Girly time!!

Since the boys are off having a blast in the north, Clara and I are having our girly time together.  I will admit…this age 2-3 is a HARD time for me.  I don’t handle, “No, I don’t want to”, whining, etc. that comes with that age frame very well.  I never thought I would have a girly girl….but that she is.  The other day we experienced our first pedicures together.  Clara really liked it.  She was bummed that she did not get to do the lotion/massage and bath for your feet.  ;)  Next time I will make sure they let her do it.  Since it was the first time I was not sure how she was going to handle it all.  She went first and then I got my pedi on.  She did well waiting but did not like that she missed out on those few extras Mommy got and not Clara.  After the pedis, we ran into a couple of stores.  Clara really likes to shop!  Maybe she will help me become a shopper.  I mentioned to her that we were going to Target and she squealed with delight at the top of her lungs and said, “TAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGEEEEETTTT!!!!”  I wish you could have heard her.  A few ladies in the store we were in started laughing and said everyone feels that way about Target…LOL .  When we arrived at Target Clara proceeded to ask for “Clara shoes?”  She likes her shoes too!!  We did not get shoes that trip but she handled the let down well. 

Enjoy the shot of her precious, precious toes!  They are pretty pink with a pretty little white flower on her toes.  She is proud of them!  I look forward to many more Mommy/daughter pedi days! 

Big Bad Musical & New Addition to the Family

Well, again it has been too long since I blogged.  I have too much to try and cram into one post but I will try.

Christian was involved in a play with the children’s theater.  It was a great play.  It was a musical and comedy in one.  It was a combination of all the fairy tale characters.  The Big Bad Wolf was on trial and ultimately it was up to the audience to determine if he was innocent or guilty.  It was GREAT!  Here are some shots.  We also had the cast party over here and I think everyone had a great time. 

  

This past Wednesday I finally added an addition to our family I have been wanting for many, many, many years.  I have always LOVED dogs and have had an involvement with them whether it was through work (vet’s office, dog groomer), dog rescue/fostering, training, etc.  I have always dreamed of doing competitive obedience with a Doberman.  I love the breed, their dedication, loyalty, intelligence, and of course their looks.  Well, life has always gotten in the way of me taking the time to work on this dream.  The kids’ upbringing and education are my #1 priority but I have also decided I need to have something just for me too.  A time I get away even if it is just a couple hours a week and focus on a hobby for myself.  Okay….now….introducing……Mya or her AKC name is HillCo’s Devil Woman!  I know…I know…not a fan of her AKC name but I am hoping that one day it will look like this HillCo’s Devil Woman, CD RN WAC CGC (etc, etc. not sure how all the titles work but you get the idea)  The titles after her name will be accomplishments we have made together in obedience/rally, temperament testing, etc. 

She is almost 20 weeks old.  In that picture she looks like such a grown dog but she is still very much a puppy.  Here are some puppy pics of her and her litter mates. 

Here are some the day after I brought her home…meeting everyone. 

I will probably have to post her ears for another month or so and then we will be finished with that.  She is a real sweetie with a fantastic temperament.  She is very calm and well behaved for a puppy.  She is doing pretty good at housebreaking and will get there soon enough.  She is just great!

On another note, my boys will be gone for over a week!  They left early Saturday morning.  They are traveling up north with my Mom and Dad to visit with my brother and his family.  They are making some stops in Kentucky (to visit some cave), Niagara Falls, and also New York City.  When they get up to Boston they will also be traveling to Vermont to enjoy a 4-day Christian concert/event while camping in the mountains of Vermont.  I am kind of jealous but oh, so happy for them!  I miss them so much already.  They will be back next Monday or Tuesday.  Please keep them in your prayers for safe travel there and back and a blessed time together with the Meemaw and Pawpaw and their cousins, aunt, and uncle. 

