Start of the Christmas Season

Like I said in my last post, our holiday season has been fast and furious, with hardly time to come up for air, but it's all been things I enjoyed doing!

We got invited to attend CARTI's Festival of Trees with some friends, which was a really fun event. Some of the trees were spectacularly decorated and the survivors cancer stories were truly inspiring, what a great cause!

There's been normal bedtime routines with reading the Bible and remembering scripture.


Mom and Dad got tickets for us all to see the Rep's rendition of Little Mermaid. The costumes and set decorations were amazing.  I have to say The Rep did a great job with this show, the kids had a terrific time! (Pascha, we sure missed you, so sorry you were sick sweet girl!)

We have been looking for a boat for some time now and Adam finally found one that would allow us to ski and wakeboard while also taking another family along with us.  So Adam got an early Christmas present that we all will enjoy next summer!  We picked it up two weeks ago and drove it down to Hot Springs, the kids were beside themselves with excitement! We're looking forward to making more family memories!

Then there was the annual Santa brunch. The kids enjoyed the hot egg nog, candy canes and of course talking to Santa.


We had someone take a quick picture, its not the greatest, but we got it.

We enjoyed eating dinner with our friends Shana and Cache.  My boys love playing with Cache, chasing up and down the halls is a favorite past time!  This year we made reindeer ornaments together.  We love these two and are thankful for their friendship!

Our D-group from church had a tacky Christmas party, which is hard for me…I don't do tacky well. Adam convinced me that I needed to go "full out" and not just do an ugly Christmas sweater with jeans, so we went with these hideous Christmas pajamas. We started with dinner catered from Oceans. Nothing says "Merry Christmas" like a Godzilla sushi roll, it is my FAVORITE, if you've not gotten it, try it next time! Thanks to Keri, each couple had the opportunity to pick an ornament with a name of God on it and then go around and share what that name has meant to us this past year.  I really enjoyed this portion of the evening.  Our ornament was "Christ is Lord".  We shared about how thankful we are that Christ is Lord of our home.  Sometimes, with normal fleshly reactions and sin that so easily jumps out in the context of every day living, Adam and I are grateful that both of us have Christ as Lord, because without Him, it would be hard to forgive and offer forgiveness to one another.  Because we have both experienced God's forgiveness (over and over) we are more easily (but certainly not perfectly) able to offer that same forgiveness to each other, our kids and others we come in contact with each day.  And in this year where we have honestly been busier then ever before, we have found it so comforting to know that "Christ is Lord" when the going gets tough, when days are long, trials are never ceasing and conflicts arise.  Thankfully we have "Christ the Lord" to lean into and on when life is just hard with kids, their activities, school, work events, marriage and family.  I'm so thankful that Christ the Lord, our Savior, was born!

This year I am the Staff Appreciation Chairman at the boys school.  Since I really enjoy planning parties I thought this would be a fun job for me.  It was (and is) a lot to plan each month, but December had a lot going on.  I planned a luncheon for 100 teachers and staff, but it was great to give back to them for all they do for my kiddos!   We truly have a great school and I so appreciate all that they do to teach my children, keep them safe and watch over them each and every day of the week!  My friend Emily helped me do the mailbox treats for all the staff, then we set up for the monthly staff meeting and also pulled off a lovely staff luncheon all in one week!

Each Christmas, Adam enjoys helping to plan the Heart Hospitals Christmas party.  This year had a record attendance, I think there was over 500 people at the Embassy Suites. Vicky and her team do an awesome job of decorating and planning for the hospital wide party.  The past two years they've done an American Idol style talent competition.  From a Scottish bagpipe player to singers and dancers, the AHH team's got talent for sure.  There are many door prizes given throughout the evening from gift cards to an iPad mini, culminating in the winner of the competition receiving a ticket for a cruise.  This year there was a guest singer.  You may have heard of Sam Hunt, the Country R&B singer, well his talented "brother" made an appearance and gave a slammin' performance if I do say so myself, though I am slightly biased because I happen to be married to "Slam".  "Slam" wrote a song about Coby's Place, the new cafeteria at the Heart Hospital as well as all the different diet plans the cardiologists believe in.  The video of his performance is too long to upload to here with Flickr so you'll have to go watch it on my Facebook page.

