Wednesday, July 28, 2010

froggie

Yum.....
Been making some different summer fresh fruity drinks lately.  SO good.  This one shown here is
5 strawberries, 1 peach - skinned (make sure it's nice and ripe or it will be sour), and 1 banana.  I then add a little sugar (to taste), then fill with water about 3/4 of the way up the cup.  Then blend a 'la magic bullet!  and viola, a perfect yummy treat!  and since I am not using yogurt or milk or ice cream, it is also much less fat/calories than a regular smoothie!  Who doesn't love that?!

I can't believe how tall our babies are getting.  They can now reach the deadbolt...
Chris has been locked out like 5 times already.  Hilarious! He goes out to water the veggie plants and Gabriel shuts and locks the door.  :P 

Our pet frog....
OK, so maybe he's not really our pet...we found him on our back porch yesterday morning while outside playing.  The kids really loved him.  Although at first Gabriel shouted "beeeeeeee!" and tried to step on him.  Luckily I saved the frog and explained to Gabriel that we don't kill frogs.  I got it into one of our buckets, showed the kids that they could touch him.  Asher wanted to pick him up.....and he found out real quick that frogs jump!  HA!  It was pretty funny. After he got over it he continued his squeals of excitement. 

Our kids like nature.....especially Asher "bug".  :)
And then we let him go by our gate.  Pretty sure our kiddos would have loved if we could have kept him. 

Yesterday I cleaned and organized our pantry again.  It really drives me insane when it is in complete disarray and I cannot see everything and when I know there is stuff that must be thrown out.  Something about a clean, organized pantry makes me smile ahhhhh. 

And while in there I saw that we had pudding that was still good, so I decided to make all our pudding we had in there.  One box each of chocolate, butterscotch, and banana cream.  YUM!
And Asher REALLY enjoyed his :)
I have to say the fave was prob chocolate for Gabriel, butterscotch for Asher, and Trinity liked 'em all!

Gabriel "big boy" swinging...
A new favorite spot...coloring away

I brought these hats home from work during "Adventure Week".  Trinity will only wear it wrong side out.

Word.  All she needs is to be throwin' up a gang sign.  baha
mama's lil'homegirl
...and Trinity "hep bruder wing"  aka....helping brother swing :)
She is so sweet.  Always helping out.  They all help out, but she just has that nurturing about her that I love. 
Yesterday when I was handing out snack, I gave her her bowl of cereal first.  What did she do?  Yeah, she gave her snack over to Asher, then just waited for the next bowl.  Sweetness.  Pure sweetness. 

God has really blessed us.  And we know it.  Our children are such little jewels.  Truly gifts.  They make God's love known to us even more each and every day. 

Monday, July 26, 2010

bee's, bears, & beds

Lots to talk about.  Long post.  But I guess that's what happens when I go over a week without a post...

Not quite sure where to start, so I will start with bee's.....YES bee's...

This past week Chris spent some time each night working on our yard in some way.  Just little things, mowing, watering, spraying turf builder, and knocking down 6...yes, SIX nests.....i think he said we had 3 red wasp nests, 2 yellow jacket, and one reg wasp nest...and these all in our beautiful new fence.  It's a good thing he's a 3rd degree Black Belt, 'cus he had to use some of it on an angry red wasp.  He won.  No stings.  No E.R. visits.  :)  After he sprayed the nests, faught a couple off with a broom (aka bow staff) and he knew there were no more around, he knocked down their homes and through them out.

That's MY man, ladies.  Bee hunter, backyard protector.

On Wed I had our WIC re-certify visit which is always loads of fun for everyone.  I have to say though this time it went rather smooth.  Neither Gabriel nor Trinity cried when they got their fingers pricked.....although they didn't like the scale or the height measurement...go figure.  Asher of course had to show a little drama with the finger poke, but he liked his "sticker"  aka bandaid :)  The elderly nurse lady who did all of our tests was pretty funny.  and a bit grumpy.  She did everything with them fully clothed, shoes and all,  for height and weight....except Asher's shoes fell off, so he shows as being like a half inch shorter. lol she totally didn't care.  she cracked me up.  We were her first appt. and she was apparently in a hurry. But I didn't want to stay any longer than we had to so not complaining.  We got in and out of there and loaded in the truck in an hour.  record time!  And I have to say we are SO thankful for WIC.  I honestly think it is awesome.  We've had it since the kiddos were about 5 months old.

