Life with my sister

We are ready to welcome in a new year here at our house. 2013 was a wonderful year, yet new beginnings are always exciting. I have not blogged much lately because I am too busy to sit still and write. I vow to do better in the coming year. I do miss it and being still is always my goal, yet rarely achieved. Bring on 2014!  We scored these fun glasses at a 5k we ran in Memphis last weekend. It was a night run through the light display at Shelby Farms. We ran as a family and got cool stocking caps and shirts. We have had fun with the glasses tonight, for sure. They glow in the dark! It doesn't take much to excite us around here!  13 years ago tonight, Randall and I met on a blind date. It is always fun to celebrate that fun time and now that we have Henry it takes on a new meaning. We went to eat Mexican food and came home early to ring in the new year! We had a parade of our very own all through the house. I love our crazy life and look forward to what lies ahead!  Happy N...

Christmas started last Saturday for us. We drove to Jonesboro to have Skutt Family Christmas with Daddy, Connie, Aunt Babs, Uncle Joe, Hollye, Matthew, and Claire. I hadn't seen any of them ( except the Lee's) since last SFC. It's always great fun to open gifts and play a little dirty Santa. We laugh loudly, and we laugh a lot! So fun! We also take a lot of pictures. This is one of MANY! Aren't we cute! We then headed to the Fort for some more Christmas fun. We got to worship with our home church Sunday morning and it was wonderful. I love those people! Abby, Randall, and Henry came and spent time with us too. Somehow, I didn't get a picture of Stephen's parents. We went to a couple of movies and ate countless meals.  Our Christmas tradition is brunch on Christmas morning after we open presents with mom. She makes eggs, biscuits and gravy(the best gravy ever), sausage, and garlic cheese grits. Oh my, the garlic cheese grits. Yummy! We had an excellent Christmas ...

Merry Christmas from our home to yours!   Abby

Well, who knew it would be weeks until we blogged again? You'ld think we have a lot going on, or something! (I don't, Abby may) We've been enjoying Christmas shopping, being with friends, and sitting in our living room with our Christmas tree. Delta Church had a float in the Christmas parade, and that was loads of fun. Cold, but fun!  Anna spent the night with a friend last night. Angie, Audrey's mom, said that when Anna was decorating the candy cane cookie she said she was going to decorate it as a J for me. The preciousness of this child is too much for me! This is Audrey, Anna, and Audrey's brother Nick. Audrey also has three brothers, no wonder she and Anna are such good friends!  I can hardly stand Anna being gone. She is my sidekick and her not being in the house is just weird. I don't think I'll let her spend the night with anyone again. Just kidding! Maybe! We're in the final days of Christmas preparation. We're finalizing plans, buying gifts...

  Can you believe Henry Patton will be 4 years old tomorrow?! Neither can we. We celebrated his birthday last weekend with his first all boy party, polar express style. I had so much fun preparing for it, as you can probably tell! My mother who is never at a loss for words said it looked like Polar Express threw up in my house. She was SO right and we loved it! We had a breakfast pajama party with 7 three and four year old boys. It was such a fun time.   I had his pajamas monogrammed with a train and his name. He loved them and I liked how they sort of looked like the ones on the movie. Henry loved all the bells I had everywhere. There is no doubt we believe at this house. We had the jingle loud and proud!   I had his invitation made from a shop on Etsy and I was very pleased with them. One of his little friends came to the door ready for me to punch his ticket. It was so cute. I ran to get a hole punch and punched it for him. Every good p...

This year was Thanksgiving together. About every 3 years we end up eating turkey together and for that we are thankful. Stephen has this new fancy camera so he was all photo snazzy and for that we were also thankful....or at least for the most part! We had Thanksgiving in Little Rock at our great aunt's house. It was wonderful to have the original four together for a short bit. Sadly, it is rare for us to all 4 be together, and especially with Mawmaw. We are a busy people with lots of life to live. Sarah and Zach are brother and sister, and belong to our mother's sister, Janet. We all grew up together in Fort Smith. Sarah and I are 11 months apart and Zach is the baby of our group...his wife is having their first baby this coming spring. Much to be thankful for!    Pioneer Woman ain't got nothing on AJ! My BLT cheese ball fronting like a turkey. Not Pinterest worthy, but hey, I attempted it. Stephen found great humor in my turkey and provok...

