Daughters

I have two wonderful sons, Patrick and Brett. I have really enjoyed being their mom and have a special place in my heart for boys. I can get a little defensive when people stereotype boys and sometimes feel boys are are viewed a little like second class citizens compared to girls. There are a lot of things that my sons do that make me feel very special. Their hugs are about the most wonderful moments in my life. Admittedly, I have always wanted a girl and always felt David would have been the perfect dad to a daughter. (By the way, I think he was the perfect Dad to our sons.) You might be wondering by now if I made a mistake in the title of this post, Daughters. I didn't. Patrick and Brett have blessed us with the most amazing women that we have the honor to call daughters. Patrick's wife, Jana, and Brett's wife Jes, have become a very special part of our family. Not only do they "complete" our boys but they "complete" our family. We have gotten to spend some really special time this summer with Jana and Jes. They are both so sweet and we really feel their love and respect for us. I have gotten to do some girl things like baking a cherry pie from scratch with Jes and making a collage for Hannah's birthday with Jana. I really felt honored that they wanted to spend time with me. I am looking forward to years of girl activities with my "daughters".

Obviously we are not baking a cherry pie but a sweet moment none the less!

Thanks for stopping by,

Hannah's Birthday Adventure

I have recently discovered how to make slide shows with music. I have made two slide shows. One is Hannah's first year of life. I made it for Patrick and Jana's birthdays (Aug. 4 and July 26, respectively). I also made one of the trip we took to the Children's Museum of Richmond for Hannah's Birthday (July 31). I hope you enjoy! Click on link to view.
http://www.onetruemedia.com/my_shared?z=2e03fc55f2dd1b2d7d99d8&utm_source=otm&utm_medium=text_url

Special People, Special Times

We had a wonderful week last week with our granddaughter, Hannah! We think she is totally amazing. Everything she says and does completely captures our attention and hearts. We are madly in love with this beautiful child and can hardly believe we get to share her life!

Jana's birthday was July 26th and the balloon and fruit arrangement were from Grandma Jan. It had fresh strawberries, pineapple, kiwi and mango. Delicious!

We were so glad that Grandma Jan, Hannah's "Great" Grandma was able to be with us too. She had so much fun playing with Hannah, helping her put on shoes and making sure Hannah had sunglasses like her!

One of the highlights of our week was celebrating Hannah's first birthday. We made a lemon cake, and Jana let Hannah have a couple of bites. I am sure that is the first sugar and white flour she has ever had! Hannah wasn't very impressed, she definately prefers fresh fruits and veggies, whole grain bread, oatmeal, and plain yogurt.

We took Hannah to the Children's Museum of Richmond. She enjoyed wandering everywhere and exploring everything and we had a great time chasing her around. She particularily enjoyed the cars. She would climb in and move the steering wheel like she was driving. She even made noise while driving. Is she amazing or what? She enjoyed crawling through tunnels and the archeology dig areas filled with a sand like substance made out of rubber where she kept picking up handfuls and pouring them out. Her favorite thing was the water area. A large water table inside and a sprinkler area outside.

Needless to say, David and I were having a great time too.

To top off this already great week, Brett and Jes came for the weekend. They brought their little "girl" Cali. She and Hannah got along great!

Special friends, Christy and Lauren wish Hannah HappyBirthday"!

We missed Patrick very much. He was in Oshkosh, Wisconsin working at a huge air show. I think he missed us, too!

Praise God from whom all blessings flow! Family and friends bring such joy. Thank you for sharing in our lives!

David and Des

Beaches, Kites, Nana & Pop Pop

It's A Wonderful Life!

David and I spent the first week of June celebrating 28 wonderful years as Mr. & Mrs. We started our anniversary trip at Nags Head, NC. We stayed in a friends beach house about 2 blocks from the beach. We packed up every morning with cooler, chairs, towels and umbrella to spend several hours basking in the luxery of doing nothing! Reading and tanning took all my time and David enjoyed flying a kite, walking, exploring and swimming in the chilly Atlantic! We always hope to see dolphins and we were not disappointed! We took our time doing everything!

