Teamwork

Teamwork is a good thing.

This day Todd was putting together our new grill which I am so thankful to have. I used it today as a matter of fact BEFORE the rain set in. We had grilled hamburgers and homemade french fries. You know the kind where you actually peel the potatoes and cut them up. Mmmmm It was DELICIOUS.

Anyway, Avery was certainly into teamwork on this project. She got her part of Poppas tools out and got to work. It took a while to get that grill together mind you, but she worked and worked right beside her Poppa until the deed was done.

No worries, no fussing, no complaints. Just work, work and more work.

Then it was done.

She and her Poppa are a great team!

Teamwork is a good thing. :)

"Oh Christmas is so exciting!"

Here are the remainder of my favorites from the "Christmas Photoshoot" I did with Avery a bit ago.

"Is anyone looking cause I think I'm gonna need to open one of these."

"I love Christmas. I am so glad we celebrate baby Jesus birthday around here!"

"This Christmas dress is great for twirling."

"Just like this, Just like this."

"Oh Christmas is so exciting."

Great Few Days

I had a really GREAT last few days.

The weekend was soooo nice. Sundays Church service was wonderful. I was blessed to be able to teach the adult class some things I learned about how a tree works and how we are like that tree thats planted by the water from Jeremiah 17: 7 & 8 when we put our confidence in HIM. (Also in Psalms). Enjoyed learning that myself. Then Calley informed me that her little one was sick and she wouldnt be able to lead the music but PRAISE THE LORD. It wasnt just me and my guitar this time. I was so blessed to have Rob to help me out with the keyboard, and Lance on his NEW bass guitar, and JT who is doing awesome learning the drums. So that was a blessing too.
Then we got to go see our boys, one of whom will be turning 23 in a couple of days. So we treated them to dinner and got his birthday gift. (A grill).
Then we got to go get Avery and take her shopping all day with us. I must admit I was a little concerned that this would not end up as well as it did. But Todd insisted and agreed to totally watch her while I shopped, which he did, and she was AWESOME! We had a great time together except for the one small, well ok not so small incident where I allowed her to fall through the chair at lunch landing on the floor beneath. OUCH! Poor sweetie. I quickly prayed for her and she was fine. THANK GOD FOR ANSWERED PRAYERS.

Great last few days!

To back up a bit though, on SATURDAY, I did some photography. A friend from high school is the sister to Trey who I had done some Family Photos for recently. You can see those here. Anyway, she saw those pictures and asked me if I would mind doing some of her and her sons. I LOVE to take pictures so I took it as an opportunity to learn more and try to improve. She said I could share some of them with you so here I go. These are my favorites from the day. I hope she likes them. I was pleased. :)

On That Christmas Eve

This may be kinda mushy, kinda sappy, but so what.

I just realized this. So I had to say it.

As you may know our little miracle Avery Grace was born on January 21st. Her 3rd birthday is fast approaching. Hard to believe, but back to the story at hand.

When Avery was born we learned that her tiny two pound self had stopped growing 4 weeks before. Little did we know there was a problem with Casey's placenta. When we went in that day for that "fun" sonogram there was backward bloodflow from the placenta.

4 weeks

This had been going on for 4 weeks.

I just realized today that 4 weeks before Averys birth date was Christmas Eve.

So what really happened was:

On that Christmas Eve, Caseys placenta gave out in a sense. No more nourishment for baby Avery.

On that Christmas Eve there was backward flow from the placenta. That could have been it.

But on that Christmas Eve God decided to give us a most precious Christmas gift.

On that Christmas Eve God chose to allow just enough nourishment to get through to baby Avery to keep her alive. Every day for the next 4 weeks there was backward bloodflow from the placenta, and on no day was there enough nourishment going to Avery to allow her to grow. But every day God allowed enough nourishment to get through to her, to keep her alive until the doctors found out the problem.

What a wonderful amazing Christmas gift we were given on that Christmas Eve from our Lord. A gift no words can express our thanks for.

But, you know, a picture is worth a thousand words right?

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving day this year I did a ton of cooking. Well most of the cooking was the day before but the eating, that happened on Thanksgiving Day. Well the eating was going on every day. Man we eat a lot in this family! :)

Anyway we had a great Thanksgiving Day.

It was nice to have all the kids here.

We had a very nice time together.

The food was GREAT!

It was so cool that we had family all together. We had all our kids, (Charlie counts) and Avery, and Mickey (Todds brother), and his parents, and even Todds other brother Richard came with his wife Coree, and their precious little boy Sebastian.

We had a good time outside with them watching the kids play and visiting with each other.Sebastian, like every other 4 year old LOVES to wrestle with his daddy. This is when he was making fists ready to go in and sock it to him.
His favorite thing to do Thanksgiving day though was to jump real high on the trampoline,
And then LAND on his daddy!


We dont get to see them real often so it was good to visit with them.


This is about when Sebastians mom and dad were saying it was time to go. I think he was devising a plan to stay here. {It worked.}


Mark hung around a while out there with us too.

I love this picture of Mark and his cousin.

I know Bill and Linda enjoyed being able to spend Thanksgiving with three of their children, 4 of their grandchildren, and a great grandchild too. I love this picture of them with their grandson Sebastian.
So our Thanksgiving day was great. We were and ARE all very THANKFUL.

THANK YOU LORD FOR YOUR MANY BLESSINGS.

"That's my cousin."

I was so glad we were able to see my brothers grand daughters while we were there. They were so cute and sweet. Little Cadence kept looking at Avery and saying "That's my cousin."
They played together for a while and had a good time. And then we put them back in their cage. JUST KIDDING! They were just cleaning out the guard dogs night night quarters. It's busy work being a toddler. So much to be done.

Mom was pleased to be able to see them as she hadn't seen them in a while. They seemed to be doing so well and we were especially pleased to see how well Alyssa was doing as she has some hearing issues. But her speech is improving and she was doing great.

Another fun thing we did was make and decorate cookies. Oh and we ate them too. Yummy!

Here is one last look at mom's guard dog. Fierce I tell ya!
And then as quick as it all started it was time to get in the car and head back home to Louisiana. Goodbye to Grandmother, Goodbye to Bogey, Goodbye to Uncle Johnny, Goodbye to colorful fall leaves. Until next time.

Childrens Museum

Avery loves a Childrens Museum.

She has been to a few of them so when we were deciding between the zoo and the Childrens museum we went with the museum for this trip. Maybe we will do the zoo next time. She thinks we made the right decision.

As soon as we walked in that place she took off and never slowed down once. From one activity to the next, no breaks, no resting, no slowing down. None. She loved it.

We went back to the Dentist place about 3 times. She really like that for some reason. Maybe we have a Dentist in our future. ???

She absolutely LOVED the grocery store too. She shopped until she dropped. Oh wait, she definitely didnt drop. She just shopped and shopped. As a matter of fact I was beginning to think we werent going to be able to get her out of that grocery store without loud screams. But we did entice her with the water feature at the next station.

Another favorite of her was the kitchen. She worked hard in there cooking for all of us. As you can see in this photo she took this pretty seriously. She is bringing out her chicken she fried up for Nonna and Grandma. Safety first of course which is why she is wearing her pot holder. Serious stuff.

I dont think Avery would have been happier if we had been in an actual palace.

After our FUN time at the Childrens Museum we took Avery into the gift shop since she was such a good girl for a treat. She chose a horn that she adores.
Our trip was: