Jakey Loves Jesus

For the past several weeks, Jake has been asking us about Jesus and about heaven and salvation. He was also asking his grandma and his teacher a bunch of questions. Darrin and I were hesitant about teaching him about salvation because what does a six year old know about a decision like that? But his persistance encouraged us to trust that the Holy Spirit was touching his young heart. So in our living room, while I was at the grocery store, Daddy and Jake prayed together and Jakey asked Jesus to come into his heart. Then he cried.

AND I MISSED IT! That's okay though, my blubbering would have been a distraction anyway. What a special moment for Daddy and Jake. We are so proud of him.

In honor of his decision, we took him to pick out a brand new bible. Before we got to the book store he had decided that he wanted one with red and blue on it. And we actually found one.



I filled out the presentation page for him and wrote him a squishy love note. Then we added the date of his decision.



I think we are going to wait a little while before getting baptized though. Still a little skittish of water in the eyes.

YAY JAKEY!

Staycation

This week Daddy and Jake took Thursday off of school so that we could embark on our Powers Family Staycation. On Wednesday afternoon, as soon as the boys came home, we loaded into the car and drove the ten minutes to our staycation destination.

The Hilton Homewood Suites.

The Homewood Suites building is a hotel with little mini condos instead of hotel rooms. The kids didn't know what we were doing, they only knew that swimming was involved.


In the lobby, checking into our room and checking out the bears.


Jumping on one of the two big beds! Our room also boasted a pull-out couch.


New water wings! Time for our swimming adventure!


All the babies and all their muscles, ready to go!


Riding the elevator, just one of the many adventures that made our staycation AWESOME!


Running down the hall to the pool. "Coming, Mom?"


Swimming time!

The kids impressed us with their swimming abilities. Both Jake and Jordan are very good at swimming around in life jackets but nobody had ever worn water wings before. Jake and Jordan took off for the deep end and paddled around immediately. Joshy spent most of his time on the stairs. He was very nervous about the whole situation.

The next morning Jake even swam around with nothing but a kick board. Daddy was beaming with pride at his bravery.


This face pretty much sums up Josh's opinion of swimming in the deep pool.


This face sums up Jordy's opinion of EVERYTHING!

The hotel provided us a complimentary dinner (and breakfast the next morning) as part of our package. So after dinner I took Josh down the road to Walmart to buy fixings for ice cream sundaes while Daddy took the other two kids swimming again.


When we returned from Walmart, Joshy didn't want to go back to the pool so we played in the room instead.


Ice cream sundaes were a huge hit!


We ordered up some cartoon network too.


Time to snuggle up for movie time! We rented G-Force.


Jaycob, enjoying a life of leisure. What a goober.


All tucked into bed!

The next morning we woke up, went to our complimentary breakfast (which was SO GOOD) and then we went to the pool again for a couple more hours before checking out. Josh had more fun in the pool the second day. At noon we checked out of our hotel and drove across the street for the lunch buffet at Golden Corral. I don't care what you think, that place is GOOD.

This little adventure was such a neat family outting that didn't cost too much money. We splurged on a room bigger than we needed but this whole staycation cost us less than $200 including all meals, entertainment and travel expenses! We spend more than that in one camping trip easily.

Jordan Speaks

"I want to pick some apples. Mommy, apples are so juicy and yummy! Mommy, I want to pick some apples on my pogo stick if I have one."

Jordan lives in her own universe. I wish I lived there. It sounds AWESOME.

Kids Choir

Jake and Jordan are both in kids choir at church now and last night they had their very first performance in big church. Jordan is the one with the little round red clip in her hair and the sparkles on her pants (and the one dancing her heart out)she is the second girl to the right of the girl with the pink sleeves. Jake is the blond guy in the front row (when the camera pans over) with the grey stripes on his shoulders.

"Mom...this life is not so fun."

Jake was sitting at the tall table with his brother and sister, idly picking at his chicken nuggets. He had his head propped in one hand and a pitiful look on his face.

I took a breath, preparing to launch into a mommy lecture about making the most out of every situation, being grateful for what we have, and always looking on the bright side, blah, blah, blah....but before I could begin, he continued.

"It's not fun that we have to stay on just one planet."

Superhero Day

Today was superhero day at school. Spiderman got in trouble twice today for talking.