I'm grateful for these two men who Adam gets to work along side each day, they're both hilariously funny and men of character, so thankful for their friendship to Adam.

So, as you can see, our start to the Christmas season has been packed with fun and memories and I'm  so thankful for each one!  I'm loving all the Christmas cards that keep pouring in each day!  It's one of my favorite things about Christmas time!

Thanksgiving 2015

The past three weeks have been a complete whirl wind for us.  This time of year is always busy but between our family's activities, which has been something every day and every night for twenty-one straight days, there has been absolutely NO time to blog.  So, now that it's Dec 19th, I'll try to get caught up from Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving is the holiday that is full of remembering our nations history, how God provided for the Pilgrims, but also a time for remembering all that God has done for us personally.  Years ago, my grandmother bought one of FamilyLife's Thanksgiving family activities and it's become a tradition for us to do each year.   It walks you through many of the stories that the Pilgrims went through and recounts the many miracles of God's provision for them as they traveled the long journey, began to make their new colony and as they established themselves in the New World.  I'm not a huge history buff, but I do enjoy reading, remembering and telling my kids about all that God has done not only in the past for others but for our own family as well.  Remembering and retelling all that God has done solidifies His goodness to us and marks "memorial stones" in our minds that we can call back to when times are trying or when things are hard.  Remembering God's goodness never gets old, or outdated…its always a good time to give thanks to the Lord!

This Thanksgiving as we went around the table each night sharing our "high/low" and what we were thankful for, it was fun to hear the kids share.  They said some of the "normal" things that they were thankful for, like our "warm house", "lots of food in the pantry" and "their cozy bed", but there was also some sincere Thanksgiving's too, like one who said he was thankful for his feet so that he could run and play, another said he was thankful for our family.  It's always a crap shoot sitting at the table with four children when you try to do something like this cause it could go incredibly well or just totally flop.  Some nights it flopped but a few times it really was meaningful.  Seeing the hearts of our kids growing as they begin to realize and understand all that God does for us on a daily basis really is awesome because in explaining to them all that He does for us each day, reinforces to myself, what He is in fact doing in and through us, which helps solidify the fact that He is not a far off God, but rather a very intimate and present One! I'm grateful for the Thanksgiving season and time to remember that our God is a good God who loves us and give us good gifts.

This years Thanksgiving day was a mix of sadness and thankfulness.   Adam's Aunt Gloria past away unexpectedly, just days before Thanksgiving.  It was a difficult time for our family, especially Adam's Dad.  Her service was uplifting as loved ones shared stories of her humor and fun loving side, we even got to hear a recording of her singing her own quirky rendition of Happy Birthday sung to Bill last year.  I loved what the pastor, Harry Li, shared.  He said, Gloria sees clearly now who our God is.  What an incredible thing to think about, Romans 14:11 says, "As surely as I live, says the Lord, every knee will bow before me; every tongue will acknowledge God" and that's what Gloria is doing now.

I am so grateful for family and for the fact that God placed me in a loving family so that I can experience a small taste of His great love for me.  Within our family I feel loved unconditionally similarly to how God shows me unconditional, undeserved favor and I look forward to the day when I get to see clearly who God is and how majestic, magnificent, glorious and sovereign He is.

Peyton's Camping Party

This year, when I asked Peyton what kind of party he wanted, he emphatically said, "I'd really like a camping party." I slightly winced at those words, since his birthday is in mid November and in Arkansas, weather can be volatile not to mention the idea of several boys "sleeping" outside, sounded a little bit intense, but after Adam and I let it roll around in our heads for a bit, we decided it really could be a lot of fun.  So the planning commenced!

Last weekend we had nine of his little buddies join us as we celebrated Peyton's 9th birthday.  We rented a camp site toward the back corner of Maumelle Park.   There was a field right behind our site so it was a "perfect" location for learning a little bit about land navigation (which my prior Army husband thought would be fun for the boys).  My one warning that I would give someone who is doing a camping party OUTSIDE at NIGHT, is to remind them that taking pictures will be difficult.   I totally had trouble getting good ones, so I went so far as to turn my headlights on to help shine light on the camp site, in turn, my battery died, thankfully we had jumper cables, so all was not lost!  Looking back on what I was able to capture, I think they had a terrific time!

Here is what the invitation looked like.

