Twelve years ago we said, "I do"

August 12, 1995, marked the day we became Mr. and Mrs. Jason Rieth.

Then....

and now...

The best thing about marrying Jason has been the fact that I have shared the last 12 years with my best friend; watching him grow in his faith and character; and, his uncanny ability to make my world at peace by just his presence. I have truly been blessed! Jason understands me probably better than I understand myself and has given God room to refine me and grow into who I am today.

We were able to go out to dinner on the 11th and filled our stomachs with halibut for Jason and a ribeye steak, garlic mashed potatoes and grilled asparagus for me. I get to enjoy the leftovers today! We reminisced about the last 12 years, the good, the bad, the up's and the down's. Thankfully, we have had more good than bad and more up's than down's, but truly know that we wouldn't be where we are today without any of them. God definitely made us for eachother and I am so thankful.

Thirteen more and we'll be celebrating our 25th! And, being married at 20, we do have the potential of making 60! I doubt I'll still be blogging at 80, but if I am, I don't think I'll be posting the "then and now" pictures!

Pictures of My Trip to the DR

Dominican Republic Mission Trip

"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brother of mine, you did for me.'" Matthew 25:40

What an incredible experience! Our team, which consisted of 30 people, 9 adults and 21 youth, returned late in the evening on July 22nd from our short-term mission trip to the Dominican Republic. We left Central Wisconsin airport at 6 a.m. on July 12th on three different flights to eventually meet and regroup at the airport in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. The travel presented challenges throughout the trip but God is faithful and everyone arrived where they were supposed to be and lost only one suitcase!

Our trip was arranged and sponsored through Solid Rock Missions, which has been working in the DR for 20 years. Their main ministry has been in the town of San Juan. Over the years, a guest house, clinic and school have been built and are firmly established in the area. Over 80% of the students who graduate from the Christian school go on to the university. They are looking to expand a similar ministry in El Cercado, which is where our team was ministering. As of right now, a clinic has been built and is operating. Anyway, we began our trip by staying in a hotel in Santo Domingo on the 12th and the next morning traveling by bus for 3 1/2 hours to El Cercado. Once we arrived in El Cercado met our host families. I stayed with a family of five whose children were 21, 19 and 16. The middle son spoke some English so we were able to communicate a little bit. I am hoping to improve my Spanish before I go back again.

Saturday was the beginning of the construction project. We spent the day painting their multi-purpose building, inside and out, with two coats of primer and a finish coat.

Sunday we attended church with Pastor Morales. After church we had the opportunity to take a bus ride to a dam about 1 1/2 hours away to go swimming. After the previous day's work in the warm weather, swimming felt pretty good.

Monday through Thursday we did Vacation Bible School with the children in the morning. The VBS was awesome! We started with 83 kids on Monday, but by the end of VBS on Thursday, we had approximately 300 kids waiting in line before we even started. We had to limit admission to 100 kids due to a limited amount of craft supplies, but the remaining children stood outside and participated in the worship, dramas, etc. Then we all took off to the park for game time. And after lunch we resumed painting the multi-purpose building. Through this 4-day VBS program, approximately 30-40 children raised their hands indicating that they had prayed to ask Jesus to be their Savior. God is good!

Thursday was a powerful day for me as instead of painting in the afternoon, we traveled about 40 minutes into the mountains to distribute rice and beans to extremely poor families. These were not poor in the sense that they had little; it was poor in the sense that they had almost nothing. Many children we saw were malnourished and it was heartbreaking that we could not do more. However, despite the difficult circumstances, the joy that these people conveyed was incredible. I will never forget these people or this experience. To share the love of Jesus in such a powerfully tangible way was truly a privilege.

Our "mission" ended on Friday with us completely finishing the painting of the multi-purpose building. Saturday and Sunday were full travel days and despite some interesting challenges, the Lord was faithful to bring us all home safely.

I can't help but reiterate how inadequate words seem to be to describe how mightily God worked in my life and in the lives of others. I learned in a completely new way what it means to serve the Lord and appreciate what he calls me to do, both at home and wherever else I am. While it was a joy to serve and give, it was made clear to me that I cannot out-give God. I returned feeling that I gained more than I gave up.

"But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ." Philippians 3:7-8

We are headed out...

