Mother's Day

Last Sunday Larry took the kids and I was able to go scrapbooking all afternoon with my mom. We went to a local place that sells everything my little scrapbooking heart could want. They have tables in the back and a potty close by-hehe. We talked and laughed and I completed ten pages of my little boys baby book. We are up to 6 months old, which is great considering I am having my next one in about 4 months. We then drove to Mom and Dad's for dinner prepared by the hubby's. We had Strawberry cake and ice cream for dessert and just had a wonderful time together as a family laughing and watching everyone be really silly that night. Water spilling, cake licking, Evan's constant crying(he apparently missed mommy a lot) lot's of memories.

Larry not only gave me the day to get away but he also gave me a gift certificate to a spa to get a manicure and pedicure!!!




Dad gave mom a Ipod shuffle and the kids gave her an Itunes gift card. We gave her coffee, a mug and her favorite cute stuffed animals.

Birthday weekend

My sister in law has offered to take my kids from today until Sunday! I am so excited. Larry and I are going to go to the Narnia movie and dinner and I am going to do a lot of resting maybe a little bit of shopping too! I am about to redecorate my living room.
THANK YOU ROBIN AND STEVE!!!

My little girl

Katherine is not a toddler anymore. The questions she asks me and the conversation that is constantly on her lips shows me that she is becoming a little girl. We have more fun together and I tend to tell her stories all the time. She is playing games, communicating how she feels and I enjoy being with her. Now, we definitely have our days that we need to be separated but I even need a break from my best friends from time to time.

At Katherine's b-day party I could see a side to her that gave me a peek into how I can more effectively pray for her as she encounters others. She LOVES her friends and gets a lot of her energy from the fun times that they have together. They way they think about her and the things they do for her really touches her little heart. She has talked so much about what everyone gave her and how much fun she had. I have known for awhile that she was just like me but seeing her shine at the party proved it all the more. Get her to a party when she is sad and take away getting with her friends when she is bad(like being disrespectful to me all day, have I mentioned her strong attitude?) I am so grateful to have a little idea of some of the struggles she will have because we are so much alike. I also am excited to see her thrive in certain things that I love too. The Lord knew what He was doing when he gave her to me. It is tru they are a blessing from the Lord.

Mommy loves you baby and I know, you say I say that all the time but I do, I LOVE YOU!!!

Did I mention she was born on my birthday-God has a way of setting things up like that doesn't HE??

Friends at the Party

Birthday party

This is just a taste of the great day we had. She was so cute all day and so grateful for EVERYTHING that she received.

Feelin' better

It has been a week and a half and I am doing a lot better. I got up this morning with no pain and I walked normal. Now, I still have to take it easy because in about an hour or so I will start to ache if I do too much.

All of the wonderful ladies who have helped me in the last week and my man who has done an amazing job, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. It has shown me so much about service and love. I am truly humbled by your gifts to me.

We have a crazy weekend and there will be lots of pictures and videos come Monday to upload. B-day parties, Church picnics and Mother's day it is going to be fun! I will be sitting waching all of these events but fun none the less.

I honor you all fellow Mother's!!! It takes you to make this life so much richer for our kids!!

Evan's big boy bed

Since I can't lift anything for two weeks we had to pull down the Toddler bed from the attic for Evan. He is doing great!! He hasn't gotten out of bed one time. Can you believe that?! We do our evening routine just like always and he calls for us in the AM to come and get him out of bed. Amazing. I am so pleased to see that all the hard work that we did with routine and their own beds from a month old has paid off with both of them. Katherine did just as well when we moved her to her big girl bed. She would get out but only to explore a little during nap time.

Bum leg!!

