Snow Day!!!

We had a great snow on Feb. 13. The kids had a blast playing, making snow angels, building a snowman, eating snow cream and more. Enjoy the fun pics of our kids and house covered in snow!

Sara

Emily making a snow angel

Henry

Building a snow man

Here's our cute little snow man!

And then...

No more snowman!

Oh well, they knocked the head off!

Sara and Emily playing in the snow

Sara playing on the snow covered table

Our playset covered in snow!

Henry trying to uncover the slide

without much luck!

Henry and Emily

Emily

Henry

Going diving

This was an email I sent to Ben last week who asked me to put it up on the blog as he thought it was hilarious. Hope you enjoy and can empathize with the ever growing sea of boxes with which I am exploring through daily.

"I just went diving...

Through a sea of boxes in our garage. While plundering through box #1, I located our windstream modem and the instructions to my camera. This made me think the wireless would be there since that was office equipment, but when I hit the bottom, no such luck.

So I swam over other boxes and climbed over rails to reach yet another box that read storage misc. Maybe this would be it! What did I find- an unopened stapler, the box for my OLD camera, and more office supplies. But no wireless modem. Ugh!

So then I viciously attacked the largest non-bedding box, literally falling in with only my feet kicking out. At this point, Henry walks out with his southern "mommy whacha dooooiiiinnnggg?".

After throwing out every kid safe equipment we own, except the much needed door safety knobs of course, discovering our camcorder, I was about to give up when something caught the light at the bottom of the box and hope filled inside me as I saw it... Wedged between a Noah's Ark trash can, a tapestry hanging and some stuffed animals.

I shout for joy! We have wireless!!!

Well, it isn't hooked up yet, but I did find it!"

And for those of you who actually read through this... our wireless is now hooked up and I am typing this from our computer in the living room while the modem and wireless are safe in our bedroom. Ah the simple things that make me happy!

Sara and Emily turn FOUR!!!

On Sunday, December 13,we celebrated the twins fourth birthday!! I cannot believe they are four. It was a small gathering with only our immediate family and the grandparents. But it was the first birthday celebration in our new home! The kids love the house and we do also.

Sara and Emily blow out birthday candles

Emily enjoying the yummy cake made by Grandmother!

Sara loved the cake

Sara

Henry

Emily

Em and Mamaw

Sara with Grandmother and Granddaddy

House update

The potential buyers are moving at a snail's pace!  They had set a date in November for closing, but haven't decided to move forward and accept the counter.  Apparently, the husband wants to build while the wife wants our house.  (Prayers that the wife wins this argument!)  So, we are back to being patient and hopeful.  We have the house up for sale as well as up to rent, so we will see which happens first.  My prayer is to sell it so we can move forward.  I will keep you posted!

A prayer and a giveaway

It's Friday!!!  Internet is up and running, but no pictures today- sorry!

It has been a long, stressful week.  I didn't realize how stressed I was until my husband said that I wasn't acting like myself.  I am anxious about the house selling.  I can't quite wrap my head around whether I am sad that the house is selling, frustrated that we will love mucho money when we sell, or stressed that the buyers have STILL not gotten back in touch about our counter.  And we gave them our counter on TUESDAY!!!  Seriously...  I am ready to know one way or another- will this offer work out or will we need to have patience to wait on another offer.

So, I am needing prayers.  Prayers that something, anything will happen this weekend.  (And may it be that we are locked into a contract!)  And a prayer that I will let go of the stress and actually sleep.  I can't sleep when my mind is wondering and so these past few nights I have been wide eyed.  And of course, when you are sleep deprived, you are no good to your kids. 

And I need some other prayers, not for myself, but for my friends Leigh and Gray Ladd.  I have posted about them several times over the past few weeks, but today, after reading her blog, I wanted to share once more.  Leigh and Gray set out many months ago to adopt a child from Ethiopia.  Following their call from God, they began the adoption process and are in full swing of trying to raise their initial fees.  At the end of last week, they thought that $5000 more would do it.  But God has a way of changing things around when we least expect it right?  At a conference on adoption, Leigh and Gray heard God calling loud and clear that they were to open their home to not one child, but to two children!  Amazing, yes!  Scary, yes!  And so now, they must come up with close to $8000 in the next couple of weeks.  Prayers please for the Ladds, for their family, for the children they seek to adopt and for those around the world who are supporting them in prayer, financial donations and giveaway donations.  The Ladds feel strengthened by all the support, but $8000 is still a daunting number!

