The Story of Us

Yesterday, our family celebrated its 8th anniversary! Eight years of being a family!  Every year around this time I get to thinking about how things were before I met my husband and I get an itch to tell the story of how we came to be.  I know that everyone has a love story but (for obvious reasons) ours is my favorite.
Once upon a time I was single mother of 3 small children and I was happy.  I had accepted that my children were my life and I had everything I needed.  A few months later, while listening to K-LOVE I was encouraged to pray for love.  So out of the blue I found myself behind the locked door of a bathroom praying to God and telling Him that if he had someone for me, I was ready and would love to meet him. (Yes, in the bathroom! The kids and I were living with my parents at the time and there were few places in the house I could hear myself think!) 
While using my computer later that day, match.com ads kept popping up and I kept ignoring them.  For the next week every time I would use my computer match.com adds would pop up. Ok, so maybe it was a sign, maybe I had just never noticed them before but seriously the ads were relentless! After about a week and a half of this I said to myself, "Why the heck not?!" and gave myself one month. Everyday, I checked in on the 29-35 year old dating scene and was disappointed.  Then one day, this super cute dad of one popped up on my screen as I checked in.  His name "Happy Beach Dad"! His priority was his son and I was compelled to send him an email. I clicked send and watched as his profile popped back up stating that he was actually 28 (I had typed in the wrong age). He quickly responded and it was quickly established that he thought I was someone else that he had been hoping to match up with.  Long story short, we ended up emailing back and forth for a couple of weeks before meeting for breakfast at an IHOP (within 3 weeks of signing up on match.com).  We sat in a booth across from each other, I ordered a veggie omelet that had cauliflower (yuck!) in it and he ordered pancakes.  We laughed at my omelet and talked about our kids.  I would be lying if I said that I didn't know then.  There was this moment, while we were talking when I actually heard in my head, "That's him".  I knew that he was the one, like I had never known anything else in my entire life. We went thrift store window shopping after breakfast, before I headed home and got ready for work.  I remember walking into work and the first co-worker I saw asked me, "How was the date?" and before I could really think about it, I answered, "I met the guy I'm gonna marry." Less than a year later, we were engaged!

Everything was so simple as far as our little family went.  Our 4 kids were siblings from the start; They clicked and we were just happy! We all had so much fun and simply enjoyed being together.  By the time we got married in January of 2007, we could not wait to add another kid to all the craziness.  It took us a bit and a heart-breaking miscarriage but we finally met our youngest child in 2010.  
I'm not saying that our relationship is perfect but I will say this: I married my best friend.  He is always there for me and always believes in me.  Best of all he sees the good in me, even when I cannot.  He makes me laugh and listens.  He brings flowers for no reason at all.  He washes dishes!! Oh, and he does laundry!! (Now do you understand why I think he is SO awesome?!) 

Every now and then my mind wanders to the what-ifs...what if I had continued to type in 29 instead of making a mistake that day? What if I had completely closed my heart to the idea of the existence of someone out there falling in love with me AND my children? The what-ifs don't keep me up at night though because there is no doubt in my mind that this family was meant to be. I often find myself praying and thanking God for this life!  I am beyond grateful that my husband and son stepped into our lives when they did and I am so thankful that I have such an amazing someone with whom to share life's storms and blessings.
So, here's to another year of crazy chaos! This family is my world and as much as I love all of the memories that we have created, I am also looking forward to what the future holds!!
Happy Anniversary to Us!!

Welcome to our World of Creative, Chaotic Happiness (part 1)

Our family is what you might call a big one. There are 7 of us total (5 kids, 2 grownups) not to mention 3 small dogs.  To say that it is never boring in our home is an understatement!  There is always something going on and sometimes the chaos is a lot but more often than not, I find myself steering into the skid, so to speak. 

We currently have 3 teenagers (15, 14 and 13) in our home, which makes for a great starting point for our story...

Our family has dinner to together at the dining room table (nearly) every night.  There is the occasional carpet picnic but for the most part you would find us at our kitchen table at 6:30 pm(pst)every night.  On one particular night we were discussing selflessness during dinner.  We were talking about how some of the teenagers had become a bit more full of themselves than we thought was acceptable and we were trying to come up with ways that each of us could practice thinking of others before ourselves.  Never did it occur to me that the conversation we had that night would lead to such a great idea for a family project. There was a lot said, a lot of ideas thrown around but in the end it was decided that our family had some shopping to do...The Homeless Present Project was born!

So, what is the Homeless Present Project? Well, it started out as us buying some socks or something like that, wrapping them up and giving them to homeless people that we would see while we were out and about.  The idea was to give presents to people who often are forgotten at Christmas time.  There are a lot of programs for children and families with children and they are all wonderful!! We decided that we wanted to focus on the homeless...the man we see everyday at the park not far from our house and the people that nap at the plaza. By the end of dinner we had decided that this did not just have to be a "Christmas thing".  Everyone was super excited!! I personally felt like I had scored major awesome parenting points with the Man upstairs!

A couple of nights later, we went to the Dollar Store and Big Lots to collect our supplies.  We bought gallon sized zip up bags, applesauces, cheddar cheese snacks, yoohoos, fruit snacks, toothbrushes, hand sanitizers, gum, combs,candy canes and reusable spoons. (It ended up costing us about $50 give or take a couple of bucks.) 

Phase 1: Sorting....The kids put all of the items into stacks.  This is the first time we had done this so we set our goal this round at 12 presents.  

Micah on the assembly line, loading his bag with lots of goodies!

Phase 1 Complete!

Phase 2: Wrapping! We all wrapped up the little bundles in fun paper.  The kids really liked this part!!

All of the goodies ready for Phase 3!!

I think that it's important to point out that we are not rich by any stretch of the imagination! We are basically a single income family of 7 (and the 3 dogs!). I have an etsy shop that is not even close to where I want it to be! We do budget our money though, and the money for this project came out of our monthly "Target" allowance.  This meant that this month we spent less on our beauty and cleaning supplies...we bought cheaper brands and skipped some things all together and we were happy to do it!!

Thank you for checking out our first post!! Come back soon so that we can tell you all about Phase 3 and 4! 

Love,

from the Chaotic Crafty Happiness of our home