End of School Year 2013

I missed the last two days of the school year and my kiddos missed their last full week due to my grandfathers funeral. Obviously God's hand was all over that because we were snowed in the weekend/beginning of the week before and wouldn't have been able to make it home..I'm so thankful that we were all able to come home and say good bye. Since being at my parents house I have been going through his old photo albums and finding AWESOME pictures. I have pulled some to scan and blow up to put in our home....awesome black and whites of my dad when he was Baby Boy's age, awesome wedding pictures from my papa and nanas wedding and a really neat album from his time in the air force with what look likes lots of top secret pictures and pictures of my Papa in uniform working.
I've already mentioned before that my dad and granddad repaired their relationship before he died but in all honestly I don't have a whole lot of good memories of him, just because of some choices he made that kept us from always being able to visit him. Those pictures allowed me to see a happier time in my dad and granddad's life and gave me another way to remember him. Don't get me wrong, I loved my papa, went to visit him every time I came home since we left Alabama, made sure my kids knew who he was....but just like all family there were some memories that are hard to forget. I will treasure the pictures he took (he loved to document like me) and I'm so thankful for those memories he left behind. On a lighter note, my dad told me that before he died the only thing he would drink was Pepsi......that's definitely where I get my love for Pepsi....I would choose that as my last food too  :).

Anyways, here are some fun pictures from the end of the school year that I did get to take!

Since the kids stayed in Alabama with my parents while we went back to TX to close on our home and give exams we had 2 free nights to ourselves.....we could have stayed at home and cleaned, or worked on the remodel or quite frankly just SLEPT..but instead we went to SIX FLAGS :). Check out this awesome funnel cake we split...there is funnel cake somewhere under all that ice cream, strawberries and whip cream.

It was really hard to have any fun without our kiddos though :).....said in complete sarcasm. (we did miss them, some, I promise :)

I'm so very proud of my 8th grade girls!!! I heard about this family where the mom was struggling to make ends meet (she is putting herself through school, without any help from a dad or other family), her two youngest were both just diagnosed with one as autism, one with diabetes and she was having a hard time paying bills and providing Christmas. The thing that drew me to her though was that she had given up her 4th child to be adopted 8 years earlier and was still in contact with the adoptive mom. The adoptive mom is the one that told us about her. They have a wonderful relationship and are a big part of each others lives. I presented the idea to my 8th grade girls to help provide Christmas for them and BOY DID THEY!!! The parents (as usual) were wonderful as well and we were able to gift them with at least 20 giftcards, several toys, clothing, cookware, groceries, a massage for mom :) a TV and just love on them. Here is the picture of us after we met them, cried with them, talked and told them how much we love them. I was one proud momma teacher :)

See the young girl in the middle?...by the time she left she was saying " i want them all to be my sisters"

Some of my girls couldn't be there for different reasons but here is a shot right before they walked in :)

Ribbit, mommy and CC went to get our nails done :)

Christmas Overload

Since the last time I posted we have been going full steam....today has been really nice since we have no schedule and the kiddos are content to play card games, color, play with my parents dog and catch up on their cartoons :).

In Huntsville we were able to have Christmas with both sides of the family. Some of the highlights were:

--Ribbit walking up to her cousin Emily (whom we had been telling her she would get to see and play with all morning) and saying " I thought Emily was brown"...ha. When we reminded her that Emily was in fact white she was ok with that too :).

--All of the stealing and oohhiinnng and aaahhiiing at Dirty Santa. I stole a super soft, really pretty throw and Ribbit immediately claimed it as her own and has slept with it every night since. The only time I have been able to use it is when she is sitting with me :).

--Watching Goober and Baby Boy play with their boy cousins.

--Watching all of my kiddos cling to their Aunt Erika and Uncle Jason as if they were gold :). Even the grandparents got by passed at some point which never happens!!

--Catching up with Adam's artsy fartsy cousin ;)...we got to talk real printmaking, none of this styrofoam plate junk :)

--Eating Nana Harvell's butternut squash soup (YUM) and Nannie Mashburn's fried apple pies.

--Watching Goober compete in the Olympic long jump while Uncle Ronnie raked the gravel every time for him to try and beat his record.

--Getting together with Adam's best friend from Huntsville, his wife and their sweet baby girl. Its always fun to hear stories about Adam before I met him, well some of them :).

--Grabbing all the chocolate in the house and hiding it before Baby Boy can find it, he has a serious problem and will eat ANYTHING chocolate...as much as possible!

