A wedding and time alone with Daddy and Papa

My best friend Mrs. Natasha got married this past weekend to a wonderful, godly man.  I had the privilege of being in their wedding.  It was a quick 4 day trip to Oklahoma and back.  I literally spent a whole day to get there and a whole day to get back, but I would gladly do it again in a heart beat.  Mrs. Natasha and I have been friends since 1st grade!  We were in Girl Scouts together and were room mates in college.  We share lots of silly secrets and I cherish the times we have together.  We have been prayer partners for years and I know that I can count on her if I need her.


Mr. A and Mrs. Natasha were married on a beautiful cool Saturday evening.  It was beautiful and an answer to prayer.  God is so faithful and good.  I hope I didn't ruin too many pictures since I cried through the whole thing, but I'm blaming it on the pregnancy hormones. :)  The reception was wonderful and was a great time to catch up with friends.  I didn't get many pictures as my camera died because I forgot to charge it before I left.

While I was away, Bryan (Papa) and Mathieu took care of the kiddos.  They seemed to have a wonderful time and they even had something special for me when I got home.  Daddy got out the finger paints!

A Surprise Valentine's

My husband is a romantic, but only when he wants to be.  But when he wants to be, boy is he good!  After the C Family left on Saturday, Mathieu told me to pack a bag with overnight stuff and put on a nice dress, shoes and do my hair if I wanted to. (I had no idea what to think, we don't have any overnight babysitters where we are, so my mind was going crazy!) He left and told me I had about 45 minutes to get ready.  The kids were down for a nap and I had plenty of time to curl my hair and paint my toes.  A little while later he called and let me know that I needed to come outside.  Much to my surprise was my father-in-law pulling into our drive way in our van and Mathieu was right behind him in a rental car.  Bryan wasn't suppose to be at our house for another 5 days, so this was a big surprise.

We went to a beautiful, locally owned restaurant in downtown Carmel.  We ate amazing steak and chicken and enjoyed Banana's Foster for desert.  Afterwards we attempted to walk around Lovers Point, but it was freezing and very comical.  We had a little misunderstanding earlier in the afternoon about needing "cokes", I really said "coats", he heard "cokes". :)  We then went to a quaint Bed and Breakfast in Pacific Grove.  It was on the bay and you could hear the waves through the windows.  The room was set up beautifully and we played pool and had a nice surprise of a couples massage.  They also served us evening tea and brownies which we enjoyed by the beautiful flowers Mathieu got me.  We enjoyed breakfast the following morning in the dining room on antique silver dinnerware.  We had baked blueberry french toast, sausage and tea or coffee.  It was delicious!

We both throughly enjoyed our night out.  It was a much needed relax time for both of us and a time to reconnect.  We are so thankful that Bryan was able to come out early and help in this wonderful surprise but we are also thankful for the extra time we got to visit!

Friends reunited.... for a day!

One of our very close friends came to visit us all the way from Virginia!  We couldn't be more overjoyed with the few hours of time that our children got to reconnect and we got to fellowship together!  You see, we have been friends with the C Family for almost 6 years!  Our oldest boys are born just days apart and have been the best of friends ever since.  Our family's have grown in Christ together and God keeps putting us in each others paths.  We had a wonderful time eating lunch and playing on the X-box Kinect.  

Quilts

After several requests, I have decided to post my recent quilts here.  I love to quilt and I hope you like what you see.  I do take custom orders in any size. :)

Girl baby quilt

adult throw "chocolate and roses"

baby boy quilt

Our bodies are made for....

Since we are studying love this month, I decided we better start with ourselves and the central part of our body.  I traced the children on some long paper and then had them draw their body parts.  I then labeled each part with what they told me they were for.  We had several deep discussions on how each part of our bodies function and how we use self control for all of them.  

Natasha working on her body

Nehemiah working on his body.

Samuel was feeling left out and decided to try his car one more time, of course this is the time that he figured out how to ride it and decided it was a great idea to scoot and zoom all over their drawings. :)

Rachel working on her body.

Samuel being a ham and cheesing

Nehemiah's body says: eyes to see, nose for smelling, mouth to say nice words, heart is for to know Jesus, to love Him and to love each other.

Natasha's body says: nose is for smelling, eyes are for closing and opening, mouth is for talking, heart is for Jesus

Rachel's body says: mouth is for talking and praising God, heart is for Jesus in it and for loving each other, eyes are for looking, nose is for smelling

Loving others.....

"I give you a new command. Love one another. You must love one another, just as I have loved you."  John 13:34 NIrV

For a lesson on loving others and Valentine's day we made and decorated paper hearts.  Which we hung from our dining room beam and we put our memory verse in the middle.  It was a wonderful reminder everyday about who we love and are thankful for.