Choosing Good Neighbors

As a Marine Corps family that moves (on average) every 3 years, we are always thinking about where we're going to be living.

Is the house that we will be moving to bigger or smaller? two stories or one story? have a backyard or no backyard?

There's a thousand questions.

Nick and I have never lived on base, and we've always picked where we lived.

We've lived in everything from an 800 sqft apartment in San Clemente, CA to a 2600 sqft, two story home with a basement in Massachusetts.

But the one thing we can never choose is what neighbors we get.

Or can we?

EVERY SINGLE place we have lived at (6 residences total), Nick and I have been continually blessed with amazing neighbors who have become lifelong friends.

When we moved to Massachusetts, we were once again amongst some AMAZING neighbors.

 We couldn't believe it.

What are the odds?

Then the Romers invaded Texas, and AGAIN....

We ended up having the most amazing neighbors.

The thing is, my mom has always been a praying mom.

She has constantly prayed for us to be blessed with great neighbors every single time we have moved, and God has been extremely faithful to our family.

If y'all remember, I was extremely depressed and miserable when we moved to Massachusetts, and I am truly convinced that I really grew to love some of the things about living there because of the amazing neighbors we had.

Every place we have lived, our neighbors have become lifelong friends.

So, can you choose your neighbors?

No.

But I am a strong believer that, with faith and prayer, God will always place your family right where your family needs to be.

So far, he has been so good to our family and our lifestyle.

It's like HE knows that struggles that our lifestyle can impose on our family, and he has always made sure that we have been surrounded by amazing people.

Our next door neighbors, Greg & Kayla have become some of our best friends.

It was their 1 year wedding anniversary yesterday!

We became instant friends when Kayla came to our house with fresh eggs while we were painting the inside of our home to introduce herself. 

Nick and Greg bonded over Nick's 72 Chevelle. 

Since then, we rarely go a week without hanging out with them at their house or at our house.

Last night, we went over to their house to watch their wedding video with them.

We are so blessed to have made such great friends who live just next door!

 This is Nick and Greg sitting all close and cuddly together last night.

:)

Another blessing has been our neighbors across the street from us!

They have two girls and a boy!

Dannika has become such great friends with them, and we often take turns watching each other's children throughout the week.

Their middle child (and oldest daughter) is our "Mattis whisperer".

She comes over and watches him for me while I get things done around the house.

She helps me bathe him and put jammies on him at night.

She loves on him, and plays with him.

I couldn't ask for a better group of kids on our street!

How have your neighbors been?

Grace and Compassion

You know those people who tend to have what I call "diarrhea of the mouth"?

You know those people who say what's on their minds regardless if it's appropriate or not?

They say out loud what EVERYONE else is thinking?

Yeah, that's not me.

Although, I do feel that maybe in my younger, less mature years of life, I suffered from this disease...diarrhea of the mouth.

As a Marine, this disease came in handy when it came to standing up for myself or my Marines in front of higher ranking people. 

It also got me a lot of ass chewings.

But, hey...at least my point was made, and I stood up for someone. 

As I got more mature (and wiser) in the Marine Corps, I learned this thing called "tact".

Which if used correctly, saying "F*&^% you" to someone using "tactful and professional sounding words" is actually a lot more powerful than spewing out anything and everything under the sun.

Since getting out of the Marine Corps, and finally moving back to Texas, I've become a way happier, peaceful, and optimistic version of myself. 

Gone is the girl who hated the world, the Marine Corps, Massachusetts...

Gone is the girl who just saw the negative in everything. 

I've mentioned before that people close to me have noticed even my Instagram (@domesticatedcombatboots) and Facebook posts have become seemingly more cheerful and upbeat since moving back here to Texas.

Last night, my happy, peaceful, and optimistic version of myself temporarily left me.

I won't go into detail over the incident, because frankly, it's none of my business...or anyone else for that matter.

But I lost it on a person last night.

I was defending a friend who I felt was treated unfairly and wrong.

I defended a friend who ended up in a predicament because of "untruths"....I won't say "lies" because I don't know the whole story. 

