Kenz

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Becky Rapier

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Joy

Pete and I had the chance to speak in church yesterday.  As much as we all hate the pressure, it was a positive experience.  Our topic was Experiencing Joy in all phases in your life.
I had a good week thinking about this.  I had a conversation with a 2nd cousin of mine and wanted to share her positive outlook with each of you.

I choose JOY!

I had a good friend ask me to define how we can have JOY in every aspect of our lives. My simple declaration is: IT IS A CHOICE.
During this glorious journey of life no one is exempt from occasional strife, hardships or unexpected tragedy. It is ok to own sorrow and grief, it is not in your best interest to stay there. "Expecting a trouble free life because you are a good person, is like expecting the BULL to not charge you, because you are a vegetarian!"  ~ Jeffry R HollandSo my secret is to surround myself with things that make my heart smile...and then say "Thanks" continually throughout the day. A grateful heart, is the pathway to all that is bright and beautiful, even on the stormiest of days...When I fall short of the mark, I hate the feeling that clouds my heart. It is so much easier to apologize, make amends and "Get over it!"
I love music, moldy oldies, hymns, rock 'n roll, western ballads, instrumentals...Christmas carols all year long...
READ uplifting stuff! Adventure stories, historical novels...a science textbook, keep your mind challenged continuously. Avoid the negative, and darker words...anything that does not uplift your soul, is a waste of time. But it is YOUR time...we are just addressing how one can have JOY!
It is so important to be anxiously engaged in good...we are after all, here to shore each other up. To lessen the burdens when we can, to offer encouragement, to work together, to love and serve one another. To be good, and do good. Surround yourself with people who are of the same mind. Be the one that touches someone's life for good. I ask daily for direction in how I can be HIS, hands.
Set goals, and when they are reached...set some more. Optimism and discipline are muscles that get stronger with use.
Remember life is a journey...and only you hold the map..For me I like to believe something wonderful is about to happen. I am perfectly imperfect. And I choose JOY!

Melanie

1st week of "real" college done!

I finished up my first week at SJSU and it's been interesting. Ha, I know that says nothing about how it really went. So I am taking 4 classes 3 are on campus and one is an online course; 3 of those course all are within my major which is Communication studies. The study of communicating, not to be confused with communications which is entirely a different school. Communications is you know newspaper, television, and internet, the vehicles in which we communicate to people. So ya that's what I am doing. 

So far I am loving my professors, well one technically isn't a professor yet because she doesn't have a PHD. My classes feel like they could become a lot of work pretty fast. I have 3 communication courses, 1 of which seems like it's going to require a lot of writing. Well it is a writing workshop, so what should I have expected hahaha. The other 2 courses are: study of communication theory and social movements communication. My other class that's not a communication class, but kind of relates, is Public Relations. It kind of relates because being in PR there is a lot of communicating. 

Anyway I've been taking the lightrail to school which has so far saved me some time and money. I heard some students say they were searching for parking for like an hour! OH my gosh it didn't even take me that long to get to school. Luckily I am conveniently located next to lightrail (5 minutes) and it's like a 5ish minute walk to school from lightrail drop off. I say 5ish because you have to cross some streets and one has a light so you have to wait for the walk sign...well at least I wait for the walk sign, other idiots not so much. 

I look forward to the challenges this new semester is going to bring, well at least I say this now. Let me post an update in a few weeks or at the end of semester. Anyway just wanted to update you all on what's going on in my life for now.

Oh I think we play BYU in November, I don't really watch football but I might make an exception and go to the game.




   

Family Traditions

Hello, family!
I don't even know if I'm the only one who checks here anymore. I want the family's input on an idea I'm brewing, so I thought this would be the best way to get it. I know everyone's busy, and I'm insane to be thinking of Christmas, but we all knew that already, so nothing new there!
Meanwhile.
I don't know how many of my cousins will remember the calendars Gramma and Grampa Great used to send the families at Christmas each year. Inside would be penned in Gramma Great's best calligraphy everyone's name and age on their birthdate, along with wedding anniversaries for the whole family.
Those calendars were really special to me. I remember looking for my name and age every year, and feeling like they were thinking of me.
I want to renew that tradition of personalized wall calendars for each family. My love says that nobody uses wall calendars anymore, and it would be a waste. I think that if we sent out calendars, they would be used and appreciated. What are your thoughts? Would you use them? Would your kids (or you!) get a kick out of seeing your name on a calendar? Would I be wasting my time and money?

My plan was to send one to each couple (Gramma & Grampa, their kids & spouses, and their grandkids & spouses), plus one to the missionaries and college students who aren't married yet, but don't live at home.

