Last Saturday night, we had our annual Lunch Bunch Halloween party. This year was a total flop on getting a good couch picture of all the kids in their costumes though.

I love the chaos that proceeds trying to get any group picture of the kids. 😉

These are the best I could get. We finally gave up on the costumes and tried to get one later of just the kids after dinner.

My dear, dear friends! So blessed to know these women!

And one with all the husbands – I love that they are all friends as well. We had a great time!

Sunday was my favorite sister’s birthday. 😉 We had so much fun – we went to Olive Garden, we went to Starbucks and we watched Nathan decimate her presents. He’s the official present helper (aka, he’s the only one unwrapping).

Every time he helped open a present, he said, “WOW!! WHAT IS THIS??”

Me and Cayce!! I love this girl so much! 🙂

Nathan is pretty fond of his auntie too. 🙂

Happy birthday, beautiful sister! We love you lots!!

I am thinking of the blessings God has given me in this quest for contentment. Will you join me?? I’m hoping to make this something of a continual series so on days (like today) when I am just very disappointed with life and it’s struggles, I can look back and see God’s faithfulness even now.

Today, I am so thankful for my little workout buddy:

We took a walk in the freezing cold and then came inside and did “piwotties” (Pilates). He kept telling me “go fwaster! Go fwaster, Mommy! Wun!” on the walk and it was my best time yet. 😉

You are up. What are the blessings around you today?

This has just been one of THOSE weeks.

A lot of it is just our busy, busy month and I think since we’ve had a few days of rest, my body has just decided it’s time to shut down completely. All I have wanted to do is lay around, drink spiced tea and pretend that it’s a lot colder outside than it is. That was all easier before I had a two year old.

Oy.

Monday, we met our Lunch Bunch group at the pumpkin patch for a little bit before heading to a birthday lunch with Gammy. Nathan and I were, I hate to say, both horrendously grouchy.

I think I’m going through the terrible twos along with my son. Two will not go down as my favorite year ever. There are many days where I just sit and cry because I feel like such a failure as a mom.

But then there are times where he is just SO cute and SO sweet that I just want to pick him up and hold him tight enough to slow down this incredible speed that his life is racing by. Today he gave me a big hug around my neck out of the middle of nowhere and said, “Aw, I love you Mommy!” and then he was gone playing again.

He is very imaginative. He loves, loves to sing and will sing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” to anyone, anytime, anywhere. LOUDLY. He loves to read. He would sit through 20 books before nap time if I let him (sometimes we start nap time routine WAY early just to have time to wind down before actually getting in the bed).

I love my baby. I know why most adults have gray hair now, but I wouldn’t trade him – even with all the frustrations and fits – for anything in the whole world.

P.S. Nathan’s absolutely adorable hat was sent to us by a super sweet reader, Shannon Graupman. She has the cutest Etsy shop – www.littlebuttercupbaby.etsy.com. You should definitely go check it out!! Thank you so much, Shannon! Nathan (and I!) love the hat!! 🙂

P.P.S. I would like to promise that we normally match our outfits better than we did in these pictures, but when it’s laundry day, we usually don’t. 😉 So, you’re getting the real us, I guess!

Thank you all so much for your sweet thoughts on my last post! I am so excited for you guys to meet Paige. 🙂

This last Friday, my dear friend Kaitlin and her husband, Eitan, came in town from Israel. SO wonderful to see them! We Skype often, but I haven’t seen her in person in two years. AND – she’s pregnant! They are due with their little son in January. 🙂

We all crashed at Mom and Dad’s for the weekend and it was so wonderful. On Saturday night, we got to do a double date with them – we had so much fun!

Nathan adored Kaitlin. He showed off the whole weekend. 😉

And today is my wonderful mom’s birthday! We went to dinner last night to celebrate at Olive Garden. Nathan was just ridiculous. At one point, he shot a straw wrapper over our heads and over to the table behind us. It landed in their salad bowl.

I may have cried. From laughter or embarrassment, I’m still not too sure. They were, thankfully, a very sweet table with a bunch of kids as well, so it was okay. Oh, that kid. He does keep us entertained.

I am so blessed to have a mother who loves and serves Jesus and cares so much about her kids. It’s always been my life’s goal to grow up to be like her – I have a long way to go. I love you, Mom!!

