Pictorial Weekend Update

I'm just checking in with some pictures from the weekend. I wish I had a more substantial post for today, but 1) I have too much to do, 2) I don't have anything substantial to say, and 3) I just don't feel like thinking much beyond posting some pictures.

So here you go!

"Unusual Day" at school means that Avery gets to dress herself!

Kids Movie Night at church on Friday night

Camila's baby shower Saturday morning

Kendra with her mom and sister

Hostesses with the gorgeous mama! Debbie, Cindy, Mom, and me

Strolling through the Walk the Light art festival

Dinner at Matt's! This kid loves cheerios and cheese.

Avery makes goofy faces like this all the time! She's a total ham.

Grandaddy is totally entertaining

Zoo trip with Jacob, Candace, and Ricky!

Napless mornings make for a VERY sleepy Landon

Checking out the giraffes with Ricky

Landon wants in with the big kids

Cheetah!

Worn out. Although this was BEFORE Avery's major afternoon meltdowns. Good times.

Spontaneous dinner in the back yard. Who needs patio furniture?!? Okay, maybe it just makes us white trash. It was a gorgeous day though, so I don't even care.

I get to see Mary Poppins tonight with some of my favorite people. Dinner at Razzoo's and a musical at Bass Hall? Not a shabby Tuesday at all!

Friday Five

After yesterday's downer of a post, here are five fun things for this Friday!

1. Joann has minky fabric on sale for 50% off right now. And if that's not exciting enough, there's also a coupon for 25% off your entire purchase that can be used in conjunction with the sale. I got 5 yards of minky, two colors of thread, and one spool of ribbon for $35. Why yes, I do enjoy saving $50, thank you very much.

2. Today's been fun, and my sister-in-law Chelsea is coming over this afternoon with baby Evie! The poor girl will probably be attacked by both of my children who just love her to pieces. Landon loves her so much he tries to eat her feet if we let him anywhere near her. Later tonight we're having kids movie night for the little kids (2s-2nd grade) at the church. We have 30 kids signed up for a fun night of 101 Dalmatians, complete with "pup"peroni pizza and Cruella cream dessert. Don't worry, there's some fruit to balance out all the junk. Have fun getting them to sleep tonight, parents (haha)!

3. Kendra's shower is tomorrow! I'm so excited to see all the fun things that baby Camila gets. I'm also excited to post some pictures of my first product that has a real live tag for my Etsy shop on it. Eek! I feel so official.

4. I finished The Hunger Games in two sittings. Yes, I was late to the figurative party, but I'm just glad I gave in. My heart was pounding from the minute the games started until I finished the last page. It was intense and thought-provoking. Good stuff. I'm so ready to start Catching Fire, but I'm going to see the movie on Sunday night, so I figure I'll just wait until then. Now I'm just trying to get Matt to finish it so I can finally talk about it with him, but he keeps falling asleep. How does that even happen?!?

5. One of my very favorite families in the entire world is coming in town and we get to hang out with them on Monday!! I'm so ready to spend some time with Candace, Ricky and Jacob. Love them!

Happy Friday, everybody!

My mind it is a churnin'

I usually keep my posts pretty light-hearted. The point of my blog is to share our family story with friends and family who don't get to interact with us every day, but it's also our way of looking back and preserving memories (especially since I stopped scrapbooking the minute I got my sewing machine). As an added bonus, I've gotten to know some pretty great people through blogging.

My posting has been pretty scarce the past couple of weeks.

One reason was spring break and how little "free time" I have when Matt's home. We're too busy hanging out together for me to hide behind a computer.

Another reason is that I have way too much on my mind. That seems a little counter intuitive I guess because it would make sense for me to brain dump using this medium. It's easier for me to express my thoughts in writing, but for some reason I can't bring myself to do it. At least not yet.

So without going into too many details, here's a list of what's taking up space in my brain:

• Politics. I don't feel like I really "fit" with either party. I'd call myself conservative in that I want government to have a minimal role in everyday life, but I hate the narrow-mindedness that goes along with most "Church Republicans." On the other hand, I absolutely cannot buy into the government dependency that the Democratic party tends to create. There's a lot of hate on that side of the political spectrum, too.
• The Church. I've grown up in church. I know all the stories. I'm a good girl who follows the rules. But I truly believe in the gospel of Christ's redemption. I've done enough soul searching and have come to my own conclusions, so my faith truly is my own and not just something that's been fed to me my whole life. I'm thankful for my parents who taught us to THINK and have modeled true servanthood and commitment to Christ. But now that I'm on "the other side" as a children's ministry director, I see a whole new side of the Church. There is so much ugliness in peoples' hearts, mine included. We're studying 1 Peter in our ladies' Bible study right now, and it's convicting me a lot, especially in how I relate to certain people that are, um, hard to love.
• Social Justice. How do I really get involved in helping the poor? What does it look like practically for our family? Where do we even start in building relationships with those who are hurting outside of our little bubble? I ran across this post last night which has helped, but I'm struggling with what it looks like for our family to really get our hands dirty, so to speak.We just started a study called Seeking Social Justice in our Sunday School class, so I'm really excited to keep processing all that God's throwing in my face.
• Raising kids. How do you raise kids to love Jesus with all of their hearts without brainwashing them? I want my kids to really know God and serve him by loving his people. How do you teach them the reality of the gospel without it being completely legalistic?
• Etsy. I'm a perfectionist. This whole idea to start an Etsy shop has made me completely obsessive. I want to either do it right or not at all, and I've already gotten started so I guess there's not much of an option! So I'm currently overwhelmed with pricing, shipping, packaging, product descriptions, product photos, and how in the world we can afford the initial start up costs. And what if the baby accessory market is just too saturated and I completely fail?
• Event planning. I'm currently planning 11 events. Kids event at church tomorrow. Baby shower Sunday. Kid's ministry to the Ranger game. Bachelorette party. Landon's birthday party. VBS. Avery's birthday party. Preteen camp. And THREE vacations this summer.

