Count Your Blessings....

I hope you all had a wonderful 4th of July. What a blessing it is to be in a country full of freedom. Today's blog is about the emotional day thatl led me here because I always feel better when I write things down or....nowadays...blog!
Today we went to visit my grandpa (my mom's dad) at the nursing home. He usually lives with my grandmother but due to some pretty rough health problems he is there for awhile. Grayson and Ella enjoyed seeing him and the nursing home he is at seems great. They had little glow sticks (for fireworks) and the elderly were singing along to a guest playing a guitar and they enjoyed hot dogs and root beer floats. Grandpa was overjoyed to see us but unfortunately some dementia is really stepping in which is causing a lot of confusion for him. My granny (my dad's mom) is also really dealing with this, as well. It really breaks my heart to see such important people in your life not too sure about who you are. In my grad school classes for counseling, we studied some mental health diseases in the elderly. Book wise and in my head, I understand it but when it's family members you love and that you have so many memories with, it's difficult. Well, being at the nursing home already had me emotional over my Grandpa and then thinking about my Granny, too, but then as I sat there watching the other residents of the nursing home, I teared up. So many people forget about the older population....about what they have been through, who they were and still are, and what they have lived. Many of them gazed at Grayson and Ella....I think for two reasons. One, they are just too darn cute (haha)...and two, they were probably thinking about when they were my age and had their little ones, probably reminiscing when they had all of their family and their home. Then, it made me realize that I need to count my blessings.....Joey and I are blessed by the Lord with a wonderful time in our lives. We are starting out and raising our precious family and these are times they we can never get back. It also made me realize how important it is to spend time with the elderly and not take grandparents for granted. I am just so thankful to God for putting this on my heart today and really opening my eyes. Please keep my Grandpa and Granny in your prayers and kiss your babies, husband, wife, mom, dad, or whoever is next to you and just be thankful for this time in your life~

Sweet Granny Clark-please keep her in your prayers! :) Isn't she too cute?

Grandpa Fabon-please also pray for his health!

Ella Grace is One and it sure was FUN!

Ella's birthday was this past Saturday and I am a bit embarrassed that I have not posted pictures sooner. We have had a lot going on at church with all the fun summer activities and an ENGAGE ministry team. I am actually about to pack for our trip to the Gaylord tomorrow. It is just a little min-stay-cation for our little ones (and Joey and I) to have a little fun! If you and your little ones get bored this summer, you should check it out, they are having some great summer deals and neat events going on!

Great Summer Deals   

Ella's birthday turned out to be wonderful, we had such a great turn out and it was such a blessing. I tried to make as many things as I could possible. My sister made the adorable Elmo smash cake and a teacher friend from work made the too cute cookies (and they were so yum, too)! 

As you can see she just attacked loved that cake. We had to take it away from her because we knew she would just EAT IT ALL!! Thank you to everyone that came out and celebrated what a blessing our sweet girl is!!
Before I let you all get outta here, I have to share some little home projects that I worked on last week...some of them with my amazing cousin's wife, Tina. She is just too darn talented.
One I had started a couple of weeks back....I had just ADORED this beautiful white and pink table and chair set at Pottery Barn Kids (I just love their stuff)! I had my eye on it and was hoping to save up and get it...but the Mr. wasn't to keen on the idea of paying $400 on a table for a baby....so my mom had a wooden table and chair set that was a natural wood color so I called dibs on it....with some cleaning up and $10 of spray paint, I have a pretty close match for ten bucks.

The beautiful Pottery Barn version

My $10 version...keep in mind that Ella had already thrown toys on it...haha!

Next, Tina had come over last week to help me make a headboard for Grayson's room. Joey and I had looked a lot of places and we couldn't find a lot we liked. So, I decided to make one. After Tina showed me, I was amazed and how quick and easy it is. 

I was really happy at how turned out. Now, I am just getting ready to order this cute comforter from Pottery Barn Kids...I told you I just love their stuff!

I hear Ella ready for a snack....see you all soon! :)

Love,

Melanie

Great Gaylord DealsGreat

Happy First Birthday and Happy FIVE Year Anniversary!

Tomorrow, June 24th is two special occasions all rolled into one! Tomorrow I have oodles to do with a haircut, shopping, taking our little guy to see Cars 2, preparing for Ella's party, and our anniversary date so I decided I will go ahead and blog this today!
Before I start, aren't you amazed at how frequently I have been blogging? I am...haha! Gotta' love summer break!

Five years ago, God blessed me with the most wonderful man. The Lord surpassed my prayers when I met Joey. He is everything I could have asked for and much more. Here are some things I just love about my husband....

-He is a man of God. He loves the Lord and devotes himself to being a Godly man and leader of our family.
- He is the best daddy to our two kiddos. He wakes up with them, gives them their bath, plays on the floor with them, comes to their rescue when they are upset, and leads them in the way of the Lord.
-He treats me like a lady and treasures me. He worries about me going places or if I feel sick. He takes care of me and always makes me feel special.
-He still tells me that he thinks I am beautiful. (after two kids, sometimes I need to hear that)
-We have fun together!
-I can always trust him and he is always there for me.
-He is such a gentleman and too darn CUTE!

So, Joey, here is to many more happy years to come with our family and maybe more babies (depending on what God thinks) and lots of love with each other and with the Lord! (oh and thanks to Joey's parents for raising such a wonderful son)! :)

Now for a HAPPY 1st BIRTHDAY to our sweet Ella Grace. It does not seem like it can even be possible that she is already one. Time really does fly by. When we had Grayson, we thought that we could never love another child as much as we love him and then we had Ella and now know that you really can love two kiddos sooo much!
Ella is what we call our little fireball. She is very sassy but has a whole lot of sweetness to her. She is what we call our Scottish princess because she has reddish hair and big blue eyes.....and here I am half asian! Ella is a blessing to our lives and does a great job as a little sister to Grayson. She plays with him and gives him hugs and has also tackled driving him crazy! We look forward to all the future memories that are in store with our sweet family and thank God for our sweet little girl!

10lbs 5 oz

Pudding Paint and a Growing Reader!

Today we headed on down to the library to check out the free puppet show they had. It was awesome and both of my kiddos were laughing! After the show, Grayson wanted to check out a book and he had his mind set on getting a big book....not a large picture book...but a "grown up" book. He was so funny and he even went to check it out with his own library card.

We had grabbed some pizza by the slice and made our way home. When we got home, Grayson was CRAZY  very energetic. He wanted to play outside but with this 100 degree Texas weather and his asthma, we thought today was not a good day. I had bought some vanilla pudding so we made PUDDING PAINT!
All you need is a box of vanilla pudding.
-Make it according to the box, I used two so we could have leftovers to eat with crumbled graham crackers.
-Divide it up into small bowls and add food coloring to make whatever colors you would like.

-Then let them loose!!
I let them finger paint and just eat it up. They L-O-V-E-D it! They were literally squealing and laughing most of the time. I think it's good to let kids get messy and creative sometimes, it's almost therapeutic!
Grayson kept saying, "Mama, I love this!! Yet, he is like his Daddy and at first, he was concerned about getting too messy.

Ella, being a wee little one, just straight up ate it all.

Then they were done painting but wanted to eat the rest, so we crushed up some fruity Cheerios and made a little dessert. They thought that was the best part!

With being home ALL summer (which I do love) we are looking for cheap, easy ideas to keep the kiddos going each day. We try to do a couple things out every week but it gets so expensive! What are some things y'all do out there???? Leave a comment, I would love to read them!