Happy Anniversary

Today is our wedding anniversary. Yep, thirteen years ago, Craig and I were in my former church in downtown Orlando, getting ready to open this new chapter in our life. What a ride we've been on.

For a crazy reason, I'm having a hard time with this blog. I mean, how do I put into words what these thirteen years have meant? We've grown so much - as a couple, as a family, as two individuals. We've founder a deeper commitment that we couldn't possibly fathom when we said our vows. We've supported each other, encouraged each other and stood beside one another.

How do I put into words how much I love my husband? He makes me laugh. He makes me smile. He challenges me. He listens to me. He makes me talk. He is faithful. He is patient. He loves our kids. He is an amazing handyman and can fix just about anything. He lets me have girl time with my friends. We minister along side one another. He leads our family in wonderful ways. He is a true gift. He lets me cry when I need to and cries with me when we both need to. However, this does not come close to expressing all that he means to me. There just isn't enough space and nowhere near the words needed to voice them outloud!

I have enjoyed the past thirteen years. Here's a quick look at where we've been ~

Our Wedding Day

Our Honeymoon at St. Simons Island

5 Years Together (2 months before Trinity was born)

10 Years Together (one week before Xander was born)
13 Years Together

I am greatly looking forward to where God takes us in the future.

Happy Anniversary, Honey!!!

I love you!!!

Y<><>Y

A Farewell for Chris

Last Sunday, we got to share in a celebration and farewell luncheon for one of our church's recent graduates, Chris. (And before you ask, no we were not celebrating Chris's departure.) It has been quite a treat to watch Chris grow over the past 6 years through the youth ministry. That's probably one of our favorite things about working with youth - seeing where they come from and where they go.

It was a relaxed outdoor lunch at one of the nearby parks. The luncheon was a great time to wish him well and fellowship with friends. The kids got to play on the playground, which was a big thrill for them.

On Sunday, August 30th Chris heads off to Parris Island for boot camp for the Marines. We are very proud of the decision he's made to go into the military. We know it will be hard for him, but he will be covered in prayer by many.

Way to go, Chris!!!

Messy Party

Our friend, Teri, has a great tradition to mark the end of summer. This year was the third annual Messy Party. Yes the gathering lives up to it's name. Each year, she adds one more messy component and makes it that much messier. Kalyn, Xander and I packed a lunch, a few towels and a few changes of clothes and headed out last Friday to the party.

Kalyn is all about this party. It takes her all of about 30 seconds to find something and get it on her shirt. Xander was a bit more cautious. He came up to me, lifting up his hands saying, "Mommy . . . wet." I told him that it was okay. He responded with, "No, Mommy. Not okay." But he did get messy. He did get wet and he did have fun. The party included a sheet to spray paint upon, a pool of spaghetti noodles, a Georgia mud pool, a pool full of water and water guns, bubbles, a station with shaving cream and food coloring, a sand box and an area to paint smaller sheets of fabric and little clay statues.

A shaving cream fight between Britton, Allie, Kalyn and Sam

Picassos at work

Xander, Ivey and Kalyn having fun with the shaving cream. Kalyn's taking full advantage of the chance to get messy.

Spraypainting the big sheet

Spaghetti slinging (we just have to make sure this doesn't happen the next time we serve spaghetti for dinner)

Sitting in the sand (a great combination with a wet little boy)

The great part about the party is that they kids just run from area to area, coming to you only to be hosed off every so often. The kids got completely filthy and had an amazingly wonderful time with their friends!! What a great way to end the summer.

Slip & Slide

Last week, we brought out our newly-purchased Slip and Slide for the kids. Craig and I both remember sliding and having great fun with our slip and slides when we were kids and wanted to bring the same fun to our backyard. So, as the summer wound down, I was on the watch to find one on clearance. Success - I found one for only $5. It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon, so we decided to pull it out for some smiles.

Well, it took a while for the kids to figure it out. I know, it's hard to figure out a toy that involves running and sliding, but for some reason only Kalyn seemed to get it. But even she enjoyed sliding on her knees instead of on her stomach. Craig did a slide to show them how to do it. Then he had the kids start on their stomachs and he would slide them down, much like a bowling ball. After a bit, they finally seemed to get the hang of it and enjoy it!

We began in the back yard. Craig even added some baby shampoo to add to the slickness of the slide. Then, we decided to move to the front yard. There's a little bit more hill in the front and we thought the kids would slide a little easier. They did. We laughed. Gotta love the fun that a plastic sheet and some water brings!!!

