Father's Day...

My two loves... Brandon and Grace. It has been amazing to watch Brandon grow into the father that he is. Grace wanted nothing to do with him when we first got her and it hurt his heart. After all, we waited so long for her we wanted her to want us too! Boy has she changed! She loves him with all of her heart, and when he's home she's quickly on his heels wanting to do everything he does. We got him a sprayer for the four wheeler, and Grace picked him out a hat for him to wear while he mows our grass. Happy Father's Day to Grace's favorite man (even though it's late!)

Meet Reynolds Warner Ratliff...

This beautiful child was born June 16th, at 9:26 P.M. She weighed in at 7 lbs. 4 oz. and has beautiful hair! Reynolds has been prayed for about two years now. Her mom, Amy, is a good friend of mine and we belong to the same prayer group. Reynolds is a daily reminder, to her parents and anyone else who prayed for her arrival, that we serve an awesome God who always shows up right on time!

By the way, when we left the hospital, Grace looked at me and said, "I want one of those!" Hmmm.....

Know, Speak, Live-God's Unshakable Truth!

This past week was VBS week at our church. The theme this year was, "Outrigger Island". We had an absolute blast! Whitney, our children's minister, did a great job of getting this together. I helped a friend of mine with preschool snacks. I've never actually "constructed" snacks before but I might start now! It was really fun getting to see the kids faces when they showed up at the "snack shack" for their snack for that day! Grace particulary likes the VBS music! It sounds very Hawaiian, and we have been listening to it now for almost two weeks. Lifeway always does a great job putting the music together, but this year they outdid themselves! The verse this year was Psalm 86:11 which says, "Teach me your ways, O Lord, that I may live according to your truth! Grant me purity of heart, that I may honor you."

Here are Whitney, Anna, Briley, and Madison getting ready to lead worship during the worship rally...

Sarah and Abigail helped too...

It looks like Grace is having a blast!

My nephew, Joseph, went with us this year...

One of our "constructed" snacks! We followed this with a fruit kabob that had bananas, grapes, and marshmellows, along with some pretzels. They had lemonade to drink!

Our Beach Pictures of Grace

This year I decided to take some pictures of Grace to hang in our bathroom. They turned out great! I took 309 pictures of her on the beach late yesterday afternoon. They were all good, but these are just a few of my favorites!

This is one of my favorites! She's just standing there checking everything out!

In this picture she was drawing in the sand with her finger.

This one is sweet

There are those sweet, little feet again!!!

This is her true smile! It's sometimes hard to catch on film. I'm glad we got this one!

Random Pics...

Here are just some random pics that I couldn't really fit in anywhere but still wanted to share with you! Enjoy!!!

TA DA! That's what Grace was saying when I snapped this picture! Lately, when I tell her I'm going to take her picture she automatically wants to pose. Some of her poses are absolutely hilarious!

A couple of days ago I opened the door to our room at the condo so the noise would wake up Grace from her nap. About five minutes later we heard Travis talking but we couldn't find him. We found him in our room just as you see him now. He was saying, "Wake up Gracie Bug". It was so cute!

They are awake and ready to go! Travis and Grace have a unique, love/hate relationship. They will be loving on each other one minute like they are in this picture, and then they'll be screaming at each other because they want what the other one has. This has made for an interesting week!

How Many Pictures Do You Have to Take to Get the Perfect One?

With these kids there's no limit. We never did get one of them all smiling and looking at the camera at the same time. Here's a sampling of our shoot...

Actually, now that I'm loading them this one isn't so bad! This was attempt number 1!

Attempt number 2. I don't really know what Grace is looking at.

Now we're just being silly!Travis, Jay, and Grace talking...Our beautiful Grace!!!These are two of my nephews, Travis and Jay. They went with us to the beach this year.

Walking down the beach with Jay

Jellyfish, Stingrays, and Crabs Oh My!

Well today is the first day we've been able to go out onto the beach because of the million jellyfish that have been down there. There were only a few left so we made a morning of it. While we were in the ocean we saw a stingray swim by and then some kids beside us caught a beautiful, huge blue crab! Lots of sea life where we are this year! Enjoy the pics!

Today on the beach Grace would sit and shovel sand into her bucket until it was full and then take it and pour it into the ocean. This process was repeated about a gazillion times! Seemed like aimless wondering to me, but who cares! She was having a blast!

Grace is normally not scared of anything. Today it was taking a little coaxing getting her to go into the water. Could have been all the things we saw in it!!

One of my favorite things about Grace are her long, narrow, little feet. How can you not love something that cute? I also love her little hands. Next is a picture of her and her daddy holding hands.

Grace kept wanting her daddy to bury her in the sand. We didn't think she would like it, but becuase she is a persitant little rascol we finally buried her. She loved it! Especially coming out of it!

This is one of my favorite pictures so far this year. Last year when we were here this picture would have been unheard of. What a difference a year makes! She loves her daddy now more than anything! What a beautiful picture of a daughters love for her daddy.

Vacation Is Here! Let The Picture Taking Begin!

Hello from the beach! We began our vacation bright and early last Saturday morning at 6AM! There's nothing I love more than being at the beach except for taking pictures! So, combine them both and I'm in heaven! Here we go!

After 5 1/2 hours on the road they are finally asleep! With only 1/2 hour left to go!

This is Grace's second trip to the beach and this year she loved the sand even more than she did last year!!! Everyone cover your eyes 'cause sand is gonna fly! I absolutely love this next picture of Grace. Grace is very passionate about life so we jump full speed ahead into everything we do-including throwing sand!

Grace and her daddy walking...

No fear of the water! This is why we are taking swimming lessons when we get home!

The first night of our vacation it is tradition to eat at one of our favorite places- The Crab Trap!

This is Monkey See and Monkey Do climbing over the gate. They had just seen their older cousin, Jay, do the same thing.

This next picture could have come straight from China! When we were there getting Grace everytime any of the Chinese people would take a picture they would make hand signs. I guess she had been practicing these except for that I have no idea where she learned them. She just said, "Mommy take my picture!"

This is Grace being her silly, fun self. It was so late by this point that we were all gettin kinda silly!

Grace and her daddy... she has become quite the daddy's girl lately!