Life Lately (part 2)

What a crazy couple of months it has been since I have written. We have moved, unpacked (kinda...), got a new kitten, started the new school year, and had a hospital stay.  I am so thankful for everyone who helped us with the move! We are so blessed to have people who care about us in our lives. We still have some things in boxes, but I think I will get to those eventually  soon. :) Billy is the newest Abernathy. He is such a feisty little thing. He definitely knows how to get on our nerves, but he makes up for it by being extra cute. He is our indoor/outdoor kitty. Right now, he only hunts grasshoppers, but I'm hoping he will graduate to larger prey. 

I started back at Hutcheson JH this fall. It's amazing what a difference a year can make in terms of teaching experience. I learned so many different things last year and changed a lot of my procedures and how I run my classroom. It also helps that I don't have any "double block" classes. I had to get used to teaching everything I needed to cover in 45 minutes instead of 90 minutes. I love my students so much already. They are interested in learning and I can tell that they care about school. Last year, I did not love my job. I dreaded going to work every day. This year is such a different story. I love teaching, again! 

About a week ago, Thomas started complaining that his stomach hurt on the right side. He said he thought it might be appendicitis, but decided to wait and see if it got better. On Tuesday, he decided to make a doctors appointment. They couldn't seem him until Wednesday afternoon. When he went to the doctor, she told him to go ahead and go to the ER. (He calls me at this point and tells me that he is going to the ER. I'm in 7th period, trying not to panic) I decided to stay at school and get a little bit of grading done while he was still waiting to be seen by the doctor at the ER. When I got to the hospital, he had seen the doctor and had some blood work done. I went to get dinner and when I came back, they had just done a CT scan. The scan revealed that Thomas was right. It was appendicitis.

Wednesday night he had the appendectomy. I stayed the night at the hospital. The couch/bed/thing I slept on was not super comfy, but I was so glad that Thomas was okay. We got to go home Thursday evening. Everyone at Hutch was so great about helping me out with everything while I was out. I am so thankful to have an awesome team!!

Thomas is still recovering, but he is doing really well overall! Thanks for all the prayers and well-wishes! 

One Year!

It has been a whole year since I married the love of my life! I honestly can't believe how fast this year has flown by. Everyone said it would go fast and it definitely did. We have had an amazing first year of marriage. Here a just a few pictures of our first year as husband and wife! <3

In the car, right after the ceremony!

Moody Gardens in Galveston

 Our tickets

 At a buddy wedding

 Same wedding, different picture

 Another buddy wedding

 Being goofy

Start of my big girl career

 Thomas graduated!!

 Happiness is being married to your best friend

 All the Abernathy animals

Fish pond where he proposed! We had to stop and take a picture last time we were in College Station. I am just so happy to be married to my best friend. There is absolutely nobody else I would want to spend the rest of my life with. I love you, bee! 

#jessandtombuyahouse

Yep... You read that right! We're buying a house! I haven't really posted much about it in case something fell through or we didn't end up getting this house, but everything seems to be progressing exactly how it should be! Praise the LORD!! I'll just give a little recap of how we found this house and a few other details. We knew that we didn't want to be in our rent house for more than a year. We didn't like the thought of paying so much to live in a house that wasn't ours. We love our house right now, but we wanted something that is ours. We wanted a place that we could paint and change the cabinet colors if we wanted. We also wanted to get out of Mansfield. Mansfield is great and will always be my home, but Tom and I are ready to make a home in another town.  I started talking with my Realtor friend, Brenda, at the beginning of the year. I told her the things we were looking for in a home and some places that we saw ourselves living. I began receiving links to homes for sale in Burleson, Midlothian, Waxahachie, and (yes...) some Mansfield. I would occasionally send Tom links to the houses I liked and he would tell me his opinion on them. Over Spring Break, my sister and I went with Brenda to look at four houses. Three of the houses were great and I liked things about all of them. The fourth house was terrible. I walked in and immediately walked out. That weekend, Tom and I were going to look at the three houses again, but never got around to it.  A couple of weeks passed and a house that I liked popped up in my email. I sent it to Tom and told him that it also had some land (something we both wanted). It was about 30 minutes away from where we are now. Both of us agreed that it was a location we were happy with. I set up an appointment with Brenda to see the house on April 6. As soon as we walked in the house, I knew it was a place I could see myself raising a family. Tom told me that he felt the same way. We walked through the house and fell in love. The next day we made an offer. By the end of the day, the sellers had accepted our offer and we started the loan process. Everything happened so incredibly fast! Our inspection was last Saturday. I was very concerned about this, just because I am a worrier. Everything was fine, though, and God reassured me that this is where we are supposed to be. Right now, we are in the "pending" stage. The mortgage company just ordered the appraisal and then we will continue with the extremely long loan process.  We will hopefully close the week after our first wedding anniversary!   I am so thankful for Brenda. She has been so helpful and selfless during this whole process. She has driven checks all over the place. She has set up appointments. She has answered all of our questions and made us feel completely at ease.  If you're on Instagram or Twitter follow me (@jessab12) and be looking for house pictures under the hashtag: #jessandtombuyahouse 

The field of wildflowers in our backyard! 

