Baby #3 Shower

The ladies at church who I have been doing women's Bible study with for years and who have become such sweet friends, threw me a baby shower today. They went out of their way to show me kindness and generosityand to make my day special. The decorations and food were wonderful and the fellowship and time spent together was even better. We also did a Bible study. :) The gifts were appreciated and me and my family have been blessed by them. We will miss them much when we move, along with our whole church family. These are the yucky parts of moving. Thank you, Sabine, for taking pictures, didn't get any of you, though! :( Somehow Faithlyn and Amy missed the camera, too! 

Nice face, Ry! lol

The chocolate cupcake was delish!

Sick Hunter

This is my baby yesterday.  He got up from nap time super fussy and ended up falling back asleep on the chair next to me.  He was not feeling well at all with pretty high temps.  We had been giving him round-the-clock Motrin and Triaminic and Sean and I were waking up every 2 hours through the night to check on him, give him meds, and cool tub baths to bring down his temp.  I have to say I was a little concerned and wondering if we were going to end up making a trip to the ER.  Well, through the night the fever broke!!!!!!!!  I'm sharing all this because I learned something........I had gone to check on him during the night and he was super sweaty at one point, but still sleeping and not hot at all.  I wondered if that meant his fever broke.  We Googled it and found that it is a sign.  So watch for sweat (and a lowered temp of course, lol)....could mean the fever is gone! I think he is still not feeling 100% today though because the fussiness did not disappear with the fever.

Pioneer Woman

I am not too big on 'learning' about photography or my camera.  I am more of a trial and error kind of gal.  I don't read manuals and I don't especially want to learn photography lingo or techniques.  I think part of it may be the fact that I do enough with school work for my bachelors degree in nursing. Photography is a hobby and I don't want to turn it into work or a chore or a job.  I don't even really know much about Photoshop.  I just click buttons!  lol  Well, I stumbled upon a great site called The Pioneer Woman.  She actually has a cooking show on The Food Network that my coworker and I will watch on Saturdays at work if we are not busy sometimes. That led me to her blog, which is great!  She has different sections related to cooking, photography, homeschooling, gardening, etc.  I am especially enjoying her photography area.  She makes it sound so simple and I am actually learning a teeny teeny tiny bit without it feeling like school!  I also enjoy looking at her photography (she is really talented) and others who post to her site.  So, I decided to try a few of her tips.  We have some new baby ducks so they were easy subjects and flowers are always nice.  :)  Here is her site.  http://thepioneerwoman.com/

Sean's big birthday!

We started out with cake for breakfast.  Sean picked coffee cake, which I will also share the recipe.  It was delish!  I also got some fancy schmancy Starbucks ground coffee to go with the coffee cake. 

Forgot to take a picture of it before we started to devour it!

Then we took Sean to the shooting range

Lunch at Quaker Steak and Lube

Boys already worn out on the way home from lunch!  Good thing it's time for naps! 

Dinner at Red Robin at Citrus Park Mall with the fam and Steve and Melinda

Took the boys on the carousel afterwards.  Ry had fun.  Hunter did not.

Happy, Happy birthday to my hubby!

Since our wonderful birthday celebration on Friday, lots happened over the weekend and up to today. Hunter has had a fever since Saturday and Sean took him to the doctor today. He had some white spots on his tonsils so they checked for strep, but it came back negative. The doc said she has seen some other children with the same symptoms and that it is some kind of virus. Fever should break on day four. He's been up to 101.8. Poor little man. Sean and I didn't get much sleep last night because of our sick baby and I think I will need round 2 nap for nap time today so I probably won't post the other pictures I had, but will wait until tomorrow. He is highly contagious, but no one else has it in the house and I will just pray that it stays that way. I had a baby appointment today and baby and me are looking good.....30 weeks today!!!!! Last, but certainly not least, Tropical Storm Debby has become the focus around town! We had over 10 inches of rain yesterday! Not much today, but we are under tropical storm warnings, flood warnings, tornado watches, and it's been windy........close to 45 mph! Looks like it's gonna hit north of us, but expected to get much more wind and rain and continued watches and warnings. I am a bit of a weather nerd so I've been enjoying it!

Here is the link for the coffee cake. :) She has step-by-step instructions with pictures, which came in handy!

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2010/06/the-best-coffee-cake-ever/

Family Pictures

Like the fingerprints on the scanner glass!?  lol

On Monday we decided to get some family/maternity pictures done.  Now, I am not really a big fan of posed pictures at studios....it's just not my style.  I like pictures that are natural where the photographer captures a moment that otherwise may not have been.  However, we were pretty happy with these and the one of Hunter is one of those captured moments that I love.  The place was called 123 Click in Countryside Mall.  The guy we worked with was great and we got the pics back the next day.  Prices were pretty reasonable, too.  These are just scanned in pictures (you have to pay extra to get a CD of them) so it's not the best quality, but I wanted to share.  :)  The boys did really well; they were all over the place and happy - definitely not fussy!  And as you can see, they liked playing with props.  :)

Happy Father's Day!!!!

Yes, it's a litte early, but for our family today indeed was Father's Day!  Since I work on the weekends, and for some reason every holiday falls on the weekends, we decided to do it today.  This year I decied to just have Sean do whatever he wanted to do for the whole day.  We had a great time together and I must say he was quite creative! 

