Monday, November 17, 2008

Good Grief...

So, I am terrible at this. Life is crazy, what else can I say?

Things are going really well. We are anxiously awaiting the birth of Britton Thomas, which will be sometime in Jan. I am growing like nobody's business, but feeling decent most of the time. I have started to swell at an abnormal rate, which had to be checked for blood clots today, but everything is clear. Hopefully we will find out what is really going on soon, I am in pain.

Cooper is doing well. He has adjusted to life here pretty quickly. He is growing up so quickly it is crazy. He loves being with daddy as often as he wants since Clint's job is pretty flexible. He cannot wait to be a big brother. He loves to just lay on my tummy and rub it and talk to Britton. It is so sweet, I can't wait to see them interact once Britton is out and about.

We are still waiting on our house to sell, so please let anyone and everyone know that it is available! We are considering renting the house, so if anyone wants to rent it, let us know. We would really like to be in an apartment by the time December rolls around. I miss our things that are still packed up! ;o)

Not much else is going on, as long as everything goes as planned, we will be in Lubbock for Carol of the Lights, which I am super excited about!

Monday, September 8, 2008

I am so behind....

Well, who is surprised by my lack of posting?? Everything has been super crazy around here! It is so nice to live in the same town and only have one job...

Cooper and I have adjusted nicely to Decatur, we have really enjoyed seeing the family on a weekly basis! Church is going great, Clint is loving his job. What a blessing!

I suppose that I never officially "announced" that we are pregnant again, but we are! WooHoo! We find out tomorrow (Tuesday) what this little one is! I can't wait. I have enjoyed feeling all kinds of kicking in just recent days. What a sweet reminder of what is going on inside! We are praying that all is healthy with this little one, and that we can finally choose a name! :o)

Clint and I were blessed to be asked to teach at a Special Friends retreat this last weekend. It was amazing to say the least. It is a retreat for special needs people of most ages, although most were over 18. It was a blast, and we especially enjoyed the talent show! We of course enjoyed the very very very very most seeing Ben, LeAnne, and Isaac! We were so overdue for a visit with our beloved cube. Cooper enjoyed loving on Isaac, probably too much, so sorry LeAnne! :o) We miss our friends the very most! We were also able to bum around Lubbock for about 4 hours on Friday morning, so we headed out to New Home to see our previous youth group. What a surprise they had! We were so glad that we were able to see them during their lunch hour, and it was even better to see the look of total and complete shock on their faces. We miss them so much! It was great to see them, and we were amazed at how much they have grown up over the last few months.

Not much else is going on. The house is Lubbock is still forsale...please tell anyone that needs a home in Lubbock to take a look and BUY it! :o) We miss Lubbock, but it would sure be nice to have everything officially moved over to Decatur. Let us know if you will ever be in the DFW area, we would love to see our friends!

(I will probably update on Wednesday with the gender results as I have class tomorrow evening...)

Monday, July 14, 2008

An update would be good...

Well, I suppose I should update since it has been a while. We survived the funeral. Clint did a fabulous job singing and playing the guitar, probably the best he has ever played. The family and everyone there really seemed to enjoy his song choices.

I was able to complete my 3 classes in June. I was taking Master's level classes so that we would able to move. I made all A's! WOOHOO!

Camp in Glorietta was unbelievable. We arrived around 11pm New Mexico time on Monday evening. We had a blast the whole week, with only a few bumps in the road. Clint sprained his ankle on Tuesday which set us back for the whole week. We still had a good time though...it is gorgeous up there.



We returned from camp on Saturday evening, went home packed up Clint's portion of the house, and drove to Decatur. We had our first official Sunday at Cornerstone, and it was amazing. Clint then left Monday morning for camp with Cornerstone. They had a great week of bonding and growing closer to God and each other. And I am a little bitter that I wasn't there.



While Clint enjoyed camp, I started my last class at Tech. I also experienced having a hot water heater break and flood my carpets by myself this week as well. NOT FUN! My mom came in town on Friday, and we are still waiting on the carpet company to come and fix it all up. Hopefully we will end up with some new furniture and carpet through all of this...and maybe our house will sell better!

LeAnne and Ben also welcomed sweet Isaac into the world on Thursday, July 10. He is precious, Cooper and I have had to hold ourselves back! We could just eat him up! :o)

Not much else is going on here...I would love to hang out with everyone before we officially move on August 6!

Friday, June 27, 2008

Devastated

Devastated...

That pretty much sums it up.

