The Beginning of the End

All of you loyal readers know the crazy ride we’ve been on for the past 16 months. So, with a good bit of excitement I am thrilled to tell you that after a long week of counter offers and negotiations, we signed a contract to sell our house back in Gastonia!!

While we couldn’t be more thrilled to be moving on from this chapter of our lives, there will be some tears shed as we part with this beautiful place that we called home. There were so many sweet memories with so many wonderful people, made in that house… but we’ll save that for another blog post. :)

God has been SO faithful in providing for us EVERY step of the way, even when things seemed impossible. This last bit of the journey I am certain will only show more of HIS greatness!

SO… we can’t wait to share the whole story of how everything has unfolded… but we want to see how this last chapter plays out. So hang tight with us, pray with us, and may our October 1st closing date come quickly without problems. There is a BIG CELEBRATION party to be had!

Thanks y’all!

We love you and are so glad to share this journey with you.

 

August 2005 – Our 1st Home (and baby)

Little Mamas

Tonight we enjoyed dinner with another great family we’ve met through church and oh how Mark and I have missed great fellowship like that. Amazing people with such great hearts!

They have three wonderful kids—all older than Audrey and Madeline who wonderfully entertained them all night long. Here is Olivia, Audrey’s “little mama” this evening!

I was MORE than happy to have a break from holding Audrey all the time and I am pretty sure Olivia had fun taking care of her. A definite win-win situation.

We look forward to more evenings with new friends as we begin to sink our feet in and turn this place into “home.”

Miss Fashonista

Madeline has been dressing herself since she was three but only in the last few months does she want to pick out her own clothes.

I know that lots of people let their kids pick out their own clothes and wear what they want, but I am a little too “Type A” for that. I was in the habit of giving her two options every day and she seemed pretty fine with that but then suddenly she wanted to pick out Audrey’s clothes for the day and wanted their outfits to coordinate together. WHOA… too much effort to go through EVERY morning. So we came up with a system.

**Remember: We have very little furniture with us where we are living right now—most is still in Gastonia.**

The girls clothes are all crammed in the one closet in their bedroom but every weekend, I go through and pull out 7 (or more) outfits for each of them. In our bedroom, I have the bottom two drawers in our dresser empty, one for Madeline’s outfits and one for Audrey’s.

Each morning, Madeline brings Audrey with her to our bedroom and discusses with Audrey what they should wear each day. I am sometimes shocked that Madeline even allows Audrey to pick her own outfit sometimes.

Here she is in her drawer… I decided to let her get dressed before I took a picture of her this morning. :)

It’s a system that works great for us—she is happy that she gets many choices, and I am happy that she isn’t wearing mismatched things! Let’s hope this nice little system works for a few years once she enters her school age years.

Tongue Tied

Madeline had a nice long stretch without any major injuries, but Saturday we reset her “days with no injuries” back to zero.

She and Mark were playing with the dogs, jumping around, carrying on when they ran into each other and sobbing ensued, from Madeline that is.

I was brushing my teeth in the bathroom, so when Mark brought her in there, all I could see was blood gushing out of her mouth.

** Random fact you might not know about me… I hate ANYTHING to do with teeth! Seriously, you could be missing an arm and squirting blood everywhere or have a key stuck in your eye and I wouldn’t flinch… but teeth. CAN’T STAND THEM!! Makes me shudder just thinking about dental injuries. Madeline’s front tooth injury at 18 months was enough to nearly send ME to the hospital.**

I sent Mark to get a washcloth to stop the bleeding so he could assess the situation… meaning, make sure all teeth were intact… and then I could deal with the rest. As I waited for him, Madeline was hysterical, so I just pushed her head into my shirt and let her cry. She calmed down pretty quickly, and we realized she took a big huge chomp out of her tongue. (She has the same marks on the bottom of her tongue too.)