Look what I got in my inbox today!! 🙂

SO cannot wait for you to meet Paige!! 🙂 Paige Torn (first of a three book series!) will be hitting bookshelves May 2013! Soooooo excited!!

We had the craziest, most fun weekend!!

A very, very, very long time ago, I met my dear friend, Shannon.  She is actually the first person who introduced me to Starbucks, the one who fueled a lot of my writing creativity and one of my absolute favorite people in the whole world. She moved to Dallas about eight months after we met, but we stayed best friends even though we haven’t lived in the same town for the last fourteen years (good gracious, we’ve been friends for a long time!). She’s the first person outside family I told about Jon, she was a bridesmaid in my wedding and this past weekend, she got married!!

I just adore her and her whole family.

AND – she and her husband, Eric, are moving to Albuquerque!! I am so very excited, I can hardly stand it!!

We drove to Dallas Wednesday afternoon, got there very late that night and spent Thursday hanging out with my wonderful cousins and aunts and uncles. I love going to Dallas – I wish we made it there more often.

Friday, there was a tea in Shannon’s honor that morning which was beautiful. I think I had better posture that day than ever in my life. Here are the bridesmaids with the beautiful bride-to-be at the tea!

The wedding was absolutely perfect, everything went flawlessly and Shannon and Eric are just adorable together.

I loved their reception! The dancing was so fun. At one point, the crowd turned into a big circle during one song and people were going out to dance in the middle.

Guess who went out there, danced a little jig and then did the splits, much to the applause of the masses??

My boy the entertainer. 😉

I love weddings! Apparently, my sweet boy does too.

I love these dear friends so very much!

We kind of, sort of, just might maybe like her a little bit.

Only a little bit though. 😉

We love you so much, Nama! Thank you so much for coming to see us! We miss you already.

This is a typical morning at my house:

Not even 8:30 and someone is already completely decked out over his jammies. He’s such a silly. Nathan’s new thing is to ask me about 67 times a day: “You happy, Mommy? You having fun?”

On Monday, we had Lunch Bunch at our house. A few of our friends were sick, so it was a smaller group. Such fun still. Love this picture – Nathan is a little out numbered by all these beautiful girls, as you can tell. I spend most of Monday mornings reminding him that we don’t tackle girls. Only, only, only, only, only, only, only Daddy. 😉

We’ve had a few slower days these last two days which has been nice since the rest of this month is SO BUSY. I walked in the kitchen yesterday right before lunch and found this:

Ha! I think it’s hilarious that he picked his two husky stuffed dogs to sit there and taunt Kody. Poor dog.

And I finally, FINALLY finished re-doing Nathan’s letters in his room to match the new baseball theme. Now I’m just looking for some good deals on some old-fashioned baseball posters for his room and I think we’ll be getting close to done…three months later. Oy. 😉

This weekend starts the Balloon Fiesta here! My grandmother is coming in town for it and I cannot wait!! 🙂 Nathan is already talking about the fiesta as well. I told him we could get doughnuts and he said, “FRECKLED DOUGHNUTS??!!” I think he means sprinkled…. Ha!

Yesterday, we went to my favorite little place to visit in the fall, a pumpkin patch here in town that benefits a charity for troubled youth. I absolutely LOVE this place!

 Mom and Dad came with us again this year – we are getting quite the wonderful progression of pumpkin patch pictures through the years!

It was Nathan’s third time to go and he was so funny. It is really geared toward toddlers, so he was the absolute perfect age to play with all the fun farm toys and he was so excited about the animals!

He got to pet a horse. I think a few years ago they did pony rides, but I guess they aren’t doing them this year. So sad – that would have been hilarious!

He was very excited about the Shetland Ponies. I think those are just the most awkward looking animals. No offense to any miniature horses out there. 😉

Is it just me or does he look like he’s about 18 and a wrangler on a ranch somewhere???

I love how serious all of them look while doing the duck races. Ha!

My boys. Cannot even tell you how much I love them.

Me and my baby.

Our little family.

Nathan loved picking out pumpkins for our front porch. He probably picked about eight, but we kept putting them back. 😉

All through the years – oh my goodness, I cannot even believe how big he is now. Sweet, precious, crazy boy!