Miracle

My daughter posed for a picture!! And of course, by "posed," I mean didn't run or scowl.

Game night

We had a houseful (and then some!) Saturday night for our game night/birthday bash. We celebrated Rob's and Elissa's birthdays, and had lots of fun playing games, and, of course, eating!

Devastating Loss

You may have seen on the news about the plane crash in Montana, with 14 confirmed dead, 7 of them children. Well, a family of four that we knew in Paradise, CA, was on that plane. Brent & Kristen Ching, and their 2 children were going for the last ski trip of the season. If you could pray for the Mautz & Ching families, I would appreciate it. May God give peace to them in this time of loss.

After-hours Art

When Sofia takes a nap during the day, she usually gets to stay up a little later than her brothers to do "big girl" activities that Mommy is afraid to do during the day. Tonight she got to make pictures with a paint set Aunt Julie got her for Christmas. It has fun shapes & animals made out of sponges. Very easy painting! Sofia had so much fun, she made three pictures: one for mommy, one for daddy, and of course, one for herself.

Life at the Cozy Cone

My kids are moderately obsessed with Disney's Cars. Today Sofia's project was to create Cozy Cones to sleep in.
My apologies to the couch.

Signs of a neglectful parent

I swear I have beds for them upstairs. They prefer the cupboard, really! Besides, they've always wanted bunkbeds.

Rub a dub dub....

Good day for a scrub!

Card Not Initialized

Oh, frustration! My mom, the kids, and I went to Sea World this morning and had a great time. The boys even rode their first ride--the easter-egg ferris wheel. My mom got some cute pictures. Good times. So when I came home to load the pictures from her camera onto our computer, this is what I get: Card Not Initialized. I have encountered this before. So I formatted the picture card, and attempted to retrieve the pictures. To no avail. Those sad pictures are lost, unless my dad can resurrect them. We'll see. Or we won't. So sorry, no pictures tonight. Oh, frustration!

Guitar lessons

Our friend Kim and her kids Skylar & Brady came over for lunch today. After lunch, she and Filipe had an impromptu guitar lesson. Soon she can help us out with vespers!

Vespers

We have a group of people come over every Friday night to welcome the Sabbath together. This was our group this week--





If you're ever in the area on Friday night, stop by and join us for music, Bible study, food, and fellowship!

The fruits of my labor

Filipe and my mom took the kids to the Children's Museum this afternoon.... blessed peace! For me, not them, ha! Here's the product of that lovely quiet time....







Let's see, there's Banana Chocolate Chip Mini-muffins, Lemon-filled Coffee Cake, Pecan Poppy Seed Loaf (actually made yesterday), Cheesy Mexican Corn Bread, Sausage Enchiladas (thanks, Kim!), and Spaghetti Pie. OH..... I can't wait to start eating!

If seeing is believing...

Last night I told Filipe he should make sure the windows were closed on the van, because it was supposed to rain overnight. He scoffed at me, and said, "I'll believe it when I see it."



Well, this afternoon, he finally had to admit he should close the windows. If seeing is believing....

New Blog!

I've decided to start a new blog. You can find it at www.pantingforwater.blogspot.com. I'm calling it my serious blog. Sorry, probably no pictures. It's actually going to be a kind of spiritual journal for me. I'm finding it's too easy for me to get distracted by busy work so I'm not doing a whole lot on the spiritual front. I'm hoping this blog will help change that. So it's basically going to be my thoughts about what I'm reading or experiencing, and I'm going to try to keep it pretty regular. So, keep checking back, and help keep me on track!

Hangover

After I put the kids down last night about 8:15pm, I tooled around the kitchen, cleaning up a bit. Then I realized, hey, I'm tired. Wouldn't it be funny if I went to bed now instead of wasting time watching tv or surfin' the 'net? So off to bed I went. Only I made the night-altering choice to grab a book I had just picked up at the library. It's by one of my favorite Christian novelists, Kristen Heiztmann

I crawled into bed and thought, A couple of chapters won't hurt. Hahaha.... I must really have forgotten who I am. Let's just say I was conscious for boy #1's 1am wake up, and then for boy #2's 3am wake up, then also for girl's 3:15am wake up, and boy #1's 3:30am wake up. And I was just drifting off to sleep for boy #1's 4:15am wake up and his 4:45am wake up. I'm actually kind of glad I was already awake for most of those, because once I'm sleeping, I really hate being woken up. Maybe that's why I'm not a big fan of newborns.

Anyways, at least the kids had the decency to sleep in until 7:45 this morning. I've got a bit of a headache, and still the stuffy/runny nose, but honestly, it was good. It was good to take some total selfish and virtually unredeeming time for myself. It is a bit of a shame that it had to take place in the middle of the night, but really, it felt kind of good to do something I used to do all the time before kids. I know there's more pieces of me in there somewhere.... I just hope it doesn't take a hangover to find them.

Say a Prayer

My Grandma Marie who lives in San Marcos fell this weekend and broke her hip. She is now in the hospital, but they can't perform surgery for a while due to complications, of which the biggest is multiple pulmonary embolisms (blood clots in her legs that have broken loose and are now in her lungs). She is currently in critical, but stable condition. Most of the family is flying in to be with her, so if you could remember to keep her, and the rest of the family, in your prayers, I would really appreciate it.

Snug as a bug

The kids love it when I vacuum, because I roll up the rug and throw it on the couch, creating an instant house tunnel.