Big things going on at the Mayo house!

Oh where to begin!

First, we are back in an almost normal routine. Jim has been in band camp this week and that has meant everyone getting up super early and leaving the house around 6:30am! We have also had WAY too much going on in the evenings this week, so as a result I am exhausted! I did exercise Monday and Tuesday and then the fatigue hit me and I have not made it since, but next week we do not have all the stuff going on in the evenings so I think it will all go much more smoothly. We have done well over all though. The kids have adjusted and are going to bed at a normal bedtime. I would like to say I am looking forward to a fun, relaxing weekend but unfortunately I have all our monthly shopping to do! I am planning to do this tomorrow afternoon after we spend the morning swimming. I do get to go shopping solo! That is a good thing and means that it will get done quickly, as quickly as possible when you have 5 stops to make!!

Well lets move on to big thing #2. We have termites. We discovered the problem on Sunday evening. We both handled it pretty well although we were both worried over the cost to take care of this. So on top of our already busy afternoons we have been entertaining pest control companies trying to determine who the best one, with the best rates, was to go with. We made our decision yesterday afternoon and they will be out on Monday to treat the house. We both tried really hard to keep a positive outlook on the situation and to not stress too much about the money. It was easy to quickly get down about it as we just spent a good amount of money on air conditioner repairs and then van repairs. But since issues typically come in 3's I will trust that we have had our 3 and maybe won't have any more major issues for a while! Truthfully though we are really so blessed. I tried very hard to cling to Jesus this week as I worried about the money we would have to pay for the treatment and yet know that God promises to provide for our need, not our wants. He takes such good care of us. As I looked to Him through this week I was reminded that even if our house was destroyed and fell down around us we are still so richly blessed and have so much more than many around the world.

And now for the 3rd big thing going on in our family. We have made the decision to leave our church. This has been something that we have struggled with for about a year now. We love the people of our church so very much and we have been actively involved there for a long time. We would have been members for 9 years on September 9. We have been there basically our entire married life. God has made it clear to both Jim and I that it is His will for us to be somewhere else. Nothing has happened at church to cause us to make this decision, it is just simply God's will for us right now. We have no idea at this point where that place will be. We will remain at our church on Sunday mornings until the end of August in order to finish out teaching obligations. We began this past Sunday and Wednesday evening visiting around. It was very different and a little scary walking into a new place. We would appreciate your prayers as we seek God's will. Please pray for Drew especially. I do not know if he fully understands yet and he sometimes has a hard time warming up to new people.

Well the last thing I will share today is our family portraits that we had done a few weeks ago. We will be ordering prints soon. Let me know what your favs are!

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The Story

Okay, here is the JC story that I promised.

CAUTION: Memaws and Nanas procede with caution. This story will contain material that may alarm and shock you!


As I mentioned before, JC has learned to be very mischevious. Especially when there is only one parent at home and it seems to be particularly bad when it is his mama that he is left with! Monday Jim had a meeting at the school and I was home with the kids. They had been bathed and were completely ready for bed but it was a bit early to put JC down. I was trying to finish up cleaning the kitchen. Drew was watching a movie and I decided that he and JC could play with his Thomas Trains together. We got them out and I made sure they were all acceptable sizes that they did not pose a hazard to him swallowing any. So I am back and forth in the kitchen checking on them. The first thing he decided to get into was the puzzles that are stacked on a table in the dining room. Since I could see him from the kitchen I knew that he was getting into them and went in, popped his bottom and told him "no!". I headed back to the kitchen only to return a few moments later to him trying to pull on the blinds in the dining room. Again a pop on the bottom and a stern no. This time I put him on the rug, in the living room, surrounded by dozens of trains. You would think he would just play with the trains, right! So I went back in the kitchen. I was now done with all my kitchen duties and was pouring myself a coke with the intent of sitting in the recliner to supervise the playing. Now I was literally only gone for the short span of time that it takes to get a cup from the cabinet, coke from the fridge, pop the top and pour. I hear Drew gasp, knowing that this was going to be followed by a report of what his brother was doing wrong, I simply waited for Drew to come report. He comes running into the kitchen to tell me that JC is in the rocks in the fireplace. I take off running into the living room to find him in front of the fireplace surrounded by about 15 little rocks from the gas logs and reaching in to get more. I immediately popped his hand and told him "NO!". He starts crying which causes me to see that his mouth is FULL of rocks. Now I am freaking out! I dig rocks out of his mouth and am panicking about whether or not he may have swallowed one. My first reaction was to call Jim and get him home but I managed to pull it together and calm myself slightly. I accessed him and realized that he was breathing fine and seemed completely okay. So I decided to call my friend whose husband is a medic with the volunteer fire department, sorry Scott I do not know the technical term! I ask them what I needed to do and he assured me that if he was breathing okay and able to drink and not have any issues then he was most likely fine but may have still swallowed a small one. Thankfully he was breathing and drinking fine and we have not seen any evidence on the "other end" to indicate that he did swallow any. I made him sit in the recliner with me for the remainder of Drew's movie. He was not happy with me for containing him! I kept him up a bit later than normal just to make sure he was breathing just fine. Later after I had put him to bed I sat down with Drew and told him how proud I was of him. That he had done just the right thing by coming and getting me so quickly and probably saved his brother's life. It was probably the scariest moment of my life when I saw all those rocks in his mouth. I am so thankful that God protected us that evening and that Drew was so vigilant. This boy is quick and kinda bad!





