WOW! It's November 30! 2007!

I am constantly amazed at how fast time flies. Oh my goodness. Where in the world did November go?? It seems like it was just summer 2 weeks ago. And now we're talking about Christmas?? Thankfully, I have an early start on things! I have most of my Christmas shopping done. I'm almost done with our Christmas cards (which need to go out in the mail TOMORROW). Dan decided that he doesn't want to have a Christmas tree this year. ??Who knows why. He says we have a Christmas Piano, and we can put the presents on top of it. Ahhh.... yes, because that makes a lot of sense. A Christmas Piano... Ok! I can work with that!

Thanksgiving went really well :) Dan's family came to Des Moines!! WOW! And Cheryl and I made dinner. We had CHICKEN (yum!), corn casserole, green bean casserole, potatoes, and biscuits. I think that was all. Hmm.. my potatoes were pretty salty, apparently. Yuck. So no one ate them. We through them out. Oh well :). We went antique shopping and I found ... what did I find..? .... I really can't rememb- OH! We bought Dan this way cool dart board that is enclosed in a wooden case (looks like something out of a pub). I like it a lot. And I'm very good :). Only seldom do I completely miss the board and hit the wall. I think that should count for 100 points. Dan had a 14 hour day Saturday - SO, while he was gone, Bill and Cheryl decided they wanted to redo our basement as a present to him! Wow!!!! It looks so great. Very Drake Blue. He was SO SURPRISED! And relieved that he didn't have to do any of it :). Now all it needs is a sleeper couch and a big screen TV.

I joined an Anytime Fitness gym! Well, not officially. I'm actually still debating. I have a 2 week free trial. I love that they have trainers available and that I can get in anytime, whether it's 2 am or 2 pm, holiday or not. BUT Drake is so much cheaper ... and they have a pool, weight room, cardio machines, a gym, an indoor track, locker rooms, raquetball courts, etc. Ugh. Priorities, priorities. If I stick with Anytime Fitness, I could go to it even if I were in Indiana. Having complete access is very appealing to me, because I think I would be more apt to consistently go if I didn't have to adhere to the business' hours. IDK. (.... "idk, my bff Rose"! hahahahahahaha.....what's SO funny is that my Grandma really has a BFF Rose...) What do you think? Any of you guys go to the gym?

Well!! I might be moving back to Indiana for a few months. I need to finish my degree, and apparently there's a class that DMACC (Des Moines Area Community College) can't fulfill ... so the easiest thing would be for me to take what I need in the fall of 2008, probably staying with John and Kami to help with the babies, if that's OK with them. Fun! Dan would hopefully be able to drive out twice a month for a week. But we'll have to see and work out all the logistics. I'm so ready to finish my schooling! Just to have some closure, if nothing else.

What's new with you?

Be Thou My Vision

Check out this video on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XZ3ja-quhA

Andrea Hartstein
(515)494-1167

^ Me right now!

It's 6:23 pm. I'm sitting in Starbucks in Des Moines, Iowa, surfing the net. Dan is working tonight at the Walgreens across the street from Drake. I'm thinking about visiting him and getting some action shots! What'd'ya think?





I love visiting other websites of our friends. SO of course I was visiting those listed to the side. I also love visiting our friends, the Jamison's, site. But their site is password protected ... so that's why it's not listed on the side.





AHAHAHAHHAHAHA - This is SO funny .... SO the Jamisons :) I hope this works... Can you see this? Or do you need the password... http://web.mac.com/jonjamison/iWeb/Site/Priceless.html


I hope you can just see it .... but if not, sorry! It's so cute. I'm going to post it and I'll come back and erase this message if it isn't working...





SO, what are the Hartsteins up to lately, you ask? Well, let me tell you! We are busy loving life! Dan has been working at random pharmacies (all Walgreens, just different locations), and Andrea's been busy making our home more of a haven. What's that mean, you ask? My aren't you full of questions! Well, she has been cleaning and decorating and LOVING surprising her HH (Handsome Husband). It's been very helpful in the romance department :) Hey - it takes inspiration to create a new being! OK, update on that - God has been taking extra care in creating our precious baby and we're just waiting for Him to be ready to bestow him or her upon us! So, we are doing everything we know - if you know what I mean - to ensure we're not missing our opportunity! But LORD - We are so ready! Whenever You are! Grant us patience, continue to build up our anticipation, love and excitement, because we trust that You are a BIG God and that You are in control. You see the big picture, and we trust that You will show us where to put the right puzzle pieces. Praise Your name on high!