Injury, Discouragement, and Moving Forward

Well, Friday evening my foot started aching/hurting.  I came to the conclusion that I probably have a stress fracture.  You talking about discouraging.  The one time in my life I have really gotten into and enjoyed the fact I am treating my body better through exercise and I go and do too much at once.  Man, does that sound like me….;)  I have stopped the running and took some days off to take it easy.  I have kept up some swimming.  I have lost track of what days I have swam but I have gotten some good ones in.  My longest was today at approx. 800 to 1000 yards.  I also rode the bike a little over 2.5 miles.  I think the bike is going to be the hardest for me in the tri. At least it did not hurt my foot so as much as I might not enjoy it I will be able to work on it and build up how far I can ride.  At this point 14.5 miles seems like FOREVER away!!!   I am just trying to stay encouraged and have the attitude that I will do my best and I will only get stronger.  I don’t have long to train as the tri is in September.  At this point, I just want to complete it….I just keep telling myself that…but the competitor in me wants to do better than just complete it.   Clay has offered to stay behind and complete the tri together but I hate holding him back.  How great is he!   God has blessed me more than I could have ever dreamed of or prayed for!  Well, that is it for the tri-training update.

On another note, Christian has been working on another play with the children’s theater.  The shows start tomorrow night @ 7, Saturday at 2 and 7 and Sunday at 2.  We are watching tomorrow night.  Matt, Candy, my Mom & Dad, GG (my grandma), Jerry (my Dad’s brother, my uncle) along with Amy and her son Kyle are going to watch it.   Afterwards we are coming back over here to play some volleyball!!  I cannot wait!   

Cullen also did a week long academy at the children’s theater last week and he did AWESOME!!  I was so proud of him. This was his second time and he really improved.  He enjoyed it and I was thrilled that he would like to do more of them.  I need to get the pics off my phone (b/c I FORGOT my camera) and try to post them here…not sure how to do that though.  We shall see.

That is it for now…..until next time!

Triathlon….Here I come!

God is truly amazing…. AMAZING I tell ya!! First he heals me of a life-long eating addiction through veganism and healing my body of depression, anxiety, and lowering my blood pressure to as low as it has ever been, losing 30 lbs over the year instead of gaining 20 or so as I had been doing in the past years. He has given me energy I never thought I could have, and a true happy, peaceful feeling about my health that I cannot remember ever having. He has also basically taken away Cullen and Clara’s eczema. Cullen’s asthma is history! Our family is hardly ever sick and if so it is minor. Well, God has gone and done it again. He has given me the hope and energy to attempt a triathlon in September. I am hoping to use my blog to document my activity to encourage myself to continue on this physical health journey and hopefully be an encouragement to others. God has a tremendous sense of humor and I can see Him laughing at me right now. I had always said I would NEVER do a triathlon and have even given Clay grief over his riding his bike so often and working so hard. I feel badly I was not as encouraging and uplifting as he is for me. I continue to work on that weakness of mine! I just pray that God continues to push me to be a better me and to treat myself as He had planned!

This week thus far I have:

SUNDAY: I rode my bike 5 miles, walked (ran a bit) of a mile, and swam almost 200 yards in the lake. We are going to try making one day during the weekend our tri time. Where we work our way up to the triathlon. (for those of you that don’t know what a tri consists of like myself for so long it is a 14.5-mile bike ride, 3.1-mile run, and a 650 yard swim!) I am going to do my best and that is all I can do! I have to again say how AWESOME my husband is. He is so encouraging. He did the mini-tri with me (he set it all up for me…I thought I was only going on a bike ride) and encouraged me. He would say things to encourage me especially on the bike ride when I thought I was going to DIE!!!!

MONDAY: I ran 1/2 a mile and walked 1/2 a mile and got a good swim in.

TUESDAY: I completed almost a 1-mile run (I started out walking). Then got a 10-minute swim in.

I am hoping to make a complete 1-mile run tonight. It will be the second complete mile I have run in my life. This time feels totally different than the first time I ran a mile which was probably 2 years or so ago. It was one of the best feelings I have had in my life but I felt like I was going to DIE…felt awful…just awful!!! I knew it was only God b/c at that time my body was full of JUNK and I am surprised it was still functioning for me. Only God can make something (like the human body) that can be treated so horribly, horribly bad for so VERY long and can still keep on truckin’. It will catch up with us though in the form of cancer, heart attack, strokes, diabetes, depression, anxiety, MS, taking drugs to combat all this stuff we could prevent with diet and so many more awful things. Then once you start treating it the way it was meant to be treated it heals itself!!! This time I felt great doing it but just tired. I have convinced myself for so long that I cannot do it that I have believed it. No longer! With God I can do all things!! He is an AMAZING God, I tell ya!!

Clara singing Happy Birthday!

We have a little actress on our hands! She cracks us up! She cracks herself up too....LOL

Some of June! Awful, worst blogger award!

