Thanksgiving

So Thanksgiving is in 2 days. I'm so scatter brained right now that it takes a lot for me to focus. To sit and really think. I always call and ask Layne to help me sort through things in my head and emotions because I have a hard time balancing. Balancing life.

Layne and Jon have been posting and updating on a 13 year old boy Marcelino. He is suffering immensely right now and I can't even imagine what it is like to be in Layne and Jon's shoes and to be witnessing this pain and heartache in such a real way. I cry every single time I read one of their posts. I can't help but want to immediately sell everything we have here, pack up and move to live with them. They are doing such an incredibly hard thing yet incredibly beautiful by loving these people through some of the hardest and most painful times of their lives and ushering them into heaven with prayers and tears and most importantly the love of Jesus. They are physically being the hands and feet of Jesus to these brave and precious people. Oh how I want to just go...

And then I see my parents. I see them doing the same thing but here. I see them serving those who need the love of Jesus just the same as those in Africa. I see them going to Driscoll children's hospital and shining the light of Christ to everyone they speak to. I see them investing in people's lives and being strong enough to hang in there when it seems as though nothing is changing. Still serving and loving and going beyond themselves. Putting others first. I want to serve...

This Sunday we heard from a man that my dad grew up with. He played professional baseball and gave that up to take his family and be missionaries in Africa. He said something that really hit home. He said, " God isn't going to send you off to another part of the world if you aren't already doing something right where you are at here." There are so many things I need to work on. Areas I need some major pruning. I want to be faithful and diligent to serve right where I am at and to stop wishing to be somewhere else. People are hurting and dying all around us. I thank the Lord for people like Jon and Layne who are answering a call on their lives to serve in Africa. I just know that I want to be faithful right now. No matter where I am at. I want Jesus to look down and say "well done." I want to radiate Him through every part of my life. I have so much stuff and self in the way that I need him to help me remove it. But I'm going to keep praying. Keep pressing in. There is SO much more to life than the here and now. So much more than vacations and lifestyles. I want to change...

Lord Jesus I ask you to prune what needs to be pruned. To take away and refine the ugliness of self and sin that are so in control and to replace it with your love. Your light. Your truth. Change me Lord. Don't ever stop sending things in my life to change me. You are what life is all about. Help me to keep You as my FOCUS.

So this Thanksgiving I am going to try to do what is hard for this scatter brained mom to do. I'm going to focus. I am going to spend time praising and thanking the Lord for the blessings in my life that I so don't deserve. I am going to pray and interecede for those who can't. Those who are serving selflessly. I want to truly be

THANKFUL.

So it seems silly posting some of these pics right after writing that but I can't figure out how to copy and separate the two. So here are some pics of what we have been up to.
:)

I got this flapper style band for new york. I thought it would be fun :)

The flapper style I think is so FUN!

I painted her nails and toes. She was very happy about it and it's the most still she has ever sat! I was impressed!

One of my closest friends and her husband opened up a new ice cream place called Camille's. She has a sweet little one year old that needed a shirt and bow for opening night! I had a blast making this! And if you are in Corpus ever. Go check it out. It's some YUMMINESS!

My little hams. :) Our turkey's I should say ;)

Yay! I'm blogging again! And with pics!!

Yesterday was our Thanksgiving Feast at Mother's Day and it was YUMMY! Of course my picky child Gauge started crying because he does not like chicken nuggets, macaroni and cheese, green beans or corn. For reals? The child eats peanut butter crackers everyday. And raisins. So I had to sit with him and tell him I would get him some when we left. PB crackers that is. So now we have a week off from Mother's Day Out and I have plans of catching up on my crafts and cleaning!! :) Maybe a little organization if there is time. Ha probably not. I can dream eh?

Then we go back for one week at the beginning of December and then Chris and I are off for NYC!!!!!!!!

