The Truitt Times

Vacation Part 2

2011-10-30T19:57:00.000-05:00

Our family decided to stay on in Branson for our family vacation this year. We spent a week relaxing and doing some fun things in between!! We always make sure and visit our favorite show, The Dutton's. They are an amazing family with more talent than is fair! :)

Andrea and Abagail Dutton. Andrea spent hours when she was on chemo treatments watching DVD's of the Duttons. She loves to get her picture taken every year with Abagail.

Troy and the boys love the challenge of putting huge puzzles together. Here they are working on a 1000 piece puzzle. They are gluing all the puzzles they put together so they can frame them and hang them in the basement.

Troy and the boys finally got to do something they have wanted to try for years....ziplines. They said it was one of the funnest things they have ever done!

Riding Go-Karts is another favorite thing....we finally found a track where Andrea was tall enough to drive her own car.

Troy and Alex were racing with Andrea

And the most entertaining thing to watch...a track of 3 and 4 year olds driving Go-karts! Every time Alex would look at us and try to wave, he would drive into the wall! :)

Family vacations are memories that will never be forgotten!!! We may not remember what we got for Christmas when we were a kid, but it is guaranteed you will always remember those special times and places you went and spent time with your family on vacation!!

Vacation Part 1

2011-10-20T10:01:00.001-05:00

At the end of September we met up in Branson with Robert and Penny, my dad and his wife Kim. We had a blast hanging out for 4 days together. We rented a big house that had a huge basement for the kids to hang out in. It was a great time to relax and visit!

We spent two days at Silver Dollar City. The kids love the rides ( Troy included with the kids...:) ) the adults love the shops and watching the crazy people!!

Luke, Lauren, and Tyler

Ashlyn and Alex

Jenn, Dad, and Penny

Robert and Penny

Me and my Sweetie

Branden, Grandpa Sam, and Travis

Alex...having a little chicken and a lot of ketchup!

Oooops....looks like Lauren and Grandpa Sam got caught!!

Dad and Kim

Ashlynn and Aunt Jenn

The whole gang!

Grandpa Sam, Penny, and Ashlynn

Miss Ashlynn....I could take pictures of this little doll all day long!! Her smile makes my heart melt!!

Troy and Alissa...riding the caterpillars

Ashlynn

Jillayne and Ashlynn

Alissa and Andrea....a little wet from the Great American Plunge!

The Great American Plunge....Grandpa Sam had no idea what he was getting into!!!

Getting ready to dive into Wildfire....3 loops numerous drop....only insane people ride these kind of things!!

Lauren, Alex, and me

Aunt Penny and Alex

Luke and Lauren

Travis and Branden

Penny, Kim, and Jenn

Alissa and Andrea!

Jillayne and Tyler

One of our other favorite things to do is to ride go-karts!! We spent an evening racing each other and having a blast!!!

Grandpa Sam and Andrea getting ready to take off!!

Lauren and Travis

In line...ready to roll!

Vacation memories just can't be replaced!!! If you think back and try to remember gifts you have been given....you probably can't remember to many things! Memories from vacations you have taken....they are never forgotten!!

Summer Fun Pictures

2011-10-05T23:15:00.006-05:00

This is a miscellaneous post of fun pictures I have taken this summer...

Travis and Alex

Andrea and Katie Snodgrass

Alex

Alex was so proud of his new rubber boots....with trains on them, how cool can you be?!!

This is how I found Alex one afternoon. I guess he was worn out from swimming and decided to get a snack but was just to worn out to even eat it!

Alex and Andrea made a new buddy at the Bible Methodist Camp we attended this summer. Miss Meagan Loper is one of the sweetest young ladies you will ever meet! She toted these two all over the place. Alex was heart broken when she had to leave and go home!!

My two beautiful girls!

Lauren was so excited when one of her best buddies, Katie Snodgrass got to pop in for a surprise visit this summer!

Miss Madison and Lauren

Maddie and Katie

We have a lot of great memories of a wonderul summer!!!

PNC Camp

2011-10-05T23:00:00.008-05:00

We made our way back to the beautiful hill country of Dickson, Tennesee for our annual church family camp. The kids love this camp ground because of the beautiful creek that runs through the property!

Ride 'em cowboy was the theme for the kids services...Alex was super impressed with the cowboy hats!

Luke here with some of his buddies....Luke was so glad not to have a broken foot this year!! :)

Travis...ready for church

Alex and Ashlynn kept the nursery occupied!

Miss Maddie Snodgrass

Cousins...Andrea and Alissa

Beautiful girls all dressed up for church

So thankful for the wonderful camp memories!!

July 4th Celebration!

2011-10-05T22:25:00.009-05:00

Our 4th of July celebration this year was very relaxed....we spent most of the day doing mostly nothing. Early in the evening my family came over and we grilled hamburgers and hotdogs. After supper we headed out with some friends to watch fireworks. The fireworks show was a real dissapointment this year, I think it lasted all of about 11 minutes.....funds must be low at the city! :) The surrounding neighbors made up for the city and we got a pretty spectacular show just from the people around us! Tyler had a lot of fun trying to photograph the fireworks. He captured some pretty neat pictures!

Mammaw

Travis taking it easy on the back deck

Toya keeping us entertained!

Lauren looking a little tired or bored here?

Andrea is ready to watch the sparks fly!

Casey taking Maddie and Alex for a ride on the

Luke settled in for the show

Mr. Travis

Tyler

Me and my sweetie!

Alex

Jaidyn and Alex

Amanda Nabors and Trent Davis

Fathers Day

2011-10-05T22:10:00.003-05:00

Happy Fathers Day to an awesome Dad!!!

Anyone can be a Father....it takes some-one special to be a daddy!!

Youth Camp

2011-10-05T20:20:00.007-05:00

The first of June always finds us frantically making grocery lists, team lists, menus, schedules....It's youth camp!!! Unfortunately I didn't get to take many pictures because I'm in the kitchen cooking most of the time. But, here's a few of the little guys and their relay races.

The cutest little thing I've ever seen....my niece, Ashlynn

We make so many wonderful memories every year at youth camp!! We're already making plans for next year!!

Mothers Day!

2011-10-05T19:45:00.004-05:00

Enjoying my special day with my 6 special blessings!!! I love my kids!!! I can't imagine life without them! They are all so different yet, they all bring me sunshine every day!!

the boys....

the girls......

They sang a song with me at church for mothers day, "we're only kids"

Tornadoes!

2011-10-05T17:41:00.007-05:00

May found us running up and down the stairs at all times of the day and night, with tornado sirens ringing in our ears! Alex and Andrea were terrified but started to grow numb to being jerked out of bed in the middle of the night and drug downstairs one more time! One day in May we were being warned that it was probable that we could have tornadoes like the major one that took place in Joplin. My family came and spent the day with us since we have the safest basement. My mom had heard that if more kids would wear their bicycle helmets during storms that there would be far fewer injuries.....Tyler, Andrea, and Alex took her advice to heart and put those helmets on! :) I guess Alex thought his swimming goggles were added protection....he looked hilarious!!

The clouds were rolling in....

After a scary, nervewracking day....God's promises are always true!!

Even better...a double promise!!!!

There have been a few times I felt my life looked like those storm clouds.....but the rainbow of promise has always come shining through!!!

May Birthdays

2011-10-05T17:30:00.007-05:00

May is the month of birthdays for our family. We start out on the 14th with Travis. He turned 10 this year.

Tyler turned 12 on the 17th.... He wanted dirt cake for his birthday.

Luke wrapped up the May celebrations on the 29th turning 15 ..... he was sick of dessert altogether so we just had supper! :)

It's not all bad having so many birthdays in one month... you can just leave the decorations up!

Shiery Family Reunion

2011-10-05T16:41:00.013-05:00

In April we had a Shiery family reunion at our house. We hadn't all been together in over 20 years! Everyone of Mammaw's living children and their families were all there. We also celebrated this special ladies 89th birthday! Mammaw is one of the most amazing people I have ever known! I hope I can grow old as gracefully as she has!! Her dream was for all of her family to be together again.....we were all thankful we were able to make it a reality for her!!

Mammaw with her 4 living children, their spouses, 9 grandkids, and 14 great- grandkids!! It took no small effort to get this picture taken!! :)

James and Linda, Charles and Deborah, Mammaw, Debby and Eldon, Mike and Karen

The 9 grandkids and the greatest grandma ever!!

Mammaw and her 14 great grandkids!!!

Robert, Penny, Jillayne, Branden, Alissa, and Ashlynn Jones

Our gang! Special thanks to Susan Nabors for her amazing photography skills!!

Sunday Easter Service 2011

2011-04-26T12:12:00.009-05:00

Easter Sunday is always such a special day! This year was no exception! We made a huge push to have all of our Outreach kids who come on Sunday evenings attend and help with the special songs. They practiced for weeks and did such a great job! Each class had a song they sang. Quite a few of the kids got stage fright and sat glued to their seats when it was their turn! :) We had a wonderful day with 105 people from our community in attendance! Now if we could just get them all there every Sunday! Funny thing is that everyone who was there with the exception of two people from out of town, consider our church to be their own! They all come, just usually not all on the same Sunday.

Heidi, Dave, and Troy sang with the teen class...."I've got a Mansion" and "He's Coming Soon"

The Teen Class

Sis Shirley's class....part of them

Patti's class

Only a few of Troy's class came up.....he has the rowdiest class of the bunch!!

Troy

So glad we serve a risen Saviour!!!

Happy 17th Birthday Lauren!!!

2011-04-26T11:03:00.004-05:00

We were able to pull off a surprise birthday party for Lauren this year. I about had a nervous break-down trying to get it all together at the last minute but, it turned out great! Lauren is redoing her room in black/ hot pink so I used this theme for her decorations. It was so much fun!! I love doing this so much....wish I could start some kind of party decorating buisness!

Lauren's favorite cake is carrot cake. It was so yummy but not the easiest thing to decorate! Homeade cream cheese frosting isn't very stiff..... It isn't the most beautiful cake but, it did taste good!

SURPRISE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy 17th!!

Madison, Lauren, Katie, and Tara

These girls were laughing so hard, trying to pose for this picture that they blew all the candles out before we could even take one picture! We had to relight and do it again. :)

Alex loves to open presents so he was right there helping tear into everyone. Each time they opened a gift, he thought he had bought it for her so he would tell her it was from him. Finally he exclaimed in amazement, " Lolo, I can't believe I got all this stuff for you!!!" Gotta love the innocence of 3 year olds!

