Praying for Susannah today

Please lift up Susannah todayas she undergoes surgery! You can read all the details of the victories the Irwins are experiencing, as well as the prayers still needed at Room for At least One More.

Weekend Review

It was another fun and busy weekend for our family! I am giving you the photo recap of Saturday. It is so not my fault that you never get to see pictures of Brandon. On this particular day, he slept in until noon and then had better things to do than hang with us. Who can blame him - he is a teenager! Sophia "played" soccer - she did eventually get up off the ground and get into play.

Gracie cheered her on.

We went to Gentry Farm to hang around.
Gracie found herself a new cozy spot.

We took a hayride and saw cows.

And we tumbled down a slide.

Note - if you found this e:mail making you yawn, I do apologize . . . however, it maybe wasn't mean for your entertainment as much as it was for my parents and family back home.

If you want laugh out loud funny outside of my family antics and craziness, go check out some You Tube videos such as Jesus is My Friend , or Bon Qui Qui .

Happy Monday!!!

Continue to Pray / Fav Foto Friday

Please continue to pray for Susannah and her family. Susannah is having a heart cath this morning to see what the doctors can do for her.
Please pray that Susannah is able to get the care she needs to be a spunky little sister to the Irwin brothers, just like Sophia has been to her brothers. However, Leslie would prefer more princess than Power Ranger in Susannah!

Words can not describe

I am not a word smith by any means. I like to write and read but I am not eloquent at all. Sometimes I will even make up words when I can't think of the real word I need to use. I get laughed at and smiled sweetly upon when I use words incorrectly. I do not believe that I am the S word, I just don't believe that speaking plain simple English is a gift of mine. And now in this moment, I wish it was. I wish I had the words to paint the picture of what I took part in last night. It was amazing. It was beautiful. And it was all about my God and His grace and mercy and healing that He has showed on a sweet adorable little girl named Susannah. You really just must read the full story at Room For At Least One More (see left side bar for link). God just really showed up! He just swept in and reminded us all what HE CAN DO! He restored our faith and brought us in close to say, "See, look what I can do!" We so often get wrapped up in our daily lives of mundane tasks and To Do lists. We get wrapped up in doing this and doing that for our church thinking we are doing something for God. But as we were all reminded yesterday, He really just wants us. He wants us to worship HIM and pray to HIM and talk to HIM and just spend time in His strong waiting arms. He wants us to run to Him and KNOW that He is the one, the only one, that can calm our storms and bring us peace and restoration. And last night as I stood and watched a family be reunited and a little girl hold her brothers hands for the first time, yet like they had been together forever, I remembered who HE was and is in our lives. And went home singing to myself "Praise God from whom all blessings flow . . . ". He is an amazing God! And He is going to continue to do such great things if we only ask him to believing that He will. He loves us so much! And He is so worthy of praise!

Fav Foto Friday

Here we are on the beach in Destin in July!

A Rare Form of Encouragement

This was what I read last night in Sophia's take home folder from pre-school:

"Sophia was encouraging two of her friends to fight today. When told they were going to have their stickers pulled, Sophia said go ahead I don't care."

(sigh)

Only God . . .

Yesterday, I asked you to pray for Charlie, Leslie, and Susannah. Today I ask you to pray without ceasing for them. You can see their story in the Room For at Least One More blog on the side. I think it is only GOD when their blog earlier today was . . . Why is He So Far Away? . . . and the Stuff Christians Like blog had . . . Thinking God Is Far Away. Only God would have Leslie ask the question to have the answer on another blog. To show us all that HE IS right here with us, and with Charlie, Leslie and beautiful Susannah in China. Please keep on praying and believing for the miracle for Susannah! God is not far away, HE is coming to our rescue!

Be praying . . .

So often when I think about blogging I want to be sure it is funny and enjoyable for anyone who reads it. And as I made the rounds this morning checking blogs and trying to determine if I had anything to write about, I realized there was only one thing that made any sense to put on this blog today. And that is to ask you to pray for a sweet little almost 3 year old in China. Her name is Susannah. She is the daughter of Charlie and Leslie from my church. They are there with her now and anxious to bring her home so she can get the medical help she needs. Little Susannah has a weak heart and is in the hospital right now fighting for her life. I know God can perform the miracle needed to allow Charlie and Leslie to bring Susannah home. I know God can move the mountains that are standing in the way right now. I know God can allow officials in that country to make exceptions that they would have never thought about making before to get this little one home. Would you please be praying today for Charlie, Leslie and Susannah that all the mountains will move, and that Susannah will have the strength to come home to her forever family and get the care she needs??? Thank you!

Hebrews 4:16 Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need!

Soccer Season Kicks Off

Soccer season finally got under way on Saturday. We were rained out on Week 1, but came out strong and HOT this week! This is Sophia's first season, and she loves it. Although she did mention the sweating was not fun. Dawson has been playing since he was about Sophia's age and still loves to play. Neither of our teams won this week, but we were having a good time anyway. Here is a photo recap of Saturday . . .

Grace and baby enjoying the hot day watching soccer.

Brandon "watching" his siblings play soccer.

Favorite Photo Friday

Feb 21, 2005 . . . .

C&L - I am praying for you as you are about to share this very special moment with your daughter as she is placed in your arms forever! May God heal her little body and allow her to come home!!!

