See you soon Momma!

On Wednesday morning I received a call to get to the hospital because my mother had been in a car accident. That is all I knew. I cried and prayed all the way. When I was almost to the hospital these words came rushing to my heart. "God will take care of you, through every day, ore all the way. He will take care of you. God will take care of you." When I arrived and saw my Preacher, he told me that she didn't make it. I felt like my whole world had just crumbled. My preacher's wife was right there to comfort and just hold me just like my momma would do whenever I was hurting. I thank God for her. It is hard. I NEVER thought I would be on the other side of the receiving line this early in life. My dear mother was such an example to me of sacrificial giving of herself. It was because of her that I was able to do many things for others, because she kept my girls and did things to help me.

She was always doing things in the background to help. She even scraped the tile floor in the fellowship building nursery and waxed it. It took several days process, on her hands and knees, and she used her days off to do it. She really loved keeping the nursery for bus church. It really showed in how she made sure it was cleaned up and safe.

The hardest thing is when I want to call her and tell her something that has happened with the girls. I always just picked up the phone and called her. Last night we had Christmas with the church staff. I was so excited that Naomi got something she has been wanting for several months and I had forgotten about it. I picked up the phone to call Mom and realized I couldn't. It hurt all over again.

I will miss her so much but I know that I will see her again; I hope that it is really soon. It makes heaven so much more real.

Thank you all for the prayers and the friendship through this time.

Easter

We have an Easter Parade at our church where the kids walk across the platform. Abigail was not happy about it. She would not smile for anyone!

Naomi was posing for pictures. I think Paw Paw wanted to show her off. HeHeHe.
Cheyenne didn't want to walk across the platform.

This turned out really good for only taking one pic. I guess it was because Maw Maw Birt had the touch. :)

Abigail is so cute smelling the flowers. The funny thing is that another family came in the flowers right after us and the little boy was walking on the flowers and the little girl was pulling off the flower heads. It was so funny! Shhhhh, don't tell Mrs. Ava! LOL!

Oh! No!!!!!!!!!!

I was getting breakfast for the girls and then sit on the couch when I saw a clump of hair in the floor. ABIGAIL!!!!! She had gotten hold of some scissors and cut off her bangs :( HELP MOM!!!!! I had her hold a chunk that Chey found in another part of the living room. They were big scissors so she couldn't really get them on her hand. If it had been little ones, I'm sure she would have done worse! Beware Mrs. Deborah! We have a beautician in training LOL!

Adventures of the Carter Clan 1

I know it has been a LONG time since I posted so I wanted to tell our adventure during the snow storm.

A few weeks ago, we were to have a snow storm. We went to church as we always do and it started to snow before church got out. It usually doesn't get that bad around here. Ken, being from CO, can drive in the snow so I wasn't worried. We had planned an afterglow after church with the young married class so we went ahead and had a quick time of fellowship before going home. While we were there it dropped about 3 more inches of snow. It was falling fast! We tried to get out of the parking lot and almost didn't make it. We finally got out and were headed home very slowly. The road was pretty bad. We got about a mile from the church and got stuck on a hill. We just could not get up the hill toward home. We weren't going to make it home. We called Joel and Daniel who had 4 wheel drives that could possibly make it to us. Daniel lives not far from church, so he was home already and coming to get us. But he had never driven in this much snow and the visibility was almost nothing. So we were going to have to walk up the hill to meet him when he got closer. I was in my high heels, and Ken was in his dress shoes, Naomi and Abigail in their dress shoes and stocking. We would have to carry the little ones because the snow was already way over their little feet. Luckily Chey had cowboy boots on so at least her feet were covered. Ken had left a pair of his sneakers in the van from going to someones house, so I tied them as tight as I could on my feet. There was thunder and lightning with this snow storm! I have never seen that before. We started walking up the hill and the girls were saying "Daddy I'm scared." And Abigail was crying "I teered." Ken took a nose dive with Naomi in the snow. They were both OK. Ken only had his suit coat on and was getting very wet. We walked about half way up the hill and some very nice strangers stopped in a 4 wheel drive and took us to the top of the hill. Poor Daniel got to us and was hanging out the door to see. The defrost wasn't working in his Durango. No one had anything to wipe the window with. Daniel had just cleaned out his car. Ken's suit coat would not work and my leather one wouldn't either. All I had in the diaper bag was pull ups. So, we used pull ups to wipe the windshield. Finally we made it to their house and decided not to take the Durango to our house, afraid it wouldn't make it. We got all settled in with the kids on the floor and got in bed around 11:00. And the power went out! Meaghan and Daniel are only in this house temporarily so they didn't have any heater or candles. We only had tea lights. We were going around with tea lights trying to find clothes and shoes for all the kids. We knew the heat wouldn't last long in a single wide trailer. Been there, Done that, Didn't want to be without heat with 9 kids! And we knew the power would be out for a long time. We decided to make the trek to Joel and Pam's, who had power and a fireplace. We all packed into the Durango and headed off with all the blankets.