We still have one more family Christmas with my parents side so I will sum those up later.

We left Huntsville with a VERY CROWDED van..good thing we brought the cartop carrier....my kids all got big gifts this year :).

Hanging out in Uncle Jason's lap during present time...he is also sporting Aunt Erika's new elephant bag.

Helping Aunt Erika open presents

Homemade Christmas cookies with Lolly

Handing Nana Harvell her Christmas present.

More to come :).

Quick Recap

I took 2 naps today....and I'm still exhausted.

My paternal Papa died Friday, December 13th at 7 in the morning. We knew he was declining but I was holding up hope that we may see him one more time over our Christmas break. His service was very honoring....reminding us that he served 22 years in the air force, loved to travel and loved food :). The blue angels flew over during the burial and that along with the 21 gun salute, tapps and presentation of the flag made for a very sad good bye. Many good things came out of his death though, which is only possible through Christ. My dad has shared this publicly already so I feel I can to...he made amends with his dad before he dad after not having a relationship most of his adult life. He also shared the gospel with him and is very hopeful that he accepted Christ. Its so hard to share Christ with the ones closest to you but we have to remember that if we love someone enough to care about their soul then we must share.

That trip to Alabama went from Friday to Tuesday and the drive was once again miserable. We left the kids in Alabama with my parents and went back to work for 3 days :). We also closed on our house the day after we got back...huge blessing to not move but simply own the house you have lived in, remodeled, made your own and developed close relationships with the neighbors already! Adam and I also went to six flags by ourselves which was honestly weird, kinda like we didn't know what to do with ourselves...except stuff our faces with BBQ and funnel cakes...and NOT SHARE!

Then we drove back to Alabama on Friday night (miserable) and came to Huntsville for Christmas. The grandparents had exchanged the grandbabies the day before in Auburn. We have already had one Christmas since yesterday, gone to church and like I said taken several naps.

We are really contemplating Christmas at our home next year, like no joke. That or renting a limo and a nanny for the trips here and back :).

I can't upload pictures right now since I'm on the Harvells computer but will do soon.

Snow Days

We are on day #3 of being snowed/iced in...so far so good. I'm thinking that tomorrow will be our last day indoors and hopefully we can venture out on Tuesday. Its kinda nice to have a cleared schedule and eat every meal with your whole family :).

So far we have gone sledding (2x) and we will venture out for another round after they wake up from their naps today. We have almost finished 8 homemade gifts (which involved mom repainting some after Baby Boy helped out a little too much. We have watched Auburn win the SEC Championship game and then as Ohio was defeated move on to the National Championship game!!!! California here we come!!!!

We have built a fire, moved the couches up close and slept out in the living room. We have cleaned out the playroom, bookshelves and toy bins in their rooms to add to our yard sale closet and to make space for Christmas :). There is only 1 basket of dirty clothes to be found in the whole house...which is not an easy feat. Most of the Christmas presents are wrapped and the best part is that Adam got the tile floor laid in Ribbt's bathroom :).

The kids have enjoyed building forts, making cookies, jumping on their indoor trampoline, watching Christmas movies, coloring, working on their homemade gifts, putting on puppet shows, running laps and stuffing their face with marshmallows and hot chocolate :).

Check out this stud!!

Look at that pitch!

Silly picture after winning 2nd place!! And his sweet teacher came to cheer him on!

Back home football is our kinda sport, especially after bath time!

And look who we caught using the potty together early on a Saturday morning...check out those faces!

Snow Day

We are under a blanket of snow! and school is cancelled for today!! YIPPPEEE.
We were quite skeptical since the last time they called for 100% snow it didn't even freeze..so the kids and the parents were very excited to wake up to find a winter wonderland surrounding us.

Ribbit has been asking "when is it gonna snow?" and reminding us that "we live in Texas so it doesn't snow that much here" for several days now. She was quite easily the most excited one of us all. She said "God brought the snow and we have to remember to ask him to clean our hearts :)".

We went up the school and used trash can lids and cardboard to sled down the huge hills into the football field. The kids had a great time and were asking for more but after an hour we had to stop because Baby Boy had a full diaper and cheeks were really red....and Ribbit's lips were cracked and bleeding :). I think they will take good naps today!!

After they wake up I'm gonna take them to see Frozen. We aren't your normal stay inside when it snows family...we drive carefully and get out in it. Adam is working on the bathroom remodel today and tomorrow since all of his basketball games and outings were cancelled!

