Love Love Love!

Here are some pics from our Valentine's Day.. better late than never right? Unfortunately our Valentine's day was clouded with the ever daunting statistics project I was working on but since Sam worked the night before I was forced to take the evening away from work (yay!) and had a great night with Sammy and Hannah and a fabulous morning before returning back to work (boo!). We try not to go to all out on Valentine's day as it seems like such an artificial holiday but on the flip side I am not one to miss an opportunity for a teachable moment. Valentine's day is such a fun way to teach some good love lessons to your children and a great excuse to sneak away and have a wonderfully romantic date night with the love of your life, or if you are single to have a fun girly day with your girlfriends.

How did we celebrate you ask? Well Hannah, Sammy, and I all went out on a date and had a wonderful time. We went out for pizza b/c that is what I had a coupon for, not quite as fancy as I had hoped for but hey.. it is our reality but we made the best of it and had such a fun time. Hannah pretended she was a fancy lady and wore some fancy jewelry and I just truly enjoyed sitting at the table chatting with them. I love that Sammy can join the conversation now and that he has his own opinions an thoughts. They are rather silly for the most part but still I love that he is a part of it. We talked about a wide range of things, from serious to silly and we laughed a whole lot. We came home and made cookies, played some indoor soccer, and made a fort with sheets and once inside it we had our "love lesson" where we learned some about how God commands us to love one another. I tried to talk with them some about how when we celebrate Valentines we are not only celebrating love in the romantic sense but also we are celebrating God's love for us and b/c of that our love for others.

After they fell asleep I put out Sammy's "art cloth" which is a plastic table cloth from the dollar store we use to cover the table when he paints or uses glue. I realized it had pink cupcakes (this is why it is his art cloth, ha ha) on it and would be festive for Valentines day. I put that on the table along with my flowers Sam and the kids surprised me with in the center and then arranged their surprises. Molly's bday party had been the night before and I had swiped some cute heart goody bags filled with Valentine's candy and treats so Sammy & Hannah really lucked out this year! Each year they get a little stuffed animal and a candy treat of some sort but this year they had goody (or doddy as Sammy called them) bags too! Hannah especially made out b/c Valentine's fell on a Sunday, so she got extra! See, after first being matched with her it came to my attention that she and her sibs miss out on some of the cool stuff involving parents at their school (field trip chaperones, family picnic days, etc etc). So, for our first Valentine's day together I left a brightly colored gift bag at the front desk of her school. It had a small stuffed animal and some treats with a Valentine's card in it so that they could deliver it to her in class and surprise her. I did it that first year and it made her feel just oh so special, it was ALL she talked about for several weeks. Her teacher even called me at home to mention how important it was to her and that she had that moment where she could show all the rest of her class how special she was to us. I decided right then and there it would HAVE to be a tradition. So, not only did Hannah get her treat at school, but she also had something valentine's morning b/c I didn't want her to feel left out. I found her a $3 lava lamp at Kmart and thought it would be perfect. Lets just say it was $3 for a reason. More to come on that another day.

On Valentine's morning I like to sprinkle sweathearts candy on the stairs for them to find when they wake up and the candy trail leads down to the table where their surprises wait. This year was even better b/c Sammy was old enough to really get into it too. We had such a great morning together! I made heart shaped pancakes and we had a sweet family prayer time, it was just wonderful and was oh so hard to take Hannah home but I had to get back to my stats project. As I drove her home I told her I wanted to be sure she really understood why we gave her the gift and why we made valentine's day so special. She responded with "cuz yall love me". Yes true, but it is so much more I said (I thought to myself "um hello child.. can you not remember what we talked about in our fort not less than 12 hours ago!" but I kept that to myself). We had a great talk about loving God and loving others. It seemed to really sink in this time and I prayed that some of that conversation will be stored away in her heart forever.

