on the farm

These three asked me to do some pics of them one evening during camp. We wanted Abby to be in them too - it's not a complete "best friends" set without her - but she was being stubborn and wouldn't do it! :-p So we did it without her!

I love the vintagy look these edits give the pictures. It's probably one of my favorite edits to use and fit well with the farm surroundings. :)

12:34

Warning: Unusually long post. I won't blame you if you don't make it all the way through! But it's an update on my life in general. :)

I borrowed this idea of a summer “bucket list” from Meg's blog. She does this with her children every summer. I have thought it was such a great idea for several years but had never gotten around to doing it before. I decided it was very important to do it this summer though. Important because this is my last summer with my kiddos. Some of you already know this. They will be going to a really great private school in just a couple weeks. All three of them. All day long...plus aftercare. Therefore, they won’t need me anymore. So I have been soaking up this last summer with my three beautiful children. We have done many things on our list, although we have some left to do in the next two weeks.

As for the questions everybody is starting to ask...

Do your kids know?

Yes, they’ve known all summer, although the concept of me not being here has been pretty abstract until this past week. It just clicked in Little Miss Sunshine’s mind last week just exactly what it means when mommy says they will still see Kiki sometimes - it doesn’t mean they will see me outside when I walk down my stairs on the weekends or in the evenings...it means I will not be living here right next to them anymore and they will only see me if I come to babysit every now and then. The look on her face when that clicked in her head was pretty sad. Little Miss Giggles has said often in the past week, “But Kiki, I don’t want you to go!” Mr. Happy has said off and on all summer, “Kiki, you know that day when you aren’t going to be here anymore?? I just hate that day already! I hate that day!” Which is hard to type without getting tears in my eyes.

Wow, you will miss them, won’t you?

Well, duh! :) I have been here for five and a half years and I love them like they are mine. No one except possibly my friend Rebekah, who has done the nanny thing before, completely gets just how much I will miss them and how hard our separating from each other is going to be. No one gets just how strong a bond there is between us all - but probably between Mr. Happy and me the most, just since I have been the one to care for him almost every day since he was 8 weeks old. The closest thing I’ve been able to compare it to is getting a divorce and losing custody of your children....except no one is angry with anyone, thankfully! :) So HECK YES I will miss my babies!! I’ve told wendy I get first dibs on babysitting now...and I have claimed Boo at the Zoo as mine in the fall. :) I’ve taken them every year for four years now and I’m not about to stop!

Where will you live and what are you going to do next?

Yeah. That would be nice to know! I am waiting for Him to show me where He wants me next. I am fully and completely 100% confident that He will be faithful and provide exactly what I need and beyond. There is another blog I love, written by a mom named Linny and honestly, just simply reading her blog has strengthened my faith so much! Her faith is rock solid and I see Him answering prayers and moving mountains for her all the time and realized one night...wait a second...she loves and serves the same God I do...He can totally answer my own prayers like that!

However, while I know He will provide, I am human and the waiting and unknown can sometimes be a litlte bit scary to this girl who does not like change, when I forget to keep my eyes focused only on Him. He has been increasingly faithful in moments of doubt to remind me that He is still there. Like the title of this post:

12:34

I decided a long time ago that that is my favorite time of day. 12:34. The numbers go in order...1,2,3,4. When I happen to glance up and see that time on a digital clock, it always reminds me that the God Who created the entire universe, who ordered the stars in the sky, who sees when a tiny sparrow falls, is the same God Who is taking care of me every moment. He is here. He holds my life in His hands. He will never leave me. He is in control and He knows my future. I don’t usually see that time on the clock very often seeing as it only comes twice a day! And while I am a night owl and am often still up and getting ready for bed at 12:34am...I’m not usually looking at a clock at that time of night. And usually during the day I am fixing lunch for my kids at about that time. So I only see it every once in a while. But can I just tell you how many times I have seen it in the past two weeks?! I was sort of dreading coming back from camp because I knew the following three weeks would get increasingly hard as the time to say goodbye rushes closer and closer, but a couple times during the second week of camp i would glance at my phone and realize it was

12:34.

“I’m here.”

I can’t even remember how many times I saw it last week!

12:34.

“I’m in control.”

