My New Role

I've always been a teacher.  Sure a wife and mother, but my calling and occupation has been a teacher.  I love teaching and love middle school students especially.  My role these days is quite different.  I've transitioned to being a caregiver and I'm really honored I have the chance to do that.  B's parents live with us now and I take care of them full time.  I could list the things I do, but really I just love and care for them.  I really do love them.  They are our family.  I no longer think about my family of 6, rather my family of 8.  It's nice being a multigenerational family (most of the time) and of course we have our ups and downs just like any family.  

My FIL has Alzheimer's and my MIL has some physical restrictions and not much strength.  Bryce and I made the decision to move them in with us around Christmas time and I began looking at houses.  We finally found the perfect house for us in March and moved in April.  P/V sold their house in Texas and flew to NC April 22.  We've lived together in this new house for 9 months!  Our house is great.  There's enough room for all 8 of us and we have a bonus room upstairs so the kids can have some space away from adults.  We have so many funny stories and I wish I would have written them all down, so maybe I'll try to document them here.  

Let me try and play catch up LOL  

Bryce got a job at The College at Southeastern (SEBTS) and we moved to NC in August 2021.  Rin is in 9th grade at Franklinton High School.  She participated in the Marching Band and right now she's on the high school swim team.  Abe is in 7th grade at Cedar Creek Middle School.  He made the school football team and is on the wrestling team.  Wes is in 6th grade also at CCMS.  Wes was the manager of the football team because he was too young to play and he's also on the wrestling team.  Ell is in 4th grade at Youngsville Elementary.  She's on the Battle of the Books team at school.  Her school is year round so every 9 weeks, she has 3 weeks off that she gets to stay home with me!  Paul and Vicki come with us to school events and sporting events too.  I take them to all their doctor appointments, nail appointments, hair appointments etc...  We call them our adult children :) 

Back in North Carolina

 It's hard to believe we are back in NC after 7/8 years of being in Texas.  We have been back for a while but I've been completely absent in the blogging habit.  We live in Youngsville, NC and B's parents live with us now too. 

Basketball Team

 I can't even begin to try and go back and catch up.  Not today anyways...maybe one day I will lol.  

Rin is in 7th grade and tried out for the Reading Jr. High Volleyball team in August.  She did not make the team (tear) but we weren't that surprised because she has never played volleyball in her life.  She's on the taller side but she still didn't have much of the knowledge and skill to make the team.  

After Christmas R tried out for the basketball team and she made it!  We are so excited for her.  This feels different than all other other sports she has played because for the first time, she has earned it on her own hustle and skill, not our registration money.  She has worked hard and we are very proud of her.  Yesterday she found out that she made the A team, for the first week at least.  I am extremely proud of her humility and desire to get better each day.  I've heard many coaches say they can teach skill but they can't teach heart and hustle.  R's practices are before school at 6:30.  She wakes herself up at 5:30 and gets everything ready to go.  We just drive her there.  She's very motivated and pretty independent. 

Because of Covid-19, only one parent can attend games.  B and I have not talked about how we will decide who will go.  I'm hopeful that maybe they will allow 2 parents to attend games, but he says that won't happen.  Stupid Covid-19.  

I don't have any pictures of her in her uniform but here's a picture of the first day of try-outs when we dropped her off at 6:15 am.  

Wow....Just wow

I cannot believe I've gone an entire 6 months (half a year) without documenting anything.  It's pretty sad and a little unbelievable all at the same time.  I'm trying to talk myself back into getting in the habit and rhythm but I want to be realistic and reasonable.  It's summer right now, June 27th to be exact so I have time.  Question is: Will I use my time to blog? 

Here's our most recent family picture.  June 16, 2018 after the Spartan Sprint and the day before Father's Day.  I have tons to upload and update. 

12th Anniversary

We didn't forget our Anniversary....we just didn't make a big deal about it.  I believe it was Friday (December 8) when I asked B if he had gotten me anything and he said he hadn't.  I told him it was okay because I hadn't gotten him anything, not even a card.  We just wanted to be together.

Merge Christmas Party 12/8/17

Our 12th anniversary was on a Sunday and we started the day off like any other Sunday.  We went to 8:15 service with the family and then to Merge at 9:30. When I say our family, I mean the 9 of us because we had the Marsh cousin.  PM had his company Christmas party on the 9th so we hosted the 3 Marshlings for a fun sleepover.  Our kids love it when they sleep over and it's fun when they all play together.  B was teaching Merge so he threw some of our wedding pictures up and talked about our anniversary with the class.  It was really sweet of him to do that.  It's always fun to reminisce about our wedding day.  After class we picked up all the kids and came home for lunch.  B grilled burgers and we had left overs plus a cheese and meat tray.  P&A came over to pick up their kids so they stayed and ate lunch with us.  It was fun to hang out with them for a while.  After lunch our family took traditional Sunday afternoon rests before Awana.

