Monday, March 26, 2012

Another Trip Around the Sun





So, my dad made it another year, and like always, we came out to celebrate. We had most of our family there for the occasion, and here's what we came up with!
Happy Birthday and Many More Daddy!!!!




Friday, March 9, 2012

Hi!

Just wanted to share a few pictures and thoughts with ya!
Please note that these pictures were taken with my cell phone, so they aren't all the clearest, but you get the jest.

First, I am so thankful for my new laptop!!! It was funny when Derrick first tried to use it, he didn't know what to do!!! He just looked at it!

I was very happy when I walked outside on my back porch last week and saw these little blooms! They are left over from last fall!
Look at Nicholas wearing Noah's hand me down shoes! Aren't they cute?!?!
I am thankful for long lost family....meet Tiffany(my sister...don't judge, just accept!) and Tiffany!!!
Tiffany taught me to make candles. What fun!
I am thankful that Derrick killed this big guy, and not vice versa! D found him out on his work route!!! In a yard where every month a little toddler is outside playing, but wasn't home this day!
That's 8 rattles and a button! Look at Derrick's face...haha.....he's gonna kill me!
Buddy had a good check up at the vet! He needs to lose 10 lbs though....must run in the family!
Look at D reading to these boys (sorry it's blurry!) and them laughing at each other!!!
I love that Noah is an awesome big brother. I was a little worried at this time last year that Noah would be jealous of the baby who was then in my tum tum, and he'd want nothing to do with him. I couldn't have been more wrong. Noah wants to spend as much time as possible with this little guy, who flips and flips and rolls and rolls! Noah gets a kick out of that!
The sweet feeling is mutual!!!

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Like a Rock!

Long ago, before the beginning of time.....
Nah, really, back when Derrick lived the bachelor's life, he ordered a new truck.
He was, as one of his personalized tags said, LVNITUP
in this 1995 Z71!
As young Derrick got older, and closer to settling down, he decided to sell this beast to make a good down payment on what is now our home!
Ever since, he drove a little s-10, and an old Nissan pickup, with a nice paint job (my brother did it!) shown here with our Crimson Tide Yacht!Well, as you see, the above "Stripey", with her 265,000 miles, and small back seat, was getting to small for our family of four, and was starting to need repairs. So, we began looking high and low for a low mileage used truck. We looked for over a year, at every lot in our county, several in Mobile and Pensacola, looked in people's yards, looked at friends' trucks, even checked Craigslist and Ebay! I kept telling Derrick that for some of the payment prices (we kept trying to save so we wouldn't have many payments, but life kept happening, chipping away at our savings!) anyway, I kept telling him that I just didn't know if it could be done.
He did a lot of looking around by himself, just because he could get out and about better without two kids ,
and I would warn him not to look out of our range....new was not an option. It'd probably have to be 2010 or older! If there was something he thought I should see, I'd go. But mostly, he did the looking. He left his number with several lots, and they would call with a "deal we couldn't refuse" and if I could go look, I would, otherwise, he did after work. One Thursday, when Derrick was very busy, the Chevy Dealership in Foley called him, and had several to look at. Derrick called me and told me to go look myself, he wouldn't get a chance. So, I loaded up while Noah was at school, and headed down there in Stripey, we figured we'd get a trade in estimate then too. I pulled up, and the salesman Derrick had been working with met me outside, and walked me over to this..


It's a 2011 with 8 miles on it....and I took this picture with my cell phone and text it to Derrick and asked, "How do you like my new truck?!?!?"
It was love at first site....of course, we had the cost to work out, but they really did give us a good deal, or should I say God worked out this good deal for us! It's actually cheaper than some of the used ones we saw, and since it was a 2011, they marked it as Demo (2,000 miles) rather than new....which took thousands off the price.
So, we prayed....hard.....and decided that with the continuing of our frugal lifestyle, we could do it! So, we personalized it....

And it does look pretty good in our driveway!!!
I am not bragging on us, I am bragging on God. I can honestly tell you, rather you believe it or not, if God hadn't of worked this out, we wouldn't have it! We made the choice to follow Him, and to have His will operating in our lives. I was happy to wait on Him to show us the way to go, and when to go! We have so much to thank Him for....and this is one of His many blessings to us!