i'm a little behind on the house pictures but here is the latest-



i can hardly believe that the end is in sight. but it really is.
we will be moving there in august or as soon as we get our cabinets set, appliances put in, railings on the stairways, and a railing on the patio. and hopefully some shelving in the closets.
we may not have things like base, crown, trim around the windows, or DOORS. but we will be TOGETHER.

front entry-



great room-



master bath and closet-



master bedroom-



mudroom and side entry-



powder room-



kid's bathroom upstairs-



shaeya and tekoa's room-
dave and i started the hardwood this week and we will be focusing on getting the rest done next week.



nothing like an intense homestudy visit and a parade of homes open house in the same week. LOTS of work getting ready for them both and emotionally exhausting having to "show" everything that is happening with our family, our marriage, and with both houses.

i've never been more thankful for the 2 "really strong good guys" i have on my team. :)

wren and her new friend :)



my handsome boy :)



one of the many wonderful things about him is that he will sleep anywhere. truly wonderful. and that means there are a few rare occasions where i get to actually sit for a minute or 2 when we go to the pool :)





silly absentminded mommy buckled neiko into wren's car seat. and had completely tuned wren out as she asked, "what are you doing, mom??" over and over while i was buckling him in her seat :)



i think he's getting a bit too big for her to hold.....



a few pictures of the wedding in kansas this past weekend.....
most everything went great that day except that the groom was really sick and it was 100 degrees outside- and an outdoor wedding.

a groomsman and the flower girl....











cousins :)





the kids did pretty well for how many hours (24 hours of travel) they spent in the van. we made a few stops along the way to break up the trip......













we got home on monday night and were thrown right back into our normal chaos.
we have our second homestudy visit tomorrow. i am waaaay less nervous than i was the first time :)
and we have the second weekend of the parade of homes to prepare for.
the first one went fine without us, but our fill-ins were overwhelmed by the amount of people that came through. hundreds.
and 2 of those people were interested in buying the house.
and 1 was willing to pay a good amount........
but we decided that no amount of money is worth our sanity. or the vision we've had for this house for the last 15 months.
so, no thank you :)

and now for a couple of cute stories....
the other day tekoa asked me if there really are bad people in this world.
i told her, "yes, there really are. but we don't have to worry about that because we have the best, most strongest GOOD GUY on our team."
and she said, "yep. daddy." :)

well, i told her that GOD and daddy are both on our team, but God is the strongest.
and then we met dave for lunch. she ran right up to him, put her little hands on his cheeks and said, "dad, you're awesome. do you punch bad guys??"
he laughed pretty hard even before i filled him in on the previous conversation. :)

and little wren, as we drove past dave's office building yesterday yelled out, "i see daddy's house!!!!"
poor girl. i can see how that could be confusing. someday daddy will live at "our house" again. except that won't be here at grandma's house. that will be at daddy's other house. then this will be grandma's house again and daddy's other house will be the whole family's house......
can't come soon enough, right wren?

and lastly.....
sometimes God just LETS YOU KNOW that He cares. it seems like ever since we brought neiko home He does this more than ever for me. and i LOVE HIM for those times. i love Him for all times but especially for those times.
like yesterday.
it was our first day back home and we woke up to NO MILK. i know some of you know the devastation of being in that predicament....
we had to rush a bit that morning because tyden and shaeya are in vacation bible school in the mornings this week. so i promised the girls we would get milk on our way back from dropping tyden and shaeya off. and we pulled into the parking lot of the grocery store right as tekoa dumped an entire bottle of juice on her lap and her car seat.
she started sobbing.
i looked at all three little kids and decided that getting the milk would be more trouble than it was worth at that point.
so i drove home with tekoa bawling the whole way.
we got home and cleaned up the juice mess and about 5 minutes later there was a knock on my front door. i opened the door and there was my neighbor standing there with a gallon of milk in her hands.
she had extra and wanted to know if i could use some......

and bam. i know my Savior loves me. and that He cares about the little things as well as the big.
He cares about things on this earth as well as things in heaven. He cares about hearts and thoughts and faith and attitudes. and He cares about milk and He cares about families.
right, buddy?

i am soooo behind on the blog. i have a million and one things going on and i'm just too tired to get it all out, so i will give you a condensed version.

the first home study visit went great. we only have to have 2 more. plus all the finger-printing and physicals and copies of marriage and birth certificates.
the social worker concluded by saying that our children were very well behaved (thanks for the prayers!!) and that she appreciated our view of the adoption.
relief. i will not be as nervous for the next one :)

this week has passed in a blur of cleaning and working. i've been helping my family's company get another house ready for the parade of homes during the days, and then working on our house in the evenings.
the parade starts this weekend. and i think we will end up meeting our goals for our house but only because of some help from dave's parents and my brothers.
THANK YOU SO MUCH ALL OF YOU!!!!

