Prayer Request

This is the Gallion family.Howard is my 1st cousin and pictured with him is his sweet wife Nicole and their two precious boys Haden and Keaton.


Howard is in the Airforce and is currently deployed to Iraq. Nicole is alone with the boys in London where they were stationed in February.

For the past 2+ years Horward and Nicole have struggled to conceive baby #3. Imagine their delight when, days before Horward was deployed, they found out that they were expecting!

However, what they weren't expecting was that Nicole would go for her Dr.'s appointment to discover that not only were they going to have a third child, but also a forth, AND a fifth, AND a sixth all at one time! Yes, they are expecting Quads!

All of their family lives in Texas.

Can you imagine being alone in a foreign country while your husband is in Iraq and taking care of two kids all while pregnant with Quads???

This is where your prayers come in!!

Here is how you can pray:


*pray that the paperwork goes through for a reassignment to Texas very quickly. Nicole really needs to get back as early in the pregnancy as possible.

*pray for Howard's continued safety in Iraq

*pray for the 4 precious babies to continue growing

*pray for Nicole's strength and sanity as she cares for her two boys and takes care of herself so that the babies get just what they need.

*pray for Haden and Keaton as they prepare to move once again and for the transition that will come with the arrival of the new babies.


This is just the short list!! I will try to keep everyone updated on the "Quad Squad" as time passes. Thank you in advance for your prayers!

Promises

I love when I read a scripture that I have read hundreds of times and God allows it to somehow come alive to me and I see something that I have never seen before!

Last week while I was reading through Proverbs Chapter 13 I had one of those moments. It happened when I read Proverbs 13:4 "The sluggard craves and gets nothing, but the desires of the diligent are fully satisfied." I am sure that I have read that verse before and thought "ok, don't be a sluggard...got it." But last week I saw so much more.

God allowed me to see who I am through that verse. As much as I hate to admit it...I am the sluggard. No, I don't dream of being a couch potato and I don't just like to sit around and eat bon-bons. My desire is NOT to be a sluggard but to often I find myself in that spot. Why you ask? Because I never looked deeper into that verse...I never realized that there in the middle of that short little verse is a HUGE promise. The promise is that those who are diligent will see results. My problem is that I get overwhelmed...I haven't lost weight on my diet that I started 2 days ago so I give up, there is so much laundry piled up that I will never get it done so why not just do something else.

I have realized that diligent means...even when I am tired...even when I am not getting results as quickly as I would like...even when I am in a bad mood...even when I think it will never get done.

This brings me to our latest endeavor. We have purposely been trying for the last several years to get completely debut free except for our house. To be honest God has blessed in amazing ways and we are closer than we thought we would be by this time. However, last week we decided that it was time get our budget in check. We gave ourselves a set amount of money for groceries, gas, and entertainment.

Here is a picture of my very first budget shopping trip:

The budget was $100.00...I spent $105.00.:) I felt like it was a good effort since we needed some of the more expensive items this trip (diapers, batteries, laundry detergent, carpet cleaner etc.) Now, I did make a few mistakes. Like spending the whole amount at one time. I should have saved some for emergency items like running out of milk or baby wipes. But all in all I felt ok about my first attempt.

This made me think a lot about that verse. The old Jenna would have decided this is too hard, I went over the budget, I couldn't get everything I wanted, this will never work, and I would have given up. But not this time. I am clinging to that promise that "the desires of the diligent are fully satisfied." I believe that God honors good stewardship and that if we will be diligent (even when it is hard) we will see the results.

I believe this carries over to ALL of the areas of my life. Being fit, being a godly woman, being a godly mom and wife, and most of all being person who is ready to share about my faith in season and out of season WILL NOT happen overnight. It will happen it the small moments when I choose to die to my sluggard self and push forward in diligence knowing that God himself has promised me my desires to be that person He wants me to be will be satisfied.

Because the small moments matter...

It's Raining, It's Pouring...

and since no one is snoring we decided to go for a walk and it turned into a fun day of puddle jumping! Being a "boy mom" can be so fun!

Game Day!

Nathan went to Shreveport to visit his parents this weekend and came back with Halloween Costumes for the boys. Since it was game day and all they just had to break them out! Hopefully they are still in one piece by the time Halloween gets here!

Go Tigers!

Kaden and Daddy having a little pre-game warm-up!

Nathan was just beaming seeing his two little boys all decked out LSU gear! Don't worry, we didn't leave Kolson out...he is going to be a football! We didn't get pictures today but I am sure there will be TONS on Halloween!! Hope everyone is having a great weekend!

Karter is 2!!

Yesterday our sweet little Karty turned 2 years old! To be honest it seems like it has been longer than that...Nathan and I can't decide if that is because Karter is, well, a little challenging, or if it is the fact that we had another baby so quickly so Karter just didn't seem like a baby anymore.:)

Like all of our children, Karter will always hold a special place in our hearts. Karter is our long awaited one, our faith baby, our miracle boy.

