Tonight Papa Ronnie is here staying with us while he is in town for the World Pork Expo.  Thank goodness the rain came during the day so that it was dry enough for us to play outside tonight after supper.  Josiah & Anya showed him how good they are at hitting the ball off the tee and of course JP had to take a spin with Papa on the lawn mower.  Now the kids are in bed and Ron & Jason are busying talking Hawkeye football….big surprise huh??!!

Last week (Wed-Sun) Jason & I got to take a business trip to Dallas, Texas to attend a trade show for Graphic Authority.  Neither of us had ever been to Texas and we had a lot of fun.  The tradeshow was at the Arlington Convention Center which was right in the middle of Cowboy Stadium, Ranger’s Ballpark and Six Flags over Texas.  We spent Thursday, Friday and Saturday at the trade show, but we did manage to sneak in some fun also.  Being the amusement park enthusiasts that we are, we went to Six Flags twice and holy cow do they have some crazy roller coasters!!  We also discovered a few great places to eat with Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen being my favorite of the week!

While we were gone, the kids were busy helping Papa Ronnie, G’ma Jeryl and Aunt Joni run the farm in Winfield. They had a great time and of course Josiah spent some quality time with Papa Ronnie in a tractor!!

It was a fun week for everyone in the McArtor family!

Jason & I made it back from our cruise on Sunday. We had a fantastic time! I never imagined how much I would miss Anya & Josiah, although they had the time of their lives with Papa Jim & G’ma Barb.

Once we get life back to normal (which could be awhile considering my body is still rocking from the ship), I will post some pictures of all our fun in the sun!

In T-minus 10 days (but who’s counting?), Jason & I will be leaving behind the cold Iowa weather and sailing the sunny warm Caribbean waters aboard “The Freedom of the Seas”! We are traveling with another couple to paradise and frankly, the next week and a half can’t go fast enough.

Here’s the boat, Freedom of the Seas:

Here’s where we are going:

I am trying not to think about how much I will miss the kids (as this will be the longest I have ever been away from them) and focusing on all the FUN we are going to have. We will do our best to bring the warm weather back with us!

How do you like the new look of McArtor.net?

This weekend Jared so graciously helped me update my blog (which had been the same for almost 6 years now….wow I can’t believe I have been blogging that long…). Anyways, he helped me update my blog to the newest version of wordpress so now I can do all sorts of fun things with it…like the new fall theme I currently have. Pretty nifty I think!

Anyways, the comment section that was previously not working correctly has also been fixed….another huge headache for me resolved.

Thank you Jared for saving my blog!!

This summer has been full of construction zones for us. For those of you that aren’t familiar with where we live, our house is located at the end of a dead end street off of a dead end street. Interesting huh?! So, what makes this so crazy for us is that the one single major road that is the only way to our (very) small neighborhood has been under major construction since the middle of May and we have been limited to going only one direction off our street for a few weeks now. It is not a huge deal (just slightly inconvenient and more than slightly annoying) and it would be an understatement to say that we will be thrilled when 2-way traffic is back and I don’t have to go 15 minutes out of the way just to get to work!

So, to add to the construction we have looming at the end of our off-street, we also have it in our front yard. Why you ask? Well, again, for those of you unfamiliar with where we live, we have a creek that runs the length of the west side of our property. Unfortunately, the original culverts that were installed for the creek (that are located on the NW part of front yard) were placed at an incorrect angle making it possible for water to back up and cause flooding in developing neighborhoods just north of us. So, they are fixing the problem and in the mean time reeking havoc on our front yard. Actually, the damage has been much worse for our neighbor but the county (who is in charge of this project) swears that everything will be restored and beautified when it is all said in done (minus the 20+ trees they had to cut down in our wooded area). So, time will tell. The good news about this whole ordeal is that the workers seem pretty nice and always take the time to answer our questions (which have been many) and don’t seem to mind us out “watching” their progress several times a day. Sounds like the construction part of it will be done in a week or so and then the landscaping team will come in to put everything back the way it was. So, hopefully by mid-July everything should be close to back to normal. We’ll keep you updated.

So, here are a few pictures of the creek construction. I’ll be looking forward to posting the completed pictures soon.

I know it has been awhile since my last update. Unfortunately, my computer is in the shop getting a little maintenance work done to it. So, I am sneaking on one of Jason’s computers downstairs for a few minutes and thought I would blog quick that all is OK in McArtor world. Hopefully my computer will be back tomorrow or Monday at the latest.

Have a great weekend everyone and I will update more as soon as my laptop is back!

I don’t know if any of you have heard about Stellan, the 5 month old Minnesota boy who has a rare, life-threatening heart condition–but there has sure been a lot of “talk” about him on the internet. I actually stumbled across his mom’s amazing blog and have been reading it for quite some time, even before his heart condition was discovered. It is funny how you can feel like you actually “know” someone by just reading their words on a website, but that is how I feel about this family. I feel like we have traveled through this journey with their baby’s condition without having ever even met them. Here is the link if you are interested in checking out the blog: mycharmingkids.net

Anyway, Stellan had a very risky heart procedure called an ablation performed yesterday in Boston as a last-ditch effort to help control his heart rate. Seems as if the procedure was as successful as it could be considering everything, but nothing with this baby’s story has been easy and chances are good that he as he grows, he will have to have a pacemaker put in (they are hoping to make it to age 4 before that happens). So, if you have a few minutes today, just pray for this little boy and his family. Their faith and trust in God is simply AMAZING and it is inspiring to read how calm they have been through this whole ordeal just knowing that He is in control.

I know that after following this family’s story, I have been ever aware of all the blessings in our life. Not because of our possessions, our jobs or anything else that can be replaced, but because of having each other, having our loving family & friends, having healthy children and having God to trust in all that we do. When you think about it, there doesn’t seem to be much more we need in life.

For those of you that know Jason & I, you know that the election didn’t turn out they way we had wanted or hoped. We knew for quite sometime that it would turn out they way it did….can anyone say they are truly surprised by the outcome? Being a Christian and conservative in a town, state and country that doesn’t necessarily feel the same way we do about issues in life is something that we have gotten use to. It isn’t that we are fanatical McCain/Palin supporters, it is more a matter of us supporting and believing in the ideals they represent. Jason & I had a conversation after the election about how we were going to handle the fact that Obama was the president-elect—we decided we had 2 choices: 1) have a negative outlook on anything and everything he did and make our own lives miserable for 4 years or 2) support him and give him a chance to to make changes for the better. In Romans 13 it says:

1Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.

So, according to that, we will support our new president. We know it doesn’t matter who is sitting in the White House for the next 4 years because our true leader, the One we put our faith and hope in, is sitting in Heaven. It is by God’s will that we live. No popular election result will ever change that.

We just wanted to let everyone know that starting tomorrow (October 24) we will no longer have a home phone. So, to get a hold of us, please call our cell phones. If you need our cell phone numbers, please either email one of us or leave a comment to this post and I will get the information to you!

Happy Thursday!