Something tells me though that the whole story isn't the full truth anyway. 

I said hurtful things and hurled insults. 

I said things that felt liberating when I said them, because I said everything that everyone else was thinking.

I even got a few "attaboys" and "thank you! someone finally said it!"

But the minute that feeling of liberation went away, I instantly regretted the way I handled the situation.

I woke up this morning feeling awful, and I had this pit in my stomach.

 I have this personality trait where I tend to take on the burden of people's pain and sadness...especially people I love and that I am close to. 

I had said some pretty mean and nasty things to someone who is probably experiencing deep pain of their own...a broken person.

I was ungodly, and looking back, I wish I would have shown more grace and compassion towards this person rather than let my temper and anger take over me. 

I prayed this morning for everyone involved, and prayed for myself. 

I hope that the next time I see this person, I'll have to courage to apologize for being a jerk, and not showing more grace. 

Hopefully, through that, this person can see God through me....

Needing Some Prayers

I took my son to the doctor today to get his hand looked at.

I hadn't touched the dressing that the burn unit had put on his hand, so it would be my first time seeing his little fingers.

Honestly, I didn't even look at his fingers at the hospital because I was so traumatized.

I remember glancing at these huge blisters that had formed on his tiny hands, and bawling.

The nurses wouldn't let me watch them pop the blisters and cut the dead skin off.

I was so distraught.

It's been two days now, so I thought I could handle it.

I held him down while the doctor delicately cut the dressing off to assess the wound.

A soon as I saw the last layer of gauze come off, I wanted to puke.

It was like something out of a horror movie.

As she reapplied the antibiotic ointment and redress it, my son started screaming in pain.

I started to shake and get dizzy.

I somehow managed to hold it together at the doctor's office.

It wasn't until I got out to the parking lot in my Jeep when the tears started coming uncontrollably.

Never in my life have I ever felt so irresponsible as a parent.

My four year old has never been to the ER for anything other than the occasional high fever.

Even with everyone telling me their horror stories with accidents with their children (some that sounded worse than my situation), it still doesn't make me feel better.

I know accidents happen, and kids get hurt.

It's part of growing up.

I just don't think my 5 month old needs an "accident" like this as part of growing up.

He won't remember this, and won't learn anything from it.

The doctor said these types of burns takes 3 weeks to heal.

I know God can heal on HIS own time.

I've been praying so hard for him to heal quickly and painlessly. 

I don't ask God for much.

Most of my prayers are prayers of thankfulness.

But lately...today...I'm needing some prayers for my son and for me.

Thanksgiving in Houston (pt.1)

As soon as we got into Houston, my mom picked us up from the airport, and we met up with my dad to have lunch at a Korean/Japanese noodle restaurant. 

We were really excited since it would have been my dad's first time ever meeting his new (and only) grandson.

If you can't tell, he was elated (and Mattis looks surprised...lol)!

Afterwards, we headed over to my grandparent's house.

I feel so lucky to be able to give my grandparents to opportunity to see their great grand children.

I know a lot of people don't have that sort of opportunity, so I felt really blessed to be able to do that for them.

My poor grandma had fallen and fractured her foot the week prior, so she was in a boot.

To make things worse, she fell in her bathroom on Thanksgiving, broke 4 ribs that collapsed her lung, and was hospitalized the entire time I was home.

I got to go see her every day at the hospital, but it wasn't the same as going to her house to see her,

Please pray for my grandma!

This is my grandpa (AKA the Rev) holding Mattis for the first time.

My kids and their great grandparents.

My grandma and me

One thing that I do every time I go home is get my hair cut.

I've lived in New England now for a year, and I still have yet to find a hair salon that I really love.

When I lived in Orange County, it felt like there were state of art hair salons in every corner, but after moving here, it's been such a challenge.

I always make a trip to Michaelyndon Salon in Houston to get my hair done with Alvin.

As always, he did not disappoint!

I told him my hair was all falling out due to post pregnancy hormones, and he knew just the hair cut to get me through the "awkward hair stage".