Anyone who has been to our home recognizes the sign in the above pic as the one that hangs in the family room above the entry way to the kitchen that states very simply "Love God. Love Others". We chose this location so that it can always be seen and serve as a daily reminder that this is our family "motto"if you will. This is what we hope our family will be known for and remembered by. I recently read this written by Mike Clark..

1 Corinthians 13:2 says "if I have all faith and can move mountains but have not love then I am nothing." That is what makes us either something or nothing. It is not our status, race, nationality, position in the community, or wealth. It comes down simply to the question "do we love others?". Your quality of life will be measured by how much His love flows through you to others. Without love your spirituality becomes useless and cold.

I firmly believe that when I die, the job I had, degrees I earned, money I made, etc will just not matter. What will matter is how well I loved others. His words regarding quality of life are so true, if you are not living your life in a way that pours love out on others, you really will lack joy. Sure you can feel happy and I am sure you can feel happy quite often but I think there is a huge difference between happiness and Joy. Joy is from the Lord and doesn't leave you, even in your darkest moments. Even when your world is caving in it is possible to still have joy when you have a relationship with Jesus and I for one am a living breathing example of that! I have had some dark moments but never did his joy leave me, never did He leave me. Life is all about relationships and I need to be sure that each and everyday I do my best to reach out and love others, especially those who feel they are unworthy of love. This is what it is all about, truly making a difference in the lives of others and being His hands and feet to a world of hurting people. This is not easy, especially with people who are hard to love and those who do not appreciate your self sacrifice and effort. It can be exhausting but let me tell you, God will ALWAYS see you through and multiply your time and energy when you are obeying Him in this way. So, if you have been thinking about stepping out in faith and taking on something extra maybe some sort of volunteer position or a mission activity of some sort, I strongly urge you to stop "thinking" about it or "praying" about it and just Do it! The answer is YES and I am sure God agrees with me on this one. We love each and everyone of you who reads our blog! Thank you for caring about us and our little family!

If you like our sign, you can click here to order one yourself! I found this site where they offer $10 of the purchase to Hati's disaster relief through Compassion International. How great is that??

Sammy had fun writing out his valentine's cards for his little friends in his class.... and making some for our family and friends. *sidenote* he BEGGED to wear his train sweater vest with jeans to school that day! He looked ridiculous and didn't match but I let him b/c it was oh so important to him. ha ha It is funny to watch his little sense of style emerge, I love it.
He took this very sticky vday card to his YaYa and she was proud that it was all written in spanish and we got it right too! Mui bien mi Samuelito!
He helped me make cupcakes for his class and Hannah's class parties...
Check out all his cards! If his Aunt Sarah or his Aunt Cindy are reading this right now then don't peak.. we have been slackers and haven't mailed yours yet and we want them to be a surprise so just skip past this pic! Better late than never right?????? Hey I have been seriously really busy
This is a historical picture.. please everyone take note!! This is the last ever picture you will see of cupcakes for either kid's classes b/c I vowed to NEVER sign up for cupcakes again. It is too much work and I have learned to only sign up for plates and napkins from here on out!
He was really proud of his bag of valentine's from his buddies. We had to read them over and over again for about a week until they all kinda fell apart and I snuck them in the trash when he didn't notice.
My man surprised me with these beautiful flowers!!!! It was so sweet and I loved that Hannah got to see him spoiling me.. I told her when she is considering a hubby to get one who spoils her, even if it isn't with things, not talking money talking LOVE. She needs to be treated like a princess always and needs to accept nothing less!
My little chef making a kissy face.. muah!
Teaching Sammy how to do it. She was great sport b/c his turn really messed up all her hard work.
Already for the am!
Sammy was up first and excited is an understatement. He was in total awe that there was candy on our "staiws"!
He grabbed all the candy off the steps he could reach from behind the safety gate
My sweet card from my sweet little lovey!
look who we found creaping down the stairs grabbing up all the sweathearts!
I love this action shot of the two of them, they couldn't grab it fast enough ... Sammy's little mouth was so full! *sidenote* I do not usually approve of eating off the floor but the stairs were freshly vacuumed in preparation and I figured it was worth it for just this once.
reading her card.. that's right cuz our girl can READ like a champ now!!!
They did a switcharoo for the pic but Sammy named his dog "Ralph" we have no idea why and she named her dog "Sarah" because "Sam's sister Sarah is getting married and she is so pretty and I want to be like her" awww! Hannah loves her some Sarah that is for sure! She always takes their pic off our fridge, I need to just print her her own copy.
Here is my sweatheart trying to figure out Hannah's horrible lava lamp... oh the drama that ensued. My honey was such a good sport and he got it working after all and was oh so patient!!!
I love my Hannah Banana and she loved her heart pancakes!
Such a fun fun morning!!!

