Random Things...

Hello all! Sorry for my tardiness! I've been meaning to blog all week....but don't have anything big to blog about these days.

Most of my "extra" time is filled with study hours. 2 weeks from today and I will be writing the NCLEX exam already! So, I have certain areas that I really need to work on and review and we as a family are going to be putting in the hours the next 2 weeks. And then it will be done =)

I've really been enjoying learning again and using parts of my brain that have been a little dormant =) It has been mentally refreshing and is good for my heart! I'm so thankful for the grace the Lord has given us for this short season and I'm glad that it isn't like this all the time because that would be too much =) Normally, I always nap when Noah is napping. With the blessing of the time change and the grace of the Lord for studying, I have been able to use many naptimes for studying instead =) Yay!

So, please pray for me in the next 2 weeks and especially on April 12th as I take the test!

Here are cute family pictures from last weekend after a 2 year old birthday party!

Introducing....the long-awaited......sign!

Community living has awesome blessings and large challenges that ebb and flow in different moments and quarters. It has been the cause of many smiles and many tears in my world over the past 2 years.

We've thought about putting up a sign on our door many, many times but just hadn't done it yet.

Well, it has been done. We have a sign on the door.

I have laughed and laughed about it this week and find it funny (and awesome) that my incredibly gracious and patient husband finally had enough of the business knocks at all hours of the day and wrote it, laminated it and put it up =) I'm giving him a high five!

I'm guessing you want to see this sign....so here it is. Welcome to the Farrows!

And ps. we've had no business knocks since the sign went up this week! It's been peaceful!

So Weird....

Midwest...your weather is so bizarre.

Tangtop, flip flops and 26 degrees Celsius this afternoon. Walking outside in the beautiful weather.

This evening, rain, thunder and lightening with a 30% chance of snow tonight.

So weird.

Official!

At the beginning of January, I wrote that I was pursuing writing my NCLEX (aka American Nursing Exam). I felt the peace to proceed forward in the process back in fall and started the mound of paperwork required, doing a bunch of it during my trip to Winnipeg in November.

This week I got my official letter in the mail and the authorization to test email from the testing center! I can write it whenever I'd like to now!

So, I'm still praying about the exact date but am hoping to write the test in the next 5 weeks before my mom and Henry come to visit! I'll keep you posted as I know!

The study motivator has been turned up! I'm aiming to studying 2 hours a day over the next few weeks and working on a schedule to make that possible. It has been fun to be in the books again and feeling like a student again =) My sister and I even had a study date at a cute coffee shop yesterday morning =) Fun!

Love Feast with the Returning Missionaries!

Last night, we had the honor of being invited to the Love Feast for our returning missionaries of our September DTS. A love feast is a special dinner the school has together to celebrate together and love one another. It was most famously practiced by the Moravians, according to Wikipedia.

Today is their graduation so last night was a special meal together where they all got dressed up and ate together, connected with one another and showed slide shows of their 3 different outreaches. It was so great to see their pictures and hear a few stories from the field. Tonight they will share more in our community gathering and that will be fun and faith building! And the food was awesome....and such a blessing to not have to cook =)

On a mama note, in the midst of the early evening, I decided to be a little flexible over the bedtime hour and kept Noah out a little past bedtime, which we practically never do. He's sitting in his booster seat at 6:30pm, hanging off the edge saying "home" and "I tired". Lol! My little routined toddler THRIVES on his routine. And that works just lovely for this routined mama =) So funny that I live a little and give him a special privilege and he's the one asking to go home and go to bed =)

Either way, it was a great time and an honor to celebrate those who have spent the last 3 months of their lives loving on people in foreign countries and sharing Jesus in the nations!

Go Canada Go!

A week ago was the end of the Olympics and the final gold medal mens hockey game.

Since our house is alive at 6am, we thought it would be fun to open up our living room to the other Canadian guys on base who would want to watch the game =) So, there were 7 of us Canadians (me being the only girl) and we watched, cheered and felt a little Canadian pride over those 3 hours together! It was fun and Noah loved having the guys over bright and early =)

Yay! Go Canada Go!

This boy makes me laugh!