After our appt., I had a bill to drop off and Chris suggested I use my time that I had the truck to get out of the house for more than just an appt....so we went to the Promenade!  It was nice and there was close to no one there because nothing was open yet.  Well, nothing except the Choc Factory and Antie Anne's!!!  So, I grabbed a lemonade, 'cus they have the best lemonade around here and it was already getting crazy hot out.  Then I looked over at the chocolate side and saw they had these little chocolate bears on sticks!  And they were affordable, so I got each of the kiddos one...YUM-O
They never get treats like this so they were giddy :)  to say the least.  It was great, except for the heat which was starting to melt them.  And quick is just not something Asher does with food.  Then he ended up dropping his on the concrete.  Luckily he ate about half b4 that happened, but still did not make for happy time :(  But he eventually got over it, the other two finished their bears and we went on.

I had forgot how nice it is to have a vehicle throughout the day.  Something I totally used to take for granted.  But I sure did enjoy every minute of freedom on Wednesday!

As much as it still feels like only yesterday we were at the hospital, our kiddos are growing up so fast right before our eyes.  And again I am so incredibly thankful to be a stay at home mama so I can enjoy every minute of it.

And as you may have read in one of our previous posts, Gabriel had been climbing out of his crib.  SO, Friday evening Chris converted Gabriel's bed to a toddler bed.  As much as I want to cry at the fact that my babies are growing up, they are so stinkin sweet, and I love every stage....this just seems to make the toddlerdom (i make up words...i like it) final....
sweetness.  such a big boy.  And he is doing crazy well.  After hearing other parents horor stories of toddler beds...kids never going to sleep, constantly getting up, continuing the play b/c they can just get out of bed on their own, etc....I was literally amazed.  Not once has Gabriel done any of that....yet :)  It's like he feels this new sense of responsibility and big boy-ness.  Especially since the other two don't have theirs converted yet.  Unfortunately their side rails are both broken.  Our fault for not unwrapping and checking when we first got them.  SO, we have to wait till we can order two more b4 Trinity and Asher will be "big kids" :)  officially.

vocabulary
It is seriously amazing me how much more our children are talking just withing the past like 2 or 3 weeks.  It's just crazy.  Especially Trinity.  She can repeat almost anything.  Although some words still come out a bit...um.....like the words shirt, skirt, sock, shorts, fork.....she can say her s' and sh's and r's....but when you put them together in the same word something usually gets left out.  :)  She can also say lots of other words and prases now too.  some examples:
sorry "shaury"
bless you "besh oooo" or "shoo shooo"
banana "bana" or bananana"
balloon "balooo" or ballooloo" or "noonnooon" - not quite sure what started the last one?
please "peeeeeez"
thanks you "ink yoooo"
love you "wuv yooooo"
where you going? "whereyoooogoing"
stop "stop"
cow "tow"
foot
toe
no ma'am "nomaaaam"
....and many more...pretty much anything we ask them to say they at least try.
It's seriously crazy

Everything must come out!  Apparently a phase.  they all have to grab every stuffed animal, lovey, and blanket out of their beds b4 getting out.  cracks me up.  I literally have to wait on Trinity to grab, drop, grab again, drop, then finally just grab everything in a hug then look up like "ok, get me out" :) 
Gabriel's bed stash :)

Asher caries light :)
Art in the clubhouse
and a couple other random pics
Trinity "heping" brother up the slide :)

Oh yes, and we have been exposed to "24".  How on earth do people watch this show on cable waiting a week for the next hour, literally, in the show.  It would drive me insane.  I was thinking that you watched a 24 hour period each episode not each season! AGH  needless to say we were up till midnight or later watching Season 1 episodes 1-5.  mad that we had to stop so we could sleep.  ha!  just one more reason to not have cable, then watch things years later.  I can't stand waiting.  Thank you netflix.

Monday, July 19, 2010

Little Rock!

Our weekend began early Friday morning.  We headed out for Little Rock at 640am, stopped to grab some McD's, then we were on our way!
Gabriel on our way....TI-RRRRED :) with Froggie on his head.  He eventually fell asleep...as did Asher and Trinity. 













We arrived at Children's about 20min early and they saw us right away.  The test took less than an hour total.  After that we were on our way to the hotel, then to eat, then off to the zoo!!!

