Faithful Fans

No matter how bad the Panthers play, we'll be forever fans :) Especially with Joe as the head of our house!! These pictures are from the annual tailgate party we had with the staff from CrossWay. Fun times! I particularly love little kids dressed up supporting their team! At the picnic Alathea overheard some of the guys talking about another team and she burst into their conversation and said, "No, GO PANTHERS!" Haha! It was adorable. Alathea was so pro-Panthers that she insisted she wear her size 18 month Panthers jersey! Which is how Abi ended up in the size 3T UNCC cheerleading outfit. They swapped outfits! How I love my girls. 

Praying for the house hunt

Now that our house is "under contract" we are praying that the inspection and settlement go well. Our settlement is Nov 13th. On Monday we officially began a new "house hunt". I've had many friends tell me to enjoy the process. I am trying to! It's harder than I thought, mostly because of my lack of patience and lack of trust in the Lord to provide what we need in His Perfect Timing! We looked at about 9 houses on Monday, and there weren't any that I loved.  None  that even came close to the house on Cambridge Bay that we had hoped to buy (the one that is now under contract). We are praying for wisdom! We need wisdom!! There was one house on a street with a bunch of our friends that we liked, but it was expensive for the house and neighborhood. I wonder if our friends didn't live on the street if we'd like it as much? And there was a new neighborhood that Joe likes the idea of building in. Those were our best two options so far, but neither do we feel at peace to act on immediately. We hope to look again on Monday. Please keep us in your prayers! I'm praying for a miracle home and that the Lord would give both Joe & I peace and direction every step of the way. I want my  heart to be full of gratitude and faith, not discouragement and fear. I'm still a little sad about the thought of being "homeless for the holidays", but do well when I take life one day at a time and remember how good and faithful God is.

Life with Our Princesses

We are so, so blessed! I don't know how we could love these two little girls anymore than we do. We've been soaking up all this lovely weather lately, and spent every free evening outside. The other night the girls got all dolled up in their princess attire, and asked their Daddy (aka "The Prince") to dance. Joe is a very lucky man to have two (really three) adoring little girls, and he knows it.

Also an update on the house, we're UNDER CONTRACT! Wow! That's all I can say. God provided miraculously! How amazingly quick in such a buyers market! This has been an emotional week, contemplating leaving this home we love and heading...who knows where? But God knows. I must rest there. And we are praying for God to miraculously provide a new home that we really love!! More on the house stuff to come.

House Update

Thank you for praying for us! We got an offer from the lady I met at Starbucks! Praise the Lord! Nothing short of a miracle. (God does work in mysterious ways though! If this goes through, no one can ever give me grief for going to Starbucks again :) Anyways, the offer was a bit low, so we countered today, and are praying they would accept it.  Sadly, even after all the Lord has done, I am tempted to be anxious that things won't work out. And then the next hour I am totally sad about the thought of leaving this house I love so much. I'm learning how much I lack faith in the wise, good and sovereign Lord!! I'm praying my heart will be full of gratitude and faith! The Lord has been so good to us. Thanks so much for your prayers even still!

Big Sis, Little Sis

I walked and found Abi sitting on Alathea's lap during movie time.

They stayed like this for a full 20 minutes.

The funniest thing is that they are practically the same size :)

When Abigail was first born, I thought we were crazy for having the girls so close in age. But now I am soooo grateful! They are the best of friends. We love hearing them "talk" across the room to each other at night while in bed. We love hearing them run and laugh and play together. Their favorite thing of late is to run around the house following each other laughing hysterically. Its quite funny to watch.

As much fun as it is to see them as friends, I've loved watching the Big Sis-Little Sis relationship play out. Alathea seems to revel in being the big sister. And Abigail seems just fine with having Alathea do things for her. Alathea will get Abigail snacks when she's hungry. She'll wash her hair in the bath tub. She'll peel her banana for Abi can eat it. Alathea will even read Abi books, and Abigail sits still and listens. The best is when Alathea looks Abi in the eyes and calls her "sweet-heart". It makes me laugh thinking about it.

