almost there

I have been working out now for some time and all i can say is wow. i can sure feel the difference in my strength. i am not quite there yet, but i am on my way. tomorrow i do weigh ins just to see how much i have lost. i know i am not far from my gaol. which is 155. but i will get there. i have to say that over all all the work that i have been putting in my body has paid off. the time was def. worth it. now i have a new goal. and that is to run a marathon...yeah just something that i can say i did. one of my great friends has been pushing me every time we run and i go one more lap than i did that following week i have a little bit till the marathon but i am determined to run the thing. not sure if it will be a half or the full but i will do it. you would be surprised on how much further you can go when you have someone there pushing you. plus it helps to keep your mind off of what you are doing.
little Micah is growing like normal. seems like he does a new thing everyday now. but he still runs around the room saying dadadadada. its cute. we are trying new words and new foods everyday. its a good mix. but he does repeat a lot of what i do now. thats kind of scary, but he is doing good. and so is esha. her belly is looking very cute! she has the whole glowing thing going on now and wow wee. she is beautiful. we are hopeing this time for a girl but will be happy with either or.we shall see.

things left behind

i often wounder about what life. whats is the purpose and why am i here? why are we all here? i am sure you all have asked that question some point in your life also. but have you found the answer? i have been thinking about all the skills, talents and passions i have, and how i can use them. why i even have them. and why am i not using them all. do you have any that you don't use? i am sure you do.
my wife and i have been reading "the purpose driven life" by Rick Warren. the book has been sitting on my self for some time now untouched, i picking it up one night and reading the first few pages i thought man i am going to do this. there was so much good information that i need that i wanted to do it with esha. so one night i grabbed it and started telling her about it and now we read it nightly. so far i can relate to this book. things hit right at home when i read through the chapters. tonights was great. What drives your life? is it guilt,resentment and anger,fear, materialism, or approval? a little but of everything for me. but i woke me up a bit, the biggest one for me is to have the approval of others. and fearing what they think of me. am i living up to there standards? like for instance my tattoo. many people look down at them. mine is plain as day on my right forearm. its a cross with three nails in it. i found it to be a great reminder for myself to live for God. and also to stand up for what i believe in. some say that i should not need a reminder but i tell you it keeps me in check. and out of trouble... but down here i get looks. so i think to myself what are they thinking about? are they judging me?
i always fear what others think of me, trying to please everyone! i want to use all of my talents and passions but as i read (and from what others tell me) i need to stop. yeah i do have a lot to give, but i need to focus on what it is i am giving and how/who i am giving it to. a good question for me to keep in mind, is this work or use of my passion/ talent going towards work for God? if its not than i need not to do it. plus i need not to worry about what others are going to say because i am not going to do it. whatever it may be.
so far i am learning a lot form this book. i know it will continue. if you have not read this book you need to. when you have questions like why am i here and what am i doing with my life. it makes you think about everything that God has giving you, and is there a purpose for your life.

thinking out loud, should i be?