Okay, so I deserve the worst Blogger award!  Life has been very busy!!  This move has been a tough one!  We are slowly but surely settling in a bit more.  I have had some wonderful help with a decorator, who is now a new friend, help me get things together.   We will soon have the main areas of the house painted and we are going to go ahead and do our bedroom too.  I have really struggled with the feelings of sleeping in someone else’s bedroom.  I am ready for it to feel like our bedroom.  The living room/dining/kitchen area is finally beginning to feel like ours.  We are getting closer and closer to finished. 

We made our annual business/fun trip to Oklahoma City.  We had a good time.  We usually are set up in a foo-foo hotel and we have not been too fond of the one for the past few years.  They moved us to the Hampton which we LOVE!  We have had a wonderful experience with Hampton and we have preferred it ever since.  When we were in our adoption process and God was waiting for to place Clara in our lives…we had the opportunity to potentially adopt another little girl.  Her name was Denaya (where we got Clara’s middle name from…Denae) .  We went to Louisiana to take care of Denaya and waited out the 5-day period for birthmom to sign relinquishment papers.  We even waited another day.  Long story short…and heartbreaking….birthmom changed her mind and decided to keep her baby.  It was a really sad story and it took her 8 hours to find a ride to pick up her baby.  My heart still breaks for her and her young family as she had 2 other children already.  She lived in a chaotic, violent home as we were told.  When we met her she was just broken.  We hugged her and told her we were not mad and it would all be okay.  It was one of the hardest things I have gone through.  Denaya will be 3 in August and I think of her and her Mom often.  I pray they have a blessed life and that they can rise beyond what they have experienced in the past to have all God has planned for them! 

Anyway…I veered off course.  During the terrible time of waiting for Denaya’s Mom to pick her back up the Hampton was so supportive of us.  They set us up in their lobby area which was set up like a living room.  They made the kids cookies and were such gracious hosts during such a terrible time of loss for us.  This Hampton in Oklahoma City was no disappointment!!  It had the coolest pool we have ever seen in a hotel.  It was completely set up for the kids. 

This pic is misleading….Little Miss Clara was too scared and ended up not going down the slide.  I was shocked!

As you can see it was pretty neat!  They had little explosive dynamite set up in the deeper part.  There were handles on the side of the pool you pushed down and it would cause a water explosion in the pool.  It was really different and fun!  Oklahoma was a neat trip.  We made a trip to 105 Degrees which is a raw restaurant.  It was a neat experience but one 2 year old was exhausted and was not feeling it was time for a dining out experience.  All in all a good and memorable trip to Oklahoma City.

We have had many paddle boat outings and kayaking outings.  Christian caught the first fish. 

There has been much more fishing.  The boys have learned if they use the catfish food and put it in their nets they can catch lots of perch.  Daddy has taken the whole gang out for a fishing outing. 

We have seen more wildlife….  baby turtles, baby birds, baby ducks, rabbits, etc.  We visited the beaver home on the other end of the lake too.  It is neat to see how they do that.  Not so neat when they eat the rope holding your anchor.  LOL  =)

This is a shot of baby ducks….and not a good shot.  Sorry!

A sunset in the backyard…

For the 4th we spent time at Meemaw and Pawpaw’s.  The kids spent the night before over there.  Clay and I went to dinner and a movie.  Saw Eclipse.  I have to throw in how sad I think it is that people think this movie is appropriate for preteens and teens.  The unhealthy relationship between the main characters rivals obsession and the lust exhibited in the movie is sad.  It is definitely not material younger children and teens should be exposed to during such a learning time in their lives.  They should be learning of healthy relationships that their parents exhibit and not exposed to such confusing feelings of lust and false impressions of what love is.  Okay…enough ranting there. 

We enjoyed our fireworks at the lake with Meemaw and Pawpaw along with Matt & Candy.  We even had drop in visitors with Candy’s brother & wife and their kids and Candy’s cousin and his wife and their kids.  I did not take any pics this year but the fireworks were the best yet.  They even had a firework that exploded into a smiley face….How cool is that?  I hope you all had a safe, fun 4th!  I hope to be blogging again soon!  I also hope to have a video of Clara singing Happy Birthday up soon on Youtube.  She cracks me up!!  She loves to sing and she actually did it for the camera this time with her acting talent involved too.  Speaking of singing too….Christian got a part in the play “"The Big, Bad Musical”.  It will be a busy month of getting him to rehearsals, performances, and we will be hosting the cast party but I cannot wait to see him perform!!  Congrats, Christian!!!

