Beautiful

Three! Three? THREE! THREE?? My BABY turned three yesterday. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I had a mini-meltdown while looking for birthday gifts for her. The whole, "not suitable for under three," hit home. I always take those as suggestions. And now? She's THREE! When did that happen?



Dear Clarissa,

You are our precious princess, our baby girl, our Claire Bear, our "Cluck," and most importantly our beautiful baby girl. You constantly amaze us at how sweet you can be. You are so funny and such a girly-girl. You love getting your hair and nails done. You love people doting on you. You love playing with your brother and currently love putting on "circuses" for Mommy and Daddy. You love dragging around your big giraffe and love anything dinosaur related. You tell us your favorite dinosaurs are the triceratops, giganonosaurs (I can't even spell it but have learned how to pronounce it due to your teaching me), T-rex, and steganonosaurs (another one I can't spell).

You bring much joy to our lives and we are blessed to be your parents.

Love you,

Mommy & Daddy

That's Amore

I know, I know . . . it's been a while. There really just isn't much to say. Our days are filled with school, play, sleeping, and eating. That pretty much sums up our entire blog. Boring?

Anyway, I figure I'd post a picture of the kids and me since that's out of the norm.

There's Power in the Blood

I've been really horrible at blogging lately. I'll blame it on the fact that I'm kind of overloaded on school work and the kids.

Anyway, I'll try to post a better update later, but I wanted to share some amazingly, fantastic, wonderful news!

Let's rewind to the 8th of October. I read a book to the kids for their night time talking about how if you were scared, you could call upon God for strength. Anyway, Joey started asking A LOT of questions. We ended up talking for forty five or so minutes. He ended up accepting Jesus in his heart that night and it was amazing being able to be there to witness it.

Jump

We bought Joey the cutest pogo-stick today and Joey was excited to try it once he got out of school. I helped him twice and now he's a pro!



By the way, how cute is that pogo-stick? We'll make him a cowboy somehow!

Summer Thing

I can't believe how quickly summer is coming to an end. The past few days have really kicked us into fall here. The leaves are starting to change and Keith even made homemade pumpkin pie this last weekend.

We've been trying to spend as much time as possible outdoors before the weather becomes too frigid. How is it that sixty degree weather is freezing during this part of the year, but ask me in spring and I think it'll be a scorching day?

Anyway, Friday we had our friend Nicolas stay the night with us. This was the first time the kids had a sleepover at our house. They've stayed the night at his house once before and we were excited to have him in our house. The kids did great and actually went straight to sleep.



Saturday morning was a bit hectic. Clarissa had her first ballet lesson and Joey had his gymnastics plus Keith had to drop off Nicolas at our other friends' in time for him to make it to Applefest later that afternoon.

Clarissa had a great time at her ballet lesson! I am thrilled that she enjoys it so much. Ugh?! And that costume? Can she look any cuter?



After about five minutes to breathe from our morning activities, we headed to the annual Applefest in Northborough. It's always such a fun time and fun time for the whole family.







Sunday was a pretty relaxing day. After church we just sort of hung out at home. Later, we decided to take a family picture. The kids really enjoy the self-timer. They love seeing the camera light blink and the anticipation for the sound of the click is pretty hilarious to watch.

Mama I'm Coming Home

I know it's been a while since I've updated. Life's just been a bit busy for us. A week and a half after we got home from our New Hampshire vacation we left for Texas for two and half weeks. I'm not going to recap everything that we did there. Instead, enjoy a top ten list:

Top Ten Favorite things we did in Texas
(There is no particular order to the significance of ranking)

10. Meet up with our friends, the McAden's

We met our friends YEARS ago while we were members at Indiana Avenue Baptist Church in Lubbock while Keith was in college. We were all in the same Sunday School class: The Young and Married. I know . . . Young? That was a long time ago. Often times we would have lunch together after a morning full of wonderful worship on Sunday's at Taco Villa.

Our friends left a few months before we did to be missionaries in Russia. It was exciting hearing from them and their beautiful stories. If anyone is interested, they were involved with Campus Crusade for Christ . They stayed there for five years and it was great reconnecting with them. Their oldest, Max, is two days younger than Joey. Their youngest, Marlys, is a year younger than Clarissa but has the same birthday as Joey.





(Please note that they are standing in front of a Taco Villa)

9. Take a tour of Texas Tech

After leaving our friends, we headed to Texas Tech. Neither of the kids have ever visited Lubbock and of course when we had the opportunity we had to take them on a tour. Nevermind the stifling heat, we enjoyed it.

I especially enjoyed taking the kids to the library where Keith's thesis is located. I sure am proud of my husband.








8. Celebrating Keith's 30th Birthday

Somehow I managed to keep a surprise from my husband. We threw him a little surprise party and he was able to visit with a couple of his close friends.



7. Seeing Trent Wind Farm

We were able to see a HUGE wind farm. It was actually quite spectacular and kids were excited we stopped to let them take a closer look.



6. Terra's wedding

As most of you know, the reason our trip was planned for August was due to the fact Terra's wedding was in August. I was able to be a bride's maid. (Am I called that since I'm married?)




5. Five Generations

At Keith's surprise party we were able to take a five generation picture.



4. Panhandle Plains Historical Museum

Keith and I took a morning off to just spend time with our little family. We took the kids to the museum and the kids had a great time. It was really interesting seeing them experience for the first time the museum we had visited countless times as children.







3. Jump-N-Jive

Cindy treated the kids to a special afternoon at J&J. The kids had a BLAST and subsequently, the kids will be having their birthday party this year at a similar place here in Massachusetts.



2. Trains!

Has anyone noticed how many trains pass through Amarillo? The kids (especially Joey) were thrilled at that fact. We often took the long way to my parents' house just so the kids could see the trains.



1. FAMILY

Obviously, we greatly enjoyed our time with family.

9 to 5 (Part Four)

We're to the final days.

Friday morning we woke to our friend telling us something had gotten into the trash. The cabin we were staying at had no trashcans so we decided to place the trash in the bed of Keith's truck since it had a cover and was pretty air tight. There was trash everywhere and upon closer inspection, Keith's cover was damaged.

We figured a raccoon or something of that nature had managed to break into Keith's truck. When we went on the balcony and overlooked the scene it was pretty clear it wasn't a raccoon, but a bear. There were paw prints . . . big bear paw prints on the bed. Eventually, we found some black bear hair on his truck and further evidence it was a bear. Crazy. We're just happy that no major damage was done.





*Saturday morning we found paw prints on our friend's van. We're not sure if they had been there the day before, but regardless . . . there was a freakin' bear at our place! Keith and I had the front room so we had patio doors that entered to our room. Imagine it . . . FEET away from a bear!

Anyway, our Friday was pretty low key. The moms and all the kids went to the park since the dads were in Maine that day picking up one of the other dads.





Once the dads came back they took the kids so the moms could clean. Not so much fun for the mom's.

That night we fired off the remaining fireworks. There were A LOT of remaining fireworks.

Saturday morning was pretty low-key. We all ate breakfast and headed out to do our own things. We were headed to Mount Washington . However, about ten minutes away from the cabin one of our friends called with car trouble.







However, six hours later, we decided after fixing our friends' car that it wasn't going to happen. We opted to drive another way home for a prettier, scenic route. (We also drove into Maine for a bit so I could cross off another state on my map)






There you have it, folks!