Where You Go, I Will Follow...Even to South Dakota

There are so many things I love about Easter. Most of all I love getting ready and going to church on Easter Sunday, knowing that we are celebrating the most holy of days - the day Christ defeated death and bought our salvation. Ever since college, when my relationship with Christ changed and grew, Easter has become even more important to me.

And then there are all the other little Easter details that are the icing on the cake...family meals with delicious, refreshing dishes and desserts that always make me think of spring... the promise of new life in nearly all of nature - beautiful flowers blooming, grass greening up, the promise of warm, sunny days ahead... so on and so forth.

So, admittedly, when I found out that a bull sale in South Dakota we were planning to go to was on the Saturday before Easter, I was pretty disappointed. I hated to think I would be missing out on all those things I really love about Easter because we would be traveling.
It wouldn't have been that crazy for me to say that Taylor could go to the sale, and I would stay home with Taylee. After all, that's a long drive for a baby on top of it being Easter weekend... but that's not how Taylor and I want to approach things.

We've never been the "you-do-your-thing-and-I'll-do-mine" type of relationship. It's important to us to do things together. We share a bank account (and all the loans) ;)... We sit down for supper together as often as possible... We work in our garden together... Heck, we even shower together when we can!

The most beneficial class I have ever taken was a class at K-State called Family Studies with an amazing teacher, Kelly Welch. And one of the things she said that really stuck with me was "People don't fall out of love. They fall out of intimacy."

If Taylor and I are constantly doing things independently of each other, how can we develop and strengthen the intimacy that is so very important to a successful marriage?

So... we went to the bull sale in South Dakota together. And even though we weren't sitting in church on Sunday morning, I believe God was still glorified. I think He rejoiced in the strengthening of our marriage - a commitment we made before Him - through time spent together and some good conversation we were able to have in the car on Easter morning.  And He was glorified as we listened to a wonderful book called This Life I Live by Rory Feek where he tells about the ways God and his wife, Joey, changed his life.

I may hope that next year I'll be able to sit in a pew with my family and worship on Easter morning, but I'll cherish the memories from this Easter as well.

We ended up getting three really good bulls for our cows. I enjoyed going through all the animals with Taylor, figuring out the best ones, and seeing Taylor's excitement about the quality of the animals we got.

We got back home Easter afternoon, and Taylee got to open her Easter basket from Grandma and Grandpa Stabel, including this cute, little Easter bunny hat. :)

Taylor and I try to do a lot of things together, but on occasion it doesn't always work out. We hadn't been back to my parents' since Christmas, so last weekend I made a trip up to see them with Taylee. Taylor stayed home to be prepared since there was a chance of snow and it's a good thing he did - we had a full-blown blizzard on April 30th. I loved getting to spend a relaxing weekend with my family, but I felt terrible for Taylor and all the feedyard employees. They worked extremely hard to try and take care of the cattle in the feedyard through the blizzard. We lost power at our house, so I stayed an extra day at Mom & Dad's to avoid hazardous driving conditions and to give the power company a chance to get our electricity back on.

On Sunday night we watched some old episodes of the Grand Ole Opry. Taylee got to dance around the kitchen with Grandma and Grandpa and help Kallan with her piano practice.

This is a picture of my garden with at least a foot of snow covering the whole thing.

We got between 1 and 2 feet of extremely wet snow on April 30th. There were drifts higher than my jeep at the entrance of the feedyard, and as I was driving home from my parents, I went a mile where every single power line was snapped off from the wind and weight of the heavy snow. Many people were still without power a week later, and many cattle were lost across the entire western part of the state. Please keep these people and their animals in your prayers as they recover from this harsh weather.

"Obey me, and I will be your God, and you will be my people. Do everything as I say, and all will be well!" Jeremiah 7:23

The lesson that accompanied this Scripture was a really good one. It reminded me that I am not responsible for the actions of others - I am only responsible for my actions and obeying my Lord. Everything else I will trust to Him.

