The Purple Clad Jewel: January 2015

Hello!!!

So you know what's going on- I've decided to basically make this blog my family scrapbook. Just a log of all that has been going on in the lives of our little family. Now that we are living in Alabama it also seems like a great place for our family to see what's been going on in our lives. So here it goes...

A sweet girl in our youth group had a birthday the other day at this great park that we have been wanting to take the kids to. It's a historical park with a great playground, live animals, hiking, and buildings that were true to the 1800s. It was so much fun and the kids had a blast! Here are some pics from the day...

Sister Love...

Love this one! Ruthie's hair- Wild!...

Getting pushed by big sister...

Look at that face!...

Zip Line...

Silly faces with her Mama...

My boy (he styled his own hair- Love it!)...

This goat looked at us like we were crazy. We probably are...

Nolan and the kiddos with a few boys from our youth group...

Later that night it was pass time for Nolan to get a haircut! He preached Sunday so he needed to look goooood. As you can see he was so excited about it...

Baby Girl turned 2! I'm pretty sure she was more excited about the balloons we got for her little party than anything else. Next year she's just getting balloons. There was a green one but her sister made sure to pop that one about five seconds after we got home...

We bought pizza and I made cupcakes- It was quite the party!...

I'm not sure she liked it...

Happy Birthday Baby Girl!

This last picture is from Christmas. I just love the picture so I thought I'd throw it in. I love the man in this picture with me so much! He's pretty much the best. I need to tell him that more often. I want him to know that I'm proud of him and how hard he works to love his family. I'm thankful for the way he shows me and the kids how to follow and love our Savior. And he's nice to look at...so there's that too.

So that's what has been going on around here.

Blessings!

Our 2014...A recap.

Where to start?

A lot happened in 2014 I feel like.

Early 2014 my hubby started to feel the call into ministry after being a high school teacher/coach for the last 8 years. We visited three different seminaries pretty sure that God was calling him to school first in preparation for full-time ministry. Even though we were fairly certain that seminary was God's will Nolan still seemed to have a nagging feeling that maybe we were wrong (when you have a wife and three kiddos to think about, quitting your job, becoming a full-time student, and hoping you find a part time job that pays you enough for you and your family to survive on can be a little scary). However, after visiting Southern Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky we felt certain that is where God was calling us...

We were wrong...

The day after we arrived home from Louisville sure that we were headed there a friend of ours who is a pastor at a church in Alabama called us and told us his church had an opening for an Associate Pastor/Youth Ministers position and he felt like God had laid my husband on his heart.

God is so funny sometimes isn't he?!.

So once again we started praying for direction, for peace, and for His good and perfect will to be accomplished through us.

Would we ever make a decision? I was starting to wonder.

In the end we truly felt God calling us to Alabama. The hubby felt at peace knowing that he would be providing for his family while getting experience serving and working in a church all while doing his seminary work online. It really was amazing how God worked out all the little details and showed us (me mostly) that sometimes we must earnestly seek and pray for His guidance and will to be revealed, and He doesn't always make it easy or quick. We must learn to be patient as we learn to listen and understand what He's saying to us. While the uneasiness of being in limbo and just not knowing what we were doing and where we were going was enough to make me completely frazzled at times I wouldn't change that time in our journey for anything. Learning to earnestly pray and seek God during that time grew my faith in ways I didn't even realize possible. We learned to trust God's provision and to know that He would make his plan clear to us in His time. I learned to trust my husband as he lead our family. It was such a blessing to experience His hand at work in our lives and has become such a huge part of our story- how God has truly shown himself good and faithful to us.

So in 2014 Nolan changed professions and we moved to Alabama! Pretty Huge Right?!!

We bought a house that was built in 1912.

In the short amount of time we've been here we've made some amazing friends.

We love our church, and immediately felt right at home. We work with the youth at our church. We have them over often. The highlight was our tacky Christmas sweater party. I wore a Christmas jumper with matching turtle-neck. It was pretty legendary I'm not going to lie.

In November we took the students out door to door to pray for those in our community and to offer meals to those in need for Thanksgiving. It was eye opening to see the huge need in our own community, and a blessing to take our students into the community to serve. We delivered around 40 meals to those in need on Thanksgiving. It was awesome to be a part of! Since we didn't go home for Thanksgiving we had our own Thanksgiving here in Alabama and invited a few friends over to celebrate with us. I cooked my own Turkey! It was so scary and gross- I totally didn't pull out the bag that was inside it...oops.

The kids and I volunteer once a week at a local thrift store that raises money to buy food for the needy. It's pretty awesome to serve right along side my kiddos, and to see them learning to love and serve those in need.

Little man played football for the first time ever, and started piano lessons. He rocked Jingle Bells out like an All-Star pro at his Christmas Recital. He's now in basketball season, and he's getting better and better. He continues to be an amazing reader, but his most exciting news of all is that he excepted Jesus Christ as his personal Lord and Savior in January of 2014!

Ruthie continues to be sassy, but at the same time sweet and loving. She loves her big brother and and thinks he hung the moon. We are hoping she might play soccer in the spring but in all reality she just wants to dance, twirl, dress-up, and use her imagination to take her to places that I'm sure are full of unicorns and colorful dresses and high-heels.

Baby girl is a mess! She is by far the friendliest child we've had. She waves at and tells everyone she sees "Hi!". She's a climber, but by far the craziest thing she does is take her diaper off every chance she gets! I seriously can't hardly keep the thing on her- and it's all fun and games until she's poopy! I'm sensing potty-training in her near future- Ugh!

Nolan is doing awesome and I love him more and more each day. He's serving in our church. Working on his Masters degree through New Orleans Theological Seminary. Playing basketball when he can, and starting Monday I'm making him do a 10-Day Detox with me...He's very excited about it. I feel so blessed to share this journey with him by my side!