The Kennett's Krazy Life

18 Months

2012-02-09T11:03:00.002-06:00

Today marks 18 months on the wait list. Sure sounds like a long time. Honestly, it is a long time. Based on the way things are moving (slow) there will be more of these monthly updates.
After spilling my guts earlier in the week, I don't really have much to add today. Just that this is hard and all we can really do from here is pray. And that's what we're doing.
Happy 18 months! Actually, it feels like an accomplishment! 18 months and I'm still halfway sane! :) We're SO ready!

Weighty Update #1

2012-02-06T21:34:00.001-06:00

Well, I figured it was time for an update. To keep me honest, you know.

As I reported, I started the Daniel Fast Jan 1 and lost 11 lbs in 21 days. I started Weight Watchers 2 weeks ago today. I've followed it to the T and have worked out for an hour or an hour and 1/2 on 9 days in the 2 weeks I've been on the plan. The first week, I even still had over 20 of my 49 optional plus points (that can be used at any time during the week and are in addition to daily points to use and points that I earn by being active) that I hadn't used. When I weighed in last Monday, I'd lost 1.2 lbs the first week.

This week I used all of the optional plus points. J and I had a date night this weekend and we had cheesecake for dessert and yesterday we ate Super Bowl snacks and I drank a coke. I wanted to see what would happen if I actually stayed within the plan, but used those extra points that are available on the plan.

I weighed in this morning and I lost the exact same amount of weight this week! Down another 1.2 lbs!

Down 12.6 lbs total!

Losing 1-2 lbs per week is my goal. My dr recommended losing 1/2 lb per week. So really, I guess 1/2 lb or more per week is good for me. I'm trying to lose it the right way this time instead of trying to lose it too fast. Hopefully by doing it sensibly and the right way, I'll have an easier time of keeping it off.

I never posted these pictures because I was too embarrased at how bad I looked! These are the 2 worst pictures I have of myself. But, I'm over it. I swear, turning 30 does something to your brain and makes you not take yourself so seriously anymore. And I love that about my 31.5 year old self!

Let's keep it real, folks.

Special thanks to my husband for snapping this beautiful and gorgeous picture of me.... You are too kind :)

See, I told you I have a long ways to go.... Ugh.

I don't have a full length picture of myself as of late, but I do have a head-shot-self-portrait that I snapped after I got home from our date on Saturday night.

I can already tell a difference in my face. There's a lack of double-chin in this one! :) Progress! Yay!

1 cabinet done!

2012-02-05T17:46:00.001-06:00

So I started my household cabinet makeover in the laundry room. I've never done anything like this before, so I was pretty nervous. I wanted to start in the most inconspicuous spot!

I forgot to take a proper before pic, but I have this one taken after Jason took the doors off for me.

I should've started the painting with a clutter-free laundry room....nah! :)

Making progress!

The process took forever because I'm using oil-based paint. (lots of research went into this decision. I felt like it was the best choice for me.) It takes 24 hours for each coat of paint to dry. I only used 1 coat of primer, then i used 2 coats of paint. On the doors, it was a 5 day process. 1st day, primer on one side of the doors (started with the inside if the doors). 2nd day, primer on the other side. 3rd day, 1st coat and only coat of paint on the inside. 4th and 5th days, 1st and 2nd coat of paint on the outside of the doors.
On the frame, it was 3 days. 1 coat primer and 2 coats paint.

Bad part of working on a project like this would be that I have less time to devote to my other household chores. Case in point:

The pile of dirty laundry on the left was as tall as me and there were 4 more full laundry baskets in the house too :)

There's more evidence, but I'll spare you :)

Today, Jason hung the doors back up for me.

Here's the finished product:

I love it! We added the knobs and I think it helps the look a lot. Also, I painted the door hardware with a stainless steel spray paint.

Up close, it's a little rough in appearance because I learned I was using the wrong type of roller for the primer. I bought the right kind and used them for the paint. I will be using the small, smooth foam rollers for every coat from here on out.

I wanted to sand down the beveled edges and use some stain to give them more of an antiqued look, but I'm terrified of it! I don't want to mess them up! Maybe I'll get brave enough one day :)

This is only step 1 of this project.

This morning my sweet hubby gave me a head start on this next week's work.

Ready to get started on the Master Bedroom cabinets!

My plans

2012-02-03T12:01:00.002-06:00

Note: I didn't really check this post for editing. It's long. You might not even care to read any of this. But that's ok. It's just my attempt to share some of my jumbled thoughts and get them out of my head. I just thought you needed to know that I don't have it all together. Since I usually just share the pretty stuff here, I don't want you getting ideas that there's no ugly in my head that I have to deal with :)
And quite honestly, I rarely read blog posts where waiting families talk about the feelings associated with waiting, etc. Sometimes I begin to feel like I'm the only one who's struggling, which further leads to my feeling like a failure because I don't have it all together all the time. And when I stop and think about it, I really don't think it's true. I think we all struggle in our own way, but I really don't believe it's easy and all roses for anyone who's on this journey like us. So if you're reading this and you're struggling with your feelings and emotions, please know that you're NOT alone!
So- for better or worse- here's a glimpse into my messed up head!

It's no secret- I've shared this numerous times- I'm a planner. I saw this quote somewhere as a younger person:
"If you fail to plan, you plan to fail."

I took that to heart and have been a planner ever since. I have a love affair with my calendar/organizer and I'm the nerd that loves writing things down months in advance. Part of that obsessive planning can be a good thing. Having 3 kids who are all in school and all involved in many extra-curricular activities would be an absolute nightmare if I didn't keep the calendar neatly organized. Almost every school day one of the kids has something special at school- a meeting, a conference, pajama day, bring "xyz" to school day, tests, parties, etc. Plus, I pay a decent sum of money for soccer, dance, guitar lessons, tutoring, etc. I'd be really upset if we missed something with no excuse! B did miss a guitar lesson the week of Christmas when Jason was super sick with strep. I had been tending to him all day then had 3 class Christmas parties/ last day of the semester stuff going on that day and I just totally forgot! I didn't even think about it until after 7 that night! It was on my calendar, but I just didn't bother to look at it all day. Lesson learned!
Anyways, you get my drift. Sometimes all the planning is definitely to my advantage.

On the flip-side, it is to my detriment at times.
Namely the big-picture-scheme-of-life stuff. It's fine and good to have general ideas and goals, but if you are one who flips out about not being able to pencil dates in on the calendar... Well... Let's just say there's been some flipping out over the last year or so on my part.

My husband's work schedule is even more unpredictable than Arkansas weather. (If you can believe that!) We can't really schedule trips or vacations very far in advance because it all depends on what he's got going on at work. We took a nice vacation in the Summer of '09. Didn't do anything in '10 because we were in hard core adoption savings mode. By the time Summer of '11 rolled around and our adoption process wasn't moving along (not able to plan for that either!) I was just done and begging for a break from reality for a few days. It didn't look like we'd be able to get away because of work. Then, suddenly, Jason called one day to say it looked like he might be able to spare about 5 days. I was on the computer asap and had a condo at the beach rented before the sun went down that day. We were gone in less than a week and got to stay away for about 6 days. It worked out, but it drove me crazy! I would've loved to plan it out months in advance and been looking forward to it all that time!

I'm already having that same battle with myself inside my head over the very same stuff this year. We are not planning to take a family vacation this summer because J and I are HOPING we'll be going to Ethiopia at some point this year. Hopefully TWICE!! In my head: "but what if we don't?! Then we don't get to get away for some fun at all! And we'll all really be going crazy!!"

I think this kind of stuff is what's been the hardest about our adoption process for me. The expectations on timing have just changed so much since April '10 when we started. I had penciled in 8-9 months for a referral. Then about 6 months after that she'd be home! By that plan, she would've been home over 4 months ago! And yet here we are, still waiting on a referral. With no idea how much longer we will wait for a referral or how long it will take after that to get her home. No idea. And.friends.it.is.killing.me.

I had this perfect little plan all worked out. Including how well I thought God's call on our life fit into my life plan! :) We got married young and made the decision to be young parents so that we could have the energy to fully participate in every aspect of their lives AND we'd still be young-mid 40's!- when the youngest graduated from high school. Then we'd still have plenty of life (and more money?) left to enjoy each other and see the world and do all of those things that we chose to forego as newlyweds when we started our family so young. Adding 1 more little one right into the mix just a few years younger than our youngest seemed to be a perfect plan! The siblings would be good ages for growing up together and everything! We'd still be pretty young when she's grown too! Only now, with all of the waiting, the age gap between all of our children is getting wider and wider... They are now age 11, almost 9 and 5.5.... Stretch. Stretch. Stretch. We are all stretching. Our expectations and plans are morphing right before our eyes. And I'm ok with it for the most part, but I do still have freak outs from time to time :) I will say that I am SO glad that the initial expectations were different, or I'm afraid that I would've been too afraid to veer off of my own plan far enough to even begin this process. And despite everything, I really am so glad we are on this journey. I really am!

Owning our own business, it's not like it's going to be easy to pack up and leave at any ole' time either. There are LOTS of things that will have to be taken care of beforehand! And we have to have a plan for him to be reached almost at all times... How do we go about that?? And who will do payroll and invoices while we are gone?? Those things can't wait! If I had a clue on a timeline, I could start preparing for that. But I don't. So I can't. Contributing to my crazy.

There are opportunities for jobs that J will have to be here if he takes them... But we don't have any clue when we will need to be out of the country... So do we take the job? (In this economy, who wants to turn down work?!?!?!) Or not? So, we talk everything through and pray about it. Not such a big deal on the short term stuff, but on the more long term stuff, it can get tricky. Eventually we have to make those decisions and be prepared to live with them no matter what happens. My hubby is so go with the flow-- he just doesn't get all worked up about those details. But I do! All the hundreds of details that are so up in the air just drive me insane.

I'm really trying to turn all of those thoughts over to God when they enter my head, and praying that I will trust Him and not worry about it. But sometimes, it seems like those thoughts and details are coming at me like rapid fire and I just get overwhelmed.

This past week was one of those weeks when I just felt overwhelmed and hopeless all week. I cried every day and actually even felt a little disconnected from my life. I just felt like I was in a fog... Just moving about like a robot checking things off my to do list because I had to.

It's not like I'm not talking to God about all of my hopes and fears and every detail... Believe me, I am taking it to Him first. But, have you ever just gotten to a point where you just don't even know how to pray for the same thing one more time? Where you've searched the scriptures and journaled the ones that He shows you to help you persevere through the situation you are in, but you reach a point where you've duplicated those same scriptures over and over and you just start to feel a little numb... Or when you start to realize you sound like a spoiled child who's begging and begging and begging over and over and over again for the same thing and the poor parent keeps repeating "No. Not now. I might give you that another time, but not today", etc. And the brat keeps asking! :) Well-- that's kind of where I was last week.

I had a heart to heart with J around the end of the week and that helped. I put some plans into motion to try to get out of my own head and provide a bit of a distraction. I decided to finally start painting the cabinets in our house. And boy, is this a project! And in the middle of my crazy busy tax time?! What WAS I thinking?? Also, we are going to make time for a much needed date night for just the two of us this weekend. This will be the 2nd date we've had since school started. We are definitely over due... I really think that will help me get the rest of the way out of my "funk" too.

I share all of that just to keep it real. This process is certainly not glamorous. It's real and hard and painful and beautiful all at the same time.

I know that this is the refining fire that is changing me and molding me and shaping me into more of who God wants me to be. Let's be honest though, being refined isn't fun. Sometimes I feel like I just can't take the heat anymore and I want to run.... But that's when I can most feel the prayers my biggest supporters are praying over us. (And I KNOW there are so many that are continuing to pray for our family!! Thank you SO much!!) That's when the Word I've studied through the years comes to mind and I can't escape it even if I try. I know the truth of Christ's sacrifice for me so that I can live a life filled with joy and hope and purpose and I know the height and width and depth of God's love for me. I have to remember that He has a perfect plan, even if it's so far from my own plan that I think is better. Some days, I have to remind myself of that hour by hour and minute by minute. Whenever this stage of my life comes to an end, I will be able to look back and see just where God was working and how he was using my circumstances for his glory.

For now, I just have to be content in remembering that his power is made perfect in my weakness (and there's plenty of weakness here...) and trust that he is still working. Even when I can't see it or feel it or touch it.
Ah, Faith....
And the tangled web it weaves when I try to mix it with my own mortal plans....
There's only room for one boss- one maker of the master plan. And this is me realizing, yet again, *sigh* that it ain't me.

Boys/Girls Weekend

2012-01-31T10:03:00.000-06:00

A couple weekends ago Jason and the boys left town right after B's soccer game on Saturday morning and headed to Mt. Nebo State Park for some tent camping. Our camper is too big to get to the park, plus they've been wanting to tent camp anyways. But in January!? I thought they were a little crazy, but it was definitely a fun boy thing! J's parents were there too, so they had company.

Meanwhile, Sis and I stayed warm and cozy here at home! We also headed out for some fun!

Saturday afternoon, we went to the movies and to church in the evening.

