5 days and counting

Keith is about to start his last week of student teaching! Friday night we will be celebrating his HUGE accomplishment. We've almost made it, it's within our grasp!!! We are so very ready to move forward and discover what the Lord has for us in this new stage of life (hopefully it involves less moving around, less doctors, less stress and much much more family time :).

And for the record...I was able to get my hair to look like it's "old" self today. YAY!!! I should probably take a picture. Oh..and this weekend marks the one year completion of my cancer treatment! I have a CT scan on Tuesday and a dr. appt on Wed...hopefully I'm still in remission :).

A Few Pictures of Our New Home

Well...this is it :). The front of the house could use a little color....but nothing a few flower bushes can't do!

This is the front porch! I'm so excited to have one....I've always wanted a place to relax outside. Now I just need some furniture for the summer time. I think I want white wicker to soften up the dark brown of the house....any other ideas?

And our living room! (btw the front door is 4ft wide - it made moving in really easy). The valence came with the house so I'd like to replace them with a not so gold/fluffy style or I'm going to make some....I just need to decide what color to bring in.

Our bedroom. We have the loving brown wall in but at least it's kinda hidden behind the furniture and drapes...every old house needs one ugly wall right.

This is the girls room. They have their own "walk" in closet and bathroom! So fun! Sadie's crib is on the wall you can't see but her stuff is in there too.

The dinning room. Our table ended up fitting really nicely in this spot and I started doing a little Christmas decorating before we left so those are ornaments hanging from the light.

This is one of the sides of the beautiful built in hutch...I'm finally able to display my china :)

I love this hutch!!! I've always wanted one and right when you walk in our front door your eye automatically goes to this beauty....I wanted to rent this house the moment I saw it :)

"The Nook". I decided to put the girls table in the kitchen nook so that we could do projects and play dough over tile and not carpet....it turned out fitting really well.

This is one of our craigslist find! The house didn't come with a kitchen and our landlords said if we wanted to find one they would take off a week of rent...this stove saved us $152...very cool!

And this is my cute little kitchen. It's small but I think it will be very functional. There is a dishwasher to the left of the sink and cabinets lining the walls above the counters. All of the wood and tile look new and so clean! The house also has central heat and air, fans in every room, a big backyard, a large laundry/service porch off the kitchen -we found our washer and dryer off of craigs list too and I'm so excited to see what if's like to have laundy in my oun home...I'm sure it's great!!!

So we are pretty much all moved in and in a few weeks Keith will be done with scholl and we will take our girls to their new home for the fist time since moving in. We are very excited to settle in and make our first house a home!

So Much To Do...and so little time!!!

Well needless to say we have been VERY busy these past few weeks!
Keith turned the big 26 years old
Bekah turned the big 3 years old
Keith has 4 weeks left of his student teaching...Yay!!!
and
We finally sat down and talked about what our next step is after Keith get's his teaching credential. After many months of discussing, praying and avoiding the topic we finally made a decision.
WE ARE MOVING....to the valley
And we are actually looking forward to it...and least mostly. We always knew we would most likely need to move out of SLO after Keith graduated but we finally decided to go the Fresno area. My sister - Katie - lives in Kingsburg with her family and loves it. Our good friends just moved to Visalia for teaching jobs. There are about 4 or 5 job openings that Keith has applied for in the area and plenty of subbing opportunities if the jobs don't work out. The rent is lower and the jobs pay more.....and most importantly we both felt led to take this step and go....so we are.
I went up with my mom and the girls this past weekend and after a lot of searching I found a cute little older house that has 2 small bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a big back yard!!! and laundry hook ups!!!! (Keith and I have been married for almost 5 years and we have never had laundry in our home). It's on a quiet street in Selma (8 minutes away from my sister) and our landlords are really sweet... and they live right next door. They offered the house to me a few minutes after we met and hugged me when I left! Oh and it's month to month rent!

Keith and I are moving all of our stuff up the weekend before Thanksgiving (I have sooooo much packing to do!) so that I have a few days to clean our appartment and maybe have a garage sale before Dec. 1st. Then we will spend the first two weeks of Dec. living back at my mom's house while she and Bill are out of town so that Keith can finish school and then it's up to our new home in Selma.

I can't belive I'm actually going to be leaving San Luis - this is a first for me - but I'm ready for the next step in this journy we call life and I'm excited to see the blessings that come from it.

Surgery Update

Thanks for all who have been praying for my Dad (see previous post). The update is that the doctor said the prostate surgery went "perfect" and the outlook is excellent. I know he so appreciates your prayers, so thank you! Keep em coming!

In other news, I am slightly over the half-way point at my student teaching down at Lopez High School in Arroyo Grande. I just submitted grades for my first term and continue to be alternately inspired and, yes, sometimes infuriated by my students. Some are fighting to get an education despite already having babies or dealing with crippling life circumstances while others lose more and more of themselves through drugs and alcohol. And I get to walk in there every day and do my best to empower them. I love this profession.

Thanks Cara for being so understanding, loving, and just all around amazing!! She is making sacrifices every day to allow me to follow my dream.

Surgery for my Dad tomorrow

Around two months ago now, my Dad (Mike Badger) was diagnosed with early stage prostate cancer. I'm humbled to remember that he was diagnosed just after Cara and I were reflecting back on the last year and asking Why did God have us go through all that? The answers to the question are unfathomable, but it left us realizing that God has a plan, however cliche that may sound--it is absolutely true.

So tomorrow my Dad goes up to Mountain View to have surgery. Since they caught it early, the chances for full recovery are extremely high and he won't need chemo or radiation, phew! He's in good spirits tonight and looking for how God can most be glorified through this latest trial, but he needs prayer for tomorrow morning and the subsequent recovery. So take a moment just as you're reading this to stop and pray for him--thank you!

Wherever you are tonight, here's hoping that your afflictions are being eclipsed by glory.

Is there such thing as an EEA group!!!

I've been eating left over pizza and mini cinnamon rolls all day and I need to stop but I can't...I keep telling myself that my diet starts up again tomorrow but part of me really doesn't want it to...and as I'm typing this post all I want to do is go eat more junk food! I think I may need to join
Emotional Eaters Anonymous

Why does bad food have to be so stinkin yummy?

Our Sadie Lady