Like?

Seems like each of our kids always had funny ways of saying things, some of which we still say to this day, although I can't always remember who said what. 

Well, Matthew's latest thing is if he doesn't like something, he will say, "No, I dee yike ick!" And that means, I don't like it. Or he will say, "I yike ick!" It's so cute! 

He used to love the show, Little Einsteins, and still does when he's not watching his 500th episode of Jessie for the week. Lol! Only he has always called it "Tee Tee Yuh Kine". And even though he's old enough now to say it correctly, we all still call it TeeTee Yuh Kine. :)

One thing he does not like is pirates. He is terrified! That creepy pirate on spongebob is what did it for him. He was watching Austin & Ally in the car the other day and started crying hysterically. I could not figure out what was wrong! And he did not want to leave to go bye-bye later that day either. I finally figured out that one of the episodes had a pirate guy in it! So I guess we won't be having any pirate themed birthday parties in our future! 

Daddy?

Today, the girls were sitting on the couch playing one of those games on the iPhones where they show you a pic and you have to guess the word they're looking for. This particular one that Madi was doing was on body parts and it showed a picture of a bald man.....the answer was "scalp."  But, Matthew just happened to see it and said, "take a picture of Daddy?"  Lol!!! I guess to him, all pics of bald guys are Daddy? Haha! We all got a good laugh out of that one!

Weekend Fun

LKaylee participated in the writing team for UIL this weekend and she was so excited to win 1st place!! She has been on the team for 3 years and placed every year, but was so excited to get 1st! She is my book lover, so it's no surprise that she loves to write too. I'm so glad she had a great time. 

When I took her pic above, world war 3 broke out as Matthew started yelling for me to take his picture! Look how huge he looks in his high chair! 

Then later on, the girls (Kaylee and Lily) had both of his magna doodles and were drawing pictures. You know, cause they have no toys of their own to play with?! Ha! Lily asked me if I'd take a pic of her drawing and put it on Instagram. Lol! Hope blogging is close enough. 

Madi was at a friend's house, so she missed out on making it into this blog post. Lol! We had a nice, relaxing weekend. Well, I did. I went shopping with Matthew at a local boutique while Kaylee was at UIL and Morgan was at softball tryouts with Lily. I didn't even buy anything. About 5 minutes after we got there, Matthew started saying, "I ready to go." Typical boy, huh?  :)

I've been kind of in a funk lately. Not sure why. I just don't have any motivation to do much of anything lately. I think I've been down because I know I really need to eat better and exercise, but just can't seem to get there. Everything is going great life wise. The kids are great, marriage is great, finances are great. I do miss church a whole lot and I'm sure that's part of it. I don't think I ever shared on here what happened to lead us to not going to church anymore. My whole church journey is here on my blog, so if you've been here, you know how long the journey was to get to church and how much we loved it. I'll have to save the story for another post, but the short version is our pastor left unexpectedly and suddenly, and everyone was shocked and hurt. We hadn't been going regularly at that time because of Matthew, so that made it even worse. I don't think it would have hurt quite as much if our church had a long history, but since our church was planted by our pastor and was only 4 years old when he left, and we had been there from the beginning, it just took the wind out of all of us, I think. I don't think we will ever know why. Maybe some do and just haven't shared. The point is, god knew this would happen all along and he still chose Lifepoint to be the place we would first go to church as a family, so I trust Him. We are currently trying to decide if we want to go back there.....we are hearing great things about the new pastor, or if we want to try a different place. I'm really trying to listen for God's voice. But, Matthew being 2 makes it hard. He's very hard to control, so it terrifies me to think of how he will act being left at church. I'm just praying and remembering it's just a season. 

Anyhow, I'm sure that's most of my issue. I think it's just this season of life too. Nothing is quick or easy when you have a 2 year old by your side 24/7. He is precious though and I know before I know, I'll blink and he will be 10. Well, that's enough. I wasn't sure if I'd keep up this blog, but I'll at least try for my own scrap booking reasons. I know hardly anyone reads blogs anymore and that's fine with me. It will be nice to have the updates though. I still go back and read my old posts sometimes. 

