Stokes' "Smokey" 10th Anniversary!

This past weekend Tim and I celebrated our 10th anniversary in the Smokey Mountains, staying at a resort called "Mountain Loft," which was beautifully tucked away from the hustle and bustle of the family vacation destination, Gatlinberg, TN. We were so grateful for the opportunity, given to us by friends from church who had enough timeshare points to share generously with us. Not only that, they watched our kids the whole weekend! What a blessing.

We thoroughly enjoyed time to enjoy the beauty of God's creation, hiking quite a bit at the Smokey Mountain National Park. I found out Tim's sense of adventure definitely exceeds mine, though! He wore me out with a hike on Saturday, but at least we could go back to the resort and take a nap! And then go swimming outside with a beautiful view of the mountains - can't complain. We woke up to that same beautiful view, in fact. They built the units to each have a mountain view.

This time was truly a gift from God in the midst of a very crazy time in our lives. We had to be prepared to move to the day after we came back! We did just that and now I continue to be in the middle of a certain amount of chaos. We are unpacking, doing Vacation Bible School at our church every night this week, and preparing for a trip to Maryland next week. So I can't imagine anything more on our plate right now. But praise God for His blessings in the midst of our craziest times.

Illinois Family Reunion!

We enjoyed a couple of days this past week with much of Tim's family and extended family on Tim's dad's side. We stayed at his Aunt Kathy's big country house along with Tim's parents and many of his siblings and their families. The kids had a blast with grandparents and cousins, aunts and uncles, great aunts and great uncles, and even got to meet their great-grandma. We enjoyed the break from our routine to hang out in the country with the picturesque cows and corn fields, go creek-stomping, see lots of farm equipment, play lots of cribbage, and do lots of nothing except hang out with family! We were very thankful for the opportunity and took some fun pictures to share. Included is Tim walking across the creek on a log with Beka sleeping on his shoulder! There are more pics I'd like to share later, but here's a start. God bless!

July 4th!

We had a very wet fourth of July and thought everything might be canceled that evening, but the rain held off that night enough to have a really fun time! Our church had games, free ice cream, a patriotic service led by Tim, a bike "parade" for the kids' outside, and last but not least a fabulous fireworks display. We even had a DJ show up - at first Tim didn't know what to do with him because we hadn't asked for one, but long story short - he was for free and it was great to have the patriotic music along with the fireworks.

So we are posting some pictures of our evening - the kids loved decorating their bikes, the ice cream, the fireworks, the friends, etc... Rebekah even thought she had fireworks in her hair - Rachel's added touch with the colorful clips, but the loud booms scared her.

Tomorrow we take a trip to visit family in Southern Illinois and hopefully I'll be able to post that update next week! God bless!