Beach time!

We purchased a groupon for Newport Aquarium tickets, as did our friends the Ross's, so a beach trip was therefore in order! We stayed at a place a little south of Newport called Waldport. Not much to Waldport, but who needs much really when you have the Ocean! The house was really nice, although when we got there, all the beds were unmade, and had clearly been slept in. So, we had to do a little laundry, but are getting our housekeeping fee back! It was a really relaxing trip, and the kids had their own little bunkroom with pingpong table and big screen tv....and adults rooms downstairs, plus it was a beachfront place. We enjoyed quality time with friends, played lots of Dominoes, hung out on the beach for a bit (it was pretty chilly), enjoyed a trip to the Aquarium, and did a lot of laundry.... :-) We for happy to get away and put our toes in the sand for a bit!

Annabelle...creating with shells :)

Annabelle, Ella R, Ella C, Tobin...gettin their feet wet!

Girls!

Chris and I, and our infamous, one-armed shot :)

All the sleepy kiddos...sometime in the 7:00 am hour...

All of us (minus Chris who is taking the pic), at the Aquarium

Jelly Fish

Little miss cutie pie Ella ;)

These three sharks all converged and ran into each other! The sharks are definitely the best part of the Aquarium.

Annabelle!

Refreshed!

So I got the privilege of spending a very stormy and wet weekend in the Coastal California Redwoods at Mt. Gilead's Women's Retreat with my mom for the second year in a row. It is such a blessing in my life, as I have shared before. The place where I grew up in my faith and met my husband. Gilead is the place where I am convinced that Jesus lives :) . So, I will try to go every year that God allows! This year was all about healing fractured relationships, accepting grace and believing the truth that God loves me just the way I am. The two things that were pounded into my brain were: "Jesus knows me, this I love", and to "get out of my own way", so that Christ can use me! I cannot do this life successfully without him. Some great reminders for me. I also was extremely encouraged by listening to women share their struggles and faith journey's. I got to reconnect with some old friends also! Mom and I had a wonderful time together too :) I feel refreshed, focused and incredibly grateful for my life and circumstances. God. Is. Good.

After a crazy storm on Sunday evening, somehow, these logs were picked up
and thrown up into the power lines!

More crazy storm aftermath....a tree branch pierced the dining hall awning!

Ruth Burch, Terah Lites and I, all former Mt. Gilead staffers.

Mom and I :)

Camping in luxury

Annabelle with two of her buddies, Isaiah and Mikayla

All of the kids (minus the 3 Sweeney kids who left a day early)

The whole group

I just followed in suit with Ella...

Kristen, Jenn and I

The Curry family went camping for the first time together as a family over Labor Day weekend. It was a really great time "roughing it" at the Thousand Trails Campground in Chehalis, Wa. If you have never been to Thousand Trails...while yes, we pitched our tent and made our own food, we also had access to a pool, a hot tub, mini-golf, and other fun things for the kids to do. Not so serious camping, but FOR SURE the way to go with kids! We went with our lifegroup and had a grand total of 17 kiddos, 12 adults and one large group campsite, where the kids gleefully rode bikes together, swam, and ate lots of other people's food. Kinda a dream for a kid. It was really a lot of fun, and we really couldn't have asked for better cohesiveness within a group. The kids did fabulously. We even got a compliment from the older couple staying at a campsite across the road from us. Not too shabby!

Growing.....and cutting

Annabelle couldn't take the excruciating hair brushing I put her through each morning, any longer! She has been asking for short hair for quite some time, and I kept saying , lets wait until summer. Well summer came. We have a neighbor who is a hair stylist, and offered to cut Annabelle's hair. Annabelle is the most excited that she has bangs. I have never done bangs on her before. It also just so happened that we went over and did the hair cut at our neighbors house on the last day of school, so watching that haircut was almost more than my heart could handle. Last day of Kindergarten, and a haircut. Not only all that, but now all she wants to do is run around the neighborhood park, playing with all the neighborhood kids. We have entered a new phase of life. It is bittersweet to say the least. I made a last day of school cake for Annabelle, congratulating her for a job well done. I am so amazed at how academically inclined she is! It is so fun to see her love to learn. She tested off the charts in all things with words/phonics/reading this year, and is in a summer reading program through the library. New beginnings are good. God is good. Amen.

Before

During

After

Ella turns 4!