Yesterday morning in Lubbock there was a wreck involving a motorcycle and a Tahoe on 82nd and Milwalkee. The Tahoe had a young mom and her two kids under 5. The motorcycle had a dad and a 14 year old boy. The wreck ended with 2 fatalities. Justin, the 14 year old on the bike, goes to New Home Baptist Church, and Clint and I are his youth pastors. We had the joy of being with him Wednesday night, preparing for camp, and enjoying a swim party as a part of Clint and I's last official Wednesday. Dan, Justin's dad, was also at the meeting. We had the chance to meet him and brag about Justin and his other son, Jacob, 16. That was the first and last time we met and saw Dan. Justin is in Heaven now, and we are rejoicing. Yet the town of New Home has been rocked to the core...again. Just 2 short years ago they lost a student to a car wreck on her way to school. How will the kids survive this?

Please pray with Clint and I for the sweet town of New Home. Please pray for Jacob as he is going to be lost without his best friend and younger brother. Please pray for Sherry as she copes with losing a husband and son and has she mourns with their 10 year old daughter. Please pray for the whole school as they are lost right now and unsure of what to do next.

Clint and I have never dealt with this as youth pastors. We are just praying praying praying and loving loving loving. It is hard to shake seeing the family find out the news as Clint and I were at the hospital all day yesterday. Hard to have about 50 kids in the waiting room sobbing hysterically as they find out that their friend won't be making it. Hard to patiently wait to see how God is going to move this town and these kids.

We are scheduled to leave for church camp on Monday morning. Please pray that the services will be Sunday or Monday morning and that the autopsy will happen soon. We need these kids to be in a place where they have few distractions, where they can be together, and where they can be moved by God.

Here is the story. http://everythinglubbock.com/media_player.php?media_id=13681#

Thursday, June 12, 2008

WOOHOO!

Well friends. It is official. Clint and I have a new job. We are now the newest youth pastor at Cornerstone Baptist Church in Decatur, Texas. WOO! God is so good! We have been praying and searching for a church that we could serve at full-time, and here it is! We are so excited, but spazzing out at what needs to be done! We are currently prepping the house to put on the market ASAP. We have a little left, but otherwise it shouldn't be long. I am also taking 9 hours at Tech in June, so that has me busy from 10-4 everyday. Plus we have our responsibilities in New Home to finish up....oh man. Here is our schedule for the next few weeks:

June 16-27 Kerry finishes up class at Tech
June 22- meet and greet Sunday at Cornerstone
June 27- Clint's last day at APS
June 27-28 in Abilene for Cooper to be a ringbearer at our dear friend's wedding
June 29- last official Sunday in New Home
June 30-July 5 Church camp with New Home
July 6- first official Sunday with Cornerstone
July 7- Clint leaver for camp with Cornerstone
July 7- I start summer school for July
August- hopefully I move to Decatur with a sold house!

Please keep us in your prayers!!!! Check out the churches website too. www.cornerstonedecatur.org

God is GOOD!

Monday, May 19, 2008

Christmas morning yet??

I feel like a small child waiting for Christmas morning....

The suspense is killing me!

Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Amazing how God works it all out...

Well well well, friends. School is officially over! I can proudly say that out of my 3 classes that have posted grades, I have 3 A's! Now if I can just see the other classes...Not too bad for having a load of 18 hours, working part time at Parent's day out, working with the youth at our church, raising a 2 year old and spending some time with the husband! As you can probably tell, I have been patting myself on the back a little for this good semester! I even went and got a mani and a pedi! I am enjoying my time off of school, but things haven't slowed down just yet. Summer school also starts on May 28...(our 3 year anniversay, no less!)

Well, on to bigger and better (God-related things). I ask that everyone be praying for Clint and I this weekend as we are leaving town to take part in some very important business. I can't share right now, but I will say that it would involve some huge life changes for us. We will covet your prayers until a final decision has been made. If you want to know, you can email or facebook me, but I can't quite share on blogspot yet! God is doing some amazing things though!

Well, my "d" on the keyboard has decided to fall off, and I am struggling through this post. Figures I would use more "d's" now then ever.

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Almost there!

Homework...

Lots of homework....

May 1 = freedom (for a while)

Sunday, March 30, 2008

Hmmm.... Update much?

Well, I thought that I was doing a great job on updating and then...I stopped. I do have a good excuse though! Let's see where we left off.

