Merry CHRISTmas!

I can't remember the last time I had a White Christmas...but this year we got one. We had a big snow storm..actually they called it a blizzard..come through our area on Christmas Eve. This is what we woke up to on Christmas morning, about 10 inches of snow with a bunch of ice under it.

Santa was still able to make to our house even through the blizzard. I guess Rudolph was able to guide the sleigh. You might remember a blog last month about about a red dress Katie wanted to so badly...well notice what is hanging from the fireplace.

The girls dived right into the present...Katie very excited over her Hannah Montana Dress up from Uncle Kevin and Aunt Brandy.


Bree got in the grove of opening presents...I guess she learned a few things from Christmas Eve. She is enjoying all things Dora that she got.
Katie in her lovely red dress and playing her guitar from Great Aunt Denise.

Bree getting in some game time with Nana. Playing Tumbling Monkeys.

There are plenty more pics and video out on our picasa page.

We had a great Christmas. So thankful we didn't lose power as some around us did. The girls got lots of nice thing from friends and family. All the madness was over by 10am on Christmas morning. Got to spend the rest of the day relaxing and playing. It is so nice to be able to provide a nice Christmas for our girls but I am more proud of the fact that they know and are starting to understand that Christmas is about one person and the is Jesus Christ and the love God has for us by sending his son on this day. I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas and the God has and will continue to bless you and your family. Happy Birthday Jesus!

Christmas Eve

On Christmas Eve we did our family traditions:

Made cookies for Santa.

Can't do anything with two toddler girls without it getting a little crazy.

We baked our birthday cake for Jesus....we always sing Happy Birthday to him on Christmas.

We normally go to Christmas Eve service at our church but the weather got really bad. We had lots of ice and snow falling so we stayed in. We read the Christmas Story at home and afterwards we let the girls open on present...their choice.

Katie picked one from nana and papaw and it happened to be her Littlest Pet Shop she really wanted. She was so excited.

Bree was a little hesitant to open her gift but after some coaxing she did was excited to see her mickey mouse kitchen...also from nana and papaw.

Soon after it was time to get tucked in so Santa could come and visit us.

This is a video of Katie running around out in the sleet when it started on Christmas Eve. She just couldn't wait to see the snow.

Winter Program

The girls had their Winter Programs at Miss Kristy's over the past two week. Bree's was last week. We were so excited to see her first program since she was sick and couldn't participate in the fall program. When we walked in the room she was dressed as a christmas mouse, so cute. Once she saw all the parents lined up front to watch she got majorly shy and started crying and ran to Chris. We couldn't convince her to go out there so we didn't get to watch her perform. Maybe next one she will be do it, but she was so cute looking in her little outfit.

I tried to get a little video of her all dressed up.

Katie had no problems performing infront of the crowd.

Thanksgiving and All Things Christmas

It has been a few weeks since I updated the blog. Christmas season came full swing as soon as Thanksgiving was over, so here is a bunch of different things that have been going on. This one might be a long one.

Thanksgiving

We went to Georgia to see Chris' family. What a trip it was....it was so tiring but worth it for his family to see the girls. Here is a glimpse of our trip. Tuesday, we left at 4pm and drove to Memphis, Wednesday we drove to Guntersville AL to pick up Chris's Mom. She had to work Wed night so we stayed the night. Thursday morning, got up and on to Georgia, thankfully this was only a 2 hours drive. Friday back up and on the road again, this time we made it a little past Memphis before we stopped again for the night. FINALLY on Saturday we made the last part of the trip home. Five days, five different hotels and 1700 miles. It makes me tired thinking of this again. We only got to spend a day with his family but the girls were so good and just loved on everyone in the family. Even thought they haven't seen them in two years. Katie got out of the car and ran and gave everyone a hug. It made their day. Bree was a little shy at first but warmed up quickly to everyone.

Tis the season to be busy...We have had several things going on over the past couple of week. Katie had her Christmas program at church on December 4th. It was a great little program and quite humerous in parts. Below is the link to you tube to watch the video. I couldn't get it to load on here because it was too big. The camera got a little shakey towards the end because I was trying not to laugh. The last two songs they sing they struggled a little with, but it was so cute. Also, the little boy infront of Katie is her friend Braeden and he was cracking me up because he stood the entire time with his hands on his hips, with a look like he didn't want to be up there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEahHmoohbo

The other weekend we took the girls to our towns Christmas Parade. We went with our friends Mary and Adam. They have two kids the same age as Katie and Bree. It was so cold on this morning, but we had already told the girls we were going, so it was either bare the cold or handle the meltdown. As you can see we took the cold and I also knew they would love to watch the parade and see Santa.

