I'm bAAAaack

Clearly............I've dropped the ball. I kept putting off posting a new blog because I kept getting overwhelmed with all the things I needed to post. A lot has happened between September and now, things I really wanted to blog about. Our 5 year anniversary in October, Thanksgiving  in Alabama, Christmas, time with family, time with friends, sweet times around the house. But the time has come for me to come face to face with those overwhelmed feelings and wave my white flag and just surrender. It's just not gonna happen. I will just say all those things were incredibly awesome, leave it at that, and start fresh. As I come across pictures I may post things from time to time for my own memories sake, but I'm ready to blog again so I'm just going to give up on "catching up".

So last week we went to Disney World! Yep, that's right...........you read it right...........D.I.S.N.E.Y.......W.O.R.L.D.  Blue and I were counting down the days until we went and that day finally came. We COULD NOT WAIT to see Campbell's face when she saw the castle for the first time and when she got to meet all of the princesses and, of course, Piglet. She is in a MAJOR princess phase. When I say she wears her little princess dresses all day, I mean that in the  most literal way I can mean it. For example, one morning I woke up to the sound of her yelling from from her bed, "Mommy! I need my princess dress! And my princess shoes! And my crown!" The girls feet hadn't even hit the floor yet. Part of my job description is apparently a "Lady in Waiting." :) I think this phase is so precious to watch. Today I caught her picking up each dress, holding it up to her, twirling while holding it and saying "thank you so much.....thank you so much" as if someone was telling her how beautiful she was. Is that not so cute, ha???? Anyway, back to Disney World............She was on cloud 9 when she met the princesses. She just ran straight up to them and hugged them. You could tell she already thought they were best friends. And throughout the entire day in the park she would periodically tell us she needed to go back to "her castle". When I asked her who lived in the castle she said, "Cinderella............and Sleeping Beauty...........and Snow White.........and ME." I love that girl so much. Piper had a good time too! She smiled a lot when she saw Winnie the Pooh, Minnie Mouse and Mickey Mouse. She leaned in and tried to eat the nose off of every character and almost took off Minnie's glove, probably causing a traumatic experience for every child standing nearby, but she loved it! :) We ended up eating at the Crystal Palace (the place where you eat with all the Winnie the Pooh characters) so the girls got to meet Piglet and the whole gang. We found out that was the only place you could meet Piglet so going there was a no-brainer. In case anyone forgot, Piglet is Campbell's best friend and security blanket.

It was The. Best. Trip. Ever. We are already counting down the days before we can go again.  It was so, so nice to just get away and have time together as a family. Thanks so much to Susan and Mark for giving us your RCI points so we could go down there:)

It. Was. "Magical." :)

Campbell wearing her Cinderella dress and looking at Cinderella in the parade

Tired at the end of the day

Piper pumped and ready to start the day

Campbell with Mickey and Minnie

Us staring into the sunlight

Campbell telling Sleeping Beauty that she just met Cinderella and Belle

Blue and Piper at Rainforest Cafe

Campbell all geared up for the Mickey 3-D movie

Waiting for the fireworks to start. Campbell is clearly excited.

Campbell on the teacups

I think Piper is trying to figure out how to start chewing on Belle's nose

Piper hanging out in what HAS to be the best set-up ever. The middle of a bunch of pillows.

Tigger had a great nose to grab and Piper wasn't going to let the opportunity pass without taking a swing at it

For the life of me, I can not turn this picture

Not a great picture of any of us.........but you gotta have the classic castle pic:)

Lessons Through My Children

Everyone says that when you have children your life will change. I don't think I ever could have imagined how true that statement actually is. Yes, I have personally changed, my marriage has changed and my day-to-day life has changed. But I never fully realized how much having children would effect my relationship with the Lord.

Let's start here.....