Seriously, you can't find a salon like that up here!

I'll write more about the rest of my trip later!

Dear Lord...

 Here's my 39 week baby bump pic, and also my last one before baby comes next Monday (or sooner).

I'm thoroughly positive that Baby M will not be here until my induction date on Monday.

If I weren't being induced, I'm sure he would probably wait even longer PAST my due date. 

It's a funny thing, but at church last Sunday, part of the sermon was about surrendering your will to God.

Do you know how hard it is for a 9 month pregnant woman to surrender her will to God?!?!

It's tough!

Lately my prayers have been this...

Dear Lord,

I know this is not the right way to pray, but...

I need you to put me out of my misery, and make this baby come out...

like right NOW...or sometime today or tonight!

But only if it's Your will of course...

And if it's not your will, can you make it your will to make this happen soon? 

In Your name I pray, Amen.

God has a sense of humor, right?

I'm sure he's laughing at my prayer while quietly telling my heart to be patient.

But seriously...

Mama is uncomfortable and miserable.

Let's speed this up, God...

I wonder if he reads my blog?

Prayer Life

Hubby and I went to a prayer breakfast at our church over the weekend.

It was a small class on prayer life, and answered questions that people had about prayer.

There are two things that stuck out to me from the class.

1. Prayer is two way communication with God.

2. One of the most common struggles that couples have in a marriage is praying together.

The first one is obvious...

Prayer is one of the most intimate forms of communication with Him.

I never feel like I talk to Him enough, and when I am talking to Him, I feel like all I am doing is asking Him for things.

This is something I'm working on.

Anyone else feel like that?

As for the #2...

That's something that I have been working on daily, and praying about of course!

I consider myself a "quiet and to myself" kind of prayer girl. 

I don't like praying out loud in front of people or groups, and that includes my husband. 

I just feel awkward and uncomfortable.

I like the conversation with God to be just Him and me.

However, I do know that praying together as a couple is important and a way to bring us closer together to God.

So this week, I'm going to make a conscious effort to pray together with my husband once a day.

I'm hoping it becomes so natural that it becomes habit.

Especially with such big changes about to happen (baby) and possibly happen (his career) in the next year, I think it's important that we pray together.

How is your prayer life as a couple?

Sunny Skies and Dog Drama

Dear New England...

Thank you for teaching me to appreciate nice weather so much!

I seriously feel like I've spent more time outside these past two weeks than I have in my entire 10 years of living in Southern California!

I think after being cooped up inside all winter long and turning into a winter hermit had me going a little stir crazy.

So when the first ray of sunshine came out, I wanted to soak up as much of it as possible!

I've never just wanted to sit around outside in the sun with no agenda in my life until now!

I grew up in a pretty hot and humid climate with mild winters (TEXAS, BABY!), and then spending 10 years in southern California where the weather is mild ALL year long made me take nice weather for granted.

We spent one of the afternoons playing some mini golf :-)

Even daddy rushed home from work a little early to meet us for a round.

I love a fresh and crisp salad with all my favorite veggies when the weather gets warm.

Also, I am a huge fan of ranch dressing (What Texan doesn't like ranch?!), but it's so high in fat and calories that I rarely buy it. However, I found an organic ranch dressing made out of yogurt that tastes SOOOOO good with hardly any unhealthy fats or calories.

Almost 23 weeks, and I'm feeling great! (minus the occasional nagging back pain)

We had some crazy "Dozer drama" this weekend. 

We normally keep him off his leash when we are out front playing with him, and for the most part we're pretty good about controlling him when joggers and other dog walkers stroll by. 

Dozer has a hard time controlling himself when people walk by our house. 

A little boy came skateboarding down our street yesterday being pulled by his little dog, and before we knew it, Dozer had darted out onto the street, scared the crap out of the poor little dog, and the little boy came flying off his skateboard.

Nick came to the rescue, calmed the boy down, and drove him and his dog down the road to his parent's house.

