Oh Splendid March

Is it Monday already? I normally welcome Monday so that I can get my house back in order and slip back into our routine, but I wasn't quite ready for our great weekend to pass. I'll start my recap at Thursday.

My sister flew in from Atlanta on Thursday morning. Curtis had taken the day off, so I left Jackson home with him and took Annabeth to meet my mom, dad and sister at La Madeleine. Jackson ran some errands with his daddy and got a haircut. For some reason he reminds me of Ricky Schroder when he gets his hair cut. Adorable! That evening I had to get my highlights done. My roots were the worst ever and that is saying something. I think I set a new personal record for regrowth. Awful! I've felt like a new person since then.

I had reserved Friday evening for hanging out with my sister, but I found out she had plans to be at a wedding. So we called Heather's family to see if they wanted to come over and watch some of the college basketball games. Heather and Curtis are both really into March Madness. They came over and we had pizza (none was dropped in the doorway), cookies, and ice cream cake. The big kids mostly played in the backyard and upstairs and left us to chat and watch the games. Mollie Kate and Annabeth were really cute playing together downstairs. We had one game on the TV and the Duke game on the computer. Curt is a lifelong Duke fan and to his dismay, none of their games have been shown in Houston. The upside is that they are playing IN Houston next weekend and he will get to see the game(s) in person. I'm really excited for him.

On Saturday morning I went to the Barnes and Noble on Memorial for the Beth Moore and Francine Rivers book signing. Do I even need to tell you how excited I was about this? The first thing I did was buy Francine's new book. Then I went into a back room where she and my mom were both signing stacks of books for the bookstore to have. I got to give Mrs. Rivers a quick hug and then I got into a deep conversation about hair color with my sister. A few minutes later we went out into the store and the signing began. It was especially fun to see Lindsee Lou, Jen the Newlywed, and Melanie in line. My sis took tons of pictures but supposedly they all turned out horrible. Dern! Once things died down I went through Francine's line and she signed my copy of Her Mother's Hope. She was so nice and I told her how much it meant to me and how excited we were that she and Mom were doing this book tour together.

Melissa and I unexpectedly got to have lunch with the whole Tyndale crew at Escalante's before they headed out to the Woodlands. I'm on a major diet right now (yes, it has finally come to this) and it was horrible to sit in front of a big basket of chips and white queso. Ugh! And then to order a salad? Double ugh! But I've lost about 6 pounds already and that is making this worth it.

On Saturday night we asked our babysitter to come over so we could have a date night with my best friend from high school and her husband. Jennifer and Justin live in Fort Worth, so we don't get to see as much of them as we'd like. We had dinner at my most recent favorite restaurant - Gigi's Asian Bistro and Dumpling Bar. I looked long and hard at the menu, trying to bend my mind around what I could possibly order and stay on my eating plan. Then I just said, "Forget it! I'm eating like a normal person tonight!" And so we feasted. After 9 days of being very disciplined and never feeling full, it was pretty darn great!

The next morning we went to church. Curtis has been teaching the high school seniors this month, so I went to our old Sunday school class to hear my friend Emily share her testimony. It was so awesome and God-glorifying. Then I worked in a three-year-old Sunday school room. Several of my friends' kids were in there, which made it so fun. We did lots of puzzles and dressed lots of baby dolls. Does anybody else feel inadequate when they do puzzles? I'm horrible at them.

As soon as church was over, we high-tailed it out to the country to have a cookout with my whole family. We had spread out a large quilt on the ground for some of us to sit on. Annabeth would not leave the quilt and the tremendous blessing of that was not lost on me!

I just ripped these off the LPM Blog.

Here was our fire. I had a very serious talk with Jackson about it and thankfully he didn't seem attracted to it.



My daddy.



My new favorite pic of my parents.



Lissa and Colin.



No matter where he is, my dad always takes a nap after lunch. Always.



Jackson and Big Pops (my Pappaw).



Annabeth and Bibby.



Annabeth's hair is always crazy after church. She had a raging mullet, so I twisted it up and clipped it like this. Voila! Her first updo!



Melissa was helping Jackson roast a marshmallow. He was staying such a nice distance away from the fire.





Torched.





A pair of mavericks.









A pair of Moore girls.







Daddy-daughter time.



Last night the little girls from next door came over to play with Jackson. They are so precious and he was having a blast with them. I love that we are in this stage now.

I've felt like a dark cloud was hanging over me for the last couple of months, but this weekend the sun started shining again. I'm so thankful.