In my "younger years" I made tons of mistakes. I realize now how selfish I was. Even if I knew the Lord was strongly telling me to walk down one path, if that was not the path I wanted, well, I did not always take it. I knowingly walked into sinful situations time after time. Looking back I can see a pattern of brokenness after every period in my life when my relationship with the Lord struggled. I always grew closer to Him during this time of brokenness, however, I always asked "Lord, why do I have to experience this amount of pain?" I would think "If You can do things like part the Red Sea can't you just teach me this lesson without having me go through so much heartache?"

And then I had kids........

When Campbell first learned to walk I would get so nervous watching her walk around our family room due to the fact that it was not baby-proofed yet. We have an entertainment center in the corner of the room that would easily hurt her if she fell on it. So clearly, she would continually clumsily walk toward the entertainment center. Time after time I would put things in her path to try to distract her. I would pick her up and face her in the other direction. I would even pop her little bottom and try to talk sternly to her. But without fail, she would continue to rebel against me and eagerly walk toward what she knew was off limits. One day I realized that the only way she was going to learn that the entertainment center was dangerous for her to play around was for her to fall and get hurt. So one day I sat on the couch as she pranced on those cute little pudgy legs toward the entertainment center and I held back every impulse to run and save her. It broke my heart. I knew she was going to be in pain. But I also knew that I loved her too much to continue to watch her continually walk towards a dangerous situation. So I sat and watched, just waiting for that moment where she would truly learn. I sat on the edge of my seat just waiting to run and scoop her up and love on her and kiss all of her "boo-boo's" until those tears stopped flowing.

Then I understood.

The Lord never wanted to see me in pain. He just wanted me to truly learn. I realize now those times when He was allowing me to experience brokenness were times when He was loving me in a deep and intimate way. He was drawing me away from my sin and toward Him. Away from danger and toward safety. I realize that not only did He not want to see me hurt, it absolutely broke His heart. He was waiting to come and scoop me up and love on me and kiss all of my "boo-boo's" until those tears stopped flowing.

Praise Him.

Thank you, Lord, for what You teach me through my children.

Happy Birthday, Campbell!!

Campbell,

You are two years old!!! I can't believe you turned 2 on August 5th. You are looking and acting more and more like a little girl instead of our little baby. We feel like we blinked and you are all of a sudden dancing around the living room with your little purse on your shoulder and putting on your pretend lipstick. You have such a sweet personality that is full of energy and curiosity. You are so adventurous and enjoy stressing mommy out by climbing to the tallest point you possibly can and jumping off of it. However, when you flash that huge grin of victory mommy can't help but smile at your fearless spirit. Daddy and Mommy just melt watching you run around the house with your bouncing blonde curls and your beautiful blue eyes and we are tempted to give you anything you want when you show us that pretty smile or start bursting out in that contagious laughter. We absolutely love hearing you talk and are so proud when we see that look of determination on your face when you are trying to figure out how to say a new word. You are starting to put sentences together now and while we are so proud of you when you get the sentence right we absolutely love it when you get the sentence wrong because it is ridiculously cute.

Your favorite thing in the world right now is your piglet doll. However, piglet is not the only stuffed necessity in your bed at bed time. We also have your Minnie mouse doll, two bunnies, a lamb, a monkey, shamu, baby shamu, 2 baby dolls, a zebra and a blanket. You are so thoughtful and you want to share your pillow with all of them so you don't have much room left. You LOVE, LOVE, LOVE shoes! You want to put on a pair as soon as you wake up and you have recently starting telling me "no" when I pull out the wrong pair until I get the exact pair out that you want to strut around in that day. You love your purses and your play make-up. You also take great care of your dolls by telling me you need to change their diapers, feed them and burp them. They are so lucky to have you. You love to play your Disney princess CD player and dance around the room. You are such a good little dancer. You love to have books read to you and love watching Strawberry Shortcake, Sid the Science Kid, Mickey Mouse Club and Curious George on TV. You absolutely LOVE to be outside playing and if you see a set of stairs you could spend all day going up and down them.You are SO much fun!!