It just so happened that his dad was a doctor, and he knew right away his wrist was broken!

I FELT HORRIBLE!

The family was SO sweet though (hallelujah!).

They texted us a picture of their smiling son in his cast from the ER last night, and told us he would be ok.

They also kept thanking Nick for acting so quickly and bringing him home!

I was SO mad at Dozer!

He's beginning to be such a handful a lot more than I can handle at times on my own.

This dog is driving me crazy!!!!!

Pic of the happy couple enjoying the weather (pre Dozer drama)

I am STILL loving my pinterest project...the chalkboard painted pantry door! 

This week, I put a memory verse on it for Nick and I to memorize by the end of the week!

Kisses from mama :-)

I made the hubby take a pic of me this morning before church because...

Today was the first time since moving here that I've worn open toe shoes!!!!!!!!!

Oh...the little things we appreciate with nice weather....

For those who don't know, I was honorably discharged from the Marine Corps 5 months earlier than my original EAS (end of active service).

I spent the last 2 years of my career in the Marine Corps being treated for osteoarthritis, osteochondral knee defects, severe cartilage damage, meniscus tears, PCL tears, and a myriad of other things wrong with my knee and hip joints. 

Finally, after surgery, it was determined that continued service in the Corps was too great of a risk of further damage, and a bunch of important people in Washington D.C. decided it was best to medically discharge me.

The majority of my injuries came from years and years of long distance running.

I used to run an average of 6-10 miles, 6 days a week......that is no bueno!

My days of running ridiculously are over, but you can't tell a runner to stop running cold turkey.

While I've found other fun ways to stay fit (crossfit and cycling), I still like to throw on my running shoes every once in a while and go for a long run.

My body hates it, but it makes my mind feel so good!

Today, I ran a little over 3 miles...5 1/2 months prego...and yes...it felt great mentally.

However, my knees and my hips are now in pain!! 

 It'll take a few days for my body to recover, hence the reason why my days of running everyday are long gone!

Excuse the blurred out face. I didn't get permission from our neighbor to put her daughter on my blog!

Nick pulled his crotch rocket out of the garage for the first time since moving here and cleaned it up!

He's really excited to get on it now that the weather is nice!

And a beautiful weekend would not be complete without a picnic day at the park!

I hope y'all had an amazing weekend!

The Quest to Find a Church

The quest to find a church to call home is OVER!

HALLELUJAH!

This post is a continuation of this blog post that I wrote last week.

This last Sunday, our family went to check out Connect Community Church.

Just a little refresher on how we found this church...

I found this church was after a night of insomnia.

Because of my body's unwillingness to slumber one evening, I decided to pray (something I had not been doing diligently for several months), and then I decided to Google churches again (something I had spent countless hours doing already when we moved out here).

CCC was the FIRST church that popped up on my Google search that evening. 

If you really want to WHOLE story, go back and read my extremely long blog post.

As I wrote previously, I felt like this church was "the one" even before I stepped foot in it, and last Sunday our whole family got out of the house and went on our journey to try yet another new church.

As soon as we stepped foot in this church last Sunday, I immediately knew that I had "hit the jackpot".

The atmosphere of the church, the people, the worship...

Everything just felt right, and for the first time since moving here, I felt the exact same feeling I felt every Sunday when our family went to church in California at PCC.

For those who have never attended church, it's hard to explain the feeling of going to "your church".

Every other church our family tried going to out here, we felt like we were in someone else's home...a stranger's home.

The minute we walked into CCC, we felt at home....FINALLY!

I honestly feel that if this church failed the meet our needs, I probably would have lost all hope or would have REALLY REALLY been discouraged, and I think God knew this.

In the end, our family FINALLY found a home of worship!

Now that I think back at our last few months here, I really learned a lesson in patience and trusting God.

Please pray that our family gets plugged into a small group soon and involved more with ministry!

We're super duper excited!

Just some pics from the last week...

