True Confessions

~ Blah ~

I have been in a very "Blah" mood when it comes to blogging. I always go through these phases at one point or another. Life is going great! Darren is up and walking which is amazing. He still has a very long road ahead of him, but we are getting there one day at a time.

Work has been challenging but great. This is the last week before a week off for Easter and I cannot wait! I just want to relax, catch up on a few things around the house and read a few good books!

Church is awesome! I have been singing a lot more and I love it. God speaks to me so much when I sing. I cannot take credit at all for singing either, I can only thank God for blessing me with the opportunity and the desire to worship! On top of all that we have been meeting some great couples that are becoming good friends which is really nice to have!

Darren and I are coming up on our two year anniversary this May which is crazy! I seriously married the most amazing man on this planet. I could not ask for a better husband! Through everything he has gone through he still takes the time everyday to show me that he loves me and I thank God every day for him because I am truly BLESSED!

Other than that life is good, just doing our same things day in and day out. I will try to make more of an effort to blog. Hopefully this "blah" phase will end soon! :)

Until Then,

Cheers,

Kristin

~ Hi Larious ~

While Darren was in London he saw a commercial and thought of me and knew I would love it because it was my kind of humor. Well, he was dead on and I laughed so hard. I had to share it with you all!

 

 

~ Beyond Excited ~

Tomorrow...actually today, my best friend finally comes home! I have missed him so much these last two weeks! I can't believe the two weeks are over with. It seemed so much longer than that! I hope we never have to be apart for this long again! It was terrible. I cannot wait to see his wonderful smile, hear is sexy voice and feel his arms around me! The hours cannot go fast enough! He lands at 7:30pm so please pray for a safe flight for him!

Until Then,

Cheers,

Kristin

~What A Week~

Since the passing of my brother in law, its been pretty hectic. Trying to find a flight that we could afford for Darren to fly to London was a nightmare. But amazingly, and not surprisingly, God worked it all out for us and we found the perfect flight for a more than perfect price. So Darren left for London this past Monday and will be gone till the 17th of Feb. That means in 10 days I get to see my baby again and I honestly cannot wait!!!

At first I thought to myself, wow two whole weeks of just Kristin time, but after the first day I was ready for Darren to be back. It is definitely much quieter, much cleaner and a whole lot lonelier without him here. Now the cleaner part I don't mind at all. It has actually given me a lot of time to do all the odd jobs that have been bugging me for quiet some time, like cleaning all the blinds in the house and finally getting that annoying cobweb on the corner of the ceiling. Things that you notice everyday but just don't have the time to properly clean them when you want. It has been really refreshing to get it done and I feel a huge sense of accomplishment. But I would trade all that in to have my husband next to me again. I haven't been sleeping well and I find myself talking to our dog Daisy just to hear someones voice, pathetic I know! I didn't want to do too much this week and with all this crazy rain, I pretty much stayed in every night. But starting tonight I am going to hang out with some friends which will be nice.

Natalie and I are going for sushi which I cannot wait!!! I have been saving my appetite all day for our dinner tonight! I am leading a song at church tomorrow which I am so blessed to be given the opportunity to do. And the best part is, I will have the choir standing behind me singing along with me. I have always dreamed of doing that! I am so excited!!! I also have been making some friends at the Younger Marrieds group at our church and hopefully will get together with them as well! Im looking forward to this week and excited to see what all it brings.

Darren is doing quiet well. The cold weather has been hard for him. It makes his leg ache quiet a bit which I think will be something he will have to deal with now. Since he has a metal rod that goes from the bottom of his foot to the middle of his leg, I think he will feel the cold a lot more. Thankfully we live in So.Cal where it really doesn't' get too cold, but he is feeling it in London. They have had so much snow lately! More than I have ever seen there. Makes me wish I were there, its so beautiful!

Darren's family is doing better as well. There were over 500 people at Roberts funeral which is amazing. Just goes to show how loved he and his family are! What a blessing to have that kind of support. Darren said it was beautiful funeral. He even got up and spoke which I am so proud of him for. He stayed a few days extra to spend time with his dad and the family and had a really great time and they loved having him so I am glad he got to do that. I can only imagine how hard this must be on them all and I know only time will heal the hurt they are feeling, but their spirits are up and they are smiling and trying to keep on with life which is wonderful. Please keep them in your prayers though.

Ok, well I have to get ready for dinner tonight! Felt good to blog again! Hopefully I will try t do some more soon! And to those who do read my blog, especially family in London, please feel free to leave me a comment! I love to hear what you have to say! Yes, I am talking to you Samantha :) ha ha!

Until Then,

Cheers,

Kristin

~ A Tragic Day ~

Im urging everyone to please pray for my family in England. My brother in law Robert, passed away last night in a horrible car accident. He was only 19. He made it to the hospital and a few hours later went. Please pray for his dad (Darren's dad) Dave, his wife Jan and there other son David. I spoke with Jan briefly before he passed and I didn't even know what to say, I mean what can you really say? Please pray for Darren as well. Everyone has taken it very hard. Death is always hard, but when a life taken so unexpectedly without any goodbyes I think its even harder. Darren is going to try and fly out this weekend, we are just waiting on a call back from the surgeon to get the ok from him.