Little Miss Maddie Snodgrass....look at those killer blue eyes!!

Where oh where did my baby girl go?

Happy Birthday to a bright ray of sunshine in our house!!! Love you Lo!!!

March

2011-04-25T22:57:00.003-05:00

In March we celebrated my moms b-day a few days early since she was headed down to Alabama for a visit. She went to see my sister, Penny and her family for about 10 days. Tyler, Travis, Andrea, and Alex went along for the fun.....what a shock it was to our household!! Utter silence with only Lauren and Luke here!! We decided it definitely cut down on the laundry and dishes but, we didn't like it at all!!! By the end of the visit we were about ready to go roam the streets and haul home whatever kids we could find! :) They had an awesome time visiting their cousins and made memories that will last a lifetime!! Thanks Uncle Robert and Aunt Penny for letting them come!!!

Alex and Alexis Auer helping Nana open her presents!

Lauren celebrated March by making her first major purchase in life....a car!! After searching for weeks we found exactly what she was looking for, a PT Cruiser with a sun roof and the color gray! She held those precious dollars in her hand for one last time before we headed out to sign the dotted line! All those hours of working when she didn't feel like it paid off! She is now the proud owner of her own wheels.....paid for with her own $$$ So proud of you Lauren!!

February Fun

2011-04-25T22:32:00.005-05:00

February is such a dreary month to me!! I really don't like the cold and I'm just counting the minutes until warm weather takes over and I can pull my flip flops out! :) This February was extra dreary since Troy left for a 1o day missions trip to India. To ease our lonliness we took a day and went to the new "bounce house" we have here in Cape. It turned out to be a really neat place for all ages! They even let the parents join in the jumping! I opted to watch and take pictures!

Lauren...worn out after hours of chasing Alex and Andrea around!

Luke looks pretty tired here himself!

Andrea taking a break and building some block houses

Travis takes a flying leap down a long slide

Alex taking a turn

Tyler....I think he was caught off guard on this picture!

This is definitely a place we will look forward going back to!!

Happy 7th Birthday Andrea!!

2011-02-18T11:36:00.008-06:00

Andrea had plans for her birthday all laid out! She wanted Emily to come spend the night with her on Friday night. They had a blast together and even included Alex in their adventures! He tags along with great enthusiasm!

The next morning we loaded up and went to Luke's basketball game. They cheered him on the whole way!

Sunday night we had Andrea's actual party out at the Boardman's house.

Emily, Maddie, and Andrea. These 3 girls have a lot of fun together! So thankful for great buddies!!

Here are the sack heads! :)

The best part....opening presents!

How many girls does it take to blow out 7 candles?

Can't believe our baby girl is already 7! Where in the world does time go?!!!

Happy 3rd Birthday to our Giant Dude!!

2011-02-08T11:08:00.006-06:00

Finally the long awaited day arrived!!! Alex has been waiting forever for this birthday to come! He was so excited and had everything planned out....his wish was that he would get enough nerf gunsso that each person in our family have one, and we could have a nerf war! :) His wish came true! We have about every type of Nerf gun available! I am about to lose my mind with all the nerf darts laying around everywhere!!!

When I was getting ready for his party, I asked him what kind of cake he wanted.I thought he would say Cars or Thomas .....his answer, "one with LOTS of yummy icing''!! He could care less about the cake, just give him the icing!!

He had to sample it right away!

Alex totally enjoyed his birthday this year!!! This is what I found when I came back out to the kitchen to clean up....Alex on the counter enjoying the icing to his hearts content!

This is the damage that was left behind!

Oh well ....I guess that's what you can get away with when you're the baby! Don't tell him I said he was the baby.....today he is "Big Rascal"!!!

Happy 40th Birthday Troy!! Happy 80th Birthday Dad!!

2011-01-18T20:21:00.006-06:00

This past Friday night we had a suprise 40th birthday party for Troy and an 80th party for my dad. They both thought the party was for each other so they were 100% suprised! I had a blast decorating for it! I used my cricut to make the banner and some other cutouts that I decorated with.

Troy and Dad with their cake

The cake turned out awesome....the black icing was a nightmare to eat! :)

Alex was very upset that we forgot to put the candles on before we cut the cake....so he added them in for us!

Our great friend Jason gave the kids rides on his high speed wheelchair...it was the highlight of the kids night!

Alex showing off his icing tounge!

Ben and Luke...not sure what they were doing under the counter!

A little more icing

Lauren giving me her happiest face! :)

Tyler with his silver mop head

Alex was checking out Papa's presents. He was pretty impressed with this tie.

Troy was all smiles opening his birthday presents!

Miss Andrea

Mr Jason and Lauren

Emily and Andrea taking a spin

What a fun evening spent with family and friends!! I think this is one birthday they won't ever forget!

Stylish Blogger Award

2011-01-08T20:43:00.006-06:00

Thank you to my friend LaNaye from http://www.livingalifeoffaithinthestorm.blogspot.com/ for awarding me the stylish blogger award! She must be my friend to have awarded me this since I don't consider myself a great blogger! :) LaNaye has been a real inspiration to me as I have watched her face the greatest of any trials a mom can face this past year. Check out her blog and read her story!

There are 4 duties you must perform :

1. Thank and link back to the person who awarded you

2. Share 7 things about yourself

3. Award 15 Great Bloggers

4. Contact the Bloggers you award and tell them about their award

7 Things about me:

1. I am terrified of heights

2. I love being a mom!!

3. I don't enjoy teaching anyone to do anything, but
have homeschooled for the past 11 years! :)

4. I love to iron

5. My dream is to go into the medical field or photography when my kids are grown.

6. Math is my favorite subject

7. I hate to be cold soooooo winter is not my favorite season!

http://www.kimboscrafts.blogspot.com/

http://www.kellyskornerblog.com/

http://www.farmgirlreport.blogspot.com/

http://www.charitree.blogspot.com/

http://www.thefoglemanfamily.blogspot.com/

http://www.indianaenglands.blogspot.com/

http://www.jonandjesswelch.blogspot.com/

http://www.iheartorganizing.blogspot.com/

http://www.tipjunkie.com/

www.littlelightstudio.blogspot.com

http://www.fergyfamforum.blogspot.com/

http://www.brownpaper--packages.blogspot.com/

http://www.romantichome.blogspot.com/

http://www.thriftydecorchick.blogspot.com/

http://www.kellishouse.blogspot.com/

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!

2011-01-01T22:32:00.004-06:00

Happy New Year!! I haven't posted since last year so thought I better get busy! :) We had a very quiet and uneventful New Year's Eve! It was wonderful!! We just spent the evening relaxing and brought in the New Year with a fun toast and sparkling grape juice! Our family has a tradition of opening our stockings on New Years Day morning. It gives the kids something to look forward to after the buisiness of Christmas. My mom started this when I was a little girl and we have carried it down all these years. Some of us were a little under the weather so we didn't move around very early!

Alex and Travis....they look like they are up to something mischevious!

Tyler...I think he is on a growing spree...he is constantly eating something!

Travis enjoying the sparkling grape juice!

Andrea and Alex are ready to open stockings!

Lauren and Luke giving me the 2011 sign!

I'm looking like I should have been tucked in a few hours ago!

A family toast!

We all remembered things about this past year as we made our toasts. Some good memories and some that we'd really rather not remember at all. I am once again reminded of the words to one of my favorite songs when we were going through Andrea's chemo treatments, " Through it all, through it all, I've learned to trust in Jesus, I've learned to trust in God. Through it all, through it all, I've learned to depend upon His word"!!! Trusting the best is yet to come in 2011!

Fall Catch up!

2010-12-31T21:43:00.017-06:00

Once again I'm so far behind that I feel like I'll never catch up! I had really good intentions back in October, then I ran into computer problems and lost around 700 pictures! That took all the fun and inspiration out of blogging!! I learned my lesson and bought an external hard drive. Let me tell you, if you don't have one.....get one!!!!!! It has made sorting, editing, and storing pictures tons easier!! So here I am on New Year's Eve trying to get the last of the year wrapped up! The thing I love about blogs is that it helps you keep up with life and remeber things that are easily forgotten!! So prepare yourself for lots of pictures!!

In September we had a fall picnic out at the Boardman's house. It was complete with pizza, hayrides, and lots of fun!

Troy and part of his Sunday School class.

Ben, Luke and Lauren

Andrea and Emily looking a little wind blown!

The hayrides....

This has become an annual event that our whole church looks forward to, thanks to the Boardman hospitality!

After our picnic we loaded up and headed to St Louis to attended a Corn Maize sponsered by the Friends of Kids with Cancer organization. It was a super windy day but, it was fun, especially for Andrea and Alex. They were super impressed with the horse rides....

and the camel ride!

Fall fun

We got our family pictures taken a little earlier than normal. Heidi Boardman and I decided we would give it a try so we came armed with two camera's and a lot of ideas! It was a lot more fun than setting in a stuffy studio with starchy clothes and smiles to match! All in all they turned out pretty good!!

Daddy and his girls

Troy and the boys

Me and the girls

Me and my boys

The whole gang....it took a lot of patience to get this

All my favorite kiddo's!!

The boys...

The girls...

This year for Thanksgiving, Troy's side of the family came to visit. There were 8 adults and 13 kids! Out of those 13 kids 10 of them were under the age of 9! To say the least the only quiet moments were when everyone was in bed! We had a great time with everyone! We also got a family picutre taken while we were all together. It had been about 5 years since we had one so there were several new faces to add! :)

Troy's brother Steven's youngest little sweetheart, Layla....

We were entertained by Jesse and Steven....I think they could start their own show!

Andrea and Karissa

Jesse and Steven at it again!

Boppaw and Grammy with all the grandkids....it was about 40 degrees outside while we were taking these pictures.....Needless to say it was pretty miserable but, everyone tried to cooperate

Brothers

The whole crew!

We had our church Christmas supper the first part of December..... As usual we had enough food to serve half of Cape! It was a very relaxing evening!

Mammaw and Andrea

Emmy and Andrea

We had our ladies night out this month at my house with a salad supper and an ornament exchange! I had a lot of fun setting up my breakfast room and decorating for it. I'm really bummed that I forgot to take pictures of all the ladies while they were there!

We finally got a new family picture with the Mahan side of the family this year as well!

Mom and Dad

Toya and Patti

Me and my sweetie!

Robert and Penny

All the girls

Sisters!!

The newest member.....Miss Ashlynn Paige

Papaw and Nanna and all the grandkids!

The family!

For the first time in my 36 years the entire side of my mom's family wasn't able to be together for Christmas. This was quite an adjustment for all of us but, we made the best of it and had a good time!

God has safely brought us through another year.....we eagerly anticipate a wonderful New Year!!!

Mr Alex

2010-10-24T22:21:00.003-05:00

We did some fall pictures while we were in Alabama.... Alex is 2 1/2 now and is at just the perfect age to make it nearly impossible to get a decent picture! When I tell him to look at me and smile, he closes his eyes and yells, "cheeeeeeeeeeeese"!!! WOW! Thankfully I have a cameral that will shoot several shots a second so I did manage some pretty good pictures! Hard to believe he is almost 3!

Alabama

2010-10-24T21:40:00.005-05:00

The first week of October we headed out to Alabama to my sister, Penny's house. Troy was scheduled to preach a revival at their church and there was no way we were letting him go without us! We piled in the van and headed out! The cousins were all thrilled at the thought of getting to spend a full week together even if they did have to go to church every night! :) While we were there the kids decided it was time to paint the fort.....and themselves! Thankfully they were all wearing clothes that could go straight to the trash when the mission was accomplished! They started out staying pretty clean but if only I would have gotten a picture of the boys when it was done!!! I'm not sure if the fort or the boys had more paint! Great memories were made so they cheerfully scrubbed, and scrubbed, and scrubbed some more trying to get clean in time for church! We still found some paint in hair a few days later...but hey, who cares!

Travis and Branden getting ready for some serious work!~

Taking a short break for some lunch

Jillayne stayed about the cleanest!!

I'm not really sure how this happened mom!

Miss Alissa hard at work!

Alex found a water spout close by and there he stayed!! He hates his hands to be dirty so he didn't paint for long.....

Just long enought to get it all over his face!!!

Catching Up.....again!

2010-10-24T17:42:00.004-05:00

Sorry I have been missing in action for sooooo long!! I have been sitting around on the couch eating cupcakes.....NOT!!! :) I keep thinking life will slow down and life will be "normal". I have finally come to the realization that this must be normal..... I do not like normal!!! I feel like we have been around the world and back again since my last post which was in July~ Truth be know we have been at least halfway there! We were at church family camp the first week of August, celebrated our 19th Anniversary, spent a week at God's Bible School in Cincinnati while Troy preached their fall revival, started school, spent a couple days in Branson, celebrated our 10th year anniversary of Pastoring in Cape, had Andrea's port surgery removal, went for revival in Alabama at my sister and brother in law's, came home and started revival here the next night.....are you tired yet?!!! :) At least we aren't bored around here! I thought I would share a few pictures of Andrea's port removal surgery which is another story in itself!! She gave us a huge scare right before surgery and we thought it was possible she might be relapsing.....needless to say it was a scary time but we were full of thanksgiving when everything tested out okay!! The surgery went forward and now she has a nice scar for a reminder!~ :) I say it is a beautiful scar and one to be proud of!! We are so thankful that God has been with us all the way!!! I have a ton more pictures of our Alabama trip and other summer fun but.....that will have to just wait for another day!!

Andrea waiting impatiently for them to come and take her away.....I can't tell you how excited she was to be back at the hospital and in her bed and room!!! I know......she is an unusual kid!!
Nana came up with us since Daddy had to work

Our great nurse and even more importantly our wonder friend, Kristin!!! She is our angel!!!

After surgery.....her surgeon gave her a special heart dressing.

Trying to sleep off the sleepy meds!!

Hope to get some more up soon!!!

Finished object....of the year!

2010-07-09T23:46:00.005-05:00

Since we are going to get to make a trip to Alabama next week to see the newest niece...Ashlynn Paige.... I am on a mission!! I have made about 30 bows for her and now I am working on some onesie outfits! It is soooooo much fun!! I have had way to many boys.....lets just say that dressing girls is of the charts when it comes to fun! I think we may have to change this baby girls clothes about 6 times a day! :)

The completed outfit

A close up of the ruffle.... I just took a plain onsie and decided how long I wanted the ruffle.... this is a newborn size onsie and I made the ruffle about 4 inches long. I overcast both edges the then I added the elastic trim which made it ruffle up on its own. After it was ruffled I pinned it to the onsie and voila... add a little ribbon rosette and you have a shirt and a skirt! :)

I love this bandanna ribbon, especially with the pink rosette!! This is just way to much fun!!!! Andrea thinks we need to adopt a little girl from China...soooooo if I'm missing for awhile... I may be in China! :)

4th of July!!

2010-07-06T22:22:00.004-05:00

We celebrated the 4th about 3 times this year! We had friends over on Friday night and the kids shot of a bunch of fireworks. Then on Friday night our next door neighbors came over and we had another great show....Sunday night we saw fireworks from our fair city.....I think the kids did better than Jackson! :) It was a fun weekend! I am proud to be an American!!!

Luke.... wow this is a serious moment!

Sunday afternoon we all had Ice cream cones and it got pretty interesting!

Gotta love the ice cream/ chocolate mustache!

Andrea got just a little carried away...

and.....Alex was out of control!!!

I finally got everyone roped together to try to get some pictures...do you have any idea how hard it is to have 4 boys all look in the same direction at the same time without being crazy?!!! It is no easy task!!

The 6 reasons I get up every day.....oh and so I can do laundry, cook, pay the bills........ :)

My most favorite person in the whole world!!!!!

That summed up the 4th for us..... I wanted to add a couple of pictures I took this evening.....

Alex had been playing outside in the dirt with his cars....he came in wearing these goofy boots and asking for a yogurt drink. Look at that dirty backside....

The front doesn't look much better.... it looks like he may have been eating the dirt!! Oh well I'm sure it wasn't the first time and I'm sure it won't be the last!! Besides Troy's dad always said dirt was good for you.... good for what I don't know....maybe whatever ails you....I think I may go have a serving of dirt! :) Not really!!!

Yay for me....I'm all caught up!

JUNE

2010-07-06T21:54:00.003-05:00

June found us frantically getting ready for our youth camp! I always think I will be better prepared but so much can't be done until the last couple weeks. I think my kids were beginning to think they might be orphans!! :) The Sunday night before we were to leave on Monday morning I got 1 hour of sleep and headed out at 5:30 am with Heidi Boardman to go pick up the groceries! I don't think Heidi had any idea what she had gotten herself into! :) We made it safely and before we could get caught up on our sleep...it was already over!!! The wonderful thing is that it is so totally worth it that I would turn around and do it again next week....okay maybe next year will do!!! We did have a wonderful week with many getting their spiritual lives back on track!! That makes all the sleepless hours and days worth it all! We brought our 2 nieces and nephew home with us so my sister could hopefully rest up and get ready for their little baby girl who was due to arrive July 29th. To my amazement I received a call from my sister early Monday morning telling me that she would be here before the day was out!!! She arrived almost 5 weeks early weighing 6lb 7oz! Her name is Ashlynn Paige Jones and she is one of the most beautiful little girls I have ever seen! There will be many more pictures of her next week! ( we are going down to spend a week with this coming Monday.) Little Ashlynn wasn't quite ready for this world yet so she spent over a week in NICU but is now home and being loved to death!! We had a great time entertaining her brother and sisters while they waited for her to get home! Everyone was sad to see them leave and I think they were even a little sad to go! I can't believe I didn't get more pictures of them while they were here!! I guess it was due to the fact of 8 kids in the house.....7 of them under age 11! :) Lauren was also gone that week....she was at my sisters house spending some time with her best buddie, Katie Snodgrass! So I lost my right hand and didn't get much more done than cooking and doing laundry~ :) I loved every bit of it!!! I'm so glad my kids have cousins they are close to and get along so well with!!!

Troy and the boys decided to give our house a much need bath!!! Tyler was more than happy to get up on the roof and assist!

I was in the house when I heard this terrible CRASH!!! I was almost to scared to come out and see who had fallen off the roof....much to my relief it was only the ladder that had gotten knocked over. Luke came to the rescue so they wouldn't have to spend the night up there! Am I ever thankful for the "sparkly" clean house!!

Best Buddies for life!!! These two have so much fun together!

What a serious moment!! I'm not sure what he was thinking about but I love this picture!!

That brings us to July....actually July 4th.....

MAY

2010-07-06T21:05:00.002-05:00

Alex's favorite toy of all times is a laundry basket! Anytime there is one around, empty or full, he claims it! Of course 2 necessary items are always included: a paci and the one and only green blanky! He will just lay around in it, push it around and generally entertain himself for long periods of time! Very cheap entertainment!!

The month of May is our marathon birthday month! Travis starts it out on the 14th- as you can see this year was the big "9" for him!

Having a fun sleepover with his buddies, Caleb and Gabe.

At the top of Travis' wish list was his very own 24 pack of Mountain Dew...which I might add was consumed very quickly! That smile looks a little scary!!!

Tyler was right behind Travis on the 17th....11 years for him. Tyler is our dare-devil..... I wasn't to excite about this two wheeled unstable "rip stick" but true to Tyler form, he has it down!

Tyler also wanted his own 24 pack of Mountain Dew.....he was smart and hid his.....he still has quite a few cans left!!!

In between birthday's our great friend Jason Eftink invited us to spend a Saturday out on Kentucky Lake in his pontoon boat. It was the most enjoyable Saturday I have had since our last vacation!!! It was a picture perfect day and we enjoyed it to the fullest! Jason had a diving accident when he was only 19 years old and is paralyzed from his upper chest down. He is an inspiring person to be around to say the least! There isn't anything that he won't try to do!~ He operated that boat with amazing skill!~ Thanks Jason for the awsome day!!!

Jason's nephew, Aiden, and Alex became great buddies!

Tyler, Andrea, and Alex fixing to take off on a tube ride.

We ended this good month on the 29th with Luke turning 14! I can't believe how fast the time has flown by!! Luke didn't want a birthday cake.....so we had a yummy choc chip cookie cake!

What a great guy!! Happy 14th Luke!

Well that sums up the month of May........ June will soon follow!

APRIL

2010-07-06T20:14:00.005-05:00

April was an incredibly busy month at our house......then again, I'm not sure there are many months that aren't busy around here! :)

We left our house the 5th of April and headed down to Westlake, LA to spend a week at the Kenny Adamson's house. Troy spoke at their church every evening and on Sunday. We had a great time while we were there! The Adamson's are a lot of fun and we just kind of adopted them! :) We arrived back home late on April the 12th....my birthday....not my favorite thing to do....ride in the car for about 13 hours!

On April the 17th the Tony Ross' arrived at our house to spend the weekend with us. Bro. Ross spoke at our church over the weekend. We always enjoy the Ross' being here! They are super special people!!

April the 20th we loaded up our van again and headed over to Cincinnati, Ohio for IHC. This year we were able to get 2 rooms right in the convention center! If you have ever been to IHC this is the only way to go! Troy feels the need to try to visit the several thousand people while he is there for 2 days and I'm just not interested!! So Andrea, Alex, and I hung out a lot in the motel room!! :) Troy also had the privilege of speaking to the young people in their service... that was the highlight of his time there! We had fun seeing a lot of old friends and meeting some new ones!!

After IHC Troy, Lauren, and Josh Boardman headed over to GBS for their VIP days. The rest of the kids and I along with Heidi Boardman and her kids headed over the Paul Holden's to hang out! We had a great time visiting there! They are awesome hosts and took good care of us! We did cause a little excitement that I'm sure Sara, Heidi, and I will never forget.....Luke had a diabetic seizure and we had to call 911....none of us do to well under stress like that and I think an ambulance was about necessary for us girls....Luke was fine! :) To say the least we will never forget that trip! We made it home late Saturday evening just in time for Lauren and Andrea to go participate in the Relay for Life cancer walk. I ended up going for a little bit and was really touched! It was a really incredible experience!!!

The back of Andrea's shirt....

Lauren and Andrea making a lap!

My sister Patti, my mom, my brother-in-law, Toya and Andrea

Lauren turned "sweet 16" while we were at IHC so we waited until we got home to celebrate....her great friends, Tori and Abby made her a beautiful birthday cake!!

Lauren and a bunch of her friends for her birthday!!

That about wraps up our month! I have great intentions of keeping this up every month.......sorry!!! I'm going to try to get caught up through June at least! :) Maybe one of these days I will get it together!!!

My latest project

2010-03-22T20:38:00.002-05:00

This past week my mom took all of the kids and went to visit my sister and her family in Alabama. Talk about a drastic change at our house! I only ran the dishwasher one time while they were gone...it always goes at least one time a day and sometimes twice! The house was as quiet as a tomb.....way to quiet!! But I did use the quiet time and get caught up on some things I needed to do! I also spent some fun time sewing a few dresses for Andrea...they turned out so cute now I am really inspired!!

Well I am finally up to date on my blog!! I have such good intentions of posting every couple weeks....sigh!! I'm not making any crazy promises to do better because you just never know what is going to happen on any given day around here!!!

March

2010-03-22T20:21:00.002-05:00

This Sunday we celebrated my moms Birthday. Alex was more than glad to assist her in every way with her presents! I didn't get a good picture because he was busy waving the cards around!

Basketball Fun....

Troy, Travis and some of their team

Luke,Tyler and two of their teammates

Andrea....showing her first lost tooth

Alex....I think this paci is a permanent thing.... ugh!!

February

2010-03-22T20:06:00.004-05:00

February was a busy month! We celebrated birthdays, hosted Preacher's Meeting, and took care of sick kiddo's!

Alex came down with an upper respitory infection and ear infections. He was a sick little guy for several days. He was really cooperative and took his breathing treatments like a champ!

A heart sucker makes everything better!

Fellowship after a late night board meeting!

You better watch out! Cowboy Alex is on the loose!

Best Buddies....Tara Snodgrass and Jillayne Jones

Andrea's 6th Birthday

2010-03-22T20:00:00.002-05:00

Andrea couldn't wait to turn 6! She counted the days for months...it finally got here!

Getting ready to dive into the presents!

Finally 6!!

Snow Days!

2010-03-22T19:49:00.002-05:00

We finally got a good snow the first part of February! The kids spent day and night outside! We had so much fun!

Lauren and Troy

Brandon ( Luke's good buddy who lives across our back field ) and Luke

Nana even came out to join in the fun!! She and Andrea are on the sled waiting to be pulled up the hill with the 4 wheeler.

Travis goes air-borne!!

Alex 2nd Birthday

2010-03-22T19:40:00.003-05:00

Alex turned 2 on January 28th. All he wanted for his birthday was shotguns! So thats what he got....little guns, big guns, quiet guns, noisy guns! :) He was happy!!

He found some suckers and of course you can't just eat one at a time...go ahead and see how many you can eat at once!

Get your hands up in the air!

Getting ready to tear in!!

Superpoints....

2010-01-29T09:39:00.002-06:00

This might be something you would like to check out...it is kinda fun and you can earn points several ways and redeem them for gift cards. If you are interested you can check it out here..
http://www.superpoints.com/spd/jennatruitt7

2010-01-28T22:18:00.003-06:00

The first project of this New Year was to get the upper shelves in the Living Room/Kitchen decorated. They look so pretty at Christmas with garland, lights, and a multitude of snowmen but when it all came down......BARE.....DEPRESSING!!! Sooooo I went bargain hunting and this is what all came together

This side of the shelf is in the kitchen right above the walk in pantry

This is the cupboards just to the right of the pantry

I just love this plate!!

I found these cute tin containers for just a couple $$ on clearance at Hobby Lobby! I love that store!

This is the living room side

I still have some vacant spots to fill in but at least it isn't so bare now! The worst part of all this is the climbing up and down to get it all in place! I got my exercise!!

Our next event was the three oldest boys joining the UPWARD basketball team here in Cape. It is a church sponsored organization that teaches not only basketball skills but good sportsmanship etc. They asked Troy to coach Travis' team and he is having a blast doing that! There are about 350 kids all together and they are divided up into around 40 - 50 teams. They have a practice once a week, then on Saturdays they play each others teams. It has been a really neat way to meet a lot of people in our community. Troy also gets to give a devotional at each practice with his team. Here they are ready to go to their first practice.

Our first Birthday celebration of this year started out with Troy....he is the big 39 this year....just wait until next year!! :)

The greatest daddy in the world with the people who make his world go around!!

I am finally feeling like I am getting my life back under control after the holidays! It was really spinning around here for awhile!!

A Christmas Recap....catching up!

2010-01-26T07:37:00.007-06:00

Okay, I have finally gathered up the courage to get back on here and try to catch up! I did so good up until the middle of December and then.... :) I loaded these pictures backward but, I decided it really doesn't matter!! So... here we go!!

The corner cabinet is Andrea and Alex' favorite hiding spot! They love to scare me!

We finally got some snow right after New Years and so the mess began! It was bitterly cold out so I just stepped out on the back deck to get a few pictures. The kids played out for hours...how I don't know!

Alex was so excited that he got to go out this year. He just sat at the top of the hill and watched them sled...he wasn't about to try it himself!!

Our family tradition is to do Stockings on New Years Day. The problem is that stocking just aren't made for stuffing so...we used pillow cases! :)

We had 23 people at our house for a week this Christmas. It was a great time! Now they didn't all sleep here but, most of the meals and all the excitement was right here! We ate until we couldn't eat any more and I offically went on a cooking strike after the holidays!!

Alex dedided to relax and enjoy his pie....you can do that when Nana is in charge!

Luke trying out his new "gangster" look!

Getting ready to tear into the presents!

On Christmas Eve we have a huge "snack" meal....lets just say there was enough food to have fed our whole neighborhood!!

Me and my sweetie on Christmas morning....we are looking pretty happy for 7:30am!

Andrea with her long awaited for Rebecca!! She wasn't shocked or suprised....she was sure she was getting her because, she asked for her!

Luke and his punching bag....he was surprised about this!!

Alex was so happy with his Lightning McQueen cars!! He didn't even want to open anything else!

Best buddies...our little Christmas angels!!

This is where I left off in my last post...we were getting ready to decorate cookies!!! :) I finally gave up control this year of trying to get them all to look good and just turned the kids loose! They did a great job and tasted just as good as the "perfectly" decorated ones....see I am learning! I CAN NOT DO IT ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

More to come soon on whats been going on this month!!

Days of Christmas ~ 16

2009-12-16T23:29:00.003-06:00

For the past years or so we have hosted a "Christmas at the Parsonage" as our gift to our church people. It is a night we really look forward to and enjoy! This year was no exception! We had around 35 or so people who were able to come. There was enough food to have fed about twice that many....:) I'm paranoid about not having enough so I always do way to much, but, hey we have lots of leftovers!! We have the best group of people in the world!! They make pastoring a very lovely thing!! Now I can set back and relax...all I have left to do before Christmas is:
1. Finish my shopping
2. Wrap about 50 gifts
3. Address 100 Christmas cards
4. Decide if I will write a letter to go in those cards
5. If I decide to include a letter then I'll have to write it
6. Get those cards mailed
7. Bake sugar cookies and decorate them
I think I'll just stop there cause I'm already exhausted just typing the list!! :)

Some of the ladies getting ready to dive in...

John and Nancy Fields hanging out with Troy

One of the counters filled with food.....

Dessert.....aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!

I'm really feeling good about today since I'm getting my post done 15 minutes before midnight!!

Days of Christmas ~ 14 & 15

2009-12-15T23:07:00.002-06:00

Baking, Dipping, Eating........ :) We had a girls baking night tonight at my house! 3 of our friends, Lauren, Andrea, and I had a great time seeing what all we could create! I almost burned the house down trying to cook some pizza....that is another story altogether!! :0 Thankfully Troy came to our rescue and saved the day....the main concern is that our house was filled and I mean FILLED with smoke and the fire alarms never went off!!! Now that isn't a very comforting thought! We will have to see what we can do about that problem very soon!! We did get about 3000 pretzels ( ministerially speaking ) dipped and decorated.....I don't ever want to see another pretzel!! :) Going to be cooking all day tomorrow getting ready for "Christmas at the Parsonage" !! I better get to bed!!

Days of Christmas ~ 11,12, & 13

2009-12-13T22:14:00.003-06:00

Sorry I have been MIA for the last 3 "Days of Christmas"! This is what we have been getting ready for.....our Christmas Program!! After all the stress and worrying if it would turn out.....it turned out! We had 102 people in attendance which was very exciting!! The simple Christmas story never fails to touch my heart every year!! All 34 kids did great and we can now breath a huge sigh of relief!!!

One of the 14 shepherds!!!

Caleb Boardman and Andrea.....Andrea was estatic that she got to be Mary! She has looked forward to tonight for weeks now!!

The " wise guys" !

