Braces

Noelle has had an RPE in for awhile now expanding her upper pallete. When she first got that, it is was fun watching her try to talk. Now the braces are in, and I think she looks really cute. She is doing good so far. She will have these on for about a year, then we should be done til she is in middle school. Bless her heart, she got a really messed up mouth. She is such a trooper though. I think she is even a little excited about being the only one in 2nd grade to have braces.

Funky Hair

We are the proud owners of all sorts of little hair gadgets. Becca had to get all sorts of stuff for a prop box for one of her class projects. She brought the left over stuff to LeeLee since she loves to do hair. This was the beautiful result of her playing with all that stuff. Pretty cute isn't she!

And another one leaves

The one thing that is hard about working with college students, is that they leave. Katie had become so precious to me. I love her spunky personality. She is truly a young woman of God. It is obvious in how she handles everything. She really has a heart for youth, and I know that God is really going to bless her. She got married to a wonderful guy. We know that Britt will be great for Katie. Katie, I love you and I already miss you! I will be praying for you this year, and for all the kids lives that you are going to touch! You will be the best teacher ever! By the way, that is the best wedding cake I have ever tasted!

Cow Appreciation Day

July 11th was cow appreciation day at Chick-fil-a. We love this day. We got up early and got dressed up and headed off for breakfast at Tiger Town. Then we went to the mall for lunch. We finished the day off with dinner on Magnolia. It was so much fun to moo for the cashiers and get our free meals. The managers at Tiger Town laugh at us as we dress up for all there fun activities. We walked in the other day to see two of our pictures hanging up. We are the Cow Appreciation Family of the Year, and we were selected to represent their super hero night. Another family at there commented on how we are a famous Chick-fil-a family. Our picture (that they took) has now been entered in the national cow appreciation contest. The people at the mall were cute too. At lunch we were the only family that had been brave enough to come to the mall, and they said we were the cutest herd they had every seen. Our heard changed throughout the day. This photo is from breakfast, by dinner our herd was 13 cows strong.

4th of July

For the 4th, we helped host a youth party. My kids love being around the youth. We had alot of fun, and the night was a real success. I think there were about 150 youth and their families. We were definitely tired by the time we hit the bed though.

The Dreaded Flower Beds

Please, don't give me plants. When they make there way to my house, they generally die. Now granted the mass loss of plants was not my fault this time, it still happened under my watch. Paul sprayed them all with round up then claimed that the dog had gone tee tee on them. Oh well, I didn't like them anyway. So, one of my sweet high school students, Kira, came to the rescue. She volunteered to design my flower beds for me, and we went to work planting and creating. I added some confederate jasmine to her already beautiful plan. For the first time since we have moved in here, I like my plants. I am trying real hard to keep them alive. My grass is still dead though. Not much I can do about that right now!

Super Hero Night

We will do anything for free food. So when Chick-fil-a announced that they were having super hero night, we knew we had to go. So, the costumes went on. Eleenah is super ballerina in case you couldn't tell. I didn't have a super hero costume that fit her, so we just added a cape. All the employees were dressed up, and it was alot of fun. We are looking forward to cow appreciation day which is coming up on the 13th. Yeah for cows, yeah for free Chick-fil-a.

Papa's new toy

We spent the day at Callaway Gardens on Hunter's actual birthday, then he wanted his birthday dinner at Papa and Tita's house. When we got there, Papa had just gotten a new toy. The kids loved the mule and had a blast riding around the neighborhood on it. Hunter thought that was a pretty nice birthday present. Anyway, Hunter had a great time eating his hotdogs and hunting frogs. He is such a boy.

Emily Left us!

I know that when Emily arrived, she thought time was moving so slow. However, in the end, time had moved to quickly. On June 11, we made our tearful goodbyes at the Atlanta airport. It was really hard to let Emily go. When you open your home up to someone for a year, they really become family. Emily is like another daughter to me, and we miss her so much. We learned alot this last year with Emily, and we really enjoyed watching her grow. She learned so much while she was here, and it was fun to watch her progress into a true American teenager. We are most excited about the fact that Emily learned about Jesus while she was here, and gave her life to him. She has already found a church in Taiwan, and is going every Sunday. Please join me in praying for her parents, that they would see Christ in Emily and the she can be a light that leads people to Jesus! She is truly a special girl, and we are blessed just by knowing her. We get to talk to Emily through the webcam. The kids get so excited when she is on the computer. They miss their "Emmy". We can't wait til she comes back to visit next summer. I'm sure time will fly again, and it will be time for her to be here! Oh yeah, she would still be here, if Anna Ruth and I hadn't packed her stuff for her. That was a major ordeal trying to get all that stuff packed up. Thanks Anna Ruth! We love you Emily! We miss you lots!

Time out at Chick-fil-a

LeeLee loves Chick-fil-a. Here she is taking a time out from the playground, but she made it clear that she was not ready to leave. She cracks me up!

Party for Emily

We had a good bye party for Emily at the lake. It was alot of fun. We had the best hosts, the Giffins. Their daughter, Katie, has become a special college student to us. They graciously offered their home, and took care of two meals. We all had fun, and only a few of the girls returned home with sun burns.

Hunter turns 5!

When our kids turn 5 they get to plan a special trip of their very own. They get to pick one parent and pick what they want to do. I was very jealous when Noelle picked Paul and they went to New York. They did all the fun little girl stuff that I would love. Well, I lucked out, and Hunter picked me for his trip. He wanted to go Iquana hunting. So we headed off to Cozumel, Mexico for a week to hunt iquanas. We took Tricia along with us so we wouldn't be alone. We had a blast. Hunter became a celebrity at the resort where we were staying. All of the staff knew him by name. Half of the staff went Iquana hunting with him one day, and that was alot of fun. We made some special friends while we were there. We loved Yazmin, Arnold, and Omar, and were sad to leave them. Hunter also made friends with Paco, who was a firefighter in 9-11 and was in the middle of the tragic events from that day. Hunter and I found over 200 iquanas and about 20 tolocs. We had a blast. The highlight of the trip for me was swimming with the dolphins. I had a great time with Hunter. He is such a fun kid, and he really enjoyed being in the spotlight without his sisters!