NOLA

We had a great trip to NOLA! Inman had been back several times to check on our "vacation home" but Jacob and I had not been back yet. We have been trying but from Gustav to illness we kept having to cancel our trips. I was in BIG trouble for not bringing Logan sooner but we finally made it!

We had a great time reconnecting with friends that had become like family. (so much fun that we took NO pictures at the Smiths house:(

Our great friends the Smiths had dinner and a full house waiting for us when we rolled into town! We had a great time & kept our kids up too late but loved seeing FBNO folks.

The next morning we met the Hopkins at the zoo. We spent many days at the zoo with them before we moved & it was the perfect place to get together. The weather was a warm day for January even in NOLA & Logan was introduced to short sleeves and no socks in the winter! Luke & Jacob picked up right where they left off and that warmed my heart!

Luke was so cute with Logan

Jeanine had waited a long time to get her hands on this boy!

Look! A picture of the 4 of us! (only because Jeanine is a mom & had the great idea of taking a picture of the 4 of us, something we often forget to do!)

My old friends from Baptist (not that we are old but we all worked together before Katrina-I think we would all say we haven't found quite what we had prior to being split up. We were a great team and miss working together!)

Jacob had an awesome time at the Crosbys (otherwise known as Hotel Crosby:) 

This city boy got to feed the chickens and gather their eggs.

The Crosbys always make us feel at home & I always tell them to be careful that means we will come back!

(yes, between trips after Katrina and a broken AC for a week a couple of summers ago, we have stayed there A LOT)

Our time in NOLA changed our lives in so many ways. Ways that I can't even capture in a blog entry or in words for that matter. We are thankful for the friends we have there & NOLA will always have a special place in our hearts!

Thursday afternoon

2 hours

No kids

Triple coupons @ Ingle's

Spent: $109.69

SAVED: $104.99

There were items they PAID ME to take out of the store!

Enough said......

Milk, milk, milk!

Through a string of blog stalking and I think a TOTAL God thing, I ran across Sarah who will be bringing home her little baby girl from Ethiopia soon! She posted a couple of weeks ago that the Hannah's Hope home & the surrounding orphanages  were in severe need of formula. I sent out a mass email to friends who may still have extra formula or be able to contribute. Enter my friend Heather from our seminary days. Her class was studying Africa and looking for a service project. (I told you a total God thing!) In just one week (because of needing to get the formula to Sarah so she could prepare to travel) they collected tons of formula. I got a few other donations and picked up the formula to take to Sarah. I enjoyed getting to meet Sarah and hearing about their journey so far. Please be praying for Sarah as well as several other families that will leave this week to pick up their children and bring them forever HOME! Check out their blogs & you can see pics of how word of mouth, a very generous class & yes, blog stalking led to providing much needed formula for these precious children.

On a lighter note.....

What do you do on a COLD weekend in Asheville?

You let your kids run off energy every chance you get, in this case during the youth worship

You watch movies on the laptop (No TV @ ridgecrest)

After being inside for 2 days, you bundle your kids up & tell them, "You have 5 minutes" because Momma & Daddy can only stand it that long!

You enjoy time with friends, Heather & Carlos & the gang

You bundle up!

You spend a lot of time in your room! And enjoy breakfast in bed!

You have a great time but are glad to be home!

History

When I started this blog a while ago, I promised there would not be much besides pictures of our family, cute stories, even said "nothing political." Today is not about politics but history. Today we will witness history. You would not need to know me long to guess which way I voted last November. But today is not about republican vs democrat, right vs left but the privilege of living in a country where we get to vote for our leaders. The vote may not always go the way we would have liked but we have tremendous freedom in the United States, freedom we take for granted daily. There are many dedicating their lives to defending that freedom while we go about our day rarely considering the sacrifice they make and that of their families.

I have become so frustrated with the negative talk surrounding this election and the process following. I have grieved the fact that many professing Christians have slandered the future president and his family often on "facts" that may or may not even hold a grain of truth.

