Visitors

Yes -I know we have been missing in action for the past week. We have been a little busy! We have been blessed to have had so many visitors - The Hancheys, The Hams, The Wilsons and my mom! Such sweet tastes of home...we are overwhelmed at their love and friendship - our cups overflow with thankfulness for each special visit.

We started off with the Hanchey family - Summer and Justin (and Jill) are friends from Shadowbrook our church in Georgia...Justin and I have known each other since high school! I can hardly believe that we both have kids and are all grown up! We love you guys!



The Hams - dear friends from NorthWake our church in North Carolina who now live all the way in Idaho were in the area visiting family and made a special stop to visit with us for the afternoon! Our hearts are so encouraged by you guys - we love you!

The Wilsons came and spent some time with us during their two week road trip vacation! They are friends from Wake Forest - now they are in Mississippi and we hope maybe one day they will be in DC (wink wink). We had so much fun with their family - parks, the zoo, the national mall. Thanks you guys for coming - we love you!

My mom came on the 4th of July...no pictures of her to show off because she had the camera and so most of the pictures were of Judah - go figure! She completely spoiled us and we hated to see her go. Mom we loved having you here - we miss you and love you so much!

This weekend we are looking forward to the Crafts being with us - they are coming to look for housing so that they can start packing. We are so excited! Please be praying for their trip.

The Knight Hotel is taking reservations!

Finger Painting - Not The Best Idea

There is a reason that fingerpaints say 3+ years! The other day I had the great idea to try finger painting with Judah - I stripped him down, sat him on the counter and pulled out the paint. Little did I know that we were in for such a BIG mess in such a short time. It was so crazy that we did not even get the second jar of paint open before we both wanted to call it quits. Good thing dad was home to get Judah in the bath tub while I tried to get the blue paint off of everything in the kitchen. I think that we will hold off on the artwork for a little while longer...maybe watercolors!

Yes the water color is slightly blue and yes we still have a faint blue line around the tub! What fun we had - we will definitely stick to the finger paints made for bathtubs.

Wordless Wednesday

Happy Father's Day!

Father's day is such a special day - not just because we can celebrate the men in our lives who are dads but because it makes me stop and think about how God is my heavenly Father.

"...In LOVE He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us." Ephesians 1:5-7

This Father's day I am so incredibly humbled by and thankful for the amazing grace that has been lavished on me - the precious gospel of Jesus Christ. To think that I can call the Creator of ALL things, the King of kings and Lord of lords - Abba Father takes my breath away.

Even though nothing can compare to our Heavenly Father - I am so thankful that my little boy has been blessed with a great earthly dad - one who loves him very much and tries so hard every day to love Jesus the best way he knows how. My heart is filled with joy to watch them play and to hear the squeals of joy from my little one as his daddy wrestles with him only to end in the sweet sound of a daddy saying..."I love you little buddy...I love you so much."

Happy Father's Day Nathan - thank you for loving your family so well!

Hanging with the Davis Family

A joy - that is what the Davis family was to us! We loved having them in our home doing life and hanging with us. It was a sweet time of encouragement for us and it gave the Davis family a glimpse into what life as a new church planting family is all about.

Judah loved having a friend to play with every day! He especially loved her beautiful curly hair...when he would walk by her he just could not resist touching it. Thank goodness that he did not pull it and that Lana was patient with him. We had such a great time and miss them already!

Dinner at Old Ebbitt - a must in DC!

Just playing around - waiting for all the grown ups get ready to go to dinner!

Picking flowers outside the restaurant as we waited our turn - The first flower that Judah ever picked for me...I know not intentionally but he did pick it and then hand it to me so he could pick another one! That has to count for something :)

Playing at the park - somehow Lana stayed clean and Judah required a bath when we got home! Maybe if we had given her a little more time to get dirty but we had to cut our playtime short when it started to thunder and we had about 1/2 mile walk home.

As you can see we did not make it before it started to pour rain - we laughed the whole way home and we definitely have a fun memory of running home in the rain.

So much fun and such a great blessing-We can't wait for their next trip to DC.

Thanks for coming Davis Family!!

Mom or Dad?

We all know who Judah acts like but who do you think that he looks like? I have gathered some baby pictures for you to do a comparison. Take a look and leave a comment as to who you think Judah looks like.

DAD

MOM

We look forward to seeing what YOU think! The Davis Family (Dan, Rachael and Lana) are coming to stay with us for a few days - check back to see what fun we have with them. Thanks for checking in on us and what is going on in our life!

A Trip Home - I Mean A Trip to Wake Forest

Judah is napping and Nathan is working (Starbucks) so I have decided that this is a great time to catch up on blogging. We just got back to DC from Wake Forest. It was a wonderful trip and we had a great time. Many thanks to the Doyles who let us become part of their family for 5 days - Jeff is the head of church planting at North Wake, his wife Sandrine is amazing, and the 3 boys - Caleb (6), Nate (4) and Josh (2) are full of fun energy! Judah had a BLAST hanging with the big boys and the boys were great to let him tag along in all of their fun. While we were there we got to hang with sweet friends, attend North Wake for Sunday morning services, and be accessed by Acts 29 church planting network - not to mention that Nathan was able to attend the Advance Conference (the main reason we were there!).

Instead of words I will let the pictures tell the rest of the story - so fun!

The last picture sums it up! We were lavished in so many ways on this trip "home" to Wake Forest - we had such a fantastic time and we were all worn out when we got home to DC. The Lord is ABUNDANT! (On a side note...doesn't Judah look so big in his big boy car seat?! Thanks Wilder family for the great gift!) He absolutely loves it - that is a tremendous blessing to mom and dad since it makes for much more pleasant car rides.

We wish we could have seen everyone while we were in Wake Forest but if we missed you we will see you next time!!! What a great reason to plan another trip :)