Dallas Visit

Josh and I were blessed with some plane vouchers during our Disney trip in the spring and we were glad to use them to go see my brother Justin and his family in Dallas. Josh had never been to Dallas so I was glad he could make the visit this time. It was a quick 4 day trip but we enjoyed the time with them. The weekend we were there, the youth group were having their annual Live Nativity at the church. The weather was perfect for it too. Just cool enough for a bonfire and hot cocoa, but warm enough that the angels on the roof weren't freezing.

It worked out that the kids had Monday off school, so we visited the Dallas Zoo! It's a really great zoo with a large open safari area that is pretty cool.

We went in to a caged area where the birds were flying around freely. We didn't even have any food and they began landing on us...well mostly on Justin first. They seemed to be interested in licking the inside of ears. It was quite an odd feeling.

Josh experience nice birds and maybe a little ear licking...

...now a little ear nibbling is going on and he's getting uncomfortable...

...and while the bird on his ear was distracting him, the bird on his hand went in for the BITE!

The animals just aren't being nice to Josh:)

This gorilla was making us laugh as he kept throwing this hay up on his back and walking around

A little tired from a day at the zoo!

They took us to Prairie Lights one night. It has a 2 mile drive displaying more than 6000 lights! In the middle of the drive we stopped at Holiday Village where you can buy food, see a show and walk through a path of thousands of more lights. We tried some jalapeno peanut brittle and bought some really yummy kettle corn. 

We really enjoyed our time visiting the Pickard's. It was a great Christmas gift for all of us!

Merry Christmas 2012

Merry Christmas to our wonderful family and friends!  We hope you had a year full of new adventures and wonderful blessings that outshines any stress or difficulties that have occurred.  We were both very busy this year, but I know we enjoyed wonderful moments with family, friends and time for just the two of us. 

Josh has continued to work hard in classes and during clinicals for his Doctorate program in Physical Therapy. He has spent many days and nights studying, writing papers, working on projects and analyzing his own limbs or mine to better understand what he was studying:) He had his pediatrics and inpatient clinicals this year.  The hospital setting brought some interesting experiences for him, including being able to sit in and watch a back surgery. I admire Josh for his discipline and determination. His fellow PT students look up to him a lot for his knowledge and understanding of the assignments and the field itself. I’m extremely proud of him! He is very glad to be completely done with his classes for this program.  He has a three week break before beginning his final two clinicals before graduation in May 2013. 

I am still working in the front office at a counseling clinic close by.  This year I have taken on a role that is very much that of an office manager without the title.  The office has been ever changing since I started working there in spring of 2011. I am very grateful for the job and I truly enjoy those I work with, however, it has been a very stressful and draining job. It has helped to have wonderful women that I work with at the front office who have become great friends:) I have also had the opportunity to begin earning clinical hours towards my counseling license.  Those hours are accumulating very slowly, but forward progress is being made. I now have two patients and I am making plans to lead a women’s group in the spring.  In September, I took on another great endeavor and became a Thirty-One Gifts consultant under my sister-in-law Tara. I have loved and purchased Thirty-One for about two years before realizing that it would be a great job for me that I would enjoy. I have LOVED it! I’m only doing it part-time of course, but it gives me moments of accomplishment and encouragement along with time to meet new people and socialize that break up the stress of my other job. 

This year we enjoyed a handful of trips.  In the spring we had our traditional 5 year trip to Disney with the Pickard side of the family.  That is always a packed yet fun trip:) It was the first year that every family member went on a couple rides together now that the kids are older. Josh and I took a camping trip to the UP to celebrate our 5 year anniversary.  We stayed at several different locations.  Did a lot of hiking and driving through beautiful areas of nature and visited Pictured Rocks.  We got to take the boat tour of Pictured Rocks at sunset and it was incredible! It was a nice trip to get away just the two of us. We were able to visit Traverse City to celebrate my brother Jon’s wedding and we spent one of the days at the Sleeping Bear Dunes! Late in the summer Josh was able to spend some time visiting Mike in Chicago.  Then for Thanksgiving we both visited Mike and joined him and some friends for turkey dinner.  Mike gave us a tour of Loyola’s campus and Roger’s Park.  We also took the train into the city and walked around on Black Friday (not for shopping) but there were a lot of people and it was pretty cold. We drove down to see Josh’s sister and family several times for Easter, the arrival of our sweet niece Lucy, for an all family get together in the summer and we joined them in cutting down their Christmas tree a couple weeks ago.

With Christmas approaching we are now looking forward to a trip to Dallas to visit my brother Justin and his family for four days.  It will be a quick trip due to my work schedule.  Josh has never been to Dallas so he’ll get a chance to see that everything really is bigger in Texas:) We also look forward to visiting Josh’s parents in Ohio a few days after Christmas.  We saw them briefly a couple times while they were visiting Melissa’s family this year, but it will be wonderful to see them for a few days and celebrate the New Year. 

In the New Year we look forward to Josh’s graduation and the transitions that will follow.  We don’t yet know where we will end up. But we are trusting in God’s guidance for Josh to find a great job and for me to consider other options for work as well. We wish all of you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! May The Lord be ever present to you during the holiday season and thru the next year.  Follow us here on our blog through the year.  I’m going to work harder and posting more often. Plus 2013 is bound to bring a lot of new experiences and changes for us:)

Blessings,

Josh & Jenean Moore

Labor Day Weekend

For Labor Day weekend we were glad to be able to make it up to Traverse City for my brother Jon's wedding. The wedding ceremony took place at one of Tara's family members house on Lake Ann and it was a gorgeous day for a wedding with the lake in the background. The ceremony was very nice and Jon and Tara were so happy to have that day arrive:) The reception was a lot of fun. They created some great Pinterest ideas that really added a special touch to the atmosphere. Jon painted awesome signs to direct guests. Tara had a couple sections of the reception tent decorated with antique furniture and accessories for welcoming the guests, leaving cards and for displaying the cake. My favorite part was the giant frame Jon made and hung between a couple of trees to set up a photo guest book. They had little paper mustaches, hats, glasses, lips and ties on sticks that guest could use to had some fun to their picture. The guests could also write a message for Jon & Tara on small chalkboards that they held up when the picture was taken. I was glad to help take the pictures for this guest book. Many of the guests got into the fun spirit of the activity that I'm sure Jon & Tara will look many times over the years to come:) Here are some pictures of the shining couple and wonderful day.

Congratulations Jon & Tara!

While we were visiting we enjoyed time with family and spent a day out at the Sleeping Bear Sand Dunes (one of my favorite places:) A handful of us made the trek to the top. Braden made it up and down the big hill a handful of times on his own, ha. I'm sure we didn't that once upon a time too! It was a perfect day out for climbing the dunes and then stopping at the beach to see Lake Michigan. These are some pictures from this awesome day at the dunes.