Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Finally!!!! :)

I know I know.......IT has been forever since I posted....:) I have been busy....but here are some pictures of what took place in the last few weeks. Thanksgiving was awesome! My family was all together for the first time in a while. My parents were able to make it and both brothers. I didn't get many pictures of my brothers which I am upset about but here are a few. This was everyone sitting down for the meal. Of course I bought plastic dishes because I never want to do dishes after THankgiving! What can I say...lazy maybe....but it went well. :)






Here is a pic of all the kids...but it turned out terrible....at least you can see them a little bit.


It was so beautiful outside! It was in the 60's and everyone was able to play outside. It was great because the kids had cabin fever for a while when it was cold before. THis way they played all day and went to bed early! :) My brother Justin has two kids that are the same ages so it was really nice! Jevan is 5 and in between the boys ages and Saige is 6 months older than Ellie. They all played together so great I barely saw them all week. Here is my mom and Adam watching the girls on the Teeter Totter.

Here are the boys making guns and spaceships out of their construx! They loved every minute of being together and had the best time.

Here they are playing on the trampoline! How fun!

Here is Samuel...like usual...getting into something. This time it was my recipe box and of course he was putting them all in my toaster oven!! :) He's cooking recipes already! ;)

When my brother Justin and his wife left we were able to spend time with my parents. It was so nice. I haven't seen them since last Christmas so it had been almost a year! We did my parents Christmas presents before they left so they didn't have to send them to us this year. Here is everyone opening up their goodies!
My brother Jonathan has lived in Toledo for the past few years but got layed off at his job a month ago. So now he is living in my basement. It has been good and I actually get to see him now. He leads the youth at his church and is also a worship leader. God has given him an incredible gift and he has written many songs. He is finally getting a few recorded this year. Pray that God will help him start his music ministry God has planned for him.


This year after Thanksgiving the kids, gramma and I made Christmas cookies. It was a lot of fun and the kids loved the decorating part. Here is the finished product!
After the cookies they all wanted to be firemen and sat in the suitcases the boys got for Christmas. It was too cute not to take a picture!
Anyway, that has been life the past few weeks. It was fun to see the whole family together again! I do have a prayer request. I go in for a gall bladder ultrasound and some blood work this friday. I have been in some pain and this will tell me if I need surgery pretty soon. Thanks guys! Love you all!~

Monday, October 16, 2006

My wonderful little Samuel....

Samuel is my busy kid. There is not a day that goes by without him getting into something. Most of the time I catch him sitting in the toilet bowl playing in the toilet water, or playing in my clean folded laundry baskets and find the laundry in a big pile, or I'll walk into the kitchen to find all my pots and pans and tupperware on the floor. It amazes me what he can get into in the short amount of time when I turn my back.


Out of the 4 of my children Samuel is my busiest child. He is so sweet and very loveabe but he can be very what do you call it...stubborn...if he doesn't get his own way. I have never had to deal with a child with the fits that he throws. I think it is mainly because he can't communicate to me what he wants most of the time. I love him to death though and try to remain calm if I can....God help me as a mom....it's difficult sometimes.
The other day night I had a spa party to go to. It was very different...they offered eyebrow waxes and tints, 10 minute massages, hand parafin waxes and hand massaging scrubs and then went through a list of what the spa sells and all their different services they offer. It was very fun. When I came home... this is what I saw......


Talk about getting shaken up. I am so glad I wasn't at home when it happened! And...of all things I leave my cell phone at home. That night of course Samuel was playing with one of my laundry baskets downstairs. All of a sudden the laundery basket flipped and pinned Samuel in between the glass coffee table and the edge of the basket. Adam said Samuel was stuck to the table and he had to peel him off. When he did he could see his skull. I would have flipped and I thank God it happened when I wasn't home!!! Oh my word! At least the small hospital close to our house had no waiting. I thank God that some of Adam's friends were over too. Otherwise he would have had no ride. Poor Samuel! He looks like he has a unibrow! :) When I put him to bed that night I prayed for him like I do all the kids and I was asking God why and he told me to thank Him for sparing him of a much worse tragedy....so I did. I thanked him for His protection against anything worse that could have happened! We don't know what we have been spared from.....


Here is the trooper eating pizza after the incident....what a bad day!!