For her full story, jump on over to her blog  http://leigh-onedayatatime.blogspot.com/
And after reading the blog, please, please join in praying for the Ladds and if you are able to support them financially, donate to the giveaways posted on http://bringingourbabyhome-onedayatatime.blogspot.com/

More later...

house

For those of you know that we have been trying to sell our house, we have an offer on it!  Finally!  We put the house up on the market in February.  With no offers by July, we took it off in order to pack up, move, paint and put some new carpets in.  We decided at that point to try at rent it.
Well, after 3 months of trying to rent it, we decided to put it back on the market last week.  It was kind of a least push, let's rent or sell, whichever comes first.
We had our first offer tonight!  It is low, but at this point we will take low in order to get out of it and let that burden go.  We did counter and now it is just a matter of waiting to see if that is accepted.
Please join us in prayer that it will be, that we will come up with the money to cover our loss and we will be able to fully start our life here in Greenville.

On an aside note, we will have internet up and running by Friday so I will be able to post pictures again!!!  Hooray!

It has been awhile

Wow! I cannot believe my last post was in APRIL!!! There has been a lot going on with our family and I just never found the time. Sorry!

Long story short...

We couldn't sell our house- sad!!! So, we are trying to rent it out. And of course, in order to do that, we had to have the whole house painted, carpets redone and cleaned, etc., etc.... too much money for a house we aren't living in!!!

We are renting an apartment in Greenville until we figure out where to go from here, but at least we are together! We moved in last week!

Greenville is going to a great place to raise our family. There is so much for the kids to do and I cannot wait to be on the adventure with him.

I am still missing my work, most especially the people, but everyday I wonder how the heck I was a fulltime minister and fulltime (single during the week) mother. I am so grateful that my husband has the ability to support our family so I can spend some of these precious years at home. Without him, it would not be possible.

Okay... I promise to post lots of pics and keep this blog updated. In the meantime, here are a few scrapbook pages of our last few months in our Matthews home.

It has been way too long

Yea, yea, yea... it has been over a month since I have posted. I have so many pictures and videos to upload. Just be patient with me and give me a little more time to post all of those one here. In the meantime, here is a brief update...

A lot has happened in our family over the past month.

On February 13, we put our home on the market. Our home that we have had only 13 months and our home that we love... sad! BUT it is all for good! Once we sell it, our family will be back together again and living in Greenville, SC. I get to move back to South Carolina!!! Not that I don't LOVE NC because I do, but there is just something about being born and raised in SC that makes you long to go back... as my husband says "I'm a true sandlapper."

On February 15, I announced to the session of my church our decision to move. This comes with so many conflicting emotions. I am so sad to leave PPC. It is my home in many way. It is truly a church home for our family. All 3 of my kids were baptized here, my husband in a member, and the congregation is made up of people I call friends. Yes, I am sad, but also grateful for the time I have had a PPC. This congregation has reaffirmed my call to ministry and I know that I am stronger and more faithful because of their lives.

When we leave Charlotte, I will have the opportunity to stay at home with our 3 kids! I cannot believe that God has placed this opportunity in front of us because we did not know if it would ever be financially possible. But we are hopeful for the future and excited that I will have a few years of just being a mom before the kids go off to school. Time goes so quickly!

So, we have had 3 showings so far... not too bad with the economy, but we are hopeful that spring will bring more and someone will fall in love with our home like we did!

Aside from the stress of keeping the house clean with 3 kids underfoot, there hasn't been too much excitement in the Cox house.

We had our first trip to "visit Daddy" in Greenville. It was very interesting trying to explain to the kids that we were going to visit Daddy. But they loved it and we all managed to sleep in my husband's tiny one bedroom apartment!!! Poor Henry had to sleep in his pack in play in the laundry room. Wonder if I will ever share with him all the interesting places we set up his pack in play?

Ben and I also had the opportunity to go to Las Vegas for a few days last week. My parents kept the kids so it was a nice restful trip for me. Poor Ben was actually there for work and WORK they did!!! He started some days as early as 6:30 and wasn't finished until after dinner every night. We didn't get to see much of each other, but I got to relax and had no one asking me to do ANYTHING for them. We stayed at the M Resort that just opened at the beginning of the week. I was able to take in some spa time... amazing being in a spa that has only been open for 3 weeks! How spoiled was I!!!

It was good to get back, but now I am looking at my to do list grow and grow and grow and trying to find time to fit it all in while remembering those brief days of relaxation.

That's enough for now... I will post those pics and more about the kids as soon as I can!