Here is Sammy making a valentine....no idea what the bumble bee song is and also no idea why he mentioned Campbell, his little friend down the street that he rarely plays with


and this was a second attempt at getting his heart song on film that was a failed attempt!

Uno Mos Birthday!

The last in my series of birthdays we celebrated in February is that of our sweet Cristina. For those who don't know Cristina, you can click here and here to read previous posts on her that have some silly videos of her and describe our relationship and history with her in detail. This Feb we celebrated her 16th birthday! Sadly we could not celebrate with her as she in in Guatemala and we can't just fly down there, but we were celebrating with her in spirit for sure. I know several of you have been to Guatemala with us and have met her yourselves and can attest to what an amazing girl she truly is but for those of you who haven't met her words can't describe just how great she is. I thank God literally everyday for putting her in our lives and using us to minister to her. I know we have taught her a lot and helped her but I personally have learned so much from this girl. She is so wise beyond her years. I have to admit when I first met her I would never have guessed at the dramatic turn around she has made! She was always just as sweet as could be with us from the start but as I spent time with her I realized she got in fights a lot with her peers and spent a lot of time in punishment. She was hurting so bad, her little heart was just in pieces and she acted out a lot as a result. I would go looking for her after we finished working only to find out she had punched someone and was having to sit out from everything. Her grades were horrible b/c she had just arrived at Casa and never been in school before so it was a struggle and big adjustment to learn how to study. We had written letters back and forth for almost 2 years before we finally met her and I remember the night after spending our first day with her Sam teased me and said.. well you did it! You've managed to find someone a girl just like Hannah all the way in Guatemala! ha ha!

In all honesty, I was even a little shocked myself at how God had yet again hooked me up with a little girl who had SO MUCH POTENTIAL yet was being held back by all the junk from her past and issues she was dealing with. I remember thinking, I am seeing a pattern here God! One is difficult enough, now 2?? I trusted Him with it all though and boy am I ever glad I did. I remember praying so hard that night in the good ol' Gringo dorm. I just kept asking God to use me b/c I was not ok with her past defining her future. "Not her Lord, she is so special. Use her God. Turn her ashes to beauty, use her awful past to glorify you, please God help me to help her. Guide me and give me wisdom with each situation we encounter with her, let my arms be your arms that hug her. Let her see that each tear I wipe away is really you, loving on her. Fill both of our hearts with lots of good memories bathed in love. Help me to love her as best I can so she can truly see her see her real beauty and importance on this earth. Whisper dreams and goals into her heart. Please begin to work on her future husband's heart too Lord. Please give her a strong Godly man who will care for her and love her forever. Most importantly, Lord please use her to advance your kingdom. Please give her a mighty role to play in winning people over for you. Please put people in her path to point her towards you so that she will one day come to know you and want a relationship with you. More than anything Lord I beg you to please soften her heart so she will give her life to you one day." My prayers for her didn't obviously stop that night, I continued to pray each day for her year after year. Each letter we get from her is like gold to us. God has just grown our relationship more than I ever hoped for in my wildest dreams. He has changed her, from the inside out. She is not only a strong growing Christian living her life out for Him but she feels called to full time ministry and wants to be a missionary! Isn't our God amazing??? She has had a serious difficult time at Casa for some of the choices she has made for God. Sure it is a Christian children's home but...she still lives with 500 other kids and teens! Being a teen ager is hard but it is even more difficult when you don't have parents to help walk you through and when you share a dorm with 40 or 50 other girls your age who tease you and mock you b/c you are different. I am really proud of her for the decisions she has made and I was yet again, blown away by her when we saw her in August. We both skipped out of something (shhh... don't tell, he he) so we could just sit and chat and we talked for 2 1/2 hours with no interruptions, which is hard to do in a place like that. At one point I had a tear roll down my cheek and Cristina said "oh Teri, you sad? What is matter? I say wrong thing?" and I just smiled and grabbed her in a big hug and said "nope, I am just so proud of you and so happy to be sitting here with you, is all". I told her I am actually more than proud but I don't have a word for that so we created the word "muimuchoistoproud" ha ha. So silly. I have talked with Mike (the director at Casa) a few times about getting her some good devotion books and mentoring, etc. I feel like I bug him but I just can't help it, the mama bear in me comes out and I just want to be sure she has plenty of resources to guide her. He thankfully has been so wonderful and helpful with it all, very receptive which is good.