(Do you find it weird that I talk to God in my posts..??)

He is so cute

We're in the basement trying to go through as many boxes as possible.
Dan found his old Halloween costume: superman. So here he is cleaning,
with his Clark kent glasses on.

... What's a shoe mitt?

Water Cats

We've got another one who likes water!

Got home from brown county on a rainy night

Ooops!

So.... We stopped at walmart on our way home from brown county,
Indiana. I had to go potty.. And I walked into the men's room! I
think that's the first time I've ever done that.

Cell Group

Cell Group

New member of the family!!

Speaking of sunsets...

Hi mom!

You mentioned how beautiful the sunset was tonight in Maryland. Here
it is setting in Iowa.

Love andrea!

Working on the Christmas Newsletter

Ok... So maybe its a little early... But I want to get a head start on
the holidays. My goodness! Tomorrow is already OCTOBER!!

Sydney White

I'm watching "Sydney white" right now... Wow, I really like this
movie. Amanda bynes impresses me. She's funny and usually has a
great attitude. Why wouldn't you want to be more like her? I have to
ask, is she a Christian?

Andrea Hartstein
Sent on my iPhone

Abba, Abba, Abba

Abba, Abba, Abba

Abba, Abba, Abba

Precious Horatio

I love this cat so much. He is just the best. We're thinking about
getting him his own pet kitten :)

The Friendship Baptist Center

I've been helping at the Friendship Center every Mon and Wed
afternoons, working with youth and children. I'm really being blessed
by it. I'm getting to know many of the kids. We play games, color,
work on homework, learn about Jesus and how to be more like Him. I'm
hoping I will be able to help for a long time, Lord willing.

Which way leads them to the witch?

Good Morning!

Its officially morning!! Yeah :). I did get a bit more sleep.. Like
another hour. I'm listening to the plan. I love listening to this...
It inspires me and makes me want to seek God harder everyday. It
makes me want to do as much as I possibly can in my area of the plan.

Andrea Hartstein
Sent on my iPhone

Yeah, we're tourists. That's right.

I said it. Everyone else was thinking it.

Here's a pic of dan in the car in Dubuque, Iowa. We took our friend
Kathy there for a day visit. It was actually very nice! (he's SO
handsome!! Mwahhh!)

Phone Blogging

Well, its about time! I have been trying to figure out how to blog
using my phone for awhile now - and I've figured it out!

Its about 5:20 am and I'm having trouble sleeping. I'm trapped
snuggly between my HH (handsome husband) and my cat, Horatio. I think
I've been up since about 2:45 am or so... I've surfed the web,
checked my email, fought the urge to send text messages, read a
portion of Jane Austen's book, "Emma", all while snug in bed using my
iPhone. Praise the Lord for technology!

I'm starting to get a little sleepy tho.. I think the reason I'm
awake is bc I slept most of Sunday away. Why? Well, without too much
detail, its my time of the month and I was trying to sleep away the
pain. Dan is so cute... Shortly after dinnertime, he told me he also
wasn't feeling well. He said, "I think I gots my period.. I hate my
period." I just laughed and kissed his face. I love him so much!!

Ok, now that I know how to do this, I will blog again soon - later!

Andrea Hartstein
Sent on my iPhone

CCM For Life!

We just Thomas off at CCM! (Center for Creative Media, Teen Mania's Honor Academy)

Alexis Taylor Brown

She's here!! My little niece, Sexy Lexi, was born August 14, 2007 just after 4pm central time (5pm her time). Isn't she cute with her big nose and chubby cheeks :) ? Mom and baby are both doing very well. Christi said the labor and all was 100% better than her last experience. So everything's great!! Now all she needs are some little Hartstein cousins...

Global Expeditions on NBC's Nightly News

Ragman Peru x

This is the "Ragman" - one of the dramas we [Global Expeditions] have performed on mission trips. I just found it on youtube and had to share it

Katie, do you remember this??

