Prayer Request

Thanks to everyone for all the calls and support after the terrible tornados yesterday. We are fine and so is our house. We do have a prayer request though. Tomorrow morning from 9-11 Hannah will be having kidney imaging done. Please pray that this would be a good experience for everyone involved that that our great healer might get the glory and she would be completely healed! Thank you for all your support!

Adding a Page

So after much debating we have someone we'd like for you to meet.....

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PUMPKIN... our fish! HA! Gotcha!

Hannah got him for her birthday and is super excited to have a pet all her own.

Sorry Grandparents if we gave you a heart attack!

Life's Hard... Get a Helmet

Sometimes these kids crack me up! It's when I am getting frustrated with them or annoyed at life in general that God always sends me a little reminder..... and most of the time it's in the shape of laughter!

Watching TV is a dangerous job!

Life's hard... get a helmet!

Hannah stats at 4

Since this is like an online journal for the family thought I'd put Hannah's 4 year stats here so I'd remember. The baby book has long been forgotten and I'm pretty sure that I never actually finished the first year. Oh well! Put it in my pile of started but never completed projects. I'm pretty sure that when Drew goes to the dr. next week he will have overtaken her in the weight category!

Height: 37inches (7%tile)
Weight: 28lbs (5%tile)

She continues to be a peanut but is full of life and energy!

Birthday Photos

Here are a couple more of the birthday party! I love this picture of the girls! They could play together ALL the time! Her mommy and I kind of like each other too! ;) I keep hoping that maybe I can get Drew to marry one of the Hawthorne girls! (If things with Bethany don't work out her sister is 6 months old... so maybe Drew can go for a younger girl!)
Here is Daddy! Very excited about some dalmatian cupcakes....
Don't they look yummy!
Here are the dog bone cakes.... each girl had their own. BIG HIT! A disaster to make!
And finally a little bit of the table decorations. The party hats each child made themselves and of course we had to have blowers. But the highlight of the meal.... eating out of the dog bowls that were filled with puppy chow. What more could a 4 year old want?!

Happy Birthday Hannah and Bethany!

ER Visit

Well it was almost 2 years and it was just our first visit. I would have definately lost if we had been betting. My son is a master climber, crawler, scaler, and genuin dare devil. The fact that we made it almost 2 years without a disaster is proof in it's self that God is in total control. Man oh man! Yesterday our injury free streak ended though. And with something minor at that! After all the climbing and jumping he simply fell when running. (Well chasing Hannah but still....) Somehow when he fell he landed on his hip wrong. He never cried, never complained.... but he got up and couldn't walk. Poor little guy would try to walk and just collapse into a heap. Of course it was a Sunday so nothing was open so onto the ER we went. $300 and some xrays later we were told it probably was a deep bruise or a joint that had popped out and back in. They gave him motrin! A huge bill and very long wait and the little man was on his way. But not until he had all the nurses eating out of his hand... he really is a cutey! So we headed home and by the grace of God this morning he was running, jumping, and otherwise giving Mommy a heart attack again today!

Note to new mommies and old ones too.... motrin and popscicles can fix most things!

The Dalmation Plantation

Happy 4th Birthday Sweet Hannah!

My sweet baby girl is 4! It's so hard to believe. It seems like just yesterday that we were on our way home from the hospital scared out of our mind.
She was soooo tiny! Only 6lbs and her carseat just swallowed her right up.
Yet at the same time I can barely remember what life was like before kids.

Oh yeah... it looked like this... I had 14 teenage girls that kept me BUSY! Man I miss these girls!

Today we had a joint birthday party for Hannah and her best friend, Bethany. It was a dalmatian theme and the girls were adorable!

We had 6 "big kids" and 6 "little kids" but man even with just 6 families (including birthday girls) it was WILD! But what do you expect if you have 12 puppies running around.
We played outside in the gorgeous 80 degree weather! The playground in the backyard was perfect. This may be the cutest little boy puppy ever!

We had a dog bone hunt.... which was a huge hit. Hannah was a champ of this. I think some of the mom's thought she had been in training. She was amazing!
Here are some of the girls hanging out. We also ate lunch out of dog bowls, had bone shaped cakes, and painted puppy picture frames. Hopefully more pictures will be coming soon. I did a terrible job of taking pictures. (And my photographer is in China! Love you Laura... we sure did miss you today!) I am one tired puppy myself... but I'm pretty sure everyone had a great time!
And with a face like this thanking you.... it's worth it! If only she would stay this size forever!

When I'm 44!

Today as my sweet girl and I were out for a walk we were talking about her birthday. I told her I didn't want her to grow up. I wanted her to stay my baby forever. Her answer.... "I can't. God made me this way." I kind of laughed but then told her that I wanted to to stay little so because she was my best friend. Her response to this....

"Mama whether I'm 44 or 46 I'll be your baby and you'll be my best friend."

Sweet girl I hope I make it til you are 44 or 46 and you always will be my baby and my best friend! Love you sweet girl!

When your purse is the new diaper bag....

So you know that stage when you really don't need a full diaper bag but you can't go without the wipes and a diaper or change of clothes.... yeah well we've hit that stage. I am super excited to be able to carry a purse again. My husband thinks I'm nuts but it's nice to have a real bag as opposed to that giant diaper bag. Now don't get me wrong... it's not a cute little purse like I used to carry but it's really the first time in 4 years that I'm diaper bag free! Can I get a woot woot?!

Only down side is every now and then you tell someone to grab something from your purse and see their shocked face when they turn to you holding a pair of panties! Hey I'm still a mom... the gum is in the front pocket.... princess panties are on that side!

