Let the Birthday Celebrations Begin...

Our Laney-lou turns 5 on Tuesday. I really can't believe it. Saturday was celebration number 1 with all of her friends. Her request was a Fancy Nancy Party. The night before Laney and Daddy had some fun time together and outside he drew a special picture just for her! A cool thing we did this year at our Youth leader's Christmas party was have our gift exchange be something meaninful rather than our normal goofy white elephant. Everyone had to bring a gift of themselves. Some people brought artwork, some offered photo shoots, free meals, etc. One gal offered to throw a free kids birthday party. Guess what I chose? After the girls went to be Friday night the gals came over and decorated. Here are some pics of the girls Saturday morning completely surprised. It was better than Christmas!

At the party everything was fancy. There was nail painting!

Getting hair and make-up done (thanks, Aunt Jen)!

Decorating butterfly placemats. Aren't all the girls so cute! We had 14 of them at our house...all so sweet and polite, and especially fancy!

Of course we ate flower-shaped sandwiches, fruit kabobs, cinnamon twists, had cute cupcakes and ice cream in fancy cups to boot!

Here is one of my all-time favorite pics of my big girl! I love it. She is so beautiful inside and out, but oh, she is no longer a baby and part of that makes my heart a little sad.

May all your dreams come true...

What's a party without some dancing?

Lots of fun friends...

Laney with the best party hostesses around. Thank you, thank you, thank you Carrie, Cozette and Lindsey! It was fabulous!

These girls are like sisters...

The fam all dolled up for our special birthday girl!

Happy birthday, sweet girl! You deserve to be celebrated! Love you! Love you!

I'll be back later in the week to celebrate our Laney Hope a little bit more.

Prettiest Flowergirls in the South

This past weekend we traveled to East Texas for Jason's cousin Lauren's wedding. It was beautiful and had the most beautiful flowergirls I have ever seen in my life. Here are all 4 at the rehearsal. Ashlyn and Reese walked down one aisle together while Laney walked down the other aisle with Lizzie.
Lauren had all of the girls' hair done and the gal did a great job. All of the girls hair was so cute! Notice the toothless grin from our big girl!

Sweet Laney Hope who turns 5 in just a week and a half!

And little britches who has not been in the picture taking mood lately. She wouldn't turn around for me. But this gives you an idea of their hair...she's 2! I wish I had hair like Reesie.

Finally in their dresses!

The beautiful bride...love you Lauren.

The weather was perfect for the outside reception following the wedding. Lauren had a kids table set up with crayons and a paper table cloth.

An old married couple...still very much in love:

Yes, we know...Jason will need to carry a very big stick to keep the boys away!

The girls danced and danced and danced. I finally looked at Jason at 10 and we decided to get them home. Mimi and Reesie doing a jig.

One of my all-time favorite pics:

The bridesmaids were teaching the girls all the right moves. I told Jase that it is so cute right now but if I let my mind flash forward a few years...my throat starts closing in. I have no idea where our 3 got their rhythm, but I'm telling you, they've got moves!

This is about 10 at night. I think once they slowed down the time caught up with them.

Time to call it a night, sweet girl.

Lauren and Colby, we pray your marriage is full of God's blessings big and small, and that your love for the Lord and for each other grows with each passing day. Thank you for letting the girls be a part of your special day!

Easter

So much was lost that day, and yet everything was won!

"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life!" (John 3:16) I saw this Eater craft in one of my magazines and so the girls and I decided to try it ourselves. Not too shabby for a 2, 4, and 7 year old.

On to Easter egg decorating...

A little Easter egg hunting action...

Our only family photo of the weekend since I received a good dose of either food poisoning or a stomach bug just in time for Easter morning.

Cousins pic:

Home Does My Heart Good

This first comment has absolutely nothing to do with my post, but it is on my heart and so I'd like to share. I want to make a difference in the Kingdom. I want my life to be more about the eternal than the temporal things that are all around me and often fight for my allegiance to Christ. I want to leave the world having left Christ's thumbprint rather than my own. I want my life to leave a legacy of His love...for the hurting, the broken, the everyday Joe's and even those who are so successful they don't realize yet that they too need Him. I still don't know what this looks like in my life over the next couple of years or even the remainder of my days, but I really want to love Jesus in a way that makes others want to love Him too. How about you? I've been gone three out of the last 4 weekends. Two were for youth retreats and one was for my favorite nephew, the Drewster's, 2nd birthday. More pics on that later. I have always been a home-body but as I was sharing with a friend over a chai tea latte tonight...I almost feel panicked when I am away from home for very long. We did the normal family things...beautiful Laney Hope went to an amazing princess birthday party of one of her friends. They had a face-painter come...crazy talented was the woman...don't you think?