OK, I'm going to try to find the original one that we first saw in 2002-2003. I don't know if this one has the same boys ... but it's the exact same song and the exact same movements. I'm on it!

...Anyone know what the chinese writing is? Hopefully nothing offensive.. My apologies if it's anything less than respectable!

My God, I'll Only Ever Give My All!

THis is our new favorite worship song in youth group. Abba, take take TAKE IT ALL!

David Crowder Band's

Praise God!!

This is SO me! Abba, I love you!!!

Does this ever happen to you??

You're living life and loving it - and the perfect blog topic enters your mind?? But then when you're sitting in front of your computer screen, trying to remember what that phenominal topic was ... you go blank?

So, that happens to me all the time. Rather than just tell you about my day, I'd rather give you stories and pictures so that you could experience my day. Dan and I were driving to [our new house] and I asked him, "hey, handsome face - if you ventured into your mom's attic and you found your great-great-grandfather's journal, what would you hope to find inside it??"

BEFORE WE GO ON... My answer to that question probably would have been, "a picture, their thoughts, their dreams, an idea of what their days were really like, what they wanted to achieve before they died, what they felt their purpose in life was" - you know, shallow things like that :)

But his answer included ... "money, a map to buried treasure, stock certificates for IBM, family secrets, etc"

THIS has actually helped me out tremendously :) So now in all of my journals, I will put at least one dollar between two pages and I have been inspired to capture "family secrets" - you know, just stuff that we wouldn't necessarily shout about or expect anyone to care about in the future. Hmm... I'm interested in capturing some :)

It's Sunday afternoon, June 17, 2007. Father's Day! Happy Father's Day to all you fathers out there :). Well, we have a lot going on this summer. Pretty exciting!

Dan's working full time at Walgreens. He's waiting for a date to take his board exams. Next week I'm helping at the Friendship Center with VBS from 9 am - 1:30pm. Not too sure what to expect, but I'm thinking good things :) ! We've had two summer missionaries: Lindsay and April. April just left today for her next site (Souix City ... but she'll be back with us in a few weeks!) and Lindsay has one more week with us. Then we (me, April and Lindsay) head to Kids Camp! They're going to be family leaders (camp counselors) and I'm the camp photographer. So in the afternoons all this week, I'm going to be preparing for that. THEN I leave with our leadership team of youth camp for an overnight stay in Illinois to see how they do their "Super Summers". We get back Friday, but that morning .... Dan signs on our new house! Yea!!!! You can see pictures of it in our album section of our family website: www.thefamilypost.com/hartsteinfamily. Then we have youth camp in July (which is in the same week as our 2nd year anniversary), then I go to Texas for Seminar for Mary Kay. Then I come back and head to Indiana for a Tuesday Girls Night with a church. And then we can think about relaxing. But just for about 2 seconds before I leave with my mom, dad, and Thomas to take him to Teen Mania's Honor Academy. SUCH a busy summer. Busy, busy, busy.

What I'm thinking of doing is taking it one chunk at a time :) Getting it all on the calendar and planned out and plan LOTS of Dan&Andi time :) around it.

SO ... I'm going to go do some of that right now..!

Let me take this moment to remind you to visit us online at www.thefamilypost.com/hartsteinfamily . We update with pictures and videos ALL the time!!

See you there!

Leave us a message on our message board :) Horatio LOVES that

I don't blog as much as I used to. I don't journal (handwriting) as much either. As much as I treasure knowing what I was thinking at a certain point in life, I have come to realize that I dwell so much on tomorrow rather than today. See for yourself. If you go back through my blog entries, I'm sure you'll see lots of dreaming about having children and dreaming of plans for when Dan graduated, etc. I've gotten tired of living in tomorrow; I was missing so much of today! So I decided that I want to have a positive outlook. I am choosing to live for today. What you think about comes about, right? And if I can't be content with what I have today then I would be choosing to be a miserable person. And who wants that??