Adios 2013!

Hey y'all! Happy 2014! I have a hard time grasping the fact that it is already 2014. 2013 absolutely flew by. I thought that I would post some highlights from 2013 so I won't forget them!

• In February Tom and I adopted Barli.
• On April 12 we celebrated our 7 year anniversary.
• On May 18 we got married and had a fabulous time celebrating with family and friends.
• In June I was hired to teach 8th grade math in Arlington.
• In July we were approved to rent a house in Mansfield.
• In August we moved into the house and Tom graduated from A&M.
• Later in August I started teaching!
• In September Tom started his job at Polk Mechanical.
• On September 11 Barli had her leg amputated.
• Throughout the fall we went to a few Texas A&M Football games (Rice, Vanderbilt, UTEP)
• We celebrated Thanksgiving with my family in Mansfield.
• Christmas day we ate lunch at an Asian buffet

We have been so incredibly blessed this year. We are so looking forward to see what 2014 has in store for us. I have absolutely loved having these 2 weeks off of work. I definitely needed to have this time to reflect on the first semester of school and what I need to do differently in order to be the most effective teacher I can be during the second semester. Teaching has been a completely different experience than I was expecting. Please continue to pray for me during this second semester. I appreciate it, y'all! 

Long Time No See

Hey y'all! Sorry it has taken me so long to write again. I have been so incredibly busy! Thank You, Jesus, for these next 5 days off school!! I desperately needed them (and so did the students!). I have so many things on my mind right now. I feel like making a list. Lists calm me down and help me feel like I have slightly more control than I really do. 

• I love looking at stars and finding ones that I remember from taking astronomy in college. Tonight I found Venus and it comforted me. I guess it made me feel better because I know that I am not alone in this crazy universe. God created so much more than what we can see or even fathom. Here's the picture I took of Venus. 
  
• 3 years ago today I found my princess kitty. I can't believe that she is 4 years old! 
• We don't know Libby's or Barli's exact birth dates. I decided that the day I found Libby (November 26) would be her birthday. When we got Barli, we decided to make her birthday the same day as Libby's. We know Barli was born sometime in November, so November 26 sounded good! haha
• Teaching is the hardest thing I've ever done. Like ever. I don't know how people do it for 30+ years.
• I really, really, really love being married. It's like having a sleep over with my best friend every night. I am so glad that I found someone who I can share silence with.

Life Lately

Hi y'all! Sorry that I haven't written in what feels like 100 years! Did you know that having a full time job is not easy? I didn't know. I was definitely surprised. I honestly did not think it would be this hard. I hate feeling unprepared, but honestly, that's all I feel lately. I have such a great support system, though. I have really had to learn to rely on them and on God who is enough for me.  This morning while I was doing my Bible Study Fellowship lesson one question really stood out to me. It asked "What positive and/or negative thoughts does the word 'saved' bring to you? Why?" Here's my answer: "Rescue - I am completely helpless without God's gift of salvation. I NEED to be saved, rescued. It's not a matter of need versus want... It's not up for debate. I NEED a Savior." That's what I have realized over the past 4 weeks of school. I cannot do this without Him. I tried. Ask me how that went. The past 2 days where I've started my day with God, meeting Him in my kitchen before school, have been INCREDIBLY DIFFERENT than the other days I've been at school. I have had more patience, more empathy, the students have been better behaved. I know that it's God.  A little update on Barli: She had her leg amputated today. This was an extremely difficult decision to make. I posted my thoughts on it here. My super awesome, loving, caring, stud muffin husband dropped her off at the vet this morning. I am so thankful that he was able to do it so that I didn't have to. I am having a really hard time with this. I feel so silly for crying about it, but it literally makes me cry. We will pick her up either Friday evening or Saturday morning. What I keep thinking is that I'll never see my dog with all her limbs again. Please pray for me that I'll have peace with our decision and for Barli's recovery! 

Barli Bear

In case you don't know Barli's story, here you go: In February, my sister-in-law who volunteers at the humane society in Bryan texted Tom and told him about a brindle Boxer puppy at the shelter. She told us that the puppy had a broken leg. Tom told me about her and I was convinced that we had to save her. Tom was the first approved applicant, so the puppy was ours. 
We named her Barli (little bear) and she stole our hearts. Tom took her to a vet down here to have her leg looked at and the vet gave us two options: amputate or try to save the leg. We chose to try to save the leg, even though it was more expensive and not guaranteed to work. Barli had surgery to put pins in her leg. These pins were in there for about a month and a half. She couldn't be a normal puppy during this time. She couldn't run or jump. She cried a lot and was on constant medications. When her pins came out it was such a good day. We had a "normal" puppy. 
Fast forward to May. We had noticed that Barli isn't walking right. This has caused her to put pressure on her paw and the pads on the bottom of her paw were wearing away. We took her to the vet in Mansfield and he gave us some medicine to put on the pads. By June the problem hadn't gotten any better. We had an x-ray of her leg done and it seemed like the bone didn't heal correctly. This is what was (possibly) causing her to walk wrong. Dr. K told us we might have to amputate a toe. 
Fast forward to yesterday. The pads were STILL gone (think bloody paw prints everywhere) and an abscess had formed on the side of her foot, too. I took her to the vet in College Station today and he did an x-ray. He said that he thinks everything healed correctly, but that there has been nerve damage in her paw and that's why she walks wrong, twisting her foot with every step. He suggested we amputate the whole leg. He said that there's not going to be a way to save the foot. Of course, we are going to get a second opinion from Dr. K, but how do you look at your puppy that you've come to love so much and try to picture her with one less leg? 
How do you decide whether or not your dog gets to keep all her legs? How do you know if you're making the right decision? How do you make that decision knowing that you can't go back? I feel like this is so insignificant when compared to other people's problems, but she's my fur baby. She's the closest thing I have to a child and I want to protect her. I want to take the pain from her. I want to make it all go away. I want to have a "normal" 7 month old Boxer, who doesn't lay on the couch all day, not eating, not playing, because she's hurting. 
Please pray for us that we will have wisdom making this decision. My heart is hurting. 

