Giving Thanks with a Grateful Heart

Ever since I have had kids, I feel like I have learned a lot about what it means to really give thanks and to count my blessings. I don't wait until Thanksgiving Day to give God the glory and thanks for what He has placed in my life, but every day I spend time in prayer thanking Him for blessing me.

One thing I am thankful for is this guy. This little 2 1/2 year old that is now about 1 month away from turning 3. I am thankful for his health, his witty personality, and his constant love and affection. And this little ball of energy. My little 10 month old that has a smile to offer to anyone who looks at him. A kiss to offer when asked. A feisty personality that makes me believe that I am going to have my hands full when he is 2 1/2. I am also thankful for his health and well being.

My amazing husband of almost 5 years. Thankful that he asked me to be his with my dream proposal. Thankful that he works so hard for our family and is always willing to serve at any moment. Thankful for a husband who will see that I need help with something and won't wait for me to ask for help, he will just do it. I am so thankful that I have a husband that meets and exceeds every expectation that I have ever had for a husband. He is my hero, the rock, backbone and heart of this family. I can't imagine this family functioning without him.

Thankful for my parents who raised me up to have Godly morals. For my dad who taught me to take care of and cherish the important things in life. To invest in my spiritual life, family, and education. Thankful for my mom who has modeled for me for what it means for be a forgiving, patient mother and spouse, and loving unconditionally.

Thankful for the greatest in-laws in the world. Thankful for a family who has welcomed me into their family as their own. Thankful for these individuals who have shown me what it takes to love genuinely and to serve whole heartily. Thankful that my boys have such wonderful male role models surrounding them and the most awesome cousins, nieces and nephews. All these kids walk into a room and the place just lights up. I am so grateful that each one of these children are all healthy and happy.

I am thankful for my sister and brother in law, Josh(whom I was unable to see this Thanksgiving). She is a beam of light and has a heart of gold. I am praising God this holiday season for answering all our prayers and blessing her with the gift of pregnancy. I can't wait to hold baby M and bless the britches off him/her.

I am also thankful for my health and that I am able to get up every morning and be a mother and a wife to some of the most amazing people. My heart and mind grieves for those mothers who are sick or have sick children. I have been blessed and I don't/can't explain why God has been so gracious to me, but I am forever thankful for what He has brought into my life.

And most importantly, I am thankful for the freedom of salvation. I am thankful that Jesus died for me so that I may have life. One of my new favorite songs has been around for a while, but now that I am kind of an adult, I really understand the meaning of the words. "Jesus paid it all, all to whom I owe. My sin has left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow." I am thankful for Jesus who is patient with me everyday and each new day, it is a clean slate.

Finally, I am thankful for you who have taken the time to read this blog. I am curious if people even read this anymore since all my blog friends are on Facebook. Have a wonderful holiday season and if you don't hear from me in the next three months it is because I am a terrible planner and decided to have a baby 4 days before Christmas, get married on New Year's and have another baby soon after Christmas. I will be busy planning parties, preparing for parties and shopping. Yea for the busiest time of the year. *sighing....heavily!*

My boys

Christian's new trick. I always think he is about to stand up, but he plops down on his bottom. Even in public we have to sit Broseph in time out for not playing nice.

Scary, but this is what I have in store for myself. Two crazy brothers joy riding. I think I will start praying my safety prayers right about.....now.

If I wasn't scared of CPS taking my babies away, I would totally eat his cheeks. I love this babies face ;-)

This kid loves balls.

Sorry it has been such a long time since I have posted, but we have been extremely busy and the only reason I am posting tonight is because Jeff is out of town and I finally have some free time.
We have been doing very well. The boys are growing like weeds and CHK is now 3 months away from turning one! For Halloween, Joseph, Christian and I went to Dallas for a four day weekend. Friday, my mom, sister and my family made a trip to Canton and did some shopping. I realized here that my boys are BOYS and do not like shopping. On Friday night, we bundled up and headed to my old high school's homecoming football game. It was a lot of fun to be back at RHS and to sit in the bleachers and look at the field where I played a lot of soccer games.
Saturday we laid low in the morning and then in the evening we headed out for some trick or treating. I was planning on dressing the boys as Mario and Luigi, but right before we left I tried the overalls on Joseph and he didn't want them on...at all. Thank goodness I had a back up plan and have realized that some things just aren't worth fighting over. The boys ended up dressing up as boys for the 60's and it turned out okay. The neighborhood that we went to was awesome! Some houses gave out FULL size candy bars and bags of skittles. I have never seen that and have wondered if that really existed.
Then Sunday and Monday we did our usual shopping trips and my mom spoiled the boys...as usual. Joseph was able to add to his collection of Cars, so he was happy.
Here are some pictures of us over the past month.

Jeff and I have determined that C's going to be our expensive child. As you can see, he is going to need braces because he sucks his thumb all day (I love this, so this isn't a complaint), he LOVES remote controls, phones and pretty much anything that is electronic. OH BOY!

Joseph-Excited about getting candy.


Christian-Could careless.

This picture is geniune...Joseph really does love his little bro.

I love this boys eyes.

If only I looked this cute sleeping like this. (You notice his Car book? I am telling you, he sleeps with something Cars related every single night.)

My birthday boy and his guitar cake. I made it for him and Jeff really liked it.