Lately Baby Boy has been saying " MMMEE TOOOO" after almost everything the big kids say...he wants to be in the thick of it. He is running at lightning speed, and can go faster than I can on a scooter. He is still our biggest cuddler and loves to wrap himself around you and squeeze you until he shakes. He sings "jesus loves me" and says "he is strong" very passionately. He still sleeps with us about 3/4 of the night, every night. However, he has started sleeping around our waist which is so much easier on Adam and I. A foot to the shin is taken much easier than a foot to the gut in the middle of the night! He loves all things monkey, train and bball (every sport is bball to him!)

Ribbit has been singing "feliz navitod" (feliz navidad) a lot....and "rain rain go away, the old man is boring, he went to bed, he bumped his head and didn't get up in the morning (a combo of two songs) a lot!! She loves to sing and she doesn't want anyone to sing with her...she always ask me to start off "rudolph" but once she gets the rhythm then I am ordered to stop singing at once. She is doing much better at school..9 stickers in a row...WHEW HEW!! She cries nightly for either Uncle Chris, CiCi or Lolly. She will ask you the same question about 9 times in a row until you either a)give her the answer she is looking for or b) give her a long explanation that is too boring for her to pay attention to. She changes about 9 times a day and has great fashion sense!

Goober has been doing a lot of football watching lately with dad and is getting to where he can have a conversation about it. He loves playing the cardgame WAR with mom and is pretty good at making forts for him and the babies to play in. He is the best eater and compliments every dinner I make him...even if its just ramen noodles :). HE LOVES CILANTRO rice and asks me to make it constantly. He eats ALL the time and has 2nds at almost every dinner. He had a really rough day when Uncle Chris left..he cried at least 5 times throughout the day and at 10:00 that night came out of his room saying how worried he was that Uncle Chris would wreck. Good Byes are so much harder on him ....not sure if that is because of his past or how much he loves his Uncle's constantly wresting, football playing and love :). I also brought up a work that triggered a memory of his past and it reminded him of his birth mom. He said he couldn't stop thinking about memories and that his heart felt like it was beating to fast...needless to say we had a long good cry that night and he slept with momma that night (oh and later Baby Boy joined us). Poor Adam, he is getting used to musical beds every night!

We are almost completely done shopping for Christmas...I got a huge chunk done on Black Friday....so now we just need to wrap, label and pack it all for the long trip to Alabama coming up in 2 weeks!

Pictures from a wedding of one of our dearest friends here in Texas....we love Debbie and we were so happy for her and Jim!!! (in the white wedding dress on the left and Adam on the far right doing a totally different dance :)

 Some of our closest friends from work...I am so glad we get to have the same group of friends everywhere we go now :) The couple right beside Adam and I both also work at our school!

The hubs and I

Sweet sweet friends..the one in the black and white to the right of me is also our neighbor!!!

I could stare at this picture all day. Ribbit looks so grown up and so BEAUTIFUL in this picture. This was at her friends princess birthday party...it was her first party by herself. She went with our friends since we were heading to the wedding. She cried as we left which broke my heart but we heard she had a great time!

Sometimes Goober and I go on ice cream dates....he is so sweet about figuring out which flavors taste the best and reminding me that we are alike when it comes to our favorite flavors...so I normally just follow him around and get exactly what he gets....it never disappoints!

Ribbit is always helping me STIR things..she drags a chair over and goes to town!

War Eagle

Did you see that?
That awesome 109 yard touchdown run?
That #4 team beat the #1 team?

We are all emotionally and physically spent :).... Sore throats, bad backs and still comforting our children and letting them know that we are happy, not insane :)

This thanksgiving week was even better since Uncle Chris was here...for 10 whole days! We have gone to Disney on Ice, Christmas parties, played settlers, eaten good food, and watched tons of football. We are always glad to have more family around.

The kids have had lots of play and wrestle time and have been sleeping pretty late , Unlce Chris would disagree though since Ribbit comes and wakes him up every morning at 5, steals his phone and takes several pictures of him.

We got 99.9% of Christmas shopping done, some on Thursday night and some today....even though we are adding Iron Bowl shirts to our list :).

We decorated for Christmas, set up our Jesse tree, and got things squared away to close on our home :). That's right, we will be homeowners again on Dec 20. We are already picking out paint colors and choosing which walls to knock down and just how to lay out our new master closet.

Ribbit finally got 5 stickers in a row at school last week so she and Adam went on their Daddy Daughter date... She of course chose "Old Mcdonalds"!