Please pray for our girl, 16 is hard and you feel stuck between a woman and a girl. Emotions are all over the place and it can be a rough age. I know she is struggling now in some way. God has placed her so heavy on my heart each and every day. I dream about her every night. I haven't had a letter in over 2 months so I am not sure what is going on but please pray for God to keep her strong in her faith, to take away any doubts or insecurities she may have about herself. Pray for her relationship with her boyfriend, that God would continue to grow them closer to each other through their relationship with Him, pray for her education that she will continue to study hard and seek help with the things that are difficult (particularly math, it is as if she inherited my poor math gene and we aren't even related!) and lastly, please pray for her new dorm situation. Please pray for her family, she has an older sister at Casa and several other siblings somewhere but they have never visited the girls there. Cristina seeks out the kids at Casa who speek Catchiqual (sp?), a Mayan dialect that her family spoke, so she can be fresh on her language skills for when she finds them so she can share how God changed her life. Pray that one day she can be reunited with them if it is God's will. Carolyn (her old dorm parent) messaged me that Cristina left Esperanza Abajo and asked to go to Doncelles (the next dorm up) for a particular reason but she and I both think it was really something related to a disagreement with a friend or something. Pray that she will adjust well and find a good strong Christian friend in that dorm. She has had problems relating to the other girls b/c she doesn't get in to all the silly gossipy typical stuff so they exclude her and make fun of her. Lastly, please pray that anytime she feels lonely or thinks of leaving Casa that God will remind her of how many people here in the states love her and that He would fill that emptiness in her heart and keep her goals and dreams in mind. I pray she will stay at Casa and finish her education, it is so important.

Thank you for praying for our girl! It means the world to us and it is really all we can do from here, other than write to her, so lets flood those gates of Heaven on her behalf!

I included a couple videos from our last trip. I had no idea she and Sam made these, so it was fun surprise when we got home. It was getting dark outside so is a little difficult to see. The first video is him prepping her on who to talk to.. his family and mine. She knows all of our family so well from pictures so when he says.. "Say hi to my mom and dad" she responds with "and your sister sarah..awwww!" I can't wait to show her pics from Sarah's wedding, she was so excited that Sarah was getting married and asked that we bring Brennan to meet her. Ha ha! I will include translation at the bottom, after the videos b/c she was too shy to do in English so she said.. you have Gloria tell you what I say, yes?

I love him even more because he loves her so much!
We always bring videos of our friends and family for her but this year it was of Sammy actually talking to her in Spanish which she loved and some of him dancing and singing for her. We had some of Gloria and her kids again speaking to her in Spanish and she loved seeing "mi Gloria" as she calls her. The other girl in the pic is Julissa who I have nicknamed JJ and we love her so much too. JJ is one of the many kids there who are forever in our hearts.
Look at us now... we have all grown so much from that first day all those many years ago! God is so freaking cool!