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Lyndee

The Process of Teamwork

Not too long ago I was listening to a book by Chip and Joanna Gaines, the people from the reality show Fixer Upper. I had never watched their show before and didn’t know much about them, but they are a husband and wife team that work together remodeling homes. In one part of the book they talk about how they make such a good team because they seem to energize each other the more they work together.

I have to say, that’s a special relationship.

After five years of marriage and 7 months as new parents, I can honestly say Taylor and I make a good team… but that doesn’t mean working together has always been easy.

We still joke that one of our biggest…um… shall we say “marriage building” experiences came when we were working cattle together after we’d been married for over a couple of years.

We’d just bought the growyard and gotten it up and running, but our hospital barn was still in the process of being built, so we had a portable pen with a manual chute set up so we could treat any cattle that needed it.

It was early one morning in June during wheat harvest. Taylor and I were hurrying to go feed cattle before heading to the field, but when we got there we noticed a new pen had a bunch of cattle that needed to be treated. So we fed, and then spent the next couple of hours sorting over a hundred head of cattle and treating any that were in need of some medicine. But the portable pen and manual chute definitely made the job more than a little difficult, and during that time a few cattle slipped by me or didn’t get caught in the chute quickly enough and we’d have to go back through and sort them out again. Long story short, trying to be good caretakers of the cattle entrusted to us, and trying to get a new business up and running, while also trying to hurry and get to the field to cut wheat made for a stressful situation. And let’s just say by the time we were done, Taylor and I didn’t walk away holding hands.

But we learned from the situation, and our marriage grew stronger from it. We’re a long ways from perfect, but we have become more patient with each other in our weaknesses and learned to play more to each other’s strengths.

When we are working together well, it’s really satisfying to see how much we can accomplish together. We had a nice, warm weekend earlier this February, and within a single afternoon we had cleaned up our garden so it could be ready when we start planting things this spring; We cleaned out our chicken coop and spread the litter on the garden; and we swept and reorganized the tack room in our calf shed. It was a really enjoyable day made even better when Taylor ran to town to pick up barbeque for supper so we could relax together instead of me spending the rest of the evening cooking supper and cleaning it up.

I just pray God will help us to become better partners and teammates every day, not only because it will make our marriage better, but because it will make us better parents to our little girl as well.

Each year for Lent I like either give up or do something extra. This year I want to try something new.

Over a year ago I served at a spiritual retreat called Women's Encounter. It was an amazing experience, but one of the things I loved most was the time we spent in prayer for the women who were attending and other aspects of the weekend. Prayer has been one of the more powerful ways I have experienced God, especially when I am praying not for my own wants and desires, but for the needs of others.

So this year for Lent I want to devote an extra 10 minutes a day praying for other people, but I will need help to do this. I am asking for people to share any prayer requests they might have and at some point during Lent, I will spend at least 10 minutes praying for it/you. I will not share these requests with anyone - I will be the only one who sees them. You can send me a private Facebook message with your requests if you are interested.

I pray this will be a great way for me to grow in my faith during this season, but that more importantly others might benefit from it as well.

The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results. James 5:16

Since the last blog…

Taylee and I made a trip to visit my little sister and her family. We live in opposite corners of the state, so it’s a long drive, but the company is well worth it. :)

Our daughters are about 6 weeks apart in age, but I am always amazed at how different their personalities are already. Before becoming a mom I had assumed that, to a certain extent, a baby was a baby.

Afton is a lot more expressive than Taylee, and she’ll readily smile at pretty much anyone. Taylee is typically a very content baby, but she can be very somber. Unless you catch her in a really good mood, or if you’re someone she knows very well; you’re going to be hard pressed to get a smile out of her.

Taylee also went on her first ski trip this past weekend. Because of his knees, Grandpa Stewart didn’t ski, so he and Taylee got to hang out while we skied a couple hours in the morning and afternoon.

