Christmas

We had a great time in Colorado last week. Christmas eve shopping was a lot of fun. We went to three different Christmas's on Christmas. Plus one more on Saturday. Got to see pretty much everyone except for my cousin Ryan who's wife just had a baby, so they stayed home. Kiley had a blast. The whole way there she was wanting to see snow, and have a snow ball fight with me. She won. Her and her Grandpa Darrell hit me with some at his house and she loved that. It was really nice having everyone else hold Cambree and take care of her. She's very high maintenance right now. In fact I'm listening to her cry right now.

It's really neat to see how much everyone changes every time we go back. I've been in Texas for over 7 years now and everything is completely different. But I wouldn't want it any other way. There are some things that I wish were still the same, and some that I wish were different, but that's life. I'm really proud of my family and how much they have grown. I can't believe that Michael is 16 and in a few years he'll be in college somewhere. And Jacob is taller than I am. Kathy's kids still don't like me very much, but that's pretty much my fault for scaring them all the time.

Next week I start my new job at the Church. I'm not sure what to expect which is a good thing. I'm really excited about it. Especially since we have renovations to do on the Church's new offices that will probably last a few months. I know some things are probably going to change drastically, but I'm ok with that. I know that this is what God wants so that's what I'm going to do. Well I'm going to end this with some pictures. Or maybe begin it with pictures...not real sure how thats going to work. But I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, and has a good year this year.

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I know that all two of you have been waiting for me to post. I just had a little thing happen tonight that was pretty cool. I had to go to the store to get something. It is really cold tonight, probably going to get below freezing. I know all you yankees think that below freezing isn't cold...well come on down here and find out how fun it is. But it was sleeting and snowing while I was out. When I got home and walked in the door it was great. The Christmas tree and decorations were up. The Christmas lights were on. There was a fire in the fireplace. The beef stew was almost ready. And Kiley was bouncing around watching a cartoon on TV. I think I have it pretty good.

This weekend I am going to be licensed to preach. It's not as big of a deal as it sounds. It's more just proving that I believe what the Church believes and will be fit to be a full time Youth Director at the Church. And it needs to be done by the end of the year for tax reasons. But it has taken a lot of my time studying for it. The awesome stuff that I have learned already studying the Articles of Faith has been amazing. I hope that I can do a good job.

The girls are great. Everyone one is healthy. Cambree had a Dr. appointment today. She weighs 9.1 LBS and is 22 inches long. She is a becoming very lively when she is awake. She is starting to require a lot of attention. But we are trying to teach her to self sooth. It's a little easier the second time around to ignore crying.

We are leaving in 12 days to go to Colorado for Christmas. I am really really looking forward to it. I think it's going to be good to get away for a week and see the family. And the Christmas Eve shopping tradition is going to be awesome. If I could I would go back every year just to do that. Plus my Dad said today that he hasn't been playing his guitar much so I think I need to change that. We pretty much have our schedule set for that week. Lot's of Christmas's and shopping on Christmas Eve. And shopping in Estes with Dad, and Sharon, and who ever else decides to come with. I'm sure its going to be like any other vacation where you need rest after you get back.

Cambree was born on November 6th at 1:20 P.M. Jana was in Labor for only 5 hours. It was awesome. Everything went perfectly, without any problems. It was completely opposite from what Kiley was. It was just Jana and I at the hospital and not the whole family. Oh and the Karate Kid was on too. So it was really good. Cambree is a very quiet baby, for the most part. When she cries everyone knows about it. But that doesn't happen often.

Jana is doing pretty good. She is still taking pain pills but she's doing good. She's been keeping herself busy as usual. She is taking two weeks off but I'm sure she'll be up at the church at some point trying to get some work done. I'm taking this Thursday and Friday off. Becky, Jana's sister is in town for a few days and is helping her so I figured it would be better to take those days off.

Today I gave my six week notice at Coinstar. It was easier than I thought. Everyone that I talked to was really cool about it. I'm going to be working full time at my Church as the youth director and what ever else Preacher says. I'm really looking forward to it. I have to be licensed to preach before I can receive any tax benefits and this has to be done before the end of the year. So we're doing it on December 14th. You should see the stuff I have to memorize. But its good for me.

In this video she is 2 days old

Nothing to exciting happened in the last week but I thought I would at least give some sort of an update on life. Jana is just about ready to pop. It looks like it could be any time now. She actually just asked me if I wanted to go to Walmart and walk around with her to help her along. Its 8:30 on a Friday night. I'm not going any where near Walmart. I spent all day in Walmarts, I hate going back when I get home.

Kiley is excited to be a big sister. I think she is going to have a hard time with sharing the attention, because she gets a lot of it right now. I got her bike out last night and let her ride around in the Garage. We live on a busy street so theres no way shes going out front. She loved it, I couldn't get her to come in. So today Jana took it to the Church and let her ride around the parking lot. She's actually really good. She likes to go really fast and then turn. It scares her Dad. I'm so not looking forward that part of the next 18 years.

Work is still work. Pretty challenging this week. And it looks like more challenge in the near future. If I work this week, I'll be on a pretty easy route, but I think I'm going to be at home taking care of the girls. But after this week I think its going to get pretty crazy. But hey as long as I get my 45 hours I'm good.

