I Married My Celebrity Crush + Kid Stuff

 Last week Wes and I celebrated our
 8th Wedding Anniversary! 
Whoo hoo!!

I love that I have spent more than a third of my life with my guy!

Love how this picture captures a special passage (Ps 37:4) on the bracelet Wes gave me when we were dating on our 1st Christmas almost 10yrs ago...thanks for driving thru a blizzard to Michigan.  One of my fave gifts of all time  :)

I spent the day thinking about how thankful I am to have Wes for a husband...how he challenges me to be a better person, wife, mom and Christian.  Thank you God for blessing me with more than I could ever hope for or deserve! 

 Sorry to get mushy, its not like we have it all together, but I can be sentimental and cheesy because its our anniversary and when you have had a crush on a guy since you were 13 (like... you have sketched wedding dresses, practiced writing your "married name" and had a picture of him famed in your room) and then he asks you to marry him 6 years later it is a total God thing! (I promise I'm not a stalker!)

 

We celebrated by leaving this two little munchkins with their aunti RiRi and heading out to Grand Haven for dinner...to the restaurant where we had one of our first "dates" (which my high school buddies Brynn and Haley also attended...They didn't come this time around!)

We had a blast celebrating, remembering and looking forward.

Natalie asked to pose for a picture with mommy and her "baby" which she named "Pretty Pretty Princess"...yeah, the princess deal is still her thing ;)

 Awwwww...just had to snap a quick shot of these people.

Speaking of those little tikes, lately they have been napping like crazy.  I'm sure its because one day of their summertime routine is equal to a whole week's worth of activities during the fall,winter or spring and/or they seem to be growing like weeds.  Regardless, BOTH of them have been snoozing for a couple of hours at the same time almost every day!  I know this a freakishly awesome phenomenon and won't last long but for now I really do feel like I've hit the jackpot.

On this particular day, Stratton couldn't even wait to lay down completely before conking out.

 And Natalie was snug as a bug in a rug

So, I took advantage of the downtime, kicked my feet up and amped up my reading.

I am working on this book (thanks Al for the suggestion ;))...

 Wes and I are reading "Bringing up Girls" and "Bringing up Boys" by Dr Dobson.  We are realizing more and more how intentional and prepared a parent needs to be when raising kids today.  Lots of questions start coming out of an almost 4 year old's mouth (yikes!) and well before that we want to model, teach and provide a solid foundation of love and stability for our kids! 

This book has given me a practical piece of advice or new information that I can use THAT day.   part of me thinks that if I read this before I had kids I might have waited to be done doing EVERYTHING else in my life before having them....the challenge, commitment and energy required seems just that HUGE! But,obviously that is not reality!  I just pray for the energy and wisdom to help grow Natalie into a secure, self respecting lady who know her mommy, daddy and most importantly God loves her! 

Next up is the boys version of the book...fun to have each flavor!

So it has been a good week...In fact the only reason I am getting this post together is because the kids are FAST asleep! HA!