I got on the scale this morning and had a loss of -2.4 lbs for a total of -48.2 lbs (last week I thought I was at -46.8 but I had miscalculated and was really at -45.8.) I finally made it to the 5th set of numbers…I am still in shock to see that 10’s place number change again.  When I got on the scale this morning I almost screamed (decided not to since it was 5:20am) because I have not been in this set of number since I was a Kindergarten teachers (over 5 years ago….)  I feel great and wanted to share one more thing….I bought a pair of capris 2 or 3 months ago and they were so tight I had to leave the top button undone so that they were more comfortable.  I wore them yesterday and realized that they are so baggy I need to give them away and get a new pair!!!  Just another milestone that I wanted to share.  Hope this doesn’t ever come off as bragging (I do not ever want it to seem that way).  I just want to share things that are encouraging and exciting for me in the hopes that it encourages someone else to jump on this journey…or to keep going on the journey they are already pursuing.  Have a blessed week and thanks for letting me share!

Yesterday was Torie’s first day of school.  She is officially a second grader!  She was so excited about going, her new packback and lunchbox, her outfit, her new teacher, and new friends!  I asked her if she wanted me to drop her off in the line or walk her in…..she wanted me to walk her in (which is secretly what I wanted her to say.)  I was fine as she went into the gym to find her class and sit with them but as her class was walking out and she reached out to hug and kiss me I had to hold back tears.  Thi is her third year in school and still I cry when I take her to school the first day. There is something about letting go of your kids and trusting they are okay without you that is indescribable and a little heart breaking.  Here are some pictures of her first day.

Before I took this picture she asked if she was doing her fake smile because we are always telling her to not fake smile for pics but to do her real smile! It was only a half fake smile!!  Man, she look so grown up.

After waiting to see her off to class I rushed home to finish getting our house ready for Moms and Muffins.  A lady at CJ had this awesome idea to have all ladies (with school aged children, preschool children, grown childresn, no children) to meet together for muffins on the first day of school and share our experiences and pray.  So, after filling up on awesome muffins (thanks, Mom) we sat around and shared our back to school jitters and worries for our children.  It was awesome to hear about ladies who share our same anxieties, stories from ladies whose children are grown and ladies who’s kids aren’t in school yet.  After sharing our stories DeeDee shared encouraging words and scriptures reminding us that God calls us to relinquish our children to Him and turn them over willingly to His control.  That is not easy.  We then each prayed over our kids, our kids teachers, administrators, and all the teachers at CJ. What an awesome way to start the school year.  This was another first for me yesterday and I am looking forward to doing it again this next school year.  Thanks again DeeDee for suggesting and coordinating it and thank you again Mom for providing the awesome food!! As I close, I want to share a prayer that DeeDee printed for each of us to pray over our kids. This is taken from the book The Power of a Praying Parent.

“Lord, I come to you in Jesus’ name and give Torie to you.  I’m convinced that you alone know what is best for her.  You alone know what she needs.  I release her to you to care for and protect, and I commit myself to pray for everything concerning her that I can think of or that you put upon my heart.  Teach me how to pray and guide me in what to pray about.  Help me not to impose my own will when I’m praying for her, but rather enable me to to pray that your will be done in her life. Thank you that I can partner with you in raising her and that I don’t have to do it alone.  I’m grateful that I don’t have to rely on the world’s unreliable and ever-changing methods for child rearing, but that I can have clear directions for your word and wisdom as I pray to you for answers. Thank you, Lord, for the precious gift of this child.  Because your work says that every good gift comes from you, I know that you have given her to me to care for and raise.  Help me to do that.  Show me places where I continue to hang on to her and enable me to release her to your protection, guidance and counsel.  Help me not to live in fear of possible dangers, but in the joy and peace of knowing that you are in control.  I rely on you for everything, and this day I trust my child to you and release her into your hands.  In Jesus Name, Amen.”

Hope this brings you the same peace and comfort it did me.  There is a first time for everything…and what great firsts they were……

Just a little update on the Chappotin happenings! We are anxiously awaiting the start of Torie’s school on Tuesday, I start my first class tomorrow night, and Chris starts his class this semester tomorrow. School is on the brain here at casa de Chappotin.

