Our trip to Yellowstone & Grand Tetons

Here's a link to our pictures from Yellowstone & Grand Tetons, it was a fabulous trip! I recommend that everyone go there once in your lifetime! Memorial day weekend proved to be a great time to go, not crowded and cheaper rates on hotels... anyway click on the Yellowstone album, then click "Check all", then "View Slide Show" There's some cute pictures at the end of Emily's sweet Welcome Home sign, we missed her alot... Enjoy!!

http://photos.yahoo.com/crossstreetkids

Daddy's in China

Please pray for Steve right now as he is on a 24 hour flight to Shanghai, China... for the 3rd time in 18 months!! Emily has already told me today that this is a sad day, I asked her why and she said, "I miss Daddy already!" We made a link chain and we will tear one link off each day until he comes home. She has already asked me at least 20 times today if we can take a link off yet :) So pray for Daddy to return home safely. Until then we will just count the links on our chain, we miss you Dad!

A "Real" Princess Tea Party

On Saturday, there was a Princess Tea Party at Toys 'R Us. While waiting in line to meet the "real" princesses, Emily Grace (aka Cinderella) had lots of fun with the other little princesses that were waiting. We found another Cinderella & Snow White!

But then came the moment we had all been waiting for...Emily ran up to Cinderella & she threw her arms around her! Cinderella picked her up & Emily was totally mesmerized! She is still talking about meeting Snow White, Cinderella, & Sleeping Beauty! She keeps telling everyone, "They were REAL & they talked to me & gave me kisses!" It was a very fun day!!

Ok enough about Emily!

Ok so lots of my friends that are reading this blog have asked me to share more than just Emily news! What's going on in my life, what is God teaching me as I walk with Him through life, marriage & parenthood? wow not sure where to start but here goes...

• Your husband is not always the right person to unload all your junk on :) Why do I say that you might ask, aren't we supposed to go to our spouse in time of need? Yes you are, but think about it, your husband is a man, and men try to fix things for their lovely wives. So when you are unloading all these struggles, problems, etc... his mind is going crazy trying to figure out how to help you. Most of the time, you don't want help necessarily, you just want to get it all out (am I right?) So here's what I have discovered, rather than stressing out your poor husband with stuff that doesn't really matter in the scheme of things, share those things with a good girlfriend (who will JUST listen & maybe offer some friendly advice) or God (who can solve the problems better than anyone, right?) In my experience so far, if you don't burden your husband with every little thing that goes through your mind, and only go to him with the important things, he's more likely to give you his whole hearted attention & love you more for it!

• Churches should be about family ministry!! What does that mean you ask? I along with several of my Grace Community colleagues attended an amazing children's conference in Atlanta, GA called Grow Up (www.growuponline.com). At this conference they discussed the importance of churches partnering with the family to produce a greater influence in a child's life. In other words, teaching biblical virtues to the children at church & then the church equips the parents with tons of resources to continue teaching the same principles in their everyday lives at home. Think about it this way, the church has approximately 50-100 hrs. with a child each year, while parents have over 3000 hrs with a child each year. Why don't we work TOGETHER to teach these children how to live abundant lives in Christ!! Novel concept, I know. Anyway if you want to know more about this unique approach to family ministry, check out this website, www.rethinkgroup.org. This is life changing stuff, don't go to this website if you aren't willing the rethink everything you know about church :)

• Last but not least, I'm seeing more everyday what God wants me to be! A joy-filled wife, a caring, loving mother & a JUMPER! You might say, what a jumper???? God has led me to make a huge jump for him into ministry to children! I never dreamed I would be in this position, & the more I tried to run from it the stronger I felt God say, "I told you to JUMP!" It's an exciting adventure with rewards beyond compare, as I see 50-75 kids each week worshipping God in a way I never dreamed a kid could. As I see kids coming to know Christ as their personal Savior & as I see our youth group gather each week to minister to these kids in a mighty way & come away with a deeper understanding of Christ from leading our elementary kids in worship & storytime, I understand why God called me to JUMP! I challenge you to seek what God is asking you to do for Him, He is asking us all to jump, what is yours going to be?

That's all for now, I'd love to hear what God is doing in your lives as well!!

CC

Swimming Lessons at the Y!

