October; Tricks, treats, and Tractors!

What a great start to the month we had...Ray's football team the Knoxville Knights won the Alliance Football Championship, back to back champs! Let me give you a little history on this for those of you who are not familiar with the AFL. This is a semi pro football team who plays teams from all over the east coast and gives those guys a second chance at football to be scouted or just to play for the love of the game. Ray has been playing for over 8years now. He played with his first team the Raiders and now he plays with the Knights. We have traveled to Chicago, Georgia, Kentucky, and Virgina just to name a few! With that, I must add I love watching him play and went to watch Ray play a game only days before having Bry and to top that I was in Kentucky with him not even two weeks after having Brinley! I support him and so does my dad! We are Ray's biggest fans!!! By the way, Ray was supposed to "retire" this year but I am not holding my breath! lol.

Next, we celebrated Colton's 2nd Bday!! Yep he is in the terrible 2's!!! Colton's alias is "crash" he has like this moment of reason in his eyes but it immediately flies out the window and there he goes like reckless abandonment! Lord help me with this child! Oh yeah back to the party! We had a wonderful birthday celebration with several of our closest friends and family! He had a John Deer tractor themed party because he loves tractors. He got tractors galore! It was a wonderful party and for the grand finale he got a ride on lawn mower, just like his late pappaw (his idol)! So Bittersweet.

Last, we Trick or Treated! We kicked off the Halloween festivities with Boo at the Zoo and we took cousin Aly!Brinley was a princess (of course), Colton was spiderman, Aly a princess and Bryson was the blue power ranger! It was insanely crowded. What can I say we still loved it! Then on Halloween we trick or treated at the neighbors and family! It was a lot of fun and we got tons of candy! Bry said he wanted to do that every night! Lol. He also loved our house decorated and called it a "spook house!"

It was a great October!

November a month of Thanks?! Or A month about Bry?

November was a month of parties! For Bry that is! My little man turned the big 4!!! So we celebrated and celebrated and celebrated!

Bry wanted a party with all of his friends and I didn't think we could pull it off but we did, we took the party to Bry! His Mammaw, Nana and I got pizza, balloons and decorations then headed to Bry's mothers day out with Colton tagging along to have a party for him and his friends! We set up the big party scene for Bry to walk into and he was scared, and surprised all at once. Not the reaction I was expecting. However, after the initial shock he was happy as a lark to have us all there for his "real" birthday. The only thing he didn't understand was, where are the presents?! So presents he got. He got a big new transformer (that's totally un-transformable) and Buzz Lightyear. Bry's typical response was, and any 4 years olds, that's it?! He is just like his momma! I had to explain because his birthday was on a weekday, he would have another party on the weekend. Trying to make it to the weekend seemed like eternity for this child! Guess what, he made it and, we partied down! We had pizza, Transformer cookie cake and most importantly he got more presents! Whew, I am partied out for the big #4, wonder what he expects for his 5th birthday, thank the good lord I have a whole year until then!

A December to Remember...

Its been a December to Remember! I think I will quit my job every year for the holidays!

This was a busy month!

First, we got snow! Yes it only lasted a few hours but we enjoyed every minute of it! I have no idea how I managed to even get Christmas shopping done but I did!

We went to the Fantasy of Trees and that was an adventure, to say the least. It was not bad but the kids just weren't that into it. I think we may nap before we go next year! However, Bryson did tell Santa what he wanted (Bry is petrified of people dressed up in costumes) Spike the Ultra Dinosaur! And what did Santa bring? Spike!

Then, Bryson was a shepherd for his school performance, or other known as mothers day out. He did excellent! He had two lines, "thank you for coming to our naniviny (nativity) performance. We hope you enjoyed the show!" He said his lines in front of a full auditorium and I gave him a standing ovation, of course!! Got it all on tape and he said, "mom you went nuts with the pictures!" Too funny but I love my babies!

Then, we went to Dollywood to see the lights and Christmas parade with cousin Zhenya, cousin Avner, Aunt Alisha and Nana. This was also an adventure. Not many pics from this one! Lol.

Last, but not least was Christmas! We attended 4 Christmases, dinners and presents included in all not to include Santa on Christmas morning and too say the least it was good but exhausting! We all got more than we need or deserve!