Silly boy

Before the break was over, we all went to our favorite place - Barnes and Noble. I'm so glad my girls love books! We stopped at Panda Express for the first time. Don't let this pic fool you. Matthew was climbing all over this booth and being a stinker! 

He thought it was funny to put his ba-ba in his superman slipper the other day. Ha!

He has been crawling in his toy box lately. He is the silliest boy! 

I'm thinking potty training is still a long way off. What do you think? Lol!!

I told him I wanted to take a pic of his Mohawk and he pointed to it. His hair is getting so long and thick/curly. I really don't want to cut it, but he will probably need a trim soon. He has way more hair than the girls did at that age. 

Big shoes to fill. :)

These are just a few of the fun pics I had on my iPad. I've been enjoying having an iPad cause it's much easier to use than my phone for blogging and browsing. Yay! 

5 Years!

I totally realized that since I haven't been blogging, I missed my 5 year blogiversary!! It would have been on 11/18. Blogging changed my life in so many ways. I like to tell people that blogging was God's way of meeting me right where I was at that time in my life. I'm so thankful for the friendships I've made and how much this little blog helped me grow closer to Jesus. Some people think you have to journey far to find The Lord, but I say just give Him what you can and He will meet you right where you are so you can continue your journey together! And when that happens, get ready, cause it's gonna be an amazing ride!

Is There Anybody Out There?

Hi! It sure has been a long time since I've been on here!  About 8 months!  I thought I'd hop on here and do a little update.  Since the last time I posted, April, a lot has happened.  We've just been living life and I'm on Facebook, sharing with most of you, so I guess it hasn't been important to get on here.  But, then I think, when the kids look back, they're gonna wonder what we did while I was gone.  Ha!

Wow, let's see.

Lily is in 2nd grade this year and doing so well.  She loves school and wants to be a teacher.  She's still super quiet at school, but making A's and her teachers really seem to like her.  In fact, she was one of two kids to be chosen by her teacher from her class to participate in their Veteran's Day program.  We were super proud of her, as she was of herself.  And it was a wonderful program.  She played soccer this year too for the first time and we all had fun going to her games every weekend.  She will be starting softball again soon.

Kaylee is in 5th grade this year.  She's extremely smart.  She will be on the writing UIL team again this year and was the first one this year from her class to be chosen for Eagle of the Month by her teacher.  She's still taking hip hop class at dance and enjoys that.  She's one of about 10 kids in her grade to actually be labeled "gifted", and they have a special class they meet at once a week for that. 

Madison is in 8th grade and has really found her groove with different things that she's passionate about at school.  She is taking piano for the first time and loves that.  She's still in choir too.  She made the advanced choir this year, tried out for regions choir, and made that choir too.  She was really excited and this weekend, they will have their regions choir concert.  It's a high honor to be chosen because you have to audition for it.  She's still in art and has become quite the accomplished   artist at her school.  She was asked to design the booth for her STEM class for the Fall Festival this year and did a great job on that.  She has also been asked to do some artwork for the yearbook this year.  She's on the select academic team this year as a result of how well she performed on the Duke TIP program and taking the ACT for that.  She's one of only about 15 kids who made the team.  They are going to a gifted and talented conference this Friday for that and she will be presenting a lot of her artwork as part of her project there.  She's also in the junior honor society this year and they have to do service hours for that each semester.  She goes to art club once a week and an anime club at the local library once a month.  Once they get in middle school, they really offer a lot more for them to be involved in and she absolutely loves it all.  However, it's almost too much at times, so we have to make sure and manage it well.  Oh, she also made the UIL spelling team this year again and will be studying for that soon.  She was supposed to be in advanced art this year, but her schedule wouldn't allow for it, but her art teacher treats her as if she were in advanced art so that she doesn't get bored with what she's learning.  Her art style is drawing anime and she is really in to the Japanese culture.

My girls are just each so creative and talented.  I love to see what their passions are and I encourage them to think about why God may have given them those talents and just to pursue them and even try new things, because you never know what you may really like and find you have a talent for once you try it. 

