Monday, July 21, 2014

Who Needs a Pool When You Have a Creek?!?!

I think we are in love with summer.  We are still as busy as ever {seriously, we've not had one week yet without traveling}, but what's not to love about the hot days, warm nights, cool treats, grilled dinners, and trips to the creek?!  Yes, the creek was apart of Matt's and my childhood, so we have started to make it apart of Jude's you can see last year's visits here and here}.  He definitely loves it, too.  We went a couple weeks ago to keep the tradition alive, and it was hard to tear him away at the end of our visit.  From rock throwing, minnow watching {because those little things are so hard to catch}, and crawl dad hunting, he loved it all.  We hope to be back sooner than later. {Please note: this creek visit was the week before Matt went to India, and we are so excited that he arrives home this week.}


















Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Sending Matt Off to India + A Pregnancy Update

Matt has been away now for one week to India.  That's right, India, the country on the other side of our planet.  He and three other friends Robert, Cody, and Robbie, are spending two weeks visiting schools, churches, and villages, sharing the love of Jesus to the people of India.  This trip is not something that we decided would just be a "bucket list thing" for Matt to be able do, but rather to fulfill the mission that God has called all of his followers to do..."Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation." Mark 16:15.  So far, all of the daily reports have been fantastic with many souls accepting Christ and lives being changed by the Word that is brought forth.  We are on a 9 1/2 hours time difference, but have managed to FaceTime daily.  Yay!  Jude and I even watched Matt preach this morning via Live Stream...gotta love technology.  By the way, Jude did the cutest thing while we were watching the service.  He kept yelling something at the screen and I thought he trying to talk to Matt.  I said, "Jude, Daddy cannot hear you."  He replied, "No, Mommy. I'm saying, 'Praise God, Daddy'".  Talk about melting my heart.  :)  Jude and I are very proud of Matt and are now counting down the days until he gets back home.

Here are some pics of our farewell dinner date from last Wednesday.  We went with one of our favorite dinner spots, City BBQ.  We also took some 24 week pregnancy pics while we were out.  I can't believe that I've been carrying Ezra for 6 months now.  Time seems to be flying.  This little guy moves what seems to be constantly, which is amazing while I'm awake but not so cool at 2am.  ;)  Yes, the heartburn started this week too, but I really have no complaints.  I feel completely blessed to be able to carry this child and cannot wait to meet him!









Monday, July 7, 2014

An American Weekend

We celebrated America in a big way over the weekend.  Celebrating Independence Day deserves more than just a small party, so we started on the 3rd of July by taking Haven to fireworks after service.  We were sans Jude.  With us not knowing how he'd react this year (you may recall last year was not a success in the firework department), we thought it best to send him to his Mamaw's.  The fireworks were fantastic (thank you, Dayton, OH), but just being with our friends made the night all the more amazing. 





We began the 4th by taking some family pictures.  Matt used to work at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and received a more-than-gigantic American flag that had been retired.  He decided that he would hang the flag this year in front of the house.  It was larger than our house and totally in the holiday spirit.  We took a few pics in front of it and the sun decided to add some flares to a few of our pics, but we rather liked their festive look.




(yes, the union should is displayed on the left... we were on the reverse side because of the wind)






We then ventured out to a couple parties for the afternoon on the fourth.  First, we went to my Uncle Jeff & Aunt Mary's house for a family cookout.  We had such a relaxing time with our family & the food was out of this world.  The downfall was I only managed to get a couple iPhone photos from that event.  Afterwards, we went to our friends' house Kent and Kandy Keller for their annual firework show.  This one we decided to let Jude in on. ;)  There were so many friends to catch up with in attendance and Jude had too much fun pretending to drive their golf cart, hunting lightning bugs with Papaw, and playing with sparklers.  The fireworks seem to only get better with each passing year at the Keller's.  Jude got a little scared (could've been something to do with the fact that we felt like we were practically right under them), but nothing like in the past...so we are chalking it up as a success.






We ended the weekend with a celebration of freedom at church.  Again, I only brought out my iPhone, so the pictures are not that great in quality, but wow, what an amazing day.  Our church service reflected on historic times that led us to the freedom we our privileged to enjoy in our country.  Then, we had a potluck feast followed by a water slide, corn hole tournament, bouncy house, children's race, and softball.  We forgot all about nap time and played until our hearts were content.  Like I said, we celebrated in a big way.  We hope you had a great weekend too.





Wednesday, July 2, 2014

SOYC 2014

Southern Ohio Youth Camp was last week.  This is one of my favorite weeks out of the year; however, I broke out my camera only...count this...2 days.  Fail, right?!?!  As it turns out being five and a half months pregnant and chasing after a toddler while camping with a lot of kids is a little tiring.  Who would've thought. :)  Even still it was an amazing week.  God moved in our students' lives in such a mighty way.  I keep hearing testimonies of how they have been transformed.  This is what makes the time, effort, prayers, and investment worth it.  I captured moments on Thursday & Friday during our tribal war activities.  Matt, along with a lot of awesome leaders, organized crazy fun games for the camp.  Jude and I stood on the side lines cheering everyone on most of the week, which is second best to actually being in the games.