We all know about D's lack of hair growth. She was born completely bald, and her hair has grown in at a snail's pace (as both her mommy and daddy's hair did when they were kids). I finally decided she needed a little trim because her hair was growing all awkward and uneven everywhere, so the two of made a trip to the beauty salon to get our "hair did".

She is such a girly girl! She was SO excited to be getting all "done up".

 

TADA! Not much changed, but it's definitely a lot more "cleaned up".

 

I have been waiting for the day when I got out of the Marine Corps so that I could change my hair and do something completely out of Marine Corps hair regulations. So, here's my new do! I decided to put a few bright chunks of highlights at the top of my head! I love it!

Getting ready to go to church for the first time in MONTHS!

Just some holy inspiration from church. Another thing that has stuck in my head from the sermon was that the "church would be the world's last hope". I really felt that this message was powerful. With the way the world looks right now and the state of our country, the one thing that is constant is God's love, and I really hope that when things get REALLY BAD, people start finding hope in church again.

One the best preschools here in Natick is Natick Preschool. There is such a high demand to get into that school that they do a lottery to get in. Dannika's name got chosen to start in September! Before anything, she had to go to a screening and take a test to make sure she was where she needed to be developmentally. Can I just say, SHE KILLED IT! They were SO impressed that a 3 year old knew what a trapezoid was, could spell and write her own name, knew every single one of her upper and lower case letters, and had such polite manners (thank God for Southern parenting...yes ma'am, no ma'am, yes sir, and no sir!). 

Here she is getting ready to check out her new school and test!

So the preschool is attached to a wing of the high school. This school is freaking AMAZING! Every single high school kid gets issued a Macbook (paid for by taxes), and the preschoolers get Ipads...SERIOUSLY!

I think Nick and I were more nervous about her testing than she was...lol.

I think it was just pregnancy hormones, but I had a nervous breakdown yesterday about our washing machine. Our family spent a good chunk of cash on a state of the art front loading washing machine a few years ago. Everyone told us not to get them because they have severe mold and mildew issues, but I ignored everyone and got one anyways. I AM REGRETTING THIS DECISION NOW! After my nervous break down, my patient and loving husband came home from work early to take apart the washing machine, remove the moldy and mildewy rubber seal, remove the drum, and clean out ALL THE GROSSNESS (IT WAS REALLLY REALLY GROSS!). I love you, dear husband.

Our house has two living rooms, so we decided to convert one of them into a dining room and converted the dining room into a new playroom for D (and the new baby).  I love this arrangement because I can watch her while I cook in the kitchen, and I can see her from the living room. Her playroom that was upstairs will now be the new baby's room. No worries folks, we still have an extra bedroom in the basement if you come to visit!

Hope everyone is having a blessed week!

Finding our Soul Mate

Our family has been together in Massachusetts for 3 months now.

That is roughly 12 Sundays.

Twelve Sundays without a church to call home. 

It's been frustrating, stressful, and discouraging.

I never knew that finding a church to call "home" would feel like the search for my soul mate.

I moved out here with such high expectations for a church because my church in Orange County was so amazingly awesome, and I was also saved there.

Maybe God made it super easy for me to find a church when I was in Cali, because I was much more of a "broken soul" back there, and my soul needed to be in a church ASAP.

I've lived up and down Southern California (from San Diego to Oceanside to Orange County), and I have NEVER had a problem finding a church.

I didn't think much of it when we moved out here to the east coast. 

I figured I'd do a Google search (the way I found every single church I've ever attended in my adult life), and our family would just slide right into a church family....

WRONG!

I went through pages and pages of Google looking and browsing through different church websites, and I was disappointed 80% of the time.

While I won't go into great detail, a lot of the churches out here are extremely liberal and have skewed their biblical views to make mainstream society happy.

In fact, one of the churches I looked at (that stated on their website that they were Christians) had gone so far off the path of the bible, that they were studying other religions and other books as well!

Their view was something along the lines of how "all religions can come together and be in harmony"....I didn't get it either, and if you're a Christian reading this, it makes no sense.

It was just disappointment after disappointment.

I did find two churches that looked promising, and we decided to check them out.