Dates and Dalmations

I love Fridays! They really are the best day of the week aren't they? Both kids went to school this morning. Drew is going to mother's morning out once a week now so that I can do some contract work for NCVPS. He is LOVING mother's morning out!
Anyway, today I had met my deadlines for work, the house was clean, and the laundry was done! WHAT!? That never happens. So I had 2 hours of freedom.. what's a girl to do? I came home and Jeff was working ... he looked up and asked me what was on my agenda... I just shrugged... I had no plans. He jumped up and said let's go on a date! YEAH!! We had an awesome morning together hanging out and getting to know one another again. It was terrific. We don't have a sitter around us so this was perfect. Then he was back to work and I picked up the kids. But how great it was for us to spend a few hour together laughing and not worrying about the kids!
Tonight was great too. A sweet friend came over and we worked on our planning for a joint 4 year old birthday party. The dalmatian plantation is well on it's way folks! Don't want to give too much away but let's just say there will be good food, costumes, and crafts that I sure you will be doggone excited about!

Talking Back and Flowers

So today we finally got our first stone done. Hannah was really excited to get to do a "project." Right now everything is about "projects." I think she is going to be an arts and crafts type of kid. She loves it. Anyway, she bounds down the stairs toward the kitchen to do a Jesus Project yelling "Jesus" the entire way.... following quickly behind is my "less holy" child yelling for "Thomas" (the train). Oh well... the boy still has some learning to do!

I've had a few people ask exactly how we do our sinning stones so I thought I'd walk you through how this morning went. Honestly, it went better than I expected. Mornings aren't always the best around here.... unfortunately my children are alot like me and not morning people! We all need alot of grace especially before 10am!

I handed out juice and corralled the kids at the kitchen table. We started by discussing again what sin is. (We did this while we were painting our rocks yesterday so this is kind of a review.) Hannah says they're our "uglys" and they make God sad. I'm pretty happy with this answer so I don't really push it and move on. We read John 3:16 together and talk about what it means. She's got the first couple words memorized (from Sunday school I'm sure) and she repeats it back to me. Not too shabby kiddo and a big thumbs up to KidCity! Then I ask her what she thinks is one of her "uglys." And to my amazement she picks "talking back" she didn't even need any coxing. (Man for a kid who sometimes can't answer what her own name is first thing in the morning she is on a roll this morning. ) So we write on our stone with a paint pen "talking back."
Then we put our stone in our basket and take turns praying as a family. We thank God for sending us Jesus to take away our sins and we thank Him for opening our eyes to be able to see our sins . We ask Him to help us to try to do better because we know that we can't do it without Him. It really is a precious time and I am so excited to do this throughout Lent.

On another note... guess who got flowers today for no reason? ME! Well I guess there was a reason... it's called March Madness... and means my husband is MIA! He went to the NC State game tonight. (I know... you can pray for him... he needs it!) I know it was painful to watch especially since he had to drive to Greensboro and back. Love you sweetie, thanks for the flowers! At least you can enjoy the tournament final game and not have to wonder if your boys will win! ;)

Day late... but who's counting!

So today is the start to the Lenten season. It's been a rough day at our house everyone has been super cranky, and I admit I might have been the worst. This picture pretty much sums up the day! And how everyone was feeling!

When the day started I was very cranky.... didn't these little people understand that we are supposed to be getting ready for the coming of Jesus? Why was everyone out of sorts? We are supposed to be getting "holy" and doing our sinning stones. We have a plan people! (Um insert finger pointing at myself as I realize that I am the first one missing the point!)

But as usual God humbled me through my 4 year old because in fact she realized her need, no our need, for Jesus even more than I did. Hannah said today, in between 3 year old mood swings, "Mommy maybe we should pray and ask Jesus to change my attitude." WHAT! Well praise God I must be doing something right. More proof of my need for my own attitude adjustment and Jesus.
So despite the fact that we didn't get to actually do a sinning stone today we did manage to get them painted.... and for this mom... on a sad dreary day that's as much as I could ask for.

Here they are starting the painting process... notice how clean they are.

This is serious business for Hannah!


Little sweatshop ... we needed 4o stones. Paint faster little ones!

When finished painting rocks... remember you still need to un-paint your little ones.

On another note I've decided for lent instead of giving something up personally to try to blog more regularly. (I dare not say daily because my perfectionism will cause me to go nuts if I miss a day.) So hopefully you will be hearing more from me soon. Especially since one little girl has a birthday a week from tomorrow! My baby girl is going to be 4! Be on the look out for a post about our very own dalmatian plantation in the future!

Ash Wednesday is Tomorrow

Why does it always seem that life flies by and that even the best laid plans are not done in time? Last year many of you might remember the blessing baskets and sinning stones that we did. (You can find it here if you don't. ) Well I had great plans to have it all modified and more "user friendly" if you would. I had planned on having the rocks done and pre-painted with the kids today. That way we'd have 40 rocks and we could do one each day to prepare for Easter. I figured if it was all painted at once we could do it as a morning devotional. Alas, the kids are in bed and the rocks are not painted. Lent starts tomorrow... guess I missed boat on that plan. I had also planned on having a scripture reading plan in place... again... it looks like it will be a daily choose and I don't have a formalize plan yet. BUT.... we are going to do the sinning stones and blessing baskets. Last Easter we were so blessed by this. Hannah loved it and really seemed to "get" it. So happy lent everyone. May you take this time to reflect on who Christ is and the amazing sacrifice that He made so that we might live. How are you preparing your heart for lent?