Happy Birthday Grandpa

I hope you have a wonderful birthday Grandpa.

weird

Happy birthday Grandma

My dear Grandma:
So sorry I'm late. I wish you the happiest birthday. I have so many fond memories of your kindness and trust (with the dollhouse especially:) and your loving words of wisdom. I wish we saw eachother more often but I love our phone calls and sharing pictures of my kids with you via social media, mail, etc and I know how much you care about all of us. Sending you a hug and a kiss.

Love you,
Janelle & Family

Ps. According to eloise you look 10 years younger:)

Happy Birthday Grandma

It's your 79th year starting here. I'm hoping for you to feel better and at peace. Steve and I wish for you happiness, health and want you to know that we love you. We think of you often and keep you & Grandpa in our prayers. 

Loved this pic too so I had to post it.  Because of the colors I love it. 

Steve and I returned home after Christmas in VeGas with the family. Was so nice to see our nieces and nephews. Steph & JD have some cute kids. Loud & crazy but also very cute in my opinion. 

We rang in the new year by traveling around San Jose visiting our friends and having sparkling cider toasts. Many of our friends for some reason didn't want to venture out and I wanted to see as many as I could to usher in the new year. 

Over the past weekend we went and seen the Hobbit the final in the series. We then came home and watched all 3 of The Lord of the Ring movies. Within 2 days. 

Steve's back to work as of Monday and is busy. We have a trip planned in two weeks a cruise to Hawaii with 5 stops at 4 islands. Getting very excited. Steve not so much, he's stressed. I'm trying to ease his stress by telling him to stay late at work and don't worry about me at home but it's not really helping. Since they just got back from shutdown now everyone is all gunho, full speed ahead with whatever it is he's working on. 

Since I've now graduated from community college I'm on a hiatus from school until fall semester, which is in Aug. So for the time being I'm just working on the house and plan on volunteering. 

I'll be attending SJSU to get my BA. 

This year looks like our best yet. 

Love you. 

For my Grandmother

My Dearest Grandmother,

It's already your birthday here in Germany!! Happy 79, may your year be filled with smiles and laughter!

Our adventures never seem to stop. Our anniversary was last month, and I surprised my husband with a short kid free weekend across the boarder in France. It was Christmas Market season here, and Strasbourg, France markets itself as the Capitol of Christmas. It was intense! 10 markets all with delicious food and Christmas themed decorations all within two square miles of historical cobble stoned roads and German-French traditional buildings. It was beautiful. We stayed in a small B&B on a mini-mountain overlooking the city. It was a much needed and we'll deserved 24hour break, and according to our babysitter, we are raising well behaved children.

Our Sariah, age 5, is halfway through her year in Kindergarten, is attending German immersion and Spanish-language classes between recess and art. She is constantly singing new tunes in various languages and teaches her father and siblings all her vocabulary.

Benjamin is 3, he'll turn 4 in April and will begin preschool in the fall. Because of his sisters insistance that he learn everything she learns, he is rather advanced in vocabulary and speech. He is about to growth spurt, but at the moment is barely taller than his younger sister- a lack he makes up for in speed and cunning torture tactics. He loves trains, cars, and airplanes- often stopping right infront of his mother's path of walking to point out one of these transportation devices.

Marilyn is 2, and thinks she is queen of the house. Ok, let's be honest, Marilyn is queen of the house and rules with an iron fist and steel-like determination to get her way. She has a soft side, but only employs it when playing with her stuffed animals or "helping" her younger brother. She's very sympathetic when it comes to Dallin, often coming around when he is crying to pat his back and try to say, "It's ok baby!"

Dallin is nearly 5 months and growing fast (finally)! This week he finally reached the wonderful milestone of doubling his birth weight. He hasn't turned blue in four weeks, and we will find out this month if the hole in his heart has closed or not. We learned that he has one good working ear, and are in the process of determining if the other one is working or not. I'm very hopeful. He is a happy baby, generally quiet and always willing to give a smile whenever you need one.

Chad and I are enjoying this moment in our lives, grateful for the opportunity we have to live overseas! We send our love to you and Grandpa!

Amanda, Chad, Sariah, Benjamin, Marilyn, and Dallin.

The Clan

My story for this post:  well it isn't my story, but Kendall, Nate and Derek went out varmint calling today.  They saw several coyotes, but wasn't able to score a hit for a while.  They moved to a new place and set up the call, sent Kendall off to the right of Derek and Nate to the left and sat for a few minutes.  Then they turned on the call and within just a few minutes Derek saw a coyote running away from Derek and he was able to hit it at 188 yards!  As he lowered his gun he saw a cat 20 yards in front of him, in stalking position twitching his tail ready to go after his prey....he was looking straight at Derek, he was close enough for Derek to see 2 cow licks in the hair on the chest of the Mt. Lion!  Derek shot, to protect himself and yelled for the boys to keep him in their sights.  The cat got away, and my husband wasn't lunch THANK GOODNESS!!!!

