We've had a busy past few days! Caleb started running a fever Monday night. He didn't have any other symptoms, and I had heard there was a fever virus going around. However, my motherly instinct (maybe?! ha) insisted that I take him to see the doctor. We went Tuesday morning and sure enough, he had the beginnings of an ear infection. I patted myself on the back for taking him rather than waiting. He hasn't even been acting sick the past few days. The fever was gone by Wednesday, and he's back to normal. Jeffry actually started getting another sinus infection last night. He came home from work and took some medicine around six. By six thirty, he was out! And he didn't get up until seven this morning!! I felt so bad for him...he was pitiful. He's still a little sick today, but feeling better, I think.

I have been extremely busy at work lately. We have been transferring our store from Jeffry's parents corporation to be under our own corporation that we started. Which means tons of paperwork for me! Not to mention the fact that it's the beginning of a new year...I have been sooo busy trying to get all of our tax information together. I finally finished everything for the store yesterday. Now I'm on to our personal taxes!

We have had some bad weather tonight. Our power went off around four thirty. We actually had to shut the store down early. The entire town was out of power until about nine. Since then it keeps going on and off. We heard (who knows how true it is) that someone hit the power substation that is behind our store. Lucky for us, we have a natural gas generator that can run almost the entire house and a gas stove! Jeffry made "breakfast for dinner"- one of our favorite things, and he and Brayden played Nintendo while Caleb and I read. Then we all watched movies. It didn't turn out to be a bad night after all!

Tomorrow is my first day of piano lessons! I'm so excited. Rebecca told me to bring a book that is on my level. Scary...because I haven't sat in front of the piano for about a year. I hope she has extremely low expectations, haha. Anyway, wish me luck! I will let you all know how it goes!

Parties, Piano, and more...

It's been a few days since I posted so here is our update!

We had Brayden's birthday party at our house on Saturday. We planned to have a big inflatable slide, but it was just too cold and wet for the boys to go outside. SOOO, we had 12 four and five year old boys running around inside our house. LoL, it was so much fun. They had a blast. Jeffry's mom made Brayden a chocolate and vanilla swirl Monster Truck cake. He loved it! We really had a great time.

On Sunday, we had party number two for family members. My parents and grandmother came, along with Jeffry's parents and grandparents. Brayden was very excited that everyone came over, and he thoroughly enjoyed his presents. I didn't get any pictures with my digital camera, so I will have to post them when I get them developed.

After the party, the boys and I went to my mom and dad's in Jackson. We went and saw Evan play basketball at MC against Piney Woods. The game was awesome!! Evan played great as usual. I miss getting to see all of his games! Here's a pic from the game:


I got home yesterday afternoon and then headed to Gulfport for praise team practice. Here's my favorite news...I'm going to start taking piano lessons with our worship leader! I'm sooo excited! Jeffry got me a keyboard for Christmas, and I have been trying to play some of our worship songs. I'm really looking forward to taking lessons and just having some general direction. I start next Friday. I can't wait!

My Bray-bear

Yesterday was Brayden's 5th year in this world. I can not believe how time has flown. As many of you know, I got pregnant with Brayden before Jeffry and I were married. It is amazing how, through our mistakes and decisions, the Lord never lets go of us and continues to guide our path. I thank the Lord for bringing this special boy into my life. I can not imagine my life any other way; I never thought I could love someone so much. Our children are such a blessing from the Lord. I have never viewed Brayden as "an accident" or a mistake; I have always known that the Lord GAVE us this precious boy. I thank the Lord that He is a God of forgiveness, and He is our loving Father!! I heard on the radio yesterday that in 2006, there were 2,949 abortions in Mississippi. I still cannot fathom how someone could have an abortion. My heart breaks for those women who feel there is no other way than to have an abortion, and I am thankful that I never resorted to such measures. How could the world not have my Brayden in it? He is so special! And I know that those other babies are special too because we are all made in the image of our Father! Brayden is such a happy, outgoing child. He is "all boy" and lives outside! He loves to play with trucks, trailers, tractors, trains, dirt bikes, etc. I thank the Lord for entrusting us with Brayden, my Bray-bear...I pray that I can be an example of the Lord's love and encourage Brayden's sweet spirit to grow in the love of Jesus!