Xander cheers on Craig as Craig gets fancy.

Just You and Me Today, Mommy

A couple of weeks ago, I was given a wonderful offer from our friend Cacee. She invited Xander over to play with her son Asher one day once Trinity was in school so I could have some one-on-one time with Kalyn. As I thought about it (trust me, I quickly accepted), I realized that Kalyn has very little one-on-one time with either Craig or I. I mean, since Xander's arrival almost three years ago, she's always been with at least one other child. I was really looking forward to surprising her with a day of just me and her.

After we dropped Xander off, who was very excited about going to Asher's house, we had to run a quick errand in Target before the fun began. She was skipping down the isle singing, "Just you and me today, Mommy. Just you and me today, Mommy." It make my heart just melt. She was ecstatic about our plans. But, even though the day was just for her, she was thinking about her siblings. While we were at Target, I let her choose a special treat for herself from the dollar area. She quickly asked me if she could get something for Xander and Trinity as well. So sweet!! (By the way, she choose a bubble gum chap stick for her, a grape chap stick for Trinity and a Spider man book for Xander.)

Our first bit took us to the playground. She got to choose which area we played in. She got do really whatever she wanted. It took her a little bit to get used to playing without Xander and Trinity around, but she had a blast. She climbed up the plastic rock wall. She slid down huge slides. She got to be pushed on the swings. She went her speed on the tire swing. She ran around and climbed up and down.




Then it was lunch time. We decided to go to Chick-Fil-A so she could play on the playground. Yummy food!!


After lunch, we headed to Lifetime to enjoy some time in the pool. It was pretty empty, so that was a really nice plus. We got to spend some very focused time working on her swimming without a float. She was getting so good! We splashed, we jumped, we swam, we played follow the leader. There was a lot of laughter and tons of smiles.

Kalyn in action ~

After a while at the pool, we had to head back to pick up Xander and head home. Xander was not without lots of fun either. He had a grand time with his buddy. They played cars, blocks and even made cookies. Asher is an only child and I'm not sure whether Cacee or Asher enjoyed having Xander there. It was a great day. Thank you, Cacee, many times over for this wonderful opportunity!!

Fancy Fixing

Over the past week or so, we have noticed a slight problem with our TV. When we tried to turn it on, the little blue light (showing that it was about to come on) would light up, but nothing would happen. Craig figured out that we simply needed to unplug it, then plug it back in and turn it back on. Well, after a few days, even that stopped working every time. We've had this television for less than three years and we don't have the money to go replace it, so, Craig started searching online to find out if anything had been posted about the problem.

Well, he found something. Apparently many people had run into the same problem with this same brand of TV. Unfortunately, all he was finding read that the company knew there was a problem, but they weren't doing anything about it. Not too promising. Then Craig found the best link. Someone had figured out how to fix the problem and had posted what he had done, step-by-step complete with pictures. So, being the wonderful handyman that he is, Craig decided to try and fix our TV.

He pulled it down and took the back off. He headed to Radio Shack to find the necessary replacement capacitors. He returned empty handed stating that they didn't have the exact matching one. After a phone call to a repairman associated with the TV brand, he found out that it would be fine to replace the broken part with the part found at Radio Shack. Excitedly, he headed back out and began working as soon as he got back home.

A little soldering, a little screwdriving, a very little bit of time (around 15 minutes) and an even less bit of money ($3.41) and we have a fixed TV.

We are so blessed to Craig who is so skilled!!!

The Next Partridge Family?

Our kids have tons of creativity. And tons of volume. Most of the time, that is not a good mix. However, sometimes it just provides a lot of laughter. Here's what we were blessed with recently. Just for the records, we have Trinity on drums, Kalyn on guitar and Xander on bass drums (that's simply what we were told).

Watch out world, here they come.

(Either that or run, run for your life.)

Xander's Stylin

Boys are very different than girls. I know that's a very obvious statement, but it seems each day I am finding more and more ways that Xander is truly all boy. He loves his cars. He can spot (or hear) and motorcycle before anyone else in the car (yes, even over his sisters' chatting). He loves his bucket of sports balls. He loves to be with Daddy and do everything like Daddy.

Another big different is in the area of hair. With both girls, they were probably around three before they had their first haircut. Now while Craig does have long hair, a toddler boy with long hair is a bit of a special story. So, we've had to adjust to giving him more trims and more frequently than the girls. This week, we looked at Xander and admitted that it was that time to pull out the trimmer and scissors.