Sunday we went to lunch at Olive Garden, her pick!

Then we came home and she painted my nails while I watched football :)

I really wore that polish for a couple of days b/c she was so happy about it. For her 1st time, she did a pretty good job!

Meanwhile, Daddy was sending us photo updates along the way.

They really enjoyed watching the hang gliders.

Campsite at the top of the mountain. Gorgeous view.

They reported that snuggling up with all of their warm clothes on, sleeping bags and 4 big blankets, they stayed warm despite temps/wind chill in the 20's.

This was taken on Sunday morning. I'd say it was a little cold!

On a 4 mike hike. They shook ice out of a tree into R and big brother is licking it off!

What a fun weekend! But us girls missed those stinky boys so much and we were so glad to see them when they came home! I'll admit, I wasn't nearly as happy to see those mounds of dirty laundry they brought home with them though :)

A Weighty Issue

2012-01-27T21:26:00.000-06:00

So-- confession time. I'm an emotional eater. I've not always struggled with my weight, but I have ever since giving birth to my 3rd child. She was born in 2006.
I gained 42 lbs during pregnancy (which was not too bad for me- i gained 55 with my 1st and 37 with my 2nd) and when she wasn't gaining weight after birth I refused to give her formula. I just "fattened" up my milk any way I could. Cookies, fried foods, lots of dairy. And in large quantities. Not the best way to go about it, but she started gaining weight! So-- instead of losing weight during that post-partum/nursing baby period, basically I stayed the same weight.
After I weaned her at 15 months, I started to try to lose it. I had 3 young children, a stressful full time job and a husband who was starting a new business and worked more than he was home. It was hard, but I tried really hard. I'd lose 15-25. Give up. Gain it back. Several times.
When she was about 2, I got a trainer, lost about 20. Gave up. Gained it back.
Several times.
When we started our adoption journey, in March '10, I was at the lowest weight I'd been since I was last pregnant.
You guessed it. Since then, I've given up and not only gained those 25 lbs back, but about 7 more.
Around the same time, 18 months ago, I went to see a gastroenterologist because my IBS symptoms were getting worse. He gave me lots of things to try, but #1 was to cut out all artificial sweeteners. I had a pretty bad diet coke habit, but I knew I had to do something because my stomach was hurting constantly. Instead of weaning myself off of coke entirely, I just switched from Diet Coke to the real thing. I'm pretty sure I drank my way back up the weight scale with Cokes and Sweet Teas.
1 month ago, I weighed more than I've ever weighed non-pregnant. I was still going to the gym fairly regularly, and will lose a few and gain them right back or just not lose at all, despite several hard workouts a week, because I'm not making great food choices. Or I make great choices, but just eat too much of it.
Apparently I've learned the lesson that my metabolism isn't the same as we get older and I not only have to fight to lose it, but I'm going to have to fight to keep it off.
I'm not aspiring to be the same weight I was when we got married almost 13 years ago. (I've never been tiny, but I was healthy.) I just want to get in the target healthy weight zone for my height.
I don't know if any of you struggle with your weight, but what have you found that works. How do you maintain it? As you can see, that's the hard part for me.
I did the Daniel Fast for 21 days and I lost 11 lbs. I have 21 more to go. My doctor and several friends suggested Weight Watchers, so I started it on Monday. So far, i love it. I think its going to be really doable for me. The proper portion sizes of things has been especially eye opening. Although, after having fasted for 3 weeks, starting Weight Watchers feels like I've been given a free pass to an all you can eat buffet b/c I can eat anything! I didn't go to the gym while I was fasting, because I was pretty low on energy and I already have low blood sugar issues. I started back to the gym Mon am and plan to go 5 days a week again for a while, but will eventually have to cut back to 3 days due to time and schedule constraints.
So-- wish me luck!
During my fast, part of what God showed me was about my emotional issues with food (that I realize now I'd been in denial about) and reminded me that He is what I need-when I'm stressed, or sad, or angry or happy- not food. Or awful, sugary beverages. And especially bad foods....
I really do want to stay in control of my health and not let it slide again! This up and down stuff for 5.5 years has really been hard on my body as well as my mind.
I'm posting this so that maybe it will help to keep me accountable. I've chronicled weight loss here before and obviously failed to keep it off, but I'm trying again!

11 Random Things

2012-01-26T13:42:00.001-06:00

My good friend Ashley at We are Expecting Miracles tagged me to participate in this fun "getting to know you" type blog post. It was fun to read about her and know a little more about her since we don't get to see each other in real life very often these days. So, I thought it would be fun to participate too.

Rules

1. Post these rules
2. You must post 11 random things about yourself
3. Answer the questions set for you in their post
4. Create 11 new questions for the people you tag to answer
5. Go to their blog and tell them you've tagged them
6. Tag 11 people

My Random Things:

1. I am a huge football fan. I love the Razorbacks, but unless they're playing, I prefer NFL to College football. But I watch college football anytime it's on also. I've been to 2 NFL games (Vikings games, of course! The first one will be forever etched into my memory. I was in the same building as BRETT FAVRE. Have I ever showed you guys my Valentine's gift from my husband last year?? I should do that some time. And all of you girls will think I'm K-A-RAZY...) (Also, have I told you that when we drove in and around Hattiesburg last year, I looked into every pick-up we passed for him?? :) (Seriously, not crazy- just a big fan!) and I'd love to go to more! I'm like the husband that many wives complain about. On Sundays, I like to lay around and do nothing but eat snacks and watch football. (I feel sorry for those poor husbands, by the way!) I will be going into my post football depression soon :(

2. I hate cleaning. All of it. I do it, but I hate it.

3. I love driving a mini van. I'm so glad I was able to go back to a van last year.

4. You'd never know I grew up on a farm, I'm more of an indoor/city girl type.

5. I haven't had a mani or a pedi in over 2 years.

6. All 3 of my children were delivered in the same room, of the same hospital, by the same doctor.

7. I love to cook.

8. I have a major sweet tooth. (And am currently losing weight that I've gained over the last 18 months or so. So, not too many desserts lately!)

9.I have lived in 5 different houses since I've been married.

10. I have personally had 7 different vehicles since I've been married.

11. The color I wear most often is black.

Ashley's 11 questions for me

1. What was your favorite childhood toy?
Off the top of my head, I'd say I was most excited to get a Pogo Ball.

2. What do you like best about your husband/significant other?
Sappy, I know, but hard to pick just one thing!! Ummmm... I'd say his tender heart.

3. What is your favorite dessert?
This is also hard to just pick one! I guess I'd have to say Cheesecake.

4. Describe one of your most memorable vacation experiences.
We went on a cruise with all 3 of our kids to celebrate our 10 year wedding anniversary in 2009. We were gone 10 days. It was amazing! We drove to Jacksonville, Florida to catch the boat (the drive was the worst part! Our youngest was only 2 and was potty training...) We went to Key West and the Bahamas. SO fun!! It was our first vacation (other than visiting family) in our 10 years of marriage.

5. What do you like to do to relax/unwind?
Read in a hot bath.

6. What is the most random thing in your closet?
A Ziploc bag full of random small fall decor items that I forgot to put in the tub when I took the fall decor down.

7. If money wasn't an object, what "luxury items" would you put in your house?
#1 would definately be a hot tub outside. Other than that, I would say a big enough soaker tub to lay all the way down in, a media room and a play room. (I guess the main issue would be the space to do those things!) Oh, and a 6 burner stove and 2 full size wall ovens!

8. What trait do you admire in others that you wish you possessed?
This is a physical characteristic, but it came to my mind first. Clear skin. I struggle with acne and it's the worst :(

9. What is your favorite fast-food restaurant?
Schlotzsky's

10. You are having dinner with 3 of your favorite celebrities. Who are you with and what are you talking about?
Tim Tebow, Brett Favre, and Elizabeth Hasselbeck. I'd talk football and faith with Tim. The thing I'd most like to talk to him about would be his family's orphanage in the Phillipines. My husband and I have felt called to missions in the future and we'd most like to work in orphan care somewhere in the world. With Brett, I'd just tell him I love him and ask him to tell me football stories of the glory days. With Elizabeth, I'd love to talk about what it's like to be married to an (ex)NFL player, living in the city, being famous and also about cooking. She just wrote a cookbook, apparently, she can cook too! And she is just so darn pretty and seems really sweet.

11. What is your current favorite brand of shoe?
Toms

My 11 questions for you
1. If there was one place you could travel to, what would it be?
2. Name 3 things from your "bucket list".
3. If you were stranded on a desert island, what 5 items would you want to have with you?
4. If you could have a housekeeper, a personal chef, or a personal trainer, which would you choose?
5. What was your favorite Christmas gift you received this year?
6. What is your favorite book?
7. What would your dream job be?
8. What is one thing in your life that you regret?
9. What is the farthest place you've ever traveled to?
10. Who is your favorite famous person?
11. What is your #1 beauty secret/tip?

The people I'm tagging are:
1. Carrie
2. Sonya
3. Rachel
4. Amber
5. Courtney
6. Catherine
7. Ashley
8. Liz
9. Carrie
10. Sara

If you don't want to or don't have time to do it, no biggie! I just thought I'd like to learn more about each of you if you did have the time :)

Adoption Fundraiser

2012-01-20T17:16:00.001-06:00

I'm linking up to Kelly's Korner blog today for Show Us Your Life: Adoption Fundraisers.

Just a little about us: We are in the process of adopting a little girl from Ethiopia. We first felt God calling us to adopt in the Fall of 2009. We began our paperwork in March 2010 and today, we are still waiting for a referral and to meet our new daughter. We just can't wait to add another precious child to our family!

We are fundraising with Ordinary Hero, which is an awesome organization.

Just click on the blue banner above and start shopping and you can learn all about Ordinary Hero on the website as well. We earn a part of the proceeds from every sale made. ** Also, they are holding a grant contest that runs through this Sunday, Jan 22, 11:59pm. The top 3 sellers will each receive a $500 grant! We would SO appreciate your help in becoming one of the winners!

When you check-out-- just choose "Erica Kennett" under affiliate name. This way we will get the credit for the sale.

If you don't "need" anything, you can even donate products to those in Ethiopia such as bibles in their native language, donkeys to help with daily workload, animals for food, backpacks, blankets and shoes for children, and more!

Thank you for supporting us! If you are unable to support us in this fundraiser, we would greatly appreciate your prayers! God Bless!

Braden's "Late" bday bash

2012-01-16T21:43:00.001-06:00

We had Braden's 11th birthday over a month late because we were waiting for soccer season and fall baseball season to be over so we'd have a "free" weekend to be able to have it! His buddies all came home with him after school on a Friday and they played soccer in the back yard until it was time to go to the party.

He loved his cookie cake!

Pizza FEAST at the house was ready for them after school

At the soccer party. Sissy got into the action too!!

They ran full speed and played hard for the entire hour! They were sweaty and stinky and they loved it!!

Time for cake!

The whole gang. The big boys were nice enough to let little brother and little sister jump in this one :)

FRIENDS!!!

This bunch is somethin' else. As soon as I snapped the first one, it took them about .0053 seconds to turn into this :) I love every one of those crazy boys!

Oh, and you didn't think Mom and Dad stayed on the sidelines, did ya?

We were the goal keepers. It was quite exciting. Jason was wishing he had gotten a picture of me in action too. I was quite ok with not having it documented :)

One of the boys is a football player and hasn't played much soccer and he's VERY competitive. Anyways, I kept yelling at my defenders to protect me because he kept coming at me like he was gonna TAKE.ME.OUT! I took only 1 or 2 big shots, but I did come out alive and with my glasses in one piece. We laughed so hard. It was awesome. I will say that I had quite a bit more respect for my studly goal-keeping son after playing in the goal with those boys for an hour. That's not an easy job!!!

What a fun birthday party!!!! Can't believe my "baby" is 11.... Wow!

First Pageant

2012-01-16T21:34:00.000-06:00

Gracie has been asking me for over 2 years to be in a pageant. I've looked around for one before, but there aren't that many of them around here. So, I just kept putting her off. She's really been talking about doing it alot in the past few months, so when I heard about a little pageant coming to our area, I asked her if she wanted to enter. Of course, she said yes!

We went shopping for a dress and shoes last weekend and she's been walking in her high heels every day to practice. Although I've got some pageant experience, I never gave her any advice. I had no idea what to expect, so I didn't really know what to tell her anyway. This was a natural pageant and only a little blush and lip gloss was allowed. Also, we were told she didn't need a pageant dress. (Of course, when we got there we noticed almost all of the other little girls decked out in pageant attire and lots of makeup :)

When she would practice doing her pageant walk at home, she was rockin' it out with a sassy walk and lots of smiling and waving. She's been so excited!

When we were getting dressed for the pageant, she kept saying, "I've been dreaming of this day for so long! I just can't believe my dream is coming true!"

We had to be there 2 hours before it started, so she was pretty bored and tired by the time it was time to start. Although she was still excited.

When we got to the stage area and the younger divisions started, she was on the verge of tears and begging me to not make her do it. She said she didn't realize all those people would be there watching. After lots of talking and encouraging, she eventually agreed to walk on the stage, but she wasn't going to wave and she was only going to do one turn in front of the judges and then she was "getting out of there".