After a quick call to Shannon (my 24 hour ER nurse hotline) to confirm that there was nothing they would do we went for a popsicle to make it feel better. HOWEVER, when I went to pick her up, she started crying again, almost as frantically as when she bit her tongue. What was the matter now?!? She saw what happened to my shirt.

She was SO upset that she had ruined my clothes (pajama shirt, I might add). I reassured her that I could get the stain out and she didn’t need to worry. She was okay after that but insisted on wearing a red shirt herself, in case she started bleeding again. (Seriously, what 4 year old gets that upset over staining clothes?!?)

I would think that biting your tongue would hurt like crazy, but she hasn’t complained once. Today, two days later, it’s a bit purple and bruised, but healing nicely I’d say!

Just another fun story to add to the books. Let’s hope we can get back on a accident free streak for awhile!

Snakes

One of the guys Mark knows from back in Gaston County, was down our way this weekend, doing a program on snakes at one of the state parks.

It had finally stopped raining so we decided to check out the new to us park, and spend some time outside.

Aunt Rachel and Oma would have LOVED this presentation, as he brought some of his snake friends along with him.

We learned all about the common misconceptions of venomous snakes, what to do if you come across one, and overall some basic snake knowledge.

THEN we got to see these guys up close and personal. Audrey wanted so bad for them to crawl all over her, but this guy only slithered across her arm once or twice. You should have heard her giggle.

The guy mentioned that he sometimes does birthday parties for kids, and that’s all we heard about for at least 5 minutes out of Audrey. “Snake Birthday Party. Me. Too!”

Then there was Madeline, not quite as brave, but still touching Mr. Snake plenty.

Where we live now has the most variety of snakes in NC and while these guys didn’t bother me a bit, I can guarantee I would be as calm if I walked up on one in the woods.

Oh, the fun of nature and some excitement on a Saturday morning! Here’s hoping I don’t have to have a snake party next year! :)

Sing-a-long with Audrey

Madeline was not a toddler that liked to sing or dance. Seriously, anytime we would sing to her she would yell "stop, stop." I don't think I ever heard her sing anything until she was 3. Now at age 4, she finally does sing, but we still aren't allowed to sing with her. Just one of her most interesting quirks!

Audrey, however, has always been a singing/dancing fool!! She loves music of all kinds and we love to dance and sing with her. (Even if Madeline doesn't!)

I shot a few videos of her singing for you. She doesn't do it all by herself yet, but the faces that this child makes and the way she ends her notes at the end of songs CRACK me up!

The first is Jesus Loves Me:

Then we have her rendition of the alphabet:

And my personal favorite for funny faces, Zacchaeus! She starts out slow on this one, but the end is worth the wait.

She preformed a few more for us... Twinkle, Twinkle and Itsy Bitsy Spider... but I won't bore you to pieces.

Hope you enjoyed her singing debut, she will be wanting a karaoke machine for a birthday soon, I can already tell!! Not sure what will happen when she figures out how to dance and sing at the same time... WATCH OUT!

Perler Beads

For those of you who are clueless about what Perler beads are, don’t feel bad, I actually had to look up the name of the beads too. I had no idea what they were called but I sure loved them as a kid and was pretty sure Madeline would too.

I remember them as those tiny plastic beads you make shapes/patterns with and then iron them so they stick together. We did them in VBS when I was a kid!

I got a HUGE  container of them (and the patterns) from IKEA last time we were there knowing it would be a great birthday present. If it’s a “craft” it is 100% certain that Madeline will love it. And of course she did.

Getting the beads on the pegs just like you want them is nearly impossible, especially if you are being helped by a certain 2 year old that can’t stand to be left out. I completed my random color “masterpiece” quickly so that I could iron it and show Madeline what it would look like when she was done. She thought it was pretty cool but by the look on her face I could tell that she didn’t approve of my random color pattern.

So she sat there for about 3o minutes lining her TINY beads up in perfect order, and made a beautiful rainbow heart. She has the patience of her daddy, that is for sure!! If she’d knock some over, she’d just take them off and start over.

