Basketball

M decided he wanted to play basketball again this year, so we signed up for Upward at our church and off we went!

The boys took a few weeks to warm up to each other - they had some really good games and they had some games that we wondered if they even showed up.  :)

One of the really neat things they did this year was set up a tournament for the 5th and 6th grade teams.  At the end of the season, they played several games in a week.  The boys really came together during this time and played amazingly well.  It was so much fun to watch them play!  They won their first three games, but lost their last game by 1.  They boys were heartbroken and tears flowed, but I have never seen boys that age play so hard and leave their hearts on the court.  They had two amazing coaches that really encouraged them to grow as basketball players as well as godly young men.  We were very blessed!

Here are a few pictures from the year:

 The boys were perfecting "Tebowing."

Christmas and Baylor

I have decided I HAVE to be better about keeping up with my blog. I am making that a goal this year! I hope that even if I fall down, I will get back up and try again. So, here it goes...

The boys had the whole week before Christmas off, so we took off for the ranch (just outside of Del Rio). It was great hunting weather for the boys and I did not see much of them while we were there. They can be outside for hours - really quite nice - and I am so glad they are old enough to go out on their own!

G killed an Axis deer this year. For those of you that don't know, axis are native to Africa - they have spots and long, tall antlers. G was SO excited! Maybe one of these days I will have all my pictures uploaded so I can be current with those too. :) M also killed a VERY nice 8 point buck. Both of these will be gracing our walls in the not so distant future!

We returned to my parent's house in New Braunfels for Christmas and most of the week afterwards. While I have always been a Baylor fan, this year was more fun for us than most! We were thrilled in December when RG3 (Robert Griffen III), Baylor's quarterback, won the Heisman trophy. This was the first time in Baylor's history! What a class act he is! We were even more excited to find that Baylor would be playing in San Antonio in the Alamo Bowl. My dad was able to secure us tickets, so we got all decked out and off we went! We ended up having seats in the first level about 25 rows back on the 40 yard line! They were amazing. If you didn't see the game, the score ended up more like a basketball score than football, but Baylor pulled it out in the end with a 67-56 win over Washington. It was definitely a game to remember for all of us!

We were able to get up to Oklahoma for a few days at New Years. It is always so good to get to see friends and family, even for a short time.

After 2 weeks away from home, we were ready to get home and unpack! It is fun to get away, but always good to get back to your own bed and your own home!

 

Looking forward to hearing from all of you! Thanks for checking in on us (hopefully I can give you a reason to check in more often)!

Here are a few pictures from Game Day!

Time with Family

The boys headed off to New Braunfels to Cousin's Camp in early June.  My mom had gone to get my sister's kids from California and they all arrived on the same day for a week of fun.  They spent most of their time in the water - Schlitterbahn (several times) and tubing the river are their favorite activities for Cousin's Camp!
This year ended up being a little different.  My sister and her family were in the middle of a move during this time.  They were being transferred (by the Air Force) from California to Geneva, Switzerland so they showed up in New Braunfels about mid week.  James and I were able to join them for the weekend so we could all spend some time together before Anji and her family headed on the next part of their journey.  It was a great time for all of us and the boys enjoyed being with their cousins for a time.  This is a treasured time for all of us each year!

The kids and moms playing mini golf!  It was HOT!

The Big Boys.  Can't believe they will be middle schoolers!

The "little" boys.  They are not so little anymore - both double digits!

The munchkin!  She thought M hung the moon!  What a doll!





Xtreme Camp 2011

I had the opportunity and privilege to go with G on his very first youth camp.  I cannot believe I am old enough to have my own kid in youth!!!!!  James and I used to go on youth trips all the time before we had kids and when our kids were very little.  The last few years we have not been involved much, but I was so thankful for this opportunity!

We left early on a Saturday morning and headed to Camp WOW (Walk on Water) in Oklahoma.  I would give you a reference point, so you would kind of know where we were, but I am not sure "near Atoka" or "between Gerty and Non" will be enough of a reference.  Suffice it to say, we were in the middle of nowhere. 