They all look so sweet here...folding their hands for the closing prayer

We closed with the kids singing "Happy Birthday Jesus" ~ He is the reason for this season!!!

Days of Christmas ~ 10

2009-12-10T22:08:00.003-06:00

This evening was our kids piano recital. This was a first for Travis and Andrea and who know what number for Lauren. Andrea has been asking me for days, "how many more days until I get to play at the recital!" She surely didn't get this from me!! I always dreaded those things!! They all did great and we had a fun evening together!

Tyler is starting up piano in January and Luke is starting guitar lessons at the same time. I guess we will be a musical house. :)

Days of Christmas ~ 9

2009-12-10T09:44:00.002-06:00

This Christmas at our church is EXTRA special since we FINALLY have our own church!! We celebrated the first Sunday of December with a dedication service. Our sanctuary is newly remodeled and is beautiful!!! Happy Birthday Jesus!

Days of Christmas ~ 8

2009-12-08T16:03:00.004-06:00

Christmas is all about friends.....these two are definitely best buds!! Lauren was so glad to have Katie here for last weekend. Now they are counting the days until they see each other in February!! :)

Days of Christmas ~ 7

2009-12-07T18:42:00.001-06:00

Alex has recently discovered the joys of "licking the bow clean" ! He was really enjoying this bowl!!

Days of Christmas ~ 6

2009-12-07T01:20:00.002-06:00

Andrea and Emily at our Christmas Dinner.... these two are joined at the hip! They even came dressed in matching clothes and we didn't even plan it! :)

Days of Christmas ~ 5

2009-12-05T01:00:00.002-06:00

The stocking were hung from the Living Room ledge since there is no fireplace anywhere..... I hope Santa is pretty tall! :)

Days of Christmas ~ 4

2009-12-05T00:54:00.002-06:00

I have this smiling reminder of how few days I have left........and oh how much I have to do!!

Days of Christmas ~3

2009-12-03T23:28:00.002-06:00

I got this day in by the skin of my teeth...hey I had to grocery shop today and it was an all day thing! But the cupboards are full and I'm headed to bed! I remember about the days of Christmas and here it is....my living room tree.

Days of Christmas ~ 2

2009-12-02T14:37:00.002-06:00

This is what has kept me going for the last 2 1/2 years......FAITH! Don't get me wrong, I have had faith before that but, my faith has really been put to the test over the past 2 1/2 years in ways that it never had been before! It is easy to say things but, to acutally put them in action is a whole different thing! :) I'm thankful my FAITH is in someone who knows best.....no matter what I think I know!!

Days of Christmas~ Day 1

2009-12-01T15:51:00.003-06:00

These skates are my newest favorite find! They were just a few $$ at Kohl's! I love that store! They added such a nostalgic touch to this Coffee shelf....

Catching up for November

2009-12-01T13:18:00.007-06:00

Happy Belated Thanksgiving! Hey, better late than never! We started off the month of November at a full run! I kept thinking it would slow down....it never happened! I took the kids to a park here in town for annual pictures. I decided to try it with my own camera this year and I was pretty pleased with how they turned out!

Here is our littlest man...he thinks he's pretty big!

Alex- 18 months

Our Princess!

Andrea- 5 1/2 years

Travis with the most serious look he has had all year :)

8 years

Tyler is my right hand helper! He loves to organize and clean....after my own heart!

10 years

Luke....what a great guy! He is our easy going one of the bunch.

13 years

Lauren....my new chauffer!! I can't believe my baby girl will be 16 in April! Oh where has time gone?!!!

15 years

The Oklahoma Sooner Fans!

Lauren and Andrea....best buddies!

The Boys.....and let me tell you, boys will be boys!!!

Troy made a trip to Dallas in November to preach a weekend revival at the Dallas Spanish church. While he was eating tamales and trying to learn a little Spanish the rest of us headed down to Alabama to visit my sister,Penny and her family! It was youth hunt week while we were there so Travis and Tyler headed out with Uncle Robert and Branden to hunt for the first time in their life. To all of our amazement Tyler shot his first deer! It caused quite the excitement for the whole family! So now Troy (who is not a hunter) went and helped the boys find their first gun and they are preparing to hunt full force next year! Pray for us you all!!

Tyler and his "trophy"

We wanted to get a picture of all the cousins while we were there.....let me just say that after sitting all morning in church, it is not really the prime time to try to get 9 kids all standing still. smiling, and looking in the same direction!! Oh well, we tried!

Alex and Aunt Penny just sitting and relaxing!

Lego city in full progress...

Our missionary president presented a Christmas project for our Orphanage in India to us this month. She brought a jar and challenged us to save all of our change and bring it for the jar. We then would send this money to the Orphans to help them have Christmas. The kids took this very seriously and while the total count isn't in yet, I am guessing we have well over $300.00! Troy wrote down their guesses of how much there will be and lets just say some of them have a lot of faith!! I think the highest guess was around $100,000.00! :) You gotta love kids!

Thanksgiving Day arrived before we knew it! We had 25 people at our house for Thanksgiving Dinner! It was a wonderful relaxing day!

Take note of the China.....we usually have paper :) The china was a lot of fun!

Me and My Mom

My mom and my sister,Patti

Alex opted for his blankie, Lauren's sunglasses, and some Dr.Pepper!

The Saturday after Thanksgiving found us in our van headed to St Louis with 8 teens! Troy teaches the teen class and had promised them a trip to Mills Mall if they all made good grades on a class he taught. They did and he did! :) We had a blast! They ice skated, shopped, and generally kept us entertained! I wish I could just freeze them all where they are now and have them all live with me.....okay, I'm just kidding! They are really good kids though and it was our privilege to take them!

Well that about sums it up for November! I am going to try to do the days of Christmas...we'll see how that goes! The decorations are up, we have the next two weeks crammed full and then hopefully school will be out and we will relax......:)

Andrea's last chemo party!

2009-10-27T17:11:00.006-05:00

Monday, October the 12th our family loaded up and headed to St Louis for Andrea's last chemo celebration! We hadn't been up there as a family for over a year so everyone was pretty excited.
We arrived and Andrea got checked in. Then the party began! Confetti, singing, dancing, a no more chemo t-shirt, no more chemo sugar cookie and lots of smiles!!! We saw tons of people who have been through this whole thing with us from the very beginning. The pictures say more than words so I'll let them tell the rest!

Andrea and Dr. Gauvain. Dr. Guavain is Andrea's primary oncology Dr. and our "Angel"! Dr.Gauvain has had cancer herself so she more than sympathized with us, she emphathized! When I wondered if I was crazy for being scared for Andrea to stop taking chemo she assured me that she herself was terrified when she stopped her chemo. Dr Gauvain has been a real inspiration to our family and we will never forget what she did for Andrea!!

Let the party begin! Andrea was a little taken aback when they first started singing and dancing around! :)

Here is Bobby and Marsh holding her no more chemo shirt....she wears this shirt all the time to bed!

Andrea and Dr Bhatla....another one of our "angels"! Dr Bhatla has just recently completed treatment for cancer as well. She has taken care of Andrea many times when she was hospitalized and we love her to death!

Luke, Andrea, Tyler, and Travis waiting for her check-up. 8 people in a small room can get REALLY small, REALLY quick!! :)

Andrea....all smiles!

Andrea and her best buddy, Bobby! Bobby is truly an inspiration to our family! He is always happy and always has a smile and a hug! He made clinic so easy and something to look forward to! He sees pain and sorrow every day yet always has an encouraging word to give! We love you Bobby! You are part of our family now!!

Andrea and her favorite 4th floor nurse, Miss Kristin! Miss Kristin is our 4th floor angel!! Words cannot even begin to describe what she has done for our family...from a smile, a batch of cupcakes, to offering to take our laundry home and do it while we were in for a long stay! I know it isn't just our family she has taken care of....I have acutally seen her bringing clean laundry to rooms! ( I mean laundry she has taken home and done for someone! ) Krisitn loves God and has taken time to pray for us and with us! She lost her brother to cancer when he was fairly young and she has dedicated her life to trying to help kids with cancer smile! We love you Kristin!!

Andrea finishing her chemo was a bittersweet time believe it or not. It has been our life for the past two and a half years and that is a long time! All Andrea has know (that she can really remember) is having cancer. She still thinks she has Leukemia. We have tried to tell her it is all gone but, she just hasn't been able to process it all. My biggest fear is that we aren't doing anything at all now and will it really stay away. But, life goes on and you just have to keep trusting in God who has brought us this far!

After our 4 hour visit at the Costa Center we headed to a place we haven't been able to go to for 2 1/2 years.....Chuck E Cheese!!! This is a family favorite but has been out of the question with Andrea on chemo. We had special gift bags made for each of the kids since they have all had to sacrafice "normal" life on many different occasions. They have never complained and have rolled with the bumps like champs! I can't say enough good about these 6 awesome kids! I wouldn't trade them for all of the money in the world!!

Troy and I. Troy is my rock! He has always been so strong for our family through this time. If he ever got scared, I was in FULL PANIC mode because I know its really bad when he is scared!

5 Happy kids with their suprises! Alex was to busy eating another piece of pizza! :)

Mr Alex, enjoying a cold piece of pizza! This little guy keeps us all young!!

Sorry this post was so long but, 2 1/2 years is a long time to cover! :) Now we just wait for 5 years to see if we are all clear! Andrea will go every month for blood work for this 1st year to make sure everything is still okay. We go in about 2 weeks for her first check up. They tell us most relapses happen within the first two years and then after that the chances lessen. We are going to just take it one day at a time and enjoy every moment we have! God has been so good to us and our heart overflow with greatfulness!!!!

2009-10-07T15:27:00.002-05:00

Lauren found Alex on the kitchen floor the other day playing with his "Thomas" trains. She got some really cute pics and I wanted to share them! It is so fun to watch him play, he is very serious about what he is doing!

I bet he was really impressed with himself that he actually got more than 2 to stay together!

Of course if you have your paci it makes everything more fun!

This is my favorite! He is totally lost in his own little world!!

Shout it from the roof top!

2009-10-07T15:14:00.002-05:00

To any of you who know my husband, Troy, this will be no shock at all! :) Troy promised our church sometime ago that the first time we had 100 people in church he would schedule a service where he would preach from the roof. This Easter we had 171 people at our morning service. ( This included around 50 people from the Penn View Bible Institute Choir, so not counting them we had around 120) So on the 30th of September we had our "roof top" service! It turned out really neat! Troy loves roofing therefore he loves being on the roof! He acted like he had fallen off the back side of the church and scared me half to death...I yelled and he laughed! :) The newspaper and the local TV station showed up for the unusual service as well. Who knows what we will be doing next....with Troy, you NEVER know!

