2007 Year in Review

Fellow bloggers, I'm leaving for South Arkansas in 1 day, so this will more than likely be my last post for a couple of weeks. A week, at least. We are coming home on January 2. So, I thought I'd post a review of this year's happenings with my family and our church work.

Cayson
Boy, what a year this has been! Cayson will turn 16 months in just a few days. He's had so many milestones this past year! It was around this time last year that he first started eating a little rice cereal and now he's eating everything we do. Well, almost anything. Just not most veggies! Especially if they're green! He's got his daddy in him there! Also, he's learned to crawl, pull up, cruise, and walk. He has 8 teeth, with 1 breaking through now. He's had 2 haircuts, the first one on his birthday and the 2nd one just on Wednesday. He's growing out of a size 4 shoe and in between 12 and 18 months size clothes. He weighs about 23 pounds. This year he's been on several trips with us: to Minneapolis to the Mall of America, to Fort Worth for a youth ministry conference, and to Stuart, OK for youth camp at Camp WOW. He's got several people in our church wrapped around his little finger! If he decides he doesn't want to be in the nursery and starts crying, usually someone will come and get him out and walk around with him! We never have to want for babysitters, either! He has been such a good baby and toddler. He hasn't been very sick at all, with the exception of a couple of viruses. He's a joy to be around and I'm very thankful that God gave him to us!

Shaun
This past year Shaun has had a few milestones, himself. He turned 29 in April and celebrated his first Father's Day in June. He will celebrate his 2 year anniversary at First Southern in just a couple months. Also, this was the year of weddings for him. He sang at 3 weddings, served as best man for his brother's, and actually got to marry his first and second couple this year. I'm so proud of him and his willingness to be used by God!

Me
Well, I turned 24 in June, which means I've been out of high school for 6 years and out of college for 3. Crazy how time flies! I've experienced another move, just to a different house this time. I took on teaching the 1st and 2nd grade Sunday school class in June and I love it! Also, I taught a junior high girls Bible study this summer. I played Mary Magdalene in our Easter cantata and Lisa/Elizabeth in our Christmas musical. I found out in November, just before Thanksgiving that we're going to have another baby! Also, Shaun and I celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary this month and 6 years together in all in October.

First Southern
This has been an amazing year at First Southern. Our theme for this year was "Go". In the student ministry, we've grown a little bit, even seeing 3 of our kids come to know Christ as their personal Lord and Savior. We took the students to Minneapolis for spring break and Camp WOW for summer camp. We finished up our student worship area early this year and it looks awesome. We saw 2 of our students graduate from high school in May.

In the worship ministry area, we have grown so much! We presented "The Borrowed Tomb" on Palm Sunday. It was a huge success. We began preparing a worship cantata, "God for Us", soon after Easter. We presented it in August. It was such an awesome time of worship and reflection on what God has done for us. We had Christmas in August to reveal to the choir what musical we would be doing for Christmas. We had so much fun with that! We added several members to the choir, including a couple of teenage girls. Also, we saw one of our longtime accompanists "retire" from playing so she could sing in the choir and be free to travel. It's taking 3 ladies, including me, to fill her shoes! And we could never completely do that! She's a tiny woman, but those are some big shoes to fill, so to speak. But Shaun put us on a rotation basis so we could all still sing in the choir, too. We also add a guitarist to our worship time, which brings our instruments to piano, keyboard, and guitar. We are adding congas tomorrow!!!! We just presented our Christmas musical, "Be Not Afraid", this past Sunday and Wednesday night. This was the first time we attempted to present a musical twice and it was a success. We had over 100 people there on Wednesday night and almost half of those were guests! Tomorrow, we are having a "Homecoming Christmas". We are using 2 guitars, congas, and a praise team to lead in worship. We are also taking the Lord's Supper and singing by candlelight. I'm very excited.

We added a women's ministry this year. Our Women's Ministry Coordinator is doing a fantastic job. Last February she organized a Beth Moore simulcast conference for all the women in the River Valley. It was a huge success with many decisions made. We had a women's Bible study this fall with over 30 women taking part.

We've had 11 additions this year, some by baptism, some by letter. In our GROW ministry, we seen at least 2 salvations. For Thanksgiving, we provided Blessing Baskets for people who needed food for Thanksgiving. There was at least one salvation as a result.
Our church really stepped it up ministry-wise this year. I am so excited to see what God is going to do in 2008!

Well, that was pretty long. I think this was just as much, if not more for me as it was for you. It is so good for me to go back and remember what God has done in the life of our family and church. God is so good! I pray that everyone has a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Our Christmas Present is on its Way!