I'm so pumped. It's coming up so fast! I haven't had time to really grasp it or to think of how much I'm going to miss the kiddos. We both have to not talk about it or we get super sad. That's life right? You can't wait to a little break and vacay and then when it gets here the only thing you want to do is be back with the kiddos! My mom is just told me the other day it was going to be a lot easier this year watching them than it was 2 years ago when Teagan was only 4 months old! No night feedings! haha! She just may need a vacay when we get back where she can rest a whole week after they poop her out!

So you know how I was talking on the last post about getting up before the kids to spend time in the Word. No slacking. Start seeking Him harder. Yo. Dropped the ball! I would have to get up at 5 or 5:15 to do this because my kids are early birds that think they get a worm and man 5 comes around fast! I feel like I've been hit by a bus every morning. Anyhoo I haven't done it this week but I'm going to work on it. I told my mom the other day they woke up at 5:20 and I was complaining about how I just want to sleep till 6:30 or 7 and then it hit me. I'm supposed to be getting up anyways! I'm going to pray that He will give me the strength I need. And I know He will. Keep me accountable peeps! I need someone to come over here in the morning and yank me out of bed! :)

Here are some pics!

The first two are from Mother's Day Out and our costume parade. I made the kids Mickey and Minnie. Their favorites :)

The other is my class and I made the 4 of us 4 year old teachers and tutu and matching shirt and headband that said our names with a frog behind it because we are the frog class. :)

Then I thought I would post some preggo pics for Miss Layne! The first one is end of May so I am about 6 months preggo and then the last one is the morning I went in to have Teagan. Just wait for that one Layne. The belly is amazing. You think there is no possible way to get bigger. And then after one week of having sweet Anaya you won't even remember what that belly was like! It's craziness. The only think that helps me remember is my little pooch with elephant skin that is there for rememberance ;) hahaha

Whoa. Where have I been???

Seriously! That was one long break! I have been going non stop for a while now. I guess that's how it is with life huh? The kiddos and I have added Tues and Thursday at Mother's Day Out and I feel like whoa! It's taking me a bit to get used to it. Not that the job is hard. It's not. It's loads of fun and the kiddos are doing so good in their classes. It's just that I lost two days from 8:15-3pm to do anything else! Why do we always have to be making multiple trips to the grocery store? And cleaning?? Oh good golly. I keep it 'neat' but as far as CLEAN. Hmmmm not so much. I'm an all or none person so when I clean I gotta do the whole house. :)

BUT! With all that said, I'm going to start getting back to writing on the blog. Keeping updated. I read back through my xanga from 2008 and really enjoyed being able to see pics and read how life was and what God was doing. It's such a great way to document life ya know? I can look back and see how faithful God was and is and all He has brought us through. With that said I am also going to start being diligent in my quiettime with the Lord. Kids make it harder but I am going to push through and make it priority like it should be. I know that He is the only One who can get me through each day and give me the strength and power to do it all in joy and in Him.

So Lord, I'm ready. I'm ready to go deep with You. No more slack. No more complacency. I miss Your prescence and power in my life and heart. I want to seek You and find You and to do that I must do it with ALL my heart. So here we go Lord. I'm ready!

"For I live only to see Your face, to shine on me...."

Our First Family Vacay!

That's right! We went on our 1st family vacation this last week. We left Monday morning for Waco and stayed in Waco until Wednesday, drove up to Ft. Worth for the night and came back Thursday to eat with some friends before we drove home that night. (We decided to drive home that night so that the kiddos would sleep for the long drive back. Teagan did. Gauge slept about 2 hours and then stayed up watching for hotels all the way home.)