And sweet Matthew, where do I begin?!  If you're on my facebook, you know he keeps us entertained constantly and is a little comedian.  And SO smart, my goodness I can't believe how smart he is!  He can already count to about 12 and he has begun singing in the car and knows a few other songs.  He knows so many things, like if he sees the Walmart or Target or Subway logos, he knows what they are.  He knows what shows are on.  His thing now is to say what it is he sees and he will keep saying it until you repeat him to show him you're listening.  LOL!  He turned 2 a month ago.  My Dad and Stepmom were able to come visit for his party.  We had a small family party with a puppy dog theme.  He already wears 3-4T clothing, size 6 diapers, and is 35 pounds.  He has greenish/brown eyes and curly hair.  He still sleeps with us and wakes up at least 2 times a night still for his ba-ba.  I really want to get him off of it, but he barely eats anything and so it makes it hard to take his milk away.  He is so picky.  He won't even try meat or bread!  He will eat spaghetti and pizza though.  He loves any kind of rice or potatoes.  And still eats sweet potatoes and peaches baby food.  He loves crackers and chips and baby snacks.  Strawberries are his favorite.  But, I just can't get him to eat most dinner foods, or lunch foods, like sandwiches or meat/veggies.  I hope he will grow to at least try more foods.  He is just the cutest little thing and loves to give hugs and say "love you".  He calls Madison and Kaylee by their names, but for some reason, he usually calls Lily "Sissy".  He is super shy and reserved and will hardly acknowledge strangers if they talk to him.  Just like the girls at that age.  But the other day, Madi and I were at Starbucks with him, sitting by the door, and he would just wave at each person who walked in.  This one guy came in and said, "Yo!" and Matthew just laughed and laughed.  It was so funny!

Anyhow, how's that for a little update.  I need to really list all the words and funny things Matthew says before I forget to.  His latest is to start saying sentences.  Like instead of just coming up and saying, "water", he will say "I want water, please".  It's so cute he says "please" because I didn't consciously try to teach him that.  He just picked up on it.  He also says "thank you welcome" every time you give him something, instead of just saying "thank you".  Ha!

Here we are coming up on Christmas already.  This year has flown by.  I don't think I've been on my laptop since the last post I did on here, but Matthew hasn't even bothered me while I'm typing so maybe I can start blogging again?!  I will try my best.  I have 6 months of pics to download from my camera to my laptop and over 700 pics on my phone that I need to put on my laptop.  That's a lot!

I love keeping in touch with everyone on facebook.  I haven't read blogs in so long.  I just don't have time anymore, but I do hope to keep up with mine again for memory/journaling purposes.  :)

1st Sentence

Matthew has started talking more and his first sentence that he started saying recently is, "I did that!"

Lol!! He's a stinker and always making messes, and we would say, "Matthew, did you do that?!" So, he started saying, "I did that!" He cracks me up!

One Choice at a Time

The other day I woke up in the middle of the night and my mind was going crazy with all of these thoughts of a dream I'd just had. Of course, once my alarm went off and I woke up for real, I couldn't remember very much of the dream anymore, but I somehow knew God was trying to tell me something in that dream.

All I could remember was that in the dream, I could see that I was taking some sort of test. I could see that each part of the test had choices that you choose, like a multiple choice test. And I heard in my spirit, The Lord tell me to just keep making choices and I would pass the test.

The only thing I could really remember is that when I originally woke up, this was a huge revelation for me. It's as if The Lord was telling me that life is like that test. Every day, we make choices that take us along a path through life. If we will trust in Him, He will help us make the choices in our life that will ultimately help us pass the test.

I struggle with irrational fear and anxiety a lot and oftentimes, I don't show up for the test. The choices are just too hard and I don't know which answers to choose, so I stay home and worry I'm going to fail this class called life. But, what I believe The Lord was telling me is to just show up. Stop worrying, trust Him, and watch what we can do together. One choice at a time.

Matthew's Crazy Antics

Just a few pics of the crazy things Matthew does on a daily basis. Ha!!

