The Walden Family

First day of School 2011-2012

2011-08-15T09:24:00.003-04:00

First day of school 2011-2012
Parker 3rd grade/Peyton & Paige Kindergarten

We've reached another new chapter in life. As of today, all three of our kids are now in school all day. They attend our churches Christian school, Bethel Holiness Christian School. Parker is a pro at school now, but this was something new for the twins. They all went to bed early last night without any problems and hopped right out of bed this morning. I can only hope they get up that easy every day! :) They were so excited when we got to school and I just made myself not think about it and survived without any tears being shed.

I'm excited about everything I am going to get done on my days off while they are at school. I have great plans to clean out closets and reorganize! I'm sure I won't get it all done, but I do have high hopes...

However, things will not get organized if I continue to sit here on my laptop...

Off to clean out the boys closet....

Happy Easter from the Walden family!

2011-04-24T23:12:00.002-04:00

Our romantic date....I should say not!!!!!!

2011-03-25T21:59:00.004-04:00

Several weeks ago, Valentine's day weekend to be exact, we had some excitement around our household! (What's new, right! Something is always happening around here!)

Jonathan and I had been planning for weeks to have a nice, quiet Valentine's day date. Mom had agreed to watch our kids and I was dreaming of a juicy steak dinner. When the day arrived, I began to feel a bit guilty about not taking our kids with us so we decided to drag them along! First mistake of the weekend... ;o)

We decided on Outback Steakhouse in Indy and had a bit of a wait before we were seated. My nerves were somewhat frazzled already. As we were sliding into our booth, the waiter was greeting us and asking for our drink orders. I was trying to do the waiter a favor and asked if he could bring Parker an adult size sweet tea! (2nd mistake of the weekend...) The waiter brought our drinks back to the table and began passing them out. Parker was making a huge deal over getting the paper off of his straw and all of a sudden....crash! His entire glass of tea toppled over and came pouring across the table at me, landing in my lap! Lovely.... :( My stress level instantly rose dramatically and Parker was in tears. The waiter tried to make Parker feel better by telling him that once he spilled a glass of pop in a customer's lap and it was that person's birthday! It didn't help...

Parker then gets a kids cup with a lid, much to his dismay, and still managed to knock that one over as well! He dropped utensils, etc. during the meal and I was pretty sure he had butterfingers by the time the night was over. It was a stressful meal indeed but the steak was awesome!

Late that night, after we were home and ready for bed, Parker decided to poor himself a glass of tea! You guessed it...............he spilled it all over my kitchen counter! What in the world?!?!

We crawled into bed after midnight anxious to get a good night's rest before Sunday! For some strange reason, I woke up a little after 1am and needed to use the bathroom! I had just gone at midnight and I never do that! (I'm pretty sure now, that God woke me up!) I went to the hall bathroom, which I never do either, and as I came back into our room, I heard a strange sound! (Not Jonathan's snoring either!) :o) I couldn't figure out what it was so I woke Jonathan up! I asked him, "What is that noise over there on your side of the bed?" He listened for a few seconds and came flying out of bed and said, "It's a leak!" I immediately looked up at the ceiling and even in the dark room, I could see a horrible sight! I turned on the lights and to my dismay, I saw a HUGE mess! Something had leaked all over our ceiling and was dripping through the ceiling and onto our carpet, just a few inches shy of hitting Jonathan in bed! Jonathan spoke up and said, "If our ceiling looks like this, then our upstairs is flooded!"

(All of a sudden, I had a flash back of a conversation that Parker and I had earlier than evening! Parker had told me that he had stopped up the toilet upstairs, but that he had "fixed it!" I remembered asking him if it was okay now and he said yes so I congratulated him on taking care of it on his own!) 3rd mistake..............

Jonathan and I bolted upstairs to find the toilet completely overflowing from out of the top of the bowl and onto my bathroom floor. The water was going down by the baseboard and right into our bedroom! We quickly got it unclogged and all the water sopped up and went back down to figure out what in the world we were going to do!

I tried to soak up the water from the ceiling by throwing a towel up there. 4th mistake.......... I poked a hole in the ceiling!!!!!! Water came pouring out! A 911 call to my dad was made and we figured out it was probably good that I had made a hole! We listened to it drip all night and fill my kitchen trash can nearly half full!

I didn't dare tell Parker it was his fault. He had enough problems earlier that evening to cause self esteem issues to last a lifetime! ;o)

My ceiling is still a lovely shade of brown and is about 10 feet long. Peyton declares it's the shape of a giant's foot! ;o) I need to get it repainted but am really dreading the huge mess as the entire ceiling has to be painted. Ugh.....

So, even though I haven't blogged in months, crazy things have still been happening around our house. I just haven't sat down to take the time to blog about them!

Operation Christmas Child project!

2010-11-12T21:53:00.003-05:00

A few years ago, our Junior Church took on the Operation Christmas Child project. It's something that we look forward every year. We get donations of items and money for shipping from people in our church, then we get together and assemble the boxes. After we are finished we pray for the children that will be receiving these boxes. We pray that they will be a blessing to each child and that they will somehow come to know Jesus. (It has always been a dream of mine to one day get to go overseas and help deliver these boxes! It would probably tear me up seeing the children, but I would love to experience it!)
Parker enjoyed putting a box together for a boy.

Our group of workers with out finished products...

32 boxes this year!

We always order pizza and listen to Christmas music while making these boxes for the children. It's a fun evening and everyone enjoys helping out, even our kids!

September happenings...

2010-10-25T19:47:00.003-04:00

Parker's 8th birthday was on Sunday, September 19th
I can't believe we have an 8 year old!

He chose this theme when the Reds were still in the playoffs!!

World's biggest baseball nut!

Parker with his siblings and cousins!
Brycen Thompson, Kerrigan Anthony

Peyton, Parker, Paige and

Carter Thompson

Here comes double trouble...

2010-08-17T12:18:00.003-04:00

Paige and Peyton, 4 1/2 years old.
Today, August 17th, 2010 marked the first day of school for our twins, Paige and Peyton. They attend Asbury United Methodist's "Children's Morning Out" on Tuesday and Thursday. They were so excited to start back to school and eagerly jumped out of bed this morning. I know that before too long, I'll have to drag Peyton out of bed for school. However, there was much excitement in the air today at our house as we quickly got ready for school and ate a good breakfast. The twins are in the Red Room this year and Mrs Hollie is their new teacher. I'm hoping that they learn a lot and that this gets them all ready for Kindergarten next year!
Look out Miss Willard....you're gonna have a busy year next year!!!

He's growing up too fast...

2010-08-17T11:52:00.003-04:00

Monday, August 16th, 2010 marked the first day of school for Parker. He is now a 2nd grader at Bethel Holiness Christian School. He was excited about going back to school and seeing his friends but said he just wanted to be able to go to school, but not do any work. I took him to school and asked him if he needed my help in carrying his stuff into his classroom. He replied..."NO, Mom! I can get it just fine, you don't need to walk me in!" :( So I said my goodbye and drove off. I began to think about how quickly he is growing up on us!

He will be 8 years old in September and weighs just shy of 100 pounds! Jonathan looked up in his school book to see how old he was when he reached 100 pounds and he was in the 7th grade! I had to buy him size 14 shirts and his "husky" pants from last year are quite snug around the middle. I wonder how big he'll be, will he be bigger than his Daddy and what will he one day become?!

On that sentimental note...I hear laundry and housework calling my name!

A peek at our family vacation...

2010-07-22T15:25:00.002-04:00

We had a great time together as a normal family on our vacation to Wisconsin Dells! We had ten wonderful days together but by the end of the vacation, I think we were all on Daddy's nerves! :)

Of course, we couldn't let this trip get by without a crazy story or two! You know me...

One day the twins wanted to ride the inter tubes in the "lazy river!" I thought it sounded like fun so said I would take them! I got in the water, grabbed a double raft, and then proceeded to try to jump in very graceful like!!! I was a bit awkward to say the least. I was feeling mighty proud of myself for finally getting onto the back of that thing when all of a sudden...my inter tube did a complete flip backwards and down I went! I came up sputtering and looked at Jonathan who was about to die laughing at me. It was then that I realized that I had lost my glasses in the current of the river! Oh no.... I am blind as a bat too!!! I let my inter tube float away and grabbed the twins. Jonathan proceeded to climb into the river and go searching. He did end up finding my glasses quite a ways on down the river. They weren't broken and I was thrilled. That experience wasn't very "lazy" for us that day!!!

On Wednesday night, the weather had been bad and it was really storming outside. They kept talking about tornado warnings in certain counties. Of course, we had no clue what county we were even in that day!! The sky was black and winds were strong, thunder and lightening flashed but we didn't let that stop us from sleeping soundly! All of a sudden, Jonathan and I woke up to an ear piercing sound of the fire alarms going off in our resort! We both quickly got dressed and I went out in the hallway. People were staggering out of their rooms in a daze wondering what in the world was happening! I began to try to wake the kids who hadn't even moved since the sirens began blaring!!! Talk about extremely sound sleepers... Parker wouldn't budge and I was trying to figure out how in the world we were going to carry these kids down 5 flights of stairs! The sirens stopped as I was trying to wake the kids and I told Jonathan to go downstairs and make sure it was really something big before I woke up our kids!!! Ha!!! He took the elevator downstairs of all things!!! Said it was total chaos in the lobby and people were asking what time it really was! Would you believe it was only 11:22pm!!!!! Ha Ha!!! The storm had actually knocked the power out a couple of times and that caused the alarms to go off. It took us a while to settle back down and sleep but the kids never knew it happened!

The next morning the kids were looking out our patio door and saw some debris on the patio. As they looked below, Paige saw that a huge pine tree had fallen just below us! Good grief....

Click on the picture below for a photo journey of our vacation!

Wisconsin Dells...July 2010

4th of July weekend!

2010-07-08T23:12:00.004-04:00

On July 4th, we got to visit TaMerra Edwards...

Daniel & Angie Edwards new baby girl!
She's precious...
Paige thought she was hot stuff cause she got to hold baby TaMerra!

Parker fell in love with the farm cats at Jonathan & LuRhe's and wanted to bring one home!
Lucky for us....Paige came in from outside and her eyes were almost swollen shut! :)
I do believe she has a cat allergy! So...no kittens for this household!

Parker & Peyton having the time of their lives on the Edwards 4-wheeler!

I had several mini heart attacks that day! :)

Parker did a great job driving Peyton "slowly" around the farm!

He just HAD to take me for a ride!

I think Daddy enjoyed his ride more than I did!

Paige had her cousin Jesse wrapped around her finger!

Boys will be boys...

I'd do it all over again...

2010-07-06T12:43:00.003-04:00

It was a beautiful summer day, on July 6th, 1996. A day I had dreamed about for many years. I was about to become Mrs. Jonathan Walden! We had fallen in love at a youth camp in July of 1991 and had 5 happy years of dating.

He proposed to me in July of 1995, in the middle of a wheat field, on a huge John Deere tractor, on his sister and brother-in-laws farm.

I thought our wedding day would never arrive. We were counting the days and the hours until we would be married! I was afraid the Lord would return before we got married!!

That beautiful summer day finally arrived and our wedding was a dream come true. I was the luckiest girl in the world! (I still am by the way!)

Now, 14 years later...here we are...."So happy together!"

Happy Anniversary Jonathan. I love you SO much!

Thanks for letting me be your wife and for choosing me out of all the girls in the world! I'm so glad you did!

I Love you!

Char-broiled...

2010-06-30T20:33:00.011-04:00

Last weekend was an extremely busy weekend for me. I had a baby shower for a girl at work on Saturday afternoon and had been busy preparing my house for the shower all week long. On Saturday morning, Jonathan had gone golfing with a friend and the kids were spread out with a couple of different sitters. I had a fun day with the girls away from work and was cleaning up after the shower when the phone rang...

Jonathan was calling and wanted to know if I felt like having company that evening. He thinks every time the house is clean, we need to invite someone over! :) I told him that would be fine and we quickly decided to grill out hamburgers and hot dogs on his new grill that he had gotten for Father's day, just 6 days earlier! I ran to the grocery story and grabbed what I needed and hurried home to begin supper.

(I want to throw in a tid bit of info right here... Chuck and Mary Jane McGuire highly recommended the type of grill that we chose and said that we would never even have to use a squirt bottle on it!!!) :o) Hold that thought...

