50 Free Cards from Shutterfly What What!!!

So Shutterfly has this amazing offer to get 50 free Christmas Cards if you're a blogger and you post about the offer. Ever since I saw a friend's blog post about this I've been checking out their cards, and let me tell you, they have some super cute stuff! My favorites are in order as follows.

My favorite is the “Rejoice the Lord is King” because it is centered around the Lord. And also because this fact, that the Lord is King, has been of the greatest encouragement to our family this year. I think the Lord has matured me more in this year of my life than ever before. He has reminded me in both challenging times and joyous times that He is in control. And I am so thankful that He is! The Lord is on His throne!

My second favorite is the one with the last name initial in the middle. I think this one is very classy and elegant. It's one people could keep on their fridge and it would look cute all year round, not just at Christmas. That's why I prefer it in the color black over the red design.

And my third favorite is the one with the polka dots. I like this one a lot, but I don't think Kyle would. He might think it's not manly enough. But I love the colors and the polka dots. I think it's very festive for Christmas.

We're going to use the family pictures that Cara Croft took for us in the card. I'm sooooo excited to put the card together. This is an extremely generous offer from Shutterfly and I'll explain the process of what you do. First you go to this link: http://bit.ly/sfly2010 and fill out the information. Then in a couple of days you get an email that tells you what to do. Then you write a blog of 200+ words, follow the instructions, and they'll email you the promo card.

Some of the other neat things Shutterfly offers are things like, desk calendars, personalized thank you notes (with pictures, I saw the wedding thank you notes and thought that was such a cute idea), and of course they have many different styles of Christmas cards. Here are some links to get you to these products:

calendars:

http://www.shutterfly.com/calendars

thank you notes:

http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/thank-you-cards

Christmas Cards:

http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/christmas-photo-cards

I hope you're able to take advantage of this great deal too! Thanks Shutterfly!

Shutterfly's 50 Free Holiday Cards with Blog Post

I am so thankful to have some beautiful family pictures taken by Cara Croft. And now there is this awesome opportunity to get 50 free Christmas Cards from Shutterfly if you post about them on your blog. I have seen it on several of my friends' blogs and that's how I heard about it. Can't wait to pick them out and order them. Thanks Shutterfly for such a wonderful gift!

Stand up, stand up for Jesus...

It's been a while since my last blog and Tommy has grown so much! He is now spitting/blowing raspberries, he is rolling over like a champ (just from belly to back, he almost has back to belly down), he is eating rice cereal/oatmeal and all kinds of veggies, and he loves standing now! Tommy boy eats like a champ, there hasn't been any foods he's refused to eat yet, however, I can tell he prefers rice cereal over oatmeal. He's had green beans, carrots, sweet potatoes, squash, and peas. I think his favorite so far is squash. We'll be trying fruits soon and I'm sure he'll love those! Before Tommy I never realized how much of a young baby/child's life revolves around teaching them to eat. As soon as I have nursing down pat it's time to introduce baby food. Next will come solids and feeding himself. Eating is a lot of work. But thankfully our boy's good at it!

In other news, Tommy celebrated his 1/2 birthday with his cousin Brady, they share the same wonderful birthday! We had a blast having pizza and cookie cake and playing Uno with our sweet family. We now have a new nephew - Logan Scott Boone was born on October 27th, and he's so precious! Also, my sister Jeanne is now expecting a precious baby boy or girl, she's due at the end of May! Our family has been so blessed this year - we're growing leaps and bounds.

Oh the big new news, as mentioned before, is that Tommy is now standing! He is such a big boy and he's growing so fast and I cannot tell you what a joy it is to be this kid's mom. The Lord uses this sweet boy to bless my heart beyond belief. We're still working on sitting up, he prop sits really well and he can kind of sit all the way up by himself but if he knows you're not behind him, he loses "confidence" and let's himself fall. His PT explains it as him not having enough confidence to do it on his own because he gets scared if he realizes you're not there and lets his muscles go. However, it is wonderful that he is standing so well. A couple of weeks ago I tried to let Tom stand on his own but he needed me behind him to hold up his little tooshi, well his PT said yesterday that she thinks he could stand on his own if there was something a good height. So I tried it tonight and baby boy stood (holding onto the recliner) for probably 10 seconds! Talk about a champ! And glory be to God because He is answering our prayers. I thank the Lord for Tommy's physical and mental strength but ask Him to continue to strengthen Tommy and He is! Tommy's favorite way to stand up is while bouncing to the song "Stand up, Stand up for Jesus..." It's the only song I can get him to smile to when he's standing. He such a smart boy, he already likes Jesus!

Kyle just wrote a paper for class on counseling a family who has a child with Down Syndrome. And I almost always proofread his papers for him, more for telling him if something makes sense or sounds good/bad, not to help with grammar. Anyway this paper was such a blessing to me because it served as such a great reminder that while I should hope for the best for Tommy - as far as physically and mentally thriving in society - the ultimate goal is that he will be saved and used by God. And while I pray this daily for my son, it is so easy to get caught up in thinking about things like, "how can i get him to do this, or he really should be doing that, or I can tell such a big difference between this baby and Tommy." In the end none of that will matter. Oh and speaking of which, in helping Kyle with his paper I looked up David Ring, the evangelist with cerebral palsy. He had one video, which of course made me cry, where he said when he gets to heaven he's going to have a new body. He'll be able to tie his own shoes, and button his own shirt. He said you may not like me now, but you don't have to, I'm not finished. God's still got me in the oven. But when he gets to heaven God's going to open the oven door and say, "Well done...my good and faithful servant." It was so funny but also such a great reminder of how perfect heaven will be.

I'm not sure if there is anything that the Lord could have used to soften my heart more than this baby boy. I am so thankful.