wanna see pat in goggles?!?

sometimes i wake up and i don't feel like running. but i do anyways. because i'm thankful i can.

pat is taking joshua away this coming weekend...and he asked me to write him a letter as he's entering a new stage in his life...used my HOURS sitting at a swim meet to do it :-)

made a key lime pie. yum.

for my mom's birthday (in january!) we gave her a REAL photoshoot. we finally did it on saturday evening!

and then on sunday morning we said goodbye to rebekah for a week. she went with our church to a camp a few hours away. it is by FAR the longest she's been gone. she's our oldest. this is BIG STUFF.

we KNOW it's time for her to do this. and we trust that she will have a GREAT time! it was just hard to say, "bye!"

i don't think i'll ever forget the atmosphere in our home when we all got home from dropping her off. we were all so sad. and then realized (when we went to change from church clothes to farm clothes!) that she had left notes on each of our beds.

i bawled. for a LONG time. the ugly kind. it felt so good. and my heart hurt in a way that it hasn't before. these kids just might kill me.

i couldn't stand to be in the house without her...so we went to the farm. this is pat's attempt to make me laugh. it worked :-)

we really had a GREAT afternoon together!

i even climbed up and did that huge slide. the view from the top was incredible!

i miss her like crazy. but i was able to focus on other kids and their needs just a little more with one gone and out of the equation. it's good for all of us. but painful...there were more tears from some of us as the day ended...and she wasn't here...her relationships with her siblings are the most precious thing. she is one amazing girl!