Happy Bday GrandmaDean

Without a doubt, I have the best grandma in the world and my boys have the best great grandma in the world!

 

You can see the benefit of prayer when you look at the way her and my GrandpaGordie have covered our family in it.  She is selfless, funny, and happy--- really everything I strive to be.  The ultimate compliment is when someone says that you act like GrandmaDean.

GrandmaDean, we just wanted you to know that we are thinking about you on your b-day and that you are sooo loved!

 HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

me, GrandmaDean and mom--- 3 rather beautiful generations (hahaha)

Ashton's 1/2

As most know, I LOVE 1/2 birthdays.  And yesterday Ashton turned 4 1/2!  Ashton also loves any kind of birthday- 1/2 of whole. 

 To "celebrate" his 1/2 bday, we took a field trip with his pre-school. We went to Welcome Ranch to ride horses and see farm animals. Though we did the trip, the weather was awful. What was supposed to be 80 degrees was a very cold and windy and WET 65 degrees. Noone was dressed appropriately, the horses were spooked, and it was just cold. Thankfully, the boys were troopers and I think they had fun.

Riding Freddie together

Shep on Tator

Ash riding Freddie solo

Patiently waiting in line

Ashton with the fire hose.

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I made Ashton a cake last night. I will admit that I think of myself of a decent cook/ baker. However, somehow this poor boxed cake mix just did not turn out. The middle was not done and then I totally flopped it trying to hide that the middle was not cooked by covering it with icing.

I will show the good side first. I am begging for my cake baking friends/ family to not laugh too hard.  (Just a side note, if you want to see some a-d-o-r-a-b-l-e cakes, check out Angela's website- she is good- too bad she doesnt live nearby  --- Olivia, you are good too but since you went all private blog on me then I cant show off your work :)

Most know that I have this great phobia of failure and let's face it... This is Failure with a capital F! 

 hahaha, I cant believe I just actually showed this.   And before you ask... both of these pictures are before we ate any of it!  To make matters even worse, this cake was not one of those "it may be ugly but it is delicious" type cakes... no this cake was ugly and average in taste.  Oh, that word... average, it is almost as awful as failure.  Ok, back to what this post if really about- ASHTON and 4 1/2!!!

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To make up for the bad weather and the even worse cake, I took Ash and Shep to Chuck E Cheese for an hour of play today.  Ashton LOVES the rat and would stay all day if you just kept handing him tokens. 

Then to the mall for a quick lunch and then to his new favorite store... The Apple store to play with ipads and ipods. (He asks every single day when he turns 5 so that he can get his ipod touch.)

How is that a 2 year old can manipulate this thing better than me

 

Ashton is sooo excited to get his ipod touch in October- is it ridiculous to get 5 year old a $200 ipod?

He then picked a Mexican place for dinner where he got his ritualistic cheese dip and chips.   We finished up the evening by redboxing a Captain America movie (rated PG-13--- just a side note, is it inappropriate to let small kids watch a PG-13 movie?!?!  I struggled with it for a bit but finally gave in.  Thankfully, in this movie, the language was not bad at all.  I guess it was PG-13 for the fighting scenes which, in my opinion, were not all the bad either--- anyway, just curious where other parents fall on this one?)

So, as we normally do--- the birthday celebrations went over 1 day.  But Ashton and I would not have it any other way.

And this is Ashton in true form!  I do want to pinch him

Ashton, kiddo, you are a mess!  You are mean and then so kind.  stengy and then selfless.  Emotional and then collected.  Wild and then subdued.  Hands off and then cover me with kisses.  And I wouldn't change one thing about you.
You are my helper and my talker.  You will talk my ears off when we are in the car, or in the house, or outside.
You weigh right at 35 lbs, so still my skinny boy. 
You make me laugh with the things you say.  For example, you named your purple lizard, Jesus.  You adore Hunter and fight with Shepherd.
You used to be a huge daddy's boy, but I think daddy and me are about tied now... which makes me happy! :) 
I love you SmAsh! 
 

Stepping Out to do What?!?!

I am a huge advocate of home schooling. I have always said that if my child was not thriving or if the school systems in our area were not good, then I would definitely home school. With that said, Hunter has had a great year at school and we are districted into one of the best elementary schools in our school system, so I thought I was smooth sailing as far as not having to home school. Heck, we intentionally bought a house in this zone so that we would be in one of the “good” schools. For the record, I have had absolutely NO complaints about Hunter’s school.

God started laying home schooling on my heart and once God places something on my heart, He makes sure that I am listening.  I will go ahead and admit that I kept pushing against Him by saying, “Hunter is doing great, we are in the “good” school, his teachers are Christians, people will think we are weird, I am not patient enough, I still want my social life, etc etc etc.”

But, for all my pushing against Him, He started pushing on me even harder.  For all the excuses I came up with, He gave me reasons why they were invalid.  I am a firm believer that when it is in God’s will, then it will happen. God’s will will… period.

