20 Weeks

I really need to stop making weird faces while pictures are being taken :P As of today I am 20wks and 4 days pregnant! The baby is currently the length of a banana (about 10 inches) and weighs 12 ounces. Grow baby, grow!

God is Good

A little over a month ago, I was speaking to a couple at my church who is adopting a 3 yr old girl from Russia about the return trip they were making in October to hopefully finalize the adoption and bring her home. Because of the laws in Russia, they have to be there for the adoption hearing and then wait at least ten days before they can take their daughter with them, at which time they have to get her visa in order. With their family of five (six on the return trip), the plane tickets and extended stay become expensive. When we spoke in July, they had about half of the money they needed.

God laid it on my heart to put together a garage sale at the church to help raise money for their trip. The elders green lighted it, Cinco green lighted it and we were good to go!! My mom and I spent all last week receiving, organizing and pricing donations in the church sanctuary. I could only come after 4 on M-TH (when Nate got home) but we'd stay until at least 9 each night. My mom was there during the day every day as well (I tried bringing the kids, but it was counter productive :). We didn't know how we would get it all done, but without even organizing it or asking for help, people would drop by during the day to help. Inevitably they would show up right before a big influx of donations. God timed everything perfectly to where there were always enough people there to get the work done... it was very cool to watch :)

It became very clear that God was running this event and I stopped worrying about if we'd advertised enough or if we'd have any shoppers, because I knew that God was going to make this sale as successful as he wanted. On Saturday, I showed up 30 minutes before the start of the sale and shoppers were already lined up outside. By the time the doors opened, we had a thick line wrapping around the building and people streamed in "like it was Black Friday at Walmart" as one volunteer put it perfectly. It was crazy to see that that many people had showed up already! We had a crazy first hour and then a steady stream of shoppers for the next four hours after that!

All of our volunteers showed up on time and worked hard. The last shopper left (without be asked) 5 minutes before the official end of the sale. The Katy Christian Ministries truck arrived 10 minutes later when our volunteers had already boxed up all the remaining items for donation. The sanctuary was cleared out, vacuumed, and completely back to normal for Sunday morning by 30 minutes after the end of the sale..... We thought we would have several hours of clean up for sure! It all went so smoothly that you could almost see God orchestrating the entire thing as it went. Our grand total raised at the end of the week was $4,667.05!! God is so good!

I Tried to Just Say No

In a rather uncharacteristic move, I have found myself repeatedly turning down offers to join Pinterest..... this was the first line of the blog I tried to write last week. I was going to talk about how I have so much stuff I want to make and so little time to make it already that joining Pinterest would just be overwhelming.

Well, I typed that line and went to Pinterest to get the link to put in my blog entry..... and I saw something that caught my eye. 2 hours later I was still cruising Pinterest and had officially joined. So much for my resolve :P It turns out that I have mostly been getting recipes off of there and marking craft ideas for later. I am making 3 pinterest recipes this week... I'm hooked.

Click at your own risk~ http://pinterest.com/

The Early Bird

gets to throw a party. That's how the saying goes..... right?? Well, that's the philosophy I'm living by at the moment :) I am currently planning Lizzie's second birthday party.... which will be in February. (feel free to laugh at me here... it's been the most common response so far) But, as always, there is at least a little bit of method in my madness..... I promise.

Issue#1~ I don't have that much time to work on crafts. I really can only do it when the kids are asleep and I'm not always able to do it then.

Issue #2- The holidays are coming up, which are always insane and come with plenty of crafts themselves, from teacher gifts to Christmas ornaments.

Issue #3- The baby is due so close to the holidays that I'll be lucky if I have time to get all my Christmas decorations put up before it is born. Then after it is born I will have NO TIME or energy to craft for Lizzie's birthday a month later.

See, I told you.... method ;-) But yes, I still admit the madness too. I've already made her cupcake toppers, ordered party supplies off of Etsy, and started the centerpieces for her table. I am mulling over the menu and doing anything else that I can while my brain is still functioning. It makes me feel so much better to be on top of things..... yesterday I bought the supplies to make Micah's valentines for his preschool class..... please don't mock :P

18 Months Old!!

As of yesterday, that little bundle of pure trouble is a year and a half old! Oh my goodness. She has reached such monumental developmental milestones as getting her head stuck in between the spindles on the stairs and flinging herself off of furniture with no regard for personal safety :) Seriously though, at 18 months Lizzie is~

~ A bit of a daredevil who loves to climb and jump and live on the edge (of the furniture ;-)
~ Loves to climb behind me on the couch, poke her head out and shout BOO! and then laugh hysterically.
~ Not afraid to defend her territory against the advances of her big brother
~ A bit of a hot head. It doesn't take a lot to make her upset and she will definitely let you know if she is unhappy with a situation.
~ An avid reader... or should I say that she is avid about getting read to :)
~ Still cuddly and loves to be held or to squeeze in next to you while she drinks her juice.
~ A girl of many faces... the stink eye and the raised eyebrow (aka, I'm in on the joke) are the most prominent.

