we love our teachers

our kids sure have been blessed with some amazing teachers this year. we feel so blessed. each of them have enjoyed school and thrived in their classes. we owe this to teachers who love the lord first and for most and then love our children. i enjoy giving gifts so this was a perfect time to show my appreciation for all they have done.

these first two photos (were taken at night, so the lighting is bad) are for garrets teacher, Mrs. Marshall and the office staff at his school, Doak Elementary. i found this idea for the A&W root beer thank you on a blog that i cant find again right now. i will still keep looking for it and let you know later.
i also found these cute canvas totes at the DOLLAR STORE! love that place and painted each of the teachers initials on the bag.

the kids helped me make a jar of SUGAR SCRUB for each of their teachers. it was SUPER easy to make. i will give you directions in an upcoming post.


the bags needed a little dressing up so i made these fabric rosettes and hot glued them to the bags.
it was all really fun to make. this is the kind of stuff that gets me through the week. doing little projects, especially ones that are for amazing ladies.

so proud

thats what i feel right now.... so proud!

my oldest niece Meghan is leaving today for boot camp. she signed with the army just a few months ago. meghan is an amazing gal and will be a great asset to our military. she has been a student at ETSU and is planning on finishing school when she returns from boot camp. then she says she is interested in doing military police work. like border patrol stuff.
meghan will be turning 21 while she is at boot camp so we had a family celebration on friday honoring meghan. i snapped a few family photos while we were all together as well. the picture above also includes two foster children that debbie has loved and cared for for almost a year now. these boys have certainly become part of the family.

we even got meghan to put her uniform on for a few photos. we are all so proud of meghan and her decisions. we pray for safety and stamina while she is gone. she will do great! i cant wait to hear all about it when she gets home. she did inform us to NOT send her any cookies however. i guess you have to do 20 push ups for every cookie you receive in the mail! she is way braver than i!

WE LOVE YOU MEGHAN. will be praying for you daily.

ella is ONE

yeah! it is hard to believe we are celebrating the birth of my sweet friends daughter, Ella. she was born just 10 weeks before jori. so that means, before i know it, we will be celebrating her first birthday. the time has FLOWN by. click here to see more pics of the birthday girl.

mothers day 2011

alright so this is going to be one of those really honest posts. i always try to keep this blog completely real and honest. so here goes..... this mothers day i was a grump. i was wore out from an exhausting week before and really just wanted to some time to recoup.

dave had talked about serving up a grand dinner here at our house with all his fam. the guys and the big kids (daves sisters kids) were all going to do the cooking. i was feeling a lot of pressure with this idea and really feeling selfish. in order for us to have this big party, i had A LOT of work to do to get the house back in order. it was a disaster! i hate it when it gets so overwhelming but after the full week we had it just ended up that way. i was being selfish and didnt want to do all the work to get ready. also, in order for them to cook a nice dinner, that meant i would be entertaining the kids, breaking up fights, changing diapers, and serving them all by myself most of the day. oh that sounds so terrible and even as i write it now i know how selfish it is. but there are just some times i feel so burnt out. literally drowning, like the water is coming in over the top of my snorkel. do you ever feel this way?

dave was great and sent me out with some girl friends for dinner and a movie saturday night. it was a very nice little refresher and gave me some time to step back and think about my selfishness. i did get the house all cleaned earlier that day and felt great to get it back in order.

... little side note, we went to see Something Borrowed. i would not recommend it. i have not been to the movies in a very long time so i was completely shocked by the previews alone. every movie was about casual sex with someone other than a spouse in a situation WAY opposite of how God intended. this movie followed in the same suit and was a disappointment. we all joked at the end that our children were never going to be allowed to watch a movie rated higher that PG or even go to the theater for that matter :) even though the movie was a dud, like i said, dave was great to give me a little time to spend with my friends.

sunday morning, daves sis and her kids decided to do their own thing with just their fam, so it ended up that we spent a really nice day together as a family doing life TOGETHER!