Ok,
Remember that wonderful day on the Mtn that I talked about. One thing I didn't mention was the fact that I slipped and did a split of sorts the last 100 yards of the hike. Being the athletic girl that I am I got up brushed it off and thougth nothing of it. Especially becuase it was starting to rain and I wanted to get the kids to the car and my self to the bathroom before it poured. We went home Evan got a stomach bug I sat on the couch and did nothing the rest of the day, except eat. Monday morning I went to exercise class which I do three times a week and I left Evan in the stroller next to me while I got my heart pumpin'. My instructor decided to concentrate on Legs. If you have any experience at all with physical training you can imagine what the workout did to my leg. I have a ligament in my right hip right at the bone that has been aggravated, stretched and screaming at me every step I take. My chiro and OB are in agreement that I should be on couch arrest. I have been in this place since Wed....ARGH!!!!!!!! (Actually truth be told I went to Gymboree to get a baby gift and the video store to get 27 dresses while my mom had the kids today after I went to the Chiro) Two weeks from now I will be able to at least go for a brisk walk to get exercise but until then NOTHING. Major body issues and fears are creeping up and I am still stuffing my face because I am emotional, tired, frustrated, you name it, any reason to eat what I want. I know I should stop but I am just a mess and so are my kids.

This has been really tough on the whole family and I need your prayers. We need your prayers. The kids don't understand and Larry bless his heart is not used to me sitting at all. I am always moving and he usually has to ask me to stop and just watch TV with him. So if I am a little cloudy about how great my life is you will now understand. It is so humbling to receive all the help I have needed, especially with two kids.

SPLASH!!!

Morning on the Mountain

She posed herself and asked Daddy to take her picture because she was so beautiful--I think we need to eat some humble pie!!

Not sure what Evan is doing to his face but this is a try at getting photos of my belly.


Along the way every little puddle they saw they would jump or splash in. Evan would even backtrack if he thought he missed one.




The backdrop is just beautiful off of the mountain.

Katherine conquering the Rock. Then Evan had to conquer teh fallen tree.

We went to the Mountain today to see how far we could climb with two toddlers. We made it about halfway. I dressed the kids in their swimsuits and wet shoes so they could splash and play as much as they wanted. We got some great video and made quite a few people smile along the way.
These family times together minister to my heart so greatly.

Evan's turn to shine

Finger paints

Since Katherine has been taking art lessons she loves to paint. She mixes all the colors and tends to get it everywhere. Evan now joins in the fun and decided to paint himself as well!





Each morning Evan comes to snuggle. HE drinks his milk and gets right in between Daddy and Mommy. These are special times! He is so funny and does such cute things with us. My favorite is his one leg on the other knee in this picture. He looks like such a big boy.

Family night

On Thursdays they have family night at our local Chick-fil-A. We have a wonderful time seeing the clown that is there and coming home with full tummies and balloon hats.

Evan content with a paci

While his sister was performing to her hearts content Evan decided he had enough and went to find his paci. I found him on a corner couch all by himself with his paci in his mouth. He had found the diaper bag, retrieved the paci and sat for a good 15 minutes all by himself. I certainly have two totally different children.



After resting for awhile he decided to take the stage with his daddy and uncles and attempt to perform with them. He eventually made his way to the guitar and tried to take over for Rob.

Blossoming in front of an audience

We went to Knoxville for a birthday celebration for Larry's Aunt Carolyn. Everyone performed for her and Katherine didn't want to miss out on the action. She didn't have anything prepared but after watching her cousins and uncle perform she made some of her own music and sang these songs. I couldn't help but have flashbacks of myself doing the same thing when I was little.

His truths that speak while I drive for hours

As I drove to the beach I put in Cd's that would lift my Spirit and help me stay awake while my little one's slept in the back seat. It was a huge encouragement to me. Even though I wasn't reading scripture and closing my eyes to pray, he met me on that long road ans spoke hope to my soul!

I have been struggling with some fear that has got my imagination running to places it shouldn't about the little one in my womb. I shared with my hubby and bible study sisters last Tuesday and on Wed. while I was driving these two songs were the first one's I heard. They are especially meaningful because I haven't listened to this particular CD in awhile and one of my friends encouraged me with words from the Lord that are all throughout these songs.

Rita Springer- I have to believe

You are Good
It's Your constant love
that keeps me on my knees
The shadow of Your wings
still hides me
It's because You're slow to anger
that I still house Your fame
It's because You're rich in mercy
that I can still proclaim
Chorus:
You are good, You are good, You are good (2x)
It's the fire in Your eyes
that burns away my sin
It's the love flame in Your heart
that captures me again
It's because Your scarlet blood
flowed to steal my shame
It's because You rose from death
that I can live again

You're good and Your faithfulness,
it goes on forever
You're good and Your faithfulness,
it goes on and on and on and on

This last phrase goes on and on and it rang in my heart. I continued to dwell on it throughout the week and it has restored hope to my soul!! My Spirit is in agreement with the truth of God and I can speak in confidence that He is good and in my life He has always been faithful. Even when the trials seemed to hard to bear He has been the great reward that I would never trade for anything I was losing, grieving, or being tempted by.

