Dear Friends and Antiques

We had an amazing weekend!
We took off at 6am on Saturday morning for a 5 hour drive to visit our dear friends.
The car ride wasn't great, but it also wasn't awful.  It was a good warm-up for our 24 hour trip slated for December.

We are so blessed to call the P's our friends!!
They are the type of family, that it doesn't matter how long it's been since we've seen each other, it just feels right, good, relaxed.  Like we just spoke yesterday.
We soaked up every single minute of them.
Our kids played and laughed and reconnected.
Our sons interacted like they were old buddies (even though nearly 6 years separates them)
I loved watching it all happen.  It felt comforting and filled my heart.
Of course, we were so busy laughing and eating and catching up and eating some more that we didn't capture one single picture of the adults together.  This HAS to be a higher priority the next time we are all together! 

And then to TOP of the weekend, Ed (actually all of us!) got to visit a very special place.
Antique Archaeology.
The only way it could have been better was if Mike or Frank had showed up.
Ed is a BIG fan of the show American Pickers and it was so cute to see how happy he was to be there.  I loved it.  And when he scored a t-shirt, I swear it made his YEAR!!!
(Sorry for the crappy iphone pics)

Look at that grin!!

 

The kids got to test their 'picking' skills and choose an item and barter for it.  It was cute.

The weekend went WAY TO FAST.
It was really difficult to leave.
The entire drive home, I Thanked God for bringing the P's into our lives.
Can't wait until the "bushes are trimmed" and we laugh together again.  Love you guys!

Pretty Pumpkins!

We had a blast painting pumpkins Wednesday night.
The girls were so impressed with their brother's creation, that they ditched their ideas of patterns and designs.
I have a few Picasso's on my hands :)

 

Can you guess who each pumpkin belongs to?

 

 



 

9 Year Old Favorites

The Tradition continues.
Here's E's responses when she turned 8.

Year 9...Here we go:


What is your favorite color: Pink

Favorite animal: Monkey

Favorite food: Sesame Chicken

Favorite thing to do at school: Read

Favorite activity: Track, specifically high jump

BFF: Kennedy and Anna and Chloe

What do you think of your sister H right now: She’s pretty nice/kind

Who cooks the best: Mom and Dad

Favorite TV shows: Good Luck Charlie and Jessi

Favorite breakfast food: Donuts and Dad’s homemade pancakes

Funnest thing we've done so far this year: The Heart Heroes Super Run

Favorite pet: All of the pets I’ve ever had

Favorite day: Monday and Friday  (mom note:  WHO the HECK likes MONDAYS????)

Favorite people in the world: my family

Favorite place to visit: Las Vegas

 

Favorite thing about my mom: She’s Awesome (AAAWWWW!!!)

Favorite thing about my dad: He cuddles with me.

Favorite thing about my brother: He’s so fun to play with

Favorite thing about my sister: She plays with me

Favorite kind of ice cream: Mint Chocolate Chip and Cookie Dough

What's the nicest thing you've ever done: Helped a friend

What scares you the most: Scary stuff (mom note: pretty much everything!)

What’s your favorite place to shop:  Target and Justice

What’s your favorite restaurant:  Jimmy Johns, Red Robin and Hy-Vee Chinese

What’s your favorite candy:  Skittles and Snickers (a girl after her daddy’s heart)

9 years

Nine years ago on a Monday at 2:10pm my life forever changed.
Oct 18th, 2004 - I became a mother.
A mother to this adorable baby girl with tons of black hair

She's been all my firsts.
My first baby.  My first daughter. My first sleep deprivation.  My first crawler, walker, talker etc.
My first mistakes as a mother (good thing she often accepts my apologies). Dang near my first of everything.
She was my first chunk:

And she continues to brings lots of firsts into our lives.

Our sweet, sweet E......Happy 9th Birthday!
We are proud of the young lady you are becoming.  You are kind and generous to others.
You are a great big sister.  we LOVE you!!!

We look forward to all the 'firsts' yet to come :)

Control......and an unexpected Blessing.

I'm a control freak. 
I KNOW....most of you are SHOCKED right now. ha!

I like thinking, as least, that I have some sort of control of my life and that of my family.
Funny thing is....I KNOW BETTER, but still want to feel/think that I do.

I do know that I can control me.  My words, my actions, my responses.
That's it.  Just me.  That's it.  (Had to say it twice for good measure).

I have ZERO control over ALL the REST!!!
And "All the Rest" is a LOT....you know, little things like my children, my husband, my parents, my siblings, my boss, my co-workers, my friends, my neighbors, the people driving to work at the same time as me, the weather, the reactions/responses of others, the crap people don't do, etc etc etc.  You know...ALL THE REST!  All the rest that is the oh, I don't know....my entire life, being, existence.

