Happy Anniversary!

At this time today 9 years ago, Craig and I were officially married. Our wedding was at 2:00 in the afternoon and it was probably an hour long. I had all these great ideas when planning the wedding that I wanted included that day. Craig, being the easy going man that he was, went along with it. I know, deep down that he thought it was too much. :) We had lots of singing, a dance by two beautiful young dancers, communion for everyone at the wedding, solos by some great singers and prayer time with friends. As one of our groomsmen said at the rehearsal...."You know it is a long wedding when the wedding party sits down twice during the ceremony." LOL!!!
It was a celebration of us joining our lives together before God and it is a day I will never forget. The reception was fun and after it was over and we had taken many pictures, we headed to St Lucia for our honeymoon.
I was looking through old pictures on the computer trying to find pictures of us. One thing I learned was that once we had children, pictures of Craig and I are hard to find. It seems to be just the kids. Ha! I found some good ones to reminisce about but I could not find one picture of us on our wedding day. I am not good with computers so maybe in a later post Craig can help me scan some. :)
Here is us when we were dating and we got our picture professionally made.

Here is a picture of us when we got engaged at the beach.

This was 4th of July days before we got married.

We had a slide show at our wedding. We had pictures of each of us as kids. We also included some pictures of us when we were just friends in the college and career ministry at our church. We were friends for six years before we started dating. When we knew the time was right to begin a relationship, it was meant to be and we were married soon afterward. Here we are playing a game to see who could put the most candies on their partners face. Craig and I won!!! At least I assume we did!!! I don't like to lose! A match made in heaven :) We are so competitive....lol!

Hanging out a church event. I think it was a pajama party :)

At our rehearsal dinner:

This is where I would put a wedding picture.......oh well!
We had a great time on our honeymoon in St. Lucia. The weather was so beautiful. It was at the most in the 80's. It was not too hot, crazy since it was mid July.
Here we are hanging out at the pool.

We rode horses and even got to take them in the ocean. Craig can tell a funny story about his experience on his horse he will never forget. :)

We were at a Sandals resort that was all-inclusive. It was so nice to be able to eat anywhere on the resort and just walk out after we were done without paying a bill. It was hard getting used to paying for meals when we got back. LOL!

9 years later, 3 kids later, we enjoy the beach again just this week. This time though it was at Surfside Beach not St. Lucia! Life changes when you have kids...HaHa!

Thanks for 9 wonderful years Craig! It has been nice strolling down memory lane. I love you!

Summer has been fun so far......

We have had a fun, yet busy summer so far. I cannot believe that Liesel will be going back to school in a month. Time flies when you are having fun :)

Liesel and Caedmon spent a few days visiting Craig's mom and step dad and while they were gone, I convinced my wonderful husband to paint Caedmon's room. We moved into our new house over a year ago and since I was pregnant at the time, painting rooms only happened based on high priority. Caedmon's room was low on the list and he had been telling us that he wanted a yellow room so badly. Yellow is his favorite color. He asked me often why he was the only one in the house whose room was not painted. It made me sad :( Despite the fact that it was Father's Day weekend, Craig agreed to paint his room with me!!! After it was all painted, we finally got him a new set of bunk beds. Up until that point, he was still in his toddler bed. He loved it for a long time but he was outgrowing it. My mom and dad came over on Father's Day and my dad kindly helped Craig and I put the bunk beds together. I did actually help with some of it....LOL! Here are the final results:

 Caedmon was so surprised when he got home and loves playing in his new room!

One weekend at the end of June, two of our friends were getting married in the mountains. We dropped Liesel and Caedmon off at Craig's dad and step mom's house, took Jensen with us and headed out for a nice relaxing weekend. We shared a cabin with another couple. It was so relaxing. Here is a picture of us in the hot tub at our cabin and the view from the cabin and YES, we have a view like that at our house in Fuquay...LOL!

The wedding was beautiful in a great outdoor location overlooking the mountains. I had to get a picture of me and my wonderful husband :)

Fourth of July weekend was upon us. I took the kids to an event at AC Moore to make American Flag t-shirts with spray paint. The kids really enjoyed it. Liesel kept telling everyone that she made it. She was proud of her work. Here are the kids at a cook-out on the 4th.