We had spring break (well, I had) a few weeks ago. And it was absolutely amazing. I think that it was by far the best Spring Break I have ever had. Seriously. We went on a family vacation with my mom, sister (Dawn) and her husband (Jim) and their 2 kiddos (Bailey-7 and Tate-3.5) and my mom's mom. It was so wonderful. We were able to go to Durango, where my uncle owns a condo. The snow has been unbelievable there. I think that they had somewhere around 4 feet of snow just hanging out in random spots. The house across the way from my uncle had at least 4 feet of snow piled on their roof. We were able to sled, tube, build snowmen, eat snow, make snow angels...well you get the idea. Clint was able to ski which he really enjoyed. It was so nice to feel so refreshed and literally just taken out of your current location. I truly felt removed from everything. I have never had a harder time coming back to real life. I think that we were all a little depressed around our house last week.

School is back in full swing, and although I have "less" to do this part of the semester, I am already feeling mildly overwhelmed. I think that is in part because I am looking to what has to be done over the summer...yikes. I know I will get it all done though! I just can't think about the future right now!

Friday night we had our youth kids over and it was a blast. I usually enjoy having them over, but this time was most excellent. We have two new girls that have been coming, and one plays the keyboard/piano and the other plays the guitar. It was really cool to have them all playing along with Clint and just singing. I also love that they all feel right at home here. And better yet, they don;t mind a little dust. Good thing, because neither do we...at least not right now. Our church (New Home Baptist) also celebrated their 100th anniversary today. It was pretty spectacular. There were many many guests from all over that came back to share memories and to take part in this big celebration. They also created a little booklet that had all of the church's history recorded. It was amazing to read everything. It also made sense why they record everything at business meetings! We are also able to enjoy the fact that we made it in the book, and hopefully we will continue some sort of legacy at NHBC!

Lets see...Cooper gets to be ringbearer in a wedding on Saturday. My best friend from high school is getting married and Cooper gets to try his shot at being the world's best ringbearer, round 2. He will be able to try again in June...let's hope that he is a good as he was at Ben and LeAnne's wedding!

No other news to report except that this is incredibly long. Hopefully since I have finally taken the time to update I can do a better job from now on!

Friday, February 29, 2008

Hi Baby Isaac

My favorite quote...ever.

Cooper (speaking to Isaac via LeAnne's belly button in the privacy of hiding under her shirt) says in a quiet whisper:

"Hi baby. I Pooker." and then kisses LeAnne's tummy. So sweet. I can't wait for his best buddy to come out! (In July of course)

Saturday, February 23, 2008

Help?

Ok...so I am trying to update my blog...I just want it to be something cute, I am not too particular. BUT, I am ridiculous at trying to figure this out. So for now, I am having it on the most boring option available. If you have any ideas (above and beyond the 12 offered templates) please let me know! I need some fun in my life! :o)

Monday, February 18, 2008

My how time flies...

So the other day we were looking at Cooper's baby pictures. Wow! Bad idea! I cannot believe at how much he has changed. He is such a big boy now, I miss my sweet baby boy. Here are a couple of "then and now" photos of sweet Cooper.


These are from his first few months of life:
And these pictures are from the last few months....


Saturday, February 16, 2008

Stephanie tagged me...

So I guess that I better do this. :o)

The directions - Share five random and/or weird facts about yourself, and then share the five top places on your “want to see or want to see again” list, and finally tag five people.

Randomness:
1. I have recently felt like I have been called to be the mother to multiples. Weird, huh? Maybe just a dream so that I could have many children at once, but maybe it isn't? Who knows. My SIL also had a dream that I had twins.

2. I love to have everything organized, but a lot of times everything is a mess. I will assume that it because I am rarely home to organize everything, so it kind of gets thrown around. Maybe sometime when I have more time...
3. I am kind of an animal hater. I would never do anything to hurt them, but I just really don't care for animals. I didn't grow up with pets, and to have a puppy now is just weird. Plus, you have all the work of a child, but without the benefits of a child. IE a soul in Heaven for eternity.
4. I love to read people's blogs. I feel as though it is like a window into their lives, and although I don't really update too often, I can't wait for others to update. I also like to read random people's blogs. Like I will say down below, I am a people watcher. But not a creeper, ok? :o)

5. My parent's got divoriced after 34 yrs of marriage, and it happened (well the separation) right before Clint and I got married. I think that it has allowed me to realize exactly how much work a marriage takes. Now, thats not to say that we have it down at all, but I know that it will not be easy.

Places to go:
1. New York City! I want to go and see Wicked on Broadway (I saw it in Dallas and it was amazing!) I also love to just people watch, so I think NYC would be a great location. I also would like to live there for a short amount of time.
2. California - just because I have never been. Plus I love Disney World, so I can't wait to go to Disney Land!