There's more to the story, but that's why I've been pretty silent recently. I'll be back soon with more frivolity and fun pictures of cute kids. Maybe a Friday Five tomorrow?

Spring Break!

As much as I complain about Matt's job in February when he works every weekend, my tune changes completely during Spring Break. And summers. And Thanksgiving. And Christmas. Okay, so we've got it pretty good when it comes to his vacation time.

We had SO much fun last week, but holy blog break! I hate waiting so long between posts because it's hard to just start, but here's my catch up post. And really, it's kind of mundane, so don't feel obligated to finish just because you started reading. You won't hurt my feelings. Promise.

We started our week off with a trip to Baytown for the weekend to visit Matt's family. We got in LATE on Friday night, and both kids (who had been sleeping in the car) caught a second wind when we arrived, making it an even later night trying to get them to bed. Fun times.

So on Saturday we went to the Houston Rodeo with Matt's parents, his sister, Carrie, her fiance and his 3 year old daughter, Ava. I had never been before and it was fun! The girls had a blast riding rides, looking at animals, and playing together. Landon was content to watch everything since there was SO much to see. I think he was on sensory overload!

One of the cool things they had for kids was a little farm simulation where they could walk through each station, harvesting produce, "milking" cows, and collecting eggs. Then they got to "sell" their goods and collect money to spend on a snack. The girls loved it!

We caught the end of the Chris Young concert, where we discovered that Landon loves country music. At least he was dressed the part!

And then we went back through the carnival before calling it a day. Thanks for taking us, Terry and Arlene! We had a blast!

Landon did finally crash in the Moby while we walked back to the car. That wrap is a lifesaver!

We had a chill Sunday hanging around the house and then met up with Carrie and Bubba for dinner.

Starting him young!

We made the drive home on Monday, which basically took up our entire day. Bleh. I hate driving days.

We went to the zoo on Tuesday! Nick went with us to brave the crowds, and boy were there crowds! We had to park in overflow parking and everything. We did get to see pretty much everything though, even the new koala exhibit! I'm already loving our membership. The kids love walking around and looking at all the animals, and the little creek thing in the children's area entertains Avery to no end. And since we can take our own picnic lunch, it ends up being a free outing every time.

Kangaroos look freaky when they jump!

He posed for me. I'm such a condor whisperer.

Mufasa!

Bahaha. This just made me laugh.

My cousin Amy came over on Wednesday so I could make her a fabric milk crate cover thing. It turned out pretty nicely actually! I forgot to take a picture, so I'm still waiting on hers (ahem, Amy). We went and ran a million errands before I was able to sew the cover, and what good are errands if you don't take a Chick-fil-a lunch break?! That's right, they are no good. So we ate there.

Matt went on a police ride along with Nick on Wednesday night, so I stayed up WAY too late. I cannot sleep when Matt's not home. Annoying.

I met up with Kendra for lunch at Panera on Thursday before picking up my mom and Allison at the airport. I love all three of those people!

Friday was our crafting all-nighter at church! Oh my goodness, I cannot believe I thought I could handle an all-nighter at my old age (ha!). It was so much fun though and I actually got a lot done! I finally mod podged Landon's wall letters (pictures to come...eventually), made a banner for a baby shower I'm hosting this weekend, and cut LOTS of fabric for projects for my (upcoming) Etsy shop. We started with 16 of us on Friday night and ended with 4 on Saturday morning. After watching four movies and sewing/scrapbooking/crocheting our little booties off, we finally decided to just crash on the (very uncomfortable) floor at 5:30 in the morning, slept for a couple hours, and managed to drag ourselves out the door by 8:30.

Ugh, I am a grouch when I don't sleep. We had a busy Saturday, so I had to get over my crankiness if there was to be any peace in this family. You're welcome, Matt.

Avery and I went to a wedding shower for my soon-to-be sister-in-law Brittany in the morning. We only got to stay for about 45 minutes because Avery had a friend's birthday party to go to at Pump it Up.

I seriously could not get this girl to stop long enough to take her picture from the front.

Y'all. That place is brilliant. We had never been, but Avery had a BLAST. And what an easy place to throw a party. They do everything! And the kids (and adults, haha) loved it! Shoot, if we had more than $100 to our name (joke) I'd have Avery's birthday party there, too!

We finished up our Saturday with Matt's birthday party at my parents' house. He turned 29 TODAY! We celebrated a little early since everybody was in town and who wants to party on a Monday? I use the very "party" loosely, but there was cake involved. Ooh, and fajitas! My mom is a good cook. Maybe I should've paid more attention in the kitchen when I still lived there. Oh well.

This kid LOVES drinking from a straw. And he's pretty dang good at it!

Sunday was kinda crappy for me, but some days just are. I did start reading The Hunger Games though, and I'm so hooked already. I don't know why I waited so long to read it except that I was wary of a book series that was so talked up. I mean, every other popular series I've read just hasn't kept my attention. Think Twilight, Harry Potter, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, the Janet Evanovich books, etc. But this one's good! Yay! And I'll be done in time to see the movie.

So there's the story of our spring break. Riveting, huh?

It's pouring rain outside, and I've got a book to get back to.