Puppies Out Our Ears

Our other female dog, Rita, had eleven Labradoodle puppies! They are now almost five weeks old, and we are trying to find good homes for them before we leave for Alaska May 15. There are lots of puppies around here! They are super cute, and lots of fun, tho. Gabe just can't stop talking about them, and when we come into the puppy pen, all eleven puppies come running over to us, wagging their little tails and barking their cute baby barks.

I have been having a blast naming the puppies. There are two black ones, five red, and four brown. I named the brown ones Mocha, Cocoa, Frappe, and Latte, and the red ones are Apricot, Rose, Patch, Rusty and Rojo. When I got to the black ones, I had run out of good ideas, so they are just Curly and Coal. Puppies are fun! They are listed for sale here, and we have already found new homes for two of them.

And, as if my life isn't busy enough with a toddler and a two-month-old, I started a new job on Monday! 

I am answering calls, emails, and texts for a guy named Henry who has a puppy business. He is pretty much a pet store, but he specializes in puppies. He finds good homes for about a thousand puppies a year!

So some days, like yesterday, (my first day :/) it is crazy busy with calls and texts peppering you in the midst of everyday busy-ness, but then there are days like today, where I've only gotten two emails  and one call all morning. Life feels a lot more relaxed today than it did yesterday!

With all the learning going on for this job last week and also this week, it sometimes feels like my head is about to explode from information overload! I had never had a smartphone before, or a Bluetooth, or an Ipad, but suddenly I had to learn how to use all those things besides learning all the information to tell people looking at puppies. Shipping information, payment information, puppy personality information, the difference between dog breeds - my head felt like it was swimming yesterday, so it's really nice to have a slow day today.

This was a job we were going to start when we moved to Alaska, but the person doing it up until now suddenly needed to quit, so Henry asked us to start the job a month early. Andy has been very busy lately fixing up things we need to sell before we move, car, camper, etc, as well as doing his job helping plow and plant here on the farm. He's hoping to have the crops in for his dad before we move. So him taking on an additional job really wasn't an option. Therefore that left me!

I enjoy answering calls and texts very much, although it can be stressful when Jasmine is crying and Gabe needs his diaper changed, and it's time for supper and nothing is made yet. (yesterday was this way.) But in the midst of the hassle, I have been trying to focus on spending quality time with my children whenever there is a break between calls. I don't want to be too busy for them, even if it means missing a call sometimes and just calling the person back. The nice thing about my children is that they are young enough to still take naps and then I can get a lot done!

Last night after supper, Gabe got out his little toy phone and began jabbering excitedly into it about puppies. Just like he saw Mommy do all day! Children are so precious. :)

We Have THIS Moment

I don't like mornings. Well, maybe it's like a love-hate relationship, because I LOVE coffee, and big breakfasts, and having devotions all together. But the morning rush? No thank you. It seems like everyone needs something in the mornings, and they need it NOW. Gabe needs a bottle and his diaper changed because it absolutely cannot hold one more drop. Jasmine is crying because she woke up and is hungry. Andy needs breakfast ASAP so he can get out the door to work, and me? I just need some time to get dressed!

With Jasmine getting up in the night to be fed, it's all I can do to drag myself out of bed when my alarm rings at 6:10 AM. Often, like this morning, I cheat and go back to sleep, only to rush around the rest of the morning feeling very behind. I guess I could help this scenario by just getting up on time, but boy is it hard these days! I haven't had a good night's sleep since Jasmine was born two and a half months ago.

This morning, in the midst of the craziness, Andy said, "Let's live our lives as though we are 60 years old and looking back."

Huh, what??

"You know how old people remember back to the days they had small children and often regret how little time they spent playing with them, or just enjoying the moment? Let's try to live now in such a way that we don't have regrets when we are old."

Wise words, and ones I hope to remember in the coming days. Childhood is so fleeting. I already miss when Gabe was a baby. I don't want to lose Jasmine's babyhood by wishing she was able to hold her own bottle, play with toys, talk, etc. By always looking ahead toward what is next, I too easily miss what is happening NOW.

So this morning I took the time to read Gabe a book. Four times. And when he wakes up from his nap, I want to go play tractors with him like he is always begging for. And meanwhile, I am trying to adjust my attitude toward busy mornings. Because when the house is empty and the children gone to their own homes and lives, I KNOW I will wish I had those crazy moments back. Those precious, wonderful years of raising children.

Love Story

I was sixteen when I first met Andy. He was twenty-one. Way out of my league. But he was just such a great guy! My dad is the director of the Ohio Wilderness Boys Camp, and Andy came to work there as a counselor. 

Andy liked the same things I liked. Fishing. Hiking. Playing musical instruments. Singing. He also hung out with my family quite a bit on his off days, so I saw a lot of him. It wasn't too long until I liked Andy a whole awful lot even though I tried to guard my heart and not let the feelings get out of hand. I wanted to wait for God's plan for my love life, but meanwhile there were all these strong FEELINGS!

