Happy New Year from All of Us!

If there were any picture to capture us in our true fashion this is IT!

I hope it brings a smile to your face because it sure brings some smiles to mine.

You might wonder...

Why I haven't been posting much except for pictures. The short answer is I haven't felt like it. The past few months my family has been dealing with so much and I felt God telling me that I needed to rest in him. It has been a difficult road, my sister who is 17 is dealing with fainting spells, my brother who is also young has been in and out of the hospital with different infections that cause him to have seizures, a woman dear to my heart has been dealing with strokes and on Christmas day we found out during Church service that a young man who we taught(Eric and myself) lost his wife. She was in her early 20's and gave birth to a baby a week prior to passing on. Needless to say my heart has been heavy, my burdens hard to carry, and the silence of my savior has been deafening. It is a struggle to trust and yet I know if I did not rely totally on the faith that my God has everything in his hand I wouldn't be able to bear the circumstances.

So if you've been wondering, I am here behind the scenes on my knees clinging to my life verse.

Psalms 119:49-50

49 Remember your word to your servant,
for you have given me hope.
50 My comfort in my suffering is this:
Your promise preserves my life.

5 Blessings...

Our Christmas Letter...

The Fulkerson's top 10 memories of 2011 to make you smile, giggle, and maybe giggle so much you wiggle while you giggle.

No particular Order just great memories!

Jonah and our conversations. This is the boy who told me last year "Mom, I love you, but only on Tuesday, Thursday, and Fridays". His questions normally come as I am tucking him into bed. "Mom" he'll say "I love everybody." I laugh on the inside and ask him "Jonah do you love even mad guys?(also known as bad guys)"
"I don't know" he'll reply thinking "Jesus loves mad guys."
"Yes Jesus loves mad guys" I reply "Jesus tells us to love mad guys too."
"Mom some mad guys are scary but Jesus loves them too. I love everybody. I'm like Jesus." I am not sure a memory gets any better than that one!

Kerith being escorted off the stage at the end of the year Mother's Day Out program. Apparently she isn't a big fan of singing in front of people!

Grace Starting 1st grade. Of course she requested that her WHOLE family escort her on her first day and of course three of her siblings had to be escorted out the door so the rest of the class could concentrate!

Campfire s'mores and star gazing. The kids enjoyed roasting hotdogs and marshmallows. The parents enjoyed easy cleanup!

Seeing Grace be the flower girl in my younger sisters wedding. She did a marvelous job and asked right away when she could be a princess again.

During our stay in Texas we got to take the kids to Sea world for the first time! They all enjoyed the day despite it being 120 degrees. Ok maybe not that hot but close!

Titus started walking before he turned one! He thinks he is pretty cool now because he can walk while drinking a bottle. He is really a happy kid and loves to play with his brothers and sisters.

Micah and Kerith turned 3! It is hard to believe that the tiny babies are so big now! They had their first birthday party and enjoyed having friends over for cake and pizza.

The paid for family vacation to Washington D.C. Ok really it was a business trip for Eric's work and we decided since it was a paid for trip to take everyone. We got a little more than we bargained for. first a ruined cell phone, than our van being towed while we walked the national mall, than an earthquake, and lastly outrunning a hurricane. I would say we will never do it again but really it IS quite funny to tell the story now and one thing is for sure we will NEVER EVER forget our trip to Washington.

Um, did we mention our trip to Washington D.C?

Jonah turns 5!

Jonah turned five earlier this week. We had another cake and small celebration. The big party was on Saturday a long with Micah and Kerith. They are still young enough that they don't care if their parties are together.

All throughout the day he kept asking Mom am I bigger? as in taller. It was very hard to answer but of course I told him he was a lot taller than last year. That really wasn't enough to satisfy him so he finally told me he was ALMOST as all as me. Oh that IS coming, thankfully it is still a few years away. After all we have to get through Kindergarten first...

Happy Birthday Micah and Kerith!

It was three years ago today that my life changed forever. Micah and Kerith entered this world at 35 weeks premature and perfectly healthy. Doctors told me I would always need help to get pregnant and God decided to prove that he is in control of every detail of my life including my fertility or lack there of. Not one but two babies conceived without medication. They are my daily reminders that God's ways are higher than my own and his ways are perfect. They also remind me that when men say it is impossible with God ANYTHING is possible.

2 weeks old.

Today three years old

Happy Birthday guys!

Thanksgiving

This from 150 years ago seems very relevant today.

"We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven; we have been preserved these many years in peace and prosperity; we have grown in numbers, wealth and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us, and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us.

It has seemed to me fit and proper that [the gifts of God] should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged with one heart and one voice by the whole American people. I do, therefore, invite my fellow citizens . . . to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens."

Abraham Lincoln calling for a day of fasting and prayer.