Jensen and I decided to match with our Old Navy t-shirts.

I got the camera out yesterday to take some pictures of the kids. We all laughed so much because Jensen was the hit of the party being silly. I love watching him observe his surroundings. I have made a point with this baby to relax and enjoy the little things about babies. When Caedmon and Liesel were babies, I worried a lot and was so exhausted that they grew up too quickly. I still worry sometimes and I am more exhausted now that I have three kids...LOL!! I just make a point now to sit down and watch Jensen explore his world. Here are the highlights of our Oh, Not, So, Professional, Picture Session.
My three beautiful children:

Jensen gave them a look like "What are you all doing?"

Caedmon loves being with Jensen.

Jensen was so silly and happy. "This family is crazy!"

Liesel wanted her turn to get a picture with Jensen.

Liesel has been playing dolls a lot more lately. She carries them all around the house. All of a sudden, she ran to get her dolls and asked me if she could get the whole family in the picture. I called Caedmon over and she told me that she just wanted Jensen only with her and all her dolls. Well then!!!! She loves Caedmon, but these dolls are like the sisters she does not have :) Good thing Caedmon did not really know he was left out of this family picture. HaHa!!! It was so funny watching Jensen's reaction to all the dolls. "Oh, when did you get here????"

"Yeah, it's a party now!"

"This one is my girlfriend."

"Hi Ariel!!! Nice hair."

After we stopped laughing, Caedmon said he wanted to kiss Jensen. I did not prompt him to do that. This is true love Caedmon shows to Jensen every day. Sometimes, it is TOO much that is rough for Jensen but this time he was so gentle. He does listen to me when I say GENTLE 50 times a day! :)

A few sweet and funny things Caedmon said the other day:
1. Jensen was playing with me and I got up to go to the other room. Since Jensen's attachment to me is still evident, he started to cry. Caedmon turned to him and said "It's okay Jensen, I am here with you."
2. I asked Caedmon to go fix me some breakfast one morning to be funny. He responded back with his funny comment except his was serious......."I can't bake breakfast because I can't flip anything." I guess since I make a lot of pancakes and muffins a lot, he thinks I flip things...LOL!!!
3. Caedmon was doing a maze in a coloring book and after he was done he said "That was easy, because I got skills!!!" Who knows where he heard that. :) All we needed was the Staples red EASY button!!!

We are headed to the beach tomorrow for a few days. So excited!

2 Week Family Update

Hello,

This post is all about updating what has happened in our family for the past few weeks. We have been busy and we are just now getting able to slow down.
First thing that happened was Liesel had her awards ceremony at school. She won two awards. One was a fitness award for completing fitness units at home through out the school year and the second was the reading award. She read over 300 books at home during the school year. I was very proud of her for that. This is above required reading homework each night. Liesel's class was full of awesome readers because I think her whole class was up on stage for getting the reading award. Here is a picture of her with her teacher Mrs. Gore.

I just wanted a picture of Liesel showing off her awards but I think I may have become that embarassing mom taking pictures too much. LOL! She was not too excited.

Then I of course wanted a picture with all three kids. So I sat them in the grass and after 5 attempts, I never got one with all three looking at the camera. Am I going to have to deal with this dilemma for a few years? Do they not know how much their mother loves to take pictures? LOL! These are my two favorites: Jensen trying to steal Liesel's glasses and the other one captures their personalities a little bit.

