Casting Crumbs

Today is such a special day for me. For one, it is my brother Mike’s birthday and secondly because my firstborn son was born on this day.

Mike, I was just thinking how funny that for almost 10 years I have been teasing you that you are almost 40. This will be the very last year that I get to do that!! Next year you will be 40!!! I know, I know. . .it won’t be long and I will be there too. So, Mike, if you are reading this today. . .Have a wonderful Happy Day. I love you!

Mike on Christmas 2005

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This morning I awoke with birthday thoughts on my mind and got up to prepare Julian his special birthday breakfast. He chose “birthday eggs”.

Tom brought up his gift from the garage and put it in plain view of the breakfast table. After shooing Jaden off of it over and over, Julian came and in and gleefully accepted his prize. He had picked out the bike at Walmart and was thrilled to get it.

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Here is Julian 6 years ago when he was born and a picture of him today.

What six years of time can do. . .

He was such a gift from God after 9 years of no kids, we finally had a little bundle to raise. He has been a joy to us. It has been amazing how much he has grown up this last year. I think going to Kindergarten has turned him into a little man. He loves doing artwork and gracing all our walls with his pictures. He loves superheros, running and he has a very funny sense of humor. He adds so much to our home.

Happy Birthday, Julian!! We love you so very much!

Hi Everyone -

Thanks for your continued prayers! We appreciate them so much.

According to the calendar, it is officially Spring! I welcome it with open arms. I’m so ready for warm days and putting all the coats back in the closet. Yet winter visited us yet once again and I am thoroughly enjoying it’s beauty today! I was actually hoping for a few inches that would give us a snow day but only a dusting fell in our part of the area. I took some pictures of it and thought I would share them with you.

How great is our God!

His work is known throughout His creation!

It screams of his good pleasure. . .

And His awesome creativity!

Selah. . .

My wonderful friend, Megan, took this photo and I just had to share it. It’s soooo sweet! She surprised me at church today with a framed copy of it. Thank you, Megan!

Evely has turned into such a character, full of ornery mischief and getting into everything. It’s nice to see her this way once in awhile. There is nothing more peaceful than a sleeping baby!

“A baby will make love stronger, days shorter, nights longer, bankroll smaller, home happier, clothes shabbier, the past forgotten, and the future worth living for”

Here’s a little wish for you on this green day.

I promised everyone a rundown on my trip to Chicago. So here goes! To say it was an adventure is not doing it justice! It really was an adventure, excursion, a spree. . .with delightful moments, missed trains, laughter, tears and even FEARS!

We left Friday morning and headed for St. Louis to pick up another girl. We left St. Louis two hours behind schedule and tried to book it to Chicago. We were to be in downtown Chicago for the Beth Moore Conference at 7:00 P.M. We stopped at a gas station outside of Chicago and found out we were still a couple hours from our destination and it was almost 5:00 already! So a nice man suggested we drive to Joliet (a shorter distance) and catch the train and we would be downtown in an hour. So that’s what we did. . We drove to Joliet, found parking at the train station, ran to the train. . . and it left with us standing right in front of it!!!!!

Our train LEAVING without us!

We stayed at the station until the next train came at 6:45 p.m. So much for being at the conference on time. We finally made the train and enjoyed our hour long ride into downtown chicago.

Our beautiful group of girls in the train station.

When we got off the train we walked to the “L” (Chicago’s subway) which took us to the pavilion where the conference was.

Here we are on the “L”

Beth Moore was fantastic. It was fun letting these younger girls get a taste of a hero of our generation. All the way there they talked skeptically about Beth. . . while we raved. Then on the way home, I loved hearing them talk about her with great appreciation!

Beth!

After the conference we had a long ride back to our vans and decided to get hotel rooms there instead of staying with the people we were originally supposed to stay with. We checked into our rooms, ate some Taco Bell at 1:30 A.M. and fell into bed at 2:30! We had a very full, very fun, very eventful day!

Saturday we drove to the conference and then went to a diner called Ed Debevic’s. It was a 50′s diner that is known for their sort of “hateful attitudes”. The waitresses are not mannerly, ours at one point yelled “What is your problem!” at us. It was funny.

The staff at Ed’s dancing on the bar

After eating, it was off to Michigan Avenue for some shopping. We hadn’t thought about the St. Patrick’s Day parade being that day and it was crowded!!

Me, Megan and Michaela on Michigan Ave.

I have to say that this was not my kind of shopping. Everything was very expensive. We went in Saks Fifth Avenue and this is the sort of stuff they had. . .

Yup! The ugliest shirt in the world for $665.00!

We left the shopping district and headed toward Michaela’s friends house where we would stay the night. After getting lost in downtown Chicago for quite awhile, we all made it safely.

