You know what this picture means!!!

We were gone and now we are home. And for that reason, I am having a contest.

I will select a random winner from the correct entries. The winner will receive a $10 Starbucks gift card. I am hiding the entries until the time is up because I don't want any cheating. :) The contest will end on Thursday at 12pm.

Decipher the following paragraph:

DAD
EEL
AINA
LOVS
UOO
ELA
INA
ASP
RAWD
AVALL
PATEGS


Ready, set go!

Storms and Babies

Oh my goodness. What a night. We were up well past midnight watching the storm unfold.  It touched down in Ractliff and Etna and we have a lot of family in those towns.  Thank God for protecting them, for keeping them safe. My cousin, Matt, and his wife heard it go over their house and felt the house shake. Once it passed, he went outside and couldn't see the neighbor's house. He went to look for them and bring them back to his house so they would have a place to stay. It touched down on my Uncle Evan's land and he lost a window on his house, half of the roof of their "school house" and his I think the back half of his shop is gone. A tree fell on my other cousin's house. I haven't heard yet if our church sustained any damage but the main thing is that everyone is alive and no one was hurt. That tornado came so close to our house. It's always sad to see destruction from weather like what happened in Joplin but when it's this close to home, affecting people that you know, it takes on a whole different level of scary.

On to brighter and better news...

My older sister, Rachel, had her third little boy last night right before midnight. Ryan Mark is his name. The Mark is after my dad. He was 8 lbs and something ounces. I haven't heard any other details yet but I am going to the hospital this afternoon and will find out the story. Bet that was fun, having a baby during tornado weather.

I'm here, I'm just very, very busy. We have put our house back on the market and I have been trying to repaint and make pretty.  I'm also super exhausted. (Have I mentioned that before?) I promise at some point I will start posting often again.

Elaina's school books have been coming in and it's so exciting and fun to look at everything. Do you want to know what they are? Tell me if you do and I'll write a post about it.

Hey! Blogger's working again!

We've been adjusting rather well to having another family member. Some days are harder than others but that's to be expected. Nora James is growing like a weed despite the fact that she seems to spit up her entire meal every time she eats.  

The weather has been pleasant so I've had the girls playing outside a lot.

Daddy has been a huge help with the baby. Every morning I wake him up around 7 and he and Nora James go to the couch and cuddle together and I get back in bed.

The other day, Jason needed a break from painting so we all packed up and headed to a little park in our town.

NJ was being a little too rambunctious as you can tell from the picture below.

Making wishes...

"Practicing gymnastics"

Complete happiness

Postpartum belly

This is my 600th post.

I'm so tired. I sat down to check something on the computer and my body weight is so heavy that I can't get up. I want to. I just can't.

Everyone is good.

Everyone is happy.

My brain is too tired to think of anything else to write.

Goodbye. Snore.