Craig has become quite the barber. For the most part, Xander sits pretty still during the process. However, this time we had a little bit more fun. Here is Xander's new look!

And for those slightly harder rocker times -

Over the past week, he has sometimes asked for his hair to be "up" or "down". At one point, we were walking into the gym with it up when he started crying (I think it was about having to hold my hand in the parking lot). I turned to him and attempted to explain to him that he couldn't be a hard rocker and still cry about silly things. Unfortunately, I'm not sure he fully got it, but he did stop the whining (for a moment). Rock on, Little Man. Rock on.

The Bestest Day Ever

During Trinity's first day, I had planned to meet a couple of my friends at the gym for a hard workout and then take all the kids to the pool. Well, half of that worked out - the workout half. Unfortunately, when we headed to the pool, we found out that the hours had been changed and it would not be opened for another hour. So, we made a quick decision to take all the kids to a nearby park. Now, my kids are usually pretty flexible when changes come up (although often associated with many questions about the changes) and the park was a lot of fun, but Kalyn and Xander were very sad that they were not going to get to enjoy the pool.

So, we decided to wait and take the whole family to the pool that afternoon. We thought it would be a good "celebration" of Trinity's first day and would allow the younger two to still enjoy the pool that had been promised that morning. What a great time we had.

Throughout the summer, Kalyn has been swimming with a swimming-vest float. She's done great with it. She loves her float. Well, when we got to the pool, she told us that she didn't want her float. Not a problem in the zero-entry and shallow end. However, then she said that she didn't want it, she wanted to swim without her float. First, she wanted to try and touch the bottom of the deeper end (4'9" deep). She held her breath and touched the bottom. She was so excited about feeling the bottom!! So then we tried her hand and swimming.

And suddenly, she did. She stuck her head underwater and began kicking. Within a couple of moments, she was swimming between the edge of pool and Craig and I. She was so excited!! Our next hurdle is getting her to take a breath. She'll swim as far as she can and come up gasping for air when she gets to her destination. One step at a time.

As she was standing on my legs, she looked up at the clouds in the sky. Very loudly, she exclaimed, "There's God. He's up there." Then she began calling out His name - "God, Gooood." "I love God soooooo much!!" She continued with the following statements, "Before, I couldn't touch the bottom, now I can. Then I couldn't swim, and now I can. Isn't this the bestest life EVER, Mommy?"

I thought that was the best reminder. So often, I get bogged down with struggles of the day, whether it's arguing, whining, disobedience, bad attitudes or general frustrations. However, the days are fleeting quickly. So, yes, amid the hard moments and the mountain top highs, I can clearly and confidently say, "Yes, this is the bestest life ever."

First Day Of School

Yep, it was that time. Time to reset the alarm. Time to pack the backpack and lunchbox. Time to pick out clothes and have them laid out. Time to send Trinity off to second grade. She has been looking forward to Monday morning for about a week. I am very thankful that she enjoys school, even when she has those bad days.

Ready for the first day~

Waiting at the bus stop.

One of our concerns for the new year was her bus driver. Last year's driver was a bit . . . well, how do I say it . . . discombobulated. There were a number of times when she forgot to put out the "stop" sign when she stopped for Trinity to get on the bus - a huge problem since Trinity has to cross the road to her bus. She was very kind, giving Trinity gifts throughout the year, just a bit on the nervous side. We were very thankful to see a new driver and she seems to be very confident and comfortable driving the bus.

She had a great day at school. There are a number of kids she already knows which may help in her new class. We'll see what fun things and new challenges come up over the upcoming year!!

Birthday Bash

Saturday was party time!!! Another one of our friends was celebrating his 30th birthday (I'm not sure how we got into the loop of all these younguns). His wife has put together a surprise bash at a mutual friend's home. It was a party with lots of swimming and an inflatable water slide. The day was so much fun!! I think the adults (especially the boys) had more fun with the slide than the kids. We had another great day of Trinity in the pool. She spent much of the time jumping off the diving board and swimming to the side all on her own. It was a great day with a number of wonderful friends!!!

Lots of fun in the pool

The chair float was a big hit ~

for Sam and Kalyn,

for Trinity,

and for Xander and Asher.

The girls and I head down the slide.

Craig slides down with Xander.

Chris attempted to surf down the slide on a kickboard (let's just say this was the picture with Chris looking the most successful at this attempt).

Craig takes a flip off the top of the slide.

Chris, Bryan and Craig take a collective jump down the slide.

No damage was was suffered by anyone (or anything).

The birthday boy and his bride take a flying leap.

What a great day of celebration!!