Top Nine

Nine years old......how is it even possible that you are nine years old? I have spent the morning taking a walk down memory lane looking at a ton of old pictures of you. I want to cry for how much I miss the "little you", and yet I am so excited to be a part of the "bigger you".

It has not been a dull year so I am going to try my hardest to pick some of the Top Nine about the past 12 months.

9. For the first time (that I know of) you had a little girl writing "I love Nathan" in her notebook. Lord help me, I am quite certain it won't be the last.

8. Your official record for "controlling your emotions" was about 3 days. We will keep that little item on our To Do list.

7. You took a nose dive off your razor and ended up with some awesome looking injuries to your face. I think you milked that one for all the attention you could get out of it! You then learned how to ride a Ripstick and I pray every day you don't kill yourself on that thing!

6. You scored your first touchdown and got your first mohawk!

5. You went to your very first concert with Aunt Cyndi and me. I loved watching you wave your arms in the air , sing along to the songs, and covering your ears when things got a little too loud!

4. You were so engrossed in a book series this summer (when you weren't burying your brother in the sand) that you were actually in a full out funk when it was over. Oh, how I can relate to that!! I envy you all the reading adventures you have waiting for you.....

3. You took your first helicopter ride without thinking twice about doing it.

2. You were elected to represent your class for student council and I must say that your speech really rocked! I wish you had actually done the whole thing for your class, but I totally get how nerves can get in the way of a well rehearsed speech. I loved working on it with you and I LOVED when you stood on the kitchen chair and practiced your speech so emphatically.

1. I had the honor of sitting next to you while you told Pastor Thomas exactly why you want to be baptized. The simplicity and honesty of your answers to his questions brought me to tears (big surprise) and I was once again astounded at how pure your love for God and His Son is.

This next year promises to be a big one. Our little family is getting ready to embark on a huge adventure! I am so excited for all you will see and experience in the coming year.

I love you so much I don't think my heart can hold it all. Happy Birthday Buddy!!! I am honored to be able to Do Life with you.......

Just a Note

Tonight Scot and I celebrated our anniversary, which was actually on Wednesday, at Chuys. A restaurant we frequent often with friends and our kids......most definitely not a romantic night out. I had all sorts of aspirations of writing an amazing post about our marriage in honor of our anniversary, but I never got around to it.

We've been too busy Doing Life.

Our anniversary was spent at the ballpark watching G play. We have a birthday celebration tomorrow in honor of N turning 9 that promises to be all kinds of interesting. Scot leaves again next week and I am speaking the next 2 Fridays to our MOPS group at church.

Whew!! Life can be exhausting lately I have found myself more and more not wanting to do the work I am supposed to be doing because it's all just....well......exhausting.

I will say, in honor of 14 years of marriage to my incredible husband, there is no one else on this planet I would rather be negotiating the twists and turns of this life with. NOONE. We fully get how intense this past year was and we most certainly have patted ourselves on the back for surviving, but the reality is that we have chosen, together, to Do Life with our eyes constantly on the One who holds all the answers. It is the only way to survive!!

Now I am rushing off to bed to fully enjoy a night's sleep and the gift of not having to be anywhere until 11:00 tomorrow morning! YIPPEE!!! That makes this tired girl very happy!

I'm Grounded

Remember this?

Not a staged picture much to the disbelief of some of my friends. In fact, it really looked much worse in reality!

I am proud to say that I finally have an after picture:

I went upstairs to get this picture and almost picked up all the army men that were in perfect formation on the floor. I find it funny that my boys are so thrilled to have a playroom they can walk in and army men all in one place and not mixed in with Legos, plastic goody bag junk, and random puzzle pieces, that they actually sat down and played!

As to why I didn't have them clean up the disaster? I would not have ended up with 2 bags of trash. Instead we would have uncovered all kinds of toys that hadn't seen the light of day in YEARS that my boys just "couldn't live without". And yes, they are very good at going through their stuff to give toys to charity, but this particular task required a determined mom with no emotional attachment to one Power Ranger glove or a matchbox car with missing wheels.

It is amazing the things I can get done when I have grounded myself from Facebook on my home computer Monday thru Friday. After reading this, I realized that reading about everyone else's life instead of living my own was becoming a problem.

I am sure most people are much better at balancing their chores, paperwork, and cleaning with computer and TV time......I guess I am just not one of those. But before you all become the Facebook police, I am still checking out what all of you are doing on my phone in Facebook world while in car line or sitting at a long practice.

I'm not that crazy!!!

From Ahhhhhh to AWWWWWW

My day yesterday included time at my favorite spa here in Houston - The Trellis. And by my favorite, I mean out of the 2-3 I've ever been to I like this one the best! It was a couple of hours of pure wonderfulness......time in the tranquility room, water with fruit floating in it, hot stone massage, and pedicure followed by dinner out with friends.

My day ended like this:

Clocked going 67 in a 50. My first speeding ticket in 15 years.

That's what you get when you give a mom the dad's car for the day. It's ok because I was so relaxed and happy when I met nice Officer Busby that I actually thanked him for the work he does and flat out told him I deserved the ticket.

Poor guy.....he didn't know what to do with me and honestly looked like an afternoon at The Trellis would have been good for him, too!

