Our First Anniversary!

On this day, one year ago, my husband and I pledged our love to one another...a lot of people have told us that the first year is the hardest...well, if that's true then we have it made! Because we have had a WONDERFUL year together; and are more in love now than we were back then...God is SO GOOD to us and we are so happy and grateful that He brought us together! What a wonderful God we serve! Happy Anniversary sweetheart! I love you! In the words of the songwriter "Only God could love you more than I do..."

Memorial Day Visit

This Memorial Day Dad and Grandma LaVan came down to visit us. They spent most of the day through lunch time with us and then headed back home. We had a really nice visit...here are some of the pictures we took...


Luke, Dad and Grandma

Grandma LaVan

Luke and Dad

Us and Grandma

Patriotic Table Setting

These are some pictures taken on Memorial Day when Dad LaVan and Grandma LaVan were down for a visit...The other pictures are of our "patriotic" table LOL (Most of the decorations had been sent with them from mom LaVan LOL)
Grandma LaVan

Luke, Dad, and Grandma

The blue place mat (with fireworks on it) and the Star napkin rings were new from mom and dad LaVan

Our Table

The red place mat (also with fireworks)

Visit in Williamsburg

Last night the Hodak family from our church invited us to come meet them in Williamsburg. They are there on vacation; so since we are only 45 minutes from there, they invited us to come down for the afternoon. We went out to eat and visited with them for awhile in their beautiful resort. It was a nice time and we are glad they invited us! :0)

Odds and Ends

Here are some pictures I thought I would share...since I had pictures of the other 2 kids in a previous post from our last visit I thought I would put these in this one...He's our newest addition and he is so addicting! LOL

Jerrod showing "nana" his magazine LOL

(notice his "tie" that is painted on his shirt!!! LOL I found this at Walmart and couldn't resist!) :0)

This was at Indiana church for my membership "thing". LOL Whatever you call it! LOL I felt sort of goofy I'll admit because it was just me and Bro Cornell standing up there! LOL Oh well, we got through another thing LOL

At home in PA

While up North we spent Wednesday and Thursday at the LaVan "home away from home". Wednesday night I became a member of the Indiana Weslyan Methodist Church ( I will post a picture about this later...) and then on Thursday we just spent the day doing odds and ends. Both mom and dad LaVan took work off that day and they picked out and bought the flowers they wanted in this little corner fence garden. Luke and his dad planted them that night too (with Hunter's help! LOL)


Laying the fiber paper stuff down...

Putting in the fence

Luke with his mom and pop

Hunter chewing away at his bone LOL

Mom and Dad LaVan

The Barn Restaurant

These were taken at the beautiful "Barn" restaurant in Amish country...

A Quacking Good Time

Today we got in to Ohio and spent the evening with my parents, and my sister and her family...We ate at a restaurant called the Barn, and the kids were able to feed the ducks afterwards! What fun! Jeffery (the 3 year old) got a little scared when they came right up and surrounded him to get at the bread he had in his hand! LOL He was so frightened when they all came at him that he didn't give them any bread; so they tried to peck it out of his hand! LOL He REALLY was apprehensive after that! :0) Jessica, on the other hand, (the 7 year old) wanted to get one close enough to pet it...however, once we were out of bread, they were done with us! LOL It was really cute though, and I just had to share these pictures!


Jeffery on the swings

Jeffery and Jessica after feeding the ducks

Here we are trying to get them all fed! LOL

Jessica instructing them to share with the others LOL

Jessica feeding the "mama" duck---can't leave her out!

Happy Mother's Day!

We wanted to wish our mother's a very Happy Mother's Day...since we are not able to be with either one of them on this special day, due to the duties of a pastor, we wanted to let them know how special they really are...

There is no greater profession (nor one that requires more work, patience, or love) than motherhood...while I am not a mother myself, I have watched my own mother over the past 20 years of my life; and know that there is much sacrifice and love put into this "job"... In our world today, the idea of being a self-sacrificing mother has gone by the wayside ( or is at least considered obsolete). However, I believe that I am who I am today because of the time and energy my mother put into my growing up years. There are just some things that can't be taught in school...you just have to learn them at home from a loving and nuturing "mommy". My mother has set a godly example for me all of my life, and if the Lord sees fit to bless our home with children some day, I can only hope to be half the mother my mom has been to me. I love you mom!

While my husband is not one to get on here and blog, I know he also will echo my sentiments toward his own mother. They have supported him throughout all of his college years; and been by him during all the rough days that he has faced. We are so privileged to have family who love us and support us in prayer! The Lord has truly blessed us abundantly and we give Him all the praise, for He is worthy!

We love you mom's! Happy Mother's Day from your kids in Virginia! :0)

Dust out those corners!

Yesterday, I got to spend some time over at our cute little neighbors house (for those of you who don't know this, Sis Barbara and Arlene from our church live next door to us...). They are getting ready for a garage sale, and asked if I could help them get their garage cleaned up for the sale. We laughed and carried on, and just had us a good old time! :0) My hubby was mowing and weed wacking (praise the Lord for our new weed wacker! It does wonders! LOL) while I was next door helping the "ladies". Overall, we had a good day of good old "clean" fun! LOL (I put it in italics, because cleaning out a garage is not usually what you would consider "clean". LOL----even though Sis Barbara said she wasn't sure why it was so messy since they mop it every week! LOL They are such a hoot!)

Belated Congratulations!

I wanted to wish my big bro a VERY BIG congratulations on his graduation from college! I was so proud of him; and VERY upset that I couldn't make it to his graduation ceremony! Due to our schedule we couldn't make it to this one...I was there for his associates graduation ceremony though, and yelled really loud from the balcony when his name was called! LOL So maybe he's glad I didn't make it to this one! ;0) He graduated Summa Cum Laude with a degree in Business Management. Congratulations Jer!!! I'm so proud of you!

Catching Up!

Sister Dye in Williamsburg in front of "her" store! ;0)

Us in front of the fountain at the Jamestown visitors center

The Dyes in front of the same fountain

Wow! What a week! We just finished revival last night with John and Shirley Dye. We had a wonderful revival and the Lord's presence was felt in the services. Sunday morning was the "climax" I suppose you could call it... there were several seekers at the altar; and one major victory won! We are trusting the Lord to continue to help us!

Since they were down here so close to Williamsburg, the Dyes wanted to take some time and go look around....so on thursday (I'm pretty sure that's what day it was LOL) we took them 0ver there. We also stopped over at Jamestown area just to look around (the tickets to do anything were WAY too expensive!) But it turned out to be a really nice day to go. We had a lot of rain and gloomy days this past week so we weren't sure if it was going to work out for us to go... But thankfully it did! :0)