Pensacola Trip!

We got back from Florida on Sunday night. It was a great trip! It was relaxing and fun for all of us. Here are some of the pictures:

Loaded up in the van. 

I was surprised at how smooth the traveling was. I guess all our kids were old enough to entertain themselves and we just had to be patient with all the bathroom stops. It was about an 8 hour drive (including lunch, dinner, and bathroom stops), not too shabby. Of course, it helps to have the Wii set up in the van, our boys thought that was amazing! 

 The view from the back patio of the condo. 

Our condo was so nice! It was located on the ground floor and just steps away from the beach access and both pools. This little grassy area was right outside the door and a perfect place for the kids to hang out. Having the patio in the back meant that we didn't have to bring sandy, wet beach and pool things in the house! Everything just got dumped on the patio. Perfect!

The swing was a popular place to hang out. 

You can see our condo behind the kids, to the left. 

One of the pools. 

Our set up on the beach. 

We decided to just leave our chairs and toys on the beach for the week. In the evenings we would fold up the chairs, consolidate the toys and move everything beyond the tide line. It was never disturbed. It was so nice not to have to haul all the sandy stuff back up to the condo every night! 

(Behind the chairs you can see the beach access, wooden walkway on the right, and our condo, to the left.) 

 Jeremiah made up a game in which they all had to jump the "poisonous" waves. 

 I call this Jeremiah's Baywatch pose. 

He looked like a little surfer! 

 My friend Kendal. 

 With my boys on the beach. 

The beach in the evening. My favorite time. 

Unfortunately we only went down there once. By the time we were done with dinner the kids were usually pretty worn out so we did a quick swim in the warm pool before bed. 

Our little routine was to go down to the beach in the morning before it got too hot. The kids would play in the waves while Summer and I sat in our chairs with our feet in the water finishing our morning coffee. We would head back up to the condo for lunch and then do some swimming. At some point in the afternoon we would have rest time. Then dinner, more swimming, and bed. 

One of my favorite parts of the week was getting up in the morning (our kids all woke early, go figure) and taking my coffee out to the patio. It was so relaxing to start the day with the sound of water and the sights of the beach waking up. Sigh....

One evening we went out to dinner at the Crab Trap. A seafood restaurant on the beach with tables in shade outside and a play ground for kids to play on. All the kids got buckets and shovels and were happy to play while they waited for their food. It was one of the most relaxing meals out I have ever experienced. Summer and I just sat, talked, and watched our kids play. Who ever thought of that was a genius! 

Nathaniel and Clayton were good buddies all week! 

It was fun to watch them always up to something together. 

 While we were there Carter celebrated his 7th birthday. 

The boys thought he needed some Nerf guns. 

 We went out to lunch at the Shrimp Basket, my kids ordered grilled cheese. 

 Pretty cool dude.

 Off the beaten trail we found this amazing playground! 

Birthday cookie. 

We are sure the neighbors appreciated the horn blowing. 

Before Carter's birthday we realized that we were traveling with kids aged 3, 4, 5, 6, & 7 years old. 

So we did a little craft and took some pictures. 

Kendal, Nathaniel, Clayton, Carter, Jeremiah

Mother's Day 2012

More and more lately I sit down to blog and have absolutely no idea what to say. Life is normal, mundane and dare I say mostly boring to other people. There is also breathtaking beauty in our daily moments. We feel the joy and struggle of becoming more Christlike as we learn to love each other better. 

This Mother's Day I felt the weight of mothering in a new way. The responsibility of these souls entrusted to my care was constantly on the edge of my consciousness. I can say that I am becoming daily more and more aware of my inability to do anything, much less mother my children, in my own strength. And to my great surprise I am finding so much joy and freedom in acknowledging my weakness and laying it down. Instead of trying to fix myself, or feel guilt over all my failures, I am learning the joy of humbly coming to Jesus and resting in Him. I have prayed over and over again recently, "Lord, your Word says that I am now complete. You see me as righteous through your Son. Show me what it means to be loved, whole, and forgiven. Help me believe that I am already complete and insanely loved. Help me believe that you have already given me everything I need." 