A short time later, I had the side dishes cooking and Jonathan went out to start up the grill. He turned on the grill and heard a slight hissing sound. He said he thought the gas was just going through the tubing since the grill was new. (However, we had already used it twice the weekend before!) He then proceeded to flip the "ignite" switch and all of a sudden... huge flames began to shoot out of the back of the grill! He ran around to the back of the grill to see the entire gas tank engulfed in flames!!! He immediately sprinted towards the door, and in his haste, pulled a muscle in his calf! I was in the garage getting something, and all of a sudden, Jonathan came busting in the patio door, screaming..."I need a fire extinguisher!!!" Of course, my first reaction was "WHY???" He proceeded to quickly run to the pantry and say "The grill is on fire!" I had no clue where the fire extinguisher was at that moment but he found it within seconds. We have kept it right inside the pantry door ever since we got married! Glad he was thinking straight because I sure wasn't!

Back out the door he went, doing the "PASS" acronym to quickly put out the fire. Pull the pin, aim, squeeze and sweep! The fire immediately went out as soon as he started to spray it. The next door neighbors quickly came running out to see if we were okay! They had seen the excitement from their kitchen window. After Jonathan's heart rate slowed back to a normal rate, he then surveyed the damage on his brand new grill. :( It was now covered in a white powder, my side dishes were basically done, company was on their way and we had raw hamburgers and hot dogs!

Jonathan ended up cleaning up the grill and reconnecting the gas tank. I can't believe he would even try to light the silly thing again, but he did and it worked just fine. Evidently there was leak in the connection from the tank to the grill. It's a wonder we didn't blow up our entire street!

The hamburgers and hot dogs were delicious and we had a good time that night with our friends despite all of the excitement! We had several good laughs and made more hilarious memories! Someday, I'm going to write a book of all the hilarious happenings in my life...

Happy Father's Day...

2010-06-21T00:25:00.003-04:00

to my wonderful husband of nearly 14 years...
The kids and I got him a new gas grill that he picked out!

We had dinner together today at Mom's and it was delicious!

Jeff and I are posing with the best Dad in the world! :)

Jeff with his two boys, Carter and Brycen.

Kerrigan was celebrating with her Daddy today.

My four favorite people in all the world!
Jonathan celebrating Father's Day with his three gifts from God!

Our room...almost finished!

2010-06-11T16:26:00.004-04:00

New bedspread from Kohls. My birthday present from Mom and Dad.

Not kid friendly... the kids are not allowed to sit on it!
I didn't want to put our wedding picture away forever, but I'm not happy with the gold frame.
Jenny Grissom says I can paint it white and "distress it!"

My favorite picture ever of my kids!
Thanks to Jenny Grissom...

My purchase from IKEA...

(Now I need to get one for Jonathan's side to match!)

Another picture courtesy of Jenny Grissom!

A purchase from Kirklands...

Lamp from Hobby Lobby...

Hobby Lobby find...

I love these rub on's...

I dug this out of the basement...

The window treatments are not purchased yet and I still need to find curtain/swags.

I was afraid that if I waited to post these until after I get the windows done, my walls would need painted again!!!

Just call me Mrs Bumblebee...

2010-05-20T21:59:00.008-04:00

I had been looking so forward to this day for several weeks now. My alarm clock went off early on my day off, but I eagerly jumped out of bed to take on the new day! There were 5 of us labor and delivery gals that were all heading to Cincinnati to check out the huge IKEA store! Two of us had never been before, but had heard great things about it! We could hardly contain our excitement!

I was the chosen driver as I have the biggest vehicle! We wanted to be sure we had plenty of room to haul our purchases home! So, with our cell phones, purses, cash and debit cards in hand, off we went!

There was lots of happy chatter going on in the vehicle as you can imagine with 5 nurses on board. This was a special occasion...all of us off work at the same time, no spouses or kids, and a huge store awaiting our arrival!

I was driving on highway 46 towards Greensburg, In. I had just crossed highway 9 and was almost to Newbern. It was an overcast day and a slight chill in the air. The traffic began to slow down and we all wondered what was causing the traffic jam! After all.. we were on a mission! There was a long line of slowed traffic and 5 impatient gals in my SUV. We finally saw the culprit up ahead. It was a big truck that was spray painting those bright yellow lines down the middle of this two lane road! As we got closer, we could see a flashing sign in the back of the paint truck saying, "Warning, do not drive on paint!" Well, no duh........ We followed the truck for several miles until we got a break in the road and were all able to pass on the right! We were so happy to have finally gotten around that silly truck, but not another word was mentioned about INDOT painting the road! Until...............................................

We arrived in Greensburg and Nicole wanted to stop for some caffeine! We made a quick stop at McDonald's and grabbed something "to go" and were out the door! As I was walking out of McDonald's, I heard the shock in Nicole's voice! She squealed......"Oh no, Karen.....look at your car!" At that moment, I turned and looked at my "new paint job!"

I had apparently crossed over the freshly painted, yellow, center line in the two lane road and it had gotten all over my tires. It then splattered all over the inside of my wheel wells and onto my quarter panel and back bumper! Terri teased me about adding racing stripes to my car on the way to IKEA, while Amy teased me that I now looked like I was driving a bumble bee! We all were laughing hysterically and at the same time, I had a very sickening feeling in the pit of my stomach! You see, I was going to have to try to get this off before my husband saw it!

However, we did not let this slow us down one bit! Onto IKEA we went! I couldn't help but think of my horrible mess that was awaiting me as I walked up and down the isles of IKEA! (By the way, I loved the store and definitely want to go back again someday!) Over lunch I talked to my husband and dad and told them what I had done! Jonathan took it much better than I expected, but it was just because he could not even picture what this vehicle looked like! :o)

Later, the gals told me that they saw people pointing to my car and laughing at us! I am glad I was able to give them their laugh for the day!

Once we arrived back in town, I went to the car wash and inserted several dollars into the Super Power Wash. Unfortunately, you couldn't even tell that it helped! I went to the auto store and a body shop, and all the men basically said to me was, "Good luck!" :(

I've gotten a police report filed and will be going to see Mr Insurance agent in the morning. My dad also has a friend that has some sort of "potion" that he declares will get it off! So, I now have new plans for my Friday! I'll probably be spending it in the garage, de-striping my bumble-bee!

We had a great time in spite of the circumstances! And yes, I do want to go again, but next time, I'll let someone else drive!!!!

You might be a nurse if...

2010-05-11T20:33:00.002-04:00

1. The front of your scrubs read..."Nurses...here to save your hind-end, not kiss it!" (I had to edit this one!!!)

2. You occasionally park in the space with the "Physicians Only" sign...and knock it over.

3. You believe some patients are alive only because it's illegal to kill them.

4. You recognize that you can't cure stupid.

5. You own at least 3 pens with prescription medication names on them.

6. You believe there's a special place in hell for the inventor of the call light.

7. You believe the saying "It can't get any worse" causes it to get worse, just to show you it can.

8. You wash your hands BEFORE you go to the bathroom.

9. You believe that any job where you can drive to work in your pajamas is a cool one.

10. You consider a tongue depressor an eating utensil.

11. Eating microwave popcorn out of a clean bedpan is perfectly natural.

12. You've been exposed to so many X-rays that you consider it a form of birth control.

13. You've ever heard a patient with a nose ring, brow ring, and twelve ear rings say..."I'm afraid of needles!"

14. You've ever placed a bet on someone's blood alcohol level.

15. You've told a confused patient that your name is that of a co-worker and to call if they need help.

16. Your bladder can expand to the size of a Winnebago water tank.

17. You believe that not all patients are annoying, some are unconscious.

18. Your family and friends refuse to watch medical sitcoms with you because you spend the entire time correcting everyone and pointing out upside down X-rays.

19. You don't get excited about blood unless it's your own.

20. You've sworn to have "Do Not Resuscitate" tattooed on your chest. Soon!

21. Discussing dismemberment over a gourmet meal is perfectly natural.

22. You idea of fine dining is anywhere you can find to sit down to eat.

23. Your idea of a good time is a cardiac arrest at shift change.

24. You believe that Prozac should come in a form of aerosol.

25. You believe that "a shallow gene pool" should be a recognized diagnosis.

26. You believe that the government should require permits to reproduce.

27. You believe that unspeakable evils will fall on anyone that utters the phrase..."Wow, it's really quiet, isn't it?"

28. You've ever wanted to write a book titled..."Suicide...getting it right the first time".

29. You've ever had a patient look you in the eye and say, "I have no idea how that got stuck in there."

30. You've had to leave a patient's room before you laugh uncontrollably!

Happy Nurses Week to everyone out there!!!

Mother's Day 2010

2010-05-10T21:24:00.002-04:00

With my 3 little Walden kids!

Posing by my Mother's Day gift this year...a new storm door!
(Don't criticize Jonathan, that's what I wanted!!)

My Sister-in-law, April Thompson and her 3 kids

My brother and I with our wonderful Mom!

Easter 2010...

2010-04-04T23:08:00.002-04:00

Ready to walk out the door for church!
Parker age 7, Peyton & Paige age 4

Happy Easter from the Walden's!

We are blessed...

2010-03-03T11:43:00.004-05:00

Monday started out as a typical day at the Walden household. Jonathan's alarm went off bright and early as he prepared to head back to Winamac for another long week away from home. My alarm went off just a few minutes later and I headed to work for a long, twelve hour day. I talked to Jonathan a couple of times during the day on Monday, and everything seemed to be "routine!" Like I do every night on my way home from work, I called Jonathan to chat with him on my short trip home. While we were talking, I heard a dog bark on his end of the line and thought to myself, "There's no dogs up there..." but never asked him about it. He asked me where I was at on my 5 minute trip home, and I didn't think anything of it. As I turned onto our street, my heart immediately began to pound with fear! I blurted into the phone..."Jonathan, there's a man standing in my driveway!" He replied, "Oh yeah??? We'll who is it?" As I drove closer I responded, "It's you!!!!!!" I can't begin to explain the excitement I immediately felt! I began asking all kinds of questions and he told me to just hang up the phone so we could talk in person! :)

He proceeded to tell me that his boss had called him into his office on Monday and was asking him all kinds of questions. Some were pertaining to if he was happy, and one in particular was..."Would you like to work from home another day?" Obviously, you know his answer was "Yes!!!"

So, God heard and answered our prayers in a completely different way than what we were asking! We were praying for Daddy to get a job closer to home! All we were really asking for was that Daddy could be home more during the week! If everything works out as planned, Jonathan will only have to be away from home one night a week! You can imagine how excited the kids and I are over this news! He'll be traveling back and forth more and that'll make me nervous, but I'll be such a happy wife to have him home in the evenings again!
A Gaither Vocal Band song has been going over and over in my mind this week...

"God is good, yes He is, He's good all the time..."

What Peyton heard...

2010-02-22T15:59:00.003-05:00

Yesterday at noon, Peyton was at the table, singing a song that they sang in Jr Church. I quickly picked up on the tune, but am quite sure he didn't get all of the words right! ;o) He sang...."the rains came down, and the flush came up!" Any of you heard that version??? Hoping the flush doesn't come up at our house...

Another tooth story...

2010-02-16T20:04:00.003-05:00

Some of you may recall a story of Parker losing his last tooth down the toilet in a McDonald's bathroom! Well.....here goes another story!

Sunday afternoon, we were eating dinner at Mom's as usual. Parker has had a loose tooth for several days and had even tried to get my dad to pull it on Saturday evening. Parker LOVES my mom's Sunday dinner and had a huge plate full. He was eating a warm dinner roll and all of a sudden said, "My tooth!" He spit out his tooth and placed it on the edge of his plate! He was thrilled to have lost another tooth and then proceeded to continue eating! (Parker likes to mix all of his food together and eat it! This grosses the rest of us out!) He had evidently made a mixture of his food on his plate and was enjoying his Sunday meal when all of a sudden he spoke up and said..."Another tooth?" He proceeded to spit out a white tooth in his hand! Jonathan quickly looked in his mouth to see if he indeed had lost another tooth! What in the world?? We all then realized what had happened! Parker had accidentally gotten his tooth that was laying on the edge of his plate and added it to his mixture of food! So....he ate his lost tooth! Good grief....this child! We were able to save the tooth once again, only this time he didn't have to dig it out of a dirty toilet! The tooth was placed in a zip lock bag and put safely under his pillow on Sunday night!

And yes...the tooth fairy DID remember to come visit us this time!