Cars

Joseph's new love is the movie Cars. I bought this movie sometime in the summer and he took to it faster than ants going after a dropped cherry snow cone. He L--O-V-E-S this movie.
During potty training I decided to get him a little surprise one day at Walmart for doing such a good job. As I was checking out, I noticed they had a Lightning McQueen car. I bought it, brought it home and surprised him with it the next time he had told us he had to use the bathroom. I honestly don't think he has put it down since.
Then two weeks ago I was at H-E-B and I turned a corner and there was this shrine of the same series of cars. Joseph's mouth and face beamed with excitement and he told me he wanted down. I let him pick one out since we were about to go on a trip and I thought it would be fun for him to have in the car.
Well, it is starting to get out of control. I buy a new car for him every time I go to Walmart or
H-E-B. And just today this is how a conversation went between Joseph and I.....
J-"Mama, we going to the store?"
M-"Nope, not today. Why, what do we need from the store?"
J-"I need sheriff."
Oh boy, I have created a monster. The picture below is proof of how much he loves these cars. He takes them to bed with him every night and he has a Cars backpack that I had bought way before he ever started watching the movie and loads it up with his Cars cars and his Cars books. Yes, there are books too. Last Christmas my Aunt Kim had bought him this adorable set of 8 Cars books and carrier. I thought he was too young last year to have it out, so I put it in his closet with some other books that he isn't quite ready for. Well, we had watched the movie, he had fallen in love with it and then one day I was switching out some books and found the Cars books (which I had completely forgot about). It was like having Christmas in July. He was beaming. So now when we go places, we grab both boys, diaper bag, Cars backpack that contains 8 Cars books, McQueen, Chick, Big Mater, King, Doc, Red, baby Mater, and Sarge.
Praise the Lord these cars are only $3.98 each....and maybe I should practice some self control before he turns 16 and he wants several different cars. Jeff might not approve of me getting him a Honda, Toyota, Beamer and a Lexus.
I guess I will enjoy it while I can.

This past weekend we attempted our first family trip, with just us four. It was a great time to go to a hotel and not have to cook, clean, or have to worry about anything. Friday we headed to Grapevine, TX to the Great Wolf Lodge. We arrived around 3, unloaded and then headed to the water park. Joseph had a wonderful time. The toddler area was perfect for him. He was able to do everything in that area fairly easily.

Christian had a good time too splashing in the water and army crawling through it. I told Jeff that Christian looked like a Navy Seal in the water, because he moves along on his belly through the water. We even sent him down some slides, holding him of course, and he enjoyed it a great deal.

Joseph was telling my mom on Sunday that I pushed him down a big slide and that it wasn't very nice. That is true, but seriously, these water parks need to get on board and let me go down the slides with him. We went to the bigger kid area and I strapped on his life jacket and gave him a nudge and off he went. However, on the first turn, he ate it, and he ate it hard. He didn't cry, but Jeff, who was at the bottom waiting for him, said he looked very concerned. Joseph was done with that area after that.

There was a lot about this place that I loved and I really want to go back in the future, but Jeff says we need to wait until our youngest is about 3. And by youngest, he means our fourth (If the Lord allows it) being 3. I can't wait that long. I think if we wait two more years, Joseph will be 4, C will be 2 and maybe have a baby, it will still be fun for the two older one's. We did learn this week that Joseph is still at an age that he can't really get off his bed time routine or nap time. We ended the trip with him hitting me and having to sit out. I was making him get out of the water so we could dry off to get dressed and head out to Mimi's house. I did like his enthusiasm for wanting to stay in the water though.

October's off to a great start!

This past weekend my parents came in and we, of course, had a good time. The weekend started off with Jeff and I getting to go on a date. We went to Las Rosas where we shared some beef fajitas. We then headed to Home Depot to pick up some mulch and flowers for our flowerbeds that we were going to work on the next day. That evening ended with a stop at Starbucks where we were able to enjoy some coffee, conversation and just trying to kill time because we had just done the previous two in record time. (I think we are used to eating and doing things so fast because we always have the kids, and then when we are by ourselves, we are able to go slower, but I don't think we know how.)

Then Saturday morning, Jeff and I were going to work on the flowerbeds, but he ended up with the flu junk. He came outside and lasted for about 10 minutes and then ended up back in bed until after church on Sunday. I was very thankful my parents were in town because that could have been a long weekend without any help. So between my parents and myself, we were able to fix up the flowerbeds.

Then Saturday evening my parents, the boys and myself headed to BJ's for some good ol' pizza and Aggie football. The food and company were perfect, but the Aggies stunk it up.

Then Sunday afternoon, my mom and I took both boys to see Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs. Joseph laughed a lot and Christian was surprisingly interested in the movie too.

I have the pictures backwards, but here are the flowerbeds afterwards. You can't really tell that we did anything, but there are flowers in there. They are just really small.

Playing around with my new toy.

The beds before we touched them.

October is off to a good start. I really enjoy the fall now that I have kids. Tons of fun things to do. This month holds for us some exciting things: This weekend we are going to go to Grapevine, TX to the Great Wolf Lodge. It has an indoor water park and the the kids beds are replicas of tree houses, tents, and caves. We are in a cave room! They are also going to have a Trick or Treat Trail this weekend, so that should be fun. This month is Jeff's birthday, so I need to think of something to do there. Then we will be heading to Dallas for Halloween where my boys will be dressed as a famous brother duo.

Then of course, the pumpkin patch! I love dressing them up and taking pictures, so this should be fun. Oh, if anyone is willing to help me do this, please let me know. I don't think I can do it during the day by myself, and I don't really want to wait until the evening to do it.

Have a great October!