So, here's one of our experiences...

**prepare to do some reading**

The first Sunday we went to a church out here, my stomach was in knots and I felt like the new kid going to a new school...totally like a fish out of water, and to be honest, I was kind of dreading it.

As our family entered the building, everyone was so friendly and welcoming (actually, I've never been to a church where people aren't friendly and welcoming).

I started asking around about their Sunday school program for Dannika, and I was informed that the children participate in the worship service with the adults first and then they are dismissed to their respective Sunday schools.

That was a little different than what we were used to, but I went with the flow and our family sat down towards the back (in case we needed to make an escape...lol).

When the worship service started, it started just like any other church we had been to.

Everyone stood up and began singing while the words to the songs were put on a big screen behind the church band.

Dannika had never been in an adult worship service with us, so I think she was in awe (or maybe shock).

Several songs (and a couple prayers) into the worship, things just got strange.

People started taking their shoes off and doing some sort of interpretive dance moves around the church, people were screaming at the top of their lungs, and lots of crying was happening.

(This is the part that freaked Dannika out.)

I picked up my program to see the schedule of worship, because Dannika was starting to get restless.

I realized that the worship service at this church was an hour long, the actual sermon was an hour and a half long, and Sunday school was 30 minutes longer than the adult sermon!

That's a three hour long church service!

I tried really hard to be respectful, but I felt like I was in some sort of Christian circus, and by the look on Nick's face, he looked like he was going to burst out in laughter at any moment. 

I couldn't hold my laughter in any longer when I looked up front, and I saw a man waving a big blue (or maybe it was purplse?) flag back and forth with his eyes closed (and still singing).

WHERE THE HECK DID THAT GIANT FLAG COME FROM?!?

Then he started running around the room with it like he was doing a lap with the torch at the Olympics.

I looked over at Nick, and we both gave each other "the nod".

I think we high tailed it out of there faster than the length of a knife fight in a phone booth.

We laughed hysterically all the way to the parking lot, and ended up taking Dannika to go see "Wreck It Ralph" at the movie theater instead. 

I honestly believe that the church meant well, and it just had a different style of worship and praise than what our family was expecting.

It was just so hard for us to focus, and truly get the experience that we wanted out of a church.

Like I said, I'm a strong believer that if you can not feel comfortable at a church, it'll stunt your growth in your relationship with God.

I always have felt that a church should feel like a second home and a sanctuary, and that church did not make me feel that way.

I think Nick and I were so traumatized by our experience at this first church, it made us even more discouraged about finding a home church.

We tried out another church the following Sunday, and they did not have a very well established Sunday school program for Dannika.

That was a deal breaker for me, on top of the fact that I felt their worship service a little "old fashioned", and I felt like I was 6 years old sitting at my grandpa's church in South Louisiana.

Our family gave up, and I even contemplated just listening to podcasts every Sunday from my old church.

The cruddy weather didn't really motivate us to "get out there" and check out some more churches either.

I had horrible insomnia last night, and I stayed up browsing Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram on my IPhone.

I put my phone down to try and get some sleep, and said a little prayer to God asking that our family get out of this rut and for help to find a church.

Of course, I still couldn't fall asleep, so I picked up my phone and decided I would Google some churches in the surrounding areas (I've become a little more familiar with the area I live in).

And there it was!

The VERY FIRST church that popped up on my Google search.
How could I have missed this church in my million other Google searches?!
I really feel that God had a purpose for my lack of sleep last night, and he answered my prayers (along with my family and my church family back in California who have been praying for us).

It's the first church I've looked at online since moving out here that I have been genuinely excited about going to.

I woke up Nick up in the middle of the night to share my excitement (he wasn't too happy to be woken up and he was incoherent).

I know we haven't actually physically gone to this church yet, but something inside of me tells me that this is the one!

It almost feels like the way I did when I first met Nick.

I knew he was the one before I even fell in love with him!

Lots of prayers for us please!

I'm really excited to share our experience this Sunday, and hopefully this feeling I have is right!