snips and snails and puppy dog tails

...that's what little boys are made of!

We kept both of our nephews this weekend while Jenn and Paul celebrated their anniversary.  My parents were also in town because my youngest sister, Becca, moved back to College Station. We kept the boys very busy and had a blast! In May we kept Kaden for a few nights, but this time we got both of them! Kaden will be 4 in November and Kai is 18 months. 

When we woke up Friday morning we headed to Target to get a few essentials for the weekend. 

Then we ate at ChickFilA and came home for a nap. Kaden was so excited to eat and rest because he knew after he did both of those things he got to play on the water slide! (aka, slip 'n slide)

Ready to go!

Chris was a great uncle and got out there and did the slip n slide with them. He had some bruises to prove it. I even did it a few times!

After slip n slide and dinner, my mom and I took them to the park by our house. I had no idea there was a park so close. I could see one from the street but it was behind an elementary school so I just assumed it was part of the school. But this is a city park with several play sets, tennis courts, basketball court, swings. Very cool!

Kai was very brave on the play set. He would only go down the slide with me though.

Kaden makes friends very easily and I saw this firsthand at the park. There was a 10-year-old boy he called "friend" and they played together the whole time. 

Funny story...Kaden can't say his L's, so my name is "Wei." While we were playing he had said my name several times. "Wei, look at me." "Help me, Wei." You get the idea. Well K told the boy he was playing with that he couldn't get down from whatever he was playing on and the FRIEND say, "Ask Wei, she'll help you." I thought this was so cute and hilarious. I don't mind being Wei. :)

Kai LOVED the swing!!

We took Scout along and he had fun too!

Kaden went with Chris to do his Insanity workout while we put Kai to bed. 
On Saturday we got up and they drew on the driveway with sidewalk chalk. Kaden played "Hop-cotch" (as he called it). 
Then after lunch and nap we went to my sister's and swam in their pool. 

Oh man I love these baby blues.

I didn't get any pictures of them actually swimming. We had picked up floaties for each of them and they were fearless in the pool! Thankfully Chris and I were both able to swim with them, so we each had one.


Then we came home, ate dinner and had more slip n slide time! This time Uncle Chris oiled it up a little with some cooking oil.

I think Kai finally figured out that he had a ton of trouble getting up, but he could roll and move where he wanted to go!  And you'll also notice his swimmer diaper is on its way off his bottom...yeah, it eventually came off. Guess those things are more effective when they actually wear a swimsuit. Now I know.


Kaden got to help make homemade ice cream! It was DELICIOUS!! It takes about 15-20 minutes and he sat in a stool and watched it the whole time.

At some point during the evening the boys were getting restless and I know they like to dance, so I turned on the dance music channel on the TV and they definitely danced!

Sunday morning we went to church

After lunch and nap Chris and I met Jenn and Paul halfway to give them back their kiddos. We had so much fun with them. It was a challenge at times with two of them instead of one. And we had to wake up a little earlier than we are used to, but we sure enjoyed having them. :)

A few things I (re)learned over the weekend...

• I am reeeally out of shape
• taking care of 2 kids is very different than 1
• I love our nephews! 
• Chris is going to be such a great dad someday :)

inside kyle field

Yesterday we had lunch with some Aggie friends from Tyler. They asked if Chris had connections to get into Kyle Field because their son LOOVES the Aggies, Kyle Field, etc. Chris just shot a quick text and arranged to get a private tour of Kyle Field. Uhh, AWESOME?!

So we headed over to check it out. Brady (their son) was SOO excited. 

First we walked down by the field. The first game is in two weeks and it's televised, so they've got the grass looking good! it's weird how much smaller it looks without the 80,000 people in the stands!

Julie, little Barrett and Brady

so excited to touch the "Kyle Field grass" with his toes!

then we went up the elevator to the press box and you could see soo much from the 9th floor!

ahhhhh, i am ready for some football! but i do hope it cools off outside soooooon.

press box view. my husband rocks.

I was super impressed that Chris was able to arrange this in a matter of minutes. He knows people! This was my first time to see Kyle Field from the press box. I think I did a good job of not acting toooo excited, but I'm pretty sure I was just as excited as Brady was!

our week in review

Life has been fast the past few weeks. Since returning from Uganda, we have been going going going. In the 31 days of July, we were home for 15 of them and I worked 12 of those!

I got a new phone for my birthday from the hubs and I've been messing with it trying to get it set up with way I want it. I LOVE it. It is a huge upgrade from my PalmPre.

Chris has been doing Insanity with Hayden and has already seen results from it! He says it's definitely a beatdown but feels good to work out.

Here is our sweet (2 year old) puppy, Scout

Saturday night we went bowling with our friends Hayden, Olivia and Ella. Olivia is someone we met at church and she and I really clicked. Unfortunately, she and her husband, Chris, moved to west Texas this week. Olivia and their baby girl, Ella, came bowling with us. 

Right before we left the bowling alley turned on the black lights. Here is Ella glowing! I wish I had taken one of her in the light too so you could see her precious face!

On Sunday afternoon we took some time to relax. Love this picture :)

The rest of the week went by quickly because I worked Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights. 


When I woke up Thursday afternoon I got my hair cut and then my parents were in. My youngest sister, Becca, moved back to College Station for school this weekend, so they came in to do that and spend some time with us. THEN, Thursday night I went and picked up our nephews!! We are keeping them this weekend while Jenn and Paul celebrate their anniversary. 


