Hittin' Claire's

Catching up on blogs of the past, I realized that I never did share pictures or the experience of Taylor getting her ears pierced for her 7th birthday. She was very excited to say the least, and counting down the days to her birthday for this event to take place. Now of course she is counting down the days left until she can take the original's out and starting where all the earrings she got for her birthday and has purchased since. Only one week left!

She was definitely a trooper through the whole thing. They shot both ears and she just sat there with a stone look on her face. We then asked her if she was okay and that results in breaking down into tears and some crying. I personally don't know how she lasted that long, it hurt me just watching.

Of course, while Tay was getting her ears pierced the rest of the family had to have some fun in Claire's!

For The Cause

Amy and I have been very fortunate and grateful that our kids understand that littering and pollution is bad. We try to preach the importance of the environment and God's creations. Of course both of our jobs help assist and reinforce with that as well. As a result, we often find our children wanting to pick up garbage, clean up creeks/ponds, etc.

A couple of weekends ago they decided to all put on their hard hats and head back to "their little creek". Please understand this "creek" is really the outlet and drainageway from our neighborhood retention pond that crosses over in the very back of our property. Either way, they love it and call it their own.

They spent quite a bit of time out there and weather conditions were certainly not the best. The results are shown below in the wagon, in which they brought back up garbage and debris along with their tools of choice.

We hope they never forget this important concept and wish others would take after them!

Soul Music

A week ago Friday Amy and I were able to watch Winter Jam 2010 at the iWireless Center in Moline. We both had been waiting for this show since the day it was announced and it did not disappoint!


As a surprise birthday present to Amy, I got us VIP Passes for the show which got us in 1 hour before doors open, the choice of any seats, a chance to buy merchandise before others, etc. Below is a picture of the stage from our seats, row 5 center stage.


We happily found out a couple of weeks prior to the show that our good friends and neighbors were going to the show as well and also ended up buying VIP passes.


Another pleasant surprise was the fact that during the pre-show events they invited all Youth Leaders/Pastors to come to the back of the arena, in which Amy and I are both through our Wildfire group at the Vineyard. This led to going in a room with all other youth leaders where we had the opportunity to meet all the different bands at the concert, here them speak about youth leadership, and received a big gift bag of free cd's, iTunes downloads, camp/concert tickets for other events, etc. It was an amazing experience which closed with prayer by Tony Nolan at the end for our continued leadership of the youth in our community.

Here are pictures of some of the artists sharing with the group of leaders.

The following are pictures from the show.

Revive lead singer

Fireflight

NewSong

Newsboys

Third Day

Third Day

Third Day

Third Day

It was an amazing show with fabulous entertainers and speakers. More importantly it was truly moving to the heart and soul as we celebrated Jesus with music and 10,000+ other Christians of all ages and ethnic backgrounds. It rocked!

Can It Be?

How is our little baby girl 7 years old already? They always warn you that time flies by and your kids grow up too quickly...........how true that really is.

Tay decided to have a Fairy birthday party this year, and as always Amy outdid herself again with her homemade birthday cake. You must go see the process and detailed pictures of the final product at Amy's Cake blog which is linked on the right. In addition to the cake, Daddy chipped in with his artistic abilities and made huge crepe paper flowers for all the girls to take home.


As another one of our family traditions, she was able to invite 7 friends since she was turning 7 years old. In addition to the 7 girls Taylor decided to have over, she also enjoyed the presence of her brothers and cousin Mason.

Of course you can't have a party without dancing. In this case, there was some serious dancing going on to one of Tay's favorite presents; the Chipmunk's The Squeakquel cd.

Of course Taylor received some wonderful gifts and was truly blessed by all her friends and family that were able to share in her birthday celebration.

Happy Birthday sweetie! We love you and our so proud of you. Don't grow up too fast on us.