Here are the videos she and Sam made together. I share them not to "toot our own horn", please don't interpret it as that but rather to encourage you to either begin sponsoring a child (children) or if you already do then to write them letters each month to build your relationship with them. It really can make ALL the difference in their lives, you can be the person to show them God's love and to show them they have value and matter to you. Show them that someone cares about them and wants to know them and be a part of their lives.

Video 1 Translation:

Hi, I am so happy to have you and Sam here with me. I am feeling so happy inside because you are here and I can be with you too. I am so proud of the work you do and the words you have said to me. I am so happy to be able to talk to you here and because of what you have told me I can continue and grow stronger with God. Phillipians 4:13 is true for me as you . Gloria I pray for you everyday sometimes I forget but I try to pray for you each day too. I pray everyday for Sam, Teri, and Samuelito and I pray for Samuelito to continue to learn more Spanish everyday, so he can learn more and more Spanish. I love you so much and I love your family too. Sam, Sue, Sarah, and your Mom and Dad (Richard that is you!) too. Everyone in your family I love. Oh, now I spoke English and Spanish in this that is silly

Video 2 Translation:

Teri, everyday I am going to pray for you wherever you go. You are a wonderful compassionate sponsor I love you so much, too much too much. I hope you have prosperity and I pray for Sam to get a good job soon. I know he will and I know God will provide a good one for you I believe it. Gloria thank you for always helping us with words and to speak to each other, thank you for your gifts for my necklace and clothes. Thank you all of you thank you so much for everything.

it's another birthday....!!

We also celebrated Molly's XX birthday. I won't post how old she is but it was such a fun night. Her birthday falls on Valentine's Day so it was a pink party with lots of hearts and love decorations and you know I stole some extra goody bags for Hannah and Sammy's Valentine's day treats. Just being economical, right? I have actually known Molly for prob 8 or so years now, maybe more? We met at UNF when I was doing my senior thesis and she played a large role in me getting set up for interviews here at UF since she was already here in the PhD program. She has been such a great source of support throughout this long and grueling process. I know one of the many reasons God picked this particular program for me was the group of friends/cohort I would go through the process with. Unlike most programs I can honestly say we do not have competition with each other but rather fully support each other through each trial and celebrate EVERY victory. I love seeing each of these amazingly strong ladies do some big presentation or pass their quals, etc and get one step closer to reaching their ever so daunting goal. Now that most have started their big girl jobs, it is just great to see that we are all staying in touch and super close regardless of what state or country we end up in.

Molly has a fabulous sense of humor and keeps me laughing about even the most serious stuff but she also offers good insight during rough times. She and Mike had their daughter Jane about 5 months after we had Sammy so it has been nice to have someone to share that "mommy perspective" in our program with. She is probably the ONLY person who truly understands just how difficult it is b/c she has the same deadlines and expectations on her as I do and also struggles to keep a balance between our progress in the program and family. There are days when I will be planning to work on something to meet some huge deadline during Sammy's nap and of course, he won't nap thus resulting in a now cranky little one on top of it all. The pressure starts to creep in as I think of the consequences of not meeting whatever deadline and thankfully can call Molly and say "Sammy and I need to get out of this house, lets go to the park". We meet up and let our kiddos play and vent all our frustration and dream of what it will be like to one day be doing the work we feel called to use these degrees for AND have plenty of family time! What a glorious day that shall be!!!

