Our Charlie Brown Christmas tree

We decided not to get a tree this year because I am leaving on the 13th.
And we won't be back home until after the new year.
But after helping our friends decorate their tree, Ryan suggested we get a baby tree.
So we headed to Target and bought a 3 foot prelit number.
We decorated it tonight and put it on a table in the corner.
Ryan said it looked like the Charlie Brown Christmas tree.
But I think it's adorable.
I took this pic with my phone so it's kind of fuzzy but you get the idea.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Prayer update!

As I mentioned in my previous post, I have been baby step praying.
I have an update!
We have been having A LOT of trouble with our baby doctor out here.
She is literally never available.
She is on leave, then she immediately goes TDY, then comes back but has training, etc.
I have been praying about what to do about the situation.
So here is what has happened.
I called my regular doctor and told him about it, he put in a referral for a civilian baby doc (CBD).
They gave me an initial appointment date of Dec. 6th.
I started praying that someone would cancel so I could go earlier.
I kept trying to get a hold of my military baby doc (MBD) as well.
You can't have too many opinions, right?
Well I finally got ahold of my MBD's nurse on Wednesday and she PROMISED that my doc would call me on (this past) Saturday.
Surprise, surprise my phone never rang.
So I prayed last night that something would open up with the CBD.
I called when I got up this morning and they said a cancelation just happened, come in on Wednesday!!!
Who knows how this will all play out, but it seems like things are working out so that I will meet this new doc.
Hopefully, something great will happen with him.
Please keep me in your prayers this Wednesday!!

Today I am motivated to clean my house so that's what I will be doing.
I finished a 10 pager last night for one of my classes so I am feeling pretty impressed with myself.
2 weeks until Oklahoma!

**UPDATE** About an hour ago, my CBD's receptionist called to say that if I wanted to I could come in tomorrow if I wanted to! How cool is that? So if you don't mind say a prayer for us tonight!!

The sweetest thing.

I have been babysitting our neighbor's baby boy.
He is so precious.

Thankful!

I am feeling very blessed this year!
It has been a really awesome year for Ryan and I.
Ryan accomplished his lifelong dream and I am working on mine.
We have an amazing family.
We have friends all around the world.
We have the coolest dogs ever.
We live in paradise.
We found a church we love.
We love our house.
We love our neighbors.
All in all, things are going great for us.

We wish we could be with our loved ones today.
It would be nice if we could be in Oklahoma, Utah, Kentucky and North Carolina.
But I guess were stuck with Hawaii.

Today has been pretty eventful.
I woke up early and headed to Walmart for some last minute items that I thought I got yesterday, oops!
Headed home and peeled, cut and cooked 10 pounds of potatoes.
Now they are in the crock pot soaking up butter.
Went over to my friend Claire's to test her stuffing, yummy!
She has never made it before, silly Brits.
Just kidding Claire!
Anyway, now we are just waiting for 3 to roll around so we can pig out.

Oh and my house smells amazing because my Scentsy gear arrived yesterday!
Blueberry Cheesecake is in the air.

Time for some Christmas music!
Love you guys!
Happy Thanksgiving!!

What's up Wednesday?

I think that I am going to try to make a "what's up" post every Wednesday.
So here's my first one.

- I have 8 assignments left to finish in order to finish this semester!!
- Tomorrow we are having a neighborhood Thankgiving.
- I am in charge of making 5 pounds of mashed potatoes.
- I leave for Oklahoma in 19 days.
- Ryan had his first flight in Hawaii yesterday and it went great!
- He gets to fly twice next week!!
- The lease was signed for the new renter on Monday!
- No update on the new baby doc.
- Still no news about getting Milly paid for.

I think that is about it.
As always, Murph and Duke are great.
And Hawaii is awesome.

Love you guys!

My birthday bird!

Just before our "superman" training. 

 Our amazing Thanksgiving dinner that we made all by ourselves!!

 On our way to Black Friday. NOOO sunlight.

 Decorating the tree.

Robin's 26th birthday!!

 Getting ready for my big day

 Sketchy casino in Antigua

 

 Family photo shoot!

Just arrived in Antigua :)

Robin seeing my dress for the first time.

Okay, I have found a lot of randoms pictures, so no more titles, just pics.

ENJOY!



This makes me smile :)

Ryan's GI Bill came through!!

Thanksgiving, literally.

I just wanted to make a post of thanksgiving.
Our renters moved out on Halloween and the house has been vacant since then.
Both my parents and Ryan's parents did a lot of work around the house.
They painted, repaired cracks, installed stairs, cleaned, cut down trees, etc.
You name it, they did it!
It really meant so much to Ryan and I for them to do those things for us.
We are so blessed and we know it (which I think is the best part).
So now the house looks awesome and as of yesterday we found a renter!!!!
This is such a burden off of my heart.
I was so worried that we would not find someone because of the season.
But our property manager called yesterday to say that we not only had one person but two!
So I guess you could say we have a back-up too, just in case.

But the really amazing part is this.
I have been praying all month that we would find a renter.
But after reading one of the blogs I follow, I changed the way I prayed.
This blogger talks about how she uses specific prayers.
It got me to thinking, why not be specific?
Instead of asking for huge things or vague things, why not ask for smaller more obtainable things.
More precise prayers.
What a great way to get an inventory of how God works in your life, right?
So I started making what I call "baby step" prayers.
I pray for a lot of things, of course, so some things are still up in the air.
But I prayed specifically that we would find a renter by Monday (the 22nd).
And yesterday I got the call that we had a renter and he would be moving in MONDAY!