Words have stuck with me that my Grandmomma has said time and time again (probably most often during the Clinton years but that is a post for another day). She encouraged us to not speak negatively about the president of our country reminding us that he was chosen as our leader and deserved our respect. She came from a different time when the country's leaders were respected and the media did not encourage such negative publicity. I have thought about that many times since she put this into perspective for me. Obama was chosen by the country. Praise God we have the freedom to vote.  

I am excited that we will, my kids will be a part of history today. The first African American president. Jacob & Logan will never know any different. They will always remember only a time of equal opportunity. Months ago (before the election) I considered a statement that I had heard. The fact that African American children would now know it was possible that they could achieve anything. I thought, "why couldn't they think that before? Why didn't their parents tell them they could be president?" Then I thought, I have never been in that position. There has never been something in my life that my parents and role models could not encourage me to do because there wasn't someone to look to. I realized my own ignorance. This is quite a day for all Americans and certainly our African American friends and neighbors. I have thought over the last few weeks that it is a shame it took so long. Maybe I am pondering all of this more since we will possibly one day welcome a child to our family that does not have the same color skin that we have and I can not imagine not being able to encourage my child that they could do anything! I think more than that though God has placed on my heart the need to be praying for our country. Believers need to stand out not by their protests of the leader, their negative comments but by the fact that we pray for our country, we show respect where it is due, we stay active in our community and are responsible active citizens and that we display a sense of peace despite the fact that our vote was not the majority. People on each side have placed way too much stock in the next leader. Yes, he is the leader of our country but he will not save our country. There is only One who will save, only One that we can trust, only One that gives us the assurance that despite the poor economy, despite the projected doom of 2009 or perhaps for much longer, HE is in charge.

Let us stand out for the right reason, let us be a city on the hill. (Matt 5:14-16)

Now, I will climb down off of my soapbox. I will probably never post anything along these lines again....but no promises that the soapbox won't be approached again, just not about this subject!

Baby Food

My friend Amy had told me that she was making her own baby food. I pretty much made fun of her...I didn't have that kind of time and I think I called her Martha Stewart or some other cute name.

About 3 days before Christmas I decided since I didn't have ANYTHING else to do, why not make my own baby food?

(seriously, sometimes I can't even believe myself. I am the queen of "don't start something, don't start something, 'oh, yes! let's start a major project 3 days before Christmas with a sick child, still Christmas presents to wrap' kind of thing"

Amy has been a great resource and also referred me to the above book & 

wholesomebabyfood

So far, Logan is loving his sweet potatoes, apples, avocado, pears, peas, green beans, plums, bananas, butternut squash & we are saving A LOT of $$$. I know it sounds so granola but I have enjoyed doing it. I have bought a few jars of baby food for going out but even taking it out is not bad. I did buy baby food for going out of town this weekend, I figure a road trip and all sleeping in one room for the weekend will be about all the fun I can handle!

Let me know if anyone is interested and I can give you a view pointers that I have had passed on to me. I have already converted Laura too!

What we have and what we DON'T have.....

What we have......

These precious eyes...I can't get enough of them!

A boy happy to be sitting up and able to be on the floor playing

A boy who loves to help in the kitchen. He got a Paula Deen My First Cookbook for Christmas & has loved "cooking." The first recipe we sampled was porcupine balls and they were yummy!

He even loves helping with chores! He insisted on doing some of the dishes. What we also had after this was a flooding dishwasher due to a little too much soap leftover in the pans he rinsed:) Luckily we caught it early and all had a good laugh!

(I see in all of these pictures we also have a messy kitchen!)

Brotherly love! I love this picture. Jacob loves showing Logan new things and Logan eats up his attention. This was the first time they were really "playing" together on the floor and it wasn't baby toys but real BOY toys!

2 new teeth! I need to get a better picture but you can see his two new (lower) pearly whites

What we DON'T have.......

A puppy! This is our friend Eleanor's (OK, Austin's new puppy) & we loved playing with him but enjoyed leaving all the other puppy duties for them. Jacob knows one day when there are no more babies we will get a dog but NOT now!