Our baby is no baby. It is unbelievable that I have a 6 and 4 year old. Where the heck have the last few years gone? We celebrated our spunky little monkey last weekend. My mom and Dad and Andi and Kevin came to join in the fun, with a family BBQ pizza extravaganza, complete with margherita pizza, BBQ chicken pizza and mac-n-cheese pizza, courtesy of the birthday girl. Not to mention she had mac-n-cheese for lunch. She can inhale that stuff. I really need to start making it homemade, and freezing it. Then the next day I teamed up with a good friend whose 4 yr old had a birthday a couple days before, and we did a joint birthday party for Logan and Ella. It was a big carnival party at the park, that would have been awesome, but it of course downpoured, so we did it indoors, and it turned out great anyway! A glimpse into who Ella is at age 4:

- LOVES mac-n-cheese
- chews off her finger nails and toe nails with her teeth (she has nubbins for fingers)
- loves to play dolls and loves any dolly accessory.
- her best friend is another little girl named Ella.
- she still enjoys a good cuddle with her mommy.
- she continues to be a shoe thief and is especially attracted to high heels.
- she really does say the darndest things, alot of the time.
- she has a tender heart and can be very nurturing.
- she loves to be read to.
- candyland is her favorite game with go-fish coming in as a close second.

Blessed weekend

This last weekend, I had the opportunity to go back to the place that I hold near and dear to my heart, Mt. Gilead, to attend their women's retreat with my mom. I could talk your ear off about this place. It is a wonderful place where I grew up in my faith and met my husband, and sometimes I wish I could live there (retirement!). It is in the heart of the California Coastal Redwoods, right outside Santa Rosa, Ca. Those form-able teen summers were all spent there, and I constantly realized my need for God. I came across a quote that I just love speaking to this exact thing:

"Of all the needs (there are none imaginary) a lonely child has, the one that must be satisfied, if there is going to be hope and a hope of wholeness, is the unshaken need for an unshakable God."
- Maya Angelou

Mt. Gilead was that for me. The people during those years at camp gave me hope and showed me I needed God in my life, and I truly believed it! Not only did wonderful people invest in my life but God met me there, every time. And when you meet God, you are changed. I am so thankful for having Mt. Gilead then, and now! Going back there was such a treat for me. The whole time I was there I could just feel all the distractions melt away, and I could just be with my God, and amongst other godly women. It was like needed therapy for me! I was in an complaining, un-thankful place when I left home, and just escaping to Mt. Gilead for 2 days, gave me the perspective I needed to see that my focus had shifted off of my Father and onto my circumstances. I was a much needed drink of water for my soul. Can you tell? I am getting poetic on you :) Anyhow, I soaked it all in, and am in a good place, and am admiring a good God, who is faithful. I also had some really wonderful, much needed time with my mom, got to see some old friends, and climbed the rock wall all the way to the top. Yay for taxes that allowed me to do this wonderful weekend!

Shamrock Run!

So I got the chance this morning to run in the Shamrock Run with my good friend Jenn. She is a new runner, so we trained together, and did the 5K this morning with 21,000 other Portlanders (well they had many different legs...the 5K had 7500 people). It was quite crazy, but fun, running through the streets of downtown Portland! I did not bring my big camera with me to the Finish Line, so the pic I have is of us in the parking garage, and then one at breakfast. We celebrated with breakfast at the Tin Shed in North Portland. It was so good! Usually there is a long line on the weekends, but it also happened to be the time change this morning, so we got in there before the crowd hit! It was an awesome way to start my Sunday! Happy St. Patty's everyone! Hope you will enjoy some corned beef this week. I know I will :)

Dancin' fool

Annabelle's elementary school holds a "sweetheart dance" every year on Valentine's weekend, so Chris took our little Kindergartner to her first dance this last Friday night! I so wish I was there with the video camera, because Chris said Annabelle ran to the dance floor, front and center, and followed the DJ the entire time. She LOVED it! Not to mention that she was pleasantly surprised to get to dance....when she thought she was going to a dance....to watch a dance! So except for a couple daddy/daughter slow dances, she pretty much danced the night away with her friends! The pictures say so much more than I could about how much fun Annabelle had....

All ready to go!

Doin' the twist...all the way down to the ground :)

Concentrating hard while learning "the macarena" with Emma!

After the bubble machine! And possibly doing the "thriller dance?!"

Trying to do the limbo...

SOUL Sisters

I have been extremely blessed by this group of girls that I was put on a floor with my freshman year at Biola University in 1994. Some of us bonded through playing girls flag football together on Saturday mornings, none of us really knowing much about football. We had to come up with a team name, and because we lived on Second Odd (second floor in our dorm and odd numbers), we called ourselves SOUL (second odd ultimate ladies). It has been 10 years since we graduated Biola, and we continue to gather together and create some pretty great memories. We had our 3rd reunion in Seattle this last weekend, and I have once again come away blessed by these amazing, godly women.

SOUL, on the field, Biola U. 1995

7 of the SOUL sisters.....Dephanie, Danielle, Renee, Melissa, Amy,Traci and I, Seattle, WA, 2009!

A visit from the Nezbedas!

Summer and I hosted a "BeautiControl" party for Tina, who is selling their product and this picture shows three sexy ladies wearing a really glorious lip mask, that leaves your lips silky smooth...pretty amazing!
One of my favorite days was spending some time with my best buddies...it is pretty seldom that we are all together in one spot at one time.
Tina really does love our kiddos like an auntie would, and also spoils them as an auntie would. And they love her back just as much.
Ella got some one-on-one time with Auntie Tina!