Just last night I was looking at online nanny job postings that want to pay $5 an hour. (Seriously? For a full-time nanny?? That’s what i made babysitting way back in highschool - 15 years ago!!) I looked up in the corner of my computer screen and there it was yet again:

12:34.

“I know the plans I have for you.”

All I could say was ok, I hear You. I know You are here and in control and already know where You want me next. I will trust while I wait. :)

This past Saturday however, He reminded me in a different way. I went tubing with some friends from church. We had gone a month ago up to townsend but the water was just so shallow and still that I informed them I wanted to take everyone to a “real” tubing place down in NC. I had been tubing on the Tuckaseegee river last summer with two friends and had loved it. The rapids there are stage 2 (a stage or so above Townsend.) and I remembered that one rapid had been a little too intense for my liking and I had gone way around to the side and out of the main part. But other than that and getting tipped out of my tube once, I had a blast just floating with my friends. So I figured it would be a similar experience this time too. Yeah. I was wrong. I had forgotten how fast the water flows through the rapids and started fearing that I would be flipped out with rocks all around. I found myself just praying through the rapids, “Please don’t leave me! Help me get through this one in tact!” :) I did tip over a couple times, scraped my leg on some rocks, couldn’t quite catch my breath, and might have had a slight panic attack for a moment which one of my friends might have had to talk me through, but I was fine overall and I still can say that I like tubing...mostly... :}

(Borrowed this pic from my friend...thanks, Deanna!) :)

Of course that whole experience, I am sure, was no coincidence. Even while I was hanging on through the rapids, it brought to mind the metaphor that life is sometimes like that river - we float gently through the calm parts enjoying the scenery and everything is great. Then the rough parts come and can be kind of scary, can hurt a bit, and we can wonder what in the world is up ahead around the curve - more rough parts, or another quiet stretch? - but just like in the tube on the river, God never leaves us alone. He is faithfully with us the entire trip - rough parts and calm parts alike. And not only that, but just like my friend who helped calm me down after being dumped out a few times, He doesn’t make us go through things alone but usually sends one or more people into our lives to be His hands and feet during the rough times. I already have had multiple friends (and family too of course!) offer their homes for me to stay at while I continue to search for another job. Other friends have sent me notes just to say they’re praying for me. So while those who know me well know how much I HATE change of any kind :-p , I can still confidently say that I KNOW my sweet Savior will provide for my every need just like He provided this job for me five and a half years ago.

That being said, I would still appreciate your prayers! :) The unknown of where I’m going or what I’ll do still gets scary at moments here and there and the thought of saying goodbye to Little Miss Sunshine, Little Miss Giggles, and Mr. Happy is something I try not to think about. Not to mention what a huge enormous change this will be for each of them too! I want to make this major transition as easy for them as possible, so pray for wisdom as to how to do that.

("Eat donuts" was one of Mr. Happy's addition to our list. They each got to pick out their very own...and I think they thoroughly enjoyed every bite!)

In the meantime, I still have this week and next week with my kiddos and we still have things to finish on our list so I'd better go get ready for the day! We're playing with a big cardboard box today and I think the goal is to make it into a pirate ship. Pictures later, I'm sure. :)

k.kamp 2011 ~ girlz week

This year girls' week of k.kamp started off with a biology lesson when one of the kids discovered...

kittens being born right then!!

Abby recorded some k.kamp randomness all week. She even made a k.kamp commercial...check it out!

Lots of crafts.

Rebekah and her kiddos came back to spend another day with us - and so did Jodi! I had 23 people in the house that day! And totally loved every minute of it. :)

Outdoor games...we were dripping with sweat just standing outside!

This is not at all the same type of picture as last year! They were not at all getting ready to go do something to someone's truck again in the middle of the night...

...and I most certainly did not go down to help them......!

Proof that I have been out at camp for two weeks!

I did one more photo shoot while I was out there...coming up next! :)

two more

...of Charlotte. Because Emily has been patiently waiting for them. :)

charlotte

Like I said at the end of my last post, I had a couple friends come to see me during the first week of camp. Jodi was my close friend and roommate in college for my Jr and Sr years. She is one of the few friends from college who you know is a friend for life. We still keep in touch...although a little less frequently now that she's a mom to three kiddos! :} I was excited to meet her newest addition, Charlotte, and of course had to get in a few pics.

