Super Strong!

I love this picture of Reeser! Every Tuesday and Friday he has to take the trash cans into the garage and it cracks me up how big they are according to his little 4 year body! I keep telling him that I'm ok with him dragging them but he is insistent in showing me how strong he is!
But he doesn't have anything to prove to me ---he's always my little super hero:)

Back to OBU!

Me,Hayley, Mallory, Emily, and Abigail at OBU!

This picture is for Greg. This is the house he lived in during college- 311 West Georgia. I miss that house! Not sure who lives there now but I'm sure they didn't mind me on their porch:)


Saturday morning I went back to my alma mater, Oklahoma Baptist University, to show some of my Sunday School girls the campus. Greg and I teach juniors in high school at church and a few of the girls (Abigail, Emily and Hayley) had shown some interest in the school so I thought it would be fun to have a road trip! I haven't been back in years so I was so excited to go and show the girls the campus!
Now OBU is a small private college so it doesn't take long to give a tour of the campus. It was also SNOWING (more like a blizzard--no kidding-Oklahoma wind is brutal:) and that made it very unpleasant to walk around so we took the "quick" tour!
They had done a lot of renovations to the campus so it was fun to see all that had changed. We got to go through one of the girls dorms because one of our youth from last year (Mallory) went to OBU this year. It was fun to see her and she was able to show the girls even more than I could...I graduated in 2001 so it's been a while since OBU was graced with my presence:)
Well like I said it is a small school so after our 45 minute tour and some driving around town we headed to OKC to show them there was more to OBU than just Shawnee--which it not very impressive. :)
We were able to go to this absoluetly adorable coffee shop that some of my friends from college opened a few months back. It's called Cuppies and Joe --they sell all kinds of cupcakes and have great coffee....if you are ever in OKC look them up- it's a must see and you will just love the atmosphere! The girls loved the coffee shop too and hated to leave--they even tried to talk me into starting a cute little coffee shop here in Texas--it's very tempting--I LOVE to bake and have a ton of coffee shop experience but when I mentioned it to Greg he just laughed....do you think that means he doesn't think it's a good idea????:) Anyone out there want to go into business...give me a call!

Anyways we had a great road trip and it was fun to spend the day with the girls! They seemed to like OBU as far as I could tell--they were surprised how small it was but I think they hopefully got a glimpse of how great OBU really is!
Go Bison! ...yes our mascot was a Bison--awesome huh? Gotta love Oklahoma!

Abby and Reese chatting....

The other night I witnessed a pretty funny conversation between Abby and Reese.
Abby has been talking about St. Patrick's Day and leprechauns at school and she was telling Reese about it.

Abby- We made traps to catch the leprechauns at school for St. Patrick's Day.
Reese-What's a leprechaun?
Abby-I don't know but I know they're green and they wear a hat.
Reese- oh.. oh you mean like those guys that fix our toilets?
(this is where Abby and I die laughing) What?????

I have NO idea where he got this idea we have never had a green plumber come to our house.....he is such a character!
The funny thing is he wasn't telling a joke he was serious and only started joking around when we started laughing!
Anyways I thought this was a blog worthy conversation.....I don't want to forget a thing!:)
Aren't kids precious? I love how they think!

A Weekend of Eating!

Greg and me on the balcony at The Oasis

Beautiful huh? ~view from our table

Stacey and me and her belly---isn't she adorable???

Greg and me at the Salt Lick--one of many places we ate!

Us in front of the fountain at The University of Texas--we took a self guided tour!


