shameless plug?

it's my birthday...no, don't feel bad. i didn't expect you to remember. it's thursday night and i'm trying to wrap up some work so i can get out of here and enjoy my weekend but when i realized it's officially past midnight (the 23rd) i thought i should at least commemorate today.

so far it's shaping up to be a great weekend (despite some unexpected drama that i can easily sweep under my emotional rug because with age comes perspective - can i hear an "amen!")

- caleb's team won...he got in to pitch the last 2 innings and did really GREAT!

- sarah's first grade class had an end of the year pool party...they had snow cones for the kids and adults...who doesn't love a snow cone. (ok, i admit, our snow cones had a little different flavoring....)

- ben threw millie's toy in the toilet, not exactly in line with the caleb and sarah's stories but i found it funny. ben was really heartbroken when rob told him that wasn't a good idea - ben was honestly shocked at that reality.

anyway, it's my birthday and i plan on celebrating all weekend. IKEA here i come!

so what good is a post without a picture...i found one of my favorites. it was 1974...i was 3. (do the math...) as i flipped through my book of old pictures i realized i had this dress on A LOT, with the boots, must have been a favorite.

life is good...

maybe i relate to ben so easily being a 3rd child myself (are you putting the psychological puzzle pieces together....)

he's just glad to be along for the ride, included, and part of the crowd. here is his set up for field day...a little shade, some processed artificial sugar and dirt...just happy to be there. the bag on the chair says it all...life is good.

and yes, that's my sonic diet coke, of course.

slacking...

ok. so ROB says, "why haven't you posted lately....?" (as i looked around the room for something to throw at him i thought this is why....)

end of school!!! forget exams, this is much more difficult. try to work this equation:

1 mom travels 100 mph in every direction and 3 kids travel 100 mph in every other direction (to dance recital, school, baseball field, school parties and picnics, football camp, cheerleading clinic - go ahead and laugh at that one, i did...) At what point does "mom" collide with kids?

of course, i love chaos. really. like that is a secret. all these picnics and ballgames....i just love it. ben loves to just hang on my hip and be around the kids (the gym teacher at school keeps checking for his legs, she swears she's never seen him walk). so FINALLY here is today's post - pictures of the1st and 4th grade picnics.

caleb's friends just love ben, they've gathered around him to get ben to sign their yearbooks....he obliged with many circles. i pulled the wagon from one picnic to the other and ben was entertained by 1st grade water games and the 4th grade kickball playoffs.

i may be slacking....but the fun definitely never stops.

published illustrator!

it figures, caleb gets a book cover published before his own mom...

the 4th graders have a contest every year to choose the cover design for the school phone directory. i never did post that they chose caleb's design back in the fall. he was VERY proud of the fact that he beat the girls...he worked and worked on the cover and poured through the cartooning books we have at home.

he decided to title it himself - 'Lipscomb Talks A Lot.'

gee, that hits a little too close to home...

hi-ho silver!

needless to say the last few days have been difficult...just watching rob's sister and her family soak up all that has happened and realize now is the just the beginning of life without Luke.

we're thankful we live close enough that we could just load up the SUV and drive...and THANKFULLY we work with people who "get it"...that some things are just more important BUT, for us, mainly rob, his wheels hardly slowed down in that little brain of his. rob's "to do" list continued to grow while we were in atlanta - at the top of his list, the lawn.

the lawn is not a priority because we are up for yard of the year in our neighborhood association...or because we just had our landscaping done...ha. rob knew our jungle needed to be tamed. PLUS we JUST got an invisible fence and mowing would be quite an undertaking because he would have to take ALL of those little marking flags out of the grass and then replace them (must be about 75 of them AT LEAST).

yep, all 5 hours back in the car he knew he wasn't going to get back in time to jump start that lovely broken lawn mower....and then we pulled up to our house.

it was as if angels were lining the driveway....someone mowed our yard. someone moved ALL those stinking invisible fence flags and put them back (sorry, i bet they didn't count on that when they drove over with their good intentions...) SOMEONE didn't leave a note or message.

i'm assuming we'll find out who came to our rescue...but for now, know that when you have one of those crazy ideas of "gee, what could i do to help"...make sure you drive by their house first and see if they just got one of those invisible fences...then just send a nice card.

thank you lawn ranger.

not about us

Well today was not about me, the kids or even the dog. Today was about our nephew Luke. He was almost 11 weeks old and quite an evangelist even though he never spoke a word or even left his bed. His story and the faith of his parents and brother and sister will live forever. Luke passed into Heaven this afternoon...he's running freely without wires and tubes and nurses.

We've buried Rob's 100 year old grandmother and now we are traveling to the funeral of our nephew...not even a full 3 months old. I guess there is no magic age, no special number of days, week or years that will make you feel good about saying good-bye.

Believing in a loving God doesn't mean that things like this are simple. It just means that we admit we are not perfect and that our ways are not best and that as good as this life gets it still hurts. In the comfort of our air conditioned homes and spiffy (yep, I said spiffy) cars this world is good and sometimes pretty cool, but not great, it is not home and is not eternal.

In the midst of their sadness they are able to say it's not about them either....they have asked:

"Susan & I request that instead of flowers that if you feel led to send something, to please donate to the children's ministry at New Hope or to our Nigerian Mission Project which provides medical care & water to our friends in Nigeria, just designate one or the other. You can send a check payable to New Hope Baptist Church the website is www.newhopebc.org & the address is 551 New Hope Rd. Fayetteville, Ga. 30214 & just put a note in the memo."

(These pictures are from the many visits to the NICU in Atlanta...this is Sydney and Hogan with their little brother.)

lizard life....

who doesn't love a field trip to the zoo!?! the weather was perfect, the kids were wound up and i had a diet coke....it was a perfect day. our group of 4 stuck together pretty easily which was a good thing...there were over 2,000 kids from different schools at the zoo the same day.

we only had 1 boy in our group so we didn't stay very long in the reptile house...although i'm thinking the life of a lizard is looking pretty good to me (i think i'm definitely in summer mode.)

only 3 more mondays til summer then i will be sunning myself on a rock too.....or crawling under it.