Some Words to Describe 2011

What a blessed year Tyler and I have had. Over dinner tonight we had the opportunity to discuss our highs and lows of 2011. We have done this for the past 3 years over New Year's Eve dinner. God's faithfulness has once again been evident in our lives this year and we know it will continue to be in 2012.

Here are some words I think describe 2011 for us:

NEW (New town, new jobs, new home, new roles, new friendships...lots of new for us this year!)

BIG (Big move, big changes, big faith)

EXCITING (All of the above was very exciting!)

SCARY (All of the above was scary too!)

GOODBYES (Or should I say "See you laters?" Yeah, let's stick with that! Lots of hard "see you laters.")

HOMESICKNESS (This word probably applies more to me than Tyler. The first few months were hard, but it has gotten much easier.)

BALANCE (This word also probably applies more to me than Tyler, but boy have I had to learn about balance the last half of this year. I am still working on it.)

JOY (2011 has brought us so much joy! We have a plethora of joyful memories from 2011!)

LEARNING and GROWTH (I believe we have both learned a lot this year and have both grown as individuals and a couple, a big move and new jobs will do that to you. It's been very humbling.)

COMPLETION (I completed my Master degree! Big sigh of relief!)

LOVE (We have felt incredibly loved this past year and have had the opportunity to show love to others around us. Our love for each other has grown this past year as well.)

FAITHFULNESS (God has truly been very faithful this year. He has provided for our every need. I feel ashamed for sometimes doubting. We serve such a good God.)

HOPE AND DREAMS (I love that God has given us the ability to hope and dream. We were reminded to take each day as it came in 2011 , but also encouraged in our hopes and dreams for the future. Ultimately, our lives are in God's hands and we continue to put our hope in Him and what He has for us.)


We pray that your 2012 brings you and yours love, joy, peace, and many precious memories!
Happy New Year!!

-Tyler and Tiffany

It's Beginning To Look Like Christmas Around Here!

Us Ellises love Christmas! It's truly the best time of the year!

Here are some pics of our decorated apartment!
Our living room with tree #1! The real tree!Tree #2! Our fake tree with childhood and mismatched ornaments!

Our mini tree!

November...

November seriously flew by! What a fun and busy month!

ROCK Bowling on Veteran's Day...
We had the priviledge of attending the National Youth Workers Convention in Atlanta. It was four awesome days of jam-packed learning. We had a great time and came away feeling encouraged about our calling to youth ministry. The convention was held at a really cool hotel in downtown Atlanta. That was where we stayed. We got in late the night before the conference started and found out that they were upgrading our room to a suite. It was huge and had a beautiful view of downtown! We were so busy with the conference that we really didn't spend much time in our room but it was fun to come back late at night to a spectacular view!Thanksgiving 2011 was spent in Redding with my wonderful family! We had a great visit! I miss my family so much and the 3 days we had with them flew by. I always shed tears when we leave. It's been 3 years since I moved from Redding and I still miss it.

Fall 2011

We are thoroughly enjoying Fall here in Moses Lake. There is actually a Fall season here and both Tyler and I are loving it! A few mornings we woke up to 14 degree weather...so different than So Cal! I remember wearing sun dresses in November last year! I love being able to wear sweaters, scarves, and comfy boots!



Tyler took these pics. The leaves have been so beautiful! The pic on the left is of the sidewalk outside our apartment, the one on the right is a pic taken outside of my school. There are huge piles of leaves all over our campus...the kids love playing in the leaves at recess! The picture on the bottom right is a snapshot of the temperature gauge in our car a couple weeks ago...chilly!

Here are some pics of Ellis happenings in the last few weeks...

We carved pumpkins! It's one of our family traditions. This is year #3!

Our finished pumpkins. Mine was polka dots and Ty's was the Buffalo Bills logo!
This past weekend Tyler spoke in "big church" for the first time. He preached in all 3 services at our church and I must say he did an amazing job (you can listen to his message through podcast on livethecall.org). He worked so hard to prepare his message. I am incredibly proud of him. God is truly using him and working through him. I am beyond blessed to be married to a man who wholeheartedly pursues the Lord. Tyler's mom wanted to be here for the big weekend so she flew out from California! We had a wonderful time with her. What's nice about her visiting is she comes from a place where she has access to everything, so while she was here she was perfectly content just relaxing! We had a great time watching Netflix, sleeping in, playing Sorry, drinking lots of coffee, eating TONS of good food, and having meaningful conversation. We haven't seen her for 8 months so we had a lot to catch up on! Tyler's dad really wanted to be here too, but it was a big weekend at the Grove so he couldn't make it for this trip. Maybe next time!