Finally, the whole family picture attempt.....Not Bad!!! I guess..... Caedmon has just determined in his mind lately to not look at the camera and stress his mother out :(

So now school is officially out and for Memorial Day weekend we headed to Morganton to visit with Craig's family. It was nice to spend time with his family. The kids always love all that extra one-on-one attention they get from grandparents. Liesel and Caedmon got to go to a rodeo with their Memmaw and Pappaw and they got dirty. Too bad I was not there to take pictures. Since I do not like dirty kids too much, maybe it was a good thing I was not there. LOL!! Caedmon loved telling me how all the kids got to go out on the field and run around and get messy and how there were clowns being funny. Sounds like fun :)
Monday morning we got up early and headed to Asheboro for our second annual Zoo trip on Memorial Day. We met our friends Scooter and Jeni and their kids there. Since this was our second year going with them, it was labeled in my mind an annual event but I am pretty sure there will not be a third trip to add to the annual tradition. In case you did not know, it is VERY HOT on Memorial Day!!! Last year I was pregnant and uncomfortable and this time I had a baby to keep as cool as possible. Plus I had the added fun of trying to locate spots to nurse him at the zoo. Thanks Scooter for the suggestion to go into the chimpanzee exhibit..."No one will notice you Heidi"  HaHa!!!
Here is a picture of Caedmon wet. I know a lot of this is sweat but one time he had fun at a water fountain. His shirt says it all! :)

Jensen wants to be held a lot, by me of course, since I am usually the only person he wants to hold him lately. That is another story for another day but I kept assuring myself that it was just a phase but this phase has lasted 3 months and we are still going strong......

The whole group of kids (minus Jensen and Isaiah)

At 3:00 we called it quits and headed home to hit the pool. We all decided we are going on a cooler time of the year next time we go to the zoo.
Caedmon and Jensen have a great relationship but Caedmon at times can be a little "too loving" with his baby brother. I love watching them interact together. I got the camera out one day and got some fun pictures.
Here is the picture of Jensen biting his bottom lip. He does it almost all the time. I call him my "little old man" because I think he looks like an old man without teeth. LOL!

Jensen was trying to tell Caedmon and I something:

If I had to add a caption to this next one, it would be "What's up my brother!?!"

Here is the best picture showing the "brotherly love" that will continue to blossom for years to come!

Liesel has now been in dance 4 years and completed 3 recitals. This is her second year performing at the big auditorium in downtown Raleigh. We had the dress rehearsal on Thursday and the actual recital was Saturday morning at 10am. We are only allowed to take pictures of the actual dance during the dress rehearsal. Liesel did a great job. I loved practicing with her leading up to the big day. There was a moment in the dance where each girl got to shine. They entered from one corner of the stage and did these fancy steps and ended with a leap in the middle of the stage. This is a big stage so this takes bravery in my opinion for a 7 year old. Liesel practiced her leap multiple times throughout the house. When the big moment arrived.....SHE NAILED IT!!! I was so proud I said Yes!!! not too loud I hope and shed a few tears. I loved seeing her face and how proud she was throughout both dances. She did a ballet piece and a tap piece. She is much better than her Mama.........who froze on stage as a kid at her dance recital and her mom had to come get her of the stage. Yes I am talking about myself!! LOL!!! If you want to hear about it....ask my mom! Watching Liesel dance is like reliving what I always wanted to do but was too afraid. I love dance and think it is a wonderful expression of joy in your heart. I turned to Craig and said maybe in a few years I am going to take some of the adult classes at the studio. Hopefully, I will not freeze and have my mom come rescue me again :)
Craig and I realized during the dress rehearsal that it is time to upgrade to a better camera. They would not let you use flash so we did not get any good pictures but here is Liesel at the end of the tap piece.

Here is Liesel the morning of by the fountain.

I just love dramatic pictures like this one:

After we met our "star" and gave her some flowers. I told her she did awesome. She was very excited to eat an airhead...LOL!

Once again I wanted a family picture but as you can see by my facial expression, Caedmon would not even look at the camera and everyone was ready to go since we had been there for 3 1/2 hours by this point. Time to go! See me squeezing his hand? LOL! I think I was trying to smile while I said..."Caedmon TURN AROUND!!!"

