Happy Father's Day!

“My father gave me the greatest gift anyone could give another person, he believed in me.“- Jim Valvano

"Praise the LORD! Blessed is the man who fears the LORD, who greatly delights in his commandments! His offspring will be mighty in the land; the generation of the upright will be blessed." (Psalms 112:1-2 ESV)

I feel as blessed as a girl could be today as I celebrate my own father and the father of my children. The two most special men in my life (for now anyway, there are three little boys who will one day join their ranks!) deserve honor and celebration for their very important roles in both my life and the life of my kids.

My dad is everything those quotes up above describe. He has always believed in me and I grew up thinking that anything was possible if I put my mind to it and worked hard. As an adult I find myself soaking up his words of wisdom when it comes to ministry, parenting, and marriage. He is so wise and I appreciate that he is willing to share what he knows, good and bad, to help make my journey through this life a little smoother. And you want to talk about a man who fears God and delights in his commandments? That is my dad, a man who gave up his passion for fighting fire for his calling to seek and save the lost through missionary work in Mexico. I truly believe his heart matches the heart of Christ himself in how he longs for each and every person to know our Savior. And because he has made that choice to live his life for the Lord, I am blessed. Like I said, I am one lucky girl!

Shortly after leaving the protection and guidance of my dad I was joined together with another amazing man through marriage. Let me tell you what, the longer we are married the more I see my dad in him. He is hard-working and supports his family but he also knows how to cut loose and play like he is a kid himself. Watching his eyes light up when one of the boys does something funny or sweet is enough to make me fall in love with him all over again. Becoming a dad has changed  him for the better and I get excited when I see him pour into them because I know that their lives will be richer for it. And even though my husband is a newer Christian, he already has an intense love for Christ and amazes me daily as he grows into the leader God is calling him to be both in ministry and in our home. I am undoubtedly blessed in having this man to spend the rest of my life with.

I hope on this Father's Day you are feeling equally blessed and that you are taking the time to let those important men in your life know just how special they are.

"Hands Down Best Dad" project

This weekend is my husband's birthday and on top of the coveted XBOX 360 game I got him, I also wanted to give him a more meaningful gift from the boys . After some brainstorming and browsing through the stuff I had laying around I came up with this project I have titled the "Hands Down Best Dad" project. Simple, cheap (or free in my case since I had all the supplies!) and thoughtful...my 3 favorite qualities in a gift.

 Here's how I did it:

Supplies:
*Picture frame (any size will work...pick something that will fit your project)
*Ribbon
*Paint
*Lettering - I used my Cricut for this. You could just as easily use stickers, vinyl letters, stenciled letters, etc.
*Hot glue and a glue stick
*Paper - Something to put it all on. I recently ordered a huge roll of pattern paper for making sewing patterns. It is kind of see through so I also used some cute wrapping paper behind it that slightly show through. You could use card stock, wrapping paper, etc. I also used construction paper for the lettering.

Get Started:
1. Cut whatever paper you are using to fit the frame. This is the wrapping paper I used behind the pattern paper:

2. Paint your kids hands and press down onto paper (Can I tell you how hard it was doing the 8 month old's?):

3. I did a strip of ribbon above and below the hand prints to frame them. Cut two even strips and use hot glue to adhere to the paper (I only glued the ends, I would recommend a dot in the middle of each strip also to keep it in place):

4. Now to do the names by the hand prints. Be creative here! I wanted to match the polka dot theme I already had going to I used red, green and blue construction paper along with my Cricut and cartridge punch set to create the boys' names:

Used my Cricut to create perfect circles

Punched the boys names into the green and red circles using my cartridge punch set

Glued the red and green circles onto the blue ones for this multi-color look

Their names applied to the paper with a glue stick

5. Using my Cricut, I cut out the phrase Hands Down Best Dad and applied to my project:

6. Finally, I put it into my frame (polka dot wrapping paper first, hand print paper on top):

I am really pleased with all of the color in this project. So much more fun than a basic hand print. We couldn't wait to share this with daddy so we opened presents earlier this week and he loved it!!