"Arise, My Soul Arise"

Fear has always been a present issue in my life (as many of you know). I'm not going to go into the details, but I wanted to share a verse of a song we sung on Sunday at church that just blew me away.

First of all though I would like to praise God for His work that He has done in my life, specifically in this area, and the work He is continuing to do. The way fear grips me now is so weak compared to only a couple years ago when I remember fear just overtaking me at times. I've put a couple verses below that I've prayed through many times and that have helped me to put my trust in God when I am afraid! ...God's promises are so sweet. I'm just in awe on how His Word can change me and my stubborn ways.

Here's the last verse of the song 'Arise, My Soul Arise',
"My God is reconciled, His pard’ning voice I hear
He owns me for His child, I can no longer fear
With confidence I now draw nigh
With confidence I now draw nigh
And Father, Abba, Father Cry"

I just had to stand back when I sung that...'I can no longer fear'! I shouldn't even be ABLE to have fear present in my life since Christ owns me. How humbled I was to think of this constant struggle in my life...that shouldn't even be there at all!!! I praise God for His grace, patience, and constant forgiveness... not only in this area of sin, but in ALL areas of my life.

Isaiah 41:10
"So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous hand."

Psalm 46:10a
"Be still, and know that I am God."

July 4th pics...

We had such a great weekend together w/our family and friends and here are some pics of it. :)


Here's us at Val Vista Lakes at their 'beach pool'.







Here are some pics of Emi and I at Alyssa's swim lessons...I didn't get any good pics of Alyssa during her lesson (since she was crying the whole time!), but Boo was so cute playing in the splash pad that they have at the pool so I had to get some pics of her! :)

Finally...I got some video of Emily walking! :-)

Yarley...

Yarley is Alyssa's new 'friend'. He's pretend, just in case you were wondering who in the world would name their child YARLEY! ;) It took me a long time to realize what she was talking about...or in this case WHO she was talking about. She would just walk around the house saying, "Yarley, Yarley, Yarrrleeey." I was like okay, I have NO idea what you're saying, but whatever you sound so cute while saying it. Anyways, finally she told me that Yarley was sick...and I realized she had made up her first pretend friend. :)

It was so funny...today while we were driving Nate asked, "how is Yarley feeling" and she said, "he's still sick." Nate asked if he had gone to the dr.'s yet and she said, "yes." He said, "well, what did he say?" ...and she said, "the dr. said 'NO - MORE - JUMPING - ON - THE - BED!'" (I guess we've read "5 Little Monkeys" a few too times) ;)


***This picture has nothing to do with 'Yarley', but it shows Alyssa's crazy 'Say Cheese' smile so perfectly I wanted to share it with you all. :)

Do my hair like Mercy's please!

Okay, so as you all I'm sure have noticed, I'm not the most consistent at doing Alyssa's hair...most of the time we just run out of the house with it flying every which way! :) I've been trying to make more of an attempt to be consistent in this area since she really is so adorable with her hair brushed and put up w/clippies or whatever...even though I'm not the best at it. So the last couple days have been really funny, I've been doing her hair and all she keeps saying is "please do it like Mercy's hair", "I want it like Mercy's", "is it like Mercy's hair mommy?". I don't know if she notices how much cuter Mercy's hair is always done compared to hers or if she just misses Mercy since she's gone ALL SUMMER ;), but it's really funny! (here's another cashier story for you) ...we were checking out at a store yesterday and the cashier was saying hi and making small talk w/the girls and Alyssa starts going off about how her hair is done...and it is JUST like Mercy's! Oh my goodness she makes me laugh! (of course the lady had no idea what Alyssa was saying and just smiled and laughed) ;)

Emi's new things...

Since Emily has turned 1 she's decided she wants to be a big girl! :)

At playgroup on Tuesday she decided she wanted to finally start clapping. It was so cute, she was just sitting in the water at the splash park just clapping away! When we got home I was singing Happy Birthday to her and while she was standing she started dancing and waving her arms and then at the end she started clapping...so cute!

She also started signing the word 'more' on Tuesday. It happened when I was feeding her ice cream for dessert and as soon as I would stop she kept saying 'mo' and signing it with her hands...it's funny that it was with ice cream that she first decided to sign 'more', since Alyssa's first time was when I was feeding her pizzookie at Oregano's. Now this just proves that these are my girls! ;)

...as a side note, so I can remember the date whenever I decide to finish her scrapbook, she's been walking for a couple weeks now. The first time she really got up and walked was June 14th at a birthday party. She had been taking one or two steps here and there, but at the party she just got up and kept walking around.

HAPPY1st BIRTHDAY EMILY!!!

WOW! I can't believe my little Emi is ONE!!! She is becoming more fun everyday...from her dry sense of humor that just cracks me up to her calling ma-ma for everything and then when I pick her up I get the biggest hugs. :) Thank you Lord for Emily and all the little blessings you give throughout the day!
I love you 'boo-bear'!