Yeah I know what I'm getting for Christmas. And I'm super excited! Shaun and I decided to buy something together this year because it's so hard for us to shop by ourselves and actually surprise each other. Especially for me. He sees exactly what is spent and where it is spent. Anyway, we had purchased a Kodak EasyShare camara about a year and a half ago. Well, it broke right before Christmas last year. And we've been depending on our camara phones and family members' camaras for pictures ever since. Well, we found an awesome deal on a Fuji camara the other day. It's a 10 megapixel, 10x optical zoom, and it's got lots of other nifty features. It will be here Wednesday!!! So get ready for lots and lots of pics!

Ugh

As I alluded to in my last post, I have been very sick this week. And not from being pregnant, either. I caught the stomach bug that's been going around. I was up all night Tuesday night throwing up. Wednesday morning Shaun actually took Cayson to work with him so I could get some sleep. I am so thankful that his job is flexible like that. I slept all morning and woke up at lunch to find him cooking me chicken noodle soup! I couldn't eat much; in fact, I only drank the broth from it. Shaun left Cayson with me that afternoon because he needed his nap. Bless his heart, he slept for 2 and a half hours! So I got to sleep some more. I didn't go to church Wednesday night, either.

Thursday I woke up feeling much better, just extremely weak and sore. And this was our anniversary. I wanted to get out of the house, but my appetite wasn't completely back. So we went to Panera Bread so I could get some soup. Then we went Christmas shopping. This was so hard at first, but the more we walked around, the more my strength started coming back.

Friday I woke up feeling much, much better. I had more strength, but I was still sore. We had our dress rehearsal for our Christmas musical last night. It was kind of rough for me, standing up there for so long. But we had a pretty good rehearsal. Not perfect, though. So pray for us on Sunday morning!

I'm typing this post at 4:30 am Saturday morning. I woke up at 4 feeling queasy. I'm guessing this is just plain ole morning sickness. Plus, somehow my son ended up in bed with us. He's grown quite a bit, so that doesn't leave much room. So I came in the living room to blog and clear my head and hopefully get some more sleep on the couch.

If I get to actually plan the next pregnancy (yes, I want 3) I'm going to try and not be pregnant at Christmas! Or at least, not be in the first trimester at Christmas. It has been so hard to even want to do the things I usually love to do at Christmastime...like decorate my tree. Which still isn't done yet. It's up, the lights are on, the ornaments are in a box beside the tree, I just haven't had the time or the energy to do it. We're leaving for my parents' house in a week, anyway, to spend the week of Christmas and New Year's with them. So, it probably won't get done.

So, moms, has it been your experience that when you were pregnant with your daughter(s) (if you have one) you were sicker with her than with your son(s)? I've been told this by several women at church. If it's true, then this must be a girl! lol. Oh well, I guess I'll find out soon enough. Thanks for listening to my queasy ramblings. Have a great day and weekend!

Happy Anniversary, O Husband of Mine!

Shaun and I, while we were dating, about 2002

Razorback game this year

This was a show that we were in together at UAM.

Shaun and I got married four years ago today, after being engaged for six months, and dating for a year and a half before that. So, we've been together 6 years in all! It's so hard to believe! We've been through so much together already. We've served in 3 churches, moved 5 times, had one child, and one is on the way! One day, when I feel like writing down the whole story, I'll tell you how we met, got engaged, etc. It's a great one, the love story I always wanted.

Shaun, thank you so much for being such a great husband. I'm not exaggerating when I say that when God gave you to me, he fulfilled everything on my list. And I had a pretty good list! Thank you for putting up with me these last few weeks, especially when I was so sick. You never complained, you just did what needed to be done. I love you so much.

One Down, One to Go!

Our children presented their Christmas musical "It All Happened in the Country" last night. It was so good! Now, we just have the adult Christmas musical left. It's next Sunday morning. We're having a full run-through Wednesday night and a dress rehearsal Friday night. I'm a little nervous about it.

I also have a MOPS (mothers of preschoolers) Christmas party in the morning at 9:30 and our 20s/30s Bible study hour Christmas party is Saturday night. Then we should be through with the parties. (I think.) If I can make it through this week, I think I'm gonna be ok!

I'm so tired!

Ugh. I'm so sleepy. This has been such a long week. It's my least favorite week of the year. It's the week when we have to build the set for our Christmas musical. Last year, we were up until 3 in the morning one night working on it. Fortunately, the children's musical is first this year, so we've had more help. And we're able to use the same set for the adult musical. But it's still been 9 pm every night when Shaun gets home. And Wednesday night I stayed with him to help. Last night, we had our staff Christmas party so it was late getting home. And today, the children had rehearsal all day, so we were up there finishing up the last touches on the set and Shaun was helping to do the sound. Cayson finally fell asleep at the church at about 3 and he slept all the way home, but he woke up after we got home. Grrrr. I was hoping to catch a few zzzz's myself. And Shaun is pastoring a wedding tonight. I guess I'll sleep well tonight.

Just plain ole updates

I wanted to write tonight, but I couldn't think of anything in particular, so this is just a random update kind of post.

