Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone!
We are headed home.

Sweet Dreams

I've started thinking of my blog as an online scrapbook my boys can read someday. I want to use this time to remember the following.

I have many "favorite" moments in the day. It starts with my husband kissing me goodbye at o'dark thirty as he leaves even though I'm dead asleep. Then Issac says hi Mom in his cute little voice when I walk into the living room where he's been watching cartoons. Next is getting Landon up. He lets me know he's awake by screaming at the top of his lungs, but once I'm in there he stops, smiles and jumps up and down in his crib. So cute. Then through out the day I get to witness all that my little ones have in store for me. Some good, some.....not so good. Then bedtime comes. We taught our kiddos early in their lives that bedtime means bedtime. I put Landon down for bed and squeeze him one last time for the day. Sometimes he'll cry for a minute or two, but usually he just rolls over with his blanket and closes his eyes. Next I read Isaac a story. Usually a dinosaur book or tractor story. Then we sing a song. Lately he's wanted to sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, but he also likes The Baby Jesus Song (Jesus Loves Me). After this I relax and finish up dishes and pack Chance's lunch. Then my MOST favorite moment of the day comes. I love on the babies one last time. I can't sneak into Landon's because it would wake him up. So I pray outside of his door. I thank God for letting me be the mother to this sweet boy. Next I quietly open Isaac's door to sneak over to his bed. I fix his blanket and tuck him back in. And then I let a few tears come. The love I have for these precious babies is overwhelming. I cry for how much I love them. And I cry over the tough parts of the day we just had. I am so thankful for God's grace. I definitely need it. I literally love my boys so much that it hurts. And as I sit down next to Isaac's bed a dinosaur with a spiked tail crawls under my knee and I start crying for a whole other reason. Time to leave the room I guess.

I do this every night. And I always will.

Thankful

Our first Thanksgiving alone as a family of 4.
I have to say it was more wonderful than I thought it would be.
Not that being with my guys isn't wonderful all the time. I was afraid I'd be sad and missing family and all.
But I wasn't. Not a bit really.
We had a great day. We watched the parade. I cooked. Chance peeled potatoes and apples.
Then we stuffed our faces ate a nice meal of mashed potatoes and gravy, green bean casserole, glazed ham, and apple pie :)
We watched football and set up our Christmas trees.
It was a great Thanksgiving!

Here is our main tree in the evening :)

Our dinky tree. I'm not sure it'll stay up. I don't want to buy any Christmas stuff now. I'm waiting until after the holiday for cheap decor. I know now (after scoring the tree above for 80% off 5 days after Christmas last year) that waiting is totally worth it. The ornaments on the tree are why it's up. They are from my best friend. She bought them at a vintage shop. I love them and they mean a lot to me and they need to be up. So we'll see. They may get put up another way somewhere else in the house.

Our stockings. They also won't be hung this year. First time having a mantle and I'm waiting for after holiday sales to get the PEACE mantle hanger from Target :)

The best friend mentioned above. She gave me this ornament when we were seniors I think. Isn't it terrible that it was long enough ago the I can't remember right? Sheesh!

This used to be on my parent's tree. It's one of the things my mom let me have when I first moved out to decorate my tree. Starting December 1st there will be a chocolate in there every morning for Isaac to discover. He loved it last year. Landon will start next year. Right now he's learning to leave the tree alone. Doing pretty good so far :)

The boys' hand prints from the past two years. Now that I have the tree I realize my skirt doesn't match too well. I'll most likely get a new one after the holidays and trace these to the new one. We'll see. For now I melt every time I look down at it :)

Daytime tree :)

And the sweet, handsome men who God has blessed me with. I look at them each day and I can see God's love for me. I am so thankful for my Savior who sent his Son to die for my sins. And then he gives me these three guys? I am so loved and I hope that you may also know of His love for you.

Fall Swap!

I had the pleasure of participating in the Just Add Color Swap hosted by Ashlee at On the Front Porch Looking In and Jessica at You Are My Color a few weeks ago and I can tell you with great certainty that I was paired up with the best partner! Victoria over at Mine to Live...with Faith, Hope, Love and Coffee sent me the BEST scarf and nail color. Seriously I am in love with this polish and it is all I have worn since I got it in the mail. And I know I've mentioned it here before, but I love getting mail. I just love walking to the mailbox, reaching in and seeing something personally addressed to me. Makes me feel special ha ha. It's true! Anyways, so here is a picture of the awesomeness which is the polish and scarf I received. And my new hairdo. It's growing on me :) literally...

(And my computer camera takes terribly dark photos. Obviously.)

Content

Recently I have been pulled to books, verses, and stories about contentment. I am currently reading Reshaping it All by Candace Cameron Bure. And just in case you're looking for a good read on physical and spiritual health, this is it! Sometimes I struggle with not being content with my clothes, house, family size, spiritual life, food choices, etc. You name it, I've struggled over it! Candace says something that encourages me and give me something to strive for in relation to what I eat.

"God calls us to be content, and contentment cannot abide with greed, nor can it abide with self-pity. A content person will be just as happy to eat an entree in a restaurant as she will a salad on the go. I've learned to appreciate abundance, and I've learned to also appreciate those times when I've had to skip a meal or grab a granola bar as I'm heading out the door."

