Our week...(and some pictures.)

So, we've had such a busy week this week as I was trying to get stuff together for a garage sale at my parent's house. I am so sorry that I've had a hard time blogging. So, I'll try to make it up this week, but no promises. So, here is a brief review of our week...

Monday...Went through the house trying to get out Garage Sale stuff, and catching up on laundry.

Tuesday...Mia had gymnastics, then the girls and I headed to Childress where Jody was leading worship at a See you at the Pole rally. (Jody and the other guys came down later that afternoon.) We got home VERY late that night. Not fun!

Jody at his dad's church for the rally.


Wednesday...I got in (last minute) to get my hair done. It was about 3 weeks overdue! I always go darker in the fall, so I did! I went from blond to brown. (Now Eisley and I really don't look much alike. My "paid for blond hair" was our only matching quality.) Then more getting ready for the garage sale.

Summer look...


Fall look...(yes, a self-taken portrait.)


Thursday...Mia went to MDO and Eisley and I helped out at Day 1 of the garage sale. Long day, but at least I made a little bit of cash. That night, both Eisley and Mia stayed the night at my mom's house so I could come over very early in the morning to help, without having to wake the girls up early. It worked out perfect! Since Jody and I had a free night together, we went to see a late movie! We haven't been to a movie, or a date, in a long time. It was so nice!

Friday...I had an early start again for the garage sale. This day was slower, but a still made a couple of bucks. Then that evening, Eisley had an apt to get her pictures taken. (I do milestone pictures for the first year, you know, baby, sitting up, standing hold on to a chair, then free standing and walking. It should be 3, 6, 9, and 12 months, but that never happens for me. Oh well. This is the 3rd stage pictures.) Well, we get about 3 pictures taken, and Eisley falls down, and it was all over! She was so upset for the next like 10 minutes, and would not get out of my arms, so we had to reschedule the pictures for next week. Bummer. I am praying she will be more rested and not remember her traumatic pictures. (it really wasn't that traumatic.) So instead, we all went to Old Navy, and they were having a great sale. We got several necessities, and when we got to the checkout, we realized that if I bought one cheap thing of chapstick, it would push us over $100 which allowed us to get the full 40 percent off, therefore, we got to save $40!!!!! Wow, we were so excited!!!! What a deal!

This is Eisley in her new carseat (well, Mia techniqually got the "new" carseat that converts to a booster when she's 4, and Eisley got Mia's old one. Oh, I hope she's not scarred by hand-me-downs. I totally know what its like to be the second girl who didn't always get new stuff.) We were waiting for dad and Mia to get to Old Navy after our unsuccessful photoshoot.


See what I had to deal with at the photo shoot. Not a happy baby that evening. Cheerios just weren't enough!!!


Today...This morning Eisley and I went to my very good friend, Melissa's, baby shower. (Mia was not in a good mood this morning, so she got to spend the morning with Jody. They needed some bonding time anyways.) We had a great time. Melissa is due late November, but she definately doesn't look like she is two months away. She looks great and got so many great things! Now, we are just finishing up lunch, waiting for Jody to get home from his lunch with a friend, so that i can make a very over-due trip to the grocery store. Yuk! I'm not looking forward to it, but it HAS to be done! Then, we will head to church.

Melissa (in the middle) opening all her gifts...


Melissa (I told you, she doesn't look like she has 2 months left!), me, and Eisley (sorry its kinda fuzzy. I need a new camera)


*Bonus Picture of super cute Eisley's shoes!!!*


So, its been a great week, a busy one, but great! I hope you all had a great week too!

Another part of my Heritage...

So, its kinda strange that the day I would post about the heritage of my spiritual foundation and growth, would be the same day as the passing away of part of my life heritage...my great-grandmother. My Grammy Woods passed away in the middle of the night this past Sunday in her lifelong hometown of Stephenville, Texas. She was 97 years old, but she never once acted her age. Yes, the past few years have been a little more of a struggle with her health, but even at 90 years of age she was still working on her farm with all her cattle. She also LOVED playing in the band and singing for the "old people at the senior citizens center." Yes, she never considered herself to be one of those "old people." Even though I didn't get to see her much in the past several years since she never left Stephenville much at that point, she is still dearly loved. She left behind such a strong legacy of life, strength, and passion. I pray that I can be as passionate about what I love as she was. What a remarkable woman. Thank you Grammy for the legacy you have left behind, and the heritage that will continue speaking for years on end.



