4 Months Later

All right friends and family, if anyone ever actually looks at this thing anymore. For those of you on facebook this will be a repeat of posted pictures, for everyone else enjoy. I'm thinking maybe just posting pictures might help me keep this thing updated. We shall see. Love to All~ The Ross Family

This is us at Easter (I'm just going to pick up where we are now.)




Our sweet sleepy girl and us together on Mother's Day :)

Christmas Catch Up

Hello All,

Otenti Christmas pictures are now up on Flicker. The link is to the right, so enjoy.
There are also some pictures of our sweet girl enjoying her new Matryoshka dolls, (little wooden figures- each one smaller than the last and they fit inside each other) painted in Mickey Mouse characters of course!


Our sweet friends, the Bull Family, are in Russia, and they sent us these cute dolls, which Chloe spent the rest of the evening opening and closing, lining them up, hiding the Pete doll in each of the other bigger dolls. I compared them to Higglytown Hereos (a show on the Disney channel- all the people are like these dolls), so she calls them "Higglytown Hero Minnie, Higglytown Hero Daisy, ets." Cute huh? Thanks to our sweet friends the Bulls, they're too cute!

Happy New Year to All,
The Ross Family

I'm Rediculous, I Know

Why have a blog if you're only going to write on it once a month, you ask? I don't know. It seemed like a good way to keep people updated with pictures if nothing else, but I don't even do that well. Oh well....anyway....

Christmas at the Ross house and with various family members went well on all counts. We all got rid of our stomach bugs (mostly) just in time to be able to enjoy the holidays. Other than that, some of our blessings included lots of books, movies (mostly Veggie Tales), a great new camera lens and digital picture frame for me, the traditional tool for Casey from his dad, and some super cute clothes for Chloe. I have pictures of her in them already.

Hope everyone else's Christmas' went as well if not better. Safe travel to everyone who's now headed home after the holidays.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

~Crystal

Happy Thanksgiving

Hello All,

I hope that everyone had a THANKFUL Thanksgiving Day. We spent the day with Casey's Dad out in Waxahachie. Casey, his Dad, his uncle, and sort of brother-in-law Aaron all went and played golf for the morning while the ladies stayed home relaxing and preparing food. The turkey took it's precious time cooking, but it all turned out well and everything was delicious.
Then, Friday we went to my sister's house in Garland. We all spent a good bit of time admiring the beautiful work that her husband (Timm) and our dad did in putting together my new niece's nursery. Then we had more turkey and played games before heading home.
We haven't gotten the big tree out yet, we'll have to wait till next weekend, but I've already got lots of stuff to wrap. That's my project for this week. Then this weekend, the Christmas parties and series of birthdays begins. We have 4 in December, 2 in January, 3 in February, 3 in March, 2 in April, and 1 in May. It's the partying time of year!
Hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season and that no one is getting blown away in this blustery wind. It almost got Chloe the other day! She had to take several steps, moving with the wind to avoid being knocked over, and I had to go get her! So be careful out there.

Love to all,
Crystal

I'm Another Aunt!!

Ava Joyce Dilling was born Friday, November 7, 2008 at 7:20 pm by C-Section at McKinney Hospital. She measured 8lbs 12oz. 20in long, and that was 2 weeks early! Here she is with her Big Sis Jadyn (who calls her "my baby"), her proud Daddy (Timm), and then between Mommy (Heather) and Big Sis Jadyn. Jadyn and Ava are the beautiful girls of Timm and Heather Dilling (Heather is Crystal's sister).

Welcome to the family Ava!

Love,

The Ross Family

Facebook

Hello,

I first heard of Facebook awhile ago, but I hadn't bothered looking into it since I'm so terrible about keeping up with this simple blog. That is until last weekend. Our friends, The Bull Family, put up pictures on their Facebook page, and maybe I was wrong, but it seemed as though I couldn't see the pictures unless I was a member. So I took the plunge and joined, just to see pictures of our friends. Then I saw a bunch of people I went to school and church with growing up and now I'm really starting to like it. So there's my little plug for Facebook. Don't expect me to be any better about posting on there than I am on here though. Once Chloe sees me pressing buttons it's hard to do anything on the computer because she wants to press buttons too.