The next evening was our Christmas party for the community group we are apart of at church. Even though Chris and I teach the 12th grades on Sunday morning we still are apart of this group for social things. It was a fun time. Each year we do a white elephant gift game and it is always fun to see what "things" people bring and some gifts keep coming back. The couples in our comminuty group are so much fun and I love when we are all able to get together. So this has been what is happened so far this crazy month. If you want to see pics of the stuff we have done you'll have to go to our picasa page as for some reason I was having a heck of time getting pictures to load to this blog entry.

Thankful Thanksgiving

We are leaving tonight to go to Georgia to see Chris' family for Thanksgiving. We haven't seen his extended family since we moved here, so they are anxious to see the girls. Before we leave I wanted to update my blog with some things I am thankful for, since I didn't do very well with doing my thankful status on Facebook.

Of course I thankful for so many things that I can't even list.

I am so thankful for my saviour Jesus Christ and that he died on the cross for my sins. Life just isn't the same unless I am walking with Him side by side. He is there to carry me when I can no longer walk through the trails in life and He is there to cheer me on when I am succeeding in life. As our pastor said on Sunday you can have a great life without Jesus, but you will have the BEST LIFE when you have Jesus. That is so true. God has answered so many prayers in my life and He has revealed to me so many ways he has been working in my life. I am so not worthy of His outpouring of grace, love, mercy and blessing, but He says I am and loves me unconditionally. And for that I am truly thankful.

I am thankful for Chris and my girls. Each day brings new adventures and obstacles, but I know there is no one else I would want to experience life with. They each bring joy into my life in a different way. Chris, it is just knowing he is there with me each day. I have him on my side no matter what. He is the spiritual leader of our family, the person who prays for me and with me. Always gives me the encouragement I need. Katie, her personality along brings joy to my life. She has the most compassionate spirit about her. She truly cares and feels for others when they are either happy, sad or hurting. It is amazing to me that she understands these things at only 4 years of age. Her bedtime prayers are so sweet and when I sit and listen to her it is so heart warming to hear her pray for others and thank God for things in her life. Bree, she is just a little ham. She loves to play and giggle. The moments I get with her to snuggle and love on her our beyond words. I love to hear her talk and try to explain things to me in her broken words. I love it when I ask her where is Jesus she says" Jesus in my heart" That just makes me smile.

I am thankful for my parents. Not only for raising me in a christian home, but for always being there for me. They have always wanted to have an active part in my life and now in the lives of Katie and Bree. I can't tell you how much it means to know that they have grandparents that I can completely trust to take care of them. It has been a blessing to have them help so much with the girls even though we have always lived far away. Mom and Dad thanks so much for being the loving parents you are. I am blessed to have you in my life.

I am thankful for all of the friends that God has blessed me with in my life so far. I have old friends that are always there for me even though they all live in other places. These friends have been a rock in my life when I lived in places I had no friends. They have always been there when I need to talk and always let me know that I am loved by their emails or phone calls. God has also blessed me with many new friends here in Oklahoma. Before we moved here I earnestly prayed for God to let me meet some good friends. He has answered that prayed and beyond. My second family here is my Church family. It is a blessing to know that I have people here that I can call at a moments notice and they would be more than willing to help us out if needed. I truly believe that if you go where God wants you to be he takes care of the rest and my concern moving her was not being close to family. God knew that concern and He provided a way by leading us to Arrow Heights.

I could list more, but I have to finish packing for our trip. I pray each of you have a Happy Thanksgiving. Lots of love!

Introducing Theerawut

Chris and I have been sponsoring a child in Thailand for almost a year now. His name is Theerawut and he is five years old. We give money every month that helps support him and his family. It allows him to have food, clean water, better education, etc. When I was looking through all of the children that need a sponsor I was overwhelmed, thinking it was so hard to just pick one out of all of these kids. But then I came across this sweet little face and he kind of reminded me of Chris' baby photos and he lived in Thailand so I just knew this was the one for us to sponsor. Over the past year we have written and sent packages to Theerawut and he has also sent letter back to us. We have learned about him and what his life is like in Thailand. We recently received a progress report from him on how he is doing in school. The picture here is the one he put in there for us. Sorry it is so small but I had to scan it in. All I know is he is a cutie and he has now become part of our family. The cool thing is that if we are able to every visit Thailand we can actually set up a meeting with him and his family. If you are interested in checking out any children to sponsor yourself you can got to http://www.worldvision.com/. I know it has been a tremendous blessing to us to get to know Theerawut and to be able to sponsor him.