Here she is on stage. She did her little walk so fast that she had to stand there for a little bit while the MC finished reading her info :)

Here she is getting a medal for "Best Personality"

Here she is getting a trophy and a crown for Runner-Up!

Here she is with all of her awards afterwards.

After it was all over, she decided it wasn't that bad and she'd like to do it again. I'm not opposed to her doing it again, but we're not going to jump right into it. I'll just have to see how much she talks about it and try to judge if she really wants to do it. Because the next time, it's going to require the real pageant dress, etc. I sure don't want to invest in that stuff if she's going to get embarrased and beg me not to make her walk on the stage again! :)

But for a first experience, it was good. She walked away with some awards and she really loved getting all dressed up. She really did look so very pretty!!

And, to top off the fun day, Daddy took the family out to eat a really nice dinner afterwards to celebrate! It was our first nice dinner out of the year and everyone enjoyed it!

17

2012-01-09T21:55:00.001-06:00

Today marks 17 months on the wait list. Our family is still super excited and anxious about when we will get our referral call.

At last report, the average wait time was up to 18 months, so we likely still have a decent amount of time to wait. There hasn't been much movement, as far as new referrals, in our agency in the past several months. It's hard and we don't understand, but we trust God's timing.
We're not giving up! We are still praying! And if I even try to forget to pray about our adoption and our little girl, the kids sure don't let me!
Lately, the boys have been asking questions about how we will handle it when we do get our referral. Will I come and check them out of school? Will they get to be home for the call?
I assumed Gracie didn't really understand any of those conversations.
On Sunday, she and I were alone walking in the Wal-Mart parking lot hand in hand and out of the blue she said, "Every time we get a call or a message in my classroom, I'm hoping it's for me to check out because we got our referral."
Talk about faith! Those kids are believing every single day that "today could be the day!"
I believed it for a while, and then when too many days came and went, that bold faith went too.
I think it's time for me to find that bold, crazy faith again!!
God has been so faithful to us through this whole, long process. He continues to be faithful to us. He's supplying abundant peace in the midst of uncertainty. Perhaps that is what I'm most thankful for. I'm not real happy with being faced with waiting even longer, and even more unhappy with still not having any clue when this chapter will close and the next chapter will begin. BUT, He has given me this peace that I didn't think possible. Our God is an awesome God! He is in control and we will follow where he leads.
I'm a planner and living last year on the fly, unable to plan anything too far in advance, was extremely hard for me. I was so glad to see 2011 end! But here I find myself... On the other side of that year... And in the same predicament! We were talking about Spring Break over the weekend and realized that we still can't really make any plans. I'm learning.
Life isn't about how well I can plan it all out and execute my perfect plans with precision. Goodness... Have I sure been learning that lesson! And it's not been fun either! Can I say that I'm better for it already though? Absolutely.
I'll end this month's post with the same feelings I always have. Hoping that this is the last one of it's kind!!
Amen!

Happy

2012-01-06T08:53:00.001-06:00

I'm a happy girl today!

1. It's Friday. Need I say more?!

2. The Hogs are playing in the Cotton Bowl tonight.
Woooooo Pig Sooie!!!!!!
I wish we could've gone to the game. That would've been so fun!

3. The weekend is here. That means my husband shouldn't have to work for a couple days! I have only seen him about 2 hrs total since Wednesday night. We miss him!!

4. I officially pick back up my title of "Soccer Mom" tomorrow. Braden's indoor season starts up early in the morning and he is so excited he can hardly sleep! I was really ready for a break when the season ended in mid-November, but I'm ready to get going and get back to our busy routine now. I think... Here in a few months, I may be ready for another break! Less than 5 months till school is out for summer! We can do it!! :)

5. I've almost made it through my first week of the Daniel Fast. Hallelujah! It's been a great week. The first day was ok until about 3 in the afternoon, when a massive headache hit and had me writhing in bed until I finally went to sleep around midnight that night. It was due to caffeine and sugar withdrawal, no doubt. But I've felt good since then, praise the Lord! My fellowship with the Lord has been really sweet and He has blessed me so much. I've been praying for peace for a while now and God has truly answered my prayer. This week, especially, I have a peace that I can't explain. After spending too much of the last year with worry, fear, anxiety, frustration, disappointment and even sometimes anger, I am so thankful to be in this place of peace. I just want to serve the Lord where I am today. Even if my life's circumstances aren't exactly what I would hope for, I want to rest in Him and just joyfully serve Him anyway. No more pity parties for myself here! Woo Hoo!
I pray for peace in the midst of life's circumstances for each of you! And thank you, once again, for praying for me and my family!

6. I only have 3 loads of laundry to do today!!!

7. 1st week of NFL play-offs is this weekend. Football, football and more football. Yes, please! I'll be having my annual football withdrawals before too long, but for now----- I'm happy! :)

8. It's Friday!!

Have a GREAT weekend everyone!!

Things I love about Christmas break

2011-12-31T00:57:00.001-06:00

1. Staying up late. I've stayed up past midnight almost every night.

2. Sleeping in. Since the day after Christmas, I've slept until at least 9 am everyday but 3. And I've not gotten out of bed until around 10 on most of those days! Don't judge! It's my guilty pleasure!

3. Extra time with my babies. They are 11,8 and 5. I am aware that they are no longer babies. They will always be MY babies.

4. Cooking a big (late) breakfast for the kids almost every day.

5. Daddy-O got to come home for a long lunch a couple of the days. LOVE that!!

6. Staying in our jammies all day with nowhere to go. We managed this a few days. Heaven for a busy family.

7. Listening to the sounds of extra guitar practicing.

8. Seeing my kids all reading new books and getting into the stories.

9. Cooking big meals for the family almost every night.

10. Laid back. I could have the tendency to turn into a home body if I could... All this chill time is fabulous!

Ahhh-- we need more of these breaks!

Christmas Post #2 in pictures

2011-12-31T00:47:00.001-06:00

Christmas Eve morning, we headed to Jason's parents house for a gathering with all of the Walker/Wilkerson clan. Had great food and a great time. My camera battery died and I didn't get a single picture :(

For Christmas Eve night, we went to Russ and Aggie's house for the annual Henley Christmas. I'm kicking myself for not getting a picture of the table! Aggie prepares a 12 dish Polish feast for us each year. It was awesomely delish!!!

I did think to snap a few pics with my phone of the kids.

All 5 kiddos ready to open presents! My niece was wearing one of her cute wigs :)

Hello Kitty!

Ray Lewis jersey!

Hunting game!

Pippa got a present from her grandparents too!

A few pics from Christmas night.

Boys playing the new xbox kinect. Soccer, of course!

Our Christmas night feast.

Yes, that is Mac and cheese, pizza rolls, leftover pizza and chicken patties. On paper plates.

Be jealous, people!

We had eaten so much awesome food the previous 2 days that we just wanted to munch. And we were in super lazy mode, so fast and easy was perfect. :)

We enjoyed every minute of our Christmas weekend!!

Thank you to all of our family for spoiling us! We definitely felt the love all season long!

Christmas Post #1 in Pictures

2011-12-31T00:03:00.001-06:00

Kennetts Christmas Eve Eve gathering at our house with Gramma, Grampa and Uncle Jeff. We were excited to see Uncle Jeff for a little bit. We had hoped to spend more time with him while he was home, but strep throat visted us the week leading up to Christmas, so he was wise to stay away from our nasty germs! We were so thankful that God answered our prayers and everyone was well for Christmas!

New ping pong paddles!

His first real gun. Should the look in those eyes scare me??

Bubba.....

An easel that is useful on both sides! Yay!

Reading the Christmas story early on Christmas morning to start our day. After we read and talked about the birth and life of Jesus for a while, Daddy prayed. This is my favorite Christmas tradition. Although the presents are fun, we never want to forget that the reason we celebrate Christmas is Jesus. He is worthy of honor and praise!

Soccer book!

Curious puppy under the tree :)

Snuggie! All my kids got them and they love them!

Dollhouse! More like doll mansion!

Michael Oher jersey and his new Wii hunting game from MeMe and PaPa. And Daddy wearing his new cold weather work gear. Gotta keep my sweetie warm in the nasty cold weather that is coming. I got him some battery heated socks too! :)

Goofy boy in his Wes Welker jersey

A girl and her dog

2011-12-28T23:23:00.001-06:00

Sissy loves her Pippa. They have been spending lots if extra time together this Christmas break.

Saying goodnight...

Sleep tight girls!

So sweet!

I might have a future artist living in my house

2011-12-26T21:43:00.001-06:00

B got sketch pads and sets of drawing pencils and charcoals from all of his grandparents for Christmas.
This was his second drawing in his book.

He says he doesn't think it's all that great. I'm thinking if the professional soccer plan doesn't work out for him, he could have a future as an artist!

For the record, he sure as heck didn't get this from me. I can't even draw a proper stick figure!

A few of my favorite ornaments

2011-12-25T18:07:00.000-06:00

Here is a little tour of my favorite Christmas ornaments.

This picture isn't in focus, but this gold ornament was Our First Christmas ornament. 1996. The white star is one that was made by Jason's late Grandma. She passed away when I was pregnant for Rhett. I have over 50 of these that she made, some snowflakes, some stars, all different shapes and sizes.

These two were made by the boys when they were each in 2nd grade. The pictures don't show the detail very well, but there are tons of sequins, each pushed into the ball by a straight pin. They are so shiny and beautiful!

A new addition to our collection.

Jason gave this ornament to me the same Christmas he gave me my promise ring.

We were given this one as a wedding gift and we put it on our first Christmas tree after we were married. 1999.

This is also a new addition to our collection this year.

I love having my tree up. We are planning to leave it up until next weekend :)

Jingle Bell Rock

2011-12-23T22:28:00.001-06:00

Merry Christmas from our little dancin' queen :)

YouTube Video

Masks

2011-12-22T21:54:00.000-06:00

B made these Picasso inspired African masks for the 5th grade product market. I thought they turned out great!

This is the finished product after they were painted.

We used cardboard shirt boxes for the masks, as well as the nose and also a piece on the back to help them hold their rounded shape. He drew on the facial expressions, then used colored tissue paper to build up the facial features.

This is what they looked like after that step.

There is about 15 man hours involved in the making of them. He is going to sell them for $8 each and is hoping to make a big profit off of them!

I wish he would've had time to make one for me! I love them!!

Overnight Trip to Branson

2011-12-19T10:34:00.000-06:00

A couple weekends ago, we headed out of town right after the kids got out of school on Friday and headed to spend the night in Branson.

First stop: We went straight to Silver Dollar City to see the lights!

We always get season passes to SDC, but the last time we made the trip to see the lights was when Gracie was 1. We were WAY overdue for a trip to see all the Christmas beauty!

Here's me and the kiddos. It was pretty cold (below 30 degrees), but we bundled up really well and we were all quite comfortable the whole night.

Waiting to see the Frosty show :)

Gracie rode the carousel.

On Saturday, we had a few hours to hang out in Branson before we had to head back towards home because we needed to be at church before 5pm.

We had a yummy room service breakfast and lounged around the room for a couple hours before checking out and heading to the Ripley's Believe it or Not Museum.

Here's Rhett on a homemade flying contraption.

Braden, the undersea diver.

World's Tallest Man

World's Heaviest Man

Largest ball of twine

We really enjoyed Ripley's and stayed for about 2 hours. We had a couple hours left before we needed to head back home, so we opted to check out the Titanic museum as well.

We weren't allowed to take any pictures in the museum, but it was great! We all really enjoyed it! We spent 2 hours there and it was an environment where the kids needed to be very well behaved and quiet. I was so proud of them! After spending 4 straight hours walking around museums, they were absolutely wonderful. The Titanic museum was very educational and informative and it was a place that Jason and I could've probably spent all day in really looking at and reading every detail, but we needed to head out, so we enjoyed it as much as we could in the time that we had.

We were only away for about 25 hours, but it felt like we were gone much longer than that. We all needed a little getaway and came back refreshed and ready to get back into our normal routine.

Decorating for Christmas

2011-12-17T22:08:00.000-06:00

We put up our Christmas decor the weekend after Thanksgiving. I LOVE to have the decor up and have the twinkly lights on all the time. Rhett took all of these pictures of us having fun and putting up our decorations.

Pippa's first Christmas :) She sure is a good girl, letting the kids tote her around all the time!

Work in progress!

I didn't take any photos of the "after", but you can look at last year's post because the main things look the same this year!

Did I mention how much I love Christmas?!

Little Rock Field Trip

2011-12-17T21:04:00.000-06:00

At the end of November, I was able to be a chaperone on Braden's class field trip to Little Rock.

We went to the State Capitol and the Clinton Library.

I was so excited to go because I'd never been to either place!

Here's B in front of the Capitol... squinting in the bright sun!

The Capitol is absolutely beautiful. Loved the rotunda.

They were beginning to decorate for Christmas, which made it even better!