My Noah is so delightful =) He makes me laugh!

Yesterday, he requested a certain thing to watch while eating lunch. It wasn't on. So, he was in tears, very sad. Shane and I couldn't help but laugh because he was sooooo cute. Our little man was crying about something neither of us have ever cried about.

"I want bull riding!".....yes, our son loves watching bull riding on Sundays. Too funny!

Many, many times a day, I get to hear the phrase "huggin the mommy" from a very cute toddler....his request for many hugs each day. I try my best to cherish each of these hugging moments and hope that he wants to "huggin the mommy" even when he's a teenager =)

And....tomorrow. Tomorrow we have a date. It's Tuesday and therefore time for grocery shopping. Today we were talking about the food that animals eat, since he has a strong like for hay. Somehow we ended up talking about what dogs eat. So......

Tomorrow we have an exciting date down the dog food aisle! I am going to show Noah the big bags of the food that dogs eat. He thinks there are taste testers but I'm trying to warn him that there are not. And yes, he has already tasted it before....from Jack's food (my mom's dog) =)

Ohhh....toddlers are a hoot!

God is doing big things!

It's pretty amazing!

YWAM Kansas City started out just over 2 years ago with a few staff and a Discipleship Training School (DTS), renting a building on a beautiful property owned by another missions group that has sent out women missionaries for decades across the USA.

2 years have passed and God has done a lot. We are about to start our 9th DTS and we currently have about 50 students between our DTS and Church Pioneering School (CPS) on campus. It has been quite a ride! God continues to add to our numbers through staff and students! It is so fun to meet new people each quarter and have new staff joining in a steady stream. God is bringing them in!

Thursday, February 13th, 2014, was a big day in our history. Not only is it my mom and sister's birthdays but it is also now YWAM Kansas City's anniversary for buying our property!!!

We are amazed and blessed. The campus we having been using and renting, is now ours! All 36 acres! All 10 buildings!

We believe the Lord is doing something big in this time in history! And He is doing something big in the area of prayer and missions, here on our base in Kansas City! He saw fit to bless us with a huge campus so we can grow and stretch in big ways! We trust He will bring the staff and the students we need to mobilize missionaries all over the world =)

As our second DTS of the year begins next week, please pray that the Lord brings every student He wants here. Also, as the take over of the campus is underway, please pray for the transition and the God-sent staff members that we need to run this place. These are exciting times!

Also.....if your heart is being stirred.....if you feel the Lord knocking on the door of your heart....if your heartbeat is starting to pound to see the gospel go forth in the nations....if you long for a season of focused time with the Lord.....

Come join us! Tuition-free DTS is happening all year because we believe the Lord is calling many and we don't want anybody to miss out! Check out www.ywamkansascity.com!

The Olympics

My husband and son are huge sports fans. The weekends are fun for Noah because Daddy is home and all kinds of sports are on! You can see him running around the apartment with hockey stick in hand, throwing footballs, soccer balls and basketballs around, doing the plank as he acts out snapping a football and all with a big, red bicycle helmet on and yelling "touchdown!" or "ready, set, go!" or something of the like. He is such a boy and I love to watch what he naturally loves =) Just like his daddy =)

So, it's fun right now that we have the Olympics to watch! He was in awe of the luge this afternoon and has been enjoying the skiing =) What was super cute earlier today was when he was saying a new word. It took us a few seconds to realize he was saying "olympics"! That is adorable!

Ready? Set?

Go, Noah, go!

The End of an Era...

It all started almost 7 years ago...May 19, 2007.

My facebook life began.

So many great moments and so many benefits. A ton of reasons why I wanted to carry on as usual...

And yet...I want more. More peace in my busy mind. Less burdens to my tender heart. More attention focused on the things that really matter.

The Lord spoke to me and gave me an invitation. It took me a while to decide so that I could do so with my whole heart, decided and at peace.

As 2013 ended, I stopped my usual relationship with FB. No more scrolling down the news feed and getting my own type of entertainment fix. And it has made a HUGE difference in my world. Looking back over the past 5-6 weeks, things are calmer on the whole in my head and heart. It is so awesome to hear my husband tell me what a difference he's noticed and it makes it worth it.

