Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Makeover Pics Cont'd

Drew's Room, two walls are red and two are blue. This is kinda our Thomas the Train or Cars themed room. The colors worked for both. I know my mom is cringing b/c the bed is not made! I promise I do make mine every morning mom, but some days I just don't make it in there!

Kitchen, right now the tile is all the way to the end of the cabinets. Now the appliances will have to be moved to work behind them.

Drew's Bathroom
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Our Bathroom will be tiled also but nothing has been started on it yet so there is nothing to post, unless you want to see the icky carpet that is in there! Why would anyone put carpet in a bathroom!

Home Makeover!



These are pictures of our "Summer Makeover Project". Jim spent most of June painting the house on the inside. Only the dining room and Drew's room actually got "new paint" the other rooms got touch ups and eventually all the doors and trim will be repainted. My dad is in the process of putting down new flooring for us. The laminate hard wood in the living room and dining room was done back in June while we were in Branson. Now he is the process of working on the tile. Most of Drew's bathroom is done and a good portion of the kitchen too. So here are some current shots of what things look like. I will of course post more when everything is done. It is looking really good and we are very happy with the colors and all.

Here is the dining room. I love the new color in here and I think the new floor compliments it very well!

Living Room
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Vacation Pictures

I am trying to use some new software for setting up pictures and albums to be used here on my blog. So my first experiment is with my vacation pics, so we will see how it does. I am putting a link here to the album so we will see!

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Randam Pics and Sillyness!

This post is just going to be a collection of fun shots and videos that we have made over the last couple of weeks. Hope you enjoy!This is Drew wearing Jim's glasses. He looks like Daniel, my nephew. Daniel wears glasses and I think they make him look very smart! Drew looked so cute in the glasses and I had to get a picture








Randam silly faces! He can be a ham when the camera is out!













Drew was playing in the closet last night as we were getting ready to go somewhere. He actually stayed in there with a flashlight and played for quite a while. Well when he finally came out this was what he looked like! Of course I ran for the camera and told him to stay there so I could get his picture and when I came back he started striking these crazy poses!


This video was of him dancing around all crazy one evening at home. At the end of it I got him to sing I'm a Little Teapot.

Thursday, July 24, 2008

A Very Busy Week

Well, I guess the summer fun it officially ending! Let me give you some reasons why:
1. It is like 200 degrees outside and even the thought of being outdoors for more that 5 minutes makes me break out in a sweat! You gotta love some summer in Mississippi!
2. Jim has begun band camp this week. Well, actually just drum camp (color guard is having camp too but if he was in charge of that we would have some real issues!).

This entire week has been busy. I do have to give us all a little pat on the back though because we have done so good at getting to bed early or on time and getting up at a good time. Sunday night we were all in bed by 9:30pm! This is almost unheard of in our house! Monday evening consisted of me getting home from work, quickly preparing dinner and Jim heading off to a band parent meeting at the school. I forgot about the meeting so that just managed to add a little extra spice to the whole thing! But my wonderful husband helped me by getting our son bathed before dinner and we were able to eat together in peace before he left. Drew and I watched a movie together that night, Underdog. This was a really cute movie and I would highly recommend it. No bad language and not any of the off color humor that has become commonplace in children's movies today. While we watched the movie I did laundry. Drew became very interested in me folding clothes and towels all over the living room floor and wanted to help. Now my friends out there are cringing thinking that me, Miss Gotta Have it all Perfect, could never have handled letting a 4 year old help me fold laundry. Well I will have you all know that I did let him help me fold towels, did not point out the errors he was making, and did NOT refold them before putting them up!! WOOHOO, that is like major OCD progress for me!!! It was fun to see how he was so interested in being a part of what I was doing. I did not get any pictures of this, I should have. I will do better next time.

Now on to Tuesday Night. After eating dinner we decided to go to Walmart to shop for a birthday present for Drew's baby sitter's daughter. She will be 2. I already knew what I wanted to get because I had looked at the Walmart near work but I wanted Drew to experience getting to "pick it out". So I talked to him the whole way to the store about what he wanted to get her. He insisted that he wanted to get her a squeaky snake. I knew this would not be something she would want but decided that if he wanted to get a snake we would let him get one and put it in the bag with the other item. So we bought this snake and of course he had to play with it the whole way home. Well before long he started telling me that Hannah, the baby sitter's daughter, did not like snakes. So Jim and I started asking him why he wanted to get her a snake if she doesn't like them. It took a while to get him to finally say that HE wanted the snake. We then told him that if the snake was going to be his that he would have to pay for it out of his weekly allowance and that would mean going home and getting money out of his bank to pay daddy back. He gladly agreed to this! So when we got home he paid for his snake and we have now made our first purchase from our allowance money! A snake of all things!