It was so great though to get to spend some time with all of my dad's family, including my cousins that I am so close to. (hopefully I will have pictures to share when my cousin emails them to me.) We had a great time just talking and laughing. Its never fun to have something so sad have to bring you together before your usual holiday gatherings, but it was still such a joy to be with family. None of our spouses were able to join us for the funeral, but it was kinda fun for it to be just the original family (minus my cousin Aaron who couldn't make it.) It was just like old times. Thank you Memaw (Grammy was Memaw's mom) and Papa for allowing me to have the table and chair from Grammy's house. Each time I look at them I will be reminded of Grammy and the life she so strongly lived. Thank you for blessing me with this fun furniture! We love you and will continue praying for you during this hard time.

Thank you Randy, Becky, Amy, Zach, and Zoe for taking care of our girls. It helped more than I ever thought to have my hands and time free while at the funeral. I am so blessed for family that is so quick to step up and help at a moments notice. I love you all! Thank you!

Heritage...

So, this morning the girls and I (Jody was leading worship at another church) joined my parents and my brother and his wife (my sister and her family weren't able to go) at my parents' church, Paramount Baptist, here in Amarillo. It was a special service for the church's 50th anniversary. This was the church I grew up at. I attended this church from the time I was born until I went off to Tech, then got married. When Jody and I got married and moved back to Amarillo, we knew that the Lord was not calling us back to this home church of mine (it had also become Jody's church during the few years that he lived in Amarillo before going to Tech.) It would have been easy to just go back to my church home, you know, back to familiarity and comfort, but instead, the Lord had another path ahead of us. I would not have traded that for anything!



So, as I was sitting in the service, I began to become overwhelmed by emotion. The Lord began to show me all the heritage in this church, especially the heritage I inherited through the 21 years I was a member of that church. This was the church that I grew up going to mission friends, pre-school, GA's (you Baptists know what I'm talking about), then youth group and college ministries. This church is where I asked Jesus to be the Lord and Savior of my life at the age of 7, and was then baptized a few weeks later. This is also where I attended numerous Disciple Nows as both a student and later as a leader. This is where I went to many, many church camps. This is where I began the journey of this relationship with Christ that continues abundantly today. This is where I learned what it meant to tell people about Jesus both in other countries, and at my own school. This is where I was blessed to be a summer youth intern while in college and had the privilege to teach many girls Bible studies and take girls to hang out at Sonic. This is also the church that I ended up meeting the love of my life and best friend, my husband. This is also where I made so many lasting friendships! I have so many fond memories of Paramount. It was the foundation of who I am today. I am so thankful that I was raised in church, and on top of that, a church that was striving to teach me who God is and what it meant to have a relationship with Him. Even though I no longer attend this church, I still love it. I was truly brought to tears in the moment it hit me in all the Lord had done in me during my years at this church. I am so blessed!

A new week...

So, slowly but surely I have begun feeling better. It wasn't until this weekend that Jody and I realized a small detail to this story of my severe headache. Last Monday, I was pulling out of the garage (in a hurry), and backed right into Jody's truck. Oh, I hit it pretty hard. Hard enough to dent my car pretty bad, and even bend his bumper a little too. We didn't think much of it, until it dawned on Jody that maybe I had a little bit of whiplash/minor concussion. I didn't agree with his thoughts really, especially since I woke up that morning with a bad headache that lingered all day. But, the past couple of days, I've had a small headache lingering and now my neck and shoulders are hurting a little more. Who knows. We don't have insurance right now, so its not like I can really do anything about it right now, but if it doesn't get better soon, I might have to break down and go to the chiropractor. We'll see. For now, pain medicine once a day is taking care of it pretty well.

