amelia meets more family!

our trip to nashville back in june had "family bookends". we started off seeing family, and we ended our trip seeing family. let's start at the very beginning... (a very good plaaaaace to start!)


after a day's drive, we were so happy to see my great-aunt norma and great-uncle clarence! as usual, norma had a table full of delicious food ready for us, complete with a texas sheet cake. if you do not know what that is, your pants probably fit you much better than mine do! oh man, it is good stuff. in our family, it is my grandma's and aunt norma's signature dessert. i grew up on it, and i don't know very many people who've even heard of it. shame, shame. ANYway, we spent a day or so with norma and clarence, and it was such a blessing. they have always treated me like one of their own grandchildren, and now they love my kids like they are their own great-grandchildren. (growing up, i was always amazed at how much they loved me even though i wasn't "theirs", but it hit me that karina's children and i will share the same relationship that norma and i share... and of course i will love those babies like my own!) when norma wasn't cooking for us, she was holding my baby.



or feeding my baby.



or rocking my baby to sleep.


while norma claimed "baby duty", clarence entertained the older kids with the dog and toy cars in the garage. looks like the dog needs to give my kids lessons on smiling for the camera. :)


we loved every minute of our time with norma and clarence. i have no doubt that norma will be my first comment on this post. :) she is quite the blog follower! i have affectionately called her "aunt email" for the past several years, but i may need to update that to "aunt facebook". :) we love you, clarence and norma! thank you so much for your precious hospitality!!

after the wedding weekend, we ended our trip by staying a night at my brother's house. the kids were so excited to see uncle ryan and his cute little dog! my mom and my brother actually watched the kids so i could enjoy christie's wedding empty-handed, so they got lots of time to chase lucy louise around. poor dog- i hope she has recovered by now! i was really hoping to have more time to hang out with ryan during our visit, but the day just got busier and busier. hopefully it won't be another year and a half before we see each other again! in a fluke moment of clarity and rational thinking, i had the kids pose for pictures THE minute we walked in the door. usually, i realize as we are packing up that i didn't get that picture i wanted... and by then, the kids are not feeling much like photography material. i'm sure there was some food that i used to bribe them, too. but i like to think it was my fine-tuned plan. haha. here are the kiddos with uncle ryan (who they called "uncle brian" half the time, confusing his name with their daddy's!). i love this picture of them....


my grandmother also got to meet amelia and play with the kids for a little bit. the kids had fond memories of spending time with her over christmas, and they were thrilled to see her again. (so was i!) i think she gets worn out just by watching them play and go crazy, but it seems like she enjoyed her time with us. this picture is pretty much priceless!! (can you tell that my mom was standing to my right trying to make the kids smile?)


amelia was perfectly content sitting with grandmother and playing with the edge of this table... had this picture been taken this week, she would have been gnawing on that table like crazy!


our cousin betsy came by for a quick visit as well... we had fun catching up and laughing. sorry, betsy, i think your eyes were closed in every picture. :( but i had to post at least one of us together!!


and here's me and my brother! it has been a long, long time since we've taken a picture together. so i'm glad we got this one. thank you, ryan, for letting us stay with you!


the kids loooooved playing on my brother's organ. it was a very close race between the organ and the dog for "most entertaining object at uncle ryan's house". i'm sure the dog was voting for the organ!



it looks like caroline votes for the organ, too. play it, sister!



don't let this look fool you. it surely didn't fool my parents 28 years ago!


i was so thankful that we were able to spend time with family on this trip. it was pretty busy moving from house to house every few days, but it was surely worth it. i would load and unload that pack-n-play a hundred times if it meant an evening with a loved one. and ok... i guess i'll take the texas sheet cake, too. :)

firefly wonder

the kids saw their first fireflies during our visit to tennessee. i have so many summer tennessee memories of watching these intriguing bugs, and i was just as excited as my children were to see the flying lights around my aunt norma's backyard. well, i take that back. i think caroline was just a little more excited than me. :)


ethan could have stayed out there all night looking for these lightning bugs. shhh, don't tell him it's just one big mating festival!


we caught one little guy, but i felt bad and let him go after a little bit. as a child, i remember catching them and watching them glow as i fell asleep only to find them dead the next morning. so i had pity on this one... go, little guy! go find your mate!


this experience was by far one of the highlights of our trip for ethan. (get it!? highlights!??!) :)

a quick visit

my time with my college friends in nashville in june was just not long enough. we squeezed lots of catching up and chasing children in that 48 hours, in addition to christie's wedding festivities! i took lots of pictures, but i am trying to get caught up around here... so this one's gonna be (relatively) short and sweet.