Brandon

This is my Brandon. As most teenagers do, he finds it odd and annoying that I blog. He has joined the club of "only old people blog". I try to defend myself in the fact that I am a cool, hip, young and fresh blogger , and besides that I have a Facebook. He still says I am wierd and that there is no need to blog about him. Of course, if you are a parent of a teenager, this is an open invitation to torture your teen. We "old" parents have to have our small joys in life. :-)
Brandon is 16 and a junior in high school! We don't see him as much as we used to, or we would like to. But even though I am getting old, I do remember being a teenager and enjoying that new found freedom of a job and a car and going where you wanted (within curfew and preset rules). He is an excellent student, and a hard worker (you can see him at Snappy Tomato 4-5 days a week)! I wanted to write a blog with stories about what a sweet and sensitive son he is, and what an amazing big brother he has become! And how I cherish him and will miss him when he graduates. But I didn't want to embarass him with the stories of how caring and compassionate he can really be. And how I admire how much he loves Jesus and how he worships Him with complete abandon. These are the things I wanted to say, but didn't want to make him blush. So if you know my Brandon and see him, you can just say that you read his old mom's blog and she said how great he was! Thanks!

Oh the places I get to go . . .

Let me tell you about the crazy Saturday I had. First, Mom got me up early on Saturday to go to Sophia's FIRST ever soccer game. As Mom was finishing putting my shoes on, we found out the game had been cancelled. UGH! Turned out to my advantage because Daddy was able to make me some yummy waffles.

After breakfast, Mom, Sophia and I headed to Target. We rode in the big kids cart. I was so excited. Really, under that thumb, I am just giddy with excitement. Actually Sophia was happy to have me along so that she could finally get the big cart (or buggie as we call them down south).






After we got home from the ole Super Target, the Boro Stahly's came over and we went to McD's for lunch. I love me some Nuggets , Fries, Apples, and drinking out of a straw!!!


After lunch, I took me a quick nap because that afternoon I went to my very first birthday party for my friend, Reese. I am hoping her mom will post some super cool pictures over at Riding the Bandwagon because Mom left her camera behind and missed all my cuteness as I played with my friends Reese and Lucy.


After Reese's party, I went to the park to eat with all Mom and Dad's big people friends. We had some way yummy food and I got to play on the playground. I loved the slide with Daddy and Mr Eldon.



My crazy friend Kyle took me on the swing. I am not sure who had more fun.

We had a lot of fun at the park. When we finally got home, all I wanted was a bath, my milk, and bed. Thankfully Mom and Dad agreed and I was out.

I am just one crazy cool chic who had one crazy fast Saturday!

Which came first . . .

This is how the conversation went on the way home from church last night . . .

Sophia: Dawson, did you know that God created the workers that build the houses?

Dawson : Yes (sigh)

Sophia: Dawson, did you know that God created all the grass and flowers and stuff?

Dawson: Yes (bigger sigh)

Sophia: Dawson, did you know that God created all the food we eat?

Dawson: Well, Sophia, he didn't really create all the food. He creates the animals then we eat them.

Sophia: No, Dawson, God gave us hamburgers.

Dawson: (sigh, slight smirk) No actually Sophia God gave us the cow and we kill it and then we eat hamburgers.

Sophia: No, Dawson, God gives us the hamburgers. How would we kill a cow anyway?

Dawson: Probably with a gun. And then we cut it up to make hamburgers.

Sophia: No, DAWSON, God gives us the hamburgers. We don't kill animals to eat.

Dawson: We kill the cows. God gave us cows.

Sophia: God gave us hamburgers.

Dawson: We kill the cows to make the hamburgers.

Sophia: No, God gives us hamburgers.

on . . . and on . . .and on

Mama: Dawson, just let God give us the hamburgers please.

What a SWEET weekend!

Now many of you are thinking right away that it was a sweet weekend because it was three day weekend with no work or school on Monday. And it was sweet for that reason. It was also sweet because Brandon didn't have to work much of it and we got to spend some time with him. It was sweet to get to watch the race with our friends the Fields on Sunday night (even though Kasey didn't win and is still not "in" the Chase). It was sweet to spend a lazy day in the Boro with family and Timothy swimming, eating and playing Wii. But the real SWEET of the weekend comes in the baking and decorating that went on here this weekend.
Dawson had checked out some crazy kids dessert book from his schools library. He had asked and begged and begged and asked to make something out of the book. So finally I said, sure, which ones? He picked a Dessert Pizza and Cupcake Cones. I quickly realized this book believed in making things from scratch . . . I mean everything from scratch. Going for the quick, easy way out, I went to the internet and found the Betty Crocker version of Cupcake Cones, and the Pillsbury version of Dessert Pizza.
Also on Thursday, Becky and I found a delicious blog where a woman makes truffles, cake balls, and desserts that we could not believe. (at this time we are refusing to release the blog name until we have amazed all of the locals with her recipes, hee hee ) After drooling over the delicious blog, I had decided I needed me some Oreo Truffles, Nutter Butter Balls, and Red Velvet Cake balls.
Parts of each day of this long sweet weekend were spent making and eating above sweets. Dawson and Sophia had a great time making big dessert cookies to celebrate Grandpa Stahly's birthday (which I forgot to take pictures of). They also loved decorating the cupcake cones and shared them with the neighbors.
It was such a "sweet" weekend that as Sophia woke up this morning, she said "Mama, my tummy still hurts from all those sweets I had this weekend." Lucky for her, it doesn't happen too often here.

(oh and Gracie learned this weekend how to climb up and over the couch on to the sofa table and throw things from it)