Playing at the Cox's Home

After the shower we attended from the Cox family, we all were invited back to Mike's parents' house for dinner and playtime. His parents have a huge tree with 2 swings that Ethan, Caleb, and Mike's nieces, Charis and Ilana, had fun swinging in. I didn't get very many clear pictures of how high they could go in the swings, but they had a great time swinging so high! I wished I could've fit in the swing, it looked so fun!

Ethan and Ilana swinging and Uncle Mike pushing both niece and future nephew.

Megan and Ethan

Caleb in the swing

Caleb, Ethan, Ilana, and Charis
(The girls will be flower girls and the boys will be ring bearers in Mike and Megan's wedding in August, so it was good for them all to get to meet before the wedding!)

More Pictures from Wedding Shower

The second shower we attended this past weekend was given by Mike's Aunts. Since we had already made a bouquet of ribbons for Megan at the earlier shower, they decided to make her a hat out of the bows at this shower.

Megan, Stacy, and I

Me, Megan, Stacy, & Victoria

Megan with the cute tissue holder that her new mother-in-law, Cindy, made for everyone. They are in her wedding colors of blue and brown. She is very creative! She also made a little beaded bracelet that was around the tissue holder in brown and blue too. What a neat favor idea!

Wedding Shower Weekend in Baltimore

We had a lot of fun visiting Megan and Mike, meeting more of Mike's family, and attending two different wedding showers. The first shower was hosted by the bridesmaids and my mom.

My mom, Megan, Stacy, and myself

Megan

Mike's mom, Cindy, and Megan's new sister-in-law, Victoria

Bridesmaids that could attend the shower: Jacqui, me, Megan, Lindsay, Stacy, Cara

Carl's IceCream

This past weekend, the boys, myself, and my parents made a trip up to Virginia and Maryland to attend wedding showers for my sister, Megan, who is getting married in August. Unfortunately, Scott couldn't get off work to come with us this time. We had a whirlwind trip with lot's of fun along the way! We stopped by Fredericksburg, VA to pick up my sister, Stacy, who had just moved to VA with her husband, Zach, only 2 days earlier. We made an icecream stop at Carl's IceCream and got to visit with Zach and his parents.

My IQ Score

http://www.iqresearchlab.com/

I don't know if this is accurate or not, but I found this link online to take a free IQ test. It was at the above web address. I was curious, so I decided to give it a try! I went through about 5 or 6 computer screens of questions, and some of them were a bit difficult. I even had to get out pen, paper, and calculator to complete a few. But at the end, it said to get your score, you had to complete offers. I thought, great this is just a hoax trying to get me to buy something! But I went ahead and tried to pick an offer than wouldn't cost me anything. After all, I just spent 25 minutes or so taking this test that felt like the SAT! So, I clicked on one of the offers about receiving free downy and fabric softener etc. I had to join some health survey site and answer a few pages of health related questions about myself and my household. After receiving a $3 off coupon for some medicine to help stop nosebleeds (I get them about once every other month pretty bad, and that was about the only health problem I answered positively on), then I went back to the IQ webpage that stayed open on my browser and clicked "continue". It finally gave me my score! It said my score was 155, which is in the 5th percentile of the population, and that people who score this are genius or near genius. Wow! I hope it's true! If anyone else takes the test, let me know if you get the same thing or different. I wonder if they tell everyone this that takes the test to make them feel that they are a genius! Kind of a fun little thing for a Wednesday night! Give it a try!

Contend for the Faith

Today, I searched out a passage of scripture that would encourage me to "contend for my faith". I came across the book of Jude in the New Testament. Jude was the half brother of Jesus and full brother of James. My Quest Study Bible comments that Jude wrote the book because he was concerned that Christians might be drawn away from the truth by teachers of false doctrine. He wanted to urge believers to contend for the faith.

With so many false doctrines and teachers in our world today, we must continue to fight for our faith, because it is worth fighting for. If you read on in Jude, you will read that some of our battles for the faith will occur inside the church too, not just out in the world. I urge all believers of Jesus to stand firm to the truth that they believe in, and to take a stand for your faith, no matter what opposition you may be facing.

Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt I had to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints. - Jude v.3

Pay Attention

We must pay more careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away. For if the message spoken by angels was binding, and every violation and disobedience received its just punishment, how shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard him. God also testified to it by signs, wonders and various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will. - Hebrews 2:1 - 4

I pray the Lord would give me a renewed devotion to studying my Bible, so that I will not drift away from what I have heard and learned about the Truth. How do we know that this salvation, which God offered us freely through His Son, Jesus, is the Truth? It was confirmed by those who heard the Lord, firsthand. Not confirmed by someone having a vision of something the Lord said. There of course were signs and wonders and miracles that we read about happening in the Bible, such as the boy's loaves of bread and fish feeding a multitude of people. But what about the signs and wonders and miracles that have been confirmed in our own lives? How can you not believe in God when you witness the miracle of your children being born? That is a miracle in my own life that confirms to me that Jesus is real. Lord, help me to pay attention, and continue to learn more from your Word.

Some thoughts lately . . .