By the time we were done, I had officially banned Audrey from these beads until her 21st birthday or whenever she moves out of my house—THAT was a mess I didn’t enjoy cleaning up at all. And oh did she think it was funny. I know I say it all the time, but how in the world can 2 children, with the same parents, be SO different?!?

Another fun rainy day of crafting at our house! I’m praying for some sun soon because although we’ve had plenty of new things to play with at home this week, I am about to go stir crazy being stuck in the house. I want to go the beach for goodness sake!! :)

Legos

Madeline got her first set of Legos from the Raynor crew for her birthday! If you haven’t seen the cool “girl Legos” they have out now, you should totally check out the Lego aisle next time you are out shopping. They are quite amazing!!She was so excited about her gift but then quite disappointed that I made her wait until we got back to our house to open it and begin assembly! (Sorry, Madeline. 400+ pieces with 4 kids around. I didn’t think we stood a chance!!)

This morning I got Audrey busy playing with her dollhouse in the playroom and set Madeline up with her Legos on the kitchen table. The age on these Legos are 6-12 years, but I figured we could do it in a few different sittings and she would do well with it.

Well, she blew me away!! I opened the book and she quickly started picking out pieces and assembling. Don’t get me wrong, she by no means could do it by herself, but with me pointing at the pictures and asking her questions as she was working, she was well on her way to building a masterpiece.

Some of these pieces, you’d need fingers as small as hers to fit together. I’m amazed at who comes up with all these designs… and the poor people that have to pack all the materials!! CRAZY!

She worked for a solid hour and finished the whole thing. Every time I asked her if she wanted to take a break, she’d say “No mom… we are getting so close!” She was quite proud of herself as you can tell!

Captain Crazy made her appearance halfway through building, and Madeline was nice enough to let her play with the outdoor portion she had already finished. Of course we had to rebuild parts of it, but Audrey got bored pretty quickly and went and dragged out her Mega blocks to build monsters instead. We did have to pretend to be scared every time she ran in the kitchen with a new “monster” growling, but overall that child is so good at entertaining herself!!

So here is the completed café!

Tonight we ran to Wal-Mart to pick up a few things and we went to check out the other Lego sets because she mentioned she would like to buy another set with the birthday money she got. She found a few in her price range, but really liked two sets that were above the amount she has by $5 and $10.

I told her that I would give her the $5 if she would help me clean out her old toys and donate some to Goodwill and then we would think of another way she could save up $5 more. With the most serious face, she turned around and said, “Can’t I just call Oma?” I just shook my head.

I was never much into Legos as a kid, but it appears I’m going to be as an adult. I must say that with all the cool girl sets now, they are much more appealing.

Stay tuned for the continuation of the Lego saga and how she earns her money to buy her next set, I’m sure there will be a story to tell!

Trampoline

We’ve been talking about it all summer, but tonight we FINALLY got together with one of the wonderful families we’ve met through our church in Southport.

Mark and I enjoyed some adult conversation over dinner while our two little ones, had 4 new friends to entertain them! They were excited to play with all their cool stuff inside… until then they found out they had a trampoline!

This was the first time my girls have ever been on a real full size trampoline before. They absolutely LOVED it!

Audrey had Julie and Kelly to assist her all night with everything. They were so good to her!

Before long, they got their jumping legs acclimated and were all about it! All I heard the whole way home was about how they wanted a trampoline for Christmas.

We had a great evening with the Bible Family and can’t wait to hang out again soon!

Celebrating Birthdays

Before heading back home today, we met up with Gramma and Grampa Blevins for dinner to celebrate Madeline and Grampa’s birthdays. (Grampa’s birthday was on the 12th!)

My two were more than excited to see them!

The wait staff at Cracker Barrel came and sang “Happy Birthday”, bringing cake and ice cream along. Who wouldn’t like that on their birthday?!

