guess who's back again?

hi friends! remember me?

okay. I didn't, by any means, forget that I had a blog. I just stopped writing for the blog that I know I have. sad? yes. necessary. sometimes. there's been other stuff going on. take a look. 

we've been at Parker's a lot. and also at church. 

monopoly games have been played. 

my sis and I totally and completed rearranged our bedroom. 

still working. (top left is three of my kiddos, top right is their backyard, bottom left was taken after I addressed five hundred postcards and bottom right is my sweet Eden girl). 

and my sinuses have tried to kill me. 

but enough about me...what's new with you? ("well my girlfriend kicked me out, and I'm livin with my dad. and my family killed president Lincoln") if you know what movie that is from then fist bump. we are now best friends. 

but for reals, I am coming back (have I said this before??) and I still have a post from my sis to publish. blogger wasn't working when I tried to publish it last. but soon and very soon. 

until next time, have a merry Wednesday, a happy weekend and a lovely everything-in-between. 

oh and enjoy the coming of fall. 

love you guys,

Jen 

confession time

so guess what, friends? I make mistakes. (are you surprised?) I mess up. and I'm very incredibly fickle. I jump from one thing to the other. that is something that I hate about other people, but I do it CONSTANTLY. ugh. it makes me annoyed with myself.

today is confession time. some of these will be deep, some (seemingly) silly.

-I hate cats. CANNOT STAND THEM. a cat lady I am not. here's the thing: cats are like women who have an attitude problem. one minute they're all: 'oh, today we can be friends and you can rub me and we can just hang out' and then two minutes later they're like: 'you're not worthy of me. leave me alone or I'll bite your hand off.' umm...just no. besides, they are just freaky. like the whole back-arching thing...I dislike it. it freaks me out. cats are just not my thing. (did I mention that I dislike cats?)

this is how I feel about cats and mornings

-I don't do mornings either. when I wake up in the morning, I groan. sometimes out loud. I really just hate mornings. I love sleeping. and I'm grumpy in the morning, too. don't talk to me, don't look at me and whatever you do, DON'T TOUCH ME...unless you want to feel the wrath of grumpy-its-still-morning Jennifer. trust me, you don't.

-I used to hate Justin Bieber. USED TO being the keywords there. Michael (my 25 year old brother) finally broke down my walls, and I started listening to him. honestly, I love his music now. he has a song to fit most of my moods. his song "Be Alright" off the Believe album is my favorite. (closely followed by Believe). Be Alright is my favorite mostly because its just a really good song, but also because Michael and I listened to it the morning I left for Slovakia. Biebs wrote the song for his sister while he was away on tour, and so the lyrics are super sweet, and so now I kinda feel like that's mine and Michael's song. but anyway.

-Moms is my best friend. I am a crummy best friend sometimes and don't tell her things and am rude and a royal pain in the neck. but she's loyal. (well, she's my mother, so she can't exactly just dump me...) she's patient and she listens. she encourages me constantly. she's the greatest.

-my fear of sharks is unsurpassed. legit. I cannot look at them. not even pictures. the last time I looked at a picture of a shark I really almost cried. the time before that when I looked at one (I was trying to conquer my fear) I did cry. it's sad. but seriously, they are SCARY.

-when I was little, one time I got mad at Michael because he wouldn't let me play baseball with him and Thomas, so I yelled, "I'm gonna bash your head in with a shovel!!" needless to say, he ran away from me. I was violent as a child.

one of my favorite pictures ever

-I once wrote two posts. they were titled: Tim Tebow, One Direction, the Beatles and Michael Landon. those two posts can be found HERE and HERE.  well...basically everything I wrote in those posts still stands. I still stand on the fact that shirtless celebrities are bad business. I still stand on the fact that lusting after a celebrity is BAD BUSINESS. but, friends, I have become a complete and total teeny-bopper. along with a new-found love for the Biebs, I listen to One Direction. they do have some good songs. yeah, some of their stuff is silly and semi-ridiculous...but I'm just putting that out there. I'm being honest here, guys. don't make fun of me.

-I am so blessed. I have made so many dear, dear friends through this crazy blog world. I started making friends online before I even started blogging. its so crazy to have girls that I can email and ask questions and ask for prayer and just say "hey, how's your day going?" and we have never even met in real life! its crazily amazing. I thank God for my blog friends.

-I believe that dance parties and loud music are always a good idea. and chocolate. and eating good food. and celebrating birthdays. and loving Jesus. and working out at 11:30 at night. do those things and do them with people that you love and you'll be happy.