Cayson is over the sign language setback. I'm not even sure if I blogged about it, but a couple weeks ago or so, he just didn't want to do any of his signs, except for drink. But now he's doing them again and he's gotten pretty proficient at "hungry" just today. It's so exciting to be able to communicate with him. Plus, he's saying, or at least repeating, lots of words. Also, he's mastering the spoon!

We had a long day at church. Starting things off, our pastor is on vacation so we had a guest speaker. Shaun had to redo the bulletins because his printer messed up. I had a lot to prepare for my Sunday school lesson (I teach 1st and 2nd grade) and one of my kids came about 20 minutes early! Which means I pretty much have to stay in the room. Fortunately, my lesson book has a section for kids that come early, so I had an activity for him to do. Our accompanist had to be at work at 12 noon today, so she had to leave immediately after the singing portion of our worship time was over. She wanted me to play the invitation and the offertory, but I just didn't have time to practice so Shaun played his sax during the offering and one of our very talented guys did the invitation. We had to be back at the church by 2:30ish so Shaun could prepare for drama practice at 3:00. I'm in the drama so I have to be there too, and wrestle with my kid at the same time! (Incidentally, I'm playing Lisa who plays Elizabeth, mother of John. One of my lines is "Oh, I'm not pregnant, they just dressed me up like this for the play!" And later I say "I'm sorry to interrupt things, but I just got some great news on my voicemail...we're expecting!!!" Talk about life imitating art!) After drama, we had choir at 4 and then small groups at 5ish. We have the youth and officially ours doesn't start until 6, but since some of the girls are in choir and we finished choir at 5....they just stay and hang out until time. Finally, we got home at about 8:30 or so. Whew! I love it, but it sure gets tiring sometimes!


I forgot to mention this a while back. I posted Labor day weekend how Shaun was putting a new floor in our kitchen and we encountered problems and it took longer than expected. I realized that I never posted that it was finished. He finished it in the middle of October. It looks so good! Now if I can just get rid of the pesky wallpaper...

Speaking of our Christmas cantata...we are presenting it on Sunday morning, December 16 and Wednesday evening, December 19. If you are in the Fort Smith area, we'd love to have you! It's called "Be Not Afraid". It's a musical within a musical. I'll save the synopsis for another post. Our children's choir is presenting "It All Happened in the Country" next Sunday night at 6. I'm not sure what it's about, but it's bound to be cute!

I was in a parade yesterday. The Lavaca Christmas parade. Our church entered a float. Our theme was "There Sno' Man Like Jesus" and we had a nativity scene and snowmen all around. The kids were all the characters. It wasn't bad for our first float. I rode in the back of the truck with Shaun and the sound system. I was really impressed with Lavaca's parade, being such a small town. We were number 31 and there were several floats behind us, too. And there were plenty of people watching, too.

My mother-in-law bought me some preggie drops. They are pieces of candy that promise to help with morning sickness. And they actually do help a little. I'm not sure if it's like taking a sugar pill, or what, but it works. And they're pretty good.

I'm so ready to be in maternity clothes! I really don't like this stage where you feel like you're gaining weight, but you just look fat instead of pregnant. At least most of my pregnancy will be in spring and summer so I shouldn't have to buy too many new clothes.

I guess that's it. I hope everyone has a great week this week! Merry Christmas!

Please visit...

...my hubby's blog. It's been kinda lonely over there at Steps in a Journey, mostly because he doesn't blog much...or at all! However, he got pretty frustrated over something the other day and he decided to use his blog to rant, I mean draw attention to it. So mosey on over to Steps in a Journey, leave a comment, and encourage him to continue blogging! Thanks!

Lost

Update: She came back! We think one of the construction guys put her back in our yard. Please pray she doesn't get out again!

Our family dog, Batgirl is lost! The city of Barling is doing some construction behind our house and they had to remove the back part of our fence. They replaced it with some chain length fence, but Batgirl still managed to get out. The construction guys said they'd seen her all morning, but Shaun just went looking for her and he didn't see her. And they are all scared of her. Not that she'd hurt them...I don't think, anyway. She would if they posed a threat to one of us. I'm so upset. She's been with us ever since she was born...and she was conceived on our honeymoon! Trust me when I say she's one of the family. Please pray that we find her!

The Details

Here they are, the gory details of this pregnancy so far. (Hopefully not too gory!)

I usually have a pretty regular cycle that lasts about 25 days. So when 28 days had come and gone I was starting to get a little suspicious. That was almost 2 weeks ago. Since we were broke, I made myself wait until Monday, when Shaun got paid, to buy a test. It was really hard going that whole weekend without knowing. We weren't trying, so I freaked out a little bit at first. Financially, I didn't think we were ready for another one so soon. But I began to realize that God had His hand in this and He brought us through the first pregnancy--with no insurance--and He'll bring us through this one. So Monday rolled around and when we did our grocery shopping, I got a test. I learned my lesson last time with those tests that have the lines that are hard to read sometimes. So we went for the digital. I knew that the best time to test was in the morning so I made myself wait until the next morning. Tuesday morning, November 20 I woke up and took the test. Very quickly and plainly it said Pregnant. It was such a relief to know for sure! I immediately began planning how we were going to tell our families. Since it was right before Thanksgiving, I knew there was an opportunity for some creativity.