So maybe you all should try it out, if you haven't been praying that way?
Let me know how it goes, if you try it!
I will keep everyone posted on my baby step prayers!

I love you guys!

And again I say What's Up?

- I got Milly's estimate done. She is going to cost $166 to fix.
- She is getting services as I type this.
- I am half way through my courses for this eight weeks.
- I plan to finish at least a week early so I can be homework free in OKC.
- Ryan gets to fly for the first time in Hawaii on the 23rd (Happy Birthday Robin!)
- The house is still not rented :(
- I have an appointment with a new baby doctor on Dec. 6.
- Ryan is taking a life saving course right now. They are sticking tubes down peoples throats, starting IVs, etc.
- Duke tracked mud all through the house today so I get to mop today (least favorite chore, followed by laundry).
- Ryan and I are going on a couple's retreat.

I think that pretty much covers the stuff going on here in Hawaii.
Love you guys!

Trouble in paradise.

Today Ryan and I went to enjoy our complimentary lunch from Chili's for Ryan's service.
Afterward we walked over to Wally World and looked through the garden center.
We found a DVD/CD combo that makes your TV into a "fireplace" and plays Christmas music.
We both looked at it and then grabbed it.
The downside of living in paradise, is that there are no indicators that it is the holiday season.
It's 80 degrees outside, that doesn't exactly bring up thoughts of turkey and ornaments.
So we bought ourselves a little Christmas spirit.
I closed all of the curtains and now we have a cozy little fireplace scene and Christmas carols playing.
I am thinking of making some hot apple cider and turning the AC on full blast.

I can't wait to come home and have a legitimate reason to put on a sweater.
I am soooo excited about seeing the family in Decemeber!
Love you guys!

Filed a claim.

Okay, since everyone seems to believe that the woman who hurt Milly needs to fix her (and so do I)
I called and filed a claim with my insurance this morning.
David, the very nice claims guy, said he would take care of it.
So we will see what happens.
I am just praying that the woman has insurance.

Also, my dad went by my house last night to put out the trash cans and he ran into my property manager.
He said three people were coming to view it last night so hopefully we will find a renter soon!
I really don't want to carry the mortgage, especially not this time of year.
So everyone just say a prayer that someone will love the place and make it theirs.

Oh and one more important announcement.
I am now the "secretary" for the FRG here.
I have no idea what my duties are but apparently I am qualified.
So this should be interesting.
Wish me luck!!

What's up?

So I thought I should make a post about what ELSE is going on in my life besides pictures of fun adventures.
Here is a breakdown of the highlights (or lowlights).

-Currently taking 18 hours at OU.
-Just got an acceptance letter from University of Hawaii to take classes concurrently.
-Got approved to use Ryan's GI Bill so college is covered except books.
-Finally got the house completely done, including art hung.
-Started eating healthier after reading studies on nutrition (thanks Claire!).
-Taking yoga twice a week and running in between.
-Fertility business is on hold until the new year.
-Murphy & Duke can finally play in the backyard, the housing removed their super sprinklers.
-We got a ticket in the mail for Ryan's Jeep that happened before we owned it.
-Milly is a damaged woman but she is sparkly clean inside because I gave her a vacuum yesterday.
-Got our Christmas airline tickets booked, finally.
-Doctor told me I have asthma, started using an inhaler.
-Got my skin screening for the year, no skin cancer for me.
-Ryan still hasn't flown a helicopter since we have been here :(
-Someone stole his GPS out of his Jeep.
-The renters moved out of my house.
-Here is the link to my craigslist post if you know anyone interested in a rental.

I think that pretty much covers it.
Love you guys!

Well, poop.

I am sure all of you know this but back in May, Ryan bought me my very first brand new car.
I love it very much and I try to take good care of it.
I always park in the back of the parking lot or in corner spots so no one will ding me.
Today we drove to church and Ryan picked out a corner spot and parked far enough away from the car beside it that Milly (that's my cars name) would be out of harms way.
We come out of church and there is this really old dinged up car in the parking lot RIGHT next to my car.
Inches, literally.
Where this car is parked is not a parking spot but I guess they decided that it was.
You would think if you were creating your own parking stall you would make it as big as you wanted but no.
Milly now has a quarter size chip of paint missing in her door.
The paint was still hanging off of the other persons door.
It was a sad sight.
So Ryan and I decided to wait and just bring it to the other persons attention.
I know from shipping the car here that a ding like that is going to cost at least 100 to repair.
So we think, oh it happened at church, of course this person will offer to repair it for us.
NOPE!
She comes out and Ryan points the spot out and she says "oh i see. I'm sorry about that but you are parked very close to the line so.."
Ryan didn't know what to say to her at that point so he just said okaaaaaay and walked away.
I don't really know what to do about it now.
I mean do we press the issue or just suck it up and pay for it?
It's a big bummer.

Flowers of Hawaii

While the Murphy's were here we visited a waterfall that is located inside of a botanical garden.

I put pictures of the waterfall in my last post but I didn't get a chance to include the flowers.

So that's what I'm going to do now.

Cassie did a really good job on these pictures so I have to share them.