Valentine's Day 2010

2010-02-14T22:12:00.004-05:00

Celebrating our 19th Valentine's Day together!

A dozen red roses from my 3 favorite boys!!!

We had a nice Valentine's Day weekend together. On Friday night we took the kids to Buca Di Beppo's for some great Italian food. They loved it and we left there stuffed and smelling of garlic.
Then on Saturday, Jonathan and I had a double date with Darin and Amy Shearer. We were grateful to the Grandma's for babysitting for us and giving us a night out. We went to Derby Dinner in Clarksville and had some yummy food and watched a hilarious play.
Today we spent the day together as a family. We told the kids that we buy things for each other to show how much we love them. They had fun passing out their Valentine's at church and have had more then their share of Valentine's candy today!!!
On a funny note....we found out that there are NO secrets in the Walden household! On Saturday, I took Paige shopping with me and Jonathan took the boys. Paige and I arrived home before the boys and I didn't think to tell her to keep a secret! The boys came busting in the door a few minutes later. Peyton ran to me and said, "Mommy, we bought you flowers to show you how much we love you! Come see them!" Paige pipes up....."And Daddy, we bought you a watch too!" So......Jonathan decided we might as well go ahead and exchange our gifts on Saturday instead of waiting until today!!! ;o)

Happy Valentine's Day from the Walden family!!!

Paige's pink room...

2010-02-08T09:39:00.006-05:00

We got Paige's room done a couple of weeks ago, but I have been waiting until I got it completely finished to post pictures! However, I can't seem to find anything to put on her shelf and dresser and who knows when I ever will, so here is what we have done so far...

Paige has been bugging me for weeks to make her a pink room...

I saw this quilt at Potterybarn Kids and knew it was the one for her...

What a pain to get those dotted lines all stuck on the wall in the right spots...

Letters from Potterybarn Kids that I just HAD to have...

My dad would not even attempt to hang them for me so they're stuck up there with adhesive tape! (As soon as the twins saw them they said, "It looks like stairs Mom!")

Her barbie doll dreamhouse that she got for Christmas...

I cannot tell you how many times I have organized this little house. The tiny pieces drive me crazy...

I need to find some cute little girl decorations for her dresser...

(Any suggestions on where to look???)

Decorations found at Hobby Lobby

Again...I need to find something for the shelf!

The pink barbie doll case is going to have to go in the closet after seeing this picture!

Paige is loving having a pink room all to her self! She and Peyton have shared a room together ever since they were born. He now says "I hate pink" and wants nothing to do with her new room!

Lamp I found at Hobby Lobby...

(MUCH cheaper than the one I saw at Potterybarn Kids!)

The valence has been ordered but has not arrived yet. We still need a few decorations for the dresser and shelf and her room will be finished!

And for our next big project..........our room!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :)

A long overdue project...

2010-01-17T20:03:00.004-05:00

This was a booger to put up... I don't recommend it with a washable paint!

I finally found a flower with purple in it!

My favorite decoration!

I've told myself for years that I was going to redo our hall bathroom. When we moved in over 9 years ago, I wanted it painted a pale yellow. The yellow I picked out was way too bright so I just had Dad paint it the typical off white color. After 3 kids and numerous hand prints on the walls, it was time for a change.

I finally decided to try a light lavender/purple color. That color is obviously not the "in" color right now as I had a horrible time trying to find stuff to go with it. Note to self...next time pick out decorations first, then match up paint! Would make life much easier!!!

Thanks Mom and Dad for your help in this project! Now....first thing tomorrow morning, bye bye Winnie the Pooh border in the twins room! Paige can't wait to get her pink room!!!

Happy 4th Birthday to Peyton & Paige!

2010-01-06T11:14:00.006-05:00

When our lives were forever changed...

Happy Birthday to my honey!

2010-01-05T10:13:00.003-05:00

Just wanted to wish my hubby a Happy 34th Birthday! He's in Winamac celebrating in the snow! Hoping he gets to come home tonight, but if not, we'll meet him in Indy for supper! We celebrated with Mom and Dad on Sunday and here are a few pictures of that...Sunday dinner at his favorite mother-in-laws house!
He doesn't care for birthday cake, so a cookie it was...

His 3 favorite little people...Just the coat he wanted! (He picked it out and gave it to April to buy for him at her discount. She told him they accidently sold it and he was soooo upset! He had no idea he'd end up seeing that coat a few days later!!!) Good job April!!!

Bundled up and ready to celebrate his special day in Winamac! :(

Happy Birthday honey! Hope to see you tonight!

We love you very much!
Love,

Karen, Parker, Peyton & Paige

Christmas with Santa 2009

2009-12-21T11:00:00.000-05:00

Nearly frostbitten......

2009-12-10T12:21:00.006-05:00

Last Saturday was our town's annual festival of lights parade. I had gotten called off of work that day so we had decided to have a fun family evening together! The parade was to begin at 6pm. We wanted to get a good "curbside seat" so we got downtown about 5:30pm. Jonathan dumped Parker and I out to set our lawnchairs up and get ready for the show! He and the twins parked in the parking garage and found us a few minutes later.

The weather was a frigid 29 degrees and the parade ran late as usual. It didn't begin until about 6:30pm! We quickly found out why such a good curbside was available! It was right under some type of a tree that had dripped nasty sap and gummy junk all over the sidewalk and road. Our shoes were completely nasty!!!! The parade was good, but extremely long. We enjoyed seeing the different types of floats and band instruments all decorated! By the way.......kudos to Columbus Regional Hospital for winning the grand champion for the best float in the parade!!!

The twins kept crying because they were having trouble grabbing the candy before other kids got to it. We tried to explain to them to keep their gloves on and we would buy them candy afterwards. That didn't matter! (By the way, once we got home from the parade, they haven't asked for one piece of that candy since!!!)

2 frozen solid hours later.....we headed to our vehicle. They were going to light the mayor's Christmas tree and have the musical fireworks, but we opted for supper at a local Mexican joint instead! The kids didn't realize how cold they were until we were on our way to the car, then Peyton decided to cry and let the whole town know!!! After sitting in the car quite some time, our fingers and toes began to tingle and we knew we were finally thawing out. It was a fun family night and we had fun being together, making memories!!!

Thanksgiving 2009 at Mom & Dad's

2009-12-01T21:05:00.001-05:00

Thanksgiving 2009

Click on the above photo for more pictures of our day together. We had Thanksgiving together on Sunday afternoon this year. Jeff and April had her Mom over for Thanksgiving, we went to the Walden's and Mom and Dad went and ate with some of the Thompson's.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2009-11-25T13:01:00.002-05:00

Thanksgiving 2009
Our little family

Our three blessings!

From our family to yours, may you have a wonderful Thanksgiving spent with family!

Photos taken by Daylin Richardson

How far would you go to save your lost tooth???

2009-11-17T10:12:00.004-05:00

Last Saturday, I took the kids to McDonald's in Greenfield, Indiana for an early lunch. Jonathan was practicing with the quarte,t and the kids and I were starved, so off we went. Parker got his usual, Fish Sandwich combo meal and was almost finished eating when he said, "Look Mom, my took is about to fall out!" Sure enough, he was right, it was bleeding and just hanging there by a thread. He had a bite still in his mouth so he said he was going to the bathroom to spit out his food and would come back and let me pull it out at the table! Yuck...... A few minutes later, he came out of the bathroom grinning from ear to ear and holding up his tooth! He said that when he went to spit out his food his tongue hit his tooth and it went into the toilet!!! He quickly stuck his arm down in the toilet to retrieve his treasure!!! He said he had to get it so he could put it under his pillow! After hearing his story, the first words from my mouth were, "Did you wash your hands after putting it in the toilet?" His reply, "Well, NO!" I immediately sent him back in to scrub his hands with soap!
The tooth fairy did find our house on Saturday night and we had a happy little man on Sunday morning!

Welcome Hunter!!

2009-10-22T16:35:00.002-04:00

Hunter Drew Dunn arrived in this world today t 12:15pm to Montie and Elaine Dunn. He was born via C/S and both mommy and baby are doing fine. Due to strict hospital visitation policy, big brothers, Collin and Blake are not able to see him until he comes home. :( I'm sure this is very disappointing to these little guys! Hunter weighed 7 pounds and 11 ounces. Daddy forgot to tell me how long he was. I'm full of germs myself so I won't be going to visit for a few days either! Congratulations to the Dunn family on boy #3!!! You are outnumbered now!!! :)

Happy Fall Ya'll...

2009-10-12T23:15:00.001-04:00

National Quartet Convention 2009

2009-09-22T18:14:00.003-04:00

Once again, we were able to attend part of the National Quartet Convention in Louisville, Kentucky. We thoroughly enjoy going and would love to be able to attend more of the convention. However, this year it was not possible. Our only night there was Friday evening. We got to see some of our favorite groups, chat with some of our friends, and pick up several of their new CD's. Here are several pictures from our view of the NQC. Some of them are slightly blurry, sorry about that! (I'm posting these for Jonathan to view up in Winamac!!!) Just click on the picture below to view all of the photos!

National Quartet Convention 2009

Happy 7th Birthday Parker!

2009-09-19T22:47:00.005-04:00

Happy Birthday Parker man!!! We love you SO much! You have brought so much joy to our lives. We can't imagine life without you. It's hard to believe you are growing up so fast and are getting to be so tall. You'll soon pass Mommy up! :( You are a very sweet little boy and a great big brother to your "twins!" We're glad you had a fun party today with your friends. Mommy will have to try to post some pictures on here of your party. We love you very, very much!
Love,

Daddy, Mommy, Peyton & Paige

Please pray for our friend Todd Myers...

2009-08-24T10:44:00.003-04:00

Many of you have heard about Todd Myers recent diagnosis of Lymphoma. There is a "praying for Todd Myers" page set up on Facebook where you can get frequent updates about his progress. Todd starts his Chemo treatments today and it is going to be an eight hour treatment this first time. I wanted to post this on here for those of you who might be reading this, but aren't members of Facebook. Please remember Todd in prayer, not only today but every day. He's got a long and difficult road ahead of him, and he needs all the prayers and encouragement we can give him!

Jonathan and long time friend, Todd Myers

(Todd played the piano for The Singing Friends when Jonathan sang with them and currently plays the piano for Convention Quartet.)

First day of school 2009-2010

2009-08-20T11:27:00.004-04:00

Last Friday, was Parker's first day of First Grade! Parker is going to our Christian school, Bethel Holiness Christian School, and is loving it so far! He says "school is awesome!" His favorite part is recess of course! He loves the fact that he gets to go on recess 3 times every day! He loves his teacher, Miss Willard, and is enjoying making new friends! He goes to school all day, which is a first for us this year! The twins are getting used to Parker being gone and are settling into their own routine. I'm glad he's able to attend there this year and hope he'll learn a lot. I'm also glad he's getting a Christian education!

Another babysitter gets married...

2009-08-19T21:16:00.003-04:00

Here are several pictures of the wedding that all 3 of our kids were in a couple of weeks ago. Once again, we've had another babysitter run off and get married on us! I'm a believer that if you're single and you want to get married, just come and babysit our kids! It's a guarantee you'll be married within a year or two! :)

The kids had so much fun dressing up and being in Seth and Alicia's wedding. They did what they were supposed to do, stayed in their dress clothes for approximately 10 hours and we made it through the day without any temper tantrums! Jonathan kept telling Peyton if he wasn't good he'd be "kicked out of the wedding!"

Click on the picture below for a glimpse of the wedding. I took over 200 pictures and didn't want to bore you with all of them!

Alicia and Seth's Wedding

Worn out...

2009-08-13T22:38:00.002-04:00

This is how I found Peyton last night after a long, hard day of playing. The babysitter told me that the kids were tired, but I never expected to see this sight! :) He is always the last one to go to sleep at night and usually wide awake well after midnight! Not this time...I just might have to keep this babysitter!

Drama King...