After church
It was hard to say goodbye to Mom Ellis yesterday, but in a couple weeks we will see my family for Thanksgiving and at Christmas we will see Ty's family. I love this time of the year. I love holidays. I can't wait to spend time with the wonderful people who we love and miss dearly.

Classroom Pictures...

My "far away" family has been asking for classroom pics for some time now. Since our camera died while we were in Florida, I haven't been able to take pics of anything. We finally bought a new camera over the weekend. It's red, small, and I love it. So, here are some classroom pics. Keep in mind that it's a work in progress!

My desk:) That picture of my cute husband helps keep me cheerful on the stressful days:)

Door to the hallway
Math board
Back of the room. Look at the cute Fall trees my kiddos finger painted.

I love my reading corner:)
What you see when you first walk in
Front of room

I absolutely love my job and my cute "school babies" (that's what I call them!).

September Update...

September is most definitely flying by! In only 7 more days it will be October! I am giddy that yesterday was the first day of Fall! From now until right after my birthday (January 27th!) is my absolute favorite time of year! I love everything about Fall!

Life in the Ellis household is going well. I have been in a bit of shock trying to adjust to teaching full time and supporting Tyler in ministry. I am exhausted. I have been putting in long hours everyday at school and then bringing work home to do in the evenings and on the weekends. I am trying to find balance and take time for myself; I'm learning how to do this. I am so thankful for Tyler and for his patience with me. There has been more than one day where I have been an over-tired, grumpy girl! He's so good about figuring out what I need and taking such good care of me. I am blessed with a wonderful help-mate!

Although I have been exhausted, I absolutely love my job. I really can't imagine doing anything else. Yesterday, my kiddos were doing a Fall painting project and I was walking around the room helping them and I had a moment when I just stopped and thought, "Wow, I get paid to do this." Tyler and I weren't called to jobs that are going to make us millionaires, but we sure do feel fulfilled and love our jobs. I'm pretty sure not every millionaire can say that.

I totally need to update my blog with pictures of my classroom, life, etc, BUT if you remember, our camera decided to die on our vacation in Florida, so I have nothing for you. We will be buying a new camera next weekend when we go out of town for date night, and then I will finally have some!

Homesickness

Missing all these faces right now...

The last few weeks I have been so homesick...the kind of homesickness you feel in the pit of your stomach. The kind that makes you burst into tears at the most random times. I think a lot of the reason I have been feeling so homesick has to do with starting a new job and feeling yet another big change. I am very thankful for my new job, but with it comes the stress of a new thing. I have only seen my parents and brother once since the start of the new year and it was for a mere 36ish hours as we were passing through Redding during our move to Washington. I am really missing my family. I miss the Ellis family a ton too. When I fell in love with Tyler, I also fell in love with his wonderful family. I gained 3 brothers and a sister, not to mention my 2 beautiful nieces. I miss watching Leila and Sadie grow. We have just been through so much change and I am longing for the familiar. Have I also mentioned that we also do not have a Target or a fro-yo place here? (I think I have lamented about it in previous posts, but just thought I'd mention it again.);)

Tonight as I was sitting at the dinner table in tears (I think my tears often seem to surface at the dinner table because it's the time of day that Tyler and I process through our day together) I was telling Tyler that one thing that really helps me with my homesickness is to remember ALL that I have to be thankful for. First of all I have Christ in my life who has and continues to guide me through all of the big changes, a wonderful husband who loves and cherishes me, supportive family and friends who rally behind us even from far away. Tyler and I both have great full-time jobs (many people can't say the same right now) We have food, clothes housing, and transportation (many people on the east coast are facing losing all of these with Hurricane Irene on its' way...definitely saying prayers for them right now). We have the means to do fun things. We belong to an amazing church where we are loved. We both have an education that can't be taken away from us. We are blessed abundantly. Sometimes it's easy to dwell on the not so pleasant things, but when I reflect on my many, many blessings I soon realize how good God is and that He has us right where we are supposed to be.