Supreme Court

Me and B on the front steps

The Clinton Presidential Library

B in front of President Clinton's Car

My personal favorite was the exact replica of the Oval office. I wish I could've gone in and just sat and enjoyed it for a long while. It was gorgeous and I loved hearing about some of the more interesting items in the room.

This was B's favorite exhibit. It was a lego exhibit. The artist makes amazing art out of thousands and thousands of legos. It was incredible! This is just one of the many pieces.

The Clinton Library was wonderful. I enjoyed it so much. I could easily spend an entire day there looking over every single thing. I can't wait to go back again someday!

We had a great day! I carpooled down with 5 other moms, of which each of their sons are B's BFFs, so it was especially fun! I had a group of 4 boys to walk around with all day and we had fun. Braden loves to have me around and took care of me all day; making sure I was right there with him and keeping up with them. He even invited me to eat lunch with him and his buddies and gave me his spot on the picnic blanket and sat in the grass instead. What a wonderful young man, if I may say so myself :)

I can't believe this is his last year in Elementary School! I'm glad we are doing lots of fun stuff and enjoying it to the fullest!

Still catching up

2011-12-13T22:22:00.001-06:00

Our little doggie Pippa is such a snuggler. Here she us snuggling on the couch with me.

This is her afternoon perch. She looks out the window for the kids every afternoon!

I've been doing a lot of catch up on my scrapbooking lately. I keep all my stuff in this armoire and it's easy to pull out when I want to work on them. Here's what it looks like when I'm working on my books. A mess! :)

Rolling pumpkins down the big hill at Uncle Guy and Aunt Cathy's house after Thanksgiving dinner.

I love the twinkling lights all over the living room!!

Oh, look! A soccer ball at his feet. What a surprise :) Yes, even in the house.

"no dogs were harmed in the making of this photo"

I came out of my baking hiatus temporarily to make these chocolate-caramel beauties for a party. I also made white cake with vanilla buttercream. 8 dozen in one night, whew! But they sure were yummy!

Tuesday Night Randomness

2011-12-13T21:04:00.001-06:00

My laptop still isn't working and I still haven't been carving out time to update my blog. :(
Here's a few pics for another catch up attempt.

1. This was at Braden's Shakespeare performance. Poor Rhett, he had a hard time finding Shakespeare interesting enough to stay awake after the first 2 hours of performances.

2. Here he is taking a photo for his photography contest entry. He seriously rocked it out-- his picture was so awesome! And, yes, the cape does help the photographic quality :)

3. This was Gracie and Pippa after we picked her up from being boarded at the vet for the weekend. Gracie had missed her and wanted to hold her so bad, so I let her sit with her on the back seat. They are best pals!

16 Months

2011-12-09T13:58:00.002-06:00

Today marks 16 months on the waitlist for our baby girl. 16 months is a LONG time to be waiting "in limbo" and not knowing when this part of the journey will come to an end. Two weeks ago, the average wait time for a referral had gone up from 16.5 months to 17 months, and the average time is expected to continue to grow due to the fact that they are not expecting referrals to begin to be ready any faster any time soon.
Just a couple weeks ago, I thought we were finally catching up to that average time and I was confident that we'd receive our referral before Christmas. Now, it appears that we will be waiting AT LEAST another month or two. Thank you for continuing to pray for our family...

Our family is enjoying this Christmas season very much. We are keeping busy, but we are also making memories and spending as much time together as we can. This month is filled with family and friend gatherings and, of course, remembering the reason we celebrate Christmas in the first place. CHRIST! Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. For in Him, we have abundant HOPE and JOY and PEACE!

I pray that all of us will focus less on the material aspect of this season and, instead, focus our hearts on Him... that we may realize and count EACH and EVERY ONE of the blessings that we have in our lives...from the big to the small... and that we may be ever thankful...and that we may REJOICE in God's goodness, mercy and grace in our lives.

"Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!" 2 Corinthians 9:15

We got a dog!

2011-11-22T12:33:00.004-06:00

Yes, it's true! We got a dog! My kids have been begging for a long time, but I just wasn't ready. My plan was that after we got our little one home and settled, then we'd begin discussing the idea of getting a dog. Since the process of getting our little one home has been so LONG (and getting LONGER by the minute, I might add) I started re-thinking the idea. One day, a friend posted a picture of her on facebook saying that she needed a home and I fell in love. That was on a Friday and I went and picked her up that following Monday. Her name is Pippa Lucille and she's a sweetheart. We fell in love right away.

This is the first picture I took of her after I got her home that day.

The main reason I didn't want to get a dog was because I knew it would create a lot of work for me. I wasn't wrong in that assumption. She digs, makes messes and goes potty in my house. She's actually getting better, we are almost done with the house training!! But, for the first couple months, she pooped in the house almost every day :( Also, she sheds. That is the main thing I didn't want. We were told that she doesn't shed that much. That is a LIE. But, she's here now and we love her, so I have to deal with all the excessive sweeping, mopping and vaccuming. Yeah, like I have TIME for that?? Oh well! Good thing she's cute :)

Here's an example of her mess making...

She is really sweet. This was taken not long after we got her. I was baking in the kitchen and she had curled up and laid her head on the top of my foot.
She loves to snuggle! This is her snuggling with Rhett and I on the couch one night as we were doing Rhett's reading homework for the day.
Sometimes when I'm working in my office, she curls up on my good chairs where she can see me and she takes her little "cat naps" there.
She has 4 outfits. This is the first one I bought her. Yes, it has a pink tutu on it. She looks pretty ridiculous in it, but I got it on sale for $2 and couldn't resist :)

We think she was about 7 months old when we got her in September, so she's about 9 months old or so now. She was in the vet right away for a checkup and shots, and she was spayed about 3 weeks after we got her. We weren't taking any chances! So, she's all healthy and definitely a part of our family. Now the kids think they need another dog. And I promptly told them they'd lost their minds!!

Things I am thankful for

2011-11-22T12:09:00.002-06:00

Rhett wrote this in class on 11/17. He just brought it home yesterday and since I still don't have my laptop/picture situation fixed (this has been a total nightmare), I thought I'd share this today.

"Thanksgiving, Turkey all makes me think of the thangs I am thankful for. First, I am thankful for my loveing parints, my loveing dog Pipa, and my brother and sister. Next, I'm also thankful for chrch. I pray evry day and night. Last, I am thankful for my hole famaly. Thay are so loveing. finaly, if you were me you would unrstand."

Coming from my boy who has improved his school work IMMENSELY this school year... this is just extra special. His handwriting on this paper was so neat I had no trouble reading it at all! It's a true miracle! Thank you Jesus! :)

Did you notice that he's thankful for his dog? Yeah, that was a post that was done but lost in oblivion, thanks to the kind person that hacked my computer with a nasty virus. Anyways, yes, we got a dog! I'll get a whole post on her up at some point :)

Love my sweet boy. We have so much to be thankful for.

Word to the wise...

2011-11-11T14:22:00.002-06:00

1. Back up your pictures, videos and important docs on your computer onto an external hard drive or burn them to a disc regularly.

2. In addition, make sure you have an anti-virus program installed and that you update it when necessary.

If you do not do these things, don't blame me if you are up all night worrying about 2 YEARS of pictures and videos being GONE FOREVER.

Also, you will end up wasting HOURS of your life trying to retrieve your items, reconfiguring your computer, and FINALLY backing up all those thousands of pictures and videos.

How do I know all of these fabulous tidbits of information, you ask?

Because I have 1 computer (with all of my business stuff on it) that I am a good girl and keep everything backed up and virus program installed and functioning.

I have a laptop however, in which I use for internet, blogging and picture storage.... and because I am stubborn and lazy when it comes to stuff like this... as I was happily surfing the net last night on said laptop, it was infected with a virus.

After spending some time with the nicest Geed Squad guy on the planet this morning, I discovered that it was a rather tame virus, which didn't delete my hard-drive, but hid and locked everything so that I cannot find it or access it.

In lieu of giving them $350 to restore my computer I am spending hours of my precious and valuable time that, quite frankly I do not have to spare, trying to fix it myself.

Yikes.

This will be a once in a lifetime deal, people. I've learned my lesson. Amen.

In addtion, I had MANY blog posts already done and waiting to be posted on the laptop. They are gone. So, there may be another bout of blog silence until I can get this figured out.

Grrrrrr.

Happy Birthday MeMe!

2011-11-10T19:23:00.001-06:00

Happy Birthday MeMe! Your KRAZY grandchildren wanted to send you this special birthday message :)

15 Months

2011-11-09T21:41:00.001-06:00

I haven’t really written many adoption update posts lately. Mostly because it’s impossible to put how I’m feeling into words. And sometimes, I just can’t make myself go there and to try to put it into words. But, I’ve been getting lots of questions lately, and thought it was time for an update and to try to put at least a few thoughts about how we’re doing into writing.

Today marks 15 months on our adoption agency’s wait list. As of the end of October, the average wait time for families to wait for a referral was estimated to be 16.5 months.

If this holds true for us, we are finally really getting close now—just 6 weeks away from that! As the average wait time has changed through the months, we’ve never been less than 2 months away from the average, so there is definitely a sense of renewed hope. We are still praying and believing every day that it will be even sooner than that though! :)

We are excited and anxious as we wait for that phone call.

If you will remember, when we first announced our plans to adopt, the details included that fact that the entire adoption, from start of paperwork to having our child home, was supposed to be anywhere from about 15-18 months.

Here we are, 15 months on waitlist and almost 19 months since we started the paperwork…. and we haven’t even seen her little face yet. Much less court…and Embassy… Sigh… this is shaping up to be nearly twice the time that we had expected.

I’m not going to lie, the waiting has been really, really hard. But, it’s also been really good and beautiful too. We (all 5 of us!) have seen our faith grow so much.

The Lord is close to the broken-hearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 34:18

The Word of God is TRUTH. All of it. And this has been so true for us. We’ve felt Him close in these times of uncertainty. I am so thankful for that. I can look back and see how He had His hand on us and in different situations. I didn’t always see it at the time, but looking back I can.

Among other things, I’ve been given ministry opportunities that I wouldn’t have had if she was here and I was in “full time mom mode”. I’m so thankful for each opportunity that God gives me to encourage and love on others. I feel like I’m most “me” when I’m serving.

I know that God is preparing our hearts for our little girl each day, so we’ve had extra preparing! I trust that his timing is perfect and am convinced that there is a specific child that he has for us to parent and it’s not just by random coincidence.

I know that the other side of the waiting isn’t going to be easier and I know that once the adoption process is complete and she is home—it won’t be easy then either. (Have I ever mentioned that I REALLY need my sleep…???) BUT- I know that God is already equipping me to be her mother and that he will continue to do so as we go through the ups and downs of life.

The kids are handling all of it really well. They still pray for her every night and talk about her every day. They are still really excited about having a little sister. There have been times that they’ve really questioned the process and why it’s taking so much longer than we thought it would. We have been totally truthful with them about each step and they know exactly what’s going on and the reasons. Mostly, we have had so many teachable moments with them. Through every step and every bump and every milestone, we’ve talked with them about God’s perfect plan, His faithfulness, trusting in Him alone, what it means to have faith, how to find our hope and joy in the Lord. Of course, they don’t grasp or understand everything, but any chance we get to talk about these things with them, we are. It’s a daily thing, really.

Also, we are really busy most of the time. With all 3 kids in school and with homework and extra-curricular activities. Mixed in with their Mamma and Daddy running a business—we stay BUSY. I’m not gonna lie—being busy sure does help the days to pass by just a little quicker.

I don’t want time to pass by too quickly because we have so much to enjoy about life NOW, but looking at it in the context of waiting for our girl… it helps :)

We have SO many family members and friends who are so anxiously awaiting her arrival into our family. Literally hundreds of people. She is going to be SO loved. I just can’t wait to be able to introduce her to everyone who has been praying for her and loves her.

My heart swells to think of what it will be like to finally be able to share some news other than, “we’re still waiting”…..

So, there it is. A few thoughts on how we’re doing. Not sure if any of this made sense as it rambled out of my head, but it is what it is I guess. I’m planning to head to bed early tonight and spend some extra time in the Word and prayer.

Thanks so much to everyone for your continued prayers for our family. We are so blessed and so loved. I promise that we are so thankful for that and do not take any of it for granted.

Braden on Shakespeare

2011-11-08T15:17:00.001-06:00

All of the 5th grade GT (gifted & talented) students in the school district recently put on a Shakespeare Festival. Each elementary school participated and it lasted 2 nights and 2 1/2 hours each night. That’s a lot of Shakespeare!

Each school’s 5th grade class chose which play they were going to do. They were limited by time, so only did certain scenes of the plays.

Braden’s group did a scene from Macbeth. He played the part of Banquo.

While the theater arts may not be his most favorite thing in the world, we thought he did a great job! It was fun to watch him perform!

He makes his entry about 3:30 into the video. He is wearing the green vest.

Grandparents Day

2011-11-05T09:16:00.001-05:00

My Dad, aka Papa was able to make it to Grandparents Day at the kids’ school this year. We were thankful that he was working in our area that day and he could be there!