Falling to Pieces

It's official......I'm falling apart. And I don't mean the kind that results in wearing sweats for days on end, scattered - used tissues and peanut butter cup wrappers. I mean the physical kind that reminds me of how close my 40th birthday is closing in on me. I have one year and 3 months until I am half way to 80.....Yikes!!

I did go to the doctor for my hip. Apparently I have what is called a tight IT muscle. Not "it", but IT......like the dudes that know way too much about computers. I was sent to the Sports Rehab place (because I am practically an athlete) and was given an excercise program and instructed to be nice to that muscle for a couple of weeks.....which I take to mean no running and no boot camp. (I am most certainly not grinning ear to ear as I type this.) Lots of stretches twice a day and then slowly start the training up again. We'll see....

I have also been having bouts of irregular heart patterns for awhile now so I figured while I was at it with the bad hip, I would visit the cardiologist as well (all good practice for when I actually AM 80). Now I am sporting a fashion forward monitoring devise that is large and clunky with a button I'm supposed to push every time something weird happens.

This past weekend I was weeding our jungle out front and stood up quickly which caused a slightly irregular heart beat and I pushed the button and waited for the call to check my symptoms. The lady called me back and asked why I pushed the button......I told her my heart was racing for a moment and that's when she let me know that next time I needed to wait for something worse to happen before hitting the button.

OK.......guess I'll train my boys and all the neighbor kids that if Miss Keri hits the deck, push the button so the lady that calls can be happy THAT SOMETHING WORSE HAPPENED!!

Deep breath in, deep breath out......interesting how you approach your day when wearing a heart monitor 24/7. Scot has been out of the country for all of this - suffice it to say that I think he considers the heart monitor thing a fun challenge for when he gets back. That's all I'm going to say about that!

In other news, G is officially off the market. I am bringing arranged marriages back into fashion so I would like to announce that in about 20 years, when their 5 year age difference isn't so weird, he will be marrying this sweet girl and they will have loads of precious red headed babies that I will get to see all the time because this sweet girl (and her mama) love me! Ok, one down.....one to go! Doesn't G look pleased?

One more tidbit of fun news......N scored his team's first touchdown of the season last night. This picture was NOT taken last night, but pretty much sums up the season so far. Lots of rain, lots of cancelled games, and 3 games straight with no score for the Titans. That all changed last night with a victory for our boys! Go Titans!!

Spare me

It's Mother/Son Extreme Bowling night. I should have totally been brushing up on my bowling skills because my guys are going to wipe that nasty floor with me. I will try to keep my competitive edge in check since noone wants to see a 30 something mom doing a victory dance and yelling "Take that Strike and eat it" while her young and impressionable sons sit on the verge of tears.

In an ironic turn of events, I was actually asked to speak at this event tonight. Moms and 1st-6th grade boys.........I spent a TON of time praying about what in the world I was going to say. Once again God dropped the perfect topic into my head and now I just have to get out of the way so He can speak.

It's going to be interactive and fun with my boys playing small parts in it. My prayer is that all of us moms walk away feeling encouraged and challenged to seek God for wisdom in raising these creatures called boys.

Ears, Cheers, and Tears

I sometimes forget people actually read this blog until I start getting texts, emails, and Facebook messages asking how certain things are going......like G's follow-up appt for his tumor ear.

The doctor thinks the issue is scar tissue around the mastoid bone (big bone behind your ear they had to drill into in order to remove 2 bones and replace with titanium). When I asked the doctor if he was sure, he said "no".

Okey dokey then. He told us to come back in a couple of years for another CT scan to see if the thing has grown except we'll be in Asia - so we're going back in May. If it's grown, it's the tumor making a return visit. If not, we're in the clear. G's hearing was tested again and while the hearing works, the listening often does not. Unfortunately, the Audiologist was at a loss for what to do about that. Oh well!

This past weekend a girlfriend of mine from high school and college was in town visiting. We met in Waco for a walk down memory lane with some friends. They have turned an old haunt on campus into a coffee shop where a bunch of high schoolers, I mean college students, now hang out. So funny......coffee, Macs, iPods, cell phones.......how in the world did I survive my college years without any of those things?

It was a wonderful evening - especially when I left dinner thinking I would choose those girls as friends all over again. Love you guys!! Cheers!

We spent the night with one friend in Austin, met up with another for lunch and then back to Houston. A whirlwind trip for sure, but well worth it!

Monday was a holiday and I took full advantage and slept in. My girlfriend, Mel, was not scheduled to leave until 2:00, but living on a ranch has her trained to be an early riser. G is also an early riser. Apparently he woke up with a ton of ambition to provide a breakfast buffet for those of us sleeping in and having Mel in the general vacinity was all the supervision he felt he needed.

By the time I got to the kitchen, he had made waffles from scratch and was working on pancakes with green food coloring and mold (chocolate chips). He had "set" the kitchen counter complete with flower arrangement, silver platters, and labeling for the syrup. He was so proud of himself and I just fell in love with him all over again! He has such a sweet spirit and is going to be an incredible husband one day......tears!

If you think about it, say a little prayer for us. Scot leaves in the morning for a two and a half week trip all over the place. Although we are used to his absences, the boys and I do miss him terribly.

I hope all of you have a great week!!