My Love

Three years ago today I married the love of my life. We had the most perfect wedding and honeymoon. No thought to how we would pay off our wedding/honeymoon debt. Or how we would all learn to live and love together as a family of 6. Alex (my oldest child) went from being an only child to having a step dad, two step brothers and within 1 year a baby sister (we didn’t plan that one either- God did) I thought we would have a perfect/American dream house that had perfect décor. The fact is we don’t even own a house and that's ok. Sometimes God has other plans, and I’m glad He does. You see God knew exactly what he was doing when he made us a family. And just so you know all that American Dream stuff- it really doesn’t matter. But that is another day and another blog post.

So today I celebrate my love for Chris and the marriage God has blessed us and continues to bless us with!

I love Chris for so many reasons. Because he is a Godly man and leader to our McConnell Mob, he is loving, caring, laid back, a handy man, smart, witty, humble, honest, how he kisses me every morning before he leaves for work; how he still tells me I’m his hottie and sends me sweet texts. How he dances with me in kitchen, holds me when I cry, prays with me out loud, works hard for our family to provide and for me to stay home with our kids. I love how he strives to be Christ like, how he wants to serve others, how he listens to me constantly talk about when and if we can adopt, I love that he gets excited about us serving locally and in Haiti. Really when it comes down to it I’m just thankful that he is in Love with Jesus because without that the rest wouldn’t fall into place! I can’t wait, and am so very excited to see what the next three years will hold.

Here is a  peak into the day we became ONE.

Somebody turned the BIG 30!!

July is filled with birthday's- there are so many I can't even keep up. But on Friday my hubby turned the BIG 30! I got the kiddos to make him a poster and hung it in the kitchen for him to see when he came home from work on Friday.

Chris: I really don't feel any different now that I'm 30
Me: Thats only because youv'e hit the next stage of life that I'm in and you can't make fun of me anymore!

I wanted his birthday to be special so I booked the back room at a local BBQ joint and messaged all of his friends to show up and surprise him. I had my friend Rachel take the cake and balloons to restaurant. It was perfect... Chris thought it would be just us and one other couple eating for his big day and was very surprised/excited to see everyone when we got there. Afterwards a few friends came home to hang out with him for a while. He told me it was the BEST birthday he has ever had! 

Here is Johnny and Chris at our house after the birthday dinner. At least he doesn't act like he's 30, LOL.

The very next day- Saturday, was Leah's birthday!

 Her, and her husband Josh, Chris and I became friends over the past couple of years through our church. We took Marley and went to their house to play in the river and have a small get together that night for her 23rd birthday- she has some catching up to do, LOL. Oh what it was like to be 23!

Marley and Hudson in the river, she loves feeding him clams.

December through March and then some

Wow has it really been since December that I updated our blog?!? Well there is so much to share some exciting and some disapionting times and of course pictures to go along with it all. This post will be pretty long so bare with me. December was filled with lots of laughter and love, there is nothing like the sparkle in a childs eye and the magic that children believe that time of year.

 But it is also warming to hear my children remind each other the real reason we celebrate Christmas and that is JESUS. Im so thankful our children are continuing to learn of others less fortunate and that we have so much to be thankful for! Each of the kids filled a box for Operation Christmas Child for a coresponding child of their age, and we delivered them to a drop off point. I also paid the shipping online so that the children would recieve notification of where their boxes were delivered to.

Belize! Our boxes went to Belize they were so excited. The email had a link that provided us with information on the country of  Belize, I showed them where Belize was on the map, we looked at pictures and read all of the stats. It was a very heart warming moment and a huge blessing! We have already started buying items for this years boxes. With a little over 2 weeks off for Christmas break, that gave us time to make a ton of sweets! I can't even begin to tell you how many dozens of different cookies we made but here are a few pictures.

Making Gingerbread Men

The Finished Product

And each and every Christmas card we recieved was so thoughtful!

And then the big night comes Christmas Eve, being the procrastonator that I am we didn't complete Marley's big Santa present until the kids were in bed. And then we were up until almost 2am sawing, drilling, nailing, and painting four coats of paint, just so that our little pumpkin could play with her first kitchen playset (custom built by Daddy and painted by Mommy) on Christmas morning!

Valentines Day came and went the kids and I made some heart shaped sugar cookies with frosting.

 Chris surprised me with a new Willow Tree Angel- Je t' aime which means I Love you!

Then before I knew it.. it was here consignment season! For those of you that don't know I run a semi annual consignment sale called Be Green Consignment. You can visit my website at http://begreenconsignmentga.com/ The week of the sale was crazy as usual! It has grown a little each time, we had 5 new sellers this time and made over all about $400 more than the last sale. There wasn't a lot of profit because we bought all of our own clothing racks instead of borrowing like we have in the past.

Of course the same weekend as my sale the circus was in town (Atlanta) and we had tickets. I couldn't turn it down and it would be Marley and My very First time to the circus! And boy was I excited!

We had the best time, hope to take the kids again someday!

                                From March to April Alex had golf, they had a great season!

Marley loves watching her big brother play golf and thinks she can play too!

The months of March and April also brought Little League! I feel like we live at the ball field,  between Nathan, Nick and Chris softball we have games every night.

Nick's team the Ironbirds on opening day before the parade.

I would say from December to now we have been pretty busy! Just wait until I post our sprink break adventures, and after that I will really really try to stay caught up with our blog.