Happy Birthday, Amber!

A page from her photo album.

The wonderful woman she turned into! :-)

Twenty-four years ago today, Bob and I became parents for the first time. Our precious firstborn is 24 years old. We are blessed to be her parents. I pray that God will give her the desires of her heart this new year with multiple blessings beside. Her verse for the year is from Ephesians 1:18-21: "I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which He has called you, the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints, and His uncomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of His mighty strength which He exerted in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly realms far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come."

Amber, God's power is available. I feel that this year you will see God move on your behalf in a way you've never seen before. Keep the hope that you have in Him. He is faithful to complete the work He's doing in you!

Teenagers goofing off on Mother's Day

The teens brought us some awesome entertainment after a wonderful lunch of Mom B's cooking. They did the cup game, rhythm thingy after telling awesome jokes around the table. We were all so impressed with their talent! Actually, Amber is an adult but she acted like a teen here.

Don't you wish you had been there with us?

Mother's Day went to the dogs!

Mom B invited both sides of my family to her house for lunch on Mother's Day. Dad B. did most of the cooking. Karen and Lincoln, Calvin and Karli, Amber (without Matt because he didn't really want to paint our kitchen!) and Mom and Dad G. came, too. Rollin and Laura brought their HUGE dog, Henry but they had to leave him tied to the truck because the littlest dog, Peanut (Mom and Dad B's dog) tore into him too much. Peanut also tore into Cinnamon so she had to be tied up. Breanna brought Cinnamon there. Cinnamon chased Scooter who would chase the ball into the water. Scooter would jump into the water and get the ball and bring it back. Scooter loves to do that and will do it for hours on end. Cinnamon didn't care about the ball at all. She just chased Scooter (who is her father) around all day. She was panting and panting when we finally quit!

Henry

Peanut

Breanna is hitting the ball with the tennis racket to get it to go into the water.

Invitation to Open House

Everyone reading my blog is invited to Jezra's open house on Saturday, June 2 from 10am to 1pm. I won't say my address online so if you don't know it, leave a comment and I'll contact you directly.

Jezra is actually graduating and he's going to Purdue in the fall. Kyle has applied to Ball State to begin a philosophy degree this fall, too. All of the sudden, we're going to have an almost empty nest. I'm not sure I'm ready. I told Kyle I would miss him and he said that he might after a couple months in college :-)

A long day of painting

A long, hard day to a new kitchen began when Amber and I got started around 8am on Friday morning. Grandma G and Tami joined us around 10am. We worked to get the primer on all the places we were going to paint and then began the "colors" to make it look good. When Grandpa G joined us, he brought us pizza so we could eat and get right back to it. It was exhausting but a fun day with all the help. I'm very grateful to everyone who helped us get this done. It wasn't an easy job when we did the two-tone cabinet doors!

Second Shift

Grandpa G, Bob, Kyle, Breanna, and Matt O joined us in the afternoon. Tami left around 2:30 to get Lindsey and Anthony for the weekend. Grandpa bought us all pizza. We took a break than then got right back to painting. We finished around 9:30. Grandparents left around 8:30 or 8:45! Boy am I sore today!

New Kitchen

You can kind of see what it will look like finished. We have to put the cabinet doors back on. It sure looks different and sure took a lot of work and a long day!

A Guitar Player!

Kyle began taking guitar lessons from a guy on our worship team. Here is our next worship leader!

Orchestra Awards

Last night we went to the awards dessert banquet for Orchestra. Breanna got a key chain and a star for having so many points by turning in her practice sheets and participating in activities and events.

Isn't she the coolest?

She is in awe of how Matt can spin a styrofoam cup!

This lamp was given to the director by the senior orchestra students. It has all the seniors names on it as well as some instruments. It was made by one of the dads in the class.

Tackling a Big Job!

Because of Amber's prompting, we are going to paint our dining room and kitchen including the cabinets this weekend. Last weekend and yesterday, we began scraping wallpaper to get ready to paint. Here's the brave people who helped us. Yesterday Tami and I finished it but I didn't take any pictures. I'll show you the completed job after this weekend. Amber is coming on Friday and Mom and Tami are going to help, too. Hopefully we'll get it all done. I want it finished for Jezra's open house on June 2nd.

Tami showed us how it was done last Saturday and we ended up scraping for an hour!

Sunday Breanna and Bob worked on it while I was walking 3 miles for a fundraiser in memory of Kim Love. They had it over half way finished when I got home. It made yesterday go easier. Tami and I wouldn't have gotten it finished by ourselves if they hadn't done two walls!

Don't you love the color underneath the wallpaper? Why am I painting it??