Right before we left, while we were filling up gas at the Sam's Club, Chris and I shook on that we would be ducks for the week and let everything roll off our backs. Well it worked! :) I think taking on the attitude to be laid back and not worry about anything such as naps and eating and all that made for a really fun trip. (Good thing I'm learning early huh? I'm sure my kids would appreciate this mentality more often at home too! ;) )

Anyhoos we did stop at Van's for some killer breakfast (which I totally want to enter them in for Diners Drive Ins and Dives!) and then kept trucking until Buda so we could let the kids run around at Cabela's. Layne, they were super interested in the animals from Africa and kept saying "These animals are where Aunt Layne and Uncle Jon are!" :) We finally made it to Waco about 3:30ish. We had dinner at the Pizza House with Chris' friend from work and his wife and little girl and also drove by our old house and Chris' work, to which his boss actually walked out when we were turning around and he tried to get his job back ;) Then it was back to the hotel to see how sleeping would go! First night I had to sleep on the floor with Teagan. Second night I had to start off down there and then moved to bed. Third night they slept together on the air mattress fine and dandy. I believe they were POOPED! They really didn't ever nap but occasionally would fall asleep in the car so we would try to drive around for a while.

Tuesday we got up and went to the Waco Cameron Park Zoo to meet up with our friends the Ward's and the Kleins. The zoo was awesome and it was so fun catching up with our friends and watching everyone's kiddos together. We all grabbed Bush's Chicken (which was a must and did not dissapoint) to take back to their house and meet up with the Perry's. We had half of our old LifeGroup back together and there were 7 kiddos altogether. None of us had kids when we were in LG together so it was so fun to see everyone again and their sweet munchkins. I wish we would have had weeks to spend together but we had to all go since our kiddos were getting to the end of their ropes and needed naps. So glad we got to see the Perry's and the Klein's before they left back overseas. We ended up swimming at the hotel later that afternoon with the Ward's and then went to eat at Ninfa's (another one of Chris and I's favs).

The next morning the headed to Ft. Worth to see the May's, the Phillip's and the Boatman's. We met up at the Chuck E Cheese and then decided to go to the Ft. Worth Zoo since it was half price day. It was so stinkin' hot but the zoo was awesome! Both zoo experiences were amazing and I'm so glad we did them. I'm going to make the kiddos one of those photo books of our trip so they can look back through all we did. They absolutely LOVED the animals and definately the hotels! ;)

We had dinner at the Phillip's house with everyone and it was such a good time laughing and catching up with everyone. It had been over 3 years for some of us to see each other and we definately said we wouldn't wait that long again. Wish we all lived closer!!

The next day we headed back to Waco so we could eat dinner with the Ward's and Klein's and so Chris could see Dustin. We had a blast and the kiddos were pretty exhausted from the whole trip that we decided to drive home that night and let them sleep on the way home.

The trip went so well and so much better than I expected. We really bonded the 4 of us and the kids are going to be sad when Dad has to go back to work after having him off on vacation for 12 days! It was such a great and fun experience and I can't wait to keep having fun times with the fam! It was SO great to catch up with all of our friends. We left sad because we so badly would love to be back in Waco. We miss it. It's such a great little place and we miss our church peeps. The one year we were there for so impacting and impressionable that we love it so much and it hold so many great memories and relationships. Maybe one day we will be back there. :)

We sure loved coming home and seeing family again though. The kiddos missed everyone and they were super excited to see their NiNi! ;) And of course everyone else too!

I'm praying God would just use that time we had as a family and catching up with friends as a refresher and to give us a little push to go deeper with Him. We hit roadblocks sometimes and it's nice to have that encouragement from people you love and respect.

So here's to next summer! We will see where we go! I think we might just be a vacationing family now ;)

The Kleins
River

Nat and Vik. LOVE THEM!

Olivia

Lucy

River

Noah loves to dance. He is such a cutie!!

They got along nicely! ;) And Amy was sneaking them her amazing Smore brownies :)

My Owls!!

The habitats here were awesome at the Ft. Worth zoo!

trying to buy ice cream with his tokens :)

He has some amazing faces. He cracked me up!

The Perry's

Gauge jumping into the pool for the first time! Brave boy!

Maya

Chris and MJ

LOVE hotels :)Katies custard

So important I posted it twice ;)