On the shuttle to church 12/10/17

Our plan was to eat at Red Lobster while the kids were at Awana for 2 hours, but since College Park had their Christmas program that night, Awana was only 1 hour long.  We didn't have enough time to drive to hwy 6 to eat, so we just hung out for an hour.  Since Awana was shorter, we came home and got to hang out with the kids before putting them to bed.

Our real anniversary date will be two fold.  We are seeing Star Wars: The Last Jedi on Sunday December 17th and then we are staying over night in New Orleans before attending the Saints/Falcons game on December 24th.  I love BFH!

Star Wars 12/17/17

Halloween 2017

I think Halloween is so fun.  We decorate and I usually buy soap for the teachers as a little happy.  I look forward to when my kids are older and we can go to haunted houses together.  We've gone to Sea World the past couple of years for Halloscream and that's always fun too.  I like getting scared.

This year we had dress up and Halloween costumes I bought last year on sale, so we didn't have to buy anything for this year's Halloween.  The kids had 4 different opportunities to dress up but I'm not sure I have a picture from all the nights.  Let me recap.

Tuesday October 24th was our school's Spirit Night at CFA Greatwood.  Kids could dress up and participate in the costume parade and contest.  I had to work a shift for PTO so I was going to be there anyways.  We were there from 4:00 pm to 5:30 pm. 

Cheetah girl, Frankie-stein, Captain from Star Wars, sky landers

Thursday October 26th was our school's Bootastic Math & Reading Night that is held every year.  It's a lot of fun and the teachers do a great job putting together activities for the kids to enjoy.  Kahoot was the biggest hit this year.

Saturday October 28th was our annual block-party.  B was unfortunately out of town so he had to miss it but we had a good turn out. Frank got on the microphone and announced to everyone that they were expecting in June!  I love our cul-de-sac and maybe next year, I will try and plan a cul-de-sac Christmas get together where the kids can draw names and exchange gifts. 

Oliver as Mickey Mouse

Old School Bobbin' for Apples

Frank brought out the fire pit because it was cold.

Tuesday October 31st FINALLY Halloween.  We met the Parles and trick-or-treated with them in Greatwood.  It was a little rainy and drizzled on and off for the entire night but the kids didn't care.  They all four came home with tons of candy!

Rapunzel

Angry Bird

Black Power Ranger

Frankie

My People

CG Games 2017 "Rise Above"

Last year I competed in CG games with 2 Fit 2 Quit.  This year B & I competed together on a co-ed team with Mike & Alli Kelley.  Our team name, Flex n Finesse, was really clever and Alli made our shirts.

Prelims were held in August on 2 different Saturdays.  We competed in both although not everyone did all 4 events.  I did all 4 on the first Saturday but knew that I could re-do them the following Saturday as well.  B's parents were in town for the second Saturday of Prelims so they came to watch and sweat with us.  I love competing with B and hear him cheering me on too.

Our van, Stormy, on the way to CG games

200,000 miles on Stormy!

Once all the times were put in, our team made it to finals as #21 out of 25 to qualify for finals.  We were so excited and wanted to do it even though we knew we were not actually going to win. There was no way because the teams ranked 1 and 2 had times minutes faster than us.  But we were proud of ourselves because there were plenty of co-ed teams that didn't make it to finals.

Finals were scheduled November 18th in Austin, TX.  We made plans to go and spend the night in a hotel for Friday night and Saturday night. Since it was my birthday weekend, we wanted to make it a fun weekend in Austin.  Check-in was Friday night so we met A&M at the CG headquarters.  After checking our team in and getting our bags, we went to dinner at some hamburger place (I can't remember the name) and it was really good.  While eating, we went over the events and all the rules once more and tried to talk strategy about the events for us to split.  We tried to get back to the hotel and get to sleep before it getting real late because we wanted to be at the fields at 6:30 am. 

Saturday was a lot of fun and our team's goal was to just finish and not die.  I was worried about the monkey bars on the peak event and Alli was worried about the endurance.  Our schedule was set for us and we had breaks built in between each event.  Our first event was interval which is one of my favorite and then Peak was next.  Peak was just a big obstacle course sort of that had sandbell throws, bear crawls, monkey bars, balance beam, and a few walls to climb over.  There was also a large inflatable slide that we had to climb up and then slide down.  Since we were a team, we each ran through the course once and had to switch over a timer we wore on our ankles.  Our third event was Endurance and it was tough because we had to carry two 15 lb sandbells on a run after doing mat exercises with those two sandbells.  We made it and none of us quit.  We finished with Strength & Agility where we each had to complete two events for a total of 8 events.  There was one that was a sandbell throw over a bar, so Alli took that one.  In our practice, I tried to throw a 20 lb bell over a field goal post and could never clear it, so I did not feel comfortable with that. 

When everything was over, we packed up and went back to the hotel.  I sort of wanted to stay and watch the finals, but we didn't know anyone who made it to the super finals, and our kids had been out there all day.  We found a dominoes and ordered pizza and went back to the hotel to watch the LSU game.