Saying "Yes" to God...

Yesterday I had the privilege of going to women's conference with some of my Renovo friends. It was held at my old church in Seattle, Northwest Church of Christ. Honestly, I wasn't that excited to go. I was excited to hang out with the girls and get to know them better, but I usually don't enjoy women's conferences that much. I'll tell you why... I have a very short attention span and it takes a REALLY good speaker to keep my attention for more than 10 minutes. I'm not sure why I'm that way, but I am. Not once on Saturday did I look at my watch while the speaker was talking. Actually, every time she was done with a session I was amazed at how much time had passed and was sad because I wanted to hear her speak more. Her name is Lysa TerKeust. Amazing woman of God. She is a nationally known speaker who I was meant to hear on Saturday. God put me in that place because He knew that's exactly where I needed to be.
Lysa just stood up there and shared her story. That was it, yet it was profound. I actually saw Lysa a few years ago on the Oprah show. They did a story about her community. Lysa had gone to see a Liberian boys choir sing at a nearby church with her 3 little girls. During the concert she heard God speaking to her "Two of those boys are yours." Her response was, "Yeah right, I don't think so." To make a beautiful long story short, she did adopt 2 of those boys and her friends adopted the rest of the choir and so far 45 children have been adopted from the same orphanage in Liberia. It's amazing because obviously these children are black and have been adopted into white families, it didn't matter. I encourage you to go watch the segment of the Oprah show on her website www.LysaTerKeurst.com
One of the things she said has me really thinking. She said that she could have told God "no" that day he talked to her about her boys. She could have told him no and no one but her and God would have ever known. However, she would have missed out on the tremendous blessings God had planned for her. Instead, she said "Yes!" Is there somewhere in your life where you need to say "Yes" to God?

Zumba Maniac

It's been awhile since I've written a post and it just seems like life is busier these days. On January 1st (with the rest of the country:) I became of member of the YMCA along with working on eating healthier. Since that day, I have worked out every day except for one. I always used to say that I hated working out, but I'm loving it! I feel better about myself, I'm sleeping better, and my clothes are already getting loose (lost 16 pounds and counting). I think one reason I'm enjoying my workouts so much is because I've found Zumba. Zumba is a salsa dance aerobic class that is so fun. They play really loud salsa type music and we just do the moves to follow the teacher. What I love about it is in the hour class, I burn 750 calories! I know I don't always look like I know what I'm doing, but I just keep moving. If you want to check it out, come join me as a guest at the YMCA. Thanks to Travis being so supportive, my workouts at the YMCA have become a great mommy break. I think God designed our bodies to get exercise on a regular basis (please remind me of that when I get burnt out:) Seriously, come check it out with me....

Peyton's Pink Party

Peyton eating her cake:)

The fam

Sitting on her new rocking chair

She loved the leopard print shoes! (Thanks Titi Selina)

The cake!

We celebrated Peyton's 1st birthday yesterday with family and friends. At first I didn't know what theme to use for her party and decided that pink would be it. Then I started thinking about how to incorporate some of her favorite things. As I stated in the last post, she loves her teddy bear, her blankie, and her bo-bo (pacifier). So, I saw this cake on-line and knew I had to copy it. It was so much fun! So, I turned the party into a pink bear party and had all of the cousins bring their favorite bear. Later in the party, each bear got a prize for being different. We had a nice dinner and watched Peyton open up her presents. She was spoiled as usual and got a lot of cute clothes. Her favorite things were probably her big purple hippo chair and the rocking chair she got from Papi. My dad re-did the rocking chair he had as a child, which is really special to us. We are going to put it in her room so when she wants to relax and read books she can:) We then sang her Happy Birthday and she dug into the cake. She was very curious at first, but finally when mommy convinced her to take a bite, she loved it! She was mad when it was time to be done. We love our little girl and are so thankful to have her in our lives. Till the next birthday...

Peyton turns 1 today!

Azteca for your birthday is a family tradition. So, here she is in the sombrero, she's not so sure about it.

She is clapping after they sang to her.

And then she got to have a few bites of chocolate mousse. She wasn't that impressed:)

Wow, I can't believe that our baby is turning one today. It is very bitter-sweet for us knowing that she is probably our last baby, but she is so much fun to watch grow up too. Peyton has a really fun personality, and she knows what she wants:) She can take command of a whole room if she really wants something or if mommy and daddy tell her "no." But, she is easy to calm down and for the most part she is a very happy, content baby. She is already walking, although crawling is still her preferred method of transportation. She says "momma", "dadda", "baby", "Bo-bo", "bye-bye", and "ba-ba" (for her brother). Some of her favorite things:
1. Peyton LOVES her teddy bear. She calls it her "baby" and we can tell she is going to be a great mommy some day. She rocks the baby, pats the baby, and gives it a lot of kisses.
2. Peyton loves her bo-bo (pacifier) and one of her favorite games to play is where mommy steals her bo-bo and she has to get it back.
3. She loves singing and music and really gets into dancing. I mean really! It's cute!
4. Peyton loves the water and swimming. She is completely relaxed in the water and didn't mind when daddy dunked her under. She just looked at him and smiled:)
5. Her favorite snack is Ritz Crackers and her all-time favorite thing would be her blanket (especially the tags, just like brother).
6. Peyton loves to give hugs. We pick her up and she pats us on the back. However, she is pretty stingy with her kisses. They are very few and far between and even less for daddy. For some reason she will almost always give a kiss to Mr. Jeremy and Brayden though, no fair!