For Shaun's parents, we were going to make a shirt for Cayson that said, "I'm going to be a big brother!" and let him wear it to the family get-together. However, our shirt didn't quite make it. So Shaun made a slide show with our Mt. Magazine pics (most of his family hadn't seen them yet) and at the end we put the picture of Cayson that had him announcing that he was going to be a brother. (From my last post.) For my parents, we made them and my brother birthday cards...they all have birthdays in November. We put our family pictures on the front and inside said, "We didn't know what to get you for your birthday, but we think it's the perfect gift. Just one catch...it won't be delivered for another 9 months!" And we taped a small Babyruth candy bar to it. My mom and brother got it, but my dad didn't. It went over his head! Everyone was really excited.

The Symptoms

So far, I've only been experiencing a lot of queasiness. With Cayson, I never threw up, but I was just occasionally queasy. With this one, I'm queasy just about all day. And guess what really sets it off: sweets! Aagh! I can't even drink sweet tea. Right now all I want is Kool-Aid. Also, I am sooooooooo tired! I can't even sort laundry without needing to rest.

As to the sex, I don't have a preference...too much. I'd love to have a girl, but I love boys too. I definitely won't be disappointed if it's a boy. We just don't have a boy name yet. The girl name has been picked out since before Cayson was born. I'll wait to divulge that when we find out.

I haven't been to a doctor yet, we've got to find one up here. Last time, I delivered in Warren. And as much as I LOVE Dr. Wharton, I can't handle the drive again. So if anyone knows of a good doctor in the Fort Smith area, let me know. However, after doing some calculating at Babycenter.com's pregnancy due date calculator, the tentative due date is July 22, which puts me about 5 weeks. So Cayson and this baby will be almost 2 years apart.

Please remember our family in your prayers, especially our new little blessing. We're very excited, even though I know it's going to be a tough road ahead. Everyone keeps telling me to be afraid of this baby since Cayson was such a good baby! LOL. Thanks, everyone, for the well wishes!

Exciting News!

Yes, we're having another baby!!!

Blessings

Our church has been involved in three ministries that culminated today. First of all, our Women on Mission have been collecting coats for people in need. Secondly, we have had several families to participate in Operation Christmas Child. And lastly, our church family has been donating money towards buying people in our community Blessing Baskets. Well, they're actually bags, but I guess basket sounds better. Anyway, this morning, everyone brought their Operation Christmas Child boxes to the church and the children each brought one to the altar and we prayed over them. This afternoon, we invited over 300 people from the Lavaca, Central City, and Barling area to our church to listen to a presentation of the gospel and to receive a bag of groceries, enough for about 2-3 days. Also, we had the coats set up where anybody could grab a coat if they needed one. I'm not sure what the actual numbers were, but we ended up with several families there tonight to receive their "basket". Hopefully we were able to meet not only someones physical hunger, but their spiritual one, as well.

I know these ministries have been blessings to our church family. I was so pleased with the amount of church members we had helping in one way or another tonight.

A Childlike Faith

A 12 year old boy phoned in to a radio station in to Houston and it was so awesome, they posted the conversation on their website. It's short, so take the time to listen.

Who Am I?

Family Pictures Fall 2007, Part 3

There are tons more, but I picked out some of my favorites. And yes, we got ALL the proofs, so there are some really cute ones of Cayson being, well, Cayson!

Family Pictures Fall 2007, Part 2

Family Pictures Fall 2007

Finally, Fall Festival 2007 Pictures!

My little monkey
2 Pirates and a monkey

Babysitting

Today I get the joy of finding out what it's like to have a 4 year old and a 14 month old. I'm babysitting a church member's 4 year old son today. So far it's been ok, other than leading Cayson to drag almost all of his toys into the living room! I quickly had to make a 5-toys-in-the-livingroom rule. It should be fun. Cayson's already enjoying having someone to play with. We'll see how it goes!

Baby Sign Language

This is the most amazing thing. Cayson, 14 months, is really starting to pick up signs now. I was a little skeptical at first, but I kept hearing how good it was for both us and the baby. So I started with a couple signs when he was about 8 or 9 months old. "Thank you" and "drink" were the ones we chose, with "more" thrown in there a little later. He did "thank you" once about 2 months ago, but he didn't do it again. This past week, he finally did "more". And kept doing it. Once he figured out that "more" got him what he wanted, he used it for everything! And I was so excited that we were communicating, I had to fight to not give he everything he wanted. He's a bottomless pit! The next day or so, we worked on "drink" with him. And he picked it up right away. Now, he's having a hard time getting the sign correct, but we know that it's "drink". And he says "drink" at the same time. (It actually sounds more like "dink"). Now he's starting to say "more" when he does the sign. Now he's learned the sign for "hungry", which is rubbing his belly. It's so cute! Today he did the sign for "thank you" again. This one is a little more sporadic, I guess because there's nothing physical to associate with it. He's picking up these signs so fast I've got to learn some more so I can keep up.