We have been taking bets on how many times Baby Boy will come out of his room before either a) finally crashing on the floor right inside his door or b)crying himself to sleep from spankings.
Most nights he averages 4 to 5 times, but I think be came close to 10 for today's nap.

We had a great Thanksgiving meal....we aren't big turkey fans (besides the roast from Jenny o) so we opted for steak :). Then we all had our favorites.....potato salad, deviled eggs, Watergate salad, southern baked beans, croissants, two kinds of homemade Mac and cheese, stuffing, sweet potatoes, canned cranberry sauce, blueberry fluff, peanut butter pie and then the kids made peanut butter turkey cookies. And of course, sweet tea!...I haven't cooked since :).

Picture Catch Up

We have been playing musical beds for the last two weeks..and my neck and shoulders are suffering from it.Baby Boy has had two ear infections and some nasty crud so he has been coming to get in bed with us around 2 or 3 every night. He waits at the edge of our bed and says "AHA" to get our attention. He then proceeds to wrap both arms tightly around me and yells "mommy" if I pull away at all. Its precious. (wheres that saracastic font?)
Ribbit has been made aware that Baby Boy gets to sleep with us some and so she has started to come into our room late at night too....which signals one of the parents to go sleep with her while the other stays in the bed with Baby Boy. Any parents knows this means that the rest of your night is spent dodging feet and elbows and Baby Boy's who like to point out that you do in fact still has nostrils as he shoves his finger up them.
Some night a queen bed feels like a twin.

We are done with Goober's baseball season. I am very thankful for that as his age group played at 8 almost every Saturday....hopefully next year we will nab the 9 o'clock spot and allow the sun to rise before sitting on the cold cold bleachers half awake.

Adam's basketball season is in full swing and we are at games every Monday/Thursday night. The kids and I attempt to make it through 1/2 of the games....that means a lot of eating, walking around and climbing stairs to keep the two littles entertained while Goober does everything in his power to not sit or stay with me since he is a big kid and needs to be with his friends.

Here are some pictures...I am slowly figuring out my iphone and downloaded an app to make this blogging with pictures thing a lot easier.

Enjoy.

This is what happens on Sundays. Adam shoves his head into the couch cushions to block out the light and Baby Boy only sleeps well when laying directly on top of a parent. Oh, and they match :)

Goober with two of his besties at school on Reformation Day (Halloween).

Here is Goober posing :) and showing off his side view of his costume. He was ELIJAH, who ascended into Heaven in a fiery chariot :). As he walked into his class his teacher said " he may have to take that off, it looks like he can't move", then we both looked at each other and said "nevermind, LEAVE IT ON!!!"

Heres Ribbit in her Reformation Day costume..we think its a bunny but she calls it a cat so we run with it. She is snuggling with her "pal" the seal.

Lolly and Captain came to visit us around Halloween and got to take the kids trick o treating. You can see they changed costumes and Goober went as a baseball player, Ribbit as Belle (with makeup and the rose :), and Baby Boy as a puppy dog.

Here is the best family picture we could get...we took about 10 pictures and apparently we didn't threaten or bribe them enough to get a "good" one :).

Again, this is the best picture out of about 15 of the three of them.

And this is from the night before our at church's trunk or treat. Goober wanted to be a scarecrow....so I said "go put on a cowboy shirt"...meaning flannel. Instead he put on one of his Cowboys jerseys :). We broke out the face paint that night ;)

The Sunday before Halloween we went to Boo at the Zoo with church friends right after church. As we were getting ready to leave their little boy hit his head on a rock and had to be rushed to the ER.....so, for the last 30 minutes it turned out to just be mom and the 3 kids. We decided to ride the train back to the front of the zoo. Well right as we got on Baby Boy pooped so much that another person saw it and told me ( i thought I was smelling animal poop). It leaked out everywhere....I couldn't change him while riding the train so as we got off it was spread everywhere and they had to hose it down. Awesome. Then I discovered that the diaper bag had been left in the craziness of getting to the zoo, packing picnic lunches and putting on costumes (you can see all of them had taken it off by then). So, I stripped Baby Boy down in the parking lot, borrowed a grocery bag from a stranger to put everything in and he rode home naked :).

Before all that though, the kids had a great time!!! Look at those moves!

They had a little gym set up for kids there and we went through it several times!

Even Baby Boy got to swing...he kept calling himself a monkey!

The 4 older kids from our group watching an alligator.