2009-08-04T14:22:00.006-04:00

Yesterday morning was the big day for Parkerman! His surgery was scheduled originally for 10:30am but had been moved to 10:55am. We reported to out-pt surgery waiting at 9:45am just as we were told and were ushered back to a small room. The nurse, Michele was very nice and tried her best to make Parker laugh. He was scared to death and afraid to hardly even talk to her! She asked him lots of questions, some were quite embarrassing to a 6 year old boy! :)She was finally finished around 10:30am and they let Parker's visitors come in to see him. His Grandpa Bob, Grandpa and Grandma Walden and Pastor Shockley came in the room! (Grandma Sheila was at our house, babysitting the twins!) Parker was happy to see all of them! They tried to make him laugh but Parker again, wasn't too cheerful! You could tell by the look on his face, that he was quite fearful!
Parker broke our hearts when Brother Shockley knelt down to pray with him before surgery! He started crying and had the entire room crying along with him! That had to be a scary feeling for such a little guy! Knowing that he had to go back to that cold OR without his Mommy or Daddy! :(

Parker is less than thrilled that he has to wear this silly looking hat and that they are running behind! He's getting a little frustrated by this point!

"Mom, I'm going to push this nurse button and see what's taking them so long!" Mom replies, "No, Parker don't!!!" :) They finally came to get him right at noon! Parker was so upset when he told us all goodbye that he had us all crying once again! He had to stop off and get sick on his way walking back to the OR! (Typical of little Parker!)

Smiling for Mommy and dreaming about food!

Finally home shortly after 1:30pm! His nurse asked him what his goal was for the day! He replied...."To go home!" He caused quite a scene in PACU from what I hear and they brought Jonathan and I back to see him and to help try to calm him down! I kept apologizing for how "difficult" he had been! He was surrounded by 3 nurses when we got back there and was hyperventilating! I looked up and saw his oxygen saturation was 77% I was determined that we were not going to have to stay on Pediatrics and was thrilled when he decided to calm down and breathe!! I was very shocked when the doctor came out to talk to us and told us that Parker actually had an ear infection in his right ear! He hadn't even complained at all! Poor kid, he's so used to that feeling, that he doesn't know any better!

Opening his present from Grandma Sheila and Grandpa Bob! As soon as he got it open, he fell asleep and slept the rest of the afternoon! Thank goodness...

Fun, "quiet" things to do!!!

Grandma knows what Parker likes!!!

Reading his get well cards!

Very happy that Grandpa Bob came to see him once he got home!
After his nap, he awoke to visitors! Amy, McKendra and McKiah Shearer brought him balloons and a gift!

Parker appears to be back to normal! Luckily, it's raining cats and dogs today so I don't have to worry about keeping him inside! Hopefully, this will solve all the ear problems and he can get "Perfect Attendance" this year at Bethel!

Thanks everyone for your prayers! We appreciate it very much!!!

Celebrating Carter Jeffry's #5th Birthday!

2009-07-15T23:27:00.001-04:00

Carter's 5th Birthday

Celebrating #13!

2009-07-09T14:39:00.004-04:00

Jonathan surprised me on Monday, and sent me 13 roses for our #13th wedding anniversary!We celebrated by eating at our favorite restaurant! They have the best steaks ever!

We got a great room on priceline.com and stayed here. Due to Jonathan's new job, nearly 3 hours away, we met in Indy that evening. It was going to be $30.00 each to valet park both vehicles at the hotel. Jonathan took a chance and parked in the parking garage across the street for $5.00 each. I was awake off and on all night worrying that I'd oversleep for work and that when I got the garage, my SUV would be towed! It wasn't, and Jonathan saved us $50.00 by being a tight wad! :)

Still in love after 13 years of marriage and 5 years years of dating! We've been together over half of our lives! My lands, we're getting old!!!

Thanks Jonathan for an awesome anniversary celebration! I love you very much!

I'd do it all over again...

2009-07-06T09:36:00.002-04:00

13 years ago today, I was a nervous bride and so ready to get married to the love of my life. Jonathan and I had dated for 5 years and I had finally talked him into marrying me! ;) We had our wedding all planned out and I knew how I wanted every detail. It was a beautiful, sunny day and the wedding was perfect! I was the happiest girl alive!

We've celebrated our anniversary in many different cities over the years, usually on vacation. This year will be another different way to celebrate! With Jonathan's new job, he is nearly 3 hours away from home! :( I am meeting him in Indy tonight for a delicious steak dinner at Ruth's Chris and a quiet evening without the kids. (Thanks Mom and Dad Walden for babysitting for us!)

I'll spare you the mushy stuff and just stay that Jonathan is a great husband and daddy and I'm the luckiest girl in the world to be able to say he's all mine!!!!

Our Wedding Photos

Happy Soggy 4th of July...

2009-07-04T22:30:00.002-04:00

...from The Walden Family!

Paige Danielle

Peyton Duane

and Parker David

Father's Day 2009

2009-06-22T13:57:00.003-04:00

I had to work 12 hours on Father's Day so Jonathan was able to get some good bonding time in with his kids on Father's Day!!! He ate lunch with my parents and brought me a plate to the hospital later! I didn't get to see my dad on Father's Day and Jonathan didn't get to see his dad either as he was at Pilgrim camp! We both called our dad's last night to wish them a Happy Father's Day!

Unfortunately, Jonathan didn't think to have Mom take his picture with the kids yesterday when they were dressed in their church clothes so we quickly shot this pose even though they had their jammies on for the night!
Hope everyone had a nice Father's Day!!

Singing with the guys...

2009-06-22T11:08:00.002-04:00

This past Saturday night, Convention Quartet sang in Richmond, Indiana. They sang in a beautiful auditorium at Reid Hospital. It was a fun evening and the guys had a blast singing together! This was taken during the middle of a song! I went down the isle to take their picture and they stopped singing and posed for me! Goofy guys!!

Singing one of the many hymns requested by the audience!

Baseball Season 2009

2009-06-18T20:57:00.003-04:00

Parker has enjoyed playing baseball once again this summer! He's still in the "pony" league where they don't actually count runs or outs. He's probably a little bored with it, but still loves to play so he doesn't complain! Next year he gets to advance to the next league where it's more like real baseball! He'll love that!
Last Saturday was the first game all season that I've been able to attend. Due to my lovely work schedule, I've missed all the practices and every game until now. Their season is over at the end of June so I won't get many in this year! Luckily, Daddy has been able to be there for about every game so Parker is thrilled! Tomorrow night, Grandma Sheila may have to take Parker as I'm working and Daddy will be traveling almost 3 hrs home after work! He's going to try to make it!

Parker is playing for the team called Mancino's and one of the coaches is the team sponsor, David Gregory! David and I went to school together years ago at Bethel. Never dreamed our kids would someday play ball together. What a small world!

Sure wish I had some Mancino's right now!!! Mmmmmmm!

A new adventure!

2009-06-15T09:56:00.003-04:00

Many of you know that back in early February, Jonathan lost his job at Cummin's due to "cut-backs." He immediately began sending out resumes and had several interviews. No one seemed to be hiring and we were getting concerned. His severance package was to run out pretty soon and we didn't know what we were going to do. I had talked about dusting off my resume and applying for yet another job in nursing. Jonathan said he didn't even want me to come home if I ended up having to work two jobs! :)

A few weeks ago, the phone rang one morning while I was at work and it was a company in Winamac, Indiana called Pentair. They said that Jonathan had applied for a job there and they wanted to do a phone interview with him. Everything seemed to flow well and they called him in for a face to face interview. Within a week, they had called him back and offered him a job! This was a huge answer to prayer for us!

The only down side to this story is that his new job is nearly 3 hours north of where we live! The town's population is 2,400 people and their only restaurant is a DQ! They offered to let him live in a house on the plant property and are even going to furnish it for him. Another huge answer to prayer for us as we didn't know if we could afford to rent him an apartment up there!

I'll have to admit that it is a very bittersweet day for me today. I'm very thankful that he has a job and that he didn't have to take a huge pay cut either. I'm also very sad that he has to be gone 5 days a week for a while. Eventually they say he'll be able to work from home 2 days a week! That will help so much!

The kids have gotten used to him being Mr Mom since February and are going to have quite an adjustment with him being gone for so long! They have been driving me crazy asking me "Where's Daddy" even if he's just stepped out of the house or ran to town. I can't imagine how many times this week I'll hear that same question!

It's going to be rough, but we're tough and will survive! If you think of it, say a prayer for Jonathan as he's nervous about starting his new job and isn't looking forward to being away from his family. While you're at it, say a prayer for me and the kids too, that we'll learn to survive without Daddy home every night!

Alphabet letter day!

2009-06-01T10:59:00.003-04:00

A couple of weeks ago, Parker's Kindergarten class was to dress up like one of the letter's of the alphabet. They have been studying the different letters all year along with what sound that particular makes. Each letter has a name and there is something special about that letter. Parker decided that he wanted to be "Mr H" who has "horrible hair!" If you know Parker very well at all, you'll know that he almost always has his hair combed and in place unless he's wearing a ball cap! We used some of Daddy's hair styling gel and a lovely can of bright blue coloring and this is what we came up with for Alphabet letter day!!!

Special thanks to Angie Davis for helping Parker get all this blue out of his hair! Parker's "letter day" was the same day as my Grandma Thompson's funeral and Angie was babysitting that day!

We can't believe that Parker only has 2 days left of school and then we will have a first-grader on our hands! Thanks to several big snows this past winter, he has to go through this Wednesday! He's ready for summer vacation! We're leaving Friday for Pigeon Forge, Tennessee!

Our fisherman...

2009-05-26T06:25:00.002-04:00

Last week the kids were at Mom's one day while I was at work. My Uncle Steve, who goes fishing about every day, decided to take Parker fishing that afternoon. They went to my Grandpa Thompson's pond and spent some time fishing. Parker caught 4 or 5 little fish and was thrilled with his catch. He was so excited that he wanted to bring them home to show Mommy and Daddy! His Uncle Steve put them in a plastic bag and let him bring them home! I was horrified when I opened the bag and saw those dead fish in there! Parker thought we were going to cook them and eat them! (I thought better of that idea!) The bag laid outside on our patio for a few days because we forgot about it. On Monday, I saw that the bag had been dragged out in our yard and I told Jonathan he had to get rid of it right away! He picked it up and threw it in Kevin's dumpster where he's building a new house!! :) (Hope he isn't reading this!) The bag smelled horrible and Parker was devastated. Last night I heard Parker praying for his fish that his daddy threw away!!! :(

Serenaded by Angels....

2009-05-17T22:02:00.004-04:00

Many of you know by now that my dear Grandma Thompson finally made her entrance to that beautiful city yesterday afternoon at 4:30pm. She had been sick for several years with the terrible disease of Alzheimer's. She was a survivor of a heart attack and breast cancer, but could not overcome the terrible disease of Alzheimer's. Over the past 3-4 years, we have watched Grandma's health deteriorate and it was hard to take. Many people remember Grandma as being a classy lady. She would always be dressed in nice clothes, not have a hair out of place, and you could smell her perfume when she walked into church!

In recent years she was unable to pick out her own clothes or even comb her hair. Her daughter, Vickie and sister-in-law, Imogene Thompson would comb her hair for her and Grandpa would have to help dress her. Grandpa was a wonderful caregiver for Grandma in her last years. He had to do all of the household chores including cooking. He said yesterday that he remembers her telling him how wonderful the food was that he had prepared. He said he didn't think it tasted good at all but she would always brag on his cooking.

Grandma was a wonderful pastor's wife for most of her life. She and Grandpa came to pastor our church, Bethel Holiness Church, in September of 1968. They remained our pastor until this past December when Grandpa had to retire due to Grandma's decline in health. They touched many lives over their 40 years of ministry here at Bethel. I was thinking today about her seeing so many of the loved ones from our church that have gone on to be with Jesus. She's probably not gotten very far in Heaven yet for seeing so many people she knows up there.

No one will ever know the countless hours she has spent in prayer for her church family and her own personal family. She was a true woman of God and I'm so proud to say she was my Grandma. I remember as I was growing up I would go up and pray at the altar. When they would ask the saints to gather in, I would listen for Grandma. She never let me down as I would always hear her praying near me, and I knew what a prayer warrior she was. I remember calling Grandma and asking her to help pray for me when I was in nursing school and had a huge test to take, or when I had to take my state board exams. I had faith in Grandma's prayers.

I could go on and on but you would get tired of reading my thoughts. They don't mean as much to anyone else as they do to me. I just wanted to jot down a few notes and share with you how special my Grandma really was to me. I kissed her goodbye on Saturday evening and told her that I was going to be sure to come and see her in Heaven someday! I'm sure she'll be standing at the gates waiting to greet me!!! Looking at old pictures...reminiscing
Grandma talking with Granddaughter, Jenny...

