My Aunts & Uncles!!

This is my Aunt Shellie. She is my Mommy's older sister and Brielle and Hay Hay's Mommy.

This is my Uncle Brad. He's married to my Aunt Shellie. He's a really fun uncle!


Here I am with my Aunt Kimmie. She is my Mommy's younger sister and Anthony and Andrew's Mommy.

This is my Great Aunt Becky. She's my NayNay's sister. She's holding baby Alex in this pic.
This is my Great Aunt Debbie. She's my NayNay's sister too. I enjoyed having lunch with her and my GreatUncle John.

This is my Great Aunt Kay. She's my Grandman's sister. She thought I was so pretty and really loved my red hair.

Cousins!!!

Here I am with all my cousins (on my Mommy's side)
Me, Brielle, Anthony, Hay Hay, Andrew

This is my oldest cousin, Brielle. She LOVES to hold me!
Anthony, Brielle, Andrew, and Hay Hay (her real name is Haleigh)
Here I am with my boy cousins. Anthony did a great job holding me.
Here's my Daddy with Andrew and Anthony and Megazord.
Brielle even gave me a bottle one time!! She's so grown up! Finally, a cousin smaller than me. My mommy is holding baby Alexandra and her cousin, Tiffany is holding me! Alex was 2 weeks old in this picture.

I just love my family so much! I can't wait to get bigger so I can play all the fun games with my cousins.

Stayed tuned...up next you'll get to meet some of my aunts and uncles.

The BEST Great Grandma EVER!!

Well here she is...the most beautiful Grandma in the whole wide world!! This is my great grandma, Gladys Kinder Flowers. I was SO HAPPY to meet her. She is so wonderful...I can hardly find the right words to describe how much she means to me. I LOVED staying at her house and soaking up the hours she spent holding me. She is such a pretty and sweet lady. I smiled at her ALL THE TIME...I just couldn't help myself. All of her friends swarmed her at church as she held me in her arms. It made me feel good to see the look of pride on her face as they doted on me. I flashed them lots of smiles and coos to let them know that I felt just as proud to have such a WONDERFUL Grandma! I love you, Grandma and I can't wait to see you again this summer!!

Easter Sunday 2006

My first Easter! How fun! The day started with worshipping God with my friends at church, www.fxcc.org for pics. After church, Mrs. Mindy held me close & actually got me to take a nap in her arms. I needed a little snooze to prepare for the egg hunt & lunch out.

Then I got to meet the Easter bunny! Who knew he had such a freakishly small head...he and Santa have a strange way of making appearances at our biggest celebrations at church. They both play a 2nd fiddle to Jesus, so no confusion here. Well, they "hum" a second fiddle in my particular "faith" heritage....

Then on to lunch at Red Lobster with George, Ben and other friends...thanks John & Jena for the treats! Who knew an Easter basket could have shrimp & salmon in it ;)

After I enjoyed my Easter basket from Mommy & Daddy, we all took a long nap. Daddy got up & pulled some weeds in the flower bed. Then we went over & talked to a neighbor, then dinner with a friend late Sunday evening. Chastity, thanks for holding me! I love making new friends.

Here's "hopping" everyone had a wonderful Easter. We should have a contest for the best caption capturing the expression on our tiny-headed bunny's face. The guy inside couldn't be any cooler, though. Thanks Mr. Paul.

Tune in later this week for pics from Mommy & Daddy's Bradley Class reunion, my 1,200 mile road trip to Indiana over Spring Break, including pics of me with my great-grandma, Gladys Kinder...I love her name. Oh yeah, and pics of me with: my Aunt Kimmie, Aunt Shellie, Uncle Brad, Great Aunt Debbie, Great Aunt Becky, Nay Nay, Grandman, Mimi, Sharon & Judy, Anthony, Andrew, Brielle & Hay Hay, and the whole Martin gang...all 8 of them. Then there's always my 2nd & 3rd cousins too....I'm enjoying learning all about my great big family.

Another First for Faith

Here's another first to share.... We made a quick trip to Baltimore last weekend (cool tunnel under the harbor) to pick up my new embroidery machine. (We bought the machine from ebay and met the seller at a McDonald's). We decided to grab a quick bite to eat before we headed home. As we were packing up, Murray exclaims..."Wow! this is Faith's first time at McDonald's. We gotta get a picture of this!" So without further ado, here is our sweet baby on her first trip to Mickey D's...

That was Jaime, this is Murray now...

Another 1st for Faith, her 1st 9 hour trip in the van going cross-country to see her great-grandmother, granparents, aunts, uncles & cousins...Pray for us & pray for Faith to sleep like the baby she is! We leave Sunday, April 9, right after church for our 1st road trip to Indy with little Faithers.

And since we brought up consumeristic "McDonald's" to you today on our blog, this quote from Dallas Willard, who is one of my favorite authors, couldn't be more ON regarding Christians become CONSUMERS in other things besides hamburgers & french fries...It's a convicting quote, which I aim at myself 1st of all. We must constantly remember what we're about so that we avoid the "customer service/consumeristic" mentality.

“Consumer Christianity is now normative. The consumer Christian is one who utilizes the grace of God for forgiveness and the services of the church for special occasions, but does not give his or her life and innermost thoughts, feelings, and intentions over to the kingdom of the heavens. Such Christians are not inwardly transformed and not committed to it.”
(From The Divine Conspiracy, pp. 301, 342)

This quote appeared on my friend Mike Cope's blog www.preachermike.com and I'm thankful he brought it to his blog-community's attention.

National Cherry Blossom Festival

We had a fabulous day today! Windy, cool, but very sunny...the trees took quite a hit on Monday evening with the hail/high winds. This is our 3rd year in a row to go to the Festival, and this is the least amount of blooms we've seen. Fortunately, the ones that were blown off last night were all on the ground, so it was sort of a nice effect in a snowy sort of way. :)

I just have to say I love being with my wife & daugther. Suddenly, everything else in life pales in comparison to the love we have in our new little family, and the joy we have in spending time together.

The Cherry Blossoms are Blooming!

These pics were taken in the Kenwood neighborhood...I think it's in NW DC, but it may be actually Maryland or northern Virginia...can someone clear that up?

Anyway, the cherry blossom trees in this neighborhood are so spectacular. Thanks to my buddy Neal who told us about this enchanted, fairy-tale neighborhood.

We're headed to the official National Cherry Blossom Festival around the tidal basin tomorrow. Hopefully tonight's hail storm and high winds didn't make the trees shed their blossoms!

I'm finding less & less time to post lately. Faith is growing so much every day, and I don't want to sit at this silly computer & miss anything! She is talking so much now (no words, but she's communicating!...and she is smiling & reacting with so much personality. If I type "so" one more time, will someone please slap me so silly?)

Enjoy our pics of God's creation!