Stella Watching Church....

 

Stella watched church with us yesterday.  Ever since "C" (bad flu) happened and Scot and I have aging parents that we don't want to get sick we've been extra careful about being in crowds.  When you go to church it's near impossible to keep away from catching something or carrying something to someone else.  We love going to church too but I've been able to get more out of the sermons by sitting at my desk with my bible open while listening and taking notes from the sermon.  Added bonus is even though it's live you can press pause and go to the restroom and not miss any of the sermon.  You can press pause so you can have a moment to write down a note before the pastor goes on in his sermon and you miss something.  You can press pause and discuss something the pastor just said that was important with your family.  While I love fellowshipping with other believers I have loved being able to get more out of the Bible teaching too.  Stella rather enjoys it too as you can see in the picture...LOL!   

Our Animals...

At first they didn't like one another and now they are like this:

Encouraging Word of The Day....

 

My Current Situation...

 

The boys are on a project so she’s trying to take over my desk and keep me from working on the computer…LOL! She’s just so darn cute.

How I Go Into Every Year!

 

My Bible Reading Plan for 2025...

This is the reading plan that I'm doing this year.  I've encouraged my guys to do it with me so that we can do it as a family.  I'd love for Tim to read through the Bible in a year at least once prior to him graduating high school.  Praying he sticks to it and starts off his homeschool day with his bible reading first.  It's what I'm encouraging him to do anyhow.  He's done quite a bit of bible in his homeschool studies but actually reading through the Bible in a year is something I don't think he's done.  He's old enough now and I know that it will be a life changing experience for him to do this.  

Stella's 1st Month...

She is so lovable and spunky. We love when she gets the zoommies because she is all over the downstairs of our house. She loves to snuggle though. When she's not snuggling with us she loves to lay on anything that smells like us. She is such a good kitty. We always said we were a dog family not a cat family but we all fell in love with her when we found her in a shopping center parking lot where she had obviously been dropped. So thankful to Alley Cats and Angels of NC for getting her ready to adopt so that we could take her to her forever home. She was so tiny when we found her which made me really nervous because I know nothing about taking care of animal as tiny as she was. She is such a blessed kitty. We all love her and she and our dog, Tucker, get along great. It took them a couple of weeks to get to know each other but they are totally fine with one another. Can't believe we've had her a month now. Her birthday as far as they can estimate was around Pops birthday in August so she was only about one month old when we found her. I found that poignant seeing as we lost Pop in 2024.

Our Favorite Moment of 2024...

 

Happy New Year 2025🎉🥳🎉🥳

Welcome 2025!  May this be the absolutely best year of everyone's lives.  May you grow in the Lord and may you cherish all the moments that 2025 brings your way.  God Bless You All!

Goodbye 2024...

We are coming to the end of 2024 and I'm thinking about everything that's happened this past year.  Very early on in the year one of my oldest and dearest friends past away suddenly.  It was so unexpected and is still such a shock even now as I think about it.  

In the midst of that loss the first half  of the year was filled with travels back and forth to see Scot's dad up until he passed on May 16th.  Our losing the family patriarch was so very hard.  He was the glue that held the family together.  He was the reason for every family gathering.  His grandchildren and great grand children loved him dearly.  To us he was the world.  There's not a day that goes by that his presence isn't missed deeply but his suffering is no more.  He's with Jesus and feeling no pain in his body for the first time in nearly 50 years of his life.  

Not too long after we lost Pop I lost my Aunt Joyce to lewy body dementia.  She had suffered a lot the last year of her life.  No one should have to go through that kind of suffering.  I just hope that she's in heaven with Jesus.  I don't know if she ever made a salvation confession.  I can only hope and pray that she did.  