He is doing better and this is a picture of him today. It's not as red. Oh well....he is my first child to have to go through stitches. It probably won't be the last and I thank God for his protection today and always!

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

I love FALL.......

I am a great big holiday fan! I love everything about it. This is what I did this year for fall....it is one of my favorite times of year (besides Christmas!) I took the picture just as the right corn stalk was falling over....:)



I told Ethan to laugh for me because as you can see what a fake smile he has in the second picture above. He is cute when he wants to be....



Ellie just got done falling off the porch about three feet down or so....I tried to have her hug the pumpkin like Ethan, turned around and all of a sudden she was on the ground crying. Thank God we have angels watching out for our kids huh? Happy Fall! (literally) :)

~Our just about finished product!~

So our basement is just about totally finished!!! Auggh!!....and.... YAY! It has been two months and it was worth waiting for! The last thing we have to do is put up the base boards and put the craft countertop in the kids room. It turned out so comfy and cozy! I am very happy with the finished product! We decided with tile and big throw rugs for the floor.(easier to clean)

This is what you see when you walk down the steps. Our computer desk fits nicely in the walk way to the family room. That way I can keep an eye on all the kids when I am at the computer!


This is the family room! I new the orange would just ~POP~ and I love it! It just adds some color if you know what I mean.
Above is our 75 inch screen! It is really nice! It feels like I'm watching a movie on the big screen in my own home. The kids really like it too!


Here is the kids toy room also. I am slowly putting the toys in once I go through them. It's nice to have a place for all the toys too! They don't clutter up the rest of the house. Anyway, just wanted to show everyone what everything looks like now. All the hard work payed off into better than what we had before. Thank you Jesus for the enormous blessing!

Monday, August 28, 2006

It is almost finished......!

So our basement is truly almost finished! It has been hard work....but well worth it. We wanted it to be a bright fun place since it is a basement so we decided on a bright yellow. We also have a black ceiling...(it covers a multitude of sins, if you know what I mean). Our ceiling was so low and had many gas and water poles so what we did was put up paper backed insulation in the ceiling and than sprayed the whole ceiling black. It looks real nice and turned out better than I expected.


Adam put in some nice lighting throughout. He is a genius and can practically do everything handy around the house. It is nice. Our computer desk is going where the nice bar of three lights is on the right. THe back is our family room which also has retractive lighting.

Here are some more pictures of the lighting....and also what we will have for a tv. Adam bought a projector (gotta love ebay!) and also some screen material which we hung to get the wrinkles out. The screen will be smaller and have a nice black frame around it. It will be a nice addition to a smaller room so we don't have to have a huge entertainment center.
Here is the kids playroom.....excuse the cluttered computer desk....



We had SO much fun with the kids that day! I bought red, yellow and blue paints and we mixed them up to make orange purple and green too. We marked the playroom for sure and even samuel has his foot and hand prints on the walls! We had buckets of water and old towels to rinse and we would paint there hands or feet and have them slap the walls. It was so funny!!! Ellie was a riot and would slap them over and over until we had a smeared mess. It was a blast though and it turned out great. We get our carpeting today and it is going in on Thursday! YAY!




So I told you I was doing some bright colors. All my accents are bright orange, black and our furniture is a sage green color. It sounds weird but looks great in my head!! :) Anyway, I will take a picture of the finished product once we get there!

Sunday, August 13, 2006

Josiah's Birthday

We celebrated Josiah's 6th birthday party this year! He is getting so big! Here are some pictures of the monumental moment. You can see my brand new curtains in the distance! (Courtesy of my Mother-in-law.) She worked so hard! :) They look so much better in person. Sam and Ellie are playing on the floor. If you don't know Samantha, she is one of my best friends and she takes care of the kids all the time. I love her to death!!




Josiah is going to be playing soccer in school this year...so her got a practice ball, cleats and shin guards this year.




He also got a really cool bike from Mommy and Daddy & Gramma and Grampa this year! He was shocked! He found it in his bedroom. It was so cute to see his face!


The cake was so adorable this year. Sam Briggs is one in a million and got him a nice CARS cake. He liked that! THanks SAM! The Birthday was fun...and he had a good time. We had 3 boys spend the night...that was a handful but was great. And....a lot of people got to see our house for the first time.