OK so i have been working out now with this new program for a while. 4 weeks to be exact. and i get invited to run at night. so i thought OK i will for a little while. maybe a couple of laps would help me shed the last few pounds that i need to reach my goal. so i take up on the offer, well we talk smack saying how she was slower than i and i was slower than her. me thinking that i have been doing good with this program i should have no problem beating her at running. X style right..some may not get that.! but anyways i go running with her on my light week, the week i was suppose to rest and take it easy. think again.
the first night i lost count on how many laps we did. i think it was 6 or so. ( mile and a half) but i get done and the next morning i am sore. no boggy been sore before. but than she calls me up hey want to run tonight. OK, but i am going to go easy. nope she pushed me to do 4 laps. next day. you can see were this is going. so i was thinking.... i need to tire her out. i need to push her to her max. after talk to her we are going to do p90x together. ha ha, master plan. now i can be on the same bring her down to my level. and it failed. after doing kenpo one night we ran 4 laps and walked about 12. thinking the whole time man is she going to call it a night soon. nope. after talking with her husband he informed me that it is nearly imposable to beat her at running. so i am thinking yay. i am going to widdle away to nothing.
so you may be asking why i do this. well i like to work out and stay in shape. it help keep my back pain away and gives me more energy. so i love it. but why if i complain so much that i am tired and being lazy that i do this. well its because after we run and workout we talk. mostly about God and what He is doing in our lives. talking with someone about problems, struggles, happy times, and sad times always puts you in a better mood. when you can go to someone who is more spiritually advanced and have them give you ideas and guidance about certain things it makes thing a whole lot easy er. i go over board to get better connected with God. and those who serve Him. i push myself sometime too far to get that 30 min of time of wisdom and knowledge. thing that i know and that i don't.i am willing to go far beyond everything that i have done to seek His word. i took a stand to lead myself in a better life, and to speak into the lives of others. i thrive on what He has done to others, how they once were lost but now am found.
now i do like working out. and i love running. i am just using this as an example on how i keep God in my life. i know i need more and i do read my bible and go to church, but you always need more. you need good spiritual friends who are there for you in every way passable. i am so thankful that God has put this couple in our lives.my wife and i are so thankful for you three and what you are doing for us, and with us. i can see that God is using you in areas that you may not see. i know He has a great plan for your whole family! i do love the time together and you putting up with my complaining and whining. only esha should have to do that.....but you do. so thank you both!!!i look forward to more nights of pushing my limits and seeing what you are made of, to see if i can out run you. thanks again for everything you have done! we love you all!
if you don't have anyone in your life like that than you need to find some. the church is a good place to start. stay away from the bars and look at what you see Sunday moring. i guarantee that someone there is looking for the same thing that you are.

something you all should read

Great news has came our way. God has been a huge blessing to us and he keeps on giving, we just found out today that iesha is 7 weeks pregnant! We are very happy that this new addition is coming soon. things around here have been great. lots of new changes have been going on here at the job. we have went from bing permanent house parents to relief. so every week we have a new set of kids come in than the 4th week we have off. i do like being the relief. it has its ups and downs but over all it is good. have many close relationships with new friends and with the kids. i am loving every minute of our new life here.
7 weeks wow. i am excited about having a new little one around here. it will be crazy for a while but things will calm down. we are hoping for a girl, but will be happy with another boy too. i am really going to have to pick up the slack around here. might have to sell some things to make room for the new one. but i am sure i will manage.
keep looking for more updates on how she is doing, and how things are progressing. thank you for reading and GOD Bless!

rest!!!

well we had finished our first week of the work out, and wow. i am sore! we started with the legs and back. that one was good because i am stronger in my legs but i suffered through the back part. i did regular chin ups did not use the bands, so i worked a little harder this time. it was still really fun.
the next day was kenpo x. that one is my favorite! i love the moves and man did i sweat! lots of fun. i managed to keep up with the program and not give in to the small breaks. it was a great work out.
on day seven it was rest or x stretch. we just rested but next time we are doing the stretching cause it helps! we started it all over this week and go for 3 weeks. take a week off of doing yoga, stretching, and some cardio. after the 90 days we will evaluate ourselves and do the whole thing over again. my wife don't know but we will switch and go into doubles if time will let us. might go the lean way and wait for the kids to start school to go into doubles, but over all this workout is the best! i have worked out in the past. going 4 hrs a day 5 days a week and this don't come close to it! they did a great job in this program. i would recommend it to anyone who wants a challenge! and have fun working out!

working out

things here have been great going so far. the little guy is up and walking around and getting into even more. everything has to be put up and out of his reach. things are still good, hurricane Alex just came last week and to be honest i was disappointed. all the hype about it going to hit us, but we just got the tip of it. i do like storms so i was excited! Micah had his first birthday and it went great. he had a little cake all by himself and wow did he make a mess. after his bath the sugar started to kick in and he was wired! i never seen him like that and wow talk about a sugar high. he would not stop moving. but all and all he had a good first birthday.
My wife and i have started the P90X work out. its a very extreme workout DVD set that is very challenging. i have worked out in the gym, and even went through pt, and this is way harder than anything that i have done. plus it is also fun. this is our first week working out and our third on the diet. so far i have lost 5.6 lbs. not a whole lot but not bad for just changing the food i eat.
the first day was chest and back. we did a lot of different push ups and pull ups. i use to be able to put them down but when you change it up by doing multiple different types of push and pull ups its challenging. we did not do the ab ripper x mostly because i did not know that we were to do it.
the second day we woke up and our whole upper body was so sore! this day we did plyometrics. lots of leg work here but tony did a great job of pushing it through and making it fun. being sore from the previous day and doing this made it interesting. but i did sweat a lot. had my pulse up to 178...that's working!
the third day is shoulders and arms, plus the ab ripper x. this one we did a lot of resistance training. it was good. worked up a little sweat. but my arms were drained!
the forth day we got a small break, or so i thought. it was yoga x time. so we started off and man did that feel good to stretch and really open up. to my surprise i had more sweat on this one than to the arm work outs. we only got through parts of it. i am not that flexible. but i woke up today and felt a little sore but mostly good.
so tonight is legs and back. plus the ab ripper x. so we will see how that one will work. i will keep updating to let you know how it works!