My New Ride

Last night we traded in our Explorer for a "new to me" car. The explorer has been good to us but over the past year we have had the transmission replaced three times so we knew that the car wouldn't hold out for too much longer. We decided to trade it when we could get more value for instead of waiting for it to break down again. Even though we hated the thought of having a car payment again, I guess it was inevitable. This car was a great deal for the low miles and all the extra's it has. So here is the new ride. Katie is absolutely in love with this car. She was so excited that we bought it. Bree's only question was if she could watch Dora in it. You can see where her priorities are at. I have to say I am excited about it myself.

2006 Saab 97x - I just SUV has I have no idea what the 97x stands for. We always seem to end up with black cars.

The interior

Does Santa Give Money??

It is so funny to me how Katie's mind works sometimes when she is trying to get something she wants. So I thought I would share something that happened over the weekend. On Sunday afternoon, I took Katie out shopping to find her a couple of dresses for church. We went into JCPenney's hoping to find some good sales. Well, Katie saw a dress and for some reason just fell in love with it. If you know Katie, this little girl is all about clothes and when she finds something she loves she will wear the heck out of it. I took a look at the dress and the price tag and it was not a price we would normally pay for her clothes, and the price was a sale price but not one I really wanted to pay. I told her let's just keep looking. We went to other stores and at the end of the day no other dresses were bought and Katie was quite upset that we were not buying the dress she just "fell in love with". The walk to our car was quite interesting as it was filled with whales of "why, mommy, why can't we get the dress" " I promise mommy, I will wear it all the time" all of this was intensified because it was 4 in the afternoon and no nap. I tried to explain to her that the dress was a little too expensive for a girl her age, but it feel on deaf ears or more likely she couldn't hear me over her own words she was screaming. We got home and of course Katie tried to turn on the charm for daddy in hopes he would cave, and when he didn't he got a rerun of what I experienced in the store. After, oh, about an hour she finally gave it up and stopped talking about this stinking dress that I wished was never made. I thought, okay, it's over she has moved on. But that would be to easy. So on her way to school this morning she asked if Chris and I would get her that dress for Christmas, I again explained why we didn't want to buy the dress and praying underneath my breath that this wasn't going to start scream fest 2, but it didn't she was calm. She then says she will just ask Santa for the dress and then I said that Santa has to get approval from mommy and daddy before he buys their presents. So then she sat there for a moment and then asked me, does Santa give money. I kind of laughed and said why. She said well I ask him to give me money and you can just approve the money and then I will go buy the dress. I looked at her, gave her a big kiss and told her she is one of the funniest people I know. After I dropped her off at school I called Chris and told him what she had said. He laughed and man that girl is persistent, and his next statement was, so I guess I am going to buy a dress at lunch today. Like the good daddy he is, he went and found the dress. It will be waiting for her on Christmas morning.

Just Stuff

So here are some things that have been going on in our lives lately. Nothing major just some random items to post out here.

We have been having awesome weather for the past week or so. It has been in the 70's and sometime up to the 80's. Katie has been loving it because she still gets to wear short sleeve shirts and her capri pants and of course her flip flops. This girl is definitely a summer girl. She would have never made it in MN if we still lived there. Just goes to show God knows what He is doing when he moved us here. Katie wanted to wear her shirt we got her in MX and as in true fashion of Bree whatever big sis does she wants to do. So Bree wore hers today also. After about four attempts to get them both to stand together still enough for me to take a photo, Chris had to intervene and hold their hands.

I have mentioned before that I am the shepard(teacher) for the 12th grade girls and my friend Stefanie is the shepard for the 11th grade girls. In our classes we have a lead teacher and then what is called a shepard for the tables. In our class Steve and Terri are our lead teachers. Stef and I are the shepards for the girls and Chris and Jeremy (Stef's husband) are the shepards for the boys. The below picture is one we took this last Sunday to send to one of the girls that used to be in our class. She had some very hard living circumstances and because of those she now has to live in a place called Owasso Baptist Home, which is pretty much like a foster care place. So as a class we try to send her things from time to time and this week is her birthday so we made her a care package and took a picture of all of us to frame and send to her. So I thought I would post the picture of the girls we teach each week so you can put faces to names I sometime mention. These girls bless my life more than I could put into words. I am so thankful that God has allowed me the opportunity to work with the youth at our church and especially these girls.