We finally got to Pam's house and the whole drive was blocked with trees bent over with snow. So Daniel and Ken got out shacking off the snow enough to get through.

Daniel shook one off and hit Ken when it sprang up.

We were so glad to be somewhere warm! The kids were still wide awake! They played for a while. I went down to get the girls in bed and they could barely keep their eyes open.

The next morning we lost power about 5:30 in the morning. It was beautiful outside though.

The guys went to "play" in the snow. They got the van out and the house to get clothes. They had to pull the van up our drive.

The roads were were OK in a 4 wheel drive, so we loaded up in the 4 wheel drive vehicles and went to lunch at the Asian, American buffet. They were not prepared to open but seeing they had customers and power they opened for us. They did great getting things out and it was so good.

Later we bundled all the kids up to play in the snow. Putting bags on there feet in their sneakers because we didn't want to buy boots that they would only wear one time. They didn't even stay outside for an hour. But we did have fun. Naomi threw snowballs at me.

We went to try to find sleds for the kids but no store in our town had any sleds! The one place that did was a farm supply store and theirs was a petal kind that cost $59 for one, and it wouldn't have worked in this kind of snow. And we had 11 kids! Sooooo Joel pulled out the tractor and pulled the old boat from their back yard behind it.

This way there was no fighting over sleds either! Everyone loved it. Chey and Nicole took too long inside getting ready so they didn't get to ride around the yard. They road around until the tractor started tearing up the yard. Then it was time to stop.

Caleb bringing up the rear.

Abigail is laughing having so much fun!

Uh Oh! Under a tree and the rope got stuck.

The kids really loved the boat ride!

Joseph was so funny throwing snow at Ethan and laughing.

Abigail and Alanna warming by the fire.

The guys all talking and Daniel knocked over Haili's snowman and she was heartbroken! No one would help her put it back :( Mean ole Daddy!

Malachi

Isaac and Joseph

Before all that...
A few weeks ago when we all were sick and passing around a virus, Ken sent us out to McDonald's. He couldn't stand the thoughts of food and didn't want to smell any either. So we went down the road to eat and have fun. Daddy got some peace and quiet.

Chey shooting hoops. Posing in a ball hoop.

Big Birthday Party!

Last week we went to Tim's house for a combined birthday party for Ken, Abigail, Tim, and Jamie. We had so much fun. Mom was reading the old Dick and Tom books to Abigail. We enjoyed listening to it too. LOL!

Abigail got this really cute Pluto puppy and she loves to play with it!

Abigail loves Naomi's baby ring and they would fight over it. SO I told Dad that it would be a good birthday present. When all the gifts were opened and Abigail had her last one to open, Dad gave her the box. If you watched real close, she pulls out the ring, throws it in the floor and continues to search the box for I don't know what. LOL!She did have it in her hand just long enough to look at it.

Jamie and Emily played the Wii boxing game and he was knocked out by a 5 year old! Funny! I didn't record the whole thing, but she beat him in the game too.