When someone talked about baby sign language before Cayson was born, I was convinced that it would lead to speech delays, but I've since learned that's not true. It's just like learning to crawl before they walk. It's an "in-between" step. And they eventually end up dropping the signs and just speaking. You can check out this site for more information about baby sign language.

New pics coming soon!

We took my son to Mt. Magazine to take family pictures today. One of our church members is an aspiring photographer so he offered to take them. We had a great time; I'm not sure how the pics are gonna turn out though, Cayson didn't cooperate very much! He was fascinated by the leaves on the ground. And he didn't want to be held at all. We'll see. We took some by Cove Lake first. There was a really big rock in that area that we climbed on. Also, we took pics from the hangliding point. And we finished up in front of the Lodge. They have this beautiful manmade waterfall in front. Cayson was getting pretty tired and grumpy by then, so we decided to head back into town and get some lunch and head back to Central City. I've really been wanting a "railroad" shot, with the 3 us walking on the railroad tracks, so we did that when we got back into town. By then, Cayson had had a nap and was rarin' to go! However, this time he was enthralled by the rocks. He wanted to throw them everywhere. We'll see how it turns out.

Pondering

I wrote this post this morning at about 6:30ish, but our internet wasn't cooperating. So I typed it up in Word and now I'm copying and pasting it in, now that my techno-hero has woken up and fixed the internet.

Main Entry: pon·der (from Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary)
Pronunciation: \ˈpän-dər\
Function: verb
Inflected Form(s): pon·dered; pon·der·ing \-d(ə-)riŋ\
Etymology: Middle English, from Middle French ponderer, from Latin ponderare to weigh, ponder, from ponder-, pondus weight — more at pendant
Date: 14th century
transitive verb

1 : to weigh in the mind : appraise <pondered their chances of success>

2 : to think about : reflect on <pondered the events of the day>

intransitive verb

: to think or consider especially quietly, soberly, and deeply
— pon·der·er \-dər-ər\ noun

I wonder if Mary, the mother of Jesus, would have been a blogger, had she lived in our modern times. I wonder this because of the part of the Christmas story when it says she pondered these things in her heart. Maybe she pondered them in her heart because she wanted them to be a secret, between her and God. But maybe, if she had the tools she would have blogged about it. I know that when I ponder some things, I get an urge to blog about it. Like this morning. Cayson woke up at about 5 this morning. Shaun went and got him and placed him in bed with us. As he was cuddling with me, I began to ponder the wonder that is this child that God made for us. I pondered the success of last night. (More about that in a minute.) I pondered the fact that even though he’s becoming a daddy’s boy, he still wants to cuddle with Mommy.

About that, him becoming a daddy’s boy. This started a few days ago, last weekend really. He wants to be with his daddy almost all the time. I love that, really I do. I can’t wait for the day when he’s old enough for his daddy to teach him how to play ball and build things and work on cars and other “manly” things. But it’s been a little hard, especially since it coincides with his weaning. Side note—we made the decision to let him wean himself, instead of forcing him to. It has been such a good decision, for both of us. But now, I’m wishing he had waited a little longer. I miss that time with him. However, I am very glad that he still wants to cuddle with me in the wee hours of the morning.

Now, about last night…we had our annual Family Fall Festival to end our Family Emphasis month at First Southern. We do a Trunk or Treat where we turn our trunks into carnival-type games. Shaun and I decided to do a trunk this year. We made it a pirate theme, even dressing the part! We turned our jeep into a boat, complete with a treasure chest full of candy and a life size cutout of Capt’n Jack Sparrow. We named our boat “The Mini Pearl”. Get it? (On Pirates of the Caribbean, the boat was called the black pearl. Plus, it’s a pun for Minnie Pearl.) I wish I had pictures to show you, but I forgot to bring the camera. Several other people took pictures, so I’ll have to beg for copies. For our game, we used our Nintendo Wii, letting the kids play tennis, bowling, or baseball. It was the big hit of the night. We always had a long line of kids. We even won a Walmart gift card for the most creative Trunk. Cayson dressed up as our little monkey. He was so adorable! And he kept his hood on for most of the night!

