Saturday and Sunday with Sawyer

Saturday started with a happy baby and pancakes which he wanted no part of!

Why is Sawyer smiling? He just gave his piece of pancake to Mr. Darcy!!
And Mr. Darcy quickly returned to see if Sawyer had more to share! Sadly, Sawyer would not share his oatmeal and Tony would not share his pancakes. Such is a dog's life!

After a slow start to the morning, the Hamblen's decide a walk to the park was in order. You might take note that his hair was in fact blowing in the breeze!

"Yes, I'm a wild child!!"

"I hope they brought a brush for my hair there are some cute chicks out here in their jogging strollers!

"Higher, Pops, Higher!!"

"I had better hydrate if I'm going to catch up to those cute chicks in this cheap stroller!"

"Thinking of pretty girls, I need to call my Momma!"

"This night night kiss is for you Momma!"

"Sunday morning and I have a present!"

(We celebrated Valentine's a little late and Sawyer was having difficulty focusing on the present because Mr. Darcy was having a fit to open the present with him!)

Mr. Darcy couldn't be held back any longer!

"And there's a card!"

"I know I can do this!"

"I've got it!"

Doing a little light reading while waiting on Lolly! Sawyer is going to go visit his Mimi while Lolly and Pops teaches Sunday School. The fun train just keeps on rollin' for Sawyer!

You know you've had some fun when you have had to change your clothes! Ha! We are back from church and Sawyer is busy reading his books again.

In fact, Sawyer is reading his Bible to Lolly! I have read this book to him since he was just weeks old and now he turns the pages and just chatters away! Uncle Josh thinks Moses is his favorite story but I think Noah is!

See, Josh, I think that is the story of Noah he has stopped to tell me! I'm just sayin'...

And sadly our weekend has come to an end! A bottle for the road and we are headed to Austin. It is hard to say which one of us will be the saddest - me or Mr. Darcy!

"My Mom and Dad missed me so much they threw an impromptu party!! They broke out the bubbly!"

The kids did a good job of getting Sawyers play room all fixed up and it was fun to watch Sawyer as he saw it for the first time. And then when they started to blow bubbles he got soooooo excited! Jeremy and Meagan were glad to have Sawyer home and Sawyer may be to young to recognize it but his heart knows that there is no place like home!!

The LORD is my strength and my shield; My heart trusts in Him, and I am helped; Therefore my heart exults, And with my song I shall thank Him. Psalm 28:7

Weekend at Lolly and Pop's

WARNING: Cuteness Alert!! Cuteness overdose is a concern and a possibility!

Jeremy and Meagan were sweet enough to allow Tony and me to pick up Sawyer Thursday afternoon and bring him to Houston for a weekend visit! Our time together in pictures follows:

What a wonderful traveler Sawyer is and it didn't even bother him that his Lolly was taking his picture while he slept. I know I'm prejudiced but he has such beautiful eyelashes! (Didn't get those from his Lolly!)

I am the happiest little boy in the world!! I have had my supper and Pops is bathing me and getting me ready for bed!

Lolly has got to get some tub toys! A plastic cup just doesn't cut it! (And if your wondering, that is not the paci Sawyer went to bed with! :-)
Friday morning after a good night's sleep and look what I've found - muffins anyone?!
Sawyer was sooooooooo tickled with himself this face turned into a giggle!! (This is his first time at Lolly and Pops that he has been this mobile and able to pull himself up!)
Uh-oooooh is that more cabinets over there...

Sure 'nuf! "Look Lolly, both hands!"
He was working hard! (As was I!)
It was time for a distraction!!!

"I am having so much fun Lolly has forgotten to put my clothes on!! Oh, boy!"
"My Mom and Dad drive through all the time and it's not so hard!!"
"What can I pick up from here?! Uh-ooh Lolly's on my trail! Foiled again!"
"What was it that Lolly said to me about smashed fingers?!
"Something's fishy about this. Lolly is letting me play here!"
"Why can't Mr. Darcy have it?!"

