Christmas 2010

Nate and Uncle Scott

Uncle Scott helping Nater put together a train set that he got on Christmas Eve!

Opening presents on Christmas morning!

Daddy and Nate BOTH got tools for Christmas!

Hanging out at my cousin's for Christmas dinner!

We were blessed with a wonderful Christmas, full of family and a TON of presents! You could sure tell that Nater is the ONLY grandchild on both sides...it looked as if Toys R Us threw up in our family room after all the presents were open!

My brother, Joshua, and my mom all came in on the 23rd. We went to the Christmas Eve service at church and then headed down to Garnett to spend Christmas Eve at my in-laws. As always, my mother-in-law made a fabulous dinner and they were far too generous with gift-giving! I just LOVE my in-laws!!! We had a fabulous time hanging out and made it back to KC just in time to leave cookies out for Santa.

Christmas morning was a blast! I think I was one of the first ones up...I am not sure who was more excited...me or Nater! Christmas morning is fun again now that there is a child around and the magic of Christmas and Santa come alive once again! I really wish that I would have had a camcorder on Nate when I woke him up. He wanted nothing with getting out of bed UNTIL I said, "Santa came last night!" He popped out of bed so fast and wobbled around his room trying to navigate himself around! My brother and I were laughing hysterically and he finally made his way into the family room where he saw all the presents under the tree. We had a great time opening gifts together and we were really happy that we had others there to join in on the fun!

After that we packed up quickly and drove to St. Louis. There had been bad weather in the area just days before Christmas but the weather was perfect for our drive. There was snow on the ground but the roads were clear and we had an enjoyable drive. Bo George rode shotgun as Nate and I watched movies in the backseat. We arrived at my cousin's house in the afternoon, just in time for Christmas dinner. My Grandma had just been released from the nursing home the day before and it was wonderful to have her with the family on Christmas. I made my Grandma a scrapbook of my Grandpa and she enjoyed looking through it over and over through the evening. I was so glad that she liked her gift and I enjoyed watching her walk down memory lane. Oddly enough we got the best present ever from none other than my Grandpa! We were sad to have our first Christmas without Grandpa but Dad and Joanie ended up finding 30 year old brand-new T-Shirts from my Grandpa's business and we all got one! I will have to post a picture of it because it is PRICELESS! Words cannot describe the humor...you gotta see it!

We headed to Dad and Joanie's and spent the night in the big town of Winfield, MO. We had a nice time visiting...AFTER Nate decided to elevate my Dad's blood pressure by taking a marker to his walls!!! Thankfully it was washable and no one was made to sleep outside in the snow.

All in all, we were immensely blessed this Christmas season. More importantly, we are thankful for the true gift that God gave us in sending His Son, Jesus to be our Savior. We may have been given many presents, but the true joy lies in the gift of Christ himself. I hope you all had a memorable Christmas and will remember the true meaning of Christmas year-round.

As Thanksgiving approaches, I am thankful for...

Our sweet new puppy, Bo George

A second chance at love with the man of my dreams...

The unexpected gift of my son whom I love 'to the moon and back'.

For friends and family who have stood by me through thick and thin.

And, for God, my heavenly Father, who orchestrated it all.

Just a few pictures...

Nate and Mommy

Our puppy, Bo George

Hanging out with Grandma DeeDee

With my mom and best friend at Women of Faith

Christmas pictures 2010

So, here is a sneak peek into a couple of pictures that you might see on our 2010 Christmas card! And, yes, Nate's hair is bright red. But there is no doubt that it fits our little boy's personality to a 'T'! We had our wonderful photographer come to our house one evening to take some pictures for us for Christmas. We are always amazed at how she captures things and we love seeing the pictures that she takes for us. We had actually just gotten our new puppy, Bo, the night before we took pictures and he wasn't too sure of what was going on! I stuck a tie on him too and I think he was having second thoughts of coming to live with us! But, both boys handled the photo shoot very well and we were very pleased. More than anything it just made us realize how blessed we are. Thank you God for family, puppies, and red spray paint. :)

