Happy St. Patricks Day!

Today we will have our first ever Family night! I am so excited - Neil gave me a little nudge and now I am off and running! We started out by getting the book The Story of Saint Patricks Day. We read it over and over. I also picked up some window clings from the Dollar store. Then yesterday we colored pictures and used our St. Pattys day stickers to decorate. We also finger painted shamrocks, however my kids were totally not into that, so it was over and done quick-quick and no pics! Today Justus helped me make our rainbow cake. I saw it on Jacindas blog, then on Heathers blog and I knew I had to incorporate it into my day. I cant wait for tonight!

Basketball - its a part of life

Here at the Pettit household we are gearing up for March Maddness. Sunday is Selection Sunday which will then ensue some wonderful, nail bitting games. Im really not much of a sports person, but I have to say, these tourny games are fun to watch. I first got my taste of them when Justus was a brandnew baby. After his open heart surgery at two weeks old, Neils job gave him his two weeks paternity leave. Well, it was during March Maddness that Neil was off, so guess what we watched....Basketball. It was a good distraction to all that we had to deal with. And, how can you resist, when someone you love really loves something and is into it, you cant help but be excited, well at least for me its that way. So, its started and tonight we brought the hoop into the living room so Justus could shoot it up while Daddy watched some Conference Championship games. Haven was enjoying cheering for Justus in her microphone and then she was doing some stunts on the ottoman/block thing! Fun times!

On my heart

Lately Ive been reading In His Steps by Charles Sheldon. It is a book written around the the late 1800's. It is very challenging to say the least. It is the book that started the WWJD movement. An underlying tone of this book is what am I doing to give and live sacrificially for Christ. Here is an excerpt that has been ringing in my ears, spoken from a character that has a beautiful singing voice and society expects her to sing professionally:

The world has been served by men and women who have given it other things that were gifts. Why should I, because I am blessed with a natural gift, at once proceed to put a market price on it and make all the money I can out of it?......I want to want to do something that will cost me something in the way of sacrifice....I am hungry to suffer for something. How much have we denied ourselves or given of our personal ease and pleasure to bless the place in which we live or imitate the life of the Saviour of the world? Are we always to go on doing a s society selfishly dictates, moving on its little narrow round of pleasures and entertainments, and never knowing the pain of things that cost?

Im truly pondering this in my heart. How can I do this in my life? What ways can I sacrifice so that it costs me something? I have a shadow of an idea....

Yum-yum Cupcake

We celebrated Ali's bday tonight at Me-N-Eds. Justus had fun watching Darren and acting like a big boy. He even got to sit at the big-kids table. Afterward the kids enjoyed the cupcakes. Yummy-yummy!

Neils Prize

Today Neil weed-eated our back yard. It is a complete jungle! He got through a good chunk of it. In the process he uprooted a GIANT weed. You can see him as he holds it up - his prize!

My Project

Yesterday I tackled one of our flower beds. It was completely covered in weeds and had a dead bush in it. I raked and hoed my little heart out. It was tough work, but I got it looking pretty clean and neat. Unfortunately I dont have any before pics to show you. But I did take pics of the rest of our front yard so you can get an idea of what it looked like and what my future projects will be.

What weve been up to

House stuff....Justus has been loving building houses with his Lincoln logs. The other day we had some people over for dinner and the guy is a contractor so it was fun to see them building houses together. For Neil and me, weve been assessing our yard situation. I had the Weed Man come for a free lawn analysis. He basically told me that he couldnt help me, everything is dead. Well, he did show me which of plants are still alive. That was nice to know. So I think we are going to seed Bermuda sometime soon. Of course first we have to pull every thing up. Not fun, but we are excited to see the completed project, whenever that will be.