Every single day (YES....Every single day!), I chant/quote/think/ponder these sayings to help counter my 'control' issues:
1. Give it ALL to God and Let Him take care of it.
2. Worry about Nothing...Pray about Everything.
3. Let Go and Let God
4. And lots of other little sarcastic comments, usually littered with some curse words.

It's hard to let it all go for me.
Really it is.
I like knowing.  I like having a plan.  I like having a schedule.
You all know that's not how it goes.

Over the past few months, I've struggled with this a bit more than likely ever before in my life.
There has been plenty of 'stuff' that has transpired that I feel I have had little control over.  I could only control my reaction.  It's been hard.
I have felt wronged, disappointed, SHOCKED, sad, humbled, and honestly PUT IN MY PLACE.
I know who PUT ME IN MY PLACE.
And I deserved it.
But it's still difficult.

Over the past months, I felt that I had some control and direction over my life, over my career, over...well, a lot of things.
God had different plans:

Pretty stinking cute already, right??!?!?!

Ok...I'm not stupid...I KNOW where babies come from (the stork, right?).
So yes...I know I had some control over that.
BUT....this little miracle was a bit of a surprise for this momma.  A beautiful, joyous blessing....but still with some good ole shock value attached.

God needed to 'shake me up' a bit.
Guess I hadn't been listening so well.  He knew THIS was big enough to stop me in my tracks.  Probably close to the only thing that would have.

So over the past few months I've had to wrap my head around this all.  This little miracle baby has made me stop and think.  Rethink my career path.  Rethink my relationships, both personal and at work.  Rethink my parenting skills (or lack thereof) and decisions.  Really....rethink it all!
That's been overwhelming to me emotionally and spiritually.  Then add the physical demand of growing a baby and I'm wiped out.

So you all have probably noticed it.
Noticed my total absence from my blog.  My absence from phone calls and get togethers.  The absence of my mind and memory. I've withdrawn a lot.

Please bear with me.  Please pray for me (or actually pray more for my husband and my kids).

Control's a silly thing.
I'm just continuing to learn to let Go and TRUST IN HIM!

Oh what April will bring....

April will bring a little more than showers........

 

 

Surprise!!!! (the good kind of surprise...but still a surprise for us all :)
Baby Anibal #4 slated to make their grand appearance on 4/4/14.

I adore the girls response :) 

Soccer....

Today I'm going to participate in my very first Throwback Thursday!
Not because I'm jumping on the bandwagon of most folks on FB and Twitter.
Nope, not me.

I'm tossing in a nearly year and a half year old picture of H because her current soccer has ended and I DID NOT TAKE ONE SINGLE PICTURE!!!

Seriously...EPIC FAIL on this mom's part.
An entire season passed.  No pictures of H.  No pictures of her team.  No pictures of her awesome coach.

H -- I'm really sorry, but honey, the memories of your mad soccer skills are burned in my head...promise!
You and the Pink Cheetahs ROCKED IT!

There's always next season, right???

Weekend Adventures!

Another quiet weekend in the Anibal house.

NOT!!

We started on Friday afternoon with E’s inaugural cross country meet.  Thanks to this mom not knowing a dang thing about cross country….specifically where the meet is….we were late.  As we pulled up, a mob of 300 girls ran literally right by the car.  I encouraged (basically tried to push) E out of the car, but she wasn’t having it.

After LOTS of convincing by me, the coach and another mom, E decided to run the race with the boys.  Not an intimidating feat at all for an 8 year old girl who has NEVER run a meet before.  Bless her little heart!

She ROCKED It!  Came in about middle of the pack of 300 boys.  And these boys weren’t little; the majority of them were in middle school!  I’ve never seen E run so hard in my life.  She about collapsed when she finished.  I was SOOOO proud of her!  I promised her that we would make it on time to the next meet or I owe her Cherry Berry every day for a month J

Saturday was filled with swim lesson and H’s soccer game, which they clobbered the other team!  Way to go Pink Cheetahs!!

Grocery shopping and the HUSKER GAME!!! And a quick shopping trip to Justice (seriously the key to every little girls heart…..p.s. I hate that store!  Even with 60% off, E’s pants still cost more than mine. WTH?)

Sunday morning, the girls and I volunteered at an aid station at the Omaha Marathon.  We had a blast!  Listening to H bellow “Gatorade” over a 1000 times what just hilarious.

Cleaning, laundry, car washes, and just relaxing.

And then I ended the day by making two huge pots of soup.  YUM!!!!  I LOVE FALL….mostly because of the food.  I could eat soup every day.  It was glorious.

What did you do to fill your weekend?

Hope it was great J

 

P.S.  I know…I know…I know…these posts are better with pictures.  I’ve been a ROYAL slacker lately with my camera and my phone.  I suck.

This is how we roll.....cookie style!