Heading up...

He looks right at home here!

Pastor Troy up in the air~

Camping Out

2009-09-28T08:27:00.002-05:00

This past Friday night my kids ( part of them ) decided it would be the perfect night to camp out in their tent. Troy used to join them but, has since decided if your bed is only a few feet away it is much wiser to make good use of it! I, by the way, DO NOT camp unless I have a room with a door and a lock, a bathroom, and a mattress ~ in other words a RV at the very least!! Luke, Tyler, Travis, and Andrea got their stuff together and headed out! Now I was thinking they would be right in the backyard where I could just look out the back door and check on them, but no..... they went way back in the woods much to my dismay!!! Troy and I went out around 11 pm to make sure they were okay and this is what we found....

Andrea having the time of her life with her great brothers!

Luke and Andrea and Travis. Travis is in the background with his burnt fingers in a bucket.....they had a nice little campfire with bricks around the edge and Travis saw that one of the bricks was out of place so not thinking about it being hot ( 8 year old boys don't always think first :) ) he tried to move it and burned his two middle fingers pretty bad

Travis with a very pained smile! Poor little man, he ended up coming inside and staying so I could play nursemaid

Tyler has a very shocked look in the pic...I'm not sure what the reason for this is!

Here they all are with Troy making sure everything is safe...

Since we couldn't see them from the house, I sent my cell phone out with them so I could check in or they could call if they needed us. About 1:30 am I started worrying about what could happen (worrying about what COULD happen is what any good mother does! :) ) out there so I tried calling about 5 times with no answer. I knew I would never sleep now, so I drug Troy out of bed with Lauren going along for fun and out we traipsed through the backyard and into the woods. Of course they were all very soundly sleeping so back to bed we went with me laying awake until around 3am still....worrying!!!!! :) Next camping trip is already being planned but all involved have been pre-warned that the tent with be within good view of the back deck!!!

Visit to Oklahoma

2009-09-28T08:18:00.003-05:00

A week ago today Troy, and I, Lauren, Luke, Tyler, and my sister Penny made a flying trip to Oklahoma City. My dad had been in the hospital with a blood clot on his lung and we decided it was time for a suprise visit!! I am pretty sure it was a big suprise! :) He was shocked a we were happy to spend a couple days visiting him and his wife, better known as Nana Kim!

It was a great visit that just ended to fast!! Thankfully my dad is starting to feel some better!!

2009-09-26T10:26:00.002-05:00

September 28th, 2009 will be a very remembered day in the Truitt house!! Andrea took her LAST dose of steroids tonight!!! I'm not sure how much she comprehended the significance of the moment but, I will say, the rest of our family sure did!! You could probally have heard the shouts of joy clear down the street!! She will take her last chemo on October the 3rd and I'm sure there will be more celebration!!!

Hugs of joy!!!

Opening up for the last dose!

The last swollow!

Help!!!

2009-09-17T11:36:00.003-05:00

Can a person get any help around here???!!!!

This is what happen when you are a mom with an 18 month old who is left to his own devices while you are trying to teach 5 kids school! :) I guess Alex was hungry and he decided if he was going to fix that problem he would have to take matter into his own hands! He did a good job of it....at least he did a good job of making a HUGE mess! When its baby # 1 or 2 you promptly correct them, when it is #6 you quickly get the camera and then blog about it! :)

Family Vacation

2009-09-08T22:11:00.009-05:00

September brought the long awaited date for our vacation in Branson, MO. We left our house on Saturday morning and landed in Branson that afternoon. We stayed at a beautiful condo right on Table Rock Lake. We could look out our back deck and see the lake. It was a very much needed relaxing week! We spent the first day, Sunday, just relaxing and enjoying the peaceful quietness! I think I would like to have a vacation that was a week of Sundays!!!!!
Monday the boys stayed at the condo and enjoyed some kyaking, playing basketball, picking up seashells and doing a lot of nothing. Lauren and I headed to town to the outlet malls and spent some "girl" time together. On Monday night we went to see "Shepherd of the Hills". It was a great evening although pretty chilly! Thankfully we had hoodies and blankets! Alex did great! He was a little scared when they started shooting the guns but got over it real quick!

The boys waiting....not so patiently!

Lauren, Alex, and Andrea.....waiting

Troy and me

Tuesday morning found us out on the Lake on a deck boat. This has become a tradition for us every year we come here. The kids probally look forward to this about more than anything we do! It was a picture perfect day and we had a great time! We always pack a lunch and do a lot of pulling the kids on the tubes. Here we are headed out with our trusty skipper at the wheel!

Alex wasn't to impressed with riding on the tubes...he kept himself entertained by eating anything and everything he could get his hands on!

I love this picture! Andrea and Lauren were the first two on the the tube and the boys looked so cute all in a row watching them.

Alex finally gave in and crashed for a hour or so.

Wednesday our great friends, the Boardmans, came and joined us. The kids were all so excited to see each other. Emily and Andrea are pretty much joined at the hip! We headed off to Silver Dollar City for two days of fun!

Andrea was so excited when she finally convinced the big kids to take her and Emmy on a water ride....none of us adults were willing! They rode the great American Plunge and got drowned!

Ben and Lauren were pretty much drowned rats after about 4 times on the American Plunge!

Troy doing what he always does....on the phone! :)

Do you have any idea how hard it is to get 6 kids looking at the same place with their eyes all open and a decent look on their face?! I tell you it is no easy job!! I think we did it.....?!!

17 years later and still smiling!

The Boardmans

Best Friends! Their shirts say " I found my prince and his name is Daddy!" Lets hope we can keep it that way for a long time!!

Harder than just 6 kids is 8 people! :)

Daddy and his girls

Tyler....10 years

Travis.....8 years

Lauren.....15 years

Andrea.....5 Years

Alex.....19 months

Luke.....13 years

We always have to ride the train and this time was no exception. We got robbed.....AGAIN!

Me, Alex, and Troy

Andrea and Emily with some incredible poodles...they could walk all around on their back two legs! It was amazing!

On Saturday before we headed out of town we went and road go -carts. Here is Andrea. If I judged her driving by how she drove this go-cart....she will never have a liscense!! :)

Troy and Travis making a lap around the track

Well as sad as it is....all good things to soon come to an end! We packed up and headed back home almost feeling more tired than when we left! :) How does that work? When you find out please let me know! We arrived home to 17 people and a semi family reunion at our house! More on that a little later! Hope you all have had a great summer! I am so sad that summer and the warm is soon to be gone! I DO NOT like the cold!!!!

Camp and Misc

2009-08-19T19:30:00.006-05:00

The end of July and the first week of August found us making our yearly trek to our Family Church Camp. This year our camp was held on a beautiful campground in Dickson, TN ( in other words...the middle of absolutely nowhere!!) The kids were totally impressed by the awesome creek that ran through the campground....I can't say the moms were so pleased....piles and piles of wet clothes which add up to piles and piles of laundry. Need I say more?! It really was a great place for the kids to play and stay cool! I will admit I even ventured down and waded for awhile! :) Here is Andrea and her cousin Alissa Jones. The first thing they did after lunch every day was to head straight for the creek!

Andrea...

Tyler and his cousin, Jillayne Jones...it must have been a little cool this day because their lips look blue!

Travis, his cousins, Branden Jones, Josh Yancey and Caleb Boardman

Me and Alex out in the creek

The kids program on Sunday morning....I'm not sure my kids were even fully awake yet! :)

Bro Steve Robinson found an electric wheelchair and put it to good use....giving the kids rides! Here is Andrea, Bro Steve, Brooklyn Yancey, Emily Boardman, Addison Boardman and Bethany Boardman

Bethany Boardman, Andrea and Brooklyn Yancey

We had a great camp this year! I really didn't want to make the trip because Troy had to preach a camp in Idaho the same dates so he couldn't come with us. This and the fact that Andrea had just had her big chemo and was on steroids didn't really sound like fun to me. We all missed him being there really bad but we did have a great time getting to see all of our friends and family and we also had some wonderful services! We made it home in one piece and have had a couple weeks of not to much happening....well we wish we had experienced a couple weeks of not much happening! :)

We got an early start on school this year and started last week. I am trying some new stuff this year and so far it is going great. Of course how could it go bad the first few days?!

Andrea and her big owie! She was running on the concrete and bit the dust! She got a huge fat lip and some concrete burns.

Alex loves shoes.... he found a pair of Luke's and decided to give them a try.

Me and Alex...he is growing up so fast!

Andrea had a chemo treatment today in St Louis. She decided to take charge and be the Dr while we were waiting . She assesed my problems and told me I was in need of a two hour nap!

Andrea's best buddy in the Costa Center, Bobby. Bobby has been Andrea's nurse since she started going to clinic. She bosses him around and tells him how to do his job...he just laughs!

During our hospital visit today we got to see one of our favorite 4th floor nurses, Kristin. Kristin is one of the first nurses I remember when Andrea was first diagnosed with Leukemia 2 years ago. My very first memory of her is Kristin asking me if she could pray with me when I was scared and crying because Andrea was going in for one of her first spinal taps and bone marrow aspirates. I was terrified that she was going to wake up and feel something. Kristin has been way more than just a nurse...she is our family!

This is how we ended our day....Alex jumped out of the bathtub, grabbed a Krispy Kreme donut he found and was running around the house buck naked chowing down! :) I guess you have to be a mom of boys to see the humor in this!

We leave for family vacation a week from today. The kids all let me know every day how many more days until we leave!! We are actually going to stay at our houst the first few days and do some fun stuff that is close to home, tubing down the Black River and 4 wheeler riding at a huge 4 wheeler park. Then we will head on over to Branson for a week. Hopefully I will be posting vacation pics soon!

Finished Object....My First Finished Object!

2009-07-23T00:39:00.006-05:00

I am feeling so happy that I finally finished something...other than laundry!! I found this pair of shorts and thought I would make a skirt for Andrea. I cut the shorts off about 2 inches below the zipper

Gathered a rufflle on a straight piece of material that was about 1 1/2 times as wide as the shorts. The ruffle was at least twice as wide as the shorts.

And what do you know.. it actually turned out!! I covered the seam with a 3/4 inch ribbon topped with a 3/8 inch ribbon.

Made a wild looking bow to match...