After the dance recital Craig had an opportunity to go with his dad on a fishing trip to Ohio so he left that afternoon. My friend Jeni and her kids spent the night Saturday night and we painted nails together and talked till 2am. It was fun having a sleepover. My parents stayed with me 2 nights and then my other friend Wendy spent the night last night. I do not like to stay alone. Craig should be home in about an hour and I cannot wait to see him!
Thank you Jeni and Wendy for staying with me.
Thank you mom and dad as always for keeping me company and helping around the house. One day my mom had the idea to have the kids do some de-cluttering in the living room. She asked the kids to find some toys to donate. Liesel is very good at finding things to part with but I think Caedmon takes after me and has a hard time letting go. He came up to my mom and said "I found something to donate." Want to guess? An orange crayon!!! LOL!! Who knows??? Later on, he came up with more things.
It has been a busy few weeks but lot's of fun!!

Once again, it has been too long since my last post. Liesel had her last day of school today . It was an awards ceremony and now she is free for the summer!!! (post to follow on that later) So I have been just trying to get her through that. The last few weeks have been exciting.

Liesel went to a Father/Daughter dance we had at our church. Liesel wanted to go pick out a new dress so we went to get her one and the one requirement she had was that it had to "twirl!!!" Every dress she tried on in that dressing room, she tested the "Twirl Factor!!!" One awesome memory that I enjoyed that night was how excited Liesel was to dress up for her Daddy. She wanted to surprise him and not let him see her until it was time to go. I absolutely love my Daddy and know how important a father/daughter relationship is to a little girl. In the book Captivating by John and Stasi Elderedge, it explains how little girls want to know they are lovely. They want their father's attention and love. Watching Liesel prepare, in a sense, to see her prince for the dance touched my heart that night. She waited downstairs for him to come down and told me to tell her when he was there as she was hiding in the guest room. She walked out as soon as he came down stairs and there was a twinkle in her eye. "Daddy, am I lovely????" She did not really say that, but I could see it in her eyes. I was very blessed to have a Daddy who made me feel lovely and now I get to sit on the other end and watch my husband show that special kind of love to his daughter. He told her she was beautiful. She twirled for him and I held back tears as I took many pictures.

Liesel, or should I call her "Miss Priss" enjoys posing for the camera as you can see!

 Jensen is about to turn 8 months old on June 4th. Wow, I cannot believe how fast he is growing up. Knowing that he is most likely my last (wink....) I have been trying to savor these baby moments that go by so fast in the first year because you are so overwhelmed. Even though I have made a concentrated effort to enjoy every moment, it still seems to be moving so fast. He is sitting up really well by himself and he is rolling everywhere. He does not like to be on his tummy, so there has been no attempt to crawl. I wonder if he will be like some babies and never crawl and use some other form of getting around before walking. When he is laying on his back, I look away and he has pushed himself with his feet halfway across the room. Guess I cannot leave him alone anymore!!! A month ago, I was changing out the clothes in his closet to the right season and size. I decided to put him somewhere where he could not get away from me. Looks like I may have to use this method more often. LOL!

Now for Caedmon.....Welcome Back to the "Funny Things Caedmon Berry Says" Show!!! One morning I was putting away clothes in Jensen's room and Caedmon came in to keep me company. As usual, he made up a game we could play right there. He kept asking me these questions and they did not make any sense. If I answered a question incorrectly, he told me that "That was UNcorrect!!!" Even after I told him it was supposed to be "incorrect", he did not change the way he said it. After the end of this game, he was quick to remind me that I got 4 wrong and only 1 right!!!! He also told me that I got "no bonus points" I did not even know I was trying to win bonus points! LOL!! Well, at least one of us was having fun :), At the awards ceremony at school, Craig had given Caedmon his phone to play angry birds on, which by the way he is obsessed with! Half way through the awards the battery on Craig's phone was almost out and Caedmon leaned over me to ask Craig this: "Daddy, did you bring the cord for your phone? It needs to be charged." I think Caedmon thinks that cord will "magically" re-charge the phone whether or not there is an outlet near by. LOL!
Liesel is now officially done with school so I am sure I will have posts more often to come of the fun we will be TRYING to have this summer!!! Please pray for me.....survival with all three kids at one time all summer!!! OH MY!!!

Kids are funny!