So this little incident prompted me to the next big thing in our house...

Christmas in July!
I decided that maybe a change of toys would get his little mind off doing things that are bad for him and back to playing with toys! So we went up to the attic on Wednesday night and pulled down all the little people toys and mega blocks. As you can see it was much like Christmas morning. Actually we were saving some of these things to be JC's Christmas present, but I have already gotten him one big item from a yard sale and that may just be it this year with all the pay cuts for Jim and all. So they had fun, and Drew is still having lots of fun with the new toys. JC however is already back to his mischevious ways!

Drew has been in VBS all week at our church. He has really had a lot of fun. This makes 2 weeks in a row that he has been at the Saddle Ridge Ranch! Last week he was with me at Longview Point. He told us last night at dinner how he was going to do all the dancing at Parent Night, which was last night. He knows all the moves because we have been singing and doing them at home this week. Well this is what he looked like through the entire program last night...
Yes, he looked mad the entire time. I cannot explain this stage fright he has. When he is in a small group he wants to be the center of attention, but put him on a stage and he is a statue! His brother on the other hand was all smiles and when he saw Drew on stage all he could do was call his bubba and try to wave at him, but Drew would not wave at him, which made him call louder and louder and louder! It was an exciting program trying to contain JC!

Just Hanging Out!

Well we had a good rather low keyed weekend. Since JC was still recovering from the ear infections we just kept him in most of the weekend. Jim took this pic of me and the boys Friday afternoon as we were playing around in the living room...

He said we looked like a 3 headed monster, which I did not think was very nice!

On Saturday Jim took Drew to a birthday party. That left me and JC on our own for a while, which was really nice to have some time with him alone but he has also learned to be very mischevious when he knows that only one of us is in the house, especially when that one is me I think! He decided that helping me with the unloading of the dishwasher was a fun idea...


He splashed in the water that was collected in the door from the clean dishes. He got his face soaked, as you can see in this pic...

When the dishwasher no longer interested him, he decided to make some tea...

But decided that perhaps it worked better as a drum...

Then we had fun playing with one of his favorite toys...

the toy bucket/dish pan! Why do we even buy kids toys! Just give 'em a box and they are happy!
Then he thought he was gonna drink out of mama's water bottle...

I don't think so baby! Mama don't drink after anybody, not even your daddy!

As you can see he is REALLY into everything, and he is not yet walking! YIKES! I will post later about what he got into on Monday night while Jim was at a band meeting, definitely a story that must be documented for future harrasment, oh I mean reference!

Toothless boy!

Well Drew has now lost 4 teeth! And he had 4 permanent teeth coming in! 2 of those were coming in behind the baby teeth. We pulled one before leaving home this morning and then the other one when he got here to work with me. He has been coming with me all week for VBS. Here is a pic of all the missing teeth and you can see all the permanent ones. The big one in the front is where he lost the first tooth...