Do you love Eric too???

So Alyssa has recently discovered princesses...specifically Ariel and Cinderella. She really loves Aerial though...and Prince Eric (who's name she can't say without blushing and smiling).
Tonight we were at a store and while checking out we ran in to Ne-ne (aka our friend Renee). Alyssa ran up to her and stayed with her while she was checking out, while we were in another line. I have no idea how Ariel came up, but we could hear her start on a role with Ariel this and Ariel that. Thankfully the cashier was kind enough to go along with it. She was saying how much she loved Ariel too and that she was her favorite princess when she was growing up, etc. etc. etc. Alyssa couldn't believe it, you could tell she was just in awe of this cashier...and then we hear Alyssa ask her, "Do you love Eric TOO?"
Oh my goodness I can't tell you how cute it was, we all just burst out laughing!!!

Blog backgrounds

Thanks Amy and Melissa! I love that you can add different backgrounds then just what blogspot offers, how fun!!! :)

Thank you Jesus for the house, the heart, and the circle???

Last night Nate put Alyssa to bed and after Nate prays, Alyssa will pray and thank Jesus for whatever comes to her mind. ...Usually it starts off with, "Thank you Jesus for Mercy, Eli & TJ" (not sure how/when Eli got added to her list since she never sees him, but I guess since he's TJ's brother he's got an in...Logan I'm sure you'll make the list soon!), and then an occasional "thank you Jesus for Sam" (depending on if they had fun or fought with each other that day). ;) So last night she prayed her normal prayer and then thanked Jesus for the house (Nate thought hmmm, that's new, but cool), the hearts (then he thought, that's kind of weird, but maybe they were talking about the hearts of mankind in her room at church tonight), and the circle (what???)! Then he remembered her new toy...see picture below. :)

Lord willing one day she'll be thanking Jesus for... OUR house that He has provided for us and she will be praying for the hearts of man.

I LOVE JESUS!

Today Alyssa and I were at the pool with the Myers gang and we were all joking about who they love...'Sam do you love Alyssa?', 'Alyssa do you love TJ?', and of course there was no question for Anna, she stated right away that she loves James...and then Alyssa screams, 'I LOVE JESUS'! My heart melted!!! Praise God for signs that He is working in our little ones hearts. :)

Jesus Loves Me!!!

Alyssa sings this so cute so I tried to get it on video...this was the best one after many, MANY takes. ;)

Mrs. Bishop and Mrs. Depert

Okay, so I finally got this on video! For those of you who may not know I was in BSF (Bible Study Fellowship) this year, which is a world-wide woman's Bible study (they have a men's one too, you can check it out at www.bsfinternational.org ). The cool thing was that since Alyssa is 2 now she can come with me and go to her own little Bible study (she calles it her 'Jesus class') while I'm in mine. She LOVED it! ...and she loved her teachers, Mrs. Bishop and Mrs. Depert. I've never seen her so excited about people before. She is constantly coming up to me and just saying their names...nothing else, just their names...and then she just gets the biggest grin on her face and becomes instantly shy. It is sooo cute! So I thought I'd try to capture it on video and share it with you all...

"All done"

YEAH! ...Emi's learning some sign language, check this out. ;)

Shhhh, it's 'quiet time'

Alyssa had a sleepover with Mercy last weekend and they were so cute! They slept in the same room and did pretty good...although they didn't fall asleep until almost 9pm and they woke up before 6am! They were pretty tired since both of them usually sleep 7pm-7am! ...so we had some quiet time before going to story time at the library. Thanks to Alyssa and Mercy's 'Jesus class' (aka Bible Study Fellowship) they were used to quiet time on mats! They are so cute!!! Alyssa thanks Jesus every night for her wonderful friend Mercy.

Emi's walking! ...well kind of

Emi's cruising w/her bike...hopefully she'll be walking on her own soon! :)

Alyssa feeding Emily

So, I haven't let Alyssa feed Emily yet because of the vision of mess I imagine when I even consider that happening. ...well, one day while walking into the kitchen Alyssa jumped up into my seat and just started feeding her. It was actually really cute, and she did a great job! Go Alyssa!!! :)

Emi...dancing, well sort of

Here's a SMALL taste of what she does when we sing to her or play music... I guess she's a little camera shy.

Alyssa 'feeding' the Elephants

Alyssa and I went with Brandon and his mommy, Miss Holly, to the zoo one morning to 'feed the elephants'. Ok, so we didn't REALLY get to feed them like you would think, but it was really fun. The kids got to first go through little exhibits to teach them how Elephants eat, play, etc. and then we got to go into where the elephants live and hide food for them to find. Then once we leave they let the elephants out and we got to watch them find the food. The kids loved it!

Misc. May pics...

My little firefighters... She loves her dress up princess shoes!