Blessings

God has showered so many blessings on us in the past few months, I wanted to share with you all some of my favorites!! The blessings I would like to share, mostly have to do with our little family and we just feel SO blessed!!!!

**We are SO THANKFUL for Wyatt's *new* job!! It isn't SO new anymore, but the freedom and flexibility that it provides our family is a continual blessing!!! I have had some health issues for the past few weeks and Wyatt has been able to be at home with us many, many days!! I am SO THANKFUL for his new job and the time off it offers!! We are SO happy!! BLESSED!!

**I am SO THANKFUL for Wyatt's promotion and raise!! God has been so faithful with our finances this past year! You never plan to take a pay cut, but God BLESSED us so much last year, we can't help but see His Hand in the entire year!! BLESSED!! :)

**We are SO THANKFUL for our beautiful warm home!! We have slowed down for this current season and have really enjoyed spending time at HOME together!!! :) We LOVE our house!! It is warm, and comfortable, our kiddos love their rooms and their playroom! Wyatt and I so enjoy spending time together in our cozy living room with the fire on just dreaming of all that is to come! :) BLESSED!!

**Wyatt and I have been married almost 8 years!! WOW!! :) I love my husband more today, that I could have ever possibly imagined!!! He is priceless to me and I am so in love with him!! Throughout this past year we have grown even closer, which has just been amazing!! :) We are closer as a married couple, we are closer spouses and we are closer best friends! I feel SO blessed that God chose me for Wyatt and Wyatt for me!! I am looking forward to improving our marriage even more this year!! BLESSED!!

**We feel so blessed that God provided Kids Korner for our kiddos this year! We L-O-V-E going to school together!! It has bonded Maddie, Zack and I SO much!! We LOVE the teachers and the program...it is just AWESOME!! We are also feeling blessed about school for next year!! Maddie is going to attend kindergarten at a private school called Gloria Deo Academy!! She will go to school 2 days a week and we will homeschool her two days a week!! For our family, it is PERFECT and I can't wait!! :) However, we are not willing to commit ourselves and our kiddos to GDA forever!! We are going to pray about it, and make the decision every year! If God decided to move us, we will totally be depending on Him!! We feel such PEACE about this decision!! It has been weighing on us so much, but we now feel total peace! BLESSED!! :)

**We are so blessed by the new and old friends that God has places in our hearts!! WOW!! Life is so sweet sharing it with good friends!! We are so thankful!! BLESSED! :)

**We feel unconditionally blessed by my mom and dad!! WOW! :) It brings me to tears! :) Their constant love and support is immeasurable!! :) We love spending time with them each week and LOVE the bond that they have with our Maddie and Zack!! We love that they are pouring themselves into our kiddos!! BLESSED!!

For all of these things are SO MANY MORE, we are BLESSED!! :):) Thank you Father for your amazing blessings! :)

Language

Do you know how much our language affects our kiddos?! It is CRAZY to me how much they pick up on, even at the young ages of 3 and 4!! Wyatt and I don't use bad words at all, they just aren't in our vocabulary, so we watch what we say, but mostly we are cautious about the tones in our voice and the sarcasm that we use!!!! Unfortunately that is NOT the case for many other people!! I often cringe when we walk past young teenagers, or a couple that is arguing...even commercials on tv! WOW!! Don't these people that my precious, innocent young kiddos are present, AND, listening, AND soaking in every words they are hearing to "try on" mommy and daddy later!?! ! Even when we are watching Dancing with the Stars... some of the language is absolutely unacceptable!!! Do we even realize that they words that come out of our mouths are a direct reflection of what our hearts looks like!? Now, I will be the first to say that sometimes my words aren't as gentle as they should be, BUT, I don't speak harshly or meanly or profanely!! We want our words to directly reflect Christ!! Lord, hear our prayers! Please help us to be so focused on you, that every thing that we do and say reflect YOU!! Please dwell in Maddie and Zack's hearts as well, so they may turn their eyes and minds on you!

"May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer." Psalm 19:14

Being Consistent!

For those of you who have little kiddos, you KNOW that consistency is key!!!! Consistency in disciplining, consistency with teaching manners, consistency with staying in bed, consistency with you-name-it-you-must-be-consistent-with-it!!! I have never really thought about having consistency with anything other than my kiddos!! (Isn't that funny!?!:)) But as usual, God is teaching me that I need to be consistent in EVERYTHING that I am doing!! :) Here are a few lessons that I am learning!! :)

**God wants me to have consistency with Him! He wants my time every morning! He wants to hear my voice as I pray to Him each time!! He loves when I spend time with Him, just He and I! I DO spend time with Him each day, but it isn't consistently!!!! Now I don't think that God is taking score, but I KNOW in my heart that He wants more of my time, which I am happy to spend with Him!! Consistency!!

