Waiting On The Lord : Family Life

And...it is August and here I am posting about March and April! Better late than never, but I feel that is a theme in my life right now, whether it is cleaning a bathtub or answering a text message. =) I digress... March and April were full months as the amount of pictures shows, and I did not even post all that I had! A good deal of March was taken up with the continued fight of chicken pox. Olivia and Hope recovered after a valiant fight, and then Ella, Leah and Joel succumbed to it within days of each other, which although difficult on them and the "nursing" staff, was a blessing to have it all over with in one fell swoop. We were all released from quarantine in time for my sister, Emma, and her family to arrive for a visit from North Carolina. During that same week, we jumped back into the full swing of house build, which had been stalled since New Years due to circumstances and winter weather. The next 6 weeks were crazy as we worked, alongside our amazing contractors, busting and sorting bricks, digging rocks in the crawl space under the house and cleaning up shingles and insulation. It was an intense season, but we have some incredible memories from them.

And to finish it all up, at the very end of April, Mom and I made the 12 hour trip to bring Grandma home to live with us.

I will allow the pictures to depict the story...

So without further adieu...

This little baby's mama could not seem to get it through her head that
she was now fully responsible for this chuck of sweetness. In the midst of
trying to convince her, Hope and I stopped for a picture.

Catching a sibling picture before Caden returns to college after
spring break.

Busting brick off of the jut-outs that were going to be torn down.

The guys pushed the shingles off, the girls picked them up!

Hanging plastic in the rooms to try to keep as much dust out as possible.

The longed for promise of spring!

After spending several days with us, Emma and her family were about
to load up in the car to return home when James (2 1/2 years) took a fall.
X-rays showed a broken femur and after a hospital visit, an ambulance ride,
a night at another hospital, and an operation later, James came home. We kept
Caleb with us until they were all able to return to NC, taking Olivia with them to
help get things settled. Update: James had the cast taken off on time and everything
looks healed and he is walking normally!

We laugh now that at the beginning of this project, we would count
the bricks as we stacked them on pallets. Somewhere along the way, we
completely abandoned this organizational techinique.

By far, one of the top worst projects we had was to dig up and haul
out the rocks in the crawl space under the house in preparation for
encapsulating. Now that it is over, we have some amazing memories
of doing it together, and those I know, we will never regret.