I have loved "doing life" with Mollz and I am so thankful to have her and her family in mine. Oh also, her mom is who Franklyn lives with now! Franklyn was my first baby, he is a 6 lb Yorkie and was just the best dog, he literally went everywhere with me, even school on my 12-14 hour days! He had his bed right next to my desk. The students who came to my office hours loved him. I trained him and got him certified as a therapy dog but once Sammy became mobile we had problems. Sammy was too rough & with Franklyn being so small I was worried Sammy would break his legs or kill him, seriously. I drug my heels for a while b/c we couldn't deal with parting with the Tank but once he started spending ALL his days shaking in fear under our kitchen table and growling when we tried to get him out from there I knew it was time. It was SO DIFFICULT to give him away!!! I always ask Molly for updates and for anyone who was wondering or knew our little Tank you should know he is VERY happy and loving life. He goes on walks, his skin condition is healed up (we couldn't afford to get the treatment), he is more than happy and is smothered in love everyday and it does my soul good to hear this. She did say he snapped at Jane the other day when they were visiting so sadly, Sammy may have scarred him for life but otherwise he is good. I still get teary over him at times. In fact, when I had to fill out some forms for Sammy's school yesterday I actually lied on the question that said "pets in home" and I put "cat- Kobe Riggs DeLucca" (yes all our pets get full names) and then I couldn't do it. I wiped my little tear and proudly wrote :" dog- Franklyn Marley DeLucca" and quickly turned the page and moved on. I don't fully think it is a true lie b/c in Sammy and Hannah's hearts, he is still our doggy. They both talk about him all the time and Hannah even wrote Franklyn a letter! Sammy loves to say "familia" and name everyone in our family and Franklyn is always in the mix.

Anyway, here are some pics from Molly's fun party! Happy Bday to an amazingly fabulous super mommy!

Amberly was so helpful with entertaining Sammy, she had him mystified with her disappearing ball trick

Vanessa and Jen cheesing it up!
Erin and Clint
Sammy literally cried to be in this pic then wouldn't look at the camera??
Jen and Jon
Love Amberly's face after learning what is in marshmellows.... cow hooves yuck

Chris and Jacquline
Amberly was teaching us her dance moves
Clearly Molly blew me out of the water with her skillz

Molly loved her pashmina she got!

Mark is EIGHT years old!!!

We also celebrated Mark's birthday this month! If you are new to the blog, Mark is Hannah's little brother and for this ONE month they are BOTH 8 years old which she thinks is pretty cool. Mark is a very cool little guy. He loves baseball and swimming and any kind of action hero. He is really smart and is in gifted classes at school. He loves animals and is good at caring for them. He has a wild imagination and loves adventures. I love how he takes up for Hannah ALL the time, even when she really is at fault. He is extremely patient when she has her episodes and will just walk outside b/c he doesn't like to watch/hear. I think it is b/c these two were in foster homes together and will always share that bond. He can be very silly and yet has such a serious side to him. He is so amazingly sweet with my Sammy and takes such good care of him. I try to stress the importance of Mark being on his best behavior when he is around Sammy b/c of how much Sammy learns from him and I think he does a good job. He is patient and really tries to show Sammy the ropes and teach him about "all kinds of sorta boy stuff" in his words. I love how protective he is of me, he also takes excellent care of me and always tries to be sure I am safe when we are out. He likes to help me clean even though I know that of all of them, Mark and Hannah hate cleaning the most but I really think he does it solely for that one on one time which I will gladly dish out. He never wants me to carry things that are too heavy and it just melts my heart. Most reading this probably don't know he had a twin brother, Mathew, who passed away when he was a toddler and although I never new that little guy I can honestly say I think of him almost EVERY time I am with Mark. I wonder what he would be like and if they would still look identical and oh how I desperately wish Matthew could have been sitting there at the table with us that night. I can not wait to meet Matthew when I get to heaven, hopefully it will be a long wait but I will make up for all our lost time when I finally get home. Lastly, I love that Mark shares his secrets with me. He has a big one right now that is so sweet and I love watching the bright red shade he turns when I ask him about it. So adorable! I hope I am still in his life when he is a teenager/young adult so I can tease him about it then. ha ha! That is so wrong of me, isn't it?