So here we are counting down to the near year of 2010, wonder what this year will bring? Praying for grace and favor.

Change, Change and more change

Well to say the least there has been change going on....

I have continued to struggle with whether or not I should, could work with three kids and what would be the best for the family. I miss medical sales but I don't miss setting at a desk all day from my previous job. I am praying for the perfect part time job to fall into my lap! In the mean time of me and my dilemma there has been even more change.

First, Colton is officially off the bottle! Yes, to some this would seem simple but for Colton, his bottle became his second mommy when I lost my milk supply and wasn't able to nurse any more. So at 2yrs and 2months we had a detox on our little man and he is "ba-ie" free!! I mean he still asks but then he immediately says, "ba-ie fooora babies." So cute. Then on top of detox mode for Colton he lost his beloved potty monkey, where you ask, I don't know or else it wouldn't be lost! So he has a new friend, baby lion! Whew! Glad he cuts his losses and moves on quickly.

Speaking of cutting, that is another change we are experiencing, Princess Brinley is cutting her teeth! This girl has no pain tolerance at all, poor baby! She is also growing and thus her appetite is too. Therefor we have embarked on the adventure of baby cereal and she loves it so much she growls and pushes the spoon into her mouth if I'm not feeding her fast enough! I will upload you a pic of this messy scene!

Last, we are still working on project remodel the whole house! Ahhh! Curse you HGTV for your ideas! Well they are not entirely to blame. We needed the space and I am not complaining, except for its a lot more to clean....and soon to be more!? To top it all Ray has mentioned he is almost ready to do phase #3 of the remodel the addition of the garage and new master suite, etc! AHHH! Ray, can I have a maid??

.....Change~no one likes it except a wet baby! :)

Things in Review 2009

All I can say is what a year...
It has been a year of good and bad, ups and downs and life lessons learned. We began 09 with a fast for "protection, provision, and prosperity" and that he did. God kept us, protected us, provided for us and prospered us but not in the way we had in mind. I was blessed with a job in medical sales, the job I fasted for and prayed for over 2 years. However, it turned out to be the job that took me away from those I loved most, my family. I took the job in October 08 to unexpectedly find out weeks later we were pregnant with our third baby. I had to travel to Tampa during the Christmas season to ponder the whole time on the decisions I had made and if the sacrifices were worth this job I wanted. Also on top of all that I was dealing with the fact they couldn't find the heart beat in this 3rd pregnancy, so literally my wonderful doctor waited till I got off my 2hour delayed flight in from Tampa, past office hours to find out if the baby had a heart beat or not just days before Christmas. Thankfully the heartbeat was strong and we knew in 09 our family would be growing. Immediately we began transforming our house from duplex to a fully functional 2 story home and added an additional living room. Its very challenging to live in a construction zone and better yet when your pregnant!
Things with work continued to be stressful and take me away from my family and then I began to have dehydration problems and it began to put me into labor at 30 weeks. SO for the next five weeks I would spend it in and out of the hospital trying to keep Brinley in till week 36. Then in the mean time the unthinkable happened, Ray's dad passed away after having a double knee replacement he had a blood clot travel and block the backside of his heart. This is still hard to talk about. I may blog on it more later. So here we are just a couple of weeks from having Brinley and we are mourning the loss of the best father in law ever. The good and the bad of 09....

July 23rd 09 and 10:20, after 17 hours of labor in addition to 3hours of active pushing and seconds away from a c-section, Brinley Rae makes her grand appearance. She was not the biggest of my three weighing in at 9lbs and 1oz but to say the least she is and was the most difficult of the three. That's all I can say about Princess Brinley Rae!

Back to the job thing, I had finally established my territory and was doing great with West Knox as my territory. I was on maternity leave for a planned 12 weeks, which is a lot more than most people get but it just wasn't enough time for all that was going on in me. So I quit. Now I embarked on the journey of a stay at home mom of three babies under age 4!

Yes,this year has been a year of changes....

This is for my fans

Well I have decided to start a blog for all of my fans and for myself. I will attempt to keep this updated to allow myself to be a little more transparent and for self therapy in my blogging. I am sure of this I am sure you will laugh, cry and hopefully be inspired. Wish me luck!

Kendra