Happy New Years!!!

New Years is a time of New Beginnings. Being a Christian I can't get around the fact that God has given us the opportunity to begin again through His new life. 2 Corinthians 5:17 states "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!" (BTW the rest of the chapter is great, but it would be too long) AMEN! God has taken our old selves with all the sin and recreated us into something new that can change and be changed.
So now here I am in my human attempt to make some changes in my life that will cause me to be better. I do this with the understanding that most likely I will fail, but with God's help I will be able to be the person He wants me to be and I want to be.

Resolutions:
#1 Drink less DP in order to create a healthier body and lose some weight
#2 Read my Bible each and every day
#3 Try to do more crafty things for myself and with my boys

I probably could do a few more, but they say to do things that you can accomplish. So it's your turn. Tell me what yours are.

Happy New Year!! May God bless you and your family this year with wonderful memories.

Views of Christmas

We tortured our children this year by making them wait until the afternoon to open presents. Actually I think it was more torture for the grandparents.

Asher the Basher

I am amazed that are tree has survived this year. Asher likes to press his boundaries and the tree was one of those places. Here he is in action. He just loved the beads too much.

Meeting of the minds

Festival of Lights - Riverside

In downtown Riverside there is an inn called Mission Inn. It is rather famous and has had many well known people stay there including a few presidents. Needless to say they have beautiful lights around this time of year. Here is a picture of our boys in front of a gorgeous tree. You can tell Aiden was really excited about it.

One of the reasons I love Southern California

The first picture is what I picked. The second picture shows how many are still on the tree.

They add so much color to our house.

There are many reasons to not like So Cal, and I am sure that traffic has to be the number one complaint. In spite of the negatives I find the positives. In our backyard we have three fruit trees, orange, lemon, and avocado. Two of the three produce for us and we are trying to figure out why the avocado does not. Here are some pictures from the lemon tree. I noticed today that they were ready to be picked. Here are the fruits of our tree.This is the orange tree. It is almost ready.

Christmas Open House

I love throwing parties. I enjoy watching people interact and having my friends meet other friends. This season I decided to throw an open house and invite all of my friends that I know (in the area) without the constraint of being here at a certain time or leaving at a certain time. I wanted to be a place for people to come have a little fun and move on. We had a small group come, and we had a blast. It was so great. Here is a picture of the boys with their Uncle J.

Concert

So this week I had the unique opportunity to go out all by myself....no side kicks. Where does a mom go when she has no kids? Well, the spa would have been nice, but instead I went to a Christmas concert starring Michael W. Smith. It was great, but even better was getting to see Melinda Doolittle. Now for those of you who keep up with American Idol will know who she is. She got to the #3 spot and then received the boot. It was very exciting. I was really into that season, but have yet to follow it again. Why, then, you ask was I so into it? Melinda and I went to high school together. Yes, we were friends. We sang in the Union Avenue Singers (Union high stands proud forever, loyalty rides high. Memories forget them never as the years go by, friends we make from year to year watch as goals are reached. Union high will always be dear to our memory). It was fun to see how she has gone so far. I am proud of her and what God has done with her life. Go Melinda!

Addresses

Ok all who would like a card from the Atchisons must send their addresses or otherwise do not complain about how I don't keep in touch.

It's been one of those days

It's been one of those days. I had a rather frustrating day at work. Then I run to get the kids from a friend who graciously watched them while Adam had a meeting in Claremont. While I was feeding one, Avery decided to show his muscle by throwing a baseball over the fence which hit the nearby window. After dealing with a hysteric child who did not want to face his issue we went to the apartments to give our information and see what we need to do. Then we head to Target to get diapers because we had none. Home by 5 to cook dinner and then here I am ready for kids to be in bed and the magic fairy to clean up dinner, do the laundry and straighten the once clean house. I know many of you have had one of those days. I grab a Dr. Pepper and my Bible and turn to James. Here is what I read "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."

Ok, so, before I could finish the blog, I was on the phone w/ my dad and I was away from the computer and my Bible...only to find out that Asher (whom Aiden has nicknamed so appropriately, Basher) had destroyed (i.e. eaten) several pages...Adam tells me there is a prophetic act--an OT (Elisha or Ezekiel) and a NT (Rev) reference-- to eating the scrolls (i.e. Scriptures), literally.

Back to the point. I know my trials are not horrible nor are they even a little bad. They are minor, but they are still my trials in which God is teaching me how to persevere because He desires me to be more mature.

Thank you Jesus for loving me enough to want me to grow in my faith in you. I wish that the hard things would go away, yet I know that they are what keep me glued to you. Help me to see that I am completely and utterly dependent on you. Help me to see the big picture and know that in reality my life is a dream. There are so many others who face far greater battles each day and here I am complaining about mine. Yet you still love me no matter what I do or say. What a peace to know I have nothing to offer and you require nothing more than myself. Amen.

Piano Recital

Avery had his first piano recital yesterday and I even got to participate.

Christmas Time

One of my favorite things about Christmas is the lights. They are just so pretty. One year we got an e-mail with this in it. I love it. I wish we were as smart as these people and could get this done at our house, but this year I will just settle for lights. Check it out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TD4g0gmQSLk
Here is another one just for fun. Same music, different house
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qaIjJ44tcg

Family Fun

My parents came in town and we took a trip south to San Diego to see our friend, Shamu.

Two, too, to

So here is a snippet of a conversation at our house tonight:

Adam: Didn't you tell Avery to stop throwing that?

Me: Yes, I did.

Adam: Aiden is too now

Aiden: No, I'm three.

