Annie is 7!

Let me just start by saying that i have been crying all day long! It has taken me by COMPLETE surprise! I woke up this morning and I have this beautiful, tall girl that lives in my home. What happened to this beautiful 1 year old, with the curly locks and sweet cherub face?

my little pudgy 18 month old with the cutest pig tails...where is she?

my 2 year old bunny?

my 2 year old pudgy dancer?

my little 2 year old getting into mischief...where is she?

right about here at age 4...she slimmed out and starting turning into this amazing girl.

her beautiful smile melts my heart

as she has learned to be a beautiful little lady. I sat this morning in my chair and cried and cried as i thought about everything from counting her toes and fingers for the first time, to hearing her laugh for the first time. Tim and I sat on the couch with her for hours and made her laugh over and over. it was the most magical sound ever. We were so amazed at every thing that she did, that we couldn't wait to see what was next. now here i am 7 years later and i can't believe it. i have tried to savor every moment, but it is going too fast.

this is her first picture this morning as a 7 year old. she looks older! i can't stand it.

hot chocolate in her princess mug this morning.

a puzzle from mommy and daddy

more beads from mimi

fun books from grammy

even "A Little Princess" which she will soon devour as she has almost completed the entire Narnia series in 2 months.

we all signed her card this morning...to the untrained eye this says "OH CAL" but it actually says "LOVE ANNIE". Then he drew his signature mark...a sword! CHING!

Toby is getting so big too...he spelled this all on his own!

She ordered up a special breakfast: face-sized pancakes with kiwi eyes, banana nose and whip cream mouth! mmmm....

the boys love all the festivities too! what a great day! I am so thankful for my girl and all Jesus has planned for her. My goal now is to just enjoy her for who she is right now and to help lead her to love Jesus more and more.

A Party fit for a Princess

1 strawberry cake, 1 yellow cake mix, 1 glass bowl, 2 round cake pans (thank you Dawn!!) and everything MUST dump out perfectly. Cool them. crumb frost layer. freeze. frost again. decorate. put the doll in. DONE!!

princess face paint! they LOVE colors!

or butterfly face paint

we even made her a little throne

she loved her cake

the girls got to have a bead party and make their own necklaces....good thing we had LOTS of help from Ms. Erin, Ms. Carol and Ms. Bevin! Thanks guys...you are the best! So thankful for other women in Annie's life to LOVE on her so much!

they had so much fun

i was a little worried i was going to light the princess' hair on fire!

but we didn't!

and everyone sat down and ate! Yum! It was a great party! Thanks to Ms. Kourtney from Oklahoma for sending us cute little purses and bead candy and Grammy for all the perfect princess party gifts! The girls LOVED them and ooed and awed over each one! Thank you so much!

Transformer Party

The big day for the party finally arrived, after much anticipation.

Here is my model for the cake...

and here is what it actually turned out to look like.

all that mattered was that my boy LOVED it!

and Jesse thought it was his birthday too!

we did face paint for everyone!

tim's idea was to build a giant paper airplane and fly it from the roof over and over. I had to make him come down and do the things I had planned!

it only took him an hour to make that plane!

try getting a bunch of boys to sit and listen to directions...hard in English...try doing it in Kurdish.

Tim drew a decepticon on the wall...

and the boys' mission was to defeat the decepticon with water balloons!

He launched it..

and hit the target on the first hit! don't you all wish you had cement walls you could draw on?

time for the cake...

blowing out the candles...

and pure joy!

Thanks to Mr. Josh and Mr. Paul for ALL their help with the WILD boys!

gotta love the boy in the pink sweater.

first bite...

Soooooo good! It was a great party all in all! The Kurdish kids were a little amazed that this party was all about them and they got to play and have fun!

My Toby is 5!

Today is Toby's 5th birthday...so I found a few older pics to post of him! Here he is 2.

Here he is 3!

saving a dance for Mommy at Aunt Mandi's wedding...

cutting the rug all on his own....Toby truly has a song in his heart and marches to the tune of his own beat! We know that God has special plans for this little worshipper, even here at age 4.

Here he is off to pre-school for the first time at age 3

here's a beach picture when he was 2

and now to present day...He is 5! a whole hand! we cannot believe it! Annie and I worked hard on this home made life size card!

the first picture of him as a 5 year old this morning!

He was so excited to get his card and celebrate that he forgot to put his glasses on. We are hoping this is the year he gets to throw his glasses away for good! we do have GOOD news though...we went to the eye doctor here and got new glasses and discovered that his weaker eye is now a LOWER prescription! So we are thankful for the little steps toward this!

Grammy and Papa really scored big and sent him Optimus Prime...much to Jesse's chagrin!

Mimi and Boppa sent this awesome Bumblebee shirt that Toby is proudly wearing today....can you tell what kind of bday party Toby is going to have? Thank you Jesus for our wonderful Son, keep him EVER in your presence!