He and I sat with each of the kids as they had their lunch and also got to go see their classrooms and meet their teachers.

In Gracie’s classroom, after lunch their teacher was helping with another class across the hall for a few minutes, so PaPa even sat on the floor with the kids and read a book to them :)

Me and the kids were glad you got to come Papa!

Labor Day Trip to Tulsa

2011-11-03T21:29:00.001-05:00

Braden had a soccer tourney in Broken Arrow over Labor Day.

We left right after the kids got out of school on Friday, checked into the hotel and headed for the Cheesecake Factory for dinner AND we each got our own piece of cheesecake. We usually share, but we had been go,go,go, crazy busy and pretty stressed—so we threw caution to the wind and splurged. And it was worth every penny (AND calorie!) My favorite is Vanilla Bean. Braden (our chocoholic) got the Hershey’s Special one. The other 3 got original. We all had some to take back to the room and eat the next day too :) Except Mamma…. I might have eaten my ENTIRE piece at the dinner table. And I may or may not have thought I was going to throw up on the way to the car because my belly was SO full. To make it a little better, I ordered something off of the “skinnylicious” menu and I only ate 1/2 of the dish JUST SO I could enjoy that entire piece of cheesecake I’d been dreaming about. But I paid for it for the next hour with a stomach ache :)

All of these pics were taken with my iphone. We only got the good camera out at the soccer field that weekend.

Waiting for our food

If these 3 were any more handsome, I don’t know what I’d do…

Sissy was COZY on her little rollaway bed.

Boys playing playstation in their beds before bedtime.
Thanks for the gorgeous face, Braden :) And Rhett looks possessed by the game! Yikes!

Playing putt-putt at the hotel before we had to leave for the first game on Saturday.

Gracie teaching Daddy and Braden some ballet positions before we left :) We decided they’d better not quit their day jobs…

Practicing her “dive” :) This was the first time she was jumping into the deep end with no life jacket and swimming to the side by herself. Growing.Up.Too.Fast.

The loot B scored at the vendor tent after the games on Day 2. Spoiled.Rotten.

Rhett got his first very own pocket knife at Bass Pro. He was so proud of it! Too bad he put it in the pocket of some athletic shorts just a few days after he got it and lost it somewhere… good thing we went with a cheaper one. Told him he has to buy his next one with his own money…

Since Monday was Labor Day and we didn’t have work or school, we stayed at the hotel on Sunday night too. We ate a nice meal, hung out at the hotel and left for home the next day after we checked out at noon.

We love being able to travel for soccer. It gives us a nice excuse to escape the real world for 2 or 3 days at a time. We can reconnect as a family as we all coexist in a small space. We always have so much fun and lots of extra snuggling and special time with the kids.

Getting away from the normal routine from time to time is always such a great thing!

Costumes 2011

2011-11-02T20:02:00.001-05:00

My kids did a great job picking out what they wanted to dress up as for Halloween this year. I had fun helping them get all of the elements picked out and put together.

Hello Kitty Ballerina

Slash. The Legend.

And Napoleon Dynamite himself.

The boys went with some great friends to their church’s Trunk or Treat on Sunday night. I was told that there were over 200 kids there and “Slash” won funniest costume :) I thought it was pretty authentic myself.

And Napoleon… we laughed so hard we couldn’t hardly keep a straight face every time he got into character. And the dance. I tried so hard to get him to perform the dance moves on camera, but it was a no go. Let me tell you—the boy’s got moves :)

Little Miss Kitty has a stuffed Hello Kitty ballerina and she wanted to be just like her, so that’s what we did! She was especially proud of the bag I got her to put her candy in. I love that she's easy to please.

Boys Fun Night Out

2011-10-30T13:28:00.001-05:00

This is another oldie/catch-up post.

Gracie was taking her turn to spend the night with MeMe and PaPa before school started, so Daddy and I took the boys to Fastlane for a night of FUN!

Go Karts

Video Games

We spent a small fortune in there…but didn’t regret it for a second. It’s really fun sometimes to go all out and have a blast together.

We bowled, ate dinner, played lazer tag, did go karts and played video games for over an hour.

I can’t even tell you how much fun we had. It was awesome!! The smiles on those 2 little boys’ faces was priceless.

Catch-Up

2011-10-29T10:23:00.001-05:00

I’d like to dedicate this post to my Dad. Who has informed me that my blog is now 2nd on his list of sites that he visits regularly—due to the severe lack of content. :)

Here ya go, Dad! I’m gonna work my way back up to #1!!

These are all pictures from my iphone that date back to July and August :)

What would camping be without smores?? It was raining outside, so we made smores over the gas stove in the camper and enjoyed them at the table. YUM!

I’m always griping about laundry… but seriously, I have a right to. After 1 weekend of camping, this is the dirty laundry we took home. This doesn’t even include the 4 or so loads of blankets…

I thought Gracie’s little tea party was so sweet :)

Family Game Night! This is my Dad’s ancient Risk board. Isn’t it so cool? We love it! You can see my pink pieces. I decided to go for Africa and protect it :)

My little chefs in the kitchen. This day they were making various yogurt concoctions. They were disgusting and they didn’t even eat what they made, but they were occupied for a few minutes anyway.

My sweet Rhett. This was taken on the day he asked Jesus into his heart. Can’t you just see the excitement on his little face? Love it and him!

My foot has healed up. All that’s left is this gorgeous scar. Good thing I was never a foot model, I guess. A friend recently pointed out that the little white/pinkish scar within the scar is shaped like Africa. Love that!

Gracie and her Uncle Goober

My hunny bunny took me out for my birthday. This is us cruising in the mini-van sans kids. :)

Fav family place to eat= BWW. This was in the lobby one night when we walked in. The boys had fun with it :)

Sweet.Goofy.Babies. Apparently G didn’t get the memo that they were supposed to be silly in this one…

FUN WITH POST-ITS :)

Gracie’s new necklace that she designed and bought with her own money :)

Rhett’s new necklace that he bought with his own money :)

My boy who HATED reading last year. Finished this whole book within the first couple weeks of school. And loved it. SO. PROUD.

There you go! A Catch up in pictures! More to come…

Skol Vikings!

2011-10-16T12:10:00.001-05:00

Recently, we got the opportunity to go to another Vikings game. The game was in KC, and we happen to know someone who has season tickets to the Chiefs games and couldn’t make it to this game. He offered to sell us his tickets at face value and threw in his parking pass for free. Ummm…. YES!

If you’ve ever purchased NFL tickets, you know that to be able to get a single game ticket with great seats at face value is impossible!

Gracie wanted to go and we would’ve taken her too, but there were only 4 tickets available, so it was just Mamma, Daddy and the boys again.

We left early Sunday morning, drove up for the game and drove home right after the game. It made for a very long day, but it was WONDERFUL!

Why, yes, that is Jared Allen (aka STUDMUFFIN!) almost close enough to touch! My sweet hubby walked down a few rows to get this close up for me. We didn’t even have our good camera with us, he really was this close!

Oh, look, there’s Jared flexing his muscles for me! :)

We got to see him get a sack!! Unfortunately, I didn’t get it on camera. Actually, I didn’t even get to see it “live”. I was standing in line for 15 minutes to get my youngest son a hot dog and saw it on the closed circuit tv…… he owes me for that one. That’s what I was waiting to see the WHOLE game!!!!!!!!!!!

A purple family in a sea of red!

Arrowhead is a great stadium. The fans were really nice and we really enjoyed ourselves. It was an absolutely PERFECT day. Clear, sunny skies with temps in the mid 70’s. Seriously, it was like heaven on earth!

ADRIAN PETERSON!!!!!

The Viks lost the game and ended up 0-4. It’s no fun to watch your team lose, but we were just so excited to get to be there, that it really didn’t matter too much.

Last time we went to an NFL game, we thought it was a once in a lifetime kind of thing. To get the opportunity to go again, was like icing on the cake.

We just LOVE football and to experience it in person is just amazing. We are so thankful we were able to go! All 4 of us had a wonderful time.

One thing would’ve made it better….
Brett.Favre. (We miss you Brett!!)

18 Months

2011-10-13T22:00:00.001-05:00

18 Months ago today, we officially began our adoption journey.

In the first conference call with our agency, we were told to plan on 15-18 months from the time we started our paperwork until we had her home and in our arms forever.

Well, we all know how that has turned out…

Today marks 18 months and we’ve yet to even get to see her little face or “meet” her.

We are still praying for her and can’t wait for the day we get our referral call and most especially for the day we get to bring her HOME!

The last month has been the hardest for me emotionally. It just seems so L-O-N-G. I even made the comment that I could’ve given birth to 2 babies by now :)

I think the hardest part is that it’s so different than what we’d expected and planned and also the unknown… we have absolutely no clue when to expect the next phases of the journey to take place, so much of our life has been put on hold and will continue to be put on hold. I like to live life to the fullest, so not being able to plan and do things has been hard for me.

BUT—God has been doing a work in my heart and I’m in a better place with all of this than I’ve been in a long time. I’m feeling good about it and filled with hope again.

“Faith isn’t believing God can, it’s knowing that He will.”

I’m BELIEVING that HE WILL!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I’m believing that it will be soon! We are expectantly waiting for our referral and trusting in God’s plan and timing. We know that He is FOR us and FOR her and that He’s holding us and guiding us to each other.

Resting in that today and PRAYING for a miracle.

Thank yall for joining with us in prayer!

Wasn't it just yesterday???

2011-09-27T12:53:00.003-05:00

that my kids were this little???

Time flies!

I sure had my hands full (in this picture, Braden was about the same age that Gracie is now),
but as I look back, I miss it!

These 3 bless me everyday. I love being a Mamma.
Thank you, Lord, for my family.

B’s Weekend Soccer Highlights

2011-09-25T23:21:00.001-05:00

I made a video from this weekend’s soccer games. The first game he was in goal the whole time and I didn’t take any video of him. The video is from the 2nd game of the day. There was about an hour of video, so I just picked some of the highlights.

As you can tell, it was raining most of the game, so there was a little slipping and sliding going on with the wet field. Holding the video camera and an umbrella and trying not to whack my mom in the face with the umbrella every time I moved was a little tricky :)

He had a really great game and we were so proud of him!

His BEST play is at the beginning of the film. LOVE it! All those HOURS of practicing are paying off for him :)

The last bit of the film isn’t necessarily a highlight, but I included it anyways because it was so funny to me. He is a quiet and respectful kid and he always takes a beating out there on the field and always pops back up and never says a word. This time, he let a little of his passion come thru when he disagreed with the ref’s no-call. I don’t want him to get cocky, but showing a little of your “heart of your sleeve” from time to time isn’t all bad.

Highlight Reel from BASC Tourney

2011-09-23T22:40:00.001-05:00

It was much easier to make a highlight reel from the first couple games at the BASC Labor Day tourney in OK than to post several different videos.

Enjoy!

Rhett’s playing Baseball!

2011-09-21T22:34:00.001-05:00

Rhett has decided to try playing baseball for the first time since he played t-ball when he was 4 yrs old. He’s played 3 games so far and so far he’s going great! Maybe he’s found the sport he really likes to play?!

Here’s some pics from his first game.

And from his second game, a video:

We.were.SO.excited! :) Fun stuff!!

Soccer Shots

2011-09-18T16:40:00.001-05:00

Here’s some action shots from some of the first soccer games of the season.

The following are from the first tourney of the season.

B with the ball- Yellow cleats. (Not #6)

Rhett took this one of him warming up—he thought it was hilarious, so I’ll include it here :)

Undefeated CHAMPS at BASC Labor Day Tourney in Oklahoma.

Preparing to receive medals. (Braden in yellow jersey)

Braden got to present Coach’s medal to him.

So proud of the boys! Go Comets!!!

Bubba, your HARD WORK is paying off! 1 game at a time!
So proud of you!!!

Proud Mamma!
(With crazy hair after it blew in the OK wind all day :)

And don’t forget the support crew:

This is G and her little buddy.

The boys played football

2011-09-17T15:40:00.001-05:00

The boys both played Kiwanis football again this summer. It was THE HOTTEST three weeks in a row that I ever remember! There were several days of practices that the temps were in the 110-115 degree range. Miserable! I don’t see how the boys could enjoy practicing in that kind of weather, but they didn’t complain much. We had LOTS of gatorades and waters to drink!

Here’s some pics of Braden from games. He played offense and defense. He’s #22.

Praying before the game :)

We were so excited to have Braden on Brandon’s team this year! He is a friend of ours and he is a wonderful role model for our kids. He is a former Razorback football player, but what really makes him special is that he LOVES and SERVES Jesus. Braden thinks the world of him, as you can tell :)

Even sitting in the bleachers and watching was HOT!

Rhett has the gloves and tall red socks on :)

#89 :)

He got to play in the Championship game, but they came up short. His coach got trophies for the boys anyway. Rhett was proud of his!!

A couple pics of the spectators got on my camera, so I thought I’d include them too. I think Rhett had the camera at this point :)

Another fun season in the books!

Rhett Baptism

2011-09-11T23:24:00.001-05:00

Rhett was baptized at church on Saturday night! His daddy had the privilege of baptizing him, just as he did big brother a couple years ago.