Everytime I think about it I laugh.

Oh Brother!

The other night Aiden asked to be put with Asher in his crib so I did. After about 1 minute Aiden was asking to get out. I don't think he liked having his hair pulled and Asher did not like sharing his bed with his brother at the moment.

My kids are just too cute

Just in case you are wondering, I didn't forget Avery. He is cute too, but he is gone at the moment so there is no current picture. Look at the previous post. He is pretty cute there.

All in a day (not really)

Here was the climb to the top in pictures.

Because I haven't post in awhile

I haven't posted in quite awhile so that should give you an insight to our lives here in So Cal. We did have a wonderful break thanks to Veteran's Day and I couldn't have been more thankful. It was Adam's birthday last Friday so we had a group go to BJs for dinner. Of course nothing goes has planned and there was a major accident which took people 1 hour to get 12 miles, but it was still a wonderful time. Now he is 30! We are getting old ;) Adam's parents were also here so we spent the rest of the weekend with them. On Monday we had some much needed family time. We attempted to hike Mount Rubidoux (pictures to come later). The boys did well it was about a mile and a half walk up and down the hill around lunch time. Life continue to go on whether we would like to pause or not.

Halloween

Of course we need to post the pictures of our Jonas Brothers. Our boys love music and rockin' out so I thought this costume was appropriate. It was the first time in about 3 years Avery wasn't a super hero. Avery was so excited about Halloween that he got it all ready the night before. Once we were at our repective Trunk or Treat places they were a little overwhelmed. All in all though they had a fun time and we have more candy than we will ever eat.

Fall Festival

We got ourselves ready for one Halloween celebration and here is the picture to prove it. This is not the boys real costumes. They are going to be rock stars with guitars and all, but we weren't ready yet. Asher was a frog, but we took off his costume before this picture. Here is one with him as a frog.

God can do it!

Sometimes I listen to people's stories about how God has totally changed them and thier lives. I tend to think that is them, but this is me. He can't do that for me. How untrue that is. He can and He will make changes for me. I need to believe. Here is a video link to some people that showed how God has changed them.

http://www.rhchurch.org/pages/cardboard-testimonies/

The oldest to the youngest

If you look at the middle you see the two big boys and the two little ones.

So we tried to recreate a previous photo. The first one is of the big boys when they were 10 and 8 months old. The second one is other their brothers who are 6 and 5 months old. I think the younger two were much more cooperative although the group picture looks a lot like the other one.

Why I love October

One of the reasons I love October is the fall festivities. One of my favorites is the pumpkin patch. The boys and I took a road trip up to Bakersfield to visit our "neighbors". Cynthia was also without a husband. So what do we do when there are no husbands we load up 7 kids and head out for fun. We had a blast. I was utterly amazed at their great behavior since they had stayed up late the night before. They went through a maze, pretended we were ants, went on a hay ride, had a picnic, and got our face painted. We have been going to pumpkin patches for awhile (since the big boys were babies) so there was some nostalgia for us. See next post.

The Up Hill Battle

I know that many of you are teachers and others know at least one (you know me:)), but it is hard to describe what a battle it is now a days (or at least in California). Most days I try to stay positive about teaching because I am surrounded by negativity. I have a hard time working in an environment like that so I try to overcompensate. Then there are days where I feel like crying. This week has been one of those weeks. I love my class. They are sweet. They are fun. They want to learn (I think). YET, I look in their faces and realize my worth as a teacher is based on their scores on the CST(that's the state test we give every spring). I look at them and their home lives and think, my worth as a teacher is dependent upon parents putting aside their wants to care for their children by making sure they do their homework and work with them at home on things they need help with. I look at them and see their work and think, my worth as a teacher is whether they can figure this out in the amount of time I give them. It seems impossible some days to think that these children who work so hard to understand yet can't seem to get the wires straightened out for whatever reason will ever "get it". So then the question becomes where is the battle that I need to fight? It is for the large mass or the one? Am I waiting till I know for sure they all get it, or do I plow ahead hoping that in the next lesson it will become clearer? I am in a quandary with my job. It is rough and hard, but "I get summers off". Thanks for letting me vent.

Oklahoma

So as you saw previously I went to OK to surprise my mom. While we were there we got to go to the Tulsa State Fair. How I love the fair. I wish I would have taken more pictures. You can get just about anything on a stick. I will say though I think I paid for it later. We also saw my Grandma

as usual. She wasn't making too much sense, but man did she love Asher. He was "precious".

Surprise!

I think I have just pulled out the greatest surprise ever. My mom has been gone for 10 months in Afghanistan teaching pilots English. I hadn't seen her since last Thanksgiving and between now and then I had had a baby. So I couldn't wait for her to come to California and visit. I decided (with the help of my husband) to come to Oklahoma and surprise her. Here is a video of that surprise.

In the Arts

One thing I love about being so close to CBU is the opportunity for my children to interact with other adult people and have cool experiences. On Monday I took the three boys to a concert on campus. The band playing was a good friend. Now you may be thinking 3 boys by yourself? Are you crazy? Not really. Avery was enthralled with the music. Gab played with Aiden while I held Asher or we switched. OR I was childless while other people enjoyed the company of my children. I love it when they can be appreciated by other people. My boys are truly "neat" people and have a lot to say. They can be insightful, but more often are good for a laugh.


Gab and Aiden negotiating











Aiden having fun running on the lawn.










The two boys enjoying the music. This is how Avery was the whole time. I am fully convinced he will one day be on stage with his own band.
















If you are looking for a new band check this out at http://www.travisryanmusic.com/