And here is the whole outfit! It was a lot of fun and now I'll do it again! I can find shorts or pants at thrift stores for a little bit of nothing. The material only cost me about $3 and the ribbon was about 25 cents! Nolw I just need a picture of her in it...maybe I'll get one when we go to St Louis for chemo on Friday!

May and June

2009-07-06T17:00:00.010-05:00

I finally found a few spare moments to catch up with all of my blogging friends! These past two months have flown by in a whirlwind!! We started out the first Sunday of May in our new church building. It was a very exciting day for all of us! The mayor of our city even came for our ribbon cutting ceremony.We are so happy to have a place of our own after 5 years of renting.

My sister and her family were able to be here for our first service....here is Andrea and her cousin Alissa. Andrea wasn't supposed to be at church since her blood was very low, but we snuck her in the back door and let her stay in Troy's office.

My nephew and nieces: Branden, Alissa, and Jillayne Jones
Alex and Travis

Celebrating Mother's Day on Saturday evening since Sunday's are so busy for our family! My kids all made me cry when they all told me why they loved me as their mom...the funniest was Tyler who said he loved me because I cooked him good food! :) I'm telling you the way to any mans heart is through his stomach!

Me and the greatest 6 kids in the world!!! ( Sorry about all of the squinting..it was very sunny!)

Andrea is one of my only willing kids to get pictures taken!

May is the month of birthdays for us...Tyler turned 10 on May 17th and Travis turned 8 on May 14th.

Look at all of those curls....we finally decided they had to go....

This was not a fun experience for any of us involved in this first haircut! I felt like I was dancing and turning in circles just trying to get the job done!

He was all worn out after all that trauma!! My baby boy looks like a little man now!

Luke celebrated the big 13 on May 29th. Now we have two teenagers in our house!! It is a lot of fun!!

The 2nd week of June brought another youth camp in Fulton MO. We had about 180 people registered this year which was a new record for us! Once again we had an incredible week! The week after our youth camp finished, Troy preached a youth camp in Greenfield,IN. Lauren,Luke, myself, Josh and Ben Boardman all went with him. By the time that week was over we were all ready for collapse!!

My mom and my grandma....they were my lifesavers at youth camp!!

Nana and Alex......best buddies!

Holly McCarthy and I seem to be having a serious converstation.....HOW many rolls do we need?!!

Don't tell anyone but we have more fun than should be allowed cooking for all of these kids!

The highlight of youth camp is the awards ceremony on the last day. Troy, Robert Jones, and Dave Boardman passing out the medals.

This is Troy and Roberts favorite week out of the whole year!! They love these kids!!

Once again we did our celebrating for Fathers Day on Saturday evening.....the greatest Dad in the world with his great kids!

Troy and the boys

When we finally made it home from our travels, our project of the summer awaited us! We have all saved our money for several years and finally had enough to buy a 15x30 oval swimming pool. According the sellers it would be a very easy job for someone in construction.....we won't go into all of the details but to say the least easy isn't exactly the words I think Troy would use to describe the job!!

The walls are finally up...now all we need is the .....

WATER!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy July 4th!!!

Alex and Nana ready to celebrate!

Our friends Justin and Kelly Brown came up from Indiana to spend the weekend with us. They have never been to Lambert, Home of the Thrown Roll so we all went there for lunch. As usual we went in starved and came out never wanting to eat again!

Justin and Kelly

Troy and Jenn

Why do boys (men) love to play with fire? I guess that is one of those unanswered questions!! :)

Andrea was so sick this weekend from her big chemo treatment but I caught this smile in a moment when she was feeling better.

The kids were laying on the edge of the road watching the fireworks.

Tyler and Alex watching the big firework show in Jackson. Alex wasn't scared at all! He loved watching the fireworks!

What a great country we live in! In spite of all the things that seem to be going backwards, I am still prould to be an American!!
I am finally caught up and now I can rest in peace at night! :) Hope all of you are having a wonderful summer!!!

We are still on the map!

2009-06-15T01:28:00.001-05:00

I know it has a been a long time since I blogged but I am really hoping to get to catch up in a couple weeks. As for right now we leave for Youth camp in about 4 hours and all of my waking moments which have been quite a few have been fill with prep! We are really excited with a record registration of over 180! Keep us in your prayers this week that we will be a blessing!!

2009-04-30T12:02:00.005-05:00

Hi everyone! Thought I would catch up since my last post. To start off Andrea landed in the hospital on a Saturday morning about 2 weeks ago. She woke up wheezing and coughing so since her counts were already extremely low it was a direct trip to stay overnight! She wasn't sad of course since she loves to spend the night.... I'm not sure I could totally agree but, we do end up sp Rending some quality time together so we might as well make the best of it! Troy loves to go up and there and meet new people. To those who know Troy that wouldn't be shocking! He met at least 2 new families who had been recently diagnosed with the same thing as Andrea so we did our best to encourage them.

Here is Andrea in the ER...very impatiently waiting to go up to "her room"

We were soooo excited to get to see Bridgett who we hadn't seen in months!! She was Andrea's nurse for the day and that was great! They both had their Cardinal outfits on so we had to get pictures!!

Andrea and Bridgett

Me and Andrea just laying around! Andrea was really upset that night and wanted me to sleep in bed with her. Does this look like a bed built for two?!!

Andrea loves to go to the playroom and do crafts. She doesn't really appreciate the mask but is willing to put up with it if she can do what she loves to do best....create!

We got to go home on Sunday evening so it was a short stay!

Lauren's 15th Birthday was on the 21st of this month. I am still trying to come to grips with my "baby" being old enough to drive now! She is an awesome daughter and we are so blessed to have her!~ Tyler, Travis and Andrea were in Illinois with Nana visiting cousins so we decided to go out to eat at Texas Roadhouse. The guys of course wanted to make Lauren crawl up on the horse saddle and endure humiliation but, I put my foot down!:)

Alex was totally into the peanuts...shell and all!!

Luke and Ben are looking a little on the bored side here, I think Lauren was opening her presents.

Alex and one of his favorite people...Josh Boardman

The beautiful Birthday girl!

We have had this old dead tree in our front yard and Troy decided it was time for it to come down. Unbeknowns to us there was a mother racoon and her 4 babies living inside. When it fell the mother ran off and one of the babies was hurt really bad. You would have thought that we had just seen one of our family members injured! We tried to help it but it didn't make it. Troy and Luke gave it a decent burial...there were several tears shed and we had to move on. I know you make think we are strange but, I guess we just consider all of God's creation to be just that, God's Creation! My men are all "real men" but I'm very thankful they have tender hearts from the oldest to the youngest! That evening Troy took the mother a plate of food...Grill pork steak, baked potatoe and french bread. He told the kids that he felt really bad and the food would by no means replace what had happened to her baby but, he sure did feel bad!

There it goes! It looks so much better in our fron yard now!

Yesterday was Andrea's scheduled visit to go to St Louis for her monthly IV chemo. I decided to take Emily Boardman and Alissa Jones ( Andrea's cousin ) along for the day! Andrea was so excited to have her best buddies going along. They all spent the night together and were up bright and early, ready to go! Nana and Mammaw came out to stay with the rest of the gang here.

Here are the girls with Nana

Out on the front porch ready to leave.... I know I am biased but aren't they just the cutest things?!!

The girls with Bobby ( Andrea's nurse that she has every time she goes to the Costa Center)

Andrea, Emily and Alissa in front of the hospital.

I have my sisters 3 kiddos with me this week while Troy, Lauren and Luke are in PA at Penn View campus days where Troy is speaking. This means I have 7 kids ages 9 and under...we are having a great time and it especially made my day when Tyler and Jillayne told me today that they were going to fix lunch for everone! I was so proud of them.....they made lunch and even cleaned up their mess!!

Their finished product!

The little "angel" :) Looks like he might have a trick up his sleeve!

That pretty well sums up the last few weeks for us. Andrea got a really bad report as far as her blood counts go yesterday. She pretty much has no immune system right now. This usually lands her in the hospital at least for a few day so we would appreciate prayer that God will keep her safe!! With Troy and our older kids being in PA ( only 16 hours away :) ) , my mom having Bronchitis/Sinuitis/Pneumonia, and me having my sisters kids while they are moving from Illinois to Alabama it isn't an ideal time for this to all be going on!!! But, I am constantly reminded that God always works "all things together for good"!!

Catching up from April

2009-04-15T10:58:00.012-05:00

These past two months have flown by...literally! We started March out by traveling to Duncan, Oklahoma for a revival. Our whole family went and we had a great time! We landed back in town only to head out 2 hours later to Alabama to our good friend, Morris Snodgrasses funeral. Somewhere during this time my great friend, Heidi Boardman and I went Bus Convention as well! On April 1st I took Andrea to St Louis for her spinal tap and big chemo treatment, we came home look at a church and then bought the church, and we started revival with Mark Cravens...all in the same day! WOW!

This is our new church...we should have posession by the 1st Sunday of May. I can't tell you how excited we are all about this!!

Emily and Andrea at Revival

The month of April also brings many Birthdays for our family!! My grandma's 87th B-day was on the 9th so the kids and I got a flat of flowers and some lunch and went to celebrate!! I hope I can have as much energy as her when I am 87.....I better find some vitamins cause I'm not doing to good!

Andrea and Mammaw

Lauren, Nana, and Andrea at Mammaw's party

Our great friends Dave and Heidi Boardman took Troy and I out to Outback Steakhouse to celebrate my b-day a few days early. We had a wonderful time as usual and shared a lot of laughs! :)

Dave and Heidi

Me and my Sweetie!

Our next major project was preparing to host the Penn View choir and orchestra on Easter Sunday. This was an overwhelming task to say the least but, when we all work together how much fun we can have!!! We started early Saturday morning at Sam's and Wal-Mart to gather all of our groceries.

My mom and my grandma loading up one of the vans

Next on to the Center to get busy cooking for 100 people!

The choir came in on Saturday evening and the Boardman's hosted a pizza picnic at their house...how many of you would like to feed 85 people at your house?!!

My sister and her family were able to come for Easter for the 1st time since I can remember! These 3 girls had a great time playing!

Emily Boardman, Andrea, and Alissa Jones

My sisters and me...better than just sisters they are my best friends!!

Patti, Penny and Me

Part of the choir

Another part of the choir~

Me, Andrea and my mom on Easter Sunday....can you believe I didn't get one picture of my kids on Easter...all of that work for us all to match and not even a record of it! :(

Me and my mom...she is the very best!!!!!

