fearfully & wonderfully made

Madelynn Vye Duncan

My friend, Stephanie, had her baby girl last week! She is precious. She was born with a cleft/lip and palate. They have a very long road ahead of them, but it will be worth it! Look at that sweet, beautiful face...

God did good!

bittersweet

Tonight was the last night of my class at Furman. I am so bummed! Having said that, the amount of information/knowledge I am carrying away with me is PRICELESS! About half the class exchanged email addresses. We are going to follow up with one another and talk about forming a Writer's Group. I am super excited about that.

The instructors, Tim Davis, http://timdaviscreations.com, and Melinda Long, http://melindalong.com, were also open to suggestions for other courses. They are FABULOUS teachers. If you ever run across a class or a workshop with their name attached, I strongly recommend you sign up. It would be well worth your time and money!

Tonight, we read the rough draft of our book. Then, we were critiqued by the class. The suggestions that mom and I received about our story were very helpful. We have some work to do. It will be fun to go back and "tweak" things a bit. Melinda handed out a worksheet with the website address to find ethical agents and publishers. So, after we make our revisions (and then maybe a few more) we'll draw up a cover letter and ship our idea to an agent.

I will keep you informed of what happens from here. I certainly expect to be turned down. Maybe numerous times. As long as the rejection is accompanied by advice on how to make things better, I'm okay with that. Besides, my favorite inspirational author, Max Lucado was rejected many times before he was published!

We'll keep our fingers crossed and lift our prayers to the sky!

on a sunny sunday afternoon

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE these boys!

wedding shower

The food was WONDERFUL! Yummy salad...

Lasagna, bread...

...and CHEESECAKE!

Sorry, Pnut, there's nothing left on the spoon!

Macie Lynn....Shhh!

Josh & Joey...all grown up!

Two of the shower-planners taking a much needed seat!

BJay & Holly

Sittin' with his favorite...Papa!

Lindi Rose devouring her yogurt bites.

Looks just like her daddy..

The Bride and Groom with the parents.

Bridesmaids.

NOT AT ALL happy about the way this one turned out...would have been a great picture. :(

The gifts.

Bubba and his tools!

EVERYONE needs a Foreman!

Mommy & baby!

Best Wishes to the happy couple! We love you guys!

coming soon!

My Bubba (Jamie) & his beautiful fiance, Natalea (Natalie)

We are celebrating Jamie and Natalie's soon-to-be-wedding tonight with a couple's shower! I am so excited for these two! Stay tuned for LOTS of pictures!!!

Also, stay tuned for a post on Open Marriages! Dr. Phil discussed this topic on his show the other day... very interesting! (And very gross!)

I hope everyone is having a great weekend! Ours is pretty relaxing so far. JP seems to finally be on the mend.

bless him

My very sweet boy watching his movie on the computer while his mommy and daddy feed their obsession with a little Burn Notice!
Look at this little man's face. I'm so ready for him to get better!

Well, God saved us AGAIN today! JP has had a cold for several days. He has been running TERRIBLY high fevers. I didn't really think anything of it because he runs fevers if you look at him cross-eyed. And with the weather doing such crazy things, I blamed the congestion/runny nose and cough on that!

Last night (Thursday) his fever spiked to almost 105. We stripped him down and threw him in a cold bathtub in the middle of the night...that was LOVELY, as you can imagine. I had to set my alarm for every two hours to put cold cloths on his neck and wrists. It was awful! He woke up this morning feeling a little better. No fever. I took him to Scott's mom's house this morning and he did great with her all day. He ran a tiny low-grade for a bit, but nothing a little Motrin didn't take out. He began eating and drinking some. So, I decided against taking him to the doctor.

THANKFULLY, I changed my mind. I, (along with family and friends), decided that because it was Friday, I mine as well get him checked out just in case. I didn't want another fever like last night. Turns out, he has had Strep since Wednesday!! I was in shock..so was the doctor. If we had NOT taken him today, things could have gotten really ugly this weekend.

Thank You, God!

random bulleted thoughts...

• I visited my friend in the hospital tonight who delivered her baby girl! Her baby was born with a cleft lip and palate. She's BEAUTIFUL! I am so thankful for a God who loves us and more importantly loves His little babies! Congratulations, Steph!!
• My sweet boy has been sick for the past two days. :( I HATE to see him like this! It breaks my heart. However, you can read JP's thoughts on his sickness here.
• My last writing class at Furman is coming up next Tuesday. I am SO SAD!!! I have enjoyed this class more than any other college course I have EVER taken! I have learned so much. We are presenting our first rough draft of our children's book to be critiqued. And then they are going to give us agent's/publisher's information....VERY EXCITED!!
• I have never been more thankful for a Friday to get here than I am this week. With Stephanie gone on maternity leave, things have gotten a little shady! Any time you work with children like ours, it's never a good thing when the "team" is broken up. However, we'll power through with SPRING BREAK thoughts dancing around in our heads!
• I have another Pinterest recipe to share soon! Love it! (Thanks, Karen!)
• Still addicted to Burn Notice...if I'm not careful, it could take over my life!
• I'm excited about a couple's shower Saturday night for my Bubba and Natalea!

Well, I guess that's it for now. All of these thoughts were swimming around in my head, so I thought I would share!

Everyone have a SUPER FABULOUS Friday! x0x0

brag '0 bit

If you love Pizza Hut like I do, you'll LOVE their Big Box deal! There are several options to choose from. Scott and I got the pepperoni pizza/bread sticks/cinnamon sticks box. It was SO YUMMY!! And the BEST part?? It's $10! Yes, you heard me right - TEN DOLLARS!! Are you kidding me?? It is such a deal. We didn't eat all of it, so technically it's two meals for that amount of money. And I didn't have to cook!
My next brag meal? The $5 foot long sub from Subway! ANY foot long sub for only $5! Again, I say, are you kidding me?!

I have had three different meals in my cupboards/fridge to cook for the past two nights. Last night I had class and tonight JP is sick. So, needless to say, cooking was out of the question for me. I am so thankful for Subway and Pizza Hut for these wonderful deals! If you haven't already taken advantage of them, it is well worth the (small amount of) money!

(And no, these restaurants are not paying me to endorse their food!)

thank goodness for president's day

(Can you tell by his expression how cold it was next to the water??)