It was definitely not a crowded night, so we spent some time on the “front porch” chatting and letting the girls play.

Audrey was all about the rocking chairs.

Both of the girls found their dancing feet as we listened to the country and bluegrass music. Perhaps we should be listening to more of this at home!

 

And Madeline got a lesson in checkers from Grampa… she still tries to make up her own rules!

It was a great evening for celebrating birthdays and catching up.

We hit the road at dark and are back home with the big mess unloaded from the car. The forecast for tomorrow is rain… looks like we will have a day ahead organizing and checking out all of Madeline’s new birthday presents. Sounds like a restful day to me!!

The Great Chicken Chase

We got to Raleigh LATE Thursday night so that Madeline could spend some extra time with her cousins for her birthday celebrations.

She got to pick all our activities on Friday, so we started off at Marbles, the kid’s museum in downtown Raleigh.

All the kids had their favorite places here, and we only caught them all together for a picture once, because we FORCED them to stand still!

Madeline had Isaac dressed up and cheering with her…

Audrey was a big fan of the science lab in the submarine…

And Lucas tricked us into building this with him so that when we got really into building, he could sneak off and scare the mess out of us. That would be the first time we lost him that day! Not sure if it is boys in general or just him, but man can he get away in a hurry!!

After three hours of play, we had some tired little ones but we were off to lunch, so they only caught a cat nap!

After lunch and REAL naps at home, Madeline and Audrey wanted to go and play with the chickens. The Raynors added these to their backyard farm back in May, so we’ve seen them grow up from baby chicks into the big old girls they are now.

Aunt Rachel lets them walk around outside of the cage sometimes and is able to hold them, so she went out and opened the coop. THAT is when the real fun began.

Here is how it began… nice chickens…

And then I had to put my camera down because all chaos broke loose!! All 4 chickens came out and were not staying around the coop like they normally do, mainly because Isaac was trying to catch them. They were not big fans of this at all, so they scattered. That’s when Rachel and I got a little nervous about them flying over the back fence and into the road. YIKES!! We really weren’t planning on chicken for dinner.

We started to circle the chickens back to the coop when the kids got bored with what we were doing and went on to other activities.

First, we looked up and didn’t see Lucas. Escape #2 for him today. The entire backyard is fenced but they do have a deep fishpond. SO, when we didn’t see him, I immediately ran there. He is there sitting on the ground next to the pond “fishing.” I brought him back with me to help chicken chase.

Next, I heard Audrey yelling from the top of their giant play set… “POOP.” Well, although we are in the first weeks of big girl panties, I called her bluff because normally we go to the potty to poop about 10 times before she actually goes. I figured I could ignore her this once, we have a small chicken crisis, right?? (Later I find out this is the first time she actually meant what she said. Oh, well.)

Rachel and I had gotten 2 of the chickens back in the coop at this point when we heard a big splash. Lucas and Audrey were both with us and I could see both big kids. We inquired about what fell in the pond and turns out Isaac had filled his small wheelbarrow with rocks and with Madeline’s assistance they dumped the rocks AND the wheelbarrow into the fishpond. He was trying to fill in the hole! Great!! But cleaning up THIS mess would have to wait until we caught two more chickens.

After chasing them around the coop about 100 more times, Rachel went in for the catch. Red Star settled right down and was very patient while Audrey petted and hugged all over her.

Snowball… was NOT too excited about being caught… AT ALL!

Did I mention that at this point Madeline was crying because she busted her knee on one of the big rocks while she was running around?!

I kid you not that this all happened in a period of 1o minutes—but the second we got the chicken coop locked, the wheelbarrow out of the pond, ALL the kids were herded into the house for some TV time. Rachel and I needed a BREAK! I have no idea which was more difficult… chasing 4 chickens or chasing our 4 kids!!

Keeping up with THESE four is always a challenge but never would I ever say that it is dull! We had a fun day but we were ready for some daddy relief by 5pm!! Thank goodness for the arrival of Brian, Mark, and Oma and Opa!!