Thats it for now.....I have been puttin off blogging lately to clean the house. We had a fondue party last night for our church group and it was nice to walk in today to a clean house since that NEVER happens!!!!

Fall 2013

The above pictures are from Goober's Greek Olympics...which was the culmination of all of their weeks of learning about Greek society and history. He won in the long jump event and you can see his posse in next picture. The 3rd picture shows his cute little face with those scratched up "non scratch" lenses :).

Today was Goobers last baseball game of the season...to say that it was his best yet is an understatement. He single handedly got all 6 of the last outs in the last 2 innings. He struck out 4 boys...most of them with 3 strikes in a row and then threw 2 boys out at first after grabbing their groundball. All of the outs happened so quickly that people were standing up and cheering and stopping to watch him. Since we don't look anything alike :), many people were commenting around me saying "that boy has an arm"..."check out that leftie pitcher". I was trying to keep Adam up to date (he was at home with a sick Baby Boy and a mis-behaving Ribbit) and he said he was tearing up at how well Goob was playing. He scored a run every time he got up to bat and just looked like he had all the confidence in the world. I thought it was so stinkin hilarious that right after the game he ran up to his best friend (the other pitcher) who is on his team and they immediately picked up their conversation about a book they are jointly making. His teacher, who had come to watch the game, told them the book sounded creepy and the other little boy, with the straightest face said "thats because its supposed to be".....HAHAHAHAHA. When I tried to tell him just how good he had done in the car on the way home he said "yeah, can we stop at Walgreens and get something?".....I guess he is just humble :)

Adam's basketball season starts this week with a game on every Monday and every Thursday. This should get pretty interesting as I am driving his teams to their games since he hasn't had time to get his CDL...that means all 3 kiddos get to come....Pray for us. At least baseball and volleyball season are over.

Baby Boy has started saying "monter" when anyone starts chasing him or he sees anything remotely scary. He also says "Micah" anytime he sees a blonde girl. I think he has his first crush :). Watch out Uncle Chris!!!!

Adam got a little more done on the bathroom remodel this weekend....hopefully we will be done over the Thanksgiving holidays...that deadline gets pushed farther and farther back. At least we have two other functioning bathrooms. I am just getting antsy to start our other remodels....which include the master bath :).

iPad post

So here goes nothing....my first post from our iPad. We have had it for almost a year now but I didn't want to leave behind all of my picture and video loading tools I have on my laptop until now. So things may not look right for a while but I'll get it sooner or later.

So for some updates...
Goober is doing better now behavior wise. He still isn't staying on top of his homework but that's probably not on the top of any 9 year olds list. He is pitching in every baseball game now...for the most part striking people out and throwing pretty consistently. His coach is a little negative for our taste but Goob still seems to love the sport. When asked "what are you thinking about when you are pitching...strikes?"...his answer was "I'm hoping that I don't get pegged in the face!". He has been working on a book with another classmate and proudly announced that he was the illustrator of the front cover and the author of the rest of the book...it's titled Avengers so we will see what the end product looks like.

Ribbit is going through an "I hate school so everyone involved must suffer" phase. Therefore there have been lots of spankings and teacher texts throughout the day. In fact our school starts at 8:00 and I got a text about  her behavior at 7:57.....that has to be a record. She is saying things like " I guess I could have that"... Meaning  I want what you have. She also says " your the best mommy, I love you, kisses please and stop talking with food in your mouth quite frequently. Good thing she is cute.

Baby boy is growing like a weed. He is saying new things daily...my current favorites are " sticker" in a very deep growl voice....." Buckle" as he squeezes his car seat buckle together turning so red and shaking while he applies as much power as he possibly can...." Sorry" with his head hung low and eyes closed in repentance.....and the best is "chug a chug a too toooo when he sees his train mural or an actual train. He also says your name until he has your full attention sometimes grabbing your face and hand....he is smart too and changes it up like " mommy, momma , mommmmmmmmyyyyy, momma, mom, mommmmmmy".... It's quite comical.

They all had a great time with grandparents visiting recently.....and all cried when they left. Mom and Dad snuck in some dates, Christmas shopping and naps so fun was had by all.

My favorite moments are of my kids sitting around the dinner table listening to daddy read them a bible story....and singing " Jesus is a winner man" in our best Ugandan accent while singing and raising our hands to The Lord.

Free time!

