40 years and counting...

My parents celebrate 40 years of marriage on January 2nd. While we had the whole family here for Christmas, we wanted to take one evening to celebrate. It's hard work being married for that long! (and of course very rewarding I'm sure...) It makes Roger and my 5 years seem like nothing!

Here we are recreating the cake cutting...

Notice the beautiful bride's dress adorning the door in the background. We begged my sister to wear it, but unfortunately her pride won over honoring my parents. :)

We were thankful to have so many family members and friends drive from out of town to help in the event!

The crowd's attention is on our Not So Newlywed game show host Jason. (You can see his reflection in the window.)

I love some of the old pictures we found of the two lovebirds before children! My sister in law made a video with old pictures, but I can't figure out how to get it to load. Unfortunate for you, because there were some dandys---just imagine short shorts, double knit suits, black thick framed glasses, and 40+year old party pix!

Time with Cousins...

Mary Katherine loves spending time with her cousins and will be so sad when she wakes up on next week and realizes that Grandma and Papa's house no longer is filled with cousins for playing!

These two may be my favorite ones! I love the different expressions on each face!

Missing Papa Wayne in this picture!

THE Reason for the Season

Beginning last year, my mother started planning for a new Christmas tradition in the Sizelove house.

Last July, she made copies of the Christmas play and gave them to us to start working on songs and lines. (I'm not sure that anyone made it home with our scripts.)

October marked the purchasing of patterns and fabric for the costumes.

Nothing was going to stop this woman on a mission...

a broken arm couldn't stop her on the sewing machine...

rolling her vehicle...nope, just shook the shattered glass off the fabric and kept on sewing!

so without further delay, let me introduce this year's cast...

I was an angel as well...but unfortunately was not able to get myself on camera.

Merry Christmas!

A must read...

If you don't already read this blog, I'd recommend stopping by and checking out the past week! Kristi is in Ethiopia right now meeting the birth mom of her daughter along with many other incredible things!

What are God's thoughts on Tradition?

This time of year, traditions are big! As a somewhat new mother, I know I've given a lot of thought about what traditions I want to begin in our small family. As a child, I loved what traditions we had. What is it that makes us all love tradition? I think it's the familiarity of it, the idea that we can recreate good memories year after year that is so appealing to our human nature. It's comfortable!

Let's think beyond holiday traditions and just the general idea of tradition. More specifically, tradition in church. Lately, I've found myself frustrated with tradition. Some of our churches are so bound by hundreds of years of tradition that it overrules Biblical truth. In some cases, I know it doesn't necessarily contradict the Bible, but seems to distract from the message. To sum it up, tradition is not saving people! So, where's the balance? If it's not adding to God's kingdom, bringing in the lost, taking care of the poor, discipling...where does it belong? I'm so tired of doing things just because that's the way it's always done. What's the value in tradition? When we think about it, aren't traditions more about gratification for self rather than to Him? Someone help me because right now I've experienced so much by the extreme that I'm not seeing it!

Someone please give me a good counter argument, because I'm not so sure I'm ready to give up all my tradition. ;)

no better view

As I was editing the other night, I look up from my computer and see this. What a beautiful picture of my sweet husband reading to his daughter!

Thank you to those who have been praying for MK! We were able to visit awhile on Tuesday with MK's neurologist. Every test so far has come back normal! At this point, she rules out anything with the nerves or dealing with the spinal cord. She wants to do a muscle biopsy to determine if it's a muscle disease. If it was normal, then she would rule out anything muscular and would diagnose it as cerebral palsy. To a parent this sounds alarming, but I have peace about either direction. What she has seems mild and it would not be a condition that would worsen. She's doing great physically and showing constant improvement and strengthening. Most people wouldn't even notice anything! As far as treatment, she will continue to wear her foot braces and regular physical therapy to help with her strengthening and coordination.

Was it worth it?