Back Row L to R: Lindsay, Lauren, Sarah, Adrienne and Terri (lead teacher)

Front Row L to R: Hannah, Stefanie and me.

Hallo-Zoo-Ween

On Halloween we had great weather it was in the low 70's all day and then was in the high 50's that night. I was excited for the great weather as we were taking the girls to the zoo for trick or treating. Trick or treating isn't as much fun if you don't have some friends to go with. My good friend Stefanie and two kids Braeden and Lydia came along as well as some new friends Todd and Sheila and their two kids Candi and Cole. all of our kids are the same ages so they had fun hanging out together. Before we headed to the zoo we made a stop by Braeden and Lydia's dad's job to trick or treat. Their dad, Jeremy, is a fireman and had to work on Halloween so we got to stop by the firehouse for a little while. The kids loved it. Jeremy gave us all a tour and let the kids play on the fire truck, ambulance and other vehicles. It was even a little exciting for them as they got a call when we were there, so the alarms went off and they heard a lady over the speakers tell them all the info. It was only an ambulance call so Jeremy didn't have to run off but the kids got to see the guys leave in the ambulance and they turned on the sirens for them and gave them a little show.

Gabriella (from High School Musical) and Little Red Riding Hood. Bree decided on Halloween that she wanted to dress up. This whole month it was no...they scare me. But once I mentioned Lydia was going to dress up she was all for it so, this was the only one she would agree to wear.

All excited to get their first round of candy at the fire house.

Candi, Braeden and Katie getting ready to go on the tour and play on some fire trucks.

Katie, Candi, Braeden and Lydia... checking out their new wheels. Cole and Bree were not at all interested in playing on this one.

Watch out....firewoman Katie to the rescue

Candi and Katie at the zoo, waiting in line to get some candy

Lydia trying to push Bree around....Bree took over Lydia's stroller about halfway through the night. Lydia was so sweet...she didn't mind at all. What a good friend.

An attempt to get a family photo at the indoor hay maze....but my lovely camera decided to start acting up and so this pic and some others are kind of dark.

Stefanie, Sheila and me getting a quick photo will all the kids were entertained by the huge world globe floating on water.

Dance Recital

Last night was Katie's fall dance recital. It is a little program the put on that shows what they have learned so far this year. All the girls look so cute. the teacher has little skirts for them to wear and she pinned some ribbon in their hair. Very precious. Here are some video and pics from the night.

Since we missed Bree's recital last week because she was sick, I got a little video of her through the window. They only give a little area to look through so you all have to over look the blind cord that keeps getting in the way...or maybe its just my bad videoing skills.

Little Munckin Sick

Bree was not feeling well today. She started running a fever and still saying her tummy hurts. Since she has been complaining about her tummy for over week now and then started with the fever I decided to take her on to the doctor. It turned out the fever is from something viral and her tummy aches are either from good ole constipation or possible issues with some foods she eats. Dr. Pfanstiel check her urine and blood to rule out anything with her kidneys or possible infections and both of those came back clean thankfully. Now we have to start slipping her a little laxative in her juice each day to get her pooping more and see if that does the trick. If it doesn't then we will have to start looking at what she is eating and see if something is bothering her. I am a little afraid of what may happen with the laxative, hopefully no blow outs will happen. :)

Bree showing her hurt finger. They had to prick her finger to get blood today. She was such a big girl didn't even cry. She had the funniest little curiosity look on her face though as the nurse was pushing the blood in the tube. You can tell she has a little of her Great Uncle David in her..she wants to show everyone her hurt finger ( LOL inside family joke there).

Back home after Dr. visit. Nothing like Dora, chicken nuggets and fries to cure a hurt finger.

Pumpkin Town

Saturday afternoon we took the girls to a place called Pumpkin Town to let them pick pumpkins and partake in some of the other activities they had like, wagon rides, pony rides, face painting, inflatables, etc. We thought we would go after naps since it has been pretty cold here in the mornings, but it seems that wasn't the best idea after all. By the time we got there the temp had dropped and it was so windy that it was almost unbearable to be outside. So Chris and I divided and conquered as I took Bree on a wagon ride and Chris took Katie over to the infatables. Shortly after that the girls were both asking to leave so we quickly let them pick their pumpkins and then we headed home. Monday night we let them carve their pumpkins to put out on the front porch. Well, carving didn't go that well. They were both over the pumpkin thing in about five minutes so they just wanted to draw on them. Oh, well....gave it a good try.