A thumb sucking boy! I wish this was Logan's vice but it's not. He wants his pacifier. Jacob is a thumb sucker and I know our day will come when we wish he didn't but it sure is nice when they can find it themselves. Logan does put his thumb or finger in his mouth to help shovel his food in but other than that, it's his paci

Which leads me to the next "what we don't have"

Plenty of sleep!

He is doing fine going to sleep, & with naps but he is waking up a lot during the night. So we DON'T have a lot of sleep around here! He regressed after a double ear infection and teething but we know this too shall pass! One day I will wish he was still little and waking me up so for now, we will live on that morning coffee!

REPTILES

You know you are the mother of a little boy when the bedtime prayer of your 3 year old is, "Thank you Jesus for a good day and that Aunt Steph took me to the snakes, and lizards and that she got me cold hot chocolate with my hamburger happy meal with 2 toys and she let me have hers too and for my spider man face."

Jacob had a blast at the "Repticon" exhibit his (science teacher:) aunt Steph took him to today. She said he touched a VERY large snake and saw lots of neat animals.

 She left her camera at my house so I got to download them first!

 

Jacobisms

I will give my occasional disclaimer of "sometimes my blog is a journal for myself that happens to be on the www but before you think to yourself, 'she thinks her kids are the cutest, smartest kids!' Remember it is MY blog and I can do just that:) Most of the people (grandparents, aunts etc) that read it think they are pretty cute and in these couple of cases, pretty funny too!

The other day we were in the car and Jacob asked which way we would be turning. I said, "we are turning right." He was in the backseat and I pointed to the right and said, "this is your right hand and we are turning to the right." He lifted his left hand and asked, "is this my wrong hand?"

I was nursing Logan and Jacob said, "Did a cow give you that milk or did God just put it there?"

While on the nursing front, Jacob will occasionally decide his tiger is hungry. (a stuffed tiger that has been his favorite over the last couple of months) Yes, the tiger eats off both sides and even burps.

We have talked a lot about how God is always with us. Even if we are alone, God is always with us & we really aren't alone. Jacob had asked again if God was always with us like in his room at night while he was in his bed. I answered, "yes, even if you feel alone, He is always with you, even if you can't see him." A few minutes later I was going to run down and get something downstairs & told Jacob to wait in his bed for me. Jacob said, "OK, I will be right here, me, God & Jesus waiting for you."

Several times recently Jacob has asked for a toy or movie that was a little more than he needed at this age. For the spider man movie asked for from Santa, I went ahead and laid the ground work that Santa MAY not bring that movie, it was a little scary for little boys. Jacob was recently watching a new children's movie he got for Christmas. I was sitting beside him on the sofa. He said, "Mom just keeping looking at your computer. This movie will have a scary part and I know you don't like scary parts."

A couple of weeks ago I was getting the kids out of the car and suddenly my purse's strap (that was only 2 months old) broke and was totally hanging there with things rolling out in the parking lot. I couldn't believe it had broken after such a short time. I commented it again when we got back in the car. Jacob said, "Mom let's talk about it anymore. I don't want it to make you sad."

Jacob likes to walk up our driveway and bring down our newspaper. He asked to go get it one Sunday. There was our normal large AJC Sunday paper plus a complimentary Gwinnett Daily paper, also pretty big. I said Jacob, "We got 2 today and they are big. I am not sure you can get both." He responded quickly with, "Mom I have 2 hands!"

When we went to start getting our Christmas decorations out. One of the first things I brought up was his fisher price nativity. I said, "Jacob you may not remember this but you have your own nativity." He has recalled only a couple of things from the previous Christmas. He said, "Mom I DO remember this and I had a wonderful time!"