Did I mention these events were all in the first 24 hours we were together?!

GOOD TIMES!!

Happy 4th Birthday Madeline!

Which way to the party?!

When I asked Madeline a few weeks ago what she wanted to do for her birthday, she said she wanted to go spend it with her cousins. Easy enough for me, so we started making plans. We came up to Raleigh on Friday and have had A TON of fun, of which I will post all about later.

But today was her BIG DAY!!

Madeline’s favorite meal of the day is breakfast, so we ended up having a brunch party for her birthday. Aunt Rachel found her a perfect shirt for the occasion. Next to noodles… bacon is her favorite food!

It was just a small family and friends gathering. Don’t they all look like a cheery bunch for breakfast?!

Even though it was brunch, we still saved room for birthday cake!! This year she wanted butterflies… not one, but MANY butterflies… and in all colors. (She’s getting a little demanding about her cake specifications as she gets older.) 

I must say, I had a lot of fun creating this masterpiece and it turned out so sweet! AND she loved it. (The center was a small cake for her with 4 butterflies and a big M, surrounded by individual cupcakes for everyone else.)

She got a bunch of fun new things from her birthday guests, but her reactions to opening the presents were my favorite! She must have said, “this is exactly what I wanted” about five different times. 

After the party crowd cleared and we had naps, Aunt Rachel pulled out another surprise for Madeline. A piñata! She had asked for one late this week but I couldn’t find a cute one worth buying. Well of course Aunt Rachel found one at Target and filled it with some Madeline type fun. She doesn’t like chocolate so instead Aunt Rachel filled it with mints, hot wheels cars, bouncy balls, starbursts and my personal favorite … string cheese!! The kids took turns swinging bats and had the best time breaking the piñata even though it required some help from Uncle Brian.

The kids spent most of the evening playing with new toys and just having fun together. It was a busy day but definitely filled with Madeline’s favorite things. When I asked Madeline at bedtime what her favorite part of her day was today, she smiled real big and said… “all of it.”

I told her today that she was getting SO BIG and she wouldn’t be my “baby” much longer—to that she replied—“Don’t worry Mom, I’ll always be your baby!” Tears?! I think so.

How has time passed so quickly?! Her arrival four years ago brought on all new meaning to our lives and I enjoy every second that I get to be her mother. She has such a kind heart and a loving spirit and I can’t wait to watch her grow into a beautiful young lady. We love you Madeline and had a great day celebrating the gift of YOU!!

Weekly Museum Fun

Now that we have a membership to the Wilmington Children’s Museum, thanks again Gramma Blevins, we are able to sign up and participate in their weekly classes. They have something going on every day… art, science, cooking, reading… for all different ages.

Today was our first official class that we’ve signed up for, ice painting, and the girls LOVED it. The museum staff had prepared all sorts of fun ice… watercolor, glitter glue, tempera paint… all frozen in cubes. They only  had the primary colors so the kids were able to experiment with mixing colors and different painting utensils. Don’t you know it was my kid that said “popsicle” and started licking the paint cubes. Yup, thanks Audrey!

The classes don’t take long, so today we also explored the rest of the art room; painting pictures, drawing with chalk, and designing paper houses.

Madeline and I also had fun tower building with these fun things. (No idea what they are called but you can tell how much Audrey liked this activity.)

We only stayed a little over an hour but I think that is what I am going to keep our time to each week. The drive to the museum from our house is 10 minutes, I FINALLY found a street with free parking for an hour downtown near the museum, and by spending a shorter amount of time each week I’m certain they won’t get bored with the activities because they won’t be doing the same ones each visit.

Next week, we have signed up for a cooking class and Madeline already decided we will be exploring the veterinarian and dentist office areas next week! Works for me!

Not sure who is going to enjoy this museum membership more… me or the girls!!

Our First Repeat

Mark has lots of fun things associated with his job that we get to participate in and some of our favorites events are the 4-H events.

