His soccer guys!

Somebody is diggin' the World Cup action!

Some work on the house!

 We are excited to be doing a little work on the house in the next few weeks.  We are having our kitchen countertops replaced with this granite and I am SO excited!  Of course, it couldn't be installed until the week AFTER my family comes to visit...ugh...

We are also replacing the kitchen floor (vinyl) with some tile.  Watching guys load tile into the van is VERY fun, did you know?  :)  Exciting things are happening!!

Tractors and Crafting

I wonder how old my kids will be before they stop asking to sit on "the tractors" every.time. we walk into Lowe's?

Working on a little craft project that a teacher friend of mine showed me....I think even I can pull this one off!

Still working on the bow, but isn't it cute?  :)

The WALLET!

The day before Jacob left for camp, I asked if he wanted to take any spending money with him.  He said no - he wasn't going to buy anything while at camp.  A little bit later, he came downstairs and said he couldn't find his wallet.  I told him to look again - he had just had it downstairs the week before to count his money.  There was a Father's Day sale on iPad Minis and he was checking to see if he had enough money.  He's been saving this money for 1 1/2 years - all his birthday money, Christmas money, tooth fairy money - etc.  He had saved $140 all by himself.  And he could not find his wallet.  ANYWHERE.  I looked with him everywhere.  Turned the house upside down.  Looked in every thing.  Under every pillow.  In every hole I could think of.  He cried.  I wanted to cry for him.  Felt so badly for him.  Couldn't think where it could possibly be.  Had a terrible feeling about Judah....he doesn't throw stuff away, but with a baby his age that is always a possibility....we looked through the trash...even looked through bins in the attic.  Nowhere.  Told Jacob to pray.  And we prayed for a miracle.  We had sweet friends that encouraged him on facebook.  Kelli suggested that I give Judah something shiny and then follow him to see if he has a secret stash :).  We had friends who offered to help him rebuild his savings account :).  Precious.  But as sick as I felt and as sad as Jacob was, we both knew it was a tough life lesson.

And then, TODAY!  I was in the office printing out some coupons while the boys were at karate.  All of a sudden, I heard Callie scream "MOM!  It's a miracle!!".  I went running and she had Jacob's wallet in her hand!  She said it was in her backpack!  I had CHECKED that backpack several times - there is no doubt in my mind that God put it there for Jacob!  :)  She was so excited - I asked if she wanted me to call David so he could tell Jacob.  She said no - she wanted to surprise Jacob herself when he got home.  So she wrapped it up and we waited a LONG 30 minutes until he got home!!

Giving Jacob what she had wrapped up...

BEAMING!  He was so excited!!  He didn't even complain about paying Callie the $20 reward he had offered :).  We are thankful over here.  That God sees and hears even little boys' prayers about their missing dollars!

Family Night at HiWire!

What a fun evening of SWEATiness!  :)  We had HiWire on our summer list and decided to go tonight!  It was  LONG day of cracking the whip and getting our chores done after a few weeks of fun things.  This was the perfect thing to do to celebrate...and cross something off our summer list!  :)

"MOM!  Take a picture of me by myself!" :)

Our romantic anniversary date

We went out to celebrate our anniversary - decided to try a restaurant that David's been wanting to try for a LONG time....it was a bust.  We waited a long time, everytime the waitress came she was apologizing for something, she brought my plate of food out and then disappeared for 5 minutes without any explanation.  When David finally flagged her down and asked where his food was, she said they hadn't even started making it.  OH MY!  The manager's explanation (when we asked to speak with her) was that they got bogged down in the back with a to go order.  For goodness sakes!  Won't be going back there.

We finished the evening with trips to Home Depot and Lowe's to look at kitchen faucets.  Are we getting old or what?  :)  But we were together and without 5 screaming kids so it was an enjoyable evening!  :)

Blowing through...

A picture like this can only mean one thing....Addison is here!  :)  They arrived late last night and are on their way to vacation in Charleston!  We were lucky enough to steal them for the night and this morning before they arrive at their destination.  We will take whatever time we can get with our favorite Raleigh peeps!  We headed to the pool for a little swim before lunch.  And of course all of Addison & Callie's babies had to come with us.  Judah was kind enough to share his wagon with them (really, they commandeered it...)

I love looking in front of me and seeing all these sweet kids that have known each other their whole lives!!