I sing while I shop. I almost wish someone sneakingly followed me around with a camera so I could see myself as others do. One of the best presents I've ever gotten is our iPod. I take it with me everywhere. I listen to sermons on it, worship music, positive Christian music, positive secular music (to a very small degree and only if it's edifying). But I do. I do sing while I shop. Typically for groceries. I have the iPod on and I sing :). I'm quite certain people hear me. I've never gotten any looks, with the exception of children. They kind of smile at me when I pass by :) Because they secretly wish they could sing, too :) And they can. They just need a little boldness :). When I caught myself singing the other day, I thought to myself, "self, quiet down. people can hear you". And then I reminded myself that I might be the only piece of humor in some of these people's day :) I do watch Ellen pretty regularly in the mornings ... she's inspired me to dance more. So today while I was singing in Dahl's supermarket, I danced :) Not crazily, but just as I was walking down the aisle of the store (kind of like how Ellen dances while she walks around the audience towards the beginning of her show, you know?)

I love it :)

Can I be brutally honest with you?

I want a baby in the WORST way.

Well, in a totally normal and would never do anything illegal way. Know what I mean..?

I just feel like we pray and pray and pray and try and try and try (Ok.. ok..) and NOTHING happens. Well, you know - besides our love deepening for each other and loving every minute of it! (You're not getting sick.. are you??) Do I need to explain the sinking and incredibly disappointing feeling every time my Aunt Scarlet (*wink, wink) comes to visit?? Ughhhh

And it's almost like I'm being MOCKED - because almost everyone I know is pregnant. My sister is pregnant, Abby's pregnant, Beth is pregnant, Traci's pregnant. Ashley just had a baby. Who's next, who's next?? I DARE you to tell me. [bring it] (uhhhh... j/k)

You know what is the most accurate depiction of what I'm feeling..? Ever see that great movie "Facing the Giants"? At the point where we first come in to the story, the Coach and his wife have been trying to have a baby for 4 years (Oh, Abba, please no). And the wife says something like, "it's as if I can hear them playing in the next room, or running up and down the halls. Anticipating them run into the bedroom during a thunderstorm. I think about teaching them songs and reading them stories. I never knew that you could miss someone so much and you've never met." {exactly} [Don't read the rest of this paragraph if you haven't seen the movie!] Later on, she goes in to get a pregnancy test from a clinic and they confirm that she is indeed not pregnant. Of coures, she is once again devastated and stops when she gets outside her truck. She looks up to the sky and says, "Lord, I will still love you" while she's sobbing. And later still .... is there anything too impossible for God..?

Truly - some days I feel like I need to watch this movie every day. So much of it comes up in my life lately. So much of it is so true.

WHAT a NIGHT! I've been up for about 24 hours. Dan's been up longer than me.

Yes, you guessed it! We had a lock in at the church last night.

You know, about half way through each time we have one, I'm always thinking, "This is the last time we're doing this". But they love it :) So we keep doing it.

Let me give you an idea of what I ran into last night ...

First of all, when I asked the kids how many they thought were coming (keep in mind that we do no advertising outside of our regular group of 15 kids or so), they told me they thought it could be anywhere between 50 and 150. I was like, "What??" [we ended up with about 40 - whew!]

About a handful of our regular youth group attenders threatened to leave because a girl came to the lock in from school which none of these kids care for. So what did I tell them? Then go. You don't have to stay. [they all stayed and I heard nothing more about it the rest of the night]

It took us roughly 1 hour and 45 minutes to get through 2 short games and a message. Why, you ask? Especially if they're considered short? Because of the all the chit-chatting. [definitely to be expected with so many kids]

I found one of the guys in a baby crib.

Around 2 am, the girls decided to give 3 of the guys a makeover. It was hillarious ... yet awkward.

First lock in where a known couple were attending together. THAT was fun.. [I had to keep reminding everyone that .. Church is NOT a date...]

3 of our six grade boys decided to play with the baby toys, slides, cooking toys, etc. And oddly enough ... everything seemed about their size...

One of our sixth grade guys was constantly annoying and aggravating one of our eighth grade guys. At one point, I heard the eighth grader say to his friends, "let's go beat him with this belt". Little did he know I was standing on the stairs when he said that, so he heard me say, "Excuse me? Did you say you're going to give him a belt as a gift? Or maybe you said you found his belt and you're going to go give it to him? Because I know that you would never say something like 'let's go beat him with this belt', right? I'm taking the belt and you'll see it in the morning". So the eighth grader stayed away from him. But the sixth grader was relentless. I would walk down the hall and hear him saying, "Just say 'truce'!". And this several times in a row for, I'm sure, more than an hour. At one point, I had to threaten them both that I was going to send them home. It helped a little.