Great Grandma and Grandpa Thompson with some of their Great Grandchildren...

Celebrating Christmas 2007 with some of their family...

Enjoying a yummy dinner cooked by their daughter-in-law Sheila...

Grandma with her son, Stephen Thompson who lives in Florida...

Grandma and Grandpa with daughter Vickie, Sons Steve, Bob Jr. and Kevin

Sweethearts for over 62 years...

Mother/Daughter Banquet

2009-05-04T11:51:00.003-04:00

On Friday night, May 1st, we had our 4th Annual Mother/Daughter banquet at our Church Fellowship Hall. We had 68 ladies and daughter's in attendance and had a wonderful meal together. Our theme was "Season's of Change" and so we decorated our tables with the different holiday's throughout the year. The Shockley women sang a pretty song and Sister Barbara Shockley spoke about the different seasons of change that we as women go through from infancy through becoming a Grandma. It was a fun evening and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves! Click on the photo below to see pictures from our fun evening!

Mother/Daughter Banquet~2009

IHC 2009

2009-04-21T11:06:00.003-04:00

This year was a "first" for us as we were able to attend IHC all three days! Jonathan had to sing in the Tuesday afternoon service that began at 1:30pm! He rode over with Chuck and Mary Jane McGuire on Tuesday morning and I stayed home to get Parker from school. We got Parker excused from public school and were able to take him with us for all 3 days! The kids and I left town at 11am and arrived in Dayton shortly after 1pm. We made it in time to hear the "Singing around the piano" service and the kids actually sat there for 3 hours that afternoon! Mom and Dad Walden also came to IHC for the entire time and helped us with the kids. I think we about wore them out!!

On Wednesday evening, Convention Quartet sang in the Patriotic service at 6pm. I made sure this year I was firmly planted in my seat at the beginning of that service!! (Most of you may recall from last year that it was during this service that I fell off the stairs and into Bro McCrary's arms! How humiliating!)

By 8pm, the kids were "over it" and so were Mommy and Daddy! We ended up going to Frisch's Big Boy at 9pm and enjoyed our fattening supper! The kids were wild and we were so glad we didn't make them stay for the entire service when we heard it lasted until 10pm!!!

On Thursday afternoon, Parker and Paige sang in the Children's choir. Paige somehow managed to wiggle her way through the crowd of kids and find her brother so she could stand by him. Much to my dismay, they ended up fighting with the little boy standing next to Parker and it was all caught on the live-streaming video! You can find it on the archives at IH Convention in the "Building for Keeps" service!

By Thursday evening, I thought I was going to make it through the entire convention without embarrassing myself! It was down to the final song and the mass choir was going to end with the Hallelujah chorus! (I didn't hear Brother Wolf say "end with" either!) They began their last song and started saying "Hallelujah" and I saw a couple of people stand! I assumed they were singing a verse of the Hallelujah chorus and that most people must not know that you are to stand when that song is being sung! So........I bravely stood up! NO ONE ELSE DID!!! I was the only one in my section and there were probably only about 12 others in the entire crowd of 4,000 that was standing!! I looked at Jonathan and said "Stand up!" He said, "That's not the right song, sit down!" I told him there was no way I was going to sit down now and to please "Let me out!" The kids had stuff strung all over the seats between us so I hurriedly began packing up my bags! By this time, people all around us were dying laughing at me and I was laughing so hard at myself. My face was burning hot and I could not seem to get the kids to move! As soon as I got to the aisle and turned to walk down the stairs, the choir FINALLY begin singing the actual "Hallelujah Chorus" and the entire crowd stood to their feet! I turned and looked up and said, "It's about time you all joined me!" They cracked up and I walked out of IHC for the final time of 2009 once again, humiliated!!!

In reality, it was a great convention. We got to see many friends and enjoyed lunch with the Myer's family and Gene and Angie Davis. The kids were potty trained this year and this was our first year in 6 years that we didn't take a stroller! The kids did really well considering the services are 3-4 hrs long! We were weary too! We loved being there all three days and are already making plans to attend next year!!!

IHC 2009

Easter Sunday 2009!

2009-04-12T23:36:00.000-04:00

Happy Easter Weekend!

2009-04-10T09:40:00.003-04:00

Last weekend, we enjoyed attending an Easter drama entitled "Bow the knee." Shirley, a girlfriend from work invited us, and we took our kids along as well! I was a little worried how the kids would handle it, as I didn't know how much the actors would visualize the true description of what really happened that day! My friends husband was the Roman Centurion, and Paige told us that she did not care for him, but she did like the other man, who was Jesus! (That role was played by Shirley's son, Josh!) At one point in the play, Jesus was hanging on the cross, there was lightening and thunder and then He bowed His head and died. It was completely silent in the theater and Peyton says right out loud....."No more Jesus!" Paige was SO excited about what all she saw that she went to church on Sunday morning and told everyone the Easter story in the words of a 3 year old child! I was amazed at how much of the story she understood! It was way more in depth than I ever could've told them! We were glad we took them and enjoyed the snacks and fellowship with the gals from work afterwards!

This weekend promises to be extremely busy for us as I'm sure it is for everyone else too! Tonight we're going to meet the guys that Jonathan sings with and practice, then head out to eat! The poor restaurant as they'll be 17 of us!!!

Tomorrow morning is a fun Easter brunch at my Mom's house! We always look forward to the yummy food every year and the kids can hardly wait for us to let them go find the eggs and get their baskets!

Tomorrow afternoon will find us knocking on the doors of our Jr Church kids making sure they will all be there on Sunday morning! We've challenged the adults and are trying to double our attendance for Easter Sunday! We have promised them a party on Monday evening if they reach their goal and we have faith that they're going to attain their goal! So...the party is being planned in advance!

IHC begins on Tuesday and we have gotten Parker "excused" from public school so we can take him with us! Jonathan is singing with Convention Qt in the Tuesday afternoon service so we'll be there all 3 days this year! Something we've never done, and I'm sure I'll be regretting it by Thursday evening!!!

We hope you have a blessed Easter weekend and are able to attend church on Sunday! This is a wonderful time of year for us Christians, remembering what He did for all of us!

Happy Easter and I'll try to post some Easter photos before we head to IHC next week! No promises...

Promised Pictures!!

2009-04-07T23:59:00.002-04:00

We had a great time at the Gaither Homecoming concert a couple of weeks ago. We went with Don and Amy Bates and thoroughly enjoyed our evening together! The concert was within 25 miles from the Tennessee border, but our guys said they'd do it again in a heartbeat! They were in "heaven" getting to see and meet Michael English! We got into some major traffic and had to ride a school bus up the mountain to get to the arena. We missed hearing the first couple of singers which included one of Jonathan's favorites....Ivan Parker! :( It was an extremely late night as we arrived home at nearly 4am, but the guys will tell you it was worth every minute of lost sleep! Click on the picture below to see photos of our fun evening!

Gaither Homecoming Concert

GVB......here we come!!!

2009-03-25T20:25:00.003-04:00

This time Thursday evening, we will be listening to the music of the Gaither Homecoming concert in Corbin, Ky! Jonathan and I along with Donnie and Amy Bates will be heading out early tomorrow afternoon for a super fun evening! Jonathan and Donnie are HUGE Micheal English fans so they are thrilled beyond words to get to go to the concert! I'm taking my new camera with the zoom lens and hope to get some good photos! We'll be arriving home in the wee hours of the morning on Friday! I'm sure the kids will be up before daylight ready for another full day!! Pictures will follow!!!

Convention Quartet and Talley Trio Concert!

2009-03-24T21:07:00.007-04:00

Last Friday night, Convention Quartet opened for the Talley Trio in Bedford, Indiana. I was able to go with Jonathan and spend some quality time with my best friend, Amy (Speer) Holsapple! We enjoyed supper together while the guys did their sound check! We hardly ever get to see each other so this was a special treat for us!

Convention Quartet did great! The audience seemed to love them and they pulled it off like they had been performing for years! They had Debra Talley fooled, she thought they sang together all the time!

We went to Steak and Shake after the concert with about 30 other people! The poor waitress didn't know what hit her at midnight! The Talley's bus pulled in not long after we arrived and so the guys enjoyed chatting some more with Roger!

We pulled our tired tail-feathers into our driveway shortly after 1:30am. We were SO grateful to Randy Dunn for babysitting our kids for 12 hours!!! (That's probably something he'll never volunteer to do again!) Peyton was still up and going strong until 3am! All the kids were up and ready for the day early on Friday and we found out very quickly that we are getting too old for these late nights!!!

Surprise!!!

2009-03-23T12:11:00.008-04:00

On Friday, we had a "surprise" luncheon to celebrate my Mom's #60th birthday!

I told her I would pick her up at 11:30am and take her out for her birthday since we wouldn't be home Friday evening. She was available and assumed we would be having "lunch for two!"

I told her that Jonathan recommended that I take her to Smith's Row, a nice restaurant in downtown Columbus! She kept trying to talk me out of taking her there, and recommended several other restaurants in town that I really like!!! I knew I HAD to get her there and just kept talking about other things.

We arrived downtown, found a place to park, and started towards the direction of the restaurant! On the way, I saw Jonathan and my dad's vehicles! I was afraid Mom would see them, so once again I distracted her by talking 90mph!!! :)

We walked into the restaurant, and I told the waiter, "Thompson, party of two!" (He was watching for me and was told that a lady in a red jacket would tell him that! That was his clue!) He immediately said, "Right this way..." and started taking us upstairs! It was quite hilarious, as I heard Mom begin to "huff" behind me as we were climbing the stairs! (She did it more than once too!)

When we arrived at the top of the stairs, I stepped out of the way and a room full of people yelled..."Surprise Sheila!"

Making a wish...
Mom with her friend, "Tree" who also cleans her house!

...with her favorite daughter-in-law, April

...with good friends, Bob and Mary Ann Williamson

...with friend/neighbor Cathy Custer
...and long-time good friend, Mary Jane McGuire!...her favorite son-in-law, Jonathan!

Happy #60th Birthday Mom!
We love you!!!

Little friends...

2009-02-25T21:28:00.004-05:00

On Saturday evening, we got together with some more friends and had an enjoyable time once again! We met at a mexican restaurant, which is one of our favorites, and then went to their house to visit! The kids had so much fun being wild and we adults were outnumbered! We managed to sneak in a couple of games and stayed until nearly midnight! Thanks so much Dunn's for a fun evening!

Paige and her friend, Blake! (They were giving hugs and kisses before the night was over!)

The boys helped themselves to some Sun-chips and were watching a cartoon while the adults were playing games!

Friday night fun with fabulous friends!!!

2009-02-23T22:46:00.005-05:00

On Friday evening, we enjoyed a great night of food and fellowship with several of our friends! We always "talk" about getting together, but rarely make it happen! We decided to just set a date, get sitters and meet in Indy for some fabulous Italian food and funny fellowship!

We met at Carrabba's in Carmel and had a fantastic meal and great time visiting! I nearly embarrassed myself by dropping the entire basket of bread, but shocked myself and everyone else with a great catch instead!

Angie felt obligated to cut up someone's meat and kept finding herself looking for sippy cups as we got up to leave!

Angie and Gene Davis
Travis and Jody Johnson Monica and John Myers

After we left Carrabba's, someone mentioned trying to find a Starbucks. Off we went in 3 different vehicles. The one Starbucks was closed and we had quite a hilarious time trying to find each other and meet at the right Starbucks! (What did we do before the age of cellphones?)

Travis...the life of the party! They had so much fun recalling some hilarious moments with

The Singing Friends...

I think we about got kicked out of Starbucks...

Enjoying the evening together and entertaining the gentleman sitting at the table next to us! I think he was just pretending to be working on his computer!
Jody...wired!

John can't believe that Jody recorded his story on her digital camera!

By the time the evening was drawing to a close, several of our friends became quite sleepy!

Jody has obviously heard all of Travis' stories before...but the guy behind her hadn't!

Some are obviously just too OLD to keep such late hours!

And some can just fall asleep anywhere!

Bedtime prayer and laughter!

2009-02-17T22:46:00.003-05:00

Jonathan was saying Parker's bedtime prayer with him earlier tonight and was quietly listening to the little man bombard Heaven. In the middle of Parker's prayer, he stated, "...and Jesus, help my head to feel better, and my foot, and my arm, because it sort of hurts when I go like this, so you can help that too if you want too..." Jonathan couldn't hold back the laughter any longer. Parker stops praying, grabs Jonathan's head and whispers, "Dad, stop laughing, it's not funny!" He then quickly returns to his prayer and says, "Sorry about that Jesus, that was my dad laughing!" Jonathan then completely lost it and laughed for the rest of the prayer!!!