Me and the girls at Pumpkin Town ...afterwords I realized that I was holding a little over 60 lbs in my arms here. Two heavy girls.

The girls digging into their pumpkins. Neither one were a fan of the yucky stuff inside.

Outside beside out Halloween Tiger. Bree loves this thing. Everyday we have him up she has to go give him a hug. :)

Random Pictures

Katie pretending to be a pumpkin - her and Bree both love playing with these little pumpkins that light up.

Now they are pretending to be ghost - they both were making their scary voices. it was so funny. I have tried to get video of them both making the scary noise but they won't do it on video. I'll keep trying.

This was the beginning of a fight over this pumpkin. The other was is a little smaller and neither one of them want the smaller one...go figure.

The girls at the hotel when we picked them up from visiting with Nana and Papaw. They were in the dresses we got them from Mexico

Katie wore hers out to eat that night. She look so grown up here.

Last Games

Saturday was the last game that Katie was cheering for the football season. It was a cold day again and the game was at 10am in the morning so it was about 45 degrees when we were out there. God Bless Katie's coach, she has the patience of a saint. She had about 10 4-6 years out in this cold and they were not in the best mood, but she gets them motivated and keeps them moving. I kept telling them that if they are cold just run in place and keep moving, and they will all run in place for less than a minute and say " I'm still cold". What can ya do?? They all made it through the came and were ready to go when it was over. I'll put up some pics for this one also once I find my camera cord.


Some of the cheerleaders on Katies team...they all looked so cute all bundled up with their cheer outfits on.

My sweet little girl

Katie and one of her good friends Lauren.. Katie was wearing Chris' ear warmers. LOL she looks like she should be in the 80's

Tailgate Time

High school football sure has changed since my high school days, or maybe it is just that high school football in the midwest is different. Evidently tailgating at high school football games is a big thing now. The 11th and 12th grade class that Chris and I help teach decided we would tailgate for one of the games this year. So on Friday night we had our tailgate. It had been in the low 70's high 60's all week but on Friday night it was in the low 40's that night. So cold for a tailgate but we still had it. It turned out to be a great night we grilled out hot dogs, had some chili, chips and of course cookies. The girls had fun too. They love all the attention they get from the bigger kids. I have some cute pics of the girls all bundled up, but I have misplaced my camera cord to download pics. As soon as I find it or get another one I will upload the pics so check back later for those.

The girls all bundled up waiting on some food.

The entire group that came out for the tailgate

Katie puckering up for daddy

Katie and Taylor....Taylor is one of our kids in teh 11th grade group. The girls think he is so funny because he acts so silly around them.

Don't Take Anything For Granted

So this is not going to be the most upbeat post that I put our here but I just felt like I needed to blog about this. Last night I got some really sad news. It was so random how I found out about this. My friend Cara called me and told me that she was thinking about me because she was talking to a friend and he was telling her about how his daughter and son-in-law went on a cruise a few weeks ago and the day after they got back they both got really sick. Cara thought about me because I had told her about how I got really sick also the day after we got back from our cruise. So her friend goes on to tell her about how is daughter got better a week or so after they return but his son-in-law did not. He kept getting worse and was hopsitalized. It turns out he had the swine flu and then that turned into another virus that attached his heart and he ended up passing away on Saturday. While Cara was telling me this story I remembered that one of the couples we sat with at dinner on our cruise was from her town in Chattanooga. It turns out that it was the same couple Travis and Krista. It was Travis that had passed away. He was only 27 years only and he and is wife had just been married for 5 years and have a little 3 year old named Abigail. I was floored when I realized this was the same guy and that just 3 weeks earlier we were having dinner with him, prefectly healthy, laughing and having a wonderful time with his wife. It just saddened me to know that his wife and daughter are now trying to figure out how to even begin to move on with life.
I spent a lot of time last night thanking God that for some reason he allowed me to heal from what I can only imagine was the swine flu and not taking me from this earth yet. It made me truely realize that life can be shorter than we think and we don't want to take anything for granted, our parents, sibilings, spouses, childern, friends and definetly our salvation. I know that Travis was a christian, we spent some time on the cruise talking about our lives and what God meant to us. I know he is a better place and that God will comfort those he left behind. So just in case you haven't today be sure to tell those around you that you love them.
Cara told me that some of her friends were friends with Krista and Travis and at the funeral they had lots of pictures from the cruise up. Even though it is a tragedy that Travis is gone I am thankful that Krista had a wonderful memory of the cruise. I can tell you from the short time we got to know them Travis loved his wife and was crazy about his little girl. Please when you read this send up a prayer for The Dent family and friends.

