Finally, Some Nice Weather

Well, it finally feels like fall around here! The boys had the day off of school today, so we headed over to Global Wildlife to enjoy the outdoors. Global Wildlife is an exotic animal park that you ride through in covered wagons and feed all the animals. We had a really good time, and so enjoyed the nice weather. Of course I have pictures!
Yes, it was the four boys today. John Ashley decided he would rather go with us than with his sister shopping.

Well, I actually made it in a picture! Me and my cutie, Cade.

Look at that cow's tongue! Is that disgusting or what?

My favorite is always the giraffe.



Oh, in other news, the bricks for the rest of my floor showed up. And, no, they don't match!!!!! The second batch on North Carolina reds are VERY red!! It couldn't be simple, no way, that would just really be too much to ask.

Have a great weekend everyone!!

Christmas List Update

Do you remember Cade's Christmas list? The list I was hoping he would lose interest in and get rid of? Well, look what I found today:

I know you're not interested in seeing my nasty toilet, but while Cade was doing his business today, he must have been working on his list. It is now 5 or 6 pages long. It is the cutest thing. He has actually asked Santa for an autographed bat for Dad, and a ring for Mom. (I like his thinking). The last thing on his list is this: "a pichrye of you ples." Translation: A picture of you, please. Now, where am I supposed to find a real picture of Santa? He knows the mall santas aren't real. That kid!

Not Much Going On

Well, I haven't really had anything to say the last few days. I know - shocker. I'm sure my family is ready to take my temperature. Nothing much blog worthy going on over this way. I do have stucco on the new house now. That's pretty exciting, but I haven't taken pictures. Other than that, we're just busy with school. Even football was canceled this week, so we are really slow. We're supposed to get some nice weather towards the end of the week, so we're looking forward to that. It would be nice to watch a football game without sweating like a pig! I have been picking out all the "stuff" for the new house. It's fun, but also nerve-wracking. To many permanent decisions all at once. They have bricked half of the brick floor, but then ran out of brick. No problem, right?, just get some more. Wrong. There was no more. We used an old brick and they didn't have any more in the state! We thought they were going to have to tear out all that they had done, and start again with a different brick, but supposedly they have found some. It is coming from out of state and was supposed to be here the end of last week, but you know how those things go. I just pray it matches!

Oh, well, that's all over here. Maybe something exciting will happen today!

Have a great day!

You Can Never Have Too Many Brothers

Cade was outside drawing with the sidewalk chalk and decided to draw our family. If you look closely, you'll see there are 4 little boys instead of 3.

He explained that there was Dad, Mom, Bryce, Braden, Cade and John Ashley. John Ashley's family has become some of our closest friends over the past couple of years. I feel so blessed to have them in our lives. John Ashley and Cade spend as much time together as we let them. They get along so well, and he just fits right in with the rest of the crew. We say he's a "part time Doughty boy". I love that Cade included him in his picture. I feel like he's part of our family as well. They are both here tonight. Braden and Richard are hunting. Bryce is at my parents, he's going with Paw Paw to play golf tomorrow. So Cade and John Ashley are having a great time without the "annoying" brothers. John Ashley was talking about something earlier and said, "Well, we are kind of like brothers". I agreed with him.
Here are the "brothers" at our last football game:

"Don't Worry"

I am reading a book for a Bible study called, "Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World". One of the chapters this week focuses on "worry". I wanted to share a couple of excerpts from the book because they were so awesome and fitting to the whole China situation.

"We face legitimate concerns every day of our lives. But instead of fretting, instead of worrying, we need to focus on discerning what we can do (with God's help) and what should be left entirely up to God"

For those of us with our dossiers in China, there really isn't much more we can do. We can't make China speed things up, nor can we just go get our girls. It is completely up to God. There is no reason to spend our time and energy worrying about something that we cannot change. (Please know that I am talking to myself)

"The reasons our problems often seem overwhelming is [that] we allow the things of time to loom larger in our gaze than the things of eternity".

Wow, how powerful is that when time is what we are really all worried about. It kind of puts everything into perspective. Just thought I'd share.

He Might Just Make It

I have been so worried about Bryce going to Jr. High, and how he would deal with all the different people there. He is not the best at making new friends. He is also very sensitive and wears his feelings on his shoulder. If someone makes fun or teases him, he gets very upset, which eggs the person on. We have dealt with this for the past few years and it drives me crazy. I would rather die than let someone know that they were getting to me, so I just couldn't stand when he would get so upset. So far, I hadn't heard anything negative about Jr. High so I was hoping everything was going good.

Last night, we were all in my bed right before bedtime just talking and goofing off, and Bryce said that there was a kid cussing him out during lunch. We asked him what the kid said and this is what he told us:

Robert: Stabs and apple in half and takes a bite and tells Bryce, "That's gonna be your head".

Bryce: "You can't eat my head."

Robert: "Shut the #*&* up. Me and my posse are going to jump you in the bathroom."

Bryce: "You don't have a posse"

Robert: "Yes I do, Tim and Todd are my posse, right?"

Tim: "Since when have we had a posse?"

Robert: "You'll come with me, right Todd?"

Todd: "No"

Bryce just laughed at him.

I know the words are harsh, and I hate that he has to hear that, but I am so proud of his responses. He also had a couple of rolled eyes in there and some shrugged shoulders. We all were able to laugh at how stupid the kid sounded. Robert also called Bryce a twig. So we asked Bryce what the kid looked like, he said he is about 6 inches shorter than Bryce. We just laughed. So this is the exchange that happened between my boys after the story:

Cade: What's a posse?

Dad: A group that sticks together.

Cade: Bryce, you have a posse.

Bryce: Who?

Cade: US! Me and Braden are your posse. I'll go up there and beat him up.

Braden: "Bryce should say, I'll get my posse, they're like a puma"

What that means, I don't really know, but I can tell you that we got a huge laugh at it.

So in honor of Bryce's new attitude, and in case you forgot how cute they are, here is the Doughty boy posse (this spring):

14 Years Ago...

...I promised to love this man forever. Well, it hasn't been forever yet, but we're still going strong. We have been through lots of ups and downs, tragedys and joys, good times and bad times. We have always stayed true to each other and worked together to overcome anthing that has come our way. He is truly my best friend. I love you, Baby.

We met in November of 1992. This picture is of us at Christmas of that year. (How about that hair?)

We were planning a wedding after just two months of being together. Our wedding was eight months later! I had dated alot of different guys and I just knew that this was IT. Can you tell, I was just a little excited?

14 years and 3 1/2 kids later, we're still going strong. There is a little more of us to love, a few more wrinkles, and a little less hair, but life is good!

Thanks for the 14 best years of my life. I love you, forever.