Praise God for He is Good

Shellie was finished with surgery around 10:30 last night and taken to recovery where she is resting. Don't know too much right now, but will update soon. I said a lot of prayers last night and am so thankful that the surgery went okay.

Following Cousin Shellie

Just got an update on my cousin Shellie. I mentioned her yesterday in my blog. She had a healthy 7 pound baby boy this afternoon. She was just taken to surgery a couple of hours ago to remove the tumor behind her eye.

Apparently, she had been having severe headaches and her eye hurt when she touched it. She was out with some friends who knew someone with a tumor in the same area and same symptoms a week ago and that is when she when to the doctor and realized what she had. We are praying now for a safe surgery and recovery.

What's Happening?

Well, I feel like a lot is happening today. The kids are taking a nap before Kaitlyn's dance class and I had to write about what is happening lately. Everyday I have been cleaning out a closet to get the house ready to sell. Praying a lot about where we want to raise our family and praying about my project at 7-Eleven. God will take care of things I know. It is just being in the trenches sometimes that is hard.

As for 7-Eleven, I have a laptop now and Margaret just doesn't want to see me go. I have agreed to work from home some and go in for a weekly meeting. We will see how that works out. Now it is just maintaining some content for the website, not a whole lot.

As for the house and metroplex, there are too many options, but we are getting priorities straight and looking at things this weekend.

As for some direction, my weekend church retreat was wonderful in mid-January. I couldn't have needed a spirtual uplift more. I can't wait for Brandon to go for a weekend in March. I know he will enjoy it so much. Thanks St. Jude.

Also in March, we just signed up for Plano's Sweetheart dance for dads and daughters. This is the first year Kaitlyn can go with Brandon. I know he is so excited. They are going to go with our friends The Dickens, Jesse and Ashley.

And as for some sad news today. My cousin, Shellie, who lives in St. Louis and is raising six children and pregnant with her seventh was just diagnosed with a brain tumor. Her husband is a surgeon. The doctors are going to take the baby three weeks early on Feb. 3 and then she will need all her strength for an operation. Please pray for their family this month.

Cast your cares on the LORD and He will sustain you; He will never let the righteous fall. Psalm 55:22

Goodnight Kisses

We haven't been sleeping really well over here. Well, who is counting. When Kaitlyn was born, my real good sleep went out the door.

But what makes it harder to sleep is how cute Kaitlyn and Jackson have been lately. Jackson has learned to blow kisses and wave goodbye with his hand. He is just too cute. I would post a video; however, my little camera is in the shop.

Now when I lay him down in his crib, he puts his hand on his mouth to blow me kisses. He then waves goodbye as he gets cozy to go to sleep. When he waves, his whole hand is flying up and down. It really is cute. It is great that he is not fighting sleep right now either. He is showing signs of only needing one nap so we are in a little bit of a transition period right now.

Yesterday for Kaitlyn's nap time, after wrestling around in her bed and trying to fight it, Kaitlyn finally laid down and asked me to tell her a story about Captain Hook. This has become her routine before bed, always a story about Captain Hook. I think Brandon and I have run through just about every kind of story we can think of. She always wants Hook to be mean, but we show her that in the end everyone is nice and learns from their mistakes. In yesterday's story, I told her how she dreamed that she was on the beach in Neverland. She was wearing her bathing suit and building sandcastles. Captain Hook helped her and then asked her to help him count his money. Oh, the story went on, and she was totally into it. She then asked for her purse with some money in it, her bathing suit and blankie. She put them all around her arm to take with her in her dream. She finally fell asleep with them all.

Here are photos of our park outing today. The kids had a great time! We got to feed the ducks and roam around a lot. Kaitlyn was my little heroine today.

She and Emilie were close to the playground on a little hill of grass. They were playing together and Jackson wondered out there to check them out. He then saw the ducks and started to make a beeline for the creek. Before I even started running after him or could say anything, Kaitlyn had walked in front of him and put her hand out to stop him from going toward the creek. Of course, they were not anywhere near the creek, but he is a pretty fast little critter. Kaitlyn told him that he couldn't go to the creek and to stop. It was wonderful to see her take care of her brother instinctively. I was so proud of her, and excited to see her sisterly love as well as her compassion for her little brother.

Bad Hair Day?

Talk about a bad hair day!!!

Nothing too important

Well, spring cleaning has hit here in a big way this week. I hope we can have a lot of stuff cleaned out by the end of the month. If you don't already know, we are hoping to move to a bigger house, still in the DFW area, in the springtime. Of course, we pick a time where home sales in the DFW area have dropped more than 30 percent in the last two months and prices have fallen abotu 12 percent, however, maybe we will get a good deal on a new house too.

And with it taking us forever to clean anything around here, it will take us a couple of months to get this house in tip-top shape, every floor board wiped and every toy put away. Oh man, the toys!

Until this week, I just didn't realize how much we have stuffed in our little house with four small closets. I think Kaitlyn has even gotten into the spirit of cleaning up this week. Jackson knocked all of the DVDs out of the case one morning this week while I was in the kitchen. Kaitlyn picked them all up and put them away. When I came back to the room, everything was nice and neat. Talk about getting into the spirit without mommy even saying a word. Gotta love those moments.

The Holiday

Before we get back into too much of a routine, here are some photos from Christmas and New Year's. We all had such a nice time with our family this year in Beaumont and in DFW. We rode in a horse-drawn carriage to look at lights with our family in Arlington and had great fun making a little video for our family in Kansas City. And then in Beaumont, Jackson and Kaitlyn kept us totally entertained, as well as cousin Maggie.Big Daddy warmed up the hot tub to play in and Gigi made lots of food. Santa came over and all was merry with tons of presents!

I can't think of one particular story to share, but there are tons of little memories like...

Going for a horse and carriage ride to see the Christmas lights in Plano with family.

Jackson sitting on the stone alligator trying to ride him like a horse.

Kaitlyn making friends with a neighbor on Gigi and Big Daddy's street.

Maggie opening all of the presents.

Jackson warming up slowly to all of his relatives, but totally wondering who all of these people are. He just wanted his mommy.

Kaitlyn performing for all of us with her dance moves.

Kaitlyn looking outside for Santa Claus and then meeting a high school friend of the family dressed up as Santa. Him sticking the cookie Kaitlyn gave him in his boot. He couldn't eat it because of his beard.

Aunt Christy and Uncle Spencer getting Kaitlyn excited for Santa and reading her a book about Christmas.

Brandon and Sarah sneaking out to go see Benjamin Button at the movies for three hours.

And waiting for Jackson and Kaitlyn to wake up Christmas morning. Then seeing Jackson push Kaitlyn out of the way so he could make his way to the blow-up school bus full of balls. Balls are his favorite.

Going to a Mavs game for Brandon's birthday.

Meeting up with friends for a holiday lunch and dinner at Rainforest Cafe and Mariano's.

Having Uncle Stephen and Amy over to play rockband on New Year's eve.

Going to the donut shop with Uncle Stephen and Amy and us for a New Year's Day breakfast.