That brings me to today. The final step in the shutting down process. It is complete. Done. Yay!

We're Not in Canada Anymore Moment - Episode 5

I'm sorry, my Canadian friends, but it's just true...

You know you're not in Canada anymore, in the midst of an intense winter, when you sit on the couch, enjoying a quiet evening and you can hear the rustling of dry leaves outside the patio door. No folks, that is not what you hear in winter in Canada. I feel for my dear northern friends this year. What a doozie!

But, you know you are in the midwest when on one day you are outside in a t-shirt and the next, you are bundled up and the bus won't start. The extremes are bizarre!

I must say though....I far prefer the dry, freezing cold temperatures of the north versus the wet, damp cold temperatures of the midwest. I'd take snow over freezing rain, for sure =)

Stay warm everyone!

Surprise!!!

Uploading pictures suddenly works again! Yay! Now I can make blogs a little more interesting again =)

For a test run, here's two pics from our night away the other week! Family fun!

Night Away Success!

We had such a nice time at the hotel for 26 hours alone! It was glorious to turn off the phone and simply enjoy one another and have fun! We ran up those stairs countless times to enjoy the water slides together over and over =) It was fun to hang out and do something fun with my best friend =)

I even stayed in bed until.....not 5:30 or 6:30 or 7:30.....but 8am!!!! Wowzers! I am so used to Noah sleeping in the same room as us that when I heard a noise as I was falling asleep, I automatically thought "oh, that's just Noah flipping over in his crib". But no it wasn't....he wasn't in our room that night! What a treat =)

Then, once we were checked out and after Noah's nap, Steph and Noah joined us at the water park for a few hours! The nice thing is that you have access to the water park until 9pm on the day you check out! So, we got a great get-a-way just the two of us for 26 hours and then we got a fun family outing out of the same deal =) So sweet!

Thank you Jesus for breaks away from the everyday! How refreshing!

A Night Away!

I'm so pumped =) Starting tomorrow around noon, I get about 27 hours alone with my husband!

We are so blessed to get to take a night away without our adorable toddler and enjoy time just the two of us! We are going to have fun and say good-bye to the usual things that get our attention and enjoy one another's company in a focused way!

I said fun....yes, we are going to have fun! We are heading to a hotel for the night with a very fun waterpark! Waterslides and hot tubs, here we come!

I'm going to try not to think toooo much about Noah and how much fun he would have if he were there. We would LOVE it if we could stay a second night and have him join us for that =) Oh well, maybe another time! He will have tons of fun with Nana (his auntie) and they will get a good amount of quality time before she heads back to school on Monday =)

Yay for celebrating marriage!

A New Year with New Adventures....

One of my new adventures for 2014 is getting back in the books! I'm excited for it! I'm a little strange in that.....I actually enjoy writing multiple choice tests and having the accomplishment of getting a mark back. I haven't written a test in a while and am looking forward to it!

I am preparing to write the NCLEX exam (American Nursing Exam) and hope to write it this spring. Up to this point, I've felt closed doors every time I pray about pursing getting my nursing license in the USA. Peace to go forward came into the process/prayer this fall and I felt the go-ahead to start the application process and start studying for the exam. I can't see past that so one step at a time =)

So, this week marked a new schedule with my first study evening! To break open the study season, Shane encouraged me to go get a special drink and do my first study night out, just for fun. So that's what I did....though the slight extrovert in me had a hard time paying for a drink when it wasn't for the purpose of connecting with someone but just by myself =)

I've got a lot of work ahead of me! I wrote the Canadian nursing exam 8.5 years ago and I need to relearn a bunch of information I haven't used in a while =) Yay for exciting adventures!

Onething 2013!

Well, Onething is here and already half way done for another year! It is always great to have many people in town visiting for the occasion!

Noah and I went the last 2 mornings and it has been so nice to be a part of the worship. Noah has been talking a lot about "worship...dark" since he loves that the room is dark with all the fancy lights =) He's been praying, singing and dancing nonstop the last few days =) It is so special to hear him praying and saying phrases like "more Jesus, more worship". Love it!

