Happy 9th Birthday Anna!

Happy Birthday to Anna! Wow, what a blessing it is to celebrate another birthday with our precious Anna. God has done so much for this little girl and we can not express how grateful we are to Him for allowing her to celebrate yet another year of good health! Anna, we love you with all our hearts. Thank you for being such a wonderful daughter who opens her heart to everyone she knows and loves them with all of her heart. We love you!

Anna began her birthday by having her very special friend, Stephanie Melcher spend the night. Then after church, Anna wanted to have all our family who could (Nana and Papa, Grandma and Grandpa, Uncle Matt, Aunt Kelly, Maddie and Biddy, Uncle George, Nene and Brynn) over for her favorite lunch, roast and mac-n-cheese and we had a great afternoon!The Birthday Girl

Here she is all ready for church after opening a couple of her presents.
Lighting her own candles...
Daddy and his birthday princess...
A fun game of softball in the backyard with family...

Farmer Jim

...and his little farmette, Hopey! Jim and Hope spent an entire Saturday planting a garden in the sunny spots of our backyard. They worked so hard, can't wait to reap the harvest!

Anna and Ashley wanted in on the action, as well.

Meanwhile, Andrew plays with his new bubble gun. He loves it!

One more thing...(sorry buddy, but mama has to brag) Andrew has been pee-ing on the potty each time he gets out of the hot tub. He's up to about 10 times now! That's a start!

LOTS and Locks of Love!!

Hopey has been growing her hair out to donate it to Locks of Love (for the 2nd time) and this past weekend, she cut her hair! She looks adorable and we know that a little girl somewhere will enjoy her new wig made out of Hope's hair!

Two of my beautiful girls...

Our week with Debi and Seth

Cousin Deb and her baby boy, Seth, came to visit for a week. We had such a great time just hanging out with family, going to Disney and playing in the backyard. Here are a few pictures of our time together. Thanks for coming Debi!

Deb and the boys riding the train at Disney
Debi treated us to lunch at the Crystal Palace where we got to meet some of the Pooh characters. It was great!

Hanging out on the couch...
Hot tubin!

Snuggle time...

The boys playing together.

Mr. Jim reading books with Seth.

Close, closer, closest!

Happy Valentines Day!

Anna and Andrew having a little Valentines snuggle on the couch...

Ashley's before and after haircut pictures, such a cutie pie!

Snow day in Florida...

It was another cold morning out this morning and I gave my girls the option of staying home and Anna and Ashley took me up on it. Danae and Hope wanted to go to school, such nerds. haha, just kidding. They're so diligent, I was proud of them! Anna, Ashley and Andrew and I stayed home and baked cookies together and did some make-up school work. It was a wonderful morning.

Andrew's favorite thing in the world...helping daddy.


Hopey and her friend Michaela were coneheads. They won't tell their secret of how they did that!

Papa came by to visit the other day and Andrew climbed right up on the couch to snuggle with him. Such buddies.

Happy 2009!

I know, I know, finally an update! This new year has proven to be a busy one for us, but a good one as well. Here are a few of the events that have taken place since our last update.

This is what older sisters do to their baby brothers. Poor little Andrew, he didn't like it one bit and either did his daddy. But us girls got a huge laugh out of it!

Anna has had a weird case of what we thought was appendicitis, but now looks like it must be mesenteric lymphadinitis (inflammed lymph nodes in her right lower abdomen). This is a picture of her in the hospital. Does she look like a little Noelle or what??? Such a precious treasure.

One of our favorite presents this year for Christmas was a zip line for the backyard. I'll have to put more pictures of this when I get some. It provides hours of fun!

Hopey turned 12 and she wanted to rent a big blow up slide for our back yard. She had a great day. We love you Hopey and are so blessed by you. Thank you for being a young woman who loves the Lord and honors her parents.

Danae, Hope and Noelle had the opportunity to be in a live, drive through nativity scene. It was a great experience for them! Danae is Mary being visited by the Angel and Noelle is Mary and Brynn is baby Jesus and Hope is a shepherd.

Over Christmas we all got to meet our niece Danielle! It was great seeing Jake and Shannon and their precious baby girl.