-I'm a messed up person. I let people down. I cry. I blame God for things. I get angry. I yell at my siblings. I am disrespectful to my parents. I waste my time. I don't always use my money wisely.

-I'm loved. I'm forgiven. I don't have to be ashamed because of the things listed above, because every time one of those things happened, grace is there. HE is there.

(confession is good for the soul. even if its just silly things. like being afraid of sharks. honestly, there wasn't a huge point to this post...just some things that were on my mind).

have a happy Wednesday, friends. a very happy Wednesday.

p.s. I'll be back before the week is out with a guest post from a special kiddo who just happens to double as my sister. you won't want to miss it. she gives some insight into the real me. (which is scary!)

a happy birthday post for my girl Kenz

today...well, today is a very special lady's birthday. and honestly, I so wish I could be with her today to go grab coffee and give her birthday hugs and gifts. but unfortunately we live hundreds of miles away from each other.

this girl, well, she's quite the character. she's funny. she's sarcastic. (just like me!) she has a huge heart. she loves Jesus so so much. she struggles daily and she still smiles. she loves running and coffee and One Direction...specifically Niall Horan. she may be a wee bit obsessed with that blonde Irishman. oh, you want picture proof? here ya go.

isn't she cute? yep.

she and I "met" via Instagram. she sent me a request to follow my IG. I clicked on her profile to check her out. she had this witty bio written out, and I learned one BIG thing from that witty bio. Kenzie and I are. twins. except...she's younger than me...and we don't look anything alike. and she lives in Minnesota and I live in South Carolina. but other than that, yep, we're twinners.

so she's basically gorgeous and funny and my hero. this girl struggles with Juvenile Arthritis. some days she hurts so bad, and she's real about it. she admits that some days it kills her. but the next day, she is smiling again, taking small steps towards heaven, where she can run her heart out and not worry about the pain.

she is such a great girl. really.

Kenzie, Kenz, Kenz. girl, I can't tell you how glad I am that you started stalking  following me on Instagram. I am so so so thankful for your friendship. someday we are gonna meet up and jam in one of our cars to really loud music, and then drink way too much coffee and just have a great time. can't wait.

sooooo...today as you're turning the big 1-8, remember that I love you very much! and hope today is awesome and totally rocks your socks off. LOVE YOU! xoxo.

slovakia, q and a

so. friends. I've been writing this Slovakia recap. and its been great. thanks to those of you who have been reading along. it means so much to me.

so here's the thing. do you have any questions? concerning the trip, in any way? like....

how much it cost? what we ate? what the stores were like?

yeah...anything. just leave a comment here... or email me your question at betterthatway[at]gmail.com
and maybe, just maybe I'll do my answers in vlog style. but I make zero promises on that one.

anyway. ask away!! :)

love y'all!!

slovakia, part 13: denis

Denis showed up on day one. I don't remember anything about him from that day. I was busy with the other kids, especially one or two of the troublesome boys. however, he made his presence known on Tuesday, and every day after that.

it was quite interesting having a troublesome boy in my group. not interesting because I disliked him, but interesting because we didn't speak the same language. it made it difficult for me to get anything across to him. tone of voice didn't usually work with him either. he was a bit of a problem. he would run away in between classes and wouldn't come back. I would have to get Filip or one of the David's to bring him to our classroom. they usually would have to just grab him and force him back into class. we were always lucky if he stayed in the first time. usually it took two or three tries.

he came every morning, wearing a black hat. he wouldn't let anyone else touch that hat. if you tried, he got mad. (I speak from personal experience here). he had jet-black hair and a cute, lop-sided grin.

somehow, as much trouble as he was, I couldn't be mad at him. yeah, he irritated me at times, but I loved that kid. he biked to camp every morning, and his grandmother would come in the afternoon and they would walk or bike away from school. He looked just like his grandmother, her hair as jet black as his and with the same smile. I don't know if his parents were around, but I never saw them.

he caused a whole lot of trouble in class. it didn't matter who he was sitting beside, he would cause some sort of ruckus. I tried everything, having Michaela fuss at him in Slovak, putting him at a table with the girls, taking away his stuff, but nothing worked. it wasn't until the last day that he didn't cause me any trouble. he sat himself on the floor of the classroom and didn't say anything. he listened to the lesson and didn't bother the other kids. it was a miracle.

