The face of 5

McKaden turned 5 on the 25th - I am still trying to believe that I have a 5 year old. She had a fun birthday week - we always celebrate the WHOLE week! Some highlights were her cousins spending the night, a new fish/fishtank from Max and dinner at Red Robin. She decided, last minute, that she did want to have a birthday cake [after telling me she only wanted to eat healthy snacks] and that she wanted it to look like a fish.


Don't laugh at the cake - I made it myself and I will leave that at that.

Meet "Rainbow" fish [yes, that is his name]






Happy Birthday McKaden! We love you so much!!

Max's Big Day

A couple of Sunday's ago we had Max dedicated at church. Our church only does child dedications 4 times a year, so you have to hope the dates work out for you. We had put off his dedication in hopes that our family from out of town would be able to attend - but with our parents unable to travel, we decided to move ahead with this. We know that they were with us in spirit. We felt blessed by the friends and family who were there to pray with us as we presented Max to God. We pray that we will be good parents and that Max will grow to ask Jesus into his life. We pray that Max will grown to be a mighty man of God!

Max liked seeing his picture on the big screen and asked if he was "going to get a trophy?" McKaden let him know that this was a "God thing" and he seemed ok with that answer.

Max, we love you so much! We pray that you will give God your whole life and follow after him. As Pastor Nate prayed - will you bring joy to others as you model God's amazing plan for us. Will you bring people together and show his love to all. You have been chosen for such a time as this ...

Happy McKaden Day

Four years ago a little, almost, one year old girl was placed in our arms!
Happy McKaden Day!
Everyday you amaze us.
We love you and are so glad you are part of our family.
ps photo courtesy of Angie Monroe-it is just amazing!

Halloween Happenings

What a fun week we have had! We started the week off with an Halloween Party for the 5 and under crowd we hang with. This was a NO ADULTS ALLOWED party - in other words, parents go out on a date and we hang with your kids. The kids had a blast with fun games, crafts and great kid food. Here were a few of our guests.


Later in the week the kids had a Noah's Ark party at school where they got to dress as an animal on the Ark. McKaden looks like she thoroughly enjoyed herself - look how dirty she is! - as the black cat on the ark. Max went as an alligator [I thought it was a dinosaur costume until the kids informed me it was an alligator]. I don't have any pictures of him in it, as he was too hot to wear it:(



We of course continued in the tradition of Daddy and kids pumpkin carving night! Great job!




AND the highlight for ALL of us was serving at Trunk or Treat this year. We have heard there were a couple of thousand people who came though this years event. We thought it would be fun to serve as a family, with our small group, and let our kids do the serving. For three hours these kids handed out candy to other kids and shared the love of Christ. It was awesome to see these kids do this - there were a lot of proud parents that night as we watched our kids. Max and his friend Mattea got a little sidetracked - but had lots of fun. McKaden was a champ and actually searched out kids to make sure they got candy. Camrie, who is only ONE, was so focused on giving out her candy - it was adorable! And Kyle did not want to trick or treat himself, but wanted to keep giving out candy.