About a month ago, after church, the Lord just kept laying it on me… up to this point, I had not even told Chad what had been going through my mind/ heart. I finally asked him to start praying about it too. I will go ahead and say that he was a bit skeptical. He has always been proud to be a product of the public school system. And, let me just add here, that I see absolutely nothing wrong with public school. There is an unnecessary segregation between the public school, private school, Christian school, and home school world. What works for one family may not work for another. Anyway, back to what I was saying… Chad immediately brought up socialization- which had always been in my mind as well. Will home schooling make our kids weird/ different? The past year, the Lord had been dealing with both us on living radically, stepping up to be different, following Jesus’ lead and staying on the narrow path. After prayer, we both realized that regardless of if we home school or not, our prayer for our kids is that they in fact are different- that they stand out.

I have realized that my time with my kids is but a small window. I think it is very important to be in the world and not of the world. Though, at times I would love to keep them in a bubble- I know that we are called to GO into the world. Recently though, Jesus has made it clear to us that before we go into the world, we must be covered in the WORD. For our family, sending our kids to school 7 hours a day where the name of Jesus is not spoken and then coming home for a few hours before doing the next activity or going to bed is just not enough. Even Jesus was 12 years old before He really went out into the world.

My panic attack begins when I start thinking in the long term. And every time I get past next year, I hear the Lord just saying, “be obedient now! Don’t worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will take care of itself (Matthew 6:34)” It may be that this next year will allow us to realign and we may send Hunter and Ashton off to public school for 2013-2014 school year. If that is case, then great! I will know that I was obedient in what God told me to do this year. I also might add that I am prayerful that He will not call me to do this throughout their entire schooling… just for good measure and to put it into writing- PLEASE LORD, NO!

But I can say with a certain amount of confidence that we will be home schooling Hunter next year. Ashton and Shepherd will also have little lessons 3 or 4 days a week. Ashton will do a Christian pre-school 3 mornings a week (from 9 to 1). I think that will allow me to concentrate on getting the hang of teaching again (since I have been out of the classroom for 3 years now and I have never taught elementary age kids.)

What started out as dread has turned to a bit of fear to a bit of anxiousness to a true excitement. I fully believe this is where God wants our family to be next year.

I would ask that you would pray for us as we move into this new phase. I am excited but I know that I basically have just accepted a full time job where payment will hopefully be eternal.

Ok, I am going to hit PUBLISH now.  I feel like there is not turning back once I do that... Deep Breath...

Eucharisteo Part 22

833- A lone leaf on his back

834- Just enough time to vaccum

835- Hunter curled up reading a book

836- Waking up to see Molly sprawled on couch

837- Sweet birthday gifts

838- Bracelet with meaning

839- Thoughtfulness of my mom

840- Nolan giving away his day for the boys to shop

841- Spring is early

842- Tons of spoons

843- Dogwoods budding out

844- Boys running the bases

845- Fluffy pine needles

846- A sliver of a moon

847- Finding the perfect outfits

848- Gift of freshly cut tulips

849- The Other Service

850- The soft chirp of the birds first thing in the morning

851- Joy found in a $9 Captain America shield

852- Hearing Shep say "the tomb is empty"

853- Resurrection Eggs and the boys telling me The Story

854- New highlights

855- Porductive shopping trip with mom

856- New movie that keeps them still

857- Feeling Him call

858- Frienship growing

859- His voice clearly spoken

860- Clean clothes stacked high

861- Daily reminder of 31 ways to pray for the boys plastered above my washer and dryer

862- Smell of fabric softener drifting out from the laundry room

863- A full peace about a new call

864- Heart of Dakota

865- Wednesday night Bible Study

866- Friend stepping up to lead study

867- Another friend sprouting

868- New windows waiting in garage

869- Baseball hits... and misses

870- Confirmation

Weekend Fun

I sat down Saturday night to record our fun little Saturday and I was still getting this error code on my blog.  Finally, this morning, I am up and running again.  I have no idea what the deal is but wish it would stop.

Anywho, Hunter had his first sleepover at a friend's house Friday night.  There were 12 little boys ages 5 to 7 who spent the night... yes 12!  Hunter had a really good time but was exhausted on Saturday!  Saturday morning, the boys had their first tball game and they played pretty good.  Hunter got to play first base one inning and did a good job catching the ball- his throwing abilities leave something to be desired though (haha).  Ashton hit one ball from a pitch and was able to field a lot of the balls that came his way.

Hunter playing first base

Ashton gets a hit!

Shepherd and Ashton's best buddy, Connor had his birthday party in the afternoon. We had a good time hanging out with friends and celebrating Connor's 3rd b-day.

Shep playing at the party

Ashton playing with the huge red ball around where everyone was eating

Shepher and Madi.

The birthday boy and his mom

Hunter's buddy, Karson.

Singing

Big blow!

Hunter haning out with his other buddy from school.

Shep and his almost birthday buddy, Jackson

Though, I just showed this picture last post... Yesterday was Molly's 10th Birthday.  She is the best little girl.  Her little face is starting to turn whitish/ gray and she is aging beautifully.  Queenie came over for her birthday party and brought her some McDonalds chicken nuggets and Molly wanted salmon patties for her birthday  meal.  The boys had her (made her) wear a super hero cape on her special day.  Happy Birthday Molly!



