Respond With Purpose

Respond with purpose
What upsets you is not what happens.
What upsets you is your response to what happens.Just as easily as you respond in a negative way,
you can easily and naturally respond in a
positive, empowering, uplifting way.The biggest problems are often caused by
what you choose to do about the smallest problems.
Most of those big, painful problems are so unnecessary.Keep reminding yourself that you are in control of you.
You are in control and you can decide
exactly how you wish to feel at any point.Imagine the power of remaining calm and focused
and resourceful when some totally unexpected,
disappointing development interrupts your day.
Truly, you can make the disappointments not disappointing at all.Respond on purpose, with purpose.
Feel the power and the joy as every moment gives you a way to move forward.
Ralph Marston

What Can You Do But Laugh?

It's been another one of those days, I seen to be having a lot of those lately. It was 1 pm and I was still in my pj's. We've had a long father's day weekend with trips back home and to the beach. I'm exhausted, so are the kids, and I feel a major headache turning into a migraine. Luckily, Ally has just gone down for what I hope is a long nap. Charles-Allen is laying on the couch trying to go to sleep, and Parker is eating and I'm hoping everything goes well and all three are asleep at the same time so I can get a nap. And then it finally happens, they're all asleep. I put Parker down, say a quick prayer that Ally and Parker stay asleep and quickly crawl in bed for a much needed nap. If you'll notice I didn't mention Charles-Allen in that prayer because almost NOTHING wakes him up once he gets to sleep. Unfortunately, I didn't realize that in less than 5 minutes a cute little neighbor boy would be ringing my doorbell over and over and over and over and over again until I could finally open it and let him in. Still this did not wake Charles-Allen, but the sound of Caden's voice as he tells me all about the parachute man he made and demonstrates how it works and inquires when Charles-Allen will be up seems to do the trick. What can you do but laugh and realize that Heavenly Father does hear and answer prayers. The girls did stay asleep, but Charles-Allen didn't:)

Friday Favorites

I've decided to start posting a Friday Favorites because I think it'll be a great way for us to keep up with what our family loves to do. I got the idea from some of the decorating blogs that I love to stalk and thought it would be a great idea for our family blog. If anyone would like to join me I would love to read about what are some of your family's favorite things to do. This week I'm featuring Emmy's favorite thing in the whole world. She has been dreaming of riding a horse for as long as she can remember. She's been able to do it at the State Fair, but even she realized that it was truly riding since you only go around in a circle for about 2 minutes. So in February when we went on vacation to Lake Lure in the mountains of North Carolina we knew that horseback riding would be the one big thing we would do that week. We saved it for the last day and were not disappointed when we got there. Emmy's horse was called Grayson and Charles-Allen rode a horse called Henry. They both LOVED it tons, and when we got in the car and were leaving Emmy said, "Dreams really do come true." WOW! That made Neal and I feel so good. We'll definitely go back and try riding again.

We're Pooped!

We're back from vacation and seriously we need a vacation. I think the picture of Ally sums it up. We're so tired. Ally slept for a solid 16 hours our first night back and then got up for about 30 minutes before taking a nap for 3 more hours. We had a great time and I'll have some more pics from vacation if I ever get the mountain of laundry done.

It's Vacation Time!!

It's finally here. Our kids can hardly stand it. We're leaving Sunday to go to Camp Singletary with the whole family. We're so excited. Emmy's had her surgery so she should be ear infection free for the whole week. We've got snacks, sunscreen, swimsuits, so much energy and excitement we might explode. So off we go, hoping to make more memories for the years to come. Hopefully, we won't have anymore mishaps on the swinging rope and hopefully Grandma won't almost drown in 2 feet of water again, but maybe we'll have a blast playing spoons and sleeping in cabins and playing in mud and sand and just spending time with family and enjoying being together.

It's Been One of Those Days

It's been one of those days. Parker was up for 3 hours last night, Charles-Allen apparently has lost his ability to hear, Ally will not keep her diaper on, and Emmy, well I really can't complain about Emmy. But at least they're really cute to look at!