An eighth grader put glue in his hair and made a mohawk.

By the end of the night, the youth room was DISGUSTING. You would not believe how long I felt like it was an uphill battle to get them to start cleaning it up. Even when I would give them a job to do, I would turn my back for a moment, and when I turned around again - they're sitting and talking with their friends! And it's amazing how so many of them all of a sudden don't feel well when I mention the phrase "let's clean up!"

*I think it's interesting to note that one of our guys in particular made it into 8 1/2 of these 10.

And that was just the tip of the iceberg :)

No, don't let it fool you. There were some incredible moments, too. We played a great game that we just learned last week called sit'n'scootch. THAT was fun. And hillarious. Visit our family site at www.thefamilypost.com/hartsteinfamily and check out the videos section to see it in action! It was also neat to see many of the kids start to open up about more personal things and matters of the heart.

YES, it's crazy. YES, it's a tough night to get through - but it's worth building relationships with the students and getting to know new friends. I think I met at least 5-7 new kids of which I have never seen. And I got to share about Jesus with all of them.

It's been a little while since I've posted anything. To be honest, I'm trying to refrain from typing too much these days. Shocking, I know :). How in the world am I to accomplish that?? But I'm starting to get pain in my right hand wrist when I'm on the computer too much. I'm starting to look forward to the days when we all have a PC that is voice driven. When I can simply talk in a microphone connected to the computer and everything I say is either done or typed out for me. When, oh when will that sort of technology be readily available to me?? :) I'm sure it's not too far into the future. I'm certain the technology itself is available - but I have never seen a computer like that which I may purchase today. If you could ... I wonder how expensive they are ... (are you mystified that I'm wasting my precious typing time to so frivolous an explanation? Me too.)

Anyway - we're doing well :) *Gotta go! I'll be right back to finish!!

OK "wheew....." *breathing air out*

There are times when I forget that people read these things. Times when I will write something, and then a few months later someone mentions it. At that moment, I think to myself, "oh wow.. they were reading that. Yikes ... what else did I say that they might have read??" This is not one of those times. I am well aware that you are reading this. And I am making a post at 1 am and choosing to post this on here to ensure that I have some accountability in this area of my life. I want you to mention it at some point and just ask something like, "hey, how's that going anyway?"

Dave Hasz is an incredible man of God who has spoken things into my life ... been a vessel which God has used to breathe life into my life. It's been a long time since I've heard a fresh message from him, but I was fortunate enough to have listened to a podcast from the Honor Academy alumni website (I would post the link to it so that you could have the opportunity to listen, but you can only access it if you are an alumni ... and if you are one, you already know how to get there).

The message I listened to tonight was entitled "Eternal Accountability". Needless to say, God has grabbed my heart tonight with this message ...

This is Dan interupting my blog: sometimes the kitty is kind of smelly. He just smells, but we love him. And we want him to know that.

An Update! An Update!

Yea! I'm posting an update. It seems like I don't post as much as I used to. I remember when I first got a blog back in 2002-2003.... I probably posted on that darn xanga site every day for a year. If not that much, definitely pretty close!!

We're doing great :). We went back home to Indiana last weekend to do our taxes. Our taxes are DONE! Thank the Lord. Everyone is sick at home - keep em in your prayers. Babies seem to be doing better, Moreys seem to be doing better, Grammy seems to be doing a lot better. Which is all great - but now I think we might be coming down with colds. Oh well, that's life, eh? We completely missed the Iowa Blizzards - again, thank the Lord! We saw probably a dozen or so cars in ditches on the way back home. Yeah, just abandoned in the middle of the highway or off to one side. It was just crazy. When we got home, there was SO much snow in the driveway. I told Dan "let's just leave it for tonight and take care of it tomorrow" but then he reminded me that if we didn't dig ourselves out that night (it was about 10pm, mind you), I wouldn't be able to go to work the next morning (oh, darn). So we did it. Took probably about an hour.

Horatio was fine! He's fat and happy as ever :).