Well I finally have some free time. Adam doesn't...we changed roles. My volleyball season ended well with lots of wins and LOTS of improvement! I had 3 girls jump serving at the last game which is very advanced for 8th grade!
Adam starts coaching 8th grade girls basketball on Monday. He is pretty excited but we will see how he is feeling after 3 months of early morning practices and two games a week :).
We are also still in the thick of baseball games with Goober, 2 a week , some of them (like this morning) as early as 8 o'clock on a Saturday which means batting practice at 7:15.
Our bible study is going really well. K has said out loud that she wants to be a christian...which means two things. 1-she realizes she is not one already and 2-she wants to know more! She has questions for us every week...even though she normally doesn't like our answers and have excuses as to why she can't do certain things like read her bible or come to church regularly. We are developing deeper relations with the others there and they are contributing with personal testimonies weekly.

Goober seems to be going through a rough patch..behavior wise. All of sudden there is cheating on HW, lying about HW, asking dad for an answer on something, not liking the answer and therefore asking mom hoping for a different answer. He is doing things that we have repetitively told him not to do. ITS BEYOND ANNOYING. The most annoying thing is that he has nothing to take away from him.....we almost want to buy him a cell phone so he can hooked on it and then we will snatch it away....thats a joke...we would never do that...maybe :). So he has been grounded from everything lately and getting a lot more spankings. He even whipped out his birthmom's picture the other day and showed it to me while I was getting onto him. For the first time ever I wanted to rip it into shreds. I told him that pulling it out during discipline seemed very in genuine and very disrespectful to me...as I have always been on his mom's side. He apologized later but I can see that becoming his thing....especially when he wants to get under my skin. Well don't worry..im gonna fix that..I'm gonna frame that pictures in the biggest nicest frame I can find and nail it to his wall so its always out and to prove to him that I don't feel competition with his birthmom and that I WANT him to MISS her!!

Ribbit is doing well in school, getting good behavior stickers daily (not every day but more stickers than not). She loves her teacher and comes home telling us something new every day. She is saying the funniest things...outloud, all day, to complete strangers and at home. After my mom had been here for a week and had slept with her every night she was having a hard time going to bed on her own. So I told her that if she kissed her fairy doll the fairy would fly to CC and kiss her. She looked at me in disgust and said " mommy, you do know that is a toy". Then I reminded her that if she got all stickers for the week we would go to Apple Annies (her new favorite store) and she could get something. She thought for a minute and said "actually I would rather go to Wal-Mart". Then one night we told her that the cheese we were eating was called "baby brie"...without hesitating she said " mmmmmm I look delicious!".

Baby Boy is saying at least one new word a day! He loves to list everyone else at the dinner table and while riding in the car. If you don't answer he says your name until you do. He also is very repentant during prayer, bowing his head low and saying MAYMAN at the end. He goes "beep beep" in the potty at least twice a day....those M&M's are working!! He knows that the minute we say "time to go watch bubba's baseball game" that he needs his hat and bat. He screams "bubba" whenever he sees him out on the baseball field and also tells him to "bat" while swinging his arms all around. He is going through clothes rapidly and loves all things "monkey".

Like I said earlier, my mom came to stay with us last week and the kids were spoiled! They got shaving cream baths, pumpkins, two different kinds of cupcakes...doggies and owls!, lunch at school, movie nights and sleepovers in the playroom. Mom and Dad got a vacation too, going out on a date to eat sushi and going to pick out our tile for the bathroom remodel ....which with kids would have been miserable as handpicked over 300 pieces....I should say "I" handpicked. I didn't want the slightest hint of orange in  any of the travertine we picked out...its the color snob in me.

So now we are sitting here watching the A&M vs. Auburn game and hoping with all of our might that Auburn pulls off a win. We are surrounded by A&M fans here and it would be so nice to end the smack talk that we have endured all week :).

For your entertainment

Here are some videos I finally uploaded from Ribbit's tap/ballet camp this summer....she is super cute, and super uncoordinated :)...both of which she gets from her momma :)

Sonic

It's really sad when you HAVE to take our kids to Sonic for breakfast due to the lack of food in your home. Well, that's not true. They could have eaten the raisin walnut oatmeal that Adam made for them, but even I started to gag when I looked at it. So, off to Sonic for tater tots and sprite we went. I looked like the cool mom, but really I was just stinkin desperate.