The good that came out of this year was that it was such a huge growth year for Tim in olympic weightlifting.  He won gold at his gyms weightlifting meet early on.  Then he came in 4th at Nationals in June.  For his first time at Nationals with Olympic Weightlifting that was a very huge placement for Tim.  He closes out the year having won gold at our States (WSO) Weightlifting Meet.  He won gold in his -61kg weight division for the youth male division, gold in the Junior male division (because his lifts qualified him for it) and gold in the open male division (because his lifts qualified him for it).  Then he also was awarded the Best Male Youth Weightlifter plaque as well.  He swept up at States (WSO) this year.  With just being a little over a year into this sport these wins were so huge for Tim.  He's looking forward to 2025 now and wants to make his last year in youth a bang up year.  We love seeing Tim so happy in what he's doing.  The only sadness is that Pop is no longer with us for Tim to share all this with.  Pop was such huge supporter of all that Tim was doing in the sports he was competing in - 1st TaeKwonDo then Olympic Weightlifting.  This was the best change Tim ever made when it comes to sports.  He looks the healthiest we've ever seen him.  His olympic dream has not changed just the path to get there has and that is ok.  Just because you start out with one path in mind to get where you want to go doesn't mean you have to stay on that path.  Paths can change as long as the dream you are going after stays the same.  Tim stands a better chance of getting to the Olympics in the sport he's doing now than he ever did in the one he was doing before.

So many folks are just glad to say goodbye to this year.  For some it's been a rough year and for others it's been a good year.  We've had a little of both this year.  Tim's accomplishments have been the silver lining in all the heartbreak that this year brought to our family with the loses we've had.  God has been good to us though.  He's always watching over us in all the circumstances of life and we are so incredibly thankful for His presence in our lives.  That's how we will go into next year too - Thankful to God for His many blessings in our lives, thankful to God for His hand on our lives and thankful to God for all that He's yet to do in our lives.  We love Him so much and are so glad that He's at the center of our family.  So....

Last Workout of 2024....

Tim did his last workout of 2024 at Athletic Lab today.  He ends the year having officially done a 177kg total for the year in the -61kg weight division in Olympic Weightlifting.  His training sessions have been incredible leading into 2025.  He is so looking forward to the North American Open Series 1 in Ohio at the end of February/beginning of March.  It's one of the biggest Meets of the year and as a last year youth Tim is looking to make a huge splash to end his youth years in the sport.  Later on in the year they will be making some slight changes to the weight divisions so it will be interesting to see where Tim and the other male youth weightlifters come out in the wash.  Some of the weightlifters are already at the top end of their divisions so we'll be watching carefully to see where everyone lands.

New Weightlifting Shoes Coming Soon...

Tim has new weightlifting shoes coming soon.  He's been wanting them since they came out.  We told him he'd have to pay half and he did so they are on their way and will be here by January 8th.  Tim is so excited and can't wait to start using these shoes.  

Tim Graduating in 2026!!!

This handsome guy adjusted his schedule so that he does the rest of this school year doing 10th and part of 11th grade and next school year he will do the rest of 11th grade and 12th grade and graduate May/June 2026 right after he turns 18.  If he really attacks his school work he could technically be done by December of 2025 but that's totally up to him getting on top of it and getting the school work done of course.  He's so glad to have a plan in place to graduate on time instead of having to be a year behind everyone.  So proud of this kid and how he pushes himself everyday.  The skies the limit for this kid.  There's no telling what God's got in store for him but we are looking forward to watching God work in his life.  

Stella's Window Bed....

Stella loves her window bed where she can rest and look out the window at the birds.  Today she loved it until the storm came through.  There was so much wind that the rain beat on the window and she was not a fan of that at all.  Her window bed is right bedside my desk and she loves being close to her humans whether it's by me at the desk or by Tim in his teen cave at his gaming computer desk.  She is certainly well loved and at three weeks in she and Tucker get along so well.  We just got done doing her registration for her microchip.  We've never done microchips before but the rescue that we adopted her from does and so we got her with a microchip already in her.  We sure love our pets though and even though she will be an indoor cat I'm glad she is microchipped incase she were ever to escape.