Asher and Gabriel checking out a nasty chicken that kept walking by us. (pic of chicken below)
  Hot princess...heat index was like 102 deg.  Good thing we had lots of water, and some super yummy fresh lemonade!  The zoo also had little misty areas you could walk through.
Kiddos checking out a donkey!
And going through the little "rain forest" area!  There were tons of little fluffy head birds just walking around...and one duck.  Gabriel thought that was the coolest ever!
Some of the animals...


As we were heading out of the zoo, we recieved a phone call from Children's telling us that Asher's test came back NEGATIVE for Cystic Fibrosis!!!!  YAY!!!  So, he is all clear and a healthy little man!  Super pumped about that!  Thank you Jesus!  And since we had such a good report the last time he visited the Pulmonary Specialist, she said that if he is negative for CF, that he no longer needs to see her!  Holler for less doctor visits!!!!

After the zoo we went back to the hotel room and chilled for a bit, then went to the pool!  I SO wish I had a picture of our kiddos in the pool with their water wings and inner tubes...it was too cute....and funny.  Gabriel didn't want his tube....that child was determined to swim on his own.  SO, he did that with daddy's help.

Saturday we visited Alex, and a couple of the other nurses who were there at UAMS that remembered us.  It was so much fun!  All the nurses that work in the UAMS nurseries are angels in my book.  Our kids couldn't have had more caring and loving bunch of ladies by their sides, especially Asher who was there for 4 months!  Goodness.  Seems like only yesterday I was making the daily walks from the UAMS house to the hospital to see my babies each day.  How fast time flies!

On the way home...
Happy Babies!  Not sure if they are happy to be going home, or just happy to have got some Vanilla Bean Cheese Cake from TGI Friday's.....they be lovin' themselves some cheese cake!  HA

What our road trips are like :P

 "Peekboo"  if you can't tell, our kids are easily amused....as are we I guess since we decided to video them 'cus we thought it was so fun to watch :P

We have also decided that another Zoo trip is in order!  Now that I know how to operate my mom's camera better, I will be able to use it for more than the ride home :)  Funny how I can work a Nikon professional camera just fine, but when it comes to a Kodak Easy Share, I am lost!  HA!  Looking at going to the Tulsa Zoo in the fall.  The LR zoo was way too expensive for them not having much to do and so many exhibits closed.  Anything was better than nothing though in our book, so it was worth it and the kiddos still had tons of fun....and that is what matters.

And...drum roll please!!!!!!
Just got a letter from Children's letting us know that our financial assistance was accepted and 100% of our outstanding bill is taken care of!!!! HOLLER!  After Asher's last visit and the test, our total was going to be around $1,000 or so, SO, this is seriously a HUGE Blessing on top of Asher's wonderful test results!!!! YAY

Monday, July 12, 2010

Great Weekend and Busy week

Saturday we had our Garage Sale and really scored!  We will have enough to make our trip and go to the zoo.  We may even stay the night in LR so we aren't so rushed. It was crazy hot out on Saturday though.  wow.  The heat nearly got the best of me.  I was draggin' when we were all done.  I closed shop around 330pm. 

After our sale was over, Chris took all the clothes and nik naks to Helping Hands and on his way back stopped at Wal-Mart and got me these...!!!!!!

Love my wonderful man!  Loved seeing him walk in with a dozen roses after my long hot day!

Then yesterday afternoon I got some me time.....well, me time at Wal-Mart :P HA!  But it really was wonderful.  Usually when I go there it is in the evening and I am rushing around so I can get back home and have some time with Chris before we both fall asleep.  Yesterday wasn't rushed at all.  I even moseyed around the book section and toy section.  Didn't find any books to buy, but it was just the point of relaxing. 

I was also super excited about getting the kiddos each a toy.  For those who really know us, you know that we just don't buy our kids stuff randomly....like ever.  Even for their b'day we got them each a milar balloon ($1) which they thought were the coolest things since mac n' cheese.  And for Christmas we got them each 1 toy. We just don't believe in getting them junk toys, just for the sake of getting them a toy...ya know what I mean?  These were toys I had actually been wanting to get them once we had the money.  And I loved that they were very inexpensive, but exactly what I was looking for to get them!  SO, this was a REAL treat for them!!!  And for us! .  
Here is a quick video of them playing with their new cool toys!