Let me just say that mom had to WORK for this picture. We started off the morning with MK refusing to wear the outfit. She never once has cared about what she wears. I get an occasional complain when I struggle to get a tight neck hole over her large head. But for whatever reason, when she saw this top in my hand she started screaming. In order to get it on, I tried reasonable discussion, distraction, bribery and finally used force (as in pinning her to the ground while she was pulling it as hard as possible in the opposite direction). It was not pretty!

After about a half an hour on helping her get back to reality (Reality being that mom had bought the outfit specifically for an occasion like this and she WAS going to wear it!), we were ready to make the trip to see Santa. She was elated to eat her first "candy caney"!

As you can see she didn't really take to Santa, so I once again made the Santa shot while a friend snapped the picture. And you can't even really see the adorable outfit!

So in the end I ask myself, was it really worth it? I'm praying that this is not already the beginning of clothing battles! Two strong wills don't make an easy agreement!

A year go, we had no idea...

I have so many things I need to be doing right now like getting ready for church, but I have so much on my mind that I want to share before it's replaced with lesser important things like pictures, packing, presents... My mind is going in several different directions, so I pray that you're able to understand as I try to put it in words.

Lately I've been reminded of how we really have no idea of what God's plans are for us and how our lives will be played out. Not only no idea, but that the ultimate control is not in our hands. So I take you back around a year. At this time, I had just started taking pictures for others. The idea of a business was very small. Didn't really charge...etc. I was pregnant, then I miscarried...

So now that I've set that up, let's go to last year's Christmas. We were at my aunt and uncle's house and I noticed a cousin of a cousin (yes, you read that right) with a nice camera, so I start talking with her about photography. In our conversation, she gives me a website of one of her good friends that was a photographer.When I got home that night, I checked out her site. She was a talented photographer, enjoyed her website. That piece of paper with the website got put in a stack of papers (yes, unfortunately I have a few of those these days.) A couple months later, I came across the paper and decided to look at her website again. Her website now took me to her personal blog. She no longer did photography as a business but was in the middle of her adoption process. I began reading her blog on and off. She would still give photography tips and had great parenting ideas. What I didn't realize at the time was that God was teaching and opening my heart at the time through her writings. My own photography business was picking up a little, but wasn't very fruitful. I remember making a valentines ad for the paper and didn't get anything back from it. (Just an example, of where it was.)

Now we come to beginning of May, when Roger and I make the decision to adopt. Our thinking was that we had no savings or ideas of funding, but we'd get a loan and pay it off little by little. In the craziness of getting all of the paperwork for the adoption, God also blessed my photography business. And I'm talking tremendously. The months of May through now are a blur when it comes to the photography business. Somewhere in the middle, we realize that God is using this as the main financing for our adoption. We had no idea!

I link up to several adoption blogs, including Andrea's (Babe of My Heart). God has used these incredible women I know to raise awareness, encourage, and teach others. He uses these things, that seems so small, as part of His plan. Now, some of my family and a few friends read these. My sister shared with us a few months ago that their family was now beginning the process of adoption. A year ago, she had no idea!

A year ago, I had no idea what this year had in store. I can definitely say that NONE of this was in my new year's resolutions! I had no idea that God was using a cousin of a cousin giving me a photography website to mold our hearts to His. I had no idea that I would be wishing for a day of no photography! I had no idea that my miscarriage would be used in the transformation of my desires. (I'm still not quite sure what I believe about this...because I don't think he caused the miscarriage, but used the miscarriage.)

I think I know some of the things 2011 will have in store....but maybe I don't. Will there be blessings? I'm certain. Heartache? I'd like to hope not, but probably. But I know I can rest in the peace of knowing there is a sovereign God who works all things to His glory!

There you have it...the thoughts impressed in my mind now. There's several other disconnected blurps I'd like to add. But not sure how to tie it all in! Maybe someday I'll be a good writer and be able to be used through it as many other's writings have been used to help me along the way...