We took 400+ teenagers and almost 100 adults as we descended for 4 days on Camp WOW.  It wouldn't be a youth trip if you didn't start out with a little excitement, so 30 minutes down the road 1 of our 10 buses started smoking.  Luckily, they were able to replace it fairly quickly and we were on the road again.

The picture below was our first order of business.  Have to get a picture before someone gets hurt, right?

Our days were very full - starting with the first day's swim tests, unpacking, and getting used to the heat.
We were divided into teams and family groups which allowed us to bond with many different people. I helped to lead a great group of junior high kids!  What a blast we had!
Each morning and evening we had worship services and phenomenal speaking by Pat Cammarata.  He really engaged the kids!  The first evening we had over 30 kids give their lives to Christ.  What a blessing!  The second night, we had 110 kids surrender their lives to ministry/missions.  I have never been a part of such an amazing experience.  The really cool thing was those kids gave up their free time the next afternoon to come see what their next step should be.  AMAZING!
The kids had a blast each afternoon - after playing group games, they had several hours of free time.  There was lots to do - tournaments, water sports, board games, crafts, wall climbing, zip lines.  I know there were things I didn't even see!
Below is G getting ready for group games, then enjoying climbing the net and going down the zip line.

This was really a great experience for me as well as G.  I got to meet some great people that love kids and will be loving on mine too!  We did not have any "issues" that I am aware of that could easily come up at camp - but the youth  minister has been doing this for a long time - he knows how to have control before issues arise.  Can't wait to go again!!!!

Pumpkin Carving

Ever since the boys were little, we have done pumpkin carving each October. This is one of our favorite activities and the boys always ask about it!

This year, since we were still living in a hotel, we had some good friends invite us over to their house to do the carving. They had never carved a pumpkin with their kids, so it was great fun to see it all from a "newbies" perspective. It was also fun to be around little ones again!

The pumpkins!

What is in there?!?

Is it supposed to look like that?

The daddys are working hard to get all of those pumpkins done!

G with his pumpkin opened up!

M with his pumpkins innards!

G with his finished product!

M with his finished product!

Drew with his finished pumpkin!

Sweet baby Evan with his pumpkin!

MCA Jog-a-Thon

The big fundraiser for the boy's new school is the Jog-a-thon! This is held in October each year and the kids get people to pledge money for how many laps they can run. I was quite surprised because the laps were not short and I would venture to guess that each lap was about 1/4 of a mile. The kids had to run as many laps as they could in 30 minutes!

G getting ready to run!

There were moms available to mark the lap logs as each kid came around another lap.
Here is G's lap log - he did 13 laps!!!!

M's group getting ready to go!

M getting his laps logged!

M ran 12 laps!!!

I was so proud of the boys as they persevered even as they were getting tired!

Moving Day

This is how we spent many a house showing! We would all pile in the car and drive down the street while someone went looking at the house. It was always a hurry up and wait scenario! Sometimes we would even eat dinner in the car! You never knew when a showing was going to happen and you sure didn't want to turn anyone away. This happened to be September 12. That evening we got a call that an offer had been made - it was for cash and they wanted to close quickly! Wow! How quickly can you move? On September 20, we had movers and packers at the house and they loaded the truck on September 21. We also closed on the house that day. So after having the house on the market for 3 months, we got an offer, moved and closed in 10 days.

James actually stayed in Oklahoma and supervised the movers and packers and with the help of his mom cleaned the house. The boys had school (Garrett had a school trip), so the boys and I left and went back to Dallas. This was such a bitter sweet time - we knew God was moving us, but this had been a GREAT house for us and we were sad to give it up!

Little did we know it would be another 2 months before we would find, buy, and move into a house in the Dallas area. But God knew exactly where He wanted us - it just took us a while to find it! :)