We got dust on our feet.
We held hands.
We ate avocados off the trees.
We referred to ourselves as gringos.
We worked hard.
We played futbol.
We laughed at our espanol.
We witnessed restoration.
We sang about our Savior.
We felt the heartache of abandonment.
We planted seed.
We made new friends…a lot of them.
We cried as we left.
We fell in love.

While I feel uniquely prepared being a mom of three kids, I know that this will probably push me farther than I’ve been pushed before. So many questions run through my mind. How will I keep an eye on my kids? How will they relate to the kids who speak Spanish? How will my heart deal with all the children that we meet who don’t have parents of their own? What will life be like when I return? I know that ultimately, I must trust in Christ and have faith that He will shape my heart with his hands. I know that I’ll return a different person and that my family will hopefully see a world in which they are compelled to live for something greater than themselves. Until then…adios.

About six months ago our family decided that we wanted to take a trip over spring break. Generally I [Finley] take students on a mission trip over spring break. This year, we’ve decided to take the whole family. We will be taking our crew of five along with about 50 other people to an orphanage in Guatemala during the week of spring break. I’m sure we will share more of that here at some point.

We applied for passports today for our kids because they are required now for travel outside of the country. The photos are supposed to be very plain with little to no expression so our kids look a bit stone faced, which is pretty weird to see. Anyway, here are a few things that I learned along the way:

• Our government loves forms/paperwork. I mean LOVES it.
• If you think you know where the kids birth certificates are, you better double check. I had to order a new one for Maye.
• Kids are in school from 8am-3pm. The passport office opens at 8:30am and closes at 3pm. Brilliance from our government again.
• You can save a lot of money by making passport pictures yourselves. Most places charge $10 a piece. We spent $1.26 by making our own.
• We were told that our background wasn’t light enough and should have been white. Let’s hope they just push them on through!

So, since it is freezing here in NWA and the cold doesn’t seem to want to go away, I thought I’d post the pictures from the HOTTEST time this last year. My family and I went to Scottsdale, AZ in the middle of July (my husband is weird like that). The pool was great, the golf was cheap, and the spa was having lots of discounts. We watched movies, including Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium out by the pool. We shopped and went down the water slide over 100 times. It was wonderful to be with the family. Just looking at these pictures makes me realize how much I could use a vacation!

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Hold on, there is more. Wait till you see the skating party we had on Sunday!! A few things to look out for: size 15 skates, me and my crazy sister, and my mother-in-law getting her roller derby on.

A couple of days ago, the kids and I headed into the backyard to tackle the growing leaf accumulation.
What ensued is every five and six year old’s dream.
Massive leaf pile. Small set of stairs. Disappear somewhere in the bottom of the pile.

My son Silas, being the adventurous and overachieving boy that he is, decided to dive head first before I could even stop him. I guess I was too busy getting the camera all set up and forgot to give him some Leaf Jumping 101 instructions. Lesson #1 – Don’t Dive. The poor guy disappeared at the bottom of the pile and it took about 10 seconds before I could make out the crying from the bottom of the pile. He knocked his head pretty good (which seems to be the trend this week for some reason.) We got some pretty stellar pics out of the deal though. I normally wouldn’t go the ‘animated .gif’ route, but in this situation, it just seemed like the best way to tell the story.

Elle, our sweet little angel (well, some of the time) was surprisingly daring. Without thought, she climbed to the top of the ladder and turned around backwards. Once, I was all set she fell backwards in perfect ‘faith fall’ position until she also disappeared underneath the massive pile.
My kids…are awesome!