Happy Anniversary!

June 20th was our first anniversary. Crazy how times flies.

We went to Orange Beach, AL to stay in a condo that my aunt owns. We stayed there for our honeymoon too. Here we are last year.

We had a great time. We had some friends come stay with us too which made it even more fun! Mom let us drive her car down..thanks Mom! We ate breakfast and lunch at the condo everyday and then went out everynight. We ate at the Hangout, which is right on the beach, Tacky Jacks which is right on the water also, and then at Lulu's, which is Jimmy Buffet's sister's restraunt. They were all fabulous!We spent most of our days on the beach; reading, swimming, playing games.

Happy Anniversary, Matt! I love you! It makes me sad to think about next year...we'll be thousands of miles apart...

While we were gone the kids stayed with our parents. They stayed with Matt's parents the first night and then mine for the others. Jenna has such a great time. She loves them all so much. Carson doesn't really care yet. :)

And Baby Ben came to play with Carson too...here they are again! Carson and Baby Ben!

More Birthday

I finally got some other birthday pictures from my sister. I don't usually have party hats at my birthday party but Jenna has a book about a party and they have hats so lately we can't have a party unless we have them. I searched everywhere for these crazy hats. Is it not cool to have them anymore when you're a kid? Dollar Tree and both WalMarts didn't have them. I finally found these at Dollar General. What I do to make her happy...

New Pool

Daddy bought Jenna a new pool and she loves it!

Jelly

Jenna opened a pack of jelly at Cracker Barrel.

Can you tell she loved it?

Is there something on my nose?

Grandmother's House

My Grandmother had our family and Anna's family over for lunch on Saturday because her sister, Kathy, was in town with 2 of her granddaughters and her husband. My Grandmother fixed an AMAZING meal! Two of my favorite things she makes are squash and onions and pasta salad and she had both that day!!!

We love taking pictures of baby Ben and Carson everytime we get together so here they are this time!

And here is a cute picture of Grandmother telling Jenna a story about a trip she took. Jenna was very interested. She kept saying uh huh everytime Grandmother would pause. So cute! Thanks Grandmother for inviting us over!!

Riverbend

We went out on my best friend's boat for Montgomery Gentry at Riverbend. We couldn't see or hear the concert very well but we had an amazing night anyways! Love hanging out with them!

Family Day

Sunday afternoon Matt's unit had Family Day. It will be the last time everyone is together until Final Load Out(Deployment Day AKA Hardest Day of My Life). It was lots of fun. They had games for the kids, ponies to ride, food, softball games, games for adults, doorprizes. Matt played two games of softball. They won one and lost one. I didn't get many pictures because I had both children while he played. This is the entire unit, 252nd MP Company, in Formation on the softball field.

This is Matt's platoon, Headquarters. He is on the front row, second from the left.

And here is Jenna with a flower she picked while watching Daddy play softball.

At the end the Captain called all the families in for a meeting. He talked to us alot about the deployment. The short version on the timeline is this...They go on orders July 26 and leave for New Jersey July 29. They stay in NJ for about 34 days for training. Then they get a 4 day break in New Jersey just before leaving the country in early September, which means me and the kids will be making a big trip up there.(Pray for us!) They fly into Kuwait and stay there 7-10 days. After that it's on to Iraq for a year. There were lots of tears in the room; kids, wives, mothers, husbands, siblings, dads...you name it. It's amazing how fast all of this has happened from when they first got their orders. Only one more drill weekend and they will be leaving. It's crazy the stages you go through getting ready emotionally for it. Scared, mad, sad, numb, excited, worried...the list goes on. And then there are lots of physical things to take care of too....tons of paperwork, packing and moving, meetings...And then questions, How will I do this for a year? Will I hear from him everyday? Will he get injured? How will things be when he comes home? Will the kids remember him? On and on and on...But one thing that keeps all of us going is knowing that this is what he lives for. He loves it. There is so much honor in serving our country. This is what he was trained to do for the last 3 years and he is finally getting to put it to use. Anyways, this begins the season of my life that I want to go by oh so quickly...

Sleeping Angels

Jen fell asleep on the couch while I was upstairs getting ready. Sweet Babies!

Happy Birthdays

Ben and I have the same birthday, June 4. He was born on my birthday when I was 6 years old.

Mom and Dad took all of us out to Tony's to eat and then to Rembrant's for dessert. We had a great birthday night. Here are a couple pictures. (Lindsey took more with her camera so I will have to add them when I get them from her.)

Relaxing babies

Here are Baby Ben and Carson relaxing at Grandmother's house on a Sunday afternoon!

Moofest

Mayfield Dairy's National Moofest was this weekend in Athens. I read about it in an e-mail I got last week and really wanted to take Jenna. I waited until the morning of the Festival to start talking to her about it because I knew she would be excited and we would never hear the end of it until we got there. So Saturday morning I started telling her about the cows. She couldn't wait to get there. She has been to Mayfield before and knew exactly what I was talking about when I told her, smart little girl. She wanted Josh and Sheri to go because that's who went last time but they had some fence issues in their backyard and couldn't go.

So we went to Moofest and she loved it. It was hot and there were tons of people so we didn't stay too long. She got to pet cows, pigs, a miniature horse and goats. They had a children's tent with coloring, face painting, and games. We went but the only thing she cared about was the coloring. I asked her if she wanted her face painted and that was a big NO! Of course we ate ice cream!! We got to try 2 of the new flavors for this year, Pomegranate Sherbet and Candy Bar. They were both really good! Little Carson slept the whole time but was very festive in his cow shirt, thanks to his Mimi! Jenna loved our trip to Athens and is still talking about the cows!

Surgery

Matt has a little out patient surgery done last week...poor guy...