Travis, Branden Jones and Caleb Boardman... you have to love boys!
My birthday was acutally on Sunday and my sister's was on Friday so Sunday night we celerated them all! The past few weeks have been a little tiring to say the least but, we sure made some great memories! We had 175 people on Easter Sunday with 57 of those being in the choir! Our church is really excited and I am thinking we have some great days ahead!

A day in the life of Alex

2009-03-23T18:25:00.005-05:00

For being such a laid back little guy, Alex gets into more stuff than all of the other kids combined! We never know what we will find when he disappears and is quiet for awhile! The following pictures will tell the story...

It sure is hard work to unload those kitchen drawers!

All of that toilet paper just setting there on the roll...got to fill up that bowl and swirl it around for good measure.

The box of crayons and pencils is much more fun to play with when it is emtpy.

Emptying out all of Andrea's barretts and rubber bands

Talking on the cell phone...something you learn rather young when you have a 15 year old sister!

Does this sweet angelic face look like it could have wrecked all off the above havoc?!! Well it can and it did! :) The following picture is what happens when you work to hard!

Thank goodness for a big brother to rescue you and let you get a little rest from your very busy day!~

Andrea's Birthday

2009-03-23T13:44:00.003-05:00

Wow...that is all I have to say about our lives over the last two months!! I can't believe how much has happened since my last post! A quick overview since it would take way to long to catch up all of the way. We made a trip to Shreveport,Louisianna for a Minister's meeting. Most of the kids stayed here with my mom and their cousins. We had a great time being with our pastor friends! We were home for a couple weeks and then my friend, Heidi and I headed to Indianapolis for a Sunday School Bus Convention. We still aren't sure how we pulled that one off but we had a lot of fun and learned a lot as well! Three days later our family left for Oklahoma for Troy to preach a meeting for a week. We had a great time while we were there and also got to see a lot of friends and family we haven't seen for awhile. We made it back home on Monday after driving all night and Lauren and I got back in the car two hours later and head to Alabama to the funeral of our friend, Morris Snodgrass. It was a quick trip and we got back home around 2am on Wednesday morning to be welcomed by the stomach flu. :( This is only our 4th or 5th round this winter...ugggh!! To say the least I feel like my world has spun totally out of control! I am hoping for a very dull boring life this month,but alas I have consulted my calander and it is just not meant to be! I know I shouldn't make excuses for my sad lack of blogging but.... I am going to post some pics from the highlights of the last two months, the first being Andrea's 5th birthday.

We started the day out with a field trip to a T- shirt making place. The girls had a great time making their new shirts!

Andrea surrounded by her presents

Andrea's main wish was roller skates...looks scary to me!

This is the best present of all, a great friend!

Tyler thought Alex would like to try out the roller skates...he was very impressed!

Hopefully I'll be back soon to continue! :)

Happy First Birthday Alex!

2009-02-12T11:06:00.004-06:00

We were a week late celebrating Alexs' birthday since we were on our southern tour on his big day. He didn't even seem to mind. :) We carried on our tradition and got him his own little cake to dive into all by himself. He had a blast playing in the icing and sqeezing it through his fingers but, he wouldn't even taste it one time! He is not a sweet eater and I guess he decided it was just too much sugar! The other kids were really dissapointed about this and did their best to get him to at least take a tiny taste...no way!

Alex and Troy....One year old!

Wow, can I really touch this?!

This is gonna be fun...

He is really getting into this now!

This is hard work,

Squishy, Squishy, Squishy!

Now onto more fun things...getting my first big boy truck from Papaw and Nana

What should I do with this big bag?

I'm not sure what this face is all about!

I can't hardly beleive a year has gone by already!! Happy Birthday to our sweet little guy!

Sledding Fun!

2009-02-12T07:44:00.006-06:00

We arrived home from Alabama to ice and snow!! The luggage was thrown out of the car and into the house in short order! Everyone was in their snow clothes and outside in a matter of minutes! :) Alex and I even joined them for a little while. Our backyard is one huge long hill so it is perfect for sledding. The best part is the 4- wheeler coming and picking you up at the bottom of the hill so you don't even have to walk back up!! Talk about taking it easy.

Tyler, ready to go again!!!

Luke the taxi guy!

Andrea was all smiles and having a ball! She missed out a lot on sledding last year because of being to sick and worn out.

Alex loves to be outside! If he sees a door open he is on his way as fast as he can go! He wanted to get down and crawl around in the snow.

Andrea, Alex, and Travis

Andrea and Alex taking a ride

Making snow angels!

Troy, Lauren, Travis, Alex and Andrea..... Andrea and Alex did NOT go on this run!

Luke and Alex

Troy and Andrea ready to go down together...there is a story to their ride! They had a wreck and the sled flipped with Troy landing on Andrea... she got a huge snow scrape on her forhead and chin and ended up with a bloody nose. Do you think that stopped her? No way, she dried her tears, wiped her nose and went back to having fun!

I was not so brave at sledding! I screamed the whole way down at the top of my lungs with my hands and feet dragging and grasping at anything!

This picture was acutally taken at the hospital when Andrea was waiting for her chemo. If you look close you can see her battle wound on her forhead.

Memories made that will never be forgotten!!!

Fun in Alabama

2009-02-01T22:25:00.006-06:00

Our family ended Youth camp tour on Friday night in Pleasant Grove, Alabama. We were going to leave on Saturday morning and head for home. A terrible winter storm had hit Cape during the week and left it covered in about 3 inches of ice topped off with 4-6 inches of snow! We were going to be unable to have church and also unable to get into our driveway so...we staying where it was only about 60 degrees! :) Thanks to our great friends, the Snodgrasses who so graciously let us hang out at their house! The kids were all thrilled we were staying as you can see by the happy smiles!

Lauren and Katie...best of friends!

Andrea...I'm not sure what she was doing! Look at that out of control hair- where was her mom?

We had a carry-in dinner at the Parsonage for Sunday lunch~ so much yummy food!

Tyler who is always "starving to death" is all smiles with that full plate!

The kids playing board games...

Travis, getting ready to make his next move.

Tara is looking a little concerned!

Luke and Alex just chillin'

Me and my great friend, Connie. We have a lot of things we both love to do...Scrapbook, Blog , read, shop ~

Lauren and Katie

Alex was very greatful for the break he got from being in the carseat!

Sunday night snack-time.

We are so blessed to have such wonderful friends!! Thanks again, Steve, Connie, Katie and Tara for sharing your home with us for a very memorable weekend!

On The Road...

2009-02-01T16:15:00.004-06:00

We have spent many hours on the road together this past week! I thought I better get a few pictures so we don't forget all of the fun we have had! Now if you ask Alex how much fun he has had....even though he can't talk let I am sure he would be happy to give you his opinion of youth camp tour!! :)

Troy has been faithful to keep us on the right road with "Mabel" our trusty GPS system that is on his cell phone

I spent most of my time on the computer getting everything printed for the services! How did we do it before lap tops and air cards?!

Lauren....texting and listening to her MP3 Player.

Luke....just relaxing!

The Three Muskateers in the back row!

Mr "not so happy traveler" Alex

We ended up getting to spend the weekend here at the Snodgrasses since there was still
3-4 inches of solid ice on the church parking lot and we were not able to have services there today. The other problem is we still can't get to our house since our driveway is a steep hill down to our house and is also covered in the same amount of ice. We are hoping it will be melted enough tomorrow for us to be able to get in! Thanks Snodgrass family for letting us stay and have a blast with you all! I'll try to post some pics of the weekend tonight or tomorrow!

Happy 1st Birthday Alex!!!

2009-01-28T13:58:00.003-06:00

Happy 1st Birthday to my baby boy!

New Year Pictures

2009-01-18T14:56:00.004-06:00

Cole Truitt...he was my little buddy!

Cole and Alex found thier favorite place...the toy closet.

Karissa and Andrea hiding out at the kitchen table so they could play Polly Pockets with no boys bothering them. The girls are way outnumbered on the Truitt side of the family!

Alex with his bestest buddy, Lauren. Look at that wild hair!! Troy is telling me its time for a haircut but the curls are just to sweet!

A boy can never have to many matchbox cars!

Me and my favorite guy!

Stevie and Seth...can you see the mischief in those eyes?!

Just waiting to dive into those presents.

Karissa... her eyes just sparkle!

The Truitt clan, well part of them. We kept meaning to try and take a family picture...you try rounding up 12 kids at the same time not to mention them being dressed and looking presentable all at the same time! I guess we just didn't have the energy we needed!

Our family drove to Adamsville, Alabama on Christmas eve to spend a few days with Troy's famly. Troy had to preach a funeral that morning so we were packed up and headed out as soon as he got home. Katie and Tara Snodgrass had spent a few days with us so we loaded them up as well to take them home. We had a great time with all 20 of us at Jesse and Mandy's house. Out of the 20 people there, 12 of them were under the age of 15...so there were no dull moments to say the least!

Random Christmas Pictures

2009-01-08T17:20:00.003-06:00

I finally got some pictures downloaded from Christmas. There is really no order to them...:)
Penny, Jenn, Patti, Mammaw, Mom

Lauren and Troy

Emily, Andrea and Alissa on Christmas Sunday

Troy, Alex and Jenn after Alexs' dedication.... a funny story to go along with his dedication! Sunday morning was crazy around here with company and with me finding out I had to play the piano about 15 minutes before we were supposed to leave for church. So I asked Luke to get Alex dressed and ready since I was running around in a dither! I told him what to put on him and left him with it. I was on the piano bench when we went up to have Alex dedicated. To my horror his hair had not been combed and was wild with little curls all over the top of his head, he had on a cute outfit, white tube socks and no shoes. He had cute little navy oxfords that he was supposed to be wearing but, when I told Luke to put his white knee socks on him, he just grabbed a pair of white play socks and couldn't get his shoes on so.....there he was! I guess that's what happens when you are #6 and your mother is maxed out! We did get a good chuckle out of it and he was dedicated with no problem even with messy hair and no shoes!:)

Alissa and Andrea at Lambert's

Alex...see all of those teeth!

Andrea and Troy at Lambert's

Cousins are such fun! It was quite an act trying to get 9 kids to look at the same time and smile! They look like they are in pain!

Our happy little guy!

Opening Presents.

I think he is a little tired and dazed!

Troy and Lauren

The kids decorating their 1st gingerbread house.

Alex

Hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas and are enjoying a great New Year! I'm going to try to work on New Year pictures soon!

Happy New Year!

2008-12-30T01:10:00.000-06:00