Moments

Sleeping

Ugly Sweater Day

Today was ugly sweater day at school so I spent some time yesterday at the local Value Village. I had the distinct honor of choosing ugly sweaters for both my husband and son. The problem with Value Village I found, is that it is suddenly very proud of its selection. While perusing the men's sweater section I realized I was going to have to pay about $20 for a truely hideous monstronsity of a sweater, or about $5 for a sweater that was "ugly enough." I chose the cheaper version and all day Darrin suffered through the stares that so obviously meant, "is that his ugly sweater or did he mean to wear that?"

hehe

Jaycob's sweater is hideous. Matched with his maroon athletic pants, he looks utterly and adorably homeless.

Sports Day

It's spirit week at school and we forgot crazy hair day yesterday. Today is sports day! So we Jayhawked it up.



It's fun when you don't have to wear your school uniform for a WHOLE WEEK!

Valentine's Day

Jake came home from church with this Valentine's Day card he had made last week.



It says "I Luv Mi Famle" and has people shooting each other all over it.

Awesome.

Sleepy Doobie

Doobie fell asleep on me. It was cute. I took a picture.

Glitteratti in the HIZ-OUSE!

That's right folks.

Once again my crazy crafting team, The Glitteratti, loaded up our glue guns and dished out the smacktalk at the 2010 Crafter's Smackdown. Just like last year, it was madness and fun-ness. Unlike last year, we DID NOT get eliminated in the first round! In fact, out of fourteen total teams, we came in third place.

WOOT!


Our write up in the program with a picture of us from last year.


The team shirts I made. See below for the aprons I made.


Team Glitteratti 2010
From left to right our aprons say, "I will CUT you." "Oh no you di'int." "Shut your face!" and "What are you lookin' at?"

Round 1 Part 1

Round 1 was a two craft round. Our first assignment was to use a large department store gift box and a small jewelery gift box as well as any of the items on the tables (which were loaded with massive amounts of crap) and craft a proposal that would not only make you say NO, but HE** NO!

Yeah.




In case you can't figure it out from the blood, the glove and the white Ford Bronco wedding cake topper, we crafted a marriage proposal from OJ Simpson.

Round 1 Part 2

During part two we had to use some slide show projector reels and craft a new fair ride.


There is a story here actually. You see, one of the other teams...an all male hockey team called the Alaska Avalanche...decided to pick on us the whole time. SO, we reciprocated. We crafted this ride called the Alaska Avalanche. As I presented to the judges I mentioned how it was a prototype for a new ride but that we couldn't get funding to build it because it is SO LAME and nobody would ever want to ride it.

And off we go to round TWO, thank you very much.

Round 2

Using a large cardboard box we had to craft a diarama of a post apocalypitic zombie fallout shelter.

What?



Yeah. We were certain we were going to be eliminated because we couldn't pull this one together. Story and craft were failing to mesh. So I grabbed the mic and talked my way into round 3. HOW? I have no idea.



Round 3

Take a shopping cart and save the world.

Uh.



Enter our friend Robert. He will be playing the part of Obama. We turned our cart into Tree Force One and crafted a big money tree filled with Obama Bucks. This is how we plan to save the world. We will fix healthcare, the economy and the environment by using money that Obama is growing on trees.



We should have considered the fact that our judges panel was extremely liberal. They didn't appreciate the joke.



I don't care who you are. That's funny right there.




Our littlest fan, Makayla.

Our third place trophy

We were required to take it with us or the boss was going to deliver it to one of our houses. I offered to be responsible for it and then I promptly left it on Tracy's doorstep.

Photo Shoot Down Time

Today, PS Photography had a senior photo session at the library, on and around a frozen pond. The little people came with us and played in a nearby snow bank. While our model was changing outfits, Tracy and I made the most of our time by break dancing in the ice and snow.

Yeah. That's right.


Tracy bustin' a move.


Aw yeah!


The little people hanging out.


Doobie has hat hair.

Dance Dance Dance

I caught Jordy practicing her dance moves while her keyboard played songs. I didn't have time to set up my camera to get the light right because I wanted to snap quickly before she saw me.


That's a pretty sweet move right there.


Oops, she spotted me mid jump.


Aw, don't stop now!


Too shy.

Just This

A little something that made me laugh today.

A New Member of the Family

Congratulations to my sister-in-law, Raychel and her husband Rusty! This morning at 7:41am (Oklahoma time) their baby boy, Rowynn Russell Stamper was born! We've been waiting a long time for this little guy. He entered the world at 7 pounds 12 ounces and 20.5 inches long.