fall festivities!

every year our downtown hosts window painting for the kids. it is always freezing, but we love it (as you can see, they were just a little excited to get started).
my favorite little mister admiring his work. he made googly monsters this year.
sunshine girl was so proud of her ladybug and flower masterpiece.
and, my pumpkin poos was just plain thrilled to go wild, dip her brush, and go to town! (she kept looking at me, waiting for me to take the brush away for making such a big mess!)
i love their creativity. it was a great day. the only sad thing in the day was that my favorite little mister got rid of his mohawk to match daddy. oh, i miss it. it makes his personality. but, he said, "well, mom, i HAVE had it since i was 4 years old!" it'll come back someday!
after the window painting, our church hosted an amazing pumpkin chase, which was a halloween carnival for kids. oh, my, they were in their glory doing games & winning candy! the girls were a bumblebee fairy & a butterfly.
on the way home as their buckets overflowed with candy, my hubby smelled chocolate. of course we interrogated the big kids, "who's eating MORE candy?" then i thought it may be pumpkin poo's clutched candy she had not put down. sure enough, she bit through the wrapper and the above is what we found when we stripped her down for bed. she was so proud. it was so funny!

happy fall!

grace & peace,
julie

my favorite little mister

the above is my new favorite picture of my favorite little mister. it fully captures who he is: so handsome, sweet, kind, compassionate, and an animal lover. he rescued the frog he is holding out of his cousin's window well. we then made a "habitat" for froggy to live in (on our kitchen counter), and he along with daddy would hunt bugs every day to feed him. froggy was living the good life in our home until the weather got colder and the bugs were more scarce. so, we decided to take froggy to a new home and we let her (she thankfully did not croak, so we know she was a female) go a few weeks ago at one of our favorite places, the morton arboretum. i took one last picture of him & his frog before it literally leaped out of his hands into the lake. as we watched her swim away, my favorite little mister was proud to say that froggy will be much happier here among the lilly pads with other frog friends. we'll be back in the spring to look for tadpoles!
here's another pic of my guy. man, i love him soooo much.

and, his sisters absolutely adore him also.

hope everyone is enjoying the colors of fall. after it stops raining, the kids and i are going on a leaf hunt!

grace & peace,
julie

treasure in heaven

oh, how i hope you know and live the truth and promise of this Scripture! the living hope and new birth that is available to all of us through putting our faith in Jesus and accepting the gift He has offered us.

in thinking of the image for this passage, i kept thinking of a treasure chest and especially a lock, in which though the outside may get battered and weathered and worn, the treasure inside which is yet to be revealed remains precious, priceless, pristine, and utterly untarnished. beautiful. it remains. i also think of the song by watermark (or now, christy nockels) "incorruptable", which gracefully speaks of this verse.

i also think of how God is the one who holds the key to this inheritance or treasure. it is His to give. He is in total control of it, though i may not fully understand it, as we need to work with Him, giving our trust and love to Him. but, it is in His timing that the fullness of our salvation will be revealed. someday He will turn that key and unlock in our lives the fullness and wonder of how great our salvation is and we will experience eternity with Him.

until then, hold on to Him tightly. love Him deeply. live for His glory. and, like this verse says, praise Him, for He is worthy!

grace & peace,
julie

pumpkin-poos is two!

on september 29th, my little pumpkin turned two! her big brother & big sister were so excited to buy her a dolly & princess dress up shoes. we had her favorite food (pizza & mac-n-cheese) and then blew candles (of which her piggy tails almost went in the flame as she leaned to the side)!

i have called her my little pumpkin since the day she was born, as we went to my favorite place, the morton arboretum, to induce labor by walking her out. every fall they decorate the arboretum with tons of haystacks, pumpkins, and gourds, and so when she was born just 4 hours after leaving the beauty of nature it seemed appropriate to nickname her that (plus, she had NO real name for 2 days, but that's another story...)
here's one of my other most recent favorite pics of her.
here she is at the arboretum at age 1.
and here she is with grandma and a little pumpkin of her own when she was just one week old.

we love you pumpkin-poos! you are such a blessing & delight to us!

grace & peace,
mommy (julie)