This Weeks Happenings

Who's due first? Me or Tabby? Well, Tabatha is due June 5th and me, Sept 10th! I do believe this is gonna be another big baby. I thought we better get our prego picture in before we left cause who knows, Logan could come into this would before I get back. But he better wait!!! Sorry Tab, I just want to be here.

This is our newest princess. I'm not sure how well of a sweet princess she is just yet, but she is pretty cute. She just came and got me to show me what she's doing in her sisters room with chalk. She drew a picture on the chalk board and I've noticed that's not all she drew on. I have a nice picture on the wall as well. At least it's chalk... for now.

We finally got the pool completely installed, cleaned out and vacuumed. Emily couldn't stand the thought of leaving my house without getting in the freezing water. So Rob put the steps in and in went all the kids. I bought these lobster inflatables last year after season and the kids love them. Of course, Madison has hers ripped already and I'm not sure if I'll be able to repair it or not.

Kaylee does not have a lobster to sit on and she begged to get on one. I asked her to smile for me and this was the face I got every time! So cute!!!

Over the weekend, during our Bible study/cook out, we had a few accidents in the family. First, Kaylee got plowed over playing red light green light. I'm sure she didn't know the game all that well (17 months old) and stopped in the middle of green light. She got pushed pretty good, had her face plowed into the concrete and had a good showing of scratches for it all.

Then before we got a chance to eat, Madison smashed her finger in the screen door. Her fingernail immediately filled with blood as she was crying something terrible. We wanted to poke a whole in the nail to relieve pressure, but she refused. So we let her be. That night, I tried again, and got over half of it scratched to the bottom of the nail, but before I could get a hole, she had me stop. She slept with it throbbing all night long, then she finally let us poke the rest of the hole later that night. It has felt a lot better since, but it still looks bad. I think she'll be losing that nail.

The girls got a chance to help their dad paint their sand box. It's still not finished. I'm suppose to be out there priming the rest of it so they can paint tonight. Looks like I need to invest in some old work clothes for the kids. They are really excited to get the sand box finished so they can play with it. I had Rob to build it up so hopefully they won't crawl in it, but I have this feeling they are gonna get in it anyway. They are kids after all.

Then the twins wanted their shark tent up in the living room. They slept in it the first night as somewhere in the morning time, they had their dad to lay down with them. Then Emily and Emma slept in it the next night, then just Emily. We finally took it back down to reclaim our living room.

We got some free coupons to go to JumeZone from the owner, so we decided to go while Emily was here. The kids had a lot of fun jumping in these HUGE inflatables. Madison ended up getting hurt going down one of the slides. Pilled the skin right off her elbow, but she ended up going down again once the pain wore off some.

This place also had play sets set up and the girls liked swinging on the tire, climbing up and sliding down the slide as well.

Then it looks like we have some future air hockey champions. All the future campers better watch out for these two. They are pretty good right now for only being 4 years old. :)

Now we are preparing to take our 16 year old nieces to NYC this coming up week. We'll spend the weekend with my parents and hopefully I'll be able to have a yard sale Sat. while we are there. We are looking to have a good time with the girls in NY. They've only held us to this trip for the past 5 years!!! We'll see how well I handle NYC being 25 weeks pregnant.

That it for now. Hope all is well.

Safe Again From Storms &... Potty Training? Oh, My Dr. Appointment.

First, some pictures...

23 weeks! And what a cheesy smile........

The twins getting their reward for singing the New Testament books all the way through.

Daddy with Kaylee and her cute hair bows.

So cute!

My Daddy being silly to Mom.

A great picture of my parents.

I finally took a picture of my girls with my parents. Carolyn, remind me to do the same when you come down! I'm so bad!

Truly a Madison fashion.

Emma with their new fish.

Another round of storms that were way too close!

I watched the weather at 5 to decide if I was going to church Wed night or not. I had already experienced 3 storms coming home one evening from church last year, ran off the road once to a huge hail storm and couldn't see the interstate. Only the vibration I felt on my feet from the warning on the side of the road led me to believe I was in danger and I steered back to the left just enough to where I didn't feel the vibration anymore. It was too loud to hear anything and my normal 40 minute drive turned into an hour.

After watching the news last night and two different stations believing the storms would be in the metro between 10 & midnight, I decided to go so I could do my service. I thought for sure I'd be home close to 9, way before the storms got here. I was WRONG and so were the weathermen!!! Thankfully I did make it without any rain just before 9, but that's not because I wasn't speeding. I saw the huge storms that were getting very close and Rob told me they were coming our way and I managed to pick up a little speed to get home before they got there and me stuck again in another severe storm.

