Goodbye 2008; Hello 2009!

Wow this has been such a awesome year! I can not believe all that we have been through this year! Some good, some bad, some sad; some truly GOD moving in our lives!

Here are some things I want to remember from 2008:

Julies graduation!

The birth of my new amazing niece! Such a beauty.

Aunt Betty went home to be with the Lord!

Finding a new Church home. CP has been a blessing in our lives!

The good times with my sisters and our babies!

Starting small groups, and then breaking off into more!

CP Baptism. Wow did God move that day!

Our first reds game as a family!

The kids birthday with Grandma Bonnie in town!

The trip to the Animal Farm

All of KI fun!

And of course getting to see Matt Redman and Big Daddy Weave in person!!

Scott playing semi pro football

Mine and Scotts mini trip to St Louis!

Robin meeting her brothers for the very first time

We have been blessed with so much this year. Next year will be even better!

Happy New Years!!

The best parents ever!

Our plans for today was to go to the Newport Aquarium and then to the festival of lights, but we ran out of time so quickly.

We had a blast at the Aquarium tho! We took lots of pictures and I will post some soon. My uncle works there and was able to get all four tickets for free! We took some pictures of the river front and my gosh it was beautiful. Julie told us that we were "the best parents ever"! She even got up the courage to pet a shark!!

I cant wait to have all the kids together again. I think our next big day out is Thursday at Dave N Busters. I know they will have a blast!

Little update on the kiddos

I talked to Robin again this evening. She assured me that they were having a great time. She also said that Austin was really getting into Jeremy Camp and she was amazed by him! This is such a good experience for my kids!!

And off they go!

Robin and Austin have left for their very first youth trip. Julie is soaking up the fact that she gets mom, dad, and grandma all to herself! I miss my older kids already. I have already called Robin well at least once, plus all the text messages. But we know that our children are in good hands with Alex, Janelle, and Kait. I pray that God will move in our children this week and each and everyday. I hope you all are keeping the youth in your prayers this week!

We have planned a full week ahead of us

Today- we are hanging at home playing the wii and taking Julie to the movies. We are watching Marlee and Me and from what I heard it is heart wrenching.
Tuesday- we are going to the Newport Aquarium. Julie has never been there. We thought it would be awesome to take her while the other two are in Tenn. My uncle works there and can get us 3 free tickets! So we will only have to pay for 1 kid ticket.
Wednesday-we don't have plans stuck in stone, but we know we will be hanging out with Travis and Jenn!! And picking up Austin and Robin!!!
Thursday- we are going to Dave N Busters. I got a gift card from work last Christmas and we have never used it. That place is the best!!!
Friday-we are going to Cosi!! Julie and I have never been and I can not wait to go!
Saturday- we are going to the Air force Museum with the Taylor's.

I guess there is more to do in Ohio than I think. And I have not given up hope that SOMEDAY I will get to go to Tennessee.

Hope everyone has a great week

My little boy is growing up to fast!

Robin and Mom

The sisters with our daughter's

Family photo on Christmas day

me and my abbygirl!

Abigail Marie!

Me and my "little" boy!

Celia and Uncle Scott

The kiddos

Robbi

Julie







The guys!

Austin and baby Abby

Poor Abby she was so sick of pictures and just wanted her nap!

I love Christmas! I love just hanging out with my family and the yummy treats that everyone bakes! But today I noticed something. Austin is as tall if not taller than me! He is now in men's clothes and wow his feet well they are HUGE! Here are some pictures I took of Austin today and some of the rest of the family. I hope everyone had a great Christmas!

Feeling Better

Wow- that 2 1/2 hour drive home from Milford must have done some good for me tonight. It will not be all that awful to give up my trip to Tennessee. The important part is that I will get to spend time with the family and enjoy not working! Scott and I have decided to plan out activities to do around here while Bonnie is here. So I guess I have some searching to do for activities. It still does stink that we loose the money we put down on the cabin.

BTW all you people from Goshen and Milford the dollar store by Kmart is closing and everything is 40-60 percent off. We got Ohio state T-shirts for 2 something. There wasn't much left in the store, but medicine is also on sale and that might be nice to stock up on.


AND Ray I thought my sister had anger issues when driving on the highway!

No vacation

Looks like my trip to Tennessee is postponed again. I can not help but to be discouraged about this. We have been planning to take a vacation this time of year for a full year. We were suppose to go to Florida for Christmas with Scott's mom, but once we found out the youth was going to Tennessee our plans changed and it seemed like a blessing because I have never been there and always wanted to go. I guess our car is going to cost more than what Scott thought at first. And then we got more unexpected bad news today on Scott's check. This stinks, I have been looking forward to this for so long.

Sunday events

That lil boy is so happy all the time!