Partners in crime! One thing we learned this weekend was that if we told Mr. Darcy no that he could not have something like the little tupperware cup, Sawyer would pick it up and give it to him and look at me with that sweet little face in the picture!
Best friends or partners in crime!
Friday, Tony had to work in his office downstairs but when he came up for a break he and Sawyer had a free-for-all of rough-housing! So when it was time for Tony to go back to work I put my hands out to Sawyer for him to come to me and he (grinning) shook his head back and forth to say no!! Jeremy had told me that he had started this and they had seen it when he had had enough to eat he would shake his head no but this was our first experience with it and it was hilarious. And, of course, Tony loved it!
Sawyer taking his best friend for a walk...
which turned into a meet and greet! And Sawyer had the young redhead wrapped around his finger! She had been tickling his feet and so when she stopped he would meekly lift his foot in the air so she would do it again!
We ended the day with a "belly laugh" and you would think that I would have enough shame not to post this picture but since Sawyer is the only one showing his belly I thought it was good to see just how happy a grandson makes his Lolly!!

Stay tuned there is more cuteness to come!

"We love, because He first loved us." 1John 4:19

I See A...

Hummingbird!

What do you see?

"Instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy." 1 Timothy 6:17

Music is...

what feelings sound like.

~Author Unkown

Remembering Mother On Her Birthday

Today I stopped by the cemetery to place flowers on my parents grave in honor of my mother's birthday. It's not a long visit because I know that 2 Corinthians 5:8 tells us to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. And my parents have been present with the Lord for some time because of the personal relationship they have with Jesus Christ but I like to take a moment out of life's routine to stop and honor their memory.

For me, Mother was a wonderful stay at home mom who took care of me when I was sick, cleaned my room when I didn't, taught me how to iron by making me iron sheets, loved me no matter what and prayed with me to accept Christ as my personal Savior.

For my Dad, she was the best bookkeeper he could have ever had, she was the visionary he wasn't, she was not only the best cook but the only cook he wanted serving him food, and she truly completed him.

For my sister, she was everything a mother should be and more and I won't try to speak for her.

For my husband, she was the mother-in-law he called "Mom" before we were ever engaged. Tony loved her and mom had a sense of fun that could take his teasing.

For her grandson, Josh, she made the best oatmeal and kept a chest of toys to play with. (Josh was five when she got sick.)


For her grandson, Jeremy, she did something he never knew about. As a grandmother, your love knows no bounds and you will fight for what you feel is right for your grandchildren. When Jeremy was two he was in the hospital and his Mimi called his pastor at home because he had not come to the hospital to visit her grandson. (Jeremy was three when she became ill.)


To her Lord and Savior she was a good and faithful servant who taught Sunday School for 32 years!

We miss you Momma and look forward to the day when we will all be together again! Happy Birthday!

"Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. 7 For we live by faith, not by sight. 8 We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord." 2 Corinthians 5:6-8

A Simple Message

There has been a constant in my life and that has been the Graham family. I have always been able to look to the Graham's to be faithful to the simple message of the Gospel which is the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Their faithfulness to the simple message of the cross have brought millions to eternal life in Jesus Christ.

This morning I ran across a letter Franklin Graham wrote and I appreciate so much his faithfulness in writing it and his courage and commitment to stand firm in his calling to preach against sin that I wanted to include a vital portion of his letter here.

Too often in our day, people are not considered responsible for their own actions. Many in America have lost any real understanding of sin. We live in a society where killing, rape, and violence are part of our daily lives through movies, books, TV, and the Internet. Instead of wickedness and sin, we see entertainment. Instead of repentance, we shift responsibility. America accepts a nonstop stream of sin portrayed as entertainment, much of it delivered right into our homes, and when real-life wickedness interrupts, we watch with fascination instead of falling on our knees in prayer.

At the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, we are going to continue to preach against sin, calling it what it is, and we are going to continue to preach Jesus Christ who died on a cross for our sin. I’m not going to be politically correct. I’m not going to retreat. The Bible says, “God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son,” and then it says, “Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life” (1 John 5:11–12). ~ Franklin Graham

May God continue to bless the Graham's and the work they do in bringing people to Christ.

“The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18).