best. parents. ever.

today i am especially thankful for my parents. let me tell you about my week...sunday night, i went to bed at 6pm. not a nap, literally in bed for the night at 6pm. slept through until micah woke the next morning. we spent the entire day at home in our jammies. i was WIPED. monday night, my throat started hurting, but i was supposed to be at work at 7am tuesday to unload the easter truck, so off i went. i made it through until 3 and then headed home. then my throat really started hurting. like the burning, have to suck on throat lozenges all night long kind of hurting. wednesday, i went to staff meeting, had one more meeting, and then i was toast. noon on wednesday, i went down hard. i went home early, and my parents stayed to help out with micah while i rested. then they went and got dinner for everyone and came back to feed us. amazing.

then after being with micah all day tuesday and wednesday, my dad came back over this morning and played with/cared for micah all morning until his nap when my mom came over. they fed me, took care of micah, and took care of me. i am so thankful because i don't think i would have been a very good mama today.

thankfully, i think i'm over the worst of it. i'm hoping to be up for work this weekend. so yeah. i have he best parents ever!

oh and did i mention that all of my dishes are clean thanks to my mama :)

easter 2011.

easter was amazing. God was glorified and i experienced the presence of the Spirit in unbelievable ways. easter started for me months ago, but really started taking shape on thursday at our staff meeting. i wish i was an eloquent writer so that i could explain the awesomeness of our staff meeting. we reflecting on stories of transformation from past easters which was inspiring, but then the Spirit fell on us in an incredibly prophetic way. there was not a dry eye, and to be honest, i just don't have the right words...you'll just have to trust me :)

the bulk of the set up was on thursday night. it was a great night and most everything got done.

friday, we had 3 services with children's ministry, and then packed up every.single.toy from the entire building to take over to the tents at the fairgrounds.

saturday was unloading the truck with the toys, and then fine tuning all of the tents. we finished in record time and then we had the stirring saturday night which was a night for the Church around orange and LA counties to get together to worship and pray for the sunday morning gatherings, and the families in the county. francis chan brought a pretty powerful message and we were mobilized to action by contributing to an amazing organization called Safe Families.


and then....easter morning! incredible. incredible. incredible! francis joined us yet again and it was not a service that will be forgotten anytime soon. since a picture is worth a thousand words, here are some captured by alex ::

we. are. STILL. insane.

do you remember last year when we moved? well, we thought that it was the craziest time to move.

nope.

now is the craziest time to move, and, you guessed it...we're moving! again.

this will be our 4th place right before our 3 year wedding anniversary.

let me map this out for you....

alex just moved to full time which means he isn't here to use wednesdays to pack.
i am in the process of helping to make Easter 2011 happen.
may 8th RH is launching a new campus in huntington.
may 12th is micah's first birthday.
may 12th also starts a three day family ministry gathering (aka conference with a TON of people).
may 15th is micah's birthday party.
oh, and did i mention that we have one of our dear friends staying with us from the 9th-15th.

yup...sounds crazy, right? yeah. we get the keys to our new place on may 10th. and we need to be completely out of our current place by the 20th. so why are we doing this? well, let me tell you ::
the new place is free standing. that's right, no shared walls!
washer and dryer hook ups.
new windows.
new carpet.
new dishwasher.
new stove.
new countertops.
a side yard!! this one is huge for us...with a little person and summer right around the corner, we SO desired a place for him to play outside without having to drive anywhere.
laminate floors in the living room.
new tub and bathroom vanity.
all of the above for a (very) small increase in rent.
not having to live next to crazy mccrazy.
no smoker right outside our window.
no stairs!
a landlord who actually wants to upgrade the property for you.

we just couldn't pass this place up. seeing it again last night totally confirmed our decision. it's everything we have talked about wanting. we LOVE it. the funny thing is that alex just happened to drive by it on the way home on Sunday...right after we had just released our hopes of finding anything better within our price range. literally, just minutes after we said that we just need to keep our eyes open but not be expectant and to trust that God would make it clear when it was time. well, He made it clear.

so yes, we might be insane, but i think we'd be more insane to pass it up!

and because no post is finished until it has some micahness in it, here's a winner ::

eleven months.

we're a little late on micah's update this month. mostly because mama has been (and still is) crazy busy!

micah,
every day i think you just can't possibly get any more fun, and then you wake up the next day and prove me wrong! you are still a ball of energy and i don't think that's ever going to change ;) this month you've gotten more steady on your feet and are braving up to 5 steps at a time now! Most of the time it's still only 2 or 3 though. you are a happy baby who never stops moving. if you're still, it's because you are asleep! you've started playing ball now and we LOVE it. you're also loving the outdoors more and more. i think you're going to turn mama into an outside girl :) we take walks nearly every afternoon and you love crawling around on the grass outside.
you are still a very good eater...the only thing we've found that you don't like is eggs. you have tried so many new things, and mama can't even keep track of them anymore! i think that means you're a big kid now.

the closer we get to your birthday, the more i get sentimental about you growing up. you are such a gift to your dad and i. we love you more than we ever thought possible and we love you more every single day!

birthdays.

We celebrated with two very special one year olds last weekend. both boys were born on the same day in the same hospital and they both mean the world to us! first up was Ryder who had a super cute fishy theme and the best cake eating i have ever seen!




sunday was brody's turn...he had an adorable baseball theme which was perfect for his family!





we had a GREAT weekend celebrating two of our favorite little boys! next up is another one of Micah's buddies...we'll be celebrating Landon today...and after that....micah's turn!

check it out.

the OC Easter site is incredible this year. i have gone to the site multiple times since it launched, and i can't get enough. seriously, the communications team did an amazing job translating what it is we're celebrating on Easter.

check it out.

spread the word.

www.oceaster.com

mommy fail.

so last night, micah was extra fussy at bedtime which isn't normal. if he's full, he usually goes down without a fight. last night he wouldn't stop crying. i tried a few more ounces which ended up calming him down. he started crying again when he finished, but fell asleep after a few minutes.

normally i have a pretty good read on micah. i usually know what it is that's keeping him from sleep, so imagine how terrible i felt when after all of that crying, i found his little blankie (that he has slept with every.single.night.) in the living room! of course i felt awful...the good news is that tonight i remembered the blankie and micah went down without a peep :)