My Valentines...

2009-02-16T21:23:00.003-05:00

Since I had to work 12 hours on Valentine's day, Jonathan and I celebrated on Friday evening. He decided to take me to Nashville, Indiana to one of the restaurants there. Mom agreed to keep the kids for the evening and off we went. Jonathan had seen this place advertised in the newspaper earlier that day and thought it sounded like a good place to eat! He was right, the food was great but I told him it didn't sound very romantic at all! :) They had a Valentine's special so we took advantage of it! Jonathan had a steak and baked potato and soup. His steak was smothered with seasonings and he gave me a bite and it was delicious!! (Wish I had ordered that...) I don't know why Jonathan cut my food off in the picture, but anyway... I had the smothered chicken with steamed veggies. It was good, but not Texas Roadhouse good!!! :)

The real treat was this delicious dessert that was included with our meals! This apple cobbler came out in the steaming hot iron skillet and was absolutely delicious! I'm sure it was at least 2,000 calories each, but it was soooo worth it!

As if you can't tell, we took this dorky picture of ourselves after dinner! I'm pretty sure I gained another chin by eating all that dessert! :(

On Saturday, I had to work at the hospital all day. That afternoon, I heard some familiar voices and saw my three favorite kids each with a rose in their hands! Paige had picked out a pink rose for Mommy, Peyton a white one and Parker a yellow rose! The baby's breath barely made it to me in one piece but they were SO proud!! Then, Jonathan peeked his head around the corner and handed me this vase with 12 red roses in it and a box of Dove chocolates!!! My favorite! I felt truly blessed to have 4 wonderful Valentines!!! They are the joy of my life and I couldn't have been any happier with my Valentines day weekend!!!

The dreaded phone call...

2009-02-05T13:48:00.002-05:00

Most of you know that Jonathan has been employed at Cummins for 9 plus years. You may also know that in December they cut 600 jobs and we were "sweating it" then, but Jonathan survived. In January, they announced that they would be cutting 800 more jobs starting February 1st. Again, we were all nervous and concerned about Jonathan losing his job. Times are tough everywhere, but especially at Cummins.
Jonathan had some red flags last week that made him worry even more. His boss scheduled a "one on one" meeting with him on Wednesday morning at 9am. They always had a weekly meeting on Friday so Jonathan figured this would be bad news.
On Sunday night, our pastor, Brother Nathan Shockley, preached an excellent message talking about "taking a leap of faith into the unknown!" On the way home from church, Jonathan looked at me and said, "That message was for me...I'm done at Cummins."
Then several times throughout this week, he kept hearing a song by his favorite singer, Ivan Parker, titled "I'll do the miracle." Again, he felt this was a sign from God to put his trust in Him and was preparing himself for the worst.
Yesterday morning, at 9am, Jonathan walked up to his bosses desk for their meeting and his boss said he wanted to "take this somewhere else!" Jonathan said he knew right then it was coming. They walked in silence down the long hallway to the front of the building, into a designated room, and sat down. His boss began to read him a manuscript and proceeded to tell him that he would no longer be employed by Cummins due to major economical cut backs. They asked for his badge, company credit card, laptop computer, uniforms, and anything else that might belong to Cummins. His boss walked him back to his desk to grab his coat and proceeded to walk him out of the doors of Cummins for the last time. As his boss was telling him goodbye, he became choked up and told Jonathan that he was very sorry and wished him and his family nothing but the best.
At 9:24am, the home phone rang and the caller ID stated it was "Jonathan's Cell." I dreaded answering it because I knew it wasn't going to be good news. Jonathan had told me if he called from his desk, things were okay, but if he called me from his cell phone, he'd been walked out! The first words out of his mouth were "I'm done." What a terrible feeling, I felt so helpless and there was nothing I could say or do that could make things better for him.
The kids broke our hearts at lunch as each one of them said their routine prayers, they all prayed to "help Daddy to find a job!" We didn't tell them to say that, but they just did it on their own. Of course, that made me cry all over again. They did it again at supper too! (I don't know how much of that I can take!)
Jonathan has been employed full-time since he turned 16 years old. He isn't one that enjoys sitting at home and especially when it involves babysitting 24/7 either!!! He's already sent his resume to two different companies and is trying to make connections to find a job as soon as possible. He did get a severance package, but that won't last long.
Please pray for him and our family that God will work something out and that he will be able to find the "right" job. Jonathan has a very positive attitude, much more that I probably would if it were me, and I know that God is helping him deal with this.
(He has no idea I'm posting this and may make me delete this when he sees it, but I thought all my blogger friends would want to know what's going on in our lives this week.) It won't be easy but with God's help, we will survive. I would love for you all to help us pray about Jonathan getting a job, and that God will work something out that will glorify Him!

We finally got snow!!!!

2009-01-27T15:01:00.003-05:00

We woke up this morning to approximately 6 inches of snow!
Our first actual accumulation of the year!

Our patio furniture...

Parker was so excited to have a snow day and couldn't wait to go outside and play in the snow.

He quickly discovered the snow was too powdery to build a snowman and so he played with the neighbor kids for quite a while. Some time later, I heard a knock on the garage door and opened it to find a crying 6 year old boy that was very cold...He said he feet were so cold they were burning! I quickly got him out of his wet clothes and had him lay by the fireplace to warm his feet. (What a mess those wet clothes are! Now I know why my mom didn't like for Jeff and I to play outside in the snow!) A warm bath quickly helped those frozen piggies and he was as good as new! I think we need to invest in some good snow boots before we let him go outside and play in the snow again!

It's sleeting here right now and we're supposed to get more snow tonight, so there's a chance that school will be cancelled again tomorrow! I'm scheduled to work tomorrow so they'll be with Grandma Sheila! :o)

Happy Birthday to my favorite Mother~in~law!

2009-01-26T12:29:00.002-05:00

Mom and Dad Walden with Jonathan, LuRhe and Donnie

~December 2008~

Grandma Walden with little Paige

~May 2007~

Dad and Mom Walden

~2007~

Just wanted the blogging world to know that my Mother-in-law is celebrating another birthday today! They are on their way to Michigan for a short trip and few days of relaxation! They'll be back Thursday to babysit our munchkins!

Happy Birthday Mom Walden...

We love you very much!

Love,
Jonathan, Karen, Parker, Peyton & Paige

We're diaper free...Yipee!

2009-01-13T22:01:00.003-05:00

I didn't want to post this too soon because I didn't want to jinx us, but after six years I think we are finally diaper free! (Doing Angie's happy dance right now!) Peyton decided a couple of weeks ago that he wanted to wear big boy undies! He got some in his stocking, we tried pull ups for a few days and he did really well! He was having trouble going poo in the potty and kept saying he didn't know how! I decided to try the big boy undies and figured he would either poop his pants or constipate himself! It took him a couple of days and I think he's finally figured it out! We're still using pull-ups at night and he cries every time he has to put them on! I can't believe after 6 years of carrying a diaper bag every where we went, I can actually carry a purse again! I'm sooooo glad to be out of the baby stage, never again to return either!!! :) Now if I can just get him to tell me when he needs wiped!!! Tonight he went poo in the potty, didn't wipe himself and didn't tell me until a few minutes later. So...we had a little mess in the undies department! :(

Yeah for Peyton, we're so proud of you!!

Acting like his daddy...

2009-01-13T13:26:00.000-05:00

Peyton and Paige's 3rd Birthday

2009-01-12T21:06:00.002-05:00

I'm a few days late posting about the twins 3rd birthday party. I've finally figured out how to upload my pictures to Picasa once again so just click on the picture below to see more photos of their birthday party!

Peyton and Paige's 3rd Birthday

Happy Birthday old man!!!

2009-01-05T14:38:00.004-05:00

I'm busy taking down Christmas decorations but wanted to take a minute to wish my husband a very "Happy 33rd Birthday!" (You won't hear me making fun of his age, because I robbed the cradle 12 plus years ago!!!)

It seems like since the twins were born, he gets a bit jipped for his birthday celebrations! Their birthday is tomorrow. He wants to go out for dinner for his birthday supper and that is fine with me!!! I offered to cook but his excuse was he didn't want me to have to spend all afternoon and evening in the kitchen! :)

Sorry for the silent blog since Christmas! We've actually been very busy the past 2 weeks and for some reason, my laptop won't recognize my memory stick so I can't upload any new photos! Grrrrrrr..... I do believe someone sold us a lemon!

We enjoyed the Christmas season but are glad to be getting back to a normal routine as of tomorrow! Jonathan was off work from December 18th until today and said he might even work a double shift just to get out of the house longer! I think 18 days of being home 24/7 was about all he could take! My schedule was horrible this year, I think I worked about every other day the entire time he was off work! I love my job, but every year at Christmas, I ask myself why I chose this profession!!!

Anyway, hope everyone is having a Happy New Year so far, is still keeping all of their resolutions and getting back to normal! More to come, right now we've got to make a quick trip to Hallmark for birthday cards!!

Happy Birthday Jonathan!!!!

Love,
Karen, Parker, Peyton and Paige

Twas the night before Christmas...

2008-12-24T22:08:00.002-05:00

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care...in hopes that Saint Nick will stop by here...
"We've been good this year!" Merry Christmas from the Walden's!
Jonathan, Karen, Parker,
Peyton and Paige

Wishing you a Merry Christmas!

2008-12-24T02:15:00.004-05:00

Dear Santa....

2008-12-22T22:29:00.001-05:00

We want it all.....

From our family to yours...

2008-12-19T22:09:00.000-05:00

Peanut Butter Christmas!

2008-12-16T11:32:00.005-05:00

The family had stopped to spend the night in a motel on their way to Grandma's house. The motel had lost power and some robbers broke into the back of their van and stole all of their Christmas presents!

Quoting scripture from Luke 2...

Emmitt Edwards got scared of the microphone and would not say his Scripture...

Peyton kept putting his hands in his pockets, pulling the pockets inside out and at one point, almost pulled his pants clear down!!! At one point in the program, Micheal Edwards had to tell him to stop picking his nose! (He learned all this from his daddy!)

Showing their parents their homemade Christmas tree...

Peanut Butter........crunchy style! Mmmmmm!
Peyton found a piece of trash and Paige is just about to flash the audience...

Thank goodness that dress was two layers!

Their last song..."Christmas is the time" to praise the Lord for all He's done!

Peyton is now gone, sitting on my lap, and Emmitt is in his Daddy's arms!

(And from behind the curtain, director Jenny Grissom, is heard letting out a huge sigh of relief that it's over!)

Great job everyone!!!!!!!

Parker goes shopping...

2008-12-15T14:18:00.003-05:00

Last week, Parker's school was doing a fund raiser and "lesson" all in one. The parents sent money to school with a list of who to buy for as well. The students could choose the items but couldn't go over their budget.
Parker had so much fun buying presents for Peyton and Paige. He was SO excited when he came home from school on Friday, that he could not wait for the twins to open their presents! He was supposed to wait until Christmas day but he simply could not wait! He was so excited about what he had bought for his brother and sister! Grandma Sheila was babysitting and didn't have the heart to make him wait!
Peyton got a car and ball and Paige got a stuffed pink fish and a rubber light up ball! They loved their toys that their big brother bought for them!

Stay tuned for pictures of our Jr Church program yesterday morning!

Gaither Homecoming Photos...

2008-12-11T14:56:00.005-05:00

Mark Lowry..hilarious as ever!

Signature Sound...

One of the first songs of the night...

Gordon Mote...
(Breaks my heart every time I see him. He's so awesome!)

Reggie and Ladye Love Smith

Jeff and Sheri Easter...

Janet Paschel...

Janet was diagnosed with Breast Cancer 4 years ago and is now cancer free!
Sheri was just diagnosed with Breast Cancer this year and just finished her last round of chemo a few weeks ago!

More Gaither Homecoming photos...

2008-12-11T14:35:00.001-05:00

Me and my friend Amy Shearer during intermission...

Some of the Homecoming group during the 2nd half...Jonathan's favorite, Ivan Parker...The Gaither Vocal Band with Mark Lowry...
(Guy Penrod is on a sabbatical)

Happy #70th to Dad Walden...

