Yogurt, Hair, Two and What a Week!!??

I guess you all know about our hard week last week. Grace got sick on Monday of last week with the stomach virus. It was the first time we have seen her vomit like she did. Very sad. The vomiting only lasted one evening but she had diarrhea for days. On Thursday we got in a wreck in our neighborhood on the snow and ice (more on that later). Then Friday, Adam and I BOTH came down with the stomach virus and it was HORRIBLE. We didn't know if we could make it through the day being SOOO sick and having no family here to help with Grace. Thankfully, we made it through and now have recovered.

After getting over the stomach virus, we have noticed Grace to be more fussy/ irritable lately. We thought maybe she was trying to cut those last molars. I know she must not feel good at times because she has just NOT been her self. She will get all upset and cry and just real needy. Motrin seems to help so that is why we thought she most be achy some where, possibly in her mouth?? As I say this, we also believe we are fast approaching the TERRIBLE two's. We have seen a little monster come out of our sweet girl with little temper tantrums, and quiet a few of them the last few days. Some of this I believe is also related to her pacifier. We are working towards taking it away from her. She usually wants it only when she is in the car, sleeping, or when we are in a store and she is tired of riding in the buggy. Recently, we have been trying to avoid giving it to her in the store and in the car. We feel she is getting so dependent on it while doing those things. The last few days or so, when she hasn't felt good she seems to know that we are trying to not give it to her and we tell her "no" when she asks for it and it seems she wants it more!! So as a result, we have seen some 'fits' related to this. Also, she wants to eat sweet stuff all of the time since she has gotten over her sickness, and not her meals. So these are just some of examples of her fallen nature at best!!!:) Hopefully, her and her moods will get better! I hate that they go through these stages..

On a lighter note..
We were trying to give her things that would be good for her stomach and since she has been ? teething, softer things have tasted better to her so we got her some yogurt. Do you think she likes yogurt!!??:)


As for her hair... it seems like it is finally growing some!!:-)

Mommy was playing with her hair this day and we managed to make her a nice little pony tail on the top of her head!!

Grace is still our sweet little girl!! She has been so good natured and we love her spirit. Here is some of her sweetness.... :)

Piling up all of her 'babies' in 'her house' aka.. castle and then giving them TONS of hugs and kisses for the night!!:)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NANNY!

Adam's mom (Debby's) birthday is today! She has always been very good to me and for that I am thankful. She is really one of the most sweetest women I know. She also has a HUGE heart.

For her Birthday, she wanted Grace to color her a paper. Grace ended up coloring two pages for her. We printed up Care Bear's papers off of the internet that were birthday related. (One had the care bears giving balloons to the other one and the other the care bear was giving a present.) She gladly colored these for her "Nanny". She was very proud of them and even posed for some pictures.





We also decided to do something a little special for her. We knew that she loves pictures and collage pictures so we put together two collage pictures of her and Gary (Papa) and Grace. It was all pictures of them together or memories we have had together. I thought they were special times! I think they turned out pretty good.

(The collage pictures are not clear on here but you get the idea and you can click on them to see the pictures bigger.)


She got them on Saturday, so she has already said she loves them and we are very glad!

So we just wanted to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY AND WE LOVE YOU NANNY!!

Smart and Silly Girl :)

These are a few short videos of Grace showing you all what she can do and being silly at the same time :)

By the way, don't mind my singing or the living room. :) Grace had her toys out..





For laughs...

We're Still Here!!!

Just wanted to quickly say that I am working on getting some videos on here. I have been trying to upload tonight but it was going extremely slow so I had to cancel. I will work on that tomorrow.

Not a whole lot has happened in the last couple of weeks. I have worked a good bit in the last week and a half. I was able to pick up some extra hours at work so that was a blessing.

As for the Mission trip, God's sovereignty in it has been AMAZING. We are reminded daily that God has called us to go on this trip and that He is going to work out all of the details! People have been so receptive and already giving to the work that the Lord has for us on this trip.

Our Mission Groups meet every Sunday night and we have the casual Converge service once a month. All of the Mission groups are trying to find ways to reach out in the community and serve others and to show and tell of the love of Jesus. Our Mission group is currently working on taking up items that we can give to a family that has 6 kids who have been living in a homeless shelter and have recently moved to a house. This family had NOTHING. One of the guys in our group is a teacher to one of the kids in this family. He heard of this opportunity. So we have all being giving away furniture items, sheets, bathroom items, etc. etc. to help this family. It is amazing all of the big furniture items that have been pooled together.

