Mystery Christmas Angel

I will preface this little story with a little recap of my day up to this point. Matt, Levi and I all got sick over the holiday weekend and decided to stay home from church on Sunday and watch our service on live stream. As I listened to the service I was struck by how I was being reminded that I am ultimately not the one in control of my life. I can say this MUCH more easily than I live it. I am a planner, I make lists, I check things off and then I make new lists. I have a today plan, a tomorrow plan and a 5 year plan. It really is a little bit ridiculous!! I took some time in the morning to reflect and think about how to make life changes so to speak to show God that I know he is in control of my life.

Not 6 hours later Matt and I are rushing through Walmart trying to get a little artificial Christmas tree and I revert back to listing off what we needed to when we got home and "being the boss" all over again. Levi was throwing quite a fit the whole time we were at Walmart because he had to have this giant candy cane we passed at the beginning of the store. Matt and I were a little bit distracted because of his screaming, etc. Matt told me he would pay and I should just take Levi out to the car.

After everything was in the car we drove home and I continued to think about everything I "needed" to do before the Monday morning came. We pulled in the driveway and went through our routine of Matt emptying the car and me getting Levi unbuckled and grabbing the diaper bag. Well...to my surprise there was no diaper bag.

My blood pressure immediately sky rocketted. I use the diaper bag like it's my purse. It had my car and house keys, my wallet, and obviously all of Levi's stuff for when we are on the go. Matt and I started rushing around calling and putting a hold on our credit cards and trying to figure out what to do.

Matt went back to Walmart to check the parking lot, the carts, and then scouring the aisles to find our "thief". Even though I was rushing around panicking somehow God's calm and quiet presence asked me "Do you think I am big enough to fix this? Do you believe that I am the God of your life? The big things? The little things?" My initial response was to push those thoughts out and say this isn't something God would really care about. It's not life or death. And then I stopped myself and just fell on my knees in our living room. I said God, I can see this is your wake up call to me. A little diaper bag can completely stop me in my tracks. I need you. Our family needs your protection and hand over us.

Now you hear these stories and think, oh that's cute but I am sure it didn't really happen that way. I can assure you it did for me. As I was still on my knees, my doorbell rang. I peeked out and saw a man holding my diaper bag. I was a little nervous thinking about what he was doing at my door but I called Matt quickly and just held onto my phone as I answered the door.

My Christmas Angel stood at the door speaking very broken English. He said "Are you Alexandra Dehong? I said yes and you brought my diaper bag to me. Thank you so much. He responded with these simple words "God bless you." Then he just turned and walked away. I wish I could repay him in some way. Not so much for the "things" in my bag but the undeniable gift from God he gave me. I am sitting in a new light today. I am reminded of the awesome power and grace my God has over my life.

Thank you God for sending my my mystery Christmas angel.

The Teacher in Me

First I would like to welcome myself back to the blogging world. It sure has been a while. Life was and is busy but I want to get back into blogging again. I always enjoy reading everyone else's story so I figure I should write again for anyone that is interested in my life :)

The past few months have had many life changes. I am so blessed to be able to stay home with Levi by opening my home up as a daycare back in January. It has been such a wonderful experience to be with Levi and the other babies in my home and I love it!

I am starting to find ways to bring let the teacher out again. Each month I am starting to pick a theme. This month is family. We made family photo albums and have been practicting everyone's names. Today we finger painted a giant tree that will hang in the playroom for our "daycare family tree". This weekend we will have a daycare family bbq and I hope to take pictures of everyone's family to hang on our tree.

Last month our theme was animals. The babies were all exposed to many animal words and the sounds they make. The youngest baby is 8 months old and the oldest is just about 20 months. (Levi is second oldest at 17 months) So they are young and I always feel quite accomplished after getting an art project accomplished...it's a BIG moment for me everytime :) It's funny because I recently went to a workshop where I was told at this age art is "all about the process, not the product!) but I usually have one they can go wild on and then we have our "teacher led" version to hang or go home!

It's been so much more of a challenge than I thought it would be to go from teaching to home. I have to remind myself in the moments of scrambling to get lunch ready, feed them all, and clean it up that I am still a teacher. I teach them about life and even though I don't have state standards to measure up to anymore, I hope the standards I set for myself and the kids are still "measuring up".

It's a boy!

We found out yesterday that we are having a little baby boy! He is growing as he should be and was moving quite a bit during the ultrasound. So much that Matt was amazed I couldn't feel him yet. The ultrasouns tech told us that usually they have to be about a pound before you can actually feel their movements which is around 20 - 22 weeks. That's only 2 weeks away, I think that will be an exciting experience to feel the baby move for the first time. We have decided on his name. It is Levi which means "united". We are still working on the middle name at this point. I wouldn't want to just post pictures of us without highlighting little Levi since this is all about him. Here they are.

All the New Beginnings

I am now about a month into the fourth year of my teaching career. My classes are really large this year with at least 30 kids in each class. I teach four classes of 6th grade science. This year is going really well in our beautiful new building and my huge science lab classroom. It feels bigger than some of my college science lab classes! My little sixth graders are finally adjusting to using lockers and getting to class on time. They are adorable...I love them:)

Matt just got back from a trip to New York for business. He has been working hard and still enjoying Pepsi very much. He is starting to look into the process of starting grad school next fall. While he has been busy with this, I have started the giant process of working on my national board certification.