Kiss'n Olaf :)  Kinsley made this little snowman for a little girl from our ward

 who is in the hospital with a burst appendex.  We put the little guy in the freezer to keep him till she gets home.

 Josh and Tatiana came home the day after Christmas, so we celebrated again.  Bryant got Josh a pretty cool shirt we thought seemed to fit :)

Our Christmas Eve Party, we read the Christmas Story and put up our Nativity.

The kids Christmas program and Bryant front and center.

 This is Kelsey Claridge, the young lady Russell baptized before he left on his mission, by this picture you would think Nate has a crush, she has become part of the family.  Not sure if She and Russ will still be interested after his mission, but we wouldn't be sad to have her as part of our family for real!

Russell and his current companion.  He and Elder Havland were in the Mexico CCM together.

Hunter was asked to a dance in Pima by a young lady.  We haven't see pictures yet of the two together.

 Tayler got some pretty nice ear muffs from Kinsley for Christmas!  It has been a joy to have the kids home over the Holidays!

Demon spends a lot of time in his kennel, so he is pretty happy when he gets to run free, and to have snow to boot, he is a pretty happy dog.

Selfie! 2015

So I'm at a friends, just got back from a happy 2015 New Years party. Love the start of my new year. 

Happy New Year!

Really bad selfie

This is our first day of the new year really bad selfie!  I looke like I have some kind of brain damage and that guy I live with looks like a grumpy bear.  Welcome to the world of Melanie & Pete!

We began this new year snuggled under a down comforter listening to the rain.  I love listening to the rain!  We have been in a drought for at lest 3 years, so every drop counts.  I hope it continues.  j

Remember when our family would regularly blog on this site?  Kind of like a giant family bulletin board?  I think everyone should resolve to check in more often.  And to make it easier on all, there is a great app in the app store for blogger.  It works on the ipad and the phones.  And for the few who are still fighting the purchase of a smart phone, you can still blog from your computer.  So go ahead, take a picture of what you are doing and post to the family blog.

Stay tuned for more exciting blogs this month featuring the return of our missionary and the shooting class we are taking in the near future!

xxxoo 

Melanie & Pete

WAHOO!!!!!

After two long months of waiting followed by three stupid weeks of fighting and phone calls, we finally have orders to Colorado! We expect to leave here between the middle and end of October, buy a van, then road-trip down to visit family and pick up some things that Mom has been holding onto for us. We think we will have to move into a furnished apartment to wait for a house on base to come available, so I have contacted a couple of places to see if they have anything that will suit our clan. Today's projects include steam-cleaning the government furniture we have been using for the past two years, sorting the broken toys from the still OK toys, clearing shelves of useless papers and dust, and generally cleaning up for the move. JD gets to do all the hard work of running around here there and everywhere making travel arrangements, housing arrangements, and transportation of goods arrangements, and making sure that everyone has all of the paperwork they need. Oh, and he has to get a TB test to show he didn't pick up Tuberculosis here.
Jacob is advancing from Wolf to Bear in Cub Scouts tonight, Zoë is still working toward earning her iPod Nano by learning the multiplication tables, Johnathan is getting better at recognizing letters and small words, and Ashley is convinced that every single toy she has is her baby and must be wrapped in scraps of fabric for blankets and carried everywhere. Justin's pediatrician noticed a heart murmur when he had his 9-month checkup, so we went down to the pediatric cardiologist at the catholic university hospital in Uijeongbu. All is well on chest x-ray, ultrasound, and ECG, so we have 3 of 5 kids with innocent heart murmurs now!
If you knew you could only access what was in 5 suitcases for 3 months, what would you put in those 5 suitcases? So far: clothes (including cold weather gear), shoes (including snowboots), 12 inch skillet, spatula, spoon, plastic mixing bowls, disposable dishes and flatware, computers, chargers, phones, hygiene items, diapers and wipes. Oh, and my yarn project. I'm thinking of including the wireless router, but I think that will have to wait and see how much space the grown-up clothes take up.... all of the kids' stuff takes up two suitcases.
Love to you all!

What's going on.