Christopher Ryan: he is as busy as ever, he never walks (only runs), he will be two next week (pretend you can hear me crying), he is starting to sing a lot (he can’t say all the words but you can tell what he is singing by the tune and his version of the words), he is in an eating phase right now (usually he is way too busy to eat….so, he may be about to grow), he gets SO excited when he sees tractors of any kind, when he gets excited he opens his eyes really wide and makes an O with his mouth (yesterday he was at my parents and Chris killed a huge spider but before Chris killed it Ryan squished it with his finger…so, my Mom was telling Ryan to tell me about the spider…he turned to me and had the big eye, “O mouth” look and said, “pido, dadda, shoe”!)  I just love his expressions and how excited he gets about everything.

Torie Mashele: As mentioned earlier, she is so excited about school starting.  Last week she was not ready but after meeting her teacher and seeing her new classroom she is excited and counting down the days.  She is really into makeup the last few weeks and if left up to her she would wear it everywhere….the other day I let her wear it and put it on by herself and she had so much brown eye shadow on I had to wipe it off before we went into the restaurant. (don’t tell her but she really did resemble a raccoon…a very cute raccoon!) I won’t keep you much longer but I have to tell you the sweetest thing: when I rock Ryan each night I sing songs to him and pray over him and his room.  I love how he will lay on me for a LONG time while I am praying over him.  Tonight I was just in the mood to pray and really needed to spend some time talking to God so I just kept going…he rocked very patiently and after I finished he said his prayer (he repeats what I tell him…SO CUTE!)  Then Torie walks in (probably because she is tired of waiting on her Mommy tonight) and I ask her to come over and pray with us.  This was her prayer, “God, be with my Mommy and Daddy and brother.  Help me to make good choices.  Help me to not get mad when my brother hits me.  Help me have a good school year.  God, be with my other Mommy and Daddy.  God, just heal up my other Mommy and Daddy.  They don’t know how to be good parents and I want you to heal ‘em up.  God, heal up everyone. Thank you for our house, thank you for our church, thank you for Jesus dyin’ on the cross.  Amen” Is that not the sweetest thing???  I just love my sweet Torie who is ALWAYS thinking of those around her who are hurting and unhappy.  May God heal up all of us!!

I just got back from an AWESOME conference in Dallas.  Women of Faith comes through Dallas once a year and is one of the most incredible renewing/worship conferences EVER.  This is my third one to participate in and they seem to get better every year.  I am amazed at how God uses these women to speak into my life each time I go.  The ladies that I went with were all talking during the break and felt like each speaker and singer were talking to each of our lives right now.  EVERYTHING that each speaker said was directed at things going on in my life now.  IT WAS A MUCH NEEDED WEEKEND!!  I feel so renewed, refreshed, and relaxed.

The group I went with had tickets that were suppose to be better than what we actually received, so Women of Faith gave us free tickets to the pre conference during the day on Friday.  I had to work Friday morning, but caught up with Rachel and Tammy on Friday afternoon.  After the pre conference we headed to our hotel and chilled out before catching dinner.  Dinner was another long post in itself (it took forever to find a restaurant without a 45 minute wait) and we were walking around downtown in the heat (and Rachel’s baby is due in about a month).  We go to the evening portion of the conference (did I mention Nicole C Mullen and Natalie Grant were singing …. OH MY GOODNESS…THEY ARE INCREDIBLE)! After an uplifting evening we head back to our hotel where Tammy and I are crammed on the floor in the back on one of the ladies minivans (we chose this instead of riding the Dart back to the hotel.) This option would have been fine but who knew the Valet parking line would take more than an hour and a half.  Finally, our butts could take it no longer, the driver popped the back hatch of the minivan and we emerge (the ladies in the suburban behind us starting cracking up…they had no idea we were in the back.)  At least it was somewhat entertaining to them and we could bring them some joy!  We decided to just walk back to our room, we got ready for bed and were sitting around talking and discovering things we had in common that none of us knew about.  It was so great to just have some girl time!  We were all excited about how awesome the beds were and I was excited to just sleep and not have to think about getting up early with kids, or think about what to make for breakfast, or think about anything but sleep.  We finally drifted off to sleep around 1am and at 2:45 Rachel wakes us up because she is having contractions (and she is not quite 36 weeks).  She is calling her hubby and finally calls her doctor (they are in from out of town, so Rachel is no where close to her doctor or hospital)  After talking to her doctor we decide to make the trek to Baylor Hospital in Grapevine.  Rachel gets checked in and it turns out her contractions slowed down and the walking, heat, and not enough water played major factors in the contractions.  Rachel decides to go to her parents so that she can sleep in late and rest.  Tammy and I head back to Dallas at around 5:30am. We get back to our hotel and back to sleep at around 6:30am.  We thought it would be best to at least sleep until around 10 and then head to the conference after that.  Although we missed the morning sessions, the afternoon more than made up for that!  I was driving home around 6 last night and wondering if my eyes would stay open until I made it home….they did!  What kept me awake were all the thoughts/feelings swimming around in my head and heart. I love the feeling of being emotionally and spiritually tired.  I love when my mind is overflowing with so much good “stuff” that it’s hard to process.  I love when my heart is so stirred I can’t put into words what I feel.  I love when my spirit is so lit up that I feel restless.  I love Women of Faith. If you ever get the chance to go, GOOOOOOOO!  That’s my Women of Faith story……