It occurred to me today, that there are many people of a different faith than I, who are professing their faith more loudly, are more committed to witnessing to others, and are drawing more people into their faith than many Christians are. I asked myself, why is this? Why does this different faith appeal to so many, when I do not see this faith as the truth.

I believe the Bible, and only the Bible is absolute truth. There is no other book. But how do I share this with others?

I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book. If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. And if anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book." - Revelation 22:18-19

How do I convince them that Jesus is the only way to heaven? There are no other rules we must follow to get into heaven.

Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." - John 14:6

I have been a Christian for so many years, that I should know tons of scripture by heart to support my statements previously. However, I can only seem to recall bits and pieces of those scriptures without looking them up in the Bible for exact wording. I hope to never stop growing in my Christian faith.

Trying on Tuxes for Megan's Wedding

Trying on Tuxes for Megan's Wedding

Caleb in his tux - preparing for Aunt Megan's Wedding

A piece of our life today

Last Day of Swimming Lessons

I realized I never updated my blog on Ethan's progress through the end of swimming lessons. I tried to upload the videos again, but they are taking forever and keep getting stuck. So, I am posting some of the still shots from the beginning of the videos that were taken on Ethan's last day of swimming lessons. He came such a long way in only 2 weeks of lessons. We are so grateful to his swimming teacher, Miss Melanie, for teaching him. He learned to float on his back all by himself, glide off the steps with his head in the water, jump in off the side and turn around and swim back to the side, jump in off the side and flip over on his back to float, and dive under water to get things that were on the bottom of the pool. I'm sure there may have been other things, but that is a majority of what he learned. He is obviously no longer afraid to put his head under, and he even jumped in off of a diving board at a friend's pool! Maybe sometime, I'll get these videos to work better and post them as videos then, so everyone can see how much he's progressed!

A piece of our life today

Mama Bailey got Ethan and Caleb a tool set with 20 tools in it. Ethan has been pretending to be Handy Manny all day. I'm trying to convince him that Handy Manny can have an assistant, in the form of his little brother! (Ethan is not so sure it is true!)

Just Talk to God Mommy

Those are the words Ethan said to me last night when I told him I needed a hug because I was feeling a little sad. There have been several events that I have been trying to organize and be in charge of lately, that seem to be increasingly difficult to get accomplished. So, I've felt discouraged that all of my hard work doesn't seem to be worth anything. I'm not mad at anyone, but just the way in which different circumstances have worked out, there has been a lot of indecisiveness around me. I am trying to stay positive about the events, but last night I was particularly discouraged about them. After Ethan gave me a hug and said to talk to God, I asked him if he wanted to pray with me. He said he did, but he didn't know the right words. So I prayed the words first, and he repeated. What an encouragement to be reminded from a 4 year old to "just talk to God" whenever we feel a little sad!

Our New Wood Floor is Finished!

I haven't been on here as much lately, as we have been in limbo between our house and my parents' house for the past week, while Scott worked on redoing our floors. We pulled up the carpet in our living room, dining room, and boys' bedrooms and replaced it with wood laminate flooring, the kind that DIYers can do themselves. Scott and my Dad worked on it mainly, and although we had planned on it taking from last Wednesday until Sunday night . . . it took until Wednesday of this week. So a few more days than expected, but all in all, I am very proud of the guys and the superb job they've done! The floors look great and I feel like I am in a new house! We are still working on getting everything back in place decor wise, but all of the big pieces of furniture are back in place. We ended up deciding to put Ethan and Caleb in the same bedroom, and making Caleb's old bedroom into the new playroom. Before, we had our dining room converted into the playroom, so I am very happy to have my dining room back again! Maybe we can easily have people over for meals again, without having to all cram in the kitchen! Here are some pictures from before and after. I wish I would've taken a picture of just the floor before we got the furniture back in, but didn't think about it until it was too late.

This is the living room floor after pulling up the carpet.

This is the living room after flooring done and new arrangement of furniture.

This is another pic of living room, looking in off kitchen.

Here is a pic of the hallway, where you can see the flooring up close.

The new combined boys' bedroom.

Another pic of boys' bedroom from entering room.

This is the new playroom (Caleb's old bedroom) - basically consists of train table, bookshelves to side with toys and books (unseen), and small activity table to sit at and draw, eat, etc.

Caleb was extra camera happy tonight, showing me his big cheeses!

Ethan's 3rd Day of Swimming Lessons

Yesterday, Ethan told me his favorite part of his swimming lesson was learning to float on his back. So, today on his third day, I told him I would come back at the end of his lesson and I would take a video of him floating on his back so we could show daddy, aunts and uncles, grandmas and grandpas what he had learned.

I told him it also would be great if he learned how to jump off the side on his own, because I knew he was working towards that yesterday. And sure enough, he did jump off the side on his own today! He even said his favorite part about his lesson today was jumping in off the side.

So, here are the videos I took of him floating on his back, swimming to the side, and jumping off the side! We are so proud of the progress he's making. Miss Melanie, his teacher, said there wasn't any whining or crying in today's lesson, so he even got a special sticker treat at the end of his lesson. I am encouraged that he is already showing more confidence only after the third lesson. Thanks Miss Melanie!