Chris- the most awesome worship leader!
Ray, Jenn, Cory, and Travis. Ray and Travis are to tall for lil Jenn- they got their heads cut off!

Isaac and me!

Jenn and I at Putters!

Church was great today, Ray brought an awesome message, and the band sounded great!

This afternoon our Small Group along with Jenn, Travis, Sarah, Danny and the three lil guys went to the Blanchester nursing home to sing songs. At first it was a little strange because they didn't have every one set up and ready so they just had us walk the halls. We stood in the middle of the hall and starting our singing and then went to each room to hand out the gifts. Isaac got scared going into one of the rooms, but his fear seemed to end. One lady was clapping so hard and Danny went over to talk to her. We went into one room and the guy "Jeremy" didn't hear us singing in the hall and asked if we could sing with him. He also wanted to know if he could sing along. The song he picked was "Amazing Grace". Here are some things that we learned today from the nursing home.

Terri has a beautiful voice.

Although some rejected us, most loved us and brought great joy to them to have us there.

Scott's new name from one of the patients is Scott Snot Smith

Danny should never just agree with a gentleman when they are discussing poop

It was a awesome feeling to see all the smiles on their face

Cory is so much like his daddy!

Eli was a big hit

Isaac had a baby "son"

Dan knows how to tie women's shoes

Robin's name has changed to Nancy

All of our last names are now Mize

After leaving the nursing home, Jenn, Travis, and Cory came over. And them my friend Jen surprisingly stopped by! I haven't seen her since Austin and Julie's birthday party.

Jenn, Travis, Scott and I decided to go grab a bite to eat and went to Putters in Milford. It was really awesome to hang out with them tonight. Hopefully we will get to hang out with them more often!!

It didn't start off good, but it ended perfectly.

What a day. My dad gave us money to do his Christmas shopping this year, so Scott and I with 2 kids and 2 teenagers set out to do just that. Little did we know that our car was going to break down in the middle of our oh so busy day! Wow we had our hands full while waiting on my dad to bring us some gas, at first that's what we thought that was the problem. We waited for over 2 hours with not so happy kids. That is what I call "BRAVE"! Scott had given me my Christmas present early this year, a new camera! Boy did that come in handy. I took over 100 pictures in the car and it was the only thing that saved my sanity lol. The kids had a blast getting their pictures taken. After my dad showed up and we put gas in the car, we learned this was not the problem. We tried jumping it, that didn't work. A stranger seen us working on the car, and offered some advice about knocking the fuel tank with a hammer to see if that would help, it didn't. My dad was able to take the kids with him, but that left Scott and I alone. By this point we knew we were going to miss the Live Nativity. Scott called Pastor Ray to see if anyone at the Church would be able to pick us up. Carrie, Jenn, and Travis came to pick us up. Travis and Jenn have some good connections AKA a brother who has a tow truck (Jason) whom towed our car for us. Travis also works on cars and is able to fix the problem which will save us um TONS of MONEY!!! We are so lucky to have awesome friends and an amazing Church Family! Thank you Jenn, Travis and Carrie and to everyone else that helped out either by waiting for us, praying for us, getting us a ride, or anything else. Here are some pictures of our adventures today! Remember we were board out of our minds and freezing!!

Me and my beautiful Niece Celia at Taco Bell starting off the afternoon

Austin and Julie- she missed her brother!

Robin and Celia- Celi wasn't very happy about something

Celia, Austin, and Julie

Julieann was the worst one in the car, she was not happy!Daddy was quickly loosing his patience lol
Celia, Austin, and Robin said leave me ALONE!








But after a few pictures, the kids were all smiles and ready for some goofy pictures! Thanks Hun for the camera, it really came in handy today!

Oh and there will be more pictures to come of the pictures I got at CP Christmas party before my camera died.

Photo Tag

Here is how it goes!

1) Choose the 4Th folder where you store your pictures on your computer

2) Select the 4Th picture in the folder

3) Explain the picture

4) Tag 4 people to do the same NO CHEATING! (cropping, editing, etc!)

This is a picture of Julie and I on her first vacation to Massachusetts. A perfect picture of what a happy baby she was all the time! I was such a lucky mom!!! I'm not going to tag anyone, but feel free to do it also!

TGIT?

Wow what a week! The project I am working on is taking a break until after the holidays so we have been slammed trying to get as many stores done as possible. I think I have gotten lazy, because it is no where near as crazy busy as Dispatch, but I am just wore out. I have went to bed early every day this week. Tomorrow is my last day before my vacation and I am so ready! I have a lot of paperwork to do tomorrow because I will not be there for 3 weeks.
I am really excited about our trip to Tennessee. It will be so nice to get away and relax.

Abigirl!

My spoiled little niece is getting so big! Here are some recent pictures!