That was on Wednesday, so you probably think I went to the grocery store that night or Thursday. Nope, I waited until this morning. Its hard to go grocery shopping when you are at church until 8:30 or when you and your spouse have put in 12 to 13 hour days and you have to choose between making lunches/ actually seeing your kids or going to the grocery store. Therefore the kids lunches have consisted of pistachios, goldfish, beef jerky and pickles...I KID YOU NOT. I did cut up the pickles, I mean I did put forth a little effort towards their well rounded meals :).

Anyways, I'm really excited about some things going on right now. Adam and I are leading a bible study for non-believers on Wednesday nights. Shhhh, they don't know its a bible study. We offer a free dinner and then discuss things like " why did Jesus have to die?" , "who is jesus?", "what is sin?". We are the youngest in this group by 30 years...again not kidding. We realized this very quickly and I instantly became very insecure. However, God has really been encouraging me that I don't have to have a scholarly answer as long as its an answer from Him. As long as I can tell how He has personally worked and moved and spoken to me then I'm being obedient. One of the ladies, we will call her K, is 73 and doesn't think she needs a savior because she is a good person and honestly does not like it when someone says sin. So instead of telling her grandchildren not to lie she tells them not to tell stories....so they won't feel bad about themselves. She grew up in Korea and in California and says she was never taught about the Bible and/or God. There is also a couple who are in their 60s and began their walk with Christ last year and have great things to offer and add to our group...please pray for them...we will call them T1 and T2. Then there is P. P keeps us late every Wednesday....almost asking our permission to live her life. She has a homosexual daughter and struggles to live by the Bible's authority, but also to love her daughter. She is depressed and has been in a constant battle with her daughter's partner. I feel for her, she is sooo distraught but for some reason she can't turn it completely over to God....easier said then done right? How do we separate sin from the sinnner, or can we as humans?...anyways pray for our words, that we would be sensitive, be obedient in what we say and that we would love on our group...we are meeting with them until November.

I'm also getting to geek it up as I just became part of the Doctrine Committee at our school. At first I felt like I was not intelligent enough to be on it, especially when the head guy said "but you add so much vibrancy to the group"....vibrancy and intelligence are not at all the same. .....but now we are studying, researching, writing catechisms for our school to adopt and I am super pumped. I am also super jealous of my children's education. They are learning their faith backwards and forwards. I am also super not jealous that they will probably have to defend their faith WAY more than I ever will....this world is making it harder and harder for Christians to live by the TRUTH but I am glad that our school is preparing our students for BATTLE!!!

Catechism is basically just a method of teaching. Some, just by hearing the word, associate it with Catholicism but it does have a place in Protestant history as well. We use the form of catechism in everything....math, english, foreign language..any subject where we ask students to memorize rules and repeat them back to us. As we speak I am itching to make my spreadsheet of 36 catechisms to match up with our mission statement.....NERD HERD ...here I come!!!

Here is my favorite one so far....beautiful

Why is He called Christ, that is, Anointed?

Because He has been ordained by God the Father, and anointed with the Holy Spirit, to be our chief Prophet and Teacher, who has fully revealed to us the secret counsel and will of God concerning our redemption; our only High Priest, who by the one sacrifice of His body has redeemed us, and who continually intercedes for us before the Father; and our eternal King, who governs us by His Word and Spirit, and who defends and preserves us in the redemption obtained for us.

10 hours of sleep

I've basically slept about 10 hours today....thats what happens when you work 13 hour days, followed by looonnng baseball games, late church nights, painting bedrooms, partying it up with 8th graders :) and then chugging nyquil to avoid the newest school bug going around. I never ever miss church but this is the 2nd Sunday this month where my head was pounding 85% of the day and like I said I slept about 10 hours...plus sleeping about 8 hours last night.

Poor Adam, he worked on the remodel almost all day yesterday (while I entertained children at various vball events, parties and at Hobby Lobby :) and then he played single parent at church and home. Maybe I really am getting old and need to pick like 4 things to do during the week and weekend instead of 20.

I also triple overbooked my family for last night and had to cancel/back out of 2 things, wasting $50 bucks in the process...ah well.

I hate saying it with only 6 weeks under my belt but I MISS SUMMER.....bring on THANKSGIVING BREAK!!!

On the bright side, it finally feels like FALL..I can go outside without melting!!!...We even roasted smores last night...that may have been a little eager :)

Videos filled with cute kiddos :

Smart huh?

Adam and I think we are soo smart.....and then tonight happens.

We ( the two littles ) basically ran like maniacs ALL OVER the ballpark, screaming their brains out, crying over spilled milk (literally) and screaming MOMMY AND DADDY as if someone was after them. We got home after bedtime and there were still baths and homework left to do.

