Quotes from Shepard

Two quotes from Shepard this week that make me smile...

 

We are working on learning what needs to be told and what is tattling.  After a good explanation from his Dad, Shep who has information he really wants to tell, points his finger at his mouth and says...

"The evidence is right here in my mouth!"

 

 And then when we were all practicing our scripture memory verses together at Morning Meeting and he was struggling to get the verse quoted correctly, Shep wanted more time so he looked at John and said...

"Please don't turn me off!"

 

 

Shepard posed for me this week so that I could get some pictures for the GKS email.  This one makes us smile.

January Project

I love January!

Why?

Because it is probably our slowest month of the year.  We get to just be home most of the time without the pressure of trying to get ready to be somewhere else all the time.

Ahhh...

 

So, we have time to tackle some projects!

(And this is the time of year when John likes to work inside...)

So, we are remodeling the guest bathroom...

can you tell what color it is now? :)

 

He loved the war paint until it dried and made his face feel like it was cracking!



Shepard's Salvation

The highlight of the year...

was at the very end of the year.

Our most joyous news of 2012 is that Shepard decided to follow the Lord on December 30th.

Another sheep in the fold...  we are THRILLED beyond words!

As parents we hesitated a little...  he's 8 years old and we wanted him to really know.  But in our discernment, we believe that this precious child had really already made his commitment to the Lord in his heart.  He just needed to make his commitment known and confirm it with us.  His heartfelt prayer to follow the Lord all the days of his life was so precious!

So, as Shepard loves to say now, "He's BORN AGAIN"!

I snapped these two pictures with my camera that evening with Shep...

(They are really grainy, but it's good that we don't have to have great pictures to have the memory in our hearts.)

January is so cold...  but we are trying to work out a baptism soon in our pond. :)

Thank you, Jesus, for bringing Shepard home!  Our hearts are FULL...

Baby Clara

As soon as the ice and snow melted a day later, we headed over the mountain to go see my family.  They couldn't all be there, but we did get to see some of them!  

Here's me with my newest niece, Clara!  She's such a doll...  LOVE her!  I was just aching to get to finally meet her.

And Shepard took this picture of his cousin, Caden, (Clara's big brother).

Sure wish we could be around these kiddos more often... Tennessee is so far away! :)

We really loved all the time we got to spend with family!

Christmas at Home

It was so different this year...

we were at home on Christmas Eve for the very first time.

We lit our advent candles and read together...

But we were so far behind in the book that we spent {maybe an hour!} on Christmas morning catching up so that we could finish the advent story with Jesus' birth.  {All before we opened gifts...  I guess we are working on making very patient children!  Actually, they were very patient!}  We enjoyed our Sara Lee butter struesel coffee cake while John read...  a MUST according the boys on Christmas morning!  :)

I am SOOOOO grateful for how John pours himself into our family!

He is a good shepherd and he consistently leads us to the Lord!

Lots of Christmas pictures!

Here's everyone with their stockings...

Opening gifts...

Watching the snow come down...

it's seems so magical when it comes on Christmas day!

But, we didn't get to go share Christmas with the Willoughby's because of the snow/ ice...  it was just too risky to drive over the mountain.  I was SOO sad to miss that!!! :(

We spent the rest of the day relaxing in our mess...

and cleaning it up!

Just feeling...  GRATEFUL!

Christmas at the Wassons 2012

The weekend before Christmas we all spent two days hanging out together at Ken and Shelley's...

it was a LOT of fun!  So much wonderful food and lots of laughter!

We managed to get a group picture...

I love the setting out there in their pasture.

And here's one of Ken and Shelley with all the grandkids...

(Will was nursing an eye injury so he had a hard time getting his eyes open, but he was so tough!)

One of the highlights of Christmas for me each year is when Ken shares a devotional with all of us before we exchange gifts.  This year he asked the older grandkids to participate and Josiah read a scripture to all of us. He was nervous, but he did such a great job.  Here he is preparing for his part...

John and Will were all cozied up together...

And here is Ken in costume for the devotion time...  we all love it!!

Opening gifts..

And my favorite...  I've never seen anyone actually get coal before!  This was awesome... John's mom gave him coal for finding his Christmas gift early. :)  LOL.

Cherishing the Christmas memories...

GG's 95th Birthday Party

I've got a little catching up to do from December...

A couple weeks ago we were able to celebrate John's grandma's 95th birthday at her home with her whole family! It was a wonderful day!

Here she is with her cake...

(Opal, GG, Mamaw... she is known to us by lots of names!)

One of the highlights of the day was when her grandson-in-law sang a special song to her from all of us...

The whole group...

Here's Ken and Shelley's family together with her...

We really enjoyed getting to see all John's family from his Dad's side!

And we loved celebrating GG's birthday... Happy 95th!

Rescuing the Christmas Tree

It's one of our favorite Christmas traditions...

I can't remember which year we started this tradition...  maybe when Shepard was a new baby.

The whole thing is a word picture...  it was John's idea.  (He's great at word pictures!)

We're trying to teach the kids that the best gift of Christmas is that Jesus came to rescue us!!

So, to help them understand we go rescue a tree...

we go to the store with cut trees and have a blast trying to find the ugliest tree... the one that surely no one will want to buy.  (Honestly, this has turned out to be a whole lot more fun than searching for the perfect tree!  Even the workers at Lowe's got in on it with us this time and had fun helping us.)

 

The tree represents us (sinners) who are in need of a rescue! 

Here is our tree...  ready for a makeover!

 

(This year we tried spraying snow on it - fun!)

 

We always end up loving our tree and it seems precious to us after we have invested so much in it.

(And part of what is making us smile this year is that we have really tall ceilings now and ended up with about the shortest tree available.  But we love it and wouldn't trade it for a big beautiful one.)

 

And, we are reminded that we are thankful for God's gift of rescue to us!

The baby Jesus grew into a man and paid our eternal debt price.

Rejoice!

Little bunny... with fur

They are definitely looking much cuter now with lots of fur!

And they are soooooo soft!

 

I "almost" held one of the sweet little bundles today, but my mom's experience a few days ago has made me a little hesitant...  ah, I just don't like getting messy.  (There's a certain picture from my childhood that says it all...  my siblings are covered head to toe in mud.  My parents made me get in the picture after much protesting on my part.  I think I tiptoed in just for the photo op.  Sigh.  Some things just never change.) Lol.

 

I did hold Charky today, though!  I think that was my first time to ever hold a chicken! :)  The kids were proud of me...  saying, "Well, Mom, you're ONLY 42!"  As if everybody holds chickens... haha.

Marking the first fruit tree...

 

Last year Josiah was baptized in the north pond... and then we let him pick out a fruit tree that we planted there in honor of his salvation.  He chose a peach tree!  (The tree is looking a little bare right now without any leaves... kinda like a big stick in the ground.)

We wanted a "marker" for the tree, so Josiah found a big rock on our property and then my parents' very sweet neighbor helped us get it engraved to mark Josiah's tree.  We got it back last night!

We were so excited...  I loved seeing the smile on Josiah's face when he saw it!

 

We hope to have a fruit orchard someday... 

wouldn't it be wonderful to eventually have a fruit tree for all our children and grandchildren around the pond?  We are praying so!