so many things to say, so little time to do so

That's how it works though, isn't it?!  

We had a wonderful Valentine's day! The kids woke up to balloons and a couple of little treats. 

After breakfast, we visited their old school and C Girlie read to a 1st grade class. She did a great job!!! 

We went home to have our little "party." We made cupcakes, did Valentine's day activities, and watched Be my Valentine Charlie Brown.

Tim and I went to a dinner theater at our church for dinner.  It was a murder mystery put on by the youth and we have so many talented kids at our church!!! They are raising money to go on a mission trip to Ecuador this summer.

Saturday, Tim & kids went to Fayetteville for game that he was on duty for and I went shopping for the day!!! They met me at Copelands for dinner and then we headed home to watch the Olympics.  

Sunday, was Compassion Sunday at church. We were blessed to hear from a formerly sponsored child and the family that had sponsored her! She is from Uganda but is now in the US attending Baylor University for her Master's degree in social work.  After church, we came home, picked up the house and spent some time outside. Our weather has been beautiful for the past few days!!! Before evening service, we went and visited the Compassion mobile experience. It was a very neat experience and one that I am glad that we were able to share with our children.  We decided as a family to sponsor two children. They are the same ages as our kids, and I'm looking forward to getting to know them!

So, it's a new week again.  B Boy had a part in Rise and Shine at school this morning.  They are celebrating Black History month and had a program highlighting famous African Americans.  B was Michael Jordan.  He had to be on stage and say his paragraph that he memorized about Michael Jordan. We are so proud of how well he did!!!

I spent today sort of "spring" cleaning.  I feel like the cold and snow have had me very unmotivated to clean or do any projects.  It's amazing how that turns around when the weather warms up!

a chocolate treat for Tim

B Boy in his Sunday school class. Love his teacher! She also teaches C for GA's!

B and one of his best friends :-)

a family who watches the Olympics together, stays together

I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.  We are going to have warmer weather at the end of this week!  The winter in itself has truthfully not been bothering me much this year. What has been bothering me is the bone-chilling cold.  We typically do not have this kind of cold for this long.

We have been SO into the Olympics.  We are the kind of people who rarely turn on the TV if sports are not on. BUT, when the Olympics are on, are booties are planted right on the couch.  

Although I'm not actively enjoying the weather, I did go along with my family on Saturday for some sledding.  I figured I would try to make some family memories since we may not get to go sledding again until next year (if we even get snow next year.  That's how it works in Arkansas :-))

Yesterday after church, we had the opportunity to see Tim Hawkins at a local church.  He was incredibly funny!  I was so thankful to have a fun afternoon date with Tim (my Tim!)

Today is the first day of February intercession for my kids.  I had a hair appointment today and they got to come along.  I was a little worried about them getting bored, but we planned accordingly and brought coloring, books, and as a last resort, the iPad.

Tonight, I'm catching up on the IF: Gathering conference from this weekend. The videos are only up until midnight tonight, and I'm so thankful they gave an opportunity to watch them!

God has been working in me a LOT over the last year.  I've learned and grown and wrestled and everything in between.  I don't know what is happening, but I know it is something.

I shared this on Facebook Saturday:

Genuine repentance doesn't happen when people put us in a corner; it happens when we realize God chose us in spite of the fact that we would never have chosen Him.
Oftentimes people would rather force-feed guilt to those they disagree with than swallow the grace that declares them equally unworthy. --Angie Smith, Chasing God

It has taken me until the last few years to know the difference. I'm so humbled and thankful that I understand His grace in a way that I never did before. It has taken people sharing their stories and their weaknesses- things that we don't often want to share with others. I pray that no one ever sees me as self righteous, but always as a lady who is not perfect, but overwhelmed daily by His grace.

O to grace how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be! Let thy goodness, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to thee. Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love; here's my heart, O take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above.

Happy things

I always get a little case of seasonal affective disorder.  

January and February are the hardest months on me.  

So far, I have been holding steady and not experiencing any symptoms! 

I suppose there has been plenty of sunshine and things going on to keep me otherwise occupied.

Last week and this weekend were really, really great too- they were filled with lots of happy things!

In case you think my house might be clean....

I'm so proud of this girl!

Wednesday, I had my friends, April and Jennifer & her little girl over for donuts and visiting.

It was so great to chat and catch up!  I love getting to watch little ones grow up too!

Thursday, I had a BPTO meeting, C girl had gymnastics, and Tim had ball game duty in Springdale.

Friday, I got to go on C girl's field trip to the Rogers Historical Museum. 

The museum was built around the Hawkins House which is a permanent exhibit. 

The 1895 Hawkins House presents a glimpse of how a middle-class family lived in middle America at the turn of the 20th century.

My favorite part was touring the home.  

It gives you a deep appreciation of how much life has changed in the last 100 years.

My phone doesn't have the best camera and I so wish that I hadn't forgotten my camera!

This is a wreath made with human hair.  It's kinda pretty, but very, very odd.

Y'all.  I'm milking the big bows as long as humanly possible.  She has started balking a little and that makes me so sad!!!

I never thought I would be one of those moms who thought, "the bigger the bow, the better!" ha!

They also had a little presentation about Valentine's Day.  It was cool getting to learn the history behind it!  They got to set up an assembly line and make Valentine's cards!

Friday night, our church had a PNO so we got a date!!!  We finally tried out River Grille!  It was seriously one of the best meals of my life!