These pictures are from Wednesday night. We took him out to eat Cracker Barrel for his birthday, which is what he requested! We let him order whatever he wanted, and he chose pancakes and a grilled cheese sandwich. He finished off with a hot fudge brownie and ice cream...haha...it's only his birthday once a year! Jeffry, Caleb, and I went to Brayden's class yesterday and took the cupcakes that I made. Last night we gave him his birthday present- a Nintendo DS. Only, he calls it an "antenna ds". SO funny! He was very thankful, which made me proud! We are having a birthday party on Saturday with tons of his friends. I can't wait. I want to make my little boy feel as special as he is to me! :) I am so thankful that the Lord gave me this child.

Sit Somewhere New

I am so thankful for my friends! God has been reminding me the past few days that friendship with others is a reflection of how He cares for me. The Lord desires our fellowship and our time to be spent with Him! That's what we do with our friends. We meet for breakfast, go to parties, drink coffee...you know, spend time getting to know one another. It dawned on me Sunday that we sometimes get stuck in a rut. Even if we don't have "our row" at church, we generally sit in the same area. How am I supposed to meet new people if I keep sitting by the same friends and sitting in the same spot? The Lord opened my eyes to see other people around me. I remember how it felt to be the new couple at church. You want to make new friends, you want to meet new people! It's so important for us to step out of our comfort zones, greet people, and truly make them feel welcome! You can't truly minister to someone unless you establish some sort of relationship with them, and you can't establish a relationship unless you step out and welcome them. As of today, I am going to make an effort to get out of my comfort zone and sit somewhere new! I want to be able to keep adding to my group of friends! I'm so thankful that the Lord didn't decide He had enough "friends"...what if I had gotten left out? I don't want to leave anyone out at church or in my community. I want all people to feel like they can come to me and find a true friend.

Splish-splash!

I woke up this morning with a plan to de-clutter my house by Monday. Monday being the optimal time because our realtor is coming by to take photos of the house. For those of you who haven't heard, we are buying some land out in the country! Basically, a farm! Sooo, we are trying to get our house on the market pretty quickly. Like, within the next two weeks. Talk about stress.

Anyway, I made chocolate chip pancakes for the boys for breakfast, which is our Saturday morning tradition. After that, they went outside to enjoy some fresh air for a while. Jeffry came home from work after only an hour because he was feeling horribly ill. He went straight to bed in our room. I got busy washing clothes, folding sheets, and washing the dishes. Except I didn't get too far washing the dishes before I noticed that I was standing in a nice pool of water. Great! My husband who can fix everything is sick, and I have pools of water underneath my kitchen sink. Being the plumbing genius that I am since having married into the hardware business, I turned off the shut-off valves under the sink. I took everything out from under the sink and cleaned up the water. Trying to be a good wife and thinking of my poor sick husband, I called one of our contractors to come check out the sink. He fixed it in about ten minutes! All of this took place while Jeffry was sound asleep. When he woke up, I told him what happened and that Steve had come to fix it. He was super-impressed and seriously grateful that I handled the situation on my own! I think I just earned a Schrute-buck.

After the sink incident, Jeffry was still feeling bad so I took him to the urgent care clinic in Hattiesburg, where we spent a good part of the afternoon. He has a severe sinus infection. :( My poor husband! Sooo, instead of de-cluttering my house...I've been playing nurse and trying desperately to keep the boys quiet so Jeffry can get some rest. I think I'm ready to go back on vacation!

Cancun!

Life has been a little stressful lately and I haven't had time at all to even start thinking about blogging!! But now that school is over and the holidays are passed, I hope to be able to do this on a regular basis!

Jeffry and I just got back from a 6 day trip to Cancun!! It was fabulous! The water there is absolutely breathtaking. I *WISH* that the Mississippi coast even NEARLY resembled that water! Ha...wishful thinking I guess. The weather was a little cold the first two days, but we were able to stay on the beach the whole day the third day. I didn't get as much sun as I wanted!! I definitely was able to relax though. We got a couples massage that was INCREDIBLE...I wanted to take the massage lady home with me! LoL. Jeffry played golf one morning, and I rode in the cart with him. We also went shopping in downtown Cancun and found this little hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurant that had the best tacos ever. Yummm. Needless to say, we enjoyed our vacation! It was a great little get away!



You can see our pictures here: http://usm.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2070402&l=cd33b&id=42810379