(the kids and dave washed my car and even scrubbed my feet for me. it was a great day to be outside, and i enjoyed getting special treatment.)

that is what i love most. DOING IT TOGETHER. i dont want to just hand over the kids as soon as dave gets home and say i'm done. i just like having an extra set of hands and an extra big heart to help me with the training and raising of our children. i get refreshed when we can DO IT TOGETHER.

we met up with daves mom and dad and had a nice dinner at a mexican restaurant where no one had to prepare or clean anything up and bonus... i got to come home to clean house. it ended up being a really wonderful day.

the annual mothers day swing picture. to see photos from years past, click here. i love looking back and seeing how our family has grown. i truly am BLESSED and praying daily for the Lord to rid me of my selfishness. i think that is what all sin boils down to, being selfish. it steals my joy. i long for the lords Joy to fill me up so i can then spill my joy, HIS joy, over into my family.

mom gave me a fantastic book called One Thousand Gifts for mothers day. i will share more on this book soon. it really is AMAZING. if any of you are reading it or have read it, let me know in the comments.

alright that was long, but that was me. i hope all my mommy friends had a great day.

i didnt get to spend mothers day with my own mom but i did get to talk to her and let her know how much she means to ALL of us. we love you mom. thanks for being a great role model and still being there for me now that i am a mom myself. lets be honest, i probably need her more now even then when i was little. :) LOVE YOU.

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mini photographer

easter 2011

our family enjoyed a lovely easter celebration in south florida with my family. (i love how we are all bare foot in the picture above :) all these photos are from my iphone. i didnt even bring my good camera with me. i never regretted that decision this time around. sometimes it is nice to just enjoy the time and not always have the camera out.
we loaded a plane... all of us... on thrusday morning. dave had a bunch of frequent flyer tickets so we were all able to fly. we normally to the 12+ hour trip to florida in the car. we didnt have a very long time to be gone so it was really nice to fly and get there in half the time. the kids had a ball. they were so excited. they kept singing.. "im leavin on a jet plane, i dont know when i'll be back again"
easter morning jori enjoyed holding eggs and being held by papa pa.
great grandma and aunt margaret came over. it is always nice to spend time with them. and i love that my kids have a great grandma that they can know and learn from.
me and my honey easter morning
mom made a great ham feast for dinner on friday night because scott and nicole and logan would all be here too. she also had a easter morning feast on sunday. the food was great and the fellowship was even better. it was so great to spend time with my brothers and sister. i love that my kids got to visit with their aunts and uncles as well too.
gram made the girls easter dresses. they were so beautiful. the girls loved them too and think it is pretty special to have home made dresses.

kenzie was a great help with the kids. they love their aunt mack.
my handsome boy is getting so grown up. hard to believe, only about 16 more days of second grade!
this last photo is of the fam waiting in the airport to get back on our final flight back home. it sure was a fun visit. thanks to mom and dad for housing our rowdy bunch. our family is so big now, we kind of take over a space where ever we go.

jori 9 months

the months keep going by faster and faster. i have an anxious feeling in my stomach as i type this. i just dont want to loose this sweet baby stage. jori went for her 9 month check up today. she is almost 20 lbs and is in the 50% for both height and weight. she was a trooper getting her shots and is now taking a nice nap :)
she is still happy most of the time. the only thing that REALLY bothers her is getting her clothes and diaper changed. not sure why but she HATES it. cries as soon as i lay her on the changing table. the other kids all loved have the eye to eye contact and and short but sweet one on one time with mom. she doesnt not like being held down that if for sure.
she has a little temper already too if she doesnt get what she wants.

if the big kids are all talking (mostly when they are arguing with each other) she starts "talking" back. it is so funny, but gets extremely load in the house or car!
she loves exploring things. she still puts everything in her mouth. she is a super fast crawler and pulls herself up onto everything. not standing on own or taking any steps yet.
she also had her first ear infection this past month! poor girl had a super high fever 103.4! the doc gave her a shot in the toosh of antibiotics to get it taken care of fast. it was sad that she was so sick and had to be on the meds but glad that it was taken care of. i really like our doc as he knows that we would choose not to medicate if that is an option, but i also respected his opinion when he said her fever is dangerously high and i would do the shot if it was my child. he is a christian also and i just feel blessed that he is in our area and that we found him.

jori loves to play peek a boo still and has enjoyed being read to and actually sitting still to hear a story and look at the pictures. she did pretty good on our trip to florida and loved all the extra attention. she had a hard time on the plane b/c she was so tired but the girl will. not. fall asleep in someones arms. she likes her own bed. this made for a restless baby but it wasnt terrible.

we love you jori.... keep on growing and exploring.