Well yesterday was again busy with church last night and meetings. I have another meeting at church tonight and then we will be spending Friday and Saturday evening over at different friends houses! Definitely reaching our busy time of year. August calendar is already filling up with all the school/band stuff. Drew will be starting Pre-K on August 18!! He is so excited. I will definitely have the camera with me and there will be a post that day, probably one written through tears. He has grown to be a little boy so fast.

Well my blog friends, that is all I have for now. I will write again soon and hopefully have some pics of something!

Friday, July 18, 2008

Vacation Bible School



Well, Drew has just finished two full weeks of Vacation Bible School. He has had so much fun. He did so good last night at Parent's Night. He actually stood on stage and sang all the songs. This is quite an accomplishment from the last time he was to stand on stage with the children's choir. That day he came running to me crying as soon as the song started! We have it all on film! They sang I think 3 songs. I filmed him on 2 of them.



He was much more into doing the hand motions than the singing part. It was so much fun to see all the kids perform. It was a wonderful week where many seeds of salvation were planted. I know of 1 young lady that prayed to receive Christ as her Lord.

Well after the program we went outside for the carnival. This was a good time, but so hot! There were two moonbounces, a dunking tank, and several other games. There were kids everywhere and many, many families that were visiting our church. I have a couple of shots of him at the carnival, so here they are...

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

A Pedicure with Jesus

Okay, so this post is going to be a little bit different. This is a personal reflection from my time with the Lord this morning.

I got my coffee and headed to my special room and sat down in my special chair. I took a few minutes to sip my coffee and try to get my mind awake so that I might actually digest what I would be taking in from The Word this morning. I opened my Bible and got my Journey magazine. If you are not familiar with this resource it is a monthly devotional guide that can be purchased through Lifeway. Our church provides them for our ladies. So I got it opened to the days lessen and then opened my Bible to todays text, John 13:1-17. Right off I could see that this was a familiar passage to me from the heading, Jesus Washes the Disciples' Feet. What was I going to gleen from a passage I have read or heard hundreds of times in my life, right?! Well, that sure wasn't what God was thinking this morning! So I started to read and came to that part of the story where Peter boldy tells the Lord Jesus Christ that if He is going to wash his feet so that he can be part of Him then to go ahead and wash all of him! I am so a Peter most of the time! I want to tell God what to do , how to do it, and when it will work best for me! Well, Jesus does not fuss at him or give him a long lecture about the error of his thinking, He gives Peter a simple answer that had SO much truth in it for me today. Jesus' response to Peter was, "He who has been bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean, but not all of you." I got stuck on that verse. I pondered it and thought about how I felt this morning. I felt sick with my own sin in my life. I felt absolutely filthy from head to toe. In the quiet of that moment I felt the Holy Spirit all around me telling me that only my feet needed cleaning! You see I am truly clean because I have Jesus in my heart as my Savior. I have turned from my life of sin and ask God to forever be the Lord of my life. But I am still human and as such I will sin everyday. Everyday I get my FEET dirty by walking through sin! Therefore, everyday, no make that moment by moment I need to stop and let the Lord wash my feet clean. He must wash that filth off of my feet so that I can continue on for His names sake. Of course the only way He can perform this cleansing is by my request. That means that as I dishonor Him and fall into daily sin I must ask His forgiveness and turn back to Him. It felt so good this morning to feel The Masters hands on me, washing away the sin I carried. I am sure that I had dirt and mud all the way up to my knees, but He cleaned it anyway, because He loves me unconditionally!

Do you have peace in Him? Do you know that if your life was required of you today that you would open your eyes in the presence of the Lord? If you cannot answer yes to each of those questions don't let another moment pass. Romans 5:8 says But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 10:13 says For whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved! Know Him today as your Savior!

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

I want to be like Daddy!

A few weeks ago, while at church, Drew found a razor in a classroom. They had been collected for baskets to be taken to a homeless shelter. They were unfortunately down on the ground where kids could get to them and they were in the room they use for Children's Choir. He found this razor and decided to try to "shave himself". He tried it on his face, hand and arm! Thankfully it only barely scratched the skin and caused no real damage. I am happy to report that the razors are no longer in a place where children may get them! Obviously I was upset and concerned when I saw what he had done to himself. Jim and I talked to him over and over again about how dangerous a razor can be and that they are not toys. So in the process of me telling him this over, and over again he told me something. In that sweet little 4 year old voice he told me "mommy, I just wanted to be like daddy". Well that just melted my heart! Of course we were never upset at him over the situation but I am sure our insistence about the dangers of what he had done made him think he had somehow messed up. Well I thought about this situation and wanted to do anything we could to prevent him from trying this again. I remembered a play shave kit that my little brother had when he was about Drew's age or a little older. I think it was from Avon, my mom used to sell it. So I got on the net and started looking for a play shave kit for him. I found one on eBay and got it. So he has been happily shaving every night in the tub now! It is a hot wheels shaving kit, it came with a play razor, shave cream and bath gel. So now he is a big boy and can shave just like daddy! Check it out below...

