Pretty sure I married a rock star...

So, Clynt gets embarrassed when I brag on him, so I share no details, however I will say that I think I married a rock star!  My husband is an amazingly talented engineer and is one of the smartest people I have ever met in my life.  I can pretty much ask him ANYTHING and he will have an answer for me (even if its totally wrong, generally I believe him!)..

Our marriage is every day getting better and more fun.  Clynt is funny and fun, witty and smart, and loving and loved.  He may have a temper at times but he loves the kids and I more than anything. His desire to provide the best life possible for the kids and I is incredible and is drive for greater education and accomplishments is to be admired.  He doesnt stop and has no intentions on it until retirement.  He doesnt get too content in one spot because he knows (and is) completely capable of the next thing coming for him.  I love this man and how great he is at what is does.  And I love that our life is forever getting better and more exciting!

I love that Clynt loves Christ and is willing to share our lives with Him.  I love that he wants to learn to be a better husband and a better dad.  This past weekend at church was about being a better husband and Garrett was sick and I was volunteering so we thought that Clynt would stay at home with Garrett.  At about 11:00pm, he went WAIT tomorrow is the service for men to be better husbands, let's think of a different way to do this so that I  can go!".. I love that!  Its incredible that he WANTS to go to church and he WANTS to learn about being a better husbands.  I can honestly say the past two weeks have been amazing in our marriage and its because we were woken up by our new Pastor on some realities on today's marriages and unfortunately we fell into a couple of the categories.  But we both have come out of it and have given it 100% and are making things better for our family daily!  Don't get me wrong, things weren't bad before, we just didn't have that 'newlywed spark' anymore and we both desire for that!

Anyways!!!!  This is about my husband!  I love him and love all the things he does for us.  And am so proud of the many accomplishments that he has had. He is an amazing husband, and father and he also is on fire for the LORD and I could not ask for anything more!

I Love you babe!!

growing

Its unbelievable how fast children grow! I do not believe for a second that Corbin is 3.5 and Garrett will be one in just over a month!!  It's crazy.  I just wanted to share a few pictures of the past few months with these crazy boys of mine!

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures....

So, most of you know that I dabble in photography and co-own a little business.  Its been over 2 years now that I've been playing with this.  It has been tons of fun and I have learned SO SO much since then.  It started when corbin was just about a year old.  I had just gotten my first 'fancy camera' and we were having our Christmas pictures/ Corbin's bday pictures done by the amazing Sabrina K Photography.  I was asking Sabrina all kinds of questions about picture taking and so on and so forth.  A few days later, Sabrina sent me the sweetest email in the world (Sabrina- no I will never forget it!!) about how I reminder her of herself when she first started.  So, I started dabbling.  Not making much but dabbling.  I got a wedding almost right away and my business partner in Austin came in to help.  Now, before you start thinking I do weddings, I DONT!  I have NO intentions of EVER doing a wedding because it makes me a nervous wreck.  however if you do need a wedding done, my partner does them and would love to work with you!.  


Anyways, I started getting people to ask if I would take there pictures.  And there it went.  Our business was growing a little.  But really at that point, I was lucky to have 1 session a month.  Then about six months ago before the holidays this year, I had my first rush!  I was having to schedule people during the week because I didnt have any openings on the weekends and so on.  And it continued.  In the past week, I have had 3 sessions.  Now not every week is like that but it does happen often enough.  Its been crazy, but good!  Im loving having something to do to keep my brain moving a little while I stay at home with my kids and the ability to schedule when its convenient for me and my kids is so nice.  Here is a little of my recent work.  I look forward to continuing to grow and continuing to produce better and better pictures.  This has been one of the funnest adventures in my life. =)  If you need any work done, please feel free to email me at deana@picturemechic.com

A special thanks to Sabrina Koogler for all the advice and everything given to me to start a business.  I can only pray that one day I will be half as talented as she is!

change!

Changes in life are so hard!!  Lately a few changed have happened and it has been very emotionally tolling on me and I  praise God for a husband who is strong and, even though I know it makes him sad, he doesnt show it so that I dont worry as much.