I mean, when your meal is described as- Two tenderloin medallions with jumbo lump crabmeat, asparagus and sauce bearnaise. Whoa! 

[And yet again, crappy phone camera :)]

and then you have a dessert called Sticky Toffee pudding?  oh my, what a meal!

Saturday brought my brother, Jessica and Parker!!!!  We were so glad to get to spend the weekend with them!!!  We spent the day visiting, had a yummy dinner, and then Jessica and I headed out for some friend time!  We shopped around Kohl's for a bit (love that store) and then went to see Catching Fire!

That movie stressed me out!!!  It was great, but very intense!

This girl got a loom for Christmas and has been obsessed.

A friend has taught her how to do it with her fingers!!!  She showed me tonight a "triple single" necklace that she made!

We had SUCH a great visit!

Tim made a wonderful breakfast this morning as always!!!

It gets better and better watching Parker and my kiddos together! 

It's just the best thing ever.

sweet cousins!

Jessica- I think the one on the left is the first one y'all ever took together!!!!  Isn't it crazy?!

Football has been on in our house all day. We made fish tacos.  C girl had her church activities tonight and I went to evening service.

It's time to get ready for the start of another week!

a week of bullet points & pictures

This verse was the verse that Joyce Rogers shared as being her favorite verse in the Bible.  I fell in love with it.

I've been taking some time to step away and simplify a lot of things in my life.  I hate having to let things go, but it is necessary sometimes.  I may not be blogging or being on Twitter as much. I may not be able to make it to every social event.  

I hate that I haven't always had enough time to make those who I love feel loved.  I don't mean my close family or close friends, but extended family that I love or friends that I'm just not able to keep up with as much.  I'm making more of an effort to invest in people/relationships.  I love blogging simply because it preserves memories.  So many times I've looked back on a post and it brings memories back to mind that I had forgot about.  

To most people, this blog is probably pretty boring.  I just talk about my life. I hope it helps keep family and friends involved in our lives when they can't be here with us.

So, here is our past week in bullet points and pictures:

• Mon Sept 30- C Girl went on a field trip to see a play written by the mom of one of her friends, Bear State of Mind!
• Tues Oct 1- I had a great visit with Amber, my best friend from high school. The government shutdown. I found out that my brother, Kevin is furloughed.
• Wed Oct 2- I decided to start eating gluten free for at least a couple of weeks to see if it helps me feel better.
• I had great talks with Kelly this week and I am thankful for 14 years of friendship and encouragement in good times and bad.
• I've been a crafting fool this week- I finished the gallery wall in B's room, made a Hog wreath for the front door, redid a canvas in C's room, hung a shelf and hung clothespin art underneath in the playroom, organized all my many craft supplies, worked on C's Halloween costume.
• C girl's Parent-teacher conference was so, so good! We are SO proud of that girlie! She is growing in every level, reading at end of 2nd grade level, and is excelling in math!  Her teacher said that she wished every student was as great as C and she could tell that we were raising her in faith.  That compliment meant the world to me!
• Thurs Oct 3- I've been working at the library to stay in focus. I get so distracted at home!  In the afternoon, Tim stopped by and finally got to see C at gymnastics.
• Fri oct 4- We went to a birthday party for one of B's friends. It was so hard not to eat the pizza there! Great to see friends though! Afterwards, we walked around the square at first Friday.  The theme this month was Oktoberfest.
• Sat Oct 5- We had rain and cold front! Saturday morning we had Mugs and muffins at church: Lauren Greenhaw and her husband led worship and we heard a wonderful word from our speaker, Joyce Rogers, wife of the late great pastor, Adrian Rogers. I enjoyed it so much! And they even had GF muffins! We had other plans for Sat. afternoon but it rained most of the day! We went and watched the first half of the Razorback game at Chili's.  The kids were getting tired by that point, so we headed home to listen to the rest of the game on the radio.  Another sad ending for the Hogs.
• Sun Oct 6- We made gluten free waffles for breakfast and they were so good!  We had a lovely service at church. Joyce Rogers shared her testimony and sang for us.  I pray that I am as spry and passionate as she is when I am in my 80's.  We went to a little pumpkin patch that is downtown in the afternoon.  I took a few pictures of the kiddos while we were there choosing pumpkins.  I'm so thankful that they will sit and pose for pictures.  The last few years have been great as far as that goes!  After that, we hopped over to the small airport in town where they were having an airport open house and Aerobatics show.  We got to see a ton of planes!  The kids even were invited in to see the inside of a plane! The planes were resting when we got there, but right before we left, a plane went up and put on a show!
• Mon Oct 7- B Boy's class led Rise and Shine!  He had a long speaking part (a quote of Martin Luther King Jr.) and he did AWESOME! We are so proud of that boy!  I visited the gentlemen that I visit for our women's ministry. He turned 97! He still works at the jewelry store that he founded and goes to church every Sunday! He's a blessing to me.  I also had a mammogram and thankfully, it turned out fine.  We thought I had a cyst, but it is just a deep band of tissue that gets sore.  I'm glad that I wasn't prepared for what to expect with a mammogram.  They are intense!
• So far, eating gluten free has seemed to help me feel better.  I probably have eaten 95% GF.  I'm sure some gluten has snuck in since I'm new at this.  This is only day 6, so time will tell better if this is what is going to work for me.