(And, Mrs. T., as I was taking them, I kept remembering the last little Charlotte I got to hold when she was about this same age...three hours of pure bliss while that little Charlotte snuggled against my chest! Now she's a big kid...sniff, sniff...)

Lol, this one is actually probably my favorite! I love her chubby little cheeks! She looks so worried here. :) But she was smiling before too long...

Hey, Em, thanks for letting me use your sheet as a backdrop! It was a perfect match for her outfit...hmm...maybe I should get sheets like that.... :)

Snug as a bug. :}

Jodi, it was great to see you! Come see me in the near future...you have to bring my cri-cut back anyways sooner or later! :)

k.kamp 2011 ~ boyz week

I'm back. From spending two weeks at my favorite spot on earth. It is always a busy couple of weeks but I love being there in the country at camp. Every worry seems to fall away as you get off the exit and enter another world as you turn onto the gravel road that leads to Coldstream. Lauren has gone with me the past four years and it is our tradition now to play Lady Antebellum as we take that exit. The music just fits somehow. :)

We started the first week of camp with a small church service on Sunday morning, followed by a baptism down at the lake. Personally, I think we should start every year that way! Tom had accepted Christ at an earlier age but wanted to be baptized again. He has spent this summer working with Jon (in the green shirt) around camp and has his own blog. He is one of a group that comes from Indiana. They have been coming now for quite a few years to help out. During the first week, the girls are counselors and the guys help Jon around camp, then they switch for the second week. Tom and a couple of the others have become good friends of Lauren's in the past year.

This first week, I had four boys, ages 8, 8, 10, and 12. Plus a 3 year old. Plus Sophie for part of the time. Plus two little sisters who are too young for overnight camp but were at day camp during the day until about 4pm. However, no boys that age want to be stuck at the house with little kids and a grown up girl, so Jon came and grabbed them every day and let them go work with the Indiana guys, which they loved. And I'm glad they got to do it! Especially when one afternoon they came back to the house after working all day and I realized it was very quiet in Evan's room. With four boys, that doesn't happen very often! I about died when I opened the door and found this:

Tug doing Clayton's hair while Clayton sits and flips through a magazine?!?! I took a pic and text it to Michael down at camp saying "proof that they boys need to be with Jon this week!!" Ha! I promise I had NOTHING to do with this!!!

Evan (right) was also working on Jackson's hair but I didn't get that pic. I won't mention that they might have proceeded into the bathroom to try out the girls' curling iron/hair straighteners..... oh wait. :}

In the evenings, Jackson's older brother, Tyler, who I used to have with me but is also too old, would come up to hang out with the guys. One day he came in the house and went upstairs, I assumed to find the other boys. A few minutes later I realized all the boys were outside, not upstairs, but I didn't remember seeing Tyler come back down. I went up to investigate and found this:

Tyler, on the floor with both my evening girls, letting them climb all over him! Sheesh! Melt my heart! :) He was obviously loving every minute of it until I snuck back with my camera and he heard the 'click'. At that point he immediately sat up and told me he would do chores for me if I would delete the picture...and where was the kitten that had found it's way inside anyways? He needed to take it back outside....! (Sorry, Ty! No was was I deleting that picture!!) :}

This was K's first year with me. She's hilarious.

This is a different K. She has been with me for several years now. Every time I saw the two K's playing, they were giggling, arm in arm, cuddling with the kittens kind of playing. I later discovered they also had a knock-down drag-out fight and didn't always get along so well!!

I had two friends come and visit during this week as well...one of whom has a 9 week old little girl. Pics of her coming next. :)

sophia

I will write a post about camp later...but for now Michael and I stole away to SB for a few minutes for some internet time since I have been itching to edit these photos! This little girl is the daughter of my friend Jewel. Jewel and I were co-counselors at camp waaay back in highschool! Now she pretty much runs camp! :} I kept Sophie for a couple days and enjoyed getting to try a couple different shots of her. Here are my favorites...

Jewel, I enjoyed getting to hang out with you a little bit while you were up at the house this week. Thanks for trusting me with Sophie - I loved getting to have a baby at camp again!! :)

Ok...back to my favorite spot on earth I go...after one more WalMart run.... :) More later!