This may not make tons of sense to everyone, but I like putting it here to encourage and for me to look back at. It took me 4 days to write this post. I started it feeling strong and believing that God wanted me to share what was on my heart. Then I started to get stressed. About a blog post I know. Kinda lame, but whatever! After mulling it over with myself for days I decided to just do it. Sometimes I let the devil trick me into believing things about myself and my relationship with God that aren't true. On this blog for example, I don't post things often about my faith because I'm afraid my past will make people laugh at my post. I know God has forgiven me, but will others? Is my walk with God not strong enough to share about what he's teaching me through my bible reading? Thoughts like these keep me from posting things that might actually touch someone or speak to them or lead them closer to Christ. Well here is just a glimpse of something I've been thinking about and sorry for rambling. Hope you all are having a great Tuesday. It's like a Monday here since Mr. had a 4 day weekend :) And before I go, here are the babies who melt my heart at least once a day.

Recent News in Photos

Buddy Bear turned 3! Wow! He got lots of great stuff including this bike from us. He wants to ride it all day every day :)

Painting pumpkins. No one else wanted to join in the fun so Buddy and I carved one, painted two and colored on the last one with crayons :)

Mr. was promoted last Friday. It was exciting to see him get to this point in his Army career. We're so proud of you babe :)

(In case you're wondering, I changed hubby's name on here for OPSEC reasons. Ooooh the Army)

Playing outside :)

This is what happens when you try to take pictures of active boys on a super sunny day :)


I melt :)

Passed out on the floor :)

I would like a new camera! One that I can produce awesome pictures from, but until then I stick with my nice little digital one :) You can't really tell but these trees are dark reds, yellows, and greens in my backyard. I like having the forest right in my view :)

He made the moon to mark the seasons; the sun knows its time for setting.
Psalm 104:19

Happy November everyone!

Prayer

My heart is heavy today for a family I do not know personally, but through the lovely blog world. Please keep The Byrd Family in your prayers.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses,

let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely,

and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,

looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith,

who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross,

despising the shame,

and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Hebrews 12:1-2

WILW

It's already Wednesday! Halloween is next Monday and then it's already November! WOW! Since having my sweet babies, the time literally seems to be FLYING! Anyways, as always I'm linking up with Jamie over at This Kind of Love to do another What I'm Loving Wednesday! These are fun :)

After a TON of pinning I finally decided I'm loving my hair blonde and plan on adding some bangs at my appt. in mid November.

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These are the inspiration for color and cut I'll take with me :)

I'm loving the weather as always. I like the cool evenings and morning and the 70's when the boys want to play outside in the afternoons.

I'm loving that Mr's company has an FRG meeting tomorrow and we're going to start planning stuff! Fun!

I'm loving all the new blogs I'm finding. I find a new blog I LOVE almost everyday! Awesome :)

I'm loving sleep. I've been so tired lately and I'm glad my boys sleep though the night!


Speaking of my boys! I'm loving them as usual :)


Happy Wednesday!

WILW

What I'm loving Wednesday again with Jamie!

I'm loving Pinterest! I'm not sure I'm doing it right but I'm enjoying what I am doing which is getting lots of inspiration for crafts and future decorating!

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I'm loving season 3 of Parenthood. It doesn't come on until 10pm which is a bummer but I love it enough that I'd watch it even if it came on at 2am :)

(source)

I will soon be (in a week) loving my position in Mr's company as the FRG hospitality volunteer :) I'm excited to get involved, meet the ladies in the company and I love whipping up welcome baskets for new comers :) should be right up my alley!

I'm loving playing trucks with my little guys. Here are their favorites :)

I'm loving that the high tomorrow is 62! Yay!


And as always I'm loving life with this man. He is truly amazing and I don't praise him enough for what he does for our family. Thank you for leading us babe :)

6 Years of Fun

Today my Maggie dog turns 6 years old!

I begged for a dog for YEARS. And on Christmas day of 2005 I got the best present I'd ever received!

Maggie was my baby until my boys came along. I still love her. She lives with my parents and is my dad's best friend now. Maggie was there for me during the craziness of high school and she was perfect. She could read my emotions and love me accordingly. I will never forget how great she was for me. Luckily my boys love her just as much as me and I hope they have years and years of playing with her ahead :)

I love you Maggie May Hoo!

(her full name and yes she was the flower girl in our wedding :)

I Love You So

I can't imagine life

before you came along.


Me there singing senseless

no meaning to my song.

Oh my sweet Buddy Bear. Where has the time gone? Just yesterday you were born and now here you are. Three years old! I just don't believe it. You are the sweetest boy. You are polite and love to give hugs and kisses. You never go a day without telling us you love us all. You are my bug finding, outside playing, bike riding, constantly giggling, monkey loving Isaac. I love you so much!

Happy Birthday sweet boy!

What I'm Loving Wednesday

I decided to join up with Jamie and do What I'm Loving Wednesday!

I'm loving the fall like weather we've been having here in North Carolina for the past week or so!


I'm loving that because of the weather, Mr and I made pumpkin spice lattes Monday!


Of course I'm loving these three handsome guys!


I'm loving that after blogging for this long I've discovered people I know who blog! YAY!

And finally I'm loving that I'm co-hosting the next "coffee" at our house with the colonel's wife near Christmas and that I accumulated everything needed to make this tree a reality in my living room!

Have a wonderful Wednesday!