What Mary does when she gets bored!

This is aparently how Mary spent some time while I was painting Abbey's room. There are a total of 10 pictures of her feet all in different poses and nine of the cat laying in the same spot. I wondered why there were so many pictures to download when all that should have been on there were the pics of Abbey's room. I just thought this was funny and had to share.

Abbey's new room

Sorry, my pictures are in reverse order (no blogger of the year award for me), but whatever it works. We have spent this week getting Abbey's new room fixed. All of them have been in one big room together since we moved in November and I wanted to get her moved before school started. We had an extra room that was filled with boxes and unused funiture. It took 2 days to get everything moved and organized in the basement. Chris was a huge help in that process. It was painted two shades of greenish brown...not what Abbey wanted. So I patched all the nail holes and sanded it down a little, vacuumed the walls with a friend's shop vac and we got started!!

At first everyone wanted to help...Tom's friends all thought it was fun, too! The thrill wore off and I finished it myself. That's fine though, because there is something theraputic to me about painting. I don't think it's the act itself but rather seeing the finished product and knowing you have accomplished something completely. Plus, it looks pretty! Abbey picked the colors herself with only a tad of guidence and I think she did a great job. I told her Nana (who is a great home decorator) would be proud of her-hahahaha.

She also picked out her comforter set and I got her approval on the sheets we bought (then we found a matching gown...too cute). I wanted her new room to be exactly what she wanted. She loves horses and so that is more or less her theme. She has plenty of room to add to her decorations but I only have so much money at the present time to spend on her room so some things have to wait. She gets that and she's happy with what we have done so far. I have some cute painter pics I'll post later of all the kids helping me. I didn't want a mile of pics on one post!

Mega church experience

Well, we went to Hebron yesterday for the first time. My mom was apparently excited about it because she and Joy Bryan had looked up where everyone went on the website so I didn't have an excuse not to go I suppose. It was extremely helpful though, so thank you mom. I know I grew up in a much bigger church than what I have been going to, but the small 100 (that may be exagerating believe it or not) family church with 2 buildings is all my kids remember. Abbey was a little overwhelmed as we walked to E Building for her sunday school and children's church classes. She was nervous and said, "Mom, this place is so big, I like our old church where I know where everything is." I explained that I grew up in big churches like this and it can be a lot of fun and that she would know where everything was in no time. She had a good time and was thrilled that she didn't have to sit thru service like she did at Dacula this year. Josh wasn't keen on it until I told him they have karate that he could take on T and TH, then it was the best church in the world. Mary loved it from the minute I dropped her off and her teachers loved her so she was fine with it, but she's younger than the other two and has a pretty easy going personality. Abbey wants to be friends with everyone imediately and there are just too many people to do that in one Sunday, but she will settle in. Josh stays on edge in situations like that where he knows no one, but I checked on him between sunday school and church and he had made a couple of friends so that eased my mind a little.

It wasn't a good sunday to get a real feel for the church...the sunday school class I visited(co-ed singles 30-45) had a substitute teacher because the real teacher was on vacation, the pastor was on vacation so the assistant pastor preached, the chior is on their 2 week hiadous for the summer, and the numbers were tremendously down in both sunday school and church. It was still nice though, very contemporary, which is not what I am used to but I do not oppose it at all. Amazingly, at least for this week, it still had a small church feel to it if that makes sense. Everyone was very nice and genuine, they do an invitation just like everywhere else, which I guess I wasn't expecting for some reason, but I liked it. The Praise team is great! The choir loft seats about 125 (mom counted) which will be so much different than the 22 person choir I've sang with for the past 4 years--but it will be awesome, I'm sure!! So, I think we will stick it out and see how it goes at least for a little while, but I'm pretty sure we will stay!

Why do they grow up so fast?

I just had to post this picture because I think it is too cute.