Sunday, July 13, 2008

Summer Fun!


We have done alot of fun things this summer. Since this blog is a way for me to communicate to family and friends what is going on in our life, I want to back track a bit from now and fill you in on some of the fun things we have done. First up is the picture above. This was taken on our first ever family vacation. We traveled with our friends, the Hanks family, to Branson, MO. We had a wonderful time. This picture was of all the kids at the Butterfly Palace. It was absolutely beautiful to see all those butterflies. Stephanie and I actually had one to land on us, well Stephanie had two. We spent an entire day at Silver Dollar City. Drew was not scared of anything! He rode all the rides that he could. Many of the "kiddie" rides go around in circles so that left me out! I love a good thrill ride or roller coaster, but spinning in circles leaves me rather ill. We spent two days at the water park, White Water. The kids absolutely loved being in the water park. Again he was quite the daredevil, riding all the slides that he could. He still has a great fear of being in deep water but he really enjoyed the water park in a way I never expected that he would. We are going to get him enrolled in swimming lessons to help with his fear. Jim and I got to enjoy a "date night". The Hanks were left to babysit all the kids one night and we went to The Dixie Stampede dinner show. It was so much fun. I am glad that we were able to experience that together. It was a fun filled week that went by quickly. We are so appreciative to our friends for sharing this trip with us and for using their timeshare points to provide us with a place to stay. I hope we will all be able to do it again in a couple of years.

Our next summer adventure was the First Annual Poppy and Nana Fishing Rodeo. My parents decided to start a new tradition this year in honor of Father's Day. We had a fishing rodeo at their house! The kids had a blast. Drew is not quite the devoted fisherman that his daddy is, but I am sure he will develop this desire with a few more years of age on him. He did catch one fish. Jim caught a few too. We ended the day with a fish fry. It was good fun and good eating!



Fouth of July! We enjoyed the fourth back over at mom's. As you can see Drew and Jim did some more fishing. We all had matching patriotic shirts, so mom took our picture. After the morning fishing we all went over to Aunt Bev's and Uncle Johnny's to enjoy their new pool. It was so nice and Drew really enjoyed the pool, again to our amazement. We cooked out that afternoon and later we enjoyed fireworks thanks to Jim and my brother-in-law, Todd. They did a good job on them. We really enjoyed the day and the weather was perfect!

A few weeks ago we had the pleasure of keeping all of my nephews for the evening while Elizabeth and Todd went out for dinner. This is always a joy to me. They are all growing up so quickly. Daniel will soon be 11, Nathan is 6 1/2, Ben is 3 1/2, and now little Matthew is here and about 7 weeks old. Drew and Ben actually sat still long enough for me to take a picture of them holding him. The other picture is of Drew pretending to be Batman. The fingers on top of his head are supposed to be the horns on Batman's helmet! It was too cute, I just had to get a pic of him!

That brings us up to date in our life! It has been a busy summer but a good one. This has actually been the most relaxing summer I can remember since Jim and I married. We have enjoyed many quiet evenings at home. Jim has been a real help in getting some of the "housework" done during the week when he has been home so I have had to do very little on the weekends. This has been so nice. Now school is just a few more weeks away and he will not be able to do that anymore. It has been a real treat. The fall will be a busy time for us as Drew will be starting to Pre-K. I am so thankful to God for the quiet and restful summer. I am trying so hard to enjoy each and every minute we have together as a family and to cherish all the memories we have made this summer. I plan to do my best to be a good "blogger" and to use this as a resource for expressing my thoughts and sharing what our family is doing and to take many pictures to share with you, all my friends and family!!

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Busy Weekend!

This is Jim and Drew goofing off at me maw's house.


We are at home tonight after spending the night with my mother-in-law. We had a good time. She lives in the "country" outside of Batesville. It is always relaxing at her house. We get to take naps and just enjoy the quiet. Drew was so excited to go to me maw's house. He has missed her as it has been some time since we went to her house for a good visit. Today, Jim got to go fishing with his brother on Sardis Lake. He caught one fish, they did not stay out on the lake for very long. It must have been incredibly hot! After Jim got back and cleaned up we all went to the outlet mall there in Batesville. We were able to get some incredible deals on clothes for Jim. He was badly in need of new pants for school this fall and a new pair of shoes. So that is all done and we are now broke!! It was fun getting out and shopping all together but it was so hot. After visiting at her house for a few more hours we packed up and headed home. We stopped by my mom's house in Coldwater to see how she was feeling after having gallbladder surgery on Thursday. She is doing good and getting around some but had definitely over done it a bit today. We ended up eating dinner with them before heading home for the night. So now I am trying to get ready for bed. I still need to review my Sunday School lesson and children's church material for in the morning. So with that I must go! Bye for now!!

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

New to bloging

Well this is all new to me! It will take me a while to get it looking the way I want it to but this will be the beginning. Bye for now!