JC has been home sick since Wednesday morning. Tuesday he started getting kinda stopped up but he has 4 teeth cutting so we figured it was just that. Well by yesterday afternoon his face was so puffy and red that we decided he needed to go to the doctor and sure enough he has a double ear infection! Everytime that boy gets a stuffy nose it ends up in his ears! Fortunately it happened this week since Jim is still home. Drum camp starts next week and that would have meant me having to take off work for a sick kid, so I am very thankful that God allowed it to be this week. He is so much more pitiful than Drew has ever been about being sick. He is really gonna be one of those whiney, pitiful, sick men! He is on the mend now though!

1st Grade Ready!!

Well I got the school supplies...

All of this for about $22. Not bad I think. Drew was very excited about going to pick out all this stuff, although I don't think any of it was exciting as he thought it was going to be. Actually he was a lot more into picking out a birthday present for his friend's party this weekend than the school supplies!!

So can you guess what the most expensive item on our school supplies list was???



Tissue!

This 3 pack of Wal-Mart brand tissue cost me $5!

So we are officially ready for the start of school! Only 3 weeks from today! I am very ready for the return to routine but I am really sad that the relaxed atmosphere of summer is coming to an end. We are looking forward to a great school year ahead!

Longview Point VBS

Well it is VBS week at work. I actually think this week, so far, has been better than last week when they were just prepping and decorating! This is actually the first time in 2 years that I have worked the week of VBS. In 2008 we went on vacation on the VBS week and then last year it was just a week after I had JC, so I was not here! Actually I was here a couple of days that week because we brought Drew and I just hung out for the day with the baby, yes I am crazy! But it is always a fun week even with all the chaos. Most importantly lives are being changed through the power of Jesus Christ!

Drew has been coming with me this week, so it has been a good start to getting back in a bed time and wake up routine. Of course it is not nearly as early as it will have to be when school actually starts but it is a step in the right direction. Technically summer is over for us at this point because Jim will be starting drum camp next week, so we are pretty much at the end of the really slow summer time. We have still been enjoying some free library movie rentals. Jim and I watched a movie last night and tonight I think we will watch one with Drew that he got, Charlie and the Chocolate factory. I have laundry to do tonight as well, but a family movie night will be a fun thing.

Drew and I are going after I get off work to buy school supplies! He is actually very excited about school starting. He keeps wanting to know how many more weeks. We don't have too many things to buy this year. We are not going to have to get a backpack or lunch box yet. We have an older backpack at home that we are going to use and last year's lunch box is still in good condition so we are going to just continue to use it for a while.

Well that is all that is going on today! I will do my best to post more of our week of VBS and take some pictures of the kiddos!

Catching Up

Okay, so every time I update the blog I tell myself I am going to do better and not let it get behind and yet here I am again posting for the first time in over 2 weeks!!! Why is it the older I get the less time I have for everything. I want to know when life slows down! It should not be this way! So I guess this time instead of saying I will do better I will just say I am going to do the best I can with the time I have.

So picking up with where the last post left off, let me tell you about the not so fun stuff that has gone on in the Mayo house.

Saturday night, June 19, we were sitting in our room. I was reading and I think Jim was on his school laptop, when I started smelling something burning. It was that electronic type burning smell. I immediately had Jim get up and start checking for the odor. It was only in our bedroom. He went in the attic and checked but said all was good up there. We decided we thought it may be his laptop because the fan in it was running really hard and perhaps it was burning up. So we put it out in the garage and left our room for about 30 minutes to see if the smell would leave. We eventually turned the air conditioner up so that it would not run either to let the air clear. Well when we return to our room the smell was gone so I went back and turned the air on. As soon as it began running we smelled it again. But the smell faded this time and Jim checked the attic again and we went on to bed. Well we woke up to a lovely 80 degree house on Sunday morning! So we knew something was wrong. We determined that the unit was frozen up and were hoping it was simply a freon issue, but the burning smell was definitely a concern. So we lined up someone from church to come look at it on Monday. We stayed in the house on Sunday night, and man was it hot! When I left for work on Monday morning it was actually cooler outside than it was in the house. Jim and Drew went to hang out at the band hall until our friend could come over. So at about 3pm we determined that the fan motor had gone out, so $150 later and about 4 hours we had a working A/C unit but still a hot house! When we went to bed it had finally gotten down to about 80, but we woke up to a 70 degree house which was really rather chilly but I was thankful! I think sometimes you have to do without some of the luxuries in life to remember that they are just that, a luxury, and to be truly thankful for them!