Hope and Healing

Instead of sitting down and casually blogging the everyday happenings with us Dulins, I thought I would write a bit on the serious side today. Eight years ago today was a very bad day for me. It is not a secret that I went through a divorce many years ago and 8 years ago tonight was when it was confirmed that my then husband was in fact having an affair. I do not talk about this to trudge up the past, I talk about it because God has redeemed my future. I revisit the hurt and heartache of the day only to remind myself of the amazing healing and hope that I have found in Christ through this situation. Yes time heals, but GOD is the ultimate healer. We all go through situations in life where it is hard to understand why something is happening. Unfortunately, we may not get all the answers while we are here on this earth but God has a way of taking our situations and making good out of them like he promises in Romans 8:28.

I am far from perfect and God never promised us a perfect life. He never said that when we give our hearts to Him that we would be void of the pain and unfairness of this world. However, he does promise us that He will never leave us or forsake us no matter how bleak the situation looks. We may ache for a loved one who we lost but we can have hope that we will see them again if we have a personal relationship with God. We may feel like a failure because our life is not what we had planned but God can still use and shape us in ways we could never have dreamed of. We may feel hopeless to be without a job, spouse (or insert whatever) but God can and will provide what we need if we trust in Him. We may have made some bad choices and/or hurt someone ourselves but God will forgive us if we sincerely ask Him. I have learned that God knows exactly what we need even when we are so sure of what we want. I look back on things that have happened and I can honestly say that I am soooo very blessed with the life that He has given me. I am grateful for his mercy, love, and grace as well as His presence, peace, and provision.

Halloween weekend

Nate and Bo, his fire dog for Halloween!

Check out that cheesy grin

We love our newest family member!

Me and my two boys

The family...oops, Bo wasn't looking!

We had a great Halloween weekend! Friday night Nate spent the evening with Grandma Pink and Papa Andy and Jeremy and I met up with some friends and went through a corn maze! Man, was that FUN!!!! We all had flashlights and we found ourselves hiding and chasing each other! We had a great time until I walked out of the corn maze and could not find my phone! Realizing it was probably in the corn maze we left Jeremy's number at the trailer and hoped that someone would find it. All in all though, we had a fabulous evening with friends and running around in a dark field like crazy college kids!

Saturday morning my mom, brother, and Joshua all came into town and we spent the afternoon at the KC pumpkin patch! Nate's uncles soon realized that they were not in Florida anymore! Gotta love the rural activities when it comes to this time of year! We had a good time despite the fact that the little man was getting tired and threw a little fit near the end. He missed out on jumping on the big pumpkin pillow but hopefully we will make it back next year. We stopped by the house to change and for the guys to catch some game scores and then we headed up to the Rogers homestead which was about an hour away. We went to the Rogers Fall Family Fest complete with abonfire to roast hot dogs and smores, and a hayride! We had such a great time! Bo met a friend, Bozley, and they ran all over the land. Nate hung out with his best friend, Hudson, along with Hudson's cousin, Ethan. They ran all over the land too. It was nice to be in the middle of nowhere so that the boys could run off some energy! And, energy they HAD!!! Sunday evening we went to our friend's house for Halloween and had chili dogs and then we all went trick-or-treating together. It was a beautiful night and we got to share it with some of our wonderful Life Friends. Nate enjoyed being a fireman and he had Bo along with him as his fire dog! I tried to put spots on Bo to make him a dalmation for the night but his shirt kept slipping down. He wasn't too impressed with it anyway!

All in all we were blessed with a great Halloween weekend!

My little fireman (and fire dog)

Nate had a Fall Party at preschool the other day and he dressed up like a fireman! Before school Nate and Bo posed for a picture and Nate called Bo his 'fire dog'. I think Bo was pretty proud of this! Daddy ended up going to the Fall Party to help out and said that it was pretty chaotic, but a really great time! Lots of food, fun, and games! Since Nate was dressed up like a fireman I stopped by the fire station on the way home to surprise Nate with real firemen! The firemen showed Nate all the trucks and Nate LOVED it. He really loved sitting in the driver's seat and seeing all the lights go off!