The Lovely Day

One week ago yesterday, I hit a major milestone... the first anniversary of my 29th birthday.

My daughter asked me how old I was going to be.  "30." I replied.  Her response was matter of fact.
"30.  That's old."  :-)  I love that girl.

I had a lovely day, full of special treats.  My Mom and Dad had sent me a pretty birthday package a few days before... I didn't have quite enough patience to wait for the big day to open it though. 

At lunch my handsome man came home on lunch break and took me out.  We fished up the date with coffee from our favorite shop.  My sweet sister-in-law, Heather, and her friend, Jessica, watched the kidos for us. 

I got a calls from a close friend, my Dad, and Randy and Raechel.

In the evening, Mom, Dad, Heather, Jessica, Win and all of our crew went out to eat.  We finished up at our house with cheesecake, gifts, tea, and chatting.  It was a blessed day with many gifts from the Lord.

Thank You, Father for 30 years of more blessings from Your hand then I could ever count. Thank You for the wonderful family, you gave me through birth and the precious family you gave me through marriage, and for the very best gift You could ever give, the life of Your Own dear Son!

Well, you might have thought the celebration was over, but the next day, Hilkiah discovered a rather good size box out front.  It was from my three dear sisters.  And here are a few pictures of the fun that happened as we discovered gifts for everyone!!!   Thank you, Aunties!  We've been enjoying the treasures!

 

 

A few moments...

Sharing a chair and watching a video together.  Love it.

Working in the back of the truck.

Cute stuff

And a garden find.  :-)

Two More

Two more shots from the zoo.  The one below is one of my favorites.  I think it would be fun to print out in black and white and frame. 

The Trip

So, I promised a post on our little vacation.  As I think I mentioned, we had to get rid of our goats and some of our poultry, so we loaded them in our pick-up and took them to a Bible camp that was a big part of Stephen's life.  We got to see friends and spent a night there.  Next day we traveled on and had a night in a hotel, enjoyed some meals out, picked up some stuff for work, saw another friend of Stephen's and took in a great zoo.  After that we had more time with friends and a night at their house, in the morning chapel and lunch and then headed home.

And now for some captured moments:

And now, the joys of trying to photograph three!  :-)

It's not everyday that Clara and Hilkiah get to feed a giraffe!

Half Way Through July...

 It's already half way through the July... and no post from this negligent blogger.   Well, I'm finally here again with some happenings and pics from round here.  First of all I have some shots of my little outdoors man.  This little guy really likes heading outside.  He gets bummed if it looks like you're taking him out and then go back inside.  He likes crawling around and exploring, playing with the hose, seeing the sights and sounds, watching the chickens and eating dirt! Don't believe me?  Scroll down.  :-)

 A wet big bro. 

Having fun with Dad on lunch break.  :-)

Pick me up please Mom! 

We did end up having to get rid of our goats and some of our birds, due to city regulations.  But we had been praying for the Lord's leading regarding our little "homestead" and I think this may have been His answer for now.  So, we now have just six chickens.  It's disappointing to not have the great milk, but it does free up quite a bit of time. 

A Bible camp Stephen grew up going to said they would take the animals we needed to get rid of, so we took them there and were blessed to be able to make the trip a family vacation!  Pictures and more about that hopefully coming soon!

 Hello, from the not-so-talkative blog.  :-) We're doing ok here.  Poor Mr. Hil is getting over a NASTY sickness.  Came on Saturday and finally today he is showing some major improvement.  Clara may have caught a lighter version... or have a stronger immune system?  :-)  Anyway, we're very blessed to have people on the mend. 

Here are a few pictures from the last week or so.


Sleeping Beauty:

Sleeping Handsome:  :-)

This happy picture was snapped by big brother earlier today.  Those eyes are looking very brown... at least in this shot.  In real life they still seem pretty hazel.  We'll see.

Total cuteness (at least in this Momma's book :-))  The boy is becoming increasingly mobile.  He's pulling up all over the place and starting to move around a bit while he's up.  He's also getting into more stuff... as you can see.  And the Marine Corps crawl is now the regular all fours crawl.

In other news, our "homestead" might have to do a major downsize.  We got a visit from Code Compliance today... and it turns out goats aren't legal... and only 6 or 7 chickens.  Stephen had checked city ordinances online before we got the two goats, and according to those we are in compliance. However, it sounds like there is additional code which makes it illegal.  The lady that came by was nice and is going to come back with some printed out info.  We'll see how it goes.  We may have to say good bye to Alice and Jenny shortly..

The Second Mother

The other day, Hil wasn't digging dinner.  :-)  So, Clara offered to finish hers and then help him with his... and that is what she did.  What a helper!

Randy and Raechel

 My brother Randy and his lovely wife, Raechel, stopped in to see us this week on their cross-county move!  And what a treat that was for us!!!  They were here for about a day and a half and we got in chat time, the zoo, a visit to our local coffee shop, plus Clara and Hil got books read to them and games played with them!  :-)  Even duck, duck, goose!
Here are a few moments in snapshot!

Ummmmm wait.... are those my kids... or do they actually belong to Aunt Raechel?  :-) 

Thanks so much for stopping guys!!!  We really appreciated it!

A video would have been better...

A video would have been better, but a word description will have to do.  This morning, shortly after Hilkiah woke up, his little brother decided to pull big brother's pacie right out of his mouth and attempt to "sample" it.  Big bro snatched it right back and returned it to where it belonged... his own mouth.  A couple moments later out came little brother's hand again, and again the pacie was stolen from big bro... again snatched back.  In good humor this casually continued for about 5 to 10 times and it was punctuated by Ittai's cute squeal - yell.  Fun moments!  Gifts from the Lord!



And another fun moment from recently... Hil wearing all stripes!

"I AM the Door"

I know that I need to build a new pen because the socio-economic problems in my current multicultural pen are not working out.  So it's hard to visualize sometimes what the pen will look like, and I got inspired and decided to just start building.  I started at the door, so now at this point, there is just a random door in the middle of my yard.  I thought of the verse from John 10:9 where Jesus Christ says "I am the Door: by Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture."

Below are some of my helpers.  We got it done right before a little sprinkle. 

Good Pictures from Recent History

Random Pics from Stephen's Camera.  Enjoy:

Uncle Win's Graduation

 

Graduation Afterparty, Madgwick Style

 

A 5 Year Old going on 23!

 

 

 

After Milkin'

This is Stephen--

To my hearts endearment, this is what I found after coming back from milking the goat and feeding the animals.

One big boy, with eyes at half mast, that moved into my bed while I was gone.

My Sweetie McMuffin who is so pretty even if she did get up 4x in the night to feed a growing heffa-lump (Not me, my baby son!).

My big girl who still sucks her thumb.

 

And a local Philistine who is way too happy this early in the morning!