We are also going to go to a senior living home not far from the church this Saturday to visit with the elderly people and to connect with them. It is WONDERFUL seeing what all the Mission groups are doing to reach out.

On a fun note, this Sunday night we are going to be all combined and have a Super Bowl Party in the Gym. We are all going to bring appetizer food and I know it will be a lot of fun.

As for Grace, she LOVES church. Every time we get her dressed up she thinks she is going to church. She has so much fun there.

She is also the sweetest, most loving little girl these days!! She can not get enough of our hugs and kisses and tells us she loves us all the time. You all should see what a sweet little loving 'mom' she is to her babies too!:)

Check back for videos...

Growing and Learning...

We see our sweet little 'babe' growing more and more everyday! She amazes us daily with new words, expressions, her imagination, and her abilities. She LOVES to sing! We have taught her how to do the 'Hokey Pokey' and she wants us to do it with her. She calls it 'Pokey Pokey'. She LOVES for us to get in the floor and play with her and for us to sing and dance with her. We have been teaching her songs with movements and she LOVES that! She is so cute to watch and listen to her. She can do 'This Little Light of Mine' and she will do the hand motions including 'hide it under a bushel.. motion' :). I will have to try to get some video of that some time. She also loves singing the ABC song but doesn't sing all of the letters.

Since she got her kitchen at Christmas, she has showed an even bigger interest in watching me cook or prepare food. She wants me to hold her so she can see what I am doing on the counter or at the stove, etc. It is quiet hard to hold her some times and prepare food so the other day, I just pulled up a chair and let her stand in the chair and watch me. She was very intent on what I was doing just watching me. :)



Today, she started really LOVING to color. For months now we have been showing her how to color and she would ask to 'cuder' every so often but she really wouldn't stay very interested in it for long. She use to not bare down hard enough with the colors to really show up good on the paper. Today, she was doing really good and was impressing herself with her ability!:) She would get another color crayon and color some and then show us every time she did something new so that we would praise her. This kept her entertained for a while this morning and really colored her first 'real' pictures today.

Here is a video of the action:)... If you notice in the beginning she says 'WOW' :) This is because we kept saying 'wow' to her artwork:)..



More random pics from the past week of our little darlin':)

NATIONAL CHAMPS!!

Well, I haven't said it yet but.. we have to give our big ROLL TIDE ROLL!! We are very proud of our team for getting our first EVER Heisman Trophy Winner-- Mark Ingram, winning the Butkus award, SEC champs, and NATIONAL CHAMPIONS!

It has been a great year and this is actually this first time I personally remember winning a Championship. In 1992, I apparently wasn't very concerned with football and I don't even remember winning it then. So ... fun times!

With this said, we got a package in the mail yesterday from Adam's parents. This is what it consisted mostly of......

and shirts for all three of us...:)

Thanks you two!!

Random... and Winter is Here!!

The cold weather is officially here and apparently it is just about everywhere else in the U.S.:) We got about 4 inches of snow on Thursday into Friday. We have had periodic light snow showers since then and even tonight. The snow has lingered here in Louisville because it hasn't got out of the teens of 20's in over a week. We haven't really got out a whole lot with Grace since it has been so cold. When we have she has been bundled up..





We did go outside and play in the snow a little with Grace. She really didn't know what to think about walking in the snow. We didn't really stay out long but I made a small snowman very quickly so Grace could learn about building a snowman with the snow. The snow didn't pack very well and it was VERY cold so it was a rushed job:)

When we went out to build a snowman I put Grace in 2 layers of clothes with the jacket, hat and hood. She was walking like she was a mummy and couldn't move:)

In other news, we have been working on support letters for our Mission trip to Zimbabwe, Africa. We went to another interest meeting last Sunday night and found out more info on it. It is truly amazing how the Lord is confirming our decision more EVERY DAY and the random things that have been happening to gain support for our Mission trip. Each time He reminds us that He is in control and to really TRUST Him!

Please continue to pray for us..

Here is a random pic before Church last Sunday..

Mission in 2010

We have done a lot of things in our lives, especially in the past five years. We have left our hometown, moved again, gone back to school, lost loved ones, and gained new ones. One of the things that God has increasingly showed us is that there is a world outside of America who is hurting and is in need of help.