First, we went to downtown Dunedin and went for a walk.  We stopped at a wholesale seafood market and got some fresh (heads even on!) shrimp. 

Next, we continued our walk to a make your own pottery place. It was so neat! I haven't done anything like that before. Basically, you pick your pottery, your colors, and then you decide how you want it to look. When all done, they do what they do (a kiln, I think) and then it is ready the following week. Ryan enjoyed it and sat very nicely and painted. Hunter, on the other hand, while sitting very nicely, did not quite understand the point of painting. He did, however, eat paint a few times.

Here's our masterpieces.  Mine is the cross.  It's hard to write in paint brush!  Sean did the plate and got Ry and Hunter's finger/footprints, Hunter (I) did the Hunter green kitty cat, and Ryan picked the letters of his name to paint.

For dinner, Sean wanted to grill out shrimp kabobs. They were delicious!

To end the night, Sean wanted to watch a new Veggie Tales with the boys (and me) Minnesota Cuke and the Search for Samson's hairbrush.

Now, it's ice cream time! 

I hope Sean enjoyed his Father's Day!!!! 

We are so blessed and grateful to God to have him!!!!! 

Happy Father's Day lovey!

New house!

I finally get to post pictures of the house that we are getting!!!!  Let me start off by saying ALL THE PRAISE, GLORY, AND HONOR GOES TO GOD!!!!!  It was pretty amazing how it turned out and such a wonderful testimony.  We were getting (or I should say I) a little anxious trying to find a house because the rental agents we were trying to work with were not being the most accommodating.  Sean had a mandatory orientation to attend last week in TN and God’s timing was perfect for that, too.  It was right when we could start looking for a rental without it being too early or too late for our move date of July 21^st.  So, Sean, Hunter, and I went out there for a few days.  Ryan got to have fun with Pappy and then Adrienne.  J  Anyway, the Friday before we were leaving, no word from the rental agents.  Starting to stress now!  By Sunday, still no word.  All weekend at work I frantically looked on the internet at houses that we could see, since it was the whole reason I was making the trip there!  I happened to come across this posting on Craig’s List for a house in Heiskell, TN, but decided to ignore it because we wanted to live in Oak Ridge and I had no idea where Heiskell even was.  Well, after work Saturday, I changed my mind and opened the post to see a gorgeous white house!  Me and Sean both loved it.  Then we Googled where Heiskell was and learned that it was only 25 minutes away from campus and also 25 minutes from Oak Ridge.  We called and made an appointment on Sunday to see the house on Tuesday while we were there. 

So Monday we got to look at one house in Oak Ridge and it was just too small and run down.  Tuesday, Hunter and I checked out the white house in Heiskell and fell in love.  Sean was at school that day for his orientation.  There was only one catch!  The owners didn’t want pets.  Yes, for a split second I will admit I thought about getting rid of Allie.  Poor Allie!  So, Wednesday, the owners wanted to meet Sean and I and talk about Allie.  It was great because Sean got a chance to see the house.  Meanwhile, Tuesday afternoon we filled out the application and put down a deposit.  Wednesday morning we met the owners and hit it off.  The husband is reserve Navy and with Sean being a former Marine, they had already told the rental agent that they felt more comfortable with us being their renters.  Sean loved the house, too!  Then the subject of Allie came up and they decided since she is an old dog, they didn’t care and weren’t too worried about her messing up their hardwood floors. 

Last Friday we heard that our application went through and today we signed the lease.  Praise God!!! 

The area is really rural.  Exactly the type of place that I have dreamed of for years.  There are cows, horses, donkeys, and a whole lot of land, trees, and nothing!!!!  The town is super small!!!!  I LOVE it!  And we love the house. 

I know I didn’t do anything to deserve such a wonderful blessing from God.  He put us right in a spot where we have desired to be for so long.  I feel so humbled and grateful and thankful to Him.  It’s because of his mercy and grace that he gives us the desires of our hearts, and because he loves us so much. 

Here are some pictures.  We signed a one year lease. The house was built in 2005.  It is 2700 square feet.  It is 3 bedrooms and 2.5 baths.  It has a bonus room, which will probably be our playroom/family area.  The furniture is not ours and not staying, but the play set in the back yard is staying, which Ryan is super excited about!!!!! 

Enjoy the pictures and I look forward to updates on our move and getting settled into our new home.  J

Oh and P.S. the trip with Hunter was amazing, as well.  Thanks be to God.  I got to really meet our little man and spend some one on one time with him.  Sean and I cherished every moment with the little guy and really got to see his personality come out. 

Psalm 86:15 But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. 

As Ryan says....the big white house :)

front porch.  I see rocking chairs and sweet tea in our future :)

hallway!  oooohhhhhh

downstairs living room

downstairs living room part 2

our soon to be office

downstairs 1/2 bath

dining

dining

kitchen

back screened in porch

kitchen/dining

master bed

master bed part 2

master bed part 3

master bath

Ry's soon to be room

Ry's future room part 2

soon to be nursery

bonus room

Bonus room part 2

New play set!

Back yard

Mailbox lol