After having Kaden so easily we took having a healthy baby for granted. When got pregnant the second time I never once thought of anything going wrong. Sure, I prayed that we would have a healthy baby, but not one time did I pray that our baby would live. So, when we lost baby Konner in October of 2005 we were in complete shock to say the least. Two miscarriages followed the loss of baby Konner and things were starting to look hopeless.

That is were faith came in big time. I will never forget the morning that I saw "pregnant" on that test. It was a Sunday morning and Nathan was already at church. I took the test on a whim not really expecting anything. I remember just peaking over the test afraid for another let down of "not pregnant" and afraid for what might lay ahead if it said "pregnant". Sure enough it said "pregnant"! I was shaking as I picked up the test and then I remember falling to knees at the side of our bed and begging God to protect this baby and to let him live. I wrote Nathan a "surprise you're going to be a Daddy!" note and gave it to him at church. Despite our many losses he was so excited when he opened the note. He came and said "are you serious?" with the biggest smile.

We kept the pregnancy a secret for a while not wanting to put anyone else through the emotional roller coaster, until we realized that this little baby needed prayers and as many of them as he could get. Our family, friends, and our wonderful church family at Martin's Mill prayed constantly for little Karter.

I was afraid to move most of my pregnancy until I came across Psalm 112:7 "He will have NO fear of bad news, because his heart is steadfast trusting in the Lord." I knew this didn't mean that there would never be any bad news but instead that if there was I could trust HIM to take me through it. I said the verse in my heart on the way to EVERY Dr. visit (there was 1 every week, sometimes 2!).

And finally on October 8, 2007 Karter Daniel Lorick made his appearance! By this time we had been called to First Baptist Malakoff so he had another whole church praying for him. He had a few bumps and had to stay in the special care nursery for a day but he was here!

I have said many times that Karter is a living testimony of the power of prayer. As challenging as his red-headed personality may be at times, we are SO thankful for God's answered prayers and for the life of our sweet Karty boy.

Prayer makes a difference!

Here is a look at Karter turning 2....

Karter's Cake...yes next time I will leave the decorating to my cake friend Julie! Ha!

Playing with Friends outside

Trying to bust the pinata...Nathan ended up having to break it...who do they make those things for...Major league baseball players?

We had Karter's favorite...hog dogs! Or "yaut yaugs" as he calls them.

Couldn't wait to dig into the cake!

Finally a bike...that is all he has wanted since he saw Kaitlyn's a couple weeks ago!(He decided to take his shirt off...Karter will be Karter :)

He was so excited I had to take him for a stroll in the dark!

More presents!
Our family of 5! Yes, I know Kolson's hair looks a little RED but it is just the light!:)

The Lo-down

Not long ago I made the mistake of renting Homeward Bound for our family movie night. I thought it would be a great family movie that we would all enjoy. I had NO idea the can of worms I was opening. After watching the movie about those sweet pets we all seemed to notice a void in our family. We were petless. So what did we do...we went to Canton and got a dog. We have all tried to blame it on one another but the truth is we all walked to the animal part of Canton and we all feel in love with this little furry guy the second we saw him. So here he is our latest pet attempt..

Kash

The last two weeks has gone by in a blur. It seems like we are always finding something to keep us busy! Here is a look at what we have been up to...

Making Stilts on a rainy day (I knew those formula cans would be good for something!)

Stuffing the pinata for Karter's birthday party

The boys have fallen in LOVE with tackle football!

They also have a thing for sword fight with our foam bowling pins...BOYS

Kash likes to get in the action as well!
K1...
He is growing and learning so much this year...he is up to 10 sight words already! He is such a great helper and LOVES to "hang" with Nathan.

K2...
well our sweet Karty has learned how to take his diaper off. In the last 2 weeks I have gone to get him out of bed to find him with no diaper and poop all over the bed...yes I said POOP! Last night alone he got his diaper off 3 times...luckily there was only tee-tee but still...oh my! Tonight he is sleeping in jeans. If that doesn't work we will resort to DUCK TAPE!

K3...

pure sweetness! He still just a great baby although he has had at least 5 MASSIVE explosions of the diaper this week. It makes me a little crazy but he is still just as happy as can be!

Thank you for your prayers for our sweet friends Luke and Kathryn and baby Maddie Kate. Maddie is now home and has touched countless live in her first 2 weeks of life.

Finally,I am begging you tonight to please lift up my sweet mother-in-law Maria. The Dr.'s have not given her a good report. Please pray for Nathan's dad, her daughter Holly, her son Cody and Nathan and his sisters. God promises to give PEACE that passes our understanding and that is what we are counting on. Thank you in advance for your prayers.