We have always been happy to pray and give to international missions and always said we would like to go. It seems like such a huge task that we could never do it. We have come to realize that that attitude will never do anybody much good. The hard things in life are hard because it takes work to get them done. Reaching the world is a hard task.

We have set out to go on mission with our church this year on a trip to Africa. I have wavered on it, even today and said we won't be able to do it. But with the faith of my wife and a nagging feeling that won't go away we are pushing forward. The trip will be for about 12 days. It is not a cheap thing to do either, the vast majority of the cost will be flying there and back. We are a couple that doesn't have much money, with school and part time jobs we barely get by. But as my pastor said this week, God owns it all. If God owns it all and He has a people who have never heard of Jesus and has put us in a church who wants people to go there and He has laid it on our hearts to go, than He will get the funds for us. That does not mean we can just sit on our duffs and wait on the cash to flow in from Heaven. We will be BUSY. We are going to pick up what hours we can, sell things if we have to and write many great friends and family who have been so good to us in our lives. God does His work through people most of the time and I believe He will now.

We will be going to see a people that have been separated by the damming up of a river. They have been largely neglected by their government and are unable to grow their own food and have a good supply of clean water. HIV/AIDS is also rampant there. While we seek to provide help for them in their physical health, we know that the greater need is one of eternity. These people need a Savior who can rescue them from their sin.

We are so excited to see what God is going to do this year and how He will bring all the pieces together just as He has planned. We covet your prayers as this task is so big that my faith in God is being shown weak today. Pray that we will trust Him, will raise the funds to go, share the Gospel with those who have never heard and have a safe time doing it and returning. Thanks so much for your time. If you would like any more information or would like to help in prayer or any other way please message me and let me know. Thanks again!

-Adam

Christmas with Granny and Papa

Grace's Granny and Papa arrived from AL on Christmas evening. They were here for the remainder of Christmas and through the weekend. I cooked dinner and we spent some quality time together at home on Christmas evening. Saturday we got out and went to Walmart and lunch and had dinner at the house. It was very cold while they were here so we really didn't want to get out too much. :) On that Saturday night we drove around and looked at Christmas lights. Grace is actually able to see them now and recognized Santa and a Snowman when she saw them all lit up. Sunday morning we all went to church and decided on eating at Logan's Roadhouse for lunch. Church was great and lunch was too! They had to go back to AL after lunch.

We really enjoyed our time with them!!


Quality time at home....

Grace was showing off all her new things to Granny (and Papa)..

How sweet.. Grace with her Daddy..

Grace was having a BLAST doing 'Ring Around the Rosey' for them.. she was getting so excited and cheering for herself!! She didn't want to stop:)

Mommy and Grace :)
(this is the outfit Aunt Marsha sent Grace)

Our family!!

Grace playing her keyboard with Papa

More cheers for 'Ring Around the Rosey'!!

Cuddling with Granny... very sweet!!

Grace wore her new outfit sent from my cousin Kim to church on Sunday! Just look at the shaw:) and the boots from her Nana :)

Great pic with Granny and Papa

Our family again!!:)

Christmas Eve and Christmas Morn.. in Louisville

I ended up being off work all of Christmas this year. On Christmas Eve Adam unexpectedly ended up getting off early and we were all home as a family to spend Christmas Eve together. We were also very happy to be able to go to the Christmas Eve Service at our church (Highview) at the Fegenbush campus. It was truly wonderful. We all sang Christmas songs and families from the church (including the kids) took turns going up to the front of the church and reading the Christmas story straight from the Bible. We ended with a song all under candlelight. It was great to stop and truly reflect on the amazing story of Jesus/ why we celebrate Christmas. Later we got Grace in her Christmas p.j.'s and to bed.

Going to Christmas Eve Service..

Ready for Santa..:)

Grace ended up sleeping till after 9 am on Christmas Day and she was pleasantly surprised when she came down stairs. She spotted her kitchen and she was so funny, all she wanted to do was to play with it and just explore every thing on it before moving to any thing else. I was trying to get her to move on and open her wrapped gifts and to later look at her stocking. She kept stopping and going back to her kitchen. She was very cute!:)

The first video she had just came down stairs so she was not totally awake:)

This cart was from Nana and Paw Paw too..

Grace enjoying her sucker from her stocking:)

This is a video of Grace 'playing' and singing!!:) Her Nana and Paw Paw sent this to her through Granny and Papa when they came up on Christmas evening. They knew how much Grace loved playing her piano..



More later on Granny and Papa visit on Christmas, and the weekend..