Whew.  BIG sigh of relief.  I logged into blogger Sunday night wanting to post Easter pictures when it totally locked down on me giving me this error message.  Thankfully, 3 days later, it is fixed!!!

I did post many of these on facebook so many of you have already seen them, but for record keeping here they are again (plus a few extras).

Easter basket prizes

3 Handsome super heroes

Captain America in the flesh

These are by far my favorite Easter clothes that the boys have ever had!  Thank you mom for buying them and shopping with me.

!!!!! Love!!!!!

Again, another good one! 

And yet another good one.  This picture just makes me smile.  Only wish we could have added in the  Calafornia crew!

Mantis and Queenie got the boys umbrellas in their Easter baskets... they LOVE them! We had quite the Super heroe theme with baskets from both sets of grandparents and Chad and I assemblying quite the super hero collection.

My cousin, Steph.

Mantis taking one of his naps

Molly laying beside the huge hole she dug in the quest to find the chipmunk.

The girls of the family

Dying Easter eggs... this was quite the mess

Ashton showing off the eggs... they were definitely not the prettiest batch as the boys truly did them on their own.

We had such an amazing Easter break.

Weekend Getaway

For the first time since we have had children, Chad and I had our first overnight date-night.  Some friends of Chads invited us to go Atlanta to Passion City Church's Good Friday celebration. It had some big names- we got to hear Chris Tomlin, Kristian Stanfill (what a cutie!), and David Crowder sing and listen to Louie Giglio preach.  The music was amazing, the preaching dead-on, and the company was fun.  We stayed the night in Atlanta and then headed back home (after a quick shopping trip to the Outlets).

Right before the concert and right before my camera battery died :(

My parents had boy patrol and I think the boys had a blast (at least the older two- Shep, is still really into mommy). 

Mantis, Hunt, Ash, Queenie (AKA Weenie), and Shep

Dad went camping with the older two even though the temp fell into the low 40's. Thanks mom and dad for helping us out.

Hunter, Mantis, and Ashton getting ready to go to bed.

We had an amazing time, but most importantly, I was able to reflect on the price that was paid for me.  The ultimate, perfect Sacrifice paid it all and then ROSE! 

Have a Happy Easter celebrating that our Savior is alive and present!

A Week in Pictures

The past week we have been quite busy and of course, I have blogged none of it.  So, here is the week in pictures.
**** I am in the process of trying to upload a couple videos so check back to this post tonight to see if I can get them working.  :) couldnt get the videos to upload :(

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Wednesday- March 28
Picnic at the Gardens (Hunter is at school)

Ashton enjoying his CFA sandwhich and "sauce"



My little guzzler



Feeding the ducks... or turtles... or fish

Question?

Brotherly love

Yep, my kid likes to pretend he eats rocks.

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Friday -
Hunter's Easter activities at school and the Moblie Zoo

Hunter loves animals so when the Mobile Zoo came to his class, he was beyond excited!

Shepherd and Ashton got to be in on the action too

Hunter learning to pet a snake.  This is actually a black snake that is white, it is not an albino though, its scales just came in white.They cant explain why... very cool.

Surprise treat from their teacher

Dance party

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Saturday -
Our church's Easter Egg hunt (this was actually the Saturday before, but it just fit here too perfectly)

Bouncing away

Shep's age hunting eggs

Then the bigger kids

Hunter on the playground searching for the harder eggs

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Sunday-
 Chad's parents church had their Easter Egg hunt after church.  We headed up for lunch and a fun-filled afternoon

My darling boys before we head off to church

The infamous slide

The older two off and running

Sheppy finds some eggs

A pony was the new addition- Ash takes a turn

Hunter breaking the poor pony's back.

My pregant sister-in-law with my niece(s)  :)

Taking a break from the insane heat with some treats

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Monday-

Papa Hub works part time at Camp Hannon where he keeps the trails clear for teams, campers, etc.  It is beautiful land!  We took a 4+ mile ride up through the trails conquering some pretty steep terrain.

H and A riding with Papa Hub

Chad driving the Gator.  Chad has too funny driving this thing down some steep slopes.  Hub made the comment that you probably couldn't get a needle up his butthole because Chad was so tense.... hahaha! 

Beautiful waterfall just a small hike from the big trails!

The group

What up?  This kid is just too cute.



Ashton being goofy.



But I caught him smiling

Grandma with the older two

Just some wildflowers

Almost back to the entrance

Front of the Camp

Sheppy taking a break

And on our way back to Easley- God reminds us once again of His promise

We got to watch the whole rainbow form from the sides to the top... breathtaking!

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Tuesday-

Visit to Gastinky to see my grandparents

Chad manhandling the tiller

GrandpaGordie watching and directing from the side

GrandmaDean bought the boys a little trainset to play with when they come... so sweet!

Dinner at fishcamp.  yum!

Chad took this one (obviously since it is so blurry- in his defense this was my little Kodak video camera)... too prove that out of the 1000` pictures I just posted that I truly am here...

So though the last week has been slammed packed, we have been having a blast!