Thanksgiving 2012

We spent the majority of Thanksgiving day with the Hollingsworths. Richard put up a bounce house for the kids and the older boys and guys played football. We ate too much and watched the Cowboys display a poor attempt at football, but it was still a pleasant afternoon!

Later that evening the boys and I drove on to my parents house for a few days. We enjoyed playing the WII at my aunt's house, seeing my grandma, and playing baseball outside. The boys and I also went over to see Tanna and Audree and of course, Brylee and Cerly. The kids played so well together and Tanna and I had a chance to catch up.

For lunch we strapped everyone in and headed to Chick Fil A. There is no way we were about to go inside with this crew, so we drove through the drive through and took it back to her house.

I also got to hold Audree for the first time. She was so good and slept the whole time, but I had to wake her up before I left so I could love on her a little.

The boys and I also made a gingerbread house. I think they were more concerned about eating the candy and icing then actually building a house, but it was still fun!

We had to finish our Thanksgiving vacation with the annual carousel ride at the mall. They always enjoy this!

Crave

It's hard to believe that the year is starting to wind down. I haven't blogged much on my word of the year, but I sure have learned a lot. And I think for all that I have learned, I have asked that many more questions that I am still wrestling with.   I came across this book several months back and have read it several times because the information was so good and hard to digest after just one reading!! 

Before I chose CRAVE as my word for 2012 I was searching for an answer to the question: How do you crave God in good times? I figured by choosing that word I could spend the year trying to find that answer and also to crave God daily like I did three and a half years ago when my life turned upside down.   After reading this book, I don't think it works that way exactly.  It's not a matter of just seeking Him more, like on a schedule or through a routine, but more of deepening my relationship with Him.  Which makes it more difficult, because I can keep to a schedule like nobody's business, but more rewarding by far!

The chapter that seemed to stick out the most with me was the suffering chapter.  The author mentioned realizing that through his own suffering he drew closer to God and in the good times he grew away.  So he began to pray for suffering in order to keep himself dependent on God.  Although his suffering wasn't anything major, it was enough to keep him focused on God and His abilities and off of himself and his inabilities.  I wrestle with praying for suffering because I am scared of what God will do, which is silly because I know He has proven His faithfulness to me, yet still I have a hard time praying for suffering, so that is still a work in progress.

I also took a look at my life to see what suffering I did have and in what ways I have given God control of it.  What I found was that I have been asking God to take that specific thing away because it makes my life more difficult.  I don't like drama and it seems to keep my life a little more theatrical than I care for, but I started looking at it differently after reading that chapter on suffering.  The author pointed me to 2 Corinthians 12 where Paul talks about the thorn in his flesh and that even though he prayed for it to be taken away, it wasn't and Christ reminded him that His grace is sufficient.  I am really trying to remember those words and instead of wasting all my energy praying for it to be taken away, I try to pray for God's grace to be enough and to use those times to draw closer to God.

Plumb has a new song that really spoke to this same topic.  It's called Need You Now.  The chorus says "How many times have you heard me cry out "God please take this"? How many times have you given me strength to just keep breathing?"  I don't know that God is always as interested as we are in keeping life comfortable.  I think He would rather us keep depending on Him daily then to take all our "thorns" away.  And when the "thorns" are not life altering and I feel like I am in a peaceful place I think God wants us to serve those around us who are suffering.  Through the serving, I stay close to God and crave Him in a different way.  As a prayer warrior or servant for others I seek God on their behalf  and I have enjoyed practicing this.  It's so easy for me to fall into "good times" and to start feeling self reliant and forget why I am here. 

Like I said, I still have a ton to work through on this topic, but I have enjoyed wrestling through this feelings.  And whether I'm in a place of suffering or in a place of peace, I feel like I have the tools I need to continue to crave God everyday.

Another Birthday Celebration

I got to celebrate my birthday again with my family today. Mom always does some sort of theme for our birthdays and as we get older they are getting better and better! The whole day everything was a secret and all we knew was that we would be having a mystery dinner. At 5:30pm cocktails were served and at 6:30pm we were summoned to the table by Mom and Dad who were dressed in wait staff attire. 

Each of our spots had an invitation with instructions on the back.

We had to take the menu items and place them into three categories for our first, second and third course. 

While we waited, we kept enjoying our sangria and all the question mark decorations that mom had decorated the table with.

Mom served a few drinks while Dad finished the last preparations of the meal.

Once the first course came out, we were a bit puzzled, but then it clicked and we realized we would be eating this meal in a random order. My first plate was a pickle, coke, a pat of butter, jello and a spoon, and they told us we had to eat every course in order to get the next course, so depending on what order you put your numbers 1-15 is what came out on each of our plates. I think the funniest one was Amber's first plate of no silverware or napkin with jello and potato salad to eat with her hands!

Teague was a little confused when his plate arrived with whipped cream, a slice of brisket, a pat of butter, a napkin and coke.

The night ended with yummy cake!!

It was a really fun night! And I can't wait to steal this idea and use if for my own party one day!!

T'was the night before Thanksgiving...

T'was the night before Thanksgiving and all through the house
5 children were stirring and running about.
Stuffing their faces with hot chocolate and sweets,
and watching a Charlie Brown Thanksgiving on TV.
A night full of games, laughter and love,
I'm so thankful for this family, given by the Lord above!


We went bowling in the afternoon.

I swear he refuses to take a serious picture!!  LOL

We love watching Minute to Win it on TV so we decided to make our own Minute to Win it game for the kids to play!

Baylee playing Golf Tower Stack

Kelby playing Bubble Blow

Koby playing Flip your Lid

Teague playing Cookie Monster

Troy playing Cereal Scramble

Koby playing chocolate unicorn

Richard playing Cookie Monster

 What a perfect evening!!

Birthday celebration

33!! It's hard to believe that is my age! I still feel like I am in college most of the time!!  My teacher's assistant surprised me with a Happy Birthday sign, noise makers for all the children and a cake. I even went to Teague's classroom and let him come to our little party. All the kids were so cute wanting to sing the Happy Birthday song a million times throughout the day.

I have no idea why Teague looks so sad!!

The weekend before my birthday Richard and I ended up being kid free for a night so we enjoyed the Texas vs. Tech football game on tv and we also went to celebrate by going to eat steak and sushi at the Hibachi Japanese grill, which was a lot of fun!!
 
 He and the boys also had a surprise for me later in the week.  They told me that I needed to be blindfolded for this surprise. They briefly let me take off the blindfold to see that I was going to be trying to break open a cupcake pinata, but after that, the blindfold was put back on and I was spun around! I looked crazy swinging at this thing and the boys were getting plenty of laughs in watching me, but finally I broke it and they loved swarming in to grab some candy!

Richard let Troy pick out a gift for me and he chose the pink cowgirl hat.  Richard said at the store Troy was having trouble deciding between the hat or a shot glass, so Richard swayed him towards the hat!  LOL 

Richard got me a nice bottle of perfume that I had mentioned I needed.  It was a great birthday and I feel so blessed to have so many wonderful people around me who helped make my day special!

Teague wasn't quite sure what to do with his atomic fireball after it started burning his mouth so this was his attempt at making the burning stop!  The picture is blurry because he was also shaking his head side to side.