Saturday, November 28, 2009

10 Years Together


Yesterday, Brent and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary. I look back with awe at how quickly these years have gone and at how much God has blessed us! We would have never thought that 10 years later we would be where we are now with 4 precious children. I would have never even imagined that Brent would be an architect and that I would be homeschooling our children. I could have never imagined how much more in love with him I would be, 10 years later. These have truly been the greatest 10 years of my life and I am excited to see where God leads us over the next 10!


Brent's parents came in town for Thanksgiving and offered to keep the kids so that Brent and I could have a night out to celebrate. We decided to stay at this hotel and made reservations to eat at 560 at the top of Reunion Tower. However, on our drive over we decided to cancel our reservations for dinner and head out for some fun at Holiday in the Park! It was opening night and we had just enough time to get to ride all the things we wanted to ride. Our favorites were the Titan and the Superman Tower of Power. Even though we missed our "fancy" dinner, we did get to enjoy some excellent steak at Texas Land and Cattle after we left Six Flags.

Today, we slept in (so nice) and then went to the 6th Floor Museum. Afterwards we had excellent late lunch at a mexican restaurant in the West End and then headed back home to see our babies. It was wonderful to have an evening out, but I think we both agreed that we were ready to get home!

We ended the evening watching the Tigers beat Arkansas! Geaux Tigers! (I just had to throw that in!)

Monday, November 2, 2009

Harvest Festival

Our church's Harvest festival

On Friday night our church held a harvest festival. It has been several years since they had one and were expecting maybe 500 people in attendance. At last count we had over 1500 people! It was amazing! The kids all had a blast and we are looking forward to doing it again next year!





Sunday, November 1, 2009

Ashtyn is 8!


Ashtyn had her first slumber party with 8 little girls spending the night! I think they all had a good time. We had friends from church, some friends from our school last year and a neighbor. God was definitley present. All the girls got along so well with each other!







Here is Ashtyn trying out her new purple scooter.


























Dinner with the family at the Purple Cow.











Part of the family





















Ashtyn, Bryce and Eisley with the purple cows

eisley's new do


Tuesday, October 13, 2009

school days: some things we've been up to

we made sneaky snakes like the one that tempted Eve in the Garden of Eden



the boys making craters in their salt models of mercury



before all this rain started, we had a few really nice fall-like days. we decided to enjoy one of them by having a nature walk. the kids had fun making a collage with their findings.

Josiah's


Ashtyn's


Isaiah's

Monday, October 12, 2009

"What are you doing?"

There really is never a dull day at our house. There is always something going on and you never know what is going to happen. Although we can usually count on Eisley to make us all laugh. I am terrible at remembering to get the camera out but this day I used it twice (in the same day!) to document the funny things Eisley does. Here I found her licking her babydoll's mouth! Why on earth would she do this?

Because today I gave her gummy fruit snacks for the very first time and they are just the perfect size to cram in a babydoll's mouth. She really wanted it back!


I also caught her playing in the dogs' food. This is actually nothing new. Even though I repeatedly tell her "no, no" it really makes no difference!


Here she is posing for a picture, with no intention to stop anytime soon!



Friday, August 28, 2009

i just wanted to share what a wonderful morning we had. I actually spent some time praying about our day and took extra time to make a schedule and plan out the day, and wow what a difference it made! imagine that! we actually finished ahead of schedule. this is what our early morning looked like...

ashtyn and josiah busy at work



isaiah, happily playing with hot wheels and waiting for his math lesson.



eisley slept a little bit later this morning!

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

the first week

our first week of homeschooling is going pretty well. i have to admit, there is alot more to do than i had realized. also, i feel completely UNorganized! so i am going to spend some time this evening planning, now that i have a taste of reality. besides those things, i am confident that we are going to have a fun and exciting year. the kids are really enjoying astronomy. we have been able to go outside the last 2 nights and look up at the sky and see some of the things that we are learning about. it is an adjustment for all of us, especially eisley. but i know it won't take long for us to get into a routine. here is a picture of ashtyn doing her math and one of all the kids with the astronomy notebooks that they made.


Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Isaiah's new bike

we have started taking almost nightly bike rides as a family. the kids love it and i love that we get some fresh air without having to bake in the hot sun during the day. isaiah was having trouble keeping up and we realized that he needed a bigger bike. thankfully, we found a great bike on craig's list for only $15. when we went to pick it up they still had the matching training wheels, helmet, elbow pads & knee pads. what a deal! here he is helping daddy put the training wheels on it.



fun summer mornings


Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

ashtyn's new look

Check out Ashtyn's new look. I am so proud of her. She cut off 12 inches of her hair to donate to Locks of Love. If you are not familiar with Locks of Love it is a non-profit Organization that provides hairpieces to financially disadvantaged children suffering from long-term medical hair loss from any diagnosis.






the new and the old

I am so looking forward to our new school year. we will be homeschooling this year. i just about have everything that i need, or think i need. the kids are getting excited and are actually ready to start now! can you believe that? I have already started with the boys they are learning to read. They are doing super! Of course it is so easy for Josiah, I knew it would be since he has had 2 years of pre k, but i have been pleasantly surprised at how quickly Isaiah is picking it up. I have to admit, teaching the boys to read was the most intimidating part for me, when considering homeschooling. if it all goes this well then we are in for a great year! I'll keep you posted on my journey!

This is the book I am using to teach the boys. It makes it easy for them and for me!


Josiah and Mrs. Light




Ashtyn with her class and Mrs. Hedgpeth

Tuesday, June 23, 2009

here comes eisley

watch out world here comes eisley! she is the girliest girl i know. at almost 15 months old. she loves to dress up. it would be normal to find her walking around with a tutu on and 20 strands of mardi gras beads (that she puts on all by herself). she also likes to take clothes out of the dirty cloths and put them over her head, and not just her clothes, ashtyn's, the boy's and mine! and let me tell you this girl can move! she dances all the time! even when she walks! we were eating dinner in memphis on our vacation and she had a table of 8-10 men, probably in their late 20's, entertained. they would dance a little and she would copy them! they thought she was the coolest baby in america! she is so funny, we really are enjoying her!

us, camping in a tent






we went camping at the cedar hill state park with our life group at church. i have to admit i was a little worried about how eisley would handle it. she wasn't walking yet, so she pretty much needed to be held all the time. okay, so maybe i was worried how i would handle it :). we all had a great time. it was so nice to see the kids playing outside with bugs and sticks and all the nature things that we don't get on a daily basis (unless you can count the flys that keep getting into our house...yuck!) brent cooked his famous jambalaya for dinner saturday night, which i know that everyone enjoyed! you have to excuse that i don't know my tent terminology, but we decided not to put the tarp (top part) of the tent on since it was such a beautiful evening.  there was a nice breeze and we could see the stars as we were laying there it was wonderful. after we had all fallen asleep suddenly I hear "Mande, get up" in a loud whisper. then i question myself "what? is someone really calling me?" then i start to feel the rain drops and then eisley starts waking. brent has jumped out of the tent and is trying to get the top on as quickly as he can. did i mention that this is a large tent (3 rooms and a screened in porch... thanks uncle david) thankfully, albert in the tent next to us heard brent and got out to help.  you have to be thankful for good friends who are willing to get up in the middle of the night to come to your aide! the 2 of them got in on before we got too wet and ashtyn, josiah and isaiah never knew what happened! i learned that camping is alot of work. i also learned alot of things that i would do differently next time, that's right i said next time. i would do it all again. maybe in the fall, when it gets cooler.