I realize that sounds like Christianity 101. But I still struggle with the need to fix myself, to somehow think that I can earn the salvation that was freely given to me by grace. I am learning to lay that down and simply revel in the depth of love poured out on me. 

This Mother's Day was joyful and poignant. I am profoundly grateful for these boys that have been gifted to me. I feel acutely the absence of the child missing from our home. Even though our paperwork is still sitting on a social workers desk waiting to be approved (it was turned in a month ago!) and no child has yet been identified, my heart is committed and feels the absence of that child. It is difficult to explain. Yet every Sunday during worship tears fall as I contemplate the birth family, the fact that our child could be being harmed right now, the foster family that may be the temporary family, the tender heart and body of a child I have yet to meet, the ache in my arms and in my heart as I yearn.. 

In all those complicated emotions I feel deep calm and peace. I can rest in His care and love. 

Busy Spring Days

Pictures of our morning spent outside the Chattanooga Aquarium. We visited with a friend of mine from college. It had been years since we have seen each other and obviously both of our lives have seen much change. So fun to see our kids all playing together! It seems like just yesterday we were in college together and now we are all grown up. :-)

Y'all. 

We are busy. 

Baseball season is in full swing with practices and games occupying almost every week night. Our calendar is full of graduations, birthdays, weddings, baby showers - crazy fun stuff. 

During our "Screen Free Week" I had a horrible sinus infection. It knocked me out for about 10 days. Surprisingly the boys occupied themselves during that week and it was actually a screen free week. I am amazed! But anyway, I had grand plans of finishing our school work, cleaning the house, working on projects, and generally getting us organized for summer. None of that happened. In fact, quite the opposite. The house descended into chaos, no official school work got done, and I feel like I am a step behind. 

I still get tired pretty quickly, but I am slowly getting us back on track this week. And for better or for worse, after this busy week and weekend the boys and I are loading up with some friends and heading to the beach for a week! I am not a beach lover, but the offer of a week at a condo in Pensacola with good friends was too good to pass up. 

Nathaniel Reads!

Sometimes I need something official to come along and push me to do something that I have been considering for a while. This week is Screen Free Week sponsored by Campaign For A Commercial Free Childhood. I have decided to use it as my excuse to unplug for a week. I have been considering unplugging for a while, but kept finding myself drawn back to the flickering screen of my computer. This week we are going cold turkey. No screens. At all. Not because I think it will make us better people, or because I think that we get some kind of points in the game of comparison parenting, but because we need as a family to reconnect. So we are going to try it. Note: I will be checking my email once a day. 

Now, on to more exciting things.

Last week Nathaniel started to read!  We have been sporadically doing lessons from the book Teach Your Child To Read In 100 Easy Lessons and he was really eager to start reading on his own. I was kind of half-heartedly working with him and thinking in my head that we would really buckle down and make learning to read the focus of next year. Last week I unearthed some old Bob Books that someone had given me. Nathaniel found them and was really interested. So I gave him the first one and asked him if he wanted to try and read it. It had the sounds that we had already worked on in our lessons. And he did it!

There are no words to describe that feeling of watching your child grasp something new and accomplish something they have been working really hard on. He was so excited!

Below is the video of his 2nd attempt at the book. Enjoy!

Boys being boys

Some glimpses of everyday life in our house lately:

 

Sometimes God gives us special surprises, just because He loves us. A friend called on Thursday night and said he had a castle to drop off for the boys. This gigantic, amazing castle was gifted to us! The boys love it! They play for hours. It is the scene of pirate battles, and Star Wars adventures, and super hero escapades. 

Aaron taught the boys how to use the sun and a magnifying glass to set leaves on fire. Jeremiah calls it, "Harnessing the power of the sun." So far they haven't quite managed to start a fire on their own but they do spend lots of time trying. 

Boys love super heroes. Something in their nature is drawn to the pull between good and evil. Someone sent the boys super hero stickers and they spent a whole morning drawing these battle scenes. They each have an elaborate story to go with their picture. One night at dinner when they were discussing what super hero they would like to be Nathaniel randomly announced that Mama should get some super hero pj's and that my super hero name should be "Fire Star." 