**I need to be consistent in my relationship with my amazing husband!! We have a pretty amazing relationship, and I am SO thankful for it!! He "gets" me in every way and I "get" him in every way!! We can pretty much tell exactly what the other is thinking...about 99% of the time!! What an incredible BLESSING our marriage is to me!! :) I guess what I mean is, that I need to be consistently thinking about ways to encourage and love on Wyatt!! I am so thankful that he is exactly who he is and knowing that his love languages are different than mine, I need to be consistent in making sure I am loving on him the way HE needs to be taken care of!! Consistency!

**I need to continually be consistent with my precious kiddos!! Never could I have imagined how MUCH I would love them!! :):) They truly are the JOY of my life!! And, they are really good kiddos, but with them being the ages that they are...consistency is KEY!! I want to be a mommy that they can count on and I want to have rules that they can count on!! :) Consistency!!

**I want to be consistent with my friends!! I am so thankful for the dear friends that God has placed in my life and I want to be consistent with the friendships that we share!! This means I need to get better about calling to check in...sending cards, and just getting good one-on-one time!! Friendships are so precious and I want to be a consistent...all-the-time friend!! Consistency!!

I am so thankful that God is consistent with me!! I am learning and growing and being challenged every day and I KNOW it is because of His love and grace!! Thank you Father for your consistency with me!!!!!

Pregnant...nope, not ME!!!! :):)

So... three of my dearest friends are pregnant right now, and I couldn't be ANY more excited for them!! :):) I cried when all three of these precious ladies told me with HUGE smiles on their faces that they were expecting!! What an incredible JOY to be able to share!!! These three couples have all been married for a long time (7 years, 8 1/2 years and 11 1/2 years:)) and now God's perfect timing has come for them each to welcome a baby into their little family!! :) WHOO-HOO!! :) It is SO special to watch dear friends experience pregnancy and the early moments of becoming parents!! It is such a JOY and God's timing is AMAZING!! Of course as I watch these new mommy's and daddy's get excited about expanding their families, I can't help but reflect on our precious little bundle's of joy! :) They were both totally in God's perfect timing and now we absolutely cannot imagine life ANY different!!!!!

Our daughter was born shortly after our 3rd anniversary and our sweet son came after our 4th anniversary!! Our kiddos are only 12 1/2 months a part which was VERY hard at the beginning but it is a HUGE blessing now!! They are the BEST of friends...they have never known life without the other!!! They have an amazing bond that I pray they keep for the rest of their lives!! We often get asked the BIG question, "Will you have any more babies!?!" We always smile and say "If God blesses us!!" :) We really don't know if we will have more, that is totally up to God, but we are SO Thankful for the perfect two that we have!! :)

I am SO looking forward to planning and throwing baby showers for these amazing ladies!! I can't WAIT to hear what sex their babies are and enjoy showering my dear friends with excitement and encouragement!! :):) WHOO-HOO!! :):)

Excited!

I am SO excited and JOY-filled for this NEW year!! There are so many things that I want to do with our kiddos this year! They are at such FUN ages and I LOVE to see their minds at work!! I am SO blessed to be able to stay at home with them, AND, be at school with them!! I get to see into their every day lives, and it is amazing!! Wyatt had gotten to have the past 14 days off with us and our family bonding time together was absolutely priceless!!! Our time off didn't exactly go as we had planned, but I think in the end, it was far better than we could have even hoped for!!! We got a LOT Of snuggle, reading, snuggling, laughing face time together with our kiddos!! Our fall was nothing short if INSANE, so we welcomed this break!!!! Now in all honesty, I do have to mention that I was very, very sick during this time...thus we weren't able to do as much as we wanted, BUT, our down time was so priceless!! Now that I am feeling MUCH better, we have so much to look forward to!!

Every January, Wyatt and I sit down and talk through goals that we would both like to achieve throughout the new year! Some of our goals are for our family, others are for us as a couple, and some of our goals are individual goals!! It is SO fun to think about ways we can better ourselves as a married couple, as parents and as individual people! :) I LOVE having these conversations with Wyatt!! There is NO ONE BETTER to hold me accountable than my amazing husband!! He is so good for me and I rarely feel like he is attacking me when he holds me accountable for something that I said I wanted to do!! We decided this year to only share our goals with each other, just to be sure we weren't trying to be showy or extreme!! (I love the way my husbands mind works!! He is so humble and Godly!! :) I am a proud woman!! :)) SO, all I will say is be watching for some good change in the Jenkins household this year!! I am SO EXCITED about what this year will bring!! :):)

"He will yet fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouts of JOY." Job 8:21