Winners

I thought I'd do some posts over the next few days of pics on my phone that I want to journal. I always post them on Facebook, but sometimes I forget Facebook isn't really permanent so if I put them on here, I'll be able to look back and remember later. :)

The first pic is a favorite one I took of me and Matthew. The second is Madi's rodeo art. And the last two are of my UIL winners. Kaylee got 3rd in creative writing and Madison got 6th in spelling. They worked hard with lots of practices before and after school, so I was very proud of them, and they were really excited too.

Christmas

Here are a few photos from Christmas. Not sure how they'll turn out since I'm posting from my phone. The last one is one that Kaylee took when they were all watching a movie one night. Ha!

Where I'm At



Well, I'm sharing a couple of pics from November.  One day I'll get caught up.  Ha!  I don't have any more recent pics on my laptop right now.

 

Here's a cute pics of all the cousins from a fun day at Aunt Barbara's house during Thanksgiving break.  The little boy and the girl up top without the glasses on are both Aunt B's grandkids.  And the other two girls are her nieces.  We love getting them all together at least a couple times a year.

 



Here's a pic from Thanksgiving Day.  Matthew's expression makes me laugh!

Not sure if I'll ever get to do a Christmas post or not.  We had a great Christmas Eve.  Went to the service at church and came home, made cookies and opened our presents.  Then Christmas Day, Lily and I had the flu so it wasn't much fun.  We went to my MIL's but I felt horrible and stayed in the back room the whole time.  I didn't want to get Zoey or Brynn (or anyone else) sick.  So, it didn't really seem much like Christmas, but I can't complain!

What's been going on?  Madi got recognized for her rodeo art by the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, which was a huge honor.  Kaylee won 4th place for creative writing in UIL.  Madison won 6th place for spelling in UIL.  All 3 girls are still maintaining straight A's and doing well in school.  Matthew continues to be a little stinker on a daily basis!

The only girl still taking dance is Kaylee.  Lily has started softball and has her opening day this weekend.  Madison loves art and choir and all things anime/manga.  Morgan is taking 2 classes this semester and it's going well so far. 

We haven't been to church since Matthew was born except a handful of times.  I go to a ladies bible study meeting when I'm able to called Prayfit.  It's about eating healthy and taking care of the bodies God gave us.  I've really struggled with not going, but Matthew screams at the mere sight of most people.  I'm not kidding.  Even Grandma.  She comes over, he immediately screams.  I know he would get past it, but right now I just can't handle to stress of trying to go.  And I really believe that's okay.  What I have learned more than anything is that our church family has continued to be there for us and support us in so many ways, by coming to Matthew's birthday party, to keeping in touch to see how we're doing........that has meant so much to me!

I think when I started this journey, in growing in faith, and going to church, I had this idea I was going to be the best little Christian there ever was.  I was going to be useful and follow this high calling and have this great purpose and do everything just right.  Ummmm, so dumb!  I'm learning that being a Mom is my calling and it may not ever earn me glory, I may not ever do anything reckless or radical for Jesus, but I know I'm right where I'm supposed to be.  One day we'll get back to church.  I know that's important.  Matthew won't be little forever, and the girls won't either for that matter........I just try to take one day at a time and treasure every moment as it comes.  I've missed writing on here.  It does my heart so much good.  :)

Matthew's First Birthday!!



I haven't been able to blog lately, but I at least wanted to share a little about Matthew's 1st Birthday party that we had for him!  He turned a year old on 11/4.  We decided to have a sock monkey themed party and I thought it turned out so cute!  Most everything I used to decorate with was stuff I already had bought for his room.  He still doesn't have a room yet, but it's almost finished.  LOL!

 

Instead of goody bags, I ordered these chocolate candy bar wrappers and gave out candy bars instead.  Cute! 



 

You can't really see it too good, but I printed out all of his monthly photos and used little clothespins to attach them to a ribbon and made a little banner to hang up.  It was one of my favorite things!  We also used the sock monkey picture that Madison drew for him and hung it up. 