While the kids were away at Cousins Camp (read the next post) Greg took me to Austin for a few days to celebrate my birthday! We headed out on Wednesday around 1pm hoping to make it into Austin around 4:30 or so. Well we had a slight delay in Hillsboro when we had a flat tire! Thankfully it happened with just Greg and me because it would have been ALOT more painful if we had to entertain the kids in the waiting room for 1 1/2 hours! We were able to get it taken care of pretty fast and made it to Austin by 6pm or so.
Now this is where the eating began! Greg has this "thing" about food---he likes to try anything and everything and is quite happy when we travel so he can pull out his Zagat book-it's basically a book of the best food places in every city and he likes to plan out our trips around the places we eat. Now this isn't so terrible because I can sure appreciate some good food--especially desserts--but it is VERY bad for the waist line! Let's just say we haven't been eating much since we got home---it's a form of punishment for our gluttony:)
Anyways- We ate at Z Tejas (amazing Southwest food), Kerby Lane Cafe (yummy pumpkin pancakes), Salt Lick (Austin style Bar-B-Que) and then at The Oasis (not good Mexican food but great atmosphere and sunset view over Lake Travis)
Also while we were in Austin we got to see my friend Stacey (college roommate) and her husband Steven.
They were the ones to introduce us to The Oasis and we had a great night of talking over chips and salsa and a beautiful sunset--what could be better?:)
It was great catching up with them and getting to see Stacey's pregnant belly!!! She's 21 weeks along and is having a boy! I am so excited for her and can't wait to see her in action as a Mommy--she's gonna do great!
Well we had a great time and when we weren't eating we were shopping with my birthday money--(thanks Greg for not complaining about that)--he was a sport going through all the boutiques and girlie stores--he even braved an Outlet mall with me:) He also surprised me with buying me a new dress that I didn't have to spend my birthday money on---he sure knows the way to a woman's heart huh? :) He says it wasn't all that bad....he got to eat and I got to shop....prefect compromise!

Texas Safari

***This is a guest blog by Debbie, Greg's mom, about Cousins Camp 2009***

Loading the tackle boxes
Safari ready

Abby, Charlie, Reese, Landry, MawMaw & Poppa headed out for our Cousins Camp Texas Safari this week. We played lots of games, sang LOTS of songs, read LOTS of books & just had LOTS of fun!

The first part of the trip was Fossil Rim Wildlife Park outside of Glen Rose. We'd done the drive through before, but never stayed over night.

Watering hole in front of our cabin

Pond & waterfall



We stayed at the Safari Camp where we had a tent cabin that overlooked a big watering hole where a lot of the animals come to drink & bathe. There are only a handful of the cabins so there weren't many people down there. We had plenty of room to explore the area. Right next to our cabin was a little waterfall & stream so the cousins had lots of fun wading in & playing around that. We did a night time hike around the area with our flashlights looking for glowing eyes. We did find several deer bedded down close by & saw a black widow spider on a log. The cousins also loved all the stars &, armed with their notebooks, identified lots of scat--we didn't see some of the animals, but knew they'd been there!







Identifying animals

The next morning a great breakfast was provided for us then we headed out for our drive through the park. We saw lots of animals not native to Texas--giraffes, zebras, rhinos, cheetahs, etc., along with several that are--mainly white tail deer.





These 2 pics are same spot, 2 yrs. apart



Ouch!

After lunch & ice cream we headed to Dinosaur Valley State Park where we saw some of the best preserved dinosaur tracks that have been discovered. We also cooled off with some wading in the Paluxy River.

From there we headed to our next overnight destination, Cleburne State Park. Poppa had prepared lots of science experiments for us and we had a great time doing those. Fire, colors & things that blow up & make messes were really a hit!





We cooked hot dogs for supper & made s'mores.
Both nights we learned Bible truths from stories from the zoo.

We started the next morning with bacon, eggs & biscuits, then went hiking. We had lots of fun getting off the trails to explore, throwing rocks at targets, checking animal tracks & climbing trees. A huge "discovery" on our hike was the camp "dump" off in the trees. It was the site where old building materials go to die--bricks, concrete, tiles, etc. Abby reported to her folks finding a house that must have burned down. Not far from the first pile was another with an old plywood Christmas tree. She declared that pile the attic. They all had fun "discovering."

We are happy to report that all 4 of the cousins were perfectly obedient going to sleep both nights. Everyone was respectful & went right to sleep. And they all woke up smiling in the mornings!

"Doodle bug, doodle bug..."

Favorites, as reported to Poppa:
Reese: just being with MawMaw & Poppa & his cousins
Abby: the science experiments
Charlie: Nothing, because he liked it all. He did say he really enjoyed the experiment where they "blew up" Cokes & he like hiking.
Landry: the scat [Landry was very observant finding & identifying it. He even found it in the dark!]