Where does the time go? Abbey is 9, Josh is 7 1/2, and Mary is 4. It feels like Abbey was just going to pre-k and now I turn around and Mary's about to go. I handled it a lot better with Abbey, that's for sure. I'm already nervous about Mary's first day at a new school (don't know why, she's been in preschool for the past two years but not every day and not all day). Plus Abbey and Josh are changing schools this year, too in the 4th and 2nd grades. That blows my mind!!

They have been through a lot over the last year but I think they have handled it like champs. Keep them in your prayers as they all start new schools in a month and a new church this week.

Celebrating the 4th on the beach

Yes, I am one of those people who dresses anything that will hold still in red white and blue on the 4th. But don't they look cute! Abbey's shirt says firecracker which I thought was extremely fitting. Anyway, we were on the beach to watch the fireworks that the Blue Parrot restaurant shot off. Their fireworks display was 20 times better than their service and 10 times better than their food. (Can you tell how impressed I was with them?)

The kids played with sparklers and then we dug for crabs in the sand. Other people were having more luck because they were using their flashlights and we were following the rules and using the "turtle friendly" LED lights that the rental place gave us when we checked in. Apparently the flashlights confuse the little hatchlings and they can't find the ocean. The LED lights are not crab hunting friendly and we didn't catch any but the kids looked at the lucky kids crabs next to us...oops-no mom of the year award for that one!

All in all we had a great 4th of July!! We headed back to the house after that and hit the hey, Mary crying all the way. She was more than exausted by the end of the day. So I threw her in the shower and put her in the bed wet head and all. I love that Josh and Abbey are past that point and can pretty much take care of themselves in the major departments. They did and everyone was asleep 30 min after we got home.

I will have to write about our dining experiences in St. George next. You will be rolling with laughter at the things these servers did! I wasn't at the time but now it's funny...good thing they added in their gratuity!

Fun in the Sun

Wow!! A week has never gone by so quickly. The kids and I spent the past week (June 30th-July 7th) on St. George Island with my mom, sisters and brother, and their spouses, my niece and Jay's dog. We rented a massive house with pool by the beach. We had a great time. It took about 7 hours to get there but it was an easy drive and didn't seem like it took that long. Everyone was there by Sunday afternoon and we had a good time. We went on a surry ride where we peddled around the island for a while, we spent tons of time at the beach and the pool, went out for some fresh seafood a couple times and the best pizza I've had in forever one day, visited the shops, the kids got airbrushed t-shirts, had ping-pong tournaments, and we played a lot in general!

Abbey is definately a fish, and not a bad ping-pong player either. She would have stayed in the ocean the entire week if we hadn't of dragged her out. She and Jay "accidentally" swam with the dolphins. They didn't know they were riding the front of the same wave the dolphins were behind until they got out and another family told them. She was thrilled and now thinks she touched one with her foot (wink wink nod nod). They spent the next hour in the same place trying to call the dolphins back....very interesting! Abbey I understand, she is 9, Jay however is 26! He did teach her the finer points of ping pong while we were down there too! She never did beat the master though!

Josh spent the majority of his time with his best friend, Uncle Dave. They mostly hung at the pool because neither of them was too fond of the ocean. Josh did like diving for shells with his mask on a few times, though. They also had some video gaming, and watched some cartoons. Dave likes to hang with Josh because he likes the cartoons as much as Josh does and Josh doesn't make fun of him for it!! Dave also taught Josh how to swim while we were there!! Yeah, Josh!

Mary learned to doggie paddle without her floaty swim suit (which I am convinced is the best invention as of yet in the world). This was very exciting!!! Mary did not like the ocean at all, but was fine playing in the sand. She loved the pool and tagged along with Josh and Dave on their adventures as well.

All of them look like little mexican children now, but they are happy and they had a great time. I had a good time as well. I took a nap in a hammock, read an entire book, put a couple of puzzles together, played some ping pong, swam a lot, and enjoyed my family!!! We've decided to do it every three years, and I'm excited about that.