Ok since Google bought blogger or implemented this weirdness I haven't really been here to try and read. Part of the issue was I was logged into a different account I guess. OMG Google is trying to take over the who internet! Let's see my life, is busy. Steve, School & friends. I always forget how busy life gets when college semester starts back up. I have 5 classes at the moment. Interpersonal Communications, Small Group Communications, Astronomy with lab, Statistics and a Aqua Aerobics class. So as long as this semester goes as planned I will graduate with a AA-T in Communications this December. The "T" just means its a transfer that I have all my undergrad courses done and could jump right into Upper division course work at a State or private college. I say "could" because that isn't really the plan now. So basically most of CA's state colleges are all impacted. OVER flowing with students. There's no room!

So basically they're not accepting mid year students and it's also taking students 3-3 1/2 years to finish their course work to get their BA. So plan B! I am planning on getting my BS in Human Services from Norte Dame de Namur University which does a night program with Mission College, where I currently attend, which lasts about 18 - 24 months to finish. But because this is a Catholic private university I am missing a few classes before I can technically transfer. Well I can start their classes which is 1 night every week (Wednesday) and continue on with the other classes I need to finish for their requirements. Their classes are 7 weeks long and then you move onto the next class. Kind of accelerated designed for "older" students with an AA or 65 credit units toward their degree finished. The 3 classes I need to finish are 2 religious study courses and another language course. So next semester I am going to try to get those 3 courses in while doing the night course too. So plan is to have my BS by June 2016. Seems far away but think I can do it.

For a graduation with my AA I'm having a party. All are invited but I'm pretty sure most won't be able to make it, which is alright. For a present Steve and I are going on a 15 day cruise. Pretty exciting!

Oh and for those who don't know, Steve has purchased a gun. He's been totally loving clay pigeon shooting. There's a course near our house and he's been going with a few other Apple employees. He likes it so much he purchase a gun and a membership to that club. So he'll be playing more shotgun "golf" in the future. Next gun we'll be purchasing is something small for target practice.

Weekend Away

look! A boat on our heads! The USS Lexington, Corpus Christi, Texas.  

We had the opportunity to go to Corpus Christi this past weekend.  We had a good couple of days that included the following highlights: a birds eye view of the ocean, worlds best breakfast tacos in a scary part of town, a walk on the beach at Padre Island, meeting new people from different cultures, attending the Flour Bluff ward, (which sounds not quite right because we are used to hearing Flower Mound), the Texas State Aquarium where we enjoyed seeing the dolphins, a small boat ride that resulted in being stranded on the canals, Pete showing his amazing mechanical skills at fixing said motor.  A ride on the harbor ferry that did not result in seeing any dolphins. Fresh caught fish on the BBQ grill, and Indian food for breakfast. On the drive back to Dallas, which was nasty traffic for 7 hours, we saw the worlds largest metal armadillo statue.  All in all a fun adventure. 

Dallin Kaimi'Olekeakua Nunes

Hey family!

The newest Leonard (ish) has arrived!

August 20, 2014.
7 lbs, 7 oz
18.8 inches long.

For a more detailed description of him: http://nunesohana.blogspot.de/2014/08/dallin-and-all-my-crazy.html

And a photo for good measure (and those of you not of Fb...)

So far, we believe he will be blonde/lighter hair and skinned like Sariah. Also, his eyes are already changing to a blueish color (different from the newborn blue). Gene pools are sure fun to play in!

Middle name pronunciation: kai-ee-mee-Oh-luh-kay-uh-koo-ah

Middle name meaning: Seeker of the Living God

Lots of love from Germany!

A (Chad and kids too!)

Fat baby!!

Justin had his 9-month checkup a couple of weeks ago. He is off-the-charts big for both height and weight! He is 29 and a half pounds and 29 inches tall! We are moving him into his size 2-T clothes this week, as his 18-month clothes are a bit hard to get on. We have been looking through old baby pictures of the other kiddos and think they all look so dang much alike, we don't know who he looks like most. :-)
He says "mamama" and "ahdada" when he wants us, and has learned to shout to get our attention. He rolls and army-crawls (like crawling but with belly on the floor), and will stay up if you sit him, but can't sit up on his own yet. He is usually very patient with the other kids as they try to help him. We are blessed to have our little chubabub!

Korea week... whatever

Hello, all! Adventures in Korea never cease. We went to Sokcho beach for the 4th of July with a few other families from our little branch here. It was a lot of fun (nothing like American beaches, either East or West), but we all forgot how quickly sunscreen washes off in salt water. 4 lobsters and 3 slightly pink people later, and we had a fantastic Independence Day. We have hit the peeling stage of the healing process, which is endlessly entertaining for me, but gross to some other family members. ;-)
In other news: We have learned that we should be heading to Fort Carson, Colorado in October, so we will be much closer to family! Yay for road trips to visit family! Clear your spare bedrooms, folks, the Lindners are a-comin'!!