Skiing was a lot of fun – there was a lot of snow on the mountain so nearly all the runs were open.  I have to take it slow, and it’s definitely not very pretty, but I really enjoy the challenge of going down some of the double diamonds with Taylor. I only wiped out once – we were coming down a spot that wasn’t very even, but you had to go fast in order to make it up the hill on the other side. I almost made it, but dip close to the top of the hill got the better of me. I ended up sliding to the top of the hill on my backside, but as I came to a stop, I looked up at Taylor and said, “I made it!” :)

It's kind of like life in general - it ain't always pretty, but keep going until you make it!

I hope you all have a wonderful rest of the week!

Lyndee

Parental Problem Solving

Growing up I was around babies quite a bit - babysitting, cousins, nieces and nephews, and so on. So I kind of figured I would know what it would be like to take care of my own baby.

And while the feeding, diaper changing, bathing are basically the same for most babies, I never realized how much being a parent would be like playing in some sort of weird, never-ending problem solving game where you win by having a more content and happy baby. The loser's prize is a crying baby.

I think this is especially true when you're traveling with an infant. When we drove to my family's for Christmas, I had thawed some milk in case we needed to tide our daughter over for a short period of time in between stops. When Taylee started to stir I got the milk ready to put in the bottle, but it was a little cooler than she would like... so I turned on my heated seat and put the bag of milk there to take off the chill.
And when Taylor and I wanted to grab some lunch and take a quick bathroom break while Taylee was still sleeping we decided that Taylor would drop me off and I would run inside while he went through the drive through. Then, when I was done, I would run out and swap with him that way we still got our food but never had to disturb our daughter while she was sleeping and hopefully we could make better time.

Taylor and I felt pretty accomplished when we reached my mom and dad's after 6 hours without our daughter ever having a crying fit. But she made sure we didn't get too full of ourselves and gave us a nice dose of humility on the way back home a couple days later! ;)

Since my post-baby time management has not progressed enough yet for me to have regular blog posts, here are some things that have happened since my last one...

In October we took Taylee to her first K-State football game. As you can see she was very excited. ;)

Most of my family was able to come visit for Thanksgiving so we had a great time cooking, eating great food and playing games together.

While my family was visiting, we had Taylee baptized. In the Methodist Church, baptizing a baby is basically acknowledging the sacrifice Christ has made for that child. It was a special ceremony, but I look forward most to the day when I pray our daughter will make her own choice to accept Christ as her Savior and make Him Lord over her life.

In December we went to Vegas for the National Finals Rodeo. Taylee was a trooper!  She slept through both flights and handled all the travel amazingly well. 

Admittedly, until you have a baby, you never realize how loud some events are. We were really glad we had some ear protectors for Taylee during the rodeo what with the fireworks at the beginning, and loud music and commentating throughout the event.

This was at our favorite breakfast place in Vegas - Mon Ami Gabi. I would go to Vegas simply to eat here! :)

This Christmas was definitely different from any others we've had so far, but Christmas with a baby sure is a lot of fun! I absolutely love this photo from Christmas morning. :)

Whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Philippians 3:7

This recent Scripture really spoke to me.  As I start the new year, I pray God will help me to recognize those things in my life that separate me/keep me from being fully committed to Him, and then I pray He'll give me the strength to make the changes I need to so I can be completely His. I pray we all would be able to help each other in fellowship through these processes as well.

Hope you all are staying warm and safe in this winter weather!

Love,

Lyndee

The Right Occupation

Throughout my life I've dreamed of being a lot of different things.
I've always loved animals, so as a young kid I thought I should be a vet when I grew up.  Then later I wanted to be a nurse like my mom. My first year of college, I spent a lot of time worrying if I was picking the right career path. I decided to switch from pre-nursing to Ag Communications, then I added Ag Econonomics, then I dropped the communications part. Then right before Taylor and I got engaged, I very nearly made the full circle and went back to nursing, but didn't end up doing it.

I changed my mind thinking each new option would bring me more fulfillment with the work involved, making me happier in the long run…but I was mistaken.

