Thanksgiving 2008

Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name - Psalm 100:4

Things I'm Thankful For:
Our God who is always there and always forgiving - growing up in a Christian home - Jay who is a wonderful husband and father - Cade who is all boy with a sweet side - our families who are always there for us - Christian grandparents and great-grandparents to set an example for Cade - our health which has never been more evident to me than this past year - our home - our jobs, even if we don't like them 100% of the time - what I've learned through 3.5 years of infertility - those who have helped us through the adoption process - and many many other things that would fill up this entire page.....

Things I'm Working on Being Thankful For:
Our adoption process.....someday it will all make sense and I'll be Thankful for what we learned and what we expereienced. Some day's though it's easier to remember to be thankful for it than others. It's definately a work in process!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!!

Pajamma Party

Cade's class won a blackout so they are having a pajamma party today. I'm still not sure what a blackout means. Cade's description of it still doesn't quite satisfy my curiosity, but I've learned to accept it. Too many questions = cranky kid. So today Cade is wearing pajamma's to school, he gets out at 1:00, he gets to be a car rider (his all time favorite thing) and he's spending the night with MeMo and Papa Jim. Does it get any better in a 6 year olds world?...actually wearing my jammies and leaving work at 1:00 sounds pretty good in my 31 year old world.

Congratulations Megan and Terry!!!!

So Terry and Megan’s wedding was the past weekend. We left for the Lake on Thursday, with a stop at Cade’s eye doctor. We got checked into our hotel somewhere around 6:30 pm. We checked out Sunday a little before 11:00 am. We had a great time, but we were so ready to get home. Saying Cade was pretty wound up, would be putting it mildly. He was nuts, not only was he staying in a hometel (his word for hotel) but he was also surrounded by family that he doesn’t see very often - John and Mary from Texas, Meagan and CJ from Virginia, Nana, Granddad and Mary from Arkansas, Steve, LeeAnn, Lauren and Kim from Illinois plus the locals - Memo, Papa Jim, Grandma Robyn, Aunt Charity and Avery. He was in a 6 years olds version of heaven. On Friday night after rehearsal, while we started decorating, he went back to the hometel with Lauren and Kim. They are Jay’s 19 and 17 year old first cousins. They had a ball talking about movies and things. They even gave him the nickname Goldfish. I’m not sure what the story behind the nickname was, but Cade was proud of it.

The wedding turned out beautiful. Everyone seemed to get along and things went pretty smoothly. Megan’s parents and family are very nice. I think the two families will get along well over the years. I didn’t get too many pictures taken during all the festivities because I ended up being pretty busy until the reception. Being the sister-in-law who has a tendency to be uptight and nervous when it comes to time, schedules, organizing, etc I thought it would be best to be seen and not heard. I had planned on staying in the shadows and keeping my mouth shut! So that didn’t happen. But I enjoyed everything that I got to do to help with the wedding and I was glad to do it. Thanks to Megan and Terry for letting us help with your special day!

No matter what worked or what didn’t work at the wedding – Terry and Megan are now husband and wife. We are praying that God will bless their marriage for many, many years to come. Congratulations!!!!!

So now for the pictures…I was so mad at myself yesterday when I realized I didn’t have one of the three of us dressed up. We did have a professional one taken but I wanted a non-professional one for Christmas cards. I’ll post a professional one once we get them back.

The Bride and Groom. One of the things that didn't work that day were the original candles that were supposed to be in front of Megan and Terry. The original ones got broke during the deocrating process that morning. Sharon and I went and picked out new candles since a certain someone was responsible for the breakage. Jay admitted to being the one who broke them during his toast. He also confessed that our wedding gift fell out of the truck, which I didn't know about. I guess Megan and Terry will see how sturdy Fiesta dishes are when they open our gift.

The Cake Table

Cade and some woman who grabbed him and started dancing. She must be from Megan’s side…..


Cade dancing some more. I think he was doing the swim with LeeAnn and her girls. There's a hint of LeeAnn's outfit on the right side of this picture

Cade and two of the bridesmaids. He seemed to be a hit with the women on the dance floor.


The car that Jay was so proud of. I’m going to have to ask Megan about that lady….she and Cade seemed to be very good friends. She’s in so many of my pictures I need to write her name down.


Jay’s other proud moment – the saran wrapped steering wheel and luggage. There were a couple of former grooms (including Jay) that had some serious payback for Terry.

A School Function

I think I’ve mentioned before that Cade is in the after school program. The school has gotten funding from the state to provide a place for kids to stay after school. They work on homework, have Karate class once a week, play computer games and are even served dinner at 4:30. I’m on the fence with this whole thing – it’s a really great alternative for parents who don’t have anywhere for their kids to go. It’s safe, it’s supervised, they get fed, they get help with their homework, etc. But on the other hand isn’t all of that the parent’s responsibility? Yes, but things aren’t as cut and dry as they used to be. There are so many parents who don’t take care of their kids which make these programs necessary. It’s a sad cycle. What really breaks my heart is thinking about the kids who are eating all 3 of their meals at school every day. It's good for them in case they weren't getting fed at home, but can you imagine not having dinner around the table with your family at all? We do have Cade in it, but if they didn’t have the program we would be fine. The only reason why we did it was because of those days Jay isn’t at school. I can’t leave work at 2:30 everyday that Jay has something going on. If I did they might as well move me to part time status. We use it because it’s convenient and thankfully not because it’s necessary.