Kutless - What Faith Can Do

Man do i love this song! its so inspiring to listen to in the morning. i am a huge fan of Kutless. they have great worship songs and now i cant wait to go out and grab the new album. if you get a chance i would listen to him explain how this song come about and why it was written. you can get it off of you tube. i had one of our kids listen to the song and he really enjoyed it. now i can not get him to stop listing to it. but i dont mind. i have been looking for some good music for our house. i wanted some soft music but i feel that having good Christian music is better. its always a better environment when you have music in the back round. plus our kids always want to know what these songs i have mean. most of them i can explain. but this one is easy. i love the strong tower album and the songs are better but i need to update my selection. so this will make a great addition.

getting ready

well things down here in Texas could not be better. the weather is always something to talk about. this summer is going to be great 113 degree. its good that we have a constant breeze coming in off the gulf. u am still liking this job more and more each day. being home with esha and Micah all the time. getting a chance to watch him grow up, each day its something different. like yesterday he started to feed himself. and he is clapping now. oh and the best part he learned how to say Dada! though he did say mom first...but who is keeping track. he is 11 moths and not far from his first birthday. it has been a true blessing working with these kids and getting to reach into there life. making a huge difference in them even if you have not done much to them. i am starting to miss home now. but its not to bad. they don't have a lot of things that i had up north. like certain foods and restaurants. but they have a lot of great Mexican places to eat. its all good too! i stay away from the Chinese restaurants here but the nicer place are OK to eat at. the beech is amazing. to go and swim when ever i want its nothing like the great lakes!
this job is nothing like any job i use to do! i really don't call it a job. its a ministry. i love this place and the opportunity that we have here! God has certainly blessed us here!

what happen

Texas is great! i really enjoy living so close to the beech. being able to go whenever i want is great. i think that the move was a smart one. at least for now. the job is going great and our little guy is ten moths old now! wow he is getting so big. i wish everyone who seen him when he was a little bean could see him now! you would not recognise him! i really enjoy having all the time with him. and esha. its nice, being with them all the time and watching him grow. amazing stuff! when the kids are at school is when Micah and i play. we have this huge bean bag in the living room, and he loves to climb on it. we chase each other all around. he laughs the whole time we play. really cute. he is really getting into everything now. but i like the fact i can put him in the living room and not worry about him. the job requires everything to be child proof. so i have no worries he is eating food again. yay. but he still drinks a lot of milk. but he will stop that in a few months. i think that the kids here really enjoy having a happy baby around. they are always playing with him and enjoying his laugh.
things here have been great! the church is good. nothing like what i have been to though. its a church of Christ. i enjoy it. but i still watch the ones from my old church. new hope and new pointe. always need fed!! another good thing about down here is its not cold! which means my back does not hurt! i can still tell when its going to rain though. its all good.
we have a men's bible study on Fridays. and we read though the bible. i am looking for some good ideas for the group. if you have any suggestions let me know i could use them. i have one that will last a couple of weeks but i want to go though the wild at heart book. but i don't know yet if these guys will be willing to do it. any ideas or tips would be great!! thanks!