Oh, and as of this past Saturday (the 6th) Eisley officially has her first tooth. Yes, my 10 1/2 month old got her FIRST tooth. I was beginning to wonder if she'd ever get teeth, since Mia had a mouth full at this age. Its been a rough few days of teething, but she's getting better. Tooth number two is soon behind, I think. I would have taken a picture, but my little turtle of a child clamps down pretty hard and does not let a finger in her mouth without a fight, much less a picture to be taken.

Hope you all have a great week! Blessings!

Our week, not a pretty one...

So, I think it is time that I update you all on our horrible week this week, well, it was mainly MY horrible week, but of course, everyone was affected. I'll just give you a play by play...

Monday: I woke up with a headache, so I just treated it with sinus medicine and ibuprofen, but it kept coming back, so I had to do this pretty much all day. (I'm used to headaches, but this one was a little different, especially since medicine wasn't taking care of it.) But, it was bearable.

Tuesday: Around 2 or 3am I woke up with an agonizing headache, like I had never known before. I finally woke Jody up around 7am and he ran to get me some migraine medicine. This did not touch it at all! I laid in bed in horrible pain, along with throwing up about every 2-3 hours. I couldn't sleep either because the pain was so strong!
We finally decided to go see our Dr friend at his clinic. I got a couple of shots and a couple prescriptions sent home too. I finally slept for two hours, and woke up feeling better, or so I thought. I felt better for about an hour, then it was CRASH again.

Wednesday: I had another horrible night of really bad pain (oh, and don't forget I have still been throwing up every 2-3 hours. even though you might want to forget that part! As do I!) The Dr had told us that if I don't get better to call him back the next day and I might need to go to the hospital. So, we finally called the Dr at 8am and he got us a room at the hospital by 9:30am (praise the Lord I didn't have to sit in the ER, since I had to be laying down at all times.)
We get checked into our room, and I am just in agonizing pain. After a couple of hours of I'm not sure what, they try to get me an IV started. But since I was severely dehydrated, they couldn't find a vein in my arm. Oh, they tried, six times they tried, and had to give up. They even called the Life Star paramedics to try to get the IV started but they were out making rescues all afternoon. Finally, our good friends, our pastor and his wife, came to see us. They prayed over us, and even prayed that the Lord would bring up a vein for the nurse to use for the IV as soon as possible. So, they left and 5 minutes later we call our nurse back in to try again, and guess what, there was a vein. Now its not an ideal place on top of my right hand, but it worked! That's all that mattered. They started out with some medicines, but they didn't seem to help much, then to a very painful Potassium drip for like 6 hrs. They even gave me two shots of IMITREX in my belly for the migraine, but still, no relief. Finally, around 2:30am on Thursday I got to have the real IV to get me hydrated.

Thursday: I woke up feeling a little better, had a CT scan (which came back normal) and even had a bath. I was doing good for a couple of hours, then started hurting bad again. They just kept giving me medicine, and after I choked down a little real food for lunch, I started feeling better. Finally by the evening I was feeling much better, and was ready to go home. The Dr finally agreed and allowed me to check out around 8pm.

This leads us to today. I woke up not feeling real great, kinda queasy, light headed, and a little bit of a headache still. Don't get me wrong, I'm better, but not like I'd like to be. I just ask that you continue praying for us. Eisley is also getting her bottom two teeth, and it has not been a pretty process. The final diagnosis is what they THINK was a severe migraine that led to severe dehydration. All tests and blood work came back good, nothing bad. So that is good.

I do want to thank my mom and sister for ALL their hard work in caring for my girls and for my mom cleaning my house (which is so nice to come home too, and it needed it bad!) I could not have done this without their generous help! And for Jody, he was amazing through all this! He took great care of me through this whole thing. I guess this is the "Worse" part of "for better or worse." I am so blessed with amazing, caring, helpful, and generous family and friends during my sickness. Thank you for each of your continued prayers as we ask the Lords complete healing in my body, and strength back to me. Along with Him giving back this week that we lost. I am so glad the Lord is my Healer!