ABC Time

Here's Jack hamming it up with his ABC's. I love Caroline's encouragement in the background too! Hopefully I'll start taking some more videos/pictures soon. Needless to say, it's been a bit crazy around here. Everyone's doing great though and the kids are at such precious ages!

Blessed

Just spending some time this morning reflecting on the blessings that we have received these past years. Today is an ultra important day in our lives as it marks the 3 year anniversary of Jack's heart surgery. What a defining moment that was in our young family's life. What a turning point in our faith and our strength and our commitment to each other. I am so fortunate to have such a wonderful husband to be there through each step of that incredible journey. And so blessed to have the vivacious and thriving 3 year old that is better today because of the surgery, tubes, doctor visits, etc that he endured in such a short time period. We are blessed people and praise God for all he has done for us!

"I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to proser you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11

I think that says it all!

Here's last year's post that looked back at the carepage I kept during Jack's medical time with some pictures included as well.

www.lifeasabowman.blogspot.com/2009/01/2-years-ago-today.html

Christmas 2009

Here are a few of the highlights from Christmas morning. You can tell Jack was very sick with his pneumonia in these pictures. Overall though, he was very excited about opening his new presents! Caroline even enjoyed opening as well. It was a great morning!

After our Christmas morning at the house, we headed to Knoxville to visit with my family. My sister Elaine and her husband, Pat, were in from California. It was great being able to spend time with everyone in town. We even got to spend time with Gigi (great-grandma).

On New Year's Eve, we headed to the Behringer Crawford Museum for the train exhibit with the Friske's. I didn't get a good picture of the boys together! They had a ball. The exhibit was so interactive and the boys had a great time watching and causing things to work. If you haven't been before, the museum has so many things for the kids to do. It's a nice mix of things for adults as well as things to keep the kids busy. It was a great children's museum. Ready to visit again!

Forgot this one

Here are the kids with Santa. Jack didn't cry, but check out the expression. There was no talking to Santa, but I would say it is a huge improvement over last year.

Just for laughs, here's last year's picture too.

Long over due...

Whew...it's been busy! Yesterday was the last day of school for me and I am so looking forward to the Christmas break. This semester was really rough! The kids are doing great. It is going to be a very exciting Christmas as Jack is in full Santa/Christmas mode. He is putting together the idea that Christmas is Jesus' birthday. I think it is still all a bit confusing though as Tommy just had a birthday, his neighbor friend had a birthday and now Christmas is Jesus' birthday. I figure the earlier we can really start getting him to hear about it the better! We will be heading to Knoxville later in the week to have Christmas down there.

Anyways, here are some fun pictures of the first real snow that we got today. Jack had a blast!

I also have to brag on Tommy. December 11th was our 5 year wedding anniversary. He was so sweet and had all this laid out when I got home that Friday. The cake is actually a small replica of our cake. He took a picture of ours and took it to someone to make. The kids even went to the neighbor's house so that we could have a quiet dinner (which he cooked!) together. What a treat!

Jump!!

We recently pulled out the jump up to see if Caroline was ready for it. I think both of them have enjoyed it! It's hard to believe that she will be 9 months old this month. She has been such a good, sweet baby. I'm really looking forward to having a couple of weeks off to really enjoy them over the holiday. It will be busy but great!

Halloween Highlights

We took the kids trick or treating today. What a blast! Jack was really into it this year and was basically running from stop to stop. We started the day at Crestview hills for one of those mall trick or treating events. We also tried the new Five Guys and Fries restaurant....yummy! Just be ready for huge portions and a bit of grease. Well worth it though. Anyways, then after naps we went over to the neighbors for some good friends and chilli. We also got to take the little ones around for trick or treating. I saw a few of my high schoolers and kept my head down. Don't want them knowing I lived anywhere around there. We were also naive and left a bowl of candy on our doorstep. When we made it around, our other neighbors told us the 4th group through dumped it all in their bags! Go figure they were big kids. Last year we were able to do that and actually had candy left when we got back. So much for trying to be nice. So here's the pictures of our Batman and monkey!