New Job

well we made it to our new home. it is beautiful! so here at our new job in San Benito Texas. the job is being a live in house parent. we will be relief parents for the full time house parents. we will have a different set of kids every week. than our fourth week we have off. for the past couple of days we have been in training. watching videos and reading the material. some of the videos are bad! but some will keep your attention. its all common sense stuff. like how to cope with difficult situations. so its kind of boring. but the hardest thing is trying to pay attention with micah.
now this blog is about my family and the growth in His kingdom. so this is the last time i will talk about our job. we are realizing how hard it is to do daily things with a baby in the house. it does take both of us to clean the house and take care of him. fir me it is hard because i like to be organized. so i am trying to get all the training, cleaning, and preparing for the other kids. its a challenge but we are really enjoying it. we have strict cleaning and securing roles here dealing with the state and federal regulations. so its hard to keep up with but once you do it makes things a little better. Micah had been fussy latly dealing with teething and getting over a cold. but he is doing ok. the air down here is dry. so both of us are having trouble breathing. i dont think esha has much trouble with it..lucky! but we got down here fine and had a good trip. he slept most of the way so that was nice. i drove it all mostly because esha dont like to drive in the city. so i drove. i did not mind.
our church is really cool. the music is all with out guitar, or even an organ, but the all sing good. so that makes it better. the last time we were here i think we had maybe 30 people. way smaller than New Pointe. but we both like the church.the message was real good last time too. so things are good. once we get our things it will be better. to fill in our courters. right now we are staying in the guest room and using the main house kitchen. i will have pics up later once we get up and running. i am going to be blogging in vox about the job. the link is up highlighted as maddaddy. that will take you to the blog. well i hpe all things are good back at home. going to miss the fam. and the one guy i still talk to up north, but things will be good down here. thanks for all the prayers and worries. love you all!

Job!!

Well, i am almost done here with this job search. it kind of stinks. right now i have about 260 applications out there. trying to find a job now is hard. i think it would be easier to find a needle in a hay stack than do this. i have applied for a lot of different jobs. none of which i want to work for. so while doing this search i really prayed and told God to lay on my heart what He wanted me to do. with my pay ending and no more money coming in i really started to worry. so i really prayed to god that He use me and put me in any job that He felt i can do. after about a week my mother told me about a couple going out to Kansas to be a house parent. i had no idea what that was. i looked into in and it was the job description for me. this is not only something that i can do but i wanted to do. after putting in my app across the u.s. i had a few takers. one in Omaha Nebraska. and one in north Carolina. but the one in San Benito Texas was great. its called Sunny Glen Children Home. here is the link to there web site.after seeing the pictures and the videos. i know i wanted to go there. i had something tugging at me to go down and look at the place.
last week we flew down and looked at the place and let me tell you WOW. it is beautiful. as soon as i got to the place i knew this is were i needed to be. we stayed down there for four days. the house we stayed at was an all girls home and they were so well behaved. i knew that God had been working! after we got back i started to pack and found out that it will cost a lot of money, but put your heart into God and HE will provide. our taxes come back just in time and we have enough to move!! things have been working so good for us,its like i have a big weight lifted off my shoulders, i pray that this job will work, and that God may use us in ways that we never knew.

2010...yay

Yes he is holding a drum stick, before i snapped the pic he poked mommy in the eye with it. sorry mom. but wow has these six months flown by. he is more than 16 pounds by now, and guess what he had started to do. crawl, that's right he found out he can move. so we are starting to put things out of his reach. but i know he will still get into things. so i have been spending some time at the church and putting a lot more into job searching, and its crazy. have about 20 to 30 a week. on week 9 right now. but i have a few options i am looking at. have any of you ever herd of a live in home parent. well i found out that there are homes for children that need christian parents to raise the kids and create a family environment to live in. now this is cool. i think i have found something that hurts me so much that i have to do something about it. this house is for abused and neglected children from 0 to sometimes 21. i have looked all through the untied states and found a lot of positions open for houses looking for christian parents to live in the homes with about 8 kids in each house. i know that is a lot of kids but i can do it. at church i had about 30 kids in one room. 3erd and 4th graders. now that was fun. yeah i only had them for about an hour but i strive on that. i love kids. i found that out at my old church. and now i feel God saying here is a way you can help. i had watched a video of one of the places i am looking at and i cried when i herd of the stories that the kids told, some good and some bad. that's when i felt Gods tug saying this is it.
i always wanted to adopt kids in a bad situations. i have tried but with out any money that's hard to do. so this is a way that i can make a difference and give these kids a chance. love them and show a new life with Christ. now were i and looking is not in Ohio, but i have never felt this strong about something. it is amazing to see God work. i am just praying that this will work out and that we will make a difference.