When I was almost nineteen I went down to South Carolina to volunteer as a cook at a girls camp. It was something I had always wanted to do, but part of the reason I went was to get away from Andy and try to forget him since he didn't seem to be showing any interest in me other than as a friend. 

It didn't work. Hard as I tried to forget about the guy, he just stayed on my mind. Andy had finished his term as a counselor at this point, but had come back to Camp as a Supervisor, so even though we were states apart, I heard a lot about him from my family. 

In August of 2013 I went home to Ohio for a visit, and it was during that time that my dad told me Andy had asked his permission to date me. I was floored! I had thought he wasn't interested in me, thought I was too young, etc, etc, but Dad informed me that Andy had in fact asked my dad to date me a YEAR AND A HALF earlier, but my dad told him I was too young.

Andy waited and waited and about gave it all up, but then my dad told him if he was still interested in me, Andy would have to date DAD for a while until he was sure Andy was serious enough. What a patient man I married! Andy endured the testing, and we finally started dating!

Two months later, Andy asked me to marry him. 

I said yes!

We were married in the spring of 2014 on a beautiful sunny day. We sure were glad it wasn't raining, because we rode away from the wedding on a motorcycle. Yeehaw!

We are now celebrating three years of married life, and while life has changed us in many ways, we are more in love now than when we got married.

It has been so rewarding to see Andy grow as a man. From boyfriend, who drove through the night to spend a day with me in South Carolina only to drive the 10 hours back the next day to be on duty at the Ohio camp. To husband, who wasn't scared off by tears, but always held me until I was ready to talk about what was bothering me. To father, who does WAY more than his share of rocking crying babies, changing dirty diapers, and doing the dishes and other household chores. My respect for him grows each day.

And now we will leave for Alaska in five weeks to start our own adventure on the Last Frontier. There is no one I'd rather do it with. We like each other a lot.  :)

Pros and Cons of Camper Living

Pro - Spending a lot of time with those you love - you can't get away!

Con - When it is cold or rainy and you don't want to go outside, you never get any alone time.

Pro - You have to be polite to each other and wait for the other person to get out of the way before you can get through the tight places.

Con - You can't MOVE without tripping on someone or something!

Pro - Living in a camper the way we did was a huge money saver for us! With rent around $1,000 a month for an apartment around here, we decided to do something different.

Con - Being different than everyone you know is HARD! We felt socially awkward and looked down on for the way we live. 

Pro - Only having a tiny bit of house space forces you to go outside and enjoy the outdoors - especially when you have a busy toddler!

Con - The busy toddler makes rainy days in a tiny space rather miserable.

Pro - Simplistic lifestyle - You simply don't have the space to accumulate much "stuff". This also helps you live cheaply. Double pro!

Con - If you're like me and care what people think of you, living simply can often leave you feeling out of style, behind the times, etc. It's hard to not be jealous of other people's big beautiful kitchens and stylish decor.

Pro - No payments! No debt! This in turn freed us up to go to Bible School for 8 weeks, go on a trip to Alaska in 2015, house-sit for friends for months at a time, and take a mission trip to Tibet when Gabe was almost a year old. We wouldn't have been able to do those things if we were either renting or trying to pay off a house.

Pro - Living in a small space with children will either drive you crazy or make you more creative in finding ways to entertain them. We found that this kiddie pool with dried corn kernels occupied Gabe for at least half an hour before he got bored with it and we had to move on to something else. (Short attention span, that one)

In conclusion, living in the camper has been a stretching experience for us. Especially me. I feel like I have learned a lot the last three years about doing what I do because I enjoy it, not because of what people will think of me. I love how we are thinking outside the box with our lives instead of just following the crowd. Because the crowd is not always right! Who says young couples have to go into heaps of debt as soon as they get married? There are only two of you. What happened to starting off small and working your way up? Sometimes it seems like my generation thinks we have to start off marriage where our parents are now. Not true! Ask them. Your parents probably started off their married lives without very much and worked up to where they are today. There shouldn't be any shame in simple living. It shouldn't be abnormal to live within your means. 

Sure it doesn't look like we have much, but that's okay. We don't have much. But we own everything we have, free and clear. We aren't putting up any fronts to make people think we are doing better financially than we actually are. 

And I have come to like it that way.

Puppies!

Our dog, Cherokee, had puppies a few weeks ago and we have been having a lot of fun with the cute little babies. Gabe especially is always wanting to go see the "poppies" as he calls them. Andy put the puppies and their mom in a big fenced in area that we can see from our motorhome window, and Gabe spends a lot of time watching them play. 

Here is Gabe with our dog, Cherokee. She is a real sweetheart and good with children.

Since we don't want to have three adult dogs and seven puppies with us on the way to Alaska, we are trying to sell the puppies to good homes. It will be sad to see them go, but I wouldn't want to travel with that many dogs in the motorhome. That would be a little too much! They are posted for sale here if anyone is interested.