Cade has a love/hate relationship with the after school program. He would rather ride the bus over to the high school every day, but he’s required to at least show up three times a week. This is where it gets tricky for Jay and I….if Jay wants to pick Cade up before they serve dinner (which is what we strive for) he has to be there early enough that Cade doesn’t realize he’s missing dinner. If Jay shows up at 4:20, Cade’s mad because he didn’t get to eat. Then when I pick him up I have to time it so I’m there about 5:15 which means I have to kill some time after work. If I get there right at 5:00 he has just gotten to the computer lab and gets upset because he didn’t get to play very long. Sometimes I wonder how “convenient” this really is for us.

One night last week the after school program had a fun night of activities at the high school. Jay had a speaking contest so Cade and I braved this one alone. The gym was a combination of jumping toys, a Wii game, face painting, noise and smelly feet. Kids were running everywhere. There was a huge blow up obstacle course that ended with an enormous slide. Cade headed there first. So naturally I followed him. The line was a little long, but he waited there for awhile. Kids were sneaking in line, shoving each other, etc. When Cade got almost to the front he got out of line and came over to me. He wanted to do something else. I drug him back over to the line and told him he was almost there. Really, what would Cade do without me making sure he stayed in his line? It would be complete chaos, or at least that’s my opinion.

After the obstacle course he wanted to try the Wii. So I walked over to that line with him. That’s where the blow occurred. The one that you know as a mother is going to happen, but you hope it will be where they’re 18, not 6. He gave looked up into my eyes, gave me a little push and very sincerely said “Mom, could you please just go away? I promise I’ll stay in line this time”. He didn’t say it hatefully; he was actually quite nice about it. He was with his friends and I was hovering too much. Ok, I was standing right beside him in line. Since there didn’t seem to be any other parents in a 24 foot radius of me I had to assume I was the only one waiting with my child in line. So I backed off about 12 feet.

While backing up from Cade I thought about something that had happened when he first got there…..when he walked to the line for the obstacle course he saw one of his friends in line towards the front so he stopped to say Hi to him. A little girl, who looked to be about 4 shoved Cade and told him to get to the back of the line. Cade didn’t say anything, just went to the back of the line. For a split second I almost got onto the girl for shoving, I don’t like to see Cade (or any child for that matter) treated that way. It’s a good thing I didn’t say anything. Not only would Cade be known as the one with the hovering mother, but also the one who got onto a 4 year old girl for pushing her 6 year old boy. But if that girl’s parents had been standing with her in line she wouldn’t have shoved. Yes, I think there is something to be said for parental involvement not only in school but also while kids are waiting in lines. Lines are like war zones for kids. Very, very scary.

Highlights from Halloween

I'm just now getting around to posting pictures from our really fun Halloween weekend. Jay and Cade were out of school that Friday and Monday so I decided to take off the same days. On Friday we went to Fayetteville and Cade Trick-or-Treated around Nana and Granddad's neighborhood

and Aunt Mary's neighborhood.

But the highlight for Cade was handing out candy for Nana and Granddad. Since we've always lived in the country we've never had trick-or-treators so this was something new for Cade. Jay and I left him there handing out candy and made a Wal-Mart run for the next day. While we were there Nana called and asked if we could pick up more candy. They had ran out and Cade wasn't too happy about it. There were two little kids on the front porch when Cade realized they were out of candy. He told them he was out but his mom and dad were bringing more and then shut off the porch light. Once we got there with the candy he went out in the yard and told everyone he was back in business.


On Saturday we went to a Razorback game with Jay, Terry and Mary. Terry and Mary sat in the normal seats and the three of us sat in the seats we got for the game. Cade did pretty well through the first three quarters thanks to the binoculars, snow cone and ice cream. At the beginning of the 4th quarter Cade and I headed back to the tailgaiting spot. The famous Tailgriller.



Can you see all of the red in crowd around me?


Then on Sunday we went to Silver Dollar City. There is nothing like looking at Christmas lights and sweating at the same time. It was over 80 degrees that day. Can you pick out Cade in this group of kids?

Wii tried out the Wii

This weekend Cade stayed with my mom. He got to go see Madagascar Friday night and then spend some time with Pampa George, Papa Kerry and Avery on Saturday and Sunday. He had a big time.

While he was gone Jay and I took advantage of that and did some Christmas shopping. We got our shopping for him finished up this weekend. Before any of you get really jealous of me because we're done remember he's getting a Wii, we didn't have to do too much for him. We already had the Wii but we still needed all the accessories. We decided to get 3 remotes and 3 wheels so we can all play at the same time. You know we wouldn't be responsible parents if we didn't try it out before Christmas. How sad would it be for Cade if something didn't work on Christmas morning? It was our duty to make sure everything was in working order on the Wii.

We are happy to say that after several games of Mario Kart and Lego Batman the Wii is in working order. Jay may tell you there were some problems on Mario Kart, but that was more operator error. We loved it. Or at least I loved it all the time, Jay seemed to only love it when he was winning. Yesterday morning I played it until I had to get ready for church. Then I got ready quickly so I could play it before we left. As soon as I got home I started playing again. I did stop for a quick nap, but then went right back. We played until mom called to let us know she was on her way with Cade. Sadly we had to box it up. We probably won't see it again until Christmas....unless....Does anyone want Cade for another weekend? I looked up online how to get past this one part on the Lego Batman game. I'm really wanting to try it out. We've got to practice some more, we can't let Cade beat us right from the start.

Get out and vote

Have you voted today?

Jay, Cade and I were at the polls by 7:00 this morning. If you didn't vote before going to work make sure you do it on your way home. Go put a sticky note on your steering wheel right now so you'll remember.