Tuesdays have become my Monday lately. It seems that they are full of angst, crisis, and tears. I don't know why, Stephen thinks it's crazy, but it's true. Last Tuesday was a humdinger. It was the worst one ever, I'm pretty sure I didn't like anyone that day. But today was different.  I woke up, and went about my normal morning rituals. When I sat down by Stephen on the couch I mentioned that I looked bad. I mean I said, "I look bad!" He looked at me, rubbed his head like he does when he can come up with no words at all and walked out of the room. I thought is was weird, but continued to read the paper. He came back in, sat beside me, and told me to never say that again.  I cried. I'm crying now just thinking about it. It was such a sweet thing for him to do. He reminded me that he loved me, no matter how I looked. And that I wasn't to say it again!  I pray that moment in time stays with me for all of my days. It spoke volumes to me. As I sat there...

Frosty the Snowman is the theme of ICE! at Opryland this year. We did Shrek last year and decided we needed to do Frosty this time. We drove over for it one day last week. It is 5 hours from our house. Henry loved the slide and went down it alone. I was so proud. He got stuck inside. It was comical watching him shake, scoot, rock, etc trying to move down. Everyone cheered when he started moving again. He was smiling so big. He was proud. We loved the red ice train. This display is so impressive. I have seen ICE! three times and I am always overwhelmed at the detail and mystery of how they make all this stuff out of ice! The had a NYC display and Henry had to drive the taxi, of course. We went in the middle of a week day so we had the place to ourselves, for the most part. Henry got to ride the train and ring the bell the whole time. We also rode the boat in the hotel, which we had never done before. It was fun to not have to fight the crowds. I rode the tea ...

I love Christmas movies. Do you? I've watched my share of Lifetime and Hallmark Christmas movies the last couple of weeks. Some of them I just adore and could watch over and over, and others I'm pretty much ok with never seeing again. Ha! I love that they all end up with a happily ever after ending, thank heavens Nicholas Sparks doesn't write Christmas movies. Can you even imagine? Santa's sleigh would probably run over the girl, or the guy would die in some horrible house fire due to bad Christmas lighting. Oh, Nicholas please don't write Christmas movies!! Anyway!! Some of my favorites are... 5. Christmas with the Kranks. Stephen and I read John Grisham's Skipping Christmas to each other for years before this movie came out. It was a fun little tradition we had. We would read it on our way home for Christmas, oh the memories. This movie is a hoot. Sweet, funny, and touching. Love it! 4. Family Affair. I had never seen the original of this movie until this year...

Today is Monday. Trash day on our road. The trash is typically taken out Sunday night so that we don't miss the trash truck. At our house, the trash can is filled to overflowing by Sunday night, we can't risk missin the trash truck. We're doing school and I just heard the truck go by. It seemed that I'm the only one that heard it. I was overcome with tears (I'm blaming it on lingering effects of the flu) and memories.  It used to be that the kids waited on Monday morning for the trash truck to come by. As soon as they heard it, they were off to the windows and then out the door to watch extra close. We made friends with the trash guys. The kids took turns taking them drinks every week and sometimes brownies. At Christmas we gave them little gifts and at Thanksgiving we wrote them thank you notes.  I always told the kids that they had what we honk of as a yucky, stinky job but without them, our yard and neighborhood would be yucky and stinky!  Today when the trash tr...

Well, as you probably guessed would happen, I'm not the only one in the house that has fallen ill. That sentence must not be grammatically correct, because autocorrect kept changing ill to I'll. It did it on that sentence to. I wonder why it doesn't like the word ill? (And it did it again! Ugh!) Stephen came home yesterday with a fever. That meant 5/6 of us were down. Samuel is the only one that is standing strong! Poor guy. He's having to do everyone's chores, run all of our errands and at the same time stay away from us.  We've made memories though. Anna and I have watched way to many Christmas movies for the middle of November. David, Daniel, and I have texted each other from opposite ends of the house. And Stephen and I have laughed while laying in bed at the hilarity of this sickness. And let's not forget that we are relying on Samuel, our brand new 16 yr old driver, to pick up meds and go to the bank for us. I love doing life with these people, it is w...