I am kind of disappointed this week because I only had a loss of -.2 for a total of -46.8 lbs. I followed my points (pretty closely but not measuring everything like I usely do) and bumped up my workouts (lifting heavier weights, changing the speed and incline on the treadmill, and adding an extra day.)  I am hoping that the extra strain on my muscles and extra day working out is the reason.  If it is muscle, I know that building up muscle will pay off in the end because the more muscle you have the more fat you burn.  So, I hoping for a much better week next week!

Misty, Jade, Torie (and now Mya) have a tradition of going to NRH2O the week before school starts each year.  This was their third year to go and Mya got to join the tradition this year.  I was considering taking Ryan but decided that he is NOT ready yet…maybe next year!!  Torie had a blast and is already looking forward to next year.  Here are some pictures I stole from Misty!

Thank you , Misty, for taking Torie and making her a part of this fun tradition.  I can’t wait to see them all in Junior high and High school still going on this trip each year!!  What fun (lifetime) memories they are making!!

Friday night we had a ladies night out with ladies from CJ…and Chris decided he would take both of the kids to the Ranger’s game.  He said they made it about 6 innings before Ryan had had enough!  Ryan and Torie both had an awesome time and Ryan came home talking about the “Naner’s” (Rangers) and “bay-ball”.  The funniest thing to me was he would wave his arm and scream, “OT” (out).  Just a little something cute that he picked up from the game that I wanted to share!  I am going to start printing some of these entries to put in my scrapbooks!! Hope you all have a blessed Monday.

Wow!  Has it really been 30 weeks??  It truly does feel like a lifestyle now.  We always talk about our lifestyle change and I am relieved that now it truly is.  I anticipated the summer being more difficult than the school year, and it has been, but I am grateful that the weight has still been coming off.  We went on a retreat for 3 days this week and even after returning have been home VERY little.  I was only able to track my points 2 out of 7 days and only worked out once.  I weighed this morning and lost -.6 for a total of -45.6!  My goal next week is -1.8 because that would put me into my 5th set of numbers…I just love it when the 10’s place changes in my weight!! Thanks for checking in…I am off to the gym!

I am in love with these pictures….to me, they really reflect my kids and who they are!!  I am having copies made of a lot of them in black in white and in different sizes…I am framing all of them in black frames and making a picture wall in the living room! I can’t wait to have the project finished and am hoping it turns out like I see it in my mind. Thanks for letting me share some of these pictures with you all!!

We are spending a lot of this week getting the final things we need for Torie to start school….she is excited but a little sad about going back.  I can’t believe she will be in 2nd grade…it doesn’t seem possible.  We have started putting the kids to bed a little early to start getting ready for the school bed time…I don’t think she likes that part very much.  But she is excited about NRH2O with Misty and Jade on Thursday!  One last swimming outing before the summer fades.

Ryan is just cracking us up lately.  I went in to get him from his bed this morning and he said, “two bay-bays” because he had 2 of his favorite blankets.  He has also recently had an obsession with shoes.  Whenever we are in a room he can’t stand for people to not have their shoes on, so he goes to me and says, “Mommy’s shoes” and puts mine on, then goes on to the next person until everyone has theirs on.  It is so fun to watch our kids grow and change (sometimes it happens too quickly and is sad)….but most of the time it is so wonderful!! Have a great week and thanks again for letting us share our journey with you!

I wanted to share a couple of pictures that we had taken of the kids!  I will post a lot more later tonight but here is just a taste.