school hunts

The Thursday before Spring Break Micah and Connor had Easter Egg hunts at their Preschool.  Zach worked from home that day so that both boys would have a parent with them.

Micah's class had a great time hunting eggs on the lawn and looking for their special name egg full of gold coins!

Comparing with Kaiden

 Connor's class hunted on the playground and then went back to their room for a rabbit feast.  Their teacher's were sick of cupcakes and cookies (THANK YOU TEACHERS!!), so they planned a menu of foods rabbits eat.  There were lots of fruits and veggies and dip on the side.  Connor is a dipping kind of man so he was happy :)

The whole way home these two nuts opened all their eggs to check out the insides and kept squealing with delight at the goodies.  Sugaraholics!

sunday song

Jesus I My Cross Have Taken

Jesus, I my cross have taken,
All to leave and follow Thee;
Destitute, despised, forsaken,
Thou from hence my All shalt be.
Perish every fond ambition,
All I've sought or hoped or known;
Yet how rich is my condition!
God and heaven are still my own.

 Let the world despise and leave me,
They have left my Savior, too.
Human hearts and looks deceive me;
Thou art not, like them, untrue.
And while Thou shalt smile upon me,
God of wisdom, love, and might,
Foes may hate and friends may shun me;
Show Thy face, and all is bright.

Go, then, earthly fame and treasure!
Come, disaster, scorn, and pain!
In Thy service, pain is pleasure;
With Thy favor, loss is gain.
I have called Thee Abba, Father!
I have stayed my heart on Thee.
Storms may howl, and clouds may gather,
All must work for good to me.

Man may trouble and distress me,
'Twill but drive me to Thy breast;
Life with trials hard may press me,
Heaven will bring me sweeter rest.
Oh, 'tis not in grief to harm me
While Thy love is left to me;
Oh, 'twere not in joy to charm me
Were that joy unmixed with Thee.

Take, my soul, thy full salvation;
Rise o'er sin and fear and care;
Joy to find in every station,
Something still to do or bear.
Think what Spirit dwells within thee,
What a Father's smile is thine,
What a Savior died to win thee;
Child of heaven, shouldst thou repine?

Haste, then, on from grace to glory,
Armed by faith and winged by prayer;
Heaven's eternal day's before thee,
God's own hand shall guide thee there.
Soon shall close the earthly mission,
Swift shall pass thy pilgrim days,
Hope soon change to glad fruition,
Faith to sight, and prayer to praise.

baby friends

The boys and I have been at my parents' house the last few days to celebrate one of my niece's birthdays and to just hang out.  Yesterday Logan and I went to visit one of my friends from forever and her little girl.  Rileigh is two months older than Logan and cute as can be.  She had a good time showing off her rolling and sitting up skills while he laughed and smiled.  

slow

One Word.  There's one word, every year to focus on.  Or at least the past two years God has led me to a single word and it's been great and helped me grow (emotionally, physically, spiritually) in ways I wouldn't have if I didn't have a clear focus.  I'm a big fan on clear focuses.  Mainly because it feels organized and clean and most of you probably know that I like to be organized and clean :)

Right after Logan was born I started feeling the weight of mothering three children while being a wife and taking care of all the little house things and maintaining friendships and balancing ministries that we are involved in while remembering that my relationship with Christ is supposed to be top priority but staying in His word was not as easy as it had been a few weeks earlier with two semi self sufficient children.  Honestly if felt almost impossible.  The word SLOW showed in my head in the form of a giant marquee sign! It should have been a welcome word but it was a little daunting.  If there is one thing Zach and I have struggled it's wondering if we are doing too much or have too much going on.

For the first month of this year I stared at my chalkboard with the one word on it wondering and praying and thinking.  Am I supposed to slow down everything?  Does that mean drop stuff we're doing and just be home all the time?  Do I just move slower?  The point of this focus is to apply it to every aspect of my life in the small and big ways but I was struggling with what it even meant.  One day I looked up synonyms and started listing them around the word.  I saw ones like patient, deliberate, lazy :), passive, quiet, lessen, relax...not the written in stone I was hoping for (aren't we all!) but direction...somewhere.

It's been three months and I can pretty much say I'm failing at the one word except for one part, my mind.  We have not cut out anything, I guess we've actually added a bit more right now with baseball, the weight of it all is still felt daily, and my bible reading/praying time is definitely not the priority it should be but I feel my mind slowing (in a good way!) I am not thinking constantly about all the things I need to be doing or should be doing, but instead I feel more present in the one thing I'm doing at the time.  Whether it's my sweet boys, my amazing husband, or my heavenly father, whatever my current task is I can feel a slowing of my mind and a focus.  You might compare it to the tractor beam on the death star.  All of ME comes to together on the target but thankfully instead of a laser of destruction it's love and attention :)

There's a long way to go in figuring out how to apply SLOW in everything but for now I am very thankful that God has sent me on that path this year and pray that even in the busyness and feelings of failure I will see Him changing me and continuing to turn me into who He planned from the beginning.

Embrace the camera: march 29th

It took a lot of takes to get them all looking at the camera at the same time.  

Logan's face isn't really that fat he was just moving.  It is pretty fat though :)  

Even so embracing with all three was a special moment!

{embrace}

mirror image

the ol' ballgame

Micah had his first game last Saturday.  He was beyond excited to get his uniform on and have his first 'real' game.  I lost count of all the times I looked at him and almost teared up because of the cuteness of the moment.  Thankfully I kept it together.  I'm sure Micah wouldn't have minded now but ten years from now if I'm still telling him how cute he looks in his uniform he might get offended!

I guess I should share that his team lost.  His team is full of very spirited players but I'm pretty sure only two of them have every played before!  I honestly could care less if they win or lose as long as he is having a good time and learning how to play the game well and with good sportsmanship and so far so good :)  So far he hasn't minded either.  He just asks us after a game if he 'got set' well or had a good swing.  

I learned a couple things since starting this new 'sports' mom gig that I thought I'd share...

* having other people cheer against your baby is not the greatest

* sunscreen is an absolute must 

* if you think you've packed enough snacks for Connor to last through a whole game you haven't

* your heart will absolutely BURST with pride when you see your son get his first hit and you will     immediately have his life flash before your eyes as you wonder how on earth did he get old enough to be so big!

I'm sure many more things will pop up as the season progresses.  As of now I am just enjoying the moments and the newness of this experience :)