Christmas and some good news!

Hello again everyone! Well I think most of you probably know this already but our biggest and best Christmas news was finding out that we will be adding a baby GIRL to our family in May! I can't believe it! We're really excited. Matt has been teaching Marshall to chant "brother" so now we need to learn "sister"!!!

We both kind of thought we would have a boy so we were very surprised to hear the technician say...it's a girl! None the less we are so excited about a girl!

Well Christmas has come and gone. My tree is gone and decorations are all cleaned up:( It's a little sad but I'm happy to have my house in order once again. I cannot believe that a new year begins tomorrow!

I hope everyone has a wonderful New Years!

Marshall's most beloved gift was the tool kit he got from my parents. It had a hard hat, along with belt and suspenders and all the tools he needs to destroy my coffee table!

First thing the next morning:)

Grandpa and his boys!

Marshall getting some movies!

Matt's grandma gave him his grandpa's old Bible for Christmas. It is so worn and fragile but such a special gift. Matt's grandpa started a church when he was young as well...what a meaningful gift.

Snow Snow Snow!

I cannot believe it's been snowing for almost a week here now! We woke up Sunday morning to snow and as a family tradition we grab Starbucks and head towards south salem since the elevation is higher out there. Matt loves to drive in the snow and as you'll see from the pics it was a winter wonderland. Marshall had fun but didn't really love trying to walk in it. He kept wanting me to hold him...very weird for my child:)
Anyways this first pic is of Heidi and I and the boys at the Salem Festival of Lights. Just a little parade they had here on Saturday night. They started blocking off all the roads early that night and Heidi and I were trying to get to a decent parking spot. I "accidentally" went a wrong way through an alley and then had my sister get out of the car to move some roadblocks. Wouldn't you know that right as she was moving the last one a motorcycle cop drove up and told us to go the other way! I was almost to my parking spot. (I hope my dad isn't reading this)
Anyways we did end up getting a great parking spot and a good story out it. Seriously I never do things like that...I just didn't think they'd have people patrolling the area yet:)
Hope everyone is enjoying this crazy weather!

By the way we have a big outreach service this coming Sunday night which we've invited a bunch of families from our community to. We're planning on having Santa, goodies, gifts and a great service so please pray that we don't have to cancel because of the snow! Thanks!

the beach in december...

We took a little family trip to the beach last Saturday. It was really fun. Very cold, as it should be in December, but Marshall definitely enjoyed the ocean. Just a few pictures of our trip:)

The First Haircut!

So Matt and I decided last week that it was finally time to take Marshall to get his hair cut. Not to mention we were getting a little pressure from some of my friends...you know who you are:)
So we headed to the barber shop where Matt always gets his hair cut by Elisa! She is wonderful but Marshall freaked out! I put him down in the chair and he reached his arms up for me and said 'mommy' in a very sad voice. So we thought maybe Matt would go first so Marshall could watch. He adjusted himself a little to the shop and we tried again. This time sitting on Matt's lap. As you'll see I spent most of the time trying to distract him from the actual haircut. He was spraying water all over the place and eating a sucker at the same time. I don't know what it was but he was not a fan of the haircut.
By the way I'm planning on learning how to cut his hair because it's so stinkin' expensive even for a kid!

Happy with a spray bottle and a sucker...this was his second sucker by the way.

Looking at his shoes to get him to put his head down...
This is one of my absolute favorite pics of all time. He's all done with his haircut but he just wanted to get out of that chair so bad. He doesn't really like being contained!

Wow it's so true that after they get their first haircut they look like a little boy. Bye bye baby Marshall!

O Christmas Tree!

My aunt and uncle own a Christmas tree farm in Lake Oswego and my family has begun a tradition of getting our trees together! This past Saturday was the chosen day for this event and we had a great time. Grandpa kept the boys busy playing "drums" in the garage as we were all getting ready to go!

Bright eyed and bushy tailed!Marshall obviously ran for the tractor the minute we set him on the ground...now joined by cousin Deakan.

Marshall's looking for the perfect tree...

...but Matt is the one who found it.
Daddy's little helper!

And Marshall got the end the trip with a tractor ride with aunt Laura.

A little early Christmas prep!

Now I know it's not even Thanksgiving yet but sometimes I feel like Christmas comes and goes so fast that I really want to enjoy the whole season this year. Thus leading me to start my Christmas projects early. We haven't had stockings up until this point because every time I looked at the stores I couldn't find something I liked or I thought was even worth what it was priced. So this year I decided to take matters into my own hands and create our very own stockings. And since I just finished them last night I couldn't very well just leave them in a box, no they needed to be up on the wall! So here is my first Christmas project! I have another cutout for the baby but we don't know the sex or name yet so we'll wait and add that one next year!

Just a little snapshot of Marshall. He likes to wear my running shoes, yes with his little ankles crossed, while he watches Veggie Tales!

Ps - For those of you, Chels, who have requested a pic of my belly to see what I look like prego right now, you'll have to wait until I look officially cute and pregnant! It might be a while....

It's so cute when you're pregnant with your first child and nothing is stretched yet. Not the case with the second one. Just look like I've put on a few pounds:)

Outward Church!

Well I finally have a few minutes, a computer and an occupied child in order for me to update my blog! I have tried the last few days but couldn't get online...sad. Anyways I don't have any new cute pics of Marshall so I decided to post some pics of the other love of our lives, Outward Church. I realized that many of my blogging friends haven't been able to come to Outward so I wanted to show a few pics of what goes on for us every Sunday night!
God is doing awesome things at the church and we are so excited to be a part of it! Enjoy!
Oh yes and pictures compliments of Michelle Young of course!

Outside of the theater!

Our other worship leader, Grae.

Matt speaking...he might be praying here I think his eyes are closed!

Matt leading worship.

Aaron our associate pastor speaking!

Okay so I did find one cute picture of Marshall and the backside of Deakan in the nursery!