We are so in love with our little girl and can't wait to see the great things that God has planned for her. She is so precious. More to come on her birthday party...

Time for another recipe

I threw a shower yesterday for my friend Tiffany, which I think was a success! One of my favorite things about it? The chocolate chip cheese ball! It fakes everyone out thinking it's a savory cheese ball (like the hundreds we all see at Christmas parties), but it's a sweet one and oh so good. I thought this might be a fun one to share. My guess is you'll want to eat the whole thing yourself:)

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 3/4 cup confectioners' sugar
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3/4 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips
• 3/4 cup finely chopped pecans

DIRECTIONS:
1.In a medium bowl, beat together cream cheese and butter until smooth. Mix in confectioners' sugar, brown sugar and vanilla. Stir in chocolate chips. Cover, and chill in the refrigerator for 2 hours.
2.Shape chilled cream cheese mixture into a ball. Wrap with plastic, and chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
3.Roll the cheese ball in finely chopped pecans before serving (I rolled it in more mini chocolate chips instead).
4. Serve with regular or chocolate graham cracker sticks.

Christmas Day

The cousins

Christmas morning at my parents

Brayden playing in his new tent!

Peyton in her Christmas pajamas

Brayden thinking "will she hurry up these pictures so I can open up some presents"

Our Christmas eve ended well as we got the house ready for the morning. We went to bed excited for the next day. In the meantime, I realized that I pulled my back out(yet again) a few days before and it was pretty sore. I woke up around 2am to excruciating pain in my back. I couldn't move and needed to use the bathroom. I had to wake up Travis and have him help me get out of bed and still it took 20 minutes to walk to the bathroom (which happens to be about 5 feet away, seriously). I tried to take a hot bath, take ibuprofen, ect... and no relief. I finally fell asleep because I was so tired. We woke up Christmas morning and I tried my best to be excited for the kids. We sang Happy Birthday to Jesus with cinnamon rolls, we opened our stockings, and then opened our presents. It was a nice and relaxing morning. Peyton loved playing with the paper and Brayden loved everything he got. I think his favorite was his tent, and Peyton's was her gold bracelet (a Puerto Rican tradition). Travis and I realized later that we forgot to read the Christmas story in the Bible (which we've done every year), but I think we were both so tired from the night before, we just forgot. Then we got ready and went to my parents house for an amazing brunch! I'm telling you, this is probably one of my favorite meals of the year. Ham, homemade bread, cinnamon roll pull-aparts, bacon, strawberry french toast, quiche, and of course an assortment of yummy desserts. We opened presents with the family and had such a nice day over there. We are all so blessed and Christmas is always a good reminder of that. We finished off the night in the ER because of my back. Nothing too exciting, just some muscle relaxers and pain medicine, but it really helped. At one point Travis and I looked at each other sitting there in the ER and smiled as we said "Merry Christmas." The funny thing is, even with the ER visit, it still was a great Christmas. Peyton and Brayden had a lot of fun on Jesus' birthday. We finished off the week with a visit with Travis' extended family down in Longview and a trip out to the cabin on Saturday with my extended family. Needless to say we were tired after our Christmas week, but reminded how much God loves us. Isn't that the point...

Christmas Eve

Grandpa showing Peyton how to use her walker

Peyton wearing the dress grandma made for her

Handsome Brayden!

Our Christmas week was packed this year, but it was fun! Christmas Eve we went over to Travis' parent's house. We had dinner, dessert, and of course opened presents. One thing I love about Linde's house is she always has cool things set up for the kids. For example, the place settings. Brayden had a Christmas table mat, some color crayons and paper, a cool cup that lit up when you put liquids in it, and not to mention the toddler friendly food she has for him. The kids had so much fun. On Peyton's highchair (yes she has her own highchair there), she had baby food and snacks to keep her busy. That always makes dinner a bit more enjoyable. We were spoiled as always. I think my favorite gift was my new set of dishes! They're pretty and I love them! Peyton got a baby stroller that is a walker that she loves and Brayden got a whole bunch of little supplies to help me in the kitchen. Travis' favorite were hunting clothes:) We missed going to church, but had a fun time with family. As soon as we got home though, the drama began. More to come in the next post....