upload all my photos and then finish a post only to realize blogger didn't upload all the photos and then being too annoyed to go back and fix it...

Anyway, I have a minute and thought I'd leave the three month saga of my life where I didn't have a husband to help and skip to a few weekends ago.  

While driving to my grandmother's house I noticed a farm with a corn maze.  They called it Get Lost, which of course is corny, but still fun.  We had decided that we were going the next Saturday.  My father-in-law happened to call me that Friday and mentioned that he and my MIL were thinking of coming down.  It had been over two months since we had seem them!  I told him we were planning on doing a corn maze and invited them to join us.  So, they did. 

The next statement I am going to make will shock anyone that knows me well, I forgot my camera! (Dun-dun-duuun, *scream*) 

We did snap a few camera pictures.

When we got there the lady told us there was an easy route and a hard route.  We of course did the hard route.  Along the maze there were questions that if you answered correctly it would help point you in the right directions.  Usually, it would tell you left, right or turn around, you would go about 10 feet and there would be more choices to make.  Thankfully we had Kieralee.  That girl ran her tail off.  We would get to a place where many trails branched off, she would pick on and take off running.  She would either come back and try another or we would hear, "Hooty Hoo" which meant she found a clue.  She got really good and by the second half of the maze we were just trying to keep up with her.  Every time we'd answer and question and tell her which way to go she would take off running and before we knew it she'd be shouting 'hooty hoo'!  

After the corn maze we went over to a little play yard.  They had a corn pit.  The corn pit was a hit!  The kids also did a quick hay maze and shot tennis balls at a board trying to make it through a hole.  Oh yeah, they also had corn hole, the game.  My FIL asked Lathen if he wanted to play.  Lathen walked right up, picked up a bag threw it overhand and landed it right in the hole.  He promptly said, "That's how it's done!" and walked away.  Smart kid.  He's already learned that if you have that amazing, blow-you-away first shot you don't have to prove yourself anymore and it's best to walk away before anyone thinks it was luck.  

Desiree kept trying to eat the corn.  I thought I kept her from swallowing any...the next day's diaper change proved me wrong. 

Hehe, I love the look on her face in this one.

Heath just rolled off Desiree :)

Heath said he was driving a monster truck.

Hiking in the rain

Every time, in the past, Kevin and I move we always talk about the local sites we didn't get around to seeing.  That is even true of our home state of NC.  When Kevin took the job he has now, and I knew we would be moving, I decided to pick something near by that we'd been wanting to do and do it.

The Grayson Highlands state park in VA was on my list and the one I picked.  It is one of the most beautiful places to hike and it has wild ponies.  I'm a bit of a softy when it comes to the equine family.  So one day when the weather said it was going to be clear (no rain) we packed a picnic lunch and headed up to the park.  We missed a turn, which made it take longer than it should have to get there, but we got there none the less.  

We picked the Rhododendron trail.  I tied Desiree to me with a baby wrap, put our lunch in Lathen's backpack and we were off!  There was this sign a few yard past the parking lot that said something about hazardous weather and extremely unexpected changes can occur, I wish I would have taken a picture of this foreshadowing sign...

Right at the trail head, about 200 yards past the parking lot, Heath decided to poop.  Lathen was kind enough to run back to the car and get a new diaper.  After changing Heath's mess we were off again!

It was a lot of fun hiking.  The views were amazing, the kids had a blast running around and the fresh air was, well, fresh.  We hiked up to the top of a ridge.  From there we could see a group of rocks that Lathen really wanted to climb.  We hiked over to the rocks and Lathen took off.  Of course Kieralee couldn't be out done so she took off up the rocks too.  Then Heath wanted to go, and Kieralee got frustrated and before I knew it I was climbing the rocks with Desiree.  I'm glad I did, it was gorgeous up on those rocks.  We decided to have our lunch up there.  

I should interject here that the weather was not exactly what the weather channel website said it would be.  It was cooler and the clouds looked more like rain clouds instead of 0% chance of rain clear skies.  While enjoying the views from the top of the rocks I couldn't help but notice the intruding clouds.

We also saw the ponies from the top of the rocks.  Unfortunately instead of being close like I had hoped they were far off, on another ridge entirely.  

Then it happened.  It started with just a few rain drops and then the bottom fell out.  It poured.  And when I say it poured I mean I couldn't see more than a few feet in front of my face.  The rain drops were coming so hard and heavy they actually hurt when they hit my arms.  I grabbed our stuff and we starting hoofing it for the car.  I took less than twenty steps before Heath froze and refused to go any further.  To his credit he did hike up a mountain. I threw him onto my shoulders and starting down the mountain again.

There I was.  One baby strapped to my chest, one on my shoulders and two more trying to keep up!  Heath started to shiver as the rain soaked him to the core and the temperature dropped to the low 50's.  The trail had become a creek as water hurried off the mountain.  What did I do? I laughed.  I mean seriously what else could I do?  Lathen and Kieralee thought I was crazy.  I simply explained that this was the kind of trip that we would never forget and why not laugh our way off the mountain.

When we got to the car everyone was cold and soaked.  (Does anyone know a word that means more than soaked?)  I mean my breast pads had completely swollen (think a diaper after being dropped in a pool).  Heath's diaper was ready to pop. No one had a piece of dry clothing (well almost no one).

I should note two miracles.  First, as I was leaving that house that morning I got a feeling to go back inside a grab a blanket.  Second, when I removed Desiree from the baby wrap she was still dry.  She actually slept the entire hike off the mountain, rain and all.  

I gave shivering Heath and cold Kieralee the blanket.  I had a towel in my car that I gave to Lathen.  We blasted the heat all the way home.  Oh, and in case you were wondering it took us over an hour to hike up the mountain.  It took us less than thirty minutes to get back down.  

The trail head, after the diaper change. 

Up the mountain they go!

Desiree enjoying the hike. 

Halfway up the ridge. 

 Lathen made it to the top of the rocks! 

Heath making his way up the rocks.

 Kieralee made it to the top.

My three oldest.

 Photo courtesy of Lathen.  Yes, Desiree is that lump on my front.

Desiree sleeping.  You can see a few rain drops...

 Soaked, cold and happily back in the car.