We love you baby girl! Happy half birthday!

A Seriously Crazy Weekend

Last weekend, Nate and I had planned to leave the kiddos here with my parents and head to Dallas for my high school reunion. God had slightly different plans in mind. My great uncle Bill passed away late last Wednesday and now our babysitters also had a reason to be in Dallas last weekend. With some crazy scrambling around, the whole family found ourselves in Arlington for the viewing on Friday and the funeral on Saturday. My parents drove the kids back here after the funeral and Nate and I drove almost directly to my reunion.

It was kinda hectic. BUT, I am so thankful that I was able to be there for Bill's funeral. He was a wonderful man of God and impacted so many people positively for Christ... he will be missed.

I also had a great time catching up with friends from high school and meeting their spouses :)

There were a couple of out of body experiences from this weekend, including~

- Watching a 9 yr old girl at the hotel breakfast pile her plate to overflowing with AT LEAST 40 strips of bacon. She did this with her father's help, ate it all herself and threw in some biscuits, gravy, cereal and more bacon for good measure.. yikes

- My dad walked into the funeral with a bag (with his camera stuff in it). He put it down next to us and realized he'd left something valuable in the car so he left to go get it. Immediately, an usher from the church approached my mom and asked frantically, "Do you know that man who just left his bag here?" To which she replied, " Yes, he's my husband." Usher (relieved)- "Oh, ok. I thought maybe he had left a bomb or something." Really? A bomb? WOW

Believe it or not, these are candid

Sometimes, when you're a toddler, you just need to climb on top of a table, put on Mickey Mouse ears and practice being cute....


If your parents are lucky, they'll get there with the camera before the moment is over...

Just before this, Micah put the ears on his blankie and declared him to be "Blankie Mouse"...

They're cute.... I think we'll have another :)

Fighting for Life

In a society that presses the idea of tolerance at every single turn, I get so tired of being made to feel like having morals, beliefs or even (gasp!) a desire to live a godly life is somehow wrong or hating my fellow man.

I recently joined a forum online that is comprised entirely of women who are due the same month that I am. In a lot of ways it is really great. If you have a question about whether something is normal or are considering something new to you (like a midwife, or a VBAC) you can ask other women who are at the same point in their pregnancy as you are and learn from their experiences.

BUT... It has started to really depress me for the state of society these days. I read posts from women who are pregnant by their boyfriends and it's not working out and they can't believe it. In so many ways, unmarried mothers-to-be out there are suffering terribly and they don't even consider that their approach to their life has led to a lot of their heartache.

I've seen multiple women complain about catching their husbands with porn and I see the responses of countless women who say it's "healthy", "normal" and that "all guys do it". Some even claim it is a constructive thing. Guess what? IT'S NOT!

I read a post of a girl who found out today that there is a 1 in 350 chance her baby might have Downs Syndrome and she is doing further testing so she'll know whether or not to terminate the pregnancy. It broke my heart. I ached for this girl who couldn't fathom that an extra chromosome didn't mean a life wasn't worthwhile. She said she hoped no one would judge her either way she decides since "no one knows what they would do til they're in that situation." I do. I know what I'd do. I'm not saying it'd be easy or fun all of the time but there is NO WAY I would terminate. I commented on her post, wished her the best with further testing and gave her a link to my friend's blog.... they have an infant son with Downs and they are hard core about advocating for the life of these children and you know what? Their son in awesome.

Our society is broken and I'm tired of being silent and pretending like abortion is ok.... it's not. Or that sex outside of marriage is ok.... it's not. Or that any number of things like pornography or (from another post on the forum) gay marriage is ok... it's not. Do I hate the people that engage in these? No. But I refuse to pretend that society going against God's will in these ways isn't the root for countless problems. I realize that most people who read my blog are my friends and hold similar beliefs anyway, but I had to get it off my chest.

16 Weeks

As of last Friday, I was 16 weeks pregnant! Everything is going well so far, the baby has a good strong heartbeat and has started getting very active. I have been able to feel it move for several weeks now, but it is finally getting consistent and Nate has been able to feel it moving from the outside a couple of times in the past few days.... that is WAY earlier than we've ever been able to feel a baby externally.... we may have a soccer star on our hands :)

The morning sickness is mostly gone by now and all I have left is unending fatigue.... which may have something to do with the 3 yr old and 17 month old I have living with me ;-)

The Circus Came to Town...

So we went, cause that's how we roll :) We got tickets for the day before Micah's birthday, packed up the fam, the grandparents and GG and went to see the show!


A key component to our success any time our kids have to sit still is popcorn...... lots of it

A little bit of sugar doesn't hurt either :)

The acts that they have in the circus now are so cool! Between caged motorcycle riders, contortionists, aerialists, performing elephants, tight rope walkers and the crazy acrobats it was a really great show!


We did have to leave a touch early though, cause the kids were definitely ready for a nap~