I didn't realize the best thing I could ever do is be a mom.  No job could even compare or bring as much happiness into my life as my daughter has.

- My heart has never melted the way it did the first time I saw her smile.
- Nothing has ever brought me such true delight as hearing her coo and jabber in her carseat as we drive down the highway.
- And I can't think of any other job in the world where I would gladly wake up "to work" multiple times in the middle of the night. (Although thankfully, the past few weeks Taylee has limited it to one or two times per night, and I'm not complaining about that!) :)

I hope I can take some of the lessons I've learned since having Taylee and make sure I am applying them to the rest of my life - like remembering how much joy the simplest things like her smile or her coos can bring me. God has blessed my life so much, I know there are things I need to be more thankful and appreciative of, so I want to make sure I see the joy in the simple/everyday parts of life as well.

These last two and a half months have absolutely flown by, and I am amazed at how much Taylee has grown.
I am truly grateful my girl is strong and healthy and growing well, but admittedly it makes me a little sad to see how quickly this stage of life is passing by.
I know it would be completely futile to wish time would slow down, so instead I'm going to pray that by looking to enjoy and appreciate the simplest parts of life, hopefully I can be more present for each moment. In the future I don't want to look back and have regrets about how I spent my time.

Most of all I want to say thanks to my husband - because of his hard work and determination to provide for our family, I am able to stay at home with our daughter and experience all these little moments with her.

On the thought of how I spend my time…I now understand my mom's abilities a little better. I have always marveled at how much my mom can accomplish on any given day. Now I realize that when you have a baby, it's like you develop another gear and a lot better time management. During nap time, you can get a heck of a lot done. :) I still have  a long way to go to be able to match my mom, but I'm getting closer! ;)

A few pictures from the first couple months of Taylee's life…meeting great grandparents, grandparents and spending time with daddy.

Taylee's first combine ride - cutting some dry land corn

As for God, His way is perfect. Psalm 18:30

This was a recent Scripture in my daily devotional, and I appreciated the lesson that went with it. It spoke of different people in the Bible who had made plans, but their plans didn't come to fruition. However, they still submitted themselves to God. Because they were willing to give themselves to God rather than closing themselves off because their plans were denied, He was able to use them for a greater purpose and bring glory to Himself.
I pray I would have faith enough to always accept Your plan above my own, Lord. I submit myself to You. Please use me. Amen.

I hope you all have a great rest of the week!
Lyndee

Pregnancy Hormones & Sasquatch Hair

All of my life I have had a head full of thick, dark hair. I was born with it, and when I met Taylor in college, one of the first things that caught his eye was my dark, big hair (Texas-styled he called it). :)

But like most women, I also shed a lot. I have been frequently amazed at the fact I'm not bald because of the amount of hair I can lose in a day.

That's not the case at the moment. Apparently my pregnancy hormones are in full gear because the last couple of weeks, the amount of hair I shed has dropped drastically. I have a hair cut scheduled for the middle of July, and I'm afraid by the time it gets here, things may be completely out of control.

So please don't be concerned if in the next few weeks you see a Sasquatch-type figure in the western Kansas area - it's just me and my crazy pregnancy hair! :)

Thankfully, the pregnancy hormones seem to be primarily affecting my hair. You hear stories about women who kind of go off the deep end and get really emotional. So far there has been only one evening when I was tired and frustrated and started crying for basically no reason. Otherwise, I feel like I've been able to keep the crazy to a minimum, but at least I've got a great husband who can take that sort of thing in stride. :)

Like usual, May and June have been busy months. We've had two baby showers - one back in my hometown and one in Lakin. At both we were beyond blessed by the generosity of family and friends. During the last two months we also AI'd our cows, helped with Bible School, attended a graduation, and started wheat harvest, just to name a few.

