Consignment sale...exhausted and excited!

I am on the planning team for the Lil' Blessings Children's Consignment sale to be held at our church NEXT WEEK! I am the webmaster, and I have been quite proud of the how the site has turned out! It is only by the grace of God, because I wasn't so sure I could do anything nearly that professional looking, especially with the timeline I had. It has all come together so nicely and we are mere days away from accepting the first clothes! And I still have yet to get all of my OWN clothes ready for the sale! With all the planning meetings and things to be done to get ready, on top of my part-time work and being a wife and mother, I am flat exhausted.

But it is all going to be worth it. It will be over soon, and all the proceeds of our sale will go towards mission efforts, and all of the donated clothes will be sent to Honduras with our church's mission team this summer. We're hoping to raise several thousand dollars which is so exciting!

What a weekend!

We had a whirlwind weekend to visit my Dad, brother and his 3 kids. It's a 5 hour drive, and we were 30 minutes down the road when my dad called to say my brother had been called out on a job (he does oil rig stuff, on call all the time) but we could still get his boys for the weekend if I wanted to be responsible for them. I said yes, of course, because I had not seen my nephews in well over a year, and one of them I had not even met yet! So we met my ex-sister-in-law and picked up the kids that afternoon, and it was crazy from there on out!

We had 6 kids for the weekend, and here they are, in age order:

Cole, the birthday boy, turned 6 on Friday. He's a typical kindergardener, who loves X-Box and making cheesy grins for the camera.

Aaron, my angel boy, is 3 1/2. He loved playing McDonald's at the drive-through playset on the deck. Can you tell we ate too much fast food this weekend?

Ethan is our other 3 1/2 year old. He's one month younger than Aaron. He was quieter than the other boys, and very helpful. I understand he can be pretty fierce if he has enough of Cole messing with him!

Lainey is Poppy's girlfriend's grandaughter, but she was one of the crew this weekend! She is 2 1/2 and is quite a wild hair!
Claire was the older of the two babies. She was a sweetheart this weekend who really seemed to like Gabe.

And finally Gabe, who turned one just two short weeks ago. He is such a sweet baby, smiling most of the time and content no matter where he is. He did get pretty angry after eating a whole piece of birthday cake, because we wouldn't let him have any more!

My brother Ross finally came in from his job late Saturday night, so Sunday morning we got a group shot of us with our kids. It's a wonder that swing we are sitting on didn't break!

Needless to say we were happy to get home Sunday afternoon. Chris brought the suitcase to the bedroom and immediately crashed in our bed for an afternoon nap. We are all still pretty tired today, and happy to be back in our routine!

The Lord gives...and interprets dreams!

For several nights in the last week I kept having nightmares that would wake me up in a panic and then wouldn't go away. In the mornings I would feel unrested and a bit uneasy, depending on what the dream had been about. Monday while I was washing dishes, I had the thought that maybe I should ask God to take away the dreams, so I could get better rest. It's almost like God started talking to me at that moment. In fact, to ensure I wasn't distracted, he miraculously got the kids to stop playing right under my feet and they both left the room right at that moment. So God started asking me what my dreams had been about. They were all different, but they focused on losing something that meant alot to me, usually my kids or other family. (One night I even dreamed that I accidentally left Claire at home by herself for several hours, and CPS was taking my kids away because I was a bad mother!)

God told me that my dreams were a sign of what I was putting my treasure in. This past Sunday in Sunday School, we read Job 1:21-

"The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away."

We also read Deuteronomy 8:17-18-

"You may say to yourself, 'My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.' But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth..."

And finally, Matthew 6:21-

"For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

God was telling me that it was HIM who has given me all I have, but I have been treasuring those things instead of treasuring Him. He reminded me that He can take away these treasures as easily as he gave them to me--this includes my material possessions and my family. This seems morbid to think about, but I think God wanted to give me some perspective.

I finally asked God to take away the dreams, and Monday night I slept peacefully! Thank you, Lord!

A Tribute to Sweetness

Claire is just about the sweetest baby ever! She has a smile that can melt your heart, even when she's being devious! Looking at these pictures reminds me of how sweet she is--most of the time!

She is a great talker--she speaks in some full sentences! She is incredibly smart: she knows several of her letters and can count to 4! She also knows most of her basic colors. Her new favorite thing is playing on the computer (the Elmo Keyboard-o-rama game). She loves reading books and more books, over and over. She always gives hugs and kisses. Daddy is trying to teach her to wink, and she does it so funny! She kinda scrunches her eyebrows down and looks so funny!

Pucker up! (Claire is sitting in my lap at this moment blowing kisses to her picture on the computer!)