We entered into a tornado warning just after 9 pm with it being about 7 miles away heading our way. Of course, Rob had to go outside to see the wall cloud as I, the mother, lifted the shelter door, put the kids inside the shelter, gathered shoes, diapers, diaper bag & a sippy cup before I went outside. By the time I had gathered everything up and checked the TV again for the location, it was about 10 streets away from us, still coming our way, but very slowly. The wall cloud was definitely getting closer to us & we looked at other clouds during the lightening strikes and saw a very suspicious looking cloud that had the form of a funnel that was just in front of our house. Too close for comfort and not sure if it was the formation of another tornado or just a floater, we decided to take shelter for the first time since we've been here.

Madison was very scared and didn't want our house to break, Emma didn't seem to mind, and Kaylee, I think she was just scared of being in a small cave. Emily, I'm sure was relieved for us to come down and join her with the kids. Getting 3 big people and 3 little kids in a 4 seater shelter was a bit crowded, but we managed to survive for 25 minutes down there in the cool humid sticky hole until our weather radio said we were out of danger. I'm thankful God heard our prayers and answered and kept us safe. We don't have any damage to our house or property but storms expected tomorrow evening into Sat.

So on to something a bit different... POTTY TRAINING.

Okay, no, I'm really not potty training Kaylee, but she THINKS she's as big as the other two and wants to go potty like them and has always had the mindset of "I'll do it when I want to." I'll tell the girls to go potty and she's right behind them or she's right behind me, gruntin' and pulling at her pant so she can go too. She's now 17 months old and is doing a pretty good job at going about 4 times a day. She'll either have me take her pants & diaper off, or she'll do it herself and I put her up on the pot. She thinks she has to play Yahtzee while sitting there and then this deep look of concentration comes over her face and she either goes #1 or #2 on the potty. She still wets her diaper often, but if I mention it to her, she'll go sit on the pot and go.

The girl still doesn't talk all that much. She only says about 13 words, but doesn't have any problems getting what she wants.

Last Tues. I did go see my Dr. for the baby. Everything looks fine. I wiggled my way out of another sugar test since I'm testing already - which by the way, the Lord has still been in control and my levels are outstanding!!! By looking at me though, he said he had no reason to believe that I wouldn't have another big baby. Of course, this time, I've gained mommy pounds than baby pounds since I'm not having the difficulty of eating like in the past. I'm not eating a ton of sweets, only when Tabby brings her delicious sugar cookies over and I can't stop eating them is when I'm bad! Okay, there's a few other days besides that also. But I'm still praying that somehow, the Lord keeps this baby under 8 pounds and works it out so I can have it naturally.

Well, this post turned out to be way too long and I have work around the house to finish and places to go.

Another Trip...

Typo's are okay... I'm beyond tired and don't care. hee hee. Sooooo.....

I was only home for a couple of days after the last post, then off to AR I went to visit family. Just me and the girls. Rob stayed behind due to school, work, and church. I was planning a yard sale at mom's, but rain made me change my mind.

So there I was for about 5 days with no Internet. I'm very behind at reading the blogs, but I had a very nice visit with my parents. The girls were so ready to visit with their family as well. It was also nice to be with my mom on Mother's Day and to see my brothers and sister-in-laws again. I had the joy of beating my mom in a couple of games!!! Now I'll play her again. She thinks I always win, but really, she blew me away the last time I played her, 3 times!

Mom and I went to a couple yard sales on Thursday before the rain came in, but the other two days were rained out. I've not been able to go to a yard sale in a LONG time. It was relaxing not having the kids. Now I'm sure Papaw was glad when we got home, but I must say, I enjoyed the time away for just a short while.

We really missed Rob while we were gone. After 3 nights away, Madison was ready to come home, that was, until she woke up, then she wanted to stay and play. Kaylee got really good at training her Papaw and "driving" him in the direction she wanted to go. The girl pretty much got what she wanted.

Rob did stay busy this week. Wed night was 4 hours of school after a full day of work, Thurs night he studied and called some people, Fri night was Bible Study, Sat was more studying and calling people, Sun morning was a special service held at a members home that is dying with cancer and Sunday night was his VLB service. Surely he didn't have much time to miss us. He slept a couple nights on the couch since I wasn't home. Poor guy!