I ordered his little shirt off etsy and I was really happy with how it turned out.  I ordered his cake from a local bakery, using an idea for the design off pinterest.  I thought it was cute, but way too expensive.  I probably won't do that again. Ha!  Not sure if you can tell from the pic, but it has a little sock monkey on top.

We had lots of friends and family that came.  Probably around 40 people.  It was a beautiful day outside too.  Matthew did really well with everyone being here.  It was just such an awesome day.  We ordered pizza to make it easy. 

I was glad to get a couple of photos of all of us!

Matthew was so funny with his cake!  At first, he didn't know what to do.  Once we showed him it was to eat, he really started to get into it. At first he was patting it like a drum.  LOL!

Here he is smiling once we started singing Happy Birthday to him.  :)

He got lots of toys and goodies and I think everyone had a good time.  It was actually one of the least stressful parties I've ever done, yet one of the cutest.  It was hard to believe how fast the year just flew by! 

Matthew is just so much fun, yet so energetic and is one that we have to keep an eye on at all times because he puts everything in his mouth and gets into everything.  Ha!  He likes to climb too, so we have to watch him.  He weighs 25 lbs. and wears size 4 diapers.  He wears 18-24 month clothes and size 7 shoes.  I think he was around 31 1/2 " tall at his appointment.  He is so smart and knows lots of words.  He follows instructions well and his new thing is to give hugs.  He is getting pickier with his food and is partial to squash and sweet potatoes, so much so that I have a hard time getting him to eat anything else.  He does like snacks like baby cheetoes, puffs, and yogurt melts though.  He likes cheese crackers and goldfish too.  And pizza.  Ha!  He's not a fan of sleeping and wakes up multiple times at night.  We can't figure out why since he sleeps right between us.  Usually he will just take a few sips of his milk and go back to sleep.

I didn't think it would be, but being a mom of a boy is so completely different than girls!  He is different in every single way from my girls.  He needs constant supervision and entertainment, whereas the girls were content to play with a toy and they never got into things.  He loves to run and be rambunctious.  He is so funny and loves to laugh.  I just adore every single thing he does!  He keeps me constantly entertained and I just absolutely love being his Mom.  We all love him so much!

Blogging - I Stink at It!

I totally stink at blogging!  I never thought that would happen.  I remember the days when I had to restrain myself from posting more than one post per day.  Now, I can barely manage to get one post per month done.  This frustrates me mostly because I'm missing out on documenting and recording important things, but it is so rare that I ever get to open my computer anymore.  When I do, Matthew comes over to the couch, smiles real big, reaches up, and starts pushing every button he can get his little fingers on.  Since the power button on my laptop is at the top corner, that's usually the one he finds first.  Or, he pulls the screen down and bonks himself on top of the head with it.  Then, when I poke my head over the top, he laughs and laughs.  It's just a fun game of peek-a-boo for him!  :D

Since I never use my laptop anymore, I never put my camera pics on it either.  Hence, another boring pictureless post!  Boo to me.  I stink at blogging!

But, I guess I'll at least record some highlights so I can look back and remember:

Lily just turned 6.  We had a swimming party at her Grandma's house.  An angry birds party.  Ha!

Matthew just turned 9 months old on the 4th and has already started walking!  He will pull up, get his balance, then take a few steps.  I think the most steps he's taken at once was probably around 10.  He weighed 22 lbs. and was 29 inches tall at his last checkup!  He's such a big boy.  He's already outgrown most of his 12 month clothes.  He's starting to babble a lot more too.  One cute thing he does lately is if you make a kiss noise to him, he will do it back!  Only he doesn't know how to just push his lips together to make it, so he puts his tongue between his lips to make the sound.  It's so adorable!  He's going to be a sweet boy!

Madison will be turning 12 at the end of this month!  She's going into 7th grade, middle school!  That's so crazy to me!  She's always been an old soul though, so even when she was 5, she was as mature as a 10 year old it seemed.  So, I guess it doesn't seem as strange to me as I would've expected it to.