The service was held outdoors and it was a beautiful night!

Hanging out before the service started

Who needs toys when you have a big brother/jungle gym :)

Worship

Those being baptized, praying before the service began.

Braden took the video: (The water was VERY cold!!!)

So proud of my husband. He’s not one to enjoy getting up in front of people and speaking, but He was so excited to do this and I think he did a great job!

So blessed to have family there to celebrate this special event with us!

Congratulations on your baptism Rhett!
We are SOOOO proud of you!!! The best thing you can ever do is follow Jesus for your whole life!!
We LOVE you buddy!!

13 Months

2011-09-09T22:34:00.001-05:00

Today marks 13 months on the waitlist for us. I’m so excited to be hitting another big milestone on this part of the journey!

We have been so busy lately with school, work and kids’ extra curricular activities that I haven’t spent as much time dwelling on the timeline.

It’s actually a blessing, I think, to be so exhausted all the time because it’s helped me not to dwell on the situation too much.

Don’t think that doesn’t mean I don’t think about her. I think about her constantly. But at least I’m not having any major freak-out sessions at the moment :)

It goes without saying that WE.ARE.READY. I’m still praying for a miracle and that we would be able to have her home quicker than the “average” time. That as soon as we are matched to a child, that our paperwork would go through quickly and with no hindrances and we will finally be able to see her sweet face and move forward in getting her home.

We will wait as long as we have to for HER. This is about HER and not about my own desire to have her here ASAP. Ultimately, I want what’s in God’s perfect plan and what’s best for HER. I’m just blessed to be on this ride and to get to share life with her. It’s not easy and it’s getting harder by the day and month, but I know that she will be worth the wait.

The current average wait time is 15.5 months. If that doesn’t change, then we at least know that we are just a couple more months away!!!

October is my favorite month of the year. Maybe it will come then? 2 of my sweet guys have birthdays that month…. that would sure be a great birthday present for them :)

*Sending ALL of our LOVE across the world Baby Girl. We can’t wait to share our life and our krazy family adventures with you!!!*

Random

2011-08-25T09:47:00.002-05:00

There are been a severe lack of blogging on my part lately. Don't really have a good reason other than, mainly, I'm just not feeling it.

I got several books recently and I've been reading at night after the family is in bed instead of blogging.

I read one of Max Lucado's classics, "The Applause of Heaven". I thought I had every book he's ever written, but somehow missed this one as well as "The Great House of God", which is on the shelf waiting to be read.

I also bought the Duggar's new book and read it. I personally love them.

I went to see The Help in the theater last week with my mom for my birthday and LOVED it so much. I went out and bought the book the next day. I started it after I finished the other 2 books, but only made it through the first 2 chapters, because my stack of bonding/attachment/cross-cultural/multi-racial adoption books arrived in the mail. So, I put The Help back on the shelf for later and started "Black Baby White Hands" last night. So good. Read a few chapters last night and hoping to be able to keep my eyes open long enough tonight to read a few more.

I've been planning to have a garage sale to benefit our adoption fund since we officially started the process in April 09. Best time to have garage sales are in the Spring and Fall. We have soccer every weekend in the Spring and Fall though, so I've been putting it off.

I thought we didn't have soccer this weekend, so 2 days ago decided to bite the bullet and throw the sale together. Later that same evening, after the garage had already been over taken by 50 something trash bags of stuff from the attic, that we do have soccer. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to miss one Saturday of soccer. But it BREAKS my heart!! I'm not one of those mom's who's just content to send Daddy with the kids for sports. No way-- if I'm going to live my life in a way that I (hopefully) won't have any regrets later on-- I'd better not be missing ANYTHING unless I have to. That's just the way we roll. But, I'm pretty sure we'll both survive and Daddy is more than capable of handling it with me for sure.

So, if you live around here, come see me Friday or Saturday from 7-1 and see if you can find something you want!! I have tons of ladies and kids clothing. I didn't realize I had such a nice work wardrobe until I started pulling things out to organize them for the sale. I had about 50 pairs of jeans/pants/capris/skirts in size 10 and 12. Guess that's the main size I was during those years! I also have quite a few in size 6, 8, 14 and 16. (Can you say yo-yo? Wow. Too bad I can't seem to stay one size for very long before I'm jumping up and down! Ugh!)

The kids are doing super great with school. They are all loving it.

My husband is my hero. He's been making a huge effort to come home earlier in the evenings than he's ever been able to so that he can help Rhett with his home work. Can't even begin to express the blessing it is to both me and Rhett that this is happening. My sweetie-pie-hunk0fahubby- has never made it home for dinner everynight for 2 weeks straight. Not in over 12 years of marriage. It's just so weird to me! But the best kind of weird. I'm afraid I'm gonna get to used to it and if he has to adjust his schedule drastically again, I will be grieving him being gone. I've been so used to him working so many hours all these years that it was just our normal.

I know he'll read this eventually: JK- I love you so much and I don't take a single bit of it for granted! You are amazing and you BLESS the socks off of me. XOXOXOXOXOXO

I'm trying to get caught up with my office work that I SO took for granted all summer by doing the absolute bare minimum. Sometimes I get caught up in the "I wish I could just be a stay at home mom and worry about my family and my house and not have to work" but MAN, is that DUMB and SELFISH! God has blessed us so much by allowing us to own and operate our own business for the last 6+ years. I'm trying to remember everyday what a blessing it is. Yes, we have to work hard, but yes it is so worth it.

Ok, I blogged. Back to work now :)

It’s a proud moment for a Mamma…

2011-08-19T18:35:00.001-05:00

My husband took this video of our children with my phone several months ago. I got a new phone and have had quite a fun time looking through all the old videos :)

Yes, that is my family. And I love them. Every silly bit of them.

First Day of School

2011-08-17T11:56:00.001-05:00

Well, as of this morning, my life changed pretty drastically.

ALL 3 of my precious babies are in school!!! It kind of feels like a “I’m free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, I’m free at last!” :)
Movie reference from one of my all time favs. Think Bette and Barbara :)

It is such a parenting milestone for me. So today has already been filled with such a variety of emotions.

Here they are—ready for their first day!!

So interesting to me how their clothing choices totally reflect their personalities. I could probably write a book about this :)

Kindergartener

3rd grader

5th grader

I woke him up and said, “Are you ready for your last first day of elementary school??” He smiled :)
He’s so ready to be the BMOC. He is so excited and anxious to sign up for the Principal’s school leadership team, science projects and all of the other awesome stuff the 5th grader’s get to do. He’s been chomping at the bit for school to start since school got out in June!

Here’s my baby girl, at her desk, ready for her first day!
She did so great and was so excited to be there!

I was a little apprehensive this morning because last night when we were saying bedtime prayers, Gracie prayed for God to
“take her nervous away”. She has been so ready and excited to go, but she realized last night that she was feeling a little nervous.
She woke up this morning and never mentioned anything about being nervous, but she was awfully quiet as we were walking to school and to her classroom.

Her little friend Kasey’s mom, (and my friend) Katt, took the girls to get their nails painted yesterday. While they were there, Gracie met the owner’s daughter and found out they were going to be in the same class.
When we got there this morning, that little girl’s desk was right next to Gracie’s!! When she saw a sort of familiar face, she seemed to relax right away.
God is so good!

Rhett and I had already said our goodbyes in the hallway and he said I didn’t need to walk him to his class. Well, his Daddy was able to show up after that and he wanted to go and wish him well. As Jason and I were walking down the hall, we heard what sounded like a party! We walked into the room, and they were all wearing party hats and blowing noise makers.

I was happy to see Rhett was sitting across from one of his friends from last year’s class and he had a smile on his face. What a great start to 3rd grade! This is such an answer to prayer!

After I snapped this picture of him and his teacher, I said my good-byes and I had to walk out… I felt tears welling up in my eyes. (here we go again…. as I type this… Kleenex, please.)

How weird is it that I was COMPLETELY fine leaving my little “just turned 5 baby kindergartener” out in the big bad world, but I couldn’t hardly hold it together to leave him there.

This sweet boy is the subject of most of my middle of the night prayers, he’s on my heart almost constantly, he is the one who struggles more in school, the one who hasn’t yet to have the “light come on” to love school, reading, etc. Anything pertaining to school has been more of a struggle for him through the years. If I could’ve bottled up all the tears we’ve cried over homework in the last few years… they would certainly fill gallon jugs.

I’ve been praying all summer that THIS would be HIS year. That he would begin to embrace it as a good experience and that he would not have to struggle as much.

Leaving was hard as I thought about all these emotions, but it was also easy because I know God is faithful and he hears our prayers. The tears were also ones of joy because to see him “partying” and leaving him with a smile on his face just felt like Jesus giving me a big ole’ hug and hearing him say, “It’s ok. I’m here. He’s going to be ok.”

I have one, and only one, year where all 3 of them will be in the same school. What a sweet blessing!

I can’t wait till the end of the day so I can hear all of their stories!!!

I am such a blessed woman.

Devils Den Camping Trip

2011-08-12T17:13:00.001-05:00

Recently, we spent the weekend at Devil’s Den. We had a great time, as usual! We spent time relaxing, playing, and swimming too. Here’s some pictures!

First time down the slide!

Somebody’s about to get dunked…

Swimmin’ Hole

A friend came by the say Hi while I was watching the family swim.

1 year

2011-08-09T15:29:00.002-05:00

1 year ago today, we were placed on the official waiting list in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia for a little girl.

On that day, 8-9-10, I never thought we'd still be waiting today. I even had the audacity to believe that we might even have her home by today... The average timelines were much different a year ago than they are today.

My heart has ached for her for almost 2 years now- ever since God placed in me the desire to adopt a little girl from Ethiopia.

I'm thankful to have the love, support and encouragement from so many family and friends throughout this process. Most of all, I'm thankful for any prayer that is lifted on behalf of our family and especially our daughter.

Please join us in praying for her. I've said it before, but we love her so much already. There is a void in our hearts that only she will be able to fill.

Please pray that NO advances by the enemy to prevent her from having a family to love her will prevail.

We would also appreciate any prayers you would send up for our family as we wait. Pray that we will not be discouraged as we wait and that we would trust in God daily to carry out the plan that he has for us in this process.

We are still believing Him for a miracle in bringing us together!!! He IS able. Nothing is too big for HIM!!! I believe that with all of my heart.

Thank you so much for joining us in prayer! It means more to us than I could ever express.

I absolutely cannot wait to be able to share some good news with you all!!!

Until then, I guess I'm off to wait some more :) I'm getting pretty good at it by now.....

Fancy Princess Birthday Tea party

2011-08-08T21:10:00.001-05:00

For Gracie’s birthday party with her friends, we hosted a fancy princess birthday tea party.

Fancy Chandelier

I draped some fabric and ribbons around the room.

Rhett met each princess at the door, gave her a pink rose and escorted her to the table.

He was also their server for the evening.

We served a 5 course meal, planned by the birthday princess, herself.

Course 1: Fruit
Course 2: Soup
Course 3: Mac and Cheese
Course 4: Finger Sandwiches
Course 5: Cake

Fruit Course

Gracie enjoying her soup course. Chicken and Stars, of course!

Cake time!

I took a little video to help us remember the day.

Group picture after dinner. Meghan and I dressed up fancy as well. It was so fun!

After dinner,it was DANCE PARTY TIME!

Introducing… DJ Big B!!

The girls busted out all of their best moves while DJ Big B kept the tunes flowing!

Here’s Gracie doing the robot :)

They made flower headbands and necklaces after the dance party.

Sweet Princesses

Can’t believe our little princess is already 5!!

Braden on Guitar

2011-07-31T20:26:00.001-05:00

After 4 weeks of once per week guitar lessons, I must say, I’m quite impressed by this boys skills.

He wanted to share what he’s learned so far.

Song list (in order of appearance):

Twinkle Twinkle
Happy Birthday
Boogie Everywhere
Hit me with your best shot
Eye of the Tiger
Turn up the Music (Lemonade Mouth)
Wild Thing
Breakthrough (Lemonade Mouth)
We Three Kings

Tell him what you think!!

Gracie’s Graduation and Birthday

2011-07-30T13:30:00.001-05:00

Gracie did her last 10 months of preschool at home with me. We were looking back through old scrapbooks a while back and she noticed the boys’ preschool graduation pictures and wondered why she didn’t get to do that. So, I went online, ordered a cap and gown set and we decided to have her a preschool graduation at home.

Here she is saying the Pledge of Allegiance while my niece Ela holds the flag.

Getting her diploma.

We also celebrated her 5th birthday since we had our family together.

Here’s the cake she picked out.

After all of the festivities, we decided it was time to take the kids to the pool to cool off!

Here’s my nephew Tre

Gracie

Rhett

Braden

Meghan and Gracie looking sweet for the camera!

We were so glad to have Meghan with us for 2 weeks while she participated in the MASH program.

My niece Ela

Here’s my brother aka Poppy blowing up a raft. A parents’ work is never done :)

Thank you to everyone who came to celebrate Gracie’s graduation and birthday. We had a great day!!