Robert was such an amazing young man. Him and his brother David! I remember when I met him for the first time he was so polite, funny, just a good all around guy! Everyone loved Rob! He was a little flirt and he knew it. I can only pray he is in a better place now.

We miss you Robert and love you very much!

(Robert is on the top right, above his mother Jan)

~First Day Back~

God is already testing me on Goal #7 (see previous post)

Not even two minutes after publishing my blog last night about my goals for 2009 I spill a whole bag of cat food EVERYWHERE in my laundry room! Took a long time to clean up too because the pieces are so small and half of the bag went under my dryer! Do you think the big guy upstairs is already putting my patience to the test?!?...Yes! 

Today was my first day back at work after a three week vacation, which was wonderful and relaxing. If I thought my patience was tested last night, oh boy, I didn't know what was coming to me today! To put it lightly I work with two very difficult assistance. Im an assistant as well in the classroom, there are 4 of us total. The two older women I work with drive me up the wall. I can't really go into details but everyday is a struggle for me! A BIG struggle. Today was the worst of them all. God really needs to work on my patience level because I didn't have any today! #7 is going to be a hard one for this year, but im going to persevere!

On a side note, I cooked fish tonight for the first time ever and it turned out great. It was Tilapia and was very yummy and I plan on cooking it again! Oh, and I just discovered that I DO like cooked spinach, not just raw, who would have guessed!

Until Then,

Cheers,

Kristin

~My Goals for 2009 (in no particular order except for #1)~

I wasn't doing to make a list this year. I didn't feel the need and I didn't have any goals, but as the year as gone on all these things have been weighing on my heart so strongly that I really think God is challenging me to better myself in many ways. I am actually going to print this and put it up in my house so remind myself of these goals that I am going to work on this year. I know im not perfect and I know that I might not meet every goal, but I am going to try my hardest. And I believe that when you share your goals with people the help hold you accountable. Here is to 2009!

1. Continue to strengthen and deepin my relationship with Jesus.

2. Be a better wife for my husband.

3. Cook more

4. Lose 50 pounds by the beginning of summer school

5. Read my Bible more

6. Stay in contact with my friends more than I have in the past and be a better friend

7. Have more patience

8. Be better with money

9. Go back to college in the fall

10. Not worry about what other people think of me

11. Learn to forgive more

12. Let the past be the past

13. Start saving for a down payment on a house

14. Get a car/motorcycle for Darren

15. Read 10 books by the end of the year

16. Be more active with singing

17. Serve the homeless for Thanksgiving

18. Walk hand in hand with my husband

19. Run in a marathon

20. Trust in God for everything

~One Reason Why I Like Facebook~

One reason why I like Facebook is that is brings people together very easily, especially old high school friends. I recently got in contact with an old friend from my alma-mater. We have emailed back and forth for a little over a week. My best friend Natalie (who I also went to high school with) got in contact with her and invited us all out to dinner to catch up.

To be honest, I was nervous. I knew this girl Lauren was going to be great because she was at school. I knew we would get along fine. I honestly had a flashback to how I looked in high school to how I look now and I thought, "Ohmygosh, im going to be that girl at the reunion who people say, look how fat she turned out!" Hair, makeup and clothes wise, I am much better in that department, but weight wise, not so much.

Well, I regardless of my fears, we had am amazing time. We met up at Los Toros for dinner and couldn't stop talking the whole time. It was a lot of fun, and really neat to know that even after 10 years, a whole decade we really are so much the same people we were in high school just a little older and wiser. It made me excited for my 10 year reunion which should be this year. I can't believe its been 10 years since I graduated from LAB! Crazy! But I definitely need to get my but in gear and start getting healthy. Its such a battle for me. But I was watching Oprah today and was really motivated, haha, seriously! So even though I didn't make any new years resolutions when that clocked hit midnight, I do have one now, actually a few!

  

Anyway, tonight was a great night filled with good food, good conversation, laughter and some down to earth girly time! It was great! I am blessed with wonderful friends and people in my life. Can't wait to see what is next in store for this year!

Until Then,

Cheers,

Kristin

~Happy New Years~

Happy New Year everyone! I pray you all had a wonderful, relaxing and safe holiday! This year we had my sister and her boyfriend over for some 7 Layer Dip, Margaritas, a little too much Tequila and a really fun game of Mexican Train. We had a blast and it was the perfect way to ring in the new year!

 

 

This year has been the most challenging year of my life to date, but I know that God has great things in store for this next year! I am excited to see where he takes us and we are both excited to follow his lead.

Here is to the closing chapter of 2008 and the beginning of great things to come for 2009!

Cheers,

Kristin

~Beyond Overdue~

It has been nearly two months since I last wrote a post and even before that I know that they were far and in between. I have been debating for a long time whether or not I want to even keep my blog anymore. The way life has been this past year I don't want this blog to become a place where all I do is complain about our hardships. With all the hardships that have happened and are still happening, it makes it hard for me to want to blog. The amount of times that I have sat at this computer, logged onto my typepad account and clicked on "Create A New Post" and then done nothing...you would be surprised! My only real motivation is not deleting this blog is the fact that I know my family in England read this (Hi Jan!) and I know this is a huge way of keeping in touch with everything going on in our lives. Needless to say, I am feeling rather torn at the moment about what I really want to do. But since I am posting, I might as well update you all on what has happened in the last few months.