After church Sunday I suddenly felt BAD! It was weird, I had felt fine all morning and then after church I had no energy to go anymore. I went home and went straight to bed, I didn't even turn on the tv and that isn't like me at all! Stephen got Wings To Go wings for supper and I didn't even eat them. That's when I knew something was wrong because I'm in love with buffalo garlic wings!  Yesterday I felt bad but acted as if I didn't, but crashed last night, and i've stayed crashed since then. Samuel took me to the doctor's office today and sat with me for 3 hours. Three hours! They finally swabbed my nose with the longest swabs known to man and announced the flu was indeed among us! Oh glory! I got home, finally, to find Anna and David coughing and alternating between being dizzy and being chilled. It seems I've infected my home. Luckily the doctor sent home prescriptions for everyone in the house, so they've begun Tamiflu just like me!  Sunday ni...

We had an awesome time at the beach this week! Don't my people look happy?! We went on a dolphin cruise. It wasn't something Stephen and I were real excited about, but the kids had wanted to go for the last couple of years. It was so fun! It was a beautiful day, the temperature was perfect to be on a boat, and the dolphins put on quite a show. I have always loved the beach, and counted it as my happy place. But I found out this week that November at the beach is really my happy place! Watching the waves roll in while laying on the beach in my yoga pants and monogrammed sweatshirt is perfection!  All four of the kids braved the cold water day after day. It rained, the waves were huge a couple of days, and the red flags were out, but it didn't stop them from getting in the water. A big thanks to Stephen's parents for letting us tag along with them to the beach!

We're at the beach for a few days of R&R. We usually try to come once a year, but didn't make it this summer, so it's better late than never! My observations of the beach so far are these: 1) The sand isn't hot!  2) My family is the youngest on the beach, and that includes Stephen and myself. 3) It's windy. 4) The waves are big which makes up for #5 5) The water is COLD! 6) There are hardly any beach chairs on the beach. Maybe two per condo, which makes the beach look deserted, which I love. ( can I have a sentence like that? With two "which's) in it) 7) There are no airplanes toting banners in the sky. 8) The sky, sun, water, waves and sand are just as beautiful in late October as they ever are. 9) Shrimp and steak are as yummy as in the summer. 10) I love my family on the beach! And Stephen just added #11) "it's like an air-conditioned beach"

Can you stand the cuteness in this picture?! Yesterday Anna and I were in Rogers at the Arkansas Baptist State Convention. I am the team leader for the Ministers' Wives Network and our annual luncheon was yesterday. The luncheon is one of my favorite days of the year. I get to spend it with women who "get" me! We have one common bond and it is so fun to get together with them. This is our team. These girls are creative, fun, and they put up with me. Which is a huge deal, trust me! Our luncheon is more of a conference, it lasts from 9:30-3:30. This year we had Kathy Litton as our keynote speaker, and Judy Martin and her daughter Kelly Stamps (of Kellys's Korner blog) spoke about being a preachers kid, and the mother of one. It was a really great day! I'm so ready to begin planning for next year! And could I look more like my mother in these pictures? Love ya Mom!

Last weekend Henry and I headed for some fun in the Fort with friends and Marmie. Luke and Henry had fun playing in the pumpkins and Melissa and I had fun watching them. They are a handsome handful. When did this child get big enough to wear boots and a belt?! He is growing up so fast and I love it and mourn it at the same time! He is hilarious and truly my child though. His poor daddy deserves a medal for putting up with us! We always have fun in the fall doing harvest related activities.  I count it all joy to make special memories like these with Henry. I hope his love for all things "holidays" will mimic mine. I am trying my hardest to make it take! ha. Spending a few days with the beautiful creation and her baby boy was medicine for my soul. Seeing her twice in 6 weeks could create a habit...a good one. This is my soulmate and forever best girl for life. I seriously could not imagine 1 day without her being a text, call or FB msg away. She gets me and w...