Our Home

Remember this post? I spent the last month or so trying to find a place for me and Tom to live. I knew I wanted it to be close enough to family, but far enough away that we could be on our own. It's hard to find somewhere to live when you're searching from 3 hours away! I am so thankful that we have a real estate friend who was awesome enough to help us by sending daily emails with info on rent houses. 
That's how I found this super cute house in Mansfield. I knew it would go fast because it was such a good price, allowed pets, and was in a good area. I messaged my friend and set up a showing to see that house and a few others. When she was setting up the showings, she couldn't get the information for any of the other houses I had requested to see, except for the Mansfield house. God totally had His hand on the situation! I did get to look at 2 other houses when I drove up to see the Mansfield house, but they absolutely didn't compare! 
The house was everything we were looking for. It has a huge garage, a beautiful back porch, large backyard, and a skylight in the master bathroom! I knew that I wanted to apply for it, but I was in DFW and Tom was in College Station (and in class all day away from his phone). My real estate friend, my sister, and I went to the property management place and got to talk to the managers about what we needed to do to be in this house. They said that in order to be considered for this house, you had to fill out the application and pay the application fee and security deposit by cashiers check. That afternoon was so hectic. We drove all around Arlington getting everything needed to apply for the house. The company was nice enough to take just my application since Tom wasn't there to sign anything. They said we could email it in. So that's what we did! When I came back to College Station the next day, we filled out Tom's application, scanned it in, and emailed it to the property management company.   We got a call yesterday afternoon from the company saying that we had been approved and that we could move in August 1! We were ecstatic!! So now we are trying to figure out how we will move all of our stuff from College Station to Mansfield while Tom is in class. HAHAH I know that it will all work out in the end, though. I might just be sleeping on a blowup mattress for a little bit ;) Even if I am, I will be praising God for giving us this amazing opportunity to be in the town we love, near the people we care so much about! 
 I am so excited to be moving in to our home in just 11 days! 

Summertime Cleaning

It's hot, y'all... Like really, really hot. Barli (our sweet Boxer puppy) has decided that the best way to beat the heat is to burrow underneath the storage shed in the backyard. I have no clue how she even figured out how to dig her way under there, but it is not a good thing! She gets so dirty and with the crazy speed at which she is growing, she could easily get stuck. Right now, she's passed out in front of a fan while Tom and I take a break from doing lots of chores around the house. So far we have sold some old video games and an old Xbox at the pawn shop, got Tom's free suit from Men's Wearhouse, started to clean off the back porch, done the dishes, and cleaned one bedroom. Tom's family is coming into town this weekend for a wedding in Katy, so I want the house to look awesome! We still need to do lots more cleaning, but getting started is the hardest part! Tonight I am taking a break from cooking and we are going to Chuy's for happy hour with my old roommate, Amber. I am excited to have a night off from doing dishes! haha I also think we have enough leftovers for me to not have to cook all weekend. I am proud of how much cooking I have done since we got married. If you know me, you know that I do not enjoy being in the kitchen, but recently I've discovered that I love doing wifey things for my hubby! I guess it was just the motivation I needed.

 A couple of the recipes that I've made recently are this pizza casserole and pasta with spinach and tomatoes. The recipe for the pasta is a little confusing, so here's what I did! Instead of using 8 oz of penne, I used the entire box (16 oz). The recipe calls for half a jar of spaghetti sauce, but the instructions say canned, diced tomatoes. I opted to use the diced tomatoes and since I did twice the amount of pasta, I used twice the amount of everything else.  

2 cans diced tomatoes

6 oz cream cheese (We used reduced fat)

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1 tsp garlic powder (We used a lot more than that, but we like garlic!)

1 tsp dried basil (We used some Italian seasoning instead)

1 cup spinach leaves

We left out the Parmesan cheese (mostly because we didn't have any...) but followed the rest of the prep instructions. I hope that everyone enjoys it as much as Tom and I did! We had lots of leftovers and it tastes just as good reheated as it did the first night.