Our kiddos have been having some allergies or a slight cold the past couple days.  Plus it feels, and sounds :) like they are getting their 2yr molars in.  And with this, Asher had 2.....count them 2 blow-outs today.  Haven't had one of these since they really were "babies".  And the first one was crazy bad.  He just happened to be on one of our chairs.  It was super great.  Luckily that piece of furniture is edura suede and was easy to clean...gross, but easy.  needles to say bath time came early today! 

Ninja Toddlers....
 last but not least....I recorded this on my phone since I couldn't get the other one off our little camera.  They didn't actually kill the fly, but you get the point of the ninja-ness :P hehe and please excuse Gabriel's loud cat dying impression in the second video.  :P 



This week is going to be kinda busy.  I am working at "Adventure Week" Mon, Tues, and Wed evenings.  This is like VBS.  Thursday evening is Life Group, then Friday is our trip to Little Rock!

Unless something crazy amazing awesome happens, I prob won't be posting anything till after our trip.  Please still be sending up believing prayers for Asher! 

Hope ya enjoyed all the videos!

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Head, Tummy, Knees and Toes

So we have added a couple things to our learning time.  We are doing a little game where I have Gabriel, Asher and Trinity reach for the sky, then touch their toes, then knees, then tummy then head....then it starts all over again.  We also incorporate jumping, twisting, spinning around in circles and running in place!  The kiddos have really been enjoying it!  It's amazing how quick they caught on. We have also started a "word a week"....this week's word is "help".  LOVING it.  They are doing great.  I can't stand the "eh eh eh" - ing....drives me insane, and them learning how to use the word help has been great.  We've used it for a while, but not in a learning sense where I show them examples...I just always tried to correct them.....the "learning word a week" is working much better.  I haven't heard one eh eh eh this week since we did this. 

It's been rather gloomy as far as our weather the past couple days, so we have been doing a lot of playing inside and some movie watching.  We went to our friends the Brown's last Friday night and they introduced us to Netflix streamed movies.  Chris really loved the idea to say the least.  We just had to fit it into our budget!

SO, since we have been getting the paper....and not making the time to read it...not to mention that I have not made time to go through all the coups and they have been just cluttering up our house, we decided to cancel the paper.  Our recycle box will be sad I'm sure :P  We were paying $7 for the paper, and now will be paying $8.99 for netflix....which we have used everyday since starting our free trial.  I lOVE that they have children shows too.  We have been introduced to the Backyardigans, which is great!  We also get to watch VeggieTales that we don't have, and many more.  Not to mention movies and tv shows that Chris and I enjoy watching!

We haven't had cable in almost 8years now, with no plan on getting it, but this is a great alternative, as we control what comes into our stream and can watch them whenever we want!!!  Now we just need to get a wireless router so we don't have to keep unplugging our internet to our computer to plug in our DVD player to watch something.

Besides all this we have been getting ready for our garage sale happening this Saturday!

Here are some random pics.....
Gabriel styling his hair Sunday morning for church!


Asher and his "Baloo"

Trinity's "pidy toes"!  Painted them for the 1st time the other day!



Playing with cars!

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Must Sell!

Raising money to make our trip to Little Rock for Asher!

Professional Camera Bag - SOLD!!!!!!  just sold this morning!
http://fayar.craigslist.org/pho/1828788062.html

Nikon N80 SLR Camera Body - film camera
http://fayar.craigslist.org/pho/1828727091.html

If you know anyone, or if you are interested, please let me know! 

And don't forget about our garage sale!
http://fayar.craigslist.org/gms/1822154410.html

An update!
We were just given some furniture to put in the sale last night after church from some friends!   2 sofa's, 1 love-seat, 1 chair & ottoman, and a dinning set!
So spread the word!

Broken, Blessed, and Given

*When Jesus was having what is commonly called the Last Supper with His Disciples, the Bible says He broke the bread, blessed it, and gave it to them.  Think about that: broken, blessed, and given.  God has to break us, He blesses us, and then He gives us to the world to help it.  An independent, self-confident person is not one that is broken.  When we are broken, we are dependent on God, our confidence is in Him, and we are pliable and moldable in His hands.

Ask God to break you, bless you, and give you to the world as a blessing.  Ask Him to break your heart with the things that break His.* - Joyce Meyer from her book i dare you

I don't know if you have ever truly been broken.  I have several times.  Just to name a couple....when I was saved, when I went to UAMS to have our trio and everything that encompassed that experience, with our finances, and now again with the test that our son Asher has coming up.

