Been Awhile

Well...I haven't been blogging.  Clearly.  I mean it's pretty bad when your father-in-law notices and comments on the lack of new blogs.  :)  But man...summer gets away from you!  Not to mention summer really started much later this year.  Obviously on the calendar it started same as every year but weather wise it sure took us awhile to get going.  And the last couple days here have felt like fall!  I feel like I should be busting out all the afghans in the house, and spending my time in the kitchen whipping up loaves of pumpkin bread and batches of potato cheese soup...but I'm not ready yet.  Fall is my absolute favorite but summer has been so short! 
It doesn't help that our year started with illness after illness and us not being able to catch up!  Somehow Adam managed to dodge most of it but really until June one or all of us were constantly sick with something.  It seems my lowered immune system wrecked havoc on the girls health.  And in just a few short months so much has changed!  The girls are so different.  Abby says and understands so much.  She is always wondering where Hannah is.  Wants to make sure she's coming too, doesn't want her out of her sight and can usually be found in Hannah's room.  Hannah, I've noticed has become even more protective of Abby.  Today I even saw her cover for Abby when Abby was about to get in trouble for something she'd already been in trouble for twice this morning.  (tormenting the dog.)  They are playing lots more together.  It's awesome to be in another room and hear their conversations and the songs they make up together, and the constant laughter....usually ending with a screaming Abby or a yelling Hannah.  There will always be a smothering, mother-hen Hannah and a touch me again and see what happens, Abby.  But they are good for each other.  They compliment each other in so many ways....if they can respect each other and always stay friends they will be such a good balance for each other.
Meanwhile, Hannah has switched from her two month protest of any new babies ever joining our family, to now again pleading the case for a new one.  She's stepped it up.  Both Adam and I have told her we haven't decided yet...we are still in discussion and almost daily she asks if we've decided yet.  And when in fact can we now have this new baby.  While out in the store today she tells me, "Mom.  After we are done here let's just stop by the hospital and have ourselves another baby." HA!  If only it were that easy, I think!  Wouldn't that be fantastic.  :) 
One never knows what road life can take you down...and we still aren't sure in this area....but I do know when I think of Hannah heading off to school next year (like she is SO adamant she is going to do) and Abby and me being here all by ourselves and then Abby heading off to school not much long after and that being it I continue to think...that can't be it!  That doesn't seem right!  So who knows...but in the meantime we are excited to add another niece to our family.  My brother and SIL are due in Decemer with another little girl they plan to name Whitney Olivia.  And we can't wait to meet her. 
So summer is coming to a close.  We've done our now traditional visit up to Ludlow Bay and stayed longer this year and had a fantastic time...I honestly was not ready to come home.  Except for the fact that I apparently lost part of my mind during packing this time and severely underpacked...or rather didn't check what got unpacked by little hands before we left.  But life right now is good.  We are healthy...we have a home...we have each other.  And that sounds perfectly lovely to me. 

8 Years together as Mr. and Mrs.

"I take you, to be my wedded husband/wife, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death do us part, according to God's holy plan; forsaking all others, and thereto I pledge myself to you."

Eight years ago today, Adam and I stood up next to each other, grinning like idiots, and pledged to love, honor and cherish each other, for better or worse, in sickness and in health, and to forsake all others until the end of life...today, we are celebrating eight years of keeping those promises together.  :)  As anyone knows a marriage is never perfect or easy.  And as you add kids it creates a whole new ballgame.  But I managed to marry my best friend, the person that continues to be my best friend in life today.  I am so blessed to have this person next to me to share life with! 

I love how I Corinthians 13 puts it (via the Message):
"If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don't love, I'm nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.  ....If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe and what I do, i'm bankrupt without love.
Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
Love doesn't strut.
Doesn't have a swelled head.
Doesn't force itself on others.
Isn't always "Me first."
Doesn't fly off the handle.
Doesn't keep score of the sins of others.
Doesn't revel when others grovel.
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything.
Trusts God always.
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.
Love never dies."

 I love you so Adam James.  Thanks for being my person next to me in life....Happy Anniversary and many, many more to come...