We had a FULL day today with lots of fun. But my goodness, I am tired!
I will post about all of our fun after we send them back home.

a few days in London

We ended our trip to Uganda with a 3 night "layover" in London. The rest of the team stayed 1 night, so we went around and saw all the famous London sites. And that night I forgot my camera. Go me. But I stole this one so I can at least prove I was there and I saw Buckingham Palace! 

The first night we did a TON of walking. And at some point towards the end of the evening I tweaked my knee. So, since I'm a sissy, our walking was pretty limited on Saturday because my knee was HURTING! But we did get to spend some time around Picadilly Circus. 

That included M&M World. Umm...SO COOL!! It's 4 stories of all things M&M.

26 different colors and about 50 different dispensers!

Seriously. This is SO clever!

These were employees that stand back there and literally, mix the M&Ms.(as people like me watch them!) What a job.

Since 4th of July was only a few days away, this party store was celebrating with America. Is it really okay for England to celebrate our independence from them?

One thing we knew we wanted to do while we were in London was go to church at Hillsong London. They have church in Dominion Theatre and it was AMAZING!

We went to the 1pm service, afterwards, went next door and ate lunch and then went back to the 3:30pm service!

Smallest, most ridiculous roller suitcase, ever?

our journey to Uganda-saying goodbye

Saying goodbye was HARD! I did not want to leave these precious people. They have absolutely made an imprint in my heart and I will always take them with me.

This is sweet Grace. She is Pastor Emmy's daughter and she holds so much of this ministry together. She is responsible for the Ugandan side of child sponsorship, knows so many of the children by name, visits each school several times a month and much more. She has such a pure heart and loved on each of us in a special way. I did teach her the word "sassy" when I told her she is sassy! She's half American, for sure! 

She even told us when she gets married she wants to have only white bridesmaids and African groomsmen. This made us all laugh!

We went to the Mbarara school for about 40 minutes before we headed out of town. The children sang for us a few more times, prayed for us, then gave each of us hugs again.

This boy was visibly torn about us leaving. The tears broke my heart.

Ellen and Jackline saying their goodbyes. They were both crying.

They are singing Thank You Jesus and then Jude prays for us.

Here is another excerpt from my blog post on PCM's site.

They care about and love us so deeply.  We went there to teach them and love on them, but I believe they did that even more for us. God formed a very unique connection between my heart and theirs during our time there. I will come home with a greater knowledge of what it looks like to truly love, as I have seen it firsthand. I am so grateful that the Lord gave me the opportunity to witness their simple lives and strong faith. I pray that my life will reflect the same faith and love that I’ve seen in Uganda.

This child had huuge crocodile tears while he was blowing us kisses and waving. sigh. I wish I could back this instant and give him an enourmous hug!

After that emotional goodbye, we drove a ways and stopped at the equator. 

Two places at once!

Did you know your body weight is 3% less on the equator? YES!

We watched a presentation of water draining. It was fascinating, really! They had 3 water pans set up, one on the equator and one on each side of the equator. The water drains differently on each of them. It spins opposite ways on either side of the equator, and on the equator it just drains straight down. Very cool!

Here is PCM's blog post on this day. 


That concludes our trip to Uganda. Thanks for reading what I had to say. God was very real on this journey and I pray that he will continue to use me at home to glorify Him. Tomorrow I'll post about our post-Uganda vacation stay in London.

our journey to Uganda-more!

I have so many pictures of our time in Uganda, but it's obviously impossible to share them all. I am going to post more to facebook, so you can see them if we're friends on there. Here are a few more of my favorites though.

Here is the whole team plus Pastor Emmy! 

PCM recently purchased a lot/building that has a partially built school on it. So they are now finishing that and the students in this picture are going to attend this school! We made this our first stop after getting off the plane in Uganda. Most of these kids don't speak English yet, but they sure did have precious smiles and hugs!

A cool group photo! Chris' idea.

I just loove man and this picture.

PCM also has a huuuge lot that has produce, early stages of tilapia ponds, banana trees, different kinds of livestock. They are in the process of building a school on this lot also. This will be a boarding school for close to 200 children. This calf is one that is out there on that land. 

The children love candy. They don't get it very often because it's kind of expensive there. But the children know that the Mzungu (white person) have candy! They say "sweet-ees". In this picture we had stopped at Pastor Emmy's house long enough to draw a crowd! The children think we are little candy machines I think! They stuck their hands the van say "Sweet-ees?!?!?!?" 

Here is a naked baby! Just had to get a picture. It's weird to think about...they don't have diapers. Of course they can use "cloth" as diapers, but most of the kids we saw just didn't have anything on. 

Here is the "choir" singing on top of the mountain. I could listen to this over and over and over.

Chris serving lunch. Beans and Ugali. The kids eat 100% with their hands. One of the groups got the kids ice cream one time and they didn't know what to do with the little wooden spoon it came with. The ministry has bought them utensils before, but with so many children, it just works better for them just to use their hands.

Please tell me you think this kid sounds JUST like a goat. Because I sure do.

Such sweet faces. :)

I'll have one more post tomorrow about saying goodbye. Here are my other posts if you've missed them. Ibanda, Rweimikoma, Mbarara.

Some of you may be wondering why the girls don't have hair. I asked this question while I was there also. At Mbarara, the boarders are required to keep their hair short just because it takes so much time to fix when it gets long. If you see some kids with hair, it means they get ready at home, so their parent(s) fix it in the mornings. At the other 2 schools it may be for the same reason, or it may be that the dirty water (like at Rwemikoma) doesn't allow their hair to grow.