Monday Morning

My heart is filled with thankfulness
To Him who bore my pain
Who plumbed the depths of my disgrace
And gave me life again
Who crushed my curse of sinfulness
And clothed me with His light
And wrote His law of righteousness
With power upon my heart

My heart is filled with thankfulness
To Him who walks beside 
Who floods my weaknesses with strength
And causes fears to fly
Whose every promise is enough
For every step I take
Sustaining me with arms of love
And crowning me with grace

My heart is filled with thankfulness
To Him who reigns above
Whose wisdom is my perfect peace
Whose every thought is love
For every day I have on earth 
Is given by the King
So I will give my life my all
To love and follow Him

Keith Getty & Stuart Townend
Copyright 2003 Thankyou Music

This song yesterday in worship ministered to my soul in such a profound way. Every word of it applies to lessons I have been learning in life lately. And every word of it encourages areas of faith that have been stretched lately.  The music played and my heart just hung on, begging for the knowledge of this truth to be evident in my every action. 

We had a fun weekend. Jeremiah's baseball team won their game on Saturday! They played so well and were such good sportsman. I was super proud of them. Jeremiah went on to spend the night with Grandmom and Grandad. Aaron and I had fun spending focused time with Nathaniel. He enjoyed being the center of our attention, however, he really really missed his brother. He doesn't really know what to do with himself when he is on his own. 

Last night we were up late at an amazing Gungor concert (more on that later) so today we are spending a quiet day in our sweats bringing order to the house and enjoying this gorgeous spring day. 

Philly Trip Pictures

Finally - some pictures from our Spring Break trip to Philadelphia. 

Sometimes vacations are stressful, especially when they are quick. But this one ended up being so relaxing. We felt like we really had time to just rest, relax, and reconnect with our family. So here are some of the highlights:

 Nothing better than watching the boys hang out with their uncles! 

I love watching my brothers, friends for life and best friends as adults, 

and hope that my boys will have the same bond. 

 The boys loved making "Peeps nests" so much last year when my parents were down with us for Easter that we decided to make them again. 

 One morning we took a walk through mom and dad's neighborhood. 

We played at the park, had a cheese steak, and enjoyed the scenery.

 The church mom and dad are attending. Just a few short blocks from their house. 

 Nathaniel and uncle Ben are kindred spirits! 

They both love to play hard, wrestle, laugh and love intensely. 

 Nathaniel and Uncle Ben compare bumps from broken collar bones (which they both have).

 Two cheeky monkeys! 

 It was nice to be at my parents place in Philadelphia and have various family members come a visit us. 

Nathaniel getting his opa spankings. :-) 

 One of Nathaniel's favorite things to do was to help opa build fires in the fire place. 

It was their daily ritual. 

Ninja moves. 

We spent our last day in Philly at the Philadelphia Zoo. It was a perfect spring day and all the flowering trees and bushes were in full bloom. It was a great day!

 Oma and Jeremiah both love maps, so naturally a route had to mapped out. 

 Nathaniel sad that I told him not to touch the peacock. 

He loves peacocks.

 Who is watching who here?

 We love giraffe's!

 Look close! Aunt Ramona and her nephews.

 One of the cool things about this zoo was that they had sculptures of animals everywhere that were not only beautiful pieces art but obviously perfect for climbing. 

 Oma and the boys took a fun ride in the swan paddle boat.

 The lions were sleeping so Nathaniel decided to roar and wake them up. 

They were pretty intent on their naps though. 

 GI Joe moves in front of the huge cobra. 

Nathaniel ran up to me, "Look mama! It's the sign for Cobra Commander!"

 The one thing Jeremiah wanted to see was a kangaroo with a joey in it's pouch. And look what was one of the last things we saw. Beautiful and amazing!

 That rhinoceros was crazy huge!

 An awesome climbing tree by the zoo exit. 

The boys could have happily climbed there all day.

One of the fun things about our trip was the boys that lived next door to my parents. The younger ones were the same age as Jeremiah and Nathaniel and the older boy was kind and patient. They spent hours each day playing outside together! It was so great for the boys to have built in playmates. It was a real gift for all of us.