Tomorrow Jason leaves for his missions trip to the Dominican Republic. He will be gone for 10 days so the boys and I have decided to head to Kansas City to visit the Hedlund family. So we will be up and at 'em at 3:15 a.m. or so. We have to have Jason to the airport by 4:14 a.m. ...yikes! Once our good-byes are said, we are on our way to Grandma's and Grandpa's house. We will spend Thursday there and get up early (again) and head out for Kansas City with Grandma on Friday. I will try and update you on our trip while we are there.

Please keep Jason and his team in your prayers. He is very excited to share Jesus with the Dominican people. I know God will richly bless him and all who are going.

So long for now.

Catch up

Whew! Sorry it has been awhile since I last posted. Our days and nights were plump full of miscellaneous things. But, I am now happy to report that things are slowing down a bit. The baseball season is over and it ended with a 2-17 record. Not great, but at least they didn't end the season at the very bottom. It was exciting to watch them improve and work together as a team with each game. During the season Kyle never got a hit (just a piece of it a few times), but did get on base a few times via a "walk". Two of the times on base he made it home...yea! We are very proud of him and the effort he put forth. Now he is onto swimming lessons and tennis lessons. When those are over and we head into the new school year, he will begin guitar lessons and eventually wants to learn how to play the drums...yikes...headaches, come on down! These have to be better than the recorder, right?


Now I need to prepare you for the pictures you are about to see. I never thought I would be doing this yet. I love my blonde-haired little boy, but Kyle has been asking to dye his hair for months now. Who thought it would start at 9. Anyway, Jason and I gave in. It's not like he is asking to permanently color his skin with a tattoo or put a hole in some part of his body...it's just hair, right?! (I'm sure the aformentioned things are coming!) So yesterday afternoon while dad was fishing, the boys and I made a trip to Wal-Mart to choose the new color. I was fully prepared to dye Kyle's hair, but wasn't quite prepared for Kory (who is 5) to also request that his hair not be this color anymore. I was also shocked by how excited they were to sit and have stuff squirted on their heads and sit and wait some more. Especially when they can hardly make it through a haircut without complaining and asking when it will be done. Anyway, the following is evidence of yesterday afternoon's experiment...

Kyle before

The processing time

The new look

Kory before

Processing...

The new Kory

It isn't quite the color I had hoped for, but I guess it will do for now. A couple of haircuts later and it will be gone! I guess I can always say that we are entering the witness protection program. I can only hope that this is now out of their system and they will be content to remain blonde until their hair naturally becomes darker.

Jason and I have embarked on a very large landscaping project for this summer... our backyard! Three weeks ago we had a landscape designer come out to the house to talk with us about what we would like to see done with our yard. Well, she is now done with her "plan" and we meet with her tomorrow evening to see what needs to be done. I can only imagine the exorbinate amount of money it will be to complete it all...I think it will be scaled down a bit :) But, when it is all done, it will be nice to have a patio and some living things back there besides the deer and the squirrels.

This week is a catch up week. We only have a few extra-curricular activities during the day (swimming lessons) and all but one of our evenings are free! And we have the bonus of dad being home for a day in the middle of the week...yea! We are not sure what we will be doing for the 4th, but for sure will be finding fireworks to attend somewhere!

Have a happy 4th of July and God bless.

Bay Beach Amusement Park

On Monday, June 11th, the boys and I drove to Bay Beach Amusement Park in Green Bay with my friend, Linda and her grandson, Tyler. This park is free and the tickets cost $.25 each and each of the rides only require 1 or 2 tickets. We bought $20 worth of tickets and they lasted for 4 hours. The boys got to ride most of the rides twice!

The Merry-go-round

The Ferris Wheel
I had to go on most of the "bigger" rides with Kory because he wasn't tall enough. I had tears running down my face riding the ferris wheel with him. He was fine while we were going slow with the loading and unloading. However, when we got going up to speed, his eyes got really big and every fiber of his being was tight. He pulled his legs up to his chest and tightened his stomach and then would just start giggling. It was hilarious.

Kory's race car

The boys flying helicopters

Kyle and Tyler on the Flying Trapeze

Kory in the bomber plane

Looking out over the bay of Green Bay. It was beautiful.

