anchors away

In just a few short hours, our family is embarking upon our biggest adventure to date. I am proud/excited/nervous/happy to say that we are adventuring back to Hong Kong! When we first began discussions about this trip, it was way back in January, so I feel like we have (in a way) been preparing since that time. Josh told me he had to do some extensive business travel in Asia and it would have meant him leaving us for over 2 weeks. Due to some other longer-term travel we'll be taking later this year, we toyed with the idea of me going to China with him and brining Huntleigh with us. But I didn't want to leave the baby for that long...so we said we'd take her. But could we leave Lucy behind? How could we leave Lucy?! Okay. Let's go as a family of 5. We're ready for it. This is what we value as a family: let's begin to put it into practice. Travel is never easy, but it is will change your life, if you allow it.

The reason this trip is so meaningful to us is because Hong Kong was Josh's and my first place we built a home together after we got married. Josh did business there for 2 years and during that time God stretched and pulled us, He put us into a fire and sustained us, He sharpened and refined us, He built a solid foundation for us to be the team that we continue to strive to be. Our youthful sense of adventure could never have even processed how shaping and influential our time in Hong Kong would be for us and for our (at that time) future children. We lived there when we were ages 25-27 and here we are, 10 years later, living out the work God began in us while we were there.

I am excited to take my children to Hong Kong today. I cannot wait to see so many of our friends who still live there and who were powerfully influential in our young lives! I am excited for our kids to meet those people...and their children. I am excited to do this flight with our kids: 16 hours from Chicago. We would covet your prayers. I am excited to connect Hong Kong to YOU, my readers, through the camera and through word, something I wish I had done whilst living there, but, oh well. Here's my second chance! I will try to faithfully blog while I'm there, since I'm assuming I'll be up in the middle of the night with children who are jetlagging! Thank you so much to everyone who so faithfully served me this week, both with physical presence or just checking in on me to let me know they were praying for me or calling me to see if they could bring me anything. I felt so loved this week! Mom, Tina, Janet, Karlee, Hannah, Leslie, JennyLark, Cary, Jd, Nin, Mollie, Emmie...thank you!

Here we go!!

mother's day and more

We have a serious drooling problem around here.

Mother's Day was really fun for me this year. This is probably the best picture of me and the three, which isn't really saying much, since Lucy and Polly are completely disinterested in the camera. Oh well. It's just a memory. And memories are always imperfect, at best. Even the best of memories. I love being a mom. It's exhausting, exhilarating, humbling, eye-opening.

And I'm really thankful for my own mom who loves me well as an adult and humbles me with her unending willingness to serve me. She is such an example of Christ to me. I love you mom! You are such a faithful woman! I am so thankful my children have you in their lives.

I went on Lucy's end of the year field trip to Tilles Park and we had a little girls' photo shoot afterward. They were working the camera. Lucy called all the shots. This was "be cute and smile":

this was "pouty face/be a grouch" (or in Eden's case, "just growl"): In my opinion, Winnie wins best pouty face....

and this was "go crazy/let's have a girl party": I think this photo is a somewhat actual foreshadowing of what slumber parties will probably look like in the near future....yikes.

Lucy with Mrs. Heinemann: her loving, tender, shepherding 3K teacher. We love Mrs. Heinemann! I can't wait for Polly to have Mrs. Heinemann in just a few short years! This was a super great year in 3K for Lucy!

in the not so distant past

Life has literally been flying by. I am sometimes overwhelmed, but truthfully, my heart is full and happy. I love that the Lord gave us Polly. She is such an amazing addition to our family. These are the pictorial memories from our life lately: This was her baptism at 6 weeks. It was important to me to keep in the tradition of baptizing Polly at 6 weeks, seeing as we did the same with both Hunts and Lucy. I love watching my children be baptized. Those are precious, precious memories to me.

Pop and B took a little princess and a cowgirl to get some fun new cowboy boots. They came home with 4 new pairs. Such a fun day for all of them!

We took a zoo trip with Poppa and Yia Yia. The penguin house was super stinky as always.

We celebrated Valentine's Day in Palm Desert, California. It was such a great family trip!

While in California, we took a day trip to Joshua Tree National Park. I'm so glad we carved out time to experience the place. Just fascinating.

I am ashamed to admit that this is the very outfit Huntleigh wore into the Park. I guess I really didn't know what to expect, and I certainly did not expect it to be as cold of a day as it was. We made a quick detour to an odd little souvenir shop where I bought this ridiculous purple Yucca tree sweatshirt and hippie hat. The aviator sunglasses really pull the outfit together, though. I'm just going to blame these choices on sleep deprivation. I had a 2-month old baby.

I love these two. Lucy's outfit was equally as ridiculous, albeit slightly more subtle in its coloration.

Here's the littlest babe, back in Saint Louis, going on 3 1/2 months old. I purchased this flowery little sleeper at Target after her blowout poop while I was shopping there. I literally had to carry her around the store naked (in a diaper, of course) while searching for an outfit in which to put her. I just pretended like no one was watching me, even though I am confident I was receiving glares from strangers. I am an underprepared mom. So what?! At least I had one diaper left for her.

In March, we took an unexpected trip to Florida during the girls' spring break. It was so much fun. This picture was taken on the girls' first fishing trip in a flats boat. There is little my husband loves more than fishing in a Florida flats boat.

By the end of our fishing day, Hunts had gotten brave enough to touch the bait fish with her bare hands. We caught a couple snook, a lizard fish, and some sea trout and ate some of our own fish for dinner. I love how rewarding that was for Huntleigh!

Love this picture of Lu.

And our family pic, right before leaving the island to go home.

Oh my gosh. I love this picture of Lucy and her special friend, Winnie. They are such sweet buddies from school. This was before their special date for Winnie's 4th birthday when she took Lucy with her to get a little manicure and pedicure. Too, too cute.

Easter 2012. He is Risen!

Scrumptrulescent Polly with Yia Yia and Poppa. I love this picture.

Hunts with her sweet friend, Ava Grace, at AG's 6th birthday party. These girls are two peas in a pod and get along just swimmingly.

At 4 months, we like to go on a special trip with our baby. We did that with Huntleigh when we went to Cologne, Germany and with Lucy when we went to Dubai. With Polly, it wasn't as far of a trip, but we had our special time with her in Portland, Oregon. And I love that Polly found her feet in Portland, just like how Lucy found her feet while we were in Dubai.

So we stayed at the super cool and hip Hotel Monaco. I have to admit that we did see COLDPLAY while we were in Portland, since I am clearly obsessed with them. It was an incredible concert. We found out right before the concert that Coldplay was also staying at Hotel Monaco. We never ran into them, which is probably for the best since I would have freaked out if I were standing within arm's reach of Chris Martin.

First Daddy Daughter Dance at our school.

And first tooth loss for my first baby. These are the days!