As I’ve been posting, I’ve been going through a Bible study called Victoriously Frazzled. Yesterday, I was able to really apply the truths I’ve learned in that study. Normally, getting ready for an event like that I would be totally stressed out. I’m a perfectionist, so if things don’t go the way I think they should I get upset. However, yesterday I was pretty calm. Even when the timeline of building our “boat” didn’t exactly go as planned and we had to leave a few things off (mainly our “cannons”). I give God the full glory for this, as there is no way I could have remained calm and peaceful myself. Also, this week’s study has been on Godly responses and letting our light shine, so to speak. I was able to apply that as well, especially since we had tons of guests. I got to meet several nice families, including one that just moved to Central City. So, all in all, last night was such a huge success…and a lot of fun!

I know this is a long blog post, but as I said, I needed to blog this morning. Something about the quiet of the morning and a steaming cup of coffee makes blogging so much easier.

Here are some updates on Cayson:

He has learned his first sign. We’ve been teaching him baby sign language and he finally is starting to pick it up. I was sitting on the couch Monday and he starting whining about something. He was standing at the gate of the kitchen. I thought at first he wanted his football that he’d thrown over, but that wasn’t it. Finally, he turned around, looked at me, and gave the sign for “more” and pointed at his empty bowl leftover from breakfast a couple hours earlier. He wanted more to eat! I was so excited to see him communicate with me! I gave him a snack and he was very happy that I understood him! He has continued to use “more” every day this week. So far, he uses it for when he wants something to eat and drink, so we’re working on “drink” and “hungry”. We’ve been working on “thank you”. I wish you could see him when he does the sign for “more”. It is so cute, makes my heart melt! And now, he’s trying to say “more” with the sign. It comes out more like a tentative “mo” right now.

He’s trying to feed himself with a spoon. He’s getting so independent. I’ll be feeding him and half-way through he’ll take the spoon and want to finish by himself. And he doesn’t make that big of a mess. He’s also trying a few veggies again, without me hiding them in potatoes!

He’s able to step up and down small steps, but he’ll only attempt when I’m holding his hand!

So far he can say daddy, mama, ball, cat, dog, batgirl (sounds like “aatguhl”, our dog btw), uh oh (his favorite word right now!), and almost drink and more.

Did I mention he’s very independent???

Well, I’ve taken enough of your time, if you’re even still reading by now. Sorry it was so long. I don’t blog enough for it to be too much of a problem, though. Cayson’s up now, so I better go. Have a great day!

Responder or Reacter?

As I've mentioned before, I've been going through a Bible study by Cindi Wood called Victoriously Frazzled. This week is all about controlling our responses to situations or people. So far it's talked about being a responder instead of a reacter. A reaction is more knee-jerk, saying whatever comes out of your mouth. Responding is stepping back, taking a breath, and saying what God would have you say. I think I'm pretty much a responder. I hate confrontation, so I typically don't say the first thing that comes to mind. A lot of the time I don't say anything, or I'll say, "I'm sorry you feel that way." or something like that. Then I hash it out with Shaun! So I guess that's what I need to work on...being able to respond in a godly way. Especially the older Cayson gets!

Also, during each week, we have a defrazzler to do. The first week was a great one: a spa day! We were supposed to take a day, afternoon, hour, whatever to pamper ourselves. That was awesome. The second one was harder. I had to pick a circumstance to give God control of and document my progress during the week in my journal. This week, I have to practice greeting people in a joyful manner and have a response prepared just in case they ask why I'm so happy. This is so hard for me! I am not very good at talking to people I don't know. I tried it out tonight on the lady that checked me out at Walmart. She seemed a little taken aback. I hope I sounded sincere, because I really was, however this makes me feel a little self-concious. We'll see how it goes this week.

Well, it's time for me to do my daily fitness test on the Wii, so I have to go. Have a great day tomorrow!

The Rules of the Game

As I sat here this morning, eating my Frosted Flakes, I started thinking about last night's Wii session with my dear husband. I could tell he was getting a little confused as to what the rules are for playing games with me are, so I thought I'd make a list, just so he knows in the future.

1. Do not beat me at everything.
2. Do not let me win.
3. If you do beat me, do not do it unmercifully.
4. Do not take it easy on me.

Yeah, I know these contradict themselves. That's how we women are sometimes. Or, at least, how I am. I hate losing. But, I hate it when someone takes it easy on me, or lets me win. I guess I can take losing as long as it's close. I hate being blown away. Especially on the Wii! My thing was bowling. I was really good at it. Unlike my husband. Now these roles are reversed in real life bowling. But on the Wii, I was really, really good. Until last night. My dear hubby beat my high score of 279. I was not happy.

Well, there's my rules. I hope he figures out how to not break them! ;) And now, I must go practice.

24

Who likes 24??? I do! And the season 7 trailer premiered today at Times Square. Click here to check it out! Looks like this season is going to be great!