We registered all the girls for school on Monday.  It took 2.5 hours, but we made it!  Madison had to take a drug test.  Crazy, huh?!  At first, she couldn't go and I handed her my water bottle and told her to drink it and try again, cause Matthew was getting super cranky, we still had one more school to go to, and I didn't want to have to come back!  Ha!  She did it!  Yay!

We are almost finished with Matthew's room.  Morgan has done such a great job on it, considering he had to bust up the tile in order to build the wall for it, and then once the room was built, he did all the electrical, sheetrock, texturing, and painting himself.  He had to move the light fixture and install the ceiling fan.  There was also all sorts of trim work and re-doing of the ceiling since it was/is a tray ceiling.  And since he added the room, that meant the addition of a new hallway which he had to build an arch for.  Well, you get the picture........he rocks!!  But, it just takes time and the only thing left is to finish painting and it will be done.  We painted it brown and I'm doing a sock monkey theme, so lots of brown, tans and red. I think it's going to be so cute!

Well, school starts in a little over a week.  I'm ready to be back on a schedule.  The girls are only taking one dance class each this year, so I think it will be a much more manageable school year.  Madison's school starts and ends an hour earlier, so I'm not sure how that will work out as far as dropping them off and picking them up, but we will figure it out! 

Oh, I almost forgot.......I started out a couple of months ago with wanting to lose some weight.  I did so well eating right when I was pregnant and then after I had Matthew, I started eating so much junk and was starting to feel horrible and gain weight.  So, I joined Weight Watchers, and lost about 5-6 pounds, but found I was still eating bad stuff like their snack cakes and ice cream and felt hungry all the time.  Y'all know I suffer from anxiety and tummy issues and since having Matthew, I've added joint pain and fatigue to that list.  :(  My pastor's wife told me about The Smarter Science of Slim, a book where the guy shows you all the research on why eating grains and sugar, and going on low-fat diets and exercising excessively, has led to Americans being obese.  It was a fascinating book, especially since it's just completely based on research and not his opinion.  Anyhow, I went off grains and sugar for a week and lost 5 pounds and 2 inches off my waist.........that's how bloated and uncomfortable I was! 

I'm not going to lie......it is so hard to not eat grains and sugar when 95% of my diet before was all junk!  But, I am convinced that my anxiety and tummy/IBS problems are due to what I eat, because when I was eating salads and healthy things while pregnant with Matthew (which I did because for some reason I craved them), I felt SO much better!  Just for the week I did the no grains/no sugar, until I fell off the wagon (LOL!), I could definitely tell a difference in the fatigue and joint pain and my tummy didn't feel all bloated and I wasn't starving all the time either!  So, I'll keep y'all posted on how I do.  It's not even about losing weight for me anymore, even though I would like to lose 20 more pounds.  It really is about feeling better.  To think that all of my fear/anxiety could have been caused simply by what I was eating all these years..........wow!!!

That's enough for now, right?!!  LOL!! 

July Review in Pics!

Here's a look back at July!

Matthew getting into his diaper basket.

Matthew's first 4th of July!  Not a fan of the fireworks!

 Madison's patriotic art was on display at our local Seniors Center.  It won 3rd place!

 We stayed home and watched the fireworks from our back yard.  Since we live on the water, there were lots of huge ones going off and the girls loved it!  Matthew did not love it, so we came inside and he did this: 

 He sure does look a lot bigger next to his sock monkey now!

 My new little niece will be arriving in 2 weeks!  We had a baby shower for her and I made her a basket of goodies.  :)

 The girls and boy! at the baby shower.

 Matthew stood up all by himself!  He has been doing it more often lately.

 Doesn't matter what he's doing, if he hears Joyce Meyer's voice come on the TV, he stops and watches her, mesmorized.  Even the intro music to her program will get him to stop.  He's been watching every day since birth, so it's not really surprising, I guess.  But funny, nonetheless!

 My sweet Lily, photographed by Madison.

 He is curious about everything!

 Found out he likes his paci!  He just cut one of his top teeth today, so I think the paci helps that feel better.

 First time to ride in the buggy!

 Matthew's 8 month picture.  He will be 9 months old in a week!

 This cracks me up!  Sissy's squeezing me Momma!