Givensmeabreak....

Well, I don't know about you but we need a vacation.  Kraig has one more week off before he returns to normal schedule.  We had Gigi and Papa come for a visit!  We had our youth Christmas party! We have a sickly baby boy (just sinus stuff) and we are pooped for all the craziness of the last two weeks.  Although, we wouldn't trade it for anything...well...the sickness but everything else was great! Last year, for our youth Christmas party, we just had a dinner and played games at the church.  This year, we wanted to do something special and off of the church campus.  So, we got the idea to go skiing.  Well, it was supposed to rain and it never got cold enough so we had to change our plans.  We racked our brains and came up with a Christmas Scavenger Hunt at the mall.  We split the groups up into 3 teams and let them loose (with a chaperone, of course) in the mall.  They had to talk to strangers, find trash, get an autograph, sing a C...

 We had a blast yesterday with our first annual Youthsgiving.  We took all the kids to Superfly out by the mall.  Its a new jump park in the area and it was SUPER fun! Then, we came back to our house for our feast!  I made a turkey and by "I," I mean, Kraig because I couldn't bring myself to touch the bird!  So, Kraig did a great job!!!  It was super tasty.  We made other wonderful treats!  It was such a fun time to just hang out with the kids and relax!   We had so much fun and are so thankful for these kids.  We always question (really more me than Kraig) if we are doing what we should be doing and after yesterday....it was once again confirmed we are right where the Lord wants us.  We love seeing these kids grow in Christ and in times like yesterday...we love seeing them relax and have fun.  We look forward to the tradition every year and can't wait to make more fun times with ...

For the past year, I have struggled horribly with fatigue, bad self esteem, weight gain and some days just not wanting to get out of bed. I think I attributed the bulk of that to having a toddler and not being able to lose the "baby bump." So, I would work out, try to eat better, try to take naps and I was still so exhausted.  I just couldn't catch up.  I would pretty much run an IV of Dr. Pepper through my body most days and still couldn't make it through the day.  I just struggled. I finally said "I AM SICK OF NO ENERGY, FATIGUE, and THE EXTRA WEIGHT!!!" and so  I started a boot camp.  Well, that worked great as far as the extra energy and gaining muscle and I could tell a difference in my sleep and just my attitude seemed to be better but I still couldn't cut the weight.  I had a friend in my college days that worked at a summer camp with me and I kept seeing her wonderful posts of her post baby health and how great she was feeling and how she w...

Let's get real for a minute.  I have put on some weight. Kraig told me once that he read an article in some sports magazine (I think, I'm not real sure)  that people who play one sport growing up are more likely to gain more weight and keep it on when they get older.  I was always a pretty active kid, however I only played one sport.  I don't know how true that article or information he read really is but it is true for me and it has stuck with me.   After having Rett, I would read blogs, magazines and books that would tell me that the weight would just fall off after giving birth especially if you nurse.  Well, I nursed and the weight never JUST FELL OFF.  In fact, it stayed.  and STAYED even a little bit more.  So, although I don't think I am overweight, I am the most unhealthy I have ever been in my life.  And being so unhealthy plays with my psyche.  Which has played a role in other aspects in my life.   SO.......

My sister recently had a baby.  He's precious.  His name is Case Holland Pryor and although I have multiple pictures of him, she's very limited with what she puts on the Internet so I'll respect her and keep him off of here.  I'm sorry.  But take my word for it...he's handsome and squishy and a great baby. Some of you may not know but my sister had a rough pregnancy.  Lots of morning sickness, aches and pains and braxton hicks and list goes on.  As her due date approached, things started to get more intense for her also.  His due date was Sept. 16....by the end of July, she was having more pains and it seemed like more calls to her doctor as well as more visits were happening.  She also had a couple late night runs to the ER but all was well.  We all knew that Case was coming early....but no one knew how early, except the Lord of course.  :) Well, my mom and I had planned for Britt's baby shower to be August 9.  It was super cut...

WOW! What a few weeks!!!  Busy!!!  I cant even begin to tell you what has been going on... Let's start with praising the Lord for what He has done.  Kraig and I have set out to take our youth kids to GoldRush 2014 in Atlanta, GA.  I have gone on this trip probably 3 times and every time I come away amazed and encouraged by the Lord.  I am so excited to take our kids.  But in order for this to happen we need to raise some money.  We put on another yard sale.  Last year, we had a yard sale and made right around $1,000.00.  Well, this year by our 2nd dropoff date, I was hoping for just $500.  I don't know why I short change the Lord.  So, on Friday (day before the sale), we went up to the church and began to set up and get everything organized.  Our kids showed up to work (and play and eat)...and our church family showed up!!!  They came out to help set up.  Such a blessing.  Over the past 2 years, I have so enj...

Last night, I got the opportunity to talk to our youth.  Usually, I just get the girls and sometimes put my little tidbits in every so often but Kraig has been super overwhelmed this week plus he is preparing for his sermon for Sunday....HE'S PREACHING!!!  So, he asked if I could handle the youth service.  I apprehensively said, "Sure...."  Whatever I can do to help....RIGHT!?!?! I already had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to talk about, it was just putting it together... I started with a video from the Skit Guys.  If you hadn't seen them, they are generally a funny duo that go around and tour with conferences and stuff like that.  This one is pretty serious.  I like how it shows that we are a work in progress and that God loves me enough to not leave me like I am.  I think the kids got the message. From there I talked about Job.  If you know anything about Job....HE HAD A ROUGH LIFE.  He had many trials and tough times ...

  Photo bomb!  Sorry for the way this looks, I'm not patient enough to figure out how the pictures should be placed.  :(  And sorry so long but we have some great pics of the last few weeks of our snow days!!!!  Hope you all enjoyed your snow/time off/rest time....it was a great time for us!                             These are from our snow a couple weeks ago.  He didn't like it.  However, we think due to a tooth breaking through, him just waking up from a nap and the lack of gloves, he just wasn't feeling it.  So, we didn't last long.  But it was a great few days with Kraig off work to be able to spend some extra time with us and a time for rest.                                 These are also from the last snow days....I gave Rett his first hair cut.   I didn't cry one t...