Break Fast

No, this post isn't about my Frosted Flakes, which I love. It's about my fast. The reason I haven't been on the internet for a whole week. I decided this time last week to fast from the internet for a whole week. I had become addicted. I was spending way too much time on here and not enough time with my husband and child and most importantly, God. (Thanks to my husband for making me realize this by the way.) So I gave it up for a whole week. The first day was so hard. I kept thinking about the blogs I was missing, or the facebook comments I wouldn't be able to reply to right away. But I got through it. And, I have to say, this was an incredible week. I spent the time I would have been on the internet praying, studying, cleaning, and playing. We went outside. The weather was awesome so we raised the windows and cut the air off. My favorite day was Tuesday. It rained all day and the sound was so soothing.

I started a new Bible study at church called Victoriously Frazzled. I really didn't think it would apply to me, but boy has it!!! The day after I decided to fast, my daily study was called "Time Management"! Talk about affirmation!

This week has been even more amazing. It's been hard though. God has really been calling me to trust Him. I thought I did trust Him, but I found out that when control is taken away from me, I have a really hard time. You know how when God is trying to teach you something and that "lesson" turns up everywhere? In your daily quiet time, at church in the music, the sermon, the Sunday school lesson, etc. Well, that's happened to me today. I'm really starting to see what it means to truly surrender all to God. I thought I knew, but I didn't. Or maybe I did, but it was all I was capable of at that point in my life and now God wants me to go deeper. I just know I'm in the middle of a huge turning point in my relationship with God and I'm excited and terrified all at the same time.

Anyway, now I'm back. But I'm going to work at limiting my time on the internet. I can't let it dictate my thoughts and actions like it was before. Tonight has been hard since I had tons of emails and blogs and stuff to wade through. And I'm not really going to check it all tonight. I've dealt with the stuff that needed to be dealt with tonight. I figure the rest I can catch up on as I have time.

This was also week 3 in our family emphasis. Tonight was "Meet a Family" night. We were supposed to invite a family over that we haven't had a chance to get to know very well yet. It went very well. We invited our multimedia tech and his wife and 2 kids, one of which is in my Sunday school class. Shaun grilled some BBQ chicken and I fixed some sweet green beans, mashed potatoes, mac and cheese, and rolls. Afterwards, we showed them how to play the Wii. It was a great time of fellowship!

To my hubby

Thank you so much, sweetheart, for watching Cayson today so I could go to my Bible study. Thank you for being a great dad. Thank you for straightening the living room and vacuuming when I didn't even ask you to. You helped me so much today. I love you so much!

Early Morning Musings

Well, now that I've started this post, it's not that early anymore, to most people anyway. But it is to me! Cayson kept us up a lot last night. He has a tooth coming in and it's really hurting him. The last time he got up was about 6:15 this morning. I gave him some teething tablets and he's finally resting comfortably. However, now I'm wide awake. Normally I would have relished holding my sweet, sleeping child, but hunger pains lured me out of bed this morning. Now a couple of slices of cinnamon toast and a glass of milk later, here I am.

My day is kind of busy today, so I'm enjoying the peace and quiet of the early morning. Why don't I do this every morning? Because normally I have a hard time getting up! Anyway, today I am starting a new Bible study! Our women's ministry coordinator at church has started leading a Bible study this week on Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights. Since both of those times were impossible for me (I'm a Sunday school teacher and I help with the students on Wednesdays), she's meeting with me, our children's coordinator, and our pastor's wife during the week for lunch. Normally it will be on Thursdays, but this week it's today. The study is called "Victoriously Frazzled".

Then later today, about 2:45, I'm giving a flute lesson at home. Then sometime today I have to go grocery shopping! We're scraping the bottom of the barrel for diapers!

Well, the sun is up and my husband should be up soon so I'm going to get off here. Thanks for letting me share my morning!

Family Emphasis at First Southern

*Update* I wrote this yesterday, but I didn't have the graphic I wanted with me at home so I waited to publish it until today!

Well, it's October and it's Family Emphasis month at our church, First Southern Baptist Church. This has become an annual event; one that our church members enjoy. Today, we kicked off the month with a Church Family Picnic at the Park. One of our church members--who is an awesome cook--grilled a brisket, some ribs, and some hot dogs for the kids. The Bible study hour classes provided drinks, salads, desserts, and breads.

We met at the park at about 5 and ate first. Then, Shaun and some of the other adults challenged a group of collegians to a game of volleyball. (The collegians weren't there with us.) I think the collegians thought they had it in the bag, but our folks stomped them 3 games to none. As our 20's Bible study teacher put it, "They looked the part, but we played the part! I like it!" We got a chance to invite them to church as well. All in all, tonight was a great success. We had a great turnout, great food, and great fun.

Next Sunday night is Family game night. We're supposed to spend the time with our family and play some sort of game. If anyone has a suggestion for something our family can do to involve Cayson (13 months) please comment. We thought about going to Chuckie Cheese, but it's been so long since we've been, we couldn't remember if there is anything he could do.

The week after that is Meet a Family night. The idea is to invite a family that you don't know very well over for dinner. This was a huge success last year. I think we are going to invite our sound technition and his family, plus a family that has been visiting for a while.