i LOVED being a part of things this week. i had some help with the kids, so i actually got to work with my husband. i laid hardwood, scrubbed garage doors, shop vacced, moved about 30 boxes of hardwood to the upstairs, and climbed up on scaffolding to help hang shutters and paint trim. and i had so much fun. seriously. it is AMAZING to feel the sense of accomplishment that comes with working really hard and actually seeing an instant result. and to know that whatever i am doing will not promptly be undone. incredible.

the floor is almost finished on the main level, and the outside trim, shutters, and posts are almost done too.
tomorrow we should be ready to focus on cleaning things up and making it all look nice.

then it will be time to pack our bags cause we will be leaving for kansas early saturday morning. dave's brother's wedding is in wichita i think and it is a 10 hour drive.
so we will be driving 20 hours in one weekend with 5 children.
the upside of this will be that i can totally catch dave up on every little thing he's missed over the last year. 20 hours should just about cover it ;)

all the funny children-related stories will have to wait cause i'm exhausted, and hopefully i can take time to take some pictures of the house tomorrow when it's all ready for the parade.

oh, and if you're going to come through for the parade, make sure you do it NEXT weekend when dave and i will be there!!

"We bend.
I bend to sweep crumbs and I bend to pick up little ones and wipe away tears. I bend over a big pot of stew and I bend to fold endless laundry and I bend over math books and spelling sentences and history quiz corrections. And at the end of these days I bend next to the bed and I ask only that I could bend more, bend lower.
Because I serve a Savior who came to be a servant. He lived bent low. And bent down here is where I see His face.
He lived, only to die.
Could I?
Die to self and just break open for love.
This Savior, His one purpose to spend Himself on behalf of messy us. Will I spend myself on behalf of those in front of me?
And people say, “Don’t you get tired?” and yes, I do. But I’m face to face with Jesus in the dirt, and the more I bend the harder and better and fuller this life gets. And sure, we are tired, but oh we are happy. Because bent down low is where we find fullness of Joy.
Praying for you as you bend today for whoever is in front of you. He will meet you there."
-auntie katie from THE JOURNEY

thank you, Jesus for constantly reminding me that i'm here to serve. that this is not too much or too hard or not 'not what i had planned' but this is living abundantly. this is my Father's work. this is serving and loving HIM.
if only i could learn to remember that all on my own without always having to be reminded!

i am feeling a little overwhelmed with all that is going on.
i need to do better at resting in Jesus and remembering that He is in control.

tomorrow i have some girls coming to help me deep clean. PRAISE JESUS. i don't think i would make it without that boost. i have been cleaning and organizing closets and re-moving boxes and trying to get things looking nice around here for the home-study visit on wednesday.
and because we are going to start showing this house very soon.

tomorrow is also tekoa's pre-school screening to see if she can get into pre-school in the new school district for the fall.

with all these thoughts running through my head plus vbs at my church starting this week and getting songs for and hearing everybody's opinions of the praise singing before church and running the nursery at church this month and dave's brother getting married in kansas in a week and a half and the parade of homes coming up and flooring and light fixtures to quickly pick out i am feeling pretty maxed out- and a bit scatter brained.

and it is showing. embarrassingly enough.

last sunday after the praise singing i helped dave get the 2 little ones upstairs for the service and then went to tekoa's classroom to teach sunday school for that day. i got the lesson ready and greeted all the children and as they were starting to settle in a friend came to the door carrying a crying tekoa.

i had forgotten all about her.

i was in HER classroom getting HER lesson ready and greeting HER friends and did not even realize that she was not there.

and then yesterday we went to a birthday party at my grandma's house, and when it was time to go we loaded up the kids and started pulling away without shaeya. they had to flag us down.

that happens, right??

and then the worst was today. i took the kids to the pool, and when we got there i told them not to get in the water until i put their sunscreen on.

i was holding neiko as we walked in and i saw an old friend so i stepped about 10 feet away from the kids to say "hi." and wren decided to jump in the water anyway- without her floaties on. there were 2 girls in the pool that saved her.

that happens too, right??

it's just a good thing they belong more to God than to me.

and i'm really hoping that things slow down a bit after this month.

(but my husband would tell you that i ALWAYS say that, and it NEVER happens :)

here is a picture of a mother's day gift gone bad-



it hung like that for quite awhile before i finally took it down and threw it away. (it used to say "faith" :)

sometimes you just have to take a picture of them sweetly sleeping.....



shaeya and wren's birthday party (1 of 2)



neiko loves the swing at the lake



really loves it....



and sometime he just needs a little peace and quiet. hard to come by around here....



the good thing is that all those concerns about neiko not being like my kids were as babies are slowly fading. he is becoming more affectionate and social and just fitting in more and more.
it is amazing to watch.

he was really trying hard to walk for awhile but now he is slowing down a bit
(but only when it comes to walking!)



tonight he said, "go."
it was really cute. i was telling the kids we needed to go and he said "go" plain as day.
and he waves "bye-bye" now too. genius :)

say a prayer for us on wednesday if you think of it!