Recently we switched churches.  I had been there 10 years or more.  Clynt was baptized there and so was I, the boys were both dedicated there and we really started our life as Christians there with our little family.  It was definitely not in the plans for our little family to take a big jump BUT things happen for a reason and we felt it was in our best interest to do so.  This meant leaving behind a small group that was the basis of most of prayer team, conveying in, and many more things in our life.  We led this amazing group of friends in small group discussion for 4 years now and the change was not the easiest thing in the world for me (or us)... Not that these people are no longer our friends, but we will no longer be seeing them on a regular basis or having a central spot where we go to and talk about all our problems.  We were comfortable with these people and they were with us.  We praise God for giving us these amazing friends and their ability to take a bad day and make it good.

Now we are at our new church home.  We are involved in a new small group, which is nice.  Its hard to go from a group where we'd hang out and do things and that knew everything about us to a group of strangers though.  They are all very nice and we really hope that we will be able to get to know them like we knew our other group members. To me, having a core group of accountability and prayer partners is critical in a journey with Christ.  Thankfully God know what we need and when we need it! =)  We are also getting involved in volunteering.  Since, at our previous church, I did a lot of work in the bookstore, I decided that that would be an excellent place for me to volunteer at our new church.  I appreciate this opportunity because by doing this, I have met so many new and amazing people.  It hasnt been an easy change but its happening and its getting better every day =)

There have been more changes in our life and I will share them also soon =)

Easter

Easter was so much fun this year with 2 little ones to play with and entertain. We had several Easter egg hunts, 1 with each of our moms groups, 1 with Clynt's mom and step-dad, and 1 with my mom and dad.  Corbin would ONLY pick up blue eggs until the last 2 hunts.  It was hilarious.  Garrett would pick up and play with it the whole time, which was perfect! =)    We died eggs twice, and we did lots of playing.  We also read some stories on the meaning of Easter, and we went to our new (yes, new, I told you lots of changes.... right??) church.  It was a great service and then we spent the afternoon at my parents house.  I love how every year, as the kids get bigger, each holiday entails more fun, love and excitement.  Corbin is actually so into doing stuff now and gets excited for the year to come around.  Its amazing! Here are some pictures of our week and all it entailed!  *WARNING~ VERY PIC HEAVY! =)

Totally behind

So, I have not posted at all this year.  Its been a little crazy and Im still honestly learning my away around prioritizing my life with 2 little ones.  Garrett is over 10 months old now.  I dont believe for a second that I am already planning a 1st birthday party with him!  And Corbin....corbin, corbin, corbin.  He is a hoot. I love spending my time with him.  I dont believe that I have been blessed enough to be at home with them for 2 years now.  The day that we made that decision, my world was changed FOREVER!  I LOVE it and totally consider myself blessed.

Well,  lately we have been making some changes around our house.  We have just last night decided on the new flooring we are going to use!!  I would show you a picture, but if you dont like it, I would change my mind.  So once its in, Ill share!  =)  We both love the look of hardwood, but we have 2 big downs and two growing boys, and would hate to see them scratch, so we decided on tile that looks like hardwood.  Its long and skinny and is printed and textured to look just like wood.  We think its amazing.  But the installation of tile is going to be the problem.  Clynt is a DIYer but Ive convinced him to at least hire some help!  So we will have help, but still doing it our selves.

While doing this we are also completely redesigning our backyard!  We love to be outside, so we figure its totally the top thing on our list to do.  So we are expanding our patio, and putting up a pergola over it.  We are also moving our swingset and staining it, putting in a metal shed (thanks to my in-laws for handing it down to us!) and painting that, moving a tree, and adding some landscaping.   We are so excited to get this done.

Other little projects that we are doing is adding new hardware and a new faucet (already installed) to our kitchen, and in a couple months putting in some recessed lighting.   Our house is 8 years old and we bought it 5 years ago, so we just figure that making some changes to make it better fit our lifestyle with our growing family would be amazing!

Okay, I will try to update a little more, I promise!  But for now, here are a couple pictures of my boys growing up!