The 4th of July..

was 10 days ago...and I guess that is how far behind I am...
and this post is actually about the Sunday BEFORE 4th of July because I have yet to get my pictures loaded from the actual day!
We (the girls and I) decided that we were going to go to Bellvue for the 4th of July celebration that they have every year...we were leaving church and asked if we could call Aunty to see if they could go with us as well! They agreed, so we went to pick them up and headed to Bellvue for a evening a fun! The kids had a blast and the weather ended up to be PERFECT...cooler with a nice breeze (Thank you Jesus!!)
Here are some pictures of the evening! Happy Birthday USA!!

My baby isn't a baby anymore...

She is a POTTY-TRAINED little girl, and she even slept in big girl panties last night!! WhooHooo!! It seemed like Avery was going to be the child that went to Kindergarten in her diaper...she had the concept down pat...but didn't want to put it to use! And we have been so stinkin busy lately, that we just kinda forgot about it...We just continued to changed diapers/pull-ups and never really said anything to her...and all of a sudden, she was telling us when she needed to go potty and she was doing it! I can't believe that I don't have "babies" anymore...my girls are growing up, but I can honestly say that I probably won't miss changin all those diapers...and we should become rich, quick! Diapers are outrageous!!

It's OFFICIAL...

and God is good! No, God is GREAT!!! After several weeks and 4 houses later...We now know where God wants us live! What a stressful past couple of weeks it has been...but God has worked it all out (with the help of Richie, our wonderful realtor...he's paying me to say that!) We found out last night after long hours of deliberation that we will, for sure, be home owners in Collierville, hopefully by August 10th! What a relief to know where we will be very soon! I took these pictures off the website and thought I would give you a sneak peek to what our "new" house looks like! What are certainly blessed and looking forward to moving and starting a new chapter in our life!

It was HER idea...

I promise, I never once asked or encouraged her to do it...She came up with the idea and bugged me about it for at least 3 weeks...
We have been talking to her for the past 6 months about taking care of the stuff that she has...She really wants a Nintendo DS and a Puppy dog, and we keep telling her that those are very expensive things that take alot of attention and responsibilty and right now, we can't trust that she would be responsible...She kept asking if she could get her ears pierced and take care of them to prove that she IS in fact, responsible...so Friday June, 26th (the same day that we got our new car, 07' Silver Ford Fusion) she begged us to let her get them pierced and so...we went to Claire's in the Collierville Mall
She had just picked out BLUE Saph-a-phires (thats how she pronounced it!)

calling Uncle Chad to tell him that she was going to go ahead and get them done before he got there (I think she might have chickened out had we waited on him)

the before picture...

and the after picture...they did both of her ears at the same time (thank goodness!) and I took this picture right after she said, "OUCH, that hurt"! But there were NO tears!

PROUD AS A PEACOCK AT HER NEW EARRINGS!!

YEP...she got her ears pierced...
and she has been SO good about taking care of them...she cleans them at least 3x's a day WITHOUT being told! We have been very proud of her for being so responsible...Does that mean that she thinks she deserves a Nintenso DS and a puppy dog? Maybe we should have thought this through a little better :)

He's getting so big...

Rowan, that is!! (our baby nephew/cousin)Several weeks ago we all (even Ray, which is rare, because he works all the time)went to Dickson to visit with family...and as usual...had lots of fun! This was the first time that Ray or the girls have gotten to spend any time with baby Rowan...and my girls LOVE him! They both wanted to hug on him and squeeze him...Brenly wanted to feed him a bottle and try to get him to sleep...and that she did...She was holding him and he feel straight to sleep, and she was SO proud!
I am sure in the 3 weeks that we have been away from him, he has grown even more, but I wanted to be sure to put these pictures on here!

I am so far behind...

and don't even know where to start...but I have good reasons for being absent...
It seems that our life has been turned upside down..in a good way. God has lots of things in store for us and we are certainly very excited about what he is doing in our life...but it has caused us to run ragged!

I have written before that Ray felt that God was calling him to transfer to Shelby Co. (and with a little resistence, Ray accepted God's calling) however we thought that his transfer was going to start late Sept. or early October...Because Brenly starts Kindergarten in the fall, our plan was to live with Kristy until Ray got transferred and then start looking for a house. We later found out that Ray's transfer is going into effect August 9th (and Brenly starts school August 10th) which is a huge blessing...(I wasn't looking forward to living two seperate lives again, like we did during his Police Academy Days!) But that made us step it up into high gear...So for the past month I have...
*starting packing up our entire house
*continuing to drive back/forth from Bolivar to Memphis
*working full time
*keeping the girls involved with different things, so that they will have a fun summer
*searching for the PERFECT house
*Losing 3 of those "perfect" houses (we now have a contract on the 4th...please pray)
*we've been out of town alot more than usual this summer, and preparing for our family vacation

and I am exhausted...mentally, physically, emotionally...praying that God will give me enough strength for just today...knowing and trusting in the fact that with God all things are possible...

So I promise that my hiatus from my blog hasn't been because I am lazy...Its because our life is C-R-A-Z-Y!!!

I hope and pray that in the coming days we will have some real exciting news about where God is going to place us!

Until then, we would love your prayers for peace and patience!