Mother's Day

 Today, on Mother's Day, I have seven and a half years of being a mother under my belt.

I am so blessed to have four children to raise, nurture, disciple, love, cuddle, tickle, kiss, hug....

Motherhood is so rewarding, so tiring, so revealing, so encouraging, so exhausting, so wonderful! 

Praises be to Christ who gives me grace every moment to raise these little people.

And praises go to my mother who showed her daughter by example how to love, how to train, how to encourage, how to persevere..

"Mom, I love you and thank you for showing me a commitment to Christ in everything you do. You have never wavered in your faith even in the midst of trial and heartache. You have raised me to love God above all else and have shown me how to sacrifice and pour myself out in service for my family. You are worthy of much praise and honor and I rise up and call you 'blessed'. I wish we lived near one another and I miss you every day."

Lijers

Elijah is cracking me up lately so I thought I better write some of these things down before I forget them.

1. He HATES underwear. He takes them off constantly and his pants/shorts are always sagging. I wish I could find boxer shorts for him, but he's so small and I can only find them in bigger sizes. 

2. Whenever I pick him up he smothers me in kisses and rubs the base of my neck with his little fingers- Its amazing- I dont want to ever forget that about him. He also likes to pat my back when I hug him. Cutest thing ever! He's definitely a snuggler.

3. He talks NON STOP about his imaginary family- its the craziest thing! Every day he will tell me something about his other mom or his brother. He says his other dad died. Sometimes I'm sorta concerned but hopefully he will grow out of it soon- its been going on a year that he talks about them. I am going to ask the doctor about it at his next visit:)

4. He LOVES to fight! He's always pretending that he is in a fight, kicking, punching. Its pretty funny. He still wrestles and fights with daddy all the time.

5. He is signed up for preschool in the fall- I am SO not sure how I feel about this. It makes me sad. He seems so little for preschool. But I do think it will be good for him. It will only be 3 days a week for 3 hours a day. (I'm planning on joining a gym:) 

6. He is a computer wizard. I cannot believe the things he can do on the computer- its crazy! 

7. Elijah is very concerned with lying right now. He will tell me that he lied without me even asking. Example: "Mom, I need to tell you something. I lied. I told you I took one graham cracker but I took two." I cannot believe the honesty. He's been doing this for a while now and he even gets punished when he tells me these things, but that does not stop him. I am thankful for his sensitive little heart right now. 

8. When Elijah falls down, he shouts out, "I'm okay." and hops back up- most of the time, there are no tears. 

That is all for now. I love my little man. 

Photographers in Training

 My children know that I LOVE to take pictures and they are ALWAYS asking to take pictures as well! Sometimes I let them borrow the camera for a few minutes and check in on them to see how they are treating the camera. Its hilarious getting the camera back and looking thru their photo shoots! 

The twins wanted me to post these pictures on my Etsy page- as you can see all their little animals are wearing my Ella Bella Creation hair accessories! 

 The following pictures are Ellas handiwork! I laughed SO hard when I looked thru these. 

I cut out about 50 of them! 

I'm glad my kiddos love photography and hope that one day they will have cameras of their own and enjoy capturing life thru the lens! 

Beach Themed Bridal Shower

Sola church is having a wedding very soon! 

Francesca and Jon are tying the knot in June on a beach in Florida! 

We are SO very happy for them as they start their new life together. 

We threw Franki a "beach themed" shower in March! 

                        Cream cheese mints (search online for recipe) were made in shell molds.

 Special thanks to:

Melody Mondragon for organizing the food- it was all so fresh and bright! 

Connie, Alyssa and  Cynthia for doing the decorations and favors- so beachy, light and sea worthy! 

I made the cake and it was such a hot day that on the ride over that the icing really got a bit soupy- oh well! It made it and we salvaged what we could. 

      Franki's sister in law made scented bath salts for favors. 

 We love Franki so much and she is going to make a beautiful bride and even lovelier wife for Jon! 

So blessed to call them friends! 

 And I must leave you with this little cutie!

Ella is all grown up!

We have always told the girlies that they had to be 5 to get their ears pierced.

Sophia was first on the exact day of her 5th birthday. Arianna waited a while because she just wasn't quite sure but followed shortly after. She freaked out and Ella saw it all! Ella keep telling me she wasn't ready and maybe when she was 10! But all her little friends at preschool started getting their ears pierced so she has been talking about it more and more. I told her whenever she was ready that we would take her! We went to the mall Saturday and stopped by Claires-  Sophia needed hoop earrings ( I told her that since she was almost 8, she was ready to wear hoops:) and while we were picking them out Ella started getting excited and contemplating getting it done. We spent about an hour walking around the mall, etc and the whole time Ella was deep in thought. It was hilarious to watch her thought process- it was written all over her face. She was so torn! In the end she made up her mind that she would do it and never turned back! I was so proud of her. It was a hard decision to make but she never second guessed herself while climbing up on the chair even though her face looked like she was going to vomit! 

 She did have a few tears but was all smiles once she saw her dazzling earlobes! 

She looks so grown up! 

Love this little girlie who is quickly becoming a not so little girl! 

Teacher Appreciation Week: "Thanks a Latte for all you do"!

This was a fun day! 

I love coffee and most teachers really love it too! 

There is a place in town called Executive Perks who have all kinds of carts that you can rent for 2 hours. We chose the espresso cart with its own barista! 

They set up shop and spoil the teachers with lattes. 

We budget in our PTO a coffee cart once a year and since we hadn't used it yet, we used it for the last day of Teacher Appreciation Week. The cost for 2 hours is $275 but that didn't come out of my budget. 

We are also very lucky to have a mom in our school who handles donations for Panera. She hooked us up with bagels and spread for all 60 teachers and staff free of charge! 

THANK YOU, PANERA! 

I had Sarah, president of the PTO and Mr. Winger, Hopkins principal, come and give a little THANK YOU to the teachers as well before school started. 

We handed out pencils and grippers to all the teachers to use in their classes.

We had the pencils in our storage closet so they were free to me and I made really good use of that cellophane! 

In the end, I only spent $313 out of $400 and I feel it was a nice week for the teachers- they really seemed to love it and are still talking about how spoiled they felt all week! 

Mission Accomplished! 

SO thankful for such a great group of staff at Hopkins Elementary! 

P.S. here is the link to the sign at the top of the post and its FREE! - its meant to be a card where you can attach a gift card to Starbucks or any other coffee joint for your teacher! Super cute! 

Teacher Appreciation Week: Thank you for being our Heros!

Day 3 was a "hero" lunch for the teachers! 

I ordered 10 feet of subs from King Soopers coming to $100 

and bought chips and sodas which was $15.

We used the leftovers from Day 1 to make a big tossed salad.

I bought these superhero labels (for a baby shower a while back) that you can print and attach to whatever your heart desires. 

here is the link on Etsy