MawMaw & Poppa's favorites: enjoying God's creation, especially our 4 grandchildren & getting to enjoy those special things about each one of them; getting to be "MawMaw & Poppa" together; all those funny grandchild expressions: verbal as well as facial; hearing thankful hearts as we prayed together at each meal & at night; hearing all the grandchildren singing--everything from "Mighty Savior," "Step by Step" ("Poppa, you sing that one to us at bed time!") to "Chickery Chick, Cha-La, Cha-La," "Talk To the Animals" & "The Lion Sleeps Tonight."

Thanks to the Moms and Dads for letting them go with us. And thanks to the "cousins" for going & being so much fun!! Reckon what we'll do next year.....?

Camping

***This is a special guest blog by Greg. Becky was not feeling it today but wanted to get something out there to you faithful followers***

We went on Monday afternoon to Possum Kingdom State Park. Yep, it's called Possum Kingdom. I never found that humorous growing up but I think it's pretty funny now. We were going to go somewhere closer to home but I didn't get a campsite reserved in time so we had to hike it out to PK. The drive was actually quite nice-- weather was great and the scenery was lovely. It's kind of rugged and hilly out west.

When we got to the park we picked out a campsite and setup camp. The kids brought their cots that Granny and PaPa got them so we put up two tents to give us plenty of room. Reese decided we should have a boy tent and a girl tent. Since I'd never been camping with Reese before I agreed that we could bunk up together (I took Abby camping a year or two ago). He was really excited since he's been on a "daddy" kick lately.

After we setup camp we played around the lake throwing rocks and stuff like that. Then we cooked some hot dogs for supper and later some smores. The kids were asking to go to bed by about 8pm. We all went to bed by about 8:30-- probably the first time I've been to bed that early since gradeschool. It's a good thing too since the birds started choir rehearsals at about 6am.

After we ate donuts we packed up camp and drove over to the trailhead. It was nice and cool when we hiked around the edge of the lake and then up and over a "mountain". We're not talking about the Rockies here, but it was fun and offered some nice views of the lake. After the hike we rented a canoe and paddled around the lake for about 45 minutes. The kids thought it was a grand adventure and were both very thankful for the canoeing and the trip in general.



The kids getting ready for a ride---while we braved the wind!

Top of the "mountain"

setting up camp--not sure what Abby is doing???

They like to climb....alot!

Skipping rocks

Oh Happy Day!

digging in at the Cheesecake Factory!


Reese and Abby got a little carried away with the whip cream--Daddy kinda started it all:)

My Birthday cake--Abby was very concerned that I wouldn't have one because I always make the cakes for everyone! Smart girl that Abby.

Abby's gift to me---cake mix and icing

Reese got me my favorite gum and some chocolate covered raisins! Nice!

Thursday was my 31st Birthday! I must say I thought 31 would hurt a little more than 30 because I would be officially "into" my 30's!;) But that sure didn't matter after all was said and done because I felt very loved and celebrated and couldn't be more happy to be 31!!! (even with Greg hackling me for the next 6 weeks that he's still 30--thanks for that Greg) ...yes I am 6 weeks older than Greg:)
I got some very thoughtful gifts from the kids and Greg. The kids both had saved their money to buy me something very special (and so did Greg:) Reese bought me some gum and some chocolate covered raisins--two of my favorite things:) Abby got me a cake mix and icing because she really wanted me to have a cake and she wanted to make it with me! She helped with the whole thing and even wrote Happy Birthday Mommy on it with blue icing! Both were so thoughtful and I couldn't have asked for anything more!
Greg was really struggling with what to get me. He is always very intentional with his gifts and really wants to get just the right thing for me. But I think this time he just couldn't narrow it down...poor guy! He finally had to come to me and ask me and together we decided on a new watch. (and not a cheap Wal-mart watch that has a bad battery....speaking from experience!)
So together we went shopping and found the perfect one and I love it!
We also went to the Cheesecake Factory to have dinner-again! I have gone to the same place for the past 3 years-- I'm a creature of habit..what can I say?:)
Anyways it was a great day! I absoluetly love Birthday's and was kinda sad to go to bed on Thursday because I knew it was all over!:(
Well Thursday ended up not being the last Birthday celebration because on Saturday all of Greg's side of the family came over to have ice cream cake (so yummy) and give me gifts! We had a great time together and the kids even put on a little show for us--good times!
Well I guess I'll have to wait a whole 'nother year until my next "me day" luckily though Abby reminded me today that Mother's Day is just around the corner! (she always knows how to cheer me up:)

Little Piggie Opera

The proud family after the show!