lynsay, christy, and i had the pleasure of staying with cary, ashley, and baby noah for the weekend. they have worked so hard remodeling their beautiful home--it was such a cozy place to relax and talk till 3 in the morning. cary went above and beyond the call of duty on thursday night when he babysat ethan & caroline while the girls had dinner with the bride-to-be. i meant to get a picture of cary and the kiddos, but that never happened. cary did survive the evening, thanks to pizza and bolt! (and his superb fathering skills, of course.)

the next morning, ashley treated us to a delicious breakfast, complete with monkey bread. and here is our hostess adding my favorite part... powdered sugar!



ethan was ecstatic that sifters don't come with lids.


after our morning sugar rush, kim's family came over and we all headed out to a really great discovery center in ashley's town. it was worth our admission fee just to get this shot of all of our busy kids in one picture! (L-R: caroline, noah, ethan, paxton, lorelei) (christy's sweet girl sadie was back home with her daddy, and amelia was snoozing in her stroller)



my kids loved this little market area.



the girls stayed busy doing girl things.



and the boys stayed busy doing boy things.





and nobody had to tell them what to do. it's like they were Made that way.
after a busy day at the discovery center, we came back to ashley's for a quick lunch. after we scarfed down our sandwiches, ashley brought out a cake for my birthday the week before! (remember, this all happened way back in june!) her bundt pan really saw some action that weekend! :) you know i am not one to turn down cake, especially this cake! thanks, girls, for remembering my birthday!


the rest of the weekend, we pretty much ate, talked, and kissed on each others' babies. here's kim's husband, josh, meeting amelia...



and while he kissed on my baby, i gave my kisses to this precious fella...


isn't noah so sweet!? he was so tolerant of my kids invading his space for the weekend! noah was just an infant last year, and it was so fun to see him growing so big!

this post does not really do the weekend justice. even though it was a busy time with wedding activities and kids in our faces every 30 seconds, my friends and i found a way to squeeze in little conversations here and there. and then after the kids finally fell asleep, we'd dive right in to our heavy late-night chats. i love these girls, and i am already looking forward to next summer's reunion!!

somebody's getting maaaaaaaarried!

remember when i said it would take me two weeks to catch up from my busy trip in june!? ummm, try almost two months! technically, it has only been 5 weeks, but anyway, i am so happy to finally be getting around to blogging about my trip to nashville. it was a friends-and-family-filled trip, complete with amelia meeting several loved ones. so this is gonna be at least a two post-er. maybe even three. but i will start with the main reason for my trip to nashville... my dear friend christie's wedding!! you faithful readers know that my college girlfriends reunite every summer, and we were so thrilled to make christie and jim's wedding the focal point of our reunion this year! the festivities started on thursday night when christie's sister julie hosted a dinner for all of christie's close girlfriends. it was so nice to meet ladies that i'd heard christie talk about over the years. i was seated next to one of christie's very best childhood friends, and we had a wonderful time laughing it up through dinner! here's the college gals (kim, ashley, christie, me, christy, and lynsay). this is one of my favorite pictures from the weekend...



the bride with her sister, the hostess with the mostess.



i was seated across the table from my shy and proper friend, ashley. ;)


our place cards were a picture of each guest with christie. i thought this was such a cute idea. i should have taken a picture of mine, since i'm sure you'd all love to see me totally painted bronze (hair and all) for a musical show i was a part of during college. but i liked this one of the bride and groom that christie used for her future mother-in-law's seat.


i'm glad i decided to bring amelia to this dinner because it was the only chance christie had to meet her! christie has always shown such interest in our kids during our reunions, so i'm thankful she was able to take a minute to love on amelia.


when she mailed the party invitations, julie also included a card for us to write down our marriage advice to christie. at the party, julie read each card out loud and asked christie to identify its author. i was amazed that christie got almost every single one right! she really knows her friends! (of course, mine was the wordiest, so it wasn't too hard to identify! ha!)



moving on to the wedding day!!!! here is my friend as a beautiful bride!


i love this picture of josh and kim and their kids, paxton and lorelei. after i took this shot, i told kim that this would be their proof that they were actually there in case they had to take the kids out. but paxton and lorelei did great through the ceremony! it did help that lorelei was convinced that christie was a princess. :) (and i think jim would agree!)


and here are christie's bridesmaids and maid of honor (longtime friend, college roommate, sister-in-law, and sister). check out julie's 'do. through the whole ceremony, i kept singing to myself, "love shack. baby, love shack!" i was waiting for julie to break out with, "tiiiiiiin roof! rusted." (for those of you with really bad eyesight, it's a topiary behind julie's head. it's not her hair. ok, we're all clear now.)