You can see how terrified we are.

The sirens stopped and we went over to Famous Barr. The sirens were going off again and a lady met us at the door and promptly escorted us to their back room that was like a storm shelter. We gathered with a bunch of other people listening to the sirens, the hail and hoping our windshields were not breaking.

This is some of the sights we saw when we finally left the store. . .

We praised God this wasn’t what happened to our vehicles!

When the storm had finally passed, we found that I70 was closed because a tractor trailer had turned over and it would be hours. So we took the best route and headed South to 50 Hwy. When we got to Sedalia we were in the middle of all the severe tornado storms!! Luckily we had our meteorologist Dad on the phone telling us every step of the way. There were times we drove really fast and others we parked and ran for our lives into a building. We would listen to the sirens while all huddling in a one hole bathroom and then get back on the road and drive for all we were worth! We finally made it!

We will never forget this trip! We were stretched to the limits, tired, encouraged, tried and challenged. It was all good!! All of it. I love these girls, they are wonderful. They never complained. We were encouraged by their quick response to pray whenever we didn’t know where we were or what we were going to do. I feel so privileged that they accepted me and included me in their trip and in their lives! Thanks, girls!

I am so blessed and excited to be leaving for Chicago tomorrow morning! The college age girls from church are going to hear Beth Moore and I was invited to go along as a sponsor.

The weird thing is that when I heard they were going several months ago I thought “Wow, I would love to go with them!”. I knew that would never happen so I put it out of my head.

Then Sunday night the youth pastor mentioned that I should go. I said “Oh, there’s no way!” Then I asked what the details were and wondered why I was standing there wallowing in this impossibility. I got in the car and threw out to Tom that Andrew had asked me to go and I was shocked to hear him say “Well, you should go!! You really should!” So my babysitting all fell into place, the money came together amazingly – all in one day! It was truly a “God moment” for me. So tomorrow I leave. I am sitting here writing this when I should be packing while the kiddos nap. Oh well, I am too excited and wanted to share it with you.

Pray that we all have a very safe trip and that we are touched and changed forever by HIS presence! I’ll give a report when I get back.

Sorry to post two things in one day, but I wanted to share my kiddos having fun on Wednesday. It was such a beautiful day – a true day of beauty. The weather was a warm almost 80!! Spring was teasing and it beckoned us all outside for several hours. It was such fun to swing the kids, swing the kids, swing the kids. . .okay, I was starting to get tired of swinging them! You get the picture. They, however, never did get tired of swinging.

Three happy amigos.

She pulled her shoes and this sock off. I am still looking for that sock!

Jaden peeking

They were so excited to be outside and Evely just cried when I finally made them all come in. She crawled over to the back door and stood there looking out the window crying. Poor baby.

Evely being happy.

Oh I am sooo ready for Spring!! It can’t come quick enough.

I have to share this really fun experience with you all. Part of you will say “I guess you just had to be there. . .” But it was just so funny.

Last Sunday we met some friends at a pizza place for lunch after church. Then a whole bunch of other church people showed up and we had the whole back half of the place filled with friends, family and lots of kids! We were having a good ‘ol time.

I noticed that my Julian was in this heated conversation with my Dad. I finally figured out what the fuss was about. We were sitting next to THIS!

A kid’s big temptation!

I kept explaining to Julian that you put money in that machine and you just always lose. After quite the discussion I said “Okay, Julian, here’s two quarters. Go play it and when you lose I don’t want to hear any more about it! ” (I am such a nice Mommy ).

So he goes over to the machine and WINS!!! Yeah, we all just started hollering and exclaiming with delight that we couldn’t believe he had won. So we gave him two more quarters because his little friend McKenna wanted a bear too. Guess what. . .!!! He won AGAIN!

Needless to say, everyone started digging for quarters and going to the cash register to get quarters for bills. The kids were moved over so all the adults could play. I think 5 animals were taken out of that machine.

We drew the hugest crowd ever and each time the hook was centered and dropped, people cheered or groaned if the animal fell off. Once we had two animals in the hook and it dropped off at the last minute. With that one my Dad said “Man, you’d think this was the super bowl!” He was right.

You can see all the adults gathered in the mirror
This is one of the “wins” being pulled out of the bunch

Tomorrow is Mom’s last chemo treatment! She really dreads it just because in her mind she is soooo completely DONE with it. However, she is keeping up a great attitude and is so very thankful this is the last one!

She has really come a long way since September. She is excited to get on with healing and feeling better once all this chemo wears off.

Pray again that the side affects will be very minimal for her on this last treatment. That is the part she dreads so much.

Thank you all for praying!!!