Claire's "wink"

Our Valentine's Day - Sharing the Love

It seems that as I've gotten older, Valentine's Day is just not that bigga deal in the grand scheme of things. Chris and I are pretty good at showing each other love every day, so V-day usually comes and goes without much fanfare.

This year was not terribly different, from a romantic standpoint. Chris gave me a card as he was getting ready for work, telling me how wonderful I am in so many different ways. Awwww... I wish I had thought to get him a card! Oops!

When the kids woke up, Aaron said, "Happy Valentine's Day, Mommy" and my heart soared. Then I gave the kids their happies. They each got a new dinnerware set (plate, bowl, and cup). Aaron got Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Claire got Little Einsteins. Aaron and I made wildberry muffins for breakfast. Mimi stopped by to bring me heart-shaped pans, so we gave her a Valentine card the kids had made, with a glitter heart on front and their handprints on the inside. She loved it! Then the kids were off to Mother's Day Out for their Valentine parties. I'm sure they got way too sugared up!

I went to work for a while then Chris and I met for lunch. It's always fun to do that because we don't really have to line up a babysitter, and it's just nice to meet during the day. I picked up the kids at 2:00 and we delivered a Valentine card to Chris's grandmother, who was home sick. Then we came home and played outside (what a treat with the weather being so cold lately!). When we came in we baked some chocolate chip cookies for Daddy. I opted for that instead of a heart-shaped strawberry cake, which is what I have done in past years. Daddy really likes my chocolate chip cookies! While the cookies were baking we looked through the goody bags the kids had gotten at school and I read them their cards.

My mom, Granny, stopped by while we were making dinner, to bring the kids their valentine's happies. They each got a cute stuffed animal, and Chris and I got a box of chocolates! We invited my grandma over for dinner, which was homemade heart-shaped pizzas. The turned out really cute and were especially delicious. Grandma seemed to enjoy seeing the kids. She also really liked the Valentine card the kids made her!

So while V-day wasn't terribly romantic this year, I felt lots of love from our family and friends, and we passed it along as well. That's what it's all about!

I just had a conversation with my daughter...

Wow, I'm quite amazed! Claire and I just had a full-blown conversation. She is only 19 months old! She had been playing in the living room, and I was working in my bedroom. Here was our conversation:

Claire: "Hi Mommy."
Me: "Hi, baby."
Claire: (holds up kleenex) "Keee-nex"
Me: "You got a kleenex?"
Claire: "Mess."
Me: "Is there a mess? Can you show me?"
Claire: "Keen up." (wipes her nose.)
Me: "Oh, I see."
Claire: "Einteins ober." (she means her video, Little Einsteins, is over)
Me: "Your video is over?"
Claire: "Milk?"
Me: "Yes, let's go get your milk."

And then I about fell out on the floor! I mean I knew she could say all this stuff, but just the way she initiated the conversation and changed topics and all just amazed me! My baby is growing up! *sniff*

First dentist visit, and a broken heart

Today was Aaron's first dentist visit! He did so good, and I was so proud. He's been with me to my dentist visit twice now, so he was very prepared. He was very excited to meet Dr. B, whose office I will say was amazing! That was a majorly kid-friendly dentist. Dr. B was really awesome with Aaron. And he said Aaron will likely need braces one day...big surprise! Mommy and Daddy both had them. He said Aaron has a slight overbite and usually that's corrected with braces. I'm so not ready for adolesence!

On a different note, today after I put Claire down for her nap I found Aaron being unusually quiet in the kitchen. When I walked in, it surprised him, and he started freaking out, saying "No, no, no, don't come in here mommy! Don't look!" He was hiding something in his hands so I assured him that it was okay if something broke, but Mommy needed to look. So he looked at me, with this very pouty face, and said in this sweet little voice, "My heart broke". I almost busted out laughing...at first I thought he meant that whatever he broke made him really sad, but then I realized he had his little red dough heart magnet he had made in Sunday School a few weeks ago, and sure enough it was broken. I promised him we would glue it back together, and he was happy then. I don't want my precious little boy to have a broken heart!

Why am I blogging?

So I've been wanting to start blogging. Not so much so that others can read what I write (although I do like to share stories!), but so I can have a place to record the random thoughts and stories when I think "Oh, I really want to remember that" or "Wouldn't it bless someone's heart to hear that?" Thank you Woodman for the inspiration to get this started, as I love reading yours!

So here's my blog! I'm a bit intimidated because I feel like I have to be profound and intellectual...but that's not really me. I'm more of a rambler. So, welcome to my rambling blog! I hope you will enjoy reading, and I hope I will remember to write!