Along the way we had some signs directing people back to our camp site.

These kiddos had a big time setting up and playing while we got things situated and arranged.  Sitting on the back of Dad's tailgate was a highlight, but the best part was getting their faces all camo-ed out, which they all loved!

We couldn't have done the party without all of Poppy's camping equipment or G-Dad's firewood!  A big thank you to you two for helping pull off this fun celebration!

Peyton enjoyed helping set up some of the tents while Lawson preferred keeping the fire manned.

I think the boys had a great time being outside in nature. The leaves are really starting to change colors and it ended up being a nice night after it misted and rain all afternoon.  (God answered my prayers for it to stop, which truly was a blessing!)

Dinner consisted of frito chili pie and drinks.  Apparently the drink of choice was Root Beer, which I ran out of within the first hour of the gathering (I'll make note of this for next time!)

After dinner, Adam gave a brief explanation of how land navigation works (and there is a whole mathematical equation to figure out your pace count per so many meters) but he decided to just give them a short version using their compasses and counting their steps.  I think they had a great time on their "treasure hunt".

Each boy got a draw string backpack with a compass and a flashlight.  Then for the treasure hunt, they learned land navigation.  Adam had five different spots in the woods that were marked by a glowing chem-light which the boys thought were awesome.  As they learned to use a pace count in order to determine where the next "treasure" was hidden, at each stop they received some beef jerky, peanuts, trail mix and candy as well as a few lessons in character along the way.   Dad's and Grand Dad's were scattered throughout the field at each of the spots and talked about a character trait such as perseverance, loyalty or integrity, before they received their treat.  I think it was pretty fun for the boys!

Next up was the cake.  I was thrilled with the Bluecake Company's rendition of what I imagined the cake to look like, I thought they pulled off quite an adorable and delicious camp themed cake.

This is the only picture I got as we sang Happy Birthday…oh well!

As if the sugary marshmallow fondant icing wasn't enough we added to it, we definitely roasted smores and ate more chocolatey goodness!   Emerson, Jojo and Ava Jane enjoyed that little treat!  Us Momma's sat around the fire pit trying to catch our breath from all the activities while the boys ran through the field doing their treasure hunt.

Saturday morning the boys enjoyed running around and playing chase while Adam whipped up some fluffy pancakes and sausage.  While they waited for breakfast, sticks and fire and "smoke signals" helped to keep them occupied…they are truly boys! Give them a stick and some fire and they were good to go!

I love this boy and was so glad to get to celebrate his birthday, though he's not actually nine just yet, he has a few more days as an eight year old!  I can hardly believe he's only got one more year as a single digit!  Happy Birthday sweet boy, Daddy and I love you so much!

Better Late Then Never

Halloween was officially a week ago today, and now I'm into November's blog posts, but I guess it's better late then never, right?  My week was filled with planning for a reception at school, loving on and caring for a sick little boy and prepping for my oldest sons 9th birthday party.  Between it all, the week was full of evening events and dinners out so this truly is the first moment I've had to document our holiday of sugary goodness.

Each year my good friend Carol, hosts a Halloween party with cute spooky food and dry-ice punch which definitely adds to the ambiance.  To see more details about the party check out Carol's blog.

Before heading to the party, all of the neighborhood kids were out so we had to try and get a picture of them together.  Stars Wars characters represent!

We also made a very quick stop by my parents house to say "Trick or Treat!"

This was my four-some this year.  I should have probably looked for a Princess Leia costume for Ava Jane but she really wanted to be Elsa, so that's what we did!

There was much eating to be had, there were mummy hotdogs, ghostly strawberries, spooky punch and more tasty goodness then could be eaten!

And as soon as the twenty-some-odd kids ages eight and under (insert Emoji smiley face with wide open eyes) scarfed down their food then we were headed out to trick or treat!  One of the guys in our group brought along his four wheeler and trailer which made the walking part (up and down hills) so much easier for everyone.  Kids didn't have to whine when their legs were tired and parents ears didn't need to be pulled off to make it through the evening; it was a win-win situation!!  Here they are, all piled into the trailer!

At each stop they jumped out quickly without a second to lose in their quest for candy goodness!  Their 2015 Halloween experience is "in the books".  I can't believe we're sliding right into the holidays!!