Seven years!

Today is our anniversary - seven years! Somedays I can't believe it's been that long, and others seem like it's been forever. When D. and I got married, he started crying really hard in the ceremony. He didn't stop until we got outside. It really freaked me out because D. just doesn't cry very often (unlike me who cries anytime the wind changes). So when we got out of the wedding ceremony, we came around the corner of the church and I said, "Stop right here. If you don't want to be married, tell me right now so I don't have to go to the reception and pretend like everything's alright." D. assured me he was fine and did want to be married and we went on and had a great time. I'm sure there have been times when he has looked back and wished he could have answered me differently. But, I have loved being married to him. He is a wonderful man and does so much to keep me happy. We have both grown so much in these seven years and I know this will only continue. I am so thankful for him every day. Here is a list of seven things (one for each year) I love about D.

1. He is so doggone handsome!

2. He makes me laugh all the time. He really is silly even though he puts up a good front not to be.

3. He has awful taste in old country music, so he has expanded my horizons.

4. He is a really hard worker. I love his work ethic. I am so proud of him for it.

5. He is the best father. I couldn't have imagined how good he would be. I love watching him play and interact with Aubrey and Mallory.

6. He helps out at church and wants to do what God wants us to. He has strong moral convictions about things I wouldn't have thought he would.

7. He loves me! He knows all about me and loves me anyway!

There are many more reasons, and I have generalized some of these, but he is so great. I love him more now than I could have imagined 14 years ago when we met.

I am praying that we have many, many more wonderful years and anniversaries to come.

good times

Nothing major going on here, we've just been doing the usual stuff. I started a new Bible study at church by Priscilla Shirer, He Speaks to Me and it is wonderful. I really love her and am already learning a lot in the short time we have been doing it.

Last Friday the kids and I went to the park for a picnic and playtime with my friend Kim and her son Jackson. Kim and I had fun watching other children get really muddy on the merry go round with the trench of mud around it. We just laughed at the fact that other mothers didn't have any idea what their children were getting into. Of course, those other mothers might just have been a lot less uptight than we are and feel like dirt and mud is all a part of childhood fun. Crazy, I tell you, but it's possible. And it was a good lesson too. We had told Jackson and Aubrey that they couldn't ride it because they would get muddy, but they assured us that wouldn't happen. After seeing a little girl get dragged around in the muddy water and run off crying, they didn't ask us again even once after that. All of us had fun, and Mallory was stuck to the slides. She couldn't get enough of them, even after she was knocked off of one by a bigger kid. I think we might have a daredevil on our hands.

Leah and Jay were here to visit this past weekend, so we had lots of fun with them playing and just hanging out. Jay loves Aubrey and Mallory and they feel the same. Of course, I think Jay really just loves Aubrey's train set, but for now that's good enough. We took them for a quick shopping trip on Monday and they had fun on the mechanical horses at the outlet mall. We are always sad to see them go, and hope that it's not too long before our next visit. Thank goodness for Skype. We have lots of face time with it.

On another note, Callie is home from obedience school. (I may have mentioned this already.) She is doing so much better. She sits and stays as well as knowing her place to lie down. It has made a big improvement in our home. Hopefully we'll only get better!

Random craftiness

Just a few crafty things I have been working on or involved in lately.

I finally finished my Valentine's crafts. Aubrey and I made his class Valentines. I didn't think of it myself, but I got plastic shovels and made tags that said, "I Dig You" and put them in a cello bag with conversation hearts. I tied it with ric rac and they turned out so cute. Aubrey was so excited to give them to his friends. He is in a pre-school class of 6 boys, so this was perfect for them.

I also decorated red pillar candles. I gave one to Aubrey's teacher for Valentine's Day. I just took ric rac and ribbon and secured them with thumb tacks in the back. So easy, but a cute decoration for the holiday.

I finally finished my Valentine garland. I hung it up on Valentine's Day, so it got a little use this year. Next year it will be out for the whole season.

Aubrey and Grandma Bonnie made homemade sugar Valentine cookies. It was a fun day for all of us.

Also, on the scrap front, I was so honored to be featured on Becky Fleck's Pagemaps site. She posts sketches of layouts, cards, tags, and others on her site. Then she has others use the sketches to make them and posts them on her site. I am featured here in the tagmaps section for February. I was so excited to do this! So go check it out. The whole site is great.

Then, last week I found out I won a contest on Stephanie Howell's blog. I love Stephanie Howell's scrap style, and her blog is so much fun. So it was a special surprise. I won an entry into the Product Pizzazz class at Get it Scrapped. I am enjoying it a lot. There are all kinds of great classes over there, so run over and sign up for something. You will be glad you did!

And finally, I just finished my layout for the ScrapWhispers blog. It's basically like the game "Telephone" where someone tells someone a secret and it's passed along, but this is with scrapbook layouts instead of secrets. There are 6 teams, and the team who stays closest to the original layout wins the round. I can't wait to see how our team turns out. I had a great time doing my layout.

I will have more kid pics this week, since we are having a fun, long weekend. Happy President's Day!

What's up? Warning! Long post ahead!

I'm sure all 4 of you who read my blog have been wondering where I've been. Well, I don't really have a great excuse, but last week 3 members of our family had a stomach bug that left me constantly changing sheets, towels and clothes and running our washing machine non-stop. I told D. that our washing machine was just going to fall over from exhaustion. We are now back to our normal selves pushing each other around the house in the laundry basket for entertainment, thanks be to God! It was awful!

I also wanted to wait to post pics of my Valentine's garland and topiary I've been working on. Alas, I am not finished yet, but I didn't want to wait any longer. I will post pics when I get it finished. We are going to put Aubrey's valentines together today and I am going to work on my garland so hopefully I will finish today.

Aubrey's pre-school sang for us in church on Sunday. They were so cute, and Aubrey sang so well. Not with an abundance of enthusiasm, but he said he was nervous. So sweet.

You may know that we have a dog, Callie. The past 3 weeks Callie has been away at obedience school. I have had such a nice break. While I love Callie, she was not trained at all, and did a lot that made our lives a little difficult at times. We have visited her at the training center a few times, and the change in her is amazing! I am actually looking forward to her coming home. D. and I have to go for the next 3 nights to learn how to keep the training going once she comes home. Then we get to bring her home on Thursday. I'll keep you posted.

I thought I would show you what Mallory got into about a week ago. I was in the kitchen and she was in the laundry room. I didn't think anything of it until she walked in and I realized she had gotten into Aubrey's art supplies. I have no idea how she got them even on the backside of her jammies! I guess the apple doesn't fall very far from the tree!