On the same note, 30,000 people and loud music = an overstimulated toddler who finally crashed after talking and jumping in his crib at nap time for 1.5 hours. But, sowing into his spirit was worth it!

I'm looking forward to spending the evening with Jesus at home as I send off the fam (my hubby and sibs) to encounter Jesus at Onething. I'm so glad He can encounter me just the same in my living room =) He's faithful to meet me too and I'm thankful for His grace in the different seasons of life.

Happy New Year!

We're Not in Canada Anymore Moment - Episode 4

Except....this is going to be a "But we still are from Canada Moment" really!

On Christmas Eve, we had a lunch with the staff who stayed on base for Christmas. I had Noah in my arms and bumped into another toddler. So, I patted her head and said sorry for bumping her.

A few minutes later, Noah was sitting in his high chair as we prepared to eat. One of our staff guys went by in a hurry and bumped Noah's high chair. Noah responded "Sorry Kent!". And repeated it. He was apologizing for someone bumping into him.

Now, as I sit here, I hear Noah playing with his tractors and little people. I can hear "Sorry man!" as part of the play dialogue.

Well, that confirms it. My son is definitely Canadian. The "sorry"s reveal it!

Blogger Book Review - Unveiling Grace by Lynn K. Wilder

Unveiling Grace is a autobiography and testimonial about the Wilder family who was deeply enmeshed in Mormonism and the story of how they found their way out and into the saving knowledge of the Jesus of the Bible. The book is written by Lynn, wife to Michael and mother to the 4 Wilder children, now adults, and takes you on a journey through decades of their story and lives.

I really enjoyed this book! It was very eye-opening to the world of Mormonism and the beliefs they hold. It gives me a better idea what kind of gospel Latter Day Saints are sharing as I've often seen people with LDS name tags walking the streets of my neighborhood back home. I really enjoyed reading the life story about the Wilder family.

The biggest take-a-way I received personally from reading this book was that it provoked me to read the Word. It increased my desire to want to read the Word as I saw the different family members dig into the Scriptures to find the truth. Their hunger and passion for the Bible stirred my heart. If ones that didn't know Jesus personally at that time could be that hungry for His Word, as one who knows Him and loves Him, I want to hunger more for His Word!

I would definitely recommend this book to others! Actually I have a friend borrowing it already =)

I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze®.com <http://BookSneeze®.com> book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 <http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/waisidx_03/16cfr255_03.html> : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Last Few Weeks...

It's been a good few weeks since I last posted! I'm a little behind on my usual posting because of our lovely 12 days in Canada!

Noah and I had a WONDERFUL time in Canada, soaking in quality time with all the different sets of grandparents. We spent the majority of our time resting with family and making memories. I got to catch up with a few friends as well, which was delightful =) My wonderful in-laws babysat a sleeping Noah a few nights for me which was a blessing!

When my heart was dreaming of the idea of a trip home, I envisioned restful, quality time with my parents and parents-in-law. It was just that. I thoroughly enjoyed time with all my parents =) I miss them already.

We returned last week and went right into birthday celebrations for our 2 year old! Noah turned 2 on December 4 and we had a wonderful day filled with celebration! A lunch party with some little friends at Chick-fil-A (who put on a GREAT party!) and a supper celebration with the things Noah requested a while back...aunties and mowers. A friend made an awesome mower cake for the occasion! So much fun!

This week on base, our outreach teams are leaving and a number of staff are heading home for the holidays. This place can go from bustling to quiet in a few days! I love the bustle of schools and students but I also look forward to the quiet times on base =) It has an element of solitude in the midst of community living =) Please keep our 3 outreach teams in your prayers! They will be on the field until the end of February.

Love and blessings from the Farrows!

5 days!

Noah and I will be on our way to Canada in 5 days =) I'm looking forward to seeing our family and friends in Canada again!

Noah has been talking about "plane & sky" and "mama & bappa"! He knows we are going to be flying on a plane and going to see his beloved grandparents. So special!

I'm thankful for this time and that it is just before his 2nd birthday and the Christmas season. It makes it even more special =)

If you are praying for us next Wednesday, please pray for our flight. I'm hoping and praying that my active toddler will be able to sit on my lap well =)