Thanksgiving...

Thank you, Lord, for all of these precious gifts.

Another Video From California!

Here we are hanging out at Papa and Patrish's house...

The kids all had such a blast on the hammock and we played zone defense to keep them out of the pool!

Trick or Treat

Here are the girls all dressed up to go trick or treating. They had an amazing time running around in the dark with their friends collecting candy! What could be better than that, huh?

Uncle Tom with Henry, the cow!

The girls with their friends Mady and Tobi~

We LOVE the Zoo!

One of our dear, sweet friends gave us a family Zoo pass. We have so enjoyed going to hang out there with all of the beasts!

Kickin' it at the Park!

Here's the next video from our trip to California!! We went to the most awesome park and the kids had so much fun!

Our Trip to California...

Here's an awesome movie Lee made of our plane trip to California... we went out there for my Papa's 80th birthday celebration!

The Perfect Time

A portrait of Mommy, by Anna


The other night I had the chance to go out for my Grandmother's birthday dinner with my precious eldest, Anna. Now, Anna and I have had a difficult couple of days together. Any of you who have children know that these hard phases in discipline come sometimes. My smart little girl has just been pushing all of her boundaries about as hard as she can. I've been really frustrated and discouraged and at times have ended up a harsh, unhappy person that I wish I'd never met.
Well, I had really been looking forward to this special time- just me and Anna. So had my sweet girl apparently, because she couldn't sleep during nap time (not a great start to this whole thing). Well, our outing was rough to say the least. It was a family get together and Anna didn't want to mingle. If I asked her to come to me, she would run the other way and give me that look like - "what are you going to do about it?" People would talk to her and she would scowl at them and cover her face up with her hands. All of this was punctuated by "I need cake now"s in increasing volume. (This was not normal behavior for my little girl, but we all have our bad days :) Needless to say, I was pretty ready to head home when it was over.
In the car on our way home I was just praying for the strength to make it home and wisdom to address Anna's behavior.
My sweet girl piped up from the back, "Mom, I'm sorry about all the bad stuff I did tonight."
"Well, babe," I replied, "thanks for saying that. You know what though? Mom makes mistakes all of the time too. That's why I'm so thankful that Jesus came to pay for all of the bad stuff that I do. God loves me even though I make mistakes, He's forgiven me for all of my disobedience because Jesus died in my place."

"I want that. I want God to take away all my bad stuff."

Was she saying what I thought she was saying? And why now? This was the worst time to have this special conversation. I still had steam coming out of my ears from our frustrating evening!
And then I thought, maybe this is the perfect time.
Isn't the perfect time to cry out to our Daddy in Heaven when we're covered in the mess of all our wrong?

"Anna, you can have that! All you have to do is tell God that you want Him to forgive all of your bad stuff..."
And my Anna prayed.
Precious girl, I love you so much.
9-12-07

Luke 18:15-17
"People were also bringing babies to Jesus to have him touch them. When the disciples saw this, they rebuked them. But Jesus called the children to him and said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it."

Friends...

An evening with Madey and Tobi Simone

-in the pool

Movie time!

...and more Friends!

A fun visit from the Froning girls and Samantha

Stayin' Around

My sweet Anna made me a card yesterday. She came into the kitchen to give it to me. I opened it up and saw some gorgeous, big, loopy green writing inside. When I asked her what it said, she told me very matter-of-factly, "It says, 'don't run away from me, Mom".

As strange as that may sound, it is a theme that has run through a lot of our conversations lately. Like sometimes Anna will say, "Mom, if Daddy's at work and you go hang out with your girls (a.k.a. my friends) then I will be all alone and I'll be so sad". I always reassure her, "Don't worry, babe, we would never leave you like that. I mean, every once in a while we go out and you get to hang out with a babysitter, but we're never gone for long. We will always come back to you".
At that point some bells start to go off in my head and I think about things like- actually, I don't really know that. Terrible things do happen everyday to tear loved ones from each other. How much of this brutal reality should I share with my 3 year old daughter? Ahhhh!
How precious is it that we have a Heavenly Father who can say things like, "I will never leave you or forsake you", and "I am with you, even to the end of the age". He doesn't even sleep so that He can watch and sing over us, His precious children.

My darling daughters, you have a Heavenly Father who can always be with you. He loves and will watch over you always. For now, your Daddy and I will be right here by your sides every day that our Lord gives us on this Earth, lovin' your socks off- no matter what!

Psalm 121

A song of ascents.

I lift up my eyes to the hills—
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD,
the Maker of heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot slip—
he who watches over you will not slumber;
indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.

The LORD watches over you—
the LORD is your shade at your right hand;
the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.

The LORD will keep you from all harm—
he will watch over your life;
the LORD will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore.

Dinner time!

Here's a snippet from our dinner tonight. The video is actually of dessert. Don't worry, we didn't eat Milano Cookies for dinner :) What a sweet, simple time this is. Lord, thank you for our girls, they are a precious gift.

My first post...

Well, I can't believe I'm doing this - creating a blog and all!
I don't feel like I have anything happening in my life exciting enough for anyone to want to read about. I've been thinking though that maybe this will just be a good way for me to document the sweet blessings of this stage of my life ~ living and learning with our 3 and a half and 1 and a half year old daughters, and blessed to have a sweet husband who I'm crazy about!
Even if we are the only ones to ever read these accounts, here they will be.