Moment by Moment

This past weekend one of Frank's oldest and closest friends flew into town along with his wife. They are getting ready to make a move (Yea for them!!) and were coming into town, last minute, to visit their family before they moved. We lucked out and were able to pick them up from the airport and have them stay the night at our house with us. It was a wonderful time of fellowship, interesting conversation and fun. We ended up playing some Wii Friday night and Saturday morning. And I don't know about them, but for me, I was sore the next day (You can tell that I hadn't played in a while!)!!=) It was very nice to have them visit with us and we were sad to drop them off at their family's house Saturday afternoon. We are very thankful, though, for the time we were given with them!!

Frank and I also spent this weekend with Carrie and Jonathan's children again. We were able to watch the kids so that Jonathan could take Carrie out for her birthday. As always, we had a great time with the kids! After Gabe got up from his nap, we walked down to the little playground in their subdivision. Marcail was a trooper and pulled Gabe in the wagon the whole way down the street!! She did great!=) Once we got to the playground both kids were able to swing a little bit, then Gabe just kinda walked around while Marcail did some more swinging and then poor Uncle Frankie had to go down the hot slide twice for both kids!!=) Isn't he a great uncle?=) After playground time we walked back to the house (with Uncle Frankie pulling the wagon this time and taking the kids through the sprinklers.) and had a great time playing inside until Carrie and Jonathan got back. It was a nice time with both Marcail and Gabe. They are just growing up too fast!!=)

Below are a few pictures from the weekend! I hope you enjoy them!!

23 Hours with Marcail

1:00 p.m.: Pick up time.  We arrive at Carrie and Jonathan's front door, knock and hear from the inside a loud voice saying, "It's Aunt Teen and Uncle Frankie!  Let's go crazy, let's go crazy!"  We open the door and see Marcail, dressed in her Ariel bathing suit, turn around, spin and continue with the "Let's go crazy, let's go crazy!".  

1:20 p.m.: Leave for the River City.  Stopped at PetSmart to do a little shopping - Marcail and I looked at the birds, guinea pigs, cats and dogs while Uncle Frankie picked up some fake plants for our turtles.  Marcail really enjoyed seeing "Flower", the puppy that was there in hopes of being adopted.  She also said that she wanted a bird, but we tried to tell her that getting her a fish had been pushing it and that we didn't think Mommy and Daddy would appreciate a bird, too.=)  (You're welcome, Carrie and Jonathan) We then headed over to Old Navy for just a moment so that I could exchange a couple of shirts.  Marcail mentioned that she remembered going to "This Place" with Aunt Betty the other weekend.=)

3:00 p.m.:  Arrive at Fernandina Beach.  Walked down to the beach, picked a nice spot to sit and proceeded to watch Marcail dig in the sand and dump it in the bucket.  Then she decided that she wanted to go down into the water (She kept telling us that she was going swimming, but we kept trying to tell her that it would be a little too hard to do that in the ocean.  We told her that sticking her feet in would be just fine.).  Uncle Frankie, myself and Marcail all walked to the edge of the water. . .where Marcail refused to go any further.  It took a little encouraging to get her to come near enough to actually allow the water to flow over her feet.  And when it did. . .well, let's just say that the water is NOT Marcail's favorite thing about the beach.=)  After this encounter with the water (which was cold, to be fair) Marcail would only go back down if Uncle Frankie held her.  HE was allowed to go as far in as he liked (all while holding her), but she was not going to dip her feet in again.=)  After a couple trips down to the water, Marcail went to work on building a sandcastle (which did not turn out, sad to say).  Uncle Frankie helped by getting water from the ocean and together we all attempted to make a small sandcastle (still didn't work.).  We also dug up some nice seashells, which Marcail got to keep.  She did ask if there were crabs in them.  I told her that these shells wouldn't fit the crabs, so it was okay that we took them.=)  A little more time spent digging in the sand, one last trip down to the ocean (in Uncle Frankie's arms) and then we decided to clean up and head over to the nice little playground near the beach.   We spent a few minutes playing on the playground and then decided to head off for pizza.