A Very Special Person Named Katie

Katie's teacher at school Ms. Laurie has been working on a project with the kids in class each day. She has been asking them questions over the past couple of weeks and recording their answers and she has also been taking photos of them. She took the questions and photos and helped them make a book about them. So the other Friday I got a book from Katie called " A Very Special Person Named Katie". The questions and the answers that Katie gave were so precious that I thought i would share them with you.

My favorite color: I like four colors: yellow, pink, purple and red
My favorite animal is: a giraffe
My favorite toy is : super princesses ( I am not sure what this is, i have never heard of it but apparently it is her favorite toy.
My favorite thing to drink is: lemonade
I like to watch the TV shows: Sponge Bob
My favorite thing to do is: go to the zoo
My friends are: Greta, Shayli, Desiree, Ms. Laurie, Madix, Noah and I always pray for my friends.
I think I am special because: Jesus made me special and I love Him
My family thinks I am special because: God made me special and I prayed for my mom when she was sick and gave her flowers.

Her little answers warmed my heart. I know I am a little biased here, but I am not sure what Chris and I did so right to have an amazing little girl like her. She has such a big heart for others and has so much compassion for others that it amazes me that she is only 4. I am very blessed to be the mommy of this little girl and I thank God each night for giving her to us. I look foward to Bree's little book like this when she gets in Ms. Laurie's room in a couple of years.

This is one of the pictures in her book.

Fantasy Cruise

Chris and I went on our cruise last week. The cruise was for our 10 year anniversary this year. We were so looking foward to this week away to just spend time together. We had an amazing time. The cruise ship was amazing. We had two stops at Progresso and Cozumel. We did an excrusion on each of the islands. At Progresso we toured the Mayan Ruins and then went to the beach. In Cozumel we took a boat ride to a private island. On the boat ride over the boat drivers go about 45 mph and start doing 360 degree turns going 45 mph hour. It was so much fun and you get drenched. Once we got to the private island, there was only about 40 people total there so it was very quite and peaceful. they had lots of things to do, but my favorit was the water trampoline. It was so much fun to get bounced off the trampoline into the water. We stayed on the island most of the day and then did a little bit of shopping right before we left. I had to get my girls some souviners. I found them lots of cut stuff, including two cute little dresses that I can't wait to see them in. The days we spent on the ship we spent time laying out by the pool, eating lots of good food, taking naps, I had an evening at the spa and we even took a couple of dance lessons. We learned the Cha Cha and how to swing dance. Now we just have to find a place we can put our new found skills to use. It was quite humerous trying to learn these dances but lots of fun. We had a great group of couples that we dined with each night. I am so looking foward to our next cruise and taking the girls with us. I decided to just put the pictures on picasa as it was too hard to pic just a few to put on the blog.
Here is the link to the pictures.

http://picasaweb.google.com/cjkbreneau/FantasyCruise2009#

Labor Day Weekend!

Our intital Labor Day plans that we had ended up getting cancelled. The girls, Chris and I had planned on going to a camp called Cross Timbers near TX, we were going to help out with the youth. The youth go there every year on Labor Day weekend for an event called Breakin Free. It is just our group and they have lots of activities for them to do. We were so looking forward to it. I knew the girls would have a blast swimming and I was looking foward to the rope course they had, but I guess God had a different plan in mind. About a week ago our youth pastor informed us that the trip had to be cancelled because of the church budget. We just didn't have enough money. The youth were extemely disappointed, in the past 9 years they have been going it has never been cancelled. Since this was cancelled Chris and I ended up having a completely free weekend with the girls. It was actually really nice. Saturday we spent time playing and hanging out, ran a few errands, grilled out some steaks for dinner and watching some SEC football. Monday we took the girls to the zoo, we got up and went first thing when it was still nice and cool outside. We stayed until around lunch time and left right when it was starting to get really busy. The girls had a fun, but our favorite exhibit the polar bear, was not there anymore. They had a sign up saying the polar bear had passed away in may due to kidney disease and they weren't sure if they would get another one. The girls loved the exhibit because they can sit and watch him swim underwater, but all the other favorites were still there. It was a nice long weekend with the girls. Now is the start of a busy week getting all of us ready to go on vacation. The girls packed for a trip to Nana and Papaw's and Chris and I off on a cruise.

My two cute little animals

Katie and Bree being monkeys.