NINE years

TODAY, we celebrated NINE years of marriage.

Tonight, we had a family date to Carrabba's to celebrate our "family's birthday." It is fun to look back over these past nine years and see how God has grown us individually and as a couple, how God has been faithful, how God has provided, how God has led and directed our family, how God has grown our family to 6.  We are so thankful that God brought us together!

Since it's a little tricky with no family in town and fostering, we did a long date this past Saturday, rather than an overnight.  We enjoyed 8 hours with each other (noon-8pm) and no interruptions. We had lunch at Epic Food, then we went paddle-boarding in the inlet, then over to Masonboro Island (so relaxing sitting on a beach and NOT playing lifeguard or constantly counting to 4...4 kids), then back.  We walked downtown a while, and had an amazing dinner at Rx.  Happy Anniversary to us!

FLORIDA summer vacation

We just got back from a short, but very sweet, vacation to see our family in Florida.  We left home Friday after lunch. It's a solid 10 hour drive to Tampa, but we had to sit for an extra 2 hours on I-75 due to an accident.  Thankfully it was late at night, cooler weather and most of the kids slept most of those 2 hours.  We stayed until Wednesday morning. Here is some of the cousin/family fun.

The park with 8 kids!

It was a full house and the noise level was high.

Visiting Bay Cities Fellowship, the church plant Luke & Jess are starting.

A big water balloon fight plus playing in the pool.

Seeing the Clearwater Maritime Aquarium

Our little guy LOVES sharks, so he had a blast!

We also enjoyed many family meals, playing with cousins, riding bikes, Clearwater beach and helping with a few house projects. Seeing the cousins all together reminded me of growing up near Luke.  Cousins are the best! We adults loved catching up and chatting at night, after the 8 kids were in bed.  We love you, Luke & Jess!

summer sanity

Here is my summer sanity.....I mean summer school....I mean summer fun. It's actually all of those things.  The last week of school, Lily had a half day Thursday, and then just award's chapel on Friday morning, well during those two half days the kids kicked my tail in the afternoons.  I knew I needed  a summer plan, like what we've done before, and I needed it figured out by Sunday evening! I asked the girls for ideas for the daily theme and ideas of what they'd like to do, just like last summer.

I came up with this:

Last summer we did something similar, where each day we had a theme for learning. This is maybe 15-30 minutes of intentional learning per day.  Otherwise, all of the sudden the summer is half over and you haven't gotten it done or had time or made time for it. I think it works for all of us! I enjoy it, we have a plan, and the kids look forward to it.

It's evolved throughout the summer to this:

One of our writing Wednesday's

Riding the free trolley downtown