It has been too long since I have found the time to sit down and blog. Over the past few weeks, my 34th birthday happened on April 16th and we celebrated Easter. Those are two very exciting things but it also brought with it sadness. 3 years ago on April 16th (my birthday) a student at Virginia Tech University went on a shooting rampage and many students lost their lives that day. Then this year on April 16th, many tornadoes touched down in North Carolina and there was massive destruction all around us. It makes me start to wonder what is up with my birthday? LOL
We were very blessed to have no damage or tornado at our house in Fuquay Varina but we had two tornadoes right around us.....one in Holly Springs and one in downtown Raleigh only 15 minutes away on either side of us. I have to admit that I was not taking any of it seriously. We had plans that day to go have lunch at my favorite restaurant Carrabas. My parents were at the house and we were going to leave at 3:30 as soon as Jensen got up from his nap. My parents kept telling me that there were tornado warnings around and maybe we should reconsider going out. Tornadoes in North Carolina? Right!!!! I have lived in North Carolina since the 2nd grade and the only serious weather I remember was hurricanes. I am imagining a thunderstorm and maybe some small funnel clouds floating through the sky, never touching down. Jensen was up on the second floor in his room taking a nap. I do not even want to think what could of happened had I left them in there and a tornado came through. Mother of the Year Award!!! As soon as our power went out, I realized maybe I should wise up and stop making MY BIRTHDAY the most important thing to me at that time. You see, birthdays are a big deal to me and after 9 years of marriage, Craig has begun to realize that. I do not expect other people to make a big deal, but I expect it from my family. Anyways, back to that day. We did lose power for a few hours and had a thunderstorm but that was it. We would have driven right through Holly Springs to go to Carrabas in Apex. The Lord protected us from being on the road that day. I am grateful for His divine protection. One of my good friends who I see every day because our daughters have taken dance together for three years lives in Holly Springs. She told me how bad her neighborhood was hit and it all just has sunk in how blessed we are. My prayers continue to go out for people in NC and now even more devastation in Alabama and Mississippi because of tornadoes there.

So the title of this post was "kids are funny." I have been keeping a piece of paper going around near my computer and when I think of it, I write down funny things Caedmon says. I wish I had more of what Liesel says but she is at school for most of the day. I hope to keep track of her comments better once she gets out for summer break. Caedmon is so funny and I want to remember these comments for years to come.
1. One day he asked me for a snack and he said "bring something healthy!"  AHHH music to my ears!!! He does listen :)
2. We were playing a monkey game where you had to put a tree together so the monkeys can hang on branches. He said he did not know how to put the tree together because "I can only do it on Saturdays, not Sundays" It was a Monday...LOL!
3. One day he was running between our couches in the Living Room which he loves to do. I tell him to stop often and he does but before you know it he has so much energy, he is doing it again. This time I told him to stop and he said to me "but mom, I am just having so much fun!" Well then in that case....keep running....LOL I did not say that :)
4. One morning I was feeding Jensen while Caedmon was playing Wii Fit Plus. He kept coming to me asking me what his phone number was. Now, you must understand that I was on the second floor and he was on the first floor. I asked him why he needed his phone number and he told me that Wii was asking for it so I started to give it to him. He stopped me and said "one number at a time". So I gave him the first # and he came back up. I then told him the next 2 numbers and told him he could remember two. After four trips up and down he said "it won't let me enter in any more numbers." Now I know I must sound like a strange mom for allowing my son to walk up and down the steps so many times without helping him but ...you know!!!! Once I got down stairs he was not entering his phone number but his waist size and how many steps he took that day. LOL!!! Well the waist size was off but his steps a day may have been a 7 digit number...LOL!
5. We live in a neighborhood right behind Applebees, Kohls, Chick-fil-a and Dunkin Donuts/Baskin Robbins. So needless to say I can get in trouble. Applebees however is at the bottom of my chain list so we have only eaten there as a family maybe 3 times in a year. One afternoon we were sitting at the light next to Applebees and Liesel and Caedmon were asking me why we do not go there much anymore. Liesel said we had not been there in over a year (slight exageration she gets from her momma) and Caedmon said that "We have not been there ALL DAY!!!!!" I love how kids are when it comes to time!
I look forward to many more Caedmon and Liesel sayings :)

Here is the Easter picture of the kids this year: