So here is the debut recording of my son's worship leading abilities! He honestly started doing this all on his own. Obviously he has been observing Matt and Grae leading worship at the church and is apparently taking decent notes!
By the way he is using a pick as well...doesn't like to play w/o one:)
Happy Wednesday...
For the last few months I have been slowly making my way through the "Experiencing God" Bible Study by Henry Blackaby. I've been mulling over so many things and wanted to share with/encourage you to pick up this study if you've never done it before.
I feel as though it's radically changing my life! This past year has definitely been one that the Lord has and is still using to reshape who Matt and I are as a family as well as redefining what we believe about who God says He is. Not that we were doubting God but over the last several months we have come to know more about and have experienced God on a deeper level than we've ever known. I'm not talking about anything crazy here, just spending time in God's word and really learning to trust him to provide for ALL of our needs! Although some months have been hard I wouldn't trade them because God has given me a new perspective on what He wants to accomplish in our lives.
Sometimes this stuff is hard to explain over a blog!
Anyways, one last thing that I was dwelling on last night...
I have been thinking about what it means to give your best as a mom and a wife and whatever other roles we each are to others. I know it's so easy to try and take shortcuts and save your energy (especially when pregnant) or be frustrated with something and take it out on your husband, etc, etc. There will always be a reason that we don't feel like doing something.
Anyhow, I was thinking last night about the fact that at any moment our lives could change. We could lose someone that we love and I would hate to look back and be disappointed in myself that I missed a chance to serve my husband or love on my child. I don't mean for this to sound morbid.
There are some days when staying home with the kiddo seems a little overwhelming and you've got to come up with a plan as to how you're going to kill some time! However, I know it's going to go so quickly. A friend of mine says, "The days are long but the years are short." I guess I want to look back over my child raising years and feel like I gave it my all. It's going to go so quickly and honestly I want to be tired when the kids are grown. I want to leave it all out on the field so to speak. (Sorry for the sports analogy!) I will still probably grumble about scrubbing food stains out of my carpet, or cleaning the house four times a day, but I'd like to choose to see it as blessing that I get to be home and love on the people who matter the most to me. I guess I'm partially thinking about all this because I know the days are probably only going to be more challenging with another litte tyke on the way! We want to have 3 or 4 kids so I'm going to be in this for a while! I think I just want to have the right perspective on life you know? I want to honor God with what He has given me...a great family!
So there you have it! A few of my wandering thoughts for your pondering! Hope you don't stop reading my blog after all my ramblings...:)
I'm so bummed that I forgot to take my camera on our Valentine's date on Saturday! We had such a great evening! We dropped Marshall off at Matt's moms and headed up to Bridgeport. We had a giftcard to McCormick and Schmick's for dinner and movie tickets that Tim and Holly bought us for Christmas! We've been saving them and it was worth the wait!
So here are my roses and a pic of Matt and I the morning after V day! 
My little munchkin!
I'm thinking Marshall has a guitar playing future! PS - he does wear clothes sometimes:)
So the Lord has definitely been teaching our family what it means to trust in Him to provide for our needs! Over the last couple of months we have been blessed in some pretty crazy ways. First some friends of ours gave us a half of a cow's worth of meat! Our freezer is stuffed with ground beef, roasts, and steaks! I even had to put some of it in a friends freezer because ours way too full! My husband is a happy man:)
Next the sister in law of a good friend of mine was getting rid of all her baby girl things and she gave them all to me! I had two huge garbage bags full of girls clothing! Lastly a good friend of my mother in law goes to these last chance sales and Nordstrom and bought me a ton of clothes for Marshall and our baby girl on the way! I have more girls clothes right now than I know what to do with and I haven't had to spend a penny! These Nordstrom clothes are brand new, with tags still on them! I posted a couple pics of some of my favorites! I actually have more on the way so I might put a few more pics up later!
The verse in Matthew speaking of how we need not worry about what we will eat or what we will wear in ringing in my head right now! God is impressing on my heart how personal of a God he really is! My hubby likes steak and I like Nordstrom! Seriously though...He is a God who is able to do more than we can ask for or imagine.
My husband gave a great message at church this past week about being generous. He talked about some of our blessings and if you have time you should give it a listen! Here's the link
www.outwardchurch.com/blog it's the first message called Worldly Squalor or Heavenly Treasure. Just click on listen below that title! Enjoy!
Life on our homefront has been pretty mellow the last few days as Marshall has had a little bug. The cough and really runny nose has been sad to watch! So we've stayed indoors for the most part, playing and watching movies! Shrek 2 was the only animated movie I had and I was so sick of it so we borrow a couple from my neighbor. 'Cars' has now become the new favorite around here!
The nice thing about sick kids is that they take long naps! Marshall slept for 3 1/2 hours the other day! That NEVER happens! He woke up after 2 1/2 hours and I brought him out on the couch with me only to have him keep sleeping for another hour! It was awesome. I documented it with these pics because I'm sure that will never happen again!
I've also decided to start potty training! We'll see how it goes. We got some Seasame Street underwear today and he's gone on the potty twice now. I'm sure I'll have my messes to clean up but he's so interested in it and I don't want to miss that!
This morning Matt had an early meeting and brought me coffee in bed after his meeting! I love that man! So all three of us sat in bed talking for a while, us with our coffee and Marshall of course with his milk! I love surprise family time! More updates about baby girl next time!
So I thought I would finally put up a pic of the belly! Here we are in all our glory! I'll be 6 months this coming week! It's going too fast. I'm trying to soak up all the time I can one on one with Marshall right now. I know we'll never have this time back:) We've been going on little dates a lot. We went to Starbucks yesterday for a bit and sat in the bar level chairs and the barista gave Marshall his own little cup of whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles! Needless to say he was thrilled! The realization that it won't be the two of us during the day much longer is starting to sink in. I'm thrilled to have another baby but I really want to enjoy this time as much as possible!
Just snapped this pic of the little man enjoying another part of the tool kit he got for Christmas...I love this age!
Also tonight we decided to take a little family date to Dairy Queen. We let Marshall have his own little cone and he loved it. He was having fun with the ice cream but got very serious when it came time to eat the cone. He finished off the whole thing!
Not a whole lot else going on here right now. Just watching my belly get bigger! Maybe I'll post some prego pics soon!
Hello hello! As we begin this new year it's crazy to think of all the changes that are up and coming for our little family. Not only are we adding a little baby girl to our family, Matt's brother Tim got engaged on Christmas eve to an incredible girl named Holly! We are so excited and looking forward to a fun wedding in July. In the mean time we are looking to move out of our sweet little studio and into a place with more room. We are looking at a house in the area but we'll see what happens. You could pray for the right place for us if you thought of it! God has been so good to us over this last year. I have learned so much about how He is my provider. I am excited to see all that our new year holds!
I also just wanted to take a minute and show you the humor I find daily in Marshall's antics. Our friend left his coffee mug here at our house a while ago and Marshall found it and thought it would make an excellent holder for his sippie cup:)
This is Marshall in the morning. He loves to put shoes on with his diaper and he also loves to put his socks on his hands to double as gloves. Go figure. Such a proud smile to go with his outfit! Hope you're laughing.
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"!!!
First thing the next morning:)
Grandpa and his boys!
Marshall getting some movies!
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!