Hmmmmm...not so smart. From now on the littles don't go to baseball games on the weekdays....OH NO, that will NEVER happen again.

Goober is playing great, learning the game and so far his team is undefeated....at least I think so, I only saw 1/3 of the game...Adam probably saw less.

Baby Boy is GOING POTTY!!! He points to himself and says BEEP BEEP when he has to go :). Its almost too funny....when you sit him on the toilet he pushes with everything he has and normally only gets a couple drops out..but HEY, the potty is the potty and we are so looking forward to being out of diapers.

Ribbit is reminding us all of our manners....like when Mommy gets onto her while she is eating ...she will say " you can't talk when your mouth is full"...and then we I ask her a questions she will stuff her face and point her finger at me. She also tells Goober that he is "noring" her....ignoring, whenever he talks and she wants to have all the attention.

Our home remodel is going well....about 70% of the painting done....Adam is plugging away on the bathroom.....probably about 50% done.

Group shot from princess camp....where did all that personality come from?

Adam has these made for our anniversary..pretty sweet huh?

Helping mommy work on her projects..look at that belly!

Blog Neglect

The blog has been neglected....as well as household chores :)

This past Saturday I spent all day at a tournament with my 8th grade team. After 10 games, sweat, fear, losses, wins and cheering we brought home a trophy for 2nd place....pretty awesome. Then I came home and basically blacked out until 11 the next morning.

The rest of our week was spent at baseball practices, volleyball games, school and church. The weather here is still pretty stinking hot so most outdoor things are happening at night, pushing back bed times and making for some crankiness!!!

Even though Ribbit started off the school year with a BANG...and not in a good way, she is now settling down and loving all of her teachers. She comes home singing shape songs and reciting the months of the year and talking about how Mrs. Young says we have to "act happy" and "not talk with our mouth full".

Goober is staying on top of all his school work, we rarely have low spelling test grades. He is also staying in the nurses office with wounds from his recess time.....something about jumping off rocks, racing towards bleachers and running through mud. His black school shoes are now brown, permanently. HE LOVES BASEBALL...his coach is playing him at pitcher for how and he already has a battlewound in the shape of stitches on his chin.

Little Man is doing well...testing the lady who watches him but learning all the time. He says "ocks" and "oes" every morning and can't wait to get them on. If he isn't first with them on then he bugs the snot out of us until they are on. He clings to you the minute he wakes up and rubs your back......he now has figured out who is mommy and who is daddy and calls us accordingly. He says "sorry", "love you", "thank you" and somewhat of a "yesmam" pretty regularly and with little coaxing from us.

Here are some highlights.....

This girl LOVES to dress up. Check out her new hat from cousin Emily, ballet clothes and mommy's high heel shoes....she walked around in this get up for 1/2 the day.

Out for birthday breakfast with mommy....Big Brother was at football camp.

I love this picture....we were playing in a room before her ballet princess camp and she is showing me her perfect form in the mirror. Baby brother is behind causing all kinds of havoc and loving life!

Practicing on the bar.

Here are some pictures of my completed summer projects. Before you think I went all crafty and learned how to sew, let me assure you I did not. I just learned how to use Sew Bond and spray paint!!!

Here is the play room before....we want it to be an extra Guest Area for long term guest so we got this day bed, put air conditioning in that room and decided we needed curtains for privacy.

I wanted to make Roman Shades for this room so I looked up a tutorial for how to make them out of blinds, using hot glue, fabric, sew bond and some time. Each set took me about 30 minutes total so for 4 windows I spent 2 hours and about $50 bucks...NOT TOO BAD!!

Here they are completely down...I went with vertical stripes with polka dots on them ..to keep with the playroom vibe and because the fabric is double sided it looks great from the backyard too! We put down the soft floor and hung some pictures in that corner as well....the other side of the playroom looks like a WORKING PLAY AREA :)

and 1/2 way up.

I also tackled the back yard furniture that we got for $75 bucks off craiglist. There was nothing wrong with it except it wasn't my style....before

and with a little bit of outdoor fabric, sew bond, hot blue and spray paint...a new set for about $50 bucks!!

I went with black fabric with multi colored large paisleys on it to cover most spills. I cut the old cushions and just kept the thick bottoms. I wrapped them in the outdoor fabric...like you would a christmas present , with overlap at the bottom. That way when the fabric is old or gets torn I can rip it off and re-wrap it.