Denis was the only one of my kiddos who made it a point to tell me goodbye after camp each day. he would try to tell me goodbye, but it never worked out because of the language barrier, but he would make it clear that he was leaving. usually I walked outside with him and watched him climb on his bike as his grandmother stood by his side. he would turn around and wave and then be off.

truth is, I miss Denis. I miss his grin. I even miss having to chase him down in the hallway. I pray for Denis a lot, too. hopefully, I'll see that kid next summer.

slovakia, part 12: to the pool we will go

hi friends! so we're back for part 12 of the great Slovakia recap of 2013. (hopefully, I will finish this recap before 2014. ha!)

wednesday! it was July 3rd and we were embarking on an adventure. camp started out that morning as usual, with lots of chasing my boys through the hallways; gratefully accepting assistance from Filip, David C. and David M; lessons, translating and then lunch time. after lunch we all piled gathered outside and started walking. we walked and tried to keep the kids from getting run over and then we finally reached our destination, with every kid in camp. 62 kids.

now, let me just take a moment to discuss the seating arrangements in Slovakia. I only wore a seatbelt one time the entire time I was there. partly because, most of the time, there wasn't a seat belt in the seat I was in. partly because we just didn't wear them. so anyway...moving on...

we arrived at the pool and everyone changed into their swimsuits and applied sunblock. I miraculously didn't get burned that day.

there were three pools. and there were hundreds of people in those three pools. (that's not an exaggeration, I swear). and we had to at least attempt to keep an eye on our kids. make sure no one drowned or died or killed anyone. haha!

there was a really big, deep pool. a small, not as deep pool and then a heated pool. the heated pool was by far my favorite. it felt so so good. plus, if you got in either of the other pools, the kids immediately tried to drown you. they liked to dunk, and then not let you back up. not my favorite past time.

we were there for about 3 hours. then we managed to gather all our kids up and head back to the school. we arrived back at school with 62 kids, and they were the same 62 kids we left with! we dismissed and then all went back to "the ranch" to prep for a church service that night.

church that night was so refreshing. made us all ready for a few more days of camp. and that was our Wednesday!

I'll be back soon with a post about a certain little boy who was an absolute nightmare, and one of my favorites.

on why my slovakia recap stopped...and why it will start back

have you ever been really in love with something? I mean really in love? I'm not talking about a person, I'm talking about an object...or a place...something that you just really feel deeply about.

that's how I feel about Slovakia. I've been told (countless times) that its just because its the first place I ever traveled. I've been told that its because it was my first adventure. I've heard that its because of the people that were there. but honestly, I just really love that country.

the day I got home from Slovakia, I wasn't happy to be here. yes, I love my family. I really love them. I was glad to see them, but my heart was hurting so bad. I held it together all through the airport hugs and stories and more hugs. I made it through the kids trying to tell me everything that happened while I was away. we drove to Sonic and I made it through an entire watermelon slush and a medium fry. but then, as Moms and Daddy and the kids and Thomas and Becca stood, scooting tables and throwing away trash, I just leaned up against a table, and thought for a minute. and I started thinking about Slovakia. and about how much my heart was hurting. I felt my lips trembling, and a tear rolled down my cheek.

Mom saw it and she came over and just hugged me, as I sobbed, right there at Sonic. I cried because I missed the people that I had grown to love. I cried because I was angry that I was my heart was hurting so bad. I cried because I just wanted to be back in Slovakia.

and you know what? I cried every day for about 2 weeks. nights were the hardest. I cried every night. and guess what? I still cry sometimes. I cry because I miss it, so so much.

as I was crying into Michael's shirt about two weeks ago, I said, "Will it ever stop hurting?" and he nodded. but honestly, as I think about it now...I don't want it to stop hurting. I don't want to ever lose my love for that country and that people.

there is a need there, friend. yeah, they seem to be well-off, they don't live in mud huts, they have shoes. they even seem happy. but you can see the need. you can see it in people like Peter. you can see it in the gypsies. you can see it in the eyes of the kids. you can see it even in a church service, when people cry as they worship.

that's why my slovakia recap suddenly came to a screeching halt. it was because the more I posted, the more I shared my heart, the more I missed it. and so, I haven't written any posts about Slovakia in over a week. but I'm coming back. because I want to share with you. I want you to know about the need. I want you to know about the fun parts. I want you to share in the adventure. and so I'll be back with more posts soon. I'm not sure how soon...but soon. if I don't show up soon, just email me and yell at me.

(as a complete side-note, I'm guest-posting over here today for my dear blog friend, Callie. go check it out and make sure you read some of her posts! she is so encouraging!!)