The last Sunday night in October is Date night. Some of our singles are going to have Wild and Crazy games at the church for the kids so that the married couples can go on a date. I'm super excited for this one...last year we were the only married couple who did not have an opportunity to go on a date as we took care of the students. This year the students are going to help with the kids. I don't know why we didn't think of that last year!

On Wednesday, October 31, we are having our Fall Festival. We do Trunk or Treat where people turn their trunks into carnival-type games. We are going to bring our Nintendo Wii (yes we got one!!!) up and let them box or bowl or something. Also, there is a chili cook-off for the adults and everyone dresses up. Cayson is going to be a monkey!

And finally, even though it will be the first Sunday in November, we are going to have a movie night. Outdoors! We're going to show "Facing the Giants". I think this will be an awesome time!

Cayson looks more like...

Holy Matrimony

On Live with Regis and Kelly this morning, they called a man by the name of Alonzo Sims who was celebrating his 80th wedding anniversary. How amazing!

Kitchen Update

No pics yet, but I thought I'd update everyone on the kitchen floor project. It's been almost a month, but we're making progress. We've ran into several obstacles, or it would have been finished now. The latest obstacle was our fridge. As Shaun was moving it back into place, it a leak in the water line. So Shaun fixed that today and finally got floor laid all the way to the back door. Now all that's left is the carport entry and the laundry room.

In other news...we got a Nintendo Wii! It was a spur of the moment thing. We bought it used (practically brand new) for $160 and 3 extra games for $10 more. So for $170 we got the Wii, an extra controller, and 3 extra games. That's a really good deal! And it's soo much fun! We have an xbox, ps2, and gamecube, but they were mainly for Shaun. We've always been on the lookout for games that we could play together (and I would like), but hadn't succeeded until now. And it's good exercise, too! And I'll just have everyone know, I'm a pro at bowling! I just can't win at anything else. It's so cute, when I play tennis, Cayson likes to swing his baseball bat when I swing the remote. And on bowling, he claps when I get a strike!

Well, that's all I've got for now. Hopefully, the kitchen will be finished soon and I'll have some pics.

I Remember

I woke up at about 7:45 that morning in order to be at class by 8:30. I had music technology, one of my favorite classes that semester. This was my first semester in college; I was a music major. We had class as usual, my professor was his usual self. After class, I left for Second Baptist Church, where I was helping babysit for the women's Bible study. We had gotten out of class early, so was on the road by about 9:10. I turned the radio on to my usual station, expecting some music, when I heard a news report. A plane had crashed into one of the World Trade center buildings. I was stunned. A moment later, one of my classmates from Music Tech called me to see if I'd heard the news. I got to the church and my friend, who was helping to babysit, already had the tv on. It was on every channel, it seemed. We sat in stunned silence, trying to make sense of it all. At the time, we didn't know the who or why of it all.

After I left the church, my mom called me to see if I'd heard and to tell me to go and fill up the car. It sounded like a good idea at the time, not knowing what was going on. However, the gas station was PACKED. I was very fortunate to even get gas. Most of the gas stations around town sold out. I think I ended up having to get the premium.

That night there was a candlelight prayer vigil at the Monticello courthouse. I will never forget that night. We were all scared and everyone was praying. Afterwards, the director of the MBSF at UAM, Rob Leonard, spoke to several of the college kids, right on the steps of the Methodist church.

September 11, 2001 is a day I'll always remember.

My little musician!
Taken at our Awana kickoff a couple of Wednesdays ago. His lips are red from a sno cone...not lipstick. LOL.

Pics of Cayson's room

I finally took some pics of Cayson's room. Here's his door.

This is the wall where his crib is. And those are baseball pennets on the wall.
Those cords aren't usually there. They are attached to his camara for the video monitor and the lamp. We hadn't found a home for them yet, when I took this pic. And he needs a toybox, as you can see.
That baseball mitt on the wall was Shaun's growing up. His grandfather made it to hold his baseball, glove, and bat. And Shaun's mom made the curtains and his linens.
That wreath was on my door at the hospital.

And this is his dresser. Notice the crooked plaque! HA. I better fix that! Well, that's pretty much it. Sorry about the yellowish light.

Kitchen Floor Remodel 6 Days and Counting

Before. This is on Sunday afternoon. Notice the linoleum peeling.

Here's our big stack of new floor.

The demolition begins! There are 4 layers of flooring. Yuck!

The actual kitchen floor is completely removed. Shaun went ahead and laid the floor in the kitchen area so I would have access to my kitchen. However, when he got to the fridge, he hit a snag. When he tried to move the fridge back into place, it kept moving the NEW floor with it. So we're waiting for some help in moving the fridge before we can go any farther. That was on Monday. But the kitchen looks good. I haven't taken a picture of it yet...I was waiting for the finished product! I'll keep you updated...

Becoming...