It’s nearing the end of August, so tonight was the End of Summer 4-H bash! The girls were more than excited to go eat hot dogs, popcorn, and popsicles for dinner. Super healthy, huh? Look at Little Miss Big Stuff! She thinks she is something drinking lemonade from her own big can.

Always a big hit… the bouncy house! The big 4-H kids are so great about watching out for my two little ones.

The girls helped Mark and I make their own tie dye t-shirts. They turned out really cool but when we went to pick them up off the clothesline before we left, Audrey’s had disappeared. I assume it was an honest mistake, Madeline blamed the bad guys, and Audrey was just in tears… “my shirt? my shirt?” All of the tie dye stuff had been put inside already, but good thing we know someone important… haha!! Mark went inside and made Audrey another shirt and all is well with the world! :)

Noodle javelin throw, anyone?? We had a heck of a time keeping Audrey off of this “apparatus.” She was certain that she was supposed to climb it! UGH!! “But why not, mommy? Why?” She is SO hardheaded. No idea where she gets that from!?

While we did have a fun night with all the 4-H kids, I had another one of those, what I like to call, “sucky” moments. We attended the 4-H End of Summer Event last year, so it is our first “repeat” event since we moved here. Why is that a bad thing you ask?

Well, it means that here we are, a year later, in very much the same situation that we have been trying to get out of for an ENTIRE year. God’s blessings are abundant in that He continues to make ends meet for us, but we still are paying a mortgage on an empty house not being able to “settle” somewhere of our own here.

It’s been a rough few weeks processing through that for me. Being home this past weekend didn’t help. I know there are people that understand, but there are a lot that don’t. Walking into our house in Gastonia is hard. It’s still quite full of our things, things that have been in boxes for 14 months. Thinking about that to me now is almost unimaginable, but somehow God has walked me through moment by moment, day by day, and month by month. His ways are higher than mine, His love for me is greater than I can fathom, and His timing is perfect in every way.

So, we keep walking, because He is building our faith and changing our hearts. I’d like to think it’s getting easier, but it’s not. So, please pray for me as I seek to find JOY in our new life, and NOT focus on the “sucky” moments.

TROUBLE

In traveling across the state this past weekend we stopped in to see my parents in Hickory. We are very blessed that they never complain about our wacky schedule, how short or how long we are able to visit, they are just happy to have us whenever we can be there. (And I happen to LOVE that I get a break from the kids hanging on me, yummy home cooked meals from my mom, and a bartender that knows exactly what drink I always need in my hand!)

And these three in no time flat, can always get themselves into a heap of trouble. On this certain afternoon it was with the washable markers and the write-on placemats… somehow all three of them were COVERED in marker! But of course, a good time was had by all.

We sure do miss being a 45 minute car trip away, but we’ll take any time we can get with them. Thanks for accommodating our schedule like always Oma and Opa… we love you!

Say CHEESE

Yesterday on our way up to the wedding, we were a little ahead of schedule so we stopped in West Jefferson at the Ashe County Cheese House.

It has been YEARS since I’ve been there, but I don’t think it’s changed much, EXCEPT for the giant cows outside, they were new to me, and the girls thought they were pretty cool.

I remember actually touring the inside of the cheese factory back when I was in Girl Scouts—but maybe we just got special privileges. Now they have a small viewing room where you can watch a video and see the inside of the factory. No one was too impressed here. (Oh, who am I kidding! I’m sure Mark thought it was great.)

The girls and I were ready to move on to samples and the gift shop!

So much CHEESE!! Audrey was in heaven!

Madeline decided that she would get candy and Audrey could get ice cream and they would share. But Audrey is smart, she didn’t want to share so she picked a funky flavor (Orange Pineapple) and Madeline took back her offer to share! :)

Fun little side trip in downtown West Jefferson! Nothing like some time to kill and my three favorite sidekicks to find a little adventure.