Connections Through My Experiences and Thoughts

I have had some down time today so I thought I would blog alittle. I am not one who expresses my thoughts, but here are a few of my thoughts that I have had the opportunity to think about while spending the day with Avery.

There is a part of our reading curriculum at school where the students have to make connections to aid in their comprehension while reading books. The connections they should be making are text to text, text to world, and text to self. With this down time today I thought I would make some connections to "self" and to the "world" through some experiences that I have had over the past few weeks and even days.



Connection to "Self"": A few weeks ago I was able to head over to my brother's new church plant in Camden. I headed over there to support my brother and also see how the Lord is working with these people and the people around them. It was such a great experience worshipping with total strangers. I was very welcomed and felt the love from this body of believers as well as the love of the Lord. It is so encouraging to read, hear, and see that the individuals at this public meeting want to reach out to those who are lost. Leaving the building I was so encouraged to how the Lord is working at this church plant so far. I was encouraged for myself to love people more so that they can see the Love I have for Jesus. Loving the Lord more is something that I need to work on and if I am stronger in my walk I can love people more. This was my connection to "self" and how I was impacted and now a connection to the "world".

Connection to the "World": The other day I went to a wedding in Maryland with Ange. I was able to sit at a table and met a guy from England. Since he was from England of course I struck up a conversation about futbol (soccer). I don't really connect with people in such a short time, but I really connected with this individual. We talked soccer here and there (Ange said something along the lines "oh great") and he was able to share his testimony with me. Currently he is a missionary in England where he has been a pastor of a church for 19 years. He shared with me about his dark times in his life and how the Lord brought him out of the tough years. This guy has been through it all; marriage with affairs, alcohol, and bringing his life back to the Lord through a drug rehab since he was a coke addict. After rehab he was called to be a missionary and a few months out of rehab an individual over in England asked him to start a church. He started a church with only a few people attending and 19 years later has about 130 committed people. He shared with me the ups and downs in his lifes (more downs) and how the Lord is working over in England. He was saying that less than 1% of people attend a church over there compared to the 50% over in the States who attend. He shared with me a story of a guy who came into their Church one day who had a messed up life and was currently struggling with things. This individual continued coming to services and eventually told his parents that he was attending a futbol practice or league. This guy eventually found the Lord through the Love that was shown by people of this church and the acceptance. There were other stories that this guy shared with me of people coming into the church with addictions, etc. and through the love of people and the grace of God coming to know the Lord. So here is that connection to the world...The congregation in Camden is reaching out to those who are stuck in sin and the congregation in England is doing the same thing. The Lord has been working for so many years over in England where people are coming to know him with this church's philosophy and outreach. It is exciting that the Lord can and will do the same thing with this church plant in Camden.

I hope I can be an outreach to people of the world where they are able to see my love for them and where they will be able to see the love of a graceful God.

Baby #2

Yesterday I went for my first ultrasound, to measure the baby and to confirm my due date! I am due May 5th, so I am 10 weeks and 2 days today!
Here is a picture of our baby. If you look closely you can see its entire face (mouth, nose and eye). He/she was sleeping but has a strong heart beat (165 beats per minute)

Recent Pictures

Here are some recent pictures, mostly of Avery of course:)

This child LOVES watermelon. . .she could probably eat an entire watermelon in one day! She wont eat it if it is cut into pieces, she only likes to eat it like a "big" girl. She is VERY independant!

Andrew and I got a new leather chair and ottoman. We have been looking at them since we got married but my frugal (wise) husband wanted to make sure we got the best deal possible. We looked at this same chair a million times (that may be an exaggeration), but for the Labor day sale it was the cheapest it has ever been; so we bought it! The day it got delivered AVERY claimed the chair. She kicked me out of it, climbed into the chair and leaned back to watch T.V. What a stinker!
Chewing a "num"ball aka gumball








We had the opportunity to go to Johnson's Farm again this year for a birthday party! Avery LOVED it. She is such an outdoor kid and is busy, busy, busy (it exhausts me some days)! Here are some pictures from the party!



Singing and Dancing for music time!



Feeding the animals! She is an animal lover!