At the end of May I was so thankful to get to spend a couple of hours with my friend Bethany and her sweet baby girl, Eleanor. In college God used Bethany to help guide me in developing a closer relationship with Christ. For the past couple of years Bethany and her husband, Morgan, have been in India working and sharing the gospel, but they came back to the states to have their little girl. It was so great to get to see them before they returned to India.

My sisters put on a baby shower for me in my hometown over Memorial Day weekend. It was so great to see family and friends that I don't get to catch up with very often. 

I definitely wasn't the only pregnant lady there. Out of a relatively small group of women, five of us there were pregnant and there were a couple other pregnant ladies who weren't able to make it.

We were blessed to get a lot of nice things, and my grandma made a baby quilt for us that we loved. One side of it matches the quilt she gave Taylor and I for our wedding (which goes perfectly with our nursery) and the other side had a barn, silo and cow.

Eryka and Roshel put on a great shower for us in Lakin with a "Cute as a Button" theme. They did such a good job, and again we were so very blessed by the people who came to support us and bring us gifts to help us get ready to welcome this little baby into our lives.

I was also very grateful for my sister, Katie, who came out to Lakin for the shower and helped me organize and put away all the gifts. With her help it only took a couple of hours, where I probably would have spent an entire day trying to figure out what to do with everything. :)

The past few weeks have felt like we lived in Iowa or something. We have gotten a tremendous amount of rain which is extremely unusual for our area, especially this time of year. It has definitely slowed down the wheat harvest, but we'll never complain about getting rain. It's really giving our fall crops a great start. (Although I do hope we are able to make some good progress from here on out, or I'm afraid I may go into labor in a tractor) :)
I'm driving grain cart again this year, but Stewart got a new tractor and it is extremely nice. It makes for a pretty smooth ride for me and the baby! :)
I did have to go to Wal-mart and buy some scrub pants so I can adjust the waistband to fit my needs. At 8 months pregnant I needed something I could wear comfortably sitting in a tractor for the majority of the day. Between my overalls and my scrub pants, I am definitely styling! :)

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and agains the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Ephesians 6:12

The lesson that accompanied this Scripture was one I felt we all needed to be reminded of from time to time. Too often I feel like we tend to ignore the devil, and that is exactly what he wants - for us to ignore him, so he can work in our lives. Instead we need to recognize him, and call him out and ask God to help us fight against him. Jesus overcame the devil and sin and death and He will help us if we ask him.

I hope you all have a wonderful rest of the week!

Lyndee

The Baby's Not Even Here and Already Our Marriage is Changing

I can't even begin to fathom all the ways God has blessed my life, but one of His blessings I am most grateful for is the relationship He has given Taylor and me. And if there's one thing we have heard many times since becoming pregnant (and even before), it's that children will change your life.
I can't wait to experience these changes, but one change Taylor and I don't want to make is to neglect our relationship. We know that we can only be good parents if our marriage is strong and we approach parenting as an unshakeable team.

But I never would have guessed that even before the baby arrived, our relationship would already be changing.

Taylor buys cattle for the feedyard so two or three days a week he is driving to sales, and once in a while he will have to travel farther and stay overnight. Recently Taylor went down to Oklahoma City and planned to stay for the first part of the week to go to a few different sales. It's a trip Taylor has made many times during the four years we've been married, but it's the first time since we've been pregnant.

Until that moment, I hadn't been aware of our relationship changing. But as he got ready to leave, we both found the idea of being separated harder to deal with than usual.
I think just the knowledge that we are going to be parents together has already made our marriage grow in new ways and become even stronger.

The week ended well, though, because Taylor and I traveled to a bull sale in South Dakota as a kind of mini-vacation, and we got to spend a lot of quality time together.  We took an extra day to visit Mount Rushmore and drive through Custer National Park.

We spent several hours driving through the park hoping to spot some buffalo. As we got ready to leave the park, this guy was standing right beside the road.

Pregnancy Update: We are now 26 weeks along. And my new favorite outfit is my overalls. :) I signed up for Stitch Fix the other day because I don't like shopping, but my wardrobe is getting very limited. Now once a month I'll just have maternity clothes sent to me instead.