Well as you can see, he is a super amazing little guy and so when we found out he didn't have any bday plans we decided to take him out for a night on the town! His "Big Brother" Terry came and we had such a great night. I baked his favorite kind of cake and thankfully Juancho and Gloria were home and could come help me decorate it. I have had some probs with my wrist lately (yes my dissertation and running too many data analyses are too blame!)and I couldn't squeeze the icing out but it was much better it worked out that way b/c they did such an excellent job! I had a great pic of them with the cake but Juancho wouldn't let me post it so all you get is the cake on here. Boo!

We met up at Pizza Hut and surprised Mark with balloons and the cake and boy oh boy was he a happy camper. He kept saying how he just couldn't believe he had his very own fish cake and then right after we sang to him and he blew out the candles he said "I feel just like I am in Heaven right now you guys, for real, I really do! I think this is what Heaven is like. You just feel happy all over and have so much fun. I know you guys all love me, I love today!! " um... is that not the most adorable thing or what? I told you he was precious! He is such a sweetheart. It just so happened there was a Gator Basketball game that night AND Big Brothers Big Sisters had free tickets for us all to go! We even got free popcorn and drinks! Yea! We had front row seats, they announced happy bday to Mark on the speaker, and Sammy LOVED watching all the action. His favorite was definitely the band. He tried to name the instruments and danced the night away, I think a close second fav moment was him seeing Albert, our mascot of course. It was a great night and I am glad Mark had so much fun.

Hannah "helped" Sam take this one so they are both missing from it
My little loveys
Mark & his big brother Terry
He made a VERY long wish, no clue what it was but it must have been a good one. I was worried the cake would catch on fire while we all waited
Me and my girl.. she was posing with some of her new clothes from our friends, she looked so adorable all fancied up!

Doing the gator chomp!
We were surprised to see their friend Michelle there! I love Michelle, she is one of my favs from their daycare, I don't know how such a big personality fits into that tiny little body. Michelle is an amazing singer in fact she was there this night b/c she sang the national anthem! Go Michelle!
She loved her free gator tatoo! Unfortunately Sammy kept trying to pick it off of her....
Our poor birthday boy got a little too carried away running up the stadium steps and took a pretty bad spill skinning his chins, so the first aid folks got him all fixed up with some ice packs

Sammy was VERY excited to see Ali coming heading our way, he could not contain himself, it was hilarious. He even started to stutter and couldn't get his words out! ha ha!
This was Hannah's picture idea, Sammy on her lap and then her on my lap. Yes, it hurt.

Feliz Cumpleaños Samuelito!

WOW we sure have been busy! February has just flown by it seems. I can't keep up! We have made so many fun memories. Sam has adjusted well to his new job and is loving his work. So far his schedule hasn't been that bad, the 12 hour days get long but otherwise it has been good. Although, I should mention he hasn't started nights YET so we shall see how that goes. I have been swamped with school. I am wrapping up the testing of the last 30 or so kids in my 3 year study and working on publishing some of my work. I have also been making progress on my job search and will hopefully be hearing back on an interview soon. Please pray with me that God will open the doors He wants opened and not those that do not fit into His plan for our lives. No matter how great a job may seem I surely don't want to be there if it is not His plan for me. I have had a rough couple of weeks as I had one deadline after another and it all piled up. It was extremely stressful and I actually dropped out of my program for a few hours one Sunday and had myself a ginormous meltdown. I'm talking meltdown of all meltdowns. Thankfully I have an amazing support system who helped me stay in the game and stay the course. I am happy to report that everything is now turned in, my presentation went great, and I am doing much better. Anyway, I have had so many things that I have wanted to blog about but just couldn't find the time. I have a lot of thoughts swirling around in my head (its a fun place to be , ha ha) but haven't had the time to sit and blog them. Lots of things that are heavy on my heart. For now though, I since I should technically be working, I will keep this one light.