4:30 p.m.:  The Pizza Place (aka OPS).  There is a neat little pizza place that just opened up in Fernandina called OPS.  This is where we stopped for pizza (It's very good! And I love supporting local businesses).  While we waited for our pizza to come Marcail and I played together with her Princess Sticker book.  We had so much fun dressing up the different princesses (but she is always quick to tell you that Sleeping Beauty is her favorite)!=)  Then the pizza arrived and we ate it all up (okay, not all of it, but at least most of it.)!=)  We also got an order of zeppoli's (thanks to a GREAT coupon in the Mint Magazine - gotta love that!) and as Marcail was in the middle of her first one (if you don't know what zeppolis are, you definitely need to try them.  They are fried pieces of dough covered in powdered sugar.  Yummy!!), she looked at me and said, "I am going to eat another one." =)  Now normally I would indulge her, but we were also going to stop for ice cream, so I kindly refused her a second one.=)  

5:30 p.m.: Chick-Fil-A Ice Cream.  Need I say more?  Yummy!!=)

6:00 p.m.:  Home.  Marcail took a bath (due to the sand that was in her hair) then we painted her toe nails (pink, of course) and she settled in to watch The Little Mermaid.  Now if you've never heard Marcail sing, you need to.  She is just the cutest when she sings!  And one of her favorite things to sing is when Ariel goes, 'Ah ah ah. . ' - you know, when she gives up her voice to Ursula.  Well, this is what she did during the movie.  And then she joined in singing Part of This World with Ariel.  It is just too cute!  

7:30 p.m.:  Skyped with Mom and Dad (aka Grandma and Pappy).  We spent a half hour talking with Grandma and Pappy, sharing our exciting day with them.  Marcail did have somewhat of a hard time focusing on the conversation, though, due to the fact that The Little Mermaid was on in the background.=)  They still enjoyed hearing about her day, though.=)

8:00 p.m.: Bedtime.  We prayed, read a story, tucked her in and off to sleep she went.  It had been a busy day!=)

This morning she went to Sunday School/Church with us and then we took her back home.  It is always so much fun to spend time with Marcail!  We are very thankful to be close by to Marcail and Gabe and are looking forward to the time when Gabe can start spending the night with us as well!  These 2 are very special to us and we are very glad to have them nearby!=)  Below are just a few pictures of our time with Marcail!  Enjoy!!

*Oh, we did discover that Marcail thought alligators lived in the ocean.  Could this be why the ocean scared her?  Who knows!  It did give us a great opportunity to talk with her about how God is always with her and takes care of her no matter what, though.  Neat moments!!

Nothing Much

This has been the theme of our lives lately.  Nothing much.  Nothing much going on, nothing much happening.  Just us enjoying this thing called life.  It's been great getting out and about in this beautiful spring weather!  Frank's been outside taking care of the yard and we've been able to take some nice walks around our neighborhood.  As most of you know, I am not a big fan of FL, but one thing I really do enjoy about it is the spring.  It's just so pretty outside and the weather is just perfect!!  I always love seeing the new life around us start to bloom!  Plus spring time always brings about the best holiday - Easter. =)  What a wonderful time to stop and truly reflect on what Christ has done for us!  This Easter was pretty neat for me.  On Thursday, April 9th my class of 4/5 year olds (most of them are 5 now, so it's hard to call it my PreK4 class), along with 2 other classes, were able to visit an assisted living home here in Jacksonville as part of a field trip.  Our classes sang 4 songs and shared a poem about Easter with the residents of the home.  It was a wonderful time of sharing Christ's message with the residents and it was so neat to have the opportunity to have the children participate in something like this!  After singing at the home, the children went to a park where we shared in pizza, cupcakes and a short Easter egg hunt.  It was another beautiful spring day and the kids seemed to have a great time!! It was a great way to end the week before Easter!! (And nothing is more precious then hearing a child tell you that the true meaning of Easter is that Jesus rose from the dead!)=)

We also received a short visit from our aunt this past weekend.  She came into town Thursday evening and stayed until Saturday afternoon.  It was nice to spend some time with her!  We were able to spend a nice day out and about on Friday, color some eggs Friday evening and then attend our church's Easter Egg Hunt Saturday morning.  It was a nice weekend.  

Sunday Frank and I traveled down to St. Augustine to visit with his family after church.  We had a nice time eating the yummy food that his mom and sister had prepared for us!  We also got to feed some horses down the road from where his sister lives.  That was really neat!  Frank's brother-in-law, 2 nephews, myself and Frank all rode the golf cart down to the horses and we fed them some carrots.  Beautiful horses!  After this excitement we drove back up to the house and played the boys on the Wii.  Frank's oldest nephew was determined to beat him in Wii tennis and. .. he did. =)  I got to try it myself and was able to deal his nephew his first loss. =)  It was all done in fun, though.  After this, the boys went swimming and we spent some time with his parents.  It was a great day!!

Now we are back to normal life and looking forward to the days ahead.  We are hoping to go see Wicked sometime at the end of April or early May and this summer is our family's vacation to Lake Norman!  I am counting down the days until the end of the school year and can't wait to get the summer started!!=)  I hope that you all had a most blessed Easter weekend!!