My good friend from Teen Mania, Melanie Farrow, once said that I am a freak when it comes to online stuff. I thought she was just silly when she said that, but more and more, I'm starting to realize that she was SO RIGHT. Think about how many websites I've used on a relatively consistent basis... xanga...blogger...myspace...facebook... and I'm sure PLENTY more.

But now... THERE'S ANOTHER ONE: www.thefamilypost.com/hartsteinfamily

OK - now, I've made a decision that we need to choose one site to blog and maybe one to have as a family site or whatever - and that's it. Because I hate confusing people when I change things around - they're always like, "hey, what are you using now?? I used to read your blog all the time but I haven't seen an update" and then I come to find out that the blog they've been trying to read is one I haven't used in over a year. SO this is it. Blogger will always be my blog site. thefamilypost.com/hartsteinfamily will always be our family site. I just have to resist the urge to try something new. (This is a horrible problem, isn't it? I'm so used to CHANGE that even in ridiculous things like this, I can't sit still long enough to be consistent)

Our family site will actually be linked with the rest of our families - so that is pretty darn cool.

I <3 the guitar!!

I'm learning how to play, can you believe it?? I'm so good, too. I can already play "Oh When the Saints Go Marching In". :) I can't begin to tell you how far I have to go. Hahaha.... *nervous laughter*

BUT I have my guitar all picked out!!!! I am SO excited!!!!!! We even went down to the Guitar store and I got to touch it and everything. Here's a picture of it:


I just have to decide on the color now. The atomic pink one, I think, is my favorite right now. They're both super sparkly and have stars on the fretboard. SO awesome. And they're made for girls, so the fretboard is smaller than normal boy guitars.

I have absolutely fallen inlove with the guitar. I can't wait until I can really worship using it.

Which one screams "ANDREA!!!!" to you? (or "ANDI!!!!!" - Whatever :))

I'm so tired.

I'm tired of being fat (that's girl code for: I want to be healthier!!), tired of being tired, tired of busyness. I get into this funk every once in awhile. And today's that day this month! So, this morning in my quiet time, I was expressing this to God when Dan walked in the bedroom as he was getting ready for work. He asked me what I was journaling, and I told him. He's tired, too. We've just both been trying to change our habits for over a year and a half and feel like we've actually gone about 3 steps backwards. Blah. So, we have a plan.

We have access to the Drake Facilities, so we are going to go for at least 1 hour right after work. We're going to run 1 mile to start and then walk for atleast 1/2 an hour. Then probably play raquet ball (our favorite to play together). Our goal is to do go 3 times per week - if not more!!

That's our plan to stay active (I do also have walking tapes by Leslie Sansone which I love, as well as Turbo Jam - the BEST workout I've ever EVER done at home).

Eating. Blah. We have agreed to help each other drink NO pop for at least one month. We're going to focus on drinking just water and milk. We're going to get up earlier each morning so that we can have breakfast together (such a crazy concept, huh? :)). We've been eating Super Suppers - basically healthy meals that I put together at their location once a month and then we freeze them. So, so good - and I don't have to plan, shop, chop or clean up!! I LOVE it. But rather than eating it for dinner, we're going to switch and eat those for lunch every day. For dinner we're going to eat ...... Salad!! Yea! The idea here is trying to re-structure our eating habits. We don't typically eat horrible food - but we do eat way too late in the day. Rather than eating little to no food for breakfast, very light lunch, and a huge dinner - we're switching it around. We're going to try to have our biggest meal be breakfast, a medium lunch, and a light dinner. That way, we're burning up as much of that days energy as we possibly can throughout the day, rather than eating late and sleeping on it all night.

So this is our plan! You know what motivates me a little bit? I'm thinking worst case scenario will be losing about 1 lb per week. At first, I think to myself, "ugh, that's it?? Just 4lbs a month??" Although, if we could be consistent with that and try to make that our average -- we will lose about 52 lbs in one year! Oh, how glorious that would be. That is so much more than even my goal weight. I can't tell you how happy I would be with that.

Now - we're not pregnant yet, but we're not preventing anything. I don't think we're really going to start trying trying until Dan graduates in May and gets a good job. I just want to lose weight so that I can have a healthy pregnancy and not have that much MORE to lose once the baby gets here, you know? I just have to harness that and use it for motivation.

Anybody else out there trying to live a healthier lifestyle?? Any success tips??