3. Hawaii - I love the beach, so I suppose that this would be the "ultimate" beach...except that it is extremely over priced.
4. Europe - I have never been, and I want to see it all!
5. Bermuda - I have been once, but I would love to take Clint to create even better memories! :o)


Five Tagees:
1. Kim G.
2. LeAnne

3. Karen
4. Clint
5. Gretchen and/or Jamie

Thursday, January 31, 2008

It's about time...

I suppose that it is time for a new update...

School has started for me again, and I am taking 18 hours this semester. I am really excited though, because they are all education classes! I will be working in school on a weekly basis, and that is so thrilling. Busy, but exciting!

So I have definitely been seeing God using all of our past experiences to use for His glory. I have been able to share our experiences and see God working in some people's lives. It has really been a blessing as I have been waiting to see where all of our experiences were taking us.

Not too much else to say, possibly more on the above statement at a later time, but we will just have to see how everything works out!

Friday, January 4, 2008

A year of changes...

So I began thinking about this past year (13 months really), and I am so amazed at what all has changed/happened. So, here is our year in review, the good, bad, and ugly. Or as we call them, the mountains and the valleys.

December 15(ish): Clint is offered and accepts a job with Adult Protective Services
December 16: Clint graduates from Tech with a major in Psychology and a minor in History (in 3.5 years mind you...including a marriage and a new baby! WOOHOO)
December 17: We are offered the part-time job of being youth ministers at New Home Baptist Church

March: We purchase our first house! WOOHOO. No more tiny apartment. God is good!

We were able to help plan and be apart of our best friends (Ben and LeAnne) big wedding day. Clint was best man, Cooper was ringbearer, and I was a bridesmaid. What a wonderful day! (and a few stressful months leading up to it...)

June: Berridge family (Clint's sister) moves in with us for 2 weeks while they are in Lubbock house hunting. Kerry also decides to return to school in the fall at this time.
July: We take our youth kids to church camp...WOW (Nana and Granddaddy Donaldson stay with Cooper)
August 10: big-time wreck in which our Mountaineer is totalled (on the way to rehearsal dinner for the above mentioned wedding, no less). Thankfully no-one is hurt.
August 11: Ben and LeAnne's wedding!

A short time after that we find out we are pregnant with number 2! A wonderful surprise and blessing that we are thrilled about.

August 20: (my birthday) But, we buy our first car! "thanks" to the wreck we were able to purchase a 2004 Buick Rendezvous.
August 27: School starts at Tech...hang on tight! 15 hours... :o)

Labor Day weekend: a fun trip to visit Kerry's grandma in Roswell turns sad when Kerry begins to miscarry the baby.

Thankfully we know that the Lord has bigger and better plans for our lives, but it was definitely a huge growing and life changing moment...or moments. My due date was in April, which is right in the middle of the Spring semester. God definitely knew what He was doing, and I feel blessed to know that we have a sweet baby waiting for us in Heaven! (maybe it is a girl! :o)) We were definitely devastated, but it helped us grow as a couple and a family. I know that this is just another way that God will be able to use us in the future!

The fall semester was surprisingly without major changes, minus the big change of getting used to Kerry being in school and working and both of us working at the church, and Clint working. And Cooper being in Parent's Day Out full time. Get the idea? :o)

December: Kerry makes it through the fall semester. Praise the Lord!

January: We get a new puppy, a Border Collie/Poodle mix named Ryder! (more pictures/info later on him)

Wow, I am worn out just reading all of that. It is amazing to look back and see that we did make it through all of that. God is so good to us. We were worried about each of those things. Would Clint find a job? Was youth ministry where we needed to be? How can we know if we should buy a house? Will Kerry really be able to go back to school? How will we ever get over this loss? And you know, God took care of us 100%! While we still worry some (so hard not to!) we know that ultimately God's plan will always prevail. We still suffer and ache and we are definitely tired, but we have survived! So now we look forward to another crazy year!

Thursday, January 3, 2008

Christmas with the Donaldsons

Well, Christmas has come and gone, and I can't believe it. I have been looking towards Christmas since I started school, it was my benchmarch. I can't even believe that I will be starting my second semester at Tech in a week! AH! That being said, I can't believe that I only have a year left! This time next year I will be preparing to student teach! Praise the Lord!



Christmas was great this year! Cooper is starting to really get into it, and we are loving it! Here are a few pictures from our Christmas in Lubbock:
He got a tool bench from Santa, and he loves it! He enjoys "working".

Here he is on his new bike that he also got.

While we were in Plano we were able to go to Santa's Village with Cooper's cousins on my side.



He also got to make a gingerbread house at his Nana Jan's house (my mom).

I think that Cooper was unsure where the icing was supposed to go... :o)

~Kerry