My friend Linda has more pictures of Kyle and Tyler. When I get those from her I'll post them. I experienced the Tilt-a-whirl and the scrambler again. Haven't been on those for years. I took Kyle and Tyler on the Tilt-a-whirl and we had that car spinning so fast. Kyle got a stiff neck from trying to keep his head from flying backwards. I have found out that a 32 year old spinning around in endless circles for 5 minutes is not a good thing. I totally felt like hurling. But, I didn't.

It was an awesome time and the boys left saying, "We have to bring dad here". I think it was a successful adventure!

Father's Day Trip to Minoqua

We spent a leisurely father's day in Minoqua, WI. It's an hour drive from our place and our first stop was at Paul Bunyan's Cook Shanty. When we saw the obnoxious sign we, of course, had to stop and try it out.

Paul Bunyan and his ox, Blue

(can't miss this sign!)

This restaurant is a "family style" restaurant. This means you pay before you're seated and they bring out three different meat plates, corn on the cob, smashed potatoes, stuffing, bread and drinks. I don't think we put much of a dent in the food. Kory had "chicken on the cob" (a drumstick), while Kyle enjoyed pot roast. The best part of this restaurant was the host. He had pants that defied gravity. The man was in some serious denial about needing a bigger waist size. Seriously, the only thing holding those pants up were some very tightly stretched suspenders. If one of those babies broke, well let's just say, we would have seen a little more than we bargained for!Look at this mess of food!

Sadly it was raining when we exited the restaurant so not sure what to do we just started driving. We came upon a Wildlife Park and decided to stop since the rain was letting up. Good choice, the rain completely stopped and we had a fun time.

The boys on our nature walk

Can you believe this buck is just sitting there letting the boys pet it. They were pumped!

There was a pen of dwarf rabbits and Kyle was able to grab hold of the tiniest one in the pen.

This is the fattest rabbit I have ever seen! This thing had to weigh 40 some pounds, it was huge!

This pot-bellied pig was a little hornory, but the baby goats loved to jump on her back and make her squeal. This too was one of the fattest pigs, I have seen.

There were goats every where and many warning signs like this..."Goats eat anything so please do not leave strollers, purses, bottles, cameras, hats and clothing unattended". One of the goats took a liking to Kyle and tried to nibble on his shirt as he walked around.

Jason and Kory petting another buck

This was the only fawn I could get up close, but there were quite a few running around.

There were so many more animals there like, tigers, zebras, peacocks, emus, bison, black bears and so on and so on. You get the idea. The boys had a blast and it was just so nice to be outside.

After the Wildlife Park we drove back into town and walked down main street. There were tons of little antique shops, a old-time candy store. We decided to stop for ice cream at an old soda fountain shop. It was such a neat place. They had it packed with arcade games, an indoor mini golf course, billard tables. Every kids dream. In the back of the shop was the soda fountain shop, which looked like a scene from the 50's. It was awesome and they had the best ice cream ever! I ignored my latose intolerance and pounded down a single scoop cookie-dough waffle cone. Well, my latose intolerance reminded me that it was still there and I could only eat half of it. After our ice cream we played some mini golf.

This was the boys' first time playing mini golf. They loved it and did really well actually. We are still not sure how Kory hit most of his balls into the cup, but he managed to get a 3 or 4 on just about every hole. Of course dad was the big winner with a score of one over par. But, it's mini golf, does it really count!

We then drove home, the boys slept most of the way. After arriving home, Kyle challenged Jason to a game of baseball on the PS2. Kyle was I'm sure thinking that he would beat his dad, but sadly he did not. I believe he lost 38 to 7. Ouch! After getting over being beat, they joined me upstairs and we all watched "X-Men, The Last Stand together". All in all I believe Jason had a wonderful Father's Day. It was just so nice to have a day with nothing on the schedule to do with what we pleased!

Good-bye Kansas...Hello Wisconsin!

It's official, we are now permanent Wisconsin residents. The decision was made in January that we were not going to move back to Kansas when the Weston 4 project was finished, but were unable to say anything until now. Last Friday was Jason's last day as an employee of Black & Veatch. It was a day filled with mixed emotions, he was sad to leave a great company, but excited to start anew with his new employer. He was very blessed to have worked at Black & Veatch for 8 years and is thankful for all of the friendships he made and the experienced he gained, which has only prepared him for his new venture. He has accepted a job with a local company, Miron Construction, and began working there today. He will manage projects and develop an internal structural engineering capability within the company. It was a difficult decision for him to make, but we feel that Wausau is the best place for our family.