Family photo!
We went on a hayride and picked pumpkins, but we don't have nay pictures of that! Avery was having a 'little' melt down during the hayride because she wanted to walk around while the tractor was moving! Also she wanted to pick lots of pumkins and poor Andrew and the diaper bag, cameras, and was trying to carry 3 pumkins while I tried to DRAG Avery back to the hayride. We felt bad for the people who were riding with us! She did better on the ride back because we busted out the candy (saves me everytime)!

Here we go again!

Just a quick update for the three people who read this blog (Andrew says no one reads this). . .We are expecting baby number 2 in early May! It is very exciting to have PLANNED this one :)

New Hobby

Ange and I were given a furniture set that dates back to 1938. We have had it in storage for awhile, but decided that were were going to fix it up so that Avery can use it for her big girl furniture.
Below are a few pictures of our project from start to finish. I really enjoyed refininishing this furniture as well as did Ange and of course Avery. I think I have finally found my hobby and can't wait to have a garage. I look all of the time for old furniture in the trash, because it really cleans up nicely.

I can do everything Mommy does!

Avery LOVES to help! She wants to be a part of EVERYTHING I am doing. If I am cleaning she needs a rag to help, but it has to be wet. If I am making dinner she stands at my leg saying "elp" (help), she wants to stir. When I vaccuum she wants to, when I do my make-up, she sits on the counter and does hers. . .you get the idea. Sometimes I just want to get things done quickly, but I also don't want to extinguish her desire to help and be a part of what I am doing! It is a hard balance, but we are working it out! Here are some pictures of her "helping" mommy!


We were making blueberry buckle! It was delicious, but the kitchen and Avery got very messy! I just go by the motto that everything cleans up!



Avery found my lipstick in my purse and thought it was a perfect color for her! She loves to carry my purse around, I need to get her her own, but I am sure it would not be the same a carrying mine :)

Avery has discovered a love for coloring! We have to work on keeping it on the paper!


Corn on the Cob!! I cut the corn off the first time I gave it to her, but she insisted on eating it off the cob! She ate the entire piece!



Andrew and I are working on re-finishing some furniture that friends of ours gave us. We worked on the 2 dressers last Sunday for about 5 hours. They are looking great! Avery of course helped us sand them down!

She also loves to drive Grammy and P-pops car! It helped to keep her occupied while we worked on the dressers! She is so big!

Ocean City 2008

This past week most of may family went to Ocean City, NJ for vacation (J and Cheryl we missed you guys)! It was a great vacation! The kids got along, most of the time (sharing is hard) and all the adults got along. . .which is MORE important than the kids! The weather was awesome -Monday was a little cloudy, but we were so lucky to have a nice week! Here is a video of our trip. At the end are family photo shoots that my sister took with her new camera. They came out great!!

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Random update!

For Father's day we got my dad some new trees for his yard. We had a very eventful day planting the new trees and moving exsisting ones. Here is a recap of the day!





















































Avery wanted to help water the plants. She was soaking wet by the end of the day, but she had a blast!


















Hugo learned how to play dead - so cute!








Corrie decided that she wanted to play with the ax that we had in the garage. It was the tiniest, dullest ax, but mom suggested that we dig out some dead roots from a tree they had removed. Notice there is no picture of Corrie playing with the ax (she did get to swing it but the boys did most of the work). Also, please take notice of the footwear people chose to wear while swinging an ax! Not the smartest people!




















































Avery kept busy while we were working!


















All the working made Hugo tired. . .












On another note. LastSaturday we went to my Aunts retirement party. It was a hawaiian theme and Avery loved the Leys. She was cracking me up!








Avery is such an happy little girl. . .I feel very blessed to have such a wonderful little gift!




I know that was random, but I was getting some grief for not updating the blog, so there you have it!

Happy Father's Day

Today is a day set aside to honor your dad's. . .Well I thought I would put together a little tribute to Andrew (from Avery of course). If you have ever seen Andrew interact with Avery there is NO DOUBT that he loves his daughter! He has amazed me as a dad - I could not ask for a better man to be the father of my children! So Andrew, thank you for loving me and thank you for being a great dad to Avery! I hope you are honored today (and every other day)! Avery just gave you the i love you sign:)





































































HA HA - two peas in a pod (she is definately his kid:)