2008-12-08T10:28:00.004-05:00

Just wanted to wish my wonderful father-in-law, Rev.Donald Walden, a Happy #70th Birthday today! (They are traveling home from Tennessee and hopefully won't hit bad weather.)

Dad Walden had a twin brother, Ronald Walden that passed away from Cancer in 1992, at the young age of 54. I am sure Dad Walden and Ron's family are thinking of him today as well.

Happy Birthday Dad Walden! We love you very much!

Love,

Jonathan, Karen, Parker, Peyton and Paige

It's the busiest time of the year...

2008-12-05T15:10:00.002-05:00

No, I didn't quit blogging, just too busy to stop, sit down and think of something profound to write! :)

Tonight we are going to the Gaither Christmas Concert at Conseco Fieldhouse in Indy! I've always wanted to attend one of their Christmas concerts but they've never been nearby until now! We had a slight scare earlier today as Parker was fairly sick. He has a double ear infection but thanks to Tylenol, antibiotics and ear numbing drops, he's feeling pretty good at the moment! Uncle Donnie and Aunt Cammie are going to babysit tonight so we can have a date with my parents and Darin and Amy Shearer! We'll try to get some good pictures with Mom's new camera!

This past Wednesday night we had communion in church. Jonathan and I went up front and when we came back, Parker leaned over to me and said, "So...what did you all have?" :) He thought we had a big snack! HA!

Last night the twins were being absolutely wild and jumping up and down in Peyton's bed! Parker was sick and Jonathan was gone helping the new Pastor move into the parsonage. I went into their room and said, "You two are in big trouble!" I started to grab Paige and pull her out of the bed and Peyton immediately began to spank his own bottom end!!! (I tried so hard not to laugh!!!) He knew he had been bad!

Tomorrow night is our Sunday School class Christmas party so I'll be fixing food for that! We have lines to memorize for our Christmas program and tons of shopping left to do, all the wrapping, etc! However, it's still the most wonderful time of the year!

Christmas comes to Columbus...

2008-11-21T20:56:00.003-05:00

We went to the Christmas Musical Fireworks tonight here in town and got to see Santa when he arrived at the mall! Jonathan and Parker froze their tails off sitting outside watching the fireworks, but the twins and I sat inside the car and froze! We had the sunroof and windows open so Jonathan and Parker could hear the Christmas music on the radio!

When the fireworks were over, Santa arrived in a wagon with two horses pulling him. We were standing on the sidewalk and he stopped right in front of us, jumped out of the back of his wagon, shook hands with the kids and went into the mall. He touched all of our kids hands and Paige was trying to be so brave, but couldn't help herself. She started to tear up...

We decided not to fight the mall crowd this year. Last year Jonathan won a $100.00 shopping spree! We figured he wouldn't be so lucky this year so we just came home!

Miss Rudolph...

2008-11-18T15:14:00.005-05:00

I've been slowly getting out some of our Christmas decorations the past two days and this morning I was hanging their stockings by the chimney with care... (Actually on our mantel, we don't have a chimney!) The kids were all excited to see which one was theirs and began pulling on them! I have the Boyds Bear stocking hangers which are extremely heavy. It took all of a minute for Paige to pull hers completely down, break the stocking hanger and cut her nose!!! (It hadn't been 10 minutes either since I had emailed our photographer to give her some dates to set up for Christmas pictures!!!) :(

Now it has a nice red streak across it and looks just lovely! Last year she had scratches all over her face in the pictures from her little twin brother. I see a pattern here!!! :(

Collingsworth concert, chicken & noodles, coconut pie and CRASH!

2008-11-16T21:45:00.003-05:00

I was so looking forward to our girls night out on Friday night. Mom kept my kids, Jonathan was off singing at the ICHA indoor camp, and I was going to Jonathan Byrd's with a friend to hear the Collingsworth family!

My friend, Amy Shearer, arrived at my house shortly after 6pm. (She had been waiting on her husband to get home from out of town so he could keep their girls!) She said she would drive, but NO, I insisted that it was my turn!!!! :)

We took off up the interstate and it was a dark and rainy Friday evening. We chatted the entire way and quickly made it to our exit. We had stopped at the stoplight just in front of Jonathan Byrd's and had about 20 minutes to spare before the meal was to begin. I was turned looking at Amy, running my mouth as usual, when all of a sudden.....WHAM!!!!! Someone rear-ended us! It sounded like a bomb went off in the car. I could just imagine the entire back end being caved in and having to call and explain it to Jonathan! I was very fortunate and did not hit the car in front of me. Instead, I mashed down even harder on my brakes! My purse went sailing to the floor, was not zipped up and the entire contents spilled!

The light turned green, we signaled and pulled over to survey the damage and the lady followed us. She was very apologetic and wanted to make sure Amy and I were okay! There was minimal damage to my vehicle, but hers was another story! (She also said she had just hit a deer last week!) I didn't know if there was really enough damage to call the cops.

I tried calling Jonathan to see if we should call the police, he was on the platform getting ready to sing so luckily, he didn't get the message! (That might have caused him to lose his concentration and mess up a tad!) :) I ended up getting ahold of dear ole dad and he said, "Yes, call the police!" We did....and 40 long minutes later, they arrived!

After all that waiting, the man said there wasn't enough damage to even fill out an accident report!!! Can you believe that?! It took him forever to fill out the information exchange form!

I forgot to mention that during all of this, Amy tried to phone several people from our church, that were already at the Collingsworth concert. She wanted to make sure they knew we were okay, and let them know why we were running late and to please save us some food! Well, none of them had their cell phones where they could hear it!

We finally arrived at the concert, just in time to get in line and fill our plates with yummy food! Even though we were a bit shaken up, it didn't stop us from filling our tummies!

The concert was great and we enjoyed an entire evening of hearing just the Collingsworth family!

(Jonathan left the camp as soon as he was done singing, showed up at Jonathan Byrd's, got in for free, AND had a much better seat than we did!) What a weasel... He must have buttered up Bro. Hood good because he gave him a seat at his table! So, I tossed him the camera during intermission! (I took Mom's new camera along and fell in love!) Now I know what to put on my Christmas list!!!!

Gold City comes to town...

2008-11-14T11:43:00.008-05:00

Parker loved their bass singer and had to get his picture with him!

Our local gospel radio station, WYGS, sponsored a concert last night in our town and we got to enjoy hearing the Gold City Quartet once again! It wasn't scheduled until about a week ago, but word got out and the church was packed!

I had worked yesterday and it was an extremely busy day, thanks to a full moon, so I arrived quite late! A man walked up to me and wanted to know if I was looking for a man with three small kids! He must've looked pretty pathetic! I sat down, and Gold City was singing one of their hit songs. As soon as they were done, they said, "Have you all enjoyed Gold City tonight?" (I thought, you have GOT to be kidding!) One song and they were done?! They had an extremely loooooong intermission, and an hour later, Gold City came back out to sing a few more songs. I enjoyed them, but they had sang all of my favorites before I got there!

None of us had eaten supper, so I mentioned Steak and Shake, which was on our way home! I meant for us to grab drive-thru, but NO, Jonathan wanted to eat inside! It was 9pm and time for Parker to be in bed! As usual, they were extremely slow, and they messed up half of our order. I was about ready to walk out and Jonathan had actually gotten up to go ask them to make it "to go" and of course, there came our food! (Well, part of it, the waitress didn't even write Jonathan's order down so he didn't even get his!) He did finally get his food, but the whole experience just left us aggravated! We got home at 10:20pm, WAY past Parker's bedtime!

(We knew we had been in the restaurant a really long time when I looked out the window and saw Gold City's bus pulling out of town!!!) They had sold product afterwards, torn down all their sound equipment, and loaded the bus, and here we still sat! Lucky for Steak and Shake, their burgers are the only ones I like, or I might not ever go back!!

Tonight I am going with a friend to hear the Collingworth's at Jonathan Byrd's in Greenwood! Jonathan is singing with Convention Quartet at an indoor camp so he can't go! I had to decide if I would rather go hear him or go hear the Collingsworth's and it was a pretty easy decision!! :)

Our church Thanksgiving dinner is this weekend too so it's going to be another loony weekend around here!

Out of the mouths of babes...

2008-11-12T21:49:00.003-05:00

We hadn't been home from church too long this evening when I noticed the twins were walking around the house singing one of our choruses. Paige was belting out the words to "God said you're gonna make it..." She and Peyton were singing "God said you're going under!!!" HA!! Amazing how much they even get out of a service. They are so bad in church that I hardly get anything out of the service. I can't believe they can pick up the words of a song!

One day last week, Grandma and Grandpa Don were helping babysit the kids. Grandpa Don told Peyton to pick up his toys. He said, Peyton stood there straight as a soldier and with his left hand saluted him and said, "Yes Sir!" :)

Last Saturday, we were going down the road and Parker and Paige were in the back seat playing with their toys. Parker had a small batman and Paige had a small Cinderella in her wedding gown. Parker said, "Paige, let's have them get married!" She agreed, so Parker started the ceremony...he said, "Batman, do you take Cinderella to be your awful wedded wife??? :)

We attended two funerals last weekend of some close friends. The kids didn't quite understand and we had tried to explain things on their level. Jonathan had to give the eulogy on Saturday afternoon and I decided it would be best if I didn't try to fight the kids alone during the service! We went to Steak and Shake for lunch (which was a disaster in itself) and then just waited on Daddy to get finished. Parker kept asking what was taking him so long and I explained to him that Daddy went to the cemetery to help bury him! He said "they are going to bury that man in his good clothes???" I then had to explain that they would bury him in that pretty casket and put dirt on top of him. He seemed satisfied with that and we went on to talk about different things. I thought that would be the end of that conversation for the day! As soon as Jonathan arrived, Parker could hardly wait until he got in the car to ask, "So Dad...was it really cool burying that man?"

Kids....they keep you on your toes!

Quiet time...

2008-11-06T06:30:00.000-05:00

Grandma Walden reading to the twins...

Daddy has quite a lapful... Listening to Daddy read Parker's book from school.

(Pay no attention to the mismatched jammies!!!)

Today's the day!!!

2008-11-04T09:35:00.003-05:00

Uncle Sam wants YOU to do your American duty... and get out to the polls and...cast your ballot...
for the BEST choice...
You know who we're voting for!!!!!!!!!!

Of all the nerve.......

2008-11-03T09:53:00.002-05:00

I just looked out my front door a few minutes ago and was shocked to see that my McCain/Palin yard sign is GONE!!! I quickly called Jonathan and of course, he didn't move it! So, there are thieves among us and I would imagine they are Obama fans! Jonathan said he would run to the Republican headquarters at lunch. I told him to grab several and we will put them all over our yard!!! (Someone told me that they wanted to run over an Obama sign when they saw them, and I would have to agree!!!)

Don't forget to cast your votes tomorrow America!!!!!!!!!

Halloween Photos!

2008-11-01T22:07:00.008-04:00

Sampson!!!Tony Stewart!!!
Curious George & Fancy Nancy!!!

We are in revival this week and so the kids were a bit disappointed that they weren't going to get to go out Trick or Treating! We told them we could not miss church for Halloween! Right at 5pm, I took the kids out around our neighborhood and they loved it. Parker was so excited and they loved ringing doorbells and having people give them free candy!

It was fairly warm here yesterday and Peyton got quite hot! We hadn't been gone from the house too long when he started complaining that he was hot and needed a drink! We were too far to turn around so I made him continue around the entire block! Parker decided to tell the neighbors that he was hot but he couldn't take off his monkey suit because he didn't have on any clothes underneath! He was having a ball telling everyone that Peyton only had his diaper on under his monkey suit! The neighbors were amused and I was quite embarrassed!

Parker got a kick out of the neighbor across the street. As he was approaching the house, the guy came "running" out to the sidewalk with a pen and paper and said "Hey Tony, can I get your autograph?" Parker got so embarrassed but went along with it and pretended to sign his name. Later he said, "Mom, I can't believe that man wanted my autograph!"

We went to McDonald's after church with several of the young married couples and Jonathan donned his wig and we could hardly take him serious! He stopped by to see the McCrary's, who are holding our revival, but they were gone to the Waffle House! They have no idea what they missed!!!

I am enjoying the huge bowl of candy that our kids collected last evening. Just what I need for my figure! I keep telling myself, the more I eat, the less of a sugar buzz my kids will get!

Happy Halloween from the Waldens!