Now for a little catch-up on what has been taking place in our house for the past two weeks. I chaperoned one of Kyle's field trips to the EAA Muesem in Oshkosh, WI. So for a day I was responsible for keeping track of eight 3rd graders in a muesem filled with airplanes. I think it went rather well, but was exhausted when we returned home. Exhaustion and all I was glad I was able to do this with Kyle, I know it meant the world to him. (also I'd better do now, while I'm still cool!). Kyle was in as close to heaven on earth as possible. He is absolutely enthralled with airplanes, how they work, etc. and then add history on top of that. I don't know if his brain could have taken in anymore information. We took alot of pictures, which will make an awesome page in his scrapbook (whenever I get back to that!).

We made another trip to Grandma and Grandpa's for Memorial Day weekend (see I told you we would fill that weekend up with something). It was so relaxing...pontoon rides around the lake, campfires with s'mores... The boys did tons of fishing and we had a fish fry one evening. And discovered that I too have a mild allergy to fish. So I will join ranks with Kyle and avoid all fish products! We ate some fabulous mexican food before going to see "Shrek the Third"...funny, but still not as good as "Shrek 2". The animation in those movies still amaze me.

Last Friday, Jason and Kyle went to a Brewers game with a bunch of people from church. They began their trek in a school bus (a bus that is much too small for a grown man to ride in for 4 hours) at 2 p.m. on Friday and ended at 2:45 a.m. Saturday. They had a wonderful time and the Brewers won! Saturday started out a little slow...Jason and Kyle weren't vertical until 10:30.

We spent the day outside on Saturday doing yardwork. We first had to go and purchase the plants, flowers and bird feeders, which took a couple hours. Jason mowed the lawn and hung the bird feeders, while I planted the flowers. Jason is very disappointed that the birds have not found the feeders, only the squirrels and deer. However, he has been getting some target practice with Kyle's BB gun and the squirrels. I have to go purchase a couple more flowers that became a deer's midnight snack! My project for the evening is to mix up my "Deer Away" recipe and spray all of my plants. I truly hope it works. I know I certainly wouldn't eat anything that contained eggs, milk, vegetable oil and dishwashing liquid.

This is the boys' last week of school...yahoo! We are very much looking forward to some lazy summer days. We only have a couple trips planned this summer. Jason is going on a 10-day missions trip to the Dominican Republic in July. While he is away, the boys and I are planning on making a trip to Kansas City to see my sister and her family. So those of you who read this and live in Kansas, I'll be coming to see you!

Well, that's all the news from the Rieth family. Have a great week.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Jason came home with this beautiful boutique, a frappacino and Starbuck's gift card. What a wonderful gift! I'll be frequenting Starbuck's for awhile!


Can you guess how old?

My friends Ali (baby Carter), Emily & Jessica (and Alaina) helped me celebrate my day by taking me to lunch. It was very thoughtful of them. They even sang "happy birthday" to me in the middle of the restaurant (those of you who know me know that this makes me really uncomfortable and embarrassed. I did survive however)

Alaina

Kory

Carter

The rest of my day was filled with the duties of "normal" life...washing clothes, cleaning house, etc. I spent my evening at the ball field watching Kyle play.

After Kyle's baseball game last Thursday we took off for Grandma and Grandpa's (at 8:30 p.m.). It is a 3-hour drive and Jason having been up since 5:15 a.m. was just a little delirious by the time we arrived at 11:30 that evening. Apparently he was waiting for me to offer to drive and I was waiting for him to just stop and say, "you have to drive". Aside from the delirium and misunderstanding we arrived safely. On Friday we spent most of the day with my dad and his wife, Sheila. They have 5 horses one of which was a week-old colt. They are beautiful horses and the boys loved petting them and feeding them hay.

Abby & Sheyenne

Sheyenne

The boys and Grandpa petting Sheyenne

Annie

Haas

Raindrop

Annie & Raindrop

The boys playing on the hay

My mom and I spent Saturday together at a Mother/Daughter brunch hosted by her church. We had such a wonderful time together. The boys spent the day helping dad and grandpa build sections of a dock and put it in the lake. After all the work was done Dad and Kyle did some fishing.

Oh and Friday night Jason, Kyle and I went to a Phillips, Craig and Dean concert in Minneapolis. How awesome!

Have a wonderful week.