Not much else going on round here. Weather is nice though. 40-50 in the morning and 80 in the afternoon. It won't get too cold until about Thanksgiving. Well thats all for now.

2nd post

This week was crazy at work. I posted in my 1st blog that my van had to go to the shop on monday. So that meant that I couldn't work since I was suppose to be driving back and forth from Wichita Falls. I was only able to clock 2 hours of work on Monday, so I had 43 more hours to work in four days. Not an impossible thing to do in most cases, but most cases don't have the after work schedule that I do. =) A little side note...Wichita Falls is 130 miles from my house. So Tuesday it was off to Wichita Falls, a two hour drive. Because the route that I am running has not been managed well since at least July it is in bad shape. So I spent 6 hours in one Walmart. This one is the biggest on the route. It should normally take me 3 hours at the very most. With this and drive time I got 10 more hours. Wednesday I drove back to Wichita Falls since I still have two more Walmarts with game rooms to service, not to mention 8 other locations in Wichita Falls. But again this route is in bad shape, so I was only able to spend 7 hours on the two Walmarts...then the drive home. This gave me 11 more hours. If you get your calculators out this would be 23 hours now. I'm still 4 hours behind, but don't worry I catch up. Thursday I drove back to Wichita Falls Texas. I hit 7 of the 8 independent locations (we refer to locations as independents when they are not a Walmart). The 8th location was left off the route schedule that I was given...oh darn. With these locations I now have 6 hours for the day, but its not over yet. I now have to go to Vernon Texas which is 50 miles north of Wichita Falls. Then its off to Quanna Texas which is 30 Miles north of Vernon. Then its off to Childress which is 30 Miles north of Quanna, and 250 Miles North of my house. I left Childress at 3 in the afternoon, and got back to Wichita Falls at about 5. I was needing to clean out the storage facility before I left because I knew I would not be back this week. So add another hour. Then the two hour trip back home. With my half an hour lunch that I'm required to log, but never take, Thursday adds 13.75 hours of much fun. This includes 8 hours driving and 6 hours working my butt off. (Quite literally, I lost almost 10lbs this week). So now if you get your calculator back out, I now only have 8.25 hours available to travel another 250 miles going to Breckenridge, Graham, Decatur and back to our office in Grand Prarie. Luckily I'm the best at what I do and I do it with ease...and a lot of coffee. So I'm really glad I'm done with this route for now. Next week i will be running a local route. The furthest location is about 100 miles from here, and if you've ever been out here you know thats practically down the street. Plus I think Jana is going to have a little bundle of joy soon, so that will give me a transition from not getting much sleep to not getting any sleep at all. But at least it will be worth it. Till next time...

First Blog

I'm getting rid of my "myspace", because it takes up to much of "my time". Plus the trash that's on it is driving me crazy. So hopefully everyone got their message and will start reading this now. I'm mostly just going to write about what is going on in our life. Stuff like kids, church, activities, school, health. You know, just keep you people updated. So here it goes.

Today was pretty good because my van had to go to the shop. So instead of going to Wichita Falls today I was able to stay home and get a few things done around the house. We are very excited about Cambree coming soon. I'm hoping sooner than later for all of our sakes. Once she is born I'll be able to do some really important stuff that I have been needing to do, but for personal reasons (that you probably don't care about, but if you do I will tell you) I have to wait until after she is born to do. Pretty exciting stuff if you ask me.

We're looking forward to being in Colorado for Christmas this year. That doesn't happen nearly enough. But maybe more in the future. Thanksgiving comes first though. I've herd a rumor that my great uncle Gordy is going to be here sometime in the next month or so. Or maybe even for Thanksgiving. That would be awesome. One of the few good memories of being a kid was Gordy yodeling after sucking on a balloon filled with helium. And spending four days at his house in Florida when I was 11 or 12. Good stuff. Plus when he was here last year, he was one of the only people that asked if he could help me while I was working on the Turners fence. Asking someone if they need some help can go a long way sometimes. A few guys at church are planning on playing some football the night before Thanksgiving. I stole this idea from the church that I went to back in Colorado.

Kiley is doing good. She is talking a lot, she picks up everything. So be very careful what you say around her. She went for her 3 year check up last week and is 34lbs now. She's almost to big to carry around, even for me. Her mom can't really deal with that much anymore. Jana is now 37 weeks along and ready to pop any day. We've just about got everything ready to go for the new baby.

God has really been good to us. Our Church has gone through a lot in the last year. More than any one church should. It seems like we're through the worst of it. We have had more people saved in the last few months than I have ever seen before. Our youth group is doing well. We started with about 1 or 2 kids 2 years ago and are up to about 15 now. When we started we were teaching the junior high, and high school classes on most weeks. But we now have a couple that are able to teach every week and that makes it a lot easier. This is a pretty busy time of year for most of our kids with school, sports, and other stuff its tough getting everyone together at the same time. But its a lot of fun.

This is what takes up most of our time in the Monroe family (Texas edition). So this is what I'll be talking about mostly. I'm trying to make a few changes in my life, including my health, and education. So please pray for me, and hopefully I will make time for them. Till next time...