Happy 1st Birthday Joanna!!

This is what Joanna looks like when Daddy is in charge....isn't that chocolate? Caught red handed!! LOL!

She loves putting things (clothes) on herself! She likes palying with the clothes and this is what she looks like when she tries to dress herself. So cute!!

All smiles! Just can not believe that she is one today!!

Posing in her "pearls". This is a onesie that she got for Christmas, it looks cute on Joanna!

Melt your heart!

Can you see Elijah behind her? He was helping her to walk. She is walking more and more!

Joanna loves doing laundry!

Happy Birthday to our sweet baby girl! We are so blessed to have her in our lives! Such a joy to have her here with us and we look forward to many many more years of clebrating her life!

What I got for Christmas!

This is what my dear Sarah got me! She spent her own money to buy it! I love it and Bryan has used it alot too!

This is what Isaac picked out for me at the Awana store. We have it outside so we can tell the tempature outside. It has been awesome and neat to know what the temp is. The big kids have enjoyed reading it too! Can you see that it says "32"? That was the temp this morning...COLD!

When we opened presents with my parents for Christmas Bryan gave me this note.

This was my present! 4 blinds! I wanted some nice blinds to go in the living room (3) and my bedroom (1). I thought he was so sweet the way he did it! :) Then he put them up for me the next day. I love them! It is amazing the difference. The other blinds were those cheap ones from walmart.

This house had two lazy suzans in the corner cabinets. I really did not like them. I just didn't have much room and the kitchen does not have alot of cabinets so I needed as much room as I could get. I had told Bryan that I would love for him to take the lazy suzans out and put in shelves. So for Christmas that is exactly what he did!! I have so much more room! So tickled over my shelves!!

Sporting their wheels!

Elijah loves driving the gator! He drives it all over the yard! I am sure for him he feels "in charge" when he is driving. LOL!
When Elijah learned to ride a bike with no training wheels we gave Timothy his little bike. Timothy LOVES riding his bike and has done so well! He can move on this bike and it makes it hard for us to keep up with him. He would ride it every day all day long if we would let him!! :)

Look at him go!!

These two have the best time together! I love it!!

Elijah does let Timothy drive some. I know you are not suppose to put anyone in the back but I had to get this picture before I told Elijah to get down. :) They have so much fun together!!

Celebrating with Grandparents!

Joanna will be 1 this coming Saturday!! Bryan's parents will not be able to come up this Saturday so we decided that we would celebrate her birthday a little early. My parents and Bryan's came up this past weekend. For lunch on Saturday Bryan made bar-b-q and then we had cupcakes. My parents had to leave when the kids went down for a rest but Bryan's parents got to stay until after supper!! We were so excited that Bryan's parents stayed a little longer this time, they usually come up Saturday morning and leave at rest time. We took them to eat at the Bell Buckle Cafe and just enjoyed spending some time with them. Here are the few pictures that I did get, my camera battery went dead during opening presents. My parents got Joanna some clothes and a piggy bank with her name on it, so cute. Bryan's parents got her some sweet little shoes, a fork and spoon set and precious moments birthday dolls. I made her cake and the cupcakes and Sarah did the decorating of Joanna's cake. I made orange cake and frosting (will share that recipe soon) and they turned out very delicious! Joanna had the best time digging in her cake and the boys LOVED watching her! So much fun!!

Joanna's cake that Sarah decorated. Thought she did pretty good for her first! :)

Opening presents.

The little boys helped blow out the candle.

Fingers first. She looked at me as if to say "Is it ok that I do this?"

Timothy was and did want to get his mouth on that cake too. :)

Dig in!! She enjoyed making a mess!!

All the kids love it when Gigi comes!

Pop and Elijah!

Gigi with her girls!

Right before we left for supper Joanna was playing in the cabinets. When I looked down I found her sitting in this big pot! She was being so silly!!

Snowman plate

Back when Sarah and I went Christmas shopping she found this plate. I fell in love with it right away. Thought she did really well to realize that this is "our family". As you can see there is a mom and dad in the back with 5 kiddos and one cat....how neat! Of coarse I had to buy it (just $2 at Old Time Pottery). Now we use it to put our pancakes and muffins on, it is perfect!

Bacon and Egg cups

This was Isaac and Sarah's first cooking assignment. When we left Alabama a dear couple in our church (WPH) gave Sarah a cookbook. Mr. Jim and Mrs. Pat were Sarah's Sunday school teachers and they hold a special place in our hearts. They knew Sarah likes to cook and the cookbook was a perfect gift for her! Isaac and Sarah chose the Bacon and Egg cups out of that cookbook to make. They were very delicious and fairly easy to make. The bell pepper is what made these.....yummy! Thought we would share the recipe with you. Thank You so much Mr. Jim and Mrs. Pat for the cookbook!! :)

1/2 cup of real bacon bits

6 eggs

1/2 cup of diced bell pepper

1/2 cup of shredded cheese

1/2 cup of half-and-half

1/4 teaspoon of salt

1/4 teaspoon of black pepper

Preheat oven to 350. Greese a 12 cup muffin tin with cooking spray. Mix all ingredients together until well blended. Fill each muffin cup with 1/4 cup of mixture. Bake 20 - 25 minutes or until eggs are set in center. Run knife around edge of each cup before removing from pan. Makes 12 cups.

The above recipe is our version. We did slightly alter the original recipe. We used bacon bits instead of bacon slices (took less time) and we used chedder cheese instead of pepper jack cheese.

Happy New Year!! 2012

I can not believe that it is already 2012! This past year has been full of blessings! 2011 started off with God sending us Joanna. She has been such a JOY to our family! Then in March we celebrated our 1 year anniversary of being at Shelbyville Mills and are so excited to be here serving the Lord! In April Timothy turned 2, in May Elijah turned 4, in July Sarah turned 8 and in August Isaac turned 10! Bryan and I celebrated our 15 year wedding anniversary in June, and loving every minute of it!! We were also blessed with (new to us) vehicles. We have truly been so blessed!

Our Pastor challenged us this morning to read through the Bible this next year and to memorize at least one scripture a week. I so want to do this, I want my kids to do this and I want Bryan to do this. This is the one thing that I believe should be the top priority in our lives. What would our lives, family and church be like if we did spend more time with the Lord? If we could spend as much time with Him as we do facebooking, texting, blogging (yes, I did put that in there), emailing, watching TV, etc. we would see a Revival like never before! My goal is to ask myself every day and in every situation is this bringing glory to God! Glorifying God is the reason that God created us!! More than anything this new year that is what I want to do and what I want for my family!!

Happy New Year to all of you!! I wanted to share a few recent pictures of Joanna. She will be 1 on the 14th, WOW!! She took her first step on Christmas Day! :) The other kids are so tickled that she is "walking". She is so cute and we love her so very much. Could not imagine life without her!!

She loves smiling for the camera! :)
Just love her!!

See her two bottom teeth? She has a total of 6 teeth!

She LOVES eating "real" food! She is completely off of baby food and eating whatever it is we do!!

Our Joanna!!