First camping trip of the year

2011-07-29T16:32:00.001-05:00

We finally got to take our camper out for the first time this year. We went to a new campground and we had a great time.

They had a giant jumping pillow and that is where our kids spent most of their time.

Of course, Daddy had to get out there and show them his amazing aerial skillz ;)

Home Sweet Home…. for 2 days anyway.

We enjoyed breakfast outside before it got too hot.

The theme for the weekend was Pirates! The kids had a great time with all of the crafts and activities.

“Walk the Plank”. They had to reach the end of the balance beam while blindfolded and being sprayed with water.

Pirate Hats!

Costume contest.

Costume contest winners!! Our family received a 50% off gift certificate for our next trip there. Yay!

Glow in the dark boy.

We had SOOO much fun!! Can’t wait for our next outing!!!

Rhett’s BIG day!!! MUST READ

2011-07-27T20:07:00.001-05:00

I have a new brother in Christ today! 7-27-11

RHETT!!!

He’s been asking questions for a while now and I’ve just been answering his questions, praying for him and telling him to let me know when he’s ready.

He came home from VBS today with some fresh questions and wanted to talk about asking Jesus into his heart. I told him again, “you just tell me when you’re ready”.

About 5 minutes later, he came into the kitchen, where I was doing dishes, with a folded up note. He told me that after he left the room, I could look at the note.

As I read the words he wrote, tears filled my eyes. He walked back into the kitchen and when he saw that I had read the note, he had a huge smile on his face.

We went and sat on my bed and shut the door so we could have quiet to talk and for about 30 minutes, we talked and asked each other questions.

My boy that has never had an attention span longer than 5 minutes, sat riveted on my every word with a big smile on his face. I probably could’ve explained things to him for another hour and he never would’ve even squirmed. He was very interested in what we were talking about.

After our conversation, I knew he was ready.

He prayed the sweetest, most mature prayer I’d ever heard him pray and I wish I would’ve captured the look on his face when he said, “Amen”, opened his eyes and looked up at me. He almost looked like he was glowing!

We snuggled up as I prayed for him and then we just had a sweet few moments of me crying and him giggling.

He was so excited, he couldn’t wait to tell his brother and his Daddy and then he wanted to call everyone! He even told me he wanted me to put it on the blog so everyone would know!

I’ll never forget this day!

Thank you Lord!! I can’t wait to see what you do in this sweet boy’s life!

Our home on wheels

2011-07-26T10:13:00.001-05:00

In 2007, we bought a 27’ travel trailer. We have taken many camping trips in it and we love it. We don’t get to take it out as much as we’d like these days, but it’s always there if we get a chance to go somewhere.

I thought I’d give you a tour!

Standing at the front door. Couch folds down into a bed.

“Master Bedroom”

Dining table also makes into a bed.

Bottom couch folds into a bed. One of the boys fell out of the top bunk a couple years ago (even with a bed rail), so no one sleeps up there these days. We usually use the space to store things out of the way- kids clothes, etc.

TINY bathroom. That’s the one thing I wish I could change-- I wish it was bigger.

There you have it… our home on wheels!

Pirate Bunco

2011-07-24T19:42:00.001-05:00

I play Bunco once a month with a group of friends from back home. (Sometimes my schedule doesn’t allow for me to make the trip on a weeknight, but I go as often as I can.) Our group loves to dress up and have a good time.

This month Tasha hosted and had a pirate theme. It was so fun!

After the games, we had some fun taking pics before I headed home.

Buddies since the 4th grade and still best of friends.
What a blessing!!

Do you see Jack Sparrow?? That’s Tasha’s Mom! She always goes all out on her costumes! She won best dressed (obviously!)

I won a prize for having the most wins! I never win! Awesome prize too!!

Vacation 5

2011-07-21T12:40:00.001-05:00

It was hard, but after just 3 days, we said goodbye to the beach and the heavenly condo that we’d so happily called home for 3 glorious days.

One last picture of the view from the living room. Just so we don’t forget.

Posing for a picture by a palm tree while Daddy loaded up the van.

Our van is the best road trip vehicle! There are 2 tvs that can either show the same thing, or 2 different things. Gracie was watching her movies on the front tv and the boys had their game cube hooked up to play video games in the back.

They hardly made a peep for the 14 or so hours it took in the car to get from here to there.

On the way back, we decided to stop and stay the night in Vicksburg instead of driving straight through. We were all relaxed from a nice few days of vacation, the last thing we wanted was to rush back home and be exhausted when we got back home.

The hotel had an indoor pool and the kids were very happy to be able to get out of the car and into the pool!

Here’s a pic of Braden practicing his swimming. He had me timing him to see how fast he could swim the length of the pool.

And here’s the other 2 wild munchkins :) They wanted me to get them jumping in the pool together. My battery died on my camera, so my phone was all I had.

What a great vacation! We hope to be able to repeat it sometime!

I’ve already told my husband that he is not allowed to wait more than 2 years between taking time off for vacation anymore. We’ll see how well that works… :)

Vacation 4

2011-07-20T21:43:00.001-05:00

Another beach day!

Rhett’s new friend!

It was HOT!! Frequent water breaks were necessary.

Taking a break from the sun. Mamma and Sissy= True love :)

Drink Break!

To quote one of my favorite people- Ms. Harriett- this is a “gorgeous creature”!

Vacation 3- Family Pics

2011-07-15T22:40:00.001-05:00

I’ve always wanted to take beach pictures like this. I’m so thankful that we got our chance!

We took these ourselves with our own camera. For the pictures of all of us together, Jason and I took turns setting the timer and running back into the picture :)

When we were all done getting the shots I really wanted to get, we just played around with the camera for a while.

Rhett took this one. We were laughing so hard… he directed us to pose like this and it CRACKED us up!

And we had fun being silly when Braden got behind the camera too :)

I’ll leave you with a few more of the fun ones that we ended our evening with.

Vacation 2

2011-07-14T19:56:00.001-05:00

Day 2 started with letting Mamma sleep in!

Daddy took the kids for a morning walk on the beach.

Beach Day 2 there was lots of fun in the sand.

First up, big sand castle fort!

Almost done!

Here’s Gracie walking thru her princess castle. She even had seashells decorating each tower.

Next up: Burying Rhett in the sand!

He decided to sit up and he asked his Daddy to make him a back rest :)

L-O-V-E

What a WONDERFUL day!

Please Help This Family

2011-07-13T15:04:00.001-05:00

Please take a few minutes and go to my friend Ashley's blog and follow the links to help the Ward family bring their little one home.
Thank you!

11 MONTHS

2011-07-11T16:59:00.001-05:00

Well… I never thought I’d have an “11 months on the waitlist” post. But, here it is. 2 days ago, we hit the 11 month mark. Looks like there will be a few more of these before we get our referral. Hoping and praying that it is no more than a few!

BUT. My God is in control. He has a perfect plan and I’m trusting in HIM alone to unite us with our little girl.

WE ARE READY. Beyond ready. But we are trying to wait as best we know how.

Some days are easier than others. Some days are just really hard.

I’ve read this on other blogs before, but I think it bears repeating:

Adoption is not for sissies!

We are praying for our sweet girl! There are SO many people praying for her—and for that we are SO grateful. We love her so much already and can’t wait to see her sweet little face……..

Vacation 1

2011-07-06T22:44:00.001-05:00

At the beginning of June, Jason was able to take off work for a few days and we made a quick trip down to Gulf Shores for a few days.

On the road!

Gracie started running a fever and complaining of a sore throat the night before we left. I was able to get her into the Urgent Care clinic right before they closed and even though her strep test came back negative, since she was running over a 103 temp and we were going out of town, they went ahead and gave her some meds.

She was still running a high fever when we left the next day, but she seemed to be feeling ok other than that.

We got about 10 miles down the road and she started throwing up. Poor thing! Here she is after she threw up. You can tell she wasn’t feeling too hot. We decided not to put clothes back on her while we were just riding in the car, because we didn’t want to ruin another set of clothes.

Thankfully, she didn’t throw up any more the rest of the entire trip and she acted like she felt ok even though she was running a fever even with her meds.

14.5 hours later, we made it! View standing in the living room. HEAVEN!

Rhett didn’t want to do anything but lounge on the balcony!

Can’t say that I blame him! Jason and I fell asleep on the lounge chairs holding hands the first night we were there.

Yes, those silly children belong to me.

FIRST BEACH DAY!!!

Gracie woke up with NO fever!! Praise the Lord!

I kept my burn covered up the whole time! I wasn’t risking sun burning that brand new skin!

Panoramic view from my beach chair. Heaven.

I got all excited when Jas found a crab. Bummed when I realized the poor guy was dead.

Taking a little break from the sun.

Playing in the sand!

Her Sand Castle Day 1. Putting water in her moat :)

The boys LOVED boogie boarding.

Braden

Rhett

Daddy played in the water with them the whole time.

Gracie was tired of the beach and ready for the pool by that afternoon.

I found me a nice, shady spot and enjoyed watching her play in the water.

This concludes the pics of Day 1. We could’ve stayed there forever. We LOVE the beach!

A little boys purchases

2011-07-02T22:05:00.001-05:00

Anytime Rhett has money, it burns a hole in his pocket. He’s recently had bday money as well as some cash from the tooth fairy. She pays pretty well here at our house… :)

One day, we were in the mall and he purchased these cool blue shades :)

Another day, he really had some cash to blow.

Here were his choices:

A new hat.

Yes, Razorback fans. That is what you think it is. The boy hasn’t stepped foot in Texas in his life. For whatever reason, he’s always said the Longhorns was one of his favorite teams.

We get to the hat store for him to buy a NY Yankees hat (what he wanted to go to the store for in the first place) and left with this. I figured I’d take a ribbing for it (from his daddy and his grandma mainly…) but I thought, “Hey- it’s his own money. It’s a stinkin’ hat. What does it really matter??”

So, I approved the purchase. And I got ribbed :)

And my favorite of his purchases. Some Converse All-Stars.

I told him I wasn’t buying new shoes until August when we’re getting ready for back to school. It’s my rule. Who wants to go back to school in ratty used up shoes? And I’m not buying 2 pairs of tennis shoes back to back for no good reason. There are plenty other things I’d rather spend our money on! The boy loves shoes and frequently will use his own money to buy cool shoes.

He wears them all the time and loves them. Plus, he’s just as cute as a button in them :)

In the summer, my kids have daily/weekly chores that they do and, in turn, the earn an allowance.They always have to keep their rooms clean and put away their own laundry. But in the summer, they also fold and put away towels and socks. Switch loads of laundry, dishes, trash, sweeping, mopping, vacuuming, dusting and even cleaning their bathrooms- toilets and all. They really do work pretty hard for young ones. (They are always too busy during the school year, so they don’t do as many chores then. They don’t get any compensation for chores done during the school year.) If the work is done satisfactorily and without whining throughout the week, they each receive the dollar amount equal to their age on pay day.

That $8/week will surely be burning a hole in his pocket all summer! In an effort to help him not buy $8 worth of junk every week on payday, I’ve been withholding his pay the past couple weeks. I don’t often carry cash… so, I’ve been keeping a running tab and I will go get some cash soon so I can pay them what I owe them. The bright side is that I’m helping him save up a little bit more so maybe he can get something nicer!

Update since I wrote this post: we went camping and I gave him his back pay of $20 the 2nd day we were there. He tried not to spend it all and just bought one thing at a time from the gift shop. But, by the time our 2 days was up, he was B.R.O.K.E :)

God speaks thru boo-boos

2011-07-01T12:33:00.000-05:00

While Braden was at church camp, he scraped his finger on the concrete ground two different times while playing in a ga-ga ball tournament. He said it bled and it hurt really bad.

He held it up and he said, it’s kinda shaped like the state of Louisiana.

I took a look at it and said, “Oh my gosh! Turn it this way. Now what does it look like?”

He looked up at me and smiled and said, “No way!”

Do you see it?

His boo-boo was in the shape of Africa!

I told him that God used his pain to speak to us!

We’ve all been a little discouraged lately. When we started our adoption journey, the average time to wait for a referral was 8-9 months and we thought we might even have a chance at having her home just after school started this next year. Now the average wait time for a referral is around 14 months.

We have been on the waitlist about 10 1/2 months. We’re getting closer! But, it still seems like we’ve been waiting for her for so long.

The kids still pray for her every night and it just warms my heart that although they are discouraged and asking questions about why it’s taking so long, they’re not giving up hope either.

How can you miss someone so much without ever even knowing them? I don’t know, but we do. There’s definitely something missing in our home and it’s her.

So, when we saw this “sign”, we talked about it and we decided to take it as God saying, “Hang in there. She’s coming. I’m watching over her. I’ve got it all under control. I love you.”

Thank you, Lord, for speaking to us!

Braden thought it was SUPER COOL that this happened to him and he’s been begging me to blog about it and tell people ever since. He has a copy of this picture in his room to remind him of it.

He’s a proud big brother and follower of Jesus!

What she does to stay occupied

2011-06-30T16:36:00.001-05:00

As you probably already know by now, I work from home. Gracie has been at home with her work at home mom since she was 7 months old. The child knows how to occupy herself!