Love to All,
Crystal

Good Times

Hello All,

We've been enjoying good times lately. Saturday the 4th was Chloe's 2nd Birthday Party (that's her cake to the left), during which, we crammed 21 people into our house! We had dinner, watched Planet Earth (that wasn't planned but everyone was glued to the tv), opened presents, ate birthday cake, and then watched some more Planet Earth. The bottom of the ocean is captivating, what can I say?

Then last weekend/week we went up to Amarillo to surprise Casey's brother Chris for his birthday. Once we got there though they (Chris and his wife Megan) turned around and surprised us by announcing that Megan is pregnant. Yeah! Their first little one is due in the middle of June and we're quite excited for them. We stayed with them Sunday through Thursday and then headed home. (That's Casey and Chris above.)

And finally, this weekend we went out to Grangee and Dodad's house (Casey's Grandparents) for dinner. Chloe got to play with her second cousins Sam and Charlie and her Great Aunt Jennifer. She had a great time. She's giving Dodad a high five there in the picture.

And that about does it for us so far this month. Hopefully we'll have a costume for her soon and go do some Fall Festival stuff. Maybe I'll attempt to cut Mickey Mouse out of a pumpkin. Although, they have a plastic one with light included at Walgreens that would be a lot easier.

Anyway, I'll try to get pictures on to Flicker later this evening.

Love to All,

Crystal

Ridiculous

Hello,
It's ridiculous how bad I am about keeping up with this blog, I know. I wasted nearly half of my picture allowance last month over in Flicker simply because I didn't upload any pictures! So this month I'll have to be super stingy as I choose which ones to put up there. Sorry guys.
Anyway, our precious girl is officially 2! Yesterday was her birthday, which she shares with our friend Karen Bull, Happy Birthday to You! (I didn't realize that till I saw it on your blog, ha!) She's already had two parties and her big party isn't even until Saturday.
Chloe's Nanny and Great Aunt CC (Casey's Mom & Aunt) can't come this weekend, so we went over to Nanny's house on Saturday to do a b-day lunch. She got Minnie Mouse ears, sunglasses and a set of Clubhouse Characters to play with. Then CC got her a very neat book that shows animals actually moving as you turn the page. (That's her Nanny in red.)

Monday night, Casey and I stayed up until 12:03am- the exact time Chloe was born two years ago- and prayed over her. Later in the day, Casey actually got to come home for lunch, and then after dinner we went ahead and let her open nearly all of her presents from us, which was a surprisingly large number. She got 5 precious outfits, a whole bunch of new crayons, a couple of new coloring books, a little Mickey Mouse Clubhouse ball, a sippy cup with her name on it, and some glowsticks, which she got a good giggle out of last night.

The fun's not over yet! I'll post some pictures from the party sometime next week.

Have a Good Week!

Time Flies Part II

Hello,

I'm so sorry to keep you all in suspense for so long regarding the Bull Family. They arrived in Russia after a fairly smooth trip and are adjusting well so far. There's a link to the bullherd, under "Our Favorite Websites" over to the right, if you'd like to keep up with them on your own, since I'm so terrible about keeping the blog updated. Thank you all for your prayers! Other goings on in our life... My family threw a baby shower for my sister the first weekend in September. That's a picture of the party crowd, taken from the landing. My brother-in-law is the only one who doesn't know whether it's a boy or a girl, so we had to hide any telling gifts before he came home. We had a good time, and they are now well stocked with diapers.
Casey and his dad share the same birthday, so we spent this last weekend celebrating the two of them with a bunch of surprises. That's Casey's dad, Jimmy, with Chloe and infront of his cake. It was a surprise party, and boy was he surprised. You can see some more pictures over on flicker, as soon as I get them in there. I guess I could put on of Casey up too huh? Since it was also his birthday!

Well, that's what we've been up to. Hopefully, I'll get the pictures up on flicker later today.

Love to All,

Crystal

Time Flies

Hello,
Time flies! I hadn't realized it had already been nearly 2 weeks since I'd last been on here. We aren't terribly busy though, so I don't know.... We did go to a few "Going Away" parties for our friends the Bull Family (that's John Bull with Casey in the picture). They're a family of 6 moving to Russia this Tuesday for 3months-to whenever God calls them back. They're going to help bring the love of God to children who have reached the age limit in their orphanages. They'll be housing a few girls along with their own 4 kids and leading Bible Studies regularly as well as teaching the girls life skills. Please help us cover them in prayer Tuesday as they make the long journey, they leave at 2pm. Thanks!
The Ross Family

More Family Fun

Hello!

