Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

The title sums up what I felt like I did all weekend!! I must have washed 4 loads of dishes. Everytime I turned around I was washing more dishes, unloading, or loading the dishwasher. In all reality - I'm happy to have an amazing family to wash the dishes after and I probably only did it 3 times. It's just so rare that we are home for so many days in a row where we eat all of our meals here.

It was a super productive weekend around our house. Saturday morning the family split and the boys went to work on the boat and the girls went shopping!

I can't believe I'm about to share with the world the chaos I've worked in for the past 4 years but here goes ... Some of you may know that I work from home 3 days a week. My office has been in 3 different rooms in our house (so far) and never has it been neat or clean. While this may not bother some, it bothers me ... I've adopted a new motto: 'Outer order leads to inner peace'. So as you can imagine, working like this has made me a bit batty ...

I'm further motivated to do this project because they've started video conferencing at work and I just couldn't find an angle for the camera that hid the insanity. So Lily and I set out for Ikea on Saturday morning. I had picked out this desk and book shelf:

This was some seriously heavy furniture. Thankfully a nice man and his son came to my rescue as I was attempting to load it up. They hopped out of their truck, loaded me up, and were off. True blessings! Steven and I struggled to get them up stairs!

I went to unpacking the pieces and this is what I found!

Needless to say, I had to call for back up and it became a family project!

Its still a work in progress so check back and I'll make sure to update with the finished product! I'm looking forward to having an ORGANIZED space for working and crafting! The good news is the room has great bones - lots of windows. I love it!

In other exciting news - I go to the orthodontist tomorrow and hopefully find out I get my braces off in a few weeks! I am thoroughly looking forward to being able to eat in public again!

Now I'm off to get some work-work done. As Lily would say 'ni-ni'!



Happy Birthday America!

Summer is so much fun through the eyes of a child! You almost forget the heat, humidity, and mosquitos when you see your kids eyes light up at the sight of fireworks. Or chase their friends around smearing popsicles on each others faces until they fall face first in the sand at the beach. The older my kids get, the more I realize how much there is to be learned from the sweet innocent spirit of a child!

A bit of background before I share our weekend - We were so blessed to have a great group of friends when we lived in Tampa. We had a teriffic Sunday School class called DINKS - Double Income No Kids. Our weekends were filled with trips to the local pizza place, bowling, and hanging out at each others house. Needless to say, we've all aged a bit and most of us have kids now. We've managed to all get together with all of our crazy kiddos for the past two years for a reunion. This year we went to St. Pete beach and the adults sat around and visited while the little ones entertained each other!

No smiles from me Daddy! Notice the kid in the background with the popsicle all over his face. That was because ...

He and his friend chased each other around with a melting popsicle!

So then I thought I could get a picture of the kids. I bribed with cookies which worked until ...

Jay realized he was out of cookie but Lily still had some. So ...

I gave him another one and this was as good as it gets!

Sunday brought church and again the idea that I could get both kids to look at me without a scowl for a picture. (I don't think I'll ever stop trying to get a good shot!)

We spent some great time with our family and Lily took her cousin in a car race!

Monday brought the question - where am I going today? I explained that Mommy & Daddy were staying home because it was a holiday - America's birthday.

And of course the next question was - can we have a party? With cake? And sprinkles? So I obliged and we made red, white, and blue cupcakes (with sprinkes!).

I really wish I had gotten a good picture of Lily during this. Jay was putting the sprinkles on himself so of course they were all over the floor. I turned around to find Lily under Jay's feet picking them up and eating them! She loves cupcakes. Today I was sharing one with her and she kept signing 'more' and saying 'mo'. Too cute - she's definintely got spunk!

We topped off our hoilday weekend with fireworks compliments of Uncle Josh! Jay liked the 'pretty colors' but didn't really care for the 'scary noises'.



It was a great weekend and good time to remember what we were celebrating. We're blessed to live in a free country and I'm so thankful for all of those who sacrifice time with their families and sometimes their lives to defend our freedom! We so often take for granted if we call the police - they come, if we attend Sunday worship we aren't persecuted or tortured for our beliefs, and we are free to speak our mind. So many people don't have such luxuries. 

God bless America! 

Woo hoo!!!

My little man is quite a rock star in my book! Our return visit with the eye doctor was today and it was GREAT!! Our first visit left me with a bad taste in my mouth about this doctor ... he looked at Jay for 5 minutes and told me very matter of factly that he has a condition that is generally only corrected with surgery but they would try some patching but that usually didn't work. Then he handed me a packet of papers on eye surgery and sent me on my way. As you can imagine, that caused utter panic in my heart! Not to mention I was by myself trying to hold back the tears so Jay wouldn't think something was wrong.

So today, we all loaded up and went back. I thought his eyes were better but I was trying not to be overly paranoid and stare at him too much. After looking at him for a few short minutes, he turned to us and very matter of factly said, 'Wow. This is the most dramatic change I've seen using patching therapy. His eyes are aligned. We'll just keep doing what we're doing and check back in in a few months.' He went on to tell us how uncommon this was and then tell all of the nurses when he left the room. God does answer prayers!

I feel like I've talked a lot about Jay lately. I need to give some love to my 'little Lils' so here goes... Lily is the PERFECT addition to our family. Her personality fits right in and adds to the chaos. She recently started walking and watch out world! She has really come out of her shell recently - she has always been very shy. To some extent she still is but now that she has perfected 'Hi', she thinks she's the greeter everywhere she goes. Yesterday in the doctors office, she greeted everyone with a 'Hi' and then she walked up to all of the people and said 'Hi' until they acknowledged her. It was hilarious. To add to the personality, her hair is finally long enough for pigtails! I've loved making her sets of bows for those perfect little piggies. (I still need to get pics of her with them).

Tonight, I caught her in the play room reading. She had pulled her chair up to the bookcase and pulled them off one by one, flipped through the pages, and promptly threw them on the floor!

Lily is such a little girl and I love it! I introduced her to a good ol' PB&J today and she loved it. Here are a few pictures from our lunchtime adventures!

And Jay had to get in on the action with hia little camera he got at the doctors office from the treasure chest. :-)

Even the most normal day around here is fun! We have plans to visit with our Sunday School friends from Tampa this weekend. We can't wait to get together with all of our friends and their kids at the beach! Jay and Lily love the beach so it's sure to be a fun weekend.

Happy 4th of July if I don't get around to posting before then! I am so thankful for my freedom and all of those who keep us free! I am anxious to have my solider home soon!