By the end of the day it's already becoming a chore to bend over and pick things up. Getting out of the shower last night, I experienced a moment of disappointment because I was able to see that I'd missed getting an article of clothing into the hamper and I'd have to go pick it up off the floor… And I know this struggle will become a lot more real over the next few months.

As I think to the coming summer months I feel like there's a real possibility I may start wearing cowboy boots with my shorts simply because I can pull them on without having to bend over and tie any shoe laces. ;) I'll try to abstain, but just in case you see me making such an awesome fashion statement, I'll ask for leniency in judgement.

Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God. 1 Corinthians 6:19

The lesson that went with this Scripture tells us that when we accept Christ, the Holy Spirit lives in us. We will fight Spiritual battles all our lives, but we won't fight them alone. God will help us and give us the strength to do what we cannot in our own power.

I hope you all have a wonderful rest of the week!

Lyndee

Playing "Dress Up"

Playing "dress up" - it's basically a right of passage for any kid whether it's tying a cape (blanket) around your neck to be superman or tromping around in your mom's high heels.

I know there is at least one extremely flattering childhood picture (insert heavy sarcasm) where I wore an old flannel shirt that was much too large for me. It was an old shirt of my dad's that I found in the back room of our farmhouse. Even from a young age, I admired my dad. He was a strong, hard-working man, and he could fix nearly anything - I wanted to be like him, so I decided to dress like him.

I realize now that it takes more than simply wearing the same style of clothes to be like someone. If there is someone we admire and respect and want to be like, it is what's on the inside that matters. It is our actions that matter. It is our character that matters.

On March 4, 2016 my friend Joey Feek left this world to go to her heavenly home. I wept knowing we would no longer get to have her presence here on earth with us, but I thank God that I was blessed to have the chance to know her.
She was someone who truly exemplified living a life for Christ and for her family. I especially loved to see the way both she and Rory sought to follow Christ's example of being a servant to one another in their marriage.  There have been many occasions where I have looked to their relationship as I sought to be a godly wife to Taylor.
Getting to attend Joey's memorial service just reminded me all the more that I want to follow her example in life. Every single person there had been touched by Joey and each person felt that he/she had been made a better person simply by knowing her.

What a way to live. So while I don't intend to go out and buy the same clothes Joey wore so I can play "dress up" to be like her, I will continue to allow her life to be an example to me. And I will think of her often as I seek to, first and foremost, love and serve the Lord my God, my husband, my family, and each person I come into contact with.

Easter is one of my favorite holidays, so I am really looking forward to next weekend. For quite a few years now, I have given up something for Lent as a way to honor the sacrifice Christ made for me. This year I tried something a little different. One of the things I gave up, or at least tried to, was complaining. I don't feel like I'm someone who gripes or whines a lot, but I'll admit this was harder for me than I thought.
Several times in the past I have given up sweets for Lent, and I guess I just put more conscious thought into what I eat as compared to what I say. I remember one time when I nearly forgot about not eating sweets during Lent. I stuck some bite of dessert in my mouth before I remembered, so I quickly went to the trash can and spit it out.

Unfortunately, words don't quite work the same way. Once they are out of your mouth there is no taking them back (or spitting them in the trash). There have been several occasions during this Lenten season when I have said something negative and only realized it after it was too late. It has made me a lot more aware of how often I say things without really thinking about them beforehand. This is something I want to continue to work on even after Easter.

I have been very blessed the past two weekends. First Annie and Abe came out to visit us, and then this weekend Mom and Dad came out to be with me on my birthday weekend. It was wonderful to get to spend time with my family.

Always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you. 1 Peter 3:15

I loved this Scripture because the lesson reminded me that we should be ready at any time to share our testimony of God's work in our lives. He has done so much for me, and I am so grateful. I want to be bold in sharing my story with others.

I hope you all have had a great weekend and have a wonderful week!

Lyndee