Here’s some snapshots I found on my phone from back in the winter.

This day, she was pretending it was a beach day. The blankets were the sand. She even had her bikini and ukulele!

This day, she had made all sorts of shapes out of construction paper and tape and put them in her rolling suitcase. She set up a “shop” to sell her wares.

She used paper, tape and a rubber band to make herself a guitar. I was pretty impressed by this one. I didn’t even know she was working on this and she did it all by herself!

Here is an art project we did together one day.

If her bubba is home, the two of them are likely to be playing pretend together. This day, they had set up an animal shop in the living room.

Do you clean up a lot of messes, you ask?

Why yes. Yes, I do.

But because these things keep her occupied for a while, at least I am able to get some work done before I have to clean it all up!!

Modern Mission

2011-06-29T20:43:00.001-05:00

Our friend Niki celebrated her 40th bday by having several families go to Modern Mission to play outdoor laser tag.

Braden had been to bday parties there 3 times before and Jason had been once. Rhett, Gracie and I had never been.

We had THE BEST time! Aside from all the ticks in the woods :)

We were split into teams (kids vs adults) and we did a few of their different options of games. They were all different war/strategy games and we had a blast.

I can’t wait to go again!! I’d love to get a big group of adult friends together to go.

Here we are getting geared up before heading out to our mission!

(I’m including this picture, just because I’m aware that there aren’t many pics of me on this blog. I look like an ultra goober the way I was all hunched over. Apparently it was my sub conscious effort to get more on Gracie’s level. Jason was doing it too! So, this picture is on here, but will remain small :)

Boys ready to go get in the action!!

Wouldn’t you know… the kids beat the pants off the parents.

Although they did have a teenager and 2 adults (1 of whom happened to be the owner of the establishment and was a total sniper…)

They thought they were big stuff!

Gracie couldn’t actually play, but she wondered the woods with us and played along. It was really hot that day and she was a trooper. My strapping husband carried her around a good part of the day once she just got too tuckered out.

I found out that I’m a pretty dang good shot for a girl. I injured and killed several members of the enemy team throughout the day.

I’m hooked. I wanna go play again!!

12 year anniversary gift

2011-06-28T21:44:00.001-05:00

May 29 we celebrated our 12 year wedding anniversary. The fact that it falls on Memorial weekend each year, is always both a blessing and a curse. This year, it was a blessing for me and a curse for Jas. Ha!

We’ve been wanting to replace the floors in our living area downstairs since we bought the house 2 years ago. We finally decided to do it over Memorial weekend this year and this was my anniversary gift from my hubby.

Best. Present. Ever.

Before pics of NASTY carpet
(I took most of these pics with my phone…)

The floor had recently been shampooed and had JUST been vacuumed. How do you like those dark stains?

How about these?

And don’t forget the large yellow pet stain left over by the previous occupants. The flash makes it hard to see, but trust me… it’s yellow. This part was hiding under our couch… so gross…

Good riddance carpet!!!

Mom and Dad came over to help us get started on the hardwood floors. We were so thankful for the help!

End of Work Day 1. WOW!

The next morning, when I woke up, I walked in on this. Laying on the bean bags (the only living room furniture we had left!) and playing Wii.

It took Jason up until late on Monday night to finish the trim and everything. At that point, he had worked 3 weeks straight without a day off and then he worked his tail off Sat, Sun and Monday of our long weekend. Then had to work a long week the next week too.

And he never complained (as usual). He said he was just happy because I was happy. Seriously, he’s my hero.

We managed to sneak away for a little bit on the Monday afternoon to go furniture shopping. (We sold our old sectional on craigslist the week before. That microfiber suede was about the WORST material to have with children. The couch was stained and I had it cleaned from time to time, but it was almost $200 to have it cleaned! Crazy! Time for something more family friendly!

I LOVE my new floors AND my new furniture. I’ve been waiting quite a while for this so I’m SO thankful!!

A view of the other side of the living room. (With all the clean blankets and sleeping bags from the weekend’s camping trip…waiting to be put away… :)

I LOVE my anniversary gift!!!!!

Mamma’s Favorite Song

2011-06-27T17:31:00.001-05:00

By special request, a special guest star made an appearance to sing my favorite song today.

Enjoy :)

We love us some Tim Hawkins!

Random

2011-06-26T23:13:00.001-05:00

Misc pictures on my computer.

Life is good :)

Body Art

2011-06-24T14:23:00.001-05:00

On the last day of school, instead of having his friends sign his yearbook, Braden decided to have them sign his arm!

I let him wear it for a couple days and then made him wash it off. LUCKILY, he was smart enough to have them use dry erase markers instead of permanent ones!

Talent Show 2011

2011-06-23T08:48:00.001-05:00

Both boys participated in the school talent show this year. They both did SO great!!

Rhett’s class performed a dance to a medley of songs that their teacher put together.

The video is split into two parts because I didn’t realize that Rhett would be coming in for his last part before the girls were finished with the Umbrella song.

Rhett is in the jeans with holes in the knees, black t shirt and black gloves. I was a little disappointed that I couldn’t see him better from where I was sitting…

Here’s the first part!

Here’s the 2nd part! The boys are slithering into their spots for the big finale as the girls are finishing up the Umbrella song. How fun and creative! I loved it and wanted to see them do it again!!

Braden and his BFFs performed a song and dance once again this year. Other than some technical difficulties with the microphones in the beginning, they did perfectly!

Braden is in the jeans, Africa shirt and fedora.

They choreographed it themselves and they worked really hard on it. They each practiced their own parts on their own time and they got together to practice as a group 5 or 6 times over the 6 weeks or so leading up to the talent show.

They’re already talking about what they want to do for the talent show next year!!

I’m SO proud of both of my boys!!! Can’t wait until next year’s talent show—Gracie is already saying she is going to be in it!

Show Day

2011-06-22T13:46:00.001-05:00

Rhett took a karate class at the Little Gym this past semester. The last day of class, they had a show day where they got to show off their skills to the parents.

Jason was working in Rogers that afternoon, so he was even able to meet us there and watch too. We were so thankful for that!!

Way to go Rhett man!!! You are awesome!!

He liked the class ok, but it wasn’t a challenge to him at all and he got quite bored with it. Even though the class age limit went up to age 12, he was the oldest kid in the class.

We’ve talked with him about his next adventure. We discussed Taekwando, Gymnastics and Hockey.

His choice as of right now is Hockey. He is going to be starting an ice skating class in a couple of weeks. If he picks up the skating ok, the plan is for him to sign up for the hockey team. I think he could be really good at it with his body type and his personality. I hope he will like it! He’s tried several different sports, but so far hasn’t found the thing that he loves. So, we’re going to keep trying until he finds it!! If nothing else, he’ll sure be a well rounded little boy because he’s experiencing so many different things.

I’m so thankful to be able to provide my children with opportunities for extra curricular activities. I’ll admit, having 3 kids involved in so many different things is hard on me because of the schedule/transporting, going to all the practices, games, etc. BUT, I wouldn’t trade it for the world!

End of year school awards

2011-06-21T08:42:00.001-05:00

First, there was Braden’s Spanish Awards.

Here he is receiving his certificate and ribbon on stage.

Each student was chosen to take part in some part of the ceremony. Some did skits, etc. Braden had originally been chosen to recite the pledge in Spanish, but he backed out because he was afraid he was going to mess it up.

He ended up having to dance….he was a little embarrassed… When we got home, he asked me if I videoed it. When I told him that I did, he told me not to put it on facebook or the blog :) He’ll just have to forgive me later. Ha!

Next we had the end of year awards ceremony.

Both of the boys got awards in Math and Reading. Awesome job boys!!!

Rhett’s Bday Pool Party

2011-06-19T21:43:00.001-05:00

The last Friday of school, we had some of Rhett’s friends over to the pool for a belated birthday party. His birthday was in April, but we were never able to have him a party, so we decided to just wait until the pool opened so he could enjoy a “summer” birthday party.

He wanted a Star Wars theme, a cookie cake and pizza. Also, he specifically wanted to put the candles in the pizza and NOT the cake :)

He had a great time and loved his party! He also got to have his first friend sleepover here and invited 2 friends to spend the night. He felt like such a big boy!

Happy birthday again Rhett!!

Mothers Day

2011-06-01T22:19:00.001-05:00

I had a wonderful Mothers Day this year!

I opened my eyes to find these beautiful roses on a table at the end of our bed. My hubby is an early riser, so he’d already woken up and gone to the store to get me these by the time I woke up.

Here’s Gracie in some of her dress up clothes with my flowers.

Here she is holding my Mothers Day card she made for me.

Braden made me a homemade piñata in Spanish class. When he gave it to me he said, “the last step was to fill it with candy and I just realized I forgot that part…” :)

Here’s my sweet card from Rhett. The colored paper at the top is a paper flower. I especially love the award at the bottom!

Inside of Rhett’s card.

After we woke up, we got ready and headed to Silver Dollar City to spend the day. We met my parents and my brother and his family there. My mom got to spend the day with all of her children and grandchildren for Mothers Day!

When we were there it was the last day of the World Fest. We got to watch performers from Trinidad and Tobago. They were incredible. I could’ve sat there and watched them all day. Here’s Rhett doing the limbo with them. Gracie had just gone through.

Rides!

I’m so thankful to be a mother and thankful that I got to spend my mothers day with my mother and my family!

Soccer!!

2011-05-25T21:56:00.001-05:00

BIG foot!!!

I love these where he is telling his team mates where to stand in preparation for a penalty kick or a corner kick. I love how much he loves the game.

One member of the BK fan club!

Another medal! Way to go Big B!

Day at the Park

2011-05-21T19:31:00.001-05:00

One nice Saturday when we had a rare break from soccer, we headed to the park to spend a few hours. We had a great time!

I looked over, and this sweet boy had gotten his sister in the swing and was pushing her. Warms a mamma’s heart!!

Proof the I have goofy kids…

Another heart warmer for this Mamma:
Big brother playing with his sister.

I LOVE this picture that Jason took.
This captures Rhett’s personality perfectly!!!!

Gracie posing… I told her to give me “fierce” :)

All of my loves on the swings!

Rhett pitching…

Braden catching.

Bad bounce caught on camera :)

I love days like this!!

Reflections

2011-05-17T22:04:00.001-05:00

Braden’s photography entry that won 1st place in his division at his school won 3rd place in the State!

He was honored at a luncheon recently.

Here he is standing next to his entry.

Miss Arkansas Alyse Eady was there! Gracie was excited to get a picture with her. We got to see her do her ventriloquism. Let me just say… she is awesome! She totally should’ve won Miss America!!

Here’s Braden with his entry, medal and certificate.

He can’t wait to enter again next year!!

Dance Pics

2011-05-16T22:02:00.001-05:00

Here’s some pics from the dance recital. She didn’t like the bright flash in her eyes and the first couple are with the flash. She did better after we turned the flash off!

Grandma came to spend the day and come to the recital with us.

MeMe and PaPa came to watch too :)

After the show with her favorite red roses

We had to get one with her cool hat!

She had a great time and loves to perform on stage. We can’t wait until next year’s recital already!

The Kennett's Krazy Life

18 Months

Weighty Update #1

1 cabinet done!

My plans

Boys/Girls Weekend

A Weighty Issue

11 Random Things

Adoption Fundraiser

Braden's "Late" bday bash

First Pageant

17

Happy

Things I love about Christmas break

Christmas Post #2 in pictures

Christmas Post #1 in Pictures

A girl and her dog

I might have a future artist living in my house

A few of my favorite ornaments

Jingle Bell Rock

Masks

Overnight Trip to Branson

Decorating for Christmas

Little Rock Field Trip

Still catching up

Tuesday Night Randomness

16 Months

We got a dog!

Things I am thankful for

Word to the wise...

Happy Birthday MeMe!

15 Months

Braden on Shakespeare

Grandparents Day

Labor Day Trip to Tulsa

Costumes 2011

Hello Kitty Ballerina

Slash. The Legend.

And Napoleon Dynamite himself.

Boys Fun Night Out

Catch-Up

Skol Vikings!

18 Months

Wasn't it just yesterday???

B’s Weekend Soccer Highlights

Highlight Reel from BASC Tourney

Rhett’s playing Baseball!

Soccer Shots

The boys played football

Rhett Baptism

13 Months

Random

It’s a proud moment for a Mamma…

First Day of School

Devils Den Camping Trip

1 year

Fancy Princess Birthday Tea party

Braden on Guitar

Gracie’s Graduation and Birthday

First camping trip of the year

Rhett’s BIG day!!! **MUST READ**

Our home on wheels

Pirate Bunco

Vacation 5

Vacation 4

Vacation 3- Family Pics

Vacation 2

Please Help This Family

11 MONTHS

Vacation 1

A little boys purchases

God speaks thru boo-boos

What she does to stay occupied

Modern Mission

12 year anniversary gift

Mamma’s Favorite Song

Random

Body Art

Talent Show 2011

Show Day

Rhett’s BIG day!!! MUST READ