Following up that incident we had to have about $175 worth of work done on the van prior to taking it out of town for the Independence Day holiday. It was pretty minor stuff but needed to be done. So now it is! It's only money! We certainly aren't taking it with us when we go so we will just press on knowing that God provides!


Now to get back track a little bit.
On Sunday, June 27, we went to Bellevue Baptist Church's Starlight Spectacular. This is the second year that we have gone and it was even better than last time! This is a totally free event that features great Christian Music Artist and finishes the night off with a HUGE firework show that is coordinated with the Bellevue Orchestra playing all kinds of patriotic music! We had incredible seats this year. We took our cooler full of drinks and snacks and just set our chairs and blankets out and had an awesome time!! The artist this year were Mandisa followed by Matthew West. It was a wonderful time of worship as we all say along with them! After they finished performing the pastor of Bellevue gave an invitation and over 100 people gave their lives to Christ, now that is what really made the night awesome, the rest was just the icing on the cake! There will be pictures in the slide show at the end of this post of our fun that night.

This past weekend we traveled to Madison to see Jim's sister and family. His mom went along with us so we took the van. It was soooo nice to have all that room! I definitely see our next family vehicle being a van! We had a great time visiting with them. We were able to see the house that they are building. They will hopefully be done with it in a few more months. On Saturday we went to a Balloon Festival and Fireworks show in Canton, MS. The kids got to play on moonbounces and a bungy jump thing, you will see pics in the slideshow. We got to see 2 of the hot air balloons take off. The others just stayed blown up on the ground. Not really sure why but they were really cool to look at! The Dragon one was so big! I should have walked Drew around to see the front of it and gotten a picture of it. After the balloons were all deflated they had a fireworks show. We could not see it really good because of some trees but we could see the big ones. It was really a fun evening and it was not too hot. We all really enjoyed seeing the hot air balloons, I have never seen one other than on tv. On Sunday we went for a swim in their neighborhood pool and then the ladies went out for a little shopping time. It was nice to do something with just the girls! We just hung out at their house that night and Justin grilled out some awesome burgers and hot dogs! We watched the fireworks in DC on the television. It was a nice relaxing evening. We had to get ready to head back home on Monday morning since it was back to usual for me on Tuesday. We really did have a nice visit though.

This week has been pretty low keyed, which has been nice! We have been enjoying checking some movies out from the library, which is free by the way and they really do have a good selection. Last night Drew had his last baseball game. It was a make up game. JC and I did not go since we were under a major heat advisory yesterday and the game was at 6pm, so not really enough time for it to have cooled off any. However, JC probably would have been better off at the ball game because he did nothing but get in trouble while they were gone! I have to pop him with the spoon twice for not listening when I told him no. He managed to open up the dishwasher on his own and had almost crawled all the way into it in order to get a crumb that he could see in the door! This after he had eaten ravioli, green beans, spaghetti squash and peaches! He later ended up eating part of a cookie too! He is getting to be a real handful! He can now stand on his own but will not take any steps. He will stand there for about 5-10 seconds and then lower himself down to his booty. He can actually stand himself up though without our help. It will not be very long now and he is gonna be walking! Drew has 2 more loose teeth! That will make a total of 4 lost when they come out. He has one permanent tooth that is a good ways in but the other one has not peaked out yet. He is good about letting me pull them. He doesn't whine or anything, my brave boy! The other one will probably be the whiney baby, and he is going to be twice Drew's size!

Oh I love my boys, all 3 of them! We have really enjoyed the summer months. It has been nice to not be as busy and to enjoy so many quiet evenings at home. But that time is quickly passing. Jim starts Drum Camp on July 19 and that week is followed by full band camp the next week. Then we are at the first week of school. Drew is very excited and ready. I am ready for the routine but I am starting to dread the business. My prayer as we start a new school year is that we will not "sweat the small stuff" and remember who we truly belong to, Jesus! All of the things of this world are temporary. I want to be a better example to my kids of a Godly mom and woman. I want to discipline with love and give sound Biblical direction in handling the little "dramas" of growing up. I want my boys to see me putting Christ first above all else. I am their example of Christ and they are my primary disciples! God please guide Jim and I as we raise these boys is such an ungodly world, give us strength and wisdom to direct them towards You!

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