Happy Anniversary!!!
After leaving Nags Head we traveled to North Myrtle Beach, SC to top off an already perfect trip with 4 days with the "kids". There are no words adaquately to describe how blessed David and I felt to be with Brett and Jess and Patrick, Jana and Hannah. This is really first time we have all been together as a family. The last time we were kind of all together was at Brett and Jess' wedding. We were so blessed to stay at a lovely beach house owned by Jess' grandparents.

Family Vacation...Priceless

Needless to say, Hannah got a lot of attention from PopPop and Nana. We are totally in love. We stole hugs and kisses whenever we could. We had so much fun feeding her, playing with her, putting her to bed, getting her up from bed, and pretty much goo gooing all over the place. David told her the first day that she would say Pop Pop before we left and believe it or not, she did!!! Needless to say, someone was extremely proud! (Just between you and I, she didn't know what she said but I don't think that even mattered!) We are looking forward to celebrating Hannah's first birthday the end of July!

Sand and Sea

My Guys

De-junkifying

O.K. so we have had a slow beginning. Very slow. Now I can understand why my kids may not update as often as I thought they should. It's harder than I thought coming up with things to talk about and finding the time to do it. So here is our second attempt. I want to start by saying I am very proud of my husband. He is now a published author. His book arrived last week. "The View From Here" is a compilation of weekly writings he has done for our local paper over the past eight years or so. I have always admired how well he writes and have encouraged him for a long time to pursue this God given talent. You can order his book for you local Christian bookstore or contact us and we can make sure you get one.

We have been de-junkifying! If Patrick and Brett are reading this should bring them a chuckle. The have experienced many de-junkifying times in our household. Some with fond memories, I believe. Like the time I asked for de-junkifying for my birthday and when I went away for Women's Retreat David, Patrick and Brett fulfilled my wish. They did a great job as usual. Our laundry room and small extra room has been filling up for a long time now. Most people have a catch all area. Well ours had grown beyond believable. Now that our boys are not living at home anymore it is harder to get motivated to do big projects. They were great helpers! David though is the ultimate de-junkifyer! He rarely has the time for big projects but when he does he goes full force. He hit the laundry room Friday on his day off right after I left for work. He used the "Clean Sweep" method. Trash pile, sell pile, donate pile and keep pile. Our youth group was having a yard sale on Saturday so this was the time. (I did have to rescue a few things from the yard sale pile, probably a big no-no according to"Clean Sweep" rules). Everything is now sorted and distributed to the appropriate place, trash, sell, donate and keep. All that was left when I got home from work was the keep pile. Now my job is to sort, organize and put away the keep pile. I am motivated now. I cleaned out the bathroom linen closet Saturday morning and am hoping to do the entry way closet this afternoon. I have a whole pile of baby things that other grandmothers have given me now that I am a "Nana". I have a booster seat and pack and play and some linens and some other misc. things. I need to make a place for these things and now that I can get to my small storage room this will be a breeze.

I must get back to my projects because my desire will wane at some point, this I am sure of.

Blessings!

We've Only Just Begun...

...to blog. Now that I have gone through this process to set this blog up, I am speechless. OK, here I go. It is somewhat intimidating to randomly write with no specific audience. The idea of maintaining a blog has been intriguing to me for some time. I regularly view and thoroughly enjoy my kids blogs. I love catching up and feeling connected at the click of a button. I also have wanted a forum for my "random thoughts". Hopefully, they will not be few and far between.

I heard a woman speak today at Women in the Vine about women's prison ministry. It was very interesting and motivating. One of the things she talked about was "heart prints". When we help one another, we leave a heart print in one anothers lives. In order to leave a heart print in someones life, I must get out of my comfort zone. Where is my comfort zone? Within the walls of my home and church! Am I going to get involved in women's prison ministry? I don't know, but I do know the Lord wants me to move out!

Someone else shared this morning about various aspects of new and new life(our theme this morning for the Vine was "New Life") and reminded us that often times we hang onto the old life not allowing us to fully grasp the new life God has prepared for us. A couple of examples she gave from Scripture was Lot's wife and the Israelites leaving Egypt. For me personally, I am applying this truth to my diet/lifestyle plan. I want to embrace the "new life" in healthy food choices and not look back at what I can't have. The promised land is before me! Hebrews 11:1 has spoke to me recently in this area as well. "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see." Gotta look forward!