We've been having a lot of family fun lately. Friday night we celebrated Casey's grandfather's 80th Birthday! Click on the flicker link to see our pictures.

Sorry

Hello All,

One of our friends asked the other day how we knew the newlywed couple pictured in the last post. It occured to me that I should probably start labeling our pictures better so that our friends know who it is we're talking about, and sometimes displaying in pictures. Soooo, I've gone back to Flicker and added descriptions to our pictures so you know who it is you're seeing. Sorry for my obliviousness.

Blessings to All,
Crystal

Update

Hello,

We've been busy visiting with family from out of town (for Grannie's B-Day- Crystal's Grandmother) and going out of town to visit family (for Ashley & Aaron's wedding- Casey's dad's soon to be daughter-in-law and her new husband). Click on the flicker link to the right to see some of our pictures.

Blessings,

The Ross Family

101 Ways to Find God's Purpose for Your Life

This book, so far (I'm only on #48), has been an interesting read. I encourage you to go find a copy at your local Dollar General for $1. The author is Natalie Gillespie. One of the quotes she included is by an unknown author, but it's worth sharing.

"Watch you thoughts; they become words. Watch your words; they become actions. Watch your actions; they become habits. Watch your habits; they become character. Watch your character; it becomes your destiny."

Have a great weekend,
Crystal

A break

Hello All,

Sorry there's been such a break in blogging. Our computer got a virus/spyware on it and is currently out of commission. Hopefully, we'll be up and running again sometime next week. Keep checking back!

God is Good!
Crystal

Ahhh Memories

Hello,

I was working on my Bible Lesson today and it led me to the story of Jesus and the Woman at the Well, which made me remember the song that the group Acappella did years ago, "He Gave Her Water". The whole thing made me remember being at church summer camp, 4-6th grade. Those times are so special to me, I had a great time dancing around with Chloe to those wonderful memory filled songs. Anyone else want to enjoy them? Click the link for a blast to the past or just some fun songs.
http://www.theacappellacompany.com/betterthanlife.html
http://www.theacappellacompany.com/rescue.html

Once you're at the site, click on a song title and it should start playing (it uses Windows Media Player).

Enjoy!
Crystal

It's July!

It's July, which means new pictures are up on our Flicker page. There are some from Father's Day, our afternoon at Grangee & Dodad's, an afternoon at Jimmy & Sheila's house, and pictures from our trip to the Dallas Zoo. Hope you all enjoy!

Love,
The Ross Family

From A.W. Tozer

"The sovereign God wants to be loved for Himself and honored for Himself, but that is only part of what He wants. The other part is that He wants us to know that when we have Him we have everything- we have all the rest." This quote is the concluding comment in my Bible study lesson for this week and while I've known for a long time that God wants us to worship Him, it never occured to me in this way. Everyone wants to be loved simply for who they are. Why wouldn't the God whose image we are created in want the same thing? I often thank Him for all that He's done for me and my loved ones, but I don't spend enough time praising Him just for who He is. He doesn't need my praise, but He definitely deserves it.

You can enjoy the lessons from my Bible study too. Click the "theroost" link under "OUR FAVORITE WEBSITES" (to the right) to go to the group's blog. You'll find the lessons under the "Weekly Lessons" tab. They've blessed me, I hope they do the same for you. Enjoy!
Blessings to All,
Crystal

Catching Up

Hello All,
Sorry it's been so long between posts. Father's Day seems like so long ago already. We don't have much to report, just pictures to share. Unfortunately, my delayed uploading of pictures taken in May has maxed out my monthly uploading allowance for June. Sorry, you guys will have to wait until next week (July) to see new pictures. I'll try to better space out my downloads throughout the month. Again- Sorry.
God is Good,
The Ross Family

If this is your first time visiting our blog- click the link to the right (under "OUR FAVORITE WEBSITES") that starts out http://www.flicker.com/ to see our family photos. Enjoy!

Father's Day

God is in control.

Happy Father's Day indeed!