Easter Pics!

Yes I am a little late in posting these, but you should be used to that by now.  :) 

Wayne really wasn't mad, but the sun was brutal!

This is little Faith who came home from Korea about the same time as Sydney came home from China.

Good friends.

One more try for a family pic.

And of course we had to hunt eggs!

Thank you for dying for me, Jesus.  I don't deserve your love, but I will forever be grateful for it.

Ornaments Found

I found the ornaments I was missing. 

Well, technically, they were right there on the tree, but hey, it's my blog! 

Anyhoo. 

These are the ornaments we bought to commemorate expecting Sarah in '95.

Also, the funeral home who took care of us when we lost Derrick this year held a memorial service for all the families that lost loved ones during the year.  They gave Hannah a gold ornament engraved with Derrick's name.  They gave other family members these ornaments.  One is an angel and the other is a teardrop.  I wanted to get something to commemorate his passing, but I didn't know what to get.  So this was such a blessing.

Here is the finished tree before Sydney got to it.  Now the bottom 2 1/2 feet of it is pretty sad.

Happy Thanksgiving!

The last few days have been filled with family gatherings!  We visited with my family first and then Wayne's family.  It was good to see everyone together, but I also had a bittersweet feeling because Abbey is missing Thanksgiving.  Does she even know that this is Thanksgiving weekend?  I highly doubt it.  God-willing this will be the last Thanksgiving that she will miss.  Here are some random pics from our gatherings:

Happy 4th of July

Happy Birthday, America. We had a wonderful 4th this year. Perhaps it was because this is Sydney's first. We bought her 2 little American flags and she carried them everywhere with her. She woke up VERY early today and because of that had to nap early which made her a bit late to the bar-b-que. Oh well, mama don't mess with nap times. Especially when we have plans for the evening. After a good day with family. we all piled into the Big Mama Van and headed to Viburnum for fireworks. This could have gone two ways. One: Sydney enjoys the experience and is facinated by the lights and sounds. Or two: we all quickly pile back into Big Mama and book the screaming Chinese child back to Oates! Well, when the first blast of fireworks exploded, Sydney jumped and climbed frantically up Sarah into her daddy's arms. However she didn't cry and as long as Daddy held her tight, she pretty much enjoyed them. About 3/4 way through the display she fell asleep. So precious.

Happy Day Before 4th of July!!!!

I love the 4th. It could be my favorite holiday. To be totally honest I do not enjoy most holidays because of the business and the pull to be everywhere at the same time. But I do enjoy the 4th of July. This year we celebrated with dear friends on the 3rd. Deb & Raymond and their children came over and we grilled. It was sooooo good. Wayne is the king of the grill, at least in our house. Just as we finished eating and huge thunderstorm came up, so we ran everyone out of the pool and inside. We put in a movie and watched the little ones play. I love seeing Faith and Sydney play together. Even though one is Chinese-American and the other Korean-American, they seem so similar in many ways. They had a blast playing on Syd's slide. It was a nice relaxing day spent with beautiful friends.

Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving y'all!!!!!!

Hope you all have a wonderful time with family or friends today.

(Just a little rebellious about all the Christmas decorations already being out. It used to be bad manners to decorate for Christmas before Thanksgiving. Or maybe I am just getting old.)

I desperately need y'all to pray for a sweet girl in my youth group. Her father was killed yesterday in a car accident. Her mother passed away two years ago with cancer. When I arrived at her house yesterday, she was understandably heartbroken. This child is 17 and the sweetest thing in the world. She has an older sister that lives at home with them and commutes to college. They desperately need your prayers.