We celebrated 4 birthdays this month! Each of these are all people who are extremely close to our family so they were all very special. The first was that of little Samuel! Samuel is one of Sammy's little budies who is just the sweetest little guy you will ever meet. We met his family through Gloria as she began watching him when he was I think around 6 months old or so, he and my Sammy are about 4 months apart. For a while there it was just Sammy and Samuel (Samuelito and Samueline as she calls them) at her house and they so enjoyed their days together. Their little friendship has just blossomed since and they are too cute together. Sammy adores Samuel's mommy, Nathalia. He talks about her all the time and always says "Nathy nice and pwetty mommy", awww!!!! Samuel's parents moved here from Columbia so they speak Spanish too and I have loved hearing Gloria and Nathalia tell me about their country and watching my Samuelito embrace Spanish will all his little heart. In fact, I had a weird moment at Samuel's party where I realized just how odd it is to have your child fully understand and know something more than you do! I was the only one there who was not fluent in Spanish. Sammy had no prob chatting and singing with the other kids and fully knew what was being said. I could catch the drift of what was everyone was talking about but missed out on some of the details. Of course everyone would switch to English to talk to me but I insisted they speak in Spanish so I could try to learn more. =)

I hope you enjoy these pics of little Samuel! I have sure loved watching this little guy grow up. He has blown me away with how smart he is and how sweet. He has a tender heart and is just so caring and loving. He has such a good nature about him and I know that whatever God has planned for His life he will surely excel at anything he does. Thanks for allowing us to be a part of your lives Nathalia! We just love your sweet family and look forward to making many more memories with you!

** Everyone MUST watch the video, it is SO FUNNY! I think him blowing out that candle is the cutest thing I have seen in a while. He tried his VERY best!!! After they sing the birthday song in English they then sing again in Spanish and Samu started dancing up a storm! Priceless!****

Samuel & Sammy with all Samuel's cousins
Happy 2nd birthday!
Sweet family pic, love that smile!
Yes they let both Samuels dig in and enjoy some icing before the cake was cut =)
Look at that face!
Our best attempt at a pic of them together. They were very tired by this point
Sammy with is buddy and his "Ya-Ya" (Gloria)

A special note to you from Hannah!

Hello everyone~
This is Teri, I was showing Hannah the Big Brothers Big Sisters video I posted on my blog~ she loved it. She had never seen my blog before and loved seeing the pics of herself. She asked if she could write on it and I thought well why in the world not? So.. with no further ado, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls..I proudly present my little.. the one... the only... MISS>... HANNAH>> BANANNA>>>

Hi my name is Hannah. I am 8 years old and so is my brother Mark. My sister Krista is 11 years old and my other sister Samantha is 10 years old and I love all of them very much. I love my big sister very much. and she is the best big sister ever. and I love her very much again. She is my family. We have fun everyday. Today we made cookies for Valentines day that spell love and th for Teri and Hannah and ss for Sam and Sammy. Sammy eated a bite of one when he was not sposed to. I love my grandma very much too and I love everyebody in my family. One day my grandpa died. and I miss him very much. it makes me sad and mad. Me and Teri are going to have a special day we do a suprise for grandpas memory and on our special tree at the park one day here. It is big and we read there. Hi aunt gayle and uncle richard and everybody in Teri family and oh yes Aunt Gayle tell everybody I said hi. Hi julie and Brian I miss you and I love you all very much. I hope you like your new home. Love Hannah,

PS. I love you all everybody in the whole world and I pray for you sometimes when I remember and am not to tired. I am tired now while I am doing this bet everyday I am not tired just sometimes. I have to go to bed right now. I am having a sleepover at Teri,s house for church.

Goodnight dont let bed bugs bight.

This absolutely GORGEOUS camera bag could be yours (or mine!)

You have GOT TO check this out! I just saw that one of my favorite bloggers is doing a giveaway for a gorgeous Kelly Moore camera bag! If you only dream of owning a fancy pants camera (as I do every day) then you could still use this bag as a super chic diaper bag or really anything. It is simply fabulous! I suggest everyone stop what they are doing and go leave a comment for her right now so you can win~ or not. Then there will be more chances for me. =) Click here MckMama to check it out!

can be used as laptop bag

Diaper bag

or really for anything