A trip to NC, Another Birthday and 1st day of school!!!!!

Well, sorry for the delay in blogging. We have been busy! The kids and I took a very fun trip up to NC to see my family and meet the newest cousin, little baby Hampton Grubbs. Apparently I don't have any pictures of any adults, just kids. Sorry! Savannah really enjoyed holding him. Ellie didn't enjoy when I was holding him and was very possessive of her mommy. She is definitely a mommy's girl and I love it!

 He really did love Savannah! Not sure what this face is saying? He is such a good, sweet baby!

 Ellie found his carseat and wanted to play in it. Sorry its blurry but she doesn't sit still for long.
 

 Hampton, Harrison, Isaiah, Ellie and Savannah (We love cousins!)
 

 Sweet brothers
 

We came home to a very special 6th birthday last week and we have started our school for the year as of today!  Savannah had a pretty good birthday and received some wonderful presents from some wonderful people. Seriously, how do we have a 6 year old, yikes where has the time gone??

 Isaiah got Savannah a tea set but it is breakable and Ellie really likes it so we can't play with it that much yet unless Ellie is asleep. Savannah has been kinda bummed about that.

 Ok, so for Isaiah's birthday I made these awesome homemade vanilla cupcakes with buttercream icing. They were a hit at his party. He didn't like them. For Savannah's birthday I made her this awesome recipe for a 3 layer chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream. No one really ate much of it. I have always tried so hard to make great homemade cakes without all the added artificial things in the box cake mix and no one ever thinks they are as great as I do. I think we have officially decided that birthdays around here will now mean a homemade ice cream cake (read, nothing but ice cream) because  we don't have many "cake" fans in our house.

Here is a video of her opening her big present, a new big bike!

 

 

We have officially started homeschool for the year as of today and they were pretty excited. We had some more behavior issues with Savannah this afternoon and I was feeling very discouraged about some struggles we have been having. After some rest and refreshing from the Word, I was able to help her and encourage her a little better than I had been. Parenting is HARD. I mean HARD but the Lord know what He is doing by blessing us with these little ones and I just have to remember to go back to Him for strength to get through the tough days. I have definitely seen that the Lord does  not call you to something (for us homeschooling) that He isn't going to give you the strength to get through. We love homeschooling, don't get me wrong, it is an absolute privilege for me to be able to teach and be with my kids each day, but today was just one of those days. I think every homeschooling mom has them. I am just praying the Word will start changing ALL (the kids and mine) of our hearts to flee from sin and pursue righteousness. To fall at the Cross of Christ and seek His Glory above all else. Ok, back to the pictures....

 When I grow up I want to be a missionary, an airplane pilot and an astronaut.
 

 When I grow up I want to be a firefighter, a baseball player, a football player, and a missionary. So hard to decide. At least the firefighter this year isn't blue like his statement last year!

 Well, lets be honest here. Homeschool with Ellie is hard. She is into EVERYTHING and climbs on EVERYTHING. I have found her standing on our dining room table, an end table and attempting to climb on top of my dresser using the knobs as foot holds. She is busy. Her sign says she is starting her 1st day of 1 year old helper/destroyer school. Yep, she accomplished that today!

 What shall I get into first????
 

 She then wanted to sit next to Savannah and "do work" on paper. We are pretty sure she is going to be a lefty and it is cute to watch!