Abby's class in in the front on their knees-Abby is 3 over from the left in a yellow sweater

Abby and her good friend Gabbie---they are crazy together...notice the missing teeth! I love it!

Tuesday night Abby's kindergarten class performed a musical called The Little Piggie Opera and it was so adorable!
They have been practicing for a couple months and Abby was so excited for us to all come see it. Poppa got it on video but it's kinda long so I won't post it but take my word for it --it was super cute!
She was pretty shy up there when she had to come to the front row but when she went back to her spot on the back row she seemed to warm up quite a bit! Greg and I both really love musicals so it was fun to see her perform in her first--hopefully many more to come....we'll see:)
Each kindergarten class was a different pig (straw (Abby's class), sticks, and brick) then another class was the big bad wolf. Reese was pretty concerned about the wolf part- he didn't want to sit in the front row but thankfully (for him) we had to sit quite a few rows back:)
~It is still weird for me to think Abby is in school and is doing musicals and stuff....I don't think I will ever get used to it but I'm sure enjoying every minute of it!
Way to go Abby --you're my SUPER STAR!

Imagination Movers!!!!!!

Us outside the Bass Hall in Ft. Worth

See how close they were?---crazy!

View from our seats


This past Saturday we took the kids to see their favorite group The Imagination Movers! They're a show on the Disney Channel that the kids love to watch everyday so Greg thought it would be fun to surprise them with some tickets to see them when they came to Ft. Worth! We have had the tickets for almost 4 months now so it has been a LONG wait for the kids but it was well worth it! They had a great time!
We were in row C so we were up close and personal. The kids at first didn't know what to make of it--they wouldn't dance or even move....they were entranced! They finally warmed up a little but only after Greg started dancing with them--Greg was really into it! It was hilarious!
We had a great time together and as Reese would put it, "We had a great time as a family!"
(Reese is always asking, "Mommy, is it family night?" -he always loves for all of us to be together...it's so sweet!)

Proud Porter Parent!

Abby getting her award from the Principle for Fairness!

Abby at the breakfast

Abby and I --she was tired of the pictures-can you tell? (you could only bring one guest for the breakfast so Greg stayed with Reese and they had their own special date with some doughnuts;) -Reese told me he had 5 --4 tiny ones and 1 normal one--crazy boy! Don't worry Grandma-- he ate healthy yesterday and the rest the day today. :)


Ok so actually it's called Proud Porter Panther but I thought it only fitting to change the name because we are so proud of Abby:)
At Abigail's school every six weeks they focus on a virtue and this 6 weeks was fairness. After the six weeks are up each teacher nominates one kid from their respective class that exemplifies that virtue and Ms. Thomson picked Abby!
This morning before school they had a special breakfast honoring the students and gave each of them an award for being so fair;)
When they called Abby's name to come up and stand next to the principle she was VERY nervous (as you can see in the pictures) but you could tell she was proud....as was I standing there taking too many pictures-as Abby put it;)
For the award the teacher made an acrostic of her name that went like this:

Always sets a good example
Believes the best about everyone
Brings a smile to everyone's face
You show fairness to everyone

It was so great watching Abby's face as the teacher read this aloud....it was evident that it meant the world to her!
Yay for Abby our Proud Porter Panther!

"Hi, my name is Joe!"

Here's a video that Abby shot the other night of Reese. It is so cute I just had to share!
Enjoy!

One Serious Mohawk!

Wow that's a nice profile!

Tonight during bath Abby went to town on her hair and created one of the best Mohawks I have seen since- oh.... about 1985~she even got the hair down in her face like they used to do--classic!
I love this picture of her because whenever she is around people she comes across shy but oh don't be fooled she is crazier than ya think!:) ~and this picture is proof!