Where to begin???

It has been a crazy week. Hopefully I don't leave very much out, but here are the highlights.

We had a great Christmas at home. We had planned on having Grandma and Grandpa G come for Christmas Eve, however due to illness they were unable to make it. We missed them, but enjoyed our time together as a family. Christmas Eve we had our traditional dinner of breakfast for dinner and then we read the Christmas story as a family. Jeff organized the program very well and the kids enjoyed all of the singing. They hung in there pretty well despite all of the excitement of Santa coming tomorrow.

We started our Christmas morning at 6:30 am. We had to wake up Trey and Adison, but Kendal and Bayley had been awake for a while. The big surprise this year from Santa was Trey receiving a lump of coal. After months of threatening and months of him calling our bluff, Trey's naughty behavior caught up with him and all that was on the couch by his stocking Christmas morning was coal. We were anxious to see his reaction, but he kind of surprised us. I guess we prepared him pretty well that he might be getting coal, because he was just excited that he got a few things in his stocking. Santa did leave him a note that he had left a few presents on the back porch for Trey if his parents decided it was all right for him to have them. He has promised to do better and I hope the memories of coal stay present in his mind. Bayley's big gift was a new bike. Kendal was excited about her new vanity and Adison got a new ride on toy. We had fun opening presents together and spending a quiet day at home. I didn't get a picture but the kids were so excited that we had snow flurries on Christmas day. A white Christmas in Alabama is very rare, so they were pretty excited.





After Christmas is when things started getting crazy. The Tuesday after Christmas Jeff was scheduled to have back surgery to take care of a herniated disc that has been causing him pain for the last couple of years. We were anxious but ready to hopefully return him to full health. Monday he went to do pre-op stuff and that is when plans started falling apart. His quick appointments took a couple of hours, his phone crashed, my child care plans fell through at the last minute, and finally we got a call late that because of bad weather in the Northeast his insurance pre-approval had not gone through. I'm not one to give up on plans very easily, but at 9:30 Monday night we finally decided that it would probably be better to wait and reschedule the surgery for a couple of days later.

Tuesday morning we found out why things had fallen apart the day before. Jeff's beloved Grandma Eloise Thornton passed away on Tuesday morning. If Jeff had gone to surgery as scheduled it would have been highly unlikely that we would have been able to make the trip to Indiana to be at the funeral. We definitely recognized the Lord's hand in our change in plans and as a result Wednesday we headed to Indiana to be with Jeff's family for Grandma's funeral. The funeral was very nice and a great tribute to a great woman. We enjoyed being able to spend time with the Thornton family and reflect upon the good times we had spent with Grandma. Bayley will never forget her yummy angel food cake. I think Kendal and Trey will remember visiting her in the nursing home and the dog that was the home's permanent resident. I know Grandma loved having the kids around and I will always remember how happy she would be when we would arrive to see them. July 2010


Saturday we left Indiana and headed to Georgia to spend time with the Griffeth family. Grant and Alyssa were there with their two girls Olivia and Madeline who we do not get to see enough. It was fun to see how much they have grown and get to put a personalities with their cute faces. Spencer and Leigh and their kids Spence and Jaidyn also spent the day with us on Sunday. It was a lot of fun having such a big group of us together. As we keep adding kiddos to the mix it definitely gets a bit more crazy! Crazy but fun!! We enjoyed playing games and catching up. It will definitely be fun to have everyone together this summer at the Lake.



Monday morning before leaving town we made a quick trip to the dentist. As you can tell by Kendal's smile we needed some dental intervention (j/k). Kendal lost her two front teeth on consecutive days giving her a new look.
No really, Spencer was kind enough to squeeze us all in for cleaning before we left town saving us a trip back to Georgia later this month.

The rest of this week has been spent preparing for Jeff's surgery. Right now I am sitting in the waiting area killing time while I wait for word on how things went. We are excited that this might be his answer to his back pain and look forward to a positive outcome. Hopefully next post I will have good news to report!