My sister moved down to NC again and I am SO excited. We have been spending some good quality time together. We are sad that her husband, Bart, already had to leave for military training though. We will be excited when he returns again.

Today we (Matt, Beka, and I) went to a church called Vintage 21. We went to a concert there a while ago with our good friends the Bennetts but now returned for our first Sunday. We really liked it and are going to continue. We have missed having a close church family and it feels like there are so many ways to get involved and connected there.

The most exciting new beginning for us is that we are ecstatic to say that we are expecting a baby, due March 26th. I am now in my 13th week, nearing the end of the first trimester. We are hoping that the symptoms of the first trimester soon too shall pass. I have been able to work through it until this week, I had to cave and get some prescription anti-nausea medicine this week. It seems to help a little bit but it wasn't the magical pill I was expecting it to be...haha. All of this is overlooked when I think about all the joy to come with our little one. We plan on finding out whether we are having a boy or girl and will post it as we find out. I know I can hardly wait to find out :)

A whirlwind summer so far!

The first month of summer break has gone by so fast. I went up to Michigan for three weeks to be a part of all the wedding happenings for my little sis Beka and my bff Nicki. I was able to go to Nicki's bachelorette party which was a lovely day on the beach and then a fun dinner and sleepover. It was fun to have a sleepover...I can't remember the last time I had one:)

For my sister's bachelorette party the following weekend, we went to Cedar Point and then went bowling and spent the night at a hotel. It was also a ton of fun!

Of course, while I was in Michigan, I had a lot of time to spend with family. It was awesome to celebrate Father's Day with my dad and his birthday was a couple of days before that. We had a picnic at a state park in Michigan and went walking and visited one of my childhood favorites...the petting zoo!

I was so excited when Matt finally joined me in Michigan for the third week. I've decided that two weeks is a really long time to be away! It was so good to have him back again:) He also got to attend Nicki's wedding and he was in my sister's wedding as well.

Both of the weddings were beautiful. I had a lot of fun being in both Beka and Nicki's weddings. It's an honor to be able to stand up in their weddings to support both of them. Here are some pictures.

When we got home from Michigan, we recooperated for a week and then decided that we were going to get that new puppy I'd been hoping for. She is a Pembrooke Welsh Corgi and we named her Riley. She is 13 weeks old. Her and Dilbert are becoming friends. She likes to chew on him and he doesn't exactly love all the attention yet. But I am sure he will come to appreciate it:)

May Happenings

The month of May has brought a lot of beautiful weather and a lot of events. Late last month (April) we helped our friends the Bennetts pack up for their move to Oronogo, MO. We miss them greatly but are very excited that they were able to move closer to both their families.

Then early in May we went to a surprise birthday party of one of my coworkers. When she walked in the door to find us all hiding in the kitches shouting Happy Birthday it was very neat!

Last weekend we went to Artsplosure in downtown Raleigh. It was a lot of fun to walk around and see all the interesting artwork and all the creative people. While we were there we saw a good share of interestingly dressed people but for the most part it was really nice. On Sunday of that same weekend we went to a wedding. It was in Benson, NC. One of my coworkers from my old school was getting married. It was a beautiful ceremony and reception at a bed and breakfast.

This past week was a somewhat stressful week because my students were taking their end of grade tests. It is three straight days of boring silence while the students work away. After the tests are over the kids think that they are done for the year so on Thursday and Friday I worked to prove to them that our year is not over until June 10th. Although, I wouldn't mind if it was finished now either ;-)

On Friday Matt and I went to see Terminator and it was pretty good. Last night we had a game night with the Shannons and one of my coworkers. We played some Balderdash. Good ole game! I woke up this morning and suddenly I am sick as a dog with a cold. I dread those summertime colds they always feel so much worse because it's unexpected! I hope that with this long weekend I can relax and feel better quickly though.

I cannot express how excited I am that the school year is almost finished and I will be headed home for Brighton for three weeks. I will be in two weddings (my sister and my best friend Nicki's). It will be fun to go back home and see everyone and not worry about teaching for the summer!

Last but not least, Matt has been working hard at Pepsi. His hard work has paid off and landed him a promotion. He is now an analyst. We are very excited!

Spring Break 2009

Spring Break started a little bit earlier for me while Matt had to continue working to support the family...ya know. I headed out for balmy Brighton, Michigan on an early Saturday morning at 6:00 AM. Once I landed my mom and sis were waiting for me at the airport and we headed out to get my sisters wedding shower cake and preparations were underway for her shower.

During the shower we played a very humorous game of the soon to be wed game. This is a picture of my sister having to cram 15 gumballs in her mouth after answering a question wrong!

After spending some time with my wonderful family and my bff Nicki I headed home at 3:45 the following Thursday, Matt picked me up and we were off to Washington D.C. We spend Thursday night and Friday with my aunt, uncle, cousin, grandma, and grandpa in Falls Church, VA. We hadn't seen my aunt's family since our wedding so it was awesome to get a chance to catch up and spend time together. We had a lot of fun:)

On Friday night we headed to our friends' house in D.C. to spend the rest of the weekend. The Robinsons are wonderful hosts. We spent time reconnecting with our old small group which was us, the Robinsons, and the Bennetts. We had a lot of fun sight-seeing, eating yummy food, playing games, and celebrating Easter at Mosaic Church in D.C. Here are some pictures of us out on the mall and hanging out with friends.

P.S. Gracy is cute and has become my second favorite dog to Dilbert:)

Until next time... dah...dah....dahhhhhhh