Hope to Blog again soon and not bombard you with so much stuff!!!  =)

Moving, moving, kinda moved??

(warning: long-winded but lots of pics to make up for it!)

Well, Sunday we made the move into the new house…..kinda.  We started sleeping here anyway.  We got our bedroom furniture, couch, Clara’s bed (which she will now not sleep in), and the washer dryer in.  We did not get that working until the next day or should I say Clay did not get that working.  He had to change out plugs, etc.  This is our 5th house.  This has been the most difficult move of them all!  It still saddens me to know that there are people out there that just don’t care how you feel or what you think.  When we first saw this home the yard was short and not overgrown, the pool was very nice looking and clean, the house was spotless, etc.  Well, we buy it and give some people a few weeks to do nothing and that is exactly what they will do!!  The yard hadn’t been touched in at least 3 weeks, the pool was all kinds of out of whack, the house was filthy, they even left us a present in one of the toilets.  To think these people wanted to lease the house back from us.  I even was trying to convince Clay that it was the right thing to do since these people needed the money to buy their other home in which they wanted to build a pool.  We said no, thank goodness!!!  They moved into a temp place until their home is finished.  I would hate to think what they would have done in a few more weeks!  GROSSS!!  I am sorry for the venting but it is so frustrating.  Someone cut themselves while they were moving and they just left the blood splatters/puddles all over the school room tile floor for us to bother with.  They left junk behind for us to throw out or just didn’t double check before they were leaving.  There were 2 PODS parked in the driveway in front of the garage, no less!  They also have not had their mail forwarded b/c there is no where to forward it to.  HELLOOO!!!!  How inconsiderate can people be?!!??  I guess we got a good taste of it with this move.  Just really frustrating.  As if there is not already a lot to do with moving anyway.

We still own our other home but have a contract pending on it.  We are praying this week goes smoothly and the inspections go well.  We are beginning to get a bit concerned as they have not had the inspection as of yet and no appraisal either.  It would be nice to sell it this go around but God knows what the cards hold.  He has the best plan!  I do know that whoever moves in is getting a spotless house and a freshly mowed, weeded, hedged, sparkling, clean pool to enjoy after they haul all their stuff into it! =)

We are beginning to see the light at the “moving” tunnel.  There is still a TON to do but we have most everything over here at the new house now.  The kids are loving it. 

We are enjoying the wildlife around.  They feed the ducks everyday.  The Momma duck and her babies hang outside my kitchen window and I get to see them a few times a day as I wash our many dishes….;)

 

This was a tiny, baby turtle I caught sun bathing on a stick. 

Here is our soon-to-be other Momma duck on her nest under our fish feeder.  There looks to be about 12 or 13 eggs in that nest.  We would love to see all of them make it through. 

This was a new find of Christian’s today.  Do you know what kind of bird this is??  She has laid her nest on the ground.  You can walk by the nest without ever knowing…..but if Momma bird is there you will sure to figure it out.  She dances around almost acting injured to lure you away from her nest.  I am so glad Christian found the nest with 4 eggs in it.  The yard guy came today and he would have mowed right over it.  :(  I am assuming the backyard did not get much action before we moved in as these birds thought they had chosen a quiet place to nest.  We will try to be patient and somewhat quiet until all hatch and are safe. 

This is Momma bird dancing around with her tail flailed trying to lure us away.  Christian took the photos of all the birds but the nest of duck eggs.  Good job he did!! 

We have also enjoyed (or should I say the kids have enjoyed) the pool of course!!  Daddy and I have not made it in yet but plan on it this weekend.

Christian is holding Clara over the fountains…she wanted to be like her brothers.

 

Loved this shot of the boys!

They are lovin’ jumping off the upper level into the lower level!  Looks fun..cannot wait to try it!

Too sweet not to share with you all!  

On another note….Cullen got braces!!  I don’t have a shot yet but will soon get one up.  Please say a prayer for him.  He is really, really uncomfortable.  He is one tough kid so I know if he is having trouble eating he hurts! Today seems a bit better and I know tomorrow will be a little bit better and so on.  I keep telling him it will get better.

Sorry such a long-winded post with lots of pics….but it has been a while.  Wanted to update you on how things are going!