christie's flower girl and ring bearer were her former students. (christie is the most amazing and most loved kindergarten teacher!) instead of dropping rose petals, the flower girl handed flowers to guests seated on the aisle. the first recipient was an older gentleman who was completely caught off guard. he politely said "no thank you" to her as she attempted to give him a flower. she just kept trying to hand it to him until he finally took it. :) then later down the aisle she accidentally gave two to her mom, and she took one back. she was so cute, and she took her job seriously!!


now here's the real reason i go to a wedding. um, er, i mean... isn't christie's wedding cake beautiful!? i love wedding cakes but not nearly as much as i love sharing in my friend's special day! yeah, that's it. (christie knows i love her more than cake! and that's a lot of love!)


isn't this a precious family!? cary, ashley, and noah were so hospitable as we all lived in their beautiful home for the weekend. more on that in the next post.



lynsay, christy, and ashley waiting on the mr. and mrs.


another one of my favorites from the weekend... these sisters are having too much fun getting these bubbles going!



and there they go! off to disney world!


jim and christie, it was such a blessing to share in your wedding celebration. may God bless you as you begin this exciting journey as husband and wife. congratulations!



and i expect to be playing with your baby at our next reunion!
(juuuuuuuust kidding!!!!!!)

our summer students

every summer, our church hosts a number of college students who are living and working as a part of campus outreach. they are away from home during their summer break, flipping burgers by day and training to spread the word of God by night. some of my first memories of our church include hanging out with the campus outreach students before brian and i were even dating. (that's when we were college students. now we're just old!) to encourage these young men and women, families from our church adopt students and provide times of fellowship together... whether that be an outing with the family on the boat or coming over for lunch after church on sunday, the adopted families are just supposed to reach out.

jeff and kristie and brian and i jointly adopted four of these college students this summer. it was one of those things that we have never done, that we have watched other families do, and i just felt really convicted that it was our turn. hospitality is not one of my specialities, but it's an area in which i truly desire to grow. so i thought this would be a good baby step... college students don't have their own homes, so they wouldn't care if mine wasn't in tip-top shape. college students living in a hotel for the summer will just be happy to be in a home, even in the kitchen cabinets are only half painted. so i presented my idea to brian, and he was pretty hesitant at first. my sweet husband is very cautious of jumping into commitments, and even more so, he is very cautious about me jumping into commitments. he knows i love to fill my plate full to overflowing, and he knows it is not pretty when that plate comes crashing down. and the plate usually hits him on the head on the way down! but this girl drives a hard bargain, and in the end, i convinced him that it would be good for us to step out of our comfort zone and host these students. kristie offered to join in with us, and that really sealed the deal for brian. SO the four of us adopted four students: allison, bryce, caroline, and micah. and we were so glad that we did.

since we don't have a family boat, we opted for the sunday-lunch-after-church route. :) we were able to have them over several times during the two months they were with us, and kristie and i shared the hostessing responsibilities. brian's parents also adopted two students, so we all went over to their house one week for a big dinner. i loved getting to know these guys. every sunday, we hugged their necks at church and asked how their weeks were going. over lunch, they filled us in on different opportunities they had to minister to people at work and how their discipleship training was going. we learned about their families (micah is one of 13 kids!), and we talked about their college life (bryce played football where my friend ashley's brother was on staff! small world!). ethan, caroline, and karina thrilled on having a captive audience for their antics, and amelia only peed on allison once! we shared funny stories about the kids, and they definitely got a taste of how not to get three small children to sit at a table and eat lunch! most importantly, we listened as they shared about how God has worked in their lives... about how they have tasted first-hand the mighty grace of God. we had to remind ourselves each week that we are at least a decade older than these students! they were so mature and were so willing to help out in any way. they were so loving and sweet to our kids, and they were so appreciative of us having them in our homes. and they didn't complain when we sent them home with leftovers, either! :) we were so completely blessed by getting to know these students. isn't that the way it always goes? you reach out to bless someone, and you are the one who is blessed even more in return!

these pictures are from last sunday, which was our last sunday with them. jeff & kristie were out of town, and micah had an party to attend for his work. i was bummed that we didn't get a picture with everybody, but you know i had to at least take a picture of some of us!!


(allison, caroline, and bryce with the kids)
we were so sad to say good-bye, but i know these guys were looking forward to a few weeks at home before gearing back up for another fall semester. thanks to facebook, we hope to keep in touch, and who knows!? maybe they'll be back down again next year. they will always have a special place in our hearts as our first college students! (that's right, brian's already given me the "ok" to adopt students next summer!) :) we are praying that allison, caroline, micah, and bryce will have a blessed school year as they sow seeds for the Kingdom! God bless you guys!