These pics are a perfect picture of their relationship. Abigail sitting quite content in Alathea's lap while they watch a movie. They stayed like this for 20 minutes. So cute. I hope they are always the best of friends!

1st day of School

Getting ready for pre-school. Alathea was SO EXCITED!

Abi was too and looked ridiculously adorable in her backpack

(which she carried with much pride)

At "school". Eileen and I (well, mostly Eileen :) are teaching a preschool

class at our church. They have a "class" (playroom) for Abigail too. It seemed like a great opportunity, considering it is almost free, just once a week, and with a bunch of Alathea's buddies. Not to mention that Alathea LOVES any kind of school. She asks me all day "can we do school now?". She's WAY more into it than I am. I'm thinking, "Your three, don't you just want to play at the park?" :) But in reality it's ME who wants to play at the park all day (I guess I'm a bigger kid than my 3 year old :)

It's hard to believe how "grown-up" my girls are becoming!!

House Update

These are the pics that our Realtor took today of our happy, little home. Our humble, little abode that we have LOVED, absolutely loved living in! It has been an amazing and unexpected gift to us (and hopefully to others who have been in it) these past seven years. We'd be happy here forever, except for the fact that we hope to have more kids :)

  THANK YOU to everyone who prayed! The lady that came by our house loved it and contacted us and Lloyd (our realtor), wanting pictures for her son. He's in the Navy stationed in Mississippi (I think) and he would be the primary buyer.  Now we are praying that the son would see the pictures and hear about our house from his Mom, and would fall in love with it too. And that he would act quickly and make us an offer. This may sound impossible, but not with the Lord! We've "heard" the other house we'd like to buy may have an offer coming in. In the end, we know the Lord is perfectly wise and knows far better than us what is best, and we want to trust HIM COMPLETELY! But we will continue to pray in the meantime. Thanks for praying!

**UPDATE as of 9/3

The lady and her son are both still interested and called today to see if we could leave everything as is in the back...meaning she wants all Joe's flowers :) That should make him happy that his hard work has paid off. He's been praying that whoever ends up here would love and care for his flowers :) They said we'll hear from them (I think meaning an offer), by Monday. So we are PRAYING for a miraculously GENEROUS offer! 

Also, we learned that the house we were hoping to buy is under contract. God knows what is best. If the Lord wants us to have it, I know He'll work it out. The process of selling our house feels like a HUGE leap of faith now,  not having a clue where we will end up! Thanks for keeping us in your prayers!

House Update/Prayer Request

Yesterday I was at Starbucks getting some boxes to finish up our house before putting it on the market last night. Since Starbucks is across the street from my house, I frequent it often :), and the employees all know me. We were talking about me putting my house on the market and a lady picking up her drink over heard our conversation. She asked me all about our house and asked for my number, saying she'd like to come by and see it. She called me a few hours later and planned to come by today at 2pm. Well, she and her son just came by and seemed to love the place (at least outwardly :). Soooo, we are praying that the Lord would move on their hearts and that they'd make us a good offer. She wants this house for her son who would take advantage of the sweet $8,000 from Uncle Sam that's available for 1st time home buyers right now. We had a great talk with them, and they are active in church, seem to be believers and are even originally from MD. Anyways, I know we may never hear from them again, but I have real faith to pray that God would direct their steps quickly to buy our home. We'd love your prayers! We heard a great message on prayer and faith today (from James 5:13-18), by our good friend Nick. I'm more inspired than ever to be faithful in prayer and the power of prayer and more than ever desire your prayers: 

"Elijah was a man just like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again, he prayed and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops"  James 5:17-18

So we are praying, full of faith, that the Lord would sell this house and preserve the other home for us. And fully knowing that God knows what is best and we want His will for us above all else. Thanks for praying!!! 