The Trip

I went to the beach by myself with the two little ones and it was an adventure. My mom asked me to go to the beach and stay with my sisters the second half of their Spring Break. We had great weather during the day and each evening as it got cooler we went to eat dinner. We all got great sun but my little sister got sun poisoning and had to stay inside one day. She wasn't too upset though because there was a ANTM marathon and she was very entertained.

Now to the meaty portion of this post. Traveling while five months pregnant with two under 4 and two teenagers is ill advised!!! I did this same drive last summer and had the kids by myself and did great. I was fully expecting another fun trip that I would love to do again. Well, throwing in the fact that I am five months pregnant and I felt the pressure of making sure my sisters enjoyed themselves on their vacation put me over the edge. I was edgy, uncomfortable and SICK of putting on and cleaning off sunscreen and sand. As much as I love the sun and would prefer to be at a pool any day over the cold weather of winter, it just wasn't ministering to me like I had hoped. In one day we went to the beach a total of three times-do you know what that entails??? Applying sunscreen, putting on bathing suits, cleaning off after fun in the ocean, then taking showers to really clean off before naps. Doing this all again twice before we get in the car to go to dinner. Are you tired??? I am exhausted. I am not a lover of sand so it might have made my job a little harder, but who likes to sleep sandy?? I don't and I sure didn't want the kids naps interrupted. I am almost done venting then I will get to the better highlights of the week. No pictures, no chocolate(one of my sisters is losing a lot of weight right now and I wanted to help her) no comfy couch, no hubby, no break from being disciplinarian, no time alone, not even in the bathroom (all you moms know what I mean) ok I think I should stop before my mom reads this post and feels really bad that she asked me to take this trip.

HIGHLIGHTS-

Shopping! I had a great time going to the outlets and getting summer things for Larry the kids and visiting the best store in the world-Carter's warehouse outlet-everything was 3.99 and they had 6-pack onesies that were so adorable. I really would have gotten into trouble if I knew what our baby was going to be. New sandals from Tommy, handsome polos at hartstrings and dresses for Katherine that she is just too cute in. At one point I was very disappointed they didn't have one maternity store-but that ended up being ok because I needed to stop somewhere. I love a good deal.

Kite flying! I loved seeing my kids run up and down the beach flying kites with their Aunt Katie. They loved it and the camera was in the hotel-sigh

Eating a dinner that I didn't have to prepare or clean up!

Laughs!! My sisters provided lots of great laughs that will make my sides ache for ages to come because our family loves to tell a good story. " Can you get my Fone(spelled out instead of asked for so Katherine wouldn't touch it)?? Your what? I know how to spell I just like to spell it that way b/c it is easier" Guess you had to be there.

Strawberries, shortcake, and whipped cream for dessert every night. YUM-O. Thoroughly enjoyed while sitting quietly after my kids were in bed.

Driving and stopping wherever I wanted because I was the only driver on the trip.

Seeing Katherine and Evan play in the ocean and the pool and just have a blast with the simple things in life. Katherine was so friendly to everyone she met and I could see what a wonderful gift she is to the world. Evan staying in my shadow an d just being content to be right where I was. A momma needs that attention when she has such an independent daughter.

My next post will describe some of the amazing things the Lord spoke to my heart as I drove for hours while the kids slept and I needed to be kept awake. He is so faithful and good!!!

****Pictures would be in the post but I didn't take one picture with my camera-can you believe that?!?*************

Oh my goodness...

...they have them for the kids too.

I am in love...

with these...
HOTSLINGS
A lady at the Farmers Market had one and she was just about my size. Her third child was in the sling while her other two were with her and it looked so comfortable. I asked her about it and she was more then happy to tell me all of the wonderful things about her Hotsling. Now I just have to decide what color and size. Thank goodness they sell them at Target so I can go soon to try one on. I also found them on Ebay and boy I could get in trouble with all the great deals and styles!!!
Come on who couldn't see me in this...