In Case They Ever Wonder

This is my little "Beach Baby," or more accurately, "Pool Baby," (since we didn't do the beach this trip due to my worries over the oil spill)! Either way, Lillie absolutely loved the water, and she adored being the "only" child for a week. Aunt Tori, Uncle Derek, Tato, and I showered her with undivided attention, and she ate it up! Not only did Lillie experience the pool for the first time, she also enjoyed a long-standing White family vacation tradition - a trip to Lambert's Cafe, complete with "throwed rolls!" Like both her brother and sister, Lillie loved sitting on the porch, listening to the waves crashing on the shore, and she loved splashing and playing in the warm pool in the early evenings. She did have her "taste" of sand (literally and figuratively), but it was at Lulu's - not on the beach! I was so thankful for my little "babymoon" with Lillie. I treasure the one-on-one time spent with my sweet baby gi...

There's no way a big brother has ever loved a baby sister more than Will loves Lillie. Even though I sometimes worry that his "big love" will land us in the emergency room, I am so thankful that Will adores Lillie the way he does. Will believes that every coo, every laugh, every smile Lillie makes is totally directed at him! A thousand times a day, I hear "she cooing at me, she laughing at me, she cooing at me!" Or, "Oh, Lillie, I you broth-o!" And bless his heart, if Lillie isn't starting to adore him as much as he adores her! I still think she gets a little nervous when she sees 40 pounds of love bounding over to wake her up each morning, but Will's declarations are starting to have some truth. She is cooing at him! She is laughing at him! She is smiling at him! Once again, love is growing before my very eyes, and I am so thankful I get to watch it.

In case, she ever wonders why Tato calls our "Lillie-white" girl Blackie... Patti-Grams fought my humongous size-10 shoes, and the shoes won. Down she went, with Lillie. I heard "No! No!" and the rest is a blur. We made a couple of trips to the doctor just to be sure, but Lillie wound up to be just fine, which is more than I can say for Patti-Grams. She wound up with a very sore shoulder and completely shattered nerves. (Mom has fallen now with all three kids, but as she said, this is the first time she "lost possession!") She said she had survived cancer and a court case, but she thought this might do her in. Not quite two weeks later, Lillie is perfect (no broken nose) and Patti-Grams is on the mend, and my size-10s are put up on the shoe shelf! The craziest thing about all of it is that Lillie had her first shiner and Will didn't cause it!

Matt officially started at TPC at the beginning of June, and while I knew the semi-calm, pretty routined life we led in Georgia would change a bit with our move back to middle Tennessee, I could never have foreseen the chaos this month would bring. The first week of June, Matt was thrown into the whirlwind of a short first week of work (Memorial Day was Monday and TPC was off on Tuesday), kids who were desperate for his attention (they hadn't seen him in weeks), a dicey move into the condo (living out of suitcases with kids who were staying up until after midnight), and a very last minute camp change thanks to the oil spill in the Gulf. The second week of June was VBS. Crazy busy week complete with crazy early mornings for our late night loving crew! As if VBS were not enough, this week was also the trial our family has been waiting on for over four years. (I intend on writing more about this later when I'm sure I have decided what I want to say.) Needless to say, this was an a...

Now, I know that the purpose of VBS is to teach children truths from Scripture and point them towards a relationship with Christ, but tonight my favorite thing about VBS is that all three of my children were asleep by 11 p.m.! Miracles still happen! Sophie and Will both had a great day thanks to all the hard work of the TPC staff and hundreds of volunteers, and now after all the songs, stories, games, and projects, both kids are passed out the earliest they've gone to sleep since we moved in the condo. Sophie reported that she is "remarkably made" and Will loved his teacher who he referred to as "Ms. Jill" (not his teacher's name, but a high compliment since he had a slight crush on Ms. Jill from the school year) Who knows, by Friday, they might have made new friends, had big fun, learned a lot, and be asleep by 10:30! I'm praying for my VBS miracle!

We are in Franklin now living in my sister and brother-in-law's two-bedroom condo. (They bought a gorgeous house a couple of weeks ago, so everything timed out great!) The condo is so cute, and if Matt and I were newly married, we'd be in seventh heaven. But as it stands, we have three kids, and sometimes at around oh, 11 p.m. when both the older kids are still awake, I feel like I'm living a little farther south of seventh heaven. Two bedrooms, five people, do the math. Needless to say, Will and Soph are sharing a room. So far, Will (who used to go to bed between 8 and 8:30 p.m., now regularly sees midnight before falling asleep. And he's lots of fun in the morning. Sure, he sleeps a little later, maybe by a whole 30 or 45 minutes. It's quite the trade off. I used to say he was my gentle giant. Now I just say, he's my giant. Last night he actually punched Sophie in the face, and he regularly grabs her by the hair. Now, no doubt, his always dramatic, sometimes-c...