Praying, Packing and Trusting

This week has been quite a whirlwind. Last Monday Joe and I were driving home from date night and passed by a house for sale that used to be owned by friends of ours. Being that we've been in the home and have always liked it (great yard, great floor plan, great neighbors and 2 miles max from church) we decided to pull the flyer. Wow, actually in our price range! So the next week we went and looked at it (and a bunch of other homes, being that we've been planning on moving sometime this year), and absolutely loved it. That is problem number one. We love this house currently on the market, but cannot buy it until we sell ours! And in this present market it will take a miracle. But God is in the business of miracles and we feel in faith to do all that we can do to sell our house and trust the Lord for the final outcome. We know our house could sell in the next 24 hours or the next 24 months, but no matter what, the Lord is Sovereign and knows what is perfectly good for us. So for now, I am praying that my heart would be at peace and full of joy regardless of the outcome, for the Lord to give me continued strength to get all the work to get our house on the market AND praying in faith for a miracle. 

Now is the time...

"Now is the time to get things done...wade in the water, sit in the sun, squish my toes in the mud by the door, explore the world in a boy just four. Now is the time to study books, flowers, snails, how a cloud looks; to ponder ‘up,’ where God sleeps nights, why mosquitoes take such big bites. Later there’ll be time to sew and clean, paint the hall that soft new green, to make new drapes, refinish the floor - Later on...when he’s not just four." 

-Irene Foster

I read this quote today, and what a lovely reminder on a sad day. Life is short, and the time that my girls will be little and want to go on adventures, and splash in puddles, and chase butterflies and marvel at a dandelion are even shorter days. These are days filled with much joy! I pray that I can keep perspective on the days filled with more tantrums than laughter and more messes to clean than games that we play and days when not one thing seems to get checked off the to-do list. These days are precious. And they are numbered.

I know one day I will get to all of my to-do list, and my house will always be clean, I will actually tackle some projects and I will be able to finish my dinner without interruption. As good as those days will be (since every day is a gift from God, so it must be good),  I bet I'll be thinking about these days and missing them a lot.  What a precious season I am in, may I be grateful for each and every day!

3 years without Mom

It was 3 years ago today that my amazing Mother took her last breath and went to be with the Lord. How I miss her!! I am grateful to the Lord for every single day I got to spend with her (23 years!) and for the amazing relationship that we had. I think it was the closeness that we shared that has made missing her so painful. Not even a few days go by without me wanting so badly to pick up the phone and call her. How I loved talking to my Mom! She cared about anything that I cared about, and would take an interest even in the littlest things that only mom's care about- like what color to paint a room or that Alathea was teething yet again. And how I miss her wisdom, helping to navigate my way through life. I heard once that life without a Mom can feel like life without a roadmap...I can at times relate to that. But I do thank God for his abundant goodness to me and my family for giving us such an amazing, godly mother who I did get 23 years with. While I wish I could have 23 more years, I know Gods plans are perfectly good. And every day that goes by is just one step closer to me seeing my Mom again. Praise God for the gift of Salvation!

Summer

Sometimes I feel like a kid who just wants summer to last forever. Its always about this time each year, as school and meetings are slowly starting back up, and pool hours are slowly shrinking, and the calendar starts looking fuller by the day and stores start selling fall clothing, that I get a little nostalgic, and think about how I don't want summer to end.

Who doesn't love the long, warm days. More time to plan adventures, take vacations, swim at the pool and splash in the fountains. I love little girls in sundresses and sunglasses and flip-flops. There is not much about summer that I do not love.

So here is a sprinkling of what I love (and will miss *sniff, sniff*) about summer:

sweet times at the pool

packing a picnic lunch and eating it in our bathingsuits, poolside

watching Alathea finally start learning how to swim

summer mornings (and evenings) spent at Birkdale with the girls,

 splashing in the fountains

bringing friends along to join in the fun

fireworks

and summer concerts at the park

cousins hanging out at the concerts...

...and watching them dance for hours to the live music

the beach (i'll miss everything about that!)

loooong summer nights playing outside with friends

Joe's blooming garden

splashing in the rain puddles

cold stone ice cream

really cute little girly bathingsuits

eating and playing outside when Daddy gets home

all the warm rainy days

the gorgeous summer blue sky

lounging in the hammock with friends

berry picking

Oh, summer. Please don't leave us too soon :)