WOW! What a busy weekend we had! Saturday I walked/ran in the Country Music Half Marathon. Judy (my SIL) and I arrived in downtown Nashville at 7 am pumped and ready! (We arrived the first time at 6 am but realized that one of us had forgotten our race number (I won't name names to protect the innocent :) so we turned around to go get it. We raced back to Baptist hospital where Judy works, ran inside to use clean bathrooms so we wouldn't have to use the disgusting Port-o-jons unless ABSOLUTELY necessary and walked out to Broadway just in time to see the first runners start. Being that Judy and I are veterans (I use the term lightly) of this race we knew that our corral would be at least 30 minutes behind the first runners so we actually weren't stressed about our late arrival. We finally found Jen J in corral 19 and proceeded to wait 46 minutes after the start of the race until we crossed the start line.

We ran about a 1/3 of the race and walked the rest. We finished the race in 2:59:45 which is 13 minutes faster than last year! We were pretty surprised because the whole race we kept saying to each other how slow we felt like we were walking. After the race we met up with Megan and Jen who ran it, and our fans, Chad, Mal and Randy!

When I got home from the race Mom and Ken were waiting for me. They had arrived about 10:00 am for a short overnight visit. Being that Brooke's birthday was last Wednesday and we had no time to properly celebrate she was waiting as well to begin her birthday celebrations which included roller-skating. Yes, roller-skating! So, we all headed to the Brentwood Roller Skating rink and we all donned our skates - from the oldest to the youngest. Surprisingly I could actually move my legs to get around the rink. Brooke and Connor had so much fun skating and Liam preferred being on the sidelines with any of the adults who were resting their weary selves. After skating we went to Cracker Barrel (Brooke's choice) to meet up with her friend Hailey who was coming to play and spend the night. After a very yummy dinner of pancakes we headed home to finally relax!

Sunday morning I awoke to very stiff and sore legs and so I proceeded to limp through the day! We had a very busy day yesterday as well so I fell into bed about 10:00 pm and awoke this morning not ready to start day. Liam was still sleeping which is RARE so I decided to take advantage of his sleeping in. My sweet hubby got Brooke ready, fed and off to school so I could stay in a bed a while longer. And now, here I sit, still in my pjs with Liam on my lap thinking that it is still much too early to get dressed! Oh well, I'll at least get dressed before I pick Brooke up from school at 3:30 pm.

Nine Years and Going Strong

Today marks nine years that Dale and I have been married. In some respects it seems like only yesterday that we stood at the altar saying our vows and in other ways it seems like a lifetime. We have shared 3 homes together, been pregnant 4 times and have 3 beautiful children. We've been in 3 pastorates and have said goodbye to beloved friends at two churches. We've come back home to where we started as a married couple although we left with only the two of us and we came back with a family.

As we have struggled at times in our marriage and I've watched others with similar or harder struggles I've often wondered how it would have felt standing at the altar knowing what "for better or worse", "for richer and poorer" and "in sickness and health" would really mean in our lives. Would I have had the courage to take the step into committing myself to stand by my husband through these trying times? As I stood there making a lifelong commitment I had no way to know that my greatest sorrows and joys were yet to come - the loss of our first baby and the subsequent birth of our three children.

As the years have past my love for Dale has deepened more than I ever thought possible. He has proven himself to be the man of character that I knew him to be when we dated and first married. Dale is such a wonderful father to our children and we are so blessed because of him. So, for better or worse, I wouldn't want to be anywhere else except right here beside Dale Benson! Thank you for nine wonderful years and I look forward to the next nine!

Happy 6th Birthday, Brooke!!

It is hard to believe that it has been six years since Brooke was born. We had no idea the joy that one tiny person could bring to a home! My first pregnancy ended in a miscarriage at 8 weeks and so the first trimester of my pregnancy with Brooke I was a little nervous but after that I absolutely loved being pregnant with her - well, except for the excessive swelling ! Take a look at my ankles in this picture - this was taken the morning I went to the hospital to have her.

We moved to Naples, FL when I was 9 weeks pregnant with Brooke and life really seemed to slow down for us. Naples moves at a slower pace than Nashville and so we just settled into a more relaxing life. I found a new doctor whom I absolutely adored (he delivered all 3 babies) and he took such good care of Brooke and me. The last month of my pregnancy I was out of work on medical leave because I was swelling so much and the doctor didn't want me on me feet (yay for me!) so I pretty much went to the pool every day, got very tan and read books! Wow - what a charmed life it was! I can barely remember what that's like now ;)

I was scheduled for a C-section on Monday, April 22nd because Brooke was breach but Dr. Crandall did an aversion and then induced me. Finally, on Tuesday morning the 23rd Brooke arrived at 9:35 am. Who knew that your heart could actually swell in your chest? I never knew that you could love someone that way. The bonding was instantaneous. Brooke was this tiny, perfect, helpless human and she was ours to care for - I suddenly got this panicky feeling of not being up to the task. We're still working on it but Brooke is growing into such a sweet and loving little girl.

Brooke is very intuitive and smart! She often outwits her Mommy. Dale and I chuckle so often at her because she is just is so matter-of-fact about life. She states things the way they are and that's that! When she asks a question she expects a straight answer. There is no being evasive with Brooke because she'll know it and call you out on it and then continue asking her question in a different way until she is satisfied that you are telling the whole truth and nothing but the truth. When Brooke was two or three she would ask questions and then say, "Mommy, is that the truth or are you just saying that?"

Brooke is turning into quite a little gymnast. Her cartwheels are the best in the class and she almost has her hand stands down pat. She loves any and all things Princess related even though she's not really a prissy girl. She's a tomboy on the outside and a Princess on the inside.

Well, I could go on forever but time is getting away from me. Thanks for letting me share a little bit about our very special little girl on her birthday.

Well, I just wanted to drop by for a minute and share a couple of things with you. You really need to go by and check out the Sweet Shoppe challenges. They are so fun! Here are some pics I took yesterday for the Shutterbug Shakedown challenge. The Shutterbug challenges are fun because they help you think outside the box when you're taking pictures and then they teach you some post processing tips and tricks.

The most recent challenge was to tell a story with your photos. Well, yesterday I saw Connor bringing down a bunch of stuff to the living room so I assumed that he was going to make a fort out of the couch as he often does. Well, as I was scrapping I realized it was really quiet so I went to investigate and I found him inside the ottoman, sleeping on a pallet he had made. It was just so cute so I ran for the camera!




















Then here is a LO that I did for the Sweet Shoppe Paper 2 Digi Challenge. I love this challenge. Every two weeks the sugarbabes find a paper scraper's gallery and the challenge is to find a LO that you like and lift it digitally. So, this is one that I lifted from Kelly Goree over at Two Peas in a Bucket! If you need some inspiration just browse through her gallery - she is an amazing scrapper! For this LO I used Kristin's The Good Life kit which is bright and beautiful and has such great and versatile elements! It is one of my favorite all time kits so you'll be seeing lots of stuff from it! Credits here.

Well, that's it for now. I'm off to Brooke's school to help in the classroom, then to get a much needed haircut and hi-lights!