Logan may not be SAYING anything impressive but he is sitting up and has cut 2 teeth so he has been pretty busy with his own thing:)

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! I guess it is only appropriate that I just now saying Happy New Year since I JUST got the Christmas decorations down! That living in NOLA for so long and having everything up until the 12th night wore off on me:)

I am not much for New Year's resolutions but am going to try and catch up on the kids' journals and baby books and continue to organize things around the house (a never ending goal)

2008 was a BUSY, exciting, life changing year for our family and it is always fun to look back on the year and anticipate the coming year. As seen on my cousin Liann's blog, here is my "8" from '08.

#1 We came to Lawrenceville and Inman preached in view of a call on January 13th, 2008. The church voted to call Inman as senior pastor and we began making plans to move our family to Lawrenceville, Ga and began serving @ First Baptist Church of Lawrenceville effective March 2, 2008.

#2 We found out the next week that we had a healthy baby! BOY! After losing our 2nd baby we were so thankful to see a healthy heart, growing (bigger than average) baby on our 2o week ultrasound. Despite Daddy's predictions, we were going to be parents of another boy. We were so thrilled that everything looked good on the ultrasound. My mom and Jacob were there for the ultrasound and my sister flew in that night. Carrying on a tradition of her in-laws, we threw her a BLUE blanket when she walked through the gate.

#3 A big move! We moved from New Orleans which had very much become a home away from home for our family. We have great memories of our time in the city. We moved when I was 24 weeks pregnant and could not have done it without a lot of help! God had many times affirmed this move but there were many bittersweet feelings. We left behind good friends but were thankful to once again be closer to family, especially with another baby on the way!

#4 Since Jacob was having a birthday right around the move, he had a birthday with NOLA friends right before we left and another family party on his real birthday, March 1st. We could not believe we had a 3 year old! So thankful for this growing little boy!

#5 Spring Break

 We had one last trip as a family of 3. Jacob loved playing with his cousins and Momma didn't mind celebrating her birthday at the beach either!

#6 Logan Marshall Houston

We were so excited to welcome this big baby boy (9 pounds, 9 ounces) on June 11th, 2008. Big brother was pretty proud too! Now the real fun begins, getting used to 2 children. 

#7 Fall of '08

The fall brought a lot of new things and kept us busy. Jacob started back to school & has loved Ms Elina and Ms Holley's class. Momma got more in the swing of things after laying low over the summer with baby brother and recovery from surgery following Logan's birth. Inman was working very hard on the church's building campaign, Fulfilling the Dream. Momma decided keeping the 20 pounds after Jacob's birth was not going to happen again! Weight Watcher gets credit for helping to shed the extra weight of Logan (we are still working on the leftover Jacob weight:) And that is just SOME of what kept us busy!

#8 The Future

We are very excited about what God still has for us. The future is exciting for both our church and family. We are already praying about the future and the Lord has laid on our heart specific things to be praying about for our family. We look forward to the plans He has for us!

And that is the short version but a great year! Wouldn't it have been cute to have a picture for each caption? Yeah, maybe that should be a new year's resolution, not to let little stuff get on your nerves. Many love the Mac and I like mine but there is an "I Photo, Mac, not sure what to do about the problem with my pictures and retrieval of them" but I am going to go worry about something else for now!

Happy New Year!

A couple of more pics

Logan discovers the Christmas lights. (I am not sure who looked more tired at the end of the day, momma or the kids!)

Papa, Mema and the kids

Grandmomma & Granddaddy and Logan

Logan was worn out by the end of the day! So was Jacob at the dinner table he asked, "when do we get to take a nap?" For a 3 yr old to ask for a nap, that is tired!

Christmas catch Up Part 2

I left off sharing about Christmas and I had to include this picture of Jacob trying out his scooter on Christmas morning in PJs, with all of his safety gear and his new spider man socks!

We may have a picture with the kids and each parent but NO picture all day of the 4 of us. We had a great time and the time got away from us. Lesson to self: walk in the door, say hello and get someone to take a picture of our little family before it gets too chaotic!

The best part of a 70 degree day on Christmas? For the boys....playing football! It might have not been a white Christmas like Jacob asked for several times but was a beautiful day! I think my brother in law had the best idea when he wore his flip flops, didn't we leave this weather in New Orleans?