Names of GOD

Pics from the last few weeks!

On Monday, Tara, Kelly, and I got together to celebrate Tara's b-day and Kelly's great writeup from work (it's a great honor to receive one at her job). :) We went to the Scenic Loop Cafe (where Tara had her wedding reception). The atmosphere there is always so nice and serene. :) We had a great meal and ended the night with a huge dessert! :) It is always such a blessing to go out with my best girl friends in the world! :)
Tara and Kelly! :)
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Last weekend, we celebrated my cousin Michael's birthday. He and his sister and mom are in town visiting before school starts for them. We had a blast visiting with cousins that we don't see very often. Here Rachel is playing with Jordan (4 y.o.), who shared her toys so nicely with Rachel. :)

Michael, the b-day boy! :) He turned 17 this week! :)

Ben and Rachel playing around on the couch! :)

Catherine (Michael's sister) and Thalia (my cousin's daughter).

Matt and Jonah (my cousins)

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Rachel got a new princess "camera" a few weeks ago. Here she is taking a picture of me taking a picture of her! ;) The camera says, "You're as pretty as a princess!" and "Say cheese!" It's too funny when Rachel "takes a picture" of her Daddy and the tells him, "You're as beautiful as a princess Daddy!" ;)
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Rachel has been enjoying her cottage at Lala and Papa's house. Yaya even gave her a little bench to add to her cottage. It's her patio chair! :)
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A few weekends ago, we had our cousins over for a fun day of play and lunch. Desiree and I chatted while the kids played! :) They had so much fun! We missed Danielle's (the youngest) b-day party, so we were able to give her her present on that day! :)
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Last but not least, Rachel is OFFICIALLY POTTY-TRAINED!!!! Yes! Over the Christmas holidays, she decided that she was going to go poopie in the potty. Just over a year ago she started to pee pee in the potty and would be dry for the day. So we put her in underwear during the day, but at night, we'd put on a pull up.
Just a few month ago, she was terrified of pooping in the potty and would wait for the pull up and night time to go poopie. I think it helped to have her older cousin, Allison around to show her the ropes! :) She started going like if it was never a problem! ;) We are so proud of her. She no longer wants to wear pull ups at night and she has been like that for 3 whole weeks (with no accidents)! :) Thank you Lord for helping us with that stage in Rachel's life! :) I was going to post a pic of her on the potty, but i didn't want to offend anyone and it may just be TMI (too much information- in a picture format). :)

Thankful Thursday

Father God,

Thank YOU for blessing me with my husband, Ben. He's been such a great companion to me for these last 8.5 years. I am amazed at how much our love has grown because of You in our lives. He's such a wonderful husband, friend, father, helper,teacher, and worker. Thank YOU for allowing our little family to be so blessed in this life. I praise YOU always.

Love,

Melony

Happy Birthday Baby! I love you with all of my heart.

Christmas Day we went to Yaya's house (MIL). We took pics of the cousins all together again.Later, after we ate lunch and the kids played for awhile, they came downstairs to decorate a cookie cake for Jesus. They were having fun eating the mini m&m's and marshmellows.

Happy Birthday Jesus!

My battery died after that, so I don't have many more pics of the day. :( I then forgot to put the battery back in the camera when I did charge it. What a bummer! I finally got it together on New Year's Eve so here are a few pics of Grandma Carrizales' 84th birthday! :) She loved being with her family. :)

Great Grandma with most of her great- grandchildren! :)

Christmas Eve

We celebrated Christmas with my parents and some of the family on Christmas Eve. First, we went to the 2 pm service at our church. Vanessa and the kids were able to join us that night for a wonderful message about Our Savior who came so humbly into this world. After service, I snapped a pic of R and Allison playing on the slide right outside of R's bible class.

After we took R home for a nap, we headed to my mom's and dad's house for some good food. Dad made a small turkey and ham that were delicious and all the fixings to go with that. We had tamales, also, and rice and beans. Some of us had the "American" meal first and then the "Mexican" meal after! ;) It was all so good.

After we ate, we took some pics. Here they are:

Uncle Ashley and Tia Lilia (Dad's sis)

Papa and Lala and Rachel

Fatima, Ashley (family friends) and R R and her new best friend Ashley

Rodolfo, Ashely, Mayle, and Fatima (New family friends of ours, their mom, Miros, was in Mexico keeping her son company during the holiday)

Grandma, Me, and R
Tia Paz and Me
Mom and I After we took pics, I read the Candy Cane Story
The little ones placed Baby Jesus on the Nativity scene with the angel who was rejoicing.

We then all rejoiced by singing Christmas carols. R was so excited about singing songs, she wanted a solo. Here she is "reading" the lyrics that she was singing.
Time to open presents.
We had a great time with our family. :) We're thankful to God for all of our blessings. :)

Random things

2 days before Christmas, my aunt Yvonne invited her brothers and sisters to eat lunch at her house. I was also invited to come to see my aunts and uncles. Not everyone of them was present, but it was so much fun to see them and hear their funny stories of their childhood. ;) My mom and her twin brother seemed to be the ones who got into so much trouble. ;) They also had such funny stories to tell. I was so glad that I could be there (like a fly on the wall) to hear about their lives in Mexico. How different their childhood was... yet being as poor as they were, they were so happy and have cherished memories that they will carry with them and pass on to us (the next generation) if we will only listen.

My cousin's daughter, Savannah, wasn't feeling sowell, so her grandma (my aunt Yvonne) was taking care of her. She behaved so well.

From the far left corner of the pic, Uncle Juan (one of mom's older brothers), Sister Cathy (mom's oldest sister and yes, she's a nun), Tia Paz (the youngest sister), Mom, and Uncle George (married to Yvonne).

Aunt Elia (married to Uncle Juan), Tia Yvonne (hostess and one of my mom's older sisters) and again Uncle Juan and Sister Cathy's head. ;) The guys on the corner are Uncle John (married to Tia Paz) and Uncle Salo (my mom's twin brother).

I was very honored to be able to visit with my aunts and uncles that day. I will cherish this memory forever. :)

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That night, Ben started to assemble the dollhouse that we were giving to R for Christmas. It was quite big, but Ben just loves to put things together. :)

A busy 2 weeks... Christmas + Lots of Family= FUN!

Hello friends who read my blog! ;) I know i haven't changed the blog's layout to a new theme, but each year I have such a hard time "getting out of Christmas". Is it me or does everyone feel that way too? I still have my decorations up (of course, I've been putting them in a corner for a few days to pack up, but the tree is still up). ;)
Anyhow, we've been super busy these past two weeks. Vanessa (Ben's sis) & the kids came into town and we were spending all the time we could with them because we only get to see them once or twice a year. Here are some pics of the night that we went to eat out a Pappasitos.

Emerson, our youngest niece, is 10 months old.

Rachel and Allison (6 yrs. old) always have fun together!
Me & Vanessa, we always have fun together too!

Matthew, our oldest and only nephew, is 9 years old.

Vanessa and Ben

I will add more pics of the last few weeks of course they will be a little backwards because that's how blogger is, so please bear with me. Thanks! It's good to be back to blogging, BTW. :)