Here she is learning how to keep her body straight for the back float... and then she's demonstrating the back float for everyone! (She doesn't really like to have her ears under the water but we're working on it)










But by far her favorite part of swimming lessons is when they are over & she gets to slide down the frog slide!!

Happy Birthday, Mommy!

For my birthday, my sweet girl picked out beautiful butterfly earrings for me, she placed them with lots of tissue paper in a Strawberry Shortcake giftbag. No birthday is complete without a cake, right? Well at least not to Emily Grace, so she picked out a HUGE cake with birthday balloons on it & she wanted the first piece with the most icing! It was a wonderful day!

Mommy's New Maid!

Well I decided that I needed to hire a maid for the Crosby household!
Since we can't afford much, this is who they sent me :)
She a little on the short side, but she gets the job done!
She has a lot more fun mopping than Mommy does, give her a few
more years & she'll hate it too!

A 3 year old's perspective on Easter

I just wanted to share what happened at the Crosby house tonight...

I was cutting green strips of paper in preparation for next week & my sweet Emily Grace picked up 2 of them & starting waving them up and down saying "Praise God, Praise God" so I picked up the video camera & starting filming, here's what she said,

Emily: Praise God, Praise God (waving her green strips of paper)

Mommy: Where did you learn that?

Emily: At my church

Mommy: Is that what they did when Jesus came down the street?

Emily: Yes and He died on a cross

Mommy: Then what happened?

Emily: They put him in a tomb, and rubbed stuff all over his body like "spikes"
(I'm assuming she means spices)

Mommy: Then what happened, did he stay in the tomb?

Emily: No, Mommy, Jesus is alive again!

It's amazing that such little minds can grasp such eternal things!!

I thank God for my church, Grace Community & the eternal things the teachers there are sharing with my child! Just when you think they aren't listening..... you'd be surprised! Keep up the good work, Grace Acres!

Easter Bunny

Here's Emily Grace with the Easter Bunny! She was disappointed that he didn't talk, but she loved it when he wiggled his tail around...

Our little diva!

Ange gave Emily Grace this Hollywood Diva outfit for her birthday! As you can see when she puts it on she definitely plays the part, check out the poodle in the purse!! Although I have to say she doesn't always have to have the outfit on to be a diva!! Trust Me :)

Emily Grace's Princess Tea Party

On Saturday, we had Emily Grace's 3rd Birthday Party! It was a snowy day, but almost everyone made it!! First we had 3 neighborhood friends over for a Princess Tea Party and then afterward our families came up to continue the Princess Party, It was a fun day!

We decorated princess crowns!

This is our friend, Ellie!

This is our friend, Teigan!

This is our friend, Sarabeth!

Now we are having our tea party with heart shaped sandwiches!

But of course opening presents was her favorite part!

Valentine's Day

After work on Valentine's Day, Daddy brought Mommy some beautiful yellow roses!

He also brought Emily Grace a rose of her very own, she thought that was super cool!!

We have a wonderful husband and Daddy, Happy Valentine's Day to all!!

My Birthday Girl

Tuesday February 14th.... My sweet 3 year old ready for preschool



She told me she wanted her hair in a braid for her birthday party at school...

I told her that they were having a Valentine's Party at school, but she was convinced that it was her birthday party!!!

All her friends did sing Happy Birthday to her, Happy Birthday Emily Grace!!

FINALLY we got some SNOW!!!!!

It's February 11th, we were beginning to wonder if it was going to snow this year!!!!
We went sledding with our friend Anna Beth in her yard and then we built a snowman family in our yard! We had a wonderful snowy day...

Daddy's Birthday

February 8th was Daddy's Birthday so Emily Grace and I made him a cake! I'm adding some pictures of Emily Grace (the princess) and her Daddy (the prince)!

Fun at Dora the Explorer

On February 2nd, Emily Grace and I went to see Dora and Diego's Pirate Adventure at TPAC. We went with a group of our friends. (Kaden, Tucker, Brock, Rachyl Ann, and Macy) It was lots of fun, Emily Grace got a flag that she was waving the whole show, she got up and danced at the end and of course we had to buy the Diego doll!!

Teigan's Tea Party

We went to Me Me's Tea Room for Teigan's 3rd birthday party, it was lots of fun! Our friends Sara Beth, Teigan, & Anna Beth were there. We dressed up in our tea party attire and ate our tea sandwiches and drank of course tea!! We thought we were so beautiful!!