2008-10-31T09:58:00.000-04:00

Parker's cool Grandpa...

2008-10-29T22:30:00.000-04:00

Jonathan's parents were babysitting our kids this past weekend and Parker was thrilled to have Grandpa Don play his Playstation 2 with him! He even talked Grandpa into wearing a baseball hat. I think he skunked Grandpa, but Grandpa Don was a good sport anyway! Parker actually can beat his Daddy at these games too! (I don't even try to play!)

Funny weekend...

2008-10-28T00:05:00.000-04:00

Getting blog material I'm sure...

Mark Lowry and Lordsong...
Parker and Connor...Two toothless friends!

Angie and I with our lively offspring...
Tired and ready to go home...

On Saturday afternoon, we headed to Frankfort to spend some time with Gene and Angie and their boys before going to hear Mark Lowry that evening. We met Angie's Aunt and Uncle who were so gracious to put up with our laughter and wild children. We had a hurried supper at Applebee's, rushed the kids back home and threw them at the babysitter!

The adults thoroughly enjoyed Mark Lowry and Lordsong. Mark is as hilarious as ever and Lordsong sounded awesome. We rushed back to relieve the babysitter and she practically ran out the door!!! (Not quite, but I think our 5 kids made her earn her money that evening!) After some more visiting and a few funny moments, we drove home and the kids fell asleep before we were hardly out of town.

Thanks Gene and Angie for inviting us to join you this weekend. We had so much fun!

We're back in business...

2008-10-27T00:01:00.002-04:00

Today, at 7am, Columbus Regional Hospital will open it's doors again for business. After being shut down just shy of 5 months, we are looking forwards to "going home!"

This has been a summer to remember for many CRH employees. My summer was going along quite smoothly and I was working at CRH on June 7th, the day our lives were forever changed. Those memories will be forever etched in my mind as we evacuated patients and waded through muddy water. I'll never forget walking out of the building that night with Dr Davis as we looked over the balcony, down into the lobby at the muddy water, and he said, "Awwwwh, we'll be back in here by Wednesday!" :)

If you look closely, you can see me in my blue scrub dress and white shoes standing by a lady in a wheel chair. I was on the news and didn't even know it! :)

I was sent to St Francis to work in their Labor and Delivery department. I am not one that likes "change" but found out that I really could do it after all! I never dreamed I would ever work in a big hospital in Indianapolis, but when forced to change, I was able to survive! I learned a lot from the nurses there, but was glad to bid my farewell to them last Thursday evening!

Not every assignment was always a bed of roses this summer. I'll always remember the day we were assigned to cook food for flood victims. Making Salisbury steaks and gravy for 400 people with one stove was not an easy task. We made some memories that day though and had some good laughs.

The day I spent sorting clothes at a local store where people drop off donations was another memorable experience. I along with another nurse from the birthing center were sorting through clothes. Some were pretty dirty and had to just be tossed. A guy came up and dumped a box of stuff out for us to sort through and I started to scream and run! There were live baby rats in that box of items! (I have a HUGE fear of mice and would not go near that bin for the rest of the day.)

I spent a day playing at the Kidscommons here in town too. That was one of the better assignments!! We sat and talked and cut pictures out of old encyclopedia's, played in the toilet, etc!

There were numerous days that I spent cleaning the hospital also. When I would get cancelled from St Francis, I would report for duty at CRH! We wiped down walls so many times we were afraid we were going to remove the paint!

The birthing center got completely remodeled during the summer and I am excited about going back to our new environment! I am looking forward to working with my co-workers again, being 5 minutes from home, and just getting back into a normal routine!

I am grateful to be employed by CRH. They have treated their employees so well this summer when they really didn't have to do so. I've seen our CEO more this summer than I ever had in all my years at the hospital. He has gained so much respect from the employees at CRH and can hardly get through his speeches due to the thundering applause!

There has been a lot of change already and more to come I am sure, but we will survive! After all "We're more than a building, we are Columbus Regional Hospital!"

You can also visit our local newspaper, the Republic, and watch a press conference recorded this past Friday.

"roughing it..."

2008-10-17T13:41:00.003-04:00

Ready to pull out on Friday morning...

(Special thanks to Mom and Dad Walden for letting us use their truck and trailer!)

Our kids were So excited...
Finally sitting down to supper at almost 8pm!!!

Thank goodness Montie brought a lantern!

Yummy steak and fried potatoes...
Pagie thought this decoration was scary!!!Ready to roast marshmallows and make smores...

(Peyton was not thrilled to say the least...)

We are having fun "roughing it!" This is about as rough as I care to get!!! :) Thank goodness there's Wi-fi here and we have great signal on our cell phones! The kids are getting filthy and I just cringe every time they throw sand on each other!

Last night had to be the longest night of our lives. The kids slept well until about 1am. They all ended up coming into our bedroom to sleep! Jonathan ended up on the hide-a-bed with Parker and later came in to beg me to trade him! I ended up out there the rest of the night. We had good intentions of sleeping in today but Parker and Paige were wide awake at 7am!!!

Montie has been quite the chef and it is amazing to see what all he can cook outdoors! I'm impressed! Sure is nice to not have that mess in Mom Walden's kitchen!

The campground is having a hayride tonight at dark and we are all signed up and ready to go!

Hope you have a great weekend! The leaves are beautiful in this part of the country!!!

Fall Festivities...

2008-10-15T08:26:00.003-04:00

At our Christian School's Fall Festival last Friday night...Enjoying Marvin's hayride...

Junior Church fall party on Saturday evening...
Kevin, Aaron, Parker and Tyler...
Paige and Hannah...
Shane and Peyton... Jr. Church hayride...
I'm pretty sure I see Jenny Grissom's mouth wide open in this picture!! :)
Amy Shearer posted on her blog about this party and said that she was sure it wasn't Jenny that we heard all the way around the church property! (Now are you so sure Amy???)

I think she was the one screaming out....Jesus love is a bubbling over...

It was a fun weekend full of lots of fall festivities and the kids had so much fun!

Apple Works excursion...

2008-10-14T09:13:00.014-04:00

Yesterday, Mom and I took the kids to the Apple Works in Trafalgar, In. for what we thought would be a fun afternoon! We had heard lots of good things about this place and I was dying for some cold apple cider and those yummy apple cider donuts.

After a quick lunch we got in the car and tried to set Mom's navigation system but for some reason, it wouldn't recognize the address. "Oh well" we thought, ..."we'll find it no problem!" We had both read the directions on the Internet and thought we were pretty sure we could find it.

We were driving along, enjoying the beautiful scenery and colorful leaves and the road began to get quite narrow. We also began to notice that there were some very steep hills on this narrow road. The kids were in the back asking, "Are we almost there?" and then would say, "Whoa" when we climbed the hills or turned a sharp curve! After driving several miles like this, we decided we better pull off and call the place and ask for directions. Mom tried to explain where we were at that moment and the lady was able to figure it out and tell us how to find our way back to them!

Shortly after our arrival at the Apple Works, a tour bus pulled in loaded with retired people anxious to buy some apples! We walked around on the grounds for a while and took several pictures. The kids had fun throwing rocks in the water and got filthy quickly. Obviously, they are easily entertained... There were no activities going on yesterday and there wasn't much for the kids to do. So...they decided to get on my nerves!!!

Once the line had gone down inside the store, Mom went in to "shop!" She quickly came back out empty handed. They told her that they were pretty much sold out of everything from having such a busy weekend! No Apple Cider, only one pastry, and no Apple Cider donuts, (they only make them on weekends I found out!) They did have plenty of fresh apples and Mom did end up buying a bag of them to make fresh apple butter!

Parker always has to check out the bathrooms, wherever we go! He got his first experience with outdoor plumbing and thought it was pretty cool! I was trying not to gag at the thought of him sitting in that outhouse and probably touching everything in sight!!!

A short time later, we loaded up the kids, took off their filthy shoes before getting into Gpa's car and headed home! They were worn out and we were hoping for a quiet ride home. Parker was making sure we were taking a different route home! (We did!!!) After traveling a mile or two down the road, Peyton starts hollering for his match box car that he had been playing with at the Apple Works place! I told him to look in his pockets for I did not have it! Much to our dismay, he did not have that little car and said, "I left it back there!" I just told him that it was gone and that broke his heart. It's a good thing Grandma was driving because Mommy wouldn't have turned around! We went back to look for this silly .79 cent car... The entire time I was trying to remember where I had last seen him playing with it. I went down the hill looking for it in the rocks and was praying on my way down that I would find it. I know it's a silly car, but he was devastated! As soon as I got to the spot, there was that little car, sticking up out of the rocks!!!!! I came walking back up the hill and Peyton was looking out the window for me. Mom said as soon as he saw it in my hands he said, "Yipee!"

All three kids fell asleep on the way home and it was a peaceful drive back to our town! It was a fun afternoon, but I can't say that I intend to go back anytime soon! If I do, it'll definitely be on a weekend so I can get some of those yummy donuts!

Parade...

2008-10-13T08:08:00.004-04:00

We met Darin & Amy Shearer and their girls downtown at the parade on Saturday!

Darin kept telling us that the people across the street would be in the sun "in about 5 minutes!"

They ended up being in the shade the entire time!!! :(

Our Mayor...Fred Armstrong
China was the feature this year in our Ethnic Expo...
The kids loved the dragon...
Showing his patriotism...
Groucho Marx...Little Groucho...

(Monkey see...monkey do...)

One of the floats was about "Laughter" stating that a laugh is the same in any language. They were passing out these plastic glasses/noses and also had cans of silly string. They were walking along and spraying the silly string at people trying to make them laugh! Well..........Peyton was standing on the curb, watching the parade, when all of a sudden, a little boy walked up to him and squirted him right in the face with silly string! Jonathan about came out of his lawn chair!!! Peyton did NOT like it and because he was standing in front of me, I quickly became covered with the nasty stuff as well! (Jonathan thought about throwing candy at the boy but decided that wasn't too Christ-like!)

We went to the pumpkin patch...

2008-10-11T15:05:00.002-04:00

...for our annual fall pictures! It was hot today, almost 80 degrees. Last year we were freezing and wiping snotty noses, today we were trying not to zoom in too much so you wouldn't see their red faces from being so hot!!!

We went to the parade this morning and about burned up sitting in the sun. The kids loved it and came home with a bag full of candy. I'll post pictures of the parade later.

In a little while, we are going to be leaving for our Jr Church bonfire and hayride party. I'm hoping the sun goes down soon and it cools off a bit. We're going to burn up roasting hotdogs and marshmallows in this heat!!!

Hope you are enjoying this beautiful fall weekend!

Fall Happenings...

2008-10-10T15:41:00.004-04:00

My blog has obviously been neglected over the past few weeks and months. I am keeping up with everyone else's and feeling a bit guilty for being so boring! Tonight I am taking the kids to our school's "Fall Festival" while Jonathan has a ballgame to play! Marvin has promised the kids a hay ride and they are so excited.

Tomorrow we plan to take the kids to a parade here in town and then we are having a Jr Church Bonfire and hay ride tomorrow night! (We'll be sick of hot dogs come Sunday!)

I am getting excited about our hospital getting ready to re-open. Our target date is October 27th!!! I was there yesterday working in our department cleaning equipment and from the looks of it, it doesn't seem possible. I thought to myself..."Oh ME of little faith..." :( I am ready to be back home in familiar surroundings with the gals I know so well. It's been quite a learning experience this summer and I am glad it's almost over! We have a completely remodeled Birthing Center from the ceiling to the floor! You'll have to have a baby and come see it!!! Parker was chosen as "Student of the Month" for October. I know that everyone will get chosen as some point, but it was cute to see his name printed in the school newsletter! He's loving school and leaning to sound out letters and read high-frequency words! I find myself quickly losing my patience with him when he doesn't get it right away! (That's an obvious sign for me that I will never be able to home school my kids!!!)

I'll try to get some fun pumpkin pictures this weekend!
Happy October!

Going to Grandma's...

2008-10-02T22:32:00.002-04:00

Three clean kids, all ready to go spend the night with Grandma! (I have to work tomorrow and thought Grandma would prefer getting them tonight instead of at 5:30am!) Hope they all sleep and let Grandma sleep too! ...now if I can go to sleep without them being home, everything will be fine! :(

All Parker wants for Christmas...

2008-10-02T22:26:00.003-04:00

...is his two front teeth!!