As promised (to both you, my blog followers, and to my children), we celebrated EIV's 2nd Heartiversary with a giant chocolate chip cookie from the Cookie Company.

The Cookie Company donates a portion of sales from the heart cookies directly to Heart Heroes.  Check out the Heart Hearts website for more info.

EIV was stoked!
(Sorry...all iphone pictures, so they are not super quality)

2nd Heartiversary!!

Today, September 14, 2013 marks EIV's 2nd Heartiversary!

This day always will stop me in my tracks.
On this day in 2011, Ed and I handed our son over to the skilled hands of Dr. Duncan to fix the two holes in his heart.

My cousin (who's always been a sister to me) stood by our side and digitally captured so much of what my brain couldn't absorb.
Remember how much he disliked that one nurse:

My aunt and uncle came to the hospital and brought us goodies and lots of love and support.

My parents were there.  Sat with us through it all.  I'll never forget the silence that fell on the room when EIV went on bypass and when our breathing resumed when he went off.

And Ed's parents were here...taking care of our precious girls.
We were surrounded with love.

I'll never forget the first time we saw him:

 

Still takes my breath away!

 

And here he is 11 days post-op:





And here he is today:



































A rambunctious, full of life, and full of energy 2 1/2 year old, who is also the featured Heart Hero of the Month for Heart Heroes, Inc.  Check his blog post out here:  http://heartheroes.org/heart-hero-edward

I've always struggled to put into words all the feelings about that day.
First and foremost, I THANK GOD for protecting our son and placing him in Dr. Duncan's skilled hands.
Dr. Duncan - is and always be our Hero!
Our family and friends who supported and loved us.  You are all the only reason why I'm not locked up with a straight jacket on.
Our girls....who loved and comforted us and their baby brother. And brought (and continue to) us joy beyond words.
And all of our Heart Hero and heart family friends....who walk this journey with us every day.  Who understand exactly how I feel. And share the same joys and sorrows.

I'm so very Thankful for my son.  For his heart health.  For his smile.  For his baby blues.

We are celebrating again this year with a cookie and a party!  because nothing screams heart health like a bazillion calorie cookie!!  We are also giving back with a day of random acts of kindness.  (More on both of these later!)

Big teddy bear

H thought Jeter looked stunning in her entire scarf collection

 

 

 

 

Oh....my poor big teddy bear.

he's such a glutton for punishment (and adorable pictures).

 

 

I need a caption.  Would love your help with one.

Labor free weekend!

Did you have an enjoyable Labor Day weekend?
Was it filled with BBQs, outdoor activities, friend and family? 
Sure hope so.

Ours was not.
Let me rephrase....ours INTENTIONALLY was NOT!
Summer exhausted us (even though I wouldn't give a moment back for anything!).  But still we were exhausted.  So we made an executive family decision to do our best to DO NOTHING for the 3 day weekend.
No scheduled sports
No BBQs or trips to the lake.
Nothing, but home and laundry.
And Naps.

Besides the girls having a play date with a friend, watching the Husker game with a friend (which about gave me a dang heart attack! I CANNOT handle another season like this!!!), hitting Burger King for dinner (yuck!) but the kids love the play tubes....we totally accomplished our goal.

Low key.
Naps on Sunday afternoon
Yes...believe it or not (I still am in shock!)...our entire family napped.  Woo Hoo! It was heavenly.
Laundry which had been so desperately neglected I found clothes that I forgot I had!
We didn't even bother showering for a couple days.  Gross I know!

Exactly, exactly, exactly what our family needed.

In search of our famous faces.

Remember the post about the kids being on a billboard?
If not, you can find it HERE

Well....we were told that there were 2 billboards in western Nebraska.

Honestly, we don't venture very far west too often, so when the opportunity to head west, thanks to my cousin's wedding reception, presented itself, we were on the 'hunt' for our faces.

We found them both!  One in Grand Island and one in Kearney.
Watching the kids faces when they saw the signs was so fun!  They were pumped, as you can tell by the pictures:

 

 

First day of school ~ 2013

I just can't believe it.
Another school year is here.
As of August 12, 2013 we officially have a 2nd and 3rd grader.

7 years of AWESOMENESS!

H's birthday celebration started Saturday with a fun filled day with her cousins swimming at a state park.

 

On her actual birthday, she requested chocolate cupcakes with chocolate chips baked inside with chocolate frosting (she is TOTALLY her daddy's daughter.....a.k.a. Chocoholic!)

So...we decided, what the heck....let's have them for breakfast!!! 

EVERYONE thought that was super cool!   And that chocolate frosting makes some fun looking 'staches!

 

Nope....she does not have stitches.....just a nice size cut from a toy that her brother chucked at her....



Then it was present time.  New bedspread and jewelry holder.  And fake nails and polish from big sister.