So many people think that brokenness is a sign of weakness.  And I guess in a sense it is. It is acknowledging our own weaknesses, surrendering to God, and letting Him take over.  Brokenness and Surrender are the only forms of weakness that actually make us stronger, because they bring us closer to our Father.  And it is a fight to surrender.  We have to allow it.  For some of us it comes easier, maybe because we've been through it already.  But easier doesn't mean easy

When the doctor told me all the information about Cystic Fibrosis, that there is even a chance of Asher having it, that he does show some signs, and what it would mean for him if the test comes back positive that he has it.....my heart broke.  I truly wanted to explode with tears. Right there in the doctors office.  It was not easy.  BUT, as soon as the overwhelming emotions came over me I remembered that I have a power on my side.  On Asher's side.  A power that far outweighs anything the doctors could tell us.  And that power is God.  That power is prayer.  That power is healing.  Right then I began praying over his little body believing. I choose to surrender.  Surrendering didn't mean that I couldn't break down and cry, but my son needed me to break down and PRAY

Each time I have been broken, I have been blessed, and have used the experience as a testimony...  (Given)

I know someone else needs to hear this today.  Let yourself be broken, God will bless you, and He will use you to light the world. 

Hebrews 10:38  But my righteous one will live by faith. 
Exodus 15:26 I am the Lord thy Physician.

Brake me
Bless me
Give me 




Chris and I will be taking Asher, and Gabriel and Trinity to LR a week from Friday for the test.. We are supposed to know that day the results.  

And for those who haven't been keeping up, we will be having a garage sale to help us with funding for this trip.  The garage sale will be this coming Saturday, July 10th....will open early!

His peace strengthens my faith and allows me to brake and surrender.  This peace tells me to come boldly with His word.  His peace declares love.  The love of my Father.  


Friday, July 2, 2010

Fun stuff

Our children are ninja's
It's official.
Gabriel and Asher both can catch flies with their bare hands....or two fingers I should say.  It's really funny to watch.  They each quietly go up where the fly is then kinda follow it for a minute with their fingers.  (gaining it's trust I guess lol...)  then they grab it's wings and yell for me "MAMA, FLYYYYYYYYY!"  it's awesome. Trinity is a master fly killer too just with different tactics, she prefers the swat method...with her lovey or a towel...not her hands...as if :) Gabriel has also learned how to silently climb out of his crib.  And I have caught Trinity trying to climb out of her crib too....then she saw that Gabriel got a spank for it and decided against the idea :P  haha  smart girl.

For the past week Trinity has not wanted to go outside in the backyard.  She gets hysterical.  whinny.  not fun to say the least.  And it was a total all of a sudden thing.  This child is a water bug, outdoorsy girl....would be out all day if I let her.  We had my young mama's life group over yesterday for a play date and she was still wiggin' out.  SO, today we did some intervention.  It honestly, for real, only took like a minute of whinny screaming outside before she was good to go.  I ignored her and played it up with the boys....since she had no one to run to and whine to it ended QUICK!  She then played like she normally does.  I think we have our normal child back :)  Thank you JESUS! As one of my friends in LG says "I don't do whining" uh, yeah  :P  Glad that was a quick phase.
                                                             lil'T playin' it up in the pool today!

For one of our lunches this week I decided to let them color at the table with their big paper and crayons b4 I had their lunch ready.  Then I used their color pages as place mats!  Going to do this more often!  It worked great.  They were so content to sit and color for the 5 or 10 min b4 eating and then I had less mess on the table to clean up!  Total win-win deal! 


Some other cute pics from today on the camera phone....
I love how the boys are taking care of their flowers by watering them <3 *squeeze*

Some funny stuff...
-Trinity's fave new word is Banana...usually in random song....."Bananas, bananana, bananananaana, apple, apple, bananana"  I have some cute video but something is up with our little camera's usb...so maybe later
-Also on that camera are video's of our kids fly hunting....pretty funny.  If I can ever get them off that camera, I will post them :)
-The word "fork" does not sound good coming out of a toddlers mouth :) 
- Trinity likes to wave and say "bye" to her um..stuff....while it is flushing.  Can't make this stuff up people
- I bought the kids this little toy camera (check-out line @wal-mart) and when I get my real camera out, Asher will click away on his little camera taking pics with me.  (also on the non working video that I hope to upload at a later time)  lol