So about his Sunday morning service. Rob called one of her sons and told him about what he was planning. At first, he wasn't sure if he would be coming since his half sister was in, but after talking with Rob, he decided to come. His whole family ended up coming and this was the first time Rob had met him after several phone calls with him this past year.

First, Rob had Sunday School with them all. He had misplaced his Sunday School book in the van that I had in AR, so I told him what the lesson was on, gave him the highlights and he went from there. Rob got roses for the mothers and had the children to write something special on a piece of paper and had each of them to read it out loud to their mom. He spoke, about something ( I wasn't there and I forgot the specifics ) before the children read what they had written, sang some songs and after the service, they all had a cook out. From what I hear, it was a very nice gathering for the family who had not been in a service for some time.

Rob then invited the one brother to Bible Study and he said he would try and come, but he DID invite us to have one at his house in two weeks!!! This is a huge door that has been opened up. The family once were members of the church, but since have slid away from the Lord and we have been praying for them for a long time. So please pray for this family that God continues to move in their heart.

I obviously made it home okay with no rain!!! Emily, my niece came home with me for a couple of weeks. We'll take her back home on our way to NYC. Hope all the mothers had a wonderful mother's day.

What A Husband!

About 30 minutes before Sherry and I were to leave, she calls to let me know she's not going. I was really bummed she didn't go and then I thought, if 2she's not going with me, I'm not going either. We were expecting storms and they had1511./; been severe here and I didn't want to chance the 2 hour plus drive by myself & chance getting in a bad storm. A reason why Sis. Loree didn't make it either. Missed her so bad. So, I really needed to leave by 4:30 to get something to eat and make it a little before to fellowship. So I called Rob to let him know I wasn't going. He was so against me staying home that he said he would take me. But I didn't have any clothes packed up for the girls, they needed a bath, the house was a mess and he wasn't packed himself. By the time he would get home, he would only have about 15 minutes to gather things. I knew it was impossible, but he insisted anyway, even if I showed up a little late.

So he came in, started to rush around and I've never seen him pack so efficiently in such a short amount of time. I mean, come on, he's the Dad, he always tells me he doesn't know what I pack, he doesn't know what they need, but he did such an outstanding job. I had already laid out a few things to help him for the weekend, but not everything was gathered. I did pack a lot of the girls clothes, but he was a trooper at gather so many things for Kaylee.

It took us about 45 minutes to get it all packed, quickly got us a room off priceline.com, left the house in a complete mess and off to Mickey D's for supper on the road. I ended up being about 30 minutes late but it was such a blessing to be at the ladies part of the revival. I enjoyed my time with everyone there and Sis. Bishop is such a sweet lady. It was nice to meet her finally. I got beat over the head mentally by Sis. Connie Wilson. Let me tell ya, don't plan to go to her house then tell her your not coming! ha! I begged for forgiveness and after a long while, I think I finally got it. I got it all right, many words thrown at me, but finally, God came through and she sweetened up. lol. She's a lovely lady and we love her dearly. I can't wait to go visit the whole weekend!!!

Then our family went to visit Aaron & Heather up in Pryor. It was Ashton's birthday, so we attended the party there at Pizza Hut. My girls like to play with Ashton, and for kids, they do a really good job playing with each other. I think they like spending the night with them too. It's always great to visit with them and Derek and LeAnndra (spelled it wrong, didn't I?) are great to be with too. Us three are getting quite big. Okay, Heather THINKS she's big, but she's so tiny even though she's bigger now than what she was with Ashton this far along.

We spent Sunday morning at the Pryor church where Rob did a VLB boost and then attended the last night of revival in Broken Arrow that night. Revival was really good and I had a wonderful prayer for my sister and niece. Only God can give peace when peace is needed.

Have a good day to all those who read.

Big Girl...

Kaylee, that is. Took her to her well check up and she's in the 97th percentile in height. The doctor said she's as tall as a 22 month old and she's 16 months old. She's in the 47th percentile for her weight. I'm just thinking if she was in the 97th percentile for her weight, she'd be a little chunky monkey. She did great with her shots and the twins did very well at waiting in the office as well.

Looks like Sherry and I are going to try and dodge some storms so we can get to the ladies weekend thing in Tulsa. It's clouding up pretty good out there and still have over an hour before we leave. Praying we make it safe. These storms are not just normal rain storms that pass through. Most all of them have been having tennis ball size hail with them and lots of rotation. Fun!

That's it for now. I have to pack some more.