You have blessed our life more than you could ever imagine. You bring us so much joy and have given happiness an entirely new meaning. We are so proud to call you our daughter. We pray that we love you in a way that points you to Christ and that you commit your life to loving and serving Him. It is our prayer that you always have confidence in the value and worth you have as a child of God and that you choose to have faith and trust in Him. We want you to always be secure in knowing that we love you so, so much and there is nothing in this world of greater value than our family. Happy birthday, sweet girl:)

Love,
Daddy and Mommy

The Gang

When Campbell goes to sleep (at bedtime and during naps) her list of "friends" that she has to have in bed with her has grown and grown. It started out as just Piglet (or "Pigga") and 2 small stuffed animals but apparently she thought that the "gang" needed some more members. It absolutely cracks Blue and I up! She totally recognizes if someone is missing and calls each one of them by name. She also wants to share her pillow with each one of them so it make things kinda crammed when she lays down at night. But if she is happy, we are happy:) I snuck in  the other night after she was asleep to take a picture........

She is such a good big sister to Piper. Whenever Piper seems upset Campbell does whatever she can to make her happy. If she cries Campbell will run in with a diaper and say "wet" to let me know I should change her, or she will come in with a bottle or a paci to let me know she  might want one of them. P.R.E.C.I.O.U.S. Well, Piper was on her playmat the other day and Campbell wanted to share her "gang" with her. I am not thinking Piper is as much of a fan..........

However, once Campbell got one of her books and started to read to Piper she calmed down. Campbell knows all the tricks.........

Piper is 6 Weeks Old!!!

I can not BELIEVE that Piper is 6 weeks old today! Our lives are so blessed because of her. We took her for her one month check-up last week (I know, it was a week late) and she is doing great! She has gained a little weight and is now up to the 36% in weight and dropped to the 84% in height. She has consistently been getting up one time through the night (usually somewhere between 2 and 3 am) and then starts the day between 6 and 7 am. So for a newborn, that's not bad - we'll take it!! One night this week she actually slept about 7.5 hours but we decided not to hold out hope that that would be a continual thing (YET!) :). She is such a little snuggler and just loves to be cuddled (which I would love to be able to do ALL DAY). I just keep looking at her and want to soak in these moments as much as I can because I know I am going to blink and she is going to be asking me to borrow my car so she can go to the mall. We love her so incredibly much and are so happy to have such a perfect addition to our family. Praise the Lord:)

Silly Little Girl

This is how I found Campbell when I went into her room first thing this morning to get her for breakfast...........

Piglet on the Big Screen

Last weekend we took Campbell to her first movie - Winnie the Pooh. My sister kept Piper for us so that we could spend some time with just Campbell. In case you are reading this and you are unaware, Campbell's greatest treasure in life is her piglet stuffed animal. I mean it truly is an endless kind of love. She wants to take it everywhere, she sleeps with it every night and if we happened to forget it when we run errands she starts asking for it in the car. She sits in the car seat and continues to say "Pigga" hoping that I will magically pull him out of my purse. It really is precious and I want to permanently seal the image of her cute little arm wrapped around him in my mind........L.O.V.E. I.T. Anyway, we thought Winnie the Pooh would be the perfect choice for her first movie. It went really well too!! I mean for a 23 month old it went GREAT! They were having technical difficulties at first so it was about 30 minutes late starting (which led us to getting free tickets...yay) so since Campbell finished eating all of her popcorn before the movie even started we got a little concerned. But once she saw the love of her life on the big screen all was well:) She was completely into it for the first 30 minutes or so, then she got kind of restless for about 15 or 20 minutes and then she was back into it for the last 10 or so. We had such a great time!!!

Blue and I tried to take some pictures with her in front of the movie advertisement, but clearly the glare won the battle...

 Campbell with her first movie popcorn

 This was the Winnie the Pooh booth. They had little Piglet, Winnie and Tigger hats you could take for your child to color on and wear....super cute!!