It's never long enough, but we LOVED having them!  Sorry we kept you up so late Beth & Anthony - but it was worth every minute!  :)

National Flip Flop Day

It's National Flip Flop Day!  Which MEANS that if you were flip flops to Tropical Smoothie today, you get a FREE Jetty Punch smoothie!  :)  So everyone got their flip flops on...

...and got our VERY own smoothies!  They were BEYOND excited that they didn't have to share!! 

(PS...we had Tropical Smoothies in Virginia Beach, but when we moved here, I was SO sad to discover that we didn't have any here in Lexington!  Very sad every June to not get to celebrate this very special holiday....so when they built one this year, I marked my calendar right away!)

Happy 16th Anniversary to US!

16 years ago, we made a covenant before God that we would walk through life as husband and wife.  It has been a journey full of blessings and challenges, laughter and tears, but I wouldn't trade a single bit of it! We are more committed to God and each other than that day 16 years ago, and I love that I get to spend the rest of my life with my very best friend!!

Last Day of VBS - Mt. Horeb

Callie and Caleb really enjoyed their week at Mt. Horeb's VBS.  It gave them something special to do while the big boys were at camp.  Judah loved getting to listen to their first few songs after we dropped them off, and today, he even got his picture taken!  All by himself!  :)

More Girls than Boys!

With the big boys at camp, we had Carlie over for two days and had a GREAT time - we FINALLY had more girls than boys in our house!! (Well, actually we were even including Judah...) The girls were into "clinking" their glasses at every meal...

They wanted to camp out in the living room...

She came to VBS with us at Mt. Horeb too!

It was a fun way for Callie to have something special for her this week!

Camp Pictures!

I mean - does this not look like the AWESOMEST camp ever?  :)

Here's the cool thing about the Body of Christ - on stage for this game is our former Music Pastor from ASBC (Roger Hammond - far left) AND our current Children's Pastor at Northside (David Ford, middle in the Upward jersey) - competing in a game together at Camp KidJam.  Isn't ministry cool?  :)

This picture was during their "track" - called "For Dudes Only".

And THIS is my friend Shari Sprouse, from ASBC!  It has been so fun for David to see so many of our sweet friends (and their kids!) from Shores there this week!

Found these pictures on the Camp KidJam facebook page!  Looks like they have had an INCREDIBLE week!! They come home tomorrow and I can't wait to hear ALL about it!!

It's Quiet Here...

These two girls have been friends for a long time...and they are two of a kind.  Callie and Carlie.  They both sent their two older siblings off to camp this week, so we got to steal Carlie for a sleepover and a couple of days of fun.  Yay!!

They keep talking about how they are sisters - twins actually - and so this was their outfits they chose to wear today.  They were FLOORED when their crew leader at VBS asked if they were twins!  Mission accomplished!

Where's Judah?

There he is!!

And PS - I finished blogging January!  Yay!  Progress!!

Camp KidJam 2014!

Josiah and Jacob left for Camp KidJam in Greenville, SC today!  To say they are excited would be an understatement!  After we picked Callie and Caleb up from their VBS this morning, we stopped to grab Subway and then head to church to eat with David before leaving.  The boys both said they were starving and would I PLEASE get them their own footlong instead of sharing.  I did, and they both DEVOURED it!  Oh my goodness - it's going to be nice to not have to cook for them for a few days!  :)

The crazy, excited gang from Northside heading to CKJ!

David gets to go with them for the week - and he's driving one of the vans.  Last time he drove one of these vans was when he was driving for YouthQuest in college - we met on one of the weekend trips at Liberty and talked for hours and hours...and then knew I was going to marry that guy!

This is what's riding behind David in the church van.  Lots of loud, excited boys!  :)

Jacob and Cooper are roomies - and very excited!

Here's my happy campers - have a GREAT time boys!!

The Northside Kids crew - ready or not, here we come!!!

Buckle up...here we go!!!

It makes me so sad that I've fallen THIS far behind on the blog!!  With the kids home from school for the summer, they have had my blog books out EVERY day and I have GOT to get caught back up again!  For goodness sakes, time does NOT slow down so I've got to just hang on with both hands and get back up!

David and the big boys just left for camp, the little boys are napping, and Callie is playing with a friend so I'm going to start NOW!  Here we go!!!  Yikes....