The weather has been gorgeous lately which has lifted my spirits greatly. We have been spending a lot of time outside. Daddy and the girls worked on the front flower beds together and did a fabulous job!

We had friends over Saturday evening too which is always a favorite among my little hostesses. A precious friend from college, Chelsea, and I have reconnected after years. She is an amazing woman of God. Months ago I had you pray for their family as they lost their precious baby boy in utero at 36 weeks. It has been humbling and so uplifting to see how Chelsea, Mark and their 3 sweet girls have handled their loss. You must check out HisChase.org!!

Anyways, here are all 6 of our girls who are all months a part from one another. They have formed a quick friendship that we look forward to the Lord growing over the years.
So that's it. Home is where the heart is, so they say. And mine is definitely with the precious girls and handsome man God has blessed me with. It was good to be home.

Celebrity Mom

We had a fun and very random adventure last week. Over spring break one of the fun activities the girls wanted to do with MiMi was go get their nails painted at a salon. While the three of them were lined up getting their nails done a woman approached and asked if these three cutie-patooties were mine. She then went on to explain she is part of a production company that puts out commercials and they were filming a cookie commercial the following week. She asked us to come down the next day to just have the girls do a quick "try-out."

I went home and checked everything out on-line to make sure they were legit...they were. Then, basically out of curiousity, took them down the next day. We had a lot to do and I knew if it were going to take real long we would just head out. It actually only took 15 minutes. Well, guess what? She called us Monday and asked for all 3 to come be a part of the commercial on Friday.

Here are the budding actresses before we left home: Laney and Reese were filmed playing tea party at a kitchen counter. Bud's Best Cookies out of Birmingham really does have some yummy cookies! All are bite-sized so there were no issues in getting the girls to chow down. In fact, our little sweet-tooth, Reese, kept eating and eating and eating...

Ashlyn had to actually act some. Here she is getting her hair done. She even got some make-up put on that cute face.

Below is her practicing with her actress mom. She had to get really excited and grab the cookies out of the grocery bag that just got brought in and start eating.

It really was a cute and fun experience since it was something we would never seek out ourselves. They did great and were adorable. Bud and his son actually flew in for the commercial shoot and kept commenting on how cute & sweet the girls were. They were extremely nice and the cookies are quite delicious. We got to come home with our own little stash. Hopefully, we'll get a copy once it's done that we can share.

When Ashlyn returned to school her teacher asked where she had been. She said Mrs. Wilkins called her movie star the remainder of the day and all of the kids in her class gathered around real close to her asking questions. She said it truly made her feel like she was a movie star!

Busy is an Understatement

To say I am busy is an understatement these days. I literally go running from one thing to the next...no really, literally running.

I am wife to this handsome man,
room mom for this precious girl who stole my heart 7 1/2 years ago!

breakfast, lunch & dinner maker, as well as chafeur and maid to

these precious two,

Champion, founder and gopher for this amazing non-profit,

and friends with this precious woman, my best friend from high school, Rach. Okay, I really don't have to do anything for her but I did want to stick in a picture from our quick "Celebration of Friendship" Friday night and Saturday morning.

Last weekend was a youth retreat and this upcoming one is Senior Sneak. I work part-time which includes writing curriculum each week and teaching a class on Wednesday nights. Jason and I have started mentoring a really neat engaged couple from church, and this week we taught at our LifeGroup.

Both Ashlyn and Laney are in gymnastics, and sweet Reesie-boo is potty-training (and doing quite well I might add)! I took a load of bags down to Medical City Dallas Children's Hospital Friday and had a wonderful LifeGroup from church help put together more bags Saturday night, as well as other projects for Gracious Legacy. T hey rocked! I have had to miss 2 baby showers and we were able to squeeze in a birthday party yesterday. Whew!

I am pretty sure I could sleep for a couple days straight, but I am